TORONTO – Pierre Poilievre is ready to succeed Erin O’Toole at the helm of the Conservative Party. With his candidacy begins – and probably already ends – the race for the leadership of the Conservatives. It is indeed very difficult to imagine another potential candidate who has any chance of victory against Poilievre, a rising star of the Canadian right, respected by the various Tory souls and feared by the other parties. Forty-two years old, in parliament since 2004 as a representative of the Carleton district – in the Ottawa area – Poilievre has held numerous government positions under the administration of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He currently serves as Shadow Minister of Finance.
To announce his candidacy he posted a video on Twitter in which he does not even mention his intention to conquer the helm of the party: in his message in fact he already directly challenges Justin Trudeau, taking his victory for granted.
“I am running for the prime minister to give you back control of your life. Trudeau thinks he’s your boss. It is the exact opposite. You are the bosses. That’s why I’m running for prime minister.” The message is clear: even he does not see potential challengers capable of hindering his race for the leadership of the Conservative Party and for this reason, right from the start, his opponent is Trudeau.
Within a few minutes, an avalanche of endorsements came of him from numerous prominent figures in the Conservative Party. Among them, the official support of 16 MPs – Dan Albas, John Barlow, Michael Barrett, James Bezan, Michael Cooper, Todd Doherty, Marilyn Gladu, Michael Kram, Melissa Lantsman, Philip Lawrence, Jamie Schmale, Jake Stewart, Corey Tochor, Brad Vis, Ryan Williams and Bob Zimmer – as well as former Minister John Baird.
Compared to the now former conservative leader Erin O’Toole, with Pierre Poilievre at the helm, the party would veer decisively to the right.
The former secretary in the seventeen months in which he was in office tried instead to dialogue with the moderate center, in an attempt to win votes in the large Canadian urban centers: an operation that miserably failed, as certified by the electoral collapse of September 20.
Poilievre instead intends to bring the party back firmly to the right, also continuing to wink at the no vax galaxy and, more generally, at that mass of voters who strongly demand the relaxation of anti-covid restrictions.
From this point of view, Poilievre’s presence in the crowd of demonstrators in Ottawa during the Convoy Freedom protest has become emblematic.
At the same time, in recent days Poilievre has continued to launch very specific messages against the prime minister, underlining several times how the time has come to move on to a new phase in the operation to combat Covid, given that with the new Omicron variant the situation has completely changed.