OTTAWA — In the wake of new allegations of foreign interference, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau insisted he has no information about money from the Chinese government working its way into Canadian elections.
Global News reported Wednesday on two briefing notes it obtained through intelligence sources that indicated the government was warned in 2019 and 2022 that the Chinese government was funnelling money to Canadian election candidates.
Senior government figures have attempted to downplay the significance of the leaks
Top federal officials have downplayed the quality of leaked intelligence on the Chinese regime’s election interference in Canada, but a review of what has been reported shows that they are more than just uncorroborated sole-source observations.
Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs David Morrison told the Commons Procedure and House Affairs Committee (PROC) on March 2 that there was no interference in recent elections and backed his position by saying disparate intelligence reports can be unreliable.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he knows Canadians still have questions about China’s role in the past two elections — but he’s still refusing to answer specific questions about the briefings he has received.
Instead, he suggested Wednesday a recently announced special rapporteur and two intelligence agencies are better placed to look into what kind of information was shared with whom.
“To be quite honest, I know that no matter what I say, Canadians continue to have questions about what we did and what we didn’t,” he told reporters on Parliament Hill Wednesday.
The RCMP says it’s still investigating two scientists ejected from Canada’s top infectious disease lab almost four years ago, sparking debate about whether the force is up to the task — or the government is committed to seeing through the potentially embarrassing case.
Questions about whether the Prime Minister’s Office was briefed on alleged Chinese interference in the 2019 election dominated question period again on Wednesday — with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau calling suggestions that he isn’t loyal to Canada “despicable.”
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre tried multiple times Wednesday to get the prime minister to respond to allegations that he and his national security adviser were warned that Chinese government officials were funnelling money to Canadian political candidates — despite their claims to the contrary.
Justin Trudeau’s Liberals are certainly desperate to stop Katie Telford from testifying about China’s election interference.
Telford, Trudeau’s chief of staff, has testified before Commons committees at least twice in the past couple of years on controversial topics with no issues.
An all pervasive corruption engulfs the land courtesy of the Liberal Party.
When the Globe and Mail told the nation that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) expressed concerns to the government about Chinese interference in our elections the Prime Minister’s immediate concern was not the interference but the fact that the CSIS memo was leaked.
“Let me also be very clear to a really important point that I think some folks are choosing to overlook in a free democracy,” Prime Minister Trudeau said. “It is not up to unelected security officials to dictate to political parties who can or cannot run. That’s a really important principle.”
So, CSIS does security and the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) does politics. Sound familiar? It was the same line of argument made over whether the government could invoke the Emergencies Act. That Act needed to be “modernized” so that the government could deal with the political realities of public disorder and not rely on the CSIS national security threat. Unfortunately, Justice Rouleau agreed.
It shows that multiculturalism has turned Canada into a divided nation of Fifth Columns.
Justin Trudeau said he was never briefed on the issue, and his security adviser has dismissed it out of hand, but two high-level national security reports before and after the 2019 election suggest they were warned that Chinese government officials were funnelling money to Canadian political candidates.
The two intelligence reports, from 2019 and 2022, raise questions about what senior federal officials knew about the alleged funding by a foreign interference network and how seriously the Trudeau government took the warnings.
It’s clear that Trudeau knew about China’s direct interference in Canadian elections but chose to ignore it because it worked in the Liberal party’s favour.
What’s needed is for Singh to do the right thing. But that won’t happen.
Call the RCMP? Even if you could would you knowing about Lucki et al?
OTTAWA – NDP leader Jagmeet Singh is prepared to give the Liberals’ plan for a special rapporteur to look into foreign interference the benefit of the doubt, but he argued a public inquiry would be a better approach to restoring Canadians confidence in their elections.
What garbage. Singh will not lift a finger to derail his meal-ticket.
Somewhere in Canada this very minute, an “eminent Canadian” may be letting all calls go to voice mail.
A new job has opened up. Wanted: someone who can restore people’s faith in democracy against a surge of partisan cynicism rarely seen before in this country.
Justin Trudeau has handed out hard tasks before, but whatever person answers the call for a “special rapporteur” on foreign election interference could well find it to be mission impossible.
Henhouse meet fox.
While Americans have been immersed in assorted political nonsense, real revelations came out about China’s involvement in Canada’s elections that are bad enough that even the media was forced to cover them.
Two weeks ago, Justin Trudeau was at pains to dismiss explosive reports of electoral interference as inaccurate or racist. But backed into a very tight corner, a desperate prime minister came out with all guns blazing on Monday.
It seemed Trudeau, whose job is looking increasingly precarious by the day, was intent on creating so much noise that it would drown out the calls for a public inquiry into this matter.
Canadian opposition parties are welcome to suggest who should serve as the “special rapporteur” charged with overseeing investigations into alleged Chinese interference, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre accused Prime Minster Justin Trudeau of playing into China’s hands by refusing to hold a public inquiry on foreign interference.
Mr. Poilievre called a news conference Tuesday to respond to the Prime Minister’s decision to name two closed door panels to investigate Chinese election interference that would later be reviewed by a special rapporteur appointed by him.
That was a neat trick the Prime Minister pulled off Monday evening.
I don’t mean just the breathtaking change in communications strategy, on the issue that threatens to devour his government: foreign (specifically Chinese) interference in our elections. The sullen stonewalling of the last several weeks was instantly transformed into a dazzling pinwheel of apparent activity: multiple investigations, a pledge to consult on implementing a foreign agent registry, a promise to appoint a National Counter Foreign Interference Co-ordinator, a vow to start implementing some of the recommendations it had received from previous investigations, etc.
