Patrick Brown isn’t going down without a fight and he seems willing to pull the Progressive Conservatives’ election hopes down with him.
The ousted Ontario Tory leader — felled by two accusations of sexual misconduct (for lack of a better description) — announced last week that he’s throwing his hat into the ring to reclaim the leadership of a party that might finally unseat the Liberals after more than a decade of red rule in Ontario.
He was cleared to run on Wednesday.
Brown, understandably, feels cast aside. What’s more, he feels he might be the victim of a coup, that members of his own party, unhappy with his leadership, conspired to bring him down. Last week, Vic Fedeli kicked Brown out of caucus, meaning his Barrie seat is now independent.
Is it fair that Brown was brought down by allegations from two anonymous accusers? No. Does it make a difference that one of those accusers has admitted some things she initially told a reporter — namely she wasn’t a minor and wasn’t still in high school when she alleges Brown picked her up in a bar — weren’t true? No, not really.
I agree it isn’t fair, but then again, few things are, life and politics being high atop that list.
Regardless if there’s any truth to the accusations, Brown would be difficult to elect now that the stink of sexual impropriety hangs over him.
Like it or not, the party had no choice but to cast him aside. A party leader with a penchant for picking up much younger women in bars (or a party leader with a reputation for picking up much younger women in bars) is a scandal waiting to happen. Of course, Fedeli and the rest didn’t have express such relish and glee while they did kicked him out.
The way they celebrated his demise as leader was gross, but what about what Brown has done since? If he were the dyed-in-the-wool Tory he claims to be, he would’ve bowed out quietly, taking his lumps for the good of the party (and his continued electability), accepting the party’s decision with tact and decorum.
He could’ve vowed to clear his name, while stepping aside to put the party’s needs ahead of his own.
Brown did none of this.
Even at the time the accusations broke, the Tories sat on top of the polls. Premier Kathleen Wynne and the Liberals are in distant, distant second, with only about 25 per cent support. The NDP, naturally, are comfortably in third. In other words, this is the Tories election to lose. Again.
If Brown were the Tory diehard he claims to be, he would be doing what he could to help the PCs win the June election, putting party before ego. He could have used his not inconsiderable internal support to heal the rift in the party and to galvanize members behind whichever leadership candidate he wanted. The Conservatives could then head into the campaign as a united force with one goal: bring down the Liberals.
Instead, Brown seems determined to ensure that doesn’t happen. Instead, he plans on using the party’s internal divisions for his own selfish ends. Apparently, Patrick Brown really, really wants to be premier.
So the party is divided, fighting itself when it should be planning to fight Wynne (who is probably chuckling to herself, thinking the Tories will once again gift her an election victory, much as former leader Tim Hudak did four years ago).
Sudbury PC candidate Troy Crowder has thrown his lot in with his “friend” Patrick Brown. Crowder’s new to politics, but this is a misstep. If he wants the Tories to win, he and other Brown supporters — like Sault Ste. Marie MPP Ross Romano — should throw their support behind a new leader (Christine Elliott and Caroline Mulroney being the best of the bunch) without Brown’s baggage.
Crowder and Romano should be telling their “friend” to act like the leader he no longer is, and put the party first.
As I’ve written before, the Conservatives have two talents: they don’t know how to choose a leader; and they are unmatched in pulling defeat from the jaws of victory.
There’s still time for Brown to change course, but the clock is ticking.
Mark Gentili is the editor of Sudbury.com and Northern Life.
