MAKEOVER PARTY: What’s in store for the post-Trudeau Liberals?

After nearly 12 years of being the Justin Trudeau party, the Liberals have a lot of work to do to detach themselves from the poisonous brand

Published Jan 07, 2025  •  Last updated 0 minutes ago  •  3 minute read

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau departs Ottawa on Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024, en route to the Francophonie Summit in France. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

OTTAWA — It’ll be a makeover of historic proportions.

Article content

Article content

Article content

Questions remain on what it’ll take for the Liberal Party — which rebranded itself in Justin Trudeau’s image, following his 2013 victory as party leader — to find a new identity and bounce back.

Sharan Kaur — who spent five years as deputy chief of staff to former finance minister Bill Morneau and is currently partner at Sovereign Advisory — said the party’s going to have a challenging time detaching itself from Trudeau.

“We went from literally polling in third place to winning a majority because of his brand,” she told The Toronto Sun. “He was a celebrity factor, he was a name, and he brought us to where we needed to be to win.”

While Trudeau may have sparked that historic comeback a decade ago, pundits also blame him for the demise of his government, which faced well over a year of progressively worsening poll numbers and countless scandals that would have hobbled other parties and leaders.

Article content

Article content

Dan McTeague, a Liberal MP from 1993-2011, said the party hitching its wagon to the Trudeau name was an act of desperation.

“(Justin) Trudeau was a quick fix, it was all we needed,” he said.  “For a generation, the name ‘Trudeau’ had been synonymous with the Liberal Party, and vice-versa. It got them out of third place and brought them to first, with a name everybody identified with.”

Recommended video

Despite Canadians growing weary of the Harper Conservatives at the time, McTeague said that without Trudeau, the Liberals wouldn’t have been much of a match in 2015 — to say anything about winning a majority government.

“Many MPs are now finally realizing, after a decade, that they went too far to the left,” McTeague said.

Article content

“This is the party that created social opportunity. This isn’t a socialist party, and yet it’s replete with socialists.”

Whatever the party chooses to do in the weeks and months ahead, their time is limited.

According to sources in Ottawa, all indications suggest a leadership vote in early March, with a membership cut-off anywhere from 30 to 40 days before Liberal Party members choose a new leader.

“The party doesn’t have much of a tradition in leadership,” McTeague added, noting the party has had  eight leaders in the four decades since Pierre Trudeau resigned.

“There’s not a lot of institutional knowledge or how these things (normally) play out, especially given the time constraints. The party normally likes three months, not two months or a month and a half.”

Article content

The contracted race will also limit candidates to those capable of raising large amounts of support and money in a short period of time, he said.

McTeague and Kaur agreed that the party needs to return to its centrist, collaborative roots if it’s got any chance of being a contender in future elections.

“There’s got to be balance, it can’t be one or the other,” Kaur said, noting the perilously divisive state of modern politics thanks to parties — including the federal Liberals — choosing to base their messaging around contentious wedge and fear-based issues like abortion rather than sound policy.

“With that type of virtue signaling on certain things, we need to balance the divisiveness a bit more — we all have more things in common than we don’t.”

[email protected]

X: @bryanpassifiume

Recommended from Editorial

1. 

   Liberal party begins process to succeed Trudeau as candidates weigh their options

2. 

   Trudeau confirms he will resign as Liberal Party leader and PM: 'Country deserves a real choice'

Article content