Procedure and House Affairs Committee on June 15th, 2023

[Daniel Jean]

First of all, let's maybe try to clarify what has been reported in the media versus the memo that I sent. I think the rapporteur also did that in his report.

The reports by Global News, according to what the special rapporteur said, referred to a draft of that memo, an earlier draft version, that would have been leaked. The rapporteur has had a chance to see that draft. I have not had the chance to see that draft.

Now, the one thing that has changed since I appeared in mid-April is that I have had a chance to see my June 2017 memo. Also, because it's been made public that I'm the author, I can at least talk about the fact that...generally what was in the note, although I cannot talk about the classified information itself.

I was the author of the June 2017 memo that was sent to the Prime Minister. I was the final author, the person who signed the memo. Yes.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Did you prepare any of the drafts?

[Daniel Jean]

Well, I would have seen some draft, right? It's always the way it works. You see some earlier draft. You make corrections. It returns. I cannot say whether or not I saw the draft of Global, because I've had no access to it. Too, I don't see all the earlier drafts, so....

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Did the Prime Minister's chief of staff, Katie Telford, ask you to prepare the memo?

[Daniel Jean]

I have no recollection of a request being made to me for a memo by the chief of staff. That doesn't mean it was not the case. It could have happened in the context.... They have a regular briefing with the intelligence assessment secretariat. Maybe they had asked for that. That's possible. But to me, no.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Your answer is, no, she did not request that you prepare the memo.

[Daniel Jean]

Me? No. But as I said, that doesn't mean the initial request may not have come to the intelligence assessment secretariat, who do regular briefings to the chief of staff and, at the time, the principal secretary.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Who was the point of contact that resulted in your involvement in the memo?

[Daniel Jean]

As I said, I can talk generally about the memo. There were a number of reasons we wanted to do that memo. We were more and more concerned about some of the activities by China. As I said before, at my last appearance, we particularly very concerned at that time about economic security and China trying to acquire sensitive technologies.

It is, actually, a good case today of where this country has acted very responsibly. We're seen as one of the countries who have sharpened quite a bit their instruments when it comes to protecting sensitive technology and all of that. I can say more of that in other....

As I mentioned in my last appearance, before the election of 2015 I was the deputy minister of foreign affairs. We had issued a notice to diplomatic missions to stay out of elections. We were seeing growing concerns that at the local level, maybe some foreign state actors were trying to connect with people. We were concerned about our research. We were concerned that at that time, as you would probably remember, there was a huge corruption—

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Jean. I apologize for interrupting, but my time is limited.

Following up on where you more or less left off, Mr. Johnston states in his report that an earlier draft of the memo contained language similar to what was reported by Global News on February 8—namely, that Beijing operatives were “assisting Canadian candidates running for political offices”. However, Mr. Johnston states, “That draft was significantly revised before the memorandum went to the Prime Minister”, and the language specifically warning of Beijing had been removed.

Who objected to the initial warning about Beijing assisting Canadian political candidates?

[Daniel Jean]

First of all, I have not seen the draft memo that Global is assumed to have seen. In fact, Mr. Johnston seems to have seen a different draft than the one Mr. Cooper reported on.

Second, the note I sent warned about all kinds of foreign interference activities by China, so there were certainly no objections to sensitizing the government. In fact, one of the main reasons for the note, on top of trying to sensitize the government about us needing to be very conscious, was this: We'd had the U.S. election and a lot of the focus was on cyber foreign interference. We wanted the government to understand that whatever tools we were going to develop needed to be as effective as fighting analog foreign interference. In fact, the tools that were adopted after the special task force—the protocol and all of that—applied as much to cyber foreign interference as they did to analog.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

You did sign off on the final memo.

[Daniel Jean]

Yes.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

The final memo contains language that, as Mr. Johnston says, was significantly revised. There was a suggestion that it should be general and that no single state be specifically identified. Why?

[Daniel Jean]

No.

First of all, that's not what the rapporteur's report says. It says that, whatever actions we take, we should be careful. He was talking about taking actions. In terms of the memo, it was very clear we had concerns about growing activities of foreign interference by China.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

[Daniel Jean]

In fact, the first thing the chief counsel of the rapporteur told me is, “Your memo is quite clear.”

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Excellent. Thank you for that answer.

Mr. Turnbull, you have six minutes.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks to the witnesses for being here today. Welcome back. As the saga continues in this work—it's important work—it's great to hear from you again and have your expertise in the mix.

Mr. Jean, I'll start with a question for you.

You've obviously read the Right Honourable David Johnston's first report. Do you agree generally with the findings in his report?

[Daniel Jean]

Generally speaking, I agree with the findings, yes.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Thank you.

[Daniel Jean]

I don't agree with every specific finding, but generally speaking, yes.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Thank you very much.

I think you mentioned previously that a lot of the focus, going back years, was on red flags raised in the U.S. election. A lot of the interference happening raised the threat level for Canada. You mentioned cyber interference or disinformation.

Was that primarily coming from Russia?

[Daniel Jean]

It was primarily coming from Russia.

In parallel, we were very concerned about a number of things to do with China. I mentioned economic security. You have to remember that, at that time, Xi Jinping was leading a major anti-corruption campaign. Some people were arguing that some of his targets were more like political rivals. We wanted to be very clear that China should not in any way try to pursue actions in Canada, try to pursue who they said were fugitives. We had a number of conversations with China as well on the importance of going through normal channels.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

There's no doubt that China has been the main focus of a lot of our discussions on foreign interference, but I note that CSIS...and other reports that have come out for numerous years have identified other state actors who are also trying to interfere in Canada's activities and democratic institutions.

Mr. Jean—I'll go to Mr. Juneau-Katsuya in a second—I want to know whether you think any public process moving forward, in whatever form it takes, should take a comprehensive approach to foreign interference and include those other state actors.