Breaking news update: Conservative candidate Don Stewart has won the longtime federal Liberal stronghold of Toronto-St. Paul’s, the CBC News decision desk projects, a stunning result that raises questions about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s future.
Below is an earlier version of this story.
Hours after the polls closed, workers are still counting ballots in the Toronto-St. Paul’s federal byelection.
Political watchers are patiently awaiting the final result because this byelection is seen as a crucial test for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his party at a time when polls suggest Liberal support nationwide has cratered.
The Liberal candidate, Leslie Church, has maintained a narrow lead over closest competitor, Conservative candidate Don Stewart, throughout the evening but thousands of advance poll ballots have yet to be counted.
There are enough votes still outstanding to possibly change the result of this race.
Elections Canada had said it would take longer for poll workers to count votes tonight because there are dozens of candidates on the unwieldy, nearly metre-long ballot — some of whom are proportional-representation activists running as a protest to the country’s first-past-the-post voting system.
“Given the unusual size of the ballot in today’s byelection in Toronto-St. Paul’s, our counting and reporting processes have been slower,” an Elections Canada spokesman said in a statement to CBC News at 12:20 a.m. ET.
“Counting will continue until it is completed. We thank everyone for their patience.”
LIVE | Latest results from Elections Canada:
The voting agency also said it erroneously sent out voting information cards to about 2,250 voters with the wrong poll location.
Elections Canada said it did resend new cards with the correct address, but some of them may have not reached some voters in time for election day.
The riding is a Liberal stronghold — the midtown seat has been solidly held by the Liberals for more than 30 years
But national polls suggest the Liberals are facing some of their worst levels of support in more than eight years of power. An aggregate of polling shows Conservatives leading by double digits.
Former Liberal staffer Leslie Church is running to replace former Liberal MP and cabinet minister Carolyn Bennett, who retired from politics after representing the riding for 26 years.
Church is up against Conservative candidate Don Stewart, a former Bay Street worker whose first foray into politics could be both dramatic and memorable if he flips the riding blue.
With ballots still being counted at 12:30 a.m. Toronto-St. Paul’s Liberal candidate Leslie Church speaks to supporters of her byelection campaign, saying it was “going to take a while” until a result.
Jenni Byrne, a senior adviser to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, said the party is expecting a loss in the riding.
Speaking to CBC News from Stewart’s election night party before any results were released, Byrne said Toronto-St. Paul’s “will probably stay on the Liberal side of things.”
“This is an extremely safe Liberal seat. Sometimes, this is a Liberal seat, and that’s what we’re going to see tonight,” she said.
But she said the Conservatives are “going to see we’ve done better than we have in the past.”
Byrne said there are questions for the Liberal team if Church’s results are much less than what Bennett posted in the last election.
A strong Conservative performance suggests some other supposedly safe Liberal seats like neighbouring Eglinton-Lawrence and Willowdale, and seats in Etobicoke and North York could be in play, Byrne said.
Speaking to supporters just before midnight as results continued to trickle in, Stewart said he was still feeling “positive” about what’s to come.
He made it clear he wasn’t conceding the race.
“Let’s not give it up!” he said to supporters. “Let’s bring it home.”
Jenni Byrne, senior advisor to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, tells CBC News’ Chris Glover she believes the Liberals will win the Toronto-St. Paul’s byelection, but added that it is typically an ‘extremely safe’ Liberal riding.
Church dropped into her election night watch party just after 12:30 a.m. ET to thank supporters for their work on the campaign.
“Let’s actually let the ballots be counted,” Church said when asked by a reporter if she was declaring victory.
“It’s a very long ballot and the count is taking an awfully long time but I’m feeling good and I hope we’ll have results soon.”
Toronto-St. Paul’s Conservative candidate Don Stewart takes questions from reporters, then delivers a speech thanking his supporters as ballots are still being counted in the byelection.
Many pollsters and pundits say a Conservative victory will put pressure on Trudeau to step down as Liberal leader. Even a Conservative loss — if marginal — could be problematic for him.
“If we do end up on Monday night with a two, three, four, five-point win for the Liberals, the Liberals will be happy to have a win, but that still means that the country is going toward a big majority government for Pierre Poilievre,” polls analyst Éric Grenier, who runs thewrit.ca, said in an interview on Rosemary Barton Live.
An upcoming federal byelection in the Liberal stronghold of Toronto–St. Paul’s may have wider political implications for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, with polls suggesting a Liberal victory may not be a given with voters looking for change.
Toronto-St. Paul’s is seen as one of the safest ridings in the country for the Liberals. Even in 2011, when the party suffered its worst-ever result and was reduced to third-party status in Parliament, the Liberals took the riding by more than eight points.
David Coletto, chair and CEO of Abacus Data, said he believes the Liberals need to win by 10 points or more to give Trudeau a credible path forward.
“I think then the prime minister can probably say, ‘Look, we can come back from this. We can convince people, persuade people to vote Liberal,’ ” Coletto said on Rosemary Barton Live. “If it is much closer, then I think there’s going to be a lot more doubt about whether he and the current team are able to achieve some of those things.”
Voters in the Toronto-St. Paul’s riding vote Monday in a crucial byelection is seen as a test of the federal Liberals and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Liberals have held the riding for more than 30 years, but pollsters say there’s a good chance it will flip.
The revolving door of prominent Liberals in the riding underscores just how seriously the Liberals are taking this race. Trudeau and at least 13 of his cabinet ministers have campaigned there on behalf of Church ahead of Monday’s vote.
“We are taking nothing for granted. The whole team is there with her … and we’re going to keep on working until the last minute,” Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said on Sunday.
84 candidates on the ballot, a federal record
Also on the ballot is NDP candidate Amrit Parhar, Christian Cullis for the Greens, People’s Party of Canada candidate Dennis Wilson and a flood of candidates unaffiliated with any party.
More than 10,000 ballots were cast during the four-day advance poll two weekends ago — an estimated 12.7 per cent of the riding’s 84,668 registered voters.
The federal riding of Toronto-St. Paul’s has long been considered a Liberal stronghold, but it’s expected to be a tight race as candidates prepare for a byelection on Monday. National polls indicate a growing desire for change among voters across the country. Chief political correspondent, Rosemary Barton speaks with pollsters David Coletto of Abacus and Eric Grenier of The Writ about the upcoming vote and the latest polling data.