Pierre Poilievre quiet as B.C. heads to the polls

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British Columbia NDP Leader David Eby’s personal crusade to force the province’s upstart Conservative Party to add “B.C.” to its ballot name ended last week when a judge refused to schedule a last-minute hearing on the matter.

It’s possible that federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre joined the NDP in being quietly disappointed by the bid’s failure, at least if his silence on the provincial campaign is anything to go by.

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“There’s certainly been a, let’s say ‘conspicuous quietude’ on (Poilievre’s) part,” said Shachi Kurl, president of the Angus Reid Institute and the moderator of the campaign’s lone prime-time leaders’ debate.

As the Saturday vote nears, Poilievre still hasn’t directly endorsed Conservative leader John Rustad to be the province’s next premier — although he did predict that British Columbians would want a “common sense Conservative (provincial) government” shortly after the late-summer implosion of centrist option B.C. United.

Poilievre spokesman Sebastian Skamski declined to say if the Opposition leader would endorse Rustad when asked by the National Post on Wednesday.

Poilievre publicly endorsed United Conservative Party leader Danielle Smith last year in the closing days of a tight Alberta election campaign, possibly motivating wavering federal Conservative voters to close ranks behind her. His unwillingness, thus far, to come to Rustad’s aid in advance of a similarly competitive provincial vote is notable.

It’s certainly not the case that Poilievre is a stranger to B.C. The Conservative leader has often chosen Vancouver as a setting for his popular short videos targeting Canada’s “broken” public policies and urban decay, taking aim at the city’s runaway housing market and sprawling homeless encampments in two of his most widely viewed clips. Not coincidentally, Vancouver Is Dying filmmaker Aaron Gunn was among the first candidates tapped to run for the Poilievre-led Conservatives in B.C.

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Poilievre also gloated in the House of Commons after the law-and-order-focused ABC Vancouver swept municipal elections in October 2022, calling the result a rejection of failed Liberal and NDP drug and crime policies.

What’s more, the B.C. Conservative campaign has effectively been a beta test of the next federal Conservative campaign. Rustad has lifted the slogan “common sense” verbatim from Poilievre and has even mimicked go-to applause lines like “axe the tax” and “stop the drugs.” Rustad has even hired ex-Poilievre spokesman Anthony Koch to run the campaign’s communications.

But while imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, Poilievre hasn’t shown any signs that he is enamoured with Rustad’s karaoke act.

Vancouver-based conservative strategist Kareem Allam said on Tuesday that the federal and provincial Conservatives are “two very different parties,” despite the surface-level similarities.

Allam said that one of the biggest differences between the two parties concerns how each engages with ethnic minority communities.

“The federal Conservatives have built up considerable internal expertise, over two decades, in cultivating relationships across cultural divides,” said Allam, pointing to the outreach activities of Jason Kenney and backroom strategists like Kaz Nejatian and Walied Soliman during the Harper years.

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“If Poilievre has a question about ethnic outreach, he knows who to pick up the phone and call.”

Allam, who managed the successful ABC Vancouver campaign in 2022, has already voted NDP in advanced polling. He says he’s one of several right-leaning urbanites who’s been put off by what he sees as the B.C. Conservative campaign’s cultural insensitivity, with one notable example being Rustad’s unwillingness to fire a candidate who’s made numerous racist comments online, including a Facebook post likening Palestinians to “inbred… time bombs.”

Allam said that most people he still keeps in touch with from the ABC Vancouver campaign have told him they won’t be voting for the B.C. Conservatives this time around. All, for now, still plan to vote Conservative in the next federal election.

Kurl likewise suspects that the racial slights have led Poilievre to keep a safe distance from the B.C. Conservative campaign.

“Poilievre and his team have very deliberately built up a multicultural candidate pool and support base that looks like Canada,” Kurl said on Tuesday.

A source familiar with the Conservative leader’s inner circle said that Poilievre considered formally endorsing Rustad but decided against it after Rustad’s performance in the Oct. 8 leaders’ debate.

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Liberal strategist Sharan Kaur says a Rustad-led B.C. government could be a headache for Poilievre.

“Rustad’s controversial views on things like climate change could force Poilievre to answer uncomfortable questions on the national stage,” Kaur said in an email. “Rustad could taint the Conservative brand Poilievre’s worked hard to build if he pushes far-right policies as premier.”

Rustad has controversially promised to scrap K-12 teaching guidelines on sexual orientation and gender identity as premier and replace them with broad-based anti-bullying programs that “protect all students.”

The Conservatives currently hold 13 of B.C.’s 42 federal electoral districts but are shut out of the seat-rich areas of Vancouver and Vancouver Island. One new B.C. riding, in the province’s southern interior, will also be in play in the next federal election, following a redistribution finalized earlier this year.

National Post
rmohamed@postmedia.com

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