While Michael Cohen was sabotaging Donald Trump's Presidency, Canada's Justin Trudeau was being lambasted in a Parliamentary Committee by his ex-Attorney General. Both are astonishing stories. You can read about the USA mess just about anywhere; here is the mind-blowing Canadian story that could bring down Justin Trudeau.
The story has to do with one of Canada's largest engineering companies, SNC-Lavalin. It was charged last year with paying bribes to Muammar Qaddafi for a construction contract in Libya. The decision was made to prosecute SNC-Lavalin on corruption charges.
The problem here becomes very political. SNC-Lavalin is headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, and employs thousands of people in Quebec and across Canada. If found guilty, the punishment would restrict SNC-Lavalin from bidding on any Canadian Government contracts for 10 years. They could continue to bid on international contracts but the Canadian suspension would certainly result in a lot of jobs lost, many of them in Quebec. I believe the company may have threatened the government that it might pull out of Canada completely.
Quebec is the centre of the Liberal Party's world. It usually wins a lot of seats in that province, and without it, cannot win enough seats to form a national government. Trudeau and the Prime Minister's Office is keenly aware of the dangers with a federal election due in October. So, what does he do? He, and at least 10 other people from the PMO, the Privy Council, and Ministry of Finance begin to twist the arm of Jody Wilson-Raybould.
Jody Wilson-Raybould (JWR) was appointed Attorney General of Canada with great fanfare, being a woman, and an indigenous woman. Trudeau chose his cabinet very carefully, based on their sex, colour, sexual persuasion, and religion. 50% women, lots of Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, and who knows what - but definitely no Christians, and several gay people.
JWR was one of two indigenous people in the cabinet, the other had to resign for sexual improprieties.
I have long complained that the cabinet was based on appearance and that some very capable and talented people were overlooked because they happened to be white men. But it must have come as quite a shock to Trudeau to find that one of those women is principled, excruciatingly honest, and has a high degree of integrity.
After dozens of attempts to persuade her to break the law and interfere in the judicial process, he finally shuffled her out of the Attorney-General's office and demoted her to a lesser ministry. She did not take that well, at least if you are a Liberal. She decided to resign from cabinet and either she, or someone close to her, leaked the story that she had been improperly influenced by senior people to interfere in the legal system for the benefit of SNC-Lavalin and, of course, the Liberal Party.
Trudeau flat out denied the story but the pressure was on from opposition parties to hold inquiries. The Justice Committee was the first to bite, but immediately restricted the guest list to people who had nothing to do with the affair. One reporter on Twitter reported it something like this: The committee investigating the fox and the hens is restricting testimony to the mouse and the rusty old shovel.
JWR stood in the House of Commons and expressed her desire to testify, but claimed she was restricted by solicitor-client privilege as well as cabinet privilege. After some considerable pressure, Trudeau released her from those privileges and allowed her to speak. She spoke this afternoon and it was stunning.
CBC:
Wilson-Raybould said she was contacted by 11 officials in the Prime Minister's Office, the Privy Council and Finance Minister Bill Morneau's office on the matter when she served as justice minister and attorney general.
"For a period of four months from September to December 2018, I experienced a consistent and sustained effort by many people within the government to seek to politically interfere in the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in my role as the attorney general of Canada in an inappropriate effort to secure a Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA) with SNC-Lavalin."
Wilson-Raybould said she was "hounded" by various officials through phone calls, meetings and text messages.
'Veiled threats'
"Within these conversations there were express statements regarding the necessity of interfering in the SNC-Lavalin matter, the potential of consequences, and veiled threats if a DPA was not made available to SNC-Lavalin," she said.
The very fact that JWR was demoted in cabinet would seem to verify that she was not just threatened but the PM made good on those threats.
I have always thought that if Trudeau were leader of an autocratic country, that he would be a brutal dictator.
She chronicled a series of meetings, including one with Trudeau and Privy Council clerk Michael Wernick on Sept. 17, 2018. She told him that she had made a decision not to overturn the decision from the director of the Public Prosecution Service Kathleen Roussel to proceed with criminal prosecution against SNC-Lavalin.
The prime minister cited potential job losses and the possible move by the company, and asked her to "help out." The clerk then made the case for a DPA and reminded there was an election coming in Quebec.
"At that point, the prime minister jumped in, stressing that there is an election in Quebec, and that, 'I am an MP in Quebec, the MP for Papineau,'" she recounted. 'I was quite taken aback."
At that point, Wilson-Raybould said, she posed a direct question to Trudeau while looking him straight in the eye, asking if he was politically interfering with her role and her decision as the attorney general.
"I would strongly advise against it," she told the committee she warned Trudeau, who responded, "No, no, no, we just need to find a solution."
Apparently, allowing justice to take its course was not a solution!
This is a huge problem for Justin Trudeau and his very Liberal Party, as opinion polls are already showing a downward trend. It also puts the newly appointed AG in a nasty position - interfere with the judicial system or lose the next election. If he does choose to interfere, it may well cost the very Liberal Party the next election anyway.
Trudeau has inspired a lot of left-leaning people. They have faith that he is one of the people most likely to save the planet from global warming, from war, and from nationalism. Finding out that he is a hypocrite, on top of several stupid stunts he has pulled, hits the faithful very hard. But he is first and foremost a politician and winning the next election is the most important thing. So important that he is willing to pressure others to break the law and act in a manner not fit for a minister in the government of Canada.
This is also a problem for Canada's mainstream media. They are head-over-heels in love with Trudeau and his very Liberal Party and are loath to bring meaningful criticism against him. For instance - last December, when the CFO of Huawei was arrested in Vancouver on a USA warrant, Trudeau answered complaints from China by lecturing them on the fact that Canada is a nation of laws and there is no political interference in those laws. He said that a few times. He said that while he was pressing JWR to interfere in the prosecution of SNC-Lavalin. The MSM seems to have conveniently forgotten that.
Expect lots of personal attacks in the MSM against JWR as they try to mitigate the disaster on the very Liberal Party.
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