‘Relentless’: The combative Pierre Poilievre finds himself in the fight of his life

Federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre waves with his family before boarding his campaign plane at the John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport in Hamilton, Ont., on Wednesday, March 26, 2025. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nick Iwanyshyn

It’s a Monday evening in an industrial building just south of Edmonton. Pierre Poilievre is on stage, surrounded by a massive crowd of supporters.

He’s been talking for nearly an hour and his speech is hitting some of his biggest applause lines.

“What binds us together is the Canadian promise that anyone from anywhere can achieve anything, that if you work hard, you can have a great life in a beautiful home on a safe street under our proud flag. That is the promise that I hold out as hope to those who are on the brink of giving up,” he says. 

He thrusts a fist into the air as he ends with, “Canada first, let’s bring it home!” The crowd cheers and the music swells as Poilievre’s wife, Anaida, pops up on the stage to kiss him.

An almost identical scene plays out on a Tuesday evening in industrial Hamilton. A Saturday afternoon in Winnipeg. A Monday in Fredericton. A Thursday in Oshawa.

Poilievre has made these rallies a fixture of his leadership of the Conservative party since he took over in late 2022, and a central part of his election campaign.

He’s polished and smooth, feeding off the energy of the crowd. Some attendees are repeat rallygoers, while others are part of his sizable social media following. Most of them have heard the speech before.

It all seems a long way from the young man Tony Greco met some 20 years ago in the Ottawa suburb of Barrhaven.

Greco is an entrepreneur, a personal trainer, author and life coach. He’s not into politics.

Which is why, he said, he didn’t recognize “this geeky guy,” young and bespectacled, frequenting the smoothie bar at his martial arts studio as a local member of Parliament.

“I go, ‘MP? This guy? Like, he looks like he’s 12,’” Greco recalled in an interview. 

Poilievre was elected to represent the riding of Nepean-Carleton in 2004. At 25, he and Andrew Scheer were the youngest members of the caucus. Fellow Conservatives took to calling him “Skippy.”

Greco said he invited Poilievre for a workout and quickly realized his appearance was deceiving — the guy was “relentless.”

“I’m like, man, this guy’s insane. It’s just crazy, because when you see him back in the day, you don’t think he’s that kind of guy,” he said.

That intense work ethic is one of the key forces behind Poilievre’s rise in federal politics, from parliamentary secretary to cabinet minister to party leader and, now, contender for prime minister.

On the campaign trail, Poilievre has made a number of references to time spent at the Greco family home while making an appeal to blue-collar workers and union members — like Greco’s father, Albino, who immigrated to Canada from Italy in the early ’70s.

Poilievre and Greco still see each other from time to time, though Poilievre is busy with his own family — his kids, three-year-old Cruz and six-year-old Valentina — and with work.

When Greco’s father was in his final days in the hospital a year ago, Pierre and Anaida surprised him by showing up. “I’ll never forget that for the rest of my life. It just goes to show you what kind of friend he is,” he said.

Poilievre often talks about his humble roots in Western Canada. Given up for adoption by his 16-year-old birth mother, he and his brother Patrick were raised by Marlene and Don Poilievre, Saskatchewan school teachers who had moved to Calgary.

He got involved in politics in high school.

At the 1996 Reform Party convention, he told a reporter why he supported the party. “I’m very concerned about the financial state of the country and think they’re the only ones who can fix it,” he said.

He came to Ottawa with his political ideology baked in and is proud he hasn’t changed his views in decades.

“Some people even dug up my old university essays, and I’ve been saying precisely the same thing the entire time,” he said in a December interview with right-wing influencer and psychologist Jordan Peterson.

In one of those essays — about what he’d do if he were prime minister — he laid out the ideas that have guided him through two decades in Parliament: giving citizens social, political and economic control over their own lives, getting government out of the way.

That strength of conviction may be a source of vulnerability now.

Poilievre’s slow pivot away from the election campaign he’d planned on — a campaign about the carbon price, affordability concerns and Justin Trudeau’s deep unpopularity — to one dominated by U.S. President Donald Trump and a global trade war happened as the Conservatives watched the 25-point polling lead they had in January melt away.

In their wide-ranging conversation in December, Poilievre told Peterson the Liberals had implemented a radical woke agenda influenced by the NDP, making the country “a hellscape.”

Now, he’s promising Canadians his government will keep dental care, maintain the $10-a-day childcare program and protect access to medical assistance in dying.

He’s saying all of this with a smile, though it sometimes seems forced.

Poilievre rose to success channelling voters’ anger at a government they saw as asleep at the switch while the cost of everything spiked.

His years of relentless attacks on Trudeau and the Liberal brand had an effect — it was clear by the start of the year that Canadian voters wanted change.

Fast-forward three months and it’s less clear that most voters want Poilievre.

Polls show many Canadians — women in particular — have a negative impression of him. Many feel he comes off as aggressive and angry. Some feel he’s too much like Trump. 

“I think he is frequently angry on behalf of people who have been screwed over,” said Ginny Roth, who was Poilievre’s communications director during his leadership run in 2022.

“I honestly hope that he doesn’t ever abandon that ability to tap into people’s frustration.”

Roth, a partner at Crestview Strategy, said their first conversation was “so indicative of every conversation we would have subsequently, which is like, straight into substance. No pleasantries.”

Poilievre has brought a populist style of politics to the Conservative party, according to former prime minister Stephen Harper.

In an interview with a Florida-based podcaster in January, Harper said Poilievre has “caught the populist wave,” though he argued he’s a “much more orthodox conservative than Donald Trump.”

His ability to reach supporters on social media allows him to ignore or attack the traditional media, Harper said, adding that the media “are the real opponent.” 

Poilievre’s office never responded to a request for an interview with him and Anaida for this story. Neither did Harper. Conservative incumbents and former ministers similarly ignored or declined requests to talk about Poilievre.

Fred DeLorey, chair of North Star Public Affairs and the party’s 2021 campaign director, said Poilievre’s strength is that “he’s a professional politician.” He is not, however, a statesman.

He’s often described as an attack dog, a political athlete who excels at the cut-and-thrust in the House of Commons.

Roth said Poilievre can “talk about pretty substantive, complex political policy matters in very plain language and in terms that people can connect with.”

That’s the style on display at his rallies.

Strategists say Poilievre has been very effective at courting the support of voters who tend not to back conservatives: newcomers to Canada and young people, especially young men.

Harper sees that as a generational shift, noting conservative politicians the world over have more support from young people than they did when he was prime minister.

Poilievre will need those voters to turn out at the ballot box.

Greco said there’s a simple reason why he thinks his friend will not only be the next prime minister, but a great one.

“He hates to lose,” he said. “He’s relentless. He’ll do whatever it takes.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 19, 2025.