Hill Climbers
Who’s who so far in Canada-U.S. Trade Minister LeBlanc’s shop
The ground continues to shift on the Canada-United States trade front, so it’s a good thing Canada-U.S. Trade and One Canadian Economy Minister Dominic LeBlanc—who’s also currently Privy Council president, and minister for intergovernmental affairs—has made strides in firming up his ministerial team.
So far reported in LeBlanc’s office are chief of staff Brandan Rowe; director of operations Alex Axiotis-Perez, who is also deputy chief of staff to the minister; director of communications Jean-Sébastien Comeau; press secretary and senior communications adviser Gabriel Brunet; and senior communications adviser Ève Loignon-Giroux.
Adding to that list, for one, is Miro Froehlich, who’s been tapped as director of policy to LeBlanc.
Froehlich spent the last almost three-and-a-half years working for the federal public safety minister—a role LeBlanc held for much of that time, having served in the portfolio (while also concurrently being minister for democratic institutions and intergovernmental affairs) from July 2023 to December 2024.
Froehlich first joined the public safety office under then-minister Marco Mendicino in early 2022 as a Quebec regional affairs adviser, having previously done the same for then-health minister Patty Hajdu. In early 2023, he became a senior Quebec regional adviser and policy adviser in the office, tackling public safety and—after that July’s cabinet shuffle—intergovernmental affairs. Froehlich stuck with the public safety office after LeBlanc was shuffled out last December, and according to his LinkedIn profile, he spent the past six months as director of policy to then-public safety minister David McGuinty.
Froehlich is also a former assistant to Quebec Liberal MP Angelo Iacono.
Rebecca Parkinson continues as director of intergovernmental affairs to LeBlanc, as she did through his recent turn as finance and intergovernmental affairs minister (which spanned December 2024 to this past March), and his time as then-minister of public safety, intergovernmental affairs, and democratic institutions before that.
A former executive assistant to then-Manitoba Liberal MP Jim Carr, between 2017 and the end of 2020, Parkinson worked in the ministers’ regional office in Winnipeg—one of 16 regional offices across Canada that support all of cabinet, and include a mix of public servants and political staff. At the end of 2020, she was hired to work for LeBlanc for the first time, beginning as a senior adviser for the Prairies and North in his office as then-Privy Council president and intergovernmental affairs minister.
Sticking with LeBlanc through his time as intergovernmental affairs, and infrastructure and communities minister—which spanned October 2021 to July 2023—and on, Parkinson was promoted to director of policy for intergovernmental to LeBlanc in September 2023. She switched titles, becoming director of intergovernmental affairs in August 2024.
Émilie Simard is LeBlanc’s director of parliamentary affairs and issues management in LeBlanc’s new office. She, too, comes from LeBlanc’s former team as then-public safety, intergovernmental affairs, and democratic institutions minister—Hill Climbers will be calling this LeBlanc’s “triple role” for the rest of this column to try to spare us all some repetition—which Simard joined in May 2023 under her current title. Before then, she’d done the same for then-immigration minister Sean Fraser. Following last December’s shuffle, Simard stuck with the public safety office under then-minister McGuinty, becoming director of operations.
Simard is also a former issues manager to Mendicino as then-immigration minister, a past press secretary to then-rural economic development minister Bernadette Jordan, and a former special assistant for Ontario and Quebec regional affairs and assistant to the parliamentary secretary to then-veterans affairs minister Kent Hehr.
Working under Simard is senior issues adviser Charles Smith, and senior adviser for research and issues management Wallace McLean.
Smith cut his political teeth as an intern with the New Brunswick Liberal Party, and went on to spend the summer of 2019 as a constituency intern to now-Secretary of State for the Financial Sector and Canada Revenue Agency Wayne Long as the MP for the then-named riding of Saint John–Rothesay, N.B. By the summer of 2022, Smith had made his way to Ottawa, landing an internship tackling issues management and parliamentary affairs in then-prime minister Justin Trudeau’s office. In early 2023, he was hired to then-deputy prime minister and finance minister Chrystia Freeland’s office as a special assistant for issues management. Smith was kept on after LeBlanc became finance and intergovernmental affairs minister, and was elevated to his current, senior adviser title, which he continued in through Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne’s first months on the job.
McLean has been working for LeBlanc since 2019, beginning as an issues management adviser in LeBlanc’s office as then-Privy Council president. McLean was promoted to senior issues adviser during LeBlanc’s time as infrastructure and intergovernmental affairs minister, and went on to be a search adviser for research in LeBlanc’s triple-role office. McLean is also a former: issues manager to then-democratic institutions minister Karina Gould, legislative assistant and policy adviser to then-agriculture minister Lawrence MacAulay, special assistant for policy and research in Trudeau’s office as then-third party leader, and assistant to then-Liberal MP Todd Russell.
Galen Richardson is a senior adviser for stakeholder relations to LeBlanc. Richardson is a former senior regional adviser for the West and North to Freeland as then-deputy prime minister and finance minister. For a few months in 2024, while working for Freeland, he also briefly lent a hand doing the same part time for Trudeau’s PMO.
An ex-associate with Saskatoon’s McKercher LLP, Richardson has also been a policy and West and North regional adviser to Champagne as then-infrastructure and communities minister, and a West and North regional adviser to then-economic development and official languages minister Mélanie Joly.
Joining Comeau, Brunet, and Loignon-Giroux on the communications team is adviser Ariane Mallet. A former intern and part-time assistant to LeBlanc as then-infrastructure and intergovernmental affairs minister, Mallet was hired to his triple-role office as a communications assistant in late 2023, and was recently a communications adviser in LeBlanc’s short-lived finance and intergovernmental affairs shop.
Mayssam Ibrahim and Monica Stella Jaillet are in place as regional advisers in LeBlanc’s office. Though usually regional advisers have a specific regional focus, Climbers understands that, together, they are covering all of the regions of Canada, from East to West to North.
Ibrahim has been working for LeBlanc since 2021 when she was hired as executive assistant to his chief of staff as then-Privy Council president and intergovernmental affairs minister. She later worked as a policy adviser in LeBlanc’s infrastructure and intergovernmental affairs office—focused on the former file—where she also offered Quebec advice. Though it was never publicly noted or reported by Climbers, Ibrahim’s LinkedIn profile suggests she was also a regional adviser to LeBlanc in his former, triple role.
Jaillet is another seasoned LeBlanc staffer, having worked for the minister since 2020 when she was hired as a special assistant in his office as intergovernmental affairs minister and Privy Council president. She went on to be a special assistant for operations in LeBlanc’s triple-role office.
Currently holding the title of special assistant in LeBlanc’s new office is Édouard Blais-Guilbeault. He previously interned with the National Bank of Canada in 2023, and spent the second half of 2024 as an intern in LeBlanc’s triple-role office, after which he was hired as a part-time special assistant in LeBlanc’s office as then-finance and intergovernmental affairs minister.
Finally, rounding out LeBlanc’s currently 15-member office is Shannon Ablett, office manager and executive assistant to Rowe as chief of staff.
Ablett has returned to work for LeBlanc, having exited his former triple-role team—where she’d similarly been executive assistant to the minister’s then-chief of staff for public safety, Cory Pike (who’s now running McGuinty’s office as national defence minister)—this past November. Ablett is also a former assistant to Pike during his time as chief of staff to then-public services and procurement minister Helena Jaczek, and is a former aide to Ontario Liberal MP Ryan Turnbull.
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