A parachute candidate, or carpetbagger in the United States, is a pejorative term for an election candidate who does not live in the area they are running to represent and has little connection to it. The allegation is thus that a desperate political party lacking reliable talent local to the district or region is "parachuting" the candidate in for the job or that the party (or the candidate themselves) wishes to give a candidate an easier election than would happen in their home area. The term also carries the implication that the candidacy has been imposed without regard to the existing local hierarchy.parachute (v) 3a, 3b Oxford English Dictionary: Retrieved 30 September 2023.
Australia Australian Labor Party Due to its factions (Labor Left, Labor Right, and Independent Labor), Labor often has arrangements in place for preselections, which would often result in parachuting candidates. Anthony Byrne lived outside his electorate, Holt, in the neighbouring electorate of La Trobe. Andrew Charlton, a former adviser to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, was criticised for being parachuted into the Division of Parramatta to succeed retiring MP Julie Owens at the 2022 Australian federal election over local candidates who were from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Before the electoral campaign, Charlton resided in Sydney's eastern suburbs in Bellevue Hill in a property worth over $A16 million and only purchased a property in the electorate once preselected. Mary Doyle: At the time of her preselections, Doyle didn't live in the Division of Aston. Doyle lived in the suburb of Mitcham, located in the nearby Deakin electorate. Mark Dreyfus lives outside his electorate, Isaacs.Holly Hales (30 April 2022) "Inside the key seat with one big thing missing". News.com.au: Retrieved 30 September 2023. Jane Garrett, a former minister in the First Andrews Ministry in Victoria, was parachuted into the number one position in the Eastern Victoria Region at the 2018 Victorian state election, a seat that future MP Daniel Mulino vacated to run for the Division of Fraser in Melbourne's western suburbs. Garrett had been the MP for the electoral district of Brunswick, which was becoming increasingly marginal, and was criticised for her role in a dispute between the Country Fire Authority, the United Firefighters Union, and the state government in her capacity as Minister for Emergency Services. In 2004, musician and activist Peter Garrett was preselected as the Australian Labor Party's candidate for the safe seat of Kingsford Smith at the federal election that year due to the intervention of leader Mark Latham, despite opposition from the local ALP branch, who labelled him an outsider. The CFMEU issued a statement criticising his selection as "a pathetic version of political celebrity squares". Regardless, Garrett was elected to the House of Representatives. Mathew Hilakari, Labor's candidate for the newly established electorate of Point Cook, was parachuted in for the 2022 Victorian state election. Hilakari, before pre-selection, was residing in Melbourne's southeastern suburbs in Seaford. He is also the convenor for Labor's Socialist Left faction (of which Premier Daniel Andrews is a part) in Victoria. Ged Kearney: As of 2018, Kearney didn't live in her electorate, Cooper at the time. Former Premier of New South Wales Kristina Keneally was preselected as Labor candidate for the 2017 Bennelong by-election. She lived 800 metres outside the electorate, which, combined with her high profile, attracted accusations of parachuting. Keneally sought preselection for the House of Representatives again in 2021, this time for the electorate of Fowler in western Sydney despite living in the city's affluent northern suburbs. She was also criticised for making the move despite retiring member Chris Hayes having already endorsed local Vietnamese Australian lawyer Tu Le as his successor in a working-class, migrant-rich neighbourhood. With heavy publicity drawn toward what is normally one of the safest seats in Australian politics, Keneally suffered a massive swing against the previous result and lost the seat for Labor for the only time in its 13-election existence, with parts of the area being held as far back as 1934 when it was part of Werriwa. This resulted in a former Liberal Party member who turned independent, Vietnamese Australian and former refugee Dai Le, being elected, and then retaining her seat in the subsequent election even with Tu Le being her main opponent. In 2013, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd asked Jason Yat-Sen Li to run as the Labor candidate for the seat of Bennelong at the 2013 federal election even though he did not live in the electorate. He lost the election.He would later go onto be elected for the electoral district of Strathfield at a by-election in 2022. In 2007, journalist Maxine McKew was preselected as Labor candidate in the forthcoming federal election for Bennelong, represented by then-Prime Minister John Howard. McKew did not live in the electorate then, and sold her home in Mosman to move before the election. She went on to defeat Howard, becoming the first candidate to unseat a sitting prime minister in an election since 1929, when Jack Holloway defeated Stanley Bruce at Flinders. Daniel Mulino is the current MP for the Division of Fraser in Melbourne's western suburbs. Mulino had previously been a member of the Victorian Legislative Council for the Eastern Victoria Region, a seat he vacated for Jane Garrett. Before his tenure in the Parliament of Victoria, Mulino was a councillor and mayor for the City of Casey. Mulino lived in the electorate of Fraser in the 2019 Australian federal election, in which he was elected. Clare O'Neil previously lived in East Melbourne, outside her electorate, Hotham, but bought a house in Oakleigh in 2020. In 2013, athlete Nova Peris was preselected as Labor's leading candidate for the Senate in the Northern Territory. Peris was born and raised in the Northern Territory, but her selection was received with controversy due to her celebrity status and the personal intervention of leader and Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who described the selection as a "captain's pick". Maria Vamvakinou: While she was MP from 2001 until 2025, she lived in Northcote, which lies outside her electorate, Calwell.
Coalition Despite representing Menzies for nearly thirty-one years, Kevin Andrews never lived there. He lived in neighbouring Jagajaga. Russell Broadbent: Broadbent while the MP for Monash, and his wife lived outside his electorate in Pakenham, Victoria, in the Division of La Trobe. Georgina Downer was Liberal candidate for the electorate of Mayo in the 2018 by-election. Daughter of long-serving MP for Mayo Alexander Downer, Downer had grown up in the area and proclaimed that she was "coming home" in the by-election. However, she had lived most of her life in Adelaide and Melbourne and sought preselection for a seat in the latter during the 2016 election. She lost to Centre Alliance incumbent Rebekha Sharkie. Eric Hutchinson did not live in his electorate, Lyons, but in neighbouring Bass. In 2013, Liberal National Senator Barnaby Joyce was preselected as Nationals candidate for the New South Wales seat of New England. Joyce was raised in Tamworth, within the electorate, but had lived in Queensland for over twenty years and represented the state in the Senate since 2005. Former President of the Australian Labor Party Warren Mundine was a parachute candidate for the Liberal Party of Australia in the Division of Gilmore at the 2019 federal election to succeed retiring MP Ann Sudmalis. Prior to Mundine's selection, the local party branches had preselected Grant Schultz, whose candidacy would eventually be overridden by the party's state executive to select Mundine instead at the request of Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Fiona Phillips of the Australian Labor Party defeated Mundine: she received a two-party swing of 3.34 per cent while Schultz contested the electorate as an independent candidate, receiving 7,585 votes. After the resignation of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull from Parliament in 2018, Dave Sharma was preselected as the Liberal candidate in the resulting by-election at Wentworth. Sharma did not live in the electorate at the time. He narrowly lost the by-election, but successfully contested the seat again several months later in the 2019 federal election. In the 2022 federal general election, Independent candidate Allegra Spender defeated Sharma. Brett Whiteley did not live in his electorate of Braddon during the 2016 election campaign, but in neighbouring Lyons, at Squeaking Point near Port Sorell. Jason Wood, the MP for La Trobe, lives with his family in Mount Dandenong, approximately 11 km outside his electorate, in the Division of Casey.
Canada Situations in which a candidate will frequently run in an area with which they do not have a connection are: When a party wins many seats in an election, but the party leader does not win their own seat, if the leader does not resign, a member in a safe seat may be persuaded to resign and allow the leader to run in the ensuing by-election. When a party elects a new leader who is not a sitting member, and the next general election is anticipated to be some years away, the leader may opt to run in a by-election that happens to occur before then, even in a district to which they have little personal connection, solely in order that the leader should have a seat and be able to participate directly in the House of Commons or legislature. In a district where a party has few resources and is very unlikely to win, it may field a paper candidate with no connection to the area, solely to make sure it has candidates in all districts. Usually such a candidate engages in no or very limited real campaign activities. Depending on the circumstances, these maneuvers may attract more or less controversy.
Federal In the 2008 Canadian federal election, in Newfoundland and Labrador, the New Democratic Party nominated Phyllis Artiss, who lived in St. John's, for the northern riding of Labrador. Artiss was nominated in the absence of any local candidate and admitted that she found her candidacy to be not ideal: "It would be much better to have someone from Labrador who has lived there all their lives or much of their lives and worked there, and I haven't done that." Artiss was unsuccessful in her bid. Former Prime Minister Joe Clark, an Albertan, was seen as a parachute candidate when he ran for election in the Nova Scotia riding of Kings—Hants at a by-election in 2000. Clark had been elected leader of the Progressive Conservatives for the second time in 1998 and was seeking a seat in the House of Commons; incumbent Tory MP Scott Brison had stepped aside for Clark. He was elected, but in the 2000 federal election, he instead sought election in the Alberta riding of Calgary Centre. He won in Calgary Centre, making it the only constituency to flip to the PCs. Chrystia Freeland faced accusations of being a parachute candidate after the Liberal Party nominated her for the safe seat of Toronto Centre at a 2013 by-election (which its former interim leader Bob Rae had represented), as she was born in rural northern Alberta and lived in New York City at the time. She ultimately won the seat. Kellie Leitch was accused of being a parachute candidate when she sought the Conservative nomination in the Ontario riding of Simcoe—Grey in 2011. Leitch was born in Winnipeg and worked in Toronto at the time of her nomination. Leitch won the seat over candidates including Helena Guergis, the former Conservative Member of Parliament whom she defeated for the nomination and who ran as an independent.