LILLEY: Brad Bradford pulls ahead of Olivia Chow for first time

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For the first time, Brad Bradford is running ahead of Olivia Chow in the race to become the next mayor of Toronto. A new poll, published by Build Canada, shows Bradford with 48.4% voter support among decided and leaning voters, compared to 43.7% for Chow, while 7.9 per cent say they would vote for another candidate.

Bradford is leading by a significant margin in North York, Scarborough and Etobicoke, according to this poll, while Chow leads in downtown Toronto and East York.

Wrong-way Toronto

The real problem for Chow is that 56.5% say Toronto is heading in the wrong direction, and 61.2% say it’s a worse place to live than four years ago. The shock for me is that the number of people saying this is a worse place to live isn’t actually higher, at least based on my experience.

Toronto is a great city with amazing potential.

We saw Toronto’s potential decline during the pandemic, which really began under John Tory and before Chow was elected mayor. Yet, under her tenure, things have not improved and in fact have gotten worse.

One of the really worrying signs for Chow’s camp is that while 55.5% of Chow voters believe the city is headed in the right direction, just 23.1% of the electorate feels that way. Bradford appears to be tapping into a feeling that the city just isn’t working as it should.

Among Bradford supporters, 86.7% felt the city was headed in the wrong direction.

Owner vs. renters

Among those with children under the age of 18, the Build Canada poll puts Bradford at 60% support. Bradford also leads among those who own their home outright or are paying off a mortgage, versus those who are renting or living rent-free thanks to family or friends.

With renters, it’s a different story completely. Renters back Chow 53.2% versus just 38.9% for Bradford. Among those who live rent-free in a home owned by a family member or friend, Chow leads 57.4% to 34.1%.

Basically, Chow is popular with voters who don’t pay taxes directly, or at least don’t think they do. Bradford is popular with those who own their own homes, who pay taxes directly and who are raising a family in this city.

You see it in the breakdowns around the various parts of the city.

Bradford leads Chow, according to this poll, by 50.3% to 43.7% in North York, 52.5% to 36.7% in Scarborough and 52.9% to 35.5% in Etobicoke. The only area of the city that Chow leads in this poll is Toronto and East York, where she bests Bradford by 51.7% support to 42.6% support.

The Build Canada poll shows Bradford leading with men by 12 points and women by one point. He is also ahead among all voters 45 and over, while Chow leads among those under 45 years.

The voters who show up

As any political operative will tell you, older voters, those who own their own homes or have a mortgage, and those with kids in the home are among the most reliable voters. At this point, according to the Build Canada poll, Bradford owns every single demographic in the most reliable voting category.

Maybe that’s why we’ve seen the Chow campaign lash out in ways that don’t make sense over the last week — their own internal numbers are showing a similar story. One campaign clearly has momentum, and it is not Olivia Chow’s campaign.

Against all odds, Brad Bradford is pulling ahead of Olivia Chow and taking the lead to become Toronto’s next mayor.

Let’s hope voters who desire real change show up on Oct. 26 and give us the change we need and deserve.

ABOUT THE POLL

Build Canada commissioned, funded and conducted this survey of 991 Toronto adults from Oct. 11 to 16, 2026, reaching them by text message through random cellphone dialing and weighting the results to 2021 Census data. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

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