Editor's note: This article originally appeared on Parliament Today, a Village Media newsletter devoted exclusively to covering federal politics.
“Do you believe the polls?”
That’s the question Canada’s major federal political party leaders were asked Thursday after a handful of people wearing hooded sweatshirts with that slogan appeared at Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre’s rally in Brampton, Ont. Wednesday night.
The “Do you believe the polls” initiative appears to be new — it has a day-old Instagram account and a website that is still under development. Peter McCallion, son of late Mississauga Mayor Hazel McCallion, told Parliament Today on Thursday that the movement comes from the Meadowvale Business Association in Mississauga.
During the last provincial election campaign, McCallion released a public letter endorsing Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford in his mother’s name, disavowing her former public support for Ontario Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie.
Crombie was defeated in the provincial election by the PC candidate, Silvia Gualtieri, who is mother-in-law to Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown and, until recently, was listed as a director of the Meadowvale Business Association on the group’s website.
When reporters asked Poilievre if he believed the polls the day after his rally, he didn't answer but said he would respect the results of the election, which he said would be based on “whether we want change with a new Conservative government.”
Liberal Leader Mark Carney also said he would accept the results of the election before comparing the turn of phrase with that of U.S. President Donald Trump, who historically has dismissed and lied about polling results.
“I know there's certain parties that just import all their slogans and their policies from America, but let's not import that nonsense into Canada,” Carney said while in Brampton himself on Thursday.
“We will have, we are in the midst of, a fair and open and free election in Canada.”
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said he would accept the results of the election, but sometimes the polls don’t show the whole picture.
“Obviously, we would accept the results of the election. We’re New Democrats — democracy is in our name,” he said.
“But in terms of the polls, we have a very recent example where many polls said that in Ontario, New Democrats would lose party status, and they formed official opposition. So of course, I've got my doubts about the way that covers our support, that our support is not accurately being represented.”
The “Do you believe the polls” initiative is not helping the Conservative party, at least according to Kory Teneycke, who recently managed Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s winning Progressive Conservative campaign.
Like Carney, Teneycke said it reminds voters of Trump.
“I feel like I'm ... shouting at the clouds on this,” said Teneycke on Thursday’s episode of the Curse of Politics podcast. “Being with Trump, and being viewed as Trump, and channelling Trump is how to lose this election — and the campaign, and Poilievre, can't stop doing it. They just can't stop, won't stop. That's the problem.”
“If you're wearing hoodies that say, ‘I don't believe the polls,’ you're getting a half step away from ‘Stop the steal,’ right?” he said, referring to Trump’s claims that the Democratic victory in the 2020 U.S. election was illegitimate.
“It's like we're getting into absolute insanity — like Trumpland — in terms of the things you're saying and things that you're doing and I just don't see how you win an election doing that,” said Teneycke.
The latest polling by Abacus Data, published on April 9, shows the Liberals leading with 43 per cent support among decided voters compared to 37 per cent support for the Conservatives. The poll aggregator 338Canada has similar data, suggesting the Liberals have about 44 per cent support while the Conservatives have 37 per cent.
Teneycke pointed to polling figures that show Poilievre winning among voters who want a change in government, but not as strongly as Carney is winning among those who said they want stability instead.
“Are you going to be, you know, crazy change? Are you channelling Trump? Or do you want to channel Stephen Harper, which is stability and economics and manage the economy,” he said.
Teneycke compared Poilievre’s rallies to “a f—ing carnival” and suggested people there would join in Trump rally chants like “stop the steal” and “lock them up.”
He also said Poilievre’s interaction with Globe and Mail’s Laura Stone, in which the politician quizzed the reporter on the size of the crowd at his recent rally, was “in the trumpiest fashion possible” and “f—ing gross.”
“And he is losing women and losing women massively. And if you want to know why, go and watch that clip,” said Teneycke, defending Stone as one of the nicest reporters in the press gallery.
Teneycke made headlines earlier in the federal election campaign for warning that the Conservative campaign — which he supports — was “going to get obliterated” because Poilievre was looking and sounding too much like Trump.
He defended those comments on the podcast Thursday, saying the campaign “is going to be studied for decades as the biggest f—ing disaster, in terms of having lost a massive lead in ways that are so obvious with so much information that says ‘You're f—ing it up.”
A banner the group held outside of Poilievre’s rally had a social media handle on it reading “@canadianrealpolls.” The associated Instagram group has a handful of videos posted stemming from the last 24 hours, including one of Poilievre hugging someone wearing one of the hoodies as he greeted supporters. It also includes videos of people talking about the polls and how they believe they aren’t consistent with the size of the crowds at the Conservative rallies, and of one person who said he does believe the polls are accurate, but there is still time for them to change before the election.