Updated January 06, 2025 at 13:29 PM ET
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced plans to resign on Monday after loud calls from within his own party to step down. Ending weeks of speculation, Trudeau said he will no longer lead his Liberal Party but will remain in office until a successor is selected.
"I intend to resign as party leader, as prime minister, after the party selects its next leader through a robust, nationwide, competitive process," Trudeau told Canadians in an address from outside his home at Rideau Cottage in Ottawa.
Trudeau said he has set the process in motion for a new election, adding that it is clear that "I cannot be the best option in that election."
Momentum for a Trudeau exit has built steadily since his deputy prime minister, Chrystia Freeland, a close ally who also served as finance minister, resigned in stunning fashion on Dec. 16.
A youthful leader who lost support
Trudeau has been Canada's prime minister for nearly a decade, after winning office at just 43 years old. But his popularity has plummeted, especially among Canadians who blamed Trudeau for higher costs of living in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. His tenure has also been hit by a string of crises and missteps — and increasingly, even his own political allies have criticized his policies.
On Monday, Trudeau defended his achievements in office, particularly his social and economic policies, saying he has worked to help Canada's middle class and ease poverty. He repeatedly cited "internal battles" as the reason for his resignation, saying Parliament has been paralyzed for months, while political rhetoric heated up.
"It's time for a reset," he said. "It's time for the temperature to come down."
Trudeau isn't leaving office immediately. His Liberal Party will now start the process of selecting a new leader, who will be called upon to face Pierre Poilievre, the Conservative Party leader who has built a massive lead over Trudeau in recent polls.
In a move that gives the Liberals more time to settle on a new candidate, Trudeau said Governor General Mary Simon granted his request to prorogue Parliament -- placing it out of session -- until March 24.
Many Canadians are very apprehensive about what's next, Fen Hampson, a professor at Carleton University, told NPR.
"I think [with] the degree of uncertainty — domestic political uncertainty, along with the uncertainty in terms of what's going to happen to the economy — this couldn't be a worse period" to change leadership, Hampson said.
Why now?
A politically weakened Trudeau was facing two important deadlines this month: his Liberal Party recently scheduled a national caucus to discuss his leadership on Wednesday; and the House of Commons was due to return from Parliament's Christmas break on Jan. 27.
Both of those events added to the pressure for Trudeau to step aside. But 2025 was poised to be an election year anyway: Trudeau and the Liberals had been on track to remain in power until this year, under a deal struck in 2022 with the leftist opposition, New Democratic Party.
Unhappiness with Trudeau grew along with post-COVID inflation, Hampson said, adding, "The second major factor was the increase in immigration" as the Trudeau government sought to boost the number of migrants in an attempt to lower Canada's median age.
From early in his career, Trudeau showed skill in leveraging social media and the politics of representation, said Stephen Marche, a Toronto-based author who covers Trudeau for several U.S. publications. But those same dynamics helped bring him down, Marche told NPR, adding that Trudeau's story can be seen reflecting an embrace of more progressive policies.
"I know that term is very loaded, but, you know, he was captain woke," Marche said, "and the world has really, really turned against wokeness in a very, very deep way."
How did Chrystia Freeland's exit hurt Trudeau?
Freeland's departure was a damaging debacle for Trudeau, a self-inflicted embarrassment at a time when in the U.S., President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly spoken of imposing new tariffs on Canada -- and has even suggested annexing America's northern neighbor.
Freeland sharply criticized Trudeau's policy plans in her resignation letter, which became public. The timing of her departure was also a shock. It came just before Freeland was set to deliver a major address on the state of the nation's finances.
News of a now-infamous Zoom call soon emerged. According to the CBC, that's how Trudeau told Freeland he would be removing her from the finance post -- but he did so without cementing plans for her replacement, Mark Carney, who is seen as possibly having hopes of replacing not Freeland, but Trudeau himself.
What's next?
Canada's next general election was initially set for Oct. 20, 2025, based on the timing of the last election in the fall of 2021. But as the turmoil surrounding the prime minister plays out, coalition party officials said on Monday that a spring election is likely.
The timing leaves Canada in an awkward spot, as it undergoes a prolonged transition period during the first months of Trump's presidency.
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