Mark Carney secures four more key endorsements in race to become Liberal leader

OTTAWA — Liberal leadership hopeful Mark Carney has secured the endorsements of four more current and former cabinet ministers.

On Tuesday, Indigenous Services Minister Patty Hajdu, Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Minister Gary Anandasangaree and former housing minister Sean Fraser all threw their support behind Carney on social media.

“He’s literally one of the most respected voices on the economy worldwide, and he’s a fundamentally decent person who cares an awful lot about the country that we all love,” Fraser said in a video posted to X, formerly Twitter.

The Liberals will choose a new leader on March 9 to replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who announced this month he will resign following immense pressure from his caucus.

Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault also endorsed Carney Tuesday while speaking to reporters at the Liberal cabinet retreat in Montebello, Que.

“I’ve known Mark for many years. We’ve worked together on issues of green energy, transition, fighting climate change and the role of the financial sector in fighting climate change,” Guilbeault told reporters, adding he’s had no discussions with Carney about a potential cabinet post.

“I will continue to work with Mr. Carney to ensure that if we don’t go ahead with the consumer carbon price, that we have something else in place that will both help Canadians with affordability, but that will help us to achieve our 2030 targets.”

While Carney hasn’t said explicitly he’d drop consumer carbon pricing if he wins the leadership, he has hinted at a policy shift by saying that if the carbon price is going to go, it must be replaced “with something that is at least, if not more, effective.”

His stance on industrial carbon pricing is less clear.

“If we don’t move ahead with consumer carbon pricing, one obvious answer would be to tighten a system that we already have … for large polluters in the country,” Guilbeault said.

Asked how Carney’s stance on carbon pricing compares to that of his leadership rival Chrystia Freeland — the former finance minister has indicated she would abandon consumer carbon pricing because it’s unpopular with Canadians — Guilbeault said he wasn’t aware of Freeland’s plan and couldn’t comment on it.

“What I can say is the person, in my view, by far the best placed to articulate a concrete plan on the question on the role of carbon pricing and the role of financial markets in the fight against climate change is Mark Carney,” Guilbeault said in French.

The Conservatives issued a release saying that Guilbeault’s support for Carney is “proof” that the former banker would be aligned with Trudeau’s policy on carbon pricing.

“The fact that Guilbeault endorsed Carney is a clear signal that Canadians will get stuck with the devastating carbon tax if Carney ever becomes prime minister,” it reads, noting that Carney has a long record of advocating for carbon pricing.

In addition to Carney and Freeland, four other individuals have declared an intention to run, including former Government House leader Karina Gould, current Liberal MPs Chandra Arya and Jaime Battiste, and former Liberal MP Frank Baylis.

Carney appears to be ahead of the pack on key endorsements, with at least eight current or former cabinet ministers in his corner now, including Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly and Emergency Preparedness Minister Harjit Sajjan, who backed him earlier this week. At least 20 other Liberal MPs have also backed Carney at this point.

Freeland has the backing of more than a dozen backbench Liberal MPs and at least seven current or former cabinet ministers, including Health Minister Mark Holland, Justice Minister Arif Virani, Citizens Services Minister Terry Beech, and Fisheries Minister Diane Lebouthillier and former ministers Dan Vandal, Randy Boissonnault, and Marie-Claude Bibeau.

MPs Lisa Hepfner and Pam Damoff have both endorsed Gould, and attended her public launch on Sunday.

Candidates have until Thursday to declare their intention to run and pay an initial, refundable $50,000 deposit. As of Tuesday no candidates had paid the fee.

The Liberal party also says it has tweaked the financing rules for leadership candidates ahead of that deadline. The party says that because banks sometimes issue holds on cheques, it will accept a sworn affidavit stating that a candidate has enough money to cover the deposit, pending the release of any money that’s being held up.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 21, 2025.

Nick Murray, The Canadian Press