OTTAWA \u2014 A top aide to former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper has lashed out at Pierre Poilievre over his leadership of the Conservative party and his recent comments attacking the RCMP\u2019s treatment of Justin Trudeau.<\/p>\n
In a recent interview with a YouTube channel called Northern Perspective, Poilievre called the leadership of the RCMP \u201cdespicable\u201d and said many of former prime minister Trudeau\u2019s scandals \u201cshould have involved jail time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Writing an oped in the Toronto Star, Dimitri Soudas said Poilievre\u2019s recent statements demonstrated \u201crecklessness\u201d and \u201ca leadership approach that remains rooted in grievance rather than governance.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn a rule-of-law democracy, no opposition leader should ever call for a prime minister or any political rival to be jailed,\u201d he wrote. \u201cIt undermines confidence in our justice system, our federal police and ultimately the Crown.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the interview, Poilievre said Trudeau \u201cprobably\u201d violated the Criminal Code during the SNC-Lavalin affair.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese would normally have led to criminal charges, but of course the RCMP covered it all up,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Poilievre also said Trudeau broke the law when he took a \u201cfree vacation from someone with whom he had government business,\u201d alluding to the 2016 Aga Khan scandal.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the RCMP had been doing its job and not covering up for him, then he would have been criminally charged,\u201d Poilievre said. He offered no proof of a coverup.<\/p>\n
An emailed statement from a Poilievre spokesperson late Thursday said while the RCMP plays \u201can important role\u201d in protecting Canadians, \u201cRCMP leadership passively accepted Justin Trudeau withholding key witnesses and evidence from investigation\u201d in the SNC Lavalin affair.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThey also declined to pursue a criminal prosecution of Justin Trudeau\u2019s 2016 Christmas vacation to the Aga Khan\u2019s private island in the Bahamas, for which he was found guilty in 2017 of four violations of the federal Conflict of Interests Act,\u201d the statement added.<\/p>\n
Poilievre\u2019s office declined to comment Friday on the Soudas oped, but flagged a social media post from Anna Tomala, chief of staff to Harper.<\/p>\n
She said the oped does not reflect Harper\u2019s views.<\/p>\n
\u201cMr. Soudas does not speak on behalf of Mr. Harper,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n
Soudas wrote that, months after losing the federal election, Poilievre \u201cseems not to have learned the lessons of his electoral defeat.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHis latest comments show once again he has failed to make the leap from critic to leader,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Kory Teneycke, former director of communications to the Prime Minister\u2019s Office under Stephen Harper and campaign manager for Ontario Premier Doug Ford, called Poilievre\u2019s recent comments \u201cabsurd\u201d and \u201ca political misstep.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think they\u2019re well advised. I think it\u2019s quite Trumpian in tone, which I don\u2019t think is really where the Canadian electorate\u2019s at,\u201d he said, citing U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s recent calls for criminal charges against his political enemies.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not sure what his objective was in choosing to go down that path, but I don\u2019t think it\u2019s one that\u2019s broadly shared by Conservatives that I speak to anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n
Teneycke, who has been an outspoken critic of Poilievre\u2019s leadership, said the Conservative leader\u2019s comments had nothing to do with holding the current prime minister accountable.<\/p>\n
Teneycke said that while Poilievre seemed to be \u201csoftening his tone\u201d immediately after the election, he now seems to be falling back into old patterns.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think looking and sounding too much like Trump was a big liability for Poilievre with a lot of Canadian voters and I think it cost them the election,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy view is that Poilievre was trying to tone that down quite a bit and I sort of thought he was moving in a different direction. This sort of feels like a bit of a relapse, but not in a positive way.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the interview with Northern Perspective, Poilievre also linked the murder of American conservative influencer Charlie Kirk with what he called an \u201cauthoritarian left\u201d that was frustrated that it \u201ccouldn\u2019t win the argument.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kirk, an ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, was killed in September while speaking at a university in Utah.<\/p>\n
Poilievre said Kirk, who was known for his debate-style engagements on politics, often won his arguments and when the \u201cauthoritarian left\u201d couldn\u2019t beat him, it \u201cultimately ended the argument.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added the \u201cradical left\u201d is trying to drive its opponents out of the political sphere, and that people need to \u201cstand up against it\u201d and protect their families.<\/p>\n
Political violence has targeted both sides of the spectrum, both in the U.S. and in Canada.<\/p>\n
In 2020, an armed man was arrested after he rammed his truck through the gates of Trudeau\u2019s official residence. A number of other individuals have been charged after making death threats against Trudeau.<\/p>\n
And in the U.S. this year, Democratic Minnesota state representative Melissa Hortman was killed in her home with her husband.<\/p>\n
Poilievre did not mention violence against the left. He said that he too has taken security precautions to keep his family safe.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve obviously had death threats targeting me. They go after my family, they target my wife,\u201d Poilievre said.<\/p>\n
Yaroslav Baran, who served as communications chief for Harper\u2019s leadership campaign, said it\u2019s not surprising that a Conservative leader would respond to Kirk\u2019s murder.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe certainly hear no shortage of it when it\u2019s the other way around,\u201d Baran said. \u201cWe\u2019re seeing it more and more all over the map, on the right, on the left.\u201d<\/p>\n
Baran also spoke to Poilievre\u2019s comments about the RCMP. He said that while there\u2019s no widespread anti-RCMP sentiment among Conservatives, some have concerns about \u201cpotential cosiness\u201d between the RCMP\u2019s leadership and its \u201cpolitical masters.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not the RCMP rank and file, it\u2019s the leadership that can sometimes come into question,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s probably a pretty broad sentiment among Conservatives that there have been problems with the leadership of the RCMP.\u201d<\/p>\n
Poilievre also spoke during the roughly 30-minute interview about lessons learned from his party\u2019s April federal election defeat, saying his party will release its platforms earlier and nominate its candidates sooner.<\/p>\n
Soudas wrote that Canadians didn\u2019t reject conservative ideas in the last election, but Poilievre himself.<\/p>\n
\u201cMonths later, there\u2019s little evidence he has reflected, adapted, or grown. If anything, he seems more committed than ever to the very approach that cost him credibility with the voters he most needed to win,\u201d Soudas wrote.<\/p>\n
Lori Turnbull, a professor at Dalhousie University, said Poilievre\u2019s statements are directed at the base of supporters he needs behind him to win a leadership review at the party\u2019s convention in Calgary in late January.<\/p>\n
Poilievre\u2019s leadership is up for review by the party membership after losing the April election \u2014 and his own Ottawa-area seat.<\/p>\n
Poilievre returned to the House of Commons this fall after an MP in a safe Conservative riding stepped aside to let him run in a byelection.<\/p>\n
Teneycke said he suspects Poilievre will easily win the leadership vote, since he doesn\u2019t see anyone else organizing to replace him.<\/p>\n
Turnbull said Poilievre is looking to tap into the people who still distrust Trudeau, and those who think the institutions of government are working against them.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not surprised that he\u2019s doing this in advance of a leadership review where he\u2019s making assumptions about who\u2019s going to show up for that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe people who are going to show up to an in-person meeting in Calgary in the dead of winter? That\u2019s not going to be a cross-section of the Conservative party.\u201d<\/p>\n
Turnbull said she doesn\u2019t doubt Poilievre can win the leadership review but his \u201climiting\u201d rhetoric is holding him back with the wider electorate.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s using his old playbook, but it\u2019s a different game now,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2025.<\/p>\n
Catherine Morrison and Alessia Passafiume, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OTTAWA \u2014 A top aide to former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper has lashed out at Pierre Poilievre…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":221276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-221275","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/221276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}