NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh says he was informed by the RCMP that serious death threats had been made on his life around the same time his wife was expecting a child.
Singh said he was first notified of the threats in 2023, and that it made him think about his life and career.
“I received a duty to warn, which is a legal obligation that the RCMP provides you when there’s a credible, real threat to your life,” he told reporters at an NDP campaign office in London, Ont., on April 26.
“I was floored when I started thinking about what it meant for me, my family, that I was the target of a real threat to my life,” he said. “I had the chills thinking about what that could mean for my wife, who was pregnant at the time, my baby girl. It was definitely a scary time.”
Singh said he had a “knot” in his stomach for several days after learning about the threat.
“I just stayed in the basement because it advised me to stay away from windows. It was a pretty serious thing.”
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He said he wasn’t told exactly who had made the threat but that ”the implication was a foreign government.”
The NDP leader said he and his wife talked about whether it was worth staying in politics, and decided it was.
“I wanted to keep on fighting, no matter how what the odds were, no matter what the threat was.”
The threat warning to Singh came the same year that Sikh independence advocate Hardeep Singh Nijjar was shot to death in the parking lot of a temple in Surrey, B.C., where he was the president. At least four people have been charged in Nijjar’s death.
Singh said he went public about his experience because it might be helpful to those who live under similar threats on a daily basis, and that “maybe sharing this would would make those folks feel seen.”
“What about folks that are faced with these threats on a day-to-day basis? What about different community groups who constantly are living with the fear of threats to themselves, to their families” he said, adding that foreign interference is “such a serious issue.”
“It became clear to me that maybe sharing a bit of what happened to me would help highlight how serious this is for those folks.”
Singh said he was grateful for the protection the RCMP offered.
“I’m an elected official, that’s part of the reason why I was targeted, but also part of the reason why I was able to get such incredible protection from from the RCMP. I’m so eternally thankful for all the hard work they put in.”
