Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford pitched himself Wednesday as the best steward of the economy in the face of looming tariffs, but the other party leaders say his record from the last seven years suggests otherwise.
Ford says he needs the strongest majority in Ontario history in order to effectively deal with the threatened 25 per cent tariffs from U.S. President Donald Trump, and held his first official campaign event in Windsor, with a backdrop of the Ambassador Bridge to the U.S.
“The bigger the mandate I receive from you, the better we’ll be able to protect our province, because this is a game to the president,” Ford said.
“He seeks to divide and conquer. Whether he imposes tariffs next week, next month, or waits another year or more, Trump’s threats are not going away.”
But as focused as Ford has been lately on the tariff fight, he has taken his eye off the ball on other pressing provincial issues, Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie suggested.
“While the premier is running around the province pretending he’s Captain Canada, he’s not solving the basic issues that matter to Ontarians,” she said at her campaign launch in Barrie.
“He said he’d fix hallway medicine. He didn’t get it done. He said he’d cut your taxes, and he didn’t get it done. He said he’d build 1.5 million homes. He didn’t get it done. I’ve looked at the homelessness, mental health and addiction crisis that exists here in Barrie. He is not helping the situation here in Barrie on the ground, or fixing the doctors crisis.”
Crombie was in Barrie alongside Liberal candidate in Barrie-Springwater-Oro-Medonte, Rose Zacharias, an emergency and family doctor as well as past president of the Ontario Medical Association. They highlighted a promise to ensure everyone in Ontario has a family doctor within four years.
NDP Leader Marit Stiles touted her own bona fides in taking on the tariff fight, saying she has bargained and negotiated with American and multinational corporations to protect jobs. Meanwhile, she suggested that Ford called this snap election not over tariffs, but to protect his own job.
“He says it’s because he wants us to hire him to be our negotiator with Trump,” she said in a speech. “Doug Ford, our negotiator? Is he kidding? I mean, just look at Doug Ford’s track record.”
Stiles pointed to a 95-year lease for a spa on Toronto’s waterfront, and that just Monday the province’s financial accountability officer found that Ford’s decision to speed up access to beer and wine in corner stores by one year will cost the province $612 million.
His government is also under criminal investigation by the RCMP, who are looking into Ford’s decision to open up the protected Greenbelt lands to housing development. It is a now-reversed decision that the auditor general said stood to benefit certain developers to the tune of more than $8 billion.
– With files from Liam Casey in Windsor, Maan Alhmidi in Barrie and Rianna Lim in Toronto.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 29, 2025.
