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This was one of the first truly significant global elections since he took office in January, and Canada did broadly reject both Trump, and Poilievre’s brand of right-wing populism. Some of the most figures in and bemoaned the loss. Australia, by the way, may be headed in a .

But as repudiations go, though, this one is not heartening. Or not as heartening as you’d hope.

First, the emergency. Donald Trump has repeatedly said he wants to end Canada as a sovereign state, is attacking our economy, and is genuinely deranged. I asked a national security expert and a military figure what would realistically keep America from, say, declaring the Arctic was theirs, or seizing our power plants in the event of a province cutting off energy over tariffs, or similar. The answer? Almost nothing, really.

Mark Carney talked in plain terms about this issue, and whether you agreed or disagreed, this was clearly an intensely consequential election for Canada. And 68.65 per cent of Canadians voted, which was the highest since 1993. Great.

Except in 2019, was 67 per cent. In 2015, 68.3. 2021 was a cynical snap election during COVID, so turnout dropped to 62.6. The Trump threat pushed Canada only slightly higher than the last change election in Canada, after Stephen Harper’s third consecutive government. If you squint, this was just a Trudeau-tinted version of that.

Worse, though, was that it is impossible to say Canada rejected the Conservative party’s brand of mean-spirited, total-warfare, anti-expert populism. Again, Pierre Poilievre is not Donald Trump, because there is, thank god, only one Donald Trump.

And yes, this was also a change election, a housing election, an affordability election, and even an inflation election. Those are real factors, and most post-COVID emergency governments have fallen in the shadow of the post-pandemic economic pain. Carney’s chief task, while wrestling Trump, is Canada’s economic well-being.

And yes, Pierre Poilievre and campaign director Jenni Byrne were hurt by their inflexibility, their zero-sum warfare, and their reluctance to condemn Donald Trump (probably because, beyond their own priors, a good number of Conservative voters approve.). That style is best viewed in the ongoing blood feud between Doug Ford’s Ontario Conservatives and Poilievre’s people, led by Bowmanville-Oshawa MP Jamil Jivani’s J.D. Vance-like attacks.Ìý

And still, the Conservatives received 41.3 per cent of the vote and won 144 seats, and held a Carney campaign to an unexpected minority. Poilievre lost his seat in Carleton, yes, but he is being defended by various quarters of the conservative commentariat, and is expected to remain the party’s champion.

Which means the already fanciful idea of moderation — of a conservative movement that moves away from the more radical, anti-reality, anti-institution, anti-media, know-nothing path of so many conservative parties across the western world, with Trump’s MAGA the apex predator of the bunch — may already be gone.

“The Conservative Party of Canada, I hope they do some soul-searching on what they believe it means to be a conservative,� said Nova Scotia premier Tim Houston, a conservative, Wednesday.

But despite — or because of — Canada’s truly toxic pretend right-wing media that disrupted debates, or Mark Carney’s child because she was trans, the CPC got 41.3 per cent. Despite this leader — who revels in being ; who calls not just the CBC but The Canadian Press state media, who calls public housing “Soviet-styleâ€� housing, who wanted to fire the head of the Bank of Canada and recommended bitcoin, who proposed to attack wokeness in universities and in general, who wants to use the notwithstanding clause to abrogate rights, who misrepresents so much, and whose philosophy of small government might fit in with the conservatives out there about applying a Canadian version of DOGE to Canada’s bureaucracy — the CPC got 41.3 per cent.Ìý

As the Star’s Richard Warnica wrote, Poilievre’s inability or unwillingness to offer real-world solutions to real-world problems was endemic. But in this difficult environment, you could see a real chance to form a future government with the same formula and a slightly renewed NDP. Though that’s .Ìý

Yes, Trump changed the race. Yes, Poilievre’s own negatives dragged him down. But not enough, at this critical time in our history. As Trump said Wednesday, “It was a very mixed signal, because it’s almost even, which makes it very complicated for the country. It was a pretty tight race.� He was, distressingly, almost right.