Poll conducted *utilizing* local students. (You made it sound like it was a Student Vote poll)
I used the standard US Election Atlas poll format, so "high schoolers" occupied the
polling firm field (since it was apparently conducted by high schoolers).
The reason why the PPC seems to be doing well in Burnaby-South is because their party's candidate is a well-known anti-transgender rights activist in the community, which seems to be appealing to a large section of the Chinese-Canadian population in this plurality Chinese-Canadian riding.
Thompson got like 30% of the municipal election's vote last year so she's running on her own brand in this by-election, not Bernier's. The fundamental reality is that Bernier's overall strategy doesn't align with what seems to be working in this riding, which is appealing to immigrants via going hard-right on LGBT issues.
It's not a coincidence that the PPC is non-existent in the other 2 by-elections happening on Monday, in significantly whiter ridings. Bernier's current message has little appeal to white voters because the Conservatives are already doing a fine job appealing to the less "racially-woke" aspects of the electorate. At the end of the day, the conservative white voters that Bernier is so desperately pining for care more about the oil & gas sector than immigrants.
All that's really up for grabs from the Conservatives are the religious and social conservatives who feel that the CPC is leaving them behind on issues of gay marriage, transgender and abortion rights, but that group is probably more diverse than the country at large because of the influence of both culture and church in many East Asian immigrant communities in Canada. However, if Bernier spends his entire time rallying against immigrants, it's hard to see them embracing him like they did to Ford in Ontario last year.
Partly. You're missing arguably the biggest factor though. The PPC candidate actually was known for getting coffee thrown at her while protesting about the Marrissa Shen case, so she had some Chinese street cred even without her SoCon positions. Somewhat counterintuitively, opposition to
more immigration can be appealing to recent immigrants.
