Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre has been defeated in Carleton, ending his nearly two-decade tenure as a Member of Parliament in the Ottawa-area.
CTV News declared Liberal Party candidate Bruce Fanjoy the winner in Carleton at 4:43 a.m.
Fanjoy won the riding with 50.8 per cent of the vote, receiving 43,900 votes, compared to 38,675 votes for Poilievre.
The result is certain to ignite questions over Poilievre’s future as leader on a night that saw the Conservatives increase their seat count and vote share but finish second to the Liberal Party.
Poilievre spoke to supporters before the results were declared in his own riding, vowing to stay on as leader after the Conservative Party finished second.
“To my fellow Conservatives, we have much to celebrate. Tonight we’ve gained well over 20 seats. We got the highest share of the vote our party has received since 1988,” Poilievre told supporters.
Carleton is the only riding in Ottawa that saw an incumbent MP defeated.
Poilievre and Fanjoy had been waging an intense ground battle in the riding where the Alberta-born Conservative was first elected in the 2004 election. The riding covers the western and southern areas of the city of Ottawa.
“Thank you, Carleton.” Fanjoy said in a post on X at 5:08 a.m.
“As we’ve said from the beginning, together we can. I’m grateful and humbled by everyone who contributed to our campaign. To all the people of Carleton, as your new Member of Parliament, I’ll work to bring us together. We are all Canadians. We have to look out for ourselves, and we have to take care of each other. Let’s get to work.”
Fanjoy, a father of two, has held several leadership positions within the private sector and served in board member roles for local community organizations, according to his biography on the Liberal Party website.
Poilievre won the riding in the 2021 election with 50 per cent of the vote. Poilieve has represented the riding of Nepean-Carleton and Carleton since 2004.
The riding was contested by 91 candidates on the ballot, largely due to a protest group called the Longest Ballot Committee, which was able to convince dozens of candidates to register as independent candidates as part of a protest for electoral reform. According to Elections Canada, 90 of 91 candidates on the ballot received a vote in the election.
Preliminary figures show voter turnout in Carleton was 81.6 per cent, the highest in eastern Ontario.
Carleton saw the highest voter turnout in advance polling in the country, with Elections Canada reporting that nearly 44,000 votes were cast over a four-day period of early voting during the Easter long weekend.
Mark Carney’s Liberals held on to power Monday night, winning enough seats in the 45th federal election to form a minority government. Carney won his seat in the riding of Nepean.
With files from CTV News Ottawa’s Josh Pringle
