Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s chief of staff finally testified during a standing committee hearing on election interference after the Liberal’s spent weeks trying to keep her off the record.
Last month, Trudeau caved to pressure from the opposition to have his Chief of Staff Katie Telford testify on what she knew about Chinese election interference, and when she told him.
This followed bombshell Canadian Intelligence (CSIS) leaks that indicated a CSIS memo to Trudeau in 2021 warned that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) interfered in the outcome of Canada’s 2019 and 2021 elections so that the Trudeau Liberals could form a minority government.
Trudeau has denied getting briefed about such.
On Friday, Telford fielded questions from Liberal, Conservative, NDP, and Bloq Quebecois MPs regarding the allegations.
The most clarity Telford gave on Friday while under oath was when she said “it’s quite possible” that Trudaeu was briefed on the issue of election interference.
But Telford refused to go into detail about what Trudeau was briefed on, and when.
“It’s been an ongoing conversation for years,” she told Conservative MP Michael Cooper.
“Whether or not it’s accurate, I can’t answer,” she later told Conservative MP Larry Brock.
Telford also said that “nothing is ever kept from the Prime Minister.”
Subsequently, Conservative MP Rachel Thomas pressed Telford.
“So, given the fact that the Prime Minister reads ‘everything’, and that ‘nothing is ever kept from him’, the committee must then assume that the Prime Minister was aware and that the Prime Minister chose to actively ignore and avoid the information, the briefings, and the warnings that were given to him by our top security and intelligence agency in this country when it comes to Beijing’s interference,” Thomas said.
Thomas further said that the only reasonable conclusion is that Trudeau ignored the briefings in order to secure his Liberal Party’s election victory.
Last month, a poll showed that one in five Canadians don’t believe Trudeau was legitimately elected as questions about Chinese electoral interference mount.
On Friday, a report by La Press suggested that Trudeau lied about having complete separation from his scandal-plagued family’s Foundation since becoming Prime Minister.
