Analysis of Chinese Interference in Canadian Politics
For decades, Chinese influence operations have been active in Canada, but have recently accelerated. In the 1990s, a joint report by the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) was leaked to the media, warning about Beijing’s operatives and criminal gangs becoming entrenched in various Canadian sectors, but the authorities dismissed those concerns. In 2010, Richard Fadden, then CSIS-head, warned about Chinese interference in Canadian politics, but was condemned by a House of Commons committee and forced to retract his statements and resign.
Recent intelligence leaks have revealed an elaborate network of infiltration operations in Canada by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to subvert Canada’s elections and engineer the outcome to one desired by Beijing, while influencing politicians to act in CCP’s favour.
The latest leaks started with a Nov. 7, 2022, Global News article that said Trudeau was briefed in January 2022 on a Beijing-directed election interference network. The article said the CCP funded at least 11 federal candidates in the 2019 election and worked to place agents in MPs’ offices to influence policy-making. It said the network includes members from both the Liberal and Conservative parties.
The Feb. 28 Globe and Mail report says Zhang Bin, a wealthy businessman linked to the CCP who attended a controversial cash-for-access event with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in May 2016, was instructed by a Chinese diplomat in 2014 to donate $1 million to the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation and told he would be reimbursed by Beijing. The two reportedly discussed the upcoming 2015 federal election and the possibility that the Liberals could beat the Conservatives.
Following the May 2016 fundraiser, Zhang went on to donate $1 million to “honour the memory and leadership” of former prime minister Pierre Trudeau, the Globe says. Of that amount, $200,000 went to the Trudeau Foundation, $50,000 toward building a statue of Pierre Trudeau, and $75,000 to the University of Montreal’s faculty of law, where the former prime minister had been a student and was later an instructor. The PMO has said that Trudeau wasn’t aware of Zhang’s donation and that he is not involved in the affairs of the foundation while he is serving in federal politics. The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation has said that it is returning Zhang’s donation.
The Global News article on Nov. 7, 2022, also said that during the 2019 election campaign, busloads of Chinese international students with fake addresses were brought in to the riding and “coerced” to vote for Dong’s candidacy for the Liberals. A follow-up article by Global News on Feb. 24 said that Liberal MP Han Dong is one of the at least 11 federal candidates in the Toronto area who were supported by Beijing in the 2019 election, based on leaked intelligence information. Dong has denied the allegations.
The Globe and Mail article on Feb. 17 said Chinese officials stated at the time that their desired election outcome for the 2021 election would be another minority Liberal government, as they deemed the Liberals the party most favourable to Beijing’s interests but didn’t want it to form a majority government in case it decides to implement policies unfavourable to Beijing. The article said Beijing instructed its diplomats and other proxies—including some Chinese-language media—to propagate the idea that Conservative MPs were too critical of China and that, once elected, they would follow the lead of former U.S. president Donald Trump and ban Chinese students from certain universities or education programs.
In response to the recent intelligence leaks, Trudeau has also said that he is “very concerned” that classified CSIS documents are being provided to the media. He has also said that his government has set up a panel, the Critical Election Incident Public Protocol, made up of top public servants, to monitor and report on potential threats of interference in recent elections. The panel has not identified any major issues in the 2019 and 2021 elections.