The Ben Mulroney Show - There have been two fights in this election campaign. One public & one private

Episode Date: April 28, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Canada vs. Trump: How Monday’s Election Will Play Out with Guest: Jonathan Martin, Senior political columnist for Politico If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Conditions apply to all benefits. Visit PCFinancial.ca for details. Welcome back to the Ben Mulrooney show. One of the questions I will have for a very long time, and I will read any book that anybody writes about this in the future. I've been amazed that the Liberal Party has been able to get people not to look at the past 10 years, don't look in the rear view mirror, don't look at the damage of the past 10 years, instead look at the potential threat in front of us in the form of Donald Trump

and his tariffs. And they have convinced enough people that that's where they have to keep their sights, that they could, they're there keep their sights, that they could they're there within striking distance of forming a government. And the the idea that Donald Trump is the issue of this election is surprising to me. But it's not surprising to our next guest, Jonathan Martin, senior political columnist for Politico, who's written a tremendous piece on this very subject. Jonathan, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show.

Well, that's high praise, Ben, from somebody who knows from Canada politics. Thanks for having me. So talk to me about what you uncovered in Canada versus Donald Trump. Well, look, the sort of view on this side of the border of the race is pretty straightforward. The race was about Justin Trudeau and then it became about Donald Trump.

I think it's a little more complicated than that. Having been in the GTA last week for a few days, I think it also has to do with Pierre's persona, the enemies he's made in his own parties. Carney's general inoffensiveness of the classic man in a gray suit, um, who is obviously not as polarizing as Trudeau. And then lastly, you guys had kind of borrowed our two party deeply polarized politics and, um, at least for a moment you've borrowed it because here you have an election in which the block and the NDP have really been marginalized by fears of Donald Trump

and Pierre. So that has helped liberals too. So I think it's a little more complex than just Justin's out, Donald's in. One thing that, it doesn't surprise me but it disappoints me is sort of the knives already being out for for Pierre Polia I mean look he could win and yet two people are treating this like a funeral and they are lining up to replace him yeah I sat down with Doug Ford last week at Queen's Park and literally the first thing he said we started talking then was that he had just been speaking with Tim Houston, the premier in Nova Scotia, and he was giving Houston a hard time for that video. I'm sure a bunch of your listeners have seen.

It's a great video. It's kind of a Nova Scotia tourism piece, but really it's about promoting the premier. And so Ford tells me, he said, I was just giving Tim a hard time. I said, can't you wait until the body is cold? Yeah. Meaning Pierre's body. So yeah, you've got these two prominent conservative premiers already circling like vultures here

before the elections even happened. But it's the difference between the Liberal Party and the conservative movement. Because the conservative party, it's a coming together and a breaking apart whenever things go wrong. Right? It's a more fragile coalition, right?

And this is part of Pierre's challenge, too, is look, three-fourths of Canadians don't think much of Donald Trump, but the quarter that does like Trump also happens to be the base of the Conservative Party of Canada. So if you're Pierre, you're kind of in a vice here because you can't go negative kind of in a vice here because

you can't go negative on Trump in a full-throated way like Carney has because you risk alienating a bunch of your core voters, especially out West. And you got to have them in every riding in the Western provinces. But if you don't talk, talk about Trump, then you're going to lose swing voters in Ontario. So he's kind of in a no-win spot. There was a Q&A that occurred today with the Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford. And I just want to read you a little bit of it when somebody said, somebody told me that two of you guys have never really met in person.

How is that possible? Talking about Pierre. That's me, that's me. Oh, that's you. Yeah, I said my Q&A with Ford last week. Oh, so you're going to have to ask him. I think seven years ago, I met him once in Ottawa, breakfast right after one of my events,

but we never really talked there. And then you said, that's malpractice on his part. Why wouldn't he make the effort? You're gonna have to ask him, but I think it's common sense when you're in an election, you reach across to as many people as you can, and then you go on, but apparently he doesn't have a relationship

with the premier of Nova Scotia either. Yeah, not at all, or local mayors, or anyone. I don't understand it. And he worked in politics. He understands politics. It's his campaign manager, Jenny Byrne, in my opinion, but he's still the boss, right? I mean, this is, this is, the call is coming from within the House. Yeah, it's pretty raw stuff and I was so struck by that conversation that we ran the thing as a Q&A if it was confined

it on Politico today. Yeah, look, he obviously has a personal history with Pierre. But to me, the fact that you're the conservative leader of Kienla, and the person who is the progressive conservative, premier of the largest province, you got to have a relationship. You got to make the call., you gotta have a relationship. You gotta make the call. You gotta have the coffee. Even if you have a beef with him, he still runs the largest province in your country

and I just can't understand why people never get it. Well, talk to me, what do you make of this language, the fact that this is a conversation that Doug Ford had before the election has even been prosecuted? Well, it tells me that then folks are circling and they're already sniffing about what's next. You mentioned at the top of the program here that, you know, oftentimes elections are about the future, not the past. Well, this is about the future. I.e., if the conservatives go down today and they dump and they and they dump here, then what does that mean for the next generation

of conservative leaders? Is that Tim Houston? Is it Doug Ford? Who wants that? This to me is about trying to gain an advantage next time around. I don't know that Doug, I mean, Doug Ford just called an early election because he said it was too important.

He needed a mandate to defend Ontario against Donald Trump. I don't understand how he could argue the need to leave then in order to try, especially if they're in opposition. Obviously, he wants to be in the conversation for whoever is next. Yeah. Wow, honestly, when I saw that Tim Houston video and now I see this stuff, but again, this is what it's like on the right side of the political spectrum in, in Canada.

As soon as, as soon as things don't go well, people take their toys and they go home. I mean, that the, the 3% of the people's party of Canada that Maxime Bernier is polling, if that was in the conservative camp, we would be having a different conversation about the election today. But this is not uncommon at the end of campaigns. People start, you know, jockeying for a vintage

about next time around, and they don't wait to borrow Ford's line for the body to get cold. Jonathan Martin, Senior Political columnist for Politico. Thank you very much. It's a heck of a piece. For someone on my side of the political spectrum, it's a little disappointing, but I do appreciate it. Thanks for having me, Ben. Take care. There's no limit to how far criminals will go to cover their tracks, but investigators will go even further to uncover the truth.

I'm Nancy Hicks, a senior crime reporter for Global News. This season on Crime Beat, I'll take you from the crime scene to the courtroom and inside some of Canada's most high-profile cases and some you've likely never heard of before. Search for and listen to Crime Beat on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts.