The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Raj/Russo -- Behind The Trade War Blues

Episode Date: September 8, 2026

Our first Reporters Notebook of our new season brings together The Economist's Rob Russo and the Toronto Star's Althia Raj. The topic -- what else? Where we are on the trade war between Canada and the United States. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello there. Peter Ransbridge here. You're just moments away from the latest episode of the bridge. It's Tuesday. It's Raj Russo time. They'll be here right after this. Okay then. It's been a long summer. Everybody's anxious to get back to, uh, well, I don't know how anxious everybody is to get back to work. But it was a good summer. That's behind us now. We've got things to talk about with Rob Russo from the economist. I'll see a Raj from the Toronto Star. Reporters notebook, we call it. Tuesdays with Raj and Russo. And we're glad to have them both with us after what's been in a fairly long absence. But we're right into it. Like, you know, as of last night, if you didn't think we were in a trade war, we're in one now.

No last minute reprieves, no last minute deals, just last minute memes, especially ones from Donald Trump. Really, like, odorous one last night on hockey. Hockey sticks, bashing. Trump bashing Karni. Anyway, I want to get a sense of where we are on this, because it looks ugly, it looks bad, and it's going to be costly

if something doesn't happen here fairly quickly. Rob, what are you hearing first? Well, there is a sense of bemusement, if not befuddlement, over the way the President of the United States has behaved in the last little while. I spent almost eight years in Washington, and I remember that Canada was considered the kindly old uncle who was living upstairs, and we barely, barely made the news in the United States. We weren't really a cause for concern, and yet we see in the last week, we see not just the President of the United States and his social media.

volleys, but we see the vice president, we see the secretary of the treasury, we see Secretary of Commerce, we see USTR, others coming out after Canada. And what does that, what does this kind of mania for Canada suddenly tell us at a time when, you know, I remember unless there was a bench clearing brawl or an Arctic blast, we did not make the news in the United States. I think it tells us that they in the United States see it as a moment of peril. I think it is a moment of peril for Canada, but it's clearly a moment of peril for the United States in a completely different way than it is for Canada. It's existential politically for Donald Trump and for his administration because he's in midterm

season. And some of what's going on is clearly having an impact. I think of Michigan and the Michigan Senate race in particular, but another parts of the country. It's existential, and he's campaigning against Canada actively. It's existential in Canada for different reasons. I think that the United States is pursuing not necessarily a strategy of annexation of Canada, but certainly of disintegration of Canada. And if it can, and it has shown tendencies to interfere in our democratic process, primarily

the referendum that's coming in Alberta, it will. So it's the moment of peril on both sides at the border. And people are kind of trying to put what's gone on, what Donald Trump has done sort of eight social media blasts, I think, in the last

48 hours about Canada, into that kind of context. Okay. Well, what are you hearing, Elsie? I mean, Rob said the groundwork, and I don't think anybody doubts any of that. It's quite something what we've witnessed. But meanwhile, what's happening behind the scenes? What do we know?

Well, I'm not sure that I would describe Canada as the kindly old uncle. So I don't know if I agree with everything. Rob said maybe like the younger brother who's like very fond of his older brother, but wants you think is differently. I think what has happened in the last few days and frankly in the last few weeks tell us that Donald Trump really wanted a deal. And he was very keen on having that deal. And he gave his advisors very clear marching orders. And he thought that he had a deal.

And frankly, I think the Canadian side from my reporting and frankly from other people's reporting suggests that they also thought that they had a deal. It wasn't, you know, Janice Charette, our chief trade negotiator, has. very clearly said, I think even on the CBC publicly, that, you know, it wasn't everything, the fine print wasn't finalized. But they, there was a framework of a deal, certainly, and they, you know, briefed the premiers on it. They briefed caucus members on it. They briefed cabinet on it. And there are different versions of what happened at the end of the day on Friday afternoon. Clearly, the Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, was not fond of the idea, to say it mildly, that Canada was willing to agree to a 15% tariff on autos, which would

decimate the auto sector in Ontario and about half a million jobs are related to it. But he wasn't the only one. Wab Canoe came out from Manitoba, opposed to this deal, and there were many caucus members, and frankly, there were actually a lot of cabinet members who were very uncomfortable with what the government was ready to sign, what the prime minister was ready to sign. Okay, let me stop you there for a second, because that's the critical moment. Were they ready to sign? I believe on Thursday the answer to that question is yes. Do you have any disagreement on that, Rob?

No, I think on Friday afternoon, on a sun-splashed stair landing outside the U.S. Trade Representative's office, we saw Jameson Greer and Dominique LeBlanc shaking hands, being jocular with one another in French, and saying, we'll see you later, we'll see you soon. Those were two men who looked like they had a deal. And I think as much as it's true that the United States wanted a deal, I think that Canada wanted a deal as well. There's been a lot of conjecture as to whether or not the people around the Prime Minister,

and there are some of them, who say, let Rome burn had had the upper hand, they didn't. If Canada could have gotten a kind of a low tariff agreement on things like steel, aluminum, automotive, forestry products, they would have signed that deal. They would have signed that deal. They were ready to sign that deal. So the suggestion that Canada, or that Mark Carney doesn't want a deal is not true. They were ardently pursuing a deal. I think there is something. David Coletto mentions something. I'm calling it the Coletto corollary to all of this. He's the pollster. 80% of people say Carney was right to walk away from that deal. The question now is, and Coletto has sort of put this forward, if 80% of Canadian

support this and are wary of a deal with Donald Trump, can Canada, can this government actually enter into any kind of a deal with Donald Trump? Or are we at the point where, I think it was Chaucer who said, if you, if you sup with the devil, bring a long spoon. There is no spoon long enough to have dinner with Donald Trump. Okay. We interrupted you, Elsie. Pick it out. If you remember where you were, pick it up at that point. Well, I would just say, I'm not sure who they are in what Rob is saying, But I agree from what I am told, the prime minister certainly wanted a deal. I think there's others who are around the prime minister who were less enthusiastic about what this deal meant and what it would mean in the long run for Canada by accepting the terms that were being put on the table.

And, you know, we've heard from the government over the past year that we have the best deal of all deals, right? We have, we still have Kuzma. Kuzma is still in existence. We have access to the lucrative American market with most goods flowing across the border tariff-free. And the reason that the prime minister walked away in June of 2025 was because the deal that was being put forward or the terms of the deal,

because I don't think we got anywhere close to a deal at that time, was really unfavorable, that Canada wanted to hold off for a better deal. It's clear the prime minister wanted the, predictability, especially in terms of attracting investment, that a deal, whatever a deal is worth with Trump would provide. But you look at some of the deals that the Europeans have signed. And yes, in some cases, Trump has gone back on his word, but generally speaking, those

deals have held. So I think that's where the government's thinking was that these are not favorable terms, but we can still negotiate better market access than anybody else has. We can limit the amount of goods that are actually going to have a tariff on them and that deal with our strategic sectors. Basically the things that Janice Charette outlined earlier this spring in terms of, I think she was speaking in the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, where she discussed what her marching orders were,

what the mandate the prime minister had given her were. And that seems to be what was negotiated. But politically, the idea that we would give way on many of the things that the government was prepared to give way, I think clashed with the idea and the mandate that Canadians gave the Carney government back in the spring of 2025. How can you go back to your own voters that voted for you to have elbows up, especially in light of the fact that we had three by-elections and say, Actually, we have to accept these terms. And some of the terms are a little fuzzy. Like, it's not actually clear if the Americans wanted to have a veto over new free trade deals that Canada would sign. It seems like they didn't actually agree on whether trucks would have, or light trucks would have the 15% duty or if they were excluded completely.

and it seems like the Trump government has gone back on whether or not French language discoverability things on social media, sorry, on the digital platform is there's really a red line or not. But I think it's mostly the other things. Like there are different visions of what the prime minister says that clash with each other. You can't say the Davos speech

and then also say, actually, we're going to tie ourselves further to the U.S. And I think that that is where there were a lot of concerns that the deal is not good enough. And all of the things, the public goodwill that the prime minister currently enjoys to do big things, things that actually challenged some of his own voters. Like I think of the new Democrat voters who lent their vote to Mark Carney because

they were really afraid of Donald Trump, who are not in favor, for example, of a pipeline, who don't like the rollback on environmental rules, but still believe that he is the right man to go toe to toe to with Donald Trump and to safeguard Canadian sovereignty. If it felt that actually we were trading our sovereignty to being closer to a client state of the United States, that's where the challenge came from.

And in the end, I think the government made a political decision that actually possibly has long-term consequences, at least in long-term in the term. of this Trump government, because I don't know what the incentive is for the, you know, for the Trump administration to go back to the bargaining table after the midterms. And it doesn't look like there would be going back to the table before the midterms. Well, that does become the next kind of question. You know, first of all, you know, the very sense that you enter in negotiations is a clear

a clear signal that you're prepared to give some things up. I mean, you don't negotiate from a point of saying I won't give up anything at all. There are things one assumes you're prepared to give up, both the states and Canada. The Canadian side just seems to me a little bit, well, muddled because, you know, you've also got the 10 premiers who were kind of weighing in on this. And depending on which theory you believe about the week, these things collapse, the premier's had a lot of influence on that final decision, especially Doug Ford, but not just Doug Ford.

I mean, Ford has, as Althea mentioned, you know, tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of jobs at stake in all those. So, like, where do you go from here? I mean, a lot of people, well, not a lot of people. well, not a lot, but some people were thinking there's going to be a last minute something before last night, before the Canadian terrorist took hold. But nothing happened. There's no signal that anything happened. You know, maybe something's going on in the background.

I don't know. I don't think either of you to know. Well, there was an exchange of text. I think James and Greer said there's been texts exchanged, but nothing in the way of negotiations. And so now we're on the escalation ladder is where we are. And Donald Trump has a much bigger ladder than we do when it comes to escalation. And I think Althea raises an important point about the prime minister's mandate. Not only did he say he could stand up to Mr. Kearney, he said that he was going to negotiate a better deal than

then Kuzma. And now Kuzma is really what's saving us. I think people in Canada have determined that you cannot negotiate with a creature like Donald Trump. But that being said, the prime minister did promise something better. He, in his Saturday news conference of August 21st, I believe, remarkable news conference if you go through the verbatim, he did say that there was a, a, another version, another try to get a prosperity and security agreement with the United States

that in some ways would have tied us closer to the United States. And we're not going to get at that now. He said, that's off the table, I think is what he said, including some sort of discussion about critical minerals that he had proposed. So where are we? We're looking at a couple of choices, right? We can, we can, looks like we're not going to have this, this sort of prosperity and security agreement.

It doesn't look like Kuzma is, as we think of it as a free trade agreement, which had like less than half a percentage point of trade between the two countries' tariff is ever going to come back while, while the Trumpists are in power. So we're going to try and muddle through. But in the interim, in the interim, we're on the, we're on the escalator. And as I said, you know, I remember hearing everybody in Canada, everybody in this government talking about how tariffs are dumb. And here we are imposing tariffs.

We are imposing tariffs. Why are we doing that? When you ask the people around the prime minister, why are we doing that? Well, they admit that they work for an economist that tariffs are not a great idea. They're kind of dumb trade strategy because your opponent is rolling boulders into the harbor, his harbor. Why should you do the same thing? Well, it's because it's a language he understands.

It's clearly provoked him. It's got his attention. But it reminds the politicians who support him. People like Rogers in Michigan who's running for, the Senate and others like that, that there is a price to be paid for supporting Donald Trump and his tariffs, and that they may pay that price. And so you have a very, very tight race for the Democratic Socialist now leading for the Senate in the state of Michigan, and he is running against Donald Trump's tariffs. So it reminds politicians around Trump that they may

pay this price. That's the reason why Mark Carney's government is doing. what it's doing on tariffs. Alcia, what do you? Well, I think it also reminds Americans, frankly, that there are a lot of American jobs at stake from the actions that the president is taking. And, you know, we've seen Canada mentioned so many times over the last few weeks.

Like, I was on holiday, but I got called by not just American media, CNN and PBS. I got called by international media. The Danish wanted to talk. about what was going on. Like people are watching this really closely and Americans more than normal are watching this really closely. I think what is interesting is that I think there was a willingness on the part of this government, of the Ontario government as well. We heard Doug Ford

talk about it of creating fortress North America. Like that was our pitch to the Americans. even back in the fall, when I think we first floated the idea of, you know, right of first refusal on critical minerals, of deeper energy integration, that we could build this fortress North America. And it has since become very clear that the Trump administration is not interested in building fortress North America. They want to build Fortress America. And that, I think, really explains why, the pitch that we are making is not landing.

Everything is seen as a zero-sum game where you can't have two people winning. And I think that is what, frankly, will prevent us from having a good deal because that's not what Canadians have in mind. We don't want, when you look at the U.S. National Security Strategy that was the release, I think it was November or December of last year,

we don't want to be a client state of the United States. We don't want to be a satellite colony that is, you know, we are profoundly opposed to that. That is why we exist, right, to not be that. And so I think that's the deeper challenge, I think, this government will face. So what happens if there is no deal, which is what it looks like now, that there's not going to be a deal, there's certainly not going to be a deal anytime soon. What happens if there's no deal?

is that when we really start to see job losses shrinkage on the economy of a number of provinces, if not all, crashing of small businesses, the automotive sector going under? Is that the picture? Yeah, look, things are very grim in certain parts of the country, but I don't think we should paint a dystopian picture just yet.

as it is now, less than 10% of the trade between Canada and the United States is being tariffed at an excessive rate. The danger lies in the next step. Again, I don't want to minimize what's going on in places like Sue, St. Marie and Jean-Care-Arre and in Windsor, southwestern Ontario, and in the forest industry on both, on both coasts, it's real. But it's what could come next, I think, that poses the most danger. And I guess we have to cast into terms the desperation that Donald Trump may find himself in.

If he does lose the midterm elections, what's at stake for Donald Trump? Well, all of a sudden, if he doesn't have control of Congress, then all of us, it's launching investigations. I don't think necessarily that he'll be, the Democrats are dumb enough to do the impeachment dance again, but they will launch investigations into his family and into his family enriching itself while he's been president and how that's happened. How is it that they become, you know, billionaires many times over while he's been in president? And these are things that threaten the president and threatened to tie him down in the last two years of a presidency in which he's clearly thinking about legacy more than anything else. That's why he's

building ballrooms and arches. He's thinking about enriching himself, thinking about legacy, and he's thinking about punishing his opponents. And along comes Canada. What is Canada representing right now? Canada is standing up to Donald Trump. Mark Carney is standing up to Donald Trump. you know, we keep hearing, it's just Canada and China that is doing this. Well, yeah, we're getting punched in the teeth. Are we supposed to just roll over and get a kick in the nose as well? And I'm always kind of, I think the word is chagrin when people say the Europeans are right behind us. Well, they're far behind us.

Where are they? where is their support? I don't hear a lot of support. When was the last time we heard from Macron? What is the King saying about Canada right now being depicted as a part of the North American, the American continent? That's what we need. We need King Charles to get out there at the front of the protest movement.

And yet, and yet, I think Donald Trump knows that if Canada gets away with this, then others might actually summon the courage to stand up to them as well. Yeah, we'll see. They haven't so far, as you well know. Let me make a couple of points here. First of all, Trump and the upcoming midterms, Keith Bogh is on the program tomorrow, and Keith has been our sort of guide to Trump,

trying to understand that Trump mind. So I'm sure he's going to have a lot of interesting things to say about not the trade situation, but the Trump situation, where we are with Donald Trump, and whether his views about Trump have changed in the 15 years or so that he's been covering him. Althea's point about there used to be a time when Canada was never mentioned on the American media and to a degree on the international media. Those days are done. I too, and I'm sure Rob and like Althea have been on all kinds of different.

international programs, radio and television in the last few weeks. It's been interesting to watch the change. You know, a couple of months ago it was sort of, oh, isn't this interesting? Canada's all upset. Now it's, they seem to, they kind of get it. A lot of these journalists who are talking to us. They've done some study on the situation,

and they're finding the story a lot more serious than they thought it was a couple of months. ago. So this brings me around. We're going to have to take a break here in a second. But when you say, Rob, that, you know, things are changing here in terms of the actions that can be taken. We saw Trump yesterday, aside from his ridiculous little cartoon thing, saying that he wasn't going to let bombard you into the States. Now, so far, that's just word. It's not real action, but it may turn into action.

Who knows? Canada can take action. They can kill the F-35 deal. And you wonder where that sits today. I mean, we got it. I think it's what 16 F-35s were into for sure. But there was many as 88 F-35s, which is billions and billions of dollars.

And there is an alternative. the European mate Gripin. What are we hearing, if anything, on that? Althea, are you hearing anything in the F-35? Well, to add to what you said, we've actually, I think, already put a down payment on the next batch, I think it might be 14. 14, yeah.

But where does that leave the rest of the order? I don't know. I don't know that the government is actually really finalized decision. I was intrigued by Steve Fior, who's the Secretary of State for Defense Procurement, who's an avid F-35. He's opposed to the F-35. He's avidly opposed to the F-35 purchase. And he's a former fighter pilot himself, isn't he? Yeah, former CF-18 fighter pilot. He had, there was a big profile on him on CBC a few days or weeks ago. And he is still, you know, publicly stating his opposition to this deal. I don't know where the government is going to land on that,

but I suspect we won't have an answer anytime soon. But is it a chip right now as a result of where we are? Absolutely. It's the question of can you trust the Americans, frankly. Do you want to tie yourself further while you're saying publicly that you need to disentangle yourself from them? Like, that's where the challenge is. Is the issue whether you can trust the Americans or is it whether you can trust Trump. That's a good question. Well, we know you can't trust Trump. I think most people in this country would agree with that.

But then who succeeds Trump? You know, I don't know. And I think this to your earlier question to Rob, about, you know, the pain that Canadians are getting ready to endure and how long that will last. all of this begs, you know, what strategic decisions will the government make that will outlast the Trump administration, both politically, strategically, in terms of defense spending, in terms of just how we organize ourselves, that could outlast this administration and change fundamentally a relationship with the United States. I think that's a deeper question that we will ponder. for years to come. Too deep for us. Not really.

Okay, I got to take a break. And there are a couple of other things we want to talk about that are related to what's going on in Ottawa these days. So we'll do that right after this. And welcome back. You're listening to The Bridge, the Tuesday episode on this first week back after our summer break. We're glad to be with you. And we're with you today with Rob Russo and Althea Raj, a reporter's notebook. sense of what's what we think is going on, a number of fronts that all relate to things in

Ottawa, both Southia and Robert, based in Ottawa. A reminder that the question of the week this week, and it can be related very easily to this, is what did you learn this summer about yourself or about your country or about issues, about our neighbors? What did you learn? What's the one specific thing. You learned this this summer. We've already got a lot of answers have come in, but there's room for more. So let me give you the quick details.

You write to the Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com, The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com. Keep your answers to under 75 words. Okay, that's hard. Got to have it in by 3 p.m. Eastern time tomorrow, Wednesday. And include your name.

and the location you're writing from. Okay, that's tomorrow. You're listening on Sirius XM, Canada Talks, or you're listening to us on our podcast, which is available on all kinds of platforms. I'll write you too. I want to tick off a couple of other issues here. It seems to me that whenever Ottawa gets into kind of rumor mode,

the most common rumor is, oh, there's got to be a cabinet shuffle coming. And that has been rumbling around a little bit of late. Is there any sense that there's like a serious cabinet shuffle? You know, the odd change here and there is often necessary for different reasons, but a significant change in the lineup of this government at what's clearly a critical time in its life right now. Are we hearing anything that would suggest that that's about to happen?

wants to take a run at that. I mean, I will. I do believe it is a cottage industry and a cottage industry that employs some of us here on the hill, but that is leaves a lot of people outside of Ottawa slack-jawed with indifference. And I do think that some people may be moved along and some newer people may be brought in at a certain point. But they wanted to wait for the smoke to clear on whether or not we had to deal with the United States before we do that. We don't. That suggests that there will not be a lot of movement at all. I can't imagine in some of the clear portfolios that deal with the biggest issue of the day.

I do see Dominic LeBlanc taking on a bigger role. I see that he's the one who's announcing or nominating people to post like Dominic. Barton and others, that's just that his role in trade is beginning to cast a shadow that, that should have the trade minister shivering in that shadow because his role is with the rest of the world. And we all know that there is some impressive, there is some impressive diversification going on behind the scenes, but that the biggest trade job in cabinet is still with Domec de la Blanc. I'll see. Not just trade.

You know, you read the Building Canada Act and Don McLeblanc gets to pick and choose what conditions to put on projects. He is basically the most, at least on paper, it seems, the most powerful cabinet minister in terms of political power legislatively. I did read that there were rumors about cabinet shuffles, but I didn't actually hear those rumors from anybody. aside from people who lashed on to that reporting and were wishfully thinking that they may finally get their place in the sun around the cabinet table, there is a little bit of a problem

for the prime minister in that many caucus members believe that the prime minister has suggested to them that they are going to get a place around that cabinet table, some of whom have confided to others that this is the case. So whenever there will be a cabinet shuffle, and I don't expect it to be soon like Rob, there will be a lot of disappointed people. And disappointed people are usually great for us, reporters, because they get annoyed and start

talking to us. But they're not a good thing for the government. So I think, you know, Mark Carney is not a stupid man. He knows that it's better to keep people waiting and then to make them disappointed. The lesson in all this, of course, is if you hear for any reason or get a hint, no matter where from, that you may be considered for Cabinet, keep your mouth shut. Don't say anything to anyone. Perhaps not even your family until it happens, if it happens.

Okay. Investment Summit coming up next week, it's been a big, thing for Mark Carney who thinks it's really, well, it is important if it works, bringing in investors from around the world who have billions of dollars potentially to invest.

It just seems to me there's kind of an odd time to be having that given the fact you've got a trade war going on with your biggest current customer. Now, I wasn't planned

that way, but it's certainly turning out to be that way unless there's some kind of sudden deal in the next week. Does this put this, you know, you're with the economist, Rob. You must be watching this thing carefully. What can possibly happen given the events surrounding it right now? Well, I think when you speak to pension funds and sovereign wealth funds, they are interested in Canada, in certain things in Canada. If you're going to build a port or if you're going to privatize airports,

those remain pretty good investments for a sovereign wealth fund or foreign pension fund. Why? Because over 25 or 50 years, those investments are going to spin off user fees and revenue for that entire period, a half century. So those are going to remain pretty good investments. And people who are coming to the Investment Summit are interested in those kinds of things. We haven't announced for sure that we're privatizing airports, but there's a strong suspicion we're going that way. Ports were rebuilding. So, yes. And I think that's one of the reasons why you see some, you know, really interesting merchandise trade figures. And I know,

Peter, you spend a lot of nights up worrying about the merchandise trade. That's it. But, but, but, but what it tells us. No, there's been a 56% increase in, in our exports to countries other than the United States year over year. That's pretty good when I was talking about some fairly impressive diversification going on beneath the surface. That's an indication of it, an 11% drop in our exports to the United States. Some of that, I'm sure, is due to tariffs, but we are beginning to look beyond the United States out of necessity. Now, where the investment summit might run into some trouble is, if you are interested in trying to get people, to invest in setting up any kind of manufacturing in Canada, well, that's always contingent on

having access to the most lucrative market in the world, which is accessible by truck and rail in Canada right over land. And that access is a question of conjecture right now. We don't know what our arrangement is going to be. And so people like Tim Hodgson and others have been trying to get Canadian pension funds to be a little bit more patriotic in their investments. But a dollar knows no patriotism and capital abhors any kind of uncertainty. And a lot of them are saying still the regulatory environment in the United States is far more amenable to return on investment than it is in Canada. I want to say something on the investment summit only because Rob mentioned the kind of potential wish list that is going to investors. The prime minister did not campaign to sell off public assets like airports.

Selling off airports has shown time and time again that it is bad for consumers, maybe great for investors. So I just want to add that note there that it is different to pitched investors to come and build, you know, critical mineral mines, to come and invest in infrastructure, which the government obviously wants to spend more on and needs to spend more on in light of the trade war. But privatizing airports is something that Mark Carney does not have a mandate to do. Okay. Here's my last topic for today, and it's Pierre Poliev. You know, I saw a picture the other day. It had to be just being yesterday. Poliev standing at a Saskatchewan Rough Riders game alongside Andrew Shear.

And the two of them were smiling, but to me, you know, it was kind of a sad picture. Here's two guys, one of whom was leader and lost the leadership, got, you know, basically stabbed by his own party. and another one who is currently the leader, but lost an election and there's constant talk about whether or not you should step down or whether he's going to get tossed in caucus revolt. Has the summer changed anything for Pierre Poliev? Lcia, wouldn't you? You want me to read his mind?

I want you to read his mind. Or no, read the situation. Read where we're at. the summer has exposed very publicly fault lines within the conservative movements between new influencers of the party and old influencers of the party and there's definitely a jockeying for what the conservative party is and what it should be and how its leader should present itself and who it should be speaking to um with regards to pierre polleyev's leadership um i think it continue to be challenged, but as far as my reporting suggests, nobody has the appetite to

actually stab him in the back at the moment. There's talk about collecting signatures to have a vote, but it's not clear that they would win a vote, the kind of vote that ousted Aaron O'Toole, for example. That being said, I strongly believe that his leadership will continue to be tested in the fall. I think there will be more departures, at least one more departure from caucus. And that is a vote of non-confidence, frankly. The fact that you have incumbents who are deciding to, you know, flee a sinking ship a year out of an election is not a good thing. And some people, I think, really believe in what Peer Puelev is selling, but what Puyiv is selling kind of depends on the day and the week, you know, yesterday he had a press conference where he says he's, you know,

putting country over party, which is great. He is saying things like he supports reciprocity in terms of tariffs, but also won't answer whether he thinks that the government should continue to escalate if the Americans escalate. And that is a position, frankly, that is not favorable with everybody in the movement. The conservatives have always been a big tent, but it's an especially big tent at the moment. I think the greater problem is that a lot of people are just completely checked out because they believe that if there is a leadership vote and peer poli of runs again, he'll likely win at the moment. So I think people are just biding their time, assuming that eventually he'll leave and there will be another leadership contest. Got time for a one minute answer from

you, Rob, on that. Sorry, Rob. No, that's okay. I think you. We've subsanob of the gist and crystallize the thoughts of conservative nation, which is they are really two parties right now, warring in the bosom of a single entity. When we see people attacking Stephen Harper as a red Tory or as a liberal or conservative and liberal clothing, we know that the conservative party is in danger, again, of splitting apart. And we all know what that meant to Canada's democracy. it meant that we were essentially a one-party country for a long, long time. When I see them, Mr. Foyev was in Regina yesterday, but part of the reason he was there was to get ready to campaign in Yorkton, Malville. Yorkton, Malville, got 77% of the vote for conservatives in the last campaign in 2025.

What is he doing there? They lost 21% down 21% in Shikutsmi Lefjouar. they have problems. I don't know if it's necessarily Mr. Polyev's leadership as much as the issue right now is Donald Trump. And if he could just keep his party together and keep his head down,

after Trump leaves he might have a chance. But for now, their support is running for cover. And I think it would behoove the Prime Minister to get back into the House of Commons now and tell Canadians, if we are in a trade war, what's at stake and what needs to, be done, but I think that that would probably be the best move for Pierre Poylev as well. Okay.

Good conversation for the first one of the fall season. So to Rob and do Althea, thank you both. And to those of you out there listening or watching on our YouTube channel, we're glad to have you with us once again. We'll see you all on the bridge tomorrow. Bye for now.