(OTTAWA, Canada) — Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced he intends to resign as Liberal Party leader and prime minister once a new party leader is determined.
“I intend to resign as party leader, as prime minister, after the party selects its next leader through a robust, nationwide, competitive process,” he said Monday from Rideau Cottage in Ottawa.
Trudeau will serve as prime minister until March 24. He will then be replaced by a new Liberal Party leader.
The Canadian Parliament was supposed to begin its new session of 2025 on Jan. 27, but Trudeau said Monday he asked the governor general to extend and not start a new session of Parliament until March 24.
Trudeau spoke in both English and French during his remarks, and said he shared the news with his children the night prior.
“I’m a fighter. Every bone in my body has always told me to fight because I care deeply about Canadians. I care deeply about this country, and I will always be motivated by what is in the best interest of Canadians,” the prime minister said.
Trudeau said he believes his resignation will “bring the temperature down” and allow Parliament to reset and get back to work “for Canadians.”
“Parliament needs a reset, I think, needs to calm down a bit and needs to get to work for Canadians,” Trudeau said when answering reporters’ questions following his announcement.
“Removing me as the leader who will fight the next election for the party should decrease the polarization that we have right now,” he said.
The development comes a month after Canada’s deputy prime minister and finance minister, Chrystia Freeland, resigned from Trudeau’s Cabinet, a sign of apparent turmoil in his government. Trudeau, 53, the leader of the Liberal Party, began serving as the 23rd prime minister of Canada in 2015.
In a letter to the prime minister announcing her resignation, Freeland cited her differences with Trudeau over how to deal with President-elect Donald Trump’s tariff threat.
“Our country today faces a grave challenge,” Freeland wrote in the letter, which she shared on social media. “The incoming administration in the United States is pursuing a policy of aggressive economic nationalism, including a threat of 25 percent tariffs.”
“We need to take that threat extremely seriously,” she continued, with actions that included the need for Canada to push back and resist “costly political gimmicks” and “building a true Team Canada response.”
Trump has proposed new tariffs on imports from Canada — the United States’ third largest supplier of agricultural products, according to the Department of Agriculture — as well as China and Mexico.
Trudeau traveled to Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s private club in Florida, last month to meet with the president-elect. Trudeau told reporters at the time that his conversation with Trump was “excellent” but did not respond to any additional questions.
In her letter last month, Freeland said Trudeau told her he no longer wanted her to serve as finance minister and offered her another position in the Cabinet.
“Upon reflection, I have concluded that the only honest and viable path is for me to resign from the Cabinet,” she said in the letter, which noted that she looks forward to continuing to work with her colleagues as a Liberal member of Parliament and plans to run again for her seat in Toronto in the next federal election.
Dominic LeBlanc, the minister of intergovernmental affairs, will now also serve as the new finance minister after Freeland stepped down from the role.
Her resignation comes as Trudeau’s housing minister, Sean Fraser, also announced he will not seek reelection for personal reasons, saying he wants to spend more time with his family.
The next federal election must be held by Oct. 20.
Support for Trudeau’s party has declined steadily for months, with the Liberals currently at their lowest level of support in years, according to CBC News. The Conservative Party holds a 21-point lead over the Liberals leading up to the federal election, according to CBC News.
Trudeau’s father, former Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, served as the prime minister of Canada from 1968 to 1979 and from 1980 to 1984, before retiring from politics before the next election.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
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