LAWTON： This strikes me as odd
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Summary
The Chinese Politburo is the gift that keeps on giving to the Liberal Party of Canada. They wanted to build a statue to Mao Zedong in Montreal, and the Prime Minister said no. Meanwhile, CSIS director Jodie Thomas was testifying before Parliament on election interference. She said she was given multiple briefings on China's interference in the 2019 and 2021 elections.
Transcript
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I did want to talk just a little bit in the remaining few minutes of the program about
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what's happening in the China file today. This is the scandal that keeps on unfolding. I don't
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want to say keeps on giving because, well, basically the Chinese Politburo is the gift
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that keeps on giving to the liberals. This one was great that they wanted to build a statue to Mao
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in Montreal. And that I think was even a little too on the nose for Justin Trudeau. He said,
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okay, hang on. I'm okay with you guys mucking around in the elections, but don't make a look
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at the statue of Mao in Montreal. I mean, Montreal wouldn't have liked that at all because it would
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have violated probably Bill 21 or something. But anyway, so the thing that's fascinating here is
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the national security advisor to Justin Trudeau, Jody Thomas, who has become a bit of a mainstay
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in Canadian politics with her comments on the Freedom Convoy, her comments on all sorts of
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other things lately. But Jody Thomas was testifying before Parliament, and she acknowledged that CSIS
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gave the Trudeau government and gave Trudeau multiple briefings on election interference.
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How many times was the Prime Minister briefed about Beijing's interference in the 2019 and 2021 elections?
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The Prime Minister would have been briefed on foreign interference in the elections multiple times
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between 2019 and 2021 and 2022. We will endeavour to get you those dates.
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So you will undertake to provide the dates and the agencies and those involved in briefing the Prime Minister?
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Every instance that he was briefed in respect of Beijing's election interference?
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I will do my best. But again, I was not in this job at the time.
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Okay, so that's fairly specific. She's saying, I'm going to need to get the dates to you and we'll,
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you know, send those over by fax, you know, at the earliest convenience, maybe, you know, 2037.
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But yeah, multiple briefings, multiple briefings Justin Trudeau got on election interference.
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Now, this struck me as a little odd at first, because I recall Justin Trudeau denying
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he was given any such briefings. There was this comment in the House of Commons not that long ago.
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The question is, has he been briefed since November 7th about whether or not a foreign power
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funnelled money to Canadian federal candidates? Yes or no?
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Mr. Speaker, as I have said a number of times in this House, to this moment, I have not,
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in all the briefings I've received, there has never been information around candidates receiving
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money from China in the 2011 election, sorry, in the 2019 election or in the 2021 elections.
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We have independent public servants who are engaged to oversee the integrity of the elections.
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They confirm the election, the elections did complete themselves with full integrity.
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Well, that's a little bit clever. Also a very specific answer. He said something very similar
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at this press conference as well, which I believe was in November, if memory serves.
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Our government has always taken very seriously the responsibility of protecting Canadians,
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of working with our security agencies to do everything we can to keep Canadians and our institutions
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safe against foreign interference. I have asked my officials to examine these media reports
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and give all the possible answers, everything they can, to the parliamentary committee that's looking
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into this. But let me be clear. I do not have any information, nor have I been briefed on any federal
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candidates receiving any money from China. Again, an oddly specific answer. I have never been briefed on
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candidates receiving money from China. He's not saying I've never been briefed on interference,
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although in context of the questions, that was how people took his answers at the time. He said,
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no, no, no, no one's ever briefing on that one specific thing. So it would strike me that there's
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a little bit of wordplay there and that odd that CSIS and all of its many briefings, its multiple
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briefings. I didn't mention that, yeah, there were some financial resources going towards candidates
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here. I wonder if he was briefed on the donation to the Trudeau Foundation. So far, he has not answered
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that. So I asked in the title of the show yesterday if this would be the end of Trudeau. And I cautioned
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that we have had political career-ending scandals from this government, like the Aga Khan Island
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vacation, like the SNC-Lavalin scandal, like the We Charity scandal, and all of them have proven to
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have reduced Trudeau's exterior, not to the shine of blackface, but to a hard nonstick Teflon coating.
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So I don't believe we should say at face value that this would be any different. In fact, the NDP
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would probably love to have a tight relationship with China, although even they are coming out right
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now and saying we need a public inquiry, maybe because they know a public inquiry is going to
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take years. It's going to release an ambiguous report, and they will still be able to keep the
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supply and confidence agreement. You're not allowed to call it a coalition government. The supply and
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confidence agreement going until the next election would be anyway. So I wouldn't even hold out too
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much optimism that even the NDP is ready to get serious with the Liberals on this.