Inside the BC Conservative Crisis

Ousted B.C. Conservative MLA Elenore Sturko is calling for more investigation into allegations that fraudulent party memberships were “manufactured” in advance of a vote to review John Rustad’s leadership.

Sturko, who represents Surrey-Cloverdale, was cut from the party’s caucus on Monday evening after Rustad won 71 per cent support in the review.

She said she was called into a meeting where Rustad accused her of organizing other MLAs to oppose his leadership.

Sturko said that’s not the case.

Instead, Sturko believes she was ousted because she continued to question Rustad’s leadership in light of the party’s own investigation into the alleged fraudulent membership activity.

“I was extremely concerned by what I saw,” Sturko said, adding she was also deeply disturbed by a Global News report that alleged some of the membership names were from deceased people. The Tyee has not been able to independently confirm that allegation.

Sturko said a more thorough investigation is needed, including where the names associated with the allegedly manufactured signups were obtained.

“I’m suspicious and would like to have clarity on where the actual information on those individuals came from,” Sturko said.

The Conservative Party of BC did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

What are the allegations?

The Tyee has obtained the party’s internal report on the problems, which has been leaked to multiple media outlets. Two B.C. Conservative MLAs have confirmed the document is the same one shared with caucus members this month.

Sturko said the caucus got a version of the report on Sept. 16 and “discussed the issue, but not the report.”

Completed by former Conservative board member Sacha Peter, the report says that 2,238 party memberships were “manufactured” in July and August during the vote that would determine whether Rustad continued as party leader.

The report says the majority of the alleged manufactured signups were created on the same day, Aug. 29.

The report says 96 per cent of the 2,238 memberships were purchased using the same credit card and states that represents a “violation” of the part of the Elections Act that governs political contributions.

Elections BC does not play a role in setting party membership rules or leadership races or reviews. But membership fees for a party are political contributions and subject to the Election Act, Elections BC told The Tyee via email.

“The Conservative Party has been in contact with our office about political contribution rules in relation to party membership fees, and we have provided guidance to the party on the relevant rules under the Election Act,” Melanie Hull, a communications staffer with Elections BC, told The Tyee.

“We have not received a complaint or a report. At this time, we are independently reviewing the circumstances related to this issue, however an investigation has not been initiated.”

The report also includes eight names associated with the credit cards that were allegedly used to purchase the memberships, but warns that because only the last four digits of the cards were retained by the party’s credit card processor, there is a “1:10,000” chance that another credit card was used.

The names the report says are associated with credit cards used to purchase the memberships include people who have been closely associated with the party and, in some cases, with Rustad. The Tyee reached out to all the people listed in the report for comment, but is not naming them because we have not been able to independently verify the allegations.

Two of the people who appear on the list sent The Tyee the same statement, saying “the information in question is flagrant, misconstrued, and includes sensitive private information about myself and my family.”

The statements said the information in the report is slanderous and it had been leaked to media “by the Conservative Party of British Columbia’s Board, and specifically the Party’s Executive Management Committee.”

The Tyee obtained the report via a third party and has not been able to contact the original person who leaked the information to media.

Another person who responded to The Tyee’s request for comment said the information in the report was false. The person said they had checked their credit card statement, and the charges for membership fees listed in the report do not exist. The person called the report “slander” and the decision to leak it to media “a smear.”

The remainder of the people listed did not respond to The Tyee’s request for comment.

How did the membership scandal unfold?

The report provides details of how the bulk membership activity was allegedly carried out. It says that in March a decision was made to change the party’s one-, two- or three-year membership to a fixed four-year membership that would cost $10. Purchases of the four-year membership were recorded in the party’s fundraising and campaign database. Between March 7 and Aug. 31 a total of 3,642 four-year memberships were processed.

The report says that while an official link to sign up was created, a second URL was also created.

The report says “it appears” this link was created “for the purpose of manufacturing membership signups.” From July 7 to Aug. 30 there were 1,806 members processed through the second link.

Peter’s analysis also found that bogus phone numbers, such as 111-111-1111 or 222-222-2222, had been listed for the suspicious membership signups and many of those signups also had the same domain — getcloudmail.co — for their email addresses. According to the report, 99 per cent of the 2,238 allegedly manufactured memberships “failed address validation” and all of the signups “failed postal code validation.” Most of the signups appear to be South Asian names, according to the report.

Most of the allegedly manufactured memberships “originated from VPN servers,” according to Peter’s report. Virtual private networks can be used to shield a user’s identity.

How the party responded

In response to the report, the party cancelled all the “irregular” signups at a meeting on Sept. 10, according to a statement the party made to CBC.

The party said it was confident that everyone who voted in the leadership review was a member in good standing.

But Sturko said she was not satisfied that enough had been done to restore confidence in Rustad’s leadership. She wanted a vote on Rustad’s leadership, done by secret ballot, within the B.C. Conservative caucus.

Sturko acknowledged her place within the party had been rocky for a long time. As an openly lesbian former RCMP officer, Sturko had switched parties from the centre-right BC United to the Conservatives in 2024 as voter and financial support was swinging from BC United to the upstart Conservatives. Sturko said Rustad had sold her on a plan to make the B.C. Conservatives a big-tent party for voters on the right side of the political spectrum.

After the 2024 provincial election, which saw the B.C. Conservatives become the Official Opposition with 44 seats, Sturko said she almost immediately came under fire from other Conservative MLAs when she commented to media about controversial comments made by a former Vancouver police board member.

“I can remember even being at the time in the media and people were saying, ‘How could you go to the Conservatives?’ and telling people that I was never asked to change who I was as a person. I was never asked to abandon my personal values,” Sturko told The Tyee.

“And that’s true. But maybe others were left with the impression that somehow I would, and I would assimilate to the values that the party had before inviting me to join. So I think that maybe there was a level of dishonesty coming from John.”

Sturko said she doesn’t regret her decision to speak up about her concerns, but she said sitting as an Independent MLA will come with a lot of challenges.

“I absolutely don’t regret my stance to want to discuss this with caucus members and to have some accountability for what happened,” Sturko said.

“It’s unfortunate that now I’m an Independent, but I will make the best of the situation, and I’ll continue to do the work that I have been doing in this place for the last three years.”