A senior Progressive Conservative candidate has been caught on camera telling a potential voter that a widely-circulated 2018 video of Doug Ford promising to open the Greenbelt for development is “fake news” and was possibly created using artificial intelligence.
The comments by Todd McCarthy, who served as a Progressive Conservative cabinet minister between 2023 and 2025, were caught on a doorbell camera on Feb. 12 as the Durham candidate was door-knocking ahead of the election.
The video was sent to Global News and shows a short conversation between McCarthy and the resident about Ontario’s protected Greenbelt land.
At first, McCarthy defended the Progressive Conservatives’ record telling the voter that his party “strengthened the Greenbelt” with new legislation after party leader Doug Ford’s decision to open 7,400 acres of the land for housing development at the end of 2022.
Less than a year after opening the land for development, Ford was forced to apologize and reverse the decision.
“It was not handled well at all, the premier said so,” McCarthy said in the doorbell video. “That’s what I love about Premier Ford. When he makes a mistake on procedure or otherwise, he says, ‘I’m sorry we’re not doing it anymore.’”
The resident, Lisa Crompton, then presses McCarthy on a 2018 video in which Ford told donors at a private fundraising event that planned to “open a big chunk” of the Greenbelt for housing development.
“There’s video of him talking to developers beforehand saying that he was going to open up the Greenbelt,” Crompton told McCarthy.
“That’s not true,” McCarthy said. “I think that’s fake news, I know the premier.”
When Crompton pressed the matter insisting that she had seen the video — one that was widely reported on during the 2018 election campaign –McCarthy raised the spectre of artificial intelligence.
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“That’s fake news. Heard about AI? Be careful… people can make anyone look like anything,” he said.
Compton told Global News the conversation with McCarthy was longer than the Greenbelt and exchange and also hit on topics like health care and education. At the end of the conversation, they touched on the scandal.
“Honestly, the entire Greenbelt thing made me pretty upset — just the entire way it was handled, I did not like,” she said.
“I just wanted to know where he stood on it, to be honest. Was he also wanting to give away chunks of the Greenbelt?”
When McCarthy suggested the 2018 video could be fake, Compton said she was shocked.
“I was dumbfounded, I was incredulous,” she said. “Honestly, it was gaslighting and it was lying. I wouldn’t tolerate that from my friends, I wouldn’t tolerate it from my kids, I shouldn’t tolerate it from my MPP.”
The Progressive Conservative campaign did not respond to questions from Global News in time for publication.
During the 2018 election, the secretly recorded video in question showed Ford telling a room of people he would “open up the Greenbelt” if elected. In the video, he said he would “open a big chunk of it up” to start building new housing.
The authenticity of the video was not questioned by the Progressive Conservative campaign in 2018 nor by the PC leader, who has made reference to it since and faced questions about it.
The release of the clip in 2018 put Ford on the defensive and he was forced to make a promise ahead of that election.
“Unequivocally, we won’t touch the Greenbelt,” Ford said during his first election campaign after the video emerged. “I’ve heard it loud and clear; people don’t want me touching the Greenbelt, we won’t touch the Greenbelt.”
When he won a second consecutive majority in 2022, Ford broke that promise and instructed his housing minister to remove land from the Greenbelt. That decision was ultimately reversed and Ford was forced to apologize.
The PC leader referenced the video and chain of Greenbelt events during the recent Ontario election debate.
“I think I was pretty clear,” Ford said on Feb. 18, referring what he said in the video.
“I said I was and then I wasn’t and then I went ahead and did it. But in saying that, I apologized to the people… I apologized to the people, we’re moving forward, we’re building homes.”
When Ford was forced to reverse his Greenbelt removals in 2023, two of his ministers resigned and several senior staff also stepped away. Opposition politicians hoped the scandal would define the next election.
The snap winter campaign, however, has seen few references to the reversal.
The Ontario Liberals have concentrated on health-care, promising everyone a family doctor within four years, and the Ontario NDP has zeroed-in on affordability, pledging a grocery rebate.
The Progressive Conservatives have kept the conversation laser-focused on the United States and the threat of U.S. tariffs, while the Greens have targeted a few select ridings they hope to pick up.
The election will take place on Feb. 27.
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