The signs have been there for weeks, if not months. In November of last year a string of outrageously expensive television ads started appearing, touting the wonders of the province of Ontario and its economy. Guess who funded them. Then came an out-of-the blue announcement from the premier that he was going to give every taxpayer in the province, and their children, a cheque for $200. This pitiful largesse was ostensibly to help deal with the cost-of-living crisis. In reality, of course, it was a bribe, a political gimmick that would cost the treasury an estimated $3 billion.
So, as the cheques started to arrive in mailboxes this week, almost no one was surprised to see the premier announce that he would be calling an election the following week for February 27th. The only question worth asking the premier at his press conference was what possible reason he had to send Ontarians to the polls some 16 months ahead of the fixed election date of June 2026.
Of course Ford had an answer ready. Wearing a ballcap that declared “Canada is not for sale!” he told reporters, with a straight face, that he needed a “strong mandate” to deal with the threat of Donald Trump’s proposed 25% tariffs. When someone asked what he meant by a strong mandate, since his Conservatives already have a very substantial majority in the legislature,[i] Ford replied “We need the largest majority in Ontario’s history.” And why? Apparently because then the opposition parties will not oppose any of his policies or otherwise cause him any grief. “When you have a strong majority from the people for the next four years, I can tell you the Opposition treats you with a little more respect.”[ii] And he needs that respect so that he can “fight for jobs in Ontario.”
Evidently the premier could use a refresher course in Democracy 101. It is, of course, the very purpose of opposition parties to oppose, albeit constructively, and this opposition scrutiny becomes even more important when a government has a substantial majority. But more fundamental still is the fact that governments are elected for the very purpose of defending the interests of their citizens. As NDP leader Marit Stiles so clearly pointed out, he does not need an additional mandate. “You are the premier of this province. It is your mandate every single day to fight for the jobs of the working people of this province.”[iii]
Meanwhile Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie denounced Ford’s own disrespect for opposition parties, epitomized by his personal attacks on her and the NDP leader at his press conference. At one point, instead of answering a reporter’s question about his planned strategy for dealing with Trump, Ford declared, “You better pray that we get elected….Imagine Bonnie Crombie or Marit Styles sitting across from President Trump. It would be an absolute disaster. And God help us if that ever happens…”[iv]
Crombie also pointed out what should have been obvious to everyone at the conference, namely that Ford has no plan. “You can’t just slap a label on a hat and pretend you have a plan to deal with a threat such as a 25% tariff” she said.[v] Indeed, some observers were struck by the similarities between Ford’s behaviour in light of the Trump threat and his earlier response to the COVID-19 threat. In both cases, with no clue what to do himself, but sensing that these were major challenges and he was out of his depth, he threw his lot in with Justin Trudeau and the federal government. Hence his enthusiastic reception to the initial and subsequent meetings of the premiers with the prime minister over the tariff threat. Ford, as the current Chair of the Council of the Federation, was effusive in his praise of Trudeau’s Team Canada united front strategy and highly critical of Danielle Smith’s rogue dissent. [vi]
In addition to the absence of any type of concrete plan, both Crombie and Green Party leader Mike Schreiner also accused Ford of acting in his own self-interest. Schreiner declared the premier was “putting his own job before your job,” by calling the election before the RCMP investigation into the Ford government’s role in the so-called “Greenbelt Scandal” is made public.
Undoubtedly Ford is indeed hoping to avoid dealing with that report, and other longstanding complaints about his government, until after he has secured a new four-year mandate. But this is not the real reason why he wants to pull the plug so far in advance.
No, the real reason why Doug Ford is determined to call an election as quickly as possible is neither his stated concern over tariffs, nor his unstated desire to avoid fallout from scandals. It is, in fact, his desperate need to secure another mandate before federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre becomes prime minister.
As virtually all students of electoral politics in Canada know only too well, it is almost a certainty that voters in Ontario will elect a government at Queens’ Park that is the opposite political stripe from the one in Ottawa. Nor is this a recent development. From Robarts vs Pearson, Davis vs PE Trudeau and Peterson vs Mulroney to Harris vs Chretien, McGuinty/Wynne vs Harper and Ford vs J Trudeau, the balancing act between the Conservative and Liberal parties at the federal and provincial level is striking to say the least.
Needless to say, Ford can see the writing on the wall. And this time, as even he must realize, this traditional pattern of alternation is likely to be more strongly reinforced than ever by the fact that Poilievre’s Conservatives are so much further to the right than their predecessors, and Poilievre himself is often described as Trump-lite. With the anticipated defeat of the Trudeau Liberals when parliament resumes in late March, Ford knows he is almost out of time to call an election to save himself and his party from the same fate.
The tariff threat is simply the best excuse he could rustle up. Indeed, the tariff argument is a mere fig leaf, not a shield, as he will soon discover. Voters will be hard pressed to believe that Donald Trump cares whether Doug Ford has an 80 seat or 100 seat majority in the legislature. Nor are they likely to be impressed by the fact that Ford is plunging the province into an election, just a month or two before the same voters will have to trudge back to the polls in a federal election. And during all this time, who will be minding the store and handling Trump?
Perhaps most important, the premier is counting on voters ignoring the same writing on the wall. A canny electorate may well anticipate a Poilievre victory and provide themselves with a Liberal or NDP government to counter the worst impulses of the federal Conservatives. Stranger things have happened.
[i] At 79 seats out of 124, the Conservatives already hold roughly two thirds of the seats.
[ii] https://financialpost.com/news/doug-ford-confirms-snap-ontario-election
[iii] https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/video/9.6623511
[iv] Casey and Jones. “Ford Confirms He is Sending Voters to Polls a Year Before Fixed Date” Ottawa Citizen. January 25, 2025.
[v] https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/video/9.6623511
[vi] https://globalnews.ca/news/10957703/us-tariffs-ontario-jobs-doug-ford/ and https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-premiers-trudeau-meeting-trump-tariffs-1.7431085
