Notwithstanding, the knives are sharp.
Ottawa: On the day when the Fall Economic update was set to be delivered, Chrystia Freeland’s resignation letter, polite though it was, detonated like a political bomb in Ottawa, sending Liberals scrambling in all directions. Beneath the calm prose lies a sharp, pointed truth: the Finance Minister took what she believed to be the only honourable exit, and in doing so, she may have invoked a constitutional coup de grâce.
Let me explain. Freeland created her de facto definition of the Notwithstanding Clause—a political escape hatch rarely seen, let alone tested, in Canadian federal governance. But instead of invoking it for legislation, she applied it to her own moral compass. Faced with a Prime Minister who “no longer credibly” offered her the confidence or authority to lead, Freeland effectively called his bluff. If Trudeau was going to pull the chair out, she chose to blow up the whole table instead.
But let’s set the table forirony.
Many decades ago, there was an infamous political story called the “Night of the Long Knives”. It was how then Premier Rene Levesque wrote of the events of November 1981. “I have been stabbed in the back during the night by a bunch of carpetbaggers,”
The unfolding of what Lévesque dubbed “The Night of Long Knives” began in the spring of 1980 when Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau’s lifelong ambition might be realized: to bring home the Canadian constitution.
All did not share Trudeau’s dream. Most provincial premiers opposed Trudeau’s sweeping Charter of Rights proposal. They feared it would diminish their influence, transferring power from elected politicians to non-elected judges. A power grab? Or the right thing to do? It was what Canada needed, and of course, there would be bitter battles, especially for Leveque, who had his dream for an independent Quebec and now felt Trudeau’s last-minute pitch was directed at him and to isolate Quebec. To make his deal and realize his dream, Trudeau had to agree to a necessary clause that seemed to be playing out once again some 40 years later and to his son’s chagrin. The Notwithstanding Clause had to be part of the constitution and it became so.
Definition: Section 33 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is known as the notwithstanding Clause. Also known as the override clause, it is part of the Constitution of Canada. Although the Clause is available to governments, its use is politically tricky and, therefore, rare. It is known colloquially as the “nuclear option” because its use is considered extremely severe.
So, as Freeland was considering her options, given the PM’s desperate move to recruit Mark Carney, the former Bank of Canada governor, and push her aside after her loyalty and commitment to him and his Sunny Ways, she had had enough. She invoked her own interpretation of the Notwithstanding Clause in a one-page resignation letter.
The nuclear option metaphor may sound dramatic, but Freeland’s letter is packed with layers that signal not just a rift but a rupture. What she spells out in clear terms is a refusal to bow to costly “gimmicks” and shallow optics. In translation, the government’s political math no longer added up. Perhaps Trudeau’s calculus demanded spending sprees and political theatrics, but Freeland saw the reality—Canada teetering toward a fiscal storm while the White House sharpens its “America First” sword.
FALLOUT FOR TRUDEAU: A FRAGILE HOUSE OF CARDS
Freeland’s rebuke echoes louder than a cabinet shuffle. It is the kind of exit that doesn’t just damage a Prime Minister; it exposes him. She frames her resignation as a sober defence of Canadian stability in the face of America’s looming economic aggression. What’s her implicit question? If not me, who? What would his strategy be if Trudeau no longer listened to a finance minister who “managed our spending” for the serious challenges ahead? None of it is apparent and, hence the demand for him to leave.
Cue the spinning pundits. Liberal MPs are already searching for replacements—though, as one Avalon MP quipped, they “couldn’t name a single soul” who could fill Freeland’s shoes. And they aren’t wrong. Freeland, whatever one’s politics, was the government’s ballast—steady in international rooms, sharp with a pen, unafraid to push back on allies and adversaries. She has stood out in Ukraine and pushed for her government to step up with aid and, more importantly, with military arms commitments. She was also one of the few who saw friend-shoring as a way for the Liberal government to get in step with allies and detach from China. Still, Trudeau and others were far too deep in propping up the CCBC and the Demarais who backed his ascendency to power to do anything too dramatic.
Without her, as some observed, the government is a house of cards on a winter storm day, with Trudeau acting as the magician pulling at the wrong threads. His government was already wobbling.
The Bigger Picture: Leadership and the Threat We Ignore
And what about those 25% tariffs Freeland warns of? Make no mistake—her resignation highlights a looming Canadian crisis. The economic fallout could define this decade if U.S. protectionism locks Canadian goods out of markets. Yet Trudeau’s government seems determined to win short-term applause with a promise of more drones and patrols.
The border security issue for Canada is certainly about illegal border crossing but its more about Canada’s role in not prosecuting the transnational organized crime groups and all those supporting the Mexican cartels, Chinese Triads and China’s reverse Opium War that is claiming over 70,000 lives a year in due to deadly Fentanyl. Fentanyl manufactured and financed in Canada and Mexico with pre-cursor chemicals supplied by Chinese companies. The PRC has even offered incentives to chemical companies to ship those chemicals to all three countries.
But Freeland saw the looming tariff war as a reason to highlight the PM’s lack of seriousness with our finances and she dropped her mic with a clarity Canadians rarely see. Trudeau’s allies will call it a political betrayal and his critics a principled exit by a once loyal Liberal Minister. But one thing’s for sure: Freeland may have used her version of the Notwithstanding Clause—and in doing so, she did what most in caucus would not: She blew up the Prime Minister, exposing him as an emperor with no clothes. Given it’s the season of giving, Freeland’s actions have sharpened the knives, and they’re looking to carve up Trudeau’s political carcass.
As Canadians are familiar, this minority government has been teetering on the brink of collapse and has remained in power only due to an agreement with the New Democratic Party and its leader, Jagmeet Singh. So, no matter who I talked with across Canada and the United States, the question was when he would resign and who would replace him.
Will it be Dominic LeBlanc, the acting Finance Minister and loyal Liberal Minister or perhaps Francois Phillipe Champagne, the current Minister of Innovation? Or, as mentioned earlier, is it former Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney. After all, according to various stories circulating in Ottawa, he was the supposed replacement for Ms. Freeland. As the Globe and Mail reported, the former Finance Minister was given the news on a Zoom call a week ago Friday and, ultimately, it led to the bombshell resignation letter that led to the chaos in Ottawa this week.
In a way, she was saying that, notwithstanding our relationship, I hereby tender my resignation. Her principled stand now looks like political opportunism. She certainly blew up the PM with her letter, which may well be the final nail in the PM’s pollical coffin. With the publisher working overtime to get her biography in bookstores, it appears she declared her hand and will vye for the PM role until an election in the Fall.
May the leadership contest begin.
* Dean Baxendale is Publisher, CEO of the China Democracy Fund and co-author of the upcoming book, Canada Under Siege.