Court rules in favour of Karahalios, will not strike out his case vs CPC

Earlier today, an Ontario judge released a ruling which denied the Conservative Party’s request to have former leadership candidate Jim Karahalios’ lawsuit struck outside of court. 

Should the request have been granted, Karahalios’ case would have been over before it even began. 

The judge also ruled that the individuals from the Conservative Party’s Dispute Resolution Appeals Committee, namely Sam Magnus, Valerie Assouline, David Connelly, and Don Plett, as well as Derek Vanstone, the Chief Returning Officer of the CPC, all be removed as defendants, since Karahalios’ suit deals directly with the CPC. 

Karahalios celebrated the decision in an email to his supporters as well as on Twitter, calling it “good news.” 

At the time of publishing, the CPC had not yet released a public statement on the matter. 

How did all this start?

The original cause of all this legal brouhaha stems from an email the Karahalios campaign released on March 7th, accusing the campaign chair of Erin O’Toole’s campaign, Walied Soliman, of ballot stuffing and nomination rigging during his time as campaign chair of the Ontario PC Party as well as publicly promoting “Shariah-based finance.” 

The O’Toole campaign responded, calling the attack “bigoted and Islamophobic” and lodged a complaint with the CPC, calling for Karahalios’ disqualification. The Karahalios campaign denied the charges, saying their criticism was “not racist, bigoted or libelous and did not racially harass anyone.” 

The Chief Returning Officer of the CPC, Derek Vandstone, ruled that Karahalios’ actions did not warrant disqualification but instead levied a $50,000 penalty on the campaign, in addition to a $150,000 deposit to ensure future compliance. 

Vandstone found that Karahalios’ actions broadly violated the party’s code of conduct, thus giving him the authority to levy a fine but not disqualify him completely. 

Karahalios is contesting that this was merely a political decision and a backdoor workaround to get him disqualified, given that he had reached the fundraising and signature requirements. 

The hearing to determine the outcome of the case is set for May 15th, via video conference due to the COVID-19 pandemic.