Karina Gould may not have the same Bay Street credibility as Mark Carney, but she resonates big with Main Street.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on January 15, 2025.

OTTAWA–Why Karina Gould? That’s the question friends posed when I gave a couple of television interviews promoting her as the next leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.

At press time, Gould had not yet announced, but her team was putting together a campaign to create a fighting chance in this shortened race to name the next prime minister of Canada. Gould has already recruited more than a dozen caucus members.

Not overwhelming, but considering her campaign only started a week ago, it is a good start.

Mark Carney has been running for the job for years. Press reports say he has about 30 MPs on his team. That number should be twice as large if Carney’s support is as wide and deep as the media keep claiming.

On just about every network, including his American pre-campaign interview on Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show, Carney is constantly presented as the almost certain winner of the upcoming race.

Resisting that pull may be difficult, but many Liberals would like to support a leader who’s in it for the long haul.

Does anyone really think that Carney—who declined offers of more than one nomination in the last election—will stick around if the party ends up in third-party status? The answer is no.  

Liberals need a leader who will appeal to young people. Gould is the most appealing to that cohort because she reflects their values and energy. Gould has managed multiple cabinet portfolios with energy and savvy.  

A superb communicator in multiple languages, Gould negotiated Canada’s national childcare via multiple provincial agreements. While child care is seen as crucial for Canadians, Gould is being critiqued internally by those who say motherhood is a reason not to vote for her.

Before we dismiss misogyny’s role in leadership, we cannot forget what happened to the Kamala Harris vote in the United States. She lost the presidency because American men voted against her. Had the election been determined only by women, Harris would have won. 

No one asked Justin Trudeau if he could manage both politics and a young family when he ran for office at age 36 back in 2008. Instead, his youth and a campaign that included cannabis legalization managed to ignite the attention of a new generation.

Gould has been generating much interest with young people. She also has support from senior Liberals who have supported the party for decades.

Unlike some colleagues, Gould reaches out regularly to party elders, seeking their advice and wisdom while other leadership candidates have either ignored them or publicly denigrated them. 

Party faithful remember the very off-putting negative response of Foreign Affairs minister Chrystia Freeland when former prime minister Jean Chrétien offered to go to China to negotiate a solution to the extradition of Meng Wanzhou to the United States.  

Freeland scorned his offer, and ended up with a protracted fight with China that cost our country economically and politically. But Freeland’s high profile during the Trudeau years have set her up as an obvious runner-up to Carney’s stardom.

Neither Carney nor Freeland have Gould’s likability factor. Parties make decisions based on whom they think can win. Canadians make decisions on the emotional feel they get from a politician. Is that person someone you would like to have a beer with? Kim Campbell was elected Progressive Conservative leader and prime minister because she was seen to be the best choice to rebuild her party in the post-Brian Mulroney era.  

It turned out to be a terrible decision that left the Tories reduced to two seats in a Liberal majority government in 1993. Today, Liberals have little time to judge the emotional IQ of each of the candidates.  

But when it comes to support from young people, reaching out to party faithful, and a commitment to the long-term rebuilding process, Gould is our best bet. 

The first question at any leadership debate should be, “If the Liberals lose the next election, are you willing to remain as leader?” The second question should be, “How can we recapture the dynamic wave of support by young people that carried Trudeau to power in 2015?”

The answer to both questions is Gould studied Latin American and Caribbean studies at McGill and philosophy at Oxford and who worked for the Organization of American States on migration.

She learned Spanish while volunteering at a Latin American orphanage. Gould may not have the same Bay Street credibility as Carney, but she resonates big with Main Street.

Correction: This column originally incorrectly reported that Karina Gould is a lawyer. She is not, and the column was updated at 8:09 a.m. on Jan. 16.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on January 13, 2025.

OTTAWA—Enemy of the state: that is the only way to characterize the threat of Canadian “economic annexation” by American president-elect Donald Trump.

His so-called joke about Canada joining the United States is turning deadly serious.

It is a threat that one would expect from a dictator. It is not a threat that one could expect from the leader of our democratically-elected neighbour, the United States.

All bets are off with the Trump claim that Canada should join the U.S. in the formation of a single country.

He even has the nerve to post a map of Canada absorbed into the United States, with the stars and stripes flag covering all the way from Mexico to the Arctic.

Trump has ruled out military force as a method of annexation, speaking instead about economic annexation.

He continues to falsely claim that Canada receives hundreds of millions in subsidies in America.

He wants to end auto, milk, and lumber imports from Canada, claiming that his country doesn’t need any of our goods to survive.

However, Trump did not mention electricity or oil and gas, Canadian exports that America needs to keep its economy running.

Trump also reached out to support the candidacy of Pierre Poilievre as a future prime minister, saying the pair are on the same political wave length.

Poilievre moved quickly to distance himself from Trump, stating the obvious: Canada will never become the 51st state.

But Conservative allies like Alberta Premier Danielle Smith plan to attend the president’s inauguration on Jan. 20 in celebration of his victory.

The Alberta premier has also refused to join Ontario Premier Doug Ford in denying the export of energy to the U.S. Ford promised to retaliate on tariffs by refusing to export energy south of the border, but Smith quickly rebutted that Ford did not speak for her province.

However, that happened before Trump launched his campaign to annex Canada.

Smith would be hard-pressed to explain her presence at Trump’s inauguration when the leader she plans to celebrate is claiming publicly he will buy Greenland, annex Canada, and take over the Panama Canal.

While Trump’s threats are being widely covered here at home, they won’t make the news very long in the U.S.

Ford was supposed to be interviewed on the subject by CNN, but his presence was cancelled when the California wildfires replaced Canada’s annexation in the news cycle.

While Americans may gloss over Trumpian machinations, we cannot afford to do so.

We need to get tough on as many fronts as possible. One of those could be a refusal to allow the president to enter Canada for the G7 meeting in June because of his recent federal criminal conviction.

Diplomacy could override that refusal, but diplomacy is also a two-way street.

Unless Trump issues a clarification regarding his crazy annexation claims, he should be kept out of the country.

Words have consequences, and the words of a bully need to be met with consequences.

Some might argue that barring Trump from the country would simply poke the bear.

But stroking the bear has not gotten us anywhere.

Peter Donolo, former prime ministerial communications adviser to then-prime minister Jean Chrétien, recently wrote an opinion piece saying that we can’t treat the Trump threats as a joke.

Instead, we need to act with political muscle. That muscle should include testing Trump in international fora.

The Organization of American States is where the unilateral declaration of annexation theory could be tested. Last year, the OAS issued a condemnation of Venezuela’s move to annex the Essequibo region of Guyana.

Canada, and the rest of the Americas, has an interest in dampening down Trump’s rhetoric.

Annexation is not legal, which is why the world has been working to get Russian troops out of Ukraine.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization should also be asked to take a stand on the American president-elect’s annexation ruminations.

The United Nations could also be an appropriate forum for condemnation of Trump’s hostile annexation rhetoric.

These claims need to be fought at the highest level of international diplomacy, including the potential for legal remedies.

The International Court of Justice should be asked for its opinion as to the legality of Trump’s annexation threats. It has a mandate to give advice on international legal issues. What could be more pressing than a claim that one democratic country will undertake ‘economic annexation’ of another?

Trump must be taken seriously. It is time to fight a bully by destroying his bully pulpit.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on December 23, 2024.

OTTAWA—Politics 101: Do not fire your most senior minister by Zoom.

And if a firing is in the works, be prepared for all eventualities, including a resignation.

At the Liberal Christmas gathering last week, senior ministers and MPs were privately shaking their heads at the incompetent way the deputy prime minister and finance minister was terminated.

They also wondered exactly what the prime minister’s office was doing on the weekend to prevent expected fallout from the Chrystia Freeland departure.

Chief of Staff Katie Telford was busy posting on social media, but not about politics. “We got away and spent a holiday season weekend in New York City! It was the best. We saw the lights, some stars (on stage!) and did a lot of walking and talking. Thanks to those who tried to minimize the phone calls….”

Lovely for her family. Not so lovely for the country.

The chief of staff should have realized that after her boss fired Chrystia Freeland, there would be pushback from the minister. Freeland is not the first finance minister to be fired, nor will she be the last.

With zero prime ministerial strategy, Freeland was able to pen her version of the exit, seizing the narrative, and dealing a deadly blow to Trudeau’s future. The Prime Minister’s Office is solely responsible for the crisis.

When then-prime minister Jean Chrétien fired Paul Martin from the finance portfolio, the move actually averted a major financial crisis.

At the time, Martin and his caucus supporters were working internally to force Chrétien’s resignation.

The two had run against each other for the top job, and Martin kept his leadership ambition active by taking over the party apparatus, including the installation of a party president who spent most of his time attacking the leader.

But Chrétien was not about to be moved, and to be fair, his personal popularity and polling numbers were robust enough that most of the caucus did not join in moves to destabilize his leadership.

Martin was getting impatient, and so his team hatched a plan to announce his resignation as finance minister at a Montreal meeting of the International Monetary Conference, including senior global banking officials and finance ministers in June 2002.

His intention was to drop the financial bomb on the world, and cause a run on the Canadian dollar to force the prime minister out.

Chretien got wind of the plot on a Saturday when a truck was seen at the department of finance exporting shredded documents from the minister’s office.

Chretien’s riposte was to get ahead of the Martin narrative, and to fire him.

Martin was informed that Sunday that he was fired, and he expressed absolute surprise at the decision.

But, in the end, the Monday meeting was chaired by newly-minted finance minister John Manley, whose fiscal rectitude and legal tax experience calmed international waters.

Martin’s attempted coup was foiled by the Prime Minister’s Office. As soon as they got wind of the shredders at Finance, instead of waiting, they elevated it to a firing offence.

Chinese military general Sun Tzu is said to be the originator of the proverb “keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”

It is the job of the prime minister’s inner circle to keep enemies close. In the case of Freeland, she had been one of Trudeau’s most loyal defenders, so her visceral and very public reaction to the firing could have been predicted.

Caucus members know that Freeland was previously viewed by the PMO as a potential future replacement for Trudeau.

Other ministers are now wondering if the prime minister could treat the most senior minister this way, what could happen to them?

As soon as the proposed cabinet shuffle occurs, there will be more public declarations from those who have been passed up for the top jobs.

What should have been a year-end celebration of some big wins on the social policy and housing fronts is instead a crisis of unprecedented proportions inflicted by the incompetency of the prime minister’s inner circle.

At one time, several caucus members called for the firing of the chief of staff. That call went unheeded.

It took more than two years for caucus to convince the PMO that the government needed to support its climate change strategy with paid advertising.

PMO’s refusal to brief caucus or seek ministerial advice before promoting issues like the ill-conceived GST holiday created this crisis.

Trudeau will pay the price for an inner circle that has lost its way.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on December 16, 2024.

OTTAWA—The most popular guessing game in Ottawa these days is how to stare down a bully.

U.S. president-elect Donald Trump lost no time in poking fun at his favourite punching bag, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, by posting a social media message suggesting it was great having dinner with “Governor Justin Trudeau of the Great State of Canada. I look forward to seeing the Governor again soon so that we continue our in depth talks on tariffs and trade, the results of which will be truly spectacular for all.”

Ontario Premier Doug Ford had a soft response: “I am sure not thinking of Justin Trudeau at midnight so if he is thinking of Justin at midnight, it’s probably a good relationship.”

It wasn’t the first crack that Trump has taken at Canada recently. After the prime minister met him at Mar-a-Lago, Trump said in an interview on Meet the Press that Canada could become the 51st state.

“We’re subsidizing Canada to the tune of over $100-billion a year … if we are going to subsidize them, why not become a state?”

Trump’s comments on subsidies are incorrect. He is referring to a trade imbalance between Canada and the United States, largely driven by the sale of Canadian electricity and gas to the U.S. If those sales are cancelled—which is the rationale behind imposing a tariff on incoming goods—much of America’s manufacturing production would be stalled due to lack of energy.

The U.S. needs Canada’s energy, and it also needs our water. We are sitting on 20 per cent of the world’s supply of fresh water while several states in the U.S. are suffering from a water shortage.

So Canada has some cards to play in this tit-for-tat verbal slugfest. Trudeau is getting lots of advice on how to deal with it.

Peter Donolo, former communications advisor to then-prime minister Jean Chrétien, told the CBC last week Trudeau should stand tough.

“It isn’t the first time in Canadian history that the possibility of a union with the United States has been on the table. It’s a mistake to laugh it off … this is an insult to Canada. This is the guy’s [Trump] MO …. we have had 150 years as an independent country … what starts off as a joke is a seed planted … our leaders should push back and not make light of it. … given Donald Trump’s own history of lawlessness … when we let Trump get away with stuff … all he does is do it again harder.”

Donolo also referred to past Canada-U.S. relations, from the charm offensive then-prime minister Brian Mulroney used on then-president George Bush, to Chrétien’s decision to refuse the American invitation to join the invasion of Iraq.

He characterized the two as the suck-up versus the stand-up approach.

Donolo also decried provincial premiers for “sucking up” to Trump, specifically citing the premiers of Quebec and Alberta: “history proves that when you cave to a strongman all it does is whet his appetite for more.”

Provincial premiers are supposed to be working with the prime minister on a united strategy to dampen Trump’s appetite for tariffs. But Donolo’s point is that if the country looks like it is running scared, Trump is the kind of bully who will simply increase tariffs and put more pressure on the Canadian economy.

The U.S. president-elect’s instability is something Canadians will have to learn to live with. But we certainly cannot allow ourselves to be bullied into submission by denying our status as an independent country.

Statistics came out last week showing that the U.S. has the highest health care costs in the world. Meanwhile, our nation has been able to shape a system where every Canadian who is sick can go to the hospital with no fear of being turned away because of money.

Canada’s level of gun violence is seven times lower than that of America’s. And while the Canadian government has just introduced legislation to further reduce assault rifle access, the U.S. cannot seem to get past its obsession with second amendment gun-toting rights adopted almost 250 years ago.

The gun-toting path chosen by Americans for their own country is definitely not one that Canadians would follow.

We will not be bullied into denying our identity, nor should our leaders be trying to assuage the ignorant comments of the American president.

Trump’s backhanded denial of Canada’s existence as a country is no joke.

And we need to push back—hard.

That is the only language that a bully will understand.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on December 9, 2024.

OTTAWA—While governments are focusing on gender designation in sport, women are just making it happen.

Charge Ottawa opened the second season last week with a three-two victory over the Toronto Sceptres at TD Place.

The game started a new season with a new name.

The league launched last year without team names, and fans were thrilled with the Charge new look.

Season ticket holders were snapping up merchandise while fans in the thousands arrived to witness the season opener for the Professional Women’s Hockey League.

Meanwhile, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s government passed three bills last week limiting transgender rights.

One bill is designed to prohibit transgender pronoun choices by minors, another restricts transgender access to human rights support.

The third is a sport bill. The Fairness and Safety in Sport Act is designed to require school boards, educational institutions and provincial sports organizations to develop policies to “protect the integrity of female athletic competitions by ensuring women and girls have the opportunity to compete in biological female-only divisions.”

The law will also require parents to opt in to education on transgender issues. Current law requires parents to opt out. The burdensome requirements for opting in include informing parents one month in advance and offering alternative education for children who do not get gender sex education.

The law will also limit educational material and lesson plans on sexual orientation and gender identity, potentially erasing same-sex families from the curriculum.

Opponents say the proposals go against research that proves sexual education reduces the number of unwanted pregnancies, sexually-transmitted diseases and unchecked child abuse.

Puberty-blocking medication and hormone therapy would be illegal for children under the age of 16. Youth aged 16 to 17 would require parental consent for such therapies.

Some bill opponents say the prohibition would be particularly challenging for adolescents trying to avoid puberty that is not aligned with their sexual identity.

Equality groups are vowing to fight the Alberta legislation as they have enjoined legal challenges against similar changes to law and policy in Saskatchewan and New Brunswick.

The Canadian Medical Association, the Alberta Medical Association, and the Canadian Paediatric Society oppose the medical limitations in the legislation.

The Alberta changes go beyond those introduced by New Brunswick and Saskatchewan.

The New Brunswick government that introduced a prohibitive transgender law was defeated recently while the Saskatchewan government faced a steep drop in its recent election support.

For years, governments have used their power to keep women out of sport, even when female athletic prowess would have meant they could participate equally in men’s sport.

Some say the sport changes are just another example of government weakening laws that protect athletes from harassment and bullying.

Meanwhile, girls and women are just doing it.

From the PWHL to the wildly popular American-based Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), professional sports has opened a new venue for girls who want to make a career of their sport of choice.

The WNBA, which has been operating for almost 30 years, has 13 teams and is the premier women’s pro team globally. Two more teams will join the league next year and their televised games are very popular.

The world of tennis is also changing as the issue of pay equality has been addressed between the genders. Last year, the Women’s Tennis Association approved a plan to achieve pay equity by 2033. Part of that proposal means that gender payments for non-Grand Slam 1,000 and 500-level tournaments will be equal in 2027.

Governments have ignored their potential role in pay equity although former federal sport minister Pascale St-Onge moved quickly to stem sexual harassment in sport, suspending world junior hockey financial support while the issue of sexual assault was addressed.

Smith could be focusing her government’s attention on equality for women and girls in sport. Instead, she is catering to a small minority that is interested in stamping out understanding or support for those who choose to change their gender.

By targeting her attention on reducing support for adolescents struggling with gender identity issues, Smith will shore up support with ultra-conservative members of her caucus.

But she opens the door to a revolt by ordinary Albertans who believe there are other health issues far more important than what pronoun is used to identify non-binary students in the classroom.

Naheed Nenshi and opposition New Democrats are hoping the legislation will provoke the same reaction from Albertans that New Brunswickers expressed at the polls when they dumped the Blaine Higgs Progressive Conservative government.

Only time will tell.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on December 2, 2024.

OTTAWA—Doug Ford is talking tough against Donald Trump.

He knows it is good politics. Canadians are extremely upset about the possibility that our economy will be bludgeoned by a bully.

As premier, Ford is in a position to talk tough and face few of the repercussions that would rain upon Prime Minister Justin Trudeau if he were to say the same thing.

Ford also took a nasty shot at Mexico, demanding they be turfed from the North American Free Trade agreement for allowing Chinese auto production into their country.

Ford has a point, and the new Mexican government may have to rethink the trade policy.

Trudeau must proceed cautiously because the reported animus that Trump feels for him could cost our country dearly.

Canadians are in for a rough ride as Trump also knows that most Canadians do not like him. He is a man who needs to be loved.

Ever since the president-elect won a majority, news from south of the border is nothing short of cringe-worthy.

Putting an anti-vaxxer in charge of health policy, especially one as crazy as Robert Kennedy, is nothing short of deadly.

Kennedy has promised to ban fluoride in all American water systems. Democratic state governors are already lining up to block any federal edicts that infringe on their jurisdiction.

Hulk Hogan is publicly ruminating that he will be given a senior position on the Trump team. An alleged sex philanderer had to drop out as Trump’s pick for attorney general.

Ford attacked Trump for claiming illegal drugs and migrants were coming from Canada. Instead, according to Ford, Canada is the recipient of illegal guns and drugs coming north.

Trudeau is working with premiers on a joint approach to the Trump threat to impose an immediate 25 per cent tariff on all goods entering from Canada on the day he is sworn in.

While Trudeau and Ford may be working together on that issue, they are going to be at political odds in upcoming elections.

Ford has already made noises about moving to the polls early, and his advertising strategy seems to confirm that intention.

His government is running non-stop messaging on radio and television to explain the strength of the Ontario economy. One of the reasons is the move to electrification of vehicles.

At the same time as government ads are lauding the new investments (made in tandem with the federal government), Ford’s party ads are designed to trash Trudeau’s price on pollution.

Trudeau’s fight against global warming is one of the reasons the federal government has invested heavily in alternative energies, and public transit.

In Ford’s party ads, the premier takes all the credit for these investments, when in reality, the push came from the feds.

Ford is intending to run his campaign against Trudeau.

Meanwhile, Trudeau continues to make announcements about good public policy with zero supportive government advertising. It is almost as though Trudeau wants to lose the next election.

In the past week, Ontario became the third province to join the federal government’s plan for a national school food program.

Newfoundland was the first to sign on to the national initiative, followed by Manitoba and now Ontario.

But while the announcement was well-received in each province, there is been little change in the poll numbers for the federal Liberals.

That is partly because of the unpopularity of the prime minister, but it is also because the government has not spent any real money explaining why helping children’s nutrition in schools will lead to stronger communities.

The only federal ad I saw last week was a vague reference to how our banking investments are covered by a government agency known as the Canadian Deposit Insurance Corporation.

For some reason, some idiot in federal advertising thinks the inner workings of CDIC are more important than telling Canadians about the new school food program.

The other recent huge-ticket item was a GST pre-Christmas holiday on some items and a $250 bonus for workers with incomes under $150,000. The Liberals have since split the bill and separated the GST break from the $250 cheques which will be sent to most working Canadians in the spring.

How did that giveaway work for the government?

With zero advertising to support the initiative, what made the news was that those who did not work were upset about being left out. What was supposed to be a gateway to a positive story is now more bad Liberal news.

The New Democrats now say they won’t support the program unless it is expanded.

This multi-billion-dollar announcement should have been launched in tandem with a national advertising campaign.

Why not follow Doug Ford.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

At the conclusion of the anti-Boissonnault attack, there’s only one question that matters: which political party has a plan to tackle the gross injustices Indigenous People have faced since colonization?

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 25, 2024.

OTTAWA—Identity politics run amok. How else to explain the resignation of employment minister Randy Boissonnault on Nov. 20?

Boissonnault was forced to step down for claiming that he is a Métis except he has never done so.

By his own admission, he was adopted into a Métis family and raised by them although he has often mentioned the influence of a Cree grandmother.

A prime ministerial statement said Boissonnault “will focus on clearing the allegations made against him.”

Boissonnault was listed as Métis by the Liberal Party Indigenous Peoples’ Commission when they compiled a list of successful Indigenous candidates after the 2015 election.

According to a commission member, an adoption by a Métis family confers Métis status on the child, which is why Boissonnault was so identified.

The Conservative Party has made Boissonnault a clear target. Three members were ejected from the House of Commons last week because of the nature of their personal attacks.

Seven Tories peppered Boissonnault with a dozen questions while Government House Leader Karina Gould tried to set the record straight.

Gould said the company managed by Boissonnault while he was not in politics was never listed as an Indigenous company, and did not receive any contracts from the government.

NDP MP Blake Desjarlais joined the attack, suggesting that Boissonnault should resign as minister because he is making decisions about Indigenous lives without knowing about his own.

Allegedly, Boissonnault’s grandmother is listed as a person with German ancestry, although Boissonnault’s understanding was that she was full Cree.

The bottom line is that this so-called scandal was nothing more than a successful attempt to unseat a minister so popular that he got elected during a Conservative near-sweep of his home province, Alberta.

Boissonnault’s departure leaves the province without a federal minister at the table.

This opens the door to the ministerial elevation of Calgary Liberal MP George Chahal.

Boissonnault’s departure is a huge loss for Indigenous and minority supporters.

He was one of the most well-liked ministers in the government with a reputation for speaking out for the underdog. He is also a self-identified gay man.

Liberal First Nations MP Jaime Battiste defended Boissonnault as an advocate for Indigenous people who never self-identified as Métis.

Battiste characterized the attack as a witch-hunt, and said that the whole issue was blown up to score points. Boisssonnault was a member of the Liberal Indigenous caucus, but there are also supportive men who have been members of the women’s caucus.

Embittered former justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould weighed in on the controversy, blaming it all on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and saying “we get to watch white people play ancestry wheel of fortune.”

The wheel of fortune has been anything but. Until Trudeau actually began tackling Indigenous issues with real financial support, the education of on-territory Indigenous children was funded at a level 40 per cent less than the rest of Canada’s children.

The wheel of fortune meant that if you lived in Indigenous territory, you were likely to suffer for years under a boil-water advisory. Trudeau and the Liberal Party fixed that.

As for Indigenous ministers, the Liberal Party actually set up a recruitment system to attract Indigenous candidates. That was how Wilson-Raybould was rewarded with an uncontested nomination in the coveted Vancouver-Granville, B.C., riding in 2014.

Conservatives who succeeded in ousting Boissonnault have zero strategy of their own on reconciliation and the recruitment of Indigenous Members of Parliament.

They are ready to use identity politics to destroy the reputation of someone as earnest and hardworking as Boissonnault.

When Andrew Scheer was leader of the Conservative Party, Indigenous voters in his own riding voted against him because he did not represent the views of Indigenous constituents.

Yet he was frontline in the attack on Boissonnault. According to everyone who follows the issue, Boissonnault’s departure means the loss of a vociferous supporter of reconciliation and minority political engagement.

At the conclusion of the anti-Boissonnault attack, there is only one question that really matters: which political party has a plan to tackle the gross injustices that have been faced by Indigenous People ever since Europeans settlers arrived to overtake their land?

Certainly not the Conservatives, whose slash-and-burn political strategy would turn back the clock on reconciliation, housing, and a huge array of other issues.

Pierre Poilievre’s carbon-tax election isn’t happening. Instead of focusing on character assassination, why doesn’t he work on specific positive issues to get things done?

That could actually make Indigenous lives better.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

When a musician can invoke that much good in the world, it is worth a deeper dive into understanding why.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 18, 2024.

OTTAWA—Canada has gone “Swiftie” this week.

In anticipation of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour in Toronto and Vancouver, the country is abuzz with excitement.

The Toronto Star is auctioning off tickets to raise money for the Santa Claus Fund. According to The Star, the fund has been donating gift boxes to vulnerable children since 1906. What could be more Canadian than that?

Swift herself donated $13,000 to the fund last year, and she wasn’t even visiting Toronto. This year, she is donating again. Two Nov. 22 concert tickets are being auctioned off by The Star, which is also encouraging concert-goers to donate to their own favourite charity.

Social media is calling on fans to follow Swift’s example by donating to something worthwhile as she has done.

Stories of charitable acts surrounding the Swift tour abound.

CTV reported that an Ottawa boy with a rare spastic paraplegia was gifted two tickets to the concert that his friends had auctioned off for $20,000.

The tickets were originally sold off to fund seven-year-old Jack Laidlaw’s experimental treatment in a Boston hospital.

Someone donated $20,000 for the seats, with an anonymous matching donation.

But the person who purchased the tickets was so moved by Laidlaw’s story that she donated the tickets to him, and he will attend the concert with his father.

Stories of similar goodness are popping up all across the country.

Taylor’s performances started on Nov. 14 with six concerts in Toronto, moving to Vancouver for three performances in early December.

Some 60,000 people will attend each sold-out concert with thousands more expected to attend the pre-concert Taylgate ’24 at the Metro Convention Centre.

Taylor Swift Way has been temporarily installed in Toronto with 22 street signs wending their way from Queen Street West to John Street, Front Street, and Blue Jays Way.

Official Swift merchandise is being sold in only one location, and hundreds of fans lined up to purchase posters, shirts, and other memorabilia when the shop opened.

Some clearly don’t understand the Swift mania that has gripped the nation.

Globe and Mail sports columnist Cathal Kelly wrote a scathing critique of Taylor’s music, writing: “On a scale of musical impact, she is somewhere north of Barry Manilow and south of Elton John. She is a less interesting Diana Ross, or a Madonna with better business instincts.”

Cathal goes on to say it is not Swift’s fault, but rather a reflection of “the enormous vacant space in cultural history that she represents. … Six nights in Toronto is another portent of mediocrity.”

He may be right, but I can’t help but wondering why thousands of people—including members of my own family—are struck with Swiftmania.

My niece won two tickets in a lottery at a cost of $500 apiece. As of last week, those tickets could be sold on the internet for up to $8,000 each.

But she prefers to go to the concert, and forego a possible $15,000 cash payout.

Like Kelly, I just don’t get it. Maybe it is just the older generation that is living in ignorance as the world moves to embrace Swift’s social media stardom.

When a musician can invoke that much good in the world, it is worth a deeper dive into understanding why.

Of course, the woman and her team are obviously marketing geniuses. That goes without saying.

But her judicious use of social media and the global response to her music is giving the world something to share in a time when, according to the young, everything else seems to be falling apart.

Perhaps Swift’s influence is overstated.

She came out courageously and loudly in favour of electing America’s first woman president. Swift was Kamala Harris’ biggest booster, much to the ire of Donald Trump.

While her fans may have been cheering, they did not all jump on board because if they had, Trump would have lost the election.

So perhaps her followers are thirsting for a brief moment, a three-hour escape from the reality of the world in which they live.

Surveys show many young people don’t even want to have children today because they are afraid of how climate change is destroying the globe. World wars and environmental disasters dominate the news.

There aren’t many moments when these disasters can be minimized.

Swift concerts, and the crazy prelude leading up to her arrival, are one way that troubles can be forgotten.

Perhaps her music won’t last for a half-century like that of the iconic Beatles.

But the Swiftie Moment is here to stay.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

Once again, a woman for president was just too much for Americans to bear. Kamala Harris was soundly beaten by an angry white man. 

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 11, 2024.

OTTAWA—After his decisive victory against U.S. Vice-President Kamala Harris last week, Donald Trump needs to get some new hats.

The stench of sexism and racism wafted from voting booths as those who wanted to turn back the clock cast their ballots for a convicted sex offender.

Trump’s numbers in most areas exceeded his previous election bids. In his first attempt, Trump made it to the White House with the electoral vote, but not the popular vote. On Nov. 5, he got it all. There is nothing stopping him now.

David Axelrod, a Democratic adviser to multiple presidents, said after the vote that racism and sexism both played a role in Harris’ loss. Given the United States has previously voted for a Black president in Barack Obama, one has to assume that gender was the deciding Harris negative.

An exit poll by Edison Research found that Harris received the majority of her support from women and minorities. As for women, she won 54 per cent of their votes, while Trump secured 44 per cent. However, the white vote generally gave Trump an edge of 12 per cent. As for Latinos, they moved toward Trump in numbers not seen in the 2020 race.

On the race front, post-election numbers show that Harris garnered 80 per cent of the Black vote, but Obama received 93 per cent. Why was there a 13 per cent drop? Was it because some Black men couldn’t vote for a woman?

Women all over the world are mourning the Harris loss because it felt that, once again, a chance to elect a woman president in American was shattered not by a glass ceiling, but a concrete one.

Harris ran a flawless campaign. She was positive, upbeat, and energetic compared to a waddling Trump who bored crowds with his incoherent, droning speeches.

A woman voter dressed as a handmaid at a Pennsylvania voting booth said it all. Without uttering a word, the anonymous woman sent a clear message of what was at stake in the election.

Margaret Atwood, renowned Canadian author of The Handmaid’s Tale, made her own plea to American voters to support Harris for president.

According to her publisher, Atwood’s novel explores “themes of powerless women in a patriarchal society, loss of female agency and individuality, suppression of women’s reproductive rights, and the various means by which women resist and try to gain individuality and independence.”

That was the narrative for women in this election.

Once again, a woman for president was just too much for Americans to bear. Harris, who took over the Democratic reins from an ailing President Joe Biden 100 days ago, was soundly beaten by an angry white man.

Trump’s multiple character flaws were on painful display in the campaign, including the fact that almost no one who served with him in the White House supported him. His last week of campaigning was a disaster.

The hope that former congresswoman Liz Cheney be put before a firing squad prefaced by a self-inflicted wound at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally in New York. Multiple participants levelled insults at women, Blacks, and Jews.

Harris herself was alleged to be a sex worker working with her pimps. Then came the now infamous insult to Puerto Ricans when a comedian called their home a floating island of garbage.

Harris faced a double whammy. As a racialized woman, she fought prejudice against her gender and her race.

Despite her comfortable majority support with women, the men did her in. The more education they had, the more likely they were to support her. But opposition from young men and those with less than a high school education was ferocious.

Harris cannot be faulted on her campaign. Her message was solid, and she delivered it with an ease of confidence reminiscent of a real leader.

Now Democrats must reboot while MAGA Republicans are already discussing a successor to the aging president-elect. In a media interview, a young Trump voter said he thought the perfect successor was vice-president-elect J.D. Vance.

The man who thinks America is being run by a “bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too” is the next great white hope.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.

Pennsylvania is a pivotal state because of the electoral college system, and the majority of the state’s 580,000 eligible Latino voters are from Puerto Rico. 

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 4, 2024.

OTTAWA—Bromance may cost Donald Trump the election.

In a plea to Trump supporters, former Trump opponent Nikki Haley told Fox News that the male-only pitch and the use of the C-word in PAC ads attacking Kamala Harris were hurting the former president’s campaign.

She also underscored a huge mistake in the Trump campaign strategy.

While Haley was the last person standing in the nomination process against Trump, she quickly got on board and offered her help.

She revealed in the media last week that while she has been involved in fundraising mail and calls, she has not been asked to join in a single rally.

Instead, Trump’s major final event at Madison Square Gardens featured the kind of supporters who would appeal to the angry young men who are already in the former president’s camp.

The event was dominated by former wrestlers, comics, and other supporters, most of whom were unknown to the general public.

Instead of reaching out to women and minorities, the Trump-approved guest list at the New York event may actually cost him the election.

Former Trump supporter and well-known Latino broadcaster Geraldo Rivera called the insulting comments made by comedian Tony Hinchcliffe a “seminal” moment which will cost the Trump team dearly in Puerto Rican support and amongst other Latinos.

Hinchcliffe is now a household name. He may go down in history as the man who took Trump down. During the six-hour long rally, Hinchcliffe got a roar from the audience when he referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage” and said Latinos “love making babies.”

Another presenter referred to Harris as a prostitute whose pimps are helping in her campaign.

The disastrous comments garnered immediate reaction in the Latino community with famous rapper Bad Bunny endorsing Harris immediately after the Hinchcliffe meltdown. The rapper’s official name is Benito Antonio Martinez Ocasio, and he was born in Puerto Rico. He has 45 million followers on Instagram.

His endorsement could go a long way in reversing the hike in Trump support amongst Latinos compared to 2016.

That increase has played very well for Trump in some states where the margin between the two candidates is less than two per cent.

Ricky Martin, another Puerto Rican, immediately sent out this message to his 18 million Instagram followers: “this is what they think of us. Vote for @kamalaharris.”

And the tight race between the two presidential candidates on the eve of the election means that a one- or two-point shift could actually change the election’s outcome.

Pennsylvania is a pivotal state because of the electoral college system, and the majority of the state’s 580,000 eligible Latino voters are from Puerto Rico.

The gaffe opened the door for Harris to remind voters how Trump pitched paper towels and little else in the aftermath of the worst natural disaster to hit Puerto Rico in 2017 when Hurricane Maria claimed 2,975 lives.

It was widely reported that federal funding to states that voted for Trump was quicker and more fulsome than relief received by Puerto Rico.

To make matters worse, Trump staff did not issue an immediate repudiation of the comedian.

Instead of responding to multiple requests for a retraction, Trump doubled down, telling the media “there’s never been an event so beautiful. … The love in that room. It was breathtaking. It was like a lovefest, an absolute lovefest.”

It took him 48 hours before he appeared on Trump-friendly Fox News to say that Hinchcliffe probably shouldn’t have been at the rally.

But the other question, unanswered by Trump, is why, in the major rally of his campaign, he refused to reach out to known Republicans like Haley in an effort to court the vote of women.

Haley told Fox News that the Trump team’s approach is alienating women voters. “Fifty-three per cent of the electorate are women. Women will vote. They care about how they’re being talked to, and they care about the issues.”

Harris moved quickly to post Haley’s comments on her social media outlets.

Trump’s attempt to “bromance” those whose support he has already solidly secured is a strategy alienating the very women he needs to secure his return to government.

Strategically, even Republican spokespeople have sought to distance themselves from the racist, misogynistic mess left in the wake of the final Trump rally in New York.

If Geraldo is right, and this seminal moment determines the election, it underscores the reality that campaigns count.

And women power is here to stay—even in the White House.

Sheila Copps is a former Jean Chrétien-era cabinet minister and a former deputy prime minister. Follow her on Twitter at @Sheila_Copps.