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On Tuesday, the same day Hillary Clinton lost the American presidency, two smart, articulate women — Donna Kennedy-Glans and Sandra Jansen — withdrew from the Alberta’s Progressive Conservative leadership race.

The timing was mostly coincidental. The November 10th deadline to pay the $50,000 deposit to officially enter the race just happened to fall two days after the U.S. election — and $50,000 is a lot to raise, and a lot to lose.

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But the parallels and resonances are real.

Jansen, the MLA for Calgary-North West quit the Tory leadership fight because of what she described as sexist harassment and intimidation, both on social media and in real life. While she didn’t name her leadership rival Jason Kenney outright, the clear implication of her comments was that Kenney’s backers had driven her from the race.

Kennedy-Glans, former MLA for Calgary-Varsity, was more measured, using coded language to talk about the lack of room for a “centrist” option in a polarized political culture. She didn’t specifically raise issues of misogyny. But then, since she timed her announcement to come just moments after Jansen’s, she really didn’t need to.