What we know about Andrew Scheer, newly elected interim opposition leader of the Conservative Party

The federal election has done more than just choose a prime minister. Several party leaders failed to secure a seat in the House of Commons, leading to a shakeup at the parties’ top levels. Jonathan Pedneault stepped down as Green Party co-leader after losing the riding of Outremont to Liberal candidate Rachel Bendayan; Elizabeth May remains the party leader. And this week the New Democratic Party appointed Don Davies as interim leader after Jagmeet Singh lost his seat and stepped down. The NDP also lost official party status with just seven seats in the House. Now it’s the Conservatives’ turn. On Tuesday it was announced that Andrew Scheer will replace Pierre Poilievre as interim opposition leader until Poilievre, who lost his seat in Ottawa’s Carleton riding on election night, can rejoin the House. The plan is for Poilievre to run in Alberta, where MP Damien Kurek has offered to resign his seat in Battle River–Crowfoot to trigger a byelection. Who is Andrew Scheer? Conservative Andrew James Scheer was born in Ottawa in 1979, and has a Bachelor of Arts in criminology, political science and history from the University of Ottawa. During his time at school he worked on the Unite the Right campaign to merge the Progressive Conservative and Reform parties under Preston Manning. Scheer was first elected to the House of Commons in 2004 in the Saskatchewan riding of Regina–Qu’Appelle, and has held that riding in every election since then. (His wife, Jill Ryan, is from Regina.) Scheer holds dual Canadian-American citizenship because his father was born in the U.S. In 2019 he said he was in the process of renouncing his U.S. citizenship, but the following year said he would no longer do so as he did not have a chance of becoming prime minister. What’s his history as Conservative leader? In 2011, Scheer became House speaker under the ruling Conservatives at the age of 32, the youngest person in history to hold that position. After the Conservatives lost power in 2015, he ran for leadership of the party. In 2017 he was elected to that position , narrowly defeating Maxime Bernier, who would go on to found and lead the People’s Party of Canada. Scheer would be leader of the opposition from 2017 through 2020. After the Conservative loss in the 2019 election he announced he would step down as leader. He was replaced by Erin O’Toole, who subsequently named him Opposition Critic for Infrastructure & Communities in his shadow cabinet. Scheer endorsed Poilievre’s campaign to become leader of the Conservative Party in 2022, and Poilievre later named him Opposition House Leader.

There is no doubt that @PierrePoilievre and his team ran an incredible campaign. The highest vote percentage in modern Conservative history. The most amount of total votes for our party, ever. New seats all over the country. His inspirational leadership has brought more…— Andrew Scheer (@AndrewScheer) April 29, 2025

How long will it be before Poilievre can regain his leadership? Canadian law prohibits MPs from resigning until at least 30 days after their election result is published in the Canada Gazette, the federal government’s official publication. This itself can take about a month, meaning it could be late June before Kurek can step down. The byelection is then called by the Governor General on the advice of the prime minister and cabinet, between 11 and 180 days after an MP resigns. However, Prime Minister Mark Carney told reporters last Friday: “I will ensure that it happens as soon as possible. No games, nothing.” Under that timeline, Poilievre could be back in the saddle by the start of the fall sitting of Parliament on Sept. 15 . Scheer would step down and return to being a regular MP.

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