It’s expected that people in Ontario will head to the polls on Feb. 27 after Premier Doug Ford announced that he’ll call an election next week.
Ford says he needs a mandate to take on U.S. President Donald Trump and the tariffs that he is threatening to put on Canadian exports.
“With a strong mandate, we will be able to fight with Donald Trump to make sure we stop the tariffs,” he said Friday at a press conference.
Ford, who already has a large majority government, suggested he is not satisfied with the 79 out of 124 seats his Progressive Conservatives currently hold. The election will be more than a year before the June 2026 fixed election date.
NDP MPP Sol Mamakwa says the Conservatives’ decision to call an early election shows a government that is out of touch with the communities he serves.
“There’s so much happening, so many needless deaths, unnecessary suffering, boil water advisories and we have a crisis of our own in the north,” he said. “And I think is a provincial election necessary? No.”
Veldon Coburn, an Algonquin professor at McGill University in Montreal, says Ford’s excuse that he needs a strong mandate to fight Trump “holds little water.”
“He uses the rhetoric that I need a strong mandate – well this is international affairs being led at the national level between Canada and the United States,” Coburn said. “Of course the premiers, as part of Confederation, want to play a part in it but he doesn’t need a strong mandate and in fact in Canadian Parliamentary affairs, and we do have the provincial parliament here, we don’t have mandates.”
In recent weeks, Ford has been focused on how the threatened tariffs could affect the Ontario economy.
Coburn says none of this bodes well for Indigenous issues in an upcoming campaign.
“I don’t foresee Indigenous issues registering very highly,” Coburn says. “The Ford Conservatives have not been terribly friendly towards First Nations peoples especially when upholding their treaty rights. So, I think that will be put aside and not even pop up on the radar during the campaign.”
Mamakwa says he’ll be ready to go when the call is made.
“It’s wintertime. Am I going to be on snowshoes? Am I going to be on skidoos? Am I going to be on, you know, a Beaver or a Cessna on skis? It’s going to be an interesting one. It’s not your typical campaign.”
Ford confirmed that he will be visiting the lieutenant-governor on Tuesday to dissolve the legislature on Wednesday paving the way for an election.
Ford has said he expects the possible Trump measures to hit Ontario particularly hard, specifically the auto sector. He said Ontario could lose upwards of 500,000 jobs should Trump follow through on his 25 per cent tariff threat.
“When the tariffs hit, it affects the media, it affects manufacturing, it affects every single sector in this province,” he said in response to a reporter’s question about whether he would release a fully costed platform.
“So you better pray that we get elected, because I’m going to protect everyone’s job, including the media’s job.”
The RCMP is probing the Ford government’s decision to open up parts of the protected Greenbelt for housing development — a now-reversed policy that saw a handful of developers stand to benefit to the tune of more than $8 billion, according to the auditor general.
Ford has said he is confident nothing criminal took place.
The 2022 election cost $145 million. Elections Ontario said it does not yet have a budget for the snap election.
With files from the Canadian Press
