BREAKING: Mark Carney sworn in as Canadian prime minister

Mark Carney was sworn-in Friday as Canada’s 24th prime minister by Governor General Mary Simon at a ceremony in Rideau Hall. He replaces outgoing PM Justin Trudeau, who resigned in January and stayed in office until the Liberal Party could choose a new leader.

Carney, who does not have a seat in the House of Commons and has never been elected to any public office, takes charge of both the federal government and the Liberal Party, which has dominated national politics for decades. An election is slated for October when Carney will face Conservative Party head Pierre Poilievre. Poilievre has been an outspoken critic of the Liberals over their backing of the carbon tax and the poor results on easing Canada's very tight housing market.

The background of the new PM is mostly in banking. He was the head of the Bank of England during Brexit and also saw Canada through the 2008 global economic crash. As he takes office, he faces increasing tensions with the US, where President Donald Trump has threatened high and retaliatory tariffs against the northern neighbor.

Border security in terms of both illegal immigration and the drug trade have been foremost in Trump's critique of Canada, and he has repeatedly called for Canada to join the US as the "51st state." This rhetoric threatening Canada's sovereignty has not gone over well, nor have the tariffs. Many stores could be seen pulling American goods from shelves in a nationalist protest.

In remarks to national media following his swearing-in, Carney said, "Canada's new government is changing how we work so we can deliver better results faster to all Canadians. We have new ministers with new ideas ready to respond to new threats and to seize new opportunities. Canada's new government is focused on the things that matter most to Canadians, growing more higher paying jobs, improving affordability and making Canada more secure."

Carney emphasized the "smaller but highly experienced team made to meet the moment we are in" and that his "leaner Cabinet will focus on two priorities in particular, first, protecting Canadian workers and their families in the face of unjustified foreign trade actions, and second, growing this great country by putting more money in Canadians' pockets, by ensuring that government spends less so Canada can invest more by building millions of homes by making Canada a superpower in both conventional and clean energies, by creating new trade corridors with reliable partners, and by forging one Canadian economy out of 13."

The new PM pledged to "relentlessly pursue this positive agenda, because Canadians know that negativity is in strength. They know that negativity won't pay the rent or the mortgage, the negativity won't bring down the price of groceries. Negativity won't win a trade war: we know that by building together, we can give ourselves far more than anyone else can take away."

Outgoing prime minister Trudeau threw his support behind Carney, as has his Cabinet, more than half of the Liberal Party. Chrystia Freeland, who served as Trudeau's deputy prime minister, was Carney's main challenger, but in the end, Carney won the support of his party with 85 percent of their vote.

In Canada's Parliamentary system, the ruling party selects the prime minister. In this case, Carney came into power with 151,899 Liberal Party votes. Freeland took 8 percent of the total while two other candidates split the remaining 3 percent.

It has been a long goodbye from former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau who announced on Jan. 6 that he intended to resign as leader of the Liberal Party after a new leader is selected. The announcement came after months of speculation about his political future. With the approval of the governor general, Trudeau suspended Parliament until March 24.

At the time, Trudeau’s Liberal Party was anywhere from 20 to 26 points behind the Conservative Party and its leader Pierre Poilievre. However, party fortunes appear to have improved with Trudeau’s absence and the emergence of Carney. Both leaders have escalated their rhetoric against President Donald Trump and have stoked the fires of a trade war with the United States, under an electoral strategy that appears to target Trump more than it does the Official Opposition Conservatives and Poilievre.

Carney will govern with a much smaller cabinet than the 37-person group that operated under Trudeau. The new 23-person cabinet includes 12 men and 11 women, and there are no ministers from Alberta or P.E.I.

After promising to discontinue a personal carbon tax in favor of one directed against corporations, Carney has removed Steven Guilbeault as environment and climate change minister – Guilbeault was the biggest proponent of the carbon tax in Trudeau’s cabinet and seen by many as an environmental extremist because of his history as a Greenpeace activist.

Carney has also dropped Liberal leadership candidate and MP Karina Gould (L-Burlington) from that cabinet. As the Liberal House leader, Gould is remembered for being instrumental in inviting a former Waffen SS member to sit

The prime minister will be going to Europe as his first order of the day and is expected to leave on Sunday, which is also his 60th birthday.

Carney has repeatedly said that he thinks the US dollar should be dethroned as the world currency of choice and replaced either with the Chinese yuan or something he calls a "synthetic hegemonic currency."

Carney took on Trump in his victory speech, saying "There’s someone who’s trying to weaken our economy. Donald Trump, as we know, unjustified tariffs on what we build, what we sell, and how we make a living. He’s attacking Canadian workers, families and business. We cannot let him succeed, and we won’t. I’m proud of the response of Canadians making their voices heard and wallets felt."

"Donald Trump is trying to weaken our economy, but there’s someone else who if he succeeds, will weaken our economy," Carney said, taking aim at his Conservative opposition. "It’s Pierre Poilievre. Pierre Poilievre just doesn’t get it. He is the type of lifelong politician, and I’ve seen this type around the world, he worships at the altar of the free market despite never having made a payroll himself. And now, in the face of President Trump’s threats, Poilievre still refuses to get his security clearance.

"At a time where our national security is under threat in a way it’s never been before. In a time of immense economic insecurity, he would undermine the Bank of Canada. He called for the closing of CBC when foreign interference is on the march. He insults our mayors and ignores our First Nations when its time to build and will put an end to international aid when democracy and human rights are in danger across the world. He will also let our planet burn."