“Loud Mouth” Kenney To Exit Federal Politics For Alberta Unite-The -Right

0
140

Jason Kenney, a key minister in the Harper government for nearly a decade and a driving force in the federal Conservative party, is ready to leave federal politics, according to CBC News, amid renewed talk of a bid to unite Alberta’s conservative parties.

OTTAWA – Conservative MP Jason Kenney, known as a loud mouth in Ottawa, is expected to announce this summer that he will leave federal politics, fuelling expectations that he intends to run a campaign to unite the right in his home province of Alberta.

CBC News reported that Kenney made his decision following a series of weekend meetings with key friends and advisers in Ottawa and Calgary.

The group includes former MP Monte Solberg, former Conservative campaign guru Tom Flanagan as well as a number of key figures in the former Harper government: Howard Anglin, Mark Cameron and Ian Brodie.

Kenney’s decision will be huge, not only in Alberta where the fractured right-of-centre vote contributed to the NDP’s stunning majority win last year, but in federal politics.

He’s considered a leading contender to replace Stephen Harper, and there’s been intense pressure on him to run to replace the former prime minister.

“I feel that if I decide to run I would have very broad and very deep support in the party,” he said in a May 28 interview with CBC Radio’s The House. “But this still doesn’t make it an automatic decision for me. There’s a lot to reflect on and that’s what I’m taking time to do.”

Kenney was first elected as an MP in 1997 when he was just 29. He held a number of senior cabinet posts in Harper’s government, including National Defence, Citizenship and Immigration and minister responsible for multiculturalism. He is considered the architect of the Conservatives’ highly successful inroads among immigrants and ethnic voters that contributed to Conservatives three straight election election wins.

He’s also been a money-raising machine for the federal party. In 2015, his Calgary Midnapore riding association doled out $183,000 to 44 Conservative candidates according to returns filed with Elections Canada.

Kenney’s supporters say he’s also attracted by the challenge of uniting the Progressive Conservative and Wildrose parties. They also believe the path and time frame for a return to power in the province is shorter than rebuilding the federal party as an alternative to Justin Trudeau’s Liberals.

The PC leadership has been vacant since May 2015 when then-leader Jim Prentice resigned after leading the party to its first defeat in four decades. Prentice quit despite winning his own riding, leaving the PCs with just nine seats and in third place behind Wildrose.

No other candidates have declared for the leadership race, which must be held before April 30, 2017.