Quebec City region CAQ MNA announces he will not seek re-election

Sylvain Lévesque, right, is the latest CAQ MNA who has chosen not to run again for Francois Legault's party in 2026. (Karoline Boucher/The Canadian Press)

CAQ MNA for Chauveau Sylvain Lévesque announced on Friday that he will not seek re-election in 2026.

His name adds to the list of numerous departures and resignations that have shaken the Coalition Avenir Quebec (CAQ) over the past year.

The director of the Chauveau constituency office, Annie Lemieux, refused to confirm the news to The Canadian Press, stating that Lévesque was currently on a plane, but another representative of the government team confirmed the information.

In the coming months, several of the 80 elected members of the CAQ caucus will have to confirm, if they have not already done so, whether they will be running in the 2026 election, so that the party can find another candidate if they decide not to run.

Lévesque had been chosen to be second vice-president of the National Assembly in 2022 until he had to resign in 2024 for violating the National Assembly’s Code of Ethics.

Lévesque is a CAQ veteran.

Elected in Vanier - Les Rivières, he was part of the wave of CAQ members in the 2012 election, when François Legault ran for the first time at the head of his new party to form the second opposition in the Quebec legislature.

Lévesque was defeated in the spring 2014 election by Liberal Patrick Huot, but ran again in 2018 under the CAQ banner and was elected, this time in Chauveau, when his party finally formed the government.

He was re-elected in the 2022 election, even though he was running against Conservative Party leader Éric Duhaime.

In 2023, Lévesque was embroiled in a fundraising scandal.

An employee in Lévesque’s office had invited a citizen who was seeking the MNA’s assistance to attend a CAQ fundraising cocktail party at a cost of $100 to meet with Finance Minister Eric Girard in order to advance her case.

The National Assembly’s ethics commissioner, Ariane Mignolet, then opened an investigation at the request of the opposition.

According to the report filed in November 2024, Lévesque had “knowingly” provided “inaccurate information” during the investigation in response to a request from the commissioner.

Mignolet recommended a reprimand, and Lévesque was forced to resign from his position as vice-president of the legislature.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Dec. 19, 2025.