SQUIRREL! (Part Deux)

Let us have no more talk about this bizarre cover-up:

Man picked to write report on Chinese election interference ran Trudeau Foundation when big donations came in from China https://t.co/JzKhGJBf6P Via @brianlilley#cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/tI5OO0yiPd

— Toronto Sun (@TheTorontoSun) February 27, 2023

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The man Trudeau mentioned who wrote the report, Morris Rosenberg, is the former head of the Trudeau Foundation.

Rosenberg spent decades as a senior civil servant, running departments for both Liberal and Conservative prime ministers. Just before joining the Trudeau Foundation in 2014, he was the deputy minister at foreign affairs under the Harper government.

An inquiry with a pre-determined outcome:

An independent review into the system that protect Canada’s elections found it worked as designed and there was not widespread interference in the 2021 election, but also found the definitions in the system are vague and the threat is growing. ...

Morris Rosenberg, a former deputy minister under both Liberal and Conservative governments, was tasked with doing an independent review of the bureaucrats’ work and his review was released late Tuesday afternoon.

Even before the report was released Conservatives dismissed it, because Rosenberg also served as the CEO of the Pierre Trudeau Foundation during which time the foundation took a controversial donation from a Chinese-Canadian businessman.

Rosenberg said while the system worked as designed and there doesn’t appear to have been widespread foreign interference in the election, he said the definitions the system uses are “vague,” and leave the decision up to the judgement of civil servants.

 

(Sidebar: yes, the system did work as designed.)

 

Various media reports over the last few weeks have suggested that China engaged in a systematic campaign to influence both the 2021 and 2019 election, targeting candidates they wanted to see defeated and pushing for a Liberal minority to be returned to office.

Rosenberg acknowledged the interference, but said it is hard for anyone to judge whether it tipped the balance.

“Were Conservative losses in several ridings with large Chinese diaspora communities due to attacks on the Conservative platform and on one of its candidates by media associated with or sympathetic to the Chinese government? Or were they the result of the Conservatives simply not being able to connect with sufficient numbers of voters in those communities?”

 

Yes, I would say that it did, Morris:

Last Friday, The Globe and Mail reported on leaked documents from Canada’s spy agency – the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) – that the People’s Republic of China meddled in Canada’s last federal election with the goal of seeing a Liberal minority government. The newspaper said then-Vancouver consul general Tong Xiaoling even boasted she helped defeat two Conservative incumbents: Richmond Centre’s Alice Wong and Chiu, who had been elected in 2019.

** 

According to my sources, CSIS started tracking Han Dong, a former Ontario MPP, in summer 2019. They said CSIS believed that Dong emerged suddenly and suspiciously as a successor to MP Geng Tan as the Liberal candidate for Don Valley North. 

(Sidebar: this Han Dong.)

CSIS investigators would later allege that Chinese Canadian seniors and students were bussed into the riding, and students were told they had to vote for a certain candidate to keep their student visas, sources informed Global News. They said Han Dong was the candidate. 

 

National security officials also allege that Han Dong, now a sitting MP re-elected in 2021, is 1 of at least 11 Toronto-area riding candidates supported by Beijing in 2019. These officials said CSIS also believes Dong is a witting affiliate in China’s election interference. 

 

Dong strongly denies these allegations. "As a Member of Parliament, safeguarding Canada’s democratic institutions is a fundamental part of my job, and I take all serious allegations of foreign interference very seriously,” Dong said. 

 

“I am unaware of the claims provided to you by alleged sources, which contains seriously inaccurate information," Dong said, in answer to my questions in this investigation.

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Liberal MP Han Dong is alleged to have been helped by the Chinese consulate in Toronto during his 2019 nomination race, by bussing in seniors & students to vote for him, according to CSIS docs & sources

CSIS asked the PM's senior staff to rescind Dong's nomination, per sources pic.twitter.com/cMSlObsPwt

— Mackenzie Gray (@Gray_Mackenzie) February 24, 2023

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Here's him on video campaigning for Han Dong AFTER he and top clearance Liberal Party staff were briefed that he's a CCP asset and after they were asked to rescind his nomination. It's pretty damning. I expect he'll resign over this TBQH. If your policing and intel agencies turn… https://t.co/dRcmo4fFxv

— Laura Love (@Panopticonomy) February 25, 2023

 

I would say that looks like direct and effective interference, even if Justin's friend, like Justin's uncle, says otherwise.