Albanese’s win mirrored the stunning victory of Mark Carney’s center-left Liberal Party in Canada, where conservative Pierre Poilievre lost both the election and his own seat, despite being 25 percentage points up in polling at the end of 2024 over unpopular then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
A POLITICO/Focaldata poll of Canadians days before the election there found three-quarters of them disliked Trump — and a majority believed Carney, rather than Poilievre, would be better suited to managing the relationship with the U.S.
2. Cost of living trumps culture wars
Australia is facing a cost-of-living crisis, with rising inflation, unaffordable housing and persistently high interest rates squeezing households. Albanese focused his campaign on these voter concerns, and policies he said would address them.
Dutton, meanwhile, chiefly fought a culture war.
Taking inspiration from Trump, Dutton said that Indigenous “welcome to country” ceremonies, which are performed by Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander elders to welcome visitors to their ancestral lands, are “overdone,” and claimed “we need to stop the teaching of some of the curriculum that says that our children should be ashamed of being Australian.”
In a nod to Trump’s attacks on the media, Dutton labeled Australia’s national broadcaster, the ABC, and the left-leaning Guardian newspaper “the hate media,” after they reported in the last week of the campaign that he was on track to lose the election.
