Day fifteen, and not every campaign was busy today. Mark Carney was quiet in the early part of the day, where he had a call with UK prime minister Keir Starmer, but was in Victoria in the evening, where he started the western leg of his tour by holding a rally. Carney will remain in Victoria in the morning, and head to Richmond, BC, later in the day.

Pierre Poilievre was in New Westminster, BC, and he promised funding for 50,000 more addiction recoveries (so I’m not sure how that translates to spaces), and said that “drug dens” (aka safe consumption sites) be forbidden from within metres of a laundry list of places, as though the people consuming on the streets care about that prohibition. Poilievre will start the day in Terrace, BC, and end the day with a rally in Edmonton.

Jagmeet Singh was in Halifax, and promised to use federal spending powers to bring in national rent control, which is 100 percent provincial jurisdiction, which they want to get around by essentially saying he would withhold federal housing money unless they brought it in (and it’s all about “corporate landlords,” but never about private ones being a problem, which many of them are). They also once again tried to trot out Ruth-Ellen Brosseau as a “star” candidate, never mind that it didn’t work the last time, and is unlikely to again this time. Singh plans to be in Toronto today.

In other campaign news, it’s the cut-off day for nominations today, and some parties are scrambling to get names on ballots. Here’s a look at how Singh has abandoned the message about becoming prime minister in favour of just trying to elect as many NDP MPs as possible, and another look at how much the campaign has been struggling since the beginning.

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian troops are pushing into Ukraine’s Sumy region in the northeast.

Good reads:

• A 31-year-old man was charged after the Parliament Hill lockdown on Saturday.
• The Post looks at the parties dropping candidates in spite of the supposed rigorous vetting process (but fails on the notion that this happens over the space of weeks).
• Mike Moffatt and company give their thoughts on the Conservatives’ housing plans.
• Dan Garner writes about Trump’s miraculous ability to unify Canadians as we haven’t been since at least the Second World War.
• Jennifer Robson has a two-part thought exercise on how to frame the challenge ahead with Trump, and the kind of insurance we need to build for ourselves.
• Justin Ling explores the moral (and logical) bankruptcy of Poilievre’s desired plan to cut foreign aid to pay for his spending promises.
• Susan Delacourt cautions against trying to frame the election ion terms of what we think Trump wants, because that is inevitably a mug’s game.
• Delacourt and Matt Gurney debate the course of the election and the learning curves of the two main leaders as it progresses.

Odds and ends:

My Loonie Politics Quick Take recaps week two of the election.

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