The Liberals under Prime Minister Mark Carney held on to power after the April 28 election, winning a fourth consecutive term.
While votes are still being counted and the results aren’t final, there are some notable takeaways from the early results.
NDP Loses Official Party Status, Singh Resigns
In the April 28 election, the NDP won or was leading in 7 ridings as of 4 a.m., a decrease of 18 seats for the party compared to the 2021 election.
In order to qualify for official party status, a party needs to hold at least 12 seats, a requirement that the NDP no longer meets.
Meanwhile, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh came in third in his own riding of Burnaby Central.
In an emotional speech after the election, Singh said he would step down once the party chooses an interim leader.
Singh, a former Ontario NDP MPP, was elected leader of the federal NDP in 2017, and became a federal NDP MP representing a B.C. riding in 2019.
Poilievre Trailing in His Riding
As of 4 a.m. EST on April 29, Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre was trailing Liberal candidate Bruce Fanjoy by 4 percent of the votes in the Ottawa area riding of Carleton, with 256 out of 266 polls reporting in the riding. Poilievre has represented the riding since 2004.
Related Stories
The vote in that riding is taking longer because an activist group asking for electoral reform, the Longest Ballot Committee, targeted Poilievre’s riding by flooding it with dozens of candidates to raise awareness about its cause.
Poilievre said in his post-election speech that he will stay on as leader, celebrating the gains his party made in seat counts and share of the national votes.
Carney, Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet, and Green Party Co-leader Elizabeth May all won in their own ridings. Meanwhile, Green Party Co-leader Jonathan Pedneault and People’s Party of Canada Leader Maxime Bernier lost in their Quebec ridings.
Health Minister Loses Seat
Preliminary results show Liberal Health Minister Kamal Khera narrowly losing in her riding of Brampton West in Ontario, getting 47.5 percent of the votes, compared to Conservative candidate Amarjeet Gill who won the riding with 50 percent of the votes.
Khera was first elected to Parliament in 2015, and held a number of cabinet posts. Prior to becoming health minister in the Carney government, she served as minister of seniors and later as minister of diversity, inclusions, and persons with disabilities under the Trudeau government.
Good Night for Liberal MPs Who Reversed Decision Not to Run
The election night was overall a good night for Liberal MPs who in the final months of the Trudeau government had decided not to seek re-election amid declining poll numbers for their party, but later reversed course.
Senior cabinet minister Anita Anand, who had previously said she wanted to spend more time with her family but later said she decided to again run for public office at Carney’s request, won with 50.7 percent of the votes in Oakville East in Ontario, with the Conservative candidate getting 45.1 percent of the votes.
Former Housing Minister Sean Fraser, who also said he wanted to spend time with his family but said Carney asked him to reconsider, won in Central Nova with 51.8 percent of the votes, with the Conservative candidate getting 43 percent of the votes, taking second place.
Incumbent Liberal MP Helena Jaczek, former minister of public services and procurement, won in her Markham-Stouffville riding in Ontario with 51.3 percent of the votes compared to the Conservative candidates’ 45.4 percent. She had previously said she wouldn’t seek re-election, but later said with new leadership, there was “new energy ” in the party.
Housing Minister Nathan Erskine-Smith also retained his seat, getting 67.6 percent of the votes, compared to the second place Conservative candidate with 23.7 percent. Erskine-Smith changed his previous decision to not seek re-election late last year after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appointed him as the minister of housing. He kept his portfolio in the Carney government.
Liberals Win a Riding in Saskatchewan
For the first time since the 2015 election, the Liberals won a seat in Saskatchewan.
Former provincial NDP MLA and federal Liberal candidate Buckley Belanger won the riding of Desnethé-Missinippi-Churchill River with 65 percent of the votes, with Conservative candidate Jim Lemaigre, a former Saskatchewan Party MLA, coming in second with 26 percent of the votes.
The riding was previously held by Conservative Gary Vidal, who decided not to run in the 2025 election.
In both the 2019 and 2021 elections, all the ridings in Saskatchewan were taken by the Conservatives.
No Gains for Liberals in Alberta
Liberals won two seats in Alberta in the 2021 election.
In the 2025 election, the party held on to the Edmonton Centre riding, with Liberal candidate Eleanor Olszewski winning with 44.2 percent of the votes compared to Conservatives’ Sayid Ahmed. The riding was previously held by Liberal cabinet minister Randy Boissonnault who resigned from cabinet amid scandals surrounding a company he used to co-own, and decided not to seek re-election.
However, the party lost Calgary Skyview, which was represented by Liberal George Chahal after the 2021 election. The riding was taken by the Conservatives in the April 28 election.
Chahal ran in the riding of Calgary McKnight in the 2025 election, but also lost to Conservative candidate Dalwinder Gill.
Meanwhile, the Liberals and the Conservatives are in a tight race in the Calgary Confederation riding, with the Liberal candidate Corey Hogan having a slight edge with 47.8 percent of the votes compared to the Conservative candidate Jeremy Nixon, a former Alberta cabinet minister, with 46.5 percent of the votes as of 4 a.m. EST.
Also in Alberta, NDP MP Heather McPherson held on to the long-time NDP stronghold riding of Edmonton Strathcona, but incumbent NDP MP Blake Desjarlais lost Edmonton Griesbach to former Conservative MP Kerry Diotte, reducing NDP’s seat count in Alberta to one from the previous two seats the party held after the 2021 election.
Polls have shown increasing levels of Western-alienation, with an April 6 poll by Angus Reid showing that a quarter of Albertans support separation from Canada. The poll said that percentage increases with the Liberal Party winning the federal election.
Liberals, Conservatives Increase Vote Share
With 99 percent of the polls reporting, the Liberals recorded a gain in the share of national votes compared to the 2021 election results, going from 32.6 percent in 2021 to 43.5 percent in 2025.
The Conservatives also raised their share of the national vote from 33.7 percent in the 2021 election to 41.4 percent in the 2025 election.
Other parties saw a decline in the share of the votes. The NDP went from 17.8 percent to 6.3 percent, and the Bloc went from 7.6 percent to 6.4 percent.
Progressives Unite
The vote split for the right-of-centre parties was less compared to previous elections, with PPC getting less than 1 percent of the national votes in the 2025 election, compared to 4.9 percent in the 2021 election.
However, many progressives changed their votes to Carney Liberals amid the Trump presidency and to prevent a Conservative government.
Former NDP Leader Tom Mulcair said during the election campaign that “die hard” NDP supporters were voting for Carney’s Liberals in this election because of the Trump presidency.
Current NDP Leader Singh told the Toronto Start that he didn’t vote on non-confidence motions to bring down the Liberal government late last year because the Conservatives were polling high, and he didn’t want to see a majority Conservative government.
As well, the Greens said they deliberately didn’t run candidates in some ridings to not split the progressive vote to stop the Conservatives from forming government.
