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.
