A candidate for the Conservative Party in the election has been targeted by a Beijing-linked transnational repression operation conducted through social media, Canada’s elections security task force says.
Officials from the Security and Intelligence Threats to Elections (SITE) Task Force provided details on April 21 about the operation directed at Tory candidate Joe Tay, who is running in the Don Valley North riding of Toronto.
Tay has been advocating for democracy in Hong Kong and authorities from the Chinese special administrative region placed a HK$1 million bounty (CA$184,000) on him in December 2024.
Tay’s case made headlines three weeks ago when comments made by his former rival, former MP and Liberal candidate Paul Chiang, surfaced during the election campaign. Chiang had suggested Tay be brought to the Chinese consulate to collect the bounty placed on him. Liberal Leader Mark Carney did not remove Chiang, but he eventually dropped out of the campaign of his own volition.
By monitoring the online space, SITE officials said they detected the transnational repression operation against Tay on social medial platforms widely used by Chinese-language speakers in Canada. Those include Facebook, WeChat, TikTok, RedNote, and Douyin, the Chinese market version of TikTok.
Officials said intelligence reporting has linked one of the Facebook accounts involved in this activity to People’s Republic of China (PRC) authorities and pro-PRC entities in Hong Kong.
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The SITE Task Force is composed of representatives from government bodies with a security mandate, such as the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the RCMP, and the Communications Security Establishment.
The task force said it identified two trends in the transnational repression operation, including the “inauthentic and coordinated” amplification of content regarding the arrest warrant and bounty placed on Tay’s head, as well as content related to his ability to run for elected office. The material includes a mock “wanted” poster for Tay.
SITE said it saw multiple accounts relaying the information, sometimes in quick succession.
The other trend noted by the election watchdog is the “deliberate suppression” of search terms related to Joe Tay.
“When people in Canada search his name, the search engine only returns information about the bounty and arrest warrant,” said Laurie-Anne Kempton, assistant secretary to the cabinet for communications with the Privy Council Office, during a press conference on April 21.
SITE officials identified this Beijing-linked operation as “transnational repression” instead of simply as an information operation.
This is “not about a single act, but rather about the accumulated impact of many acts designed to discredit a candidate, silence criticism and dissent, and manipulate the information that informs voters,” Kempton said.
Information Operation
Two weeks ago, SITE had warned of a Chinese information operation on WeChat seeking to influence Chinese-Canadian voters on Liberal Leader Mark Carney. SITE officials said both positive and negative narratives were being spread.
An analysis by The Epoch Times found the content on balance more positive towards Carney, and said he would deepen cooperation with China.
When asked by reporters why he thought China was promoting positive narratives about him, Carney said he had “absolutely no idea.”
Carney had high-level corporate engagements with Chinese authorities in the fall of 2024 as board chair of investment firm Brookfield Asset Management. A readout from Chinese authorities said Carney had pledged to increase his firm’s activity in Beijing. Brookfield also secured a $276 million loan from a Chinese state-owned bank.
Carney said during the English-language debate on April 17 he believes China poses the “biggest security threat” to Canada. Expanding on this comment the next day, he said China is “one of the largest” foreign interference threats. “So we both have to engage with China and take steps to protect ourselves here,” he said.
The Foreign Interference Commission, SITE, and CSIS have all identified the PRC as the foremost foreign interference threat in Canada.
“We are aware that never really before has Canada’s diverse communities been so highly targeted by foreign interference,” said Vanessa Lloyd, CSIS Deputy Director of Operations and SITE chair, during the press conference. SITE officials said diaspora and exiled communities are particularly targeted, including persecuted religious and ethnic minorities, dissidents, and human rights activists.
SITE officials said the operation against Tay has had low engagement since it peaked in December, but the activity had increased at various points during the election campaign. Officials said the Critical Election Incident Public Protocol has deemed the operation is not a threat to the integrity of the election, whether at the riding or broader level.
The riding of Don Valley North has a population of 113,663, according to the 2021 census, with 26,760 identifying as having a Chinese mother tongue.
The riding was the site of a well-known occurrence of Beijing interference in the 2019 Liberal nomination contest involving then-Liberal candidate Han Dong. Dong later resigned from the party amid media reports about his contact with the Chinese consulate. He has denied any wrongdoing and launched legal action regarding the reporting.
Tay is facing off in the riding against Liberal candidate Maggie Chi, a public servant with the City of Toronto, and NDP candidate Naila Saeed, a business owner.
Tay had previously been the candidate in Markham-Unionville when incumbent Paul Chiang made the bounty comment in January.
Chiang has now been replaced by Peter Yuen as the Liberal candidate in that riding. Yuen is a former deputy police chief in Toronto who had been close to an organization linked to the Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Work Department. Canadian intelligence has linked the United Front to foreign interference activities.
Yuen attended a military parade in Beijing in 2015 and saluted China’s flag while in uniform during a flag-raising ceremony at the Ontario legislature in 2016. He has not returned a previous request for comment.
Chandra Philip contributed to this report.
