section_path: History/21st century/Justin Trudeau
section_name: Justin Trudeau
paragraph_text: Justin Trudeau
  
  On April 14, 2013, Justin Trudeau, son of former prime minister Pierre Trudeau, was elected leader of the Liberal Party on the first ballot, winning 80% of the vote. Following his win, support for the Liberal Party increased considerably, and the party moved into first place in public opinion polls. In response, the Conservatives ran a series of ads attempting to " him as a silly dilettante unfit for public office" and the surge levelled off in the following year.
  
  In 2014, Trudeau removed all Liberal senators from the Liberal Party caucus. In announcing this, Trudeau said the purpose of the unelected upper chamber is to act as a check on the power of the prime minister, but the party structure interferes with that purpose. Following this move, Liberal senators chose to keep the designation "Liberal" and sit together as a caucus, albeit not one supported by the Liberal Party of Canada. This independent group continued to refer to itself in publications as the Senate Liberal Caucus until 2019.
  
  By the time the 2015 federal election was called, the Liberals had fallen back to third place. Trudeau and his advisors mounted a campaign based on economic stimulus in the hopes of regaining the mantle of being the party that best represented change from the New Democrats. The campaign was successful, and the Liberals won the election in a dramatic fashion: with 39.5 percent of the popular vote and 184 seats, it was the first time a party had won a parliamentary majority after placing third in a previous general election. Chantal Hébert deemed the result "a Liberal comeback that is headed straight for the history books", while Bloomberg 's Josh Wingrove and Theophilos Argitis similarly described it as "capping the biggest political comeback in the country’s history." Spencer McKay, writing for the National Post, suggested that "maybe we've witnessed a revival of Canada's 'natural governing party'".
  
  At the 2019 federal election, Trudeau's Liberal Party lost 20 seats in the House of Commons (lowering its total from 177 to 157) from the time of dissolution, they still won the most seats of any party—enough seats to allow Trudeau to form a minority government. For the first time since 1979, the party that garnered the largest share of the national popular vote did not win the most seats; the Liberals under Trudeau had 33.1 per cent of the popular vote, while the Conservatives under Andrew Scheer had 34.4 per cent. It was also the first time a government took power with less than 35 percent of the national popular vote since the Conservatives of John A. Macdonald, in 1867, who had 34.8 per cent of the votes.
  
  In the 2021 federal election, Trudeau and the Liberals secured a third mandate and his second minority government after winning 160 seats. However, the Liberals again came in second in the national popular vote, behind the Conservatives. They received 32.6 percent of the popular vote, the lowest percentage of the national popular vote for a governing party in Canadian history.
  
  In March 2022, Trudeau's Liberal Party agreed to a confidence and supply deal with the New Democratic Party. In September 2024, Jagmeet Singh announced that he was ending the confidence-and-supply agreement, with NDP sources saying they had "achieved all they could from the agreement." Throughout the year, the Liberals faced declining poll numbers and disappointing results in by-elections, including losses in safe seats such as Toronto—St. Paul's in Toronto and LaSalle—Émard—Verdun in Montreal, and battleground seats such as Cloverdale—Langley City in Vancouver. The months following these losses saw frequent media stories about internal frustration and discontent with Trudeau's leadership. This appeared to culminate in a caucus meeting where multiple members called on Trudeau to resign. Trudeau emerged from this meeting stating that the party remained "strong and united". On January 6, 2025, Trudeau prorogued parliament and announced his intent to resign as both party leader and prime minister following a leadership election.