Duty Free: Expect Canada to Import These Election Season Trends from our American Neighbours
John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon famously participated in the first televised United States presidential candidates’ debate in 1960. It took eight years for Canada to follow suit, pitting Pierre Trudeau, Robert Stanfield, and Tommy Douglas against each other in front of CBC cameras during the 1968 federal election.
Though the JFK-Nixon debate was seen as a turning point where American voters embraced the youthful, telegenic Kennedy, Canadians found their first broadcast debate rather dull. Mr. Trudeau said his goal that evening was “don’t fall asleep during the program.”
But the die was cast: TV debates are now a campaign staple in Canada and around the world. Across the decades, the northbound flow of political practice remains easy to spot. When a political ad is deemed too divisive for polite Canadian sensibilities, the party airing it is often accused of drawing inspiration from the United States. Perhaps it’s not a coincidence, then, that Canadian political parties have a habit of bringing in American strategists to lend advice.
Election season in North America has once again thrust our countries’ cross-border relationship to the top of the headlines. Amidst anxiety about trade policy and debates about the strategic importance of oil, potash, or bourbon, there is some certainty: Canada will continue to import America’s trends in political communication in 2025.
Alternative Media is Mainstream
“She should’ve gone on Rogan.”
Kamala Harris supporters’ frequent lament is a slice of the new media reality: you can attract more eyeballs (and get lobbed more softballs) with a top-rated podcast taping than on broadcast or cable TV. It’s not a secret strategy—Donald Trump and JD Vance both appeared on Joe Rogan’s wildly popular podcast in the run-up to the election, as did Trump’s billionaire benefactors Elon Musk and Peter Thiel.
Research shows that people are migrating away from traditional news media and consuming digital news content in growing numbers. In the United States, 54 percent of adults report getting some news from social platforms. In addition, 21 percent say they rely on social media influencers for news—and among 18- to 29- year-olds, that number rises to 37 percent.
Canada’s numbers game is similar. CTV News, which produces Canada’s most-watched newscast, has a little over four million subscribers on YouTube and X combined. Pierre Poilievre’s sit-down with Canadian academic-turned-alternative media personality Jordan Peterson received nearly 43 million views on a single X post, plus several million more on YouTube.
Combine this virality with the millions who listen to podcasts as audio (so old fashioned), watch clips spread on social channels, or see legacy media reporting on the podcast interview, and quantifying the effect on voters becomes like estimating the economic impact of a Taylor Swift concert weekend in Toronto—it’s hard to say how much exactly, but it’s a lot.
Influencers Will Be Influential
Traditional media outlets squirmed as the Democratic Party rolled out red carpets for influencers at its quadrennial nominating convention last August. Dems’ paid influencer strategy has been widely criticized as a waste of resources, a fig leaf that insufficiently covered the party’s eroding youth support.
Donald Trump’s political operation, on the other hand, shrewdly recognized that the way to reach casual, low-engagement GenZ voters was by providing typically non-political influencers with viral-quality entertainment. The President’s penchant for spectacle—clad in an orange vest at the wheel of a garbage truck or serving fries at a McDonald’s drive-thru—was a perfect match for these creators’ impish instincts.
Expect the path to reach Canada’s diverse younger voters to also run through the forward-facing smartphone cameras of content creators, then streamed on Twitch or stitched into TikToks and Reels. And yes, there will be memes.
Conservative parties, both provincially and federally, appear to be in the best position to capitalize. The 2022 convoy movement was a portent of the influence the online right can wield, even if it was outside the mainstream. It’s worth remembering that Covid restrictions were not ushered out with a mass tapping of the unfollow button. Mr. Poilievre has shown talent for connecting with these hidden levers of support while remaining a conventional candidate.
Artificial Intelligence for Real Canadians
Scammy ads featuring bizarre headlines about the major party leaders have permeated social media platforms in recent months. For now, the ads merely link through to AI-generated content hawking dubious investment schemes.
The scarier part is this: their origin is nearly impossible to track down (CBC News tried) and the potential for abuse during a writ period is manifest.
Election disinformation has taken a big leap with AI. In a campaign setting, AI generated content—including deceptive “deepfake” videos that appear to be a candidate speaking but are instead near-perfect digital simulations—could be extremely hard to identify and stop.
Our neighbours saw this trend coming. Last summer, the Federal Communications Commission scrambled to pass a rule banning AI manipulation in American elections but was unable to get it through the rulemaking process in time for the 2024 campaign.
In Canada, Bill C-65 amends the Elections Act in part to deal with deepfakes and other GenAI content. The bill was still in committee when Parliament was prorogued in January. Campaigns should prepare accordingly.
While Canadian and American election periods have synced up organically in the past, this year there is a direct link: Premier Doug Ford said he called an election to secure a mandate to protect Ontario from the Trump Administration’s economic threats. Likewise, Mr. Poilievre has insisted the Prime Minister must call an election immediately so a new federal government has “the mandate to put the country first.”
The 1988 federal election was also seen as a referendum on US-Canada trade. Prime Minister Brian Mulroney’s opponents, Ed Broadbent and John Turner, made the case that the PM’s free trade agreement was going to Americanize Canada.
One cheeky anti-free trade ad from the Liberal Party accused Mulroney of erasing the line between Canada and the US and “giving away our culture.” The Liberals also alleged that the Mulroney campaign was deploying American-style political attack ads.
Canadians apparently didn’t mind the American influence in the ads or the free trade agreement; Mr. Mulroney’s Conservatives were given another majority.
As we embark on more US-focused elections in 2025, tariffs may be at issue, but the American influence on our communication choices is certain to be imported yet again—duty free.