Information & Ethics Committee on May 2nd, 2023

[Morris Rosenberg]

I don't know, but for myself, no.

During my career in government, I always gave my opinions to the best of my knowledge and I always acted independently.

That is the spirit in which I held my office at the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

What do you say to the Canadians watching us who do not believe that you are independent, that there was no influence? Some people have a lot of doubts. What would you say to clear that up or confirm it?

[Morris Rosenberg]

The only thing I can say is that I have always tried to stay independent. I can't change the perception of people who don't want to believe me, unfortunately.

I have never acted in bad faith, and I have always acted in the best interests of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation.

[René Villemure, Bloc, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Okay.

Mr. Rosenberg, in 2016, Canada may have been naive about foreign policy and China's designs, but other countries were less so. Things have changed, and the context has also changed.

Canada was naive, but other countries were less so than us, isn't that right?

[Morris Rosenberg]

I think every country has followed a gradual path, but things changed suddenly for Canada in about 2018 or 2019.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Villemure.

Mr. Green, you have two minutes and thirty seconds—maybe a couple of seconds extra after that intervention by Mr. Villemure.

Go ahead, Mr. Green.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Rosenberg, you've now undergone almost two hours of what feels like cross-examination. I want to give you the benefit here. Allegations have been made. There are some direct comments on your character in terms of whether you're believable or not. There was the testimony from Madam Fournier, who raised some significant issues. To the benefit of your reputation and your standing, I want to provide you with the opportunity to say anything in response to any outstanding issues that you would like to have on the record.

[Morris Rosenberg]

The one I want to go back to is CSIS uncovering a Chinese plan to donate to the Trudeau Foundation. This appeared in the Globe on February 28 of this year. It was based on an anonymous source, apparently not based on a document. This is intelligence.

Intelligence is different from evidence, and I'm going to tell you something some of you may have heard from David Morrison. When he appeared at the other committee, at the House committee, he said, “intelligence rarely paints a full, concrete or actionable picture”. It's not truth; it's often inaccurate or partial or incomplete. In fact, we don't know what happened to that intelligence. We don't know where it went. We don't know who was briefed on it. We don't know if anybody was briefed on it. We don't know if it was taken seriously or not. I wasn't briefed on it.

There is a question, and it's a policy question as to how far CSIS should go outside the government when they become aware of something that might affect another non-government Canadian organization. I understand that there are limits on them with respect to revealing sources or methods, but maybe they need to be a bit more proactive in speaking and letting people know—and this is not just CSIS but the whole security community. What is the public interaction and the transparency of the Canadian security community?

I didn't know about this. I don't think anybody knew about this until February 28, and to say that nobody believes me, frankly, I'm insulted by that.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

I appreciate that.

With my remaining 15 seconds, I would ask, to give you one more opportunity, the following: Would you not agree that an independent public inquiry into the matter might help clear the air?

[Morris Rosenberg]

I think an independent public inquiry is a reasonable option. There are other reasonable options as well. I would hope that, if there is an independent public inquiry, it finds a way of making sure that not everything is happening in secret. Because there's an awful lot of security information that will never get into the public, the public part of the inquiry might be very much in question.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

That's fair enough. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Green.

Mr. Barrett, you have two and a half minutes, sir. Go ahead.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Sir, you said that intelligence is different from evidence. Of course it is.

Did you meet with PRC diplomats to arrange this donation?

[Morris Rosenberg]

No.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

We have an ATIP—an access to information record—that says that, in Montreal on the September 24, 2014, you attended a meeting with a consular official from the PRC. Does that jog your memory?

[Morris Rosenberg]

Yes, so that.... Yes, I just got a look at that. I'm sorry about that.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

At the end of that same document I'm referencing, which you've acknowledged now, it says that, once the proposal is ready, the foundation will involve Alexandre Trudeau. We talked about evidence, so we have evidence that the president of the foundation met with consular officials from a foreign government to arrange a donation, where they have the brother of....

You're shaking your head, sir, but I'm reading to you from the document. You first said that you didn't meet with them, but now you acknowledge that you did because I brought receipts. We have the receipts. You said it was extraordinary, and you couldn't recall another time Alexandre Trudeau would sign a donation agreement. He did it in this case. The foundation met with a foreign government, arranged this donation, ensured.... It's minuted that it was a requirement to have Mr. Trudeau personally involved.

At the time, even without the benefit of hindsight, could you not see that this was a foreign influence operation? This is not based on intelligence. This is based on evidence. You differentiated them before in your response to another colleague.

I'm seeing here that you attended the meeting, that consular officials from the PRC—the communist dictatorship in Beijing—were at the meeting, that the direction was to have Mr. Trudeau involved and that's what they got. They asked for it. The PRC asked for it, and the PRC got it. The Trudeau Foundation got the $140,000, and the individuals who were cut-outs acting on behalf of the dictatorship both got access directly to the Prime Minister within five months of this two-year process. Within five months, they both had access directly to the Prime Minister.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Mr. Barrett, that's your time.

I'm going to give you time for a quick response.

Go ahead.

[Morris Rosenberg]

First of all, I apologize. I didn't look at the whole list of attendees. I didn't mean to mislead anybody on that.

Second, this was an initiating meeting. This was not about the donation. At this point, they were talking about a donation to the Université de Montréal and to other universities in Canada. Then there was a committee set up with three people—Mr. Zhang, Madam Comtois and Benoît Moore from the Université de Montréal—and the evolution of this happened as a result of that. It didn't come out of this meeting.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Rosenberg.

Thank you, Mr. Barrett.

Mr. Bains, you have the final intervention for two and a half minutes. Go ahead.

[Parm Bains, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

Thank you.

You talked a little bit about intelligence versus evidence, and we previously heard from a witness.... A former executive at CSIS also stated that documents that are now reported as reports in certain media aren't actually coming from CSIS and that they think they're from somebody else, somebody with an agenda. Where could this be coming from? Ultimately, with respect to how it's being reported—which you've just mentioned—can you expand a little bit on that?

[Morris Rosenberg]

We don't know where it's coming from because my understanding is that....

It's interesting. The discussion in the U.S. after that young gamer leaked all that information was that there are thousands, if not more, of top secret clearances in the United States. I don't know how many top secret clearances there are in Canada, but they're not just in CSIS. They are in the Privy Council Office. They are in the Department of Foreign Affairs. They are in the Department of Justice. They are in the Department of Finance. They're in the ministers' offices. They're everywhere. Who knows where it came from? I would say—knowing a little bit about CSIS—that they didn't come from CSIS. That's what I would surmise; I don't know for sure. They came from somewhere.

Then the question is this: What is the the value of them? This is what we don't know. We don't know if this is a draft that somebody had, if this is a conversation that somebody had, if it was dismissed. In other words, the veracity and the weight of the intelligence, when it comes out through an anonymous source, are really hard to gauge, yet it's being taken as the gospel truth.

[Parm Bains, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

Now I just want to switch a little bit. You also talked about our security establishment engaging with diaspora communities. How can they do that better?

[Morris Rosenberg]

After 9/11, I was at the Department of Justice when we did the anti-terrorism legislation. I know that there was a concern that there would be—and there was, in fact—a backlash against people of Middle Eastern origin and other minority groups, just as I think there's been a backlash against people of Asian origin, starting with the pandemic because of the suspected origins of it. At that time, the government put together a diversity round table to meet with representatives of these communities to at least talk about what the problems were and to find ways to try to mitigate the harm.

Let me be clear. The fact that some communities may suffer a degree of harm is not a reason to avoid investigating legitimate claims of interference, but we need to be aware of that harm and try to work to mitigate it.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Bains.

That concludes the session for today.

Mr. Rosenberg, before you leave.... You were here when we had Mr. Fergus move the amendment on providing the documents.

Is it reasonable—and I'm asking the committee this—to expect that Mr. Rosenberg do this by, let's say, five o'clock on Friday afternoon, May 5? Is that reasonable, committee members?