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In recent days, reports had begun to emerge — placed by “senior Liberal insiders,” no doubt — that Trudeau now grasped the gravity of this situation. It was a crisis. Senior advisers were gathered with him. A statement of “contrition” was expected. Not an apology, per se, but an acknowledgement that mistakes had been made and that the government would do better going forward. On Wednesday, after the morning press event was announced, that message was sent again to the Ottawa press gallery — not an apology, not a surrender, but an acknowledgement of errors, and contrition.

That’s not really what Canadians got.

Photo by THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand

The prime minister spoke for about 15 minutes and took questions for longer. You can see that the tone was intended to signal contrition — the prime minister sounded serious, reasonable and concerned. He said that he had learned a lot in recent weeks and still had more to learn, including about his own leadership and ways he could potentially improve. He assured Canadians that their government would be made stronger by all this.

But an apology? An admission of wrongdoing? Not only was there nothing like that, but the prime minister actually made a clear defence of his government’s conduct. Asked by Global News’ Amanda Connolly if he was apologizing, the prime minister said that he’d be making an apology to Inuit Canadians today, and then added, “but in regards to standing up for jobs and defending the integrity of our rule of law, I continue to say that there was no inappropriate pressure.”