Don Newman

Don Newman

Welcome to the Political Needle-Threading Chapter of the Alberta Referendum Debate

As the October Alberta referendum looms closer, politicians representing the province are discovering the joys of needle threading. The most vivid example was Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s June 8th Calgary speech, in which the Alberta born-and-raised, more recently Alberta-elected MP, presented an argument to the province’s separatists for remaining in Canada. “The answer therefore for Albertans is not to pull...

Don Newman

Why not Both? A Possible Way Out of Canada’s Procurement Dilemmas

As Canada seeks to rearm and move to a modern, effective military capable of defending this country and meeting its treaty obligations to allies, the procurement choices underway by the Carney government will have implications far beyond the type of submarines and jet fighters necessary to meet those goals. The government is committed to buying new jet fighters to replace...

Don Newman

Has Danielle Smith Squared the Circle?

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has found a new way to avoid putting a direct question about leaving Canada on a referendum ballot this fall. Instead, Albertans will be asked to cast a ballot on whether they want to remain as a province of Canada or have the provincial government start the process toward a binding independence referendum. Here’s the precise...

Don Newman

After a Year of Carney, the Conservatives are Biding Their Time

On the recent anniversary of the April 2025 election that confirmed Mark Carney and the Liberals as Canada’s government, there were many analyses offered on what the year had achieved and what the next one might hold. But few people took a closer look at what the first year of Carney’s tenure has meant to the Official Opposition, the Conservative...

Don Newman

With a Little Help from his Friends: Mark Carney’s New Trade Committee

In the classic Canadian tradition of diffusing the pain by enlarging the official target field, Prime Minister Mark Carney this week unveiled a 24-member Advisory Committee on Canada-US Economic Relations to buttress his negotiating team heading into the looming CUSMA review with the United States and Mexico. The committee is composed of some pan-partisan political figures, from former federal Tory...

Don Newman

Carney’s Majority has Changed the Game, Including for Poilievre

The newly cobbled together majority government in the House of Commons has given the Liberal Party and Prime Minister Mark Carney more time and more leeway to peruse its far-reaching, extremely expensive “Build Canada” agenda. But the new alignment in the Commons has also changed the calculations of at least two of the three opposition parties. The majority created by...

Don Newman

If this Keeps Up, Carney Could be Headed for a National Unity Government

Politicians who worry that the newest Conservative convert to Mark Carney’s Liberals will hold right-wing policy views that are incompatible with the government’s social policy positions have not yet recognized what’s going on. They rightly perceive that Sarnia Member of Parliament Marilyn Gladu has held views on abortion, same-sex marriage, vaccination mandates and other policies that are counter to what...

Don Newman

The Carney Government and Alberta’s Quest for a New Pipeline

Sometime during the evening of April 13th, Mark Carney will quite likely find out that his majority in the House of Commons is secure. The results of the upcoming federal by-elections in University-Rosedale and Scarborough West in Toronto will confirm that. If, a few hours later, a Liberal victory in the Montreal-adjacent riding of Terrebonne is also confirmed, that will...

Don Newman

The New Poilievre: Further from Trump, Closer to Carney

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre tried to get back in the game this past week. Poilievre did that with a speech in Toronto on Thursday that actually mentioned President Donald Trump by name. More notably, he mentioned Trump in a critical way. Poilievre has been under increasing criticism for his reluctance to go after Trump and his administration for both the...

Don Newman

Carney’s Shift of Canada’s Defence Centre of Gravity

Prime Minister Mark Carney revealed his government’s Defence Industrial Strategy (DIS) Tuesday, including plans to spend more than 6 billion additional dollars transforming the Canadian Armed Forces into a modern self-sufficient military force. Carney said the plan’s primary role will be to defend Canada and Canadian sovereignty. But it will also meet NATO obligations with like-minded allies and allow Canada...

Don Newman

Danielle Smith is Playing with Fire

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is playing with fire. Depending on what happens in the next few months, that fire could consume Smith, her Alberta United Conservative Party government, the province of Alberta, and Canada as we know it today. As premier of Alberta, Smith is trying to play the dangerous game of appeasing the separatist movement in the province while...

Don Newman

Poilievre’s Conservative Leadership is Now Secure, for Better or Worse

After the year Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre had in 2025 — which started with victory in the air and within months turned to ashes — 2026 has begun on a high. Friday night at the Conservative Party convention in Calgary, where a required leadership review was held to enable the removal of the party leader following an election loss, Poilievre...

Don Newman

Will Poilievre’s Calgary Victory be Pyrrhic for the Party?

While we prognosticators are always cautioned to be wary of absolute, unqualified predictions in politics — especially in this era of “anything’s possible” — it is as safe as it can possibly be to say at this writing that Pierre Poilievre will be confirmed as leader of the Conservative Party at its convention in Calgary later this week. Poilievre will...

Don Newman

The Carney Doctrine

In Davos on Tuesday, Prime Minister Mark Carney delivered the most important foreign policy speech by a Canadian politician since Lester Pearson proposed the first United Nations Peacekeeping force at the UN in November of 1956. Seventy years ago, Pearson proposed a formula for bringing the Suez crisis between Egypt, France and Great Britain to an end. It won him...

Don Newman

The New Urgency of Mark Carney’s Minority Math Problem

Before the House of Commons holiday break, it seemed as though it was just a matter of time before Mark Carney’s Liberals would slip into a majority in the House of Commons. Now, as MPs prepare to return to their seats on January 26th, as Pierre Poilievre braces for the hurdle of his end-of-January leadership review in Calgary, and as...

Don Newman

The 2026 Political Look-Ahead: More of the Same

Canada is still adjusting to the dramatic political changes that affected the country in 2025. The coming year will likely include the same kind of disruptions both at home and elsewhere that will shake the political firmament in 2026. The dramatic comeback of the Liberal Party this past year and its victory in the April general election stood the political...

Don Newman

Trump’s NSS: A Warning to the World, a Threat to Canada

Anyone who thought negotiating a productive new Canada-United States trade deal with the Trump administration was in the offing will have been thoroughly disabused of that idea after reading the National Security Strategy (NSS) released late last week in Washington. The NSS — the production of which from the executive branch is mandated by federal law — is also, in...

Don Newman

The Leftward Tilt of Carney’s Casualty Count

They were among the few long faces at last Saturday evening’s annual Press Gallery Dinner. Stephen Guilbeault looked as though he had just lost his best friend. Green Party Elizabeth May looked as though she would break into tears. Guilbeault had resigned two days earlier from his job as heritage minister in the cabinet of Prime Minister Mark Carney over...

Don Newman

Could Trading Tariff Relief for F-35s be an Offer Trump Can’t Refuse?

While Prime Minister Mark Carney’s response of “Who cares?” when asked Monday about the last time he spoke with Donald Trump could have been either genuine or tactical indifference, there’s no question that Trump really does care. Canada’s review of the contract to buy 88 F-35 fighter jets from the mammoth American defence contractor Lockheed-Martin is clearly annoying Trump. We...

Don Newman

How Pierre Poilievre Just Avoided an Election, and Why he Wanted to

Pierre Poilievre didn’t want an election, and he knew that Monday night’s vote in the House of Commons on the Carney government’s first budget would be close. But the numbers that really mattered to the man doing the counting had more to do with voters outside than inside the House of Commons. When any minority government loses a vote of...

Don Newman

Ottawa’s Incomplete Major Projects List

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s announcement Thursday of seven more projects to be referred to the Major Projects Office was much like his first announcement of projects in September. It was underwhelming. It’s not easy to be underwhelming when you’re announcing projects deemed to be “nation-building,” and worth billions of dollars if they were all approved. It was underwhelming because Carney...

Don Newman

The Conservative Party’s Problem is Bigger than Poilievre

A defection to the Liberals and a controversial resignation from the Conservative caucus in the House of Commons have increased the pressure on party leader Pierre Poilievre as he faces a vote in January on his continued leadership of the party. Unless there is an unlikely crumbling of support for him in the Parliamentary caucus, Poilievre will win his leadership...

Don Newman

In an Economic War, a Budget Both Weapon and Target

The Carney government has acted as promised, presenting a budget that will change the way both the federal and provincial governments operate in Canada and boosting private-sector economic opportunities. What is not certain is that it will protect Canada from the devastating, capricious tariffs that President Donald Trump has imposed on the country and could add to or increase in...

Don Newman

The Political Peril Facing the Carney Budget

On November 4th, we will find out more details of the Carney government’s plans to develop the Canadian economy with less reliance on the United States and more independence and sovereignty for the country. Shortly after the budget speech is delivered by Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne, we will find out if the government has been successful in convincing enough Members...

Don Newman

Budget 2025: Mark Carney Needs an ‘Ask Not’ Moment

With the federal budget 10 days away, the Prime Minister has been walking two paths at the same time. One path is the traditional path of announcements. The other is the path of trying to get Canadians to realize that the November 4th budget will tell the hard truths about the country and the policy shifts and sacrifices that everyone...

Don Newman

Trade Politics in a Time of Coercion

No one should be surprised that Donald Trump and his punishing tariffs on Canadian exports to the United States are creating dilemmas for both of our country’s major political parties. Prime Minister Mark Carney and his Liberal Government are facing continued resistance from the Trump administration as it tries to negotiate relief from the 50% sectoral tariffs the Trumpsters in...

Don Newman

The Federal Budget Countdown is On

The federal budget countdown is on. November 4th is the date the Carney Liberal government will pull back the curtain on Canada’s finances and its plans for navigating the country through the economic wreckage created by the punishing and possibly illegal tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump. Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne will present his budget to the House of Commons...

Don Newman

The Poilievre-Carney Showdown that Wasn’t

I thought it might be interesting. That’s why this week I made one of my rare appearances in the Parliamentary Press Gallery of which I am a lifetime member for the opening session of the fall sitting of Parliament and the much-touted question period face-off between Prime Minister Mark Carney and Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre. Walking out after question period...

Don Newman

Parliament Returns to Face the Tests of a Grown-Up Country

Now is the time we’ll find out whether Canadians are grown-ups, and Canada is a grown-up country. Parliament returns on September 13th for its fall sitting, which feels like the real launch of the session that began with the throne speech from King Charles in May, with Prime Minister Mark Carney now facing Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre in the House...

Don Newman

As the Promise of CUSMA Fades, Carney Turns to Europe

We have to face facts. While Canadian government officials are working to prepare for the review and possible renegotiation of the CUSMA — the Canada United States Mexico free trade agreement that governs and provides for free trade among the three nations — much of that preparation may well be a waste of time. Instead of traditional trade negotiations, Canada...

Don Newman

Donald Trump’s Siege of Washington

The decision by President Donald Trump to federalize law enforcement in Washington D.C. has serious implications far beyond his already worrying expansions and abuses of presidential power. Trump announced on August 11th that he was placing the Washington DC Metropolitan Police Force under the control of the United States Attorney-General and augmenting the existing force with agents from the Federal...

Don Newman

Consultation Summer: Is Mark Carney Closing the C-5 Gap with Indigenous Groups?

The Carney government’s promise to speedily build infrastructure and other projects in the “national interest” per the provisions of the One Canadian Economy Act is running into the predictable opposition and potential delays. The government’s fast-track infrastructure program combines the nationalist appeal of bolstering Canada’s economic and trade infrastructure — ports, transportation, pipelines, hydro, clean energy, critical minerals among others...

Don Newman

Canada’s Trump-Tariff Summer and the August 1st Non-Surprise

Why is anyone surprised? Did anyone really think Donald Trump was going to agree to a deal that would reduce tariffs already in place on Canadian exports to the United States? Apparently so. For the past two months Canadian politicians, businesses, the media and just about anyone who has any interest in the play of events, both internationally and domestically...

Don Newman

Pierre Poilievre’s Fate is Now a Numbers Game

Two-and-a-half months after a federal election that made him the third consecutive Tory leader in a decade to lose to the Liberals, Pierre Poilievre’s leadership of the Conservative Party is now a numbers game: His vote percentage in a byelection, his support in a 2026 leadership review and his polling numbers at the beginning of next year, ahead of that...

Don Newman

Danielle Smith, Doug Ford, and Mark Carney’s Consultation Summer

While the premiers of Ontario and Alberta have overcome their differences over how to deal with the threatening tariffs President Donald Trump has imposed on Canada, their newfound harmony won’t necessarily be contagious this summer. As Prime Minister Mark Carney implements the changes enabled by the One Canadian Economy Act, some differences may be more difficult to finesse.

Don Newman

To Dome or Not to Dome?

The backlash to the news that Canada is in talks with Washington to participate in a space-based missile defence system designed to protect North America is an early warning to the Carney government on how difficult it will be to make substantive changes in a large number of areas promised in the recent election campaign. Prime Minister Mark Carney and...

Don Newman

From Rollout to Pileup: The Week that Was for the Carney Cabinet

For an action-oriented new government about to reinvent the Canadian economy, find new trade and defence partners and withstand the onslaught of President Donald Trump and his tariffs and territorial ambitions, this week was not an auspicious beginning. Instead of appearing as a crack, recently elected team of men and women ready to redefine Canada, the first meeting of Prime...

Don Newman

The Battles Ahead for Pierre Poilievre

Pierre Poilievre has moved quickly to consolidate his leadership of the Conservative Party in the wake of its disappointing loss in the April 28th general election and his own stunning personal loss of the suburban Ottawa riding of Carleton, which he had held for 20 years. But Poilievre’s placement of faithful lieutenant and former leader Andrew Scheer to lead the...

Don Newman

The New State of Political Play in Carney’s Canada

Mark Carney told Canadians that his career as a central banker dealing with international financial crises had made him into a skilled negotiator. It was the argument he used to convince as many Canadians as possible that he was and is the man to deal with an unpredictable, unreliable, aggressive, and often uncontrollable President Donald Trump. Trump has slapped tariffs...

Don Newman

The Homestretch: Poilievre and the Ghost of Elections Past

He materializes on the screen like the ghost of elections past. With the federal election days away, the Conservatives consistently trailing the Liberals in the polls, and leader Pierre Poilievre in danger of losing his own Ottawa riding, Stephen Harper has been enlisted to rally the troops. The first appearance by the former prime minister was at a large rally...

Don Newman

The Homestretch: Debate-Week Takeaways

As we enter the 10-day homestretch of Canada’s most important election campaign in generations, many voters will be spending this long Easter weekend either casting their ballots in advance polls across the country or taking a last look at the very different candidates. This week provided a crucial window on those candidates, especially the two top rivals, Prime Minister Mark...

Don Newman

Pierre Poilievre and the Other Leadership Question

As the campaign for the April 28th federal election passes the halfway mark, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is surely getting frustrated, and worried. The evidence of that concern came this week when he brought former Prime Minister Stephen Harper to his mammoth Edmonton rally. Usually, big-name party patriarchs are brought out near the end of a campaign to either give...

Don Newman

Not Flying the Unfriendly Skies: The Media-Free Conservative Campaign Tour

With an election call expected this Sunday, the Conservatives have devised a way they hope will increase Pierre Poilievre’s chances against Mark Carney. It is a strategy Conservatives have tried before, and now they are trying it again. Two months ago, Poilievre had every reason to be brashly confident that he would easily win the next election. But now, there...

Don Newman

What’s Next? The Road to the Federal Election

He had most of the money and most of the endorsements and when the votes were tabulated, it turned out he had most of them as well. On March 9th, Mark Carney won the leadership of the federal Liberal Party with 85.9 per cent of the votes cast in a contest with three other candidates to succeed Justin Trudeau. It...

Don Newman

Ford Snags Third Majority, with Trump as Running Mate

While Donald Trump’s disruption act has sown undeniable geopolitical discord, economic upheaval and political chaos, it has had had different impacts on Canadian premiers, depending on a range of factors from geography to ideology to temperament. In Doug Ford’s case, it possessed him to call a $190 million snap election that dropped him back in pretty much the same spot...

Don Newman

All Politics is Provincial: Doug Ford’s Washington Week

After visiting Washington in an unusual detour from a provincial election campaign, Ontario Premier Doug Ford returned to earth at the end of this week, taking a grilling over his record on housing during a leaders’ debate in North Bay, the first of two ahead of the province’s February 27th general election.

Don Newman

Let’s Not Let the Crisis of Donald Trump go to Waste

“Never let a good crisis go to waste,” Winston Churchill quipped during the Second World War. Now, it is time for Canadians to remember and repeat it. We are almost one week into the 30-day pause President Donald Trump agreed to on the 25% tariffs he has threatened on all Canadian exports to the United States except energy, to be...

Don Newman

Canada’s Quest for Clarity from America’s First Bully President

“We don’t negotiate with bullies.” That was the mantra repeated over the weekend by many Canadian politicians as they unveiled countervailing tariffs on American exports to this country after President Donald Trump announced Saturday that he would impose 25% American tariffs on Canadian and Mexican exports. While the no-negotiation pledge hasn’t been entirely true, the bully blinked, and Trump’s tariffs...

Don Newman

Poilievre’s Trumpian Aversion to the Value of Intelligence

Pierre Poilievre wants to remain in the dark. At least that’s what he’s doing by continuing to refuse the top-secret security clearance required to read classified government documents. His latest refusal came this week after the tabling of the Public Inquiry into Foreign Interference in Federal Electoral Processes and Democratic Institutions by Commissioner Justice Marie-Josee Hogue. In realtive terms, Justice...

Don Newman

Ford Makes his Early Call, with an Assist from Trump

Doug Ford has found an excuse for an election. And he has Donald Trump to thank for it. On Friday, Ford announced that he’ll call an election, expected to be held February 27, more than a year and a half before the mandated fixed election date in the fall of 2026. “I’ll be seeing the lieutenant governor on Tuesday. We...

Don Newman

All-Candidates Bulletin: Dealing with Trump II Requires a Whole New Skill Set

The race for the Liberal leadership and contest to be the next prime Minister of Canada is down to two serious candidates with a chance of winning and the defining issue that will determine the outcome is clear. It is no big surprise that despite other entrants the only people with a chance of emerging victorious when the votes are...

Don Newman

Beyond ‘Axe the Tax’: Where’s the Poilievre Plan?

The conventional wisdom in Ottawa these days is that Justin Trudeau’s imminent departure as prime minister and leader of the Liberal Party has left Canada in a difficult position as Donald Trump gets ready for his second term as President of the United States. In fact, the opposite may be true. Trudeau’s departure is an opportunity for Canada to both...

Don Newman

Trudeau Clears the Fog

Justin Trudeau has now announced that he will step down as leader of the federal Liberal Party and Prime Minister of Canada once the party picks his successor. As readers of this column may recall, the scenario we now face was forecast in my December column, Bracing for a Foggy Political Holiday Season. That fog, for the moment, has lifted...

Don Newman

Covering Jimmy Carter

I first met Jimmy Carter in December 1974, almost 50 years to the day of his death, at 100 years of age, on December 29th. We met in Kansas City, Missouri at a special convention of the Democratic Party. I had just completed my second year in Washington as the first correspondent posted there by CTV. Two years earlier, the...

Don Newman

Bracing for a Foggy Political Holiday Season

Pierre Poilievre says he wants something he knows will not be granted. Jagmeet Singh says he will do something but doesn’t say when. And Justin Trudeau says nothing, but has no plans to step down over Christmas. In other words, it’s going to be a foggy political holiday season. That is what Canadians — including an update-starved media — are...

Don Newman

Freeland’s Bombshell

On the day she was supposed to deliver the Fall Economic Statement the Liberals hoped would ignite their comeback leading into an election next year, Chrystia Freeland instead resigned as finance minister and fired a political broadside at the waterline into the already listing ship that is the Trudeau government. In doing so, Freeland ripped the Band-Aid off a festering...

Don Newman

Justin Trudeau Should be Making a List…of Retaliatory Tariffs

While Santa is busy making his naughty and nice list, Justin Trudeau should be compiling one of his own – the list of US exports headed for Canada that will be hit with retaliatory tariffs if Donald Trump delivers on the first tariff threat of his second administration. That is what the Canadian Government should be doing as we prepare...

Don Newman

Trudeau Shouldn’t Repeat his Father’s Mistake

The recent results in the Montreal byelection in La Salle-Emard-Verdun where the Liberals lost by fewer than 300 votes to the Bloc Québécois undeniably mean that the government of Justin Trudeau is finished. It was probably finished in June. That’s when the Liberals narrowly lost another byelection. This one in the Toronto riding of St. Paul’s. The ridings are among...

Don Newman

Jagmeet Singh Just Traded Policy for Politics

For his sake, I hope federal New Democratic Leader Jagmeet Singh doesn’t receive a letter from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre telling him he should jump off the Peace Tower to see if he can fly. Because based on the evidence, he might just try and do it. Singh announced Wednesday that he is terminating the Supply and Confidence Agreement between...

Don Newman

A Budget for a Disenchanted Base

One day fourteen years ago, after speaking to what was then called Ryerson University in Toronto, I was walking down a hall packed with students going to their next assignment as classes changed. Everyone, it seemed, was twenty years old except me. Suddenly, a middle-aged woman smiled and waved at me from a classroom doorway. She was a professor, and...