Trudeau won’t say if Liberal MPs allegedly conspired with foreign states

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and Green Leader Elizabeth May say none of their MPs are named in NSICOP's foreign interference report but Justin Trudeau won't say if Liberals were named.

BARI, Italy – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau would not say if current members of the Liberal caucus are named in a classified version of a stunning national security report that alleges some parliamentarians are either “semi-witting or witting” participants in foreign interference efforts.

When asked twice Saturday by Global News if any of his current MPs are named, Trudeau did not directly answer the question.

“The issue of foreign interference is one that this government has taken incredibly seriously since 2015,” Trudeau told reporters from the G7 in Italy.

The unredacted report produced by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP), a group comprised of members from all parties, said that some parliamentarians are “semi-witting or witting” participants in the efforts of foreign states to meddle in Canadian politics but did not name specific MPs or senators.

Both New Democratic Party leader Jagmeet Singh and Green Party leader Elizabeth May were given access to the full, unredacted version of that NSICOP report and, afterward, said that no members of their caucus were named.

The public, redacted version of the NSICOP report did not identify any parliamentarians and did not provide any details, such as the country involved, about how they may have participated in foreign interference. Singh and May upheld that secrecy and neither of them would identify parliamentarians or foreign states alleged to have been engaged in foreign interference.

Bloc Québecois leader Yves-François Blanchet has also committed to reviewing the unredacted report but has not yet done so. Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has declined to take the steps necessary to do the same.

Trudeau echoed previous concerns made by Public Safety Minister Dominic Leblanc, that the committee had not properly interpreted intelligence provided to them by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and other national security agencies. Both Trudeau and LeBlanc have also seen the entire unredacted NSICOP report.