Hi, hello, I’m a Canadian who agrees with the idea that Trudeau is arrogant and out of touch. (*I also think this applies to almost all politicians)

tl;dr I suspect people think Trudeau is arrogant and out-of-touch because he was born into privilege, but more importantly, has been a politician in the highest office for the past 10 years during a time of worsening prospects for the electorate (regardless of his own impact on the situation, although that is not “no impact”). Literally nothing he could say could put a shine on that.

Trudeau is a figurehead as party leader, and as PM. I mean, not only that – the PM does have significant political power as well – but it means he’s a representative of all the actions that his government takes, and not without reason. People assume that the PMO exerts its influence on party members because it does. Above-board and otherwise (see the SNC-Lavalin scandal).

In my purely vibes-based view, that’s just how Canadian federal politics be. PM stays in power for long enough, lots of little grievances build up, eventually people get fed up and want change.

This isn’t really a shocking shakeup to me - the last Liberal regime lost power amid scandal and turmoil and it seemed much messier than this (although not as messy as the UK Tories’ clown car procession).

It’s more like Liberals doing internal realpolitik. They knew they were falling out of favour with the public, and they chose to pile as much culpability on Trudeau and torch him. I’d like to say it was because the stakes are higher and this is some high-minded bid to avert our being pulled into the US’s fascist death spiral, but honestly, I think it’s more likely just an attempt retain as much power as possible.

And boy did it pay off.

The Liberals were absolutely on an express flight out of power before Trump started a trade war. And because we still have FPTP ಠ_ಠ and the NDP are toothless cupbearers to the LPC, that meant that, with an election due soon, we were locked in for a conservative government. Not just that, polls were indicating a majority.

But the cons have been playing the right-populist game, riding Trump’s coattails. Their ‘platform’ relied on the continuation of friendly relations.

The tariffs were absolute manna from heaven for the LPC, but wouldn’t have been if Trudeau had remained at the helm because his approval ratings were dropping and our (largely US-owned and right-wing-biased) legacy media have been making hay with it. Fwiw, I’m pretty sure severalmany outgoing PMs have had worse approval ratings (lookin at you, BM the PM), but their party usually loses the subsequent election.

Which is probably why Freeland knifed Trudeau – to try to distance herself from his dropping approval rating and reclaim her mantle of “PM in-waiting”.

JT’s tenure as PM lasted 10 years. During that time, housing and healthcare problems have become crises, and while no single level of government could fix these, it’s clear to me that the LPC has not done enough to address the situation. Looming particularly large are the housing and healthcare crises. Increasing numbers of Canadians cannot afford to buy a home, rent has ballooned unchecked in major metropols, and increasing numbers of Canadians do not have access to a family doctor.

And there’s also rising xenophobia and anti-immigrant sentiment, which is extremely worrying, and the Liberals are pro-immigration and have historically kept immigration levels high because this country depends on immigrant labour.

But when too many people can’t afford housing or find a doctor, the first thing a lot of people think isn’t that these are systemic failings that could have been prevented and remediated by good and timely policy interventions, it’s “there are too many people and they’re taking all the [house] [doctor] [jerb]!” And immigrants make a very convenient scapegoat, especially when it’s being modelled to such great political success by our neighbours.

I will also say that since you either aren’t Canadian, or are (as you admitted) unfamiliar with Canadian politics, I can see how you’d be confused by what seems like a sudden animus towards Trudeau if your opinion is based on his international relations and foreign policy. I have very little to say about either of those things. I agree, it’s largely been fine.

What I do have problems with has been his domestic policy, and there’s a (non-exhaustive) laundry list, so if you want as much granularity as I can try to give in a frankly prodigious act of procrastination, I put it in a different post because this hit the character limit.