Canadians give Liberals 4th mandate; Carney wins Ottawa riding

Ballots are still being counted and it’s not yet known whether the Liberals will lead a majority or minority government.

Cheers erupted at the Liberal party when broadcasters declared the party would form government, while there was relative silence in the Conservative gathering. The NDP venue on the west coast had scant initial turnout immediately following the closure of polls.

The Liberals have seen a massive rebound since the start of the year, after more than a year of the Conservatives being favoured to win a majority government while Justin Trudeau was in power.

Early results suggest the NDP could lose many of its seats as some left-centre voters turned to the Liberals as an alternative to Poilievre’s Conservatives.

The Newfoundland riding that had been held for a decade by Gudie Hutchings, a Liberal cabinet minister, has flipped to the Conservatives. Hutchings had opted not to seek another mandate in this election.

The Tories have lost the South Shore-St. Margarets riding in Nova Scotia, which had been held by Rick Perkins since 2021. Liberal candidate Jessica Fancy-Landry is projected to take the riding.

Carney, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh spent five weeks pitching their cases to voters.

Each of the main party leaders settled into their home ridings Monday after an eventful but compressed election period that lasted the minimum 37 days.

Carney, a former central banker and a political neophyte, presented himself during the campaign as a safe pair of hands for a country facing Trump’s economic threats, while Poilievre focused on addressing crime and the high cost of living.

While Singh started the campaign saying he was running for prime minister, he changed his message after two weeks and started calling on Canadians to elect New Democrats to protect social programs.

Trump loomed large over the campaign with his tariff threats and calls for Canada to become a U.S. state, causing Carney to leave the campaign trail at various times to hold meetings in his capacity as prime minister.

The American president even weighed in early on election day with a post on his Truth Social platform, where he repeated calls for Canada to join the U.S. and wished “good luck to the Great people of Canada.”

“Elect the man who has the strength and wisdom to cut your taxes in half, increase your military power, for free, to the highest level in the World, have your Car, Steel, Aluminum, Lumber, Energy, and all other businesses, QUADRUPLE in size, WITH ZERO TARIFFS OR TAXES, if Canada becomes the cherished 51st. State of the United States of America,” he wrote.

On the final full day of the campaign, all major party leaders paused to address a deadly vehicle attack at a Filipino community event in Vancouver that took the lives of at least 11 attendees, leaving more injured in hospital.

When Parliament was dissolved, the Liberals held 153 seats in a minority government and the Conservatives formed the official Opposition with 120 seats. The Bloc Québécois held 33 seats, the NDP 24 and the Greens two. There were three independent MPs.

Because of changes to riding boundaries, the 2025 general election had 343 seats contested, up from 338.

Majority government status requires a minimum of 172 seats.

— With files from Rianna Lim in Toronto and Craig Lord.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 28, 2025.