Nearly a year and half after a majority of New Democrat delegates voted to begin the process of choosing a new leader, the race to replace Tom Mulcair is set to pass a critical milestone later this week.

Under party rules, August 17 is the official cut-off date for new and returning party members to submit the necessary paperwork to be eligible to cast a ballot when the polls open next month.

It’s a critical deadline for campaign outreach teams, who likely will devote considerable time and money over the next few days to ensuring that each and every one of their potential supporters has been added to that all-important voting list.

But it may also serve as a gentle reminder to the many card-carrying New Democrats who haven’t yet made up their minds on exactly who to support – and in what order – in the first round of voting. While many factors obviously go into such a decision, in the era of e-retail politics most undecided voters likely will begin their research online — by comparing the candidates’ online offerings.

Here’s an overview of what they’ll find there, presented in the order in which the campaigns were launched.

Charlie Angus (charlieangusndp.ca)

Of the four candidates remaining on the ballot, veteran Northern Ontario MP Charlie Angus was the first to formally declare his interest in the job. His website has an elegantly minimalist look: the requisite orange, with dark grey accents and a sleek sans-serif font.

It’s not particularly fancy, but for a voter hoping to get a sense of his priorities, it’s definitely functional.

There’s a short but punchy first-person biographical snapshot that includes the fateful moment when the late Jack Layton “talked [him] into buying a $100 suit, joining the party and running for the NDP.” There are links to op-eds and press releases, as well as more detailed policy statements covering four key areas: climate change, indigenous children, housing as a “right” and “the new working class.”

Not surprisingly, Angus’ page also provides a convenient interface to buy – or re-up – a party membership, as well as a prominent link to a donation page.

On the multimedia front, there are photos scattered throughout the site, including a main page rotation that includes a shot of Angus sporting a green hardhat while chatting with workers and an arty from-behind image that appears to be from his leadership announcement.

Perhaps the most eye-catching shot, however, is on the “Join the team!” page: It features a beaming Angus alongside two similarly delighted-looking women wearing hijabs in front of a campaign poster that advertises the “Got Your Back” 2017 tour over a stylized silhouette of Angus playing guitar on stage — an impressively low-key way to remind the world that, beyond everything else he’s done before and since buying that suit, he’s also a genuine rock star.

Angus’ site also links to his official Youtube account, which offers not only a selection of clips from the House of Commons, but videos from his live performance at Timmins’ Full Beard Brewery.

As for other social media platforms, Angus’ Facebook appears to offer more detailed updates on campaign events, as well as links to (positive) media coverage and other share-ready tidbits, but his Twitter feed seems to have a more personal tone. Not only does he retweet and comment on political news, he also occasionally tweets out a music video simply because he likes it.

Guy Caron (guycaron.ca)

Presented against an airy theme that pairs orange with a subtle slate grey, his official online bio bills Caron as “a progressive economist from Rimouski” and focuses heavily on his bona fides as a fiscal expert. It also cites his history as a “long-time NDP activist in Quebec” and his role in Layton’s 2003 leadership bid.

The front page, meanwhile, pitches visitors on his plan to “build a progressive and sustainable economy.”

A sidebar menu invites interested parties to “join the Basic Income Action Team”. Its placement on the page — second only to “join us” and “donate” in importance — gives you a pretty good idea of what Caron and his team see as his most marketable policy, at least as far as New Democrats are concerned.

If you choose to “join the Basic Income Action Team,” you not only add your name to a petition, you get a “digital campaign toolkit” that will let you “provide input to Guy’s campaign” as well as promote the plan itself – and, of course, “sell memberships to get Guy elected.”

Not surprisingly, his plan to “make basic income happen” is one of Caron’s four listed priorities, along with”climate justice,” “workers first” and “making taxes work for all Canadians.” To find out that Caron is also prepared to make electoral reform “the first act” of a Caron-led government, you have to thread your way through a gallery of needlessly graphics-laden endorsement announcements filed under “news.”

Caron is the only one of the four candidates to put his family at the literal centre of his campaign site: a static portrait of h imself and his wife, Valerie, holding the hands of Dominic and Edith, ages 8 and 5, respectively.

Like Angus, Caron’s Facebook page seems to be far more user-friendly, and includes helpful links to policy statements as well as personal comments from Caron himself, while his Twitter feed features a blend of campaign sloganeering, autoposts and off-the-cuff commentary, as well as candid shots from the road, like a recent tete-a-tete with former New Democrat leader Ed Broadbent.

Niki Ashton (NikiAshton2017.ca)

This is Ashton’s second bid to lead the NDP – she was the first to drop off the 2012 ballot that ultimately installed Mulcair in the position. But even though she was a few weeks behind Angus and Caron in launching her campaign, Team Niki is laps ahead of her caucus colleagues in the contest to churn out online content– not just on the web, but across all five major social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram and Snapchat.

Not all appear to be in regular use, however. The most recent image on her Instagram account is from February, and just two clips have been added to her YouTube channel since the House rose in June.

Ashton and her team are far more diligent about refreshing her Twitter and Facebook streams, both of which are updated daily, if not more often. They offer everything from policy backgrounders broken down into 140 character chunks to photos from the campaign trail.

Meanwhile, the “issues” section of her website features no fewer than 11 policy statements – more than Angus and Caron combined – on a dizzying range of topics from Kinder Morgan to universal health care to “a just peace in the Middle East.” There’s also a separate section on “the movement” that appear to be a gallery of supporters, including some of her most high-profile endorsements.

There is also a one-stop menu with links to sign up, donate and/or volunteer. Ashton’s site also appears to be the only one that fully integrates English and French content side-by-side, as opposed to setting up two separate crosslinked sites.

Overall, the only real risk is that her site may be so comprehensive that it could deter more casual visitors who just want to get a quick sense of the broader themes of her campaign. But at this point in the race, it’s probably better to have too much than not enough.

Jagmeet Singh (jagmeetsingh.ca)



Finally, there’s Jagmeet Singh – the last to add his name to the ballot and the only one of the four candidates without a seat in the House of Commons, who appears to be committed to making up for lost time and then some.

As of this week, his website offers even more policy statements than Ashton – 15 separate proposals, although several could easily be bundled together in theme packs. He also has a presence on the big five social media platforms.

(And yes, he seems to be much more diligent than Ashton in posting to his Instagram feed, which seems to get new photos every few days.)

His Twitter feed is also sprinkled with more personal remarks as well as the usual campaign rah-rah fodder; he shared a a mini-stream of thought on the events in Charlottesville over the weekend. And he and his team aren’t afraid to get a little punny, as the name of his current mini-tour – the “AamaSingh Race” – makes clear.

His site includes separate options for supporters looking to join or renew their memberships (it’s not clear why those groups would be directed towards separate forms) as well as a lengthy bio that goes to great length to emphasize Singh’s roots both in his community and within the party.

His trademark phrase – “with love and courage” – is scattered throughout the site.

On a purely aesthetic basis, a case could be made that, as far as using the party’s signature hue goes, his site may actually edge over the line between “just enough” and “okay, that’s too much” but that seems unlikely to lose him any support among party loyalists.

In any case, New Democrats hungry for a hardcore policy fix will find plenty to read on his site – as well as the occasional mountain-climbing shot. Has he struck the right balance? We’ll find out later this fall.