photographs: french, granic allen courtesy of subjects; teneycke bygetty images;byrne, devlin bycp images62 toronto life December 2018Sun News Network. He brought in an old ally: the aggressive,
tight-lipped Jenni Byrne, whom the Globe and Mail once called
“the most powerful woman in Ottawa” for her role as Harper’s
campaign manager and advisor. “Byrne’s attitude toward the
media was that they should sit down and shut the fuck up,” one
person told me. “She wanted a rigid, authoritarian system where
nobody said a goddamn word.”
Ford’s team built a platform of populist planks but refused to
cost it (their fiscal plan was something along the lines of “just
trust us”). They had no media bus on the campaign, preferring
instead to reach voters directly through carefully controlled social
media, including an online channel called Ford Nation Live, which
later morphed into Ontario News Now. Ford relentlessly extolled
and exploited his outsider status, casting himself as champion of
the little guy, the anti-elite. “He’s an effective communicator,” one
city staffer told me. “People are being bombarded with informa-
tion these days, and if you can penetrate through with a short,
crisp, effective message, it’s going to resonate. He’s no dummy.
He correctly gauges the public mood.”
Scandal and chaos still followed Ford like a shadow. In early
May, after a video of Granic Allen making homophobic remarks
surfaced, Ford dumped her as a candidate in Mississauga Cen-
tre. Then, in the final days of the campaign, Rob’s widow, Renata,
filed a $16.5-million lawsuit against Ford, his brother Randy
and Deco, alleging that they had deprived her and her children
of millions of dollars.
But the facts—that he was inexperienced, turbulent, shady—
didn’t seem to matter. Ford won a majority with 76 seats and 41
per cent of the popular vote. He’d broadened the traditional Tory
coalition, adding to its older, white, affluent voters the large,
diverse and disenfranchised members of Ford Nation. Downtown
Toronto was now an island of orange in a sea of blue. Rob Ford
had pitted suburbanites against downtowners for political gain.
Doug had divided the province.W
hen Ford was at city hall, he was known for
coming into meetings bursting with new,
sometimes bizarre, often underdeveloped
ideas: putting a Ferris wheel on the waterfront,
bringing an NFL franchise to the city. Over
time, Rob Ford’s advisors, Mark Towhey and
Nick Kouvalis, realized that after hours, Doug
was consulting with a bunch of unseen, unelected friends, who
were helping him concoct these schemes. Towhey dubbed the
group the Night Shift.
One member of the Night Shift was the tall, silver-haired Dean
French, a long-time friend of Ford’s who later served as his
campaign chair. He was a hard-nosed Etobicoke business execu-
tive and lacrosse enthusiast whose last significant role in politics
was helping Stockwell Day in his Ontario campaigns. After Ford
arrived at Queen’s Park, he brought in French as his chief of staff.
At the photo shoot for this story, Ford said, “Dean should be here,
too. He’s the second most influential person in Toronto.”
French shares a lot with Jenni Byrne: both are tough, argu-
mentative and, à la Ford, proud of their direct line to the conser-
vative grassroots base. But Byrne knows how government works.
Ford and French, for better or worse, don’t. Ford wants to do
everything all at once, and when Byrne tries to put on the brakes,
he relies on French to move things forward for him. And movingFord Focusthe inner
circlethe premier’s
most influential
aides, advisors
and alliesDean French
Chief of staffA business exec and lacrosse player,
French served as an unofficial advisor
to Ford during his years at city hall and
later chaired the provincial campaign.
He’s pushed through some of Ford’s
bolder and more controversial ideas,
including the cut to city council.Kory TeneycKe
Campaign managerTeneycke is the former VP of Sun News
Network and previously worked as
Stephen Harper’s director of com-
munications. He was instrumental in
the creation of Ontario News Now, the
pseudo–news network touting Fordist
triumphs.Jenni Byrne
Principal secretaryAs Harper’s deputy chief of staff, Byrne
was known as a skilled operations
manager, executing projects with razor
efficiency. She brings the same disci-
pline to the premier’s office, though she
opposed Ford’s decision to cut council
during an election year.Tanya Granic allen
Campaign allyAn outspoken social conservative,
Granic Allen helped Ford court the far-
right vote in exchange for a promise to
repeal Kathleen Wynne’s sex-ed cur-
riculum. He ousted her as an MPP candi-
date when video surfaced of her making
homophobic comments.rueBen Devlin
AdvisorThe former CEO of Humber River Hos-
pital was frequently by the Fords’ sides
during Rob’s health crisis. He’s now
serving as special advisor to the pre-
mier on health policy—and he reports
directly to Ford, not Health Minister
Christine Elliott.The FiFTy MosTinFluenTiAl 2018DOUGFORD_SEND.indd 62 18-10-31 12:36 PM