Ruby Dhalla’s campaign for Liberal Party leadership crumbled Monday evening when party officials dismissed her last-ditch appeal against disqualification, cementing what she has characterized as an establishment move to block her candidacy.
The dramatic ruling came moments before candidates took the stage for the French-language debate, with the party’s permanent appeals committee standing firm on earlier findings that Dhalla had committed ten separate rule infractions during her campaign.
“The Committee reviewed Dr. Dhalla’s appeal to the decision of the Leadership Vote Committee and the Leadership Expense Committee that on Friday unanimously determined that Dr. Dhalla was in breach of 10 violations of the National Leadership Rules, Leadership Vote Rules, and the Leadership Expense Rules,” National director Azam Ishmael said in a statement.
The former parliamentarian has painted herself as an outsider battling entrenched party powers, declaring on social media that her elimination marks “not the end, but the beginning of a new movement of truth.” She maintains the party fabricated allegations to prevent her potential victory.
At issue were campaign finance practices that party officials claimed violated both internal rules and potentially the Canada Elections Act. These included questions about donation processing methods and financial disclosures that emerged during what Ishmael described as an “extensive” investigation.
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Read: Liberal Party Withholds $21,000 in Donations to Leadership Candidate
Dhalla has offered public explanations for the alleged infractions, arguing that certain questioned donations involved married couples using shared credit cards — “entirely LEGAL,” she insisted — and that her campaign had properly remedied approximately $21,000 in contributions that initially bypassed the party’s required payment system.
With Dhalla’s exit, the March 9 leadership contest narrows to a four-person race featuring former Bank of Canada chief Mark Carney, recently-departed Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, Montreal entrepreneur Frank Baylis, and veteran lawmaker Karina Gould.
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