Manitobans lined up at the polls to vote in the 2021 Canada election, after a whirlwind campaign amid a global pandemic — and the results were familiar.
At 9:35 p.m., Global News projected the Liberal government to win, and called a Liberal minority about 20 minutes later.
Familiar names were declared winners early in the evening, including Candice Bergen (CON) for Portage-Lisgar, Dan Mazier (CON) in Dauphin-Swan River-Neepawa, James Bezan (CON) in Selkirk Interlake, and Larry Maguire (CON) in Brandon-Souris.
Conservative incumbent Ted Falk, who apologized during the campaign for spreading COVID-19 misinformation, won his seat in Provencher.
Terry Duguid (LIB) won his seat in Winnipeg South, as did his Liberal colleague Kevin Lamoureux in Winnipeg North.
Melanie Maher (CON), who went head-to-head with Duguid, said despite everything, she was hopeful things may change with the mail-in ballots.
“Of course you know I’m grateful to have all of our volunteers here, we were hoping to get a little bit more of our vote out early.”
Melissa Chung-Mowat (NDP), who gave Lamoureux a run for his money, said despite the loss, she was happy with the relationships she had built during the campaign.
“And so I’m so honoured to have represented our community, and like I said it’s not the outcome we expected or that we were hoping for tonight, but it is the start of much more work to be done in our community.”
Chung-Mowat said she plans to run again next election.
Liberal incumbent Jim Carr (Winnipeg South Centre) was re-elected and told Global News despite the lack of change in Manitoba, the election was worth it.
“Was it worth consulting Canadians about childcare, about climate change, about vaccinations, about the great issues that face our country? Of course it was.”
As of 12:30 a.m. CT Tuesday, it remained a tight race in Charleswood-St. James-Assiniboia-Headingley, where Liberal Doug Eyolfson was in the lead for most of the night, until incumbent Marty Morantz took a small lead at about 10:40 p.m. with still 20 per cent of the polls still to report.
Morantz did not speak Monday night, but sent out a statement to media.
“Everyone anticipated that this was going to be a close race. There are a lot more votes to be counted, after which I will be happy to comment further.”
Other results included Daniel Blaikie (NDP) in Elmwood-Transcona, Dan Vandal (LIB) in Saint Boniface-Saint Vital and Raquel Dancho (CON) in Kildonan-St. Paul.
Dancho said thank you to her supporters in Kildonan-St. Paul.
“I’ve been doing this for about a decade now and this was by far the most difficult campaign, I believe, for the country,” she said, adding it was emotionally tough.
“It just really emphasizes the fact that we should not have been in an election, it caused further division in this country and that’s on Justin Trudeau.”
Paul Thomas, professor emeritus of political studies at the University of Manitoba, said local Conservative campaign teams may have been hurt by the current provincial Tory leadership race to replace former premier Brian Pallister.
“If you’re pre-occupied with choosing the next premier, finding time to help out your local candidate in a federal election race may not be your first priority,” Thomas said.
Voting day
While lineups around the city appeared to be moving, they were expected to move more slowly than usual due to fewer election workers and COVID-19 protocols, said Elections Canada.
Lines at the Fort Garry Curling Club, a poll in the riding of Saint Boniface-St. Vital, stretched about a block as the polls came to a close at 8:30 p.m.
People in line told Global News that getting to the voting site was difficult due to large amount of road construction nearby.
Still, many told Global News they were happy to vote.
“Luckily I got here pretty early so there was like only two people ahead of me,” said one man outside the poll at the Forks. “I turned 18 in like December so this is my first time voting.”
He said it’s important for young people to vote, noting the issues for him included climate change, surviving as a student and taxes.
Outside a poll in St. Boniface, voter Luc Guenette said the lengthy list of 21 candidates — the longest in Canada — was “kind of a joke.”
“A lot of these people didn’t even make an effort to come talk to us. I don’t even know what their campaigns were,” he said.
Voter Giselle MacDonald said the process was done “very well… they’re following all the proper protocols so I thought it went very well.”
— with files from The Canadian Press