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A day after he said it was “absolutely ridiculous” and “so dumb” that an upcoming political fundraiser was criticized as a cash-for-access event, Mayor Naheed Nenshi conceded the event had pay-to-play optics.

“I’ll admit that I did not like — and I hadn’t seen it until I read about it — the text of that invitation,” Nenshi told reporters Tuesday.

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“The fact that it looked like you had to pay-to-play, even though that wasn’t the case, I didn’t much like that.”

The “intimate fundraising luncheon,” hosted by Kasian Architecture and scheduled for Wednesday, was abruptly cancelled late Monday evening by Nenshi’s campaign team, less than six hours after the mayor adamantly defended the event.

The man who has long advocated for stricter campaign finance rules told reporters Tuesday the decision to cancel the campaign fundraiser was made because of how Kasian was treated when news of the “exclusive” affair surfaced.