Why did Chrystia Freeland resign?
In politics, nothing is what it seems. This isn't because of a dispute with Trudeau over tariffs & spending.
She resigned because she's making a play for his job, while simultaneously outflanking Mark Carney.
Let me explain the elaborate game that I think is afoot... (a thread🧵)
The whole world can see Trudeau's star is fading. Even the 🇨🇦 dollar
is in freefall. His own party wants him gone. Freeland, as his Deputy PM
+ Finance Minister, is tied at the hip to Trudeau's sinking ship.
Rumors were Trudeau was about to fire Freeland as his "fall guy".
And Mark Carney was being floated as her replacement, or possibly even his.
But here's where things get devious as she uses her resignation as a way to untie herself from Trudeau's sinking ship while simultaneously using it as a way to outflank Mark Carney in the bid for the Liberal leadership.
By using a "fiscal dispute" as an excuse to resign from his cabinet --
even as she stays on as an MP (unlike Bill Morneau in 2020 or Jody
Wilson Raybould in 2019 who both left politics) --she's pushing the
Trudeau regime's financial disaster back into Trudeau's lap. By
pre-emptively resigning, she's pinning the blame on his incompetent
leadership, and he looks ridiculous if he tries to pin the blame on her.
With this bit of theater, she's positioned herself as a comparative
"voice of reason", expressing concern for Canada's future while
insinuating grave doubts about Trudeau's competence.
Her play prevents Trudeau from scapegoating her as the fall guy -- now
he owns what his regime has wrought. This matters for whoever he tries
to appoint to replace her...
Freeland has essentially triggered a leadership crisis in the Liberal party.
By resigning in this dramatic manner, refusing to be part of his cabinet
going forward, but staying on as an MP, she has outflanked Trudeau's
effort to pin Canada's death spiral on her. He doesn't get a fresh start
by firing her and then appointing someone to replace her.
But she does (or hopes she does).
Meanwhile, anyone who is appointed by Trudeau to replace her is tying their career to his sinking ship.
Thus, the role of Deputy PM and/or Finance Minister has become a hot
potato as long as he's captain of the ship. He's left struggling to
create a stable cabinet as the rats try to flee his sinking ship.
When even his own Deputy PM and Finance Minister have publicly expressed
grave doubts about his competence and resigned from his cabinet in
protest, it would be kryptonite for the future of the Liberal party to
allow him to lead the party into the next election. He will be forced to
resign in the coming weeks/months.
Prior to her resignation, there were unhappy members but only one camp
-- Trudeau's. And Mark Carney was being groomed as his replacement by
the entire regime, by the media, and so on.
But by pre-emptively resigning while throwing shade on Trudeau's
competence, Freeland has created a rival camp in the Liberal party. The
loyalty of party members is now being split by this rift -- do they
stand with him as he sinks, or sympathize with her?
Already some MP's (like Anand) have made noises of sympathy towards her.
How can they not -- as a DEI-obsessed govt, and with Trudeau's track
record of firing female members of his govt, Freeland is now well
positioned to pick up the support of MPs trying to distance themselves
from Trudeau's sinking ship.
But she's also simultaneously thrown a wrench in Mark Carney's plans...
By preventing Trudeau from setting her up as his fall guy, Carney can no
longer be brought in as the "saviour" to clean up her mess. Freeland
has signaled that it's Trudeau's mess, not hers, that needs to be
cleaned up.
But Carney is Trudeau's special economic advisor. By association, this
has now become his mess too. And if he takes a role in Trudeau's
cabinet, he's Trudeau's special guy, brought in by incompetent Trudeau
to clean up Trudeau's (and his own) mess. If he accepts the job now, he
would be unequivocally tying himself to Trudeau's sinking ship.
Thus, Freeland's play shrewdly forces Carney to either stay away or to
rebrand himself as also being critical of Trudeau in order to avoid
further tainting himself with Trudeau's toxic aura. He can't slip
smoothly into the role anymore -- he either has to become adversarial
and publicly critical of Trudeau, like Freeland has, or he goes down
with Trudeau's ship before his career in the Liberal Party even gets
started.
The crisis that Freeland has unleashed with her resignation and pubic
criticism of Trudeau's competence has turned service in Trudeau's
cabinet into a career-threatening proposition. As his hold over his
party unravels, the probability that someone other than Trudeau will be
leading the Liberals into the next election increases dramatically.
Instead, we have two rival camps emerging as Trudeau's successor: Carney vs Freeland.
And Freeland's play positions Carney as inept Trudeau's handpicked guy
and co-architect of Trudeau's financial disaster, with her positioning
herself as the alternative.
After Freeland's grotesque mismanagement of 🇨🇦's finances during her
tenure, the idea that she suddenly has misgivings about Trudeau's
spending or that she's suddenly growing a conscience is laughable.
But this alternate explanation makes a lot more sense. Trudeau's time is
ending. The rats are finding ways off his ship and positioning
themselves to try to seize the throne.
Whether Freeland's elaborate game succeeds is another matter altogether.
Her hands are stained. Her play reeks of desperation. But she is a
skilled manipulator (otherwise she wouldn't have lasted this long in
Liberal politics), and never underestimate the capacity of the Liberal
party, the media, and liberal voters to rewrite history according to
some new emerging narrative as their love affair with Trudeau comes to
an end.
At a minimum, she has improved her chances of being re-elected by
distancing herself from Trudeau and by pinning the economic wreckage
caused by his leadership on him.
But by splitting the party into two camps, she is also forcing the other
Liberal party members to pick sides. Liberal MP's can either:
1. Remain loyal to Trudeau,
2. Jump ship to Freeland's camp,
3. Or set up a third rival camp.
Anyone considering option #3 faces a much more difficult run for the
leadership role now that Trudeau and Freeland (as #1 and #2 of the
party) are in rival camps. And by being the first to jump ship, if a
third camp does emerge, she can easily smear them as being Trudeau
lackeys because they continued to serve a failing Trudeau after she
split.
Meanwhile Carney, as Trudeau's current special economic advisor, is
going to have to find some creative way to rebrand himself to avoid
tying himself to Trudeau's sinking ship. Or stay away altogether.
In the world of politics, the headlines are all lies while the real story plays out in the subtext.