Marilyn Gladu didn’t cross the floor—she hijacked our riding for herself

The recent floor-crossing of Sarnia-Lambton–Bkejwanong MP Marilyn Gladu reveals a long-standing pattern of prioritizing personal power over the needs of her constituents. Her career has consistently favored institutional hierarchy and selective credit-taking over the grounded interests of local workers and families.

On April 8, 2026, Sarnia-Lambton–Bkejwanong MP Marilyn Gladu crossed the floor to join the Liberal caucus. The next day in Montreal, at the Liberal national convention, she told reporters it was “the best thing for my riding, for the country and for myself.”

For once, the mask slipped. In that single sentence, Gladu offered the clearest honesty of her decade in office. It was never primarily about the workers and families of our riding or the everyday realities of our community. It was about what served Marilyn Gladu. To anyone who has followed her record—as I have documented since 2016—this wasn’t a shocking betrayal. It was the logical endpoint of a career built on opportunism.

I’ve written about this pattern before. In “Marilyn Gladu and Her Dangerous Religious Beliefs” (August 12, 2019) and “Why I Had To Say Something About Marilyn Gladu” (September 1, 2019), I raised concerns after a direct conversation with her. In The Sarnia Journal, I returned to the theme in pieces like “Marilyn Gladu and the problem of political double-talk” (April 9, 2025) and my December 2025 column on her “war on faith” rhetoric. The floor-crossing doesn’t contradict that body of work. It confirms it.

A Theology That Sides with Power Over People

Gladu’s faith has never been the radical, neighbour-loving theology of place that many in Sarnia-Lambton–Bkejwanong live out through local churches and community groups. It has consistently functioned as a top-down framework that protects power structures at the expense of the vulnerable.

During our conversation, she told me her “Christian background would say that the Jews are God’s people… Palestine does not have any documented rights… Palestinians are squatting on their land.” She has long equated criticism of Israeli policy with anti-Semitism and sided with state power over documented Palestinian suffering. This isn’t traditional Christian conservatism rooted in justice for the least of these. It is a view that accommodates the strong while dismissing the weak—whether abroad or here at home.

The same pattern shows up in her local defence of coercive practices. She has pushed petitions claiming broad support from the riding’s churches for protecting “religious freedom,” while many local congregations publicly rejected her approach on issues like conversion therapy and deceptive practices in some crisis pregnancy centres. As I wrote in my December 2025 Sarnia Journal column, her rhetoric about a “war on faith” isn’t really about protecting genuine belief. It’s about shielding institutions that exercise power over vulnerable people. Her convictions—religious or otherwise—have always bent toward preserving hierarchy rather than challenging it on behalf of our neighbours.

Voting Against Sarnia, Then Claiming Credit

The economic record tells the same story of opportunism. Gladu has repeatedly celebrated federal investments in our riding while voting against the budgets that made them possible. As I detailed in my April 2025 analysis, she took credit for funding related to the Oversized Load Corridor, FedDev initiatives, COVID recovery dollars, and healthcare investments—including dental care expansions—after voting against the very bills that enabled them. These projects and supports happened in spite of her votes in Ottawa, not because of them.

She has been a professional passenger—showing up for the ribbon-cuttings while undermining the legislative road that got us there. The workers and families of our riding deserved better than photo-ops that masked her actual record.

Opportunism and Xenophobic Rhetoric When It Suited Her

Her flexibility has also appeared in fear-mongering. In 2018, during debate on cannabis legalization, Gladu linked Mexican visitors to drug cartels, suggesting relaxed visa rules would let “lots of experienced people… move in and take over the whole thing.” The Mexican embassy pushed back, calling out the stereotyping. She has also suggested immigrants unhappy with certain cultural expectations should “pick a different country.”

This wasn’t consistent, principled conservatism. It was rhetoric chosen to rally a base at the time—then set aside when a different path to influence opened up.

The Byelection Hypocrisy

In January 2026, Gladu backed the idea that MPs who cross the floor should face an automatic byelection. She said the whole point of being an MP is to represent your constituents, so if you switch parties, “we deserve a chance to have a redo.”

Three months later, she refuses to resign and let Sarnia-Lambton–Bkejwanong voters decide. Her seat, it turns out, was never truly the voters’ to begin with—it was hers to trade when a better vehicle for power appeared. If she truly believed our riding deserves that redo, she would step down and let the community speak.

Different Colour, Same Interest

Sarnia-Lambton–Bkejwanong didn’t elect a representative who would put our community first above all. We got a careerist who used the Conservative banner from 2015 onward as a stepping stone, then moved to the Liberals the moment it suited her personal and political interests.

As I’ve argued for years, this isn’t about party labels. It’s about who actually shows up for the people of our riding—the workers keeping things going, the families raising kids here, the churches and community groups doing the quiet, grounded work that matters. Gladu’s record shows a consistent preference for power-serving positions, selective credit-taking, and flexible rhetoric over steady, place-based representation.

Listen to her own words in Montreal: “the best thing… for myself.”

Sarnia-Lambton–Bkejwanong deserves better than a politician whose convictions always seem to bend toward whoever holds the keys to power at the moment. The floor-crossing isn’t a surprising flip. It’s the confirmation of what many of us have seen coming for a long time.

Different colour. Same interest.