The ascendance of Carney as a climate prime minister who didn’t talk about climate is all the more striking when considered alongside last year’s election in Mexico of Claudia Sheinbaum, a climate scientist who also avoided talking about the issue in her campaign.

It’s common for U.S. politicians to tie their opponents to an unpopular incumbent president, but this year in Canada, Mark Carney took it international. Unlike in the U.S., Canadian politics is multiparty and often defined by issues without salience to its neighbors to the south.