Klein claims he was offered PC party position to exit 2022 mayoral race to help Gillingham win By: Carol Sanders Posted: 7:01 PM CDT Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026 Last Modified: 12:32 PM CDT Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2026 Updates

Mayoral candidate Kevin Klein said he was offered a position with the provincial Tories if he pulled out of the 2022 mayoral race that saw then-city councillor Scott Gillingham defeat former mayor Glen Murray.

Klein made the revelation on Monday as he and Mike Vogiatzakis swapped accusations of offering an inducement to leave the current mayoral race. Both candidates allege that they were offered a position at city hall by the other — if victorious in the Oct. 28 election — in exchange for withdrawing.

“When I ran for mayor last time, a person with the (Progressive) Conservative Party of Manitoba came to my office and sat me down and said, ‘Look, we would like you to pull out of the race. There’s two weeks left. We would like you to pull out of the race, we’ll get you something in the party, but we need to open the door so that Glen Murray doesn’t win and Scott (Gillingham) does,” Klein told the Free Press.

“… (they said) ‘Kevin, you’re only splitting the vote, so let’s find a place for you with the (Progressive) Conservative party.”

“They didn’t really offer a lot. How it was described to me, and we’re talking four years ago now, so it’s memory, was that (they said) ‘Kevin, you’re only splitting the vote, so let’s find a place for you with the (Progressive) Conservative party. Back out and throw your support behind Scott. That would be the best thing for you to do’… I disagreed.”

On Tuesday, Klein — who wouldn’t identify the person who made the offer — said he explained why.

“I had volunteers that have worked hard, people have donated money and I feel uncomfortable doing anything like that. And they kind of left it at that.”

“To me, the rules are really clear, and people are very smart. If they didn’t offer anything specific, there’s really not a violation — it’s just a conversation. But I kept it very quick because I didn’t want to have the conversation. I just said, ‘Look, thanks for coming in, but you and I are not going to have this conversation,’” Klein said.

Klein placed third in that mayoral race then successfully ran for the PCs in the Dec. 13, 2022 Kirkfield Park byelection, winning a seat in the Manitoba legislature. He defeated his nearest rival, NDP candidate Logan Oxenham, by 161 votes. In the Oct. 3, 2023 general election, Oxenham won the seat for the NDP by more than 600 votes.

Klein said Tuesday that he brought up the alleged attempt at election interference because it’s still happening. He said the accusations made against his campaign now are “outright malicious statements that have zero merit and credibility.”

”I believe that we can change that kind of stuff,” he said, adding that’s why his campaign promised to establish a municipal ombudsman to receive reports from whistleblowers and the public, then publish findings.

“I believe democracy and people should be the ones making these decisions, and nobody should have the ability or even the audacity to put their thumb on the scale.”

Gillingham’s campaign denied ever offering Klein anything to withdraw from the 2022 race.

“We made no such offer. Mr. Klein appears to be trying to drag our campaign into his dispute with Mr. Vogiatzakis and we have no interest in participating,” campaign spokesman Colin Fast said Tuesday.

Progressive Conservative party president Peter Smith — who wasn’t in that role in 2022 — said no one acting on the party’s behalf would have attempted to bribe Klein to withdraw.

“The risk is so high and the reward is so low, no sensible person would do that.”

“I know that we wouldn’t do anything like that,” said Smith, who spoke to Klein Tuesday about the allegation.

“The risk is so high and the reward is so low, no sensible person would do that. Imagine what that would do to the PC party, or the NDP or any party, if we’re found to be attempting to manipulate people for our own advantage? It’s against the law. That would just be a disaster.”

Smith, a chartered professional accountant and corporate financial controller, said involving himself in a situation such as that would end his career.

“There’s no benefit for doing that at all. It’s reputationally destroying… If I were involved in that, I could lose my day job. I could lose employment,” he said.

“Some people, they act like big wheels, and they’re trying to make a deal like they’re (U.S. political consultant) Karl Rove or something like that. They’re just big talkers and they don’t know what they’re talking about. But when you know somebody who knows what they’re doing — and Kevin knows what he’s doing — it’s a hard ‘no.’”

University of Manitoba political studies professor emeritus Paul Thomas said any attempt to induce or pressure a candidate to enter or withdraw from an election contest is a serious offence under election laws because it violates the fundamental principle of free and fair elections. He said Klein’s allegation also suggests that political parties may play more of a role in civic elections behind the scenes.

“If true, the allegation of an offer of some position in the PC party is another debunking of the myth that civic elections are non-partisan,” Thomas said. “Candidates do not run under party labels but the provincial parties often play a role in selecting and supporting candidates.”

In 2000, all of Manitoba’s registered political parties agreed to develop a common code of ethical conduct with the goal of fostering confidence in the integrity and fairness of the electoral process.

It states that members of one political party shall not offer or give anything of value — including but not limited to financial, organizational or administrative assistance — to another party or candidate for a corrupt purpose.

Members shall not, directly or indirectly through another person, offer or give anything of value to a voter for the purpose of corruptly procuring the voter’s support, says the code that’s posted on Elections Manitoba’s website.

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“The Code will be self-regulated with good common sense and in good faith,” it states.

Thomas said the code of conduct — which is unique to Manitoba — applies only to provincial parties, and is not enforced by Elections Manitoba.

“The only way that the parties would agree to adoption of the code was that they would be responsible for enforcement,” he said.

— With files from Malak Abas

carol.sanders@winnipegfreepress.com

Carol Sanders
Legislature reporter

Carol Sanders is a reporter at the Free Press legislature bureau. The former general assignment reporter and copy editor joined the paper in 1997. Read more about Carol.

Every piece of reporting Carol produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.