Anaida Poilievre | |
---|---|
Born | Anaida Galindo March 5, 1987[1] Caracas, Venezuela |
Nationality | Canadian, Venezuelan |
Alma mater | University of Ottawa |
Occupation | Political staffer |
Political party | Conservative |
Spouse | |
Children | 2 |
Anaida "Ana" Poilievre (née Galindo; born March 5, 1987) is a Canadian political staffer, online magazine publisher, and wife of Conservative Party of Canada leader Pierre Poilievre.
Anaida Galindo was born on March 5, 1987, in Caracas, Venezuela. Her father was a bank manager.[2][3] In 1995, when she was eight years old,[2] her family moved to Pointe-aux-Trembles, a borough in east Montreal, Quebec,[4] where her father worked collecting fruits and vegetables at a farm.[2][5]
She studied communications at the University of Ottawa.[2][6]
After working in retail and customer service roles, in 2008, at 20 years of age,[5] Poilievre was employed as a parliamentary affairs advisor at the Senate of Canada before taking a job in the House of Commons of Canada.[2] In 2013, she began working for then Leader of the Senate Claude Carignan as a parliamentary affairs advisor.[5]
Poilievre is a co-founder of Pretty and Smart Co online lifestyle magazine.[2] Early in the COVID-19 pandemic she supported restrictions, but later became critical of public health measures in Canada.[2]
In March 2023, conspiracy theorist Chris Sky falsely claimed on Twitter that Poilievre was CEO of Switch Health, a company that won contracts from the Government of Canada to undertake COVID-19 testing. Sky based his statements on output from ChatGPT artificial intelligence software.[7]
Anaida Poilievre married Pierre Poilievre in 2017 in Sintra, Portugal.[8][2] She is an active part of Pierre's political life, attending events with him and featuring in a Conservative Party promotional campaign in August 2023.[4]
Poilievre and her husband have two children.[5][9] The family own a rental property in Orleans, Ottawa, which she bought in 2012 and took a mortgage on in 2020.[10] Pierre Poilievre defended the investment as “helping solve the problem by providing affordable rental accommodations to two deserving families”. He also said his wife used the equity in her property to “maximize the best interests of her financial position.” [10]
Poilievre speaks her native language, Spanish, as well as French and English.[3]
In September 2022, Jeremy MacKenzie, the far-right leader of the Diagolon online community, spoke about raping Anaida Poilievre.[11] Pierre Poilievre referred the comments to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP).[12] Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said: "No one should ever be subject to threats of violence or the kind of hatred we’ve seen increasingly ... It's important that we all stand up and condemn that."[11] The RCMP said it was reviewing the report.[8]