Conservative Carr gracious in defeat, already looking ahead

Jordy Carr wasn’t especially surprised that incumbent Liberal MP Anthony Rota won the Nipissing-Timiskaming seat in the October 21 Federal election.

The rookie Conservative party candidate was well composed and gracious in accepting Rota’s victory after BayToday’s poll tracker declared that Rota had earned enough votes to be declared the winner just prior to 11 p.m.

“We ran a really great campaign. We had amazing people working for us. We went to thousands of doors and we did what we could,” said Carr.  “I came into the game a little bit late and a few different things happened along the way, but I think we did an excellent job.”

“I wasn’t as well-known as I could have been,” said Carr.  “People know who Anthony is and he’s a nice guy. He’s just not doing his job. People are struggling to make ends meet, they are worried about their finances.”

Carr arrived at her campaign office shortly after 9:30 p.m., when polls closed in the riding.  The office, staffed by supporters and her campaign team, was quiet but optimistic.  As numbers started painting a picture of a Liberal minority government some frustration was evident, though Carr’s supporters remained polite. 

It was widely speculated prior to the election that Mark King’s campaign, the candidate for the People’s Party of Canada, could split the conservative vote, and help the Rota team. That proved false, as the combined total of the King and Carr campaigns would not have been enough to unseat Rota.

In the last federal election, in 2015, Rota captured 25,257 votes, far surpassing the 14,325 votes the Conservative candidate at the time, Jay Aspin earned. 

This year, the race was much closer in Nipissing-Timiskaming with Carr getting just over 27 per cent of the vote.

As of midnight on election night, with 193 polls out of 205 reporting, Rota earned the victory on 16,304 votes to Carr’s 11,309, a difference of just under 5,000 votes.  King’s campaign brought in 2,193.  Combining the Carr and King votes brings their total to 13,502, just 2,802 votes under Rota’s total.

Carr was emphatic when asked if she would run again.

“I am certainly interested in running again,” she stated. “I think this is the beginning of a long race. I’m happy with the results tonight.  It would be great to be number one, but I think we ran a great race and I’m ready for another one.”