Michael Ford won’t be running for mayor after all
The premier’s nephew said last month that he’d been giving a potential mayoral run “some strong and serious consideration”
Last month, former Minister of Citizenship and Multiculturalism Michael Ford told reporters that he was giving a potential mayoral run “some strong and serious consideration.”
Shortly after that, photos surfaced of Ford, who is the nephew of Premier Doug Ford, having coffee in a hotel lobby with another mayoral hopeful, Brad Bradford. Neither detailed what exactly was discussed, but both said it was a friendly chat about Toronto.
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After mulling it over, Ford has made his decision: he won’t be running, he announced today.
“After some very long and thoughtful consideration with my close family I have decided not to seek my candidacy for mayor of Toronto in the 2026 municipal election,” he confirmed to CP24. “I will remain very active in the city that I love and lend my support in whichever way makes Toronto a more safe, affordable and world class city.”
Ford is the second closely-watched potential candidate to announce they won’t be running. Former mayor John Tory published a lengthy statement last month, and elaborated in a radio appearance, that he wouldn’t seek another term due to privacy concerns. “The woman I had a relationship with, I still have a relationship with,” Tory said, referring to the city hall employee with whom he had an affair, leading to his resignation in 2023. “The notion that my family would be hurt again… I wasn’t prepared to take that risk, for them.”
Mayor Olivia Chow hasn’t yet announced whether she intends to run this October.
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Carly Lewis is a journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Times and the New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Wired, Interview Magazine, Pitchfork, Elle, and Maclean’s, where she is a contributing editor. Her work has been recognized by the National Magazine Awards and the Digital Publishing Awards. She reports on city life, culture—including what people do online—politics, art and crime. She received the Dave Greber Freelance Writers Award for “The Murder of Ashley Wadsworth,” an investigative feature about a Canadian teenager who was killed by a man she met on social media, published by Maclean’s.
