People participate in a rally on Parliament Hill in Ottawa in March. Donald Trump’s return to the U.S. presidency sparked a new wave of Canadian nationalism.Justin Tang/The Canadian Press
Remember how deeply divided Canada was over building new oil pipelines last year? Not any more.
Two years ago, politicians of all stripes felt the public would never support substantially increased military spending? Now, most do.
Free trade is almost a wistful notion from a happier past; economic nationalism is in. The pro-immigration consensus, part of this country’s social fabric for decades, is suddenly gone. Now, the majority feel too many people are coming to Canada.
It turns out that in 2025, there have been a lot of things on which Canadians agree.
Across party lines and among a broad swath of the public, economic issues are priorities and other things – apart from Canadian sovereignty and waving the flag – have largely shifted down the list of priorities. Projects, pipelines and diversifying trade are on top; environment and social issues, less so. There is a new consensus.
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“It’s a pretty stark policy shift,” said Dan Arnold, chief strategy officer with Pollara Strategic Insights and a former Liberal pollster during Justin Trudeau’s tenure.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s second term in the White House famously upended politics in this country in 2025, suddenly turning Canadian sovereignty and reliance on the United States into immediate, emotional and apparently existential questions.
Yet, Mr. Trump’s return was the latest in a series of shocks that have shifted public opinion like tectonic plates: the COVID-19 pandemic, the inflation that followed and the disruption of Trump 2.0.
Hard-headed economic interests and making ends meet matter to Canadians now. So do national interest and nationalist sentiment. Perhaps Mr. Trump’s brusque treatment of Canadians was a coup de grâce that helped cement a more broadly shared sense of some of the big things that are important.
But that doesn’t mean unity. Federal politics is still polarized, split fairly evenly between Liberals and Conservative supporters – at least outside of Quebec, where the Bloc Québécois still holds substantial support. There is a cleavage of priorities between younger and older Canadians, between those struggling to buy a home and raise a family and those who own homes and have retirement funds. Party support has flipped among age groups, with Conservatives strengthened among younger groups and the Liberals now winning 55-and-older voters.
But even in party politics, there is something of an unexpected bipartisan consensus. Prime Minister Mark Carney killed the consumer carbon tax, put $9-billion more into defence and signed a memorandum of understanding with Alberta that opened a path to a new pipeline.
Mr. Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith sign a memorandum of understanding on energy in Calgary on Nov. 27.Todd Korol/Reuters
It’s not the Conservatives who are changing, pollster Nik Nanos argues, but the Liberals.
“As a result, the Conservatives are a bit flat-footed,” he said. “Are they going to complain about defence spending? I think it’s increasingly difficult for the Conservatives to differentiate themselves on a lot of these big issues.”
In October, 2024, when then-prime minister Justin Trudeau called long-time senior Liberal staffer Andrew Bevan to take over as the party’s campaign director, the Liberals looked to be limping to a crushing defeat. Nanos Research tracking polls had showed them as one percentage point ahead of the NDP and 18 points behind Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives.
“One of the reasons I agreed to do it is because I was convinced that Trump was going to win, first of all, and even more convinced that that was going to present a whole lot of upheaval in the political world,” Mr. Bevan said in recent interview. He thought that might open a path to win an election.
It did, though not for Mr. Trudeau. Mr. Trump quickly threatened Canada with tariffs and assertions it should become the 51st state. It was apparent that the second Trump administration was going to be less constrained.
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In retrospect, Mr. Bevan argues, the Canadian response has been somewhat obvious and necessary. It was the circumstance that was so unusual. It upended Canadian politics so much that by the time Mr. Carney was chosen as the new Liberal Leader and sworn in as Prime Minister, the party was in the lead. Beyond party affiliations, public attitudes had shifted.
“Buy Canadian” policies polled through the roof, Pollara’s Mr. Arnold said. Even commercial market research found attaching a maple leaf to an ad would help sell product. In Canada, Mr. Trump had the opposite effect. A survey found Canadians were less likely to support making daylight savings time a year-round thing if they thought Mr. Trump was in favour of the idea.
“Certainly, the story of 2025 is that Canada had become much more nationalist and economically nationalist, and I think that gives a lot more licence for some things like major projects and [defence] investments,” Mr. Arnold said.
Priorities have shifted. Economic issues such as tariffs and inflation topped concerns in an October Pollara survey, while gender equality and Indigenous reconciliation were near the bottom. The environment as an issue has moved down. Mr. Carney no longer calls Canada’s foreign policy feminist and has eschewed the Trudeau-era language that some perceived as “woke.” Mr. Nanos likens it to Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the psychological theory that people seek to satisfy basic requirements such as food and shelter before moving up to aspirations such as self-actualization.
“People still support the environment. They still support stable relations with Indigenous peoples and trying to right those wrongs,” Mr. Nanos said. “But the thing is, they don’t stack up against paying for groceries this week or paying for housing.”
Concern over the price of necessities was rising before the U.S. election as inflation pushed costs up for households across the country.Sammy Kogan/The Globe and Mail
Concern about those basic needs was rising among Canadians before Mr. Trump’s re-election. The COVID-19 pandemic fuelled a minority’s mistrust of government, but the inflation and higher interest rates that followed slashed standards of living, and for many younger adults, pushed homeownership out of reach.
In 2022, Mr. Poilievre steamrolled to victory in the Conservative leadership race amid shifting public attitudes.
“We felt it,” said Ginny Roth, who was communications director for Mr. Poilievre’s leadership campaign. “I think the biggest factor of all was inflation. Inflation made everything else seem less important.” When Mr. Poilievre started talking about it, “he was basically called crazy,” Ms. Roth noted.
Mr. Poilievre linked it to overspending. His persistent “axe the tax” campaign persuaded people that the consumer carbon tax was raising their cost of living.
Politicians were reluctant to push housing policies to break down restrictions on development for fear of upsetting existing homeowners, Ms. Roth noted, but Mr. Poilievre campaigned against municipal “gatekeepers” who enforce those rules. Mr. Trudeau eventually responded a year later by announcing a “housing accelerator” program.
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Cost-of-living concerns reframed many issues. In 2022, Mr. Trudeau and Ontario Premier Doug Ford were talking about labour shortages and apparently failed to notice that a surge in international students was fuelling a spike in population. In 2024, the federal government’s own polling showed for the first time that a majority felt too many immigrants were coming to Canada – but Mr. Arnold noted the chief driver was not the old xenophobic complaint that immigrants were stealing Canadians’ jobs, but rather an inflation-driven fear that a rapid population surge was pushing up housing costs.
Perhaps public support for immigration will gradually return after a few years of lower numbers, but that is not certain. Canadians’ current support for military spending is driven by a Trump-fuelled concern about protecting sovereignty that might not last when the increasing sums squeeze out other things. Cleavages between young and old, and nationalist sentiments in Quebec and now, Alberta, are still there.
Even so, there is a new consensus on so many big issues. Canadians don’t want much population growth now. They want a focus on standards of living and quality of life, with lower house prices and safe streets. Economics matter most, but they don’t override Canadian nationalism and sovereignty, so there is permission for more military spending. Development, including resource development, is widely supported and oil pipelines and mines are in – especially if the oil and minerals are going to new markets rather than the U.S.
There is a hard-headed, flag-waving public mood that crystallized in 2025. It will shape Canada’s politics in the new year.
What the numbers show on four key issues
Oil and gas: Proposals for building oil pipelines vexed former prime minister Justin Trudeau’s government before and after they bought and built the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion. Now, there is broad support for an oil pipeline and in December, Nanos Research found that a majority favour an Alberta-B.C. coast conduit. In September, Nanos found that 67 per cent think oil and gas is important to Canada’s economic future.
Military: The promises to expand Canada’s military spending are startling for a country that has seen governments eschew serious spending since the 1960s. In July, after Prime Minister Mark Carney pumped $9-billion for additional defence spending into the annual budget, Nanos found 52 per cent said they favoured increases to reach the current NATO target of 2 per cent of GDP.
Immigration: A massive surge in international students and temporary workers fuelled population growth that reached 3.2 per cent in 2023 – and sparked a backlash. In November, 2024, for the first time in 30 years, annual surveys commissioned by the federal government found that a majority of 54 per cent think too many immigrants are coming into the country.
Economic nationalism: When Mr. Trudeau went to Chicago in February, 2018, it was his 15th trip to the United States and his goal was to convince Americans that NAFTA and free trade was good for everyone. That debate seems over in Mr. Trump’s second term. A Nanos poll in October found that four in five Canadians think boycotting U.S. goods helps Canada in dealing with the U.S. trade war.