A rapporteur resigns. Is a public inquiry on foreign interference next?

CLIP You are listening to a Frequency Podcast network production.

Jordan Heath Rawlings Over the past few months, special rapporteur David Johnston had been working diligently to determine exactly who knew what and when, when it came to foreign election interference and what Canada should do about it. He had determined two weeks ago that a public inquiry was not necessary. And he continued work on his next report. Despite criticism, partisanship and resistance, he vowed not to stop.

CLIP I will continue to invite disagreement on my recommendations, but will not be deterred from completing my work.

Jordan Heath Rawlings And then on Friday, David Johnston stopped.

CLIP My objective was to help build trust in our democratic institutions. I have concluded that given the highly partisan atmosphere around my appointment and work, my leadership has had the opposite effect.

Jordan Heath Rawlings Johnston announced his resignation late last Friday afternoon, which forced Ottawa and those who spend their time covering what happens in Ottawa to use their weekend to wonder. H okay. What now? Johnston may have dismissed the idea of an inquiry, but with him on his way out the door and the critiques of the Trudeau government not getting any quieter. It seems that the minister in charge of intergovernmental affairs has perhaps had a change of heart, though he wouldn’t put it that way.

CLIP A public inquiry has never been off the table. All options remain on the table

Jordan Heath Rawlings Now, it is Monday afternoon, the story before an interference, and the Trudeau government’s response to it remains the biggest political story in the country. Why did Johnston quit? What happens now? Will getting what they want with his resignation satisfy opposition critics and will Canadians now finally get the inquiry basically everyone seems to want? And if they do, when and who runs it?

I am Jordan Heath Rawlings. This is The Big Story. Cormac Mac Sweeney is the City News reporter on Parliament Hill. He reports from Parliament Hill for us as well, when things in Canadian federal politics need explaining, which is every few weeks these days. Hello Carmack.

Cormac Mac Sweeney Hello.

Jordan Heath Rawlings Why don’t we start with Friday, just as we thought we were out of the news cycle. Take me back to Friday around 5:00 PM Eastern Time. How did we learn that David Johnston had resigned and, you know, what did he say? What was the breaking news like?

Cormac Mac Sweeney Yeah, I think most reporters probably thought their work day was done on Friday, but then came what, what we in the industry call a Friday news dump. Whenever a government, when they want to bury something in the news cycle, they dump it on a Friday. And that’s what happened here. Late Friday in the day we get this resignation letter that David Johnston had sent to the Prime Minister, where he said, basically look, I really wanted to come out and do some objective work here to help build trust in our democratic institutions, but given the highly partisan atmosphere around my appointment and my work. His leadership has had the opposite effect and therefore he is resigning no later than the end of June. And he’s gonna continue some work trying to wrap up some loose ends about the work that he’s doing, but is essentially saying government, you take it from here and, I will try and help the best I can moving forward, but I’m out. And this of course comes after a lot of controversy and questions about his work. We heard from the opposition claiming that he was a ski buddy. That’s the conservative line to the Prime Minister, although, the skiing in question happened when Justin Trudeau was a child. But nonetheless, there were connections to the Trudeau Foundation. He was a member of the Trudeau Foundation. And then not long before this had happened, there was a House of Commons vote where all opposition parties called on him to resign. He said at the time that he was going to continue his work regardless of that. So this was kind of both expected and unexpected, this resignation because he had vowed to stay on. But then that news story came out that he had hired the same crisis comms firm that had represented liberal MP Han Dong. Somebody he was investigating in relation to foreign interference. And had cleared in his first report. And so all of this was just mounting one thing on top of the other. And it all came to this point on Friday, when he handed in his resignation letter.

Jordan Heath Rawlings As you pointed out, as recently as a couple of weeks ago. He was adamant that partisanship and criticism wouldn’t, deter him from submitting his next report. Obviously something changed. You kind of mentioned the optics around this, given where, this entire situation was at and, you know, as you kind of ran through the previous few weeks, like it was pretty clear the situation was not holding up in, in the face of criticism.

Cormac Mac Sweeney Yeah. And, and you know, the thing about conflict of interest is sometimes not whether or not it is provable, it is the optics of it all. Prima fascia on the face of it. If it looks like there’s a conflict of interest, then your integrity is called into question. And then you know, right now the whole question about this process is around the integrity of our elections, our democracy, voting in the government that makes the decisions for our whole nation. And that is at the heart of the matter here. And so the person looking into that, should be beyond questions of integrity, beyond questions of partisanship. David Johnston felt that he was that person and he didn’t like the criticisms that were being aimed at him from the opposition. However, on the face of it, there were many questions about whether he was the right person to do the job or not. And in the end, he decided, That he needed to resign as, as he says in his letter, to make sure that Canadians can once again have trust in our democratic institutions.

Jordan Heath Rawlings So over the weekend, there was some obvious immediate reaction. I wanna ask you about both sides of it. First, the government who again, recently was adamantly supporting him as an impartial decision maker. What have they said on the record about his departure and, opposition critics? Are they expressing satisfaction with this move? Are they supporting him in making this decision?

Cormac Mac Sweeney Well, we’ll start with the government. I mean, the government blames the opposition for what’s happened here. Intergovernmental affairs minister, Dominic LeBlanc, has actually now been tasked with the job of choosing the next steps, the path forward for the government here. But he released a statement saying that, you know, the partisan attacks levied by the conservative party against, David Johnston, our former Governor General, were unwarranted and unacceptable. And he says that democracy requires us to rise above partisan considerations. And he’s repeated that several times. I think he even used the word buffoonery to describe the attacks from the opposition. And calling their attacks against Johnston Exaggerated as well. So, you know, it’s clear where the government thinks the problem here is it’s not in their eyes, it’s not David Johnston, it’s the conservatives. For creating questions about David Johnson. For the opposition parties, though they see it a lot differently. I believe both the conservatives and the NDP feel that Johnson did the right thing by stepping away. Of course, they had voted for that very thing in the House of Commons, and they were not happy when Johnson said that he wasn’t gonna step down after that vote. Because they felt he should seed to the will of Parliament. But he said, look, I serve at the leisure of the Prime Minister and the government, not necessarily the House of Commons, and I’m gonna continue my work on. However, they say this is making it more clear that, we need to have a public inquiry into all of this. And that’s what one thing that was really interesting about the reaction from the government, because Dominic LeBlanc initially put out a statement, that we got Friday night. Then on Saturday morning, he decided to hold a news conference to talk a little bit more about this. And he said a public inquiry was never off the table for the government. But of course, you know, for months we’ve been talking about the possibility of a public inquiry and the government has kind of resisted every call. . Never said yes to this and hired David Johnston to look into it and vowed that they would follow whatever his advice was. His advice was not to hold a public inquiry and that sort of shut down any questions about where the government was gonna go with this? Now they’ve sort of reopened the door of possibility to a public inquiry and, that was a very interesting turn on Saturday, that they’re still open to this. But I mean, the question is, if you’re gonna rebuild trust, and Canadians trust in democracy, simply going back to a special rapporteur after what we saw with David Johnston might not have that same effect. And so now the question is, will the government, go through with a public inquiry? They are looking for, the opposition to try and bring forward ideas, bring a plan of action, talk about timelines. Talk about who could possibly lead such an inquiry and, terms of reference, because let’s, let’s remember, we’re dealing with a lot of classified information here. That is something that has to be protected and you need to have somebody who’s going to be, dealing with that appropriately in a setting that is appropriate for the sensitive nature of such a conversation.

Jordan Heath Rawlings It feels like the government is in a place where whatever they choose, they’re gonna get nailed over because of the optics of this whole thing. So does the opposition need to pick a way forward?

Cormac Mac Sweeney Well, that’s sort of what the government is, is saying in a way that, like I Dominic LeBlanc flat out said, if you want an inquiry, show us. Show us your plan. Show us what you want. Show us who you want to lead this. Show us how you’re gonna deal with the classified information because, David Johnston when advising against an inquiry, raised all of those issues and said, look, this is again, classified information that can’t be aired out in public. Therefore, that’s why a public inquiry is probably not the best way to handle this. That’s why he was suggesting to have public hearings, on any public information that could be discussed. We saw sort of an example of how this could potentially work with Justice Rouleau and the Convoy Commission where he did deal with national security information. He held closed door meetings with representatives from law enforcement and national security agencies to go over information and he was sort of, you know, I, I know the, the conservatives are using the term gatekeeper a lot, right. But he was essentially the gatekeeper of the information to say, okay, you know what? I do believe that this is, something that is in the public interest, and I don’t believe that this would threaten national security. So even though you say it is, I might. You know, unredacted this, but you know what, all this other stuff Yeah. We’re, that’s never seen the light of day and the public won’t see that. But then he was able to summarize his thoughts on where things were and, and I think that’s sort of what we’re getting at here. The opposition has made the Rouleau Commission example before saying that we could do something like that. But that’s essentially what they’re asking for. Give us names, give us your plan of action. Tell us how you would handle all of this. And we will do it. Now the opposition leaders have to get together and try and come up with that. And so they’ve all vowed that they will work together and it will be fascinating to see what they come up with, whether they publicly release their plan that they’ve submitted to the government or not. But again, it’s not a for sure thing that they’re going through with the public inquiry. Dominic LeBlanc says he wants to also talk with experts, with judges, people with knowledge of national security situations to also consult them on what the next step should be. So we’ll have to wait and see what they decide. But the possibility of a public inquiry is getting closer and closer and, and one expert I was speaking with before we recorded this said, you know, look, the government’s pretty much backed into a corner and, and a couple of experts that I spoke to said they don’t see politically. How the government can really do anything else but a public inquiry right now to restore trust in Canada’s democracy. But we’ll, we’ll have to wait and see.

Jordan Heath Rawlings They can’t just name another member of the Trudeau Foundation as another special rapporteur and just roll on?

Cormac Mac Sweeney I think the vetting process with, if, if it’s a public inquiry, another rapid tour, I think the vetting process for that person will be probably a lot more thorough, than we had with the last one.

Jordan Heath Rawlings In terms of the actual work being done, you mentioned that Johnston, will stay on until at maximum the end of June. I know from the last time we covered this, that he was working right now on another report. What happens to that? Do we know where he is with that? Will anyone ever see it?

Cormac Mac Sweeney We will, he, he does plan on releasing a final report. But you know, there’s gonna be a question about that as well. I’m sure the opposition will not put a lot of weight into that given, the concerns that they had about the integrity of Mr. Johnston, from the start of this whole process. But nonetheless, he is going to be releasing a final report at some point. I think in his letter he did say he wants it to be earlier than the end of June. But, he, he does plan to work until the end of June at the latest and get this report out there, for Canadians to see what his findings were. But you know, from the last report, he really hasn’t had much time at all to do any additional interviews. Much additional work to try and get to the bottom of all of this. You know, there were questions as well about his work with his first report, why he didn’t speak to certain people such as liberal MP Han Dong, who was named by some reports as being somewhat involved. There were questions about, conversations he had with someone in the Consul General’s office, of the Chinese Embassy in Toronto. There are allegations there in questions, and yet, Johnston had not talked to him. So there are many questions about the work that was done and there hasn’t been a lot of time since his last report to really do anything additional. It’ll be interesting to see what his final thoughts are and what his final report says. But in terms of the opposition being satisfied, I, I don’t think they’ll put a lot of weight into that because ever since the start of this process, it has been public inquiry or bust for the opposition parties.

Jordan Heath Rawlings After a weekend of statements and accusations from all sides, the government and the various opposition parties. I know the House of Commons sat today. There was a question period, you were watching it. What was the vibe like there? What’s, what was the atmosphere?

Cormac Mac Sweeney Well, the Prime Minister wasn’t in question period, so I think that impacted the vibe a little bit, if you will, because he wasn’t there to address questions around all of this. And, it’s not the first time that we’ve seen one issue pop up on headlines and the opposition party not initially focus on it in the House of Commons. It’s a, it’s a tactic that they use to try and shed light on other issues when they know more eyeballs might be glued to the TV to watch question period than a normal day, where they decide to talk about something else that’s more in their wheelhouse and put the government into, you know, a, a sticky situation or on the defensive. Today during question period Pierre Poilievre and Jugmeet Singh with the NDP were focused more on inflation and cost of living issues for Canadians with their opening rounds of questions. And then we got into, questions on this issue on foreign interference, but it was deputy leader, Melissa Lantsman from the conservatives who was leading the charge o on the second round, if you will. You know, saying this should have been the first resort, having a public inquiry, not the last resort for the liberals trying to attack the liberals, put ’em on the defensive again. And they responded much with what we heard over the weekend, with their lines saying that, it. You know, the opposition, if they want an inquiry, should be showing us their action plan. And so this back and forth sort of continued. I think what’s going to be interesting is the Tuesday question period. when we’re likely to see the Prime Minister back in action on the floor, the House of Commons, after he took a trip to Ukraine over the weekend. Which is why he wasn’t there for the Monday. That’s the one where you might see a little bit more action from people like, conservative leader Pierre Poilievre and NDP leader Jugmeet Singh.

Jordan Heath Rawlings What are the chances that if they don’t concede to a public inquiry, this is an issue that could lead to an election? If you’ve got, the two parties that could overturn the government, united on this.

Cormac Mac Sweeney I would say don’t expect to head to the polls anytime soon. And the reason for that is that the NDP has kind of ruled that out. The New Democrats say that this is not the issue that they’re going to take the government down on at this time. They’re not putting their supply and confidence deal with the liberals. And, you know, sometimes it can be easy for a lot of people to forget that this is still a minority government. And technically, usually minority governments are frail and fragile and, and can quickly fall. But thanks to the supply and confidence deal between the Liberals and NDP, they can be propped up for as late as 2025, which is when we’re expecting the next election.

Jordan Heath Rawlings Well, that’s why I was asking cuz it does seem like conservatives and the NDP are not very often aligned on issues that could bring down a government.

Cormac Mac Sweeney Yeah. And we do have this deal that comes with a bunch of conditions attached, and if the liberals don’t live up to their end of the bargain, the NDP will pull its deal and then it would be like a normal minority government, where every single confidence vote or money bill in the House of Commons, could potentially bring down the government. But the NDP is not saying, it’s going to do that at this time over the foreign interference issue. And part of the reasoning about that is that they don’t want to head into another election without getting some answers about what happened in the last two elections with foreign interference that has raised this whole issue from the start. So they’re concerned about the path forward to make sure we don’t have foreign interference problems again, that’s why, or part of the reason why they don’t wanna hold an election right now. There are other factors. Anytime a party decides to bring down a government, when they are the decision makers as the NDP kind of are right now, and in a minority, it takes all opposition, usually all opposition parties to do that. But there are other factors, fundraising, support in the polls, timing that’s right in terms of whatever your issues and your agenda is as a party. Sometimes it’s not even about whether or not you think you can win and form government, it might be saving the deck chairs as you’re going down if you know that this is the best chance you have to keep yourself alive or to keep yourself at a certain seat count. So there are a lot of factors that go into opposition parties choosing to take down a government, a government choosing to go to the polls and test the will of Canadians, or to purposely try and bring itself down and make it look like the opposition was the one at fault to trigger the election. But because the NDP has said they’re not gonna bring down the government at this time, given what we have at the moment, they’re not gonna break their deal. We’re not gonna head to the polls, the conservatives who have strengthened the polls right now over the liberals, there are multiple polls that show that they’re ahead of the liberals right now. They may love to go to the polls over this, but it just doesn’t look like it’s happening at this time.

Jordan Heath Rawlings And I guess now we watch with the ball in the court of the opposition to figure out what comes next and if the liberals will accept it.

Cormac Mac Sweeney Yeah, and you know what, the other thing about the election call is that maybe this serves the conservatives better. If this is gonna be another drip, drip, drip or death by a thousand cuts for a government, they may enjoy watching this sort of drag on month after month after month. As you say, the big question here will be what does the government decide to do from here? There were a lot of people who thought it was a no-brainer that they would hold a public inquiry when they decided to call that news conference and instead they announced a special rapporteur. So I’m not sure where they’re gonna go on this. There are a lot of experts and a lot of people who say they can’t afford to do anything but a public inquiry right now, but nothing’s 100% in politics until it’s been announced.

Jordan Heath Rawlings Cormac, as always, thank you for this and it seems like we’ll be talking possibly sooner than later.

Cormac Mac Sweeney Anytime.

Jordan Heath Rawlings Cormac Mac Sweeney reporting from Parliament Hill in Ottawa. That was The Big Story for more including the previous episodes in this ongoing saga. You can head to TheBigStorypodcast.ca. You can find us on Twitter @TheBigStoryfpn. You can write to us via email hello@TheBigStorypodcast.ca, and you can of course call us and leave a voicemail, 416-935-5935. Put yourself forward for the job of special rapporteur. I don’t know how long it’ll last, but it’s bound to be fun. Thanks for listening. I’m Jordan Heath Rawlings. We’ll talk tomorrow.

=