The Liberal Party of Canada has been without a national campaign director for over a month, but that changed on Sunday when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appointed veteran Liberal Andrew Bevan to the post. Bevan will serve during the next federal election.
The post became empty last month when longtime Trudeau advisor Jeremy Broadhurst resigned, delivering a blow to the party.
Last year, Bevan was appointed chief of staff to Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland and senior advisor to the prime minister. He was involved in developing and rolling out the most recent federal budget, the Liberal Party said in a press release.
Bevan came to the role from provincial politics, having previously served as chief of staff and principal secretary to former Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne.
He also has experience working on electoral campaigns, having volunteered for the late former Liberal MP John Godfrey in 1993 and as director of communications for Stephane Dion’s bid for Liberal leader in 2006. He also served as Dion’s chief of staff and principal secretary in opposition from 2007 to 2008.
Trudeau also appointed Marjorie Michel to the post of deputy campaign director. Michel’s background is in Quebec politics, where she held key positions in the Liberal Party’s 2019 and 2021 campaigns.
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“Andrew Bevan has been a leader in moving forward progressive priorities for more than 30 year,” Trudeau said in a statement.
Bevan said his work would focus on connecting Canadians with the Liberal Party and highlighting the government’s work.
“Building on the Liberal Party’s work to connect with more Canadians than ever before, we will build a winning campaign that re-elects Justin Trudeau and even more Liberal MPs, so we can keep Canada moving forward,” he said in a statement.
Bevan and Michel’s appointments come at a rocky time for the Liberal Party. Global News learned Saturday that some members of the Liberal caucus were mounting efforts to force Trudeau to resign. Trudeau has maintained his hold on the Liberal party even as his government’s slide in the polls became a free fall and the Liberals lost two strongholds in Toronto and Montreal byelections.
The noise grew loudest in late June after the loss of the Toronto-St. Paul’s seat to the Conservatives, but an attempt to push him out then did not garner support from more than one or two MPs.
Questions surrounding Trudeau’s leadership quietened somewhat over the summer, but came roaring back in September after the NDP pulled out of the supply and confidence deal, national campaign director Jeremy Broadhurst quit and the party lost a second critical byelection in Montreal’s LaSalle—Émard—Verdun riding to the Bloc Québécois.
In a statement on his decision to resign, Broadhurst cited the toll two decades and five national campaigns have taken on himself and his family.
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He said the upcoming federal election could be the most critical federal campaign of his life, and the party deserves a campaign director who can bring more energy and devotion to the job.
Broadhurst has been a Liberal staffer in some form for the better part of 25 years, serving multiple times as chief of staff or adviser to several leaders and cabinet ministers.
Broadhurst was national director of the Liberal Party of Canada from 2013 to 2015 and helped retool the Liberal data machine into an operation that helped them win the 2015 election.
He worked in the Prime Minister’s Office after the 2015 win and, in 2019, was elevated to campaign director.
–with files from Canadian Press