{"id":54462,"date":"2025-08-08T12:21:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-08T12:21:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/54462\/"},"modified":"2025-08-08T12:21:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-08T12:21:07","slug":"hero-to-zero-francois-legault-is-following-in-justin-trudeaus-footsteps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/54462\/","title":{"rendered":"Hero to zero: Fran\u00e7ois Legault is following in Justin Trudeau\u2019s footsteps"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Pressure is mounting on Quebec Premier Fran\u00e7ois Legault to step down, with only a quarter of Quebeckers saying that they approve of his performance.Jacques Boissinot\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Fran\u00e7ois Legault<\/a> was Canada\u2019s most popular premier. With an approval rating that peaked<\/a> at 85 per cent, Mr. Legault appeared to walk on water. Prominent members of Quebec\u2019s sports and entertainment star system rallied behind the Coalition Avenir Qu\u00e9bec Leader as they urged the public to obey his anti-COVID rules.<\/p>\n

Five years can seem like a millennium in politics. But his hero-to-zero descent in the polls has been stunning nonetheless. He is now Canada\u2019s most unpopular premier<\/a>, with only a quarter of Quebeckers saying that they approve of his performance. After winning a second majority government in 2022, and 90 of the National Assembly\u2019s 125 seats, his CAQ is now facing annihilation in next year\u2019s provincial election.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Mr. Legault seems to be following in Justin Trudeau\u2019s<\/a> footsteps as pressure mounts for him to step down before the next vote. So far, he has insisted that his resignation is not in the cards and, with no heir apparent waiting in the wings, he has been able to hold on. That could change after Monday\u2019s by-election in the riding of Arthabaska, a semi-rural riding south of Trois-Rivi\u00e8res in what used to be solid CAQ country. <\/p>\n

The contest to replace the former CAQ MNA, Eric Lefebvre, who is now the local Conservative MP in Ottawa, is expected to be a two-way race between the Parti Qu\u00e9b\u00e9cois and the Quebec Conservative Party, whose leader, \u00c9ric Duhaime, hopes to become his party\u2019s first elected MNA. <\/p>\n

Mr. Lefebvre won almost 52 per cent of the popular vote in the 2022 election, but CAQ candidate Keven Brasseur will be lucky to crack double digits this time around. The upstart provincial Conservatives finished second in the last election with about 25 per cent of the vote. But with Mr. Duhaime, whose libertarian rhetoric has made him an eccentric, if polarizing, sensation on the Quebec political scene, the party could be poised for a breakthrough.<\/p>\n

Record number of groups to speak at Supreme Court case against Quebec secularism law<\/a><\/p>\n

Quebec Premier says any new trade deal with the U.S. needs to have specific time frame<\/a><\/p>\n

There is strong anybody-but-Duhaime sentiment in parts of the riding, and Mr. Duhaime\u2019s calls for Quebec to abandon carbon pricing and electric-vehicle mandates, allow for more private health care and slash government spending has made him the principal target of the PQ candidate, Alex Boissonneault. He is likely to benefit from strategic voting by centrist and left-of-centre voters seeking to deprive Mr. Duhaime of a coveted foothold in the legislature. <\/p>\n

Mr. Boissonneault\u2019s past \u2013 he was arrested in 2001 for plotting to disrupt the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City \u2013 does not appear to have hurt his chances of scoring a third successive by-election win for the PQ. He has chalked up his far-left activism as an \u201cerror of youth\u201d and pointed to his subsequent career as a Radio-Canada journalist as proof that he has \u201clived a respectable, clean life.\u201d He left the public broadcaster in June to run for the PQ.<\/p>\n

The race between Mr. Boissonneault and Mr. Duhaime could come down to which party\u2019s agenda voters fear most: the PQ\u2019s promise to hold another sovereignty referendum if it wins the 2026 election, or the hard-right turn promised by Mr. Duhaime\u2019s Conservatives. <\/p>\n

A PQ win in Arthabaska would fuel the party\u2019s momentum as it prepares for the election in the fall of 2026, helping it attract star candidates and donations for next year\u2019s race.<\/p>\n

Under Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, the PQ has led the polls for months. And while the Quebec Liberal Party has seen its own numbers rise since the June election of former federal Liberal cabinet minister Pablo Rodriguez as its new leader, the QLP remains far behind the PQ in francophone Quebec, which typically determines election winners. <\/p>\n

For his part, Mr. Legault is promising a major cabinet shuffle before the National Assembly returns in mid-September. It could be his last chance to reboot his own political career. <\/p>\n

The Premier has been badly damaged by a public inquiry over mismanagement at the provincial automobile insurance board and by the bankruptcies of local electric school bus manufacturer Lion Electric and Swedish electric-battery maker Northvolt, which had promised to build a plant in Quebec. Both corporate failures are expected to cost the Quebec government hundreds of millions of dollars in lost subsidies. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think you need to be living on another planet not to see that Quebeckers are disappointed\u201d with the CAQ, Mr. Legault conceded as the legislature began its summer recess in June. He vowed to correct course by fall.<\/p>\n

There is speculation that Mr. Legault will move forward with the recommendations of a panel on Quebec\u2019s autonomy that called for the drafting of a Quebec constitution. He is also expected to slash the number of permanent residents Quebec accepts. But it will take a lot more than that for him to avoid Mr. Trudeau\u2019s fate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Pressure is mounting on Quebec Premier Fran\u00e7ois Legault to step down, with only…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54463,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,66,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-54462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-science","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54462","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=54462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54462\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}