2022 Conservative Party of Canada leadership election

[Hatman 🍁]

Early polling suggests Skippy will get the crazies back into the Tory fold, but has no room to grow amongst blue Liberals. Charest's numbers among blue Liberals are slightly better, but not particularly encouraging.

[Hatman 🍁]

Franco Ontarians are no monolith.

Rural Francos in GPR are certainly more socially conservative, and will vote Tory when the Liberals are weak, but usually do vote Liberal.

Francos in Orleans almost entirely work for the government, so are a fairly consistent Liberal voting bloc

Francos in Ottawa-Vanier are more working class or are students, and are more amenable to voting NDP. OV is a fairly diverse place too, and its Franco population is no exception. You have UOttawa students in Sandy Hill (very progressive), old working class Francos in Lower Town and Vanier proper, and French speaking immigrants in some of the projects east of Vanier (Carson Meadows and Cryville areas) from places like West Africa and Haiti.

And then you have Francos in Northern Ontario that often vote NDP or Liberal. You have some places like Hearst (very French) that always vote Liberal though, but then you have the Sudbury suburbs that often vote NDP.

[Hatman 🍁]

https://twitter.com/SyntheticPol/status/1493872944501559300?cxt=HHwWiMCoyebhprsp...

Not so much the topline but the type of ridings that some CPC supporters want to/ think they can flip.

As usual, Bryan Breguet is an idiot (I don't want to seem mean, but the man is an arrogant bully online, and is often, very, very wrong on things, and isn't willing to admit it). The Tories already have most of the rural ridings outside Quebec. And the ones they don't have are less "rural" and more "remote", which comes with it an entirely different political history. Granted, remote areas are trending more populist, which helps the Conservatives, especially with a weaker PPC. But they still need to do well in the 905, and that should still be their main target in every election. Can't win without it.

[Hatman 🍁]

Franco Ontarians are no monolith.

Rural Francos in GPR are certainly more socially conservative, and will vote Tory when the Liberals are weak, but usually do vote Liberal.

Francos in Orleans almost entirely work for the government, so are a fairly consistent Liberal voting bloc

Francos in Ottawa-Vanier are more working class or are students, and are more amenable to voting NDP. OV is a fairly diverse place too, and its Franco population is no exception. You have UOttawa students in Sandy Hill (very progressive), old working class Francos in Lower Town and Vanier proper, and French speaking immigrants in some of the projects east of Vanier (Carson Meadows and Cryville areas) from places like West Africa and Haiti.

And then you have Francos in Northern Ontario that often vote NDP or Liberal. You have some places like Hearst (very French) that always vote Liberal though, but then you have the Sudbury suburbs that often vote NDP.

Thanks Hatman. I was thinking along the lines of what adma described as incremental sufficient numbers. Grand Lake Miramichi is one riding where increasing the Conservative vote percentage among Franco-Canadians would be useful for holding the riding in the next election.

How would you characterize the possibility of increasing Conservative vote share among Franco-Canadians in Glengarry Prescott Russell and Northern Ontario. I am assuming it would be easier among rural Franco-Canadians.

Pretty much the only chance the Tories have to win over Francos in this province right now is in GPR. Conservatives have not done well in Franco parts of Northern Ontario, except in the North Bay/Nipissing area which is more "rural" than your typical remote Francophone communities in the north. Of course, there is still some potential there, as Franco Northern Ontarians aren't exactly progressive liberals.

[Hatman 🍁]

Some Atlas Forum exclusive data from that poll:

Skippy leads in all regions, even Quebec. Strongest in Alberta and Saskatchewan. Weakest in Manitoba. Charest is strongest in MB & QC, Brown in Ontario, Lewis in MB.  
His support goes down by age (76% among under 35 to 58% for over 65)
More popular among women than men
More popular among college education, less among university educated

Also interesting, we asked how people to rate themselves on a 7 point scale from 1=very left to 7=very right (4 = in the middle)

The mean Conservative supporter is a 4.86
The mean Brown supporter is a 4.87
The mean Charest supporter is a 4.78
The mean Lewis supporter is a 5.53; and
The mean Poilievre supporter is a 4.97

The mean Canadian is a 3.57

[Hatman 🍁]

Some Atlas Forum exclusive data from that poll:

Skippy leads in all regions, even Quebec. Strongest in Alberta and Saskatchewan. Weakest in Manitoba. Charest is strongest in MB & QC, Brown in Ontario, Lewis in MB.  
His support goes down by age (76% among under 35 to 58% for over 65)
More popular among women than men
More popular among college education, less among university educated

Also interesting, we asked how people to rate themselves on a 7 point scale from 1=very left to 7=very right (4 = in the middle)

The mean Conservative supporter is a 4.86
The mean Brown supporter is a 4.87
The mean Charest supporter is a 4.78
The mean Lewis supporter is a 5.53; and
The mean Poilievre supporter is a 4.97

The mean Canadian is a 3.57

All the patterns add up, but seeing Lewis at a paltry 6% is surprising (I would have expected higher). She's the only candidate so far to reach the donation cutoff to get authorized for the ballot. That's not to say she's the frontrunner of course, she's known to have a very strong donor network with evangelical groups/churches which is probably how she was able to raise funds so quickly, despite her actual support not being that high.

Social conservative candidates always poll worse than in reality. They maybe over represented in the party membership and/or are over represented in low response rate communities (e.g. certain ethnic and religious minorities)

[Hatman 🍁]

You guys might like this (from our Omnibus poll)

Approval of world leaders by supporters of each candidate

Biden
Charest 62-33
Brown 53-34
Lewis 21-74
Poilievre 17-79

Boris Johnson
Brown 59-24
Charest 56-27
Lewis 52-21
Poilievre 50-27

Putin
Poilievre 6-88
Charest 2-97
Lewis 1-94
Brown 1-95

Zelenskyy
Charest 95-4
Brown 90-5
Lewis 82-7
Poilievre 68-20

Macron
Charest 67-12
Brown 60-12
Poilievre 28-40
Lewis 27-31

Modi
Poilievre 21-21
Brown 19-28 (maybe due to being mayor of Brampton?)
Charest 16-31
Lewis 14-26

Xi
Charest 7-80 (lol, Mr. Huawei)
Brown 5-73
Poilievre 3-82
Lewis 1-82

Jacinda Ardern
Brown 59-12
Charest 56-14
Lewis 32-37
Poilievre 26-44

MBS
Brown 7-52
Lewis 7-53
Poilievre 6-52
Charest 3-63

Bolsonaro
Poilievre 11-31
Lewis 8-26
Brown 8-38
Charest 6-54

Queen Elizabeth II
Charest 78-10
Brown 76-13
Lewis 75-10
Poilievre 66-16

Pope Francis
Charest 51-24
Brown 44-34
Lewis 32-41
Poilievre 30-39

[Hatman 🍁]

It was established in April of this year (maybe because the mayor was focused elsewhere?), there is a deputy for West Brampton and another one for East Brampton.

That's nothing; Ottawa has three deputy mayors*

*Actually, it did have until Jenna Sudds was elected to parliament last year. They have decided to not replace her.

[Hatman 🍁]

I'm kind of surprised the vote here isn't until Sep. 10.

Are Canadian leadership races typically this long?

Yes. Just look at the other threads in this forum. The UCP race is in October and the ONDP race is not until March. And for an extreme case, the PEI Liberals haven't replaced their leader in 3 years.

[Hatman 🍁]

[Hatman 🍁]

What's also interesting is the drop in support for social conservative candidates. Social conservative voters were key in both 2017 and 2022, and their preferences helped elect both Scheer and O'Toole.

2017: 16% (Lemieux+Trost)
2020: 25% (Lewis)
2022: 10% (Lewis)

I suppose some of that is due to the party signing up new memberships of more disenfranchised types who are less likely to be socially conservative. Social conservatives may have also been turned off from participating in the party because they didn't get anything in return from supporting O'Toole and Scheer.

[Hatman 🍁]

Skippy keeps talking about the "gatekeepers" as the new bogeyman we need to be worried about. Is this the Canadian version of draining the swamp?

[Hatman 🍁]

Skippy keeps talking about the "gatekeepers" as the new bogeyman we need to be worried about. Is this the Canadian version of draining the swamp?

Does he tranlsate gatekeepers in French? I'm not sure what it means, establishment, or elite?

Hansard translates it as "empêcheurs"

[Hatman 🍁]

So how authentic is PP's populism to Canadians? His anti elite rhetoric comes off a bit hypocritical for a career politician.

It's hard to answer how authentic it is, because obviously people will disagree on whether it's authentic to them. For some Canadians, Poilievre is the most authentic politician they've ever seen, and for others, he's a phony right-winger trying to ride a wave with cynical promises. Obviously his background as a career politician undercuts his "man of the people" bona fides a little bit, but he plays up other aspects of his upbringing to counter that. He was born to a single 16-year old mother, given up for adoption, and raised in a non-political middle-class family. So there's a kind of conservative appeal of "pulling yourself up by the bootstraps" there.

In some ways, Poilievre isn't even saying the things that a populist conservative "should". Normally, populist conservatives tend to focus on social issues and nationalism/nativism as their driving priorities, while minimizing their right-wing economic views which may be perceived as elitist. Poilievre minimizes social issues, is not a nativist and has put forward some pretty immigrant-friendly ideas, and while he is somewhat nationalistic, it's not a big part of his pitch. Instead, his pitch is more about cutting taxes, cutting regulations, cutting spending, not exactly traditional populism. In American terms, he's almost like Mitt Romney on policy but Ron DeSantis in presentation (although one area where he's definitely taken the "populist" lane is his strident opposition to vaccine mandates and the WEF, but that's not his main pitch either).

His populism is anti-Laurentian. I won't go into it too much, but this concept of the "Laurentian Elite" was popularized by author/commentator John Ibbitson during the Harper years. The idea is that there's a certain "elite" based in the Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal axis that dominates politics in Canada, but also academia, entertainment, media, etc. They tend to be centre-to-centre-left, pretty deferential to state authority, anti-American, pro-welfare state but pro-business, and practice soft protectionism. "Populist conservatism" in Canada exists as a counter to that, and while Harper was a bit too boring to come off as a "real" populist, he championed the same kind of anti-Laurentian populism that Poilievre now champions.

The sentiment of a populist conservative in Canada re: the Laurentian elite is described by Ibbitson as:
They're running the country but they're running it into the ground, and they won't listen to us.

So with that framework, a populist conservative in Canada doesn't care if a politician has a fairly elite background, which Poilievre doesn't really. I mean to the extent that being a career politician undercuts his populist bona fides, remember that his opponent is the son of a famous Prime Minister. But what's more relevant to Poilievre's populism is the strident anti-Laurentian politics.

Will it resonate with Canadians? It will resonate with Canadians to the extent that Canadians agree with the sentiment that the Liberals are running the country but they're running it into the ground, and they won't listen to us.

Is there any significant political pressure for limiting immigration?

There's always some pressure against immigration, but not in any meaningful or significant way. Going anti-immigration would cost the Conservatives far more votes than it would gain them.

A lot of Canadians will say they don't want more immigrants when polled, but they don't care enough to make it an issue at the ballot box. Plus, it's a consensus among experts that Canada needs more immigrants as the boomers retire.