Anglade defends Liberals’ organization as candidate drops out, another refused

Quebec Liberal Leader Dominique Anglade is defending her party’s place in the Quebec electoral race amid questions about organization within her ranks.

One Liberal candidate’s registration was denied by Elections Quebec, while another pulled out of the race Saturday evening.

Anglade says the party will challenge the decision by the election regulator, and another candidate has already been found to replace the one who quit.

It marks the first time in recent history the party hasn’t had a candidate in every riding when it learned the candidate in Matane-Matapedia, Harley Lounsbury, was refused by Elections Quebec. The riding in the Lower St-Lawrence region has long been a Parti Quebecois stronghold.

“We put it in the hands of our legal team to look at what happened,” a clearly unhappy Anglade said. “This is a situation that is unacceptable. … We are going to have serious conversations internally.”

The province’s other four main parties have all confirmed candidates in the province’s 125 ridings.

While speaking to reporters on Saturday, Quebec solidaire spokesman Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois described the election as increasingly a two-way race between his left-of centre party and the incumbent Coalition Avenir Quebec.

Anglade says that while her party has faced challenges, there are two weeks left in the campaign.

Conservative Party of Quebec Leader Eric Duhaime told reporters that while it may be a two-way race between Quebec solidaire and the CAQ in some downtown Montreal neighbourhoods, that’s not the case in other parts of the province.