During Election Night in Montreal We Found More Shrugs Than Celebrations

Somebody at Reggie's was still holding the karaoke mic when the projections came in on Monday night. The election coverage ran on the screen behind the singers, and the songs kept coming while Quebec picked a new government.

The results of the 2026 Quebec Provinicial Election are in: Government belongs to the Parti Québécois. Paul St-Pierre Plamondon's party left the 2022 vote with three seats and is now projected to hold 59, a handful shy of the 64 it would need to govern on its own.

It's the first PQ win since Pauline Marois took office in 2012, and it lands about six weeks before the 50th anniversary of René Lévesque's first victory on November 15, 1976. St-Pierre Plamondon has said a referendum can wait until Donald Trump's presidency is over. Without a majority, he'd also need Québec solidaire on side to call one.

The rest of the board moved just as much. The Liberals more than doubled their caucus and will be the official Opposition with 40 seats. Éric Duhaime's Conservatives, shut out four years ago, arrive at the National Assembly with 19. Québec solidaire kept nine. The Coalition Avenir Québec, in charge for the past eight years, came away with nothing, and premier Christine Fréchette couldn't hold her own riding. The PQ got there with roughly 28 per cent support, the thinnest share a governing party has ever won with in this province, so expect the voting-system debate to pick up where the campaign left it.