Liberals join social media skirmish as attacks on Poilievre target battleground Ontario

After spending much of the year using its social media advertising spending to reinforce the government’s record, the Liberal Party unleashed a series of attack ads in November targeting Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s voting record, and connecting the opposition leader to the politics of former U.S. president Donald Trump. “They've always contrasted Justin Trudeau to the leaders, but what I think we’re seeing with these ads is a huge increase in volume, and that’s going to continue to grow as we get closer to 2025,” said Laura D’Angelo, a former staffer in Trudeau’s (Papineau, Que.) PMO, and current vice-president at Enterprise. “They’re really trying to highlight Pierre Poilievre’s record, standing with people wearing ‘straight pride’ shirts, voting against Ukrainian free trade, the things he’s said… I think that’s what you’re going to see a lot more of.” The English-language ads, which ran from Oct. 18 to Nov. 22, were seen almost entirely by Ontarians, with just over half aged 65 and over. The breakdown of audiences on Meta’s Ad Library shows that between Oct. 28 and Nov. 26, the party’s ads targeted postal codes in Oshawa, Uxbridge, and surrounding areas. The ads accuse Poilievre (Carleton, Ont.) of seeking to “import” right-wing politics from the United States. “Pierre Poilievre wants to make cuts to programs that support Canadians, and import far-right American-style politics here to Canada,” one ad states. “We can't let him take us backward.” The ad includes a six-part list of “Pierre Poilievre’s priorities,” stating that he wants to “cut investments for the middle class, put assault weapons back in our communities, roll back our climate action, promote volatile crypto-currencies that would hurt our economy, restrict access to abortion, promote American-style politics.” Another stated that “Pierre Poilievre’s record speaks for itself,” then lists that he voted against “$10-a-day child care, the Canada Child Benefit, dental care for kids, middle class tax cuts, increased support for seniors.” The Liberals have also sought to connect Poilievre to former prime minister Stephen Harper. In an ad with footage from a convention at which Poilievre says, “thank you, Stephen Harper… thank you again, Stephen Harper,” a graphic appears with “Stephen Harper and Pierre Poilievre’s record” of “cut taxes for the wealthy and services for Canadians, raised the retirement age from 65 to 67, denied climate change, attacked labour unions, closed nine Veterans Affairs offices.” A contrasting ad shows a list with the Liberals’ plan to “cut red tape and lower prices, help cities build homes faster, remove the GST to speed up rental construction.” Parker Lund, the Liberal Party’s director of communications, told The Hill Times in an email on Nov. 30 that “since becoming the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada over a year ago, Pierre Poilievre has been pushing for deep cuts that would gut our middle class and importing far-right American-style politics here to Canada.” “In our communications, advertising, and digital engagement, the Liberal Party of Canada will continue to contrast Pierre Poilievre’s priorities that would take Canada backward with our positive plan to make life more affordable and build an economy that works for all Canadians,” Lund said. The targeted postcodes are in the ridings of Liberal MPs Ryan Turnbull (Whitby, Ont.) and Jennifer O’Connell (Pickering-Uxbridge, Ont.), and Conservative MPs Philip Lawrence (Northumberland-Peterborough South, Ont.), Jamie Schmale (Haliburton-Kawartha Lakes-Brock, Ont.), and Colin Carrie (Oshawa, Ont.). It also includes the riding of Durham, held by former Conservative leader Erin O’Toole until his resignation from Parliament on Aug. 3. A byelection for his replacement must be announced by Jan. 30, 2024. The Tories have held the seat since its most recent iteration was contested in 2006. O’Connell, who has held her riding since 2015, won by a 10.8 per cent margin in the 2021 election. However, as reported in The Hill Times last week, Pickering-Uxbridge is among the 34 ridings listed in an Innovative Research poll as “Conservative to Liberal defector” seats from the 2015 election that were at risk of returning to the Tories. At least 22 contenders are considering seeking the Conservative nomination for the seat, as The Hill Times reported on Nov. 6. Liberal MP Jennifer O'Connell's riding was among those targeted by the party's most recent ads against Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade An Abacus Data poll published on Nov. 26 suggested that 41 per cent of Ontarians would vote for the federal Conservatives, 27 per cent for the Liberals, 21 per cent for the NDP, six per cent for the People’s Party of Canada, five per cent for the Greens, and the remainder for others. For comparison, during the 2021 election, the Liberals secured 39.3 per cent of the votes and 79 seats in Ontario, followed by 34.9 per cent and 37 seats for the Conservatives, 17.8 per cent and five seats for the NDP, and 2.2 per cent and one seat for the Greens. “I don't think it's a secret that elections can be won or lost in the 905,” D’Angelo said, adding that polling provided a good sense of the outcome in Western Canada, and a fairly good sense of the results in Quebec and Atlantic Canada. “I think that ethnic communities, and the 905 in particular, are really going to be the battleground in 2025.” Given the Conservatives’ massive fundraising war chest in comparison to the Liberals, D’Angelo said the governing party would need to be strategic in its advertising and campaiging between now and the next election. D’Angelo said the latest ads would target voters across Canada more generally, particularly those who feared the polarization seen in the United States during and after Trump’s presidency. The ads will try to tie that fear to Poilievre. She said she was not sure that she agreed with the assertion that Poilievre was like Trump, but that there had been a notable growth in polarization in Canadian politics during the COVID-19 pandemic. “It’s not outside the realm of possibility to have that adjustment to something that polarized ,” she said. “I think they’re trying to get Canadians to understand that one of the great things about our system is that there’s a lot of parties, there’s a lot of grey area in Canada, and generally it’s not black and white. So I think they’re trying to get everyone to think long and hard about if they they want to vote for someone who’s going to bring a more polarized view to Canadian politics.” Nationally, the Abacus poll showed Conservatives had the support of 39 per cent of Canadians, the Liberals 24 per cent, the NDP 20 per cent, the Bloc Québécois eight per cent (or 35 per cent in Quebec), and the Greens five per cent. The ‘T’ word In the United States, polling aggregator FiveThirtyEight shows former president Trump is projected to win the Republican presidential primary with 60 per cent of the vote, while he is competitive in a hypothetical rematch of the 2020 presidential election against incumbent President Joe Biden. In addition to his attempt to win a second term in the White House, Trump is expected to remain in the headlines through 2024 as he fights 91 felony counts in three states and the District of Columbia. The Liberals’ attempt to tie Poilievre to Trump-style politics has not been limited to the party’s advertisements. The former president’s name has rarely been used, but his campaign slogan “Make America Great Again” or “MAGA” has been alluded to. Last week in the House, Liberal MP Adam van Koeverden (Milton, Ont.), accused Poilievre of “importing MAGA-brand, American-style politics into Canada, something that is not welcome in our country,” while Trudeau accused the opposition leader of “watching too much far-right American TV” and used the term “MAGA Conservatives” to describe those opposed to climate action. During a debate in the House on a Conservative motion urging Senators to support private member’s bill C-234 on Nov. 28, O’Connell pondered whether the party was “learning lessons from January 6 in the United States and the MAGA Republicans” in the pressure Conservatives have been placing on lawmakers in the Red Chamber. The day before, during a debate on the government’s bill to introduce anti-scab legislation, Liberal MP Peter Fonseca (Mississauga East-Cooksville, Ont.) said Poilievre “is, unequivocally, an anti-labour-union proponent, aligning himself with extreme right-wing, MAGA politics.” Liberal MP Ken Hardie (Fleetwood-Port Kells, B.C.), meanwhile, apologized for a Nov. 27 post on X (formerly Twitter) that questioned whether there was a link between Poilievre and a shooting in Winnipeg that left four people dead the weekend before. After mentioning that the shooting was “beyond troubling,” the post asked “might it be the anti-social 'burn everything down' far-right attitude we're seeing creeping in from the US? And the 'creep' on the Canadian side? Pierre Poilievre?” The Canadian Press reported on Nov. 28 that Hardie initially refused to apologize, but he later posted a follow-up that afternoon stating that “it was unacceptable on my part to leave any suggestion of a direct link to the tragedy in Winnipeg. There was not. For that, I apologize.” Conservatives expressed outrage at the post, while Government House Leader Karina Gould (Burlington, Ont.) told reporters that the tweet was “absolutely inappropriate, and that’s not something that anyone should be suggesting from any political party.” sjeffery@hilltimes.com The Hill Times

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Liberals join social media skirmish as attacks on Poilievre target battleground Ontario

In new ads, the governing party has accused the Conservative leader of 'importing far-right American-style politics here to Canada'.

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