After Trump's tariff announcement triggered Wall Street's most severe sell-off, US stock market trends show a surprising comeback. What's driving financial markets and what should investors expect from Dow Jones stocks?
In a bombshell announcement at the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting, the 94-year-old "Oracle of Omaha" revealed he'll step down as CEO by year-end 2025, with Greg Abel taking the reins of the $1.1 trillion empire.
The White House's 2026 federal budget proposal marks a dramatic shift in government priorities, cutting $163 billion (22.6%) from domestic programs while boosting defense and border security funding. Our analysis explores what these changes mean for agencies, communities, and the economy.
Mark Carney's Liberals secured a minority government in Canada's 2025 election. Our analysis shows how Trump's tariffs overshadowed domestic issues like housing affordability, reshaping voter priorities and delivering a stunning political reversal.
Mark Carney's Liberals secured a surprise minority government victory (155 seats) in Monday's federal election in Canada, overcoming what had been a 25-point deficit just three months ago. The dramatic reversal was largely driven by Trump's 25% tariffs on Canadian exports and his threats to make Canada "the 51st state," which pushed economic sovereignty concerns ahead of housing affordability and cost of living issues that had dominated political discourse before the campaign.
Canada's 2025 federal election delivered one of the most stunning political comebacks in the country's history as Prime Minister Mark Carney's Liberals secured a minority government on April 28. What began as a contest likely focused on housing affordability transformed into a referendum on who could best protect Canadian sovereignty against U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive tariffs and annexation rhetoric.
When Carney triggered the election on March 23, 2025, just weeks into his leadership after Justin Trudeau's resignation, few predicted the dramatic shift in voter priorities that would unfold. Canadians faced a perfect storm of challenges: skyrocketing housing costs, persistent inflation, strained healthcare systems, and suddenly, an existential economic threat from their largest trading partner.
The path to this election was itself extraordinary. After nearly a decade in power, Justin Trudeau's popularity had plummeted by early 2025, with his approval ratings hitting historic lows amid criticism over inflation, housing costs, and immigration policies. In January, facing a revolt within his own caucus, Trudeau announced his resignation and prorogued Parliament. The subsequent Liberal leadership race culminated in former Bank of Canada and Bank of England governor Mark Carney winning decisively on March 9. Rather than waiting to rebuild party fortunes, Carney made the bold decision to call an immediate election, gambling that his economic credentials and the emerging Trump trade war would reset the political landscape.
The historic nature of this election cannot be overstated. In my thirty years analyzing political economics across multiple continents, rarely have I witnessed such a profound shift in electoral dynamics in such a compressed timeframe. The confluence of domestic pressures and international provocations created a perfect storm that fundamentally altered Canadian voters' priorities and ultimately their choices at the ballot box.
Nothing transformed this election more than Trump's sudden economic assault on Canada.
When the U.S. President slapped 25% tariffs on Canadian steel, aluminum, and automotive exports in March, the shock waves hit immediately. Factories in Ontario started laying people off. Markets tumbled. But it wasn't just the economic damage – it was Trump's rhetoric that cut deeper.
"Canada should be the 51st state," he declared at a Pennsylvania rally. He even started referring to Trudeau as "Governor Trudeau." For Canadians, this wasn't just another Trump outburst – it was an existential threat.
I spent three days in mid-April talking to voters in cities and towns across Ontario, where Trump's tariffs hit hardest. In Sault Ste Marie, where Algoma Steel announced the first wave of layoffs, the mood was less partisan than I'd ever seen it. A lifelong Conservative voter named James told me bluntly: "I've voted blue my whole life, but this isn't about Liberal or Conservative anymore. It's about Canada."
This sentiment kept repeating everywhere I went. In Hamilton, a steelworker's wife showed me their mortgage statement and asked, "How do we pay this if his job disappears?" In Windsor, auto parts workers were already being sent home as U.S.-bound shipments sat in warehouses.
Carney seized on this moment with remarkable precision. His background running the Bank of Canada during the 2008 crisis suddenly seemed tailor-made for this new threat. "I've faced down economic bullies before," he told a packed rally in Toronto's Danforth neighborhood. "I know how to handle financial pressure."
Poilievre, meanwhile, couldn't find his footing. His entire campaign had been built on attacking Trudeau's economic policies, but with Trudeau gone and the economic threat now coming from Washington, his message fell flat. When he tried pivoting to criticize Carney's response to the tariffs as too confrontational, voters didn't buy it. "We don't want diplomacy right now," a former Conservative organizer in London told me. "We want someone who'll punch back."
For my 27-year-old nephew in Toronto, Trump's tariffs weren't the crisis that worried him most. It was the $2,800 monthly rent eating up 62% of his income.
"I've given up on ever owning a home," he told me over coffee last month. "My parents bought their house for $180,000 in 1995. That same house is worth $1.6 million now. My salary hasn't gone up nine times."
His frustration echoes across an entire generation. Vancouver rents jumped another 14% last year. Toronto's waitlist for affordable housing hit 95,000 families. Montreal, once a haven of reasonability, saw average home prices cross the $650,000 mark.
The raw numbers are staggering. The Missing Middle Initiative released a study in February that found even if home prices completely froze (they won't), younger Canadians would need 18 years of steady 3% wage increases just to have the same housing affordability their parents had in 2005. For many, the Canadian dream of homeownership has become pure fantasy.
All parties knew this was a powder keg issue. The Liberals promised to double housing construction to 500,000 units yearly and introduce a national "Renters' Bill of Rights" with standardized lease agreements. The Conservatives countered with a promise of 2.3 million homes over five years, along with converting unused federal buildings into housing. The NDP went further left, pledging 600,000 new units plus a hefty 20% tax on foreign buyers.
But as the campaign progressed, these housing platforms – which would normally dominate election discourse – got buried under the Trump tariff drama.
"It's incredibly frustrating," said Michelle, a housing advocate I spoke with in Vancouver. "We finally had all parties taking housing seriously, then suddenly we're talking about steel tariffs instead of the fact that people literally can't afford to live anywhere."
Each party's approach revealed their fundamental worldview. Liberals leaned on federal coordination and developer incentives. Conservatives focused on slashing municipal red tape and permitting delays. The NDP pushed for direct market intervention through rent controls and non-profit construction. The Bloc Québécois wanted housing autonomy for Quebec.
The divergent policy approaches reflected a fundamental question about the role of government in addressing market failures. Should the federal government take a more interventionist approach through direct investment and incentives, as the Liberals and NDP proposed? Or should it focus on removing regulatory barriers and allowing market forces more freedom, as the Conservatives suggested? Voters ultimately had to weigh these approaches against their assessment of which party could most effectively implement their vision.
Beyond housing, broader affordability concerns remained front-of-mind for many Canadian households. With inflation reaching as high as 8.1% in June 2022 before moderating, many families found their purchasing power significantly eroded. Grocery prices in particular became a flashpoint, with many Canadians reporting drastic changes in their food shopping habits.
In early 2024, affordability issues were driving the Conservative surge in polls. Poilievre's message that Canada was "broken" after nearly a decade of Liberal governance resonated with voters feeling the economic squeeze. However, as Trump's tariffs emerged as a more immediate threat to economic stability, the affordability narrative became more complex.
The tariff situation created a double economic challenge: addressing existing inflation while simultaneously defending against new inflationary pressures from trade barriers. This policy dilemma benefited Carney, whose technocratic background provided credibility on complex economic management. As one Toronto voter explained to me, "I'm worried about my grocery bill this month, but I'm more worried about having a job next year if these tariffs escalate."
Canada's public healthcare system, long a source of national pride, emerged as another key issue. The system has faced mounting pressures from staff shortages, high patient volumes, and an aging population – challenges exacerbated by the pandemic.
Party approaches diverged significantly. The NDP advocated for an ambitious expansion with universal pharmacare and dental care programs. The Liberals under Carney proposed conditional funding to provinces aimed at reducing wait times and improving frontline care. Poilievre and the Conservatives suggested giving provinces greater autonomy over healthcare delivery, coupled with federal funding – a proposal critics warned could open the door to increased privatization.
The healthcare debate reflected broader philosophical differences about the role of the federal government versus provincial autonomy. For voters in regions with particularly strained healthcare systems, such as rural communities and rapidly growing urban centers, this issue carried significant weight in their electoral calculations.
Immigration went through a strange evolution in this campaign. Before Trump's tariffs dominated headlines, it was Poilievre's strongest issue.
For years, Trudeau's Liberals had aggressively expanded immigration targets – 485,000 permanent residents in 2024 and plans for 500,000 in 2025. Last October, they finally acknowledged infrastructure couldn't keep pace and scaled back to 395,000 for 2025. Too little, too late for many voters feeling the squeeze.
"They're bringing in all these people with nowhere to live," a landlord in Mississauga told me in February. "Then they blame me for raising rents when I have 30 applications for every unit."
Poilievre hammered this point relentlessly. "They grew the population almost three times as fast as the housing stock," he repeated at rallies across the country. His message that "massive uncontrolled population growth" was straining housing, healthcare, and jobs resonated particularly in suburban areas seeing rapid demographic changes.
But then something fascinating happened. As Trump ratcheted up his rhetoric about Canada, those same immigration-skeptical voters started seeing newcomers differently – as fellow Canadians facing a common threat. The discourse shifted from "they're taking our housing" to "we're all in this together."
Carney, sensing this shift, pivoted to emphasizing how immigration strengthens Canada economically against external pressures. "Our diversity is our competitive advantage," he declared at a Brampton rally packed with first and second-generation Canadians.
Business groups had always pushed for high immigration targets to address labor shortages. But now they found an unlikely ally in national security hawks, who began arguing that population growth strengthens Canada's position against American pressure.
The most sophisticated position came from Carney himself, who promised "managed immigration aligned with infrastructure capacity" – acknowledging both economic benefits and infrastructure constraints, while avoiding the simplistic "more vs. less" framework that had previously dominated the debate.
One of the most revealing patterns in this election was how priorities varied sharply by age. According to Nanos Research polling conducted for The Globe and Mail and CTV News, while the Trump trade war was the top issue for Canadians 55 years and older, cost of living remained the priority for younger Canadians.
This generational divide reflected different economic realities. For older Canadians, often homeowners with more stable financial positions, the existential threat to Canada's economic relationship with the U.S. took precedence. For younger voters still establishing their economic footing, immediate affordability concerns remained paramount.
Joshua Winters, a 33-year-old renter in Surrey, B.C., expressed this frustration when he told The Globe and Mail: "Things that are facing younger people just kind of fall to the bottom. I think we're getting forgotten in this campaign." This sentiment was echoed by other young voters who felt their pressing concerns about housing and economic mobility were being overshadowed by international relations.
This generational divergence in priorities created complex electoral calculations for all parties. The Liberals needed to maintain their traditional strength with younger voters while also appealing to older Canadians concerned about economic stability in the face of U.S. tariffs. The Conservatives needed to retain support from older, more traditional conservative voters while also continuing to make inroads with younger voters frustrated by economic conditions under Liberal governance.
When the votes were counted on April 28-29, 2025, the Liberal Party secured its fourth consecutive term in government, though falling short of the 172 seats needed for a majority in the 343-seat House of Commons. As of publication, the Liberals had secured approximately 155 seats, the Conservatives 119, the Bloc Québécois 32, and the NDP falling below the 12-seat threshold required for official party status. This outcome represents one of the most remarkable political comebacks in Canadian history, with the Liberals overcoming what had been a 25-point deficit in January.
The result signals that Canadian voters ultimately prioritized experienced leadership at a time of international economic uncertainty. Mark Carney's background as a crisis manager who had previously guided both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England through periods of financial turbulence provided reassurance to voters concerned about navigating Trump's trade war.
In his victory speech, Carney delivered a stark message about Canada's relationship with the United States, stating: "As I have been warning for months, America wants our land, our resources, our water, our country. But these are not idle threats. President Trump is trying to break us so that America can own us. That will never ever happen."
This defiant tone marked a significant departure from Canada's traditionally deferential posture toward its larger neighbor and signaled a new era in Canada-U.S. relations. The electoral outcome thus represents not just a victory for the Liberal Party, but potentially a fundamental shift in how Canada positions itself globally.
With a minority government of approximately 155 seats (short of the 172 needed for a majority), Carney now faces the dual challenge of building parliamentary coalitions while confronting Trump's tariffs. The 2025 election results reveal distinct regional voting patterns that will shape Canadian politics for years to come:
Traditionally, the most likely partner for a Liberal minority would be the left-leaning New Democratic Party (NDP). However, their parliamentary position has been severely weakened, with NDP leader Jagmeet Singh losing his own seat and announcing he would step down after the party failed to secure the 12 seats required for official party status in Parliament. This might force Carney to seek case-by-case support from the Bloc Québécois, whose support would come with demands for greater Quebec autonomy.
Governing in this environment will require political dexterity. Minority governments in Canada have historically been productive but unstable, lasting about two years on average. Carney will need to balance responding to immediate economic threats from U.S. tariffs while also addressing the persistent domestic challenges that fueled Conservative support.
The policy implications of this outcome are significant. On trade, we can expect a dual approach: strategic retaliation against U.S. tariffs while simultaneously seeking to diversify Canada's export markets. On housing, the mandate suggests continuing the Liberal approach of federal investment and incentives, likely with additional measures to address affordability as demanded by potential coalition partners.
I've covered twelve federal elections over my career, and none revealed more about the Canadian character than this one.
When pushed against a wall by Trump's bullying, Canadians didn't fracture along their usual regional and partisan lines – they fused together in a way I've never witnessed. The Liberal surge wasn't about endorsing Trudeau's legacy (he was gone) or even embracing Carney's policies (most voters couldn't name them). It was about choosing the leader who seemed most capable of standing up to an existential threat.
But here's the uncomfortable truth that got lost in election night celebrations: those kitchen-table issues that dominated before Trump's tariffs haven't magically vanished. Young families still can't afford homes. Grocery prices remain punishing. Hospital wait times continue to stretch. Indigenous communities still lack clean drinking water.
Carney inherits a country unified against external threats but deeply divided on how to fix these internal fractures. His minority government can't simply ride the anti-Trump wave – it needs to deliver tangible results on housing and healthcare while simultaneously fighting a trade war.
What happens if those Trump tariffs become the new normal? Canada sends 72% of its exports south of the border – a dependency that now looks dangerously naive. Carney's toughest job won't be standing up to Trump rhetorically (that's politically easy), but rather rebuilding Canada's economy to be less vulnerable to American whims.
For our allies watching this election, especially middle powers like Australia, South Korea and Germany, Canada has become a test case in responding to economic coercion from larger powers. Our ability to balance principled resistance with pragmatic economic survival will be their blueprint – or their warning.
The real question isn't whether Canada will ever become America's "51st state" (it won't). It's whether this moment of national unity can survive the hard choices that lie ahead. Will Canadians remain united when tough trade-offs are required? Or will we revert to our regional and partisan divisions once the immediate threat seems less urgent?
That's the test that matters now. Trump changed this election. The question is whether he's changed Canada itself.
While U.S. tariffs and threats to Canadian sovereignty emerged as the dominant issue during the campaign, voters were also deeply concerned about housing affordability, cost of living, healthcare, and immigration. The importance of each issue varied significantly by demographic group, with younger voters more focused on economic issues while older voters prioritized the U.S. relationship. A late April poll by Nanos Research found that for voters under 35, cost of living remained the top concern (42%), while for those over 55, Trump's trade policies were paramount (51%).
The Liberal comeback was primarily driven by two factors: Justin Trudeau's resignation removed a deeply unpopular figure from the equation, and Donald Trump's tariffs and annexation rhetoric created a rally-around-the-flag effect that benefited the incumbent party. Carney's background in managing financial crises also provided credibility during an economically uncertain time.
A minority government requires the Liberals to secure support from other parties to pass legislation, likely leading to more progressive policies as they court NDP votes. Expect more robust climate initiatives, expanded healthcare investments, and potentially more aggressive housing interventions than might have occurred under a Liberal majority.
Carney has outlined a dual approach: targeted retaliatory tariffs coupled with efforts to diversify Canada's trade relationships beyond the United States. His government will also likely accelerate infrastructure development, including pipelines to non-U.S. markets, to reduce dependency on American trade.
The NDP suffered significant losses, with leader Jagmeet Singh announcing his resignation. The party was squeezed between the Liberals and Conservatives, losing progressive voters to Carney's Liberals and working-class support to Poilievre's Conservatives. This highlights the challenges for third parties in elections dominated by a single overriding issue.
Housing remains one of Canada's most intractable problems. While the Liberal platform promises to double housing construction to 500,000 units annually, experts question whether this is achievable given labor constraints and provincial/municipal jurisdiction over many aspects of housing policy. Meaningful improvements will require unprecedented coordination across all levels of government.
The Liberals' plan includes several specific measures: $40 billion for new construction initiatives, a Canadian Renters' Bill of Rights with standard lease agreements across the country, a ban on "renovictions" (evictions for alleged renovations), and increased tax credits for first-time homebuyers. However, housing economists have pointed out that even if these ambitious targets are met, it would take years to address the estimated 3.5 million unit shortfall that has developed over the past decade.
This election may mark a turning point in Canada's approach to its relationship with the United States. Carney's victory speech signaled a more assertive stance toward U.S. economic policies that harm Canadian interests. Expect Canada to continue diversifying its trade relationships and strengthening alliances with other middle powers as a hedge against U.S. unpredictability.
The White House's 2026 federal budget proposal marks a dramatic shift in government priorities, cutting $163 billion (22.6%) from domestic programs while boosting defense and border security funding. Our analysis explores what these changes mean for agencies, communities, and the economy.
The GOP just voted to dramatically overhaul how Americans pay for college. With a 21-14 party-line vote, Republicans advanced the "Student Success and Taxpayer Savings Plan" to cut $330B by capping loans, restricting grants, and ending subsidies to fund Trump's tax agenda.
When Amazon considered showing consumers exactly how much Trump's tariffs added to their bills, the White House erupted in fury, calling it "hostile" and triggering a presidential phone call that changed everything in hours.
Trump's administration has hit Chinese imports with tariffs up to a staggering 245% - the highest in a century. Find out which products are hardest hit, how companies are responding, and what it means for your wallet in 2025.