Polling stations across New Brunswick are now closing, with counting set to begin.
What happens on Monday night could result in anything from a repeat Progressive Conservative majority to a Liberal majority government, with a minority government where the Greens hold the balance of power as an option in between.
The storylines are many.
Progressive Conservative Leader Blaine Higgs has his sights set on a political feat that hasn’t been accomplished in New Brunswick in 29 years: winning three straight elections.
The PCs have only done it once in the last century, with a win putting Higgs in the history books next to a four-term run led by Richard Hatfield from 1970 to 1987.
That’s as Liberal Susan Holt can make provincial history.
After becoming the first woman to win the provincial Liberal leadership in August 2022, Holt would be the first woman ever to lead the province as premier.
The two ran very different 32-day campaigns.
Higgs, 70, a retired Irving Oil business executive turned finance minister and then premier, ran a low-key campaign that bet heavily on his own fiscal track record, where he took a province teetering on the edge of the fiscal cliff and managed six straight surpluses buoying New Brunswick to a position of respectability.
Higgs said that fiscal prowess had now created the fiscal room to promise a massive two-point HST tax cut.
That’s while attempting at every turn to tie his opponent to unpopular Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Since triggering the election with a visit to the lieutenant governor, there’s been at least 10 days where the Tory leader didn’t hold a single public event.
It was arguably by design, as the Tories revealed a platform with just 11 commitments, accompanied by a message from Higgs stating he won’t be buying your vote.
That’s as Holt, 47, the former head of the New Brunswick Business Council and an adviser to former Liberal Premier Brian Gallant, unveiled a platform with exactly 100 promises.
She’s taken just two days off from public events since the runoff began.
The Liberal platform is headlined by a pledge to remove the provincial sales tax from home energy bills, give out bonus cheques to nurses, free breakfast and a pay-what-you-can lunch for all students, while offering moves to bolster health care.
That’s while promising balanced budgets.
Holt has also made sure not to let voters forget about the last two years where Higgs faced an attempted mutiny from within his own party over his leadership style and policy decisions that have arguably steered the party more to the political right than before.
Satisfaction levels with his government are the lowest in the country.
Still, Higgs has survived.
When cabinet ministers jumped, he replaced them.
While just five of the Tory candidates Higgs originally won with in 2018 are part of his candidate roster this time around, he’s seeking reelection with new blood.
Meanwhile, the wildcard in the race is again the Greens where Leader David Coon, 67, an environmentalist who once served with the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, could hold the balance of power in a minority government.
The Green leader has been unequivocal on the campaign trail that he will play no role in returning Higgs to power.
That means anything short of a majority likely means curtains for Higgs.