Senior Liberal and Conservative campaign operatives urged a collaborative approach to countering foreign interference in elections Tuesday, warning the issue is a threat to the stability of Canadian politics.
The calls come as the Liberal government is under pressure to call a public inquiry into foreign interference, and to update Canadian security and law enforcement’s tools to investigate influence campaigns from hostile foreign powers.
But while the governing party has borne the brunt of criticism in the wake of reporting from Global News and the Globe and Mail, a former senior Conservative warned the issue is not limited to any one party.
“We’re all under threat, here,” Fred DeLorey, the Conservatives’ national campaign director in the 2021 election, told a House of Commons committee probing the foreign interference threat Tuesday.
“All parties could be impacted by this in the next election. It can come from different entities, different countries. And I really wish we could see a more collaborative approach to really drill down on what the issues are and how we solve them.”
The committee’s probe was launched after Global News reported the Liberals were warned of a sophisticated foreign interference network ahead of the 2019 campaign. Citing unnamed national security sources, Global News reported that the network included both Liberals and Conservatives, and attempted to tip the scales in favour of at least 11 candidates in the 2019 election.
The network was allegedly being run out of the Chinese consulate in Toronto, Global’s sources said.
Neither Jeremy Broadhurst, a senior advisor in Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office, or Azam Ishmael, the Liberals’ 2021 campaign director, could discuss the classified details of intelligence briefings received by the party.
But Ishmael called countering foreign interference a shared responsibility.
“We can disagree with other parties on policy, but we have all consistently sought to do the right thing as it relates to protecting Canada’s democracy from foreign interference,” Ishmael said.
Global News reported earlier this year that national security officials briefed senior members of Trudeau’s team in the lead up to the 2019 election, warning that one of their candidates was believed to be part of a Chinese foreign interference network.
Global’s sources identified the candidate as Han Dong, then the Liberal candidate in Don Valley North. Dong has denied the allegations, and has launched legal action against the network.
Broadhurst confirmed that three Liberal Party operatives – Ishmael, former communications director Braeden Caley, and former IT manager Mathieu Lafrance – were briefed by national security officials on Sept. 28, 2019, but could not discuss the contents of that briefing and did not confirm that the briefing concerned Dong. Broadhurst, who said he still held security clearance from his previous role in government, was in turn briefed on the information.
According to Broadhurst, he personally briefed Trudeau on the intelligence the following day in Ottawa. Trudeau has previously avoided acknowledging he was personally briefed on the issue.
When asked by Conservative MP Michael Cooper why the nomination for the candidate for Don Valley North was not revoked, Broadhurst said, “I’m not in a position to confirm what the content of the briefing we received from the national security officials was.”
“I can say there was no actionable item there, that the security agencies were not seeking any kind of guidance or direction from the Prime Minister at that time. It was an information briefing only,” Broadhurst said.
When asked if there was any discussion with the prime minister about the status of the candidacy of the current member for Don Valley North, Broadhurst again said that he could not provide any information about the briefing or his conversation with Trudeau.
Ishmael said that while he couldn’t speak to the actions of every volunteer working on the Liberals’ 2021 campaign, that the party has never knowingly “accepted support from, or turned a blind eye to, interference in a Canadian election by any foreign state.”
Hamish Marshall, the Conservatives’ national campaign director in 2019, said the party would have to receive “very, very detailed” allegations against a candidate before making the decision to remove them from the ballot.
“In order to decide to go to the National Candidate Selection Committee and ask them to rescind someone’s nomination, we’ve got to have something very specific and something tangible,” Marshall said.
“And I’m not sure if what would have been provided (by intelligence agencies) would have met that test.”
The Globe and Mail reported earlier this month that the Liberal government has stalled legislative reforms that could address foreign interference in Canada, including making such interference a Criminal Code violation, and updating security and law enforcement agencies’ authorities to investigate the activity.
Ahead of the 2019 election, the Liberals created a panel of senior bureaucrats tasked with assessing intelligence on foreign interference and notifying the public if the integrity of a federal election could be jeopardized. While security officials acknowledged foreign attempts to influence both the 2019 and 2021 elections, there is no evidence to suggest those activities called into question the integrity of either general election.
But DeLorey said that the new structure felt like a “one-way street,” and that when his party raised concerns they were met with a “shrug” from security agencies who pointed to “legislative gaps” in addressing the behaviour.
“I think if (the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, or CSIS) is aware of what those gaps are, they should be telling you and you folks should be working with … Elections Canada and other entities and creating,” new rules, DeLorey said.
“Something that will give us real teeth that we can dig into things. Because it feels right now like it’s a good start, but it’s not solid enough.”
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