BC United candidate resigns after 2 more MLAs defect

One day after a high-ranking BC United MLA defected to the BC Conservatives, the official opposition lost another candidate in the upcoming provincial election.

Brandon Fonseca, who was set to run for BCU in the riding of Coquitlam-Maillardville, announced on social media Tuesday that he was resigning as a candidate for the party “effective immediately.”

In a series of posts, Fonseca said he had “joined BC United because I wanted to be part of the solution to David Eby’s BC.”

“However, it is clear from Kevin Falcon’s botched merger attempt that he does not have BC’s grass roots movement at heart. British Columbians have made it evident over the last couple of months that they want a common sense conservative government lead (sic) by John Rustad,” Fonseca wrote just after 9 a.m. on X.

“I therefore can no longer in good conscience stand as a candidate for Kevin Falcon’s BC United and allow David Eby to be re-elected due to a fractured free enterprise vote. I call on other BC United candidates to do the right thing and unite behind John Rustad’s movement.”

BC United had introduced Fonseca as its candidate in the Coquitlam-area riding in May.

On Monday, Surrey South MLA Elenore Sturko confirmed she was joining the BC Conservatives, with plans to run in the Surrey-Cloverdale riding for the party in the October election.

The former RCMP officer explained she was defecting to “rebuild the coalition that’s needed to defeat the NDP.”

The floor-crossing came after talks between the two right-of-centre parties broke down amid failure to settle on a deal to avoid vote splitting in the upcoming election.

The proposed agreement would have seen the two parties agree not to run candidates against each other, not to attack each other, and not merge with each other.

Sturko’s decision to defect followed a similar decision by United Caucus Chair Lorne Doerkson, who represents Cariboo-Chilcotin, on Friday.