Craig B. Chandler is a Canadian businessman, lobbyist, and political activist. He is co-founder and CEO of the Progressive Group for Independent Business (PGIB). He was a candidate at the federal

2003 Progressive Conservative leadership convention The 2003 Progressive Conservative leadership election was held on May 31, 2003, to elect a leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. Peter MacKay was elected as leader to replace former Prime Minister Joe Clark, who then retired as ...

, a candidate for Member of Parliament in Ontario, candidate for Member of the Legislative Assembly in Alberta, and candidate for Ward 12 City Councillor in Calgary, Alberta.

Political career

Early political experience

As an undergraduate at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario in the late 1980s, Chandler joined the Reform Party of Canada, where he was active as an organizer and fund-raiser. In the 1993 federal election, Chandler ran as a Reform Party candidate in the riding of Hamilton Mountain, at the age of 23 finishing in a distant second place with 10,297 votes, behind Liberal incumbent

Beth Phinney Elizabeth "Beth" Phinney (born June 19, 1938) is a Canadian former politician. She was a member of the House of Commons of Canada from 1988 until her retirement in 2005, representing the riding of Hamilton Mountain in Ontario for the Liberal P ...

, who received 27,218. Chandler moved to Alberta in 1995. He ran in the 1997 provincial election as a candidate for the Social Credit Party of Alberta in the riding of Calgary West, finishing with 1,100 votes, or 7.5% of the electorate. In 2000, Chandler's Progressive Group for Independent Business (PGIB) supported the creation of the Canadian Alliance. In 2002, ChandlerElliott, Louise. "Christian group backing Harper is for-profit business run by lobbyist." Canadian Press Newswire. March 3, 2002 and the PGIB backed

Stephen Harper Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada from 2006 to 2015. Harper is the first and only prime minister to come from the modern-day Conservative Party of Canada, ...

's successful bid for the leadership of the Alliance.

Federal politics

In 2003, Chandler joined the Progressive Conservative Party and became a candidate for the party's leadership, running on a platform of creating a coalition between the PC and Alliance party caucuses. He withdrew prior to voting and endorsed Calgary lawyer Jim Prentice, who also supported cooperation between the parties. At the end of his speech Chandler was complimentary of the leadership qualities of his competitors David Orchard and

Scott Brison Scott A. Brison (born May 10, 1967) is a Canadian former politician from Nova Scotia. Brison served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the riding of Kings-Hants from the 1997 federal election until July 2000, then from November 2000 to F ...

, before endorsing and pledging support to

Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, makin ...

lawyer Jim Prentice's leadership bid to the astonishment of many delegates in attendance. Chandler admitted in ''

The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of approximately 2 million in 2015, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on weekdays and Saturdays, although it ...

'' and the ''

National Post The ''National Post'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet newspaper available in several cities in central and western Canada. The paper is the flagship publication of Postmedia Network and is published Mondays through Saturdays, with M ...

'' (May 29, 2003) that he had never tried to seriously contest the leadership of the PC Party, but had instead served as a voice for the Progressive Group for Independent Business (PGIB) and their United Alternative efforts. PGIB donated $250,000 to Chandler's bid.

Alberta provincial politics

In the fall of 2007, Chandler sought the Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta (PCAA) nomination of

Calgary-Egmont Calgary-Egmont was a provinces and territories of Canada, provincial electoral district (Canada), electoral district in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, mandated to return a single Member of the Legislative Assembly, member to the Legislative Assembly o ...

for the up-coming Alberta provincial election. Soon after winning the contest with a massive majority, Premier Stelmach and the PCAA Executive reviewed Chandler's candidacy. The concern was Chandler's association with a Christian organization with traditional views on marriage at the time this debate was occurring. Premier Ed Stelmach rejected Chandler as a candidate for the PC Party of Alberta. In the

2008 Alberta election The 2008 Alberta general election was held on March 3, 2008, to elect members of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta. It was expected to be called early because the governing Progressive Conservatives held a leadership election on December 2, ...

held on March 3, Chandler ran as an independent candidate in the

riding against Jonathan Denis, his replacement as the Tory candidate, and Liberal Cathie Williams. Chandler was widely expected to run as a candidate for the new

Wildrose Alliance Party of Alberta The Wildrose Party (legally Wildrose Political Association, formerly the ''Wildrose Alliance Political Association'') was a conservative provincial political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compe ...

but was defeated in his attempt to win election to the new party's board of directors.McCoy, Heath
"New party to field full slate"
, ''Calgary Herald'', February 6, 2008 In the provincial election Chandler finished in third place with 2008 votes (16.2%), well behind Cathie Williams, the Liberal Party candidate, with 3289 votes (26.5%). The Progressive Conservative candidate (Jonathan Denis) won with 43.6% of the vote (5415 votes)." Craig Chandler 2003

Campaign management

Chandler claims to have managed 48 campaigns, presumably nominations, leadership races, municipal, provincial and federal elections. In November 2004 during the 2004 Alberta election, Craig Chandler managed the campaign of David Crutcher, an Alberta Alliance Party candidate in

. Crutcher was not elected, winning 1,657 votes, or 14% of the total. Notably, David Crutcher received more votes than any other Alliance candidate in an urban riding. In 2005, David Crutcher ran for the leadership of the

Alberta Alliance The Alberta Alliance was a right wing provincial political party in Alberta, Canada. Many of its members were supporters of the defunct Canadian Alliance federal political party and its predecessor, the Reform Party of Canada. Members also joined f ...

and Chandler managed his leadership campaign. Crutcher placed third out of four candidates. Chandler also managed the successful campaign of MLA Art Johnston. He was also the campaign manager for Calgary Ward 14 winning alderman Peter Demong, and briefly served as his constituency assistant. Chandler also managed the third-place race of Jon Lord for the Conservative Party nomination in Calgary Centre and produced victories for Councilor Shane Keating, Peter Demong and Joe Magliocca in the 2013 Calgary civic election. In 2020, Chandler worked on Dr. Leslyn Lewis' campaign for leader of the Conservative Party of Canada in which she was defeated. According to Chandler's website he claimed to be the Western Chair for her campaign. However, Steve Outhouse, the National Campaign Manager of Lewis's campaign refuted Chandler's claim that Chandler was Western Chair. According to the Western Standard Outhouse stated "he

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only ran the call centre for Alberta and Saskatchewan and set up a couple meet and greets for her. And that was it." In 2021, Chandler spearheaded the Take Back City Hall initiative to elect more small-c conservatives at the municipal level in Calgary, Alberta. The initiative recruited candidates and managed their campaigns in a few wards in Calgary with the Progressive Group for Independent Business (PGIB) as a vehicle. Almost all of the races ended in a loss for the Chandler backed candidates with Chandler, who ran himself in Ward 12, soundly defeated. Only a single candidate Dan McLean in Ward 13 achieved victory. In 2022 Chandler again was employed by Dr. Leslyn Lewis to work on her second leadership campaign to be the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada. However, in this second effort the results were lower than the first attempt where she garnered less than 10% of the vote losing to Pierre Poilievre on the first ballot.

In the media

Told Albertans to Vote Conservative or Leave In 2007 Chandler was on record stating that new Albertans had to vote for conservative parties, or they had to leave Alberta. There was pushback from the PCAA that Chandler was dictating how people were to vote in an election and that only those votes that agreed with Chandler's views were acceptable. Ann Coulter Speaking Tour In 2010 Ezra Levant, CEO of Rebel News, organized a cross country speaking tour at various universities by American right wing pundit Ann Coulter. Chandler attempted to pose as one of the organizers and as a result was banned from the events. According to Levant "Chandler was not allowed to attend the reception because he misrepresented himself as an organizer in media interviews during the incident in Ottawa." Coulter herself spoke on the matter about Chandler's misrepresentation saying “I was watching the local news, which was all hockey and Ann Coulter, and some nut came on claiming that he was the organizer behind my speech. urmurs in backgroundOK, his name is Craig Chandler. I sent an e-mail to my bodyguard saying Craig Chandler is disinvited from the event in Calgary. He’s on TV claiming to be the organizer and denouncing me!” Racist Videos In 2022, Chandler was featured in an online video deemed racist along with former Alberta Cabinet Minister Jonathan Denis. The video clips showed him using offensive stereotypes of first nations. In an interview Chandler stated he was pictured in one of the videos and that "Some comedy is not politically correct, but this is a private function of my close friends. The video was taken by a close friend, I thought," he said. Chandler was working on Daniel Smith's leadership campaign when the videos came out and she fired Chandler over it. Later Chandler changed his story claiming the videos were fake. However, Hany Farid, an acknowledged expert in the area of deep fakes states "But the knowledge of how these things are made, how difficult it would be to make them, I think it's extremely unlikely that these are deepfakes."

Social Media

Chandler has a long history of controversial social media posts. Threatening to sue Steve Outhouse On March 22 Chandler posted to his two Facebook pages, LinkedIn account and Twitter account his dissatisfaction with UCP Campaign Chair Steve Outhouse. He later took down three of the posts but left his Twitter post in place. Chandler professed dissatisfaction with Outhouse being named campaign chair while being from Ontario among other complaints.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chandler, Craig Living people Canadian Pentecostals Progressive Conservative Party of Canada leadership candidates Politicians from Hamilton, Ontario Alberta Social Credit Party candidates in Alberta provincial elections Independent candidates in Alberta provincial elections Ontario candidates for Member of Parliament Reform Party of Canada candidates in the 1993 Canadian federal election Year of birth missing (living people)