Early results coming in for Manitoba’s municipal elections

Early results are starting to trickle in for Manitoba’s municipal elections.

Evan Duncan, Cindy Gilroy and Vivian Santos will be among the incumbent Winnipeg councillors to retain their seats, after winning Charleswood-Tuxedo-Westwood, Daniel McIntyre and Point Douglas, respectively, CBC projects.

Jeff Palmer has won Fort Rouge-East Fort Garry, Chris Sigurdson has won in St. Vital, Ray DuBois has taken St. Norbert-Seine and Sara MacArthur has won River Heights-Fort Garry, CBC News projects. They will be among at least five new faces to join city council for the first time.

In Winnipeg, there are 12 candidates running for mayor, including incumbent Scott Gillingham.

The last sitting mayor to suffer an election-night defeat in the city was George Sharpe, who came up short in a narrow loss to Independent MLA Stephen Juba in 1956.

A recent public opinion survey suggested that although Gillingham had more support than any other candidate, his early and seemingly insurmountable lead was nearly halved about a week before election day.

A former city councillor, Gillingham won his first term as mayor in 2022. He squeaked by on election night with 27.5 per cent of the popular vote, repelling a comeback bid by former mayor Glen Murray to win by only 4,391 votes.

Gillingham, Winnipeg Sun CEO Kevin Klein and funeral director Mike Vogiatzakis, the front-runners in early polling, were the candidates eligible to participate in CBC Manitoba’s Oct. 21 mayoral debate.

Scott Gillingham, centre, goes head-to-head with Kevin Klein, right, and Mike Vogiatzakis in a televised debate hosted by CBC Manitoba on Oct. 21. (James Turner/CBC)

There are 54 council candidates and more than 90 school trustee candidates in Winnipeg, the city said.

There will be at least five new people on Winnipeg’s city council, after five veteran councillors did not seek re-election.

Eyes are also on the councillor’s seat in Transcona, where incumbent Russ Wyatt sought re-election while facing criminal charges, including sexual assault, which police say involve two men in separate incidents from 2023 and 2025.

All Winnipeg races were contested this year; in 2022, two councillors won re-election by acclamation.

Voter turnout in the city has waxed and waned in Winnipeg’s six elections since 2002. The 2022 election that saw Gillingham first elected mayor recorded a 37.5 per cent voter turnout — the lowest since 2006.

Voter turnout was much higher in 2014, when Brian Bowman was first elected mayor, with 50 per cent of electors casting ballots.

This year, a record number of Winnipeggers took advantage of advance voting to cast their ballot, the city said.

Elections outside of Winnipeg

Manitobans outside of Winnipeg also voted for new leaders and councils.

Incumbent mayors in several Manitoba communities, including Portage la Prairie, Steinbach, Winkler, Niverville and Selkirk, were acclaimed after no challengers registered to run.

Several places, such as the Municipality of Cartwright-Roblin and the Rural Municipality of Argyle, saw their entire slate of council candidates acclaimed.

Two veteran politicians who served with each other on Brandon city council are battling to become mayor of Manitoba’s second-largest city.

Incumbent Jeff Fawcett was elected Brandon mayor four years ago, after serving on council for three terms. His opponent, Len Isleifson, is also a former city councillor and was MLA for Brandon East from 2016 to 2023.

Advance voting in the Wheat City also set a new record in 2026, with more than triple the number of advance votes cast in 2022, far exceeding any advance poll held in the city in the last 20 years, officials said previously.

Up north, residents in Flin Flon voted for a new mayor after Mayor George Fontaine did not run again. Three names were on the mayoral ballot in Flin Flon. 

In The Pas, three candidates are also battling for an open mayor’s seat. The northern town has been without a mayor since August, after Andre Murphy stepped down from the job. 

Incumbent Colleen Smook faced two challengers in Thompson’s mayoral race. 

Three Manitoba communities — Winnipeg Beach, Victoria Beach and Dunnottar — held elections earlier this year. Only one mayor — Penny McMorris, the incumbent in Victoria Beach — was acclaimed.