This piece was originally published in Canada’s National Observer. 

Just weeks ago, Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative victory seemed inevitable. But now, with Mark Carney in the race and Donald Trump’s chaotic influence, the Liberals are surging. What once looked like a Conservative landslide has become an unpredictable contest.

For those of us fighting for climate action, affordable housing and workers’ rights, this shift is both an opportunity and a warning. It improves our chances of stopping Poilievre’s hard-right agenda, but also increases the risk of a Liberal sweep that wipes out progressive incumbents and hands Carney 100 per cent of the power with less than 40 per cent of the vote.  

Beating Poilievre is critical. But what happens next is just as important.

Lessons from 2015: Winning an election vs. winning change 

In 2015, on federal election night, I was in the CTV studio when Megan Leslie — a progressive champion in what we assumed was a safe NDP seat — lost in Halifax. She was the first of many progressive incumbents who fell across the country as the Liberals secured a majority before BC had even finished voting. On my way to our volunteer party, I remember Justin Trudeau’s voice crackling over the radio: “Sunny ways, my friends, sunny ways.”

At the time, I was running Vote Together, Leadnow’s strategic voting campaign to defeat Stephen Harper. That night was a hard-won victory for the broader movement working to end a decade of Conservative rule.

But many assumed that simply changing government would naturally lead to progress. At Leadnow, we fell into that trap too, trusting that polite engagement in the Liberals’ consultations would be enough to make Trudeau fix the system that made strategic voting necessary in the first place. He had repeatedly promised that “2015 would be the last election under first-past-the-post” but, without mass pressure to hold him to it, that promise crumbled.

Today, the stakes are high again. Stopping Poilievre is urgent, but it’s not enough to just win an election. To build a more resilient Canada, we have to tackle the root causes of disillusionment and economic instability that fuel right-wing populism. That means fighting for stronger democratic institutions and a strong, independent, fair and decarbonized economy funded through taxes on the ultrarich and mega-corporations.

This moment is also an opportunity to grow the progressive tent, not just in reaction to the threat of Poilievre or Trump, but because their rise has revealed just how vulnerable our system is. If we want to push back against fascism and economic nationalism, we need to offer more than resistance. We need a bold economic alternative rooted in real opportunity, secure jobs and public investment in the things that actually make life better.

Carney won’t deliver that on his own. We’ll have to fight for it.

Adjusting the strategy for progressives 

With the Liberals surging, we need to consider and mitigate the risks of unchecked Liberal power. That means electing champions on the inside and building pressure from the outside. In some ridings, the priority is clear: stopping Poilievre’s Conservatives. But in others, where they aren’t a threat, we need to elect MPs who can hold a Liberal (or Conservative) government accountable. In the last Parliament, these MPs used their leverage to secure wins such as national dental care, pharmacare and a one-way arms embargo on Israel.

Unfortunately, today’s so-called “strategic voting” tools almost always tell people to vote Liberal because they’re projecting national and regional polling trends onto riding-level outcomes. This risks ousting progressive champion incumbents and leaving Carney unchecked in Parliament.

Real strategic voting should focus on local conditions, which is why the Vote Together campaign mapped past results onto new riding boundaries, crowdfunded riding-level polls and turned people out to support whichever candidate could beat the Conservatives. While Elections Canada’s changed regulations make accurate riding-level polls rare, past results can still guide us, and we can turn out to support real champions across the country. Fighting for champions in Parliament means more than just voting — it means organizing, volunteering and donating to key races, even outside our own ridings.

Nationally, we need Carney to defeat Poilievre’s far-right agenda, but we also need to push him to make and deliver on ambitious promises. After Trudeau’s 2015 victory, he went to the Paris climate talks and declared, “Canada is back!” Then, he approved Trans Mountain and eventually bought the pipeline when Kinder Morgan pulled out. A Carney-led government could follow the same playbook, talking a big game about standing up to Trump while making decisions that deepen inequality, fuel the climate crisis and leave working people behind. That’s why we need to push him now — and keep pushing if he wins.

The work doesn’t end on election night

We’re in a crisis. With the US now in chaos, people are clinging to stability, and that’s fueling the Liberal surge we’re seeing now. Voters are defaulting to the party they see as the safest alternative to Poilievre, with the best leader to stand up to the US.

But we can’t mistake stability for progress. A Liberal landslide that wipes out progressive voices could leave us with a government that prioritizes tax cuts or deficit reduction over public investment, repeating the 1990s-style austerity that deepened inequality and gutted public services. And if we wait for a prime minister to save us, we’ll get the same broken promises that have fueled economic strain, housing chaos and climate disasters.

If we let that happen, it won’t just potentially mean four years of disappointment. It will set the stage for something even worse than Poilievre’s return when we next cast our ballots.

This election is about more than who forms the government. It’s about whether we end up with a parliament that rubber-stamps decisions or one that fights rising authoritarianism, economic coercion and climate collapse.

The answer isn’t up to Carney or Poilievre. It’s up to us. And it depends on how we organize — before, during and after election day.

Amara Possian is the Canada Team Lead at 350.org, a global climate justice organization.