Rise and Fall of Justin Trudeau

Look at the rise and what appears to be the fall of Justin Trudeau's political career.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s association with politics started before he was born. His father, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, otherwise known as Trudeau the Elder, was also Prime Minister of Canada. Justin was born during his father’s tenure as Prime Minister.

Justin Trudeau was first elected as a Member of Parliament in 2008. He became Leader of the Liberal Party five years later, spending nearly seven years in opposition before being elected and forming Government. Trudeau became quite popular over the course of the 2015 campaign. In fact, when the campaign started, his Liberals were in third place. He is the first person to get a Majority Government from third-party status. He reignited ‘Trudeaumannia’, a term which was used to describe Pierre Trudeau’s charisma and charm amongst the Canadian people when he emerged as Liberal Leader.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, throughout his tenure as PM, is most known for legalizing cannabis for recreational use. However, now Canadians see him as the central figure for a lackluster economy. They see him as the reason for the housing crisis and the reason for high inflation.

Canada is currently seeing some of the highest housing prices. To be able to live in Toronto with the bare minimum, you need to make at least $5000 per month. Food costs have also been rising. Many Canadians now rely on food banks to make ends meet.

Furthermore, through the years of Trudeau's mandates, similar to other PMs, he has had numerous scandals, quite a few of them have made history.

Trudeau’s scandals: in 2016, a year after being elected, Trudeau went on a vacation to The Aga Khan's island, he did not pay for any of the services he received there. This made him the first Prime Minister in Canadian history to break the ethics laws. In 2018, Trudeau had a cultural appropriation scandal during his trip to India. His family and himself were photographed wearing Indian clothing at events at which Indian nationals were wearing suits. He was heavily criticized by Canadian and international media for this. Then in 2019, a video of Justin Trudeau dressed in blackface was released. When asked if there were any other times he had dressed in blackface, Trudeau indicated to the Canadian people that he was a changed man and that he did that as a kid and would never have done something like that as an adult. However, soon after a picture of Trudeau was released, he was dressed in blackface when he was a teacher at West Point Grey Academy. Also, in 2019, Trudeau tried to pressure then Attorney General, Jody Wilson-Raybould, to interfere with the Justice Department's dealings. She left the Liberal party, as did Jane Philpot - another Trudeau Cabinet member at the time. In this case, the Ethics Commissioner found that the Prime Minister’s team had breached ethics rules. In 2020, Prime Minister Trudeau tried to give nearly $1 billion to a company which gave his family nearly half-a-million-dollars. Recently, Trudeau has had another scandal arise. He allegedly gave millions of dollars to companies during Covid-19 to create an app for traveling Canadians - the ArriveCan App. However, many of those who got grants were companies who have nothing to do with IT.

Justin Trudeau may have been a rising star nearly a decade ago. However, today, the hate he faces as Prime Minister is unprecedented. Never before have Canadians waved flags which curse and use obscene language against the PM. Now it seems that both Canadians and it seems the Liberal Party are turning away from Justin Trudeau. Recently, the Globe and Mail reported that Dominic LeBlanc wants Trudeau's job. Meanwhile, others theorize it is Justin Trudeau signaling that his time is up and he will not go without hand-selecting his successor.