Submission to the Public Inquiry on Foreign Interference

b) Was it Misinformation / Disinformation?

A fundamental premise behind the SITE assessment is that the WeChat/Douyin posts are distortions of the positions held by Mr. O’Toole and Mr Chiu.

In the case of Mr. O’Toole, SITE cites posts which claim that he “almost wants to break diplomatic ties with China” and that “Chinese Canadians are scared of the Conservative’s platform”. SITE further cites as evidence that these posts did not credit Global Times, hence “obscuring the narrative’s point of origin”. The SITE claim of foreign interference hence relies heavily on the assumption that views expressed on WeChat/Douyin were fed to Canadians by a foreign source.

Yet, Mr O’Toole’s position on China was already well established through his public statements, on the election platform of the Conservative Party, and in media reporting.

For example, Mr. O’Toole asserted during the election campaign that “I am the only candidate with a plan to reset Canada’s relationship with the Chinese regime. . .“ and that “the world (is) on the brink of a new cold war with another repressive regime, this time in China”. The Conservative Party’s election platform for GE44 mentioned “China” 31 times in a negative light, including the idea that Canada should “decouple” from China in certain supply chains.

The Globe and Mail reported on 24 August 2020, well before the Global Times article and the WeChat/Douyin posts, that “In Selecting Erin O’Toole, Conservatives elevate hawkish voice on China”(2). There are many other examples of Canadian media and think tanks reporting on Mr. O’Toole’s “hawkish” stance against China(3).

Why did SITE not consider that the Canada-based Chinese language news sites posted information about Mr O’Toole based on their reading of his public comments, the Conservative party’s election platform, or the Globe and Mail and other Canadian media reports? Why are Canada-based Chinese language news sites typecast as relying only on information from the PRC, and users of those sites assumed to not have the wherewithal to find information about Canada-China relations from Canadian sources?

Some months after the election, the Chinese Canadian Conservative Association called out their leader for what they described as a “hatred message” towards China in his GE44 campaign4. Did the Association come to this view because of foreign interference? Surely the more plausible explanation is that even Conservatives agreed with the assertions made on WeChat/Douyin, based on independent judgement of their party’s election platform and of the views expressed by Mr O’Toole.

The point is not whether Mr O’Toole’s positions on China are correct and certainly not about whether he has the right to take those positions. It may have been part of his calculation that a “hawkish” stance on China would win his party more Chinese Canadian votes5, but he surely would also have been aware of a possible backlash from other members of the Chinese community. That this backlash took place, as evidenced by the WeChat/Douyin posts and the reaction of some Conservative party members, should not have come as a surprise to either Mr O’Toole or our security and intelligence agencies. Why did SITE not consider that Chinese Canadians had honestly held reservations about the Conservatives’ election platform and instead jump to the conclusion that those reservations were fed by the Chinese state?

In the wake of the overwhelming attention on foreign interference from the PRC, Canadian politicians may well choose to mimic Mr O’Toole’s “hawkish” line on China as a winning strategy for future elections. That would be part and parcel of the democratic process in Canada. However, if the public acceptance of a “hawkish” position on China results in the stigmatization of those who do not agree with that position, and if it results in individuals and groups being branded as influenced by a foreign state or as foreign agents, based on little or no evidence, our democracy will have been diminished.

The case of Mr Chiu is similar. Even though SITE cannot confirm that the WeChat posts concerning his private member’s bill were PRC-directed, they in effect listed those posts as examples of foreign interference. SITE goes further in describing the posts as “false or misleading” and cite this example from a post:

A “foreign power registry act” that would designate “any individual or group connected with China as a spokesperson of the Chinese government”.

I have studied Mr Chiu’s private member’s bill very carefully and published an article in Policy Options with my findings. I believe that the WeChat posts in question are not misinformation but are reasonable, non-specialist interpretations of his bill and that they represent legitimate political debate(7).

At the heart of the issue is the requirement in Mr. Chiu’s bill(8) for all foreign principals to register, including “related entities”, which are defined – among several criteria – as one in which the leadership is “accustomed or under an obligation, whether formal or informal, to act by the directions, instructions or wishes of the foreign government or foreign political organization”(9).

Given that the People’s Republic of China (the PRC) is a one-party, authoritarian state, one could reasonably argue that all legally constituted entities in China – including corporations, educational institutions, alumni organizations, cultural groups, and municipalities – fall under the definition of a foreign principal. In that case, any individual in Canada acting on behalf of such an entity would be subject to registration if he or she were to speak with a parliamentarian or senior public official on a public policy matter. This is particularly relevant in the context of a view within our Security and Intelligence agencies that Chinese espionage is based on “non-traditional” methods and operates in a “grey zone” that could involve “diaspora communities, businesspeople, academics, politicians and political staffers, media and religious communities”(10).

I have discussed this issue more broadly in the context of a foreign influence transparency registry proposed by the Government of Canada that is akin to Mr Chiu’s private member’s bill(11).

A recent Federal Court decision confirms my analysis. In Li v Canada(12), the Court expanded the definition of “espionage” in its denial of a student visa for a Chinese national seeking to do a PhD at the University of Waterloo.

In its decision, the Court deemed that if the student “were granted his visa to study at the University of Waterloo, there are reasonable grounds to believe that he may be coopted or coerced into providing the sensitive information to the PRC”. In effect, the Court has deemed anyone who MAY be “coopted or coerced into providing sensitive information to the PRC” as a national security risk. The application of this principle to Canadians who have family, business, or cultural ties with the PRC would render them vulnerable to registration under a broadly defined foreign agent registry such as the one proposed by Mr Chiu.

The point here is not about Mr Chiu’s right to propose a bill such as C-282 and whether it is a good piece of legislation. It is about whether Chinese Canadians should be allowed to voice their reservations about the bill, in the same way that other Canadians voice reservations about any other piece of legislation, without being stigmatized as objects of foreign interference. I have received thousands of messages from Canadians voicing their opposition to bills that are before the Senate, many of which are based on distortions of the bill, and which have the imprint of American political discourse and interest groups. There is virtually no discussion, however, about these messages as a form of foreign interference emanating from the United States.

Since the findings of PIFI will influence the implementation of a foreign agent registry, it is vital that the commission point to any erroneous findings of foreign interference because of the risk that such misdirection will pose for individuals and groups who may be deemed as “registrable”.

While the phrasing of the WeChat posts is neither elegant nor precise, the idea that Mr. Chiu’s bill amounts to a “foreign power registry act” that would designate “any individual or group connected with China as a spokesperson of the Chinese government” is a reasonable lay interpretation of the bill. At the very least, it should be considered a legitimate political debate. The offending WeChat post is certainly no more distorting politicians’ positions on various issues than the much higher volume of misinformation on non-Chinese social media platforms or in the emails that flood my Senate inbox daily.

Even if one accepts that the WeChat posts were inaccurate or distortionary, it is troubling that SITE would list them as examples of foreign interference when the analysts could not establish that the posts were PRC-directed. By doing so, SITE is implying that the problem with the posts is not necessarily that they are propagated by a foreign state, but it is the views as such that are objectionable, from an election security perspective.

That amounts to a suppression of legitimate political debate and the stigmatization of those who hold such views and who use the platforms on which they were posted. The irony is that these claims, from the very agency that was entrusted to protect the security of our elections, undermined the security of Canadians who sought to participate fully in the 2021 election by expressing views on an issue that was important to them. If in a future election, the issue of a foreign agent registry comes up again, how can voters be confident that they can express concerns akin to the 2021 WeChat posts without being labelled a foreign agent or a stooge of foreign interference?