The leader of Ontario, Canada’s most populous province, has kicked off his provincial election campaign, saying he needs a strong mandate to fight the tariffs threatened by U.S.

TORONTO — Ontario Premier Doug Ford officially set a provincial election in motion Tuesday for Feb. 27, more than a year before the next fixed election date. The election had been set for June 2026, but Ford said he needs a new mandate to deal with four years of a Donald Trump presidency in the United States.

While Premier Doug Ford insists that U.S. President Donald Trump's tariff threat is why he's calling an election 15 months ahead of schedule, there are plenty of reasons why the timing is politically advantageous to Ford and his Ontario PC Party.

With a snap election around the corner, data shows that Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s Ontario PC Party will likely stay in power.  According to research from analysts at Abacus Data — if a provincial election were held today — the Ontario PC party would have a majority government.

Ontario premier Doug Ford has triggered an early election in the province, saying he needs a strong mandate to take on the tariff threat.

TORONTO - Ontario Premier Doug Ford is set to request the dissolution of provincial parliament today and trigger an early election for Feb. 27.

Ford sparked the early election on Tuesday afternoon with a visit to Lt.-Gov. Edith Dumont and a request for her to dissolve Ontario’s 43rd parliament. The proclamation she signed doing just that took effect at 4 p.m. Tuesday.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford has officially triggered an early provincial election for Feb. 27 after meeting with Ontario's lieutenant-governor, his office confirmed. Ford visited Lt.-Gov. Edith Dumont on Tuesday afternoon to ask her to dissolve the 43rd parliament of the Province of Ontario.