N.L. minister resigns after new evidence surfaces of problems in 2021 vote

Newfoundland and Labrador cabinet minister John Abbott speaks to members of the media in St. John's on Wednesday June 11, 2025. Abbott says he will step down after a court case revealed new evidence of problems with the 2021 provincial election. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sarah Smellie

ST. JOHN’S — A provincial Liberal cabinet minister in Newfoundland and Labrador says he will step down this summer, after a court challenge of the province’s 2021 election unearthed evidence of voting irregularities in his district.

John Abbott said Wednesday that rather than proceed with a costly trial that could end with a judge asking him to leave his seat, he’ll do it himself. His decision will allow the court case to end, he said, adding, “We won the election.”

However, he admitted that there were enough credible witnesses who could have presented evidence of voting issues, potentially changing the result in his riding of St. John’s East-Quidi Vidi, which he won by 53 votes.

“That could have happened,” he said. “That is definitely a possibility, but we certainly do not know. But the facts of the matter is that when the ballots were counted back in the spring of 2021, I was the declared winner, and obviously I still am, until I vacate my seat.”

Meanwhile, the Liberal government must call a provincial election this year to be held on or before Oct. 14.

The 2021 provincial election in Newfoundland and Labrador was upended by a COVID-19 outbreak, prompting election officials to cancel all in-person voting and shift to mail-in ballots. The Liberals won a slim majority with a voter turnout of 51 per cent.

Whymarrh Whitby, who lives in Abbott’s district, says he never received a mail-in ballot. He launched a lawsuit in 2021, alleging flaws in the chaotic election denied him his right to vote. Whitby’s lawsuit is co-signed by former provincial NDP leader Alison Coffin, who lost her seat in the district in 2021 to Abbott.

The case had been lurching slowly through the court system for roughly four years, but Abbott said it began to pick up in the past six months, as it headed toward a trial set to begin Monday.

That’s when lawyers for the New Democrats “came up with” new or more evidence of election irregularities, he said.

Lawyers identified a group of voters who allege they had not received ballots, and a group who may have voted in the wrong district, Abbott said. Another may have used questionable identification to vote.

“We do not know whether that was true or not,” he said. “And we would only know if we brought those potential witnesses in, those potential voters, into court.”

There were roughly 140 witnesses who could have testified, he said.

As he spoke to reporters, the provincial office of the chief electoral issued a release acknowledging there were “errors” in the administration of some ballots in St. John’s East-Quidi Vidi, “as a result of the unprecedented actions taken to conduct the election amidst the pandemic and its associated public health restrictions.”

The release was signed by Coffin, Whitby, Abbott and Travis Wooley, the acting chief electoral officer.

At another press conference, Coffin told reporters that she was satisfied with the resolution of the lawsuit. “I am satisfied that we will head into the next general election with a new vision of how elections should be run,” she said. “This was a win for democracy.”

Whitby said it felt good to see the provincial elections authority acknowledge there were problems, but he said the province needs a better system than the courts to ensure voters’ rights are protected.

“Everyone has the right to vote,” he told reporters. “And that should be something we don’t take for granted.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 11, 2025.

Sarah Smellie, The Canadian Press