Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced his resignation as leader of the Liberal party.
He will remain the prime minister until a new leader is chosen.
CTV News is carrying his announcement live. Follow along for updates through the day.
10:40 a.m. EST: Grey skies over Rideau Cottage
When Trudeau speaks, he will answer only two questions in English, and two questions in French.
More than two dozen national reporters are gathered at the steps outside the front door of his official residence, where he once held lengthy daily conferences during the peak of the pandemic.
10:20 a.m. EST: PM didn’t have enough ‘truth tellers’
“He stayed too long and I don’t think he had enough truth tellers around him,” Graham Richardson, Managing Director Edelman Public Affairs, told CTV News Senior Political Correspondent Vassy Kapelos.
“It’s not 2015. It hasn’t been 2015 for a long time,” he said, referencing the election year Trudeau’s Liberals achieved a sweeping victory against Stephen Harper’s Conservative government.
Looking back at the near-decade since, he said the entire Liberal party ought to channel lyrics to the hit Talking Heads song “Psycho Killer.”
“My God,” said Richardson. “How did we get here?”
10:15 a.m. Trudeau has prorogued before
Requesting prorogation is presumably to give his party time to run an expedited leadership race without facing the prospect of falling on a confidence vote.
The House of Commons was scheduled to resume on Jan. 27, at which point the Conservatives were angling to advance a non-confidence motion within days, as the NDP indicated last month they were ready to vote to bring down the Liberal minority in the new year.
Prorogation, if approved, would end the current parliamentary session and kill all legislative business that hasn’t passed. This decision is believed to be connected to legal advice Trudeau’s advisers received around how long the government could go without approving spending.
This is not the first time Trudeau has taken the massive procedural step of seeking prorogation.
Trudeau did so for his first time in 2020, amid the WE Charity scandal and then-finance minister Bill Morneau’s departure, after vowing when first elected to not use “prorogation to avoid difficult political circumstances,” as the Liberals accused former prime minister Stephen Harper of doing.
9:35 a.m. EST: One notable thing to watch for in Trudeau’s announcement
Scott Reid, CTV News political commentator, told CTV News Channel that he thinks it’s notable Trudeau will be taking questions “because we’ve had such a long period of silence since Chrystia Freeland stepped down as finance minister and deputy prime minister.”
9:30 a.m. EST: All eyes on Rideau
A morning news release from the Press Gallery Secretariat advised journalists to be at 1 Sussex Drive in Ottawa by 10 a.m.
A senior government source told CTV News that Trudeau will then tell reporters he intends to stay on as prime minister until a new leader is selected.
The source also said that Trudeau met with the governor general this morning and asked to prorogue Parliament until March 24.