Justin Trudeau's gender-equal cabinet could soon be replicated in the United States, depending on the outcome of the current American election.

The poll-leading presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, appeared to indicate her intention to follow suit when asked about it in a televised event on the eve of Tuesday's five northeastern primaries.

A moderator had asked about the federal cabinet to the north: "Canada has a new prime minister, Justin Trudeau. He promised when he took office that he would have a cabinet that was 50 per cent women, and then he did it. He made good on his promise. Would you make that same pledge?"

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Clinton suggested she would: "I am going to have a cabinet that looks like America, and 50 per cent of America is women, right?" That prompted the MSNBC moderator, Rachel Maddow, to conclude, "So that's a yes?"

Canada's gender-balanced cabinet has gotten a fair bit of attention in the U.S., fuelled partly by how the prime minister responded to a question about it with a shoulder shrug and the sound bite: "Because it's 2015."

But in reality, Canada didn't blaze that particular trail.

Finland's cabinet is 62 per cent female; Cape Verde's is 53 per cent; Sweden's is 52 per cent; and France's is 50 per cent, according to last year's statistics from the Inter-Parliamentary Union.

Even within Canada, the first gender-parity cabinet was created not by Trudeau – but by the former premier in Trudeau's home province of Quebec, Jean Charest.

Clinton remains the U.S. presidential front-runner, despite a tougher-than-expected primary challenge.

She retains a significant lead over her more progressive challenger, Sen. Bernie Sanders, and is expected to add to it Tuesday in primaries in Maryland, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Delaware.

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She has also consistently led general-election polls against the two Republican front-runners – Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz – although she has performed far more poorly against less-successful Republican candidates like Ohio Gov. John Kasich and the dropped-out Marco Rubio.

Trump has also been asked about the Canadian cabinet – and he won't commit to copying the Trudeau formula.