Politics

List of candidates, party officials who have made headlines for various gaffes

Here is a list of candidates and party officials who have made headlines during the federal election campaign because of various gaffes.
Former Liberal candidate Chris Austin, seen here in his Facebook profile picture, has vowed to run as an independent after the party dropped him for expressing 'views irreconcilable with Liberal Party values.' (Chris Austin/Facebook)

Here is a list of candidates and party officials who have made headlines during the federal election campaign because of various gaffes.


Aug. 7: The Conservatives showed the door to candidate Augustin Ali Kitoko in Montreal's Hochelaga riding after he shared an album of photos from Mulcair's Facebook page.

Aug. 10: Morgan Wheeldon, an NDP candidate in Nova Scotia's Kings-Hants riding, was forced to resign after suggesting in a 2014 Facebook post that Israel was engaged in "ethnic cleansing."

Aug. 18: Liberal Ala Buzreba dropped out of the race in Alberta's Calgary Nose Hill riding after four-year-old tweets surfaced of her telling someone they should have been aborted with a coat hanger and another to "go blow your brains out." She apologized for the comments.

Ala Buzreba, the Liberal party candidate in Calgary-Nose Hill, apologized for offensive messages on her Twitter account as a teen and later said it was best for the riding that she step away from the race. (liberal.ca)

Aug. 21: Conservative candidate Gilles Guibord was forced to resign from the race in Montreal's Rosemont—La-Petite-Patrie riding over sexist comments he allegedly made in online comments section of the Journal de Montreal newspaper.

Aug. 24: Conservative candidate Wiliam Moughrabi in the Montreal riding of Ahuntsic-Cartierville had to erase online comments that were deemed violent and misogynist in nature. He did not step down.

Aug. 25: Soheil Eid, a Conservative candidate in Joliette, Que., apologized twice for a Facebook post that drew a parallel between the words of Mulcair and comments attributed to Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's infamous propaganda minister.

Conservative candidate Soheil Eid was forced to apologize after linking NDP Leader Tom Mulcair words to Hitler's infamous propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels. (Soheil Eid Conservateur/Facebook)

Late August: VirJiny Provost, a young Bloc Québécois candidate in Megantic-L'Erable, embarrassed her party after a survey she answered came to light. Asked what she would need in the event of a nuclear attack, Provost wrote she'd bring "her cellphone, a penis and chips."

Sept. 7: The Conservatives dropped Toronto-Danforth candidate Tim Dutaud after he was found to have posted videos of himself making crank calls on YouTube — in one, he posed as a mentally disabled man; in another, he feigned an orgasm.

Sept. 7: The Conservatives cut ties with Jerry Bance, who was running in Toronto's Scarborough Rouge Park riding, after he was caught by the CBC on camera urinating into a coffee cup while he was an appliance repairman.

Tory candidate caught urinating in homeowner's coffee mug

9 years ago
Duration 2:08
Jerry Bance was service technician when caught on CBC-TV's Marketplace in 2012 urinating in mug and dumping contents into sink

Sept. 8: Sue MacDonell, a board member for the Conservatives' Bay of Quinte Electoral District Association, was fired after she posted on Facebook that a Cree woman recently crowned Mrs. Universe was a monster and a "smug entitled Liberal pet."

Sept. 9: Shawn Dearn, the communications director for NDP Leader Tom Mulcair, apologized after two-year-old tweets surfaced in which he used an expletive in reference to Pope Benedict. Mulcair decided to keep Dearn on his team.

Sept. 10: Christopher Brown, a Liberal candidate in Peace River-Westlock in Alberta, apologized for tweets in 2009 that used profane language and included derogatory references to women. Brown said he had become an alcoholic at the time after his partner died in a car crash involving a drunk driver. Party Leader Justin Trudeau said he accepted Brown's apology.

Sept. 10: Joy Davies, who was running for Liberals in the B.C. riding of South Surrey-White Rock, left the campaign after her controversial Facebook posts about marijuana and cancer came to light.

Joy Davies, the Liberal Party candidate in South Surrey-With Rock, B.C., resigned after saying in a Facebook post that pregnant mothers should smoke marijuana. (Joy Davies/Facebook)

Sept. 15: The Conservatives dismissed Blair Dale, a candidate in the riding of Bonavista-Burin-Trinity, because of comments posted on Facebook the party said were "incompatible."

Sept. 16: The Liberals drop Chris Austin, a candidate for Sturgeon River-Parkland in Alberta, for comments they said were "irreconcilable." The party did not say what those comments were, but a Twitter account bearing Austin's name posted several links, including one to a story about the CBC firing Jian Ghomeshi with the comment, "Will Canada Become A Fascists Dictatorship?"

Sept. 19: Chantal St-Onge, a Bloc Québécois candidate in the Montreal area, apologizes for a Facebook post she wrote in support of an event hosted by Pegida, a group that opposes the "Islamization" of Quebec. The party said it asked her to take down the post.

Sept. 22: Alex Johnstone, an NDP candidate in the Hamilton area, apologizes for crude comments related to a photograph of Auschwitz she made on Facebook in 2008. She later told the Hamilton Spectator she did not know it was a notorious Nazi death camp.

Alex Johnstone, the NDP candidate for Hamilton West-Ancaster-Dundas, seen here with NDP leader Thomas Mulcair, said she didn't know what Auschwitz was after a Facebook joke from Johnstone that referenced the infamous Nazi death camp surfaced. (Samantha Craggs/CBC)

Sept. 25: Stefan Jonasson, an NDP candidate in Winnipeg, dropped out of the campaign after comments surfaced in which he compared the beliefs of one set of Orthodox Jews to the Taliban.

Sept. 28: Liberal candidate Maria Manna dropped out of the race in the B.C. riding of Cowichan–Malahat–Langford after Facebook posts from 2010 and 2013 surfaced in which he she called the official account of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the U.S. as "the lie."

Sept. 30: Cheryl Thomas, a Liberal Party candidate for Victoria, B.C., resigned because of past comments she made on Facebook about the Muslim and Jewish communities.

Robert Strickland, the candidate for Sackville-Preston-Chezzetcook in Nova Scotia, was pilloried for condescending Facebook comments made to a young voter that he attributed to a member of his staff. (Facebook)

Oct. 1: A Facebook exchange between Robert Strickland, the Conservative candidate for the Nova Scotia riding of Sackville-Preston-Chezzetcook, and a young voter was deleted after Strickland was pilloried online for being condescending toward the 22-year-old voter and dismissing his comments. "I will wait for you to gain some experience in life. Please respond when you have a tenure higher than 1 year at any one employer and perhaps have completed a degree..." said the post. Strickland said the comment was made by a volunteer staffer.

With files from CBC News