In another pointed jab at the gay community, Doug Ford accused the mother of a gay son of “bullying” for accusing Rob Ford of homophobia.

Rob Ford has begun his mayoral campaign by saying that he deliberately avoids the Pride festival and vocally opposing the city’s decision to fly a rainbow flag during the Olympics in solidarity with the gay community in Russia. Doug Ford, his brother’s campaign manager, has complained that Pride involves “buck naked men.”

On the second episode of their YouTube campaign show, released on Tuesday, Rob Ford read aloud a letter from a Scarborough mother who said she is hurt by his actions and called him “homophobic.”

“This is about being patriotic to our country,” Ford said to the camera. “I am not homophobic. I will go to anyone’s house, anyone’s place, to help them out. I take offence when people say that to me.”

Doug Ford said: “You know how many gay friends that we have? People that have worked on our campaign. So you may want to try to bully us into things, but — that’s how I feel sometimes, Rob. I feel like I’ve been bullied into something.”

He added: “Don’t try to put a gun to anyone’s head that disagrees with you. It doesn’t mean that they hate gays. It’s just a bunch of bullying, a bunch of bullies coming after you.”

The frequency with which the Fords have criticized the gay community early in the campaign suggests a strategy to appeal to social conservatives. The comments have coincided with several visits by Rob Ford to conservative churches and come soon after he began making religious references in speeches and interviews.

Since he was stripped of most of his mayoral powers in November, Ford has returned to the rhetoric of the outsider he once was. In the YouTube episode, he calmly said he wants 39 of the 44 current city councillors defeated in the election.

“Every single one of them,” he said, “except for maybe five — Frank Di Giorgio, Frances Nunziata, Vince Crisanti, my brother Doug Ford, and I think that’s pretty well it, let’s say four. And Anthony Perruzza, although he doesn’t vote with us sometimes.”

After saying he would read out a “top 10” list of the incumbents he most dislikes, he listed 18 of them.

“They wanted the war, they’re going to get the war,” Ford said.

Doug Ford called councillors and unnamed mayoral candidates a “bunch of yahoos.” One of the YouTube segments was titled “The Yahoos.”

Rob Ford also took his first shots at possible candidate John Tory, the former Progressive Conservative leader and now chair of advocacy group CivicAction.

Tory argues that new taxes are necessary to pay for transit expansion. Ford, who himself brought in a new property tax to pay for a Scarborough subway extension, said Tory’s belief that “we need to have revenue tools” is akin to “tax, tax, tax.”

“Our friend at CivicAction wants to tax people,” Ford said. “The first thing he did when he got in at Queen’s Park, was give everyone a 35 per cent pay increase to all the MPPs. That’s the type of leader you want?”

In fact, Tory endorsed a 25 per cent pay hike, arguing that it was needed to attract top talent to the legislature. He declined to comment on Tuesday.

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Ford spent one segment railing against the council perks — free parking at municipal lots and free CNE admission, to name two — he became famous for denouncing on talk radio as a city councillor.

“Is that fair? How councillors make $110,000 a year but on top of this they get all this for free when the average hard-working person has to pay for this? No. It’s wrong,” Ford said. Councillors actually make about $105,000 per year.

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