A flameout for Bonnie Crombie
After a caucus revolt, the Ontario Liberals’ one-time best bet against Doug Ford is out as party leader
Bonnie Crombie’s term as Ontario Liberal leader fizzled out yesterday after she won a disappointing 57 per cent of her party’s support in a leadership review vote. Immediately following the vote, Crombie said she planned to stay on as leader. A few hours later, a “caucus revolt” forced her hand and the woman who was supposed to be the antidote to Teflon Doug announced her resignation.
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When the former mayor of Mississauga won the Liberal leadership race in 2023, she thanked voters for “taking a spark and turning it into a big red flame.” In the end, her stint in provincial politics was more of a flameout. Leading up to February’s provincial election, Crombie campaigned with a laser focus on health care—complete with a custom “Real Leaders Fix Healthcare” baseball cap. Her platform didn’t resonate with voters. She failed to win her own seat, let alone deliver on her promise to flip every PC seat in Peel for the Liberals.
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To be fair, Crombie inherited a losing battle. Under former leader Steven Del Duca, the Ontario Liberals lost official party status in the 2022 election. And as Trump threatened to turn Canada into the 51st state, Ford got an unexpected boost in the polls by playing Captain Canada in front of international media.
This summer, critics within the Ontario Liberal party started rumbling for Crombie’s resignation. By the end of the weekend’s annual general meeting, they got their wish. For the party, it’s a chance to regroup and recalibrate. For Crombie, it’s the end of a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad era.
Courtney Shea is a freelance journalist in Toronto. She started her career as an intern at Toronto Life and continues to contribute frequently to the publication, including her 2022 National Magazine Award–winning feature, “The Death Cheaters,” her regular Q&As and her recent investigation into whether Taylor Swift hung out at a Toronto dive bar (she did not). Courtney was a producer and writer on the 2022 documentary The Talented Mr. Rosenberg, based on her 2014 Toronto Life magazine feature “The Yorkville Swindler.”
