Melissa Lantsman

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Melissa Lantsman
MP
ML Headshot.jpg
Member of Parliament
for Thornhill
Assumed office
September 20, 2021
Preceded byPeter Kent
Personal details
Born (1984-04-08) April 8, 1984 (age 37)
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Political partyConservative (Federal)
Progressive Conservative (Provincial)
Alma materUniversity of Toronto (BA)
OccupationPolitician, public relations executive, political strategist

Melissa Lantsman MP is a Canadian politician and public relations executive who serves as the Member of Parliament for Thornhill in the House of Commons of Canada. A member of the Conservative Party of Canada, she was elected in the 2021 Canadian federal election.[1] She is the first LGBTQ woman and Jewish woman ever to be elected as a Conservative MP.[2]

Lantsman previously worked as a communications advisor to several cabinet members in the 28th Canadian Ministry of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. She was a senior advisor to the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario and its chief spokesperson during the 2018 Ontario provincial election.[3] Lantsman was previously the National Vice President of Public Affairs at Enterprise Canada, a strategic communications firm.[4]

In 2020, upon the retirement of Peter Kent from Parliament, Lantsman announced her intention to seek the federal Conservative nomination in Thornhill.[5] She defeated the incumbent Progressive Conservative Member of Provincial Parliament, Gila Martow, to become the riding's Conservative candidate on March 17, 2021.

She was elected to parliament on September 20, 2021.

Early life and education[edit]

Lantsman was born in Toronto in 1984 to a Russian Jewish family and raised in Thornhill. Her mother was an accountant and her father was an engineer who worked in the taxi business and ran several pawn shops. She attended a French-immersion program at Langstaff Secondary School in the York Region and speaks fluent French in addition to English and Russian.

She attended University of Toronto and graduated with an Honours Bachelor of Arts. She later completed the Institute of Corporate Directors education program at the Rotman School of Management.

Career[edit]

As an adolescent, Lantsman volunteered for Conservative Party candidates in local elections. During the 2008 Canadian federal election, she was appointed a senior communications advisor, with the party forming a minority government. Thereafter, she was appointed director of communications for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs under Ministers Lawrence Cannon and John Baird, serving from 2008 to 2011. From 2011 to 2012, she was the director of communications of the Office of the Prime Minister of Canada (PMO), and accompanied Prime Minister Stephen Harper on domestic and foreign visits.

After a brief stint at The Coca-Cola Company as a senior public affairs advisor, Lantsman returned to government as director of communications for the Ministry of Finance under Joe Oliver. Following the Harper Government's loss of the 2015 Canadian federal election, Lantsman returned to the private sector as a senior director for CIBC Capital Markets.

In 2018, Lantsman served as director of communications for Ontario MPP Caroline Mulroney's candidacy for leadership of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario.[6] Following Mulroney's loss, Lantsman joined the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario's campaign for the 2018 Ontario general election as its chief spokesperson and war room director.[6] In this role, she oversaw all press communications and social media releases by the campaign. The election resulted in a majority government for the Progressive Conservatives, the first since 2002 after 16 years of Liberal Government in Ontario.[7] Following the election, Lantsman joined Hill+Knowlton Strategies, an international public relations strategy firm, at their Toronto office.[6] In 2020, she joined Enterprise Canada, a strategic public relations consultancy, as its vice president for National Public Affairs.[8] She relinquished her partnership in Enterprise in 2021 to focus on her political candidacy.

Since 2019, Lantsman has appeared on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) News' Power & Politics as well as CTV's Power Play as a political panelist and has hosted a radio show on CFRB 1010 AM. She has sat on the board of the Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee, the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, Jewish Addiction Community Services (JACS) and the Michael Garron Hospital in Toronto.

Political candidacy[edit]

In 2020, Conservative then-Member of Parliament for Thornhill, Peter Kent, announced that he would not seek re-election at the next year's federal election.[3] Kent had represented the electoral district since 2008, with the highest proportion of Jewish residents in Canada at 37%.[3]

Lantsman announced her candidacy for the Conservative nomination in the district on November 27, 2020. Her candidacy was endorsed by former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, former federal ministers John Baird, Joe Oliver, Pierre Poilievre, Rona Ambrose, Michelle Rempel Garner and Lisa Raitt, as well as incumbent Ontario provincial ministers Caroline Mulroney, Stephen Lecce, Greg Rickford and Paul Calandra. She also received endorsements from federal and provincial Conservative legislators, including Eric Duncan, Scott Aitchison, Logan Kanapathi, Stan Cho, Roman Baber and Vijay Thanigasalam.[9]

Lantsman faced the incumbent Member of Provincial Parliament for Thornhill, Gila Martow, in the nomination contest.[9] She participated in a series of nomination debates with Martow between December 2020 and March 2021.[9] On April 3, 2021, Lantsman defeated Martow in the nomination election and was certified as the Conservative candidate for Thornhill. She faced Liberal candidate Gary Gladstone in the 2021 Canadian federal election on September 20 and, per preliminary results, won the seat with 51.3% of the vote.

Electoral record[edit]

Thornhill[edit]

2021 Canadian federal election
Party Candidate Votes % ±% Expenditures
Conservative Melissa Lantsman 25,687 51.3% -3.26% –
Liberal Gary Gladstone 18,168 36.3% +0.88% –
New Democratic Raz Razvi 3,041 6.1% -0.38% –
People's Samuel Greenfield 2,322 4.6% – –
Green Daniella Mikanovsky 844 1.7% -1.29% –
Total valid votes / Expense limit 50,062 99.2 0.28 $114,997.02
Total rejected ballots 390 0.77 -0.31
Turnout 50,452 58.8 -4.82
Eligible voters 85,739 76.06% 0.66%
Conservative hold Swing -4.14
Source: Elections Canada[10]

Personal life[edit]

Lantsman is openly lesbian and was married in 2017.[11]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Conservative Melissa Lantsman takes Thornhill, which once belonged to Peter Kent". Toronto Star. September 21, 2021. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  2. ^ Benzie, Robert (November 23, 2020). "Key Premier Doug Ford allies battle for federal Tory nomination in Thornhill". Toronto Star.
  3. ^ a b c Sarick, Lila (November 27, 2020). "Martow, Lantsman Vie for Tory Nod in Thornhill". Canadian Jewish Record. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  4. ^ "Melissa Lantsman Joins Enterprise as Vice President, National Public Affairs". Enterprise Canada. January 23, 2020. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  5. ^ "Key Premier Doug Ford allies battle for federal Tory nomination in Thornhill". Toronto Star. November 23, 2020. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  6. ^ a b c Silver, Janet E. (November 24, 2020). "Comings and Goings: Melissa Lantsman to run for Conservative nomination". iPolitics. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  7. ^ Rodriguez, Jeremiah (June 7, 2018). "Doug Ford's PC Party wins majority in 2018 Ontario election". Maclean's. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  8. ^ "Melissa Lantsman Seeks Conservative Nod For Thornhill". TheJ.ca. December 23, 2020. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  9. ^ a b c Nanji, Sabrina (December 18, 2020). "Gila Martow doesn't toe the PC line in Thornhill debate". Politics Today. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
  10. ^ "List of confirmed candidates – September 20, 2021 Federal Election". Elections Canada. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
  11. ^ "Real Weddings: Inside a dance-filled same-sex celebration at the Four Seasons". Toronto Life. January 9, 2018. Retrieved September 21, 2021.
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