There were dozens of reports of robocalls at Toronto homes yesterday asking residents about Mayor John Tory and gauging interest in whether or not people would support him if he ran again in a by-election.

Of course, the entire city now knows that Mayor Tory fessed up to having an affair with a much younger woman that worked for him, which is a violation of the city’s own code of conduct. He said at the time he was resigning to “take the time to reflect on my mistakes and to do the work of rebuilding the trust with my family.”

As a result of Tory’s affair, the city’s integrity commissioner is getting involved and will investigate the case no matter who ends up being mayor.

Like all political bombshells, it was delivered at the end of the day on Friday. On Monday, there was news of a group of Tory supporters on city council trying to convince him to not resign. At that point, the mayor announced his intention to stay on while the city budget was put through its paces and approved. A process that gets underway tomorrow, Feb. 15 and could last for a couple of weeks.

“This is an incredibly important budget for the City of Toronto after a challenging time, and we need his leadership,” said councillor Gary Crawford, the city’s budget chief.

Then came the robocalls. And as we know, John Tory has a long history of robocalls. It’s kind of his thing.

So our landline rang this evening, and we received this #TOpoli poll.

(I started recording on the third question) pic.twitter.com/DMFeIqvQ4B

— Gil Meslin (@g_meslin) February 14, 2023

The poll asked questions basically getting at the point of whether or not John Tory should resign and if he does whether or not he should run in the by-election to replace…him?

One Reddit commenter won the day with this quote: “And that’s why, today, we’re launching ‘ResignTO’, a pilot program which may, after adequate study, eventually result in a full resignation.” Classic.

There seems to be some unease amongst the political conservatives of the city and beyond that the so-called “strong mayor” powers Premier Doug Ford worked up for Mayor Tory would fall into the hands of some leftie do-gooder who would put the people of the city first and actually, you know, do good.

So while there are a lot of names being bandied about as potential candidates on both sides of the political spectrum there is also a lot we don’t know regarding whether or not Tory will even leave. If he decides to run again, will legitimate candidates actually go ahead and run against him, or will it revert back to the last election where a ragtag group of political neophytes’ attempt to take down the giant failed miserably.

Already many would-be great mayoral candidates are backing off: former councillor Joe Cressy, former chief city planner and one-time mayoral candidate Jennifer Keesmaat, and MPP Stan Ho, to name just a few.

Tory is due to offer an update on his intentions tomorrow, so it will be at least another 24 hours of gossip and mud-slinging. Enjoy!