Cross-partisan calls are growing for the Liberal government to call a public inquiry to investigate allegations of election interference in Canada’s 2019 and 2021 federal elections by the Chinese regime, despite Prime Minister Justin Trudeau having already ruled it out.
“When Canadians learn about possible foreign interference through leaked documents, confidence in our democracy is put at risk,” NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said in a
statement on Feb. 27.
“The way to stop alleged secret Chinese interference is to refuse to keep their secrets for them. I am calling for a fully independent and non-partisan public inquiry to shine a light into the shadows.”
Conservative MP Erin O'Toole
also wrote on Twitter earlier this month that a “national inquiry on election integrity may be in order.”
Conservative MP Ryan Williams made a similar
comment on Feb. 27, saying on Twitter: “We need a public inquiry to protect our democracy.”
Gerald Butts, Trudeau’s former principal secretary,
told the Globe and Mail that a “non-partisan inquiry” is needed, adding that it should be focused on “foreign interference in our democracy.” He added on Twitter that it shouldn’t be about “partisan politics, China or any one country.”
Recent reports by the Globe and Mail and Global News cited secret Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) documents and intelligence sources showing widespread election interference by China into Canada’s 2019 and 2021 federal elections.
This includes reports of Beijing providing funding to some candidates in the 2019 election; a Chinese diplomat
boasting that she helped defeat two Conservative candidates whose positions weren’t favourable to Beijing in the 2021 election; and Chinese authorities wanting the outcome of the 2021 election to be a Liberal minority—the reason being that they wanted the Liberals to form a government that would best serve their interests, while keeping the Liberals’ power in check by opposition parties.
‘It Is Not a Minor Issue’
Former CSIS head Richard Fadden
is also calling for a public inquiry into the election interference allegations, as well as former senior official at the Communications Security Establishment Artur Wilczynski.
“I think the first thing we need to do is to talk about this seriously, and given the general environment Canada, I don’t think it’s going to work unless we have a public inquiry,” Fadden told Global News on Feb. 26.
“We need an independent review of how we confront foreign interference. I agree with Dick Fadden that an independent inquiry may be the only way to remove partisanship from the review,” he wrote on Feb. 26.
Jean-Pierre Kingsley, former chief electoral commissioner for Canada from 1990 to 2017, lent his voice to the call for a public inquiry as well.
“We need to find out what has transpired. I favour an independent inquiry because this is what will satisfy Canadians. It is not a minor issue,” he told
The Globe and Mail on Feb. 23.
However, when asked by reporters in Toronto on Feb. 24 about the possibility of the federal government calling a public inquiry,
Trudeau said Canada’s “electoral and democratic processes have not been compromised.”
“We have continually given new resources and new tools including a panel and a task force that we set up way back in 2019,” he said,
in reference to the Critical Election Incident Public Protocol created to monitor and report threats of election interference.
The panel has not yet released its post-election assessment report for the 2021 election, but the Privy Council Office said in a recent statement that a public version of it will soon be available, without giving any specific timeline.
The Canadian Press, Omid Ghoreishi, and Marnie Cathcart contributed to this report.
