BC Conservative Leader John Rustad is staring down a “very hot and uncomfortable summer” as he undergoes an unusually long leadership review, according to a UBC political scientist.
The review, mandated by the party constitution, kicked off over the weekend — and comes amid messy infighting on British Columbia’s political right.
The process will see party members in each of B.C.’s 93 ridings vote on whether they want Rustad to stay as leader, a process Rustad said should wrap by December.
“To go through every riding in a kind of mini-review seems like, in some ways, a worst-case scenario for a leader who is besieged, because it just means that it gives opponents time, space to organize,” UBC political science lecturer Stewart Prest told Global News.
“It gives everyone with a grievance (a chance) to air that and to see whether others are feeling the same sort of thing. So it is going to be a very hot and uncomfortable summer, I would think, for Mr. Rustad.”
The review comes as the province’s political right, which unified behind Rustad and his upstart BC Conservatives ahead of last year’s provincial election, faces fragmentation.
Rustad is facing pressure over a leaked letter to the BC Conservative caucus accusing a group of former MLAs of “blackmail.”
Meanwhile, two former MLAs — Dallas Brodie, who was kicked out of the party for comments about residential schools, and Tara Armstrong, who quit in solidarity — have formed their own new OneBC party, with social and economic policies challenging Rustad’s party’s right flank. OneBC is also accusing Rustad of trying to manipulate the party’s recent annual general meeting.
Jordan Kealy, a third Conservative MLA who quit in solidarity but remains an independent, has also called for Rustad to step down.
And on Wednesday, B.C. business leader Ryan Beedie took aim at Rustad’s leadership in a LinkedIn post, arguing the party needs to rebrand itself to appeal to centrist voters.
At the same time, former BC United MLA Karin Kirkpatrick has launched her own party, CentreBC, hoping to attract those centrist voters.
“This isn’t just behind-the-scenes backroom politics; it is out in the open, we have a BC Conservative Party that is fragmented,” Prest said.
“As long as the conservative movement is essentially eating its own and dealing with the infighting, the NDP more or less gets to skate through.”
Prest said British Columbia’s political right tends to only come together and unify around the promise of victory, and to get the party’s populist and moderate wings back on the same page Rustad needs to find a way to change the conversation from his own leadership to that of the NDP government.
It’s a challenge he said will be magnified by the lengthy leadership review process.
Rustad is scheduled to speak with the media following a caucus meeting Wednesday evening.