Given results from the latest polls, it appears the hotly contested mayoral race in Mississauga is up for grabs with three weeks remaining until election night.

Two of three polls to release results the past couple of days have former mayor Bonnie Crombie with narrow leads over Mayor Carolyn Parrish while a third shows the incumbent with a nine-point advantage over her predecessor.

Liaison Strategies said Monday morning its latest Mississauga Tracker survey finds Crombie at 30 per cent, Parrish at 29 per cent, Ward 2 Coun. Alvin Tedjo at 26 per cent and Ward 7 Coun. Dipika Damerla at 11 per cent among decided and leaning voters. The remaining four per cent said they’d vote for someone else.

The pollster, a national public opinion research firm, noted “Tedjo has more than doubled his support since August, bringing the three candidates within four points of one another.”

An August Liaison poll showed Parrish and Crombie tied at 35 per cent, Damerla with 18 per cent and Tedjo with 12 per cent.

(Source: Liaison Strategies)

For its latest poll, Liaison said it surveyed a random sample of 1,000 Mississauga residents from Oct. 2-4 using Interactive Voice Recording technology. Participants were reached through random digit dialing across both landline and cellphone networks.

For the total sample, the margin of error is +/- 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20, and is higher for subsamples, including decided and leaning voters, Liaison noted.

David Valentin, principal at Liaison Strategies, observed Crombie has a narrow lead over Parrish, with Tedjo closing the gap.

“Tedjo’s gains coincide with an increase in his earned media coverage since August, when Crombie dominated the coverage,” Valentin said. “He is attracting more attention, and the race is becoming more competitive.”

Last 30 Days: 56,393 Votes

All Time: 1,559,775 Votes

1065 VOTES
What’s the biggest issue in this municipal election?

(Source: Liaison Strategies)

Meanwhile, the latest poll conducted by Toronto-based Pallas Data shows Parrish with nearly a double-digit lead over Crombie.

The pollster released its results on Saturday, showing Parrish sitting at 34 per cent (two points up from Pallas’ last poll in early September), Crombie at 25 per cent (two points down from last poll), Tedjo at 21 per cent (two points up from last poll) and Damerla at 14 per cent (two points up from last poll) among decided and leaning voters.

The “another candidate” option garnered seven per cent of votes.

Pallas noted, according to its data, 28 per cent of Mississauga voters remain undecided in advance of the Oct. 26 municipal election.

Pallas Data said its latest survey was conducted on Sept. 30 and Oct. 1 among a sample of 503 eligible Mississauga voters. It added the margin of error is +/- 4.4 percentage points at the 95 per cent confidence level.

“Opposition vote is divided”

“Parrish is ahead because the main opposition vote is divided between Bonnie Crombie and Alvin Tedjo,” said Dr. Joseph Angolano, founder and CEO of Pallas Data. “She might be in trouble if that vote coalesces around one candidate, but Crombie and Tedjo are performing well enough in their own right and maintain their share of the vote.”

Pallas noted its latest poll was completed this past Thursday night, as the latest mayoral debate featuring the four main candidates was ending. That debate, Pallas further noted, “made headlines for how heated it was. Therefore, the (poll) results predate any reaction to it.

“It was a raucous debate, and we don’t know yet how voters took it,” Angolano said. “What this poll shows is where the race stood going in, with more than a quarter of voters undecided.”

Pallas said its most-recent Mississauga mayoral survey was conducted using automated telephone interviews (IVR) on landlines and cellphones.

Third poll shows Crombie with slight lead

Results of a poll conducted by Toronto-based Mainstreet Research also released on Saturday show Crombie with a nearly three-point lead over Parrish.

The pollster, in what it describes as “a divided race,” puts Crombie ahead with 30.4 per cent while Parrish checks in at 27.6 per cent. Tedjo follows with 20.5 per cent while Damerla registered 10.4 per cent.

“The Mississauga mayoral race is the most heated race we will see in 2026,” said Mainstreet president and CEO Quito Maggi.

“The clash of these two political heavyweights, and the emergence of the new challenger in Tedjo, is one for the ages,” he added.

Similar to other municipal races, Mainstreet noted, voters in Mississauga cite affordability and cost of living as a top issue (32.7 per cent) in this election followed by crime and safety (18.5 per cent).

In addition to the three most-recent mayoral surveys, an INSAUGA Canada head-to-head poll conducted last week showed Parrish with significantly more support than Crombie among readers who answered a question about the upcoming Mississauga election.

The poll asked: Who will you vote for as Mississauga mayor?

Exactly 1,000 votes were cast, with 628 respondents, or 62.8 per cent, choosing Parrish, compared with 372 votes, or 37.2 per cent, for Crombie.

The poll was specifically a head-to-head question between Parrish and Crombie and did not include the other candidates running for mayor.

Crombie left mayor’s post in 2024

Crombie left the Mississauga mayor’s post in early 2024 after 10 years to lead the Ontario Liberals and take a shot at unseating Ontario Premier Doug Ford.

Parrish subsequently won a mayoral byelection in June 2024, defeating, among others, Tedjo, Damerla and Ward 1 Coun. Stephen Dasko.

The two highest-profile mayoral candidates have gone head-to-head in a heated municipal election campaign prior to 2026, with Crombie defeating Parrish (2,479 votes to 2,239 votes) in a September 2011 byelection for the Ward 5 council seat.

The other 10 candidates for mayor of Mississauga are:

David Shaw — ran in both the 2024 mayoral byelection and 2022 municipal election for mayor. Registered to run May 1
Mike Matulewicz — ran in the 2024 mayoral byelection. Registered to run May 5
Amjad Jilani — registered to run July 14
Frank Fang — ran in the 2024 mayoral byelection and competed for the Ward 9 council seat in the 2022 municipal election. Registered to run July 15
Fadi Naami — registered to run July 20
Karam Ahmed — registered to run Aug. 20
Aamir Bhatti — registered to run Aug. 21
Gord Elliott — registered to run Aug. 21
Mohsin Khan — registered to run Aug. 18
Ana Luisa Vasquez De Espinal — registered to run Aug. 11

For more information on who’s running and the election in general, visit the city’s election page online.


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