After months of party turmoil and a day of resisting a motion certifying his removal, John Rustad has resigned as leader of the BC Conservatives.

Rustad confirmed his decision in a statement Thursday morning.

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On Wednesday, party officials released a statement, claiming the board of directors deemed him “professionally incapacitated and unable to continue” as leader.

Rustad originally rejected the motion, taking the leader’s seat in the Legislature Wednesday, and stating he was “not going anywhere.”

“I know many are concerned by what they saw yesterday, but I want to assure every member and supporter of the caucus and the party that this was not a hostile takeover by BC Liberals. We remain a Conservative party,” said Rustad’s statement.

“British Columbia needs a strong and unified opposition that is ready to hold this government to account and defeat it. I have full confidence in our caucus, and I will continue to support our team as they fight for British Columbians every day.”

Surrey-White Rock MLA Trevor Halford has been appointed as interim leader, while the party begins the process of an official leadership race.

Speaking to media from Victoria Thursday, Halford praised Rustad, saying his resignation has left the party feeling “united.”

As interim leader, he says he’s unlikely to make any major changes to the party.

“I am not running to be the next premier of this province,” said Halford. “But I am going to support whoever accepts that and gets that by the membership. They will have my utmost support. But I’m also not going to make decisions that are going to be — should be made by somebody that takes over the office once the membership have made that choice.”

Party President Aisha Estey took to social media Thursday, thanking Rustad for his decision and congratulating him on his achievements.

“Under your leadership, the Party made history,” Estey wrote.

University of the Fraser Valley Political Scientist Hamish Telford suspects Rustad was “hurt by the coup” while he resisted resignation.

“But there are legalities and realities, and I think overnight, those realities set in that he could not hang on here — that the party didn’t want him anymore — and that’s got to hurt,” said Telford.

Rustad is expected to remain in the Conservative caucus, and Telford says he’s curious to see what role the former leader will play.

“Does he play the loyal foot soldier, and go along with the new interim leadership, and supportive of the leadership contest, and the new leader that comes out of that? Or does he play a disruptive role along with his allies in the caucus? And how do his allies in the caucus want to play this? Are they going to encourage him to run for the leadership again — which I think would be very disruptive — ?”

In the course of roughly one year since the 2024 election, five MLAs, including Elenore Sturko, left the B.C. Conservative Party, citing disappointment with Rustad.

Telford wonders if the Surrey-Cloverdale MLA will now return to the party.

“Is there a draught Elenore movement? She is certainly the person I think with the highest profile. But undoubtedly, there will be others. I think the great difficulty that John Rustad had as leader is that this is a party now with multiple different factions with their own concerns. And I’m guessing that leadership candidates will come forward from these different factions, and part of the leadership race will be to define what the party is all about.”

He says the next leader will face the same problems as Rustad.

“It has always been difficult to unite the right in British Columbia because it’s bringing together people with different ideological viewpoints. And that is more true than ever. And a new formula is going to have to be found that brings, if not all of them together, a large portion of them together. A consensus has to be reached on a new formula. And inevitably, this is not going to include everybody. There may be people further to the right in the party that don’t support this new consensus, and there may be people closer to the centre who are not entirely comfortable with it either, but it would help the party become a little bit more ideologically coherent if some of the fringes fade away.”

Halford says the leadership race will be a “great opportunity” for his party.

“I’ve been a part of a few leadership races that people have said there’s going to be fractures in after they occur. And actually, there was unification,” said the interim leader.

Halford could not provide an exact timeline for the race.

—With files from Ben Bouguerra