By reshuffling his cards Friday with a cabinet reshuffle, it became clear that Justin Trudeau no longer has any aces up his sleeve and that his political future is more up in the air than ever.
Without taking anything away from the deputies he elevated to the rank of minister, the Prime Minister threw cards on the table that are virtually unknown to the public and which will change nothing in his destiny.
A stopgap reshuffle which essentially aims to keep the machine running.
Exit the big plan to relaunch himself, to demonstrate that he still has the sacred fire, that he is capable of uniting against Pierre Poilievre.
We are far from the initial plan, that is to say to appoint people of stature with a certain reputation like Mark Carney.
A stopgap reshuffle that aims to make the machine turn
Attracting big names into its fold was possibly its last chance in the hope of reestablishing its legitimacy in the eyes of the Liberals themselves.
The complete opposite happened.
The Prime Minister's Office escaped by wanting to fire Chrystia Freeland, who paid him back a hundredfold.
His resignation letter throws to the ground the ambitions of the prime minister to present himself as a pillar in the negotiations against Trump.
He preferred to give expensive candy to the electorate, she, to save her ammunition to face the tariffs.
Faced with Trump, an almost existential threat, Justin Trudeau's credibility is almost fatally shaken.
Absent
A reshuffle is often an opportunity to send a message, to chart a new direction, to say that the government is operating under a different administration.
Nothing like that happened on Friday.
Justin Trudeau was mostly absent, except for a short statement about his new cabinet's focus on “the Canada–United States dynamic.”
He hasn't taken any questions from reporters in more than a week.
Since Monday's bomb, he has cloistered himself behind a deafening silence.
Perhaps unwittingly, some of his newly appointed ministers confirmed beyond reasonable doubt that Justin Trudeau could leave his post.
The Prime Minister would have been “clear” with his Liberal colleagues that he was faced with a “difficult choice”, underlined Montrealer Rachel Bendayan.
For the first time, the storm is too strong to sweep all this under the rug.
Over the last decade, Justin Trudeau was able to convince people that his personal popularity was the driving force behind the Liberal Party, even in the worst times.
This time, the crisis is so deep that it feels like even a Christmas miracle won't be enough.
