Fred DeLorey might have the worst job in politics right now. As a member of the Friday Power And Politics Strategists panel, and general Big Moment panel (he was on before and after the LPC debates, on the day Freeland resigned, etc), he’s in an odd spot. He was, of course, the architect of the 2021 Conservative campaign, which was both a failure - O’Toole lost seats compared to Scheer! - and a success, given the massive hole the campaign started in that his strategy clawed back.
On balance, I think DeLorey’s an A-tier talent, and certainly the best the CPC could do if they refuse to go get Kory Teneycke and hand him the keys. His punditry, especially on Twitter, sometimes lapses into a place of partisan hackery, but I’m sure he and many others would say the same about me. Such is life.
The reason I’m thinking of DeLorey right now is he was on P&P yesterday trying to play a very interesting game - being more loyal to the CPC and their campaign than Teneycke, but trying to make the case that he clearly doesn’t love where this campaign is. The thing he danced on the pin of - whether or not the campaign needs to “pivot” - was evidence of it. Poilievre hasn’t “pivoted” to talking about Trump more, it’s merely a change in tone or emphasis. But it’s pretty clear to me by the lack of fulsom and clear endorsement of the current strategy that he’s not a huge fan, whether he’d say so explicitly or not.
I got some (semi-)friendly fire from Bryan Breguet last night that I’ve been overly optimistic about the Liberals in this campaign, painting everything as good news for the Liberals. It’s true I’ve been very optimistic about this campaign so far, but here’s the thing - I’ve been right. As of last night’s model update, the Liberals are up 15 seats since the day they dropped the writ and the Conservatives are down 9. In 13 days the Conservatives’ hill to climb has gotten bigger and the amount of time to climb it is down ~40%.
I know many people won’t believe it, but it’s not like I’m pissing rainbows at the idea of spending this entire campaign saying good things for the Liberals. I know that this isn’t good for me, because it will look, whether fair or not, like I’m just a Liberal hack defending my party. But if I’m supposed to make a case for Conservative optimism that is better than “Carney might tank the debates”, I guess I’ve failed. Because I fucking can’t do it without sounding like a moron to myself.
The ways the Conservatives could break through are simple - some combination of the NDP rising to 15%, the CPC break into the low 30s in Quebec, Atlantic Canada breaks against the Liberals (or at least the Liberal vote gets more inefficient there), and the realignment of CPC voters to be younger and less white than in the past scrambles the map enough that they win Mississauga and Brampton and Surrey seats while still picking up key NDP and LPC targets in white working class areas.
The problem is the Conservatives simply refuse to get out of their own way. In Trois Rivières, Poilievre announced stiffer penalties for perpetrators of Intimate Partner Violence and killings of family members. Sincerely great thing to see on a moral level, and the kind of thing that is also pretty good politics. Especially at the end of the week that started with Biological Clock-gate, this should be the kind of thing that can do a lot of good to reassure wavering female CPC-LPC swing voters. And they botched it.
I don’t have the minute by minute breakdown, but Evan Dyer finished his report on the announcement with inside baseball on the way that the CPC press policy has worked, including not letting chosen reporters from news outlets ask questions, asking reporters what they intend to ask before granting them a question, and in one case physical pushing and shoving between staff and journalists. That was what got the bulk of the ensuing panel discourse.
For a campaign that is struggling to get traction on its non-Trump policies and message, maybe not actively pissing off the press would be a start. Would Dyer have finished with that stark reporting on the state of press freedom on the Poilievre campaign events if they’d let him ask his question today, and the campaign wasn’t asking reporters what they wanted to ask in advance? Who knows, but if I were trying to get positive coverage of an easy win - opposing Intimate Partner Violence - maybe pissing off the press wouldn’t be the way to do it.
The good news for the Conservatives, in a lot of ways, is that this isn’t a good campaign so far. It would be far more concerning for them if this is really the best they got, but it’s not. I refuse to believe there’s no low hanging fruit they can fix to make the show better from here on out. Give the press an extra question or 2, take a couple follow ups, and stop asking for the questions in advance and maybe you’d have gotten the valuable minutes of coverage about Conservative press policy more focused on what you just announced.
If this is a Conservative campaign running on all cylinders, then I have seriously overestimated the talent on the right, and I haven’t. There has to be more to this campaign than tough on crime and tax cuts. There has to be a cohesive message, of which there’s not. Conservatives coping about the polling deficit shouldn’t have their head in the sand about the great campaign they’re running and embrace the idea that they’re only 6% down while running a pretty shitty one.
If I were the Liberals I’d be bracing for a better week next week, one where the Conservatives focus more on domestic issues that will be there no matter what Trump does. If I were the Conservatives, I’d stop attacking Carney as corrupt in specific and tie together Carney’s business dealings and SNC and WE and every other instance of Liberal corruption by announcing a standing inquiry into corruption, of the kind I’ve called for for months. That way at least when you’re hammering at Carney for his sins, both real and imagined, you’d be hammering at it while also being able to say “and we have a plan to fix this”.
Immigration could be another place for the Tories to go, but again, with a better message. Instead of having to explain who Mark Wiseman is, just turn it back to past Liberal failures and contrast it with a clear and concrete plan to keep immigration levels low for a while, instead of vague statements about tying numbers to capacity.
If I’m the Liberals those would be the two things that keep me up at night. I think the Liberals have been needlessly blasé about the real concerns about corruption in the government, and bringing in someone who is more connected than God can’t help with perceptions of impropriety. And frankly, if I need to lay out why the Liberals are vulnerable on Immigration again … honestly it’s best I don’t finish that sentence.
The Conservatives have a choice to make this week - they either have to get their heads out of their asses and stop making stupid mistakes that step on their messaging, or they can resign themselves to a loss. There’s low hanging fruit they can get, but can they swallow their pride? I don’t know.
If you want to know what is coming in the form of conservative attacks, look at the Twitter feed of Brian Lilley. Based on that, we can expect the conservatives to become even more desperate.
Expect more of the following:
- Tax strategy of Brookfield while Carney was leading Brookfield
- Innuendo about Carney’s personal taxes
- Revisiting 2008 financial crisis again trying to make the point that Carney was just a spectator
- Bail issues
- Discrediting expertise and PhDs in economics
None of it will work, people want to hear how we are going to get through the Trump crisis.
I don’t know. I wouldn’t say they’ve had a bad campaign to date. They’re still above their numbers from ‘21. They’ve had some difficulties, sure, but so have all of the other parties. I think the bigger issue is structural: the context changed dramatically - Trump and tariffs, JT resigned, Carney wins leadership, key policy reversals from Libs - and the CPC were slow in adjusting to the new environment. That suggests a lack of strategic foresight and adaptability on their part, but in terms of the day-to-day tactics of running a campaign, they’ve been okay.
This is reflected in your own analysis, where you push them to focus on the things that matter but also admit they’re not that far out of it (yet, at least). My own view? This is a group that likes the smell of their own farts. I don’t expect a major campaign reorientation from them. They’ll stick to what is largely working, and what would have worked, if they were still operating in 2024.