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Brantford Mayor Kevin Davis has been appointed as the Conservative candidate in the yet-to-be-called byelection in Brantford-Brant South-Six Nations. The Liberals are not saying if they will choose their candidate through a nomination election or will appoint one.
Poilievre’s move to appoint candidate in Brantford makes high-stakes byelection more ‘challenging’ to win, says former Conservative MP McColeman: ‘that’s really the gut punch’ Brantford Mayor Kevin Davis has been appointed as the Conservative candidate in the yet-to-be-called byelection in Brantford-Brant South-Six Nations.
The Liberals are not saying if they will choose their candidate through a nomination election or will appoint one. Joy O’Donnell ran for the Liberals in 2025, and wants to carry her party’s banner in the next election. Former Conservative MP Phil McColeman, left, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, Brantford Mayor Kevin Davis, and Liberal candidate Joy O'Donnell. The coming high-stakes byelection in Brantford-Brant South-Six Nations, Ont.
, was already expected to be a tough race for the Conservatives because of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s national popularity, but Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s move to appoint a candidate rather than nominating one through a contested election has made it even more “challenging,” says former Conservative MP Phil McColeman.
“There’s this Liberal love affair going on with Mark Carney, and it’s going to be a tough election, no matter who the candidate is,” said McColeman, who represented the riding for the Conservatives from 2008 to 2021, in an interview with“We’re just trying to apply our successes for 18 years to pass that along to the next person, and that’s really the gut punch because we’re being ignored. We’re being told, ‘No, no, we know better.
’ And by making this kind of an appointment, and it could be anybody, could be someone else they parachuted in, and they know better because they should appoint someone, and we disagree. ”McColeman—who brought the riding to the blue column in 2008 after four decades of NDP and Liberal MPs representing this area—said that about a week-and-a-half before Poilievre appointed Mayor Kevin Davis as the candidate, he urged the leader not to make an appointment and instead allow a contested nomination process to determine who would represent the party in the upcoming byelection. McColeman said he offered the advice after hearing rumours that Poilievre was considering appointing a candidate.
But at the Sept. 20 rally, attended by around 2,000 people, Poilievre announced Davis’ candidacy for Brantford, even though another prospective candidate, Pastor Dave Carrol, had been endorsed by McColeman and the outgoing Conservative MP Larry Brock. To express his disappointment, McColeman left the rally after Davis’ appointment was announced.
“I hand over the baton to him to take over and be your strong voice in Brantford Brant South. He follows all the traditional conservative values of faith, family, and freedom,” said Brock in the recorded video with Carrol standing alongside him.
“He understands the importance of addressing local, provincial, and national issues. Affordability first and foremost. He will work to ensure that he is supporting local families, he is supporting workers. He is supporting businesses.
He will ensure that he works and picks up where I left off to ensure safe streets, safe communities where people can raise their families without fear of people breaking into their homes. ” Larry Brock resigned from his House seat on Sept. 18 to return to his old job as assistant Crown attorney. The riding of Brantford-Brant South-Six Nations, Ont.
, opened up on Sept. 18 after Brock resigned his seat to return back to his pre-politics role of assistant Crown attorney. He’d won the last election by a margin of 11 percentage points. McColeman said that, as things stand right now, he will not campaign for Davis.
He said that his opposition to this appointment is not about Davis personally, but about the party’s decision to appoint a candidate rather than allow grassroots members to choose one through an election. McColeman said Brantford is not a naturally Conservative riding and, unlike in some other ridings where the party brand and leader can play a critical role, candidates in the area have historically needed to build their own local brand.
As an example, he referred to the 2015 election, which he described as a “hate Harper campaign,” when Justin Trudeau’s Liberals won a landslide majority government. McColeman said that while door-knocking during that campaign, voters would tell him they did not like Harper, but supported him. He also pointed to the riding’s political history. The NDP held the seat from 1971 to 1993, including during the Brian Mulroney Progressive Conservatives’ two back-to-back massive majority governments beginning in 1984.
The Liberals then won the riding in the 1993 election and held it until 2008. Even during the 2015 change election that returned the Liberals to power after a decade of hiatus, McColeman managed to retain the seat. Senior Conservatives view the future Brantford byelection as particularly important for Poilievre’s leadership survival, given the party’s current plummeting polling numbers and poor performance in some of the recent byelections.
Some Conservatives compare this byelection’s significance to the 2024 Toronto–St. Paul’s byelection when the Liberals lost a longtime stronghold to the Conservatives. That defeat intensified concerns within the Liberal caucus about Trudeau’s leadership, and the party’s electoral prospects going forward. The concern for senior Conservatives is that Brantford has been in their column since 2008, and a defeat there would most likely raise questions about the party’s vulnerability in other traditionally Conservative-held seats.
Since the 2025 general election, there have been seven byelections, and the official opposition has won only in Battle River–Crowfoot, Alta. —one of the country’s safest Conservative ridings—where Poilievre ran after losing his Ottawa-area seat of Carleton. The Conservatives also lost Chicoutimi–Le Fjord, Que. , a riding they had held since 2018 on Aug. 31.
Some Conservatives, therefore, see a loss in Brantford as yet another potential source of internal pressure on Poilievre’s leadership. Senior Conservatives predict that Carny will call a byelection in this riding as soon as he can to capitalize on his popularity. , Sarah Fischer, the Conservative Party’s director of communications, said that the party decided to appoint a candidate to deal with a scenario that the Liberals call a byelection quickly.
“To ensure a candidate was in place and ready to hit the ground running, the Conservative Party exercised its authority under the party’s rules to select Kevin Davis as our candidate for Brantford–Brant South,” wrote Fischer by email, adding that Davis has the support of riding president, Brock’s former campaign manager and a nomination competitor Josh Wall. “Kevin Davis was overwhelmingly endorsed by local grassroots Conservatives at the rally today, including the riding association President Caine Chapman, Larry Brock’s former campaign manager Phil Gillies, nomination opponent Josh Wall, and two candidates for Mayor.
” Former Conservative MP Phil McColeman says he has no plans to campaign for Conservative candidate Kevin Davis because the party appointed him without a nomination election. Fischer also said that Davis has deep roots in the riding and is committed to his community. She said that he’s focused on fighting for a safer and more affordable future for his people living in the riding. Fischer described Davis as an “outstanding” candidate.
Davis is a two-term mayor, but is not seeking reelection. In the last municipal election, he won by a margin of a little over 200 votes. After Davis’ appointment, Carrol put out a message on Facebook expressing his disappointment. He said that he and his team had been working for about six weeks to prepare for a nomination election, but in the end, the party decided to appoint a candidate.
“One candidate has been appointed rather than selected through the nomination contest that so many of us had been preparing for,” said Carrol. “I wish Kevin Davis well, but I would be less than honest if I said I wasn’t deeply disappointed. ” The Conservative Party’s nomination rules allow the leader to appoint up to eight candidates, while the remaining candidates are expected to be chosen through nomination elections.
By contrast, the Liberal Party does not impose a limit on the number of candidates its leader can appoint. Since the last federal election, the Liberals have nominated candidates without an election in six of seven byelections. The only exception is the riding of Beaches–East York, where then-outgoing MP Nate Erskine-Smith secured a commitment from the prime minister before stepping down that his successor would be chosen through a nomination contest rather than appointed.
By entering your email address you consent to receive email from The Hill Times containing news, analysis, updates and offers. that she has already submitted her nomination package to the party and has received confirmation that all the required paperwork is in order. Based on her information, she is currently the only person seeking the Liberal nomination. O’Donnell did not know when a nomination meeting would be called.
Following the controversy surrounding the Conservatives’ decision to appoint their candidate, there is now added pressure on the Liberals to choose their candidate through a contested nomination process rather than an appointment. A spokeswoman for the Liberal Party, however, declined to say when the nomination election will be called or if the party would appoint one..
“In Brantford—Brant South and in other ridings across the country, nominations will move forward in accordance with the party’s nomination rules in due time. ” O’Donnell said she has continued campaigning since the last election and intensified her door-knocking after Brock announced six weeks ago that he would be stepping down.
She said residents have frequently asked whether she plans to run, prompting her to recently run a full-page ad in the local newspaper announcing her intention to seek the Liberal nomination.
“I am preparing for nomination meeting, I am ready to go,” said O’Donnell. “So whenever it is called, my team’s up and running, and we’ve been working really since the last election. We never really stopped. So, we’re ready to go whenever that nomination meeting is called.
”. He reports on parliamentary caucuses, nomination contests, party leadership campaigns, the Prime Minister’s Office, and cabinet. Rana won the 2025 Ontario Community Newspaper Award for Best News Story for his story on Conservative nominations in that year’s election. Contact him at arana@hilltimes.com.
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