Buckle up, U.S. politics is on one wild ride before Americans choose their next president

HALIFAX—There was a ride at the Canadian National Exhibition that made the roller coaster feel like an outing in a stroller: the Wild Mouse. It featured small seats, breakneck speed, hairpin turns, zippy ups and downs that played hell on the stomach, and of course, screaming patrons holding on for dear life. U.S. politics has boarded the Wild Mouse for 100 days of thrills and chills before Americans choose their next president. The traditional cliché is that all politics is local. For now, no politics is local. What happens over the next four months in the United States will affect everyone, which is why the eyes of the world are on Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. NATO, China, Europe, Canada, and Ukraine, and an array of others all have a massive stake in the outcome. Will Americans choose the former prosecutor, or the convicted felon; the first Black, female commander-in-chief, or the 78-year-old twice impeached ex-president who talked about shooting migrants in the legs at the border, and deporting millions of them now living in the United States. Two very interested bystanders in this most unusual presidential election are the Canadian federal leaders who may soon be squaring off against each other to decide who will be prime minister: Justin Trudeau and Pierre Poilievre. In a way, what is happening in the U.S. is an eerie preview of what may happen here. It is certainly a learning opportunity for both Trudeau and Poilievre. The extraordinary, 11th-hour change at the top of the Democratic ticket—swapping out U.S. President Joe Biden for Vice-President Kamala Harris with just 100 days until Americans vote—is a daring and dubious move. It is also a cautionary tale for Trudeau. While it is true Biden’s “Where am I?” moment in the first televised presidential debate triggered the beginning of the end for him, it took more than that to persuade a sitting president to voluntarily give up his hard-won power. Politics is an addiction, and quitting cold turkey brings excruciating withdrawal pains. That’s why for days after the debacle on CNN, Biden, with the full support of his family, stubbornly refused to step down, telling his supporters “I’m not going anywhere.” It was a bad day, a cold, jet lag, that’s all. But it was inevitable that the hard facts would call his bluff. The polls began to sour, Trump’s lead in crucial swing states began to increase, and the number of states in play began to multiply. The coup de gras? After what they saw on television, and all the bad news that followed, donors put away their wallets. And not just for the president, but for House and Senate races, too. That’s when the Democratic Party slipped a silk glove over an iron first and respectfully told Biden the truth: his campaign had lost any mojo it might have had. Concerns about his age and mental acuity could not be allayed. Which meant that come November, Biden would not beat Trump despite the Republican's lies, his criminal record, and his chaotic one-term presidency. Which is why members of Biden’s own party publicly called for him to leave when he insisted on staying. What Vince Lombardi said about football is also true of politics: winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing. In the end, not even the president of the United States could suspend—let alone repeal—the laws of the great game. You can’t play poker without chips, and you can’t run a campaign without money. Although Trudeau is not encroaching on his dotage, there is still a lesson here for him. Biden couldn’t ultimately ignore inconvenient polls, and neither can Trudeau. For months and months now, Trudeau has been several postal codes behind Poilievre and the Conservatives in the polls. A majority of Canadians don’t want him leading the Liberal Party into the next election expected in 2025. Trudeau’s answer so far has been to double down on his insistence that he will contest the next election as head of the party. He assures his nervous caucus that things will gradually get better by the time Canadians choose their next prime minister: interest rates, inflation, and lower housing costs. And they will, incrementally. The Bank of Canada, for example, just dropped the interest rate to 4.5 per cent. The problem with that approach is that it didn’t much matter in Biden’s case. The U.S. has had a robust economic recovery from COVID. It also brought down the inflation rate significantly, and is gradually lowering interest rates. But none of that had any affect because that’s not how voters were experiencing it. They aren’t grateful for a reduction in the rate at which their expenses are increasing. They are remembering what groceries used to cost in pre-COVID days. There is another problem with the PM ignoring polls showing his deep unpopularity, and a massive and consistent Conservative lead as the party of choice. If that doesn’t bother the PM, you can bet it bothers every Liberal MP looking to stay in his or her job. A restless caucus could easily become a rebellious one if the leader and the polls remain in the ditch. If the conviction sets in that Trudeau is about to lead the party lemming-like over the cliff in 2025, his own team may turn on him as the Democrats did on Biden. That’s because the Liberal caucus has seen in the U.S. the power of down-ballot candidates to remove an unpopular leader when he becomes a drag on their own reelection prospects. For now, it is up to Trudeau to decide whether it’s “damn the polls, and full speed ahead,” or the Biden option. But it may not be up to him much longer. While Poilievre is sitting pretty at the moment, there is a huge and relevant takeaway for him from events in this tumultuous presidential race. Like Trump, who concentrated all his spite and venom on one person—Biden—Poilievre has built his case for becoming prime minister on demonizing Trudeau. At one level, that was good politics with Trudeau so low in the polls. But as the U.S. experience shows, it is a strategy not without risk. The last thing that Trump expected or desired was to see Biden withdraw from the race. And look what has happened to the moribund Democratic party in the wake of that move! More than a hundred million dollars has been showered on Kamala Harris in the few days since she announced her candidacy for president. Thousands of people are volunteering to knock on doors for the woman whose actual nickname is “Momala." And the media is saying that what looked like a painful political rematch between a feisty narcissist and a much diminished incumbent is now a contest again. A new poll even shows Harris leading Trump by two points. Why? First, because the Democrats have their mojo back. And second, Trump’s whole campaign was geared to waxing Sleepy Joe. Now that same campaign has to come up with a strategy for Harris, a former prosecutor, attorney general of California, Senator and vice-president—and a woman nearly 20 years the aging Trump’s junior. So far, the best Team Trump has been able to do is cast racist and gender slurs against his new opponent. When it was reported that Trump’s tone deaf VP, J.D. Vance, called Harris a “childless cat lady," he probably pushed millions of female votes her way. So the issue for Poilievre is this. What if Trudeau bowed out? Or if the party faced the To-Trudeau or Not-to-Trudeau dilemma, and chose the latter? Unlike the Democrats, who made this momentous switch in the dying hours of the electoral clock, the Liberals have time for an orderly change. So what would Poilievre do if Trudeau were out of the picture and someone like Mark Carney was suddenly his opposite number? No one knows, but the days of a 21-point lead in the polls could quickly become a faded memory. Michael Harris is an award-winning author and journalist. The Hill Times

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Buckle up, U.S. politics is on one wild ride before Americans choose their next president

What happens over the next four months in the United States will affect everyone, which is why the world's eyes are on Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.

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