Listen to this article
Estimated 5 minutes
The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.
Three leading candidates for mayor are getting ready to march in the Capital Pride parade this weekend, but a fourth says he’ll be sitting it out.
Alex Lawson said the parade has too often found itself embroiled in controversy for him to march. He says he will only be participating in a side event earlier in the week.
“If the Pride parade was about celebrating people having the opportunity to love who they love, then I would definitely be there marching alongside them,” he said. “But the fact is that Capital Pride specifically has been very divisive over the last few years.
“There’s been a lot of controversies surrounding the group Capital Pride. They’ve been very exclusionary,” Lawson added.
Mayoral candidate Alex Lawson at an OC Transpo station on Aug. 4, 2026. (Mathieu Deroy/CBC)
He wouldn’t specify exactly which controversy motivated his decision. Capital Pride’s 2024 statement on Palestine and the war in Gaza proved contentious, but when that was put to Lawson he would only say that “many” examples influenced his decision, without naming them.
By contrast, Mark Sutcliffe, Jeff Leiper and Neil Saravanamuttoo are planning to participate in the Aug. 30 parade. Sutcliffe and Leiper say they will be part of the official City of Ottawa float, while Saravanamuttoo said he is registered in the parade and will march with his team.
“This is an opportunity for us to show our support for the people who have fought hard and won some very difficult battles over the years,” Sutcliffe said. “We can’t at this time let down our guard.”
Mayor Mark Sutcliffe, right, at a Pride flag-raising ceremony outside the Mary Pitt Centre in Nepean in 2024. (CBC)
Without mentioning Lawson by name, he said all candidates should be there.
“When you’re a leader in a community, when you aspire to be a leader in a community, when you want to show that you’re bringing people together in a community, you have to show up for them and you have to have their backs,” he said. “You have to demonstrate your support.”
‘The big day is the parade’
Fae Johnstone, executive director of Queer Momentum and an organizer of several events during this year’s Pride week, said the decision to march may be symbolic, but it’s also important to the community.
“It has meaning,” she said. “It is about what kind of mayor do we want, and the mayor that I want, that I think most of us want, is one who will show up and deliver for the people of Ottawa, but also for communities that are not as included as others in this city.”
Lawson said he will go to a community breakfast event on Thursday hosted by Capital Pride and Operation Come Home, and is excited to hear the concerns of the community there. But Johnstone said that’s not good enough.
“The big day is the parade,” she said. “It’s the moment where our community is out in all of our glory and celebrating all that we offer this city. I think going to a side event just doesn’t cut it.”
She called his argument about past controversies “a cop-out.”
But Johnstone also faulted both Lawson and Sutcliffe for sitting out a queer mayoral town hall she helped organize this past Sunday, saying there’s a difference between “standing as the mayor for a pretty photo and holding a flag versus being in a real conversation.”
Sutcliffe’s campaign said he wasn’t able to attend that event due to scheduling issues.
Saravanamuttoo and Leiper were at the debate, and say it’s important for them to be at the parade as well.
Jeff Leiper on Wellington Street W., a main street in his central Ottawa ward. (Arthur White-Crummey/CBC)
“Visibility and legitimacy and recognition continue to be key issues,” Leiper said. “Homophobia and transphobia continues to permeate too much of society, and I think it is really important to know that, whoever is elected mayor, that the city of Ottawa will continue to recognize and legitimize and validate the existence of queer and trans people in this city.”
Leiper said his participation in Capital Pride won’t be limited to the parade. He said his campaign will also have a booth on Bank Street and he will be “spending hours there talking to people” at the event.
Saravanamuttoo said he wants to be there to show his solidarity for a community that’s been under attack.
“I think there’s an important role for public figures, politicians, to show their support and to try to help change attitudes,” he said.
“It’s really important for the voting public to understand the values that candidates have, and so this is one way of expressing the values that are important to me.”
Mayoral candidate Neil Saravanamuttoo says it’s important to show solidarity at the Capital Pride parade, and at the previous weekend’s debate. (Francis Ferland/CBC)