OTTAWA –
Patrick Brown’s campaign said he consulted his legal team after the federal Conservative leadership election organizing committee voted to disqualify him from the race Tuesday afternoon.
Ian Brodie, chairman of the committee, announced the impressive move in a written statement after a meeting to discuss the matter.
He said the party had recently become aware of “serious allegations of irregularity” by Brown’s campaign.
The allegations are related to the funding rules of the Canada Elections Act, Brodie said, but did not provide further details.
Brown’s campaign responded with a statement accusing the party of basing its decision on “anonymous allegations” and without providing all the details or evidence.
He accused the party of making a “fishing expedition” and of not giving “enough time” to the campaign to respond, but said it “still complied with all the strange requests and unfounded claims”.
He went on to say the measure deprives thousands of Brown supporters of rights, who acquired party affiliation before the June 3 deadline to choose their name in the Conservative Party’s classified vote.
“This is reprehensible and undemocratic behavior that breaks the faith with hundreds of thousands of Canadians who embraced Patrick Brown’s vision of a modern, inclusive Conservative party,” the statement said.
In his statement Tuesday night, Brodie said the party’s returning director informed Brown of the concerns he received regarding the funding of his campaign, asked for a written response and decided to retain the list of provisional members of your campaign.
Brodie said Brown’s campaign response did not meet concerns and the returning director recommended that the election organizing committee disqualify him, who voted in favor.
Brodie said the party will share what it has with Elections Canada.
He said both he and the party’s general manager went out of their way to be fair to Brown, who is the current mayor of Brampton, Ontario, and a former leader of Ontario’s progressive conservatives. He also said they did their best to give time to refute the allegations.
“None of these issues have any impact on the integrity of the vote itself,” Brodie said.
“While we found it important to give a transparent answer to party members on this issue, because now this issue is subject to further investigation, we will not talk about it further.”
Brown’s campaign accused the party of acting in favor of the leadership candidate considered his main rival for the first post.
“Why is the party doing this? A coronation of Pierre Poilievre was expected,” the statement said.
The campaigns of Poilievre, a longtime Ottawa area MP, and Brown have been attacking each other throughout the race.
Poilievre had not yet responded to the decision of the organizing committee of the leadership elections on Tuesday night.
The campaign of former Quebec Prime Minister Jean Charest, who also participates in the leadership contest, did respond by calling the news “deeply troubling.”
“We look forward to more communications on the crime allegations,” Charest campaign spokeswoman Michelle Coates-Mather wrote.
“Transparency is paramount. We need to understand what the allegations are and how Patrick Brown’s campaign responded.”
The Conservatives will announce the winner of the leadership race in Ottawa on September 10th.
Other candidates for the race are Ontario Conservative MPs Leslyn Lewis and Scott Aitchison, as well as Roman Baber, a former independent member of the Ontario legislature.
Although he has been disqualified, his name is expected to still appear in the classified vote. A party spokesman said Tuesday afternoon that a large batch of them had already been mailed to members.
Last week, the party said some 675,000 members had signed up to vote for a new Conservative leader.
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on July 5, 2022.