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And early in the debate, anglophone candidates Lisa Raitt and Kellie Leitch, both of whom have struggled in their previous efforts with French, made an effort to say one or two sentences in that language before switching to English with palpable relief.

During a discussion of the language question between several candidates near the end of the debate, O’Leary retorted: “People say, ‘Kevin, you can’t speak French.’ C’est pas vrai, mon français devient mieux chaque jour.” (My French gets better every day.) He has repeated that phrase several times, verbatim, since his entry into the campaign.

Brad Trost and Pierre Lemieux, among the anglophone candidates who tend to struggle with their French, were both present at the event but didn’t participate in the debate, apparently due to a mix-up with the debate organizers. Deepak Obhrai, typically considered the weakest French-speaker among the 14 candidates, did not attend at all.

But language wasn’t the whole story Monday. Like at an unofficial debate in Halifax Feb. 4, the other candidates spent a fair amount of time trying discredit the businessman and reality TV star O’Leary for being too bombastic and not conservative enough.

O’Leary, who didn’t respond directly to any of the others’ attacks, spoke to the latter point by confirming he would embrace LGBTQI people, legalize marijuana and defend reproductive rights. “Get used to it. That is the definition of the Conservative Party going forward,” he said.