Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is stepping down from his role as head of the nation’s government.
Trudeau announced his decision on Monday at a press conference outside his residence at Rideau Cottage in Ottawa, Ontario.
“I intend to resign as party leader, as prime minister, after the party selects its next leader,” Trudeau said.
The parliament will be prorogued until March 24 as the Liberal Party seeks a new leader to replace Trudeau.
Trudeau has led the Liberal Party for 11 years and served as prime minister for nine.
The decision to step down is hardly a surprise — the prime minister has been plagued by a collapse of support from inside and outside his party over the last several months.
Most prominently, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland resigned from her posts in December.
She characterized her decision as an act of protest against the government’s penchant for “political gimmicks” while failing to address the threat of staggering tariffs from the United States under the next administration.
President-elect Donald Trump has made clear to the Canadian government that he intends to push harsh renegotiations on trade between the two North American countries when he enters office later this month. He specifically threatened a 25% tariff on Canadian goods if the country does not work to secure its border against drug trafficking and illegal migration.
Trudeau’s resignation will leave a power vacuum at the helm of the Liberal Party, which is expected to be bulldozed by its rival Conservative Party in the October parliamentary elections.
Polls show the Conservative Party holds approximately 44% of the vote in a hypothetical election, against the Liberal Party’s 20.9%.
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Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, widely believed to be a shoo-in for the prime minister’s office in October, has lambasted the Liberal Party’s past several months of floundering.
“Forty-one million [Canadian citizens] are not obliged to wait around while this party sorts out its s***,” the conservative leader said in an interview released Friday. “Like, these guys could have got rid of Trudeau a year and a half ago.”