Leadership race devolves into personal attacks

Conservatives fire away with no holds barred

OT TAWA • The Conservative leadership race is quickly degenerating into personal attacks and internal caucus squabbling — with eight months still to go before a new leader is crowned.

Leadership candidate Andrew Scheer fired back Friday against a political attack from Kellie Leitch and her campaign manager, who called him an “out-of-touch elite.”

Scheer said Leitch’s criticisms are “bizarre and perplexing,” and Conservative caucus members don’t want to see a leadership race full of personal attacks.

Brad Trost, meanwhile, continues a no-holds-barred approach in his bid. However, he is now backpedalling a bit in a spat with Conservative deputy House leader Chris Warkentin, a supporter of Scheer, as new information suggests some of his accusations against Warkentin are unfounded.

And leadership candidate Deepak Obhrai put Leitch in his cross hairs, calling her proposed values test for newcomers “un-Canadian.”

A fundraising email sent Wednesday from Leitch’s campaign manager, Nick Kouvalis, assailed Scheer, a Saskatchewan MP who joined the race this week, as an “outof-touch elite” because he announced his campaign at the National Press Theatre in Ottawa.

The email, without naming Scheer, also took a shot at him for trying to “score media points by attacking another Conservative” — a reference to Scheer saying Leitch’s values proposal is neither practical nor preferable.

Scheer, in an interview Friday, said Leitch’s criticisms are a head-scratcher considering he had a very middle-income upbringing in Ottawa and that his family didn’t even own a car when he was a child.

“I’m disappointed. My campaign will be positive and focus on the ideas I’m going to bring forward to the party and ultimately to Canadians. That’s what our members want — they want to put some of that nastiness behind us,” Scheer said.

But Leitch, who is a pediatric orthopedic surgeon along with being an MP, doubled-down on her campaign’s criticism that Scheer is part of an elite not connected to the grassroots.

“Going to the National tive leader Rona Ambrose questioning Warkentin’s neutrality.

He alleged Warkentin’s office blocked him from making a member’s statement before question period in which he planned to urge Guy Giorno, former chief of staff to Stephen Harper and a Scheer supporter, to repay tens of thousands of dollars in expenses from his 2008 move to Ottawa from Toronto.

He also claims Warkentin told him he recorded telephone conversations between the two of them and threatened to release them.

In the letter to Ambrose, Trost said it was his understanding that his office asked Warkentin and his staff for a member’s statement before question period, but was denied, potentially to prevent Trost from bolstering his leadership campaign.

Warkentin, a well-respected member of caucus, said his office has “never had anything to do with the allocation of members’ statements.”

Furthermore, an email obtained by the Ottawa Citizen shows Trost’s office contacted a staffer who works in the offices of the chief Opposition whip and the Opposition House leader, completely different positions and office than the question period co-ordinator and deputy House leader roles held by Warkentin.

In an interview, Trost said his understanding was that the House leader and deputy House leader worked together and by contacting the staffer in the whip’s and House leader’s office, they were effectively also contacting the deputy House leader’s office.

Trost acknowledged his office may have made a mistake, but said his bigger concern was the alleged phone recordings, although he has not provided any proof to substantiate his claims.

“There was very possibly an honest screw-up on both his part and on our part there, but you don’t try to phone up another member of Parliament, tape a conversation and then go nuts about it. That’s what the inappropriateness really comes down to,” Trost said.

“Why the heck would I make up something that stupid?”