By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on August 7, 2023.

OTTAWA—The more charges that former U.S. president Donald Trump faces, the more his path to power is paved.

Trump responded to multiple accusations on Aug. 3 in relation to his attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election of U.S. President Joe Biden.

The image of a former president in court does not seem to have any negative impact on his run for next year’s presidential election. His opponents are dropping off, one by one, as new legal challenges propel Trump to the head of the pack in the Republican nomination race.

Instead of finishing off the former president, allegations of conspiracy to defraud the government and obstruct an official proceeding have energized his campaign. They play into the Trump narrative that the “deep state” is out to get the former president, thus pumping up his support in the Republican Party.

His former vice-president, Mike Pence, said last week what most are thinking. According to the man who served as his running mate, the president was surrounded by “a group of crackpot lawyers who kept telling him what his itching ears wanted to hear.”

Pence also said that “anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be president of the United States.”

Trump’s reply was clear: “I feel badly for Mike Pence, who is attracting no crowds, enthusiasm, or loyalty from people who, as a member of the Trump administration, should be loving him.”

Trump does not feel badly. He was encouraging his followers to string up Pence when the vice-president refused to disallow the results of the Biden win. But the former president is known for saying one thing and thinking another.

Legal pleadings show that Pence and others advised Trump that there was no legal path to overturn the election results. Trump’s criminal charges are costing a fortune, but recent press reports say that his registered fundraising vehicle is covering the millions in legal bills.

While charges cost money, they are being paid by supporters, and those same supporters are rallying behind his 2024 bid for the White House.

It seems inconceivable to foreign observers that after all his legal troubles, Trump should still be so popular in his party.

But there is no denying that he is head and shoulders above any opponent in the race. His closest rival, Florida governor Ron DeSantis, is lurching from one problem to another. By banning books and limiting transgender rights, DeSantis has managed to alienate Floridians and drive business away from his state.

As support plummets, his campaign rhetoric seems to be increasing. At a New Hampshire event last week, DeSantis vowed he would start “slitting throats” on his first day in office as part of his battle against the “deep state.”

DeSantis may believe that he will attract supporters by reaching out to angry Americans who stormed their seat of government on Jan. 6, 2021, but Trump seems to have cornered the angry-voter market.

Such is his popularity that Republican nominee rival Nikki Haley, who served as an ambassador under Trump, has already promised to use her presidential powers to pardon him in the event of any conviction.

In Canada, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s angry fight against government pales in comparison to the deep-state conspiracy theories that motivate Republican voters.

His continuing calls for freedom amid claims that Canada is broken mimic the Trump message about the dangers of the state south of the border. The challenge Poilievre faces may be that Canadians are less skeptical than Americans about the role of government in their lives.

Poilievre has already won his party’s support and his leadership is not under threat. He does not need to appeal to the narrow band of Canadians voters who share the “deep state” mistrust that permeates the American political landscape.

Poilievre needs to reach out more broadly. But unlike the two-party fight down south, he is in a multi-party race, so he does not need to convince the majority of voters to win a majority government. All he needs for victory is about 39 per cent of the electorate evenly distributed across the country.

Last week Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attacked Poilievre, saying “cuts and being angry” are his answers to everything. Poilievre fired back, saying that the prime minister should take responsibility for Canadians’ anger.

Both are banking on the fact that anger could also be a theme in our next federal election.

But chances are, the Canadian vexation quotient is nowhere near what we are witnessing in America.

Trudeau is certainly hoping so.

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

The American claim to ‘exceptionalism’ and its history of support for democracy around the world has been delivered a severe blow.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on January 11, 2021.

OTTAWA—Whether or not Donald Trump remains in office for the next two weeks is hardly the point.

His ugly legacy has unleashed a venom in America that will be very difficult to suppress.

The world has watched in horror as domestic terrorists stormed the capital, wreaking havoc and death on the ultimate symbols of American democracy.

We have witnessed extremists becoming so mainstream that one of them, Georgian Marjorie Taylor Greene, is now sitting in the House of Representatives.

The American claim to “exceptionalism” and its history of support for democracy around the world has been delivered a severe blow.

Lindsey Graham’s ridiculous response to the Washington attack was to claim equivalency between the attackers and Black Lives Matter activists who took to the streets to protest the death of multiple Black citizens at the hands of the police.

Does anyone truly believe that if the same group of Washington attackers had been racial minorities, there would have been so few arrests?

Graham’s claim that Democrats needed to call out protesters of police brutality at the same time as he was criticizing the terrorists simply reinforced the fact that the day Donald Trump leaves office will not be the end of this reckoning in America.

The CBC revisited footage from the summer protest at the Lincoln Memorial, where row upon row of riot police were lined up to truncheon protesters. That footage was compared to the police treatment of emboldened white supremacists and conspiracy theorists who considered the attack a victory for their cause.

Some television outlets carried footage of those storming the capital taking selfies with police guarding the gates. And the Confederate flag was carried into the Senate by those who paraded their hatred right onto the floor of the Senate.

At the same time as the anarchists were outside of the Senate, chief representatives inside were speaking about the “incredible” four years of Trump rule and some of them were still trying as of last week to claim the election was stolen.

The attack on the Senate was greeted with glee by the president, who tweeted his love for the protesters.

At the same time as the state of Georgia elected its first Black Senator and its first Jewish Senator, most people are not talking about how those elections made history.

Instead, we are witnessing a country that is still deeply divided on racial grounds, and whose leadership actually promotes the supremacy of one race over another.

Trump illustrated his true colours more than three years ago, when white supremacists stormed Charlottesville and killed an innocent bystander while shouting slurs against Jews and minorities.

Trump was the first to lay out this false equivalency when he tried to claim that there were “very fine people on both sides” of the Charlottesville protest.

And multiple members of the Senate still cling to the view that there is validity in the absurdly false claims of election interference.

Notwithstanding these shocking perspectives, even in the consequential Georgia Senate runoffs, the state was almost evenly split on those who supported Trump’s choice and those who opposed.

Largely due to the incredible organizational work of Stacey Abrams and Fair Fight Action to oppose voter suppression, the Democrats were able to pull off razor-thin victories in both instances, thus securing the balance of power in the Senate. That vote paves the way forward for president-elect Joe Biden and vice-president-elect Kamala Harris to receive support in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

But they still have to face the job of uniting a country where almost half of the population oppose their vision.

All those who chose Trump were not voting based on his racial record. But the fact that they could overlook it and cast their ballot for him in such large numbers, is truly frightening.

From misogyny to racism, from his affinity for dictators versus democrats, the president still managed to garner the support of almost 75 million voting Americans, the largest number in the history of the country to vote for a Republican candidate.

Even when the president vacates the office, whether of his own accord or not, his leadership scars will endure long past his departure.

The suspension of Trump’s Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram accounts are not enough to stem the flood of hatred that has been unleashed during his presidency.

Pre-Trump, racists were largely in the shadows. But his sick vision for America has enlisted millions of followers.

This past week has only emboldened them.

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

The silence hovering over the Republican Party into the second week after Donald Trump’s loss may be working in Washington, but in the rest of the world, it is simply exposing the country’s claim to democracy as a sorry charade.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 16, 2020.

OTTAWA—America is losing its lustre as the global beacon of democracy.

It could be difficult to promote democratic principles elsewhere when most senior Republican politicians do not respect it at home.

The parody of the Trump-Biden stalled transition started off as a bit of a joke. Most people thought the Republicans were simply willing to give U.S. President Donald Trump a few days to let the defeat sink in.

But his promotion of the notion of a rigged election is shining a light into the inner workings of the Republican Party.

All senior members of the party are backing the president’s bizarre lie about who won the election.

Four years of Trump’s isolationism may have made a negative mark on the world, but it has not affected his popularity at home.

Like president-elect Joe Biden, Trump increased his own vote, and continues to claim that he won the election, but that officials stole the result by refusing to end the count.

The code of silence hovering over his party into the second week after the loss may be working in Washington but in the rest of the world, it is simply exposing the country’s claim to democracy as a sorry charade.

The president’s attack on Fox News and his claim of a stolen election has penetrated his base, with supporters across the country brandishing signs demanding that officials “stop the steal.”

Trump continues to claim illegality in states like Pennsylvania and Georgia even when their Republican officials deny any illegitimacy.

Republican Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt was adamant that there was no skullduggery in his city. He was immediately attacked by name, by the president.

But Schmidt did not back down. Instead he publicly questioned why people would so easily swallow lies about a fraudulent election.

Local Republicans like Schmidt and those who are distant from Washington seem the most likely to throw cold water on Trump’s illegality claims.

Former U.S. president George W. Bush congratulated Biden on his victory shortly after the result was called by several media organizations on Nov. 7.

But the silence on Capitol Hill was deafening. Mitch McConnell led the revisionism charge, claiming that Trump had every reason to refuse to concede as long as the results had not been certified.

But almost two weeks after the vote, courts have found zero evidence of widespread fraud. Last week, the Republican lieutenant-governor of Texas offered a million-dollar reward for any evidence of malfeasance. This is the same politician who said grandparents were willing to die during the pandemic in support of the economy.

The Georgia recount is automatic since the margin of victory is less than 0.5 per cent. But with 99 per cent of the vote in, Biden was ahead on Nov. 12 by 14,005 votes even though the vote differential was only 0.3 per cent.

In my own political life, I underwent a recount in my first provincial election which was lost by 15 votes. In those days, a difference of less than 25 votes resulted in a judicial recount. In the end, I ended up gaining one vote in the recount, legally losing the election by 14 votes.

The chance of turning thousands of votes around in Georgia is virtually impossible.

Back in 2000, the difference in the American presidential vote in Florida was little more than 500 votes. The finalized counting process took more than a month, and ultimately did not displace the initial victor, George W. Bush.

But Trump is not about to let the facts stand in the way of a good lie. And his legion of supporters in the Republican Party are listening.

Polls show that 70 per cent of Republicans now doubt the outcome of the election. That number has doubled since election night. The vast majority of them refuse to concede that the Democratic U.S. president-elect was chosen by the majority of voters and the electoral college.

The truth may be starting to set in. At press time, only four Senators from the Republican Party had broken with the majority by tweeting their congratulations to president-elect Biden. They included independent-minded Susan Collins and Trump enemy Mitt Romney.

Within the White House, some are already speculating about the pardon process, which is one of the last acts of an outgoing president.

Trump is allegedly considering a list of pardons, including one for Jared Kushner’s father, a billionaire convicted of witness tampering, illegal election contributions and tax evasion. Trump is also considering an unprecedented self-pardon.

That should not surprise.

Nothing about the Trump presidency has followed precedent.

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

Donald Trump’s failings and disgraces as president haven’t shaken his core supporters, but they likely lost him his second term.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on November 9, 2020.

OTTAWA—Revenge is a dish best served cold. Deceased Congressional leaders John McCain and John Lewis may have delivered that dish in spades from their graves.

Days into the American presidential vote count, Arizona and Georgia are among the key states, holding the balance of power in the critical road to 270 electoral college votes needed for victory.

Both states witnessed the deaths of their beloved native sons met with insult and ignominy by U.S. President Donald Trump. The state of Arizona was in the Trump column in the last election, but that was before the president spewed some of his standard anti-military vitriol, claiming that McCain was no war hero because he was captured in theatre. Ditto for Georgia, before the president boycotted the Lewis state funeral, which was attended by all other living presidents.

McCain’s family was so outraged by the slurs against the respected Republican that they campaigned against Trump in this election. But the insults directed towards icons like McCain and Lewis mattered little to most Republicans.

With the record-breaking turnout in this race, Trump managed to score more than five million more votes than Republican ballots cast in 2016. To those of us watching this election from afar, that solid support seems incomprehensible. How could anyone vote for a president who boycotted the funeral of America’s senior congressional African American? It is shocking to the world that Trump was not thrown out of office in shame, considering the chaos that has reigned during his term in office.

On COVID-19 alone, his incompetence, and the absence of a national strategy, has led to the deaths of more than 234,000 people. But his disastrous handling of the COVID pandemic does not seem to have had any influence on his popularity amongst diehard supporters.

In one CNN interview, a woman whose whole family had fallen ill from COVID was supporting Trump and did not believe he had any responsibility for the viral spread in the United States. She said she was voting for him because of his terrific success in foreign policy, and specifically cited the signing of a trade agreement with Israel.

With the massive support he received during the election, it may not have been enough to win, but he will definitely remain a player on the American political stage. Rumour has it that if Trump loses the election, which seems increasingly likely, he is so angry with Fox News that he will revive a 2016 plan to launch his own television station.

Trump was also running an irate twitter rant against Fox News, because of its decision to call Arizona as a winner for the Democrats just a few hours after the polls closed. The enraged president demanded officials stop counting votes in Democratic-leaning states and speed up voting where he was winning.

Trump surrogate Rudy Giuliani was also piling on with unproven conspiracy theories. The most bizarre was a Trump tweet quickly hidden by the political censor rules on twitter. Without a scintilla of evidence, Trump ginned up his followers with the notion that his win was being stolen by underhanded Democratic shenanigans. His supporters stormed a number of independent election counting centres, some toting arms and threatening employees as they entered or left the election premises. Protesters were acting on his bizarre tweet in the early morning hours after the polls closed, claiming he won the election and the only thing officials needed to do was to stop counting votes.

Trump was insisting on foul play on the counting front, but even Twitter political censors did not believe him. The tweet was blocked after Trump claimed, “Last night I was leading, often solidly, in many key states, in almost all instances Democrat run and controlled. Then, one by one, they started to magically disappear as surprise ballot dumps were counted. VERY STRANGE.”

It is only strange for a political neophyte. In elections around the world, polling divisions in crowded urban areas come in later and with larger numbers. It takes longer to count them. Add mail-in ballots to the mix and you can anticipate more delays. Some states did not even start counting the millions of mail-in ballots until the evening of the election. Even though this is a federal election, each state has its own voting system.

The claim that votes are being stolen is false. The principle that every vote counts is at the core of democracy. But Trump doesn’t care. He will be a one-term wonder who prefers working with dictators.

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

If elected on Nov. 3, Kamala Harris is literally a step away from the president’s job. Her boss is already 77 years old and has mused about serving one term. Maybe that is why she is always smiling.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on October 12, 2020.

OTTAWA—The vice-presidential debate reinforced every element of exclusion that women in politics and business have experienced for years.

It was almost like riding a time capsule back into the 20th century, when men were in charge and women were supposed to smile and look pretty.

Notwithstanding a clear set of rules negotiated by the Commission on Presidential Debates, U.S. Vice-President Mike Pence cavalierly walked all over his opponent, ignoring moderator questions and talking over Kamala Harris. The Democratic nominee kept smiling and weakly demanding that her two-minute speaking slot be uninterrupted.

The moderator made the situation worse by constantly apologizing to the vice-president for his failure to respect the rules. Susan Page from USA Today is a print journalist, so she might not have much experience in cutting off overbearing debate participants. Her timid, apologetic treatment of Pence allowed the man to run roughshod over the rules and his opponent.

Harris kept a grin on her face, but you just know she was screaming inside. Her lack of forcefulness was also grating because it reminded so many women, including me, of the double standard that still applies to women and men in public life.

Harris was too nice. She should have demanded the vice-president respect the rules. Even the moderator should have had her knuckles rapped. Instead, Harris played nice, constantly smiling at the vice-president whilst she was trying to shut him down.

The Democratic vice-presidential nominee was trying to balance the twin objectives of protecting her ticket’s lead and remaining collected and composed.

Her appearance was designed to make people believe that she was vice-presidential material. In that effort, she succeeded.

But the exit polling showed that her opponent, Pence, scored even higher than Harris as a potential vice-president.

There is already a huge gender gap in the support for Biden and Trump. The vast majority of women don’t like Trump and will be voting for Biden. The debate reinforced that schism.

The vice-president’s propensity to answer the questions he wanted, instead of those posed by the moderator, should have been aborted.

Instead, Page’s performance was nothing short of appalling.

The constant apologies to the vice-president, while he simply ignored the rules and kept talking were a stark contrast to her more aggressive demands when Harris ran overtime, usually cutting her off within 15 seconds.

Maybe Harris could have simply followed the lead of Pence, ignoring the moderator and barrelling ahead with minutes of airtime stolen from the opponent.

But had she done that; Harris would have been characterized as a hectoring woman who disrespected the vice-president and was not ready for prime time.

Harris faced the dilemma that has been experienced by every woman trying to make it in a man’s world.

While her opponent ignored the time limits and even the questions posed by the moderator, Harris kept a permanent smile on her face. Even when frustrated, she simply repeated “Mr. Vice-president, I am speaking, I am speaking.” She remained demure and ladylike. That too, reminded me of a gender identity throwback to the last century.

As a woman in a man’s world, I know what it’s like to be boiling inside and demure on the outside. Sometimes, too much demure is not a good thing. If the Twittersphere were any indication, the uneven treatment of Harris and Pence was painfully obvious.

In particular, women weighed in to say things like: “He interrupted me, and I’d like to just finish please, is a line every woman who has ever attended a meeting with men can relate to.” One tweeted: “The gendered dynamics of interruption and the power to interrupt is always so in your face in these settings.” Another tweeted: “Just as women get paid 20 cents on the dollar less than men, Harris appears to get 20 seconds less on the minute than Pence.”

I was hoping Harris would speak out more forcefully, to demand that the moderator start applying the principle of equal treatment.

But she opted for a risk-free evening, so as not to reduce the 10-point lead that her ticket with Biden is currently enjoying.

Harris achieved that risk-free evening. But she reinforced a frustrating perspective that women need to “play nice” if they are going to be accepted in a man’s world.

If elected on Nov. 3, Harris is literally a step away from the president’s job. Her boss is already 77 years old and has mused about serving one term.

Maybe that is why she is always smiling.

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

The COVID-19 story could spawn sympathy for the president. More likely, it will simply reinforce Donald Trump’s disastrous response to a world pandemic that has killed more than 200,000 of his fellow citizens.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on October 5, 2020.

OTTAWA—The twists and turns in the upcoming American election are never ending.

Just when we thought we had seen everything, the president, his spouse and high-ranking staffer, Hope Hicks, have all tested positive for the COVID-19 virus.

Not only will this stop the Trump campaign in its tracks, it will return COVID-19 front and centre to the national agenda, which is just where the Democrats would like it to be.

The markets reacted badly to the news of White House contagion, but that may have as much to do with pre-election confusion as confidence in U.S. President Donald Trump’s economic prowess.

If any American tuned into the first official presidential debate last week, they could be forgiven for feeling distressed about the state of the American body politic.

Borrowing from his television experience on The Apprentice, Trump hectored and bullied Joe Biden, but for the most part the wily Biden did not bite.

Trump himself had created such low expectations for “Sleepy Joe” that a measured, passing performance by Biden was viewed as a win across the country.

Couple that with the confusion about whether Trump will even accept the outcome of the election if he loses, and you have a recipe for chaos, something that world markets always reject.

Everyone knows how nasty Trump is but even his usually demure partner Melania was negatively in the news last week. She was quoted in a series of tapes, aired Thursday, claiming that migrant children who were separated from their parents were receiving better care in detention than they got at home.

The tapes were purloined by a former aide to the first lady, promoting release of her self-explanatory book entitled, Melania and Me: The Rise and Fall of My Friendship with the First Lady.

The book written by Stephania Winston Wolkoff joins tomes that have been penned recently by Trump family members and well-known journalists.

All are highly critical of the president, but nothing seems to dent his popularity with the all-important base.

By all accounts, Trump followers are motivated, even messianic. They may well represent the “basket of deplorables” that Hillary Clinton unfortunately characterized in a speech which ultimately cost her the presidency.

In retrospect, she was probably right. People who refuse to wear masks, say the coronavirus is a hoax perpetrated by political elites and Bill Gates, and claim that China created the virus to attack the United States, are the most ardent supporters of the president.

And he returns the favour, ignoring health protocols on mask-wearing to the point where his entourage pointedly removed their masks during last week’s debate.

Trump also went so far as to promote not-so-subtle support for white supremacists during the broadcast. When he was asked to call them out, he claimed they were only working to fight the far left, which was really responsible for the racial division and violence plaguing the United States.

But there is another twist on the road to the Nov. 3 election whose outcome we cannot predict.

Because the president will be under a two-week quarantine, it could free up his team to manage the messaging by targeting electoral districts where a 1,000-vote switch could make the difference.

While he still has access to his Twitter account, the quarantine may provide some breathing space to Republican spin doctors. There aren’t many left, but the party has deep pockets and the Trump family also has plenty of access to cash.

Since he spends so little in taxes (according to The New York Times in 2016 and 2017 his federal tax bill was $750 annually) he should have some money to flood the airwaves.

The newspaper plans to publish his tax returns for 2018 and 2019 later in the campaign, sending more bad news in the direction of the Trump campaign.

Unlike Canada, there is no limit on American advertising spending during a campaign.

And in the United States, a bare majority of the voting population voted in the last general election.

With the social isolation required by the pandemic, and the huge spike in mail-in ballots, electoral college votes can be decided by very small margins.

Trump supporters appear to be the most motivated.

Biden is running ahead, but no one is excited by his ticket, with the possible exception of the nomination of Kamala Harris as vice-president.

The COVID-19 story could spawn sympathy for the president.

More likely, it will simply reinforce Trump’s disastrous response to a world pandemic that has killed more than 200,000 of his fellow citizens.

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

Kamala Harris and Joe Biden will be an unbeatable ticket in the United States as Donald Trump’s mishandling of the pandemic has caused him continued erosion within his own party.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on August 17, 2020.

OTTAWA—Leaders came and went last week.

And the coming was so much better than the going.

Kamala Harris was revealed as the vice-presidential choice of Democratic White House nominee Joe Biden.

She ticked all the boxes. With a family tree straddling three continents, she can literally classify as an Afro-Asian American. She has political experience at the local, state and national levels and she represents the generational change that the American presidential race desperately needs.

The same day she joined the American ticket, Andrew Scheer spent his last day in Parliament as the leader of the Conservative Party.

And, oh, what a bitter exit it was. His final public statement was to challenge the prime minister to sue him, a reference to the heated campaign rhetoric when leaders were calling each other liars.

Scheer presented a rather sorry picture of a political leader who was wanted neither by his party nor his country.

It was a disappointing finale for a politician whose star seemed to shine brightly throughout his career.

An eastern-born westerner with a good command of French, he was the natural choice for House Speaker during the 10-year tenure of prime minister Stephen Harper.

The position came with its own set of perks, a house and a private apartment in Parliament. It also gave him a hospitality budget to wine and dine his fellow parliamentarians, preparing the way for his ascendance to the Conservative leadership.

All the while, Scheer was nurturing his brand as a smiling, softer Tory who managed to make friends on all sides of the House.

It wasn’t until he actually grasped the brass ring that we began to see the seedier side of Scheer.

His exit speech last week solidified that impression. Instead of using his time in Parliament to reflect on some of the positive things he was able to accomplish, the outgoing leader sounded like he was still on the election campaign. Painfully vitriolic was the tone of his final speech in Parliament, a far cry from the smiling young man who took his place as the youngest House Speaker in the history of Canadian politics.

Why would Scheer not follow in the footsteps of other outgoing leaders, with a gracious statement that unites people instead of dividing them?

It is to be expected that your first days in power are your best.

So, it is not surprising that Harris’ week in the news was a far cry from Scheer’s snarling exit.

She immediately hit the campaign trail with Biden and showed exactly why she was the perfect choice to be his running mate.

Donald Trump weighed in immediately, pointing out one of Harris’s few flaws; she did not do very well in the presidential runoff against Biden.

Trump hit the tweet scene to trash her. As one American commentator noted, the president seems to glean special pleasure when he gets a chance to trash-talk women, particularly women of colour.

But as others pointed out, Biden’s decision to embrace a former opponent also illustrates the glaring difference between the two presidential hopefuls.

Trump pushes every opponent away, even when they are public servants dishing up the advice that he appointed them to provide.

Just look at his relationship with Anthony Fauci.

Fauci speaks truth to power and Trump simply cannot abide someone who disputes his claim that drinking bleach can help clean out COVID-19.

Harris can expect some negative pushback from Trump supporters in the media, but they are becoming fewer and farther between.

Her selection will motivate women, uplift minorities and inspire a younger generation, all decisive players in the presidential election in November.

As for Scheer, his replacement will be voted on shortly and announced as soon as the complexities of the mail-in balloting system are conquered.

If it is Peter MacKay, you can expect Scheer’s standing in his party to diminish even further.

MacKay’s success will be dependent upon distancing himself from the Rebel right, and that was the crowd that Scheer cultivated so successfully to gain power.

If Erin O’Toole wins, Scheer will still enjoy a place of honour in a party with well-entrenched Western Canadian roots.

Meanwhile, Harris and Biden will be an unbeatable ticket in the United States as Trump’s mishandling of the pandemic has caused him continued erosion within his own party.

If the launch was any indication, Harris will be a positive force for Biden.

The same cannot be said of the outgoing Conservative leader.

He left Parliament with a bitter taste in his mouth.

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

The only way that the United States can take back its streets and its dignity is by making sure that Donald Trump is thrashed in the November presidential election. Even then, the damage done to America may be irreparable.

By Sheila Copps
First published in The Hill Times on June 8, 2020.

OTTAWA—Stockwell Day made a costly mistake last week. On a television panel he denied that systemic racism exists in Canada.

Day was quickly the subject of a social media groundswell that ended up costing him a board position at Telus and his strategic counsel job at McMillan LLP.

Day paid dearly for his mistake. But there are many Canadians who believe what he said. “Canada is not a racist country and most Canadians are not racist and our system, which always needs to be improved, is not systemically racist.”

I daresay millions share the viewpoint expressed by Day.

Most of them are not in the public domain so we don’t hear their perspectives. Even when the evidence is irrefutable, they simply don’t want to stare truth in the face.

I have known Stockwell Day for years, and he is basically a decent, fair-minded individual. However, by making the statement he did on television, he unwittingly aligned himself with those who are currently using race as a wedge issue in the next American election.

The facts on systemic racism in Canada are clear.

The last census demonstrated a clear and present racial difference in how employees are paid.

On average, second-generation Black Canadians were paid 28 per cent less than their white counterparts. The average pay of racialized and Indigenous workers was 30 per cent less than the earnings of their white colleagues.

On a personal level, that meant an average loss of income of $14,000 compared to Caucasian Canadians of the same age and education background.

We see the same wage discrimination against women.

According to Statistics Canada, in 2018, women aged 25 to 54 earned an average of 13.3 per cent less than their male colleagues for doing equivalent work.

Looking at what is going on south of the border, it is easy to see why Canadians could believe that our situation is not as grim.

But to completely ignore the reality of pay rates, disproportionate incarceration rates and all the other evidence in Canada is to turn your back on the truth.

But Canada is not facing the horrendous situation of a national leader who is doing his best to stoke the flames of racism for personal base electoral ends.

Trump is banking on the fact that the silent majority in the United States actually supports his view. There are millions who back his inflammatory approach, although it appears as though the combination of COVID-19, unemployment, and civil unrest are taking their toll.

Recent polling shows that Trump has the support of only one-third of Americans for his bellicose response to the death of George Floyd.

Cracks are also appearing in his Republican wall of support, with Senator Lisa Murkowski saying she may not support him as the party standard bearer. Murkowski, the second most senior Republican woman in the Senate, spoke out in support of the comments of former defence secretary Jim Mattis criticizing Trump’s “false conflict” between the Armed Forces and ordinary citizens.

Murkowski echoed Mattis’ viewpoint, saying, “I felt like perhaps we are getting to a point where we can be more honest with the concerns that we might hold internally and have the courage of our own convictions to speak up.”

Former U.S. president George W. Bush called on his countrymen to “examine our tragic failures.”

But the current president seems oblivious to all critics, doubling down on his view that multiple peaceful protests across the country were organized by thugs.

In Canada, Day immediately recognized his error and tweeted that “I ask forgiveness for wrongly equating my experiences to theirs. I commit to them my unending efforts to fight racism in all its forms.”

That statement was quite an about turn from his refusal to recognize systemic racism only a few short hours earlier.

Systemic racism is alive and well in Canada and, unfortunately, supported by millions of Canadians who blindly believe there is no problem.

By recognizing his mistake, Day has a chance to do something about it.

In the case of the Trumpian racism of the American president, the whole country is undermined by his deliberate attempt to stoke the flames of racial hatred.

The only way that the United States can take back its streets and its dignity is by making sure that Trump is thrashed in the November presidential election.

Even then, the damage done to America may be irreparable.

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