MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Canada's new prime minister, Mark Carney, jumped into politics just three months ago as trade relations with the U.S. hit their lowest point in decades. The former central banker is now hoping his economic chops will propel him to victory ahead of Canada's April 28 election. Darian Woods from The Indicator and Anis Heydari from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation bring us this report.
DARIAN WOODS, BYLINE: Mark Carney has never held elected office before of any kind. He's running in his first election right now. In Canada, you can become the prime minister, technically, without winning an election.
ANIS HEYDARI: You can blame the British for that one. We inherited this system from them.
WOODS: So traditionally in British-style systems, whoever leads the incumbent party usually gets to be the prime minister until the next election.
HEYDARI: And that is what's happening right now. Carney announced what Canadians would call a snap election for April 28. In the meantime, with the few weeks that we have for this election campaign, Mark Carney remains the prime minister. And so, of course, he's facing this big political and economic crisis for Canada - Donald Trump and his tariffs, which include hits to steel and aluminum.
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PRIME MINISTER MARK CARNEY: We're going to fight these tariffs with countermeasures.
WOODS: Of course, to do that, Canada is going to have to deal with all these tariffs, and that is a big one, slapping tariffs on cars assembled in Canada. Carney's response at a press conference late last month reverberated across North America.
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CARNEY: The old relationship we had with the United States based on deepening integration of our economies and tight security and military cooperations is over.
WOODS: The day after that press conference, President Trump and Prime Minister Carney actually had their very first conversation as leaders over the phone.
HEYDARI: Carney called the call cordial and constructive.
WOODS: But then, of course, came what the president called "Liberation Day," and he repeated claims about a trade deficit with Canada.
HEYDARI: I should point out, if you remove energy from that trade calculation, the trade deficit basically goes away. Deficit or not, though, a trade war could drag Canada into a recession very quickly. But this is not the first economic storm that Mark Carney has grappled with. Think back to 2008. There was a little bit of a financial crisis. You might remember it.
WOODS: Yeah, I remember the major economic collapse due to subprime mortgages, among other things, in the U.S. that spread around the world. But, you know, Canada didn't get hit as hard. Mark Carney was governor of the Bank of Canada at the time.
HEYDARI: Mark Carney cut interest rates quickly, and so in conjunction with stimulus spending from our federal government, Canada made it through the 2008 crisis.
WOODS: But Carney didn't stick around in Canada. From 2013 to 2020, he became the governor of the Bank of England.
HEYDARI: Yeah. You know, there was that whole Brexit thing in that period, too. This guy really knows how to choose easy jobs during periods of economic confusion.
WOODS: And, you know, at this time, the Bank of England's decisions were critical. It was like walking this tightrope over crocodile-infested waters. Back then, Carney stood firm that those decisions should not be politically driven.
HEYDARI: Now, fast-forward to today - Mark Carney isn't making decisions on interest rates, but he is Canada's prime minister and leader of the country's Liberal Party. He's running against the Conservative Party's Pierre Poilievre. If Carney wins, he'd achieve something rare - transitioning from leading a central bank to leading a country. Anis Heydari.
WOODS: Darian Woods, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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