On September 28, 2014, Brown announced his intention to run in the contest to replace
Progressive Conservative leader
Tim Hudak. From the outset of his campaign, Brown positioned himself as an outsider, challenging the leadership of the PC Party, which had been defeated in the last four provincial elections. In the most recent election campaign, in 2014, the party election platform included a commitment to cut 100,000 public service jobs over 4 years through attrition. As the only one of the original five leadership candidates who was not a member of the
Ontario legislature, Brown was not involved in the promise, which he considered ill-advised, Brown's rivals attempted to use this same lack of previous involvement in provincial politics as an argument against his leadership bid. In March, Brown emerged as the front-runner in the leadership election, having sold over 40,000 of the 70,000 memberships in the party. During the campaign, Brown was successful in bringing many new members to the party, many of whom came from ethnic communities. The past four leadership contests had been won by those who sold the most memberships. Brown was endorsed by the
Campaign Life Coalition and the
Ontario Landowners Association. During Brown's leadership bid both special interest groups actively supported him by selling Ontario PC Party memberships amongst their members. Brown was criticized by his main rival,
Christine Elliott, for not resigning his federal seat during the leadership campaign. Brown was absent from the House of Commons for some votes during the leadership campaign, attending 56 per cent of the votes from September to December in 2014. However, his overall attendance for votes in 2014 was 83 per cent. A spokesperson for Prime Minister
Stephen Harper confirmed that members are not expected to step down but are expected to "continue to fulfill their parliamentary responsibilities, including membership on committees and attendance at votes." in 2015.
Progressive Conservative leader (2015–2018) The campaign started with five candidates including
Vic Fedeli,
Lisa MacLeod, and
Monte McNaughton. All three withdrew in early 2015 citing membership recruitment or financial reasons. On May 9, 2015, Brown was elected leader, defeating his only remaining opponent,
Christine Elliott, winning with 61.8 per cent of the membership vote. Brown resigned his seat in the House of Commons on May 13, 2015, after winning the leadership and led the Progressive Conservative party from outside the legislature during most of the summer. On July 22, 2015,
Garfield Dunlop agreed to step down as MPP for
Simcoe North on August 1 in order to open up a seat for Brown. A provincial
by-election, called for September 3, 2015, was won by Brown. Under his leadership, the Ontario PC Party won five by-elections, including
Sault Ste. Marie and
Scarborough-Rouge River, two seats which had been previously held by the governing Liberals. Despite his record, Brown faced accusations of corruption and favouritism over hand picked candidates and unfair nomination contests.
Sexual misconduct allegations and resignation On January 24, 2018, Brown was accused by two women of engaging in sexual misconduct, which dated back to the time he was a federal MP. Brown denied the allegations and initially refused to step down. Four senior staffers from Brown's campaign had advised him that he should resign as party leader; he did not accept their advice. In consequence all four staffers resigned from his campaign team. After pressure from within the party, he resigned as leader in the early hours of January 25. A day later, fellow MPP,
Lisa MacLeod revealed that she heard rumours about similar allegations from former
National Hockey League player
Eric Lindros.
Dimitri Soudas, former director of communications to Prime Minister
Stephen Harper and volunteer for the campaign, suggested the allegations were baseless, saying, “All media organizations were turning over every single stone that they could find, and they couldn’t find anything.” A
Globe and Mail article revealed that Brown's staff had expressed similar concern with Brown's past relationships after he became leader. One of these was with Tamara Macgregor, a former staffer within Brown's office and daughter of Karma Macgregor, a former PC candidate. The day after he resigned, Brown was succeeded on an
interim basis by
Nipissing MPP
Vic Fedeli. Fedeli, who was unanimously elected by caucus, asked Brown to take a leave of absence from
Queen's Park while he defended himself against the allegations. In addition, Fedeli announced that he would not sign Brown's nomination papers if he attempted to run in a Barrie riding at the
June 7 provincial election. Brown had intended on running in
Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte in that election, but Fedeli's announcement would mean that he would have to run as an independent. In one incident, there was an allegation that Brown exposed himself to a teenager and asked her to engage in oral sex after plying her with alcohol. The accuser alleged that she was an 18-year-old high school student when the oral sex incident occurred; but on February 13, three weeks after the first public report, she amended her claim to say she was a year older than she had previously maintained, and was therefore over the legal drinking age. Corrections were subsequently made on the initial news articles. In the other incident, Brown was alleged to have kissed, without consent, a female aide in his employ while in his bedroom. Brown later took a lie detector test and claimed that he felt his name was cleared. No charges were laid as a result of either alleged incident and on April 23, 2018, he sued CTV for $8 million in damages. He then entered the Ontario PC leadership race less than two hours before the deadline. In March 2022, Brown and CTV reached a settlement, where CTV expressed "regrets" over the incorrect reporting of certain details in the article; no money was paid out to Brown by CTV as part of the settlement.
Expulsion from PC caucus and brief second run for the leadership Brown was ejected from the PC caucus on February 16, 2018, following reports that he was claiming he hadn't actually resigned as party leader and a series of Facebook posts in which he attacked the credibility of his accusers. Later that same day, Brown registered as a candidate for the
Progressive Conservative leadership election, pending approval from the party, and on February 21, after being vetted, Brown was given the "green light" by the PC Party to run for the leadership. Brown officially launched his second leadership campaign on February 18 with a rally in
Mississauga. On February 20, PC MPP
Randy Hillier filed complaints to the
Ontario integrity commissioner alleging that Brown had breached the province's ethics rules around down payments over his 2016 purchase of a $2.3 million waterfront house on
Lake Simcoe, a loan from a friend and undeclared travels. The house was listed for sale in 2018. On April 28, 2018, a 60-page report by the commissioner found out that Brown breached the ''Member's Integrity Act'' four times over matters involving his personal finances, but there was insufficient evidence to find him in breach over alleged travel violations. Brown withdrew his candidacy for party leadership on February 26, 2018, citing the difficulties of simultaneously running for leader while fighting against allegations against him. His withdrawal came days after the revelation that the integrity commissioner was investigating Brown for alleged financial improprieties and several hours after a report revealing his apparent interference, while he was leader, in a Tory candidate nomination that is then being investigated by
Hamilton Police for fraud. Brown's supporters cited harassment against members of his family as one cause of his decision to withdraw. Brown's $100,000 registration fee was not refunded by the party. After the election of
Doug Ford as the new leader, there were rumors that Brown would not be allowed to run under their banner.
Departure from provincial politics The Progressive Conservative Party's nomination committee unanimously ruled on March 15, 2018, that Patrick Brown would not be eligible to run as a PC candidate in
Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte for the
June 7, 2018 election. Brown announced on Twitter shortly afterward that he would not run as an independent candidate in Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte. It was later reported by the
National Post that a Snover Dhillon, a convicted fraudster banned by the federal Conservatives, played a role in all those nomination irregularities. Following his departure from provincial politics, Brown restarted his law practice and accepted a job as vice-president of a telecommunications company in
Vaughan. == Mayor of Brampton (2018–present) ==