With three full days left until the June 2 general election, Ontario’s political parties are campaigning for support in key rides.
Progressive Conservatives are the permanent leaders, according to CBC News Ontario Poll Tracker, with another majority in them.
The new Democrats are on track to win second place, albeit potentially with a smaller share of the vote than the Liberals. The Ontario Greens could take second place in Queen’s Park.
While not an exhaustive list, here are eight races that CBC News will be watching closely this week and election night.
Brampton North
Almost all of Brampton is a major battleground in this election, with extremely small margins of victory in three of its five races in 2018.
The New Democrats won Brampton North by just 497 votes over their closest rivals, the personal computer. This MP, Kevin Yard, lost the party’s nomination in April for this election and represented riding as an independent less than two weeks before the start of the campaign.
The NDP, the PC and the Liberals made Brampton North a priority in the campaign. New Democrat candidate Sandip Singh was joined by NDP federal leader Jagmit Singh when he officially opened his office for the election campaign in May.
Progressive Conservative leader Doug Ford made his first stop in the Brampton North campaign with PC candidate Graham McGregor. In at least one publicly available survey, computers are at the forefront here.
Liberal candidate Harinder Malhi, meanwhile, had previously represented the area before the riding boundaries were redrawn.
2022 candidates:
- PC: Graham McGregor
- NDP: Sandip Singh
- Liberal: Harinder Malhi
- Green: Aneep Dhade
- New blue: Jerry Fusek
- Ontario Party: Julia Bowman
Essex
This drive in the far southwest corner of Ontario could be something to watch on election night, with a close battle expected between the new Democrats, who won Essex in 2018, and the personal computers that were just around the corner. Together, the two parties have more than 90 percent of the vote in the ride.
Interestingly, none of the candidates running for these two parties is back on the ballot this time. New Democrat Taras Natishak, who has held the post since 2011, is not running again. Tory candidate Chris Lewis, who lost just 2,711 votes, was later elected to the rider’s federal counterpart.
Both parties have indicated that they believe they can win in Essex, but a potential complicating factor for personal computers is the popularity of small center-right parties in southwestern Ontario. The New Blue and Ontario Party collectively give about eight percent in the region, higher than anywhere else in Ontario, according to Poll Tracker. This support can bite into the share of computer voices on election night.
2022 candidates:
- Computers: Anthony Liardi
- NDP: Ron Leclerc
- Liberal: Manprite Brahr
- Green: Nicholas Wendler
- New Blue: Daniel Sylvester
- Ontario Party: Frank Causarano
- None of the above parties: Kevin Linfield
Western Ottawa – Nepian
If 2018 was an indication, the Ottawa West-Nepian race could be interesting.
Incumbent PC candidate Jeremy Roberts won just 175 votes last time, defeating New Democrat candidate Chandra Pasma with difficulty and ending the Liberals’ 15-year detention. The NDP had never taken more than 16 percent of the vote in this ride before, but it did double that in 2018.
Pasma is back on the ballot, and it seems that both the NDP and the Liberals believe the place can be reversed. NDP leader Andrea Horvat and Liberal leader Stephen Del Duca have visited the ride several times in the last two weeks of the campaign.
There are also questions about local discontent with computers so far after a deadly storm devastated parts of the Ottawa region on May 21. Ford has not been in Ottawa since the start of the campaign, although he is expected to visit the city on Monday.
2022 candidates:
- PC: Jeremy Roberts
- NDP: Chandra Pasma
- Liberal: Sam Bhalesar
- Green: Stephen Warren
- Ontario Party: Vilto Delvas
Paris Sound – Muskoka
The Green Party is pinning much of its hopes of expanding its band at Queen’s Park in this ride, a longtime stronghold of progressive conservatives. Former PC MPP Norm Miller has held the post for nearly two decades, but announced he would step down from politics last year. Personal computers have chosen Graden Smith, mayor of Bracebridge for the past 12 years, to replace Miller on the ballot.
But the Greens believe their candidate Matt Richter can win. This is Richter’s fifth time running for office. A local schoolteacher in the area, Richter won just over 20 percent of the vote in 2018. The Greens campaigned hard, with leader Mike Schreiner personally visiting more than half a dozen times.
The Greens may be helped by the fact that the Liberals have no one on the ballot. The party was forced to withdraw its local candidate after it was revealed that he had published a book detailing scientifically unfounded views on homosexuality.
Both the PC and the Greens insist they are confident they will eventually win the seat, although several riding-level polls published for Parry Sound-Muskoka have no consensus on who is leading.
2022 candidates:
- Computer: Graden Smith
- NDP: Erin Horvat
- Liberal: None
- Green: Matt Richter
- New Blue: Doug Maynard
- Ontario Party: Andrew John Cox
- Populist Ontario: Brad Waddle
- Independent: Daniel Before Jr.
Sault Ste. Marie
Incumbent PC President Ross Romano won the seat in Northern Ontario in 2018 by 414 votes to NDP candidate Michelle McCleeve-Kennedy, who is also running again. Together, the couple cast nearly 83 of the vote.
Ford visited Sault Ste. Marie was often prime minister and decided to stay in the city during the campaign.
Horvat was scheduled to be there on Saturday as part of a last-minute whirlwind tour of the north, which was postponed earlier after she tested positive for COVID-19. The problem with the plane that the campaign had to take on meant that it had to happen by live broadcast.
The original liberal candidate for Sault Ste. Marie was removed after inappropriate comments appeared in the media, which he made in an online gaming forum. The party managed to replace him with a new candidate, Liam Hancock, before the deadline for the Ontario election.
2022 candidates:
- Computer: Ross Romano
- NDP: Michelle McCleeve-Kennedy
- Liberal: Liam Hancock
- Green: Keegan Gilfillon
- New Blue: Shane Pankhurst
- Independent: Naomi Sayers
Thunder Bay – Attican
This ride in northwestern Ontario was the scene of one of the upcoming races in 2018.
The NDP candidate Judith Monteith-Farrell was ahead of the current Liberal Bill Mauro by only 81 votes, or 0.3 percent of the vote. This marked, for the first time since 1985, that the Liberals did not hold at least part of the territory now covered by the Thunder Bay-Atikokan borders.
June 2 is expected to be another clash between the new Democrats and the Liberals. Monteith-Farrell is running again while Robert Barrett is on the Liberal ballot.
Del Duca visited Thunder Bay on May 22 to campaign with Barrett. This is another ride that Horvath intended to attend on the last weekend of the campaign, but her personal appearance was canceled due to mechanical problems with the plane the campaign had chartered.
2022 candidates:
- Computers: Kevin Holland
- NDP: Judith Monteith-Farrell
- Liberal: Robert Barrett
- Green: Eric Arner
- New Blue: David Tomassini
- Ontario Party: Dan Krieger
- Northern Ontario: Kenneth Jones
Vaughn – Woodbridge
The stakes are high in this ride for Del Duca.
Del Duca was an MP for Von Woodbridge for nearly six years before being ousted by current computer president Michael Tibolo in 2018. He lost nearly 8,000 votes after holding several cabinet posts in the government of former Prime Minister Kathleen. Win.
During the campaign, Del Duca and his camp maintained a stoic belief that he would take his place again on June 2. However, personal computers said their own internal poll showed that Tibolo was firmly ahead. Thibaut was a cabinet minister during the PC’s four-year government term, but was twice demoted to lower-profile positions.
If Del Duca fails to win the seat, there will be serious questions about whether he can remain as leader of the Liberals.
2022 candidates:
- Computer: Michael Tibolo
- NDP: Will McCarthy
- Liberal: Stephen Del Duca
- Green: Philip James Piluris
- New blue: Luka Mele
- Ontario Party: Gerard Fortin
- Ontario Populists: Mario Greco
- Ontario Moderate Party: Walid Omrani
York South Weston
The incumbent candidate of the New Democratic Party, Faisal Hassan, won the seat in Western Toronto with 1,165 votes in 2018, with only about three and eight percent of the vote separating him from parties and liberals, respectively.
All three parties believe they have a chance to secure a ride on June 2. The wild card may be the recognition of the name of the PC candidate, namely Michael Ford – the nephew of the PC leader and municipal councilor in Toronto.
Ford’s political brand has a strong weight in this party in the city, and much of York’s South Weston share similar demographics with Etobicoke North, where Doug Ford won more than 50 percent of the vote in 2018.
2022 candidates:
- Computer: Michael Ford
- NDP: Faisal Hassan
- Liberal: Nadia Guerrero
- Green: Ignacio Mongrel Gonzalez
- New Blue: Tom Hips
- Ontario Party: Anna Gabriela Ortiz
- Independent: James Michael Fields
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