Doug Ford's love affair with Trump and Musk shows he can't be trusted

Three weeks from election day, Doug Ford and his Progressive Conservatives are well ahead of their opponents in the polls. That ought to give any sensible person pause. The province is home to 16 million people. It creates roughly 40 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product. It houses major industries, including automobile manufacturing, mining, real estate, and finance. In sum, the stakes are high in Ontario. Unfortunately, the Ford years have been a bumbling mess led by a buffoon who routinely exercises bad judgment — and the province may be in for more. 

It really ought to be as simple as that: Doug Ford doesn’t have the good judgment needed to be premier of Ontario. There are countless examples of Ford making bad calls, but two recent cases illustrate this, let’s say, lack of discernment, better than any other could: his support for Donald Trump and his Starlink deal with Elon Musk.

In 2018, Ford proclaimed his support for then-president Trump was “unwavering.” Throughout Trump’s first administration, he could count on the premier of Ontario to have his back in Canada — a maple Republican, a northern red-stater. Trump had already shown the world who he was, of course: an authoritarian, a vandal, an arsonist. Trump launched his presidency with a Muslim ban; he pulled out of the Paris Accords; he ripped up the Iran nuclear deal; he lied about voter fraud.

And yet, Ford’s support remained, as he said, unwavering. Even when sharper eyes, including my own, saw what was coming, and warned of it, Ford backed Trump.

Later, when Trump attempted to overturn the results of a free and fair election in 2020, Ford remained in the Republican madman’s camp. When Trump returned for 2024, threatening tariffs against Canada throughout the U.S. presidential campaign, Ford still backed him. The Ontario premier was even recently caught on a hot mic saying he was “100 per cent happy” that Trump had won the election.

“Election day, was I happy this guy won? One hundred per cent I was,” were Ford’s exact words, before adding, almost as if Trump’s attacks on Canada had been an accident, “But then, the guy pulled out the knife and fucking yanked it into us.” 

So, Ford backed Trump while the U.S. president terrorized his own country, bits of Canada, and the rest of the world. He just hadn’t hit Ontario hard enough. Yet. It’s not exactly a moment of profiles in courage.

Trump had mused about making Canada the 51st state as far back as his first term. He threatened and hit Canada with limited tariffs on aluminum in 2018. Later, when he dreamt up broader and deeper duties — 25 per cent and across the board — he was merely extending a mercantilist logic he’d long harboured openly, for anyone to see. But it took Ford until late 2024 to turn on Trump. You simply cannot trust a man who backs his own enemy until the last possible moment.

Let’s then skip the delicate language and ask the question any sensible person must be thinking: How stupid do you have to be to support a man who’s threatening to destroy your country? What kind of judgment does that show?

The bad calls don’t end there. Of late, Ford has won a lot of favour with this Captain Canada bit, with some praising him for joining the pro-Canada party. He joined late, which is better than never, I suppose. But it was quite late. When Trump’s tariffs were set to land, Ford announced the LCBO, one of the largest alcohol purchasers in the world, would pull U.S. booze from the shelves. Ontario would also, Ford said, prohibit U.S. firms from bidding on provincial contracts. And the $100-million deal was off with Trump consigliere, Elon Musk, to provide rural internet access. When Trump announced a 30-day pause, Ford reversed these decisions as fast as he’d made them. Faster, in fact. 

The Starlink deal should never have been signed. Musk is an odious figure and, now, as a servant of the Trump administration, is part and parcel of an executive branch coup. And yet, Ford has reinstated the deal with Musk that he’d been, quite wisely, if belatedly, set to cancel. He could, and should, have left it in the bin. 

Politics is ultimately about judgment, and Ford has shown, time and time again, that his judgment is poor at best. But his erstwhile backing of Trump, which for all we know could return in the months to come, and his contract with Musk, are beyond the pale. Ontario voters ought to consider this carefully when they cast their ballots later this month, and indeed, should exercise some good judgment of their own and vote for any party except Doug Ford’s.