Tim Dutaud 2nd Conservative candidate dropped over embarrassing videos
The Conservative campaign has dropped another Toronto candidate over offensive and embarrassing online videos.
Tim Dutaud, who was running for the Tories in Toronto-Danforth, was forced out Monday after he was identified as a man known as the UniCaller in prank YouTube videos that included him pretending to orgasm while on the phone with a female customer service representative and mocking people with mental disabilities. The videos appear to have been posted about six years ago.
The move came just hours after the party ended the candidacy of Jerry Bance in the Toronto riding of Scarborough-Rouge Park, after he was identified as a repairman caught on camera peeing in a homeowner's coffee cup during a service call in a 2012 CBC Marketplace investigation.
The party said Bance was dropped for failing to disclose information during the candidate vetting process.
The Conservative webpage for the Toronto-Danforth riding describes Dutaud as "an actor and producer," listing the television drama Flashpoint and the comedy series The Jon Dore Television Show among his appearances. According to his LinkedIn page, Dutaud was a radio host with The Score for nine years, in until 2010, and before that worked in television production at CBC from 1995 to 2001.
Attempts by CBC News to reach Dutaud on Monday were unsuccessful. The party biography says he is now a Toronto realtor and minor hockey coach and has a two-year-old daughter.
He has also worked under the name Killian Gray, according to his Internet Movie Database profile page. The YouTube videos appeared to have been produced as prankster-style comedy videos as a character called the UniCaller.
At a campaign event in the same part of Toronto Dutaud was running to represent, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper was asked what the controversies involving the two candidates meant for his party.
"What this means is that we keep the highest standard for candidates and these two individuals are no longer candidates," Harper said.
Harper said there would be new candidates in the ridings.
Harper 'didn't bother' to vet candidates: Trudeau
Speaking Monday at a campaign event in Summerside, P.E.I., Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau said the incidents show Harper is out of touch and "didn't bother" to find out the past of two of his candidates.
"And he lost them today," Trudeau told supporters before slipping in a barb over suspended Senator Mike Duffy's residency troubles.
"But really, is that something so surprising from a man who still believes Mike Duffy is a Prince Edward Islander?"
Dutaud and Bance are just the latest candidates to drop out during the election campaign.
Gilles Guibord ended his Conservative candidacy in Montreal after some online comments he made in recent years about First Nations and women were called into question. Ala Buzreba, the Liberals' candidate in Calgary Nose Hill, stepped down after comments she made on Twitter as a teenager resurfaced. And the NDP's candidate in Nova Scotia's Kings-Hants riding, Morgan Wheeldon, resigned after deleted Facebook posts with comments about Israel were circulated by the Conservatives.
The deadline for candidate nominations is Monday, Sept. 28 at 2 p.m. ET.