In the midst of a political scandal surrounding election interference from China, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has promised a new investigation into foreign influence in votes.
At a news conference in Ottawa on Monday, Trudeau told reporters Canada’s intelligence agencies will handle the investigation.
“Canadians have been hearing and reading a lot about the issue of attempted foreign interference, particularly from China, in our elections,” said the Prime Minister. “There have been questions raised about our democracy, our national security agencies, our parliament and even our sovereignty.”
“This is not and should never be a partisan issue.”
Trudeau noted that China, Iran and Russia have all at least attempted to interfere in Canadian democracy and in the country in general.
“This is not a new problem,” he told reporters. “We saw the impacts of foreign interference in places like the United States and France.”
Trudeau said the results of the 2019 and 2021 federal elections were not impacted by the interference, which he said were reviewed by CSIS and other officials. He said that the leaders of the other parties agree that the results were not impacted.
An independent “special rapporteur” will inform at examine foreign election interference, Trudeau announced. The “eminent Canadian” who takes on the role will have a wide mandate to make recommendations on democratic security and provide a report on their work.
However, opposition leader Pierre Poilievre and NDP leader Jagmeet Singh have called for a public inquiry – which is not coming at this point, according to Trudeau.
“We will ask the independent special rapporteur, as one of the first tasks of their mandate, to provide the government with a recommendation as to what the appropriate next step should be,” Trudeau said. “Whether it be an inquiry, an investigation, a judicial review and what the scope of that work may be. We will abide by their recommendation.”
The announcement on Monday also included a foreign agent registry announcement, which will examine how those advocating on behalf of foreign governments participate in elections – but noted that they will work against xenophobia in that process.
“We have to be mindful of history anytime we’re talking about registries of foreigners in our country,” Trudeau said.
Last month, Global News reported that Don Valley North MP Han Dong won the Liberal nomination race with assistance from Chinese nationals who were threatened with losing their visas if they did not vote for him.
Dong has denied any wrongdoing.
The report says that Trudeau was warned about Dong’s nomination race being compromised and did not act. Blackburn News has not confirmed those allegations.
