Federal cabinet minister Filomena Tassi announced Thursday she will not run for re-election, and sources tell CTV News at least three other cabinet ministers don’t plan to run again.
Their decisions will prompt Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to shuffle his cabinet, a date for which has not been set. It is likely to occur in the coming weeks, according to senior government sources.
“My reason for making this decision is deeply personal — it’s time for me to be closer to home with my family,” wrote Tassi, the minister responsible for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario, in a two-page statement posted on social media. “This is a bittersweet decision.”
Sources tell CTV News at least three other cabinet ministers don’t plan to run again. Sports Minister Carla Qualtrough, National Revenue Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau, and Northern Affairs Minister Dan Vandal will not put their names back on the ballot.
All four were first elected in 2015, with both Qualtrough and Bibeau serving in cabinet since then. Tassi joined cabinet in 2017, and Vandal in 2019.
The news comes amid growing dissent in Trudeau’s caucus. Multiple sources tell CTV News that a group of Liberal MPs plan to ask him at next Wednesday’s caucus meeting to step aside from the party’s leadership.
Other high-profile Liberals have also recently stepped down from cabinet, including former transport minister and Quebec lieutenant Pablo Rodriguez, who quit cabinet because he’s running for leadership of the Quebec Liberal Party, and former labour minister Seamus O’Regan, who quit for personal reasons.
Both decided to remain MPs until the next election, though Rodriguez is sitting as an Independent.
CTV News surveyed all cabinet ministers two weeks ago about their plans for the next federal election.
Every minister’s office responded, with the exception of Trade Minister Mary Ng’s, though her office confirmed to CTV News on Thursday that she does plan to run again.
Of the 36 initial responses — including from Tassi and Qualtrough’s offices — 35 confirmed plans to run in the next election.
Only Bibeau’s office responded that the minister was undecided. She plans to run for mayor of Sherbrooke, Que., according to sources.
In 2022, Tassi was moved out of her procurement minister portfolio at her request, stating then that she wanted to spend more time in Southern Ontario for family reasons.
She was swapped with former minister Helena Jaczek, who announced last year she won’t be running again, and was then shuffled out of cabinet entirely.
The fixed election date is next October, though speculation of an early writ drop has increased in recent weeks, following NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh’s announcement last month he’d ended the supply-and-confidence agreement that had been propping up the Trudeau Liberals for more than two years.
With files from CTV News Chief Political Correspondent Vassy Kapelos and CTV’s Question Period Senior Producer Brennan MacDonald