OTTAWA (LifeSiteNews) –– The entire board of directors, including the president and CEO, of the Pierre Elliot Trudeau Foundation resigned today after a report surfaced last month detailing how the non-profit group received a $200,000 donation that was alleged to be connected to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
In a press release sent out this morning, the Foundation admitted that the mass exodus of all its board members was directly linked to “the political climate surrounding a donation received by the Foundation in 2016.”
Last month, after the CCP-linked donation scandal broke, the Foundation said it would be returning the money.
The donation revelation came amidst an ever-growing number of reports alleging that the CCP has been meddling in Canada’s last two federal elections, both of which saw Trudeau emerge victorious.
According to the foundation, the scandal “put a great deal of pressure on the Foundation’s management and volunteer Board of Directors, as well as on our staff and our community.”
“The circumstances created by the politicization of the Foundation have made it impossible to continue with the status quo, and the volunteer Board of Directors has resigned, as has the President and CEO,” noted the group.
The foundation says that three of its directors have agreed to “remain on an interim basis so that the Foundation can continue to meet its obligations pending Board renewal, including towards its Scholars, Mentors and Fellows.”
Conservative Party of Canada (CPC) leader Pierre Poilievre noted today how the mass resignation of the foundation’s board shows that the group needs to be “investigated” for potential corruption.
“We need to investigate the Beijing-funded Trudeau Foundation. We need to know who got rich; who got paid and who got privilege and power from Justin Trudeau as a result of funding to the Trudeau Foundation,” tweeted Poilievre.
We need to investigate the Beijing-funded Trudeau Foundation.
We need to know who got rich; who got paid and who got privilege and power from Justin Trudeau as a result of funding to the Trudeau Foundation.https://t.co/chIDQ8lh0j
— Pierre Poilievre (@PierrePoilievre) April 11, 2023
The scandal surrounding the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation – which labels itself as “an independent and non-partisan charity established in 2001 – first broke in late February when The Globe and Mail reported that Chinese donors with close connections to the CCP gave the foundation a total of $1 million in exchange for having a statue of former Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau – Justin’s father – and infamous Chinese dictator Mao Zedong erected in front of the University of Montreal – where the elder Trudeau studied law.
A University of Montreal spokeswoman told the outlet that such a statue was “suggested” but that the university ultimately decided against it.
The Globe also stated that a source told them Canada’s spy agency, the Canadian Security Intelligence (CSIS) Service, had intercepted conversions regarding the donation at the time.
The foundation’s scandal is just one of many aspects of the larger scandal brewing around Trudeau and the CCP.
Late last month, one of Trudeau’s own MPs, Han Dong, resigned from the Liberal Party just hours after a news report broke alleging that he had asked a Chinese diplomat in February 2021 to delay the release of two Canadians held captive by the Communist Chinese regime.
Trudeau’s own ‘special rapporteur’ erased from Foundation’s site
Opposition parties, notably the CPC, have been for weeks demanding that Trudeau launch a full independent public inquiry into the Chinese election meddling scandal.
However, instead of a full public inquiry, Trudeau appointed former Governor General David Johnston as an “independent special rapporteur” to investigate the allegations.
Of note is that Johnston is a family friend of Trudeau and at the time of being appointed “special rapporteur” was listed prominently on the embattled foundation’s website.
Johnston’s name has since been taken down from the website.