Some Liberal MPs issued an ultimatum to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau Wednesday: decide in the next few days if you want to stay on as leader or face some unspecified consequences.
For weeks, anti-Trudeau MPs have been meeting in secret to convince caucus members to band together and push Trudeau out of the top job to save the party from electoral ruin.
After nine years in government, Trudeau's popularity has plummeted. The CBC Poll Tracker shows the Conservatives have a 19-point lead over the governing Liberals, a margin that suggests dozens of Liberal MPs could be out of a job after the next vote.
In that context, some 24 Liberal MPs have signed a document calling on Trudeau to go.
Sources said that document, laying out the argument for Trudeau's resignation, was read out in the party's caucus meeting on Parliament Hill today.
The document included a demand: Trudeau should make a choice about his future before Oct. 28 or face some unspecified consequences.
About 20 MPs — none of them cabinet ministers — also stood up in the Liberal caucus meeting today to urge Trudeau to rethink his pledge to stay on as leader into the next election, sources told CBC News.
I didn't think they wouldput an ultimatum on the table. That shows they have a great deal of resolve here that was unanticipated,
one MP told CBC News.
Sources said Trudeau looked uncomfortable at times as MPs questioned his leadership.
The prime minister also got emotional at one point as he toldMPsabout the toll his long political career has taken on his three children, sources said.
Sources said Trudeautold caucus he would take some time to reflect after hearing their concerns about his viability as leader.
Trudeau emerged from the meeting saying only to reporters that the Liberal Party is strong and united.
WATCH: Trudeau leaves caucus after some Liberal MPs call on him to resign
Watch the moment Trudeau leaves the caucus room where some MPs called for him to resign
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says ‘the Liberal Party is strong and united’ as he emerges from a meeting of the Liberal caucus Wednesday, during which some MPs raised concerns about Trudeau’s leadership.
Trudeau could decide to press on as leader even if he's dealing with significant discontent in his caucus. It's not clear what disgruntled Liberals will do if Trudeau simply ignores their demands to step aside by the specified deadline of Oct. 28.
Three MPs have come forward publicly to say they have signed the document: Newfoundland's Ken McDonald, Prince Edward Island'sSean Casey and New Brunswick's Wayne Long.
McDonald, Casey and Long have all said that while they want Trudeau to go, they're not yet willing to leave the party and sit as Independents.
Speaking brieflyto reporters before the caucus meeting, Casey said he'd like to see a secret vote to decide Trudeau's future:I wish there was a mechanismfor it, yes.
McDonald told CBC'sPower & PoliticsTuesday that he and other dissenters have also discussed voting against the government if there's another non-confidence voteand they don't see evidence that Trudeau and his team are taking their concerns seriously.
All three of those MPs are longstanding critics of Trudeau. The names of other MPs who have signedthe letter may also be made known today.
No one seems to knowwhat could come out of this potentially fractious caucus meeting, or whether a letter bearing thenames of disgruntledMPs will prompt Trudeau to change his mind.
Trudeau could decide to press on as leader even if he's dealing with significant discontent in his caucus. He has said repeatedly that he will lead the party into the next election.
McDonald, Casey and Long have all said that while they want Trudeau to go, they're yet not willing to leave the party and sit as Independents.
The move to oust Trudeau could lead to a seismic development in federal politics — or simply fizzle out like past efforts to challenge the prime minister.
It's not just the polls that signal trouble on the horizon for the Liberals.Liberal MPs are also anxious about Trudeau and his team losing two byelections in historically rock-solid Liberal ridings in Toronto and Montreal.
The Liberal candidate in another recent Winnipeg-area byelection posted one of the worst results for a governing party in Canadian history.
The party's national campaign director quit in early September. The party took weeks to announce a replacement.
Four more of Trudeau's cabinet ministers have announced, or are expected to announce soon, that they will not run again in the next election, sources have told CBC News.
That news came after MP Pablo Rodriguez left caucus to sit as an Independent while running to lead the Quebec Liberal Party.
Still, Trudeau has support from his cabinet.
Immigration Minister Marc Miller has called the efforts to oust Trudeau garbage
and said it would be better for the team to pull together to take on their main opponent: Conservative LeaderPierre Poilievre.
WATCH:Immigration minister calls efforts to oust Trudeau 'garbage'
Immigration minister calls efforts to oust Trudeau ‘garbage’
Immigration Minister Marc Miller says any time spent focusing on some Liberal MPs' efforts to oust Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ‘is a minute that’s not spent on Pierre Poilievre and what he wants to do to this country.’ Miller says Trudeau has the support of the ‘vast majority of caucus’ and the entirety of cabinet.
Any minute spent on this garbage is a minute that's not spent on Pierre Poilievre and what he wants to do to this country, and I think that is very dangerous,
Miller told reporters ahead of a cabinet meeting Tuesday.
I'm a member of his cabinet and obviously we support him,
said Housing Minister Sean Fraser.
Echoing Miller, Fraser said it's Poilievre who's the real problem.
We are up against somebody who is campaigning on promises to deny access to free birth control for women, who won't even get a security clearance to look into allegations about his own caucus members being engaged in foreign interference,
he said, citing Poilievre's controversial decision to forgo getting the necessary credentials to review top-secret documents.
Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson predicted this latest attempt to take Trudeau down will fail.
At the end of the day, we will have a robust debate, we will come out with, in my view, support for the prime minister and move forward with the election,
he said.
John Paul Tasker · CBC News
