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2025 Toronto Candidates

A Preliminary Assessment - Dec 31, 2024

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We're posting these early notes on the candidates with the greatest of caution, as we do not want to worsen vote splitting by indicating our support for a candidate that ultimately isn't best positioned to defeat Doug Ford's PCs.

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When looking at this data, please note:

  • Not all the nominees have been confirmed. Star candidates can and do make a difference. Etobicoke North had been a Liberal riding for 15 years before Doug Ford showed up. Similarly, Don Valley West's standing as a safe Liberal riding was put into question in 2022 when Kathleen Wynne retired and the PC's ran former Toronto police chief Mark Saunders 

  • History is not the whole story. Polls and past electoral results give us a lot of information, but they don't tell us everything. The 2018 election was unusual owing to the collapse of the Liberal party. The 2022 election was unusual due to the lowest turnout in Ontario history. It's hard to confirm what is a new trend, and what is simply two anomalies in a row.  

  • Campaigns make a difference. One only has to look to the 2011 Federal election when Michael Ignatieff's disaterous campaign sank the Federal Liberal party to their worst results ever, and delivered both the NDP's best result ever (aided by the highly likeable leadership of Jack Layton) as well as Harper's first majority. Similarly, in the 2015 Federal election, Justin Trudeau's sunny ways campaign took the Federal Liberals from third place to a sweeping majority.

  • Ground game matters. We've seen it over and over again. The candidate that is out with a volunteer force that goes out knocking on doors, connecting with the community and getting their message out and getting the vote out makes a difference. Most often we see this difference seat by seat, but sometimes this happens in a more global way. In Ontario, Kathleen Wynne (carrying the weight of the much-hated McGuinty government scandals) was poised to lose the 2011 election, but between Tim Hudak's and Andrea Horwath's campaign fumbles, and Wynne's personal charisma and overall ground game across the province, the Liberals eked out a majority.

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Still, we wanted to get some information out early for those of you with donation dollars to give, or who are able to volunteer directly for a candidate. 

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For the most part, we've looked at the history of these ridings, as well as the individual strength of the candidates where known. With the upcoming Federal election, we suspect some incumbents have not yet declared their candidacy provincially as they are also being tapped to run federally.

We've tried to be very cautious in these assessments, erring on the side of unknown where we had any question over whether or not a riding would be a clear two-way race or not. In any case, we will continue to watch for nominees and polling information for all these ridings to see if anything changes.

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THESE ARE NOT ENDORSEMENTS

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North Central (old city of North York)

North York is a mixed bag of safe seats, seats that are very likely to be two-way races and seats that will likely be close three-way races. We will be watching all of these ridings as the election progresses.

Safe progressive seats

  • ​Don Valley East

  • Don Valley West

Likely 2-way race between the PC's and (Opposition Party)

Probable 3-way race, difficult to call this early​

  • Humber River-Black Creek: Current NDP incumbent Tom Rokocevic is confirmed as the nominee for this riding, and as the incumbent, is a very strong candidate. However, the Liberal party has nominated an excellent candidate in Liban Hassan, the TDSB Trustee for this riding, and with two competitive candidates, we are concerned about vote splitting.

  • York South-Weston: This was a tight race in 2022. The current incumbent is the Premier's nephew, although currently he has not confirmed his candidacy for this riding. The NDP Canadidate is the former incumbent, Faisal Hassan, who has excellent ground game and is a very strong contender for this riding. That said, the Liberals have good candidate in TCSB trustee Daniel Di Giorgio, and we suspect much will depend on whether the Liberal Candidate can muster a solid ground game or not.

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East (old city of Scarborough)

Scarborough has a long history with Liberal candidates. However, the NDP had a good showing in a few Scarborough ridings both the 2018 and 2022 elections, including the breakthrough victory for Doly Begum in Scarborough South-West. That said, both these elections were anomolous for different reasons, and so it remains to be seen if this is the start of new NDP trend in parts of Scarborough, or if there will be a reversion to its previous Liberal history

Likely 2-way race between the PC's and (Opposition Party)

Waiting for information

  • Scarborough Southwest: The NDP incumbent, Doly Begum, has not yet declared her candidacy

Possible 3-way race, or difficult to determine the Unity Candidate

  • Scarborough Centre

  • Scarborough North

  • Scarborough-Rouge Park

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West (old city of Etobicoke)

Etobicoke will be a challenging area for progressive voters, with Doug Ford (boo!), Infrastructure Minister Kinga Surma, (responsible for both the mega spa in Ontario Place and the closure of the Science Centre, boo!) and PA to the Minister of Red Tape Reduction Christine Hogarth (how is this a real ministry?) holding seats here. Still, Etobicoke-Lakeshore was very close in 2022.

Likely 2-way race between the PC's and (Opposition Party)

  • Etobicoke Centre (Liberal)

  • Etobicoke-Lakeshore (Liberal - Lee Fairclough)

  • Etobicoke North (Liberal)

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Downtown (old City of Toronto)

Downtown Toronto has rarely been competive for the PCs. If you live in these ridings, and would like to donate or volunteer your time to help progressive candidates defeat Doug Ford's PCs, we suggest you look at ridings in North York, Scarborough and Etobicoke. If these are far away from you, see if you can volunteer from home through actions such as phone banking. 

Safe Progressive Seats

  • Beaches-East York

  • Davenport

  • Parkdale-High Park

  • Spadina-Fort York

  • Toronto Centre

  • Toronto Danforth

  • University-Rosedale​

Waiting for information​

  • Toronto-St Paul's: Current NDP incumbent Jill Andrews has not yet declared her candidacy. While historically this has been a safe progressive seat, the recent CPC victory in the Federal by-election raises a few questions. 

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