OTTAWA, Ontario (LifeSiteNews) — Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre has lost his seat in the House of Commons, but has indicated he plans to stay on as party leader.

Early this morning, polls confirmed that Poilievre lost his Ottawa-area Carleton seat to Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) Bruce Fanjoy after telling Canadians last night that he plans to stay on as leader of the Conservative Party.

“I thank you from the bottom of my heart to the millions of people who voted for the Conservative Party and put their hopes and dreams in our vision. It will be an honor to continue to fight for you and to be a champion,” Poilievre told supporters at the Rogers Centre in Ottawa after the April 28 election.

As LifeSiteNews reported, the Liberal Party, under the leadership of Mark Carney, has won a minority government, securing their fourth term in Canada.

Poilievre had held his Carleton seat for seven straight elections, representing the are since 2004.

Despite the Liberal victory, Poilievre remained hopeful for the Conservatives’ role in Canada’s future.

“To my fellow Conservatives, we have much to celebrate tonight,” he said. “We’ve gained well over 20 seats. We got the highest share of vote our party has received since 1988. We denied the NDP and Liberals enough seats to form a coalition government.”

“We did all of this in a very difficult environment,” Poilievre continued. “That said, we are cognizant of the fact that we didn’t quite get over the finish line yet. We know that change is needed, but change is hard to come by. It takes time. It takes work. And that’s why we have to learn the lessons of tonight so that we can have an even better result the next time the Canadians decide the future for the country.”

“Canadians have opted for a razor thin minority government, a virtual tie in the vote count,” he added.

Despite his optimism, Poilievre’s defeat comes as many social conservatives felt betrayed by the leader, who more than once on the campaign trail promised to maintain the status quo on abortion – which is permitted through all nine months of pregnancy – and euthanasia, and who failed to directly address a number of moral issues like the LGBT agenda.

Under Carney, the Liberals are expected to continue much of what they did under Trudeau, including the party’s zealous push in favor of abortion, euthanasia, radical gender ideology, internet regulation and so-called “climate change” policies. Indeed, Carney, like Trudeau, seems to have extensive ties to both China and the globalist World Economic Forum, connections which were brought up routinely by conservatives in the lead-up to the election but seemed to not have swayed a sufficient number of voters.