Minister says he won't 'sling mud' after Poilievre called him the 'master at failing upward'

OTTAWA — Justice Minister Sean Fraser says he is not interested “in slinging mud” at his opponents after Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he failed upward into his latest appointment.  Fraser nonetheless said he was surprised by the Conservative leader’s comments, coming off an election loss where voters took issue with Poilievre’s tone. “It’s surprising to see that the Conservatives, after having been handed a defeat, going into an election with one of the largest polling leads in the history of Canadian politics, and Mr. Poilievre, in fact, himself losing his seat, hasn’t made a change in his approach,” he told reporters on his way into Wednesday’s cabinet meeting. “I’m not going to sit here and sling mud at my Opposition.” Poilievre took aim at Prime Minister Mark Carney’s picks for cabinet, which were unveiled on Tuesday, pointing out that many of the ministers served under his Liberal predecessor, former prime minister Justin Trudeau. The Conservative leader took particular note of Fraser, who first entered Trudeau’s cabinet in 2021, first as immigration minister and then later as housing minister. Those two issues have dogged the Liberal government, with Trudeau announcing dramatic cuts to Canada’s immigration levels last year and announcing billions in spending to get more homes built to deal with the country’s housing crisis. Poilievre has laid the blame for high housing costs and a population that grew faster than cities and health-care could absorb at Fraser’s feet, telling reporters on Tuesday that he is now “the minister responsible for addressing the Liberal crime crisis.” “It seems like he is the master at failing upward, Poilievre said of Carney’s pick for justice minister. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Fraser, who was asked by reporters about the Conservative leader’s comments, said over the course of the most recent election campaign, people in his riding “very openly said” they did not want to see Poilievre become the prime minister because they saw him as someone who spent a career “slinging mud against his opponents” rather than proposing solutions. A request for a response from the Conservative party has not yet been returned. During the campaign, Conservative candidates told National Post that Poilievre’s tone was an issue that came up among voters, particularly among older women. Poilievre’s style was also an issue because voters noted similarities between him and U.S. President Donald Trump, whose tariffs and comments about wanting Canada to become a state became the central campaign issue for many voters, while the Conservatives ran a campaign focused on affordability. Despite the Conservative leader’s efforts to wear more smiles along the campaign trail and roll out meatier policies to boost Canada’s economic strength in the face of Trump, the party still came up short. Poilievre, who is preparing to run for a seat in the rural Alberta riding of Battle River—Crowfoot after one of his MPs stepped aside, has said while Conservatives are right to be disappointed in the election results, the party still has much to celebrate. He and other Conservatives point out that the party picked up more than 20 new seats, including in battlegrounds like the Greater Toronto Area, southern Ontario and British Columbia, and grew its appeal among young people and working-class voters. The party gained 41.3 per cent of the vote, which was a historic high for the Conservatives, but was still behind the Liberals’ 43.7 per cent. With Parliament set to resume on May 26, Poilievre has said the Conservatives were prepared to support the minority Liberals when it felt the government does a “good job,” such as on the issue of negotiating with the U.S. The Conservative leader also invited Carney to “steal my ideas,” saying the party has been leading the debates from the carbon tax to housing prices, inflation and crime. Addressing crime was one of Poilievre’s biggest focuses during the recent campaign, promising tougher laws and more technologies to address issues like car thefts. In laying out his government’s priorities, Carney has vowed to further strengthen bail laws for those accused of car thefts, home invasions, human trafficking and smuggling. The Liberals also campaigned on targeting repeat offenders and also increasing funding to the Public Prosecution Services of Canada to prosecute more drug trafficking crimes, as well as crack down on illegal guns being smuggled into Canada. Fraser said on Wednesday the government wants to move “swiftly.” He said they planned to move forward on “some” of their campaign commitments this spring, but “not necessarily all.” “I think you’re going to see some some work that we’re going to do in cooperation with the United States along the border very quickly,” the minister said. National Post staylor@postmedia.com Get more deep-dive National Post political coverage and analysis in your inbox with the Political Hack newsletter, where Ottawa bureau chief Stuart Thomson and political analyst Tasha Kheiriddin get at what’s really going on behind the scenes on Parliament Hill every Wednesday and Friday, exclusively for subscribers. Sign up here. Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our politics newsletter, First Reading, here.