B.C. conservatives are fighting a civil war, and the casualties are mounting.
In recent weeks, multiple BC Conservative Party staffers have been fired, including former caucus researcher Siavash Tahan and communications officer Lindsay Shepherd. Tahan and Shepherd both say it is because their views are too conservative for a party that is being pulled to the centre.
“What I did was express a conservative viewpoint as someone who’s part of a conservative party,” Shepherd told Canadian Affairs in an Oct. 5 interview.
Days before the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation on Sept. 30, Shepherd had tweeted that, “The Orange Shirt and the Orange Flag perpetuate untruths about Canadian history, such as the grandest lie of all that 215 children’s graves were unearthed in Kamloops. It is a disgrace that this fake flag flies in front of the provincial parliament buildings.”
Shepherd, a prominent free speech advocate, was terminated days later.
“If people who are part of the Conservative Party cannot be interested in the truth of Canadian history and accuracy, then where do we belong?” Shepherd said in her interview.
One answer to that question may be OneBC, a new conservative party that formed in June.
But some former staffers, including Shepherd, say they have not lost hope in the BC Conservative Party, which went from fringe status to the Official Opposition in just 18 months. Rather, they want the party’s leader, John Rustad, out.
“I hope OneBC will fold into the BC Conservatives over the next year, especially if we have a strong, competent and confidently conservative leader … I do not think John Rustad is that at this stage,” said Tahan.
University of British Columbia political scientist Stewart Prest says the schism reflects a larger problem facing conservative movements across the country.
“There are two different ways of being conservative … that more populist style of conservatism, and a more middle-of-the-road approach that tends to emphasize things like … fiscal conservatism, but also to embrace … inclusivity in their politics.”
Ideological divides
Adam Beattie, who worked as a caucus communications officer and field organizer for the BC Conservatives before stepping away from the party in December 2024, says Rustad has lost focus on some of the key issues that facilitated his rapid political ascent.
“At every single fundraiser, [Rustad] said he would get rid of UNDRIP,” said Beattie, referring to B.C.’s 2019 decision to align B.C. law with the United Nations’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
But Rustad has since ceased to prioritize this issue, says Beattie, who is today a prominent commentator on social media under the name Robin Skies.
“He ran on a policy of getting rid of SOGI,” Beattie added, referring to SOGI 123, the province’s existing gender identity education framework. “And it didn’t take too long for him to change his tune on that.
“Those are two pretty clear examples, I would say, in regards to a change in policy around cultural issues that are starkly different from what he ran on and what he gained momentum on in the first place.”
Tahan, who was dismissed by senior caucus staff on Sept. 12, says he suspects his dismissal was ideologically motivated.
While working for caucus, Tahan says he was told to delete a tweet criticizing the provincial government’s stance on a controversial court ruling recognizing Indigenous property rights even where private title already exists. Tahan says he complied with the request.
“I still don’t really know what I was fired for,” he said.
Rustad’s office did not respond to multiple requests from Canadian Affairs about Tahan or Shepherd’s dismissals or the party’s social media policy.
‘Professionalize the party’
Last October, the BC Conservatives were on the cusp of forming government. The BC NDP ultimately won 47 seats to the BC Conservatives’ 44, but the popular vote was almost evenly split between the parties — 45 per cent to 43 per cent, respectively.
The BC Conservatives’ success owed much to the collapse of BC United, the province’s previous leading centre-right party. The BC Conservatives leveraged the consolidated right-of-centre vote to pick up dozens of seats outside Metro Vancouver.
In the next election, if the party were to pick up a handful of suburban ridings, it could have a plausible path to power.
Tahan believes his and others’ dismissals reflect the party’s shift in priorities at the top. And they say caucus is being reshaped by an inner circle of Rustad-loyal politicos whose backgrounds and instincts are far removed from the party’s base.
“[Caucus leadership] thinks that we … have to professionalize the party,” he said. “And in their mind, that means getting rid of the young people, getting rid of the more stridently conservative people, getting rid of the populist element.
“They think that’s the … recipe for victory because they think it’s a 2007 election … where there’s this large pool of middle-class moderates who are really just concerned about fiscal issues …
“We’re much more of a populist movement. We have much more young people on our side, much more economically precarious people on our side.”
Polling this summer showed the BC Conservatives leading among 18-to-34-year-olds, with 49 per cent saying they would vote for the party, versus 29 per cent for the BC NDP.
‘Out of touch’
Shepherd similarly says she is disappointed in the course being charted by caucus leadership. She says her social media post about Truth and Reconciliation Day — though criticized by NDP MLAs — did not draw a backlash from fellow conservatives.
“I did not receive any negative comments … from right-wing people,” she said.
Former party staffers say the lack of alignment between the base and caucus leadership is most evident in Rustad’s immediate orbit. Two of his top advisers — Chief of Staff Brad Zubyk and Communications Director Ryan Painter — have previously worked for the NDP.
“With Rustad listening … to just seemingly Brad, and maybe Ryan, and maybe a few of the more left-wing MLAs … I think [the leadership] is completely out of touch,” said Tahan.
Canadian Affairs sought comment from Zubyk and Painter through Rustad’s office, but did not receive a response.
Shepherd does not know who made the call on her termination. “It could be other people telling John … It could be John himself feeling really passionately that I need to be fired.
“But the end result is the same. And what it tells us is that … they made a choice that showed they’re not interested in standing up for conservative values, at least on that issue.”
Prest, of the University of British Columbia, says Rustad faces a challenge that many conservative leaders face outside of B.C.
“This is a challenge for every conservative party in the country … Those [populist and fiscal conservative] groups will, on some pretty fundamental questions, end up on opposite sides of the political divide.
“And anytime you’re trying to win over voters in that more middle-of-the-road version of conservatism, you risk alienating members of that more populist faction of conservatism, and vice versa.”
Fracture and future
In addition to staffers, Rustad has also removed MLAs from the party.
A day after winning his Sept. 22 leadership review with 71 per cent support, Rustad ejected Surrey-Cloverdale MLA Elenore Sturko from the party.
Sturko did not respond to Canadian Affairs’ request for comment. But in a CBC article published after her removal, Sturko said she was prevented from voicing her more “socially liberal beliefs” in the Conservative caucus.
Rustad’s moves now have some seemingly pushing for his removal.
On Oct. 6, during a caucus meeting in Victoria, several reporters indicated on X that Rustad’s allies were working to keep a secret-ballot leadership vote off the agenda.
For Beattie, the former caucus communications officer, a change of leadership is necessary.
“What I want to see more than anything else is a good-faith leader who is capable of bringing the two major sides of the party together, the free market enterprise coalition and the grassroots populists,” he said. “And I think that it can happen.
“And that is what John sold himself to be. But ultimately, it’s not who he ended up being. And it is part of the reason why I think that he should no longer be leading.”
Not mentioned in this article is the Elephant south of the border. The situation in the U.S. is becoming more and more unstable, and since we can depend on Donald Trump to be his mercurial and unpredictable self, it could well doom Conservative prospects both in BC and in Canada federally. I would guess that about half of BC Conservatives are big fans of Trump but most of that group is holding their cards close to their chest so nobody else sees them. The train wreck occurring south of the border is getting worse every day. It spells bad news for Canadian Conservatives.