Canada’s election surprise after surprise aggression from U.S.

In elections on Monday, "Mark Carney achieved what seemed like an impossible feat just a few months ago, leading the Liberals to another victory after an election that was shaped by U.S. President Donald Trump's trade war and threats of annexation," says CBC News, Canada’s public broadcaster.

"It is a stunning political turnaround for a party who were widely considered dead and buried just a few months ago," says BBC News.

"The Liberals looked headed for a crushing defeat until the American president started attacking Canada’s economy and threatening its sovereignty, suggesting it should become the 51st state," says The Associated Press.

At the beginning of this year, Carney was a former central banker with no experience as a politician, says BBC News. By mid-March, he was being sworn in as prime minister — the first to never have held elected public office — after a resounding win in the Liberal leadership race.

Carney tried to define himself as a steady, mature outsider who's best to deal with the unpredictable president and map out a new economic and security relationship, says CBC News. Heading into the campaign, Carney didn't have a seat in the House of Commons. That changed on Monday as CBC News projected he's won the Ottawa riding (parliamentary seat) of Nepean.

During the campaign, Carney pointed to his time as the governor of the Bank of Canada during the 2008 global financial crisis and head of the Bank of England during the Brexit years as evidence that Canadians should trust him to steer the country's economy through turbulent times, CBC News says.

For the Conservative leader, Pierre Poilievre, the party’s stinging defeat was compounded by the fact that he lost his parliamentary seat, which he'd held continuously for 20 years, to the Liberal candidate, says The New York Times.

It's not yet clear if the Liberals — who’ve been in power for almost a decade — will be able to secure a majority in Parliament as election results continue to come in. If they don’t win a majority, the Liberals may need to rely on one of the smaller parties to stay in power and pass legislation. The Bloc Québécois, which seems set to finish third, is a separatist party from French-speaking Quebec that seeks independence from Canada, says AP. The Liberals relied on the New Democrats to stay in power for four years, but that progressive party did poorly on Monday and its leader, Jagmeet Singh, said he was stepping down after eight years in charge.