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Niagara Falls
Wednesday, March 27, 2024
Independent Strange feels ‘deflated’ but proud of campaign

Mike Strange says he’s “a little deflated” after Monday’s election.

The independent candidate and current Niagara Falls councillor was out pounding the pavement to spread his message as people came to the polls to vote.

He said it’s a bit tougher running as an independent. Nonetheless, Strange’s campaign pulled in almost 5,000 votes.

“We knew it was going to be tough running as an independent. We don’t have the budget of some of the big parties and stuff like that. It’s trying to make people understand that you’re trying to bring interest to your riding, not your party,” Strange said.

“Unfortunately, we lost but we put in a good fight. Congratulations to Tony (Baldinelli) and to Justin Trudeau.”

Strange said regardless of the results, he’s proud of how he did.

“It was good. We were crushing with signs, I had a great team and we stuck together. We’re very very proud of just going out in our yellow, gold and black shirts on.”

The campaign colours are the same as Strange’s charity KO for Kids, which hosts boxing matches to raise money for children with cancer.

“We really pounded on doors and listened to the local issues. That’s the difference, you know, the parties already have their policies and platforms made up, whereas we were going I was learning the issues.”

Strange, a former Canadian Olympic boxer, said it was interesting to see “Americanized” party politics playing such a big part in the election.

“It was such a flip of a coin who was going to win ultimately (federally). We knew it was going to be a minority government and it’s just trying to make people understand, being an independent you can hold that balance of power.

Being a Falls city councillor, if Strange won federally, his seat on city council would have gone to the person with the next highest votes in the last municipal election, Joyce Morocco.

Strange said he has “no idea” if he’ll run federally again in the future.

“We don’t know when the next election will be — it could be two years, it could be four years. I’m just going to concentrate on Niagara Falls and getting things done for our city and our council.”

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