RCMP Didn’t Pursue MP’s Suspicion That Heckler at 2021 Election Meeting Was Chinese Agent

Conservative Member of Parliament Michael Chong speaks to reporters on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on May 3, 2023. Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press

The RCMP told Tory MP Michael Chong that his suspicions that a heckler at a 2021 election meeting was a Chinese agent were “compelling,” but said they didn’t pursue the matter as it was not “actionable.”

Mr. Chong testified before the foreign interference inquiry on April 4, saying he believed the incident had been an example of interference against him by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as first reported by Blacklock’s Reporter.

The incident occurred during the 2021 federal election campaign at an Optimist Club all-candidates’ Zoom meeting held in Puslinch, Ont., within his Wellington-Halton Hills riding.

According to Mr. Chong, an unknown visitor spoke out against him, accusing him of being anti-Chinese and telling attendees that “Mr. Chong was responsible for creating anti-Chinese racism.”

“I was taken by surprise when it happened,” said Mr. Chong. “After the debate we asked around if anybody had ever seen or heard of this individual, and to this date no one has a clue.”

“I slowly came to the realization many months afterwards that event may have been a foreign interference threat activity,” he added.

Mr. Chong said he had suspicions about the person since the community of Puslinch is so small that “most everyone knows each other” and his family are the among the only people of Chinese descent in the area.

“When I became aware last May that the People’s Republic of China was directly targeting me, the first thing that crossed my mind is had I known that in the previous election, I would have hit ‘record’ on the Zoom all-candidates’ debate in Puslinch,” Mr. Chong told the inquiry.

The RCMP had responded to the claims in an email last December, saying the person who spoke out against Mr. Chong could not be identified and wrote, “Investigators have determined the information provided, although compelling, is not actionable.”

According to a Globe and Mail report last May, a top-secret assessment from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service said that the Chinese regime had targeted Mr. Chong over his sponsorship of a motion in 2021 in the House of Commons to declare the treatment of Uyghurs in China as genocide.

Mr. Chong is not the only Tory MP to tell the inquiry they were actively targeted by the CCP.

Former Conservative MP Kenny Chiu told the inquiry this week that when he had gone door-knocking in his riding of Steveston-Richmond East in British Columbia during the 2021 election campaign, many people of Chinese background had slammed doors in his face when they heard his Chinese name, and said that many people were under the impression that he hated China and Chinese people.

He said neither the government nor the election authority had alerted him to the fact that he was a target of CCP interference, saying he felt betrayed by the government.

“I thought I would be protected by my country. And I was deeply troubled and disappointed that I was exposed, and the government didn’t seem to care,” he told the inquiry.

Mr. Chiu lost his seat in the riding of Steveston-Richmond East in British Columbia during the 2021 federal election to Liberal Party candidate Parm Bains.

Former Tory Leader Erin O'Toole also testified before the inquiry, saying he believed that CCP interference cost his party as many as nine seats in the 2021 election. He also stated that he believed his tough-on-China platform made his party a target of the Chinese regime.