Trust is the quiet backbone of democracy. When people believe elections are run fairly, they accept results even when their side loses. But that trust is not guaranteed to last, and a new McGill-led study suggests it may be eroding in Canada—not across the board, but in ways that follow political fault lines. The research, led by Mathieu Lavigne of the Media Ecosystem Observatory at McGill University, found that right-leaning Canadians and supporters of the Conservative Party and the People’s Party have become noticeably less confident in election administration since 2019. This is a significant shift in a country where election management has long been considered among the best in the world. It is also a reminder that trust in democratic institutions is not simply a reward for good performance; it can be shaped by politics, information, and perception. The findings come from two related studies. The first, published in Public Opinion Quarterly, draws on more than a decade of survey data to trace how trust in elections has evolved. The second, published in Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties, looks at how attitudes toward misinformation are becoming polarized. Together, they paint a nuanced picture: most Canadians still trust the electoral process, but that trust is increasingly split along ideological lines. The problem is not that Canada’s elections are becoming less fair. In fact, experts continue to rate Canadian election administration very highly. The problem is that a growing number of Canadians on the right are losing faith in the institutions themselves. And that loss of faith, the researchers argue, is closely tied to the information people consume and the way political debates about election integrity and misinformation have been framed. This is not an abstract concern. It has real consequences for how Canadians view their democracy and for whether they accept the legitimacy of election results. The stakes are especially high because trust, once broken, is difficult to restore.
How do you measure something as abstract as trust in elections? You ask a lot of people, over a long period of time, and look for patterns. That is exactly what the research team did. The first study combined data from the Canadian Election Study, which surveyed roughly 72,000 Canadians between 2008 and 2021. That gave the researchers a long view—enough to see whether changes in trust were gradual or sudden, and whether they lined up with particular political events. To get a closer look at recent dynamics, they also used surveys conducted by McGill’s Media Ecosystem Observatory after the 2021 federal election, with nearly 3,000 respondents, and after the 2022 Quebec provincial election, with about 1,500 respondents. These smaller, more targeted surveys allowed the team to dig into the relationship between media habits and trust. Taken together, the data represent one of the most systematic efforts to date to understand how and why perceptions of election integrity are shifting in Canada. The size of the dataset matters because trust in institutions can fluctuate with news cycles. A single poll might capture a temporary spike or dip in confidence. But with more than a decade of responses, the researchers could distinguish between short-term reactions and longer-term trends. What they found was not a steady decline across the whole population. Instead, the erosion was concentrated among specific groups: people on the right, and particularly those who supported the Conservative Party or the People’s Party. That pattern is what makes the study so important. It suggests that trust in elections is becoming less about the actual quality of election administration and more about political identity. In other words, how you feel about the electoral system increasingly depends on where you get your information and how you see the political world. And because the surveys were repeated over time, they also show that these divisions have grown sharper, not just in one snapshot but as a consistent trend. That makes the findings hard to dismiss as a temporary reaction to a single event.
The central finding is straightforward but sobering. A majority of Canadians still trust the election administration process. But that majority is no longer evenly distributed across the political spectrum. Since 2019, trust has dropped significantly among right-leaning Canadians and supporters of the Conservative and People’s parties. The researchers describe this as a growing partisan and ideological divide. To understand why this matters, it helps to think about what election trust does in a democracy. When trust is high, losers accept defeat, winners govern with legitimacy, and the system absorbs conflict peacefully. When trust erodes, every close election becomes a potential crisis. Even if the actual administration of elections remains excellent, the perception of unfairness can be enough to undermine confidence in the outcome. The study’s authors note that false allegations of election fraud in the United States have circulated extensively online, and that these narratives appear to have found an audience in Canada. This is not to say that Canadian right-wing voters are simply being manipulated. Rather, the information environment they encounter is different, and it shapes how they interpret the electoral process. The researchers also point out that experts do not perceive any decline in the integrity of Canadian elections. In fact, Canadian election administration is among the most favourably rated in the world. This gap between expert assessments and public perception is a classic sign that trust is being driven by something other than institutional performance. It is being driven by politics. The study does not claim that all right-leaning Canadians have lost trust in elections. It does show that the trend is real, measurable, and concentrated. And because trust is cumulative—once lost, it is hard to rebuild—the pattern deserves attention before it becomes entrenched. The authors are not predicting that Canadian elections are about to collapse. But they are saying that the early warning signs are visible, and that democracies are often slow to notice until it is too late. In that sense, the study is as much about the future as it is about the past.
One of the most striking aspects of the research is the role of media. The authors found that people who get their political information from social media or alternative right-wing media tend to have lower trust in election integrity than those who rely more on legacy media. This is not just a correlation. The surveys allowed the researchers to compare people with similar political views but different media habits, and the pattern held. The reason, they suggest, is that the information ecosystem has changed. False allegations of election fraud in the United States have circulated extensively online, and those narratives have crossed the border. For a Canadian voter scrolling through social media, the distinction between American and Canadian elections can blur. A story about a contested election in Pennsylvania or Arizona may not mention Canada, but it can still shape general assumptions about how elections work. Alternative right-wing media, meanwhile, often frame election administration as untrustworthy or corrupt, and these messages are amplified by social media algorithms that reward outrage. The result is a feedback loop: people who are already skeptical of mainstream institutions seek out sources that confirm their skepticism, and those sources in turn deepen their distrust. The researchers are careful not to blame individual voters. The problem is structural. The media environment has become more fragmented, and the incentives for spreading sensational claims are stronger than ever. At the same time, legacy media—newspapers, television, radio—still tend to present election administration in a more neutral, factual way. That does not mean legacy media is perfect, but it does mean that people who rely on it are less likely to encounter narratives of systemic election fraud. In a country where the actual election system is widely admired by experts, this gap between media worlds is troubling. It means that two Canadians can live in the same democracy, vote in the same elections, and come away with completely different beliefs about whether those elections were fair. That is a recipe for mutual incomprehension, where the same event is interpreted in completely opposite ways depending on which media world you live in. It also makes it harder for citizens to hold their institutions to account, because they cannot even agree on what is happening.
The second study shifts the focus from trust in elections to attitudes toward misinformation. Here too, the researchers found a growing ideological divide. Based on surveys conducted during the 2021 federal election and the 2022 Quebec provincial election, the study shows that Canadians across the political spectrum generally reject misinformation. No one likes being lied to, and most people say they want accurate information. But the similarities end there. Right-leaning Canadians, the study found, are more likely to question the existence of impartial truth. They are more likely to see anti-misinformation efforts as biased against conservatives. They are more tolerant of politicians who spread misinformation. And they are more opposed to government or platform interventions designed to curb false claims. This is a delicate finding, and the researchers treat it with care. It would be easy to interpret as “conservatives support misinformation,” but that is not what the data show. Rather, the study suggests that misinformation has become entangled with political identity. For many right-leaning Canadians, the fight against misinformation is not a neutral project. It is seen as a weapon aimed at their side. Once that perception takes hold, even well-intentioned efforts to protect democracy can backfire. The study also challenges a common assumption about political psychology: that people excuse misinformation when it supports their own side. The researchers found little evidence for that kind of simple partisan hypocrisy. Instead, resistance to anti-misinformation measures seems to be driven more by concerns about fairness and neutrality. People do not necessarily object to the idea of correcting falsehoods; they object to what they see as a rigged game. This has practical implications. If interventions are perceived as favoring one side, they will not just fail to build trust—they will actively deepen the divide. The researchers argue that combating misinformation requires approaches that are seen as fair, non-partisan, and capable of earning support across political lines. That is a much harder task than simply fact-checking false claims. It means rebuilding trust in the very idea that there can be a shared set of facts, and that is a project that cannot be accomplished by fact-checkers alone. It requires political leaders, platforms, and citizens to think carefully about how their own actions affect the credibility of the information ecosystem.
Taken together, these two studies offer a warning and a path forward. The warning is that Canadian democracy is not immune to the forces that have eroded trust in other countries. The same narratives that have cast doubt on American elections are now circulating in Canada, and they are finding fertile ground among people who feel alienated from mainstream institutions. The path forward is more complicated. The researchers do not offer a simple checklist, but they are clear about the principles that should guide any response. First, efforts to protect election integrity must be visibly non-partisan. If they are seen as tools of one party or one ideology, they will make the problem worse. Second, interventions against misinformation need to be transparent and fair. People are more likely to accept correction when they trust the messenger. Third, the information environment itself needs attention. Social media platforms and alternative media outlets have become powerful shapers of political reality, and their incentives are not always aligned with democratic health. The studies also remind us that trust is not just about facts. It is about feeling that the rules are the same for everyone. When people believe the system is rigged against them, no amount of expert reassurance will change their minds. That is why the researchers emphasize the need for approaches that can earn support across political divides. Canada still has a strong foundation. Election administration is widely respected, and most Canadians continue to trust the process. But the trends identified in these studies are moving in the wrong direction, and they are moving along partisan lines. The good news is that this is not inevitable. Trust can be rebuilt, but only if the people responsible for elections, media, and public debate take the problem seriously. The evidence is a warning, not a verdict. What matters now is whether Canadians can find ways to talk about elections and misinformation that bring people together rather than driving them apart. The research will not make those conversations easier. But it does show where the fault lines are, and that is a necessary first step. If Canadians can recognize the problem for what it is—a political and informational challenge, not a failure of election administration—there is reason to hope.