The NDP leadership race is being gamed to favour an individual who supported buying a tar sands pipeline, applauded a Nazi, engaged with a CIA talk shop, sits on a NATO parliamentary body and praises Canada’s leading proponent of a state committing a holocaust. Is the NDP willing to forego $150 000+ to protect their preferred candidate from rigorous challenge?
Alongside the capitalist press, the NDP brass want Heather McPherson to lead the party and they’ve crafted leadership rules to ensure her record receives as little pushback as possible. Last week the party released more details about the rules for the leadership race such as the fact the $100,000 entrance fee is to be paid in four installments. In addition to a 330% increase in the sum from the previous leadership race, they’ve introduced a $1,500 vetting fee and the party takes 25% of all other money (above $101.500) candidates raise. If a candidate raised the $1.5 million leadership race maximum the party would get nearly half a million dollars.
To participate in the leadership race, a candidate needs to gather 500 signatures from party members based upon various regional, age and equity criteria. The financial and — to a lesser extent — signature requirements are a major obstacle to an ideologically diverse leadership race. But there’s a greater hurdle to democracy. A committee of three backroom officials decides if members are even allowed to evaluate a potential candidate. According to the rules, a prospective applicant can be excluded if they don’t comply with “the principles and core values of the Party.”
Call it the Israel lobby/tar sands/Ukrainian Canadian Congress/NATO/CIA protection clause.
Unlike an individual representing the party in a specific ridding, the leadership race (and policy conventions) ought to be where the NDP’s “core values” are determined.
Zionists, of course, believe they should determine the NDP’s and every other party’s values. Even before the race has formally begun, they are calling for my exclusion. The growing appetite for change sweeping the Anglosphere petrifies them.
In the UK, Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana’s new left party signed up 600,000 members in a week. In Minneapolis, left candidate Omar Fateh recently defeated the incumbent Democratic mayor in a primary and Sean Orr won a resounding victory in a Vancouver city council byelection.
New polling about Zohran Mamdani’s win in the New York Democratic race is important for my candidacy. According to the IMEU Policy Project, Palestine was the third most cited issue for Mamdani supporters even if the mayor has little formally to do with the issue. Even more remarkable, Palestine was cited by 83% of those who backed Mamdani who hadn’t previously voted in any type of mayoral race. In effect, anti-genocide sentiment ‘got out the vote’ for a candidate who garnered the largest ever number of votes for a New York mayoral primary.
In the NDP race, foreign policy is, of course, a more central consideration.
A poll posted to Reddit last week asking NDPers who they preferred to lead the party selected me by a large margin. While obviously non-scientific, the poll does highlight the fact there’s some buzz behind my call to challenge capitalism and imperialism while promoting de-colonization, de-growth and economic democracy. So does the over 300 who have signed up as volunteers and the large turnouts for committee meetings. My path to success in this race is to have a network of activists across the country leafleting and signing people up at Palestine events.
By blocking my candidacy, the NDP brass would be foregoing a lot of potential revenue. There are not many others seeking to raise the $100,000+ entrance fee.
Blocking a leading critic of Canada’s support for Israel amidst its holocaust in Gaza would be a major stain on the party’s reputation. Hopefully, McPherson, Avi Lewis, Leah Gazan and other prospectives candidates will declare their support for members being able to decide. Is there a better test of an individual’s willingness to stand up to the genocide lobby than rejecting their calls to exclude critics of Israel?
As foreign affairs critic who has criticized Israel’s genocide, McPherson should recoil at the prospect of the party cowering to the genocide lobby. Her silence would be complicity.
Unfortunately, my guess is that McPherson is fine with blocking a critic of her record if it benefits her campaign. She has repeatedly spoken alongside and praised leading Zionist Irwin Cotler while I’ve directly confronted his genocidal Jewish supremacism. McPherson applauded an individual who fought for Hitler while I’ve counter protested the far right in Montreal. She attended a CIA influenced Trilateral Commission meeting while US border agents blocked me from transiting through New York because I confronted the US ambassador and Secretary of State. McPherson is a member of the NATO Parliamentary Association, which I and others protested and counter-summited six months ago in Montreal. She supported Ottawa paying $35 billion for the Trans Mountain pipeline while I’m calling for shutting down the tar sands.
I hope McPherson has learned from her mistakes. The test will be if she calls for letting the membership decide if I’m a suitable candidate or not.
There’s a stark contrast in “values” between the NDP brass’s preferred candidate and myself.
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