Politics This Morning: Liberal Louis re-elected in Kitchener; recount expected in Manitoba race between Liberal, Conservative candidates

Good Friday morning, There were a number of tight races this election, delaying the official call of some contests into Sept. 23—including in Kitchener-Conestoga, Ont., where Liberal incumbent Tim Louis was finally declared the winner, having bested his Conservative challenger by 528 votes. Closest of all was the Manitoba riding of Charleswood-St. James-Assiniboia-Headingly, where a recount is expected, after just 24 votes separated the Conservative incumbent, Marty Morantz, and his Liberal challenger, Doug Eyolfson, who previously represented the riding in the House from 2015 to 2019. With 100 per cent of polls reported in the riding, Mr. Morantz sat at 17,336 votes to Mr. Eyolfson’s 17,312. https://twitter.com/DougEyolfson/status/1440843128374657035 A petition seeking to recall Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole continued to make waves on Sept. 23. Launched by Bert Chen, a member of the party’s national council, the petition had passed 2,400 signatures by yesterday evening. The Globe and Mail’s Laura Stone reported that Alberta Conservative MP Ron Liepert, who was re-elected in Calgary Signal Hill with 58.3 per cent support, called the petition “disgusting” and suggested that Mr. Chen should resign from the party’s council “and sit on the sidelines with Maxime Bernier.” “We can’t get into this revolving door of leadership campaigns. We’ve got to give the guy a chance,” Mr. Liepert told Ms. Stone, referring to Mr. O’Toole’s leadership. Among those weighing in was former Ontario premier, who urged the party to remain united behind Mr. O’Toole in an op-ed for the Toronto Sun. Still more MPs-elect were lining up to support Mr. O'Toole online, per The Canadian Press, including incumbents Garnett Genuis, Michelle Rempel Garner, and former leadership contender Leslyn Lewis, who won handily in Haldimand-Norfolk, Ont., with 47.3 per cent of the vote. Meanwhile, re-elected Conservative Chris Warkentin, who won with 68.4 per cent support in Grand Prairie-Mackenzie, Alta., has criticized the embattled leader. Speaking with Town & Country News on election night, Mr. Warkentin said he’d heard from party members who believe a change of leadership is needed and pegged a Liberal shift in polls on Mr. O’Toole’s performance. “It was when our party leader started to waffle on some of the policies that we had brought forward and hadn’t been clear that I believe that Canadians became uncertain and unwilling to continue to look at our party as an alternative,” he’s reported as saying. “I believe that was the beginning of polls shifting back in favour of the Liberals.” Twitter restricted People’s Party of Canada Leader Maxime Bernier's account for 12 hours after he posted an attack on three journalists, including a Hill Times' reporter, urging his followers to "play dirty" and sharing their email addresses. That tweet, shared with Mr. Bernier's 160,000 followers, was also spread on a white supremacist forum, according to an expert Global News spoke with. Former Liberal MP Marwan Tabbara has been granted a conditional discharge and placed on three years' probation after he pleaded guilty to two counts of assault and one of being unlawfully in a dwelling house, CBC News reported. Mr. Tabbara was charged following an altercation with a woman and a man in 2020, after which he was charged with break and enter, which was reduced at a Thursday court hearing to a count of being unlawfully in a dwelling house. He had been sitting in the House as an independent MP representing Kitchener South-Hespeler, Ont., since June 2020, following media reports of his arrest the month before, and did not seek re-election. That seat was taken by Liberal Valerie Bradford, who finished just two percentage points ahead of a Conservative challenger. In events today, at 10 a.m. the Macdonald-Laurier Institute is hosting a webinar called “a seat at the table: why Canada should promote Taiwan’s inclusion at the UN.” At noon, there's another webinar under the Empire Club of Canada banner looking at how changing the privacy landscape will impact business and consumers. Speakers include Alex Benay, global lead of government Azure Strategy at Microsoft, and Teresa Scassa, Canada Research Chair in information law and policy at the University of Ottawa, and they will consider how the new Parliament could act to best protect the personal information of individuals while recognizing the need of organizations to collect, use, or disclose personal information during commercial activities. Also at noon, The Toronto Star and Navigator are hosting a post-election analysis, with in-house experts and seasoned political journalists who will explore exactly what this government will mean and why Canadians voted the way they did. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has private meetings on his itinerary today. The Hill Times

Politics This Morning

Politics This Morning: Liberal Louis re-elected in Kitchener; recount expected in Manitoba race between Liberal, Conservative candidates

Plus, some Tories publicly backed Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole following calls for his ouster, while one re-elected Conservative criticized the embattled leader.

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Politics This Morning

Politics This Morning: Liberal Louis re-elected in Kitchener; recount expected in Manitoba race between Liberal, Conservative candidates

Plus, some Tories publicly backed Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole following calls for his ouster, while one re-elected Conservative criticized the embattled leader.

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