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This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Ian Bailey. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you’re reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter signup page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.
BREAKING - Mark Carney says he won’t run for the Liberals if there is a fall election.
The former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England made the comment in an interview with the Canadian Press.
Mr. Carney, who had been seen as a likely candidate in the looming election, told CP he’s ruling out a bid to enter elected politics because he’s made a commitment to help organize the private financial sector in the run-up to the United Nations climate conference, scheduled to run from Oct. 31 to Nov. 12.
Despite not running, Mr. Carney told CP he fully supports Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government and is not ruling out a future run for office.
You can read the CP story on Mr. Carney here.
TODAY’S HEADLINES
BORDER OPENING - Canada will open its border to fully vaccinated, asymptomatic U.S. citizens and permanent residents for the first time in 16 months on Aug. 9, and then to vaccinated people across the world a few weeks later.
APPEAL FOR HELP FROM AFGHANISTAN - A former senior employee of the Canadian embassy in Afghanistan, who says he fled the country after he was attacked by Taliban insurgents, is now pleading with Canada’s federal government to help extricate his wife and three young children, who are stuck in Kabul. Meanwhile, an organization counting retired military officers and diplomats among its ranks is looking for volunteers to welcome and help integrate any former Afghan interpreters and their families who end up being evacuated to Canada.
COURSE CHANGE ON SMALL-BUSINESS PROGRAM- The federal government has reversed course on legislation that gives more generous tax treatment to small businesses, saying it no longer plans to delay the implementation date until next year.
SPY AGENCY WARNS OF INTERFERENCE IN CANADIAN ELECTION - Foreign state-sponsored actors will try to interfere in the next Canadian federal election but not on the scale of the campaign mounted against the United States, Canada’s electronic signals spy agency said on Friday. (Reuters)
GREENS BACK DOWN ON CHALLENGES TO LEADER - Federal Green Leader Annamie Paul called on her party to put its energies into seeking support in a looming federal election after a non-confidence vote and review of her membership were called off.
GG’S LACK OF FRENCH PROMPTS COMMISSIONER REVIEW - The Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages says it will investigate the process for nominating governors general after receiving hundreds of complaints from Canadians upset that the newest nominee, Mary Simon, cannot speak French. From CBC.
WARNING OF EXTREMIST ACTIVITY - Online activity by right-wing extremists in Canada rose last year during the pandemic, despite efforts by governments and social media companies to curb extremism and hate speech, according to a new report. From CBC.
PRIME MINISTER'S DAY
Private meetings. In Hamilton, the Prime Minister delivers remarks to recognize Eid al-Adha. Later, he makes a housing announcement and holds a media availability. An interview with the Prime Minister will air on Global News Toronto.
LEADERS
Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-François Blanchet - No schedule provided by Mr. Blanchet’s office
Conservative Party Leader Erin O’Toole - No schedule provided by Mr. O’Toole’s office.
Green Party Leader Annamie Paul - No schedule provided by Ms. Paul’s office.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh - No schedule provided by Mr. Singh’s office
OPINION
John Ibbitson (The Globe and Mail) on the possibility that Jagmeet Singh may be key to denying Justin Trudeau a majority in the next election: “In every election, Liberals warn that supporting the NDP could split the progressive vote and elect Conservatives. That appeal often works. But if it is clear that the Conservatives are not going to win, progressives can support whoever appeals to them, and right now many find Mr. Singh appealing. The Liberals are confident of victory, and optimistic about their chances of securing a second majority government. The Conservatives are well funded and Mr. O’Toole is likely, at the very least, to solidify the core Tory vote of around 31 per cent. The NDP could make gains. And some or all of that could turn to dust, based on events, dear boy, events.”
Brian Dijkema (Contributor to The Globe and Mail) on why taxing today’s religious institutions because of residential-school horrors would be missing the point: “Put more accurately, some want to channel public disgust about the indignities suffered by Indigenous children at residential schools to revive their long-standing grievance with the property-tax exemptions for houses of worship, and with the federal government’s recognition of the “advancement of religion” as a legitimate charitable purpose. But this push ignores the fact that religion remains overall a public good.”
Anver Emon and Nadia Hasan (Contributors to the Globe and Mail) on government complicity in Islamophobia: “The reality is, as we show in our report, government-sponsored structural discrimination creates the conditions for a bureaucratic culture of Islamophobia to fester in the everyday, ordinary activities of government officials. We cannot hope to combat Islamophobia in this country as long as our own government enables it so overtly, without any oversight or appropriate checks and balances.”
Andrew MacDougall (Ottawa Citizen) on why smart politicians in the upcoming federal election will focus on face-to-face chats with voters: “What if we had an election and nobody followed it on Twitter? Just imagine it. An election free of arsey GIFs. Free of bots. Free of the poisonous and pointless partisan banter that passes for “debate” in 280-character bursts. You know, follow an election like they used to do it, way back in … 2006. It’s a proposition we in the Twitterati ought to test as the country gears up for the election for which the prime minister is now touring the country preparing the ground. And the people who ought to be first in line to test it are the politicians. How many voters has a politician ever persuaded on Twitter? Very few, considering it’s a platform that rewards preaching to your converted. And how many politicians have you come across on Twitter who have changed your opinion of them either during or in between elections? Zero, right? Because no platform that encourages instant and unfiltered emotion-driven takes to an audience who are already invested in you will ever represent someone’s best foot forward to a swing voter.”
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Ian Bailey