Prime Minister Trudeau said he had no idea that Chinese Communist Party advisor Zhang Bin donated to the Trudeau Foundation, despite meeting Zhang just months before at a cash-for-access fundraiser.
Trudeau met Zhang in 2016 at a cash-for-access Liberal Party fundraiser hosted by the Chinese Business Chamber of Canada chair Benson Wong. Trudeau was the guest of honour at the event.
Subsequently, Zhang donated $1 million to “honour the memory and leadership” of Trudeau’s father and former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, as reported in the Globe and Mail.
Zhang’s donation consisted of $200,000 to the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, $750,000 to the University of Montreal’s faculty of law (where Pierre Trudeau graduated from and worked), as well as $50,000 towards a statue of Pierre Trudeau.
On Tuesday, the Prime Minister’s Office told the Globe that Trudeau had no knowledge of the donation.
“Following his election as Leader of the Liberal Party, the Prime Minister withdrew his involvement in the affairs of the foundation for the duration of his involvement in federal politics,” his press secretary said.
However, according to Guy Saint-Jacques, Canada’s former ambassador to China until October 2016, Zhang clearly stated he intended to donate money towards the Trudeau foundation — and this was even before the cash-for-access event put on for Trudeau and the Liberal Party.
Saint-Jacques also said Zhang told him he would donate to the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation before Justin Trudeau won his 2015 election bid.
Saint-Jacques added that he has skeptical about where the money was really coming from and that “When Trudeau was elected, some Chinese officials were extremely pleased. They said [liberal] red is good and [conservative] blue is bad.”
This echoes a bombshell report last month that revealed the Chinese Communist Party interfered in Canada’s 2021 election to help the Trudeau Liberals win and cause the Conservatives to lose.
Donations to the Trudeau Foundation increased ten fold between 2014 and 2016, the two years between Trudeau first getting elected Prime Minister.
Also at the same cash-for-access Liberal Party fundraiser as Zhang in 2016 was Shenglin Xian, who is currently under investigation by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).
Xian is one of three founders of the Chinese-oriented Wealth One Bank of Canada who’s under investigation. Wealth One caters towards Chinese-Canadians.
Just months after Xian paid to attend the fundraiser, Xian’s then-unapproved Wealth One Bank of Canada was approved by regulators to conduct business in Canada as a Schedule 1 bank.
Trudeau has admitted that he gets lobbied at said fundraisers but insisted policies were never impacted.
