Australia, like Canada, says no to Trumpism

In elections five days apart, centrists in both countries saw their fortunes revived, as parties that had borrowed from the MAGA playbook lost, says a New York Times analysis.

Canadians on April 28 gave the left-leaning Liberal Party a fourth term in office, after the party trailed badly in the polls at the beginning of the year. Canadians embraced the tough-talking approach of Prime Minister Mark Carney, a former central banker, while shying away from the conservative candidate, Pierre Poilievre, who was viewed as being too similar to Trump, says The Wall Street Journal.

A similar dynamic played out in Australia’s election on Saturday. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was down in the polls at the start of the year, though by a narrower margin than Canada’s Liberals. As the election grew closer, the polls flipped. Much of the campaign centered on how best to address the high cost of living, inflation and affordable housing, but Albanese and his main conservative opponent, Peter Dutton, also sparred frequently over who could best negotiate with Trump, the WSJ says.

Australians also watched with alarm as the balance of their mandated retirement accounts fluctuated wildly with the markets in reaction to Trump’s policy announcements, says a second Times analysis.

“The Trump tariff decisions that were seen as mad by Australians, that really accelerated the process of people looking at Dutton, and at Trump, and going, ‘No,’” says Chris Wallace, a professor of political history at the University of Canberra. “It’s a victory for sensible, centrist politics.”

Australians’ repudiation of Dutton and the campaign he waged was most apparent in his defeat in the parliamentary seat he had held for 24 years, says the Times. And that was another parallel with Canada’s election, in which Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre lost the parliamentary seat he'd held for 20 years.