Conservative Party

Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s endorsement of Pierre Poilievre for the Conservative Party of Canada leadership is a big deal … in those parts of the country where Poilievre is already going to wipe the floor with the other candidates.

Stephen Harper’s endorsement of Pierre Poilievre for the Conservative Party leadership is a boost for the Ottawa MP that will particularly sway party members who have been on the fence about supporting him, the Conservative Senate leader says.

“So far, this is the biggest and most important endorsement,” Don Plett said in an interview on Tuesday.

But he said it’s a complicated situation. “Conservatives are strong-minded people, and if I had been a supporter of somebody else, I don’t think an endorsement like this would sway my first ballot vote. If I was on the fence, it most certainly would.”

OTTAWA – Former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper has endorsed Pierre Poilievre to be the party’s next leader.

In a rare public return to party politics, Harper, who didn’t wade into the Conservatives’ 2017 and 2020 leadership races, released a short video on Twitter on Monday discussing his endorsement.

Harper says the contest to lead the party is filled with candidates, but one stands out.

There is something to be said for how British Conservatives pick their leaders. The campaign to choose Boris Johnson’s successor is unfolding with merciful swiftness compared with the agonizing, and largely pointless, journey Canada’s Tories have been on for many months now.

Britain’s Conservatives, who will have selected Mr. Johnson’s successor five days before their Canadian counterparts finally unveil their new leader on Sept. 10, took less than two weeks to whittle the original field of 11 candidates down to two serious contenders after Mr. Johnson’s July 7 resignation. British Tories are hence spared the spectacle of a campaign tainted by unserious fringe candidates, allegations of illegal funding, and a rush to sell membership cards.

A federal Conservative party led by Pierre Poilievre would pull votes away from the People’s Party of Canada more successfully than one led by Jean Charest, a Mainstreet poll suggests.

The poll asked how people would vote in a federal election if Poilievre or Charest were the Conservative leader.

“Basically he gets a lot of that People’s party vote,” said Mainstreet CEO Quito Maggi. “His tack to the right does bring that PPC vote home to the Conservative party — it’s likely that it’s just extremely inefficient.”

Its decision, released late Friday, contains new allegations Brown used money orders to purchase memberships and allowed non-compliant membership sales through a portal.

“Mr. Brown was afforded ample opportunity to address these serious concerns,” Ian Brodie, chair of the party’s leadership election organizing committee, said in a statement.

I no longer even vote  CPC and was concerned this “progressive” might weasel his way to the leadership.

‘This will be Pierre Poilievre’s party’: Conservatives reckon with a new direction

The explosion in Conservative membership sales could significantly shake up the party’s grassroots as well as the long-standing power dynamics between various factions, multiple sources tell Global News.

The biggest beneficiary of that shake-up would likely be Pierre Poilievre, the purported frontrunner to lead the Conservative Party of Canada into the next general election.

OMG they’re resurrecting the Reform Party, someone check to see if Lucki has recently taken up smoking.

I believe the “panic” is entirely contrived by those who would wish the likes of Charest on the party.

Much as I get a kick out of Poilievre he’s not offering radical changes to existing policy, especially on such key issues as immigration.

So I don’t see what the fuss is about.

OTTAWA — The campaign for Pierre Poilievre, the perceived front-runner in the federal Conservative leadership race, announced Thursday he won’t take part in the party’s third debate planned for August, facing the consequence of a $50,000 fine.

WTF?

“… As for this new hokey team Centre Ice Conservatives, its advisory council chair is New Brunswick Progressive Conservative Education Minister Dominic Cardy, formerly provincial NDP leader. And yes, he’s a Jean Charest backer, which indicates where they both think the “centre” is.

Charest’s national co-chair is also on the “Charest Ice” advisory council, along with former senator Marjory LeBreton, who quit Pierre Poilievre’s riding association board because he supported the truckers’ convoy. Whose ideas were odd, but nothing like the limited-government agenda even of Ted Cruz, let alone Barry Goldwater or George Washington. I think the real issue was bad manners.”

You can’t make this crap up.

The Conservative leadership race is diminished by one.

Mathematically.

A couple of weeks ago, Patrick Brown was running to be prime minister of Canada. Now he has signed papers to run for re-election as mayor of Brampton, Ont. This is either a considerable downscaling of his ambitions or a return to a more moderate assessment of his capacity.

There is really nothing to fear in Poilievre, I find myself in agreement with Christy Clark – he will move or be managed to the mushy middle. Frankly he isn’t offering much different to begin with so I don’t know what all the fuss is about. A little red meat from time to time but nothing substantive like a reversal of our disastrous immigration policy.

Conservatives need to veer to moderate middle: Former B.C. premier

Pierre Poilievre is likely to pivot to the political centre if he wins the Conservative leadership this fall, says former British Columbia premier Christy Clark.

“I think that most politicians, when they finish their leadership race, change a little bit,” said Ms. Clark, who led the BC Liberal Party – a coalition of federal Conservatives and federal Liberals. “He’s a smart guy. I don’t think there’s any exception to that.”

“If Mr. Poilievre wins, he’s going to have a choice to make about how he wants to speak to Canadians about the things we share in common,” she said in a Wednesday interview with The Globe and Mail.

Centre Ice Conservatives says it wants to bring Conservatives on the centre or centre-right of the political spectrum together

The main organizers of a conference of moderate Conservatives meeting in Edmonton next month to discuss policy ideas say the initiative is harmless. Others aren’t so sure, and see it as an effort that could potentially undermine presumed frontrunner Pierre Poilievre’s leadership.

Centre Ice? More like Liberal Party 2.0.

Patrick Brown says the Conservative Party did not want a competitive leadership election and would have made up any story necessary to disqualify him from the race to succeed Erin O’Toole.

Since he was ousted from the leadership race earlier this month over alleged violations of campaign finance laws, Brown has repeatedly claimed his removal was due to corruption within the party and collusion with the campaign of leadership front-runner Pierre Poilievre. Both the party and Poilievre’s campaign deny this.

“The party would have manufactured anything to disqualify me from the race,” Brown said on CBC News Network’s Power & Politics on Monday.

On Friday, the Conservative Party of Canada began the tedious process of verifying the largest number of ballots ever received in recent political history in choosing its new leader.

OTTAWA—Pierre Poilievre may be the front-runner in the Conservative party’s leadership race. But when it comes to one of the main themes of this contest, there’s another contender who has walked ahead of him — and in one case, literally.

In mid-June, former Ontario MPP Roman Baber walked for 15 kilometres on the shoulder of an Ontario highway alongside James Topp, a leading figure of the anti-vaccination-mandate movement.

Topp’s cross-Canada march was set to culminate in Ottawa for Canada Day, amid fears his supporters would seek to occupy the capital in a manner similar to the so-called “Freedom Convoy” earlier this year.

A bit of relief from Poilievre coverage.