BC Conservative Leader John Rustad has condemned comments by one of his candidates who could still win a seat in the legislature and would be critical to his chances of forming government.
Marina Sapozhnikov finished a very close second to the NDP candidate in Juan de Fuca-Malahat, triggering a recount.
Sapozhnikov was recorded making racist comments about Indigenous Peoples during an election night interview with Vancouver Island University student Alyona Latsinnik, who shared the recording with Global News.
“They didn’t have any sophisticated laws. They were savages. They fought each other all the time,” Sapozhnikov said at one point in the hour-long interview.
“Not 100 per cent savages, maybe 90 per cent savages,” she added.
At another point in the interview, Sapozhnikov claimed “90 per cent of Indigenous people use drugs.”
The comments came after Latsinnik told Sapozhnikov she was taking Indigenous studies at university.
“It’s been five years since 2019, since we started truth and reconciliation, and it seems like we’re not that far along,” Latsinnik told Global News. “And this hate and this attack on Indigenous identities and the truth is pretty shocking, and it’s pretty scary, and it’s really an attack on the whole field of Indigenous studies.”
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In a statement to Global News, BC Conservative Leader Rustad said, in part, that he was “appalled and deeply saddened by the recent comments.”
Rustad added that Sapozhnikov’s words “are not only inaccurate but profoundly harmful, painting a distorted picture of the communities I have worked alongside for many years.”
Kamloops Centre Conservative MLA-elect Peter Milobar, who married into a First Nations family, took to social media to say he was “outraged and filled with sadness.”
“I want to be crystal clear, the comments made by BC Conservative candidate Marina Sapozhnikov regarding Indigenous people are reprehensible and I do not condone them or share those views in any way shape or form,” Milobar added.
BC NDP Leader David Eby responded to the controversy on social media.
“Is John ‘appalled’ and ‘saddened?’ He picked these candidates. He’s still supporting and cheering for them. This is a new level of gross,” he wrote.
The Union of BC Indian Chiefs also took to social media to condemn the comments.
“It is unacceptable at every level that the contempt and racism by Marina Sapozhnikov cannot be walked back by her party leader @JohnRustad4BC,” the group wrote on social media platform X (formerly Twitter).
“This abhorrent behaviour cannot be rewarded or ignored.”
Sapozhnikov is awaiting the results of a recount that could determine who forms the provincial government.
As of the election night count, no party had the required 47 seats to hold a majority in the legislature. The BC NDP held 46, the BC Conservatives held 45, and the BC Greens held two. However, if Elections BC’s final count and recounts in Sapozhnikov’s riding and the other close race in Surrey City Centre flip those seats to the Conservatives, the BC Conservatives would form a majority government.
Rustad did not comment on what will happen if Sapozhnikov ends up winning the seat.
“It’s shocking, very concerning that she could be an MLA for this area. I live in this riding, and I know that she does not represent what people think,” Latsinnik said.
Latsinnyk added that the candidates’ comments go beyond just the election.
“It just seems like this is just a huge PR thing for the Conservatives, yet there’s not a lot of thought put into just how harmful these comments are and how they portray and show just how deep the colonial narrative has sunk into our society,” she said.
Earlier in the campaign, BC Conservative candidate for Surrey South Brent Chapman was forced to apologize after decade-old racist social media comments surfaced – they included a post calling Palestinians “inbred” and “little inbred walking talking breathing time bombs.”
Sapozhnikov has yet to respond to a request for comment.