In a stunning reversal of expectations and polling from just months ago, residents across Canada are set to give the Liberals under Mark Carney a fourth term of office.
Based on results released by Elections Canada as of Monday night and the number of outstanding polls set to report, CityNews is projecting the Liberals will form government. As of 10:35 p.m. EDT, the party was leading in 150 seats but it wasn’t clear if it would be a majority or minority government.
The projected win comes more than five weeks after Carney triggered a national election just nine days after being sworn in as Canada’s 24th prime minister.
Throughout the campaign, the Liberals tried to frame the central ballot question as one of Canadian sovereignty and countering U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariff regime.
During the 36-day contest, the Liberals continually ran ahead of the Conservative Party of Canada in surveys released by the country’s largest polling firms. While polls released in the early days showed differences in the high single digits and low double digits, the gap narrowed in the campaign’s closing days.
However, the Conservatives under leader Pierre Poilievre continually pushed a message of affordability — sometimes attracting criticism from strategists within the party for not pivoting to fight back against Trump in a stronger way.
As of 10:35 p.m. EDT, the Conservatives were leading in 128 seats.
Meanwhile, gains by Carney and the Liberals appeared to be at the expense of the New Democratic Party and the Bloc Québécois (BQ).
The NDP was on track to pay the bigger price of the two with the party only leading in seven ridings as of 10:15 p.m. EDT. Meanwhile, the BQ was down 12 ridings from the time of dissolution (sitting at 22 as of 10:35 p.m. EDT).
Questions also surround the future of the Green Party of Canada as co-leader Elizabeth May was projected to be in a tight race to keep her British Columbia riding of Saanich-Gulf Islands.
No other parties or independent candidates were projected to win any ridings as of Monday night.
To get a majority government in Canada, a party needs to hold 172 or the 343 seats in parliament. Under a recent redistribution process, the total number of seats in the House of Commons increased slightly and many ridings saw boundaries change.
For real-time Canada election results, click here.
Carney’s political ascent reverses Liberal Party hopes in 2025 Canada election
Carney, the 60-year-old economist who previously headed the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, saw a meteoric rise in Canadian politics after the resignation of former prime minister Justin Trudeau.
Trudeau announced in early January his resignation as leader of the Liberal Party of Canada after months of declining popularity, capped off with the sudden resignation of former finance minister Chrystia Freeland.
For several months before Trudeau’s resignation announcement, polls had the Conservatives more than 20 per cent ahead of the Liberals.
The resignation of Trudeau triggered a two-month leadership race. Freeland along with Ontario MP and former government house leader Karina Gould and businessman and Quebec MP Frank Baylis.
Touting his economic background, Carney swept the leadership vote with 85.9 per cent support. Freeland, Gould and Baylis only got support in the single digits.
After being sworn in with a smaller cabinet in mid-March, Carney’s first act was to eliminate the consumer carbon tax — an issue the Conservatives slammed Trudeau and the Liberals on for months. Poilievre attempted to tie to tax to Carney, dubbing him “carbon tax Carney.”
Before going to see Governor General Mary Simon with a request to dissolve parliament, Carney flew to Europe to meet with leaders amid tensions with Trump and his administration.
At a few times during the federal election campaign, Carney convened meetings in Ottawa to respond to tariffs imposed by Trump. Carney moved ahead with retaliatory tariffs and tried to bring the mounting tensions into campaign, referring to Trump’s calls to make Canada a 51st state.
However, in recent days as things appeared to quieten down in Washington, the Conservatives appeared to pick up momentum in their campaign while Poilievre continued to make policy announcements surrounding housing, affordability and crime.
This is a developing story that will be updated.
