OCTOBER 2024: EH OR NAY? CANADIANS WEIGH IN ON THE US ELECTION

Nov 12

In the wake of the U.S. presidential election on November 5, 2024 and the return of Donald Trump as President-elect, Canadian interest in American politics has been understandably high. This month, we looked at Canadian opinion towards the election and the anticipated impact that American politics would have upon our country. Specifically, we assessed who Canadians preferred to win the election? What are the anticipated impacts of the new president on Canada? And how did people feel about these candidates?

As shown in Figure 1, prior to the election the Canadian population was very aligned in their sentiments towards the candidates and the outcomes of the election. We asked Canadians which candidate they would prefer to win the presidency – they overwhelmingly preferred Kamala Harris, with two thirds of Canadians and four out of five individuals over the age of 55 preferring her victory. While Conservatives were tied (within a margin of error), they only slightly preferred Trump. Men were also more than twice as likely to prefer Trump than Harris. We also asked what the impact of another Trump presidency would be for Canada. Canadians largely agreed that it would be either ‘Terrible’ or ‘Poor’ - especially the older and left-leaning population. While conservatives were split on who they preferred to win, slightly more felt that Trump’s impact would be negative.

The negative sentiments identified in our survey were strongly echoed in our online information ecosystem. We measured how Canadians talked about both candidates and major issues online. We identified 19,350 posts in September and October on social media from politicians, influencers and news organizations that included references to Donald Trump, Kamala Harris, Tim Walz, JD Vance or Joe Biden. Then, using sentiment and topic modeling, we looked at how Canadians posted about the Democrat and Republican nominees and whether they were positive or negative towards the candidates. Figure 2 evaluates the level of engagement with (circle size) and sentiment towards (gradients of negative) the main topics discussed by both candidates (Crime, Economy, Foreign Policy, Immigration and Social Justice). We find that, overall, posts about Donald Trump were 26% more negative in tone than those about Kamala Harris. This negativity varied, however, with economic posts about Trump comparatively only 10% more negative. With overall engagement in the discussion about Harris and Trump fairly equal, we see that most engagement was around the topics of foreign policy for Harris and crime, immigration and foreign policy for Trump.

This month, we saw a clear difference in public sentiment between Canadians and Americans, with Canadians showing more alignment with each other than with their southern neighbours. As the new U.S. presidency takes shape, we'll be monitoring closely to see how the situation evolves.

Key findings: