Progressive Conservative candidate Mike Harris Jr. has secured victory in the Kitchener-Conestoga riding, maintaining the PC Party’s hold on the seat. Harris Jr. had a decisive win with a lead of 4,195 votes with all polls reporting Thursday night. “It’s exciting obviously for us to regain the seats as a majority government and I think that shows that we do have a strong mandate that we wanted to put out there to the people,” Harris Jr. told CTV News. “They’ve accepted it. I think we’re somewhere in the neighborhood about a 5,000 vote margin of victory right now.” Harris Jr., who has represented the riding since 2018, successfully defended his position against his five challengers, earning 41.5 per cent of the vote. Cheers and applause erupted at St. Louis Bar and Grill in Kitchener as supporters of Harris Jr. watched the election results roll in. With drinks in hand and eyes glued to the screens, attendees celebrated as their candidate secured re-election. “When we knocked on almost 15,000 doors over the last month, the biggest thing that came up is jobs in the economy. People want to make sure that they’re going to have strong, stable jobs here in the region. One of the things that I can think of for a lot of folks, and what they were concerned about, is Waterloo Region is one of the largest exporters in all of Canada to the United States. A lot of that comes around auto industry manufacturing. So making sure that we’re able to see investments continue in those sectors. We’ve made the promise that we’ll do whatever it takes as a PC government, to make sure that that we keep those sectors stable. And I think that was something that voters really, really appreciate.” Harris Jr. earned 16,946 votes, building on his success in 2022 despite facing criticism for how the Wilmot land assembly industrial project was handled by municipal and provincial governments. This time around, Harris Jr. was trailed by Liberal candidate Joe Gowing who claimed 29 per cent per cent of the vote at the time the riding was called. With his win, Harris Jr. heads back to Queen’s Park, promising to continue his work on behalf of Kitchener-Conestoga, focusing on key issues such as obtaining a planning grant for the region’s new hospital and pushing forward the long-awaited expansion of a two-way all day Go Train service for the K-W area. The CTV News Decision Desk made the call in Harris' favour within 10 minutes of the polls closing at 9 p.m. Thursday.
