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Thursday, July 17, 2025

PPC to run three candidates for Alberta senate election in October

By
Cosmin Dzsurdzsa
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After nearly tripling its national vote count, the People’s Party of Canada (PPC) is now plunging headfirst into yet another campaign by fielding three candidates for the 2021 Alberta Senate Election. 

The election, which is set to take place on October 18, 2021 in conjunction with the province’s municipal elections, will result in three candidates being nominated to fill senate vacancies when they appear. 

Alberta is currently the only province where elections are held to nominate Senate appointments. The prime minister is not obligated or bound to the nominations and is free to choose his own senate appointment if he so wishes. 

Currently, there remains only one vacancy in the Senate for Alberta. 

The three Senate candidates registered for the election were all former candidates for the 2021 general election which ended with a Liberal minority government on Monday. 

They include Red Deer County resident Kelly Lorencz, Ann McCormack from Mannville and Nadine R. Wellwood of Cochrane. 

Lorencz, who was the PPC candidate for Red Deer–Mountainview, was able to come in third place in the riding with 12.1% of the vote. 

All three registered their candidacies on the deadline of September 20, 2021. 

In an emailed statement to True North, PPC Spokesperson Martin Masse said that the goal of the election was to give Albertans the opportunity to express approval for the party’s policies such as support for pipelines, equalization reform and opposition to a carbon tax. 

“A victory for our candidates would obviously send a message to Ottawa and showcase the PPC as the only option for people who support these policies,” Masse told True North. 

“What’s also interesting in these Senate elections is that the bogus argument of ‘splitting the vote’ that many conservatives have used against us is completely irrelevant since we are not electing a government.” 

The bid to have a PPC candidate nominated for the Senate is the first post-election step for the fledgling party which shocked voters by outpolling major rivals like the Bloc Quebecois and the Green Party of Canada.

According to Elections Canada, the PPC gained over 5% of the national vote, nearly double that of the Greens, who finished with only 2.3% of the popular vote. Despite the gain in vote count, the PPC was unable to elect a single MP to the House of Commons. 

In August, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the appointment of Karen Sorensen to the senate for Alberta which sparked an immediate backlash from Alberta Premier Jason Kenney.

The future of the PPC and Bernier’s vision for Canada

By
Harrison Faulkner
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Before the results came in on Election Day, True North reporter Harrison Faulkner sat down with the leader of the People’s Party of Canada Maxime Bernier to discuss some of the issues that the legacy media has failed to address during the election.

Bernier discusses the future of his party, the adoption of alternative media as a new way to reach out to his base, national unity, the Canadian Armed Forces and Bernier’s vision for  Canada.

Last night, the PPC managed to triple their vote share from the 2019 election. However, they failed to gain any seats in Parliament. Going into the night, Bernier outlined that a victory for his party would be to obtain 6% of the national vote, but the current numbers indicate that the PPC fell just short with 5% of the vote.

Former top adviser to Harper blasts O’Toole for losing “winnable election”

By
Cosmin Dzsurdzsa
-

Conservative strategist and former top adviser to former prime minister Stephen Harper, Jenni Byrne, said the Conservative Party will have to reckon with O’Toole’s performance for losing what she referred to as a “winnable election.” 

Byrne made the comments during a CTV News panel as it was becoming clear the Liberals were forming another minority government. 

“This is going to be part of the post-mortem that the party does regardless of what the results are because if you look at extremely Conservative ridings, there was an increase in the PPC vote,” said Byrne. 

“That is going to have to be something the party looks at in terms of this campaign – the voters that Erin thought he was appealing to – because we didn’t make any gains in the GTA.”

Although votes continue to be counted due to Elections Canada staffing issues and mail-in ballots, Conservatives are projected to have not gained any seats in the 2021 election. 

As it stands, the Conservatives are set to finish with fewer seats than the 121 they received in 2019. According to Elections Canada, O’Toole is leading in 119 seats this election while the Liberals lead with 158, a slight decline where they were sitting last election.

“It was a winnable election…the Conservatives were leading in the national polls. Unlike even in 2019, this election was a lot more winnable for the Conservatives,” said Byrne. 

On the campaign trail, O’Toole reneged on several policies he championed to the Conservative base while running for the leadership in 2020. 

Among the positions O’Toole flip-flopped on was repealing the federal carbon tax, defunding the CBC and reversing his position on the Liberal gun ban. 

Although O’Toole lost the election, he indicated to reporters that he plans on staying on as Conservative Party leader but has triggered a campaign review. 

“I will continue to work tirelessly with our caucus, campaign team, and party members, to keep building the support we need,” O’Toole said on Tuesday.

“We are building towards victory next time.”

The Conservative strategy failed. There needs to be a reckoning.

By
Candice Malcolm
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Everyone lost in last night’s election — especially Justin Trudeau’s Liberals. But the Conservatives lost too, and we need to talk about why. Leader Erin O’Toole’s strategy was to run as a moderate.

He pushed away the libertarians in the party through his authoritarian pro-lockdown and pro-vaccine passport policies, and he shunned social conservatives — pledging to ignore moral issues and move the party towards woke progressive values. He spent the final week of the campaign apologizing for the conservatives in his party.

This strategy failed. Badly.

The Conservatives failed to make any inroads among liberal and progressive voters. They were shut out of the 905, decimated in the Lower Mainland and failed to add any seats in Quebec.

In today’s episode of The Candice Malcolm Show, Candice details O’Toole’s failed strategy and calls on him to explain to this base and to longtime Conservative voters what happened and why.

SUBSCRIBE TO THE CANDICE MALCOLM SHOW

Trudeau adviser says election gives Liberals mandate to move faster on climate change

By
Cosmin Dzsurdzsa
-

As Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau was taking the stage to declare victory on election night, a senior adviser in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) tweeted that the election results give the government a clear mandate to move faster on climate change. 

PMO Adviser Sarah Goodman tweeted in the early hours of Monday morning that the party is now “ready and revved up to deliver more climate action” as it assumes office. 

Although the election results could continue rolling in until Wednesday due to Elections Canada staff shortages and mail-in ballots, seat counts show that the Liberals have won a minority government. 

To date, the Liberals were able to secure 148 seats in the House of Commons beating out the Conservatives who only were able to elect 117 MPs. 

With very few seats changing hands between parties, critics have accused Trudeau of calling an unnecessary election. 

During his election speech last night, Trudeau stated that the night’s results were a “clear mandate” for the Liberals. 

“There are still votes to be counted. But what we’ve seen tonight is that millions of Canadians have chosen a progressive plan,” claimed Trudeau. 

“I see Canadians, standing together. Together, in your determination to end this pandemic. Together for real climate action, for $10-a-day child care, for homes that are … for middle class families.”

In the past, the Liberals claimed that they would not raise the carbon tax, however, in the midst of the pandemic last year, the Trudeau government moved forward with a 50% increase to the carbon tax. 

Recent disclosures show that despite the hefty levy, the carbon tax has been unable to reduce emissions and in 2018 when the carbon tax was in effect, emissions actually increased by 15 million tonnes. 

According to estimates, this year was Canada’s most expensive election in history. 

Estimates by Elections Canada project that the 36-day election campaign cost Canadian taxpayers approximately $610 million, nearly $100 million more than the 2019 election which cost $502.4 million. 

Erin O’Toole’s top five flip-flops and walk-backs

By
Cosmin Dzsurdzsa
-

As the election results continue to roll in, it is becoming clear that Conservative Party Leader Erin O’Toole’s gamble to attract progressive and Liberal voters has largely failed. 

O’Toole was unable to unseat the Liberals despite reassuring voters his party was “not your dad’s Conservative Party.”

True North has compiled a list of every time he has flip-flopped on campaign promises made to his base. 

Proposing a carbon tax despite promising the opposite

During his Conservative leadership campaign last year, O’Toole was adamant that he would repeal the Liberal government’s federal carbon tax. 

At the time, O’Toole signed a pledge with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation vowing to not introduce a carbon tax if elected. 

Despite these promises, O’Toole would later propose his own scheme to tax Canadians for carbon emissions. While on the campaign trail, O’Toole eventually went further by refusing to commit to scrapping Trudeau’s carbon tax. 

Walking back pledge to defund the CBC 

During his leadership campaign, O’Toole was unequivocal that he would defund and privatize CBC’s English properties. His general election campaign platform was far less clear.

In the Conservative platform, O’Toole only pledged to “review” CBC’s mandate if elected.

Flip-flopping on gun control

In the midst of the 2021 election campaign, O’Toole reversed a key position, betraying his own Conservative platform, stating he would maintain the Liberal government’s bans on over 1,500 firearms. 

Prior to the flip-flop, O’Toole said he would repeal both C-71, which increased restrictions on gun owners, and the sweeping Liberal order-in-council from May 2020. 

Despite evidence that the order-in-council negatively impacts law-abiding gun owners without putting a dent in gun crime, O’Toole gave into Liberal pressure to fall in line. 

Denying caucus members free votes 

Although O’Toole repeatedly claimed that under his leadership, Conservative caucus members will be able to vote freely, he later said MPs who don’t fully support his platform won’t be allowed to sit in his caucus.

During the 2020 leadership race, O’Toole said that free votes would be a “fundamental part” of his vision for the party. 

“I have been quite clear on this both in the last leadership race and in this one, that the fundamental freedoms of MPs and the rights of free votes on issues of conscience is a fundamental part of our party,” O’Toole said in a 2020 interview with pro-life political action group RightNow.

Despite those claims, O’Toole issued a hamfisted ultimatum to candidates in August. 

“I want to make it very clear: this is the plan I am running on. It’s the plan Conservatives are running on. All of them,” O’Toole said. 

“If I am elected prime minister, it is the plan I will implement. If there are candidates who don’t support it—or any other part of Canada’s Recovery Plan—they won’t be sitting in the caucus of a future Conservative government.”

Flip-flopped on conscience rights for healthcare workers

In the midst of the 2021 election campaign, O’Toole betrayed a former vow to protect the conscience rights of healthcare professionals whose beliefs prevent them from performing services such as euthanasia or referring them to perform a similar procedure.

Facing pressure from the legacy media, O’Toole reversed his platform promise, instead saying he actually supported referrals. 

“They will have to refer, because the rights to access those services exist across the country,” said O’Toole. 

“We have to respect conscience rights but allow there to be referrals.”

Turfed Liberal candidate wins Toronto riding despite past sexual assault charge

By
Caitlin Rose Morgante
-

Ousted Liberal candidate Kevin Vuong has won ​​the Spadina—Fort York riding despite being previously charged with sexual assault. 

Vuong received 37.5% of the vote, beating the NDP by a margin of 1.8%, according to figures available Tuesday morning.

Vuong is under review by the Canadian Armed Forces as a naval reservist since 2015. This summer, he became the riding’s Liberal candidate after former Liberal MP Adam Vaughan decided not to seek re-election.

News broke last week that Vuong was charged with sexual assault in 2019. In a Thursday statement to the Toronto Star, Vuong denied the allegations and said he “vigorously fought” the charges until they were dropped in 2019. 

When the story emerged, the Liberals asked him to “pause” his campaign before dropping him as a candidate. Because it was after the Elections Canada withdrawal deadline, Vuong remained in the ballot as a Liberal.

“Should he be elected, he will not be a member of the Liberal caucus,” the Liberals previously said.

When asked how the Liberals failed to learn about the allegations, self-professed “feminist” Justin Trudeau evaded the question. 

For years, Trudeau has insisted that he does not tolerate sexual harassment despite the fact that he himself has been accused of groping a female reporter in 2000  at a music festival.

Trudeau once said he believed women who come forward with allegations of sexual assault must be supported and believed.

“When women speak up it is our duty to listen to them and believe them,”  said Trudeau in 2018. He also claimed to have been an ally and “male facilitator” in an outreach program for sexual assault victims back in university.

Maryam Monsef defeated by Conservative newcomer

By
Caitlin Rose Morgante
-

Liberal candidate Maryam Monsef will not be returning to Ottawa for the upcoming parliamentary session, as she lost the riding of Peterborough-Kawartha to first-time Conservative candidate Michelle Ferreri on Monday night. 

Monsef received 34.4% of the vote and Ferreri garnered 39.4%. In comparison — in the 2015 election, Monsef was elected with 43.8% of the vote and in 2019, she was re-elected with 39.3% of the vote.

Monsef served as women and gender equality and rural economic development minister in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet and sought re-election for a third term. Ferreri, a social media marketer and former broadcaster, beat Monsef by more than 3,200 votes.

Leading up to the election, Monsef saw a dramatic decline in popularity after she referred to the terrorist organization the Taliban as “our brothers.” 

In an August press conference, Monsef said, “I want to take this opportunity to speak to our brothers, the Taliban. We call on you to ensure the safe and secure passage of any individuals in Afghanistan out of the country.”

The Taliban is listed as a terrorist entity in Canada. Since the Taliban have taken over Afghanistan, there have been several reports that the terrorist organization is torturing and beating women. There are also reports that the Taliban are executing opponents to their regime.

Monsef attempted to do damage control by clarifying that she “doesn’t support the Taliban” and that her “brothers” reference was a cultural reference. “In terms of the terminology, if you go to masjids across the country, Muslims refer to each other as brothers and sisters,” Monsef said. 

Throughout her political career, Monsef has publicly discussed her personal story as a refugee from Afghanistan. Monsef has claimed she fled Taliban violence in Afghanistan with her mother and brother when she was 11. 

“My dad was killed, caught in a crossfire. My uncle was taken from his dormitory one night for speaking up against what was happening politically, never to be seen or heard from again,” she told Global News at the time.

Peterborough-Kawartha did not uphold its longstanding record as a bellwether riding. For the past 60 years, in almost every federal election, the party with the local winning candidate in the riding has been the party that forms government by the end of election night. 

This year, the Conservatives swept Peterborough, but the Liberals still managed to form a minority government.

Annamie Paul loses Toronto Centre, places fourth

By
Caitlin Rose Morgante
-

Annamie Paul’s lacklustre performance in the 2021 election resulted in a mere 8.5% of the vote in the riding of Toronto Centre, placing fourth behind the Liberals, NDP and Conservatives. In the 2020 by-election, Paul placed second and gained 32.73% of the vote.

The party also saw a drop in overall national support, receiving a meagre  2.3% of the vote compared to the 6.55% it received in the 2019 federal election. 

The Greens ran candidates in only 252 ridings— the fewest since 2000. Two Green candidates were elected — Mike Morrice from Kitchener Centre and former Green Party leader Elizabeth May.

While Paul said she was “disappointed” to lose, she commended Morrice and May for their success. May told CTV News that she felt “a very strong sense of disappointment” over Paul’s loss and that the party will discuss “what went wrong and what we need to do better.”

Amid rumours of party chaos, May said, “it’s way too early for me to be suggesting what’s next, except that I have confidence and faith in our membership.”

True North’s in-house pollster Hamish Marshall referred to Paul’s defeat as “absolutely damning” and said he “feels safe to predict that she will not be the Green leader tomorrow.”

Prior to the election, the Green Party saw multiple layoffs of staff and organizers due to a strained financial situation. Paul also faced a non-confidence vote by party executives due to the party’s infighting over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The non-confidence vote was ultimately halted by an independent arbitrator. 

Under Paul’s leadership, former Green MP Jenica Atwin crossed the floor to the Liberals, citing too many “distractions” in the Green Party. Atwin was re-elected as a Liberal on Monday. 

US lawmakers urge Biden to lift Canadian border restrictions

By
Cosmin Dzsurdzsa
-

While restrictions remain in place at the Canada-US border, several US Senators are stepping up to urge President Joe Biden to once again allow Canadians to cross into the neighbouring country. 

Democratic and Independent Senators Jeanne Shaheen, Maggie Hassan, Jon Tester and Angus King asked the president to lift the restriction before October in an open letter to Biden. 

“A plan with some indication of when your administration would feel comfortable lifting border restrictions based on public health data would provide clarity to businesses and families along the northern border,” the letter wrote. 

In the letter, the senators also criticized the apparent contradiction of Canadians being allowed to fly into the US while land borders continue to be closed. 

“We struggle to understand the public health rationale for the disparate treatment in modes of travel,” the senators wrote. 

The latest extension of border closures by the US was set to expire on September 21, 2021. However, on Monday, Biden announced that the border will remain closed for at least another month. 

New US regulations also require any air traveller to provide proof of a negative COVID-19 test taken 72 hours before boarding a plane and proof that they are vaccinated. 

Recently, the Canadian government opened up nonessential travel to fully vaccinated Americans on August 9. 

Despite this move, the US has not yet indicated when it would be lifting its restrictions on the land border. 

Canada’s border with the US has been closed since at least March 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic was at its height. 

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