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Federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and 213 others vying for a seat in the House of Commons will be in the spotlight Monday, as voters in a rural Alberta riding head to the polls. Two political science professors say Poilievre is expected to handily win the byelection in Battle River-Crowfoot, a sprawling eastern Alberta riding stretching from Edmonton to Calgary. The riding and its previous incarnations have been a Tory stronghold for a century.They say the only question is: by how much?“In every election from 2004 to 2025, the vote share garnered by the Conservatives’ winning candidate has been at least 80 per cent,” said Julie Simmons with the University of Guelph in Ontario.The one exception was in 2021, when Conservative incumbent Damien Kurek got 71 per cent of the vote, lar...

Prime Minister Mark Carney issued an unusual statement Saturday to praise U.S. President Donald Trump for trying to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. Carney’s public endorsement of Trump’s leadership on the world stage came as the president and his Alaskan summit were widely derided by foreign policy and security experts. The get-together was of little value and gave Russian President Vladimir Putin, a former intelligence officer, an image boost, they said.In a brief statement Saturday, Carney said: “The leadership of President Trump and the United States is creating the opportunity to end Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine.”“Robust and credible security guarantees are essential to any just and lasting peace,” Carney continued. “I welcome the openness of the United States to pro...

When Prime Minister Jean Chrétien got hit in the face with a pie 25 years ago, the only thing hurt was his pride. A quarter-century later, Canada’s security landscape has changed radically. Threats of violence against politicians have become far more common. What seemed like a harmless prank then looks more like a warning now.“There is this view that you’re a politician, it’s all fair game,” said Catherine McKenna — who was herself the target of multiple threats of violence while she served as a federal minister.“We need people to go into politics and not feel threatened. It’s literally about the health of our democracy because if you want people to go into politics, you can’t expect that they’re going to put up with this and their families are going to put up with it.”Documents released b...