COQUITLAM, B.C. – Mark Carney has led a charmed life since entering politics.

Even the latest mini-scandal that broke on Thursday works in his favour, given it concerns a subject he is desperate to talk about.

Radio-Canada reported that in Carney’s call with Donald Trump on March 28, the president brought up the issue of Canada becoming the 51st state of the United States. At the time, Carney said Trump had respected Canada sovereignty and had parked his expansionist language.

Carney

admitted on Thursday that Trump did raise the 51st state issue

. “I said he did,” he said — which he didn’t. “I was clear with everyone.”

The issue of whether the Liberal leader misled people speaks to his character, and whether he is prone to elide certain, inconvenient facts.

But more pertinent to the vote on Monday, he was able to quickly turn the situation to his advantage.

Carney was speaking at the AMPCO auto manufacturing plant in the B.C. riding of Port Moody—Coquitlam. He referred to the comments made by Trump in the Oval Office on Wednesday, when the president said he does not want Canada to play any part in the North American auto industry. “I will be equally clear. This is Canada and we decide what happens here,” Carney said.

The Conservative campaign must have felt like taking to the window ledges when the feed came out of the White House Wednesday of

Trump musing again about Canada becoming the 51st state

. If Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre fell into a bucket of lollipops, he’d come out sucking his thumb, such is his luck at the moment.

When pressed by reporters in Coquitlam, Carney said Trump “has these things in his mind — it’s not new.”

But he said the more important question is: what’s going to be done?

“This has to be a serious discussion between sovereign nations. That’s what he and I agreed. It’s not a photo op, it’s not a visit to Mar-a-Lago.”

He has repeatedly contrasted his resumé with Poilievre’s, when it comes to international crises. “A crisis is a time for experience, not experiments,” he said at the rally in Cloverdale, B.C., on Wednesday evening.

Any conversation that ends with Carney reciting his mantra: “The president wants to break us so he can own us,” is a good day for the Liberals, regardless of the preamble.

It underscores the unusual nature of this general election.

Anyone who has worked on previous tilts usually resorts to the cliché that “campaigns matter.” It is a cliché for a reason: they usually do.

But this one has not — at least, not so far.

Carney became Liberal leader on March 9. It was after that victory that the polls flipped, and the Conservative party’s dominance of public opinion ended. There have been 153 polls since then and the Conservatives have only been ahead in seven (three from the same pollster). The gap between the two leading parties has barely shifted during the April campaign, despite all the mud that has been slung.

The lead has remained constant throughout the campaign, regardless of debates, phantom numbers in the platform and the leader forgetting key facts, like the president disrespecting Canadian sovereignty on their phone call.

It is all the more unusual since, though the Liberal leader exudes confidence and has a plausible manner, there is no Carney-mania. At rallies in Laval and the lower mainland of B.C. this week there was a tangible enthusiasm gap. The leader’s speeches undulate and meander, rarely reaching the crescendo the crowd is desperately awaiting. He is hesitant in French and halting in English, apparently still learning to use the teleprompter.

None of this has mattered to this point.

A plurality of Canadians decided in mid-March that Trump’s musings about taking over Canada were so alarming they required an experienced leader with a plan to fight back, and that all other concerns were subsidiary.

Into this breach, with providential timing, stepped Carney.

He would probably argue that his good fortune is the consequence of opportunity meeting preparation — and there is some truth to this. He didn’t just start saying: “Build, baby, build” six weeks ago.

But his timing has been uncanny,

Wrap all of that in

a parable combining hockey and Canadian exceptionalism

— “Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves” — and you have a powerful narrative to peddle to voters. With just four days until polling day, it may be enough, no matter how clumsily it is delivered.

National Post

jivison@criffel.ca

• John Ivison: Carney dreams of majority but dare not say it
• John Ivison: Conservatives’ platform undermines their attacks on Liberal profligacy

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MISSISSAUGA, ONT.

—

Days after Liberal Leader Mark Carney named China as Canada’s biggest security threat, a video published by a Chinese-language media outlet shows one of his Liberal candidates calling China one of its “like-minded allies.”

In the recently-filmed video posted on Sunday, Majid Jowhari, the Liberal incumbent in the Greater Toronto Area riding of Richmond Hill South, also argued that Canada needs to deepen its trade ties with China amid the trade war with the United States.

His comments are notable because they appear to contrast starkly with Carney’s view on China expressed during the English-language debate last week.

“I think the biggest security threat to Canada is China,” Carney said when asked to name the most significant threat facing the country.

Jowhari’s was first elected in 2015 in Richmond Hill, a riding where 32.6 per cent of residents are of Chinese descent,

according to 2021 census data

. Conservative candidate and corporate lawyer Vincent Ho is challenging him for the seat.

In the roughly two-minute video, Jowhari outlines his role as co-chair of Parliament’s Canada-China legislative association and calls himself an advocate for the local Chinese-Canadian community.

“In the time of growing uncertainty and Trump’s tariffs threatening our economy and our sovereignty, it’s more important (than) ever to protect and strengthen partnership with key trading partners such as Europe and China,” Jowhari says in the video,

published on Sunday

on the

North American Canadian Voice Cultural Media’s website. 

Jowhari also discusses his work on Parliament Hill advocating against anti-Asian racism and says he has visited China “many times.”

“The blend of tradition and innovation is something that I admire. Deepening our partnership with like-minded allies such as China present opportunities for shared prosperity and supports Canadians’ role as a constructive and engaged player in the global economy.”

He ends the video by saying the “Chinese community needs a strong voice to fight for them.”

“The Liberal party needs a voice to help strengthen the partnership between Canada, Chinese-Canadians and China. I am Majid Jowhari and I can be that voice. Please vote for Majid Jowhari on April 28. Thank you.”

Reached for comment, Jowhari’s campaign declined to respond. National Post has also sought comment from the Liberal party campaign.

The outlet that published his video describes itself as being “rooted” in Toronto and says it uses its website and WeChat to publish “stories of Chinese people living abroad.” 

For years, Canadian national security agencies have considered China to be the most serious and sophisticated threat actor against Canada.

Twice already this campaign, the federal election monitoring task force has warned that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was likely behind influence campaigns in Canada.

On Monday, members of the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections (SITE) task force said the PRC appeared to be behind a transnational repression operation to undermine Joe Tay, a Toronto-area Conservative candidate and vocal critic of the Chinese regime.

SITE members said they suspected the PRC was pushing a mock “wanted” poster of Tay online and boosting disparaging stories about the Hong Kong democracy activist while suppressing searches of his name on China-based social media platforms.

“A Liberal candidate calls China a ‘like-minded ally. CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service) says China is the most serious threat actor. SITE is tracking China’s (disinformation) ops. Yet the Liberals keep sidling up,” Conservative incumbent Michael Chong posted to X.

“It’s time to treat national security seriously. Vote Conservative.”

Two weeks ago,

the electoral interference watchdog said

the PRC was behind an information manipulation campaign on China’s largest social media network WeChat to influence opinion of Carney.

The Liberals have also come under fire for their candidates’ perceived proximity to individuals suspected of ties with the Chinese government.

Last week, National Post reported that a Montreal-area Liberal candidate

invited the head of two organizations

suspected by the RCMP of operating a secret Chinese police station to a campaign event.

The previous week, this newspaper reported

on new evidence of friendly ties between the Chinese government and another Toronto-area Liberal candidate who attended a massive military parade and show of martial strength in Beijing a decade ago.

Peter Yuen, the Liberal candidate in Markham—Unionville, attended the event on the invitation of a Chinese agency dedicated to influencing ethnic Chinese in other countries.

Yuen replaced former Liberal incumbent Paul Chiang after he stepped aside following the RCMP confirming it was looking into comments that Chiang had previously made to Chinese media about Tay, the Conservatives’ candidate who first vied for the nomination in his riding.

Chiang had told the crowd they could turn Tay over to Chinese authorities to cash in on a

HK$1 million bounty (CAN$184,000) placed on him. Before he stepped aside, Chiang apologized. 

In a report published in January

, Foreign Interference inquiry head Marie-Josée Hogue said the People’s Republic of China was the “main perpetrator” of clandestine and illegal influence operations in the country.

“The PRC uses a range of tools, including Canada-based proxies. These tools include the monitoring of diaspora communities and transnational repression; activities meant to impact the outcome of Canadian democratic processes (including providing financial support to preferred candidates); and clandestinely shaping narratives in support of PRC strategic interests,” read the report.

The Chinese government also exerts significant control on the Chinese-language traditional and social media platforms and uses the influence to promote “pro-PRC narratives, spread disinformation, and suppress anti-China content,” Hogue noted.

More recently, China’s ambassador to China suggested that China and Canada could partner to push back against U.S. Donald Trump’s tariffs.

Chinese Ambassador Wang Di

told The Canadian Press

that “China is Canada’s opportunity, not Canada’s threat.”

National Post,

with additional reporting from The Canadian Press

staylor@postmedia.com

cnardi@postmedia.com

• Liberal candidate invited head of suspected secret Chinese police station to campaign event
• China linked to fake ‘wanted’ poster, repression efforts against Conservative candidate

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U.S. President Donald Trump downplayed the steep drop in international tourists to the U.S. during a scrum with reporters in the Oval Office on Wednesday.

“It’s not a big deal,” he responded to a reporter in an exchange shared by

CBS News on X

.

She had remarked that “there are fewer people suddenly that want to travel to the United States.”

He suggested citizens from other countries were probably displaying national pride. “There is a little nationalism there, I guess, perhaps.”

Then he shifted to

other topics

such as the impact of China and Japan keeping their currencies low relative to the U.S. dollar, making it hard to see American tractors there.

But the reporter persisted and asked whether incidents of international travellers being detained at U.S. entry points might be deterring tourists.

Trump continued to downplay the issue: “No, we treat our tourists great. We are the tourism capital of the world. There’s no place like this and there may be a little bit of nationalism, but I doubt it.”

President Donald Trump told CBS News’ @nancycordes he thinks one of the reasons tourism to the U.S. is down could be due to “nationalism” on the part of tourists from other countries, though also said he “doubts it.”

“There’s a little nationalism there, I guess, perhaps,” he… pic.twitter.com/kXW9V4JJzY

— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 24, 2025

 

The steep decline in visitors to the U.S. has been attributed to a

combination of factors

, including Trump’s tariffs, confrontational rhetoric, travel advisories issued by other countries, and — as noted in the Oval Office exchange — high-profile detentions of foreign visitors.

Canadians cancelling trips to U.S. amid fear of difficulty at U.S. border

Several countries, including

Canada

, Germany, France and the U.K., have updated their travel advisories, warning citizens about potential difficulties when visiting the U.S.

The recent shift is pronounced among travellers from

Canada and Western Europe

, historically the largest sources of foreign visitors to the U.S. For instance, there were

17 per cent fewer land border crossings

by Canadians in March (nearly 900,000 fewer travellers), with 31.9 per cent fewer returning visitors by land and 13.5 per cent

fewer by air

.

Drop in visitors to U.S. is worldwide

In March 2025, there was an

11.6 per cent year-over-year decrease

in overseas visitors to the U.S.,

contributing to a projected 

5.5 per cent annual decline

for 2025, according to Tourism Economics.

 This follows a 

3.3 per cent global visitor drop

(air, sea and land) in early 2025 compared to 2024

.

“

Travel to the U.S. from almost everywhere is falling under Trump,” wrote the

WWU Center for Economic and Business Research in an April 20

post to X

that included a chart showing declines from many parts of the world.

Travel to the U.S. from almost everywhere is falling under Trump. If sustained, the drop could translate to billions of dollars in lost tourism revenue, industry experts project. https://t.co/aM22LnOJ6C pic.twitter.com/4qzQV8oTG5

— WWU Center for Economic and Business Research (@PugetSoundEF) April 20, 2025

 

Tourism is a crucial economic sector for U.S.

But tourism is a

vital sector of the U.S. economy

, supporting millions of American jobs and contributing significantly to tax revenues and local economies. Even a 10 per cent drop in Canadian tourism could result in a $2.1-billion loss in spending and put

140,000 jobs in the U.S. hospitality sector at risk.

So, despite Trump’s response, industry experts and economic analysts have warned that the decline in tourism could have substantial economic repercussions, with estimates of up to

$90 billion in lost revenue

for the U.S. economy this year.

Tourism industry groups and economic analysts have sounded the alarm, warning that the combination of trade hostilities and a hostile travel environment could destabilize the entire U.S. tourism economy. The

United States Tour Operators Association

has specifically cautioned that continued tariff hikes and political tensions could cost the industry up to $64 billion this year, with a projected 9.4 per cent decline in international visitors for 2025.

The anticipated decline in tourism has already prompted airlines, such as

Air Canada

, to cut flights to U.S. destinations due to decreased demand, further compounding economic losses in affected regions.

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OTTAWA — Liberal Leader Mark Carney is admitting that U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated his threat to annex Canada to the United States during their call on March 28 despite claiming publicly at the time that Trump “respected Canada’s sovereignty.”

Carney first made the admission on Thursday after Radio-Canada reported that

Trump brought up the idea of making Canada the 51st state

during their exchange last month.

It seemingly contradicted what Carney stated publicly at the time, which was that Trump “respected Canada’s sovereignty” in his public and private comments. That was widely reported and seen as a first step in repairing the relationship between both countries.

“To be clear, as I’ve said to anyone who’s raised this issue in private or in public, including the President, it will never happen,” said Carney in Coquitlam, British Columbia, about Trump’s threat to annex Canada by economic force.

Carney reiterated they had a “constructive” discussion and said they both agreed to begin comprehensive negotiations about a new economic and security relationship between Canada and the U.S. “as sovereign nations” immediately following the federal election.

During the media availability, Carney seemed irritated by the reporters’ repeated questions on why he never mentioned Trump’s mention of the 51st state after his call with him.

“Look, the president says lots of things, but the essence of the discussion and where we moved the conversation to was exactly what I said,” he said.

“We talked about lots of things, okay? And what’s important is the conclusions of the call, the results of the call, and those are exactly the same on the American side and the Canadian side… And those were that it was very constructive,” he added.

Trump had indeed struck a seemingly more respectful tone in his read-out of his call with Carney last month and dialed back his talk of Canada becoming the 51st state. He has also not called Carney the “governor” of Canada, as he usually did with Justin Trudeau.

Last week, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt denied there was a change of stance on the annexation of Canada and said Trump still “believes that Canadians would benefit greatly from becoming the 51st state of the United States of America.”

On Wednesday, Trump

inserted himself into Canada’s federal election

during a signing ceremony inside the Oval Office, saying Canada “would cease to exist as a country” if the U.S. stopped buying its goods and that Canada “as a state, it works great.”

“He has these things in his mind. This is not news,” said Carney. “He raises it all the time. But then the question is, what’s going to be done with it? And does he understand where we stand? More particularly, where do I stand? He is under no illusions.”

Other party leaders chastised Carney for not being entirely truthful on March 28.

“I think what we’ve learned from this phone call with Donald Trump is that Mr. Carney was not being straight up with Canadians,” said NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh.

Singh wondered what else Carney would not disclose if he were elected at the head of a majority government: “If he’s not going to tell us about a phone call, what about the details of the negotiations? And what about what he’s willing to trade away?”

Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet accused Carney of “manipulating” the truth with “little precaution” to give the impression that he is a strong negotiator.

Blanchet was asked if it may have been a deliberate strategy to remind Canadians of Trump’s threat at a time where

Liberal sources are claiming polls might be tighter than anticipated

in key battlegrounds like in Quebec which could cost them their majority.

“I’m not their strategist, I’m not imagining wild conspiracies, but I can imagine that it serves them,” said Blanchet.

“Liberals are (juggling) between pretending that Mr. Carney has extinguished the threat (of Trump annexing Canada) and regularly resurrecting that threat because fear has been their main argument at the start of the Liberal campaign,” he added.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre opted to remain prudent in his comments about the call.

“I wasn’t there. But what’s clear is that we will stand up for our sovereignty, we will never be an American state, and we will focus on what we can control, which is to reverse the disastrous Liberal economic policies that Mark Carney advised Justin Trudeau to take.”

Carney said that Trump reiterating his threat of annexation is underscoring in his opinion just how important the choice facing Canadians on Monday.

“Who can stand up to President Trump, who can build Canada strong, who has the experience in order to do that? That’s the crucial choice that Canadians need to make.”

With files from the Associated Press. 

National Post

calevesque@postmedia.com

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The 21-year-old international student who was killed by a stray bullet last week at a bus stop in Hamilton, Ont., had “zero capability of avoiding” it, police said as they continued their investigation into the shooting.

Harsimrat Randhawa, a 21-year-old student from India, had recently been at a gym in the upper area of Hamilton, police said. She had taken public transit to get there, and had been waiting to cross the street by the bus stop near Upper James Street and South Bend Road when the shooting occurred.

Speaking to reporters

on Wednesday, Acting Detective Sergeant Daryl Reid of the Hamilton Police Service said he had watched CCTV video captured at the time of the shooting.

“I know from watching the video that it happened very quickly,” he said. “Harsimrat had zero capability of avoiding what was about to unfold in front of her. She had just stepped off a city bus (and) was waiting to cross the street from my understanding, and everything unfolded so quickly she had no time at all to react.”

The incident occurred at a busy street corner, he said, and there may be witnesses who have not yet spoken to police.

“It was at 7:30 at night, there was a significant amount of traffic travelling up and down the roadway,” Reid said. “We know from watching that video that there were numerous cars that just passed through at that very moment.”

He added: “Many of those people have come forward, and I thank those people for coming forward to assist us, but we know there are more people out there that might have even the smallest piece of information that could help us, and putting all of those little pieces together is what we need to do, so we continue and encourage those people to come forward.”

Also on Wednesday, people gathered at Mohawk College, where Randhawa had been studying, to remember her.

“I’m truly at a loss for words. I don’t know what to say after the senseless tragedy,” said Katie Burrows, vice president of students and international,

per the CBC

.

“I’m sure that you all shared the heartbreak that I feel — a heartbreak for Harsimrat, who came to Canada to train for a career in helping others, and who I’m sure was looking forward to what her life would look like after she finished her program.”

Randhawa was going into her second year studying occupational physiotherapy at the college.

Micheline Lancia, one of her professors, remembered her as “a very kind soul” who was taken too soon.

“It’s very, very overwhelming to see a student who was doing so well, gentle, respectful, a little bit timid, she would have been a beautiful health-care worker. So, it’s a loss to everybody,” Lancia told the CBC.

“She was just very respectful of her presence. With health care, we are constantly handling patients, so you have to ask for permission and let them know that you will be touching them so they understand the process. And she was so respectful of that entire aspect of clinical skills and working with patients.”

Police said the shots were fired from a black Mercedes SUV targeting a white Hyundai Elantra. Reid said

both vehicles had since been recovered

.

“With the assistance of the Toronto Police Service, the white Hyundai Elantra was recovered on April 20th in a residential area in northwestern Toronto,” he said. “That vehicle has since been towed back to Hamilton for forensic examination.”

The following day, Hamilton police executed a search warrant at a residence in central Hamilton where they recovered the Mercedes.

“That vehicle has also been brought back to our police station for forensic examination,” Reid said. “Investigators have been narrowing down the pool of people who are associated to these two vehicles.”

He added: “We will leave no stone unturned until we find you. We encourage those involved in the April 17th incident to contact their lawyer and turn themselves into … police and speak to us.”

Reid said he did not believe the vehicles were stolen, but said the ongoing nature of the investigation prevented him from discussing their owners.

“There’s various things that we are going to do to try to figure out who had the vehicles at the time,” he said. “Knowing an owner is one thing but knowing who’s operating the vehicle and who’s shooting the gun at the time that it’s being used is a different part.”

Randhawas cousin, Balraj Singh,

told the Canadian Press

that her parents in India are devastated by the news.

“They will not be able to come here because they are in very bad condition now,” he said. “They are not even able to eat and sleep.”

Singh said Randhawa worked at a local McDonald’s, usually on weekends. He described her as a quiet and introverted person who was “brilliant” in her studies.

“She was absolutely happy in Canada,” he said, adding that her body would be repatriated to India this week.

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Neither the NDP nor the Green Party of Canada are expected to form government after April 28, and now it’s forecast that respective leaders Jagmeet Singh and Elizabeth May are in danger of losing their B.C. seats to a Liberal and a Conservative.

In Singh’s riding of Burnaby—South, poll aggregator

338Canada

projects Liberal candidate Wade Wei Lin Chang to win with 38 per cent of the vote. Singh is forecast to finish third with 29 per cent behind the Conservatives’ James Yan, who clocks in at 32.

The margin of error for each projection is eight percentage points.

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When first elected for Burnaby South in 2019, Singh

took almost 38 per cent

of the vote. He increased it to 40 per cent in 2021, per Elections Canada.

At the time of prime minister Justin Trudeau’s resignation, 338Canada’s data gave him just over a 70 per cent chance of reclaiming his seat. In the following weeks, his odds fell and the likelihood of a Conservative win improved, only for both to be significantly overtaken by the Liberals once Mark Carney won the leadership.

If Thursday had been election day, Singh had a four per cent chance of being re-elected while Chang’s odds of turning the historically orange seat red were 81 per cent, per 338Canada.

Why Jagmeet Singh lost his cool during the French-language debate

Former NDP leader Thomas Mulcair said this week that Singh should surrender leadership if the party lose official party status.

Before the election was called, the party held 24 seats in the House, but polls since Trudeau’s departure show support dwindling much like Singh’s own fortunes. An election held on Thursday would yield just eight seats,

338Canada

projects. Twelve seats are required to maintain status.

“He’s got to ensure he gets it,” Mulcair said during

a CTV panel segment.

“I think he’s serene in his understanding of what it might mean for him, and I’m not getting any indication that he’s intent of fighting to stay on.”

Singh has been pointedly asked about his future during campaign stops.

In Winnipeg on Thursday morning

, when it was put to him that his leadership is on the line, Singh replied, “What’s on the line in this election are working people and everyday families. That’s what I’m focused on.”

On Wednesday, during

a campaign stop in Edmonton

to pitch the party’s national rent control program, Singh was asked by reporters what kind of metric he’s looking for to justify staying on as leader.

“I’m never going to stop fighting for these people. I’m never going to back down,” he replied in an answer more focused on the rent issue of the day.

It was the same

a day earlier in Vancouver

, where he insisted his only focus is the remaining campaign ahead and not what happens after.

“We got five days left–I didn’t hear any bell. Did you guys hear a bell? This fight’s not over. We’re here fighting every single day,” says Jagmeet Singh when asked by a reporter how his party would fare if fewer NDP MPs are elected to the House of Commons.
#cdnpoli #elxn2025 pic.twitter.com/3iqfaapxg2

— CPAC (@CPAC_TV) April 23, 2025

Burnaby Central was established following the 2022 federal electoral boundaries redistribution, making it a new riding for 2025. And while it still consists of much of Singh’s original riding, it now encompasses parts of what were once Burnaby North—Seymour and New Westminster—Burnaby.

Since 2015, the latter has been held by New Democrat Peter Julian, who is now seeking re-election in New Westminster-Burnaby-Maillardville.

338Canada

gives him a 49 per cent chance of winning, but he’s in a dog fight with the Liberals’ Jake Sawatzky (45 per cent).

Burnaby North—Seymour, meanwhile, has been a Liberal seat occupied by Terry Beech since 2015, but never without stiff NDP competition at the polls.

Beech wants to go back to Ottawa, and

338Canada

gives him 99 per cent chance to win.

May not ready to retire

Meanwhile, across the Strait of Georgia in Saanich—Gulf Islands, May is trailing Conservative candidate Cathie Ounsted as the campaign winds down.

As of Thursday, the long-time Green leader and member of parliament is deadlocked at 34 per cent with her Tory opponent, with respective margins of error of eight and seven percentage points, per

338Canada

. Liberal David Beckham is not far behind with a projected 24 per cent.

Ounsted has a 52 per cent chance of winning an election held on Thursday, according to 338Canada. May stands at 48.

“There are many things I want to accomplish before I decide I’m going to retire, and I want to keep working,” she told

The Tyee

last week.

The coastal riding has been May’s since 2011 when she became the first Green MP elected to the House by defeating Gary Lunn, who’d held the seat since 1997 for the Reform Party, the Canadian Alliance and then the Conservatives under prime minister Stephen Harper.

May went on to collect more than 54 per cent of the ballots in 2015, having won every poll in the riding, and just under 50 in 2019. Her margin of victory shrank in the 2021 election when she secured the win with only 37.6 per cent in the face of stiff competition from the Liberal and Conservative representatives.

In an interview with the

Times Colonist

this week, May noted that the riding has historically been some shade of Conservative, so the challenge doesn’t surprise her.

“They have a base here and they turn out their supporters. And right now, it’s a two-way race between the Conservative and me. So it doesn’t feel all that different.”

Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here.

OTTAWA — Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says he’ll do away with the Liberal electric vehicle mandate if he becomes prime minister after Monday’s election.

Poilievre said at

a Thursday event

at a Halifax car dealership that the state has no place in the garages of Canadians.

“Conservatives will put (Canadians) back in the drivers seat for a change. You will decide what’s good for you and your family,” Poilievre told supporters.

“Let me be clear, I have nothing against electric cars. If you want one, buy one. Free choice,” he added.

Under the Liberal plan, sales of gasoline and diesel-powered cars will be gradually phased out over the next decade, with a target of 100 per cent zero emission car sales by 2035.

Poilievre said that the time to act is now, with the plan starting with 2026 model-year vehicles.

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“Dealerships like this one across Canada have no idea how they’re going to meet these timelines,” said Poilievre.

Poilievre said that the Liberal mandate was effectively a $20,000 per car tax on gas and diesel-powered vehicles, which would go from the pockets of Canadian taxpayers to foreign automakers like Tesla.

Under the Liberal regulations

, car companies may generate one credit for each $20,000 invested in clean, and sell credits to other companies for the equivalent value.

The credits cannot be used after model year 2030.

Brian Kingston, the head of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association was quick to applaud Poilievre’s announcement.

“Mandating EV sales when the auto industry is under attack from US tariffs is putting the puck in our own net. Scrapping the mandate is a smart policy and urgently needed,” wrote Kingston on social media.

Poilievre also said on Thursday that he’d keep billions in Liberal subsidies for domestic EV and battery plants, promising to honour all deals that have already been signed.

“(Conservatives) will continue to support… the commitments the government has made because we don’t believe in tearing up agreements, we believe in supporting Canadian jobs right here in Canada,” said Poilievre.

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The human mind really can go blank during consciousness, according to a new review that challenges the assumption people experience a constant flow of thoughts when awake.

Instead, there are moments when the human mind seems empty of any content, and people seemingly aren’t thinking of anything at all.

“Mind blanking” is a newly explored and distinct mental state that isn’t the same as a lapse of attention or a wandering mind, the research team writes. People aren’t thinking about something else.

Instead, “our minds go ‘nowhere’ because they seem to lack content.”

Mind blanking is a common, daily life phenomenon linked to changes in states of arousal, the researchers report, and tends to occur towards the end of long and demanding attention tasks like exams, when people are sleep deprived or after an intense workout. Meaning that, “when the brain is in a high- or low-arousal state, a mind blank is more likely to occur.”

In experiments with healthy volunteers, the brain shows signs of “deactivation” and an increase in sleep-like slow brain waves during a reported mind blank. Heart rates and pupil sizes decrease. A part of the brain appears asleep, “which may represent a state of ‘local sleep’ rather than outright sleep,” the researchers write.

The experience has been described as a “lack of conscious awareness,” they noted, during which “the individual is not focally aware of any stimuli, either internal or external,” a particularly dangerous state if it occurs during high-risk, inopportune moments, like driving.

It may be the result of glitches in memory, language or attention. In experiments, people report feeling sleepier, and more sluggish, and they make more errors on attention tasks moments before their minds go “nowhere.”

While some people never report mind blanking, adults and children with ADHD (attention deficient hyperactivity disorder) report the experience more frequently than “neurotypical people,” the researchers said.

“Mind going blank” is also one of the core symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder. It’s also related to strokes, seizures, traumatic brain injuries and an “ultra-rare” sleep disorder (Kleine-Levin syndrome) that affects primarily teenage boys and that causes them to sleep up to 20 hours a day.

“The experience of a ‘blank mind’ is as intimate and direct as that of bearing thoughts,” the team of neuroscientists and philosophers write.

It’s not entirely clear what these “blanks” represent, they said. However, “We sought to better understand mind blanking by parsing through 80 relevant research articles — including some of our own in which we recorded participants’ brain activity when they were reporting that they were ‘thinking of nothing,’” Athena Demertzi, of the University of Liege, Belgium, said in a press release.

If scientists can better understand what’s happening in the brain, and if people could learn how to deliberately, instead of randomly, not think about anything, it could be an interesting strategy for dealing with anxiety, negative thoughts or other unpleasant emotions, lead author Thomas Andrillon, a cognitive neuroscientist at the Paris Brain Institute, said in an interview with National Post.

“It could represent a tool we could use to be more relaxed and improve our wellbeing.”

People assume Descartes’ Cogito, ergo sum goes both ways, Andrillon said: “‘I think, therefore I am’ and ‘I am, therefore I think.’

“We challenge the latter by showing that people can be conscious without thinking about something in particular.”

“Most of the time, by definition, mind blanking will go unnoticed, since there is no content associated with it,” Andrillon added. “We didn’t realize there was a blank.

“But sometimes, there are moments in your everyday life where we can introspect a bit about our own stream of thoughts and we can notice that there has been a gap,” like when people walk into a room and can’t quite remember how they got there, or why they’re even there. “It’s pretty frequent in everyday life,” Andrillon said.

There’s no “definitive guidance” on how to reliably measure mind blanking, the researchers write. But their review found that mind blanking is associated with specific changes in brain dynamics during “no-thinking” moments.

In his own experiments, Andrillon has tracked, via EEG and special MRI imaging, the brain activity of healthy volunteers performing different tasks.

When people are interrupted randomly and asked the contents of their thoughts — “what are you thinking?” — mind blanking is typically reported five to 20 per cent of the time.

The researchers have to rely on people’s subjective experience. “Obviously, we need to trust what they are telling us,” Andrillon said. “But it doesn’t look like these mind blanking reports are completely random — they have a specific behavioural and physiological signature” different from what they see when people report another mind state, like that they were thinking about something else, and not the task.

Brain rhythms tend to slow when people mind blank, similiar to the brain changes that occur just before the onset of sleep, again because of lower arousal. That suggests there are moments during the day “where parts of the brain start showing signs of sleeping, resulting in gaps and moments of mind blanking,” Andrillon said.

The research supports their hypothesis that mind blanking is the first step toward falling asleep, he said.

It also fits with his own ongoing research that found mind blanking more than tripled among healthy volunteers who were sleep deprived for 24 hours.

But the opposite can also be true: people who are very aroused, like after intense physical exercise, tend to report more blanking, suggesting that the phenomenon occurs “every time we go away from the sweet spot of optimal levels of arousal,” Andrillon said.

The experience of mind blanking comes in varying degrees, from a complete gap to a sensation of feeling time passing, he said. From a practical perspective, asking people how frequently they experience the phenomenon could be a helpful way for doctors to judge people’s level of daytime attention and vigilance, he said.

The review, “Where is my mind? A neurocognitive investigation of mind blanking,” is published this week in the Cell Press journal, Trends in Cognitive Sciences.

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