Claypool: Trudeau Rearranging Deck Chairs Won’t Save His Sinking Liberal Government

Over the past 24 hours, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been accepting the resignations of seven of his top cabinet ministers in what is clearly a move to try and erase many of the Liberal government’s policy failures.

So far the ministers that have resigned are:

• David Lametti – Justice Minister and Attorney General

• Omar Alghabra – Transporation Minister

• Mona Fortier – President of the Treasury Board

• Marco Mendicino – Public Saftey Minister

• Joyce Murray – Minister of Fisheries

• Helena Jaczek – Receiver General of Canada

• Carolyn Bennett – Minister of Mental Health

Of the seven who are resigning, Alghabra, Murray, Jazek, and Bennett are also not going to be seeking re-election in the next Canadian federal election scheduled in September 2025.

Justin Trudeau has also shuffled a few members of his cabinet into different positions like Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez taking on the transport file, and Defence Minister Anita Anand taking on an economic role. 

The issue is this feels much like moving deck chairs around on the Titanic. Even those the media are pointing to as the “good performers” are still in charge of ministries that have not generated much positive news. 

It is hard to say, Rodriguez, who was in charge of pushing Bill C-18 and C-11 which restrict Canadians access to the news, has been a good performer. 

Some are speculating that Trudeau wants an election in the fall of 2023, but this cabinet shuffle is not trying to position the Liberals for an election campaign, it’s trying to help them survive until 2025. 

While yes governments often shuffle cabinet before an election to give some important roles to their candidates in tough reelection efforts, Trudeau is way too far back in the polling and fundraising numbers to be cutting apart his cabinet to become election ready. 

Trudeau is doing some governmental blood-letting now, so he doesn’t have poor-performing ministers weighing him down in 2025, assuming the Liberals still have any hope of winning in 2025. 

The reason I do not believe Justin Trudeau cutting loose some of the Liberal deadweights and replacing them with new (or less abused) faces will help is that fundamentally Canadians see the failures of the Liberal government as a product of Trudeau’s leadership.

Nobody is foolish enough to believe Alghabra, Mendocino, or Lametti were granted any level of independence in their roles. What Justin Trudeau and his top advisors wanted is what they got, and so a cabinet shuffle will be seen as nothing more than Trudeau admitting he has failed as prime minister.

For maximum political impact, Pierre Poilievre and the Conservative Party should definitely not train fire on the outgoing cabinet ministers, and instead focus attention on Justin Trudeau’s failed leadership. Cast the cabinet shuffle as Trudeau merely changing the faces and names of those who will carry out his every order, and those being removed from the cabinet as dupes who were blamed for Trudeau’s terrible policy because that is exactly what is going on.

As a Conservative myself, I cannot help but feel comfortable that this event has foreshadowed what will happen in 2025 when Trudeau is forced to run in another election. A political bloodbath.