The Ontario PC party rejected a candidate for the Progressive Conservative nomination in the riding of Carleton Friday, after he referred to his rival for the nomination as “Muslim trash.”
The party doesn’t disclose the reasons for disqualifying candidates for privacy reasons, said Nick Bergamini, a spokesperson for the PCs. But he confirmed the party did know about the comments.
“The Ontario PC Party is committed to the principles of inclusiveness and tolerance,” he said.
In September, farmer and mechanical engineer Michael Nowak sent a Facebook message to fellow nomination candidate Brandon Purcell, saying he might withdraw from the race so that Purcell could “throw that Muslim trash to the curbside” – a comment that referred to fellow candidate and lawyer Goldie Ghamari.
Party officials received a screen-capture image of Nowak’s comment. On a conference call Thursday, one of Brown’s campaign chairs, Walied Soliman — who is Muslim — asked Nowak about the text. On Friday morning Nowak received an email from Bob Stanley, the party’s executive director, telling him the party had rejected his application.
“Dirty politics,” Nowak said in an interview with iPolitics. “I love it.”
Nowak said he is disappointed because he believes he was going to win the nomination.
“Patrick Brown and his cronies want to keep her around and they’ll go to any lengths to keep her,” he said in a telephone interview on Friday. “I had a special interest group backing me, and they were going to ensure they had their membership show up to ensure that I won the nomination, but it all fell apart this morning.”
Nowak said he is not racist but was upset with Ghamari because she asked him to withdraw and support her.
“And you know what, I said? ‘If I had a mallet I’d thump you on the head right now.’ I said, ‘I’m staying in the race.’ So I think I have a right to say any derogatory comments I want.”
Nowak did not deny sending the message in question.
“If it’s in there, it’s in there,” he said. “I guess that went against my chances.”
Nowak made similar comments in person numerous times “in one terribly insulting way or another,” said Purcell, who was raised in rural Ohio and moved to Ottawa to attend Carleton University. He graduated this year with a degree in political science.
“It’s absolutely dreadful that he would make those comments,” he said.
“If he were to get up on a stage at an official party event and say anything like that, it would have been absolutely disastrous.”
Purcell said the party also had access to Nowak’s comments in the Facebook message through Purcell’s social media history, which is provided as part of a vetting process.
“They have everything you’ve ever done on social media, everything you’ve ever said, every single private conversation, they have access to that,” he said.
The party also rejected as a candidate Jay Tysick, a former senior aide to Ottawa City Coun. Rick Chiarelli and now a managing partner of Faraday Partners.
Tysick said Friday he wasn’t given a reason for the party’s rejection of his nomination bid, despite asking for one.
Earlier this month, Tysick was quoted in an Ottawa Citizen piece commenting on two of his competitors.
“Neither of them were actually born in the country,” he told the Citizen.
“I look at what’s left there and I don’t feel it’s that strong and I don’t feel it’s fair to the constituents ... I just want to see really good representation there, someone who’s going to fight for the people of the riding.”
In an interview today, Tysick said his intention was to make the point that he has roots in the riding and his opponents don’t.
“It’s hilarious, to simply state a fact is not, to me, a reason to disqualify someone,” he said.
“It’s not like I commented on either of my opponents’ races and they’re both different races.”
The nomination is now down to Purcell and Ghamari, who could not immediately be reached for comment.
The nomination vote will take place November 5 at 10 am at the Alfred Taylor Community Centre in North Gower.