British Columbia’s Conservative landslide is no proof of a national surge

Lorne Doerkson’s Conservatives are set to take power in British Columbia with a commanding majority, ending nine years of New Democratic Party government. Donald Trump’s description of a “Big Victory” is justified by the provincial count, but a Conservative surge across Canada does not follow from it.

The US president wrote on Truth Social on 27 October 2026, three days after the provincial vote: “Congratulations to Lorne Doerkson on his Big Victory. Conservatives are moving strong in Canada!” The post, preserved by the Trump’s Truth archive, linked to a Bloomberg report headlined “BC Left-Wing Leader Loses to Conservatives in Vote He Called”.

Elections BC’s preliminary count, updated on 26 October, showed the Conservatives leading in 63 of the legislature’s 93 districts, against 28 for the New Democratic Party (NDP) and two for the Greens. A majority requires 47 seats.

The Conservatives had 48.06% of the valid votes counted, compared with 43.28% in the final 2024 result. If their current leads hold, they will have 19 more seats than the 44 they won then. That is a substantial provincial advance, although the counting is unfinished: mail-in and absentee ballots are due to be counted at the final count, scheduled for 6–10 November.

Eby’s snap election backfires

David Eby, the NDP premier, called the election on 22 September, two years ahead of schedule, saying he needed a stronger mandate to resist Trump’s economic pressure.

“Join us saying hell no to Trump and to his politics,” he said at the announcement, according to the Associated Press.

After the defeat, Eby announced that he would step down as party leader, CityNews reported. He was nevertheless re-elected in Vancouver-Point Grey: his party lost the contest for government, not his own constituency. Doerkson, the Conservatives’ interim leader, is expected to become premier.

Trump was not the campaign’s only issue. Reuters reported that polls showed voters focused on living costs and healthcare as well as the trade war. The Conservatives campaigned on promises to expand natural gas production and cut regulation.

Analysis: the federal picture is different

“Moving strong” is broad political language, and Trump did not claim a federal election victory. Read as a claim of nationwide electoral momentum, however, it needs evidence beyond a single province.

Nanos’s four-week federal tracker ending on 23 October put the Liberals at 47.3% and the Conservatives at 27.8% — a gap of 19.5 percentage points. The pollster described federal party preferences as relatively stable.

The telephone survey covered 1,019 Canadian adults and reported a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Its interviews ended the day before British Columbia voted, so it cannot capture any subsequent reaction to Doerkson’s victory.

Official House of Commons records also show Liberal victories in all three federal by-elections held on 31 August: North Vancouver–Capilano in British Columbia, Beaches–East York in Ontario and Chicoutimi–Le Fjord in Quebec.

Those three local contests are not a representative national sample, and federal voting intentions do not measure support for every provincial Conservative party. They do show why the distinction matters: Doerkson’s large provincial victory is real, but it does not establish a nationwide Conservative advance.