Canada’s NDP has elected its new leader following a party-wide election and the winner of the leadership race is documentary filmmaker Avi Lewis.
Lewis won the leadership race with 56% of the vote over his four competitors.
The candidate with the next most votes was Edmonton’s Heather McPherson, who had 29% of the vote.
Lewis was born in Toronto in 1967 and has long been involved with politics. As the party’s ninth leader, he follows in the footsteps of his grandfather, David Lewis who was the leader of the NDP from 1971 to 1975.
David was the NDP’s second leader, taking over the party’s reins from Tommy Douglas.
The newest NDP leader began his career in broadcasting as the host of The NewMusic, a music magazine show on MuchMusic and Citytv.
He then went on to work for CBC in the late 90s and the 2000s before working for Al Jazeera.
As a filmmaker, Lewis has written, directed, produced and/or hosted six films.
Politically, Lewis has been a candidate for the NDP in both the 2021 and 2025 elections and on both occasions did not win a seat. He ran in the West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country riding in 2021 and the Vancouver Centre riding in 2025.
Lewis has become the leader of the NDP at a particularly difficult time in the party’s history.
During the 2025 election, under the leadership of former leader Jagmeet Singh, the party lost 17 seats and currently only has seven elected MPs in parliament. This loss of seats meant that technically, the NDP lost official party status which cost them a considerable amount in funding.
In a brief social media post following his win, Lewis stated that he plans to “rebuild the foundation” of the party.
