Kellie Leitch campaign asks about screening new arrivals for ‘anti-Canadian values’

OTTAWA – Conservative leadership candidate Kellie Leitch is asking whether the federal government should screen potential immigrants and refugees for “anti-Canadian values.”

The question comes in a survey on a number of issues which was emailed to people who signed up for news from her campaign.

READ MORE: Ontario MP Kellie Leitch to officially enter Conservative leadership race

During the 2015 federal election campaign, Leitch helped promote a controversial promise to open a tip line for so-called barbaric cultural practices, to help the RCMP enforce a law aimed at cracking down on forced marriages and keeping polygamists out of Canada.

In a TV interview earlier this year, she expressed regret for that, saying her goal of protecting women and girls got overtaken by a broader conversation about the role that ethnic and cultural identity politics was playing in the Conservative campaign.

Campaign manager Nick Kouvalis says more than 8,000 people have responded to the survey, which is based on subjects Leitch has been hearing about since she joined the leadership race in the spring, but he would not otherwise comment on its contents or which side of the issue the candidate favours.

U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has called for would-be immigrants to undergo what he called extreme vetting to determine their stance on things like religious freedom, gender equality and LGBTQ rights.