Liberals leading in Manitoba byelection: poll
Brandon-Souris should have been a Conservative cakewalk.
It’s a Manitoba riding the Tories have held for all but four of the last 60 years, one they won with nearly two-thirds of the vote in the last election, and one few expected to turn into a messy battle after backbench MP Merv Tweed resigned.
Instead, Brandon-Souris has earned national attention, in part because the Tories could suffer a damaging loss to Justin Trudeau’s Liberals on Monday.
Conservative candidate Larry Maguire, a well-respected MLA, has mailed out flyers claiming Trudeau would make marijuana more available to kids and slagging Liberal candidate Rolf Dinsdale for playing in a punk band with a raunchy name. Those were followed by a letter from Prime Minister Stephen Harper that begged voters to elect Maguire instead of Dinsdale.
“Mr. Harper and his party have brought politics to a new, nasty low in this country, and it is catching up with them,” Trudeau said in an open letter to Brandon-Souris voters posted online Friday.
The Liberals have the momentum in the campaign, if a series of credible polls from Forum Research are any indication. The latest one, done just over a week ago, has the Liberals leading with 44 per cent support, an eight-point lead over the Conservatives.