Juno News - It’s make or break for Erin O’Toole today in caucus

00:00:00.640 It's make or break for Erin O'Toole today in caucus, plus we'll deconstruct a red Tories defense of Erin O'Toole. 1.00

00:00:06.560 I'm Candace Malcolm and this is The Candace Malcolm Show.

00:00:13.540 Hi everyone, thank you so much for tuning into The Candace Malcolm Show.

00:00:16.880 Today is a big day for Erin O'Toole and the Conservative Party of Canada,

00:00:20.920 and we'll break that all down and explain what's going on and what is at stake.

00:00:25.720 But first, if you are a fan of True North, if you like what we do here at The Candace Malcolm Show,

00:00:29.640 I encourage you to stay connected with True North, make sure that you never miss one of these videos.

00:00:34.000 As you know, we're doing The Candace Malcolm Show every single day, so we don't want you to miss out.

00:00:37.900 So if you're watching on YouTube right now, don't forget to like this video, subscribe to True North,

00:00:42.940 and make sure that you hit that little red notification bell so that you never miss a video.

00:00:47.380 If you're watching on Facebook, make sure that you like the True North page.

00:00:50.540 Drop us a comment in the comment section.

00:00:53.060 Let us know what you think of the show, whether you have any other story ideas that we should be covering here on the program.

00:00:58.980 And don't forget to share this video.

00:01:01.140 And if you're listening to this show in podcast form, please, please, please leave us a five-star review.

00:01:06.180 It really helps us out.

00:01:07.480 So whether that's on Apple Podcasts or Google Podcasts, and don't forget to subscribe to The Candace Malcolm Show.

00:01:12.980 So thank you so much for that.

00:01:14.760 So it's happening right now in Ottawa.

00:01:16.320 The Conservative Caucus is meeting for its first caucus meeting since the election on September 20th,

00:01:21.700 since the disappointing election.

00:01:23.060 So we have all the incoming and outgoing MPs.

00:01:26.620 There's nine MPs who lost, nine Conservative MPs who lost, plus, I think, 119 who got elected or re-elected.

00:01:34.200 And so they're all in Ottawa.

00:01:35.420 They're all in a room right now.

00:01:36.800 And from what I understand, it is intense.

00:01:40.100 They really are fighting for the heart and soul of the party.

00:01:43.480 I went through yesterday explaining sort of an insider's take after talking to a couple of MPs explaining what was going on.

00:01:50.260 So if you want to go back and get a better understanding of what happens at caucus and what's at stake, check out yesterday's episode.

00:01:56.460 Today, I mean, right now we don't know what's happening because they're still in the room.

00:01:59.860 They're locked up.

00:02:00.700 We're going to have to wait until the meetings end to really get a better sense of what happened.

00:02:05.400 But there is a lot of speculation, a lot of rumors being pushed out, a lot of journalists speaking to their sources,

00:02:12.380 their sources telling them X, Y, or Z.

00:02:14.980 And so we sort of have like a mixed understanding of what might be going on.

00:02:19.500 So I want to highlight a couple of the interesting scoops that I did see on social media, and I will give you my reaction.

00:02:25.440 So first we have Evan Solomon over at CTV.

00:02:28.180 He writes this.

00:02:28.880 He says,

00:02:29.220 Scooplet, today Conservative Party of Canada Senator Michael McDonald sent a letter to Conservative Caucus urging a vote for a leadership review of Erin O'Toole.

00:02:37.500 Voting in favor of a review vote is not pleasant, but it is necessary.

00:02:41.120 The status quo under the present circumstances is a mistake.

00:02:44.440 So there is a longer story in the Globe and Mail about this.

00:02:48.660 So McDonald's sent out an email, a letter to all of caucus, basically urging them to vote on the Reform Act.

00:02:56.500 So as I explained in the show yesterday, there's two sort of separate things that happen.

00:03:00.500 The first is what they call like an airing of the grievances.

00:03:03.860 Everyone lines up with the microphones and just, you know, lets Erin O'Toole have a piece of their mind, lets them hear it. 0.98

00:03:10.020 This is what you guys did wrong.

00:03:11.300 This is what you need to do better.

00:03:12.920 Next time, this is what my constituents are saying.

00:03:15.740 This is what I'm hearing from the Conservative base, et cetera, et cetera.

00:03:18.900 And that's the part of the meeting that includes both incoming and outgoing MPs.

00:03:23.000 So we also have to hear from the handful of people who lost, presumably because he abandoned Conservative principles and his strategy failed.

00:03:31.180 So, you know, three seats were lost in Alberta, a handful of seats in British Columbia and in the 905 around Toronto as well.

00:03:38.680 So that's one aspect of it.

00:03:41.060 Then all the MPs who lost leave and the remaining caucus stay and they vote on a bunch of procedural stuff, including the Reform Act,

00:03:48.980 which is something that was introduced back in 2015 by Michael Chong, just giving the – there's four aspects of it,

00:03:56.100 but the one that MacDonald is talking about is giving caucus the power to call a leadership review.

00:04:01.800 So it would give caucus the power to say, you know, we want a new leader.

00:04:07.440 We don't like this guy.

00:04:08.620 We want a new leader.

00:04:09.780 And that would be something new.

00:04:11.580 So when Evan Solomon says urging a vote for a leadership review, it's not even necessarily a vote for leadership review of Erin O'Toole.

00:04:18.220 He's talking about just giving them the power to do that.

00:04:20.880 But then if you read this Globe and Mail story, he does go into some detail about how he believes that Erin O'Toole is not the right man for the job.

00:04:29.200 So this is a quote from the letter.

00:04:30.820 It says,

00:04:31.400 The only conclusion that can be drawn from these numbers is that the leader's conscious decision to move the Conservative Party to the left has been a strategic failure.

00:04:38.960 As we not only failed to make breakthrough in the GTA, as promised, we actually lost seats.

00:04:44.060 So MacDonald is not happy.

00:04:45.960 This is interesting, too, because he is a senator from Nova Scotia, not exactly considered a very conservative stronghold in the country.

00:04:54.220 So if this is what a conservative out east, out in the Maritimes, thinks of Erin O'Toole, then boy, is he in trouble.

00:05:00.100 So it will be interesting to watch out for that.

00:05:03.320 And again, we'll keep you posted.

00:05:04.460 Next scoop we saw came from David Aitken over at Global News.

00:05:08.500 David Aitken is an incredibly plugged in reporter.

00:05:11.540 He knows a lot of people in Ottawa, and so I trust him and his sources usually.

00:05:16.780 So this is what he said last night.

00:05:18.220 He said MPs are being urged to vote yes to giving themselves power to dump a leader.

00:05:23.040 But I'm told that should not be interpreted as intent to use that power to dump Erin O'Toole,

00:05:27.720 who seems to have enough caucus support to carry on.

00:05:30.640 And that's what I've been hearing as well.

00:05:32.540 David Aitken goes on, though.

00:05:33.480 He says this.

00:05:34.340 But here's the kicker about Tuesday's Conservative caucus meeting.

00:05:37.240 Erin O'Toole, an insider says, is looking to take a snap caucus vote on his leadership, a public vote.

00:05:44.280 Stand up if you're with me.

00:05:45.580 Stand up if you're against me.

00:05:46.880 We'll all be behind closed doors, but interesting.

00:05:49.720 So, wow, that would be quite the power move if Erin O'Toole just invited everyone in the room and said, 1.00

00:05:54.700 guys, before we go any further, I want to know exactly where you stand.

00:05:57.780 That's pretty gutsy.

00:05:59.220 I don't think there's any precedent for that.

00:06:01.420 In fact, the MPs that I've spoken to says that he couldn't do that, that he wouldn't actually have any standing,

00:06:08.140 that a vote like that wouldn't have any validity.

00:06:10.820 But it would be like a power move just to show, basically, a shame to people who are against him,

00:06:15.760 and then he could probably punish them in some way.

00:06:18.900 So it's almost like a Soviet-style act.

00:06:21.620 I'm not discrediting David Aitken.

00:06:23.200 I think he probably did hear that.

00:06:25.060 If Erin O'Toole actually does that, then, wow, he's got gall. 0.99

00:06:28.260 And I guess good for him.

00:06:30.280 That's quite the power move.

00:06:31.720 But, again, pretty divisive way to run a party, if you ask me.

00:06:36.460 Next leak we saw came from Kian Bexley, the independent reporter out in Alberta.

00:06:41.200 He says this.

00:06:41.980 Conservative Party insiders say that the Alberta caucus is furious with O'Toole's performance at 25% of caucus membership.

00:06:49.380 Alberta meets the 28% threshold to call a leadership premium.

00:06:52.560 So this is technically true.

00:06:53.840 If every single Alberta MP were to vote against Erin O'Toole, it would meet the numbers that he's saying are correct.

00:07:02.060 However, this is just not the case.

00:07:04.300 We know this because we can look at the public support that Erin O'Toole has received.

00:07:09.220 Right after the election, a whole bunch of MPs came out and led their support to Erin O'Toole, 0.66

00:07:14.000 including a handful of folks in Alberta, people like Garnett Janis, Michelle Rempel, and I believe Blake Richardson.

00:07:20.260 So this whole idea that every single MP in Alberta is against Erin O'Toole is just not true.

00:07:27.080 That's just not the case.

00:07:28.460 And my friend Lee Humphrey made that point as well.

00:07:32.240 He says, I'm not really much of an insider anymore, but I've spoken to several folks who still are,

00:07:36.860 and I've not heard anything like this.

00:07:39.180 In fact, I'm hearing O'Toole is safer by the day.

00:07:41.840 And, yes, this is what I'm hearing as well.

00:07:43.820 Yes, there's a handful of people that are really mad, really disappointed, want Erin O'Toole to receive the same kind of treatment

00:07:50.340 that Andrew Scheer received and want him out.

00:07:52.880 But that's not the majority.

00:07:54.640 That's not even the plurality of caucus.

00:07:56.500 Most people just don't want to rock the boat.

00:07:57.840 They don't want another leadership review.

00:07:59.420 They recognize that Erin O'Toole has only been in office as leader for about a year when the campaign started,

00:08:05.640 a little over a year, and that he hasn't really had the opportunity to lead the party.

00:08:10.140 So that's just what I'm hearing.

00:08:12.000 That's definitely not my opinion, but that's what I'm hearing will happen in caucus today.

00:08:15.780 Now, I want to step back and show you something interesting that appeared in the Toronto Star over the weekend.

00:08:19.920 Now, as you know, the Toronto Star is the worst, most left-wing newspaper in the country.

00:08:23.240 They have a social justice mandate.

00:08:24.980 It is written into their editorial position.

00:08:27.140 They follow something called the Atkins Principle.

00:08:28.700 So they are an activist journalism outlet whose goal and all of their journalism is guided to make Canada a more left-wing, progressive, woke country.

00:08:38.560 And so, for some reason, Conservatives still leak stories to the Star.

00:08:43.080 They still submit op-eds to the Star.

00:08:44.620 They still somehow want to win over the Star's audience, which is a huge, huge mistake.

00:08:49.460 But regardless, I digress.

00:08:51.360 On Saturday, they had two really interesting op-eds that appeared side-by-side, and it was a debate.

00:08:58.060 The Saturday debate, should the Conservative Party keep Erin O'Toole as leader?

00:09:01.480 And as you would expect, the people who would read and submit things to the Toronto Star.

00:09:06.300 So we have two ultra-connected Conservative insiders, two former senior-senior staff members for the Harper Conservative government, who are now both consultants.

00:09:16.440 So on the yes side, we have Andrew McDougal, who is a director at Trafalgar Strategy, who was previously director of communication to former Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

00:09:24.140 And on the no side, on the side saying, get rid of Erin O'Toole, is Jenny Byrne, who's the CEO of Jenny Byrne Associates, a former deputy chief of staff and national campaign director to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

00:09:35.000 So like I said, senior insiders for the Conservative Party, very well-known people within the Conservative movement.

00:09:41.600 So I want to go through the yes side because I think it explains exactly the mindset of red Tories and why they think that O'Toole should stay.

00:09:49.140 And I'll go through a bit of Jenny Byrne's because it's pretty good.

00:09:52.300 I'll just say it's pretty good.

00:09:54.260 So Andrew McDougal starts by saying, losing to the hated Justin Trudeau is a firing offense for most Conservatives.

00:10:00.380 Just ask Andrew Scheer.

00:10:01.840 But what should happen to a Conservative leader who fights Trudeau to a draw with the deck stacked against him and with one hand tied behind his back?

00:10:08.840 Does he deserve a different fate?

00:10:10.240 So he goes on to say how the deck was stacked against Erin O'Toole, mostly because Justin Trudeau spent hundreds of billions of dollars during the pandemic,

00:10:18.460 kind of bribing Canadians with their own money right up until the election when he actually sent $500 out to seniors during the campaign.

00:10:25.600 So, yeah, most Canadians were just grateful for the help and they didn't recognize that they were being bribed.

00:10:30.280 So I'll concede that point.

00:10:32.720 That is right.

00:10:33.860 And then but then he goes into the policy and he says this is for the one hand tied behind his back.

00:10:38.380 O'Toole faced a scenario in which 75 to 80 percent of Canadians support vaccine mandates, with most of the holdouts either supporting his party or Maxine Bernier's party to the right.

00:10:47.960 Lest we forget, Trudeau's government also did a solid job procuring vaccines.

00:10:52.700 The reality left precious little room for O'Toole to maneuver on the biggest issue of the day.

00:10:56.420 Despite these pressures, O'Toole didn't take the bait and indulge the anti-vaccination crowd.

00:11:00.920 Even if it might have pulled some of that support back, that showed good judgment.

00:11:05.480 So right off the bat, the position is not to lead the country, not to be a politician who has convictions, who believes in their own principles, who carves their own path and graphs policy based on their core beliefs.

00:11:17.600 It all comes down to polls.

00:11:18.860 It all comes down to the strategy behind the percentage and which wedge issues you can run on.

00:11:23.580 And this drives so many Canadians crazy.

00:11:25.480 It's like it's like everything is based on the strategy, the polling, the micro targeting.

00:11:30.440 And you don't believe what you're saying.

00:11:32.160 You're not authentic.

00:11:32.980 You're not putting out a position that you believe in because you think it's right for the country.

00:11:36.600 You're basing it all on what pollsters tell you to say.

00:11:39.820 So I guess this is Andrew McDougall trying to say that Aaron O'Toole was smart and strong.

00:11:43.880 But to me, when I read this, it just shows weakness and a lack of authenticity because you're just basing your policies on what the polls are telling you.

00:11:52.300 And then he goes on to really make it clear.

00:11:55.140 So he says how Aaron O'Toole started the campaign strong, the polls reflected that, and then he kind of fell back and went flat around the time of the first debate.

00:12:03.860 And this, he says, is largely on account of his inability to explain why his platform included a repeal of gun regulations put in by the liberals.

00:12:11.760 The slide could be down to O'Toole's fluffed comms on the issues, or it could be drawn from the fact that people in vote-rich urban, suburban areas don't understand why anyone needs a semi-automatic weapon.

00:12:22.500 Either way, an election is a hell of a time to try to explain the nuance of Canadian gun use and gun control.

00:12:27.540 So here we have it. The entire idea is that during the campaign, you don't try to defend your ideas, you don't try to defend principles, like the idea that there's nothing wrong with owning a gun legally, and those people aren't the ones that commit crimes by and large.

00:12:41.620 But no, it's just that Trudeau picked up this wedge issue, and he was correct to do it, and the conservatives were flat-footed.

00:12:47.500 And again, this is such a bad strategy.

00:12:49.220 This is, Aaron O'Toole lost because he was listening to comms people like Andrew McDougal giving this kind of advice, because the whole idea that Aaron O'Toole should lose on an issue like crime, crime is bread-and-butter issue for conservatives.

00:13:00.800 Aaron O'Toole's supposed to be a law-and-order guy.

00:13:02.680 You flip this issue immediately, as soon as Justin Trudeau starts talking about guns, you say,

00:13:06.640 You want to start talking about crime, Mr. Trudeau? Let's talk about your record.

00:13:10.020 Let's talk about your decision to lessen sentences for dangerous criminals, violent criminals caught with illegal guns.

00:13:15.720 Let's talk about Canada's revolving door prison system.

00:13:18.060 Show some conviction. Talk about conservative principles. Flip the issue. Own the issue.

00:13:22.420 That's what conservatives expect. That's what we want to see.

00:13:25.060 And so this whole idea coming back that, oh, he shouldn't have never had this gun stuff in the platform to begin with, it's like, okay, we get it.

00:13:31.780 This is what red Tories believe. They don't want anything conservative in the platform.

00:13:35.300 And instead of blaming Aaron O'Toole for really just handling that so poorly, he goes back and says, oh, it never should have been in the platform.

00:13:42.600 And then he concludes it all by just saying, besides running another leadership race in a pandemic would be an invitation to a civil war and switching horses when Trudeau is trending towards the glue factory would be a mistake.

00:13:52.900 It would be better for conservatives to improve the leader they've got.

00:13:56.340 So basically the reasons to keep the guy are that we don't really want to have to do this again, which is not a very compelling, not a very exciting answer.

00:14:04.820 And even the people that they get to defend Aaron O'Toole have to do it half-heartedly and do it based on blaming everyone around Aaron O'Toole and not him and kind of doubling down on this idea that we need to have more liberal policies in the conservative platform.

00:14:19.040 On the other side, we have Jenny Byrne. Jenny Byrne is, sure, she's a conservative insider, but I think she's still very much a member of the base and she understands conservatism and the principles behind it.

00:14:30.660 So her piece is much, much, much more critical.

00:14:33.280 So she starts off by saying, from a political perspective, the conservative campaign was the most disappointing.

00:14:39.320 CBC ran on a platform of political expediency, hoping for a win at all costs and ending up with no wins at all.

00:14:45.740 The party has fewer seats and a lower share of the popular vote than it did in 2019.

00:14:49.020 It is less urban and less ethnically diverse than at any point in modern history.

00:14:53.520 And so she says for that reason, O'Toole's strategy to run as a liberal failed.

00:14:58.160 She says he did run a tactically good campaign.

00:15:00.460 He made the decision to run as a liberal, not to the center, as some commenters have said.

00:15:05.180 There was little contrast between the conservatives and the liberals.

00:15:07.980 People had no distinct reason to cast their vote for the conservatives.

00:15:11.060 And I suspect many people who voted for us in the past simply didn't vote at all.

00:15:14.400 The argument to keep O'Toole as leader of the party, therefore, is purely an emotional one.

00:15:18.040 It is not based on facts or results.

00:15:20.660 Many people speaking for O'Toole in the months leading up to the campaign said the conservatives needed to sacrifice votes in Alberta to win in Ontario.

00:15:28.920 Campaigns are not board games.

00:15:30.640 And if they are, they're more like monopoly than risk.

00:15:32.980 You can't simply move votes from one area of the country to another.

00:15:36.160 You must build support on what you already have.

00:15:38.380 O'Toole's carbon tax promised to amend rather than repeal Bill C-69, the anti-pipeline bill,

00:15:43.400 and constant flipping on gun control and free votes cost him the election.

00:15:47.020 The most effective attack the liberals had against O'Toole was that he would say anything to get elected.

00:15:51.820 It was effective because it was true.

00:15:54.700 I'm just going to keep reading from this because it's so good.

00:15:56.400 She goes on to say, if the Conservative Party truly intends to provide Canadians a meaningful government in waiting,

00:16:01.420 they must now have the fight that no one wants to have.

00:16:04.100 The decisions on what happens next must be based on fact.

00:16:07.140 The argument to stay the course can't be on the sense that we don't have the stomach for a leadership race.

00:16:11.100 That's bad for the party, bad for democracy, and ultimately bad for the country.

00:16:14.100 The conservatives are a diverse coalition of Canadians from across the country.

00:16:17.500 Fiscal conservatives, Western and democratic reformers, social conservatives, red Tories, and libertarians are part of the coalition.

00:16:23.220 There is the head and the heart of the movement.

00:16:26.600 The head wants to win and chooses leaders who appeal to Canadians.

00:16:29.760 The heart wants to make sure core Conservative values are adhered to and followed at the same time.

00:16:34.000 Our coalition is right now being held together by the thinnest of strings.

00:16:37.440 Dislike for Justin Trudeau.

00:16:38.860 Parts of the coalition no longer feel like they have a political home.

00:16:41.900 O'Toole won the CBC leadership race by stating that he was a true blue Conservative.

00:16:45.960 He said he was the only person who could win the next election and keep the coalition together.

00:16:49.600 Not only was that never true, O'Toole has fractured the party for the first time since its creation.

00:16:54.560 My fear is that with O'Toole at the helm, the coalition will continue to unravel.

00:16:58.540 For the good of the conservative movement and the health of the conservative party,

00:17:01.520 we need our leader to be able to proudly take principled stance,

00:17:04.460 keep our coalition together, and grow our support across the country.

00:17:07.980 Conservative members need to take a hard look as to whether Aaron O'Toole is the person and do it soon.

00:17:14.280 I couldn't have said it any better myself.

00:17:15.900 Absolutely echo those points.

00:17:17.780 And again, today is going to be a big day.

00:17:19.340 We'll be back again tomorrow and we will break down exactly what happens inside the Conservative caucus.

00:17:24.180 I'm Candace Malcolm and this is The Candace Malcolm Show.

Juno News - October 05, 2021

It’s make or break for Erin O’Toole today in caucus

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript