One of Canada’s top public servants asked for a false story about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau be removed from Facebook during the 2019 election, according to testimony and documents tabled at the Foreign Interference Commission (FIC). CBC News reported Friday the story in question was published by the Buffalo Chronicle. The story contained uncorroborated allegations involving Trudeau and was spreading online during the 2019 election campaign.The Buffalo Chronicle, which covers local news in New York, has been accused of publishing fake or misleading stories about Canada during and after the 2019 election.Documents tabled with the FIC show claims in the story were being discussed at the top levels of the Canadian government. Privy Council Office employee Allen Sutherland said in an interview with an FIC lawyer Facebook had brought the story to his attention. The lawyer said the story “might have gained significant attention were it amplified and therefore risked threatening the integrity of the election.”“At the direction of then-clerk of the Privy Council Ian Shugart, Mr. Sutherland asked Facebook to remove the article,” said the lawyer. “Facebook complied.”Sutherland said he did not make this information public because the online information ecosystem had debunked it. While Canadian government officials asked whether or not removing this story merited a public announcement, they decided doing so could amplify spreading misinformation. Conservative MP Michael Chong’s (Wellington-Halton Hills, ON) lawyer noted the differences between the Canadian government's handling of the Buffalo Chronicle story and its approach to multiple false ones about the Conservatives circulating on Chinese social media platform WeChat during the 2021 election.Documents show Sutherland believed the two instances were separate, as the WeChat articles were in Mandarin. This means the content likely would be limited to Chinese readers.He said the Buffalo Chronicle article presented inflammatory information targetting Trudeau’s character, but the WeChat postings were about policy issues and contained falsehoods.Chong’s lawyer Gib Van Ert asked if there was less concern about misinformation targetted at the Chinese diaspora than English speakers. “I talked about the Buffalo Chronicle article as being something that was highly inflammatory and was seen that it might go viral and become a national event,” said Sutherland.Conservative representatives have said they believe Chinese foreign interference might have cost it up to nine seats in ridings with large Chinese diaspora communities in British Columbia and Ontario. While some of the articles highlighted in 2021 by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and other monitoring bodies were about O'Toole's promises on China, others were more personal in nature. One article about former Conservative MP Kenny Chiu's (Steveston-Richmond East, BC) proposed bill about a foreign influence registry calls him anti-Chinese. Another story said O’Toole would ban WeChat if elected, described him as the Canadian version of former US president Donald Trump, and said he was more radical and tougher on China than former Conservative leader Andrew Scheer. Sutherland said officials must be cautious about setting the threshold for responding to false reports during an election, as having it too low could play into the objectives of adversaries trying to sow doubt about Canadian democracy.Three Canadian government aides refused to comment in 2023 on their attempt to censor a 2021 Edmonton Sun column critical of its immigration policy.READ MORE: Trudeau gov’t tried to block negative stories on Facebook, Twitter“The article in question was mine,” said Edmonton Sun columnist Lorne Gunter. An unnamed director of communications contacted Facebook and Twitter to demand they delete links to Gunter’s column, alleging it contained “serious errors of fact.”
