Libertarian Maxime Bernier Narrowly Loses Canadian Conservative Party Leadership Election – The Liberty Conservative

Maxime Bernier, QuebecMP and former ForeignMinister, narrowly lost his bid for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada on Saturday to Saskatchewan MP and former House of Commons Speaker Andrew Scheer by just 49% to Scheers 51%.

Scheer is a closeally of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who was criticized by libertarians during his tenure for his support for Keynesian-style stimulus spending. The relatively bland and generic Scheer is generallyassociated with the party establishment, while Bernier was seen as an outsider candidate.

Bernier was believed to be the frontrunner in this race after the impromptu withdrawal of fellow outsider and Shark Tank star Kevin OLeary, who went on to endorse Bernier.

However, the ranked ballot system usedin the leadership election, which involves eliminating lower polling candidates and transferring their votes to the voters subsequent preferences, made the ultimate result difficultto predict. This system appears to have benefited Scheer, who had less personal support, but had the benefit of being less polarizing than other candidates.

Bernier performed unusually poorly in his home province of Quebec, even losing the area he represents in Canadas Parliament, Beauce, to Scheer. Many in Quebec benefit from Canadas statist agricultural policy of supply management, which Bernier seeks to abolish. Supply management has been a major flashpointin Canada-U.S. trade relations, with President Trump lambasting the policy for its unfairness towards American dairy farmers.

Berniersomewhat made up for his lack of support in Canadas eastwith strong support in provinces in Canadas Mountain West, such as Alberta, where his limited government ideologyresonated with Conservative voters. Unfortunately, it appears this was not enough to prevail over Scheer.

Bernier, a self-described Ron Paul fan and an adherent to Austrian economics, previously didan interviewwith The Liberty Conservativelate last year. Much like Trump, Bernier embraced the use of memes during his the campaign, and garnered the support of prominent Canadian libertarian commentatorssuch as Lauren Southern. He also pitched himself as strong on immigration, calling for Canadian troops to be deployed to the border with the United States to prevent migrants denied refugee status there from illegally crossing the border to apply for refugee status in Canada. Berniers strong support fromCanadas young, libertarian-leaning, Trump-inspired new right managedto push Scheer in a positive direction on several important issues, with Scheer pledging last month to defund colleges that do not protect the free speech of students.

Although this result may dismay libertarians in Canada and beyond, Berniers close second place finish demonstratesthat libertarian ideas dohave electoral potential witha right-of-center electorate when combined with a healthy dose of anti-establishment populism. Should Scheer fail to beat Prime Minister Justin Trudeauat the 2019 Canadian general election, Bernier will be well-positioned to succeed him as Conservative leader and take on Trudeau in the 2023 general election.

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Libertarian Maxime Bernier Narrowly Loses Canadian Conservative Party Leadership Election - The Liberty Conservative