Brown considering a run in Brampton mayoral race if rival Poilievre looks likely to win Tory leadership

Brampton, Ont. Mayor Patrick Brown says he's considering a run for re-election if it seems he's going to lose to Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre in the party's September leadership race.

Brown said he's ruled out running under the federal party banner if Poilievre gets the top job and his recourse may be to ask Brampton voters to return him to the mayor's office.

"If it looks like Pierre is going to win, I would prefer to continue to serve municipally, rather than being a part of what will be an electoral train wreck of the Conservative Party," Brown told CBC News.

While he may be thinking about another run at municipal politics, Brown said he hasn't made up his mind just yet — there's still two months of campaigning to go before the leadership is decided.

"At this point, we still believe we can win this leadership, so not looking at any other possibilities at this moment," Brown said.

If Brown does decide to stay on in municipal politics, he'd have to file his paperwork for re-election by Aug. 19 — weeks before the Conservative leadership election results will be known in early September.

Brown said he'll make a decision on whether to run in the mayoral race before that cutoff date.

"I will look at the numbers at the end of the summer," he said. "It's not something I will look at until we know what this leadership race looks like and we don't even have the voters list yet."

Brown's musings about his future came as Conservative sources told CBC News that the party will release a preliminary membership list to the campaigns on Thursday.

With access to a master list, the campaigns will have a better sense of just how many memberships have actually been sold by rival campaigns.

The sources, who spoke to CBC News on the condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly about party matters, said the campaigns will have just 96 hours to review the list and flag any irregularities, like duplicates or questionable payment information, to party headquarters.

The final list of eligible voters will then will be released sometime at the end of July.

Preliminary membership sales figures released by the campaigns suggest Poilievre has a sizeable lead in the race, although the numbers have not yet been independently verified by the party.

Poilievre's team said earlier this month that they have sold more than 310,000 new memberships — an eye-popping number that his campaign said indicates their candidate can win on the first ballot. Brown has said he's sold more than 150,000 memberships.