In a section marked by a ìreservedî sign at Bogeyís restaurant in Chestermere they gathered on election night. Supporters of Ted Morton ó many of them who helped with his campaign ó stared up at a handful of TVs tuned to the CBC, broadcasting early election results.
Morton, the incumbent MLA for Foothills-Rocky View and Albertaís minister of energy, walked around the golf courseís upstairs lounge casually entering conversations with his rallyís approximately 30 guests.
Heíd been here before.
April 23 was the third time Morton had run for MLA in Alberta. The previous two times (2004 and 2008), he won decisive victories in Foothills-Rocky View, securing the nominations by more than 35 points. But a boundary redistribution combined large parts of the Airdrie-Chestermere riding with Foothills-Rocky View to create the new riding of Chestermere-Rocky View.
Mortonís opponent this time around, former journalist Bruce McAllister of the Wildrose party, had been aggressively campaigning in the new riding for months before its incumbent officially threw his hat into the race.
At 8:52 p.m., signs Mortonís supporters could be in for a long night flashed across the screens. Morton and McAllister were listed as one of five ridings in Alberta that were ìtoo close to call.î
ìWhere the hell were they getting the polls from the last couple of weeks?î said one of Mortonís guests. The sentiment was echoed throughout the room and across the province.
In the weeks leading up to the election, nearly all the major polling outlets in Alberta projected the Wildrose Party to be in the lead by more than 10 points. Even in the final few days of campaigning, as the Wildroseís lead started to fade, the polls still had the party close enough to pull off the upset over a 41-year PC dynasty in Alberta.
The polls showed Morton trailing McAllister only three days before election night. As the television told a different narrative from those polls, it was anyoneís guess how Chestermere-Rocky View voted.
At 9:04 p.m., it became evident the pollsters had gotten it wrong. The CBC declared Alison Redfordís PCs the winner of Albertaís 2012 provincial election, and while the Wildrose snatched up 17 seats, the race was never the nail-biter most Albertans were told it would be.
Minutes after Redfordís victory was confirmed, Chestermere-Rocky Viewís results were displayed ó Morton was down 800 votes.
ìAt the end of the day, it doesnít matter if you win by 20 votes or 2,000 votes,î Morton remarked to one of his concerned supporters.
If traditional Liberal and NDP supporters had collapsed their vote to the PCs to block a Wildrose victory ó the ìstrategic voteî phenomenon the media was now discussing as a factor in the surprising PC majority win ó there were few signs it had happened in Chestermere-Rocky View.
At 9:27 p.m., with Morton down more than 1,000 votes, four major media outlets had declared via Twitter that Bruce McAllister was the victor in Chestermere-Rocky View. When asked if he was ready to comment by the media in attendance, Morton replied, ìWhen there is something to comment to.î
He held out right until the CBC made it official at 9:38 p.m., and after some handshakes and private conversations with his team, Morton reached into his jacket pocket and removed his concession speech.
ìWeíve campaigned, if you look at it realistically, for six to eight weeks and Bruce has campaigned for six to eight months,î said Morton about the final results.
ìBut I donít want to make excuses, you all know Ted Morton, and Ted Morton believes in democracy.î
The 77 polls returned in Chestermere-Rocky View gave McAllister the win by more than 4,000 votes. Morton received 679 less votes overall from 2008, but his ridingís growth included more than 17,000 new ballots cast in 2012 from 2008, and his campaign came up short with many of these new constituents. As an architect of the Reform Party in Alberta, Morton ended up losing to a party representing an ideological movement he helped create.
ìItís a remarkable achievement for a new protest party,î he said of the Wildroseís performance in the election.
Halfway through Mortonís speech, he was offered a cell phone by a member of his campaign team and told McAllister was on the line.
ìNot right now,î he said.
Morton ended his speech by thanking his wife, Bambi for focusing on his priorities for the past 16 months, and joked that the rest of the year, ìbut no longer,î would be spent doing whatever she wanted to do. He thanked many members of his 2012 campaign team, from the doorknockers to his campaign manger, before expressing his plans for the future.
ìI donít think Iím finished in politics, Iím probably finished in elected politics,î Morton said. ìI hope I can go back to having a productive role writing about the things I care about.î
As a tenured professor of the University of Calgaryís political science department, an award-winning author and political columnist for several national newspapers, Morton has plenty of options for continuing to influence political policy in Alberta. Moments later, Morton began his life as a citizen by calling up his former rival, McAllister, to congratulate him on the victory.
