Elections Canada scrapped the dangerously biased campaign, but not after paying out hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars.
The Conservative Party is calling on the Liberals to pay back Canadian taxpayers for the botched ‘influencers’ campaign.
Elections Canada found themselves facing even more accusations of partisanship and bias, after it was revealed that many of the supposedly ‘non-partisan influencers’ were actually anti-Conservative and pro-Trudeau.
One of the ‘influencers’ had even called for Harper to be defeated in 2015, and compared him to a fascist dictator.
There's no damn way you could miss vetting Ashley Callingbull for example pic.twitter.com/q9R4XADEJ4
— Dean Skoreyko (@bcbluecon) June 20, 2019
The fact that it even got that far is appalling, as Elections Canada should have looked into the past partisan statements of those they were signing up.
But they didn’t, and have now damaged their credibility even more.
Even worse, Elections Canada paid many of the influencers ahead of time, before any work was even done.
Now, the Conservatives are calling on the Liberal Party to repay Canadian taxpayers for the $650,000 campaign, since it was basically a ‘get out the vote’ effort for the Liberals disguised as an Elections Canada effort.
Here’s what the Conservatives said in a release:
“The Trudeau Liberals and Election Canada’s attempts to use taxpayer funded partisan Liberal social media influencers as a Get out the Vote machine is one of the most egregious affronts to our democracy in recent memory.
“It was only after the Conservatives raised this issue repeatedly that it rightfully got kiboshed – but taxpayers are still on the hook for $650,000.
“For weeks, the Trudeau Liberals and Elections Canada refused to release the list of social media influencers. Now we know why. Quick Google searches showed that these influencers have partisan Liberal pasts.
“One of these ‘social media influencers’ called Liberal Party Leader Justin Trudeau her #mancrushfriday.
“One of these ‘social media influencers’ gushed that Liberal Party Leader Justin Trudeau photo-bombed her selfie.
“One of these ‘social media influencers’ described Liberal Party Leader Justin Trudeau as ‘really dreamy,’ and talked about basking in his ‘afterglow.’
“One of these ‘social media influencers’ ran an organized media blitz and campaign to defeat former Prime Minister Stephen Harper in the last election and compared Harper to Adolf Hitler.
“This appears to be nothing more than a $650,000 taxpayer funded partisan Liberal Get out the Vote Campaign – which taxpayers are still on the hook for.
“It was the Trudeau Liberals who changed the law to make these social media campaigns possible. It is the Trudeau Liberals who are stacking the deck in their party’s favour.
“The Liberal Party of Canada needs to do the right thing and pay-back the taxpayers for this $650,000 GOTV campaign.”
Will the Liberals step up and do the right thing?
We both know the answer to that.
Spencer Fernando