NDP leader Wab Kinew charms Manitoba voters with dad jokes and common sense as PCs fall behind

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For months now, Manitoba NDP Leader Wab Kinew has been using the same, hokey, sing-songy line to introduce himself to crowds in the province.

He used it to kick off last week’s televised leaders’ debate, while dressed in the royal blue suit and white pocket square that he reserves for the big days – drawing out the delivery to emphasize the corny pun.

He used it to open a bold, August speech when he accused the governing Progressive Conservatives of racism to try to scare Manitobans from voting for him. (The Anishinaabe former broadcaster donned the elegant blue suit and white pocket square on that day, too.)

And Mr. Kinew invoked it when launching his campaign in downtown Winnipeg in early September. Ensconced in his royal blue armour, he smiled, then slowly drawled: “How do you do? I’m Wab Kinew.”

The hammy act, with major dad-joke energy, has helped position the father of three as the odds-on favourite to take Tuesday’s election in Manitoba.

If Mr. Kinew manages to win – recent polls give the New Democratic Party solid leads over the PCs, a significant uptick in support since June, when the two parties were deadlocked – he will overturn seven years of Tory governance.

The son of a survivor of vicious abuse at St. Mary’s Residential School in Kenora, Ont., Mr. Kinew would make history as Canada’s first provincial premier of First Nations descent.

Invariably, the next words out of Mr. Kinew’s mouth are about “fixing” health care. It’s yet another strikingly mundane tack for a former hip-hop artist with a tattoo spanning one forearm that reads, “Live by the drum,” with “Die by the drum” running the length of the other.

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But to expect Mr. Kinew to upend Manitoba politics would be to misread what the province is and wants, says Kelly Saunders, an associate professor of political science at Brandon University: “We’re common-sense, moderate, middle-of-the-road folks. Our politics reflect that.”

Mr. Kinew, she explains, is channelling the no-nonsense centrism of three-term premier Gary Doer – another natty New Democrat with a fondness for royal blue.

Mr. Kinew coaches kids’ hockey. He took his boys to see Barbie. He loves the Jets, the Bombers, country music, glazed doughnuts. His go-to coffee is a double-double from Tim’s.

The folksy charm also serves to emphasize the contrast with Progressive Conservative Leader Heather Stefanson, says Paul Thomas, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Manitoba.

“Ms. Stefanson comes from a wealthy family,” Prof. Thomas says. “She represents the affluent constituency of Tuxedo, forgot to register a $31-million real estate transaction under the conflict-of-interest law, and is generally seen as out of touch.” Her go-to coffee order is an almond latte from Starbucks.

People who know Ms. Stefanson say the perception of the Premier as robotic and out of touch is unfair: “She’s a warm and kind person when you talk to her,” says Mary Agnes Welch, a partner at polling company Probe Research. “Like her or not, she has given her entire adult life to public service.”

Ms. Stefanson, the first woman to serve as Premier of Manitoba, had the unenviable task of taking the helm of the party in 2021, after the resignation of Brian Pallister. She promised a more conciliatory tone from the Tory government, which sank in opinion polls under the former premier. In the election campaign, health care and the rising cost of living are among the key issues.

The polls and pushback against the party seem to be getting to Ms. Stefanson, says Ms. Saunders, noting that the Premier left a Brandon Leaders’ debate immediately after the event: “It was a Chamber of Commerce event – these are her people. She didn’t seem relaxed or confident or happy. She seems to know the party is in trouble.”

Mr. Kinew’s front-runner status in the race may surprise those outside Manitoba. His early years in politics were spent trying to overcome a checkered past. This included an assault on a taxi driver and an arrest for refusing a breathalyzer test. Domestic-violence charges involving a former partner were ultimately stayed.

All of it occurred when Mr. Kinew was a young man struggling with addictions and anger issues. And it received a full hearing in the province in the past election, says Ms. Welch.

“There have been no new revelations; and he’s been fairly forthright in addressing it,” she adds. “Even centrist women seem to have made peace with it. That surprised me.”

Counterintuitively, says Ms. Welch, the NDP Leader – a former rapper with the criminal history – is a lot more relatable to voters. This holds true even with rural, Tory voters, she adds: “They aren’t going to vote for him. But they can relate to him and this idea that we all did dumb stuff when we were 19.”

Now in his early 40s, Mr. Kinew says he turned his life around years ago. He has a five-year old son with his wife, Anishinaabe physician Lisa Monkman, and two older sons from a previous relationship.

“My political opponents want you to think that I’m running from my past,” Mr. Kinew said in a speech this summer, tackling the issue head-on. “But actually, my past is the reason I am running.”

The speech helped inoculate Mr. Kinew against attacks that he knew were coming from the Tories about run-ins with police, says Prof. Thomas.

Prof. Thomas believes the Conservatives’ inability to make hay out of Mr. Kinew’s history – and the fact that the party is trailing in polls, especially in Winnipeg, where elections are won – helps explain the negative-ad campaign the party launched this week.

In a full-page ad in the Winnipeg Free Press, the PCs drew attention to past criminal charges against Mr. Kinew and a northern NDP candidate who was charged with domestic assault.

Another ad celebrates Ms. Stefanson’s “tough decision” not to search a landfill for the remains of missing Indigenous women believed to be victims of a serial killer. It reads, “Stand firm against the unsafe $184-million landfill dig.”

Letters to the Editor are an imperfect gauge of a city’s mood; but the Letters page of the Winnipeg Free Press has been flooded with angry responses to the campaign.

Prof. Thomas says the campaign marks a new low for Manitoba.

Ms. Saunders believes these are signs of desperation. “They tried to make crime a wedge issue. It didn’t work. They tried to make Mr. Kinew’s background a wedge issue. That didn’t work. Now they’re trying to make the landfill a wedge issue.”

“They are starting to unravel. Nothing is sticking. They’re backed into a corner, scrambling.”

Editor’s note: This article has been updated to clarify that Wab Kinew would become the first provincial premier of First Nations descent. Northwest Territories have had two First Nations leaders in the past.