McCallum was first elected to Surrey City Council in the 1993 election representing the Surrey Electors Team, a party which included members of the Social Credit Party of British Columbia. Doug McCallum was elected mayor in the 1996 election. He was seen as having pro-business and pro-development views, and campaigned on enhanced public safety and enacting the zero-based budgeting model in municipal governance to achieve zero-increase property taxes, which was a misstatement about the purpose of zero-based budgeting, which operates similarly to the planning-programming budgeting system but rather than submitting the previous operating numbers, departments or units submit zeros and councils determine a new figure. He won re-election as Surrey's mayor in the 1999 and 2002 municipal elections. McCallum ran again for a fourth term in the 2005 municipal elections but was soundly defeated by his emergent rival, Dianne Watts, a former fellow member of his party, the Surrey Electors Team. McCallum then sought the Conservative Party nomination for the 2006 Canadian election in the riding on Newton—North Delta, after the incumbent Gurmant Grewal stepped down. McCallum missed the deadline and instead the Conservatives chose Phil Eidsvik. In 2010, McCallum was hired as CEO of Harness Racing of B. C. After Watts announced she would not seek re-election in 2014, McCallum announced his intention to run for the position in the November 2014 election. Part of his Safe Surrey Coalition campaign included resistance to the city's renovating Newton Athletic Park to recruit the USL Pro team of the Vancouver Whitecaps FC. McCallum lost to Watts' successor, Linda Hepner, coming in second place with 26.97% of the votes. In 2018, McCallum sought to get elected after previous Surrey Mayor, Linda Hepner, said that she wouldn't seek re-election. Surrey First appointed then city councillor Tom Gill to run the Surrey First slate. In McCallum's Manifesto for his Safe Surrey Coalition slate, he pledged to replace Surrey's planned Light Rail Transit system with expanding the already existing SkyTrain network connected to Vancouver and the rest of the lower mainland. His plan would see the Expo Line extended from King George station to Langley. He also argued that Surrey's RCMP operated by the Canadian federal government is ineffective at combating crime, especially the growing gang problem in North Surrey. He promised to create a new "Surrey Police Force", which would operate off of pre-existing equipment and facilities. On October 20, 2018, McCallum was elected for his fourth term as the mayor of Surrey. In 2020, McCallum gained criticism in the media when he refused to allow Uber drivers to operate in the city of Surrey. McCallum said that the reason for the ban on Uber drivers was done so in order to protect the jobs of the cab drivers working in Surrey. As part of the ban against Uber, any Uber driver that was caught driving within the Surrey city limits while driving a passenger would have to pay $500.
