CSIS director warned Liberals of Chinese interference repeatedly

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OTTAWA – CSIS director David Vigneault told an inquiry Friday that he’s been warning the Liberal government for years that Canada has been slow to respond to foreign interference and is ill-equipped to combat it.

He also confirmed that had not verbally discussed the contents of three important briefing documents directly with the prime minister and his senior staff, although he had shared similar information with them on previous occassions.

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Testifying for a second time to the Public Inquiry into Foreign Interference, Vigneault also confirmed that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) interfered “clandestinely and deceptively” in both the 2019 and 2021 federal elections, but said that it ultimately did not impact the elections’ outcome.

Vigneault was recalled in an exceptional move for the inquiry so he could explain what, if any, information he had specifically shared  with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the prime minister’s senior staff from three top-secret briefing documents.

The three CSIS briefings were only provided to parties to the inquiry early this week, days after the spy agency’s director had already testified to the commission.

The documents, two dated Oct. 26, 2022 and one dated Feb. 21, 2023, contain much of the same information and spell out CSIS’s concerns in unusually direct ways about foreign interference (FI) by China and the Canadian government’s failure to respond to the threat.

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“Canada has been slower than our Five Eyes allies to respond to the Fl threat with legislative and other initiatives, such as proactively publicizing successful disruption of Fl activities as a means of deterring future efforts,” reads one note.

“Ultimately, state actors are able to conduct Fl successfully In Canada because there are no consequences, either legal or political. Fl Is therefore a low-risk and high-reward endeavour,” it continues.

Another document also stated clearly that China had interfered in the last two federal elections, a notable statement considering part of the public inquiry’s mandate is to determine if China or any other hostile actor had successfully interfered in 2019 and 2021.

“We know that the PRC clandestinely and deceptively interfered in both the 2019 and 2021 general elections. In both cases, these (foreign interference) activities were pragmatic in nature and focussed primarily on supporting those viewed to be either ‘pro-PRC’ or ‘neutral’ on issues of interest to the PRC government,” reads a document entitled “briefing to the prime minister’s office.”

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But during testimony this week, top PMO staffers, ministers and Trudeau told the inquiry that Vigneault ultimately did not discuss the contents of the documents during the actual briefings with the prime minister.

That caused multiple parties at the inquiry to request commissioner Marie-Josée Hogue recall Vigneault to address the apparent disconnect. Hogue acquiesced and explained Friday that she took the “exceptional” measure because she too had questions about the documents and the briefing given to Trudeau.

Vigneault told the inquiry Friday that the briefing material was prepared by CSIS employees to help him prepare for two meetings with Trudeau but did not represent what was discussed during the meeting.

But he noted that he’s told the government privately and publicly for years a similar message as was in the documents: that Canada lags behind its G7 allies when it comes to fighting foreign interference effectively and that there are “no consequences” for political foreign interference.

“I can say with confidence that this is something that has been conveyed to the government, to ministers, the prime minister, using these words and other types of words,” he said.

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Vigneault was also asked about CSIS’s assessment in an Oct. 2022 document that China “clandestinely and deceptively interfered in both the 2019 and 2021 general elections” considering repeated statements by election oversight bodies that both elections were free and fair.

Vigneault answered that both statements are true.

“We saw foreign interference in both the 2019 and 2021 elections. However, I concur with the conclusion of the panel that this interference did not amount to having an impact on the general election,” he said, referring to the panel of five top bureaucrats tasked with monitoring election threats.

“Both statements, in my opinion, are true at the same time. We saw foreign interference during those elections and that interference was indeed clandestine and deceptive. And at the same time, that interference did not amount to having any impact on the integrity of the election,” he added.

Vigneault also took a swipe at some of the media coverage on leaked documents from his service in 2022 and 2023, stating that unspecified stories “overinterpret” some of the information in the leaks.

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“We are very, very concerned about the impact that unauthorized disclosure have on the people who take risks to protect and to provide information to CSIS in order to protect Canadians,” he said.

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