MPs are rattled by rising intimidation and threats
By Tonda MacCharles
Ottawa Bureau Chief
OTTAWA — It seems only a matter of time before an elected official in Canada gets seriously hurt.
In March, somebody set fire to the garage at Liberal MP Brendan Hanley’s Yukon home.
No one was injured in the blaze that destroyed the garage, two cars and a motorbike, but it left him “shocked,” profoundly shaken, and fearful about the safety of his family, neighbours and those close to him.
Like nearly all MPs approached by the Star for this story, Hanley is reluctant to talk about the threat or details of that terrifying incident because he does not want to impede an ongoing RCMP probe.
But Hanley, a former Yukon chief medical officer of health who was elected in 2021, will say this:
“We all recognize the importance of protest and the many forms that can take. But it should never take the form of violence, and it should never encroach on someone’s personal property. I think that’s a line that has been crossed.”
It’s not about mean tweets, and it is not just online harassment anymore.
Canadian elected officials are confronting a sharp rise in physical threats and in-person intimidation, according to parliamentarians, House of Commons security officials, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
And there’s a veil of silence that surrounds it.
Vance Badawey, a Liberal MP, doesn’t want to talk about the guy who came to his Port Colborne home last year, smashed the front window with a baseball bat, threatened his neighbours and chased kids down the street.
In a victim impact statement, Badawey made clear he remains angry about the impact on his family and neighbours, who were deeply rattled, and still are.
Melissa Lantsman, the Conservative MP for Thornhill and deputy leader, doesn’t want to talk about the two individuals, one a woman, who have been charged with threatening her to the point that she required close police protection.
Eric Duncan, a Conservative MP for an Ontario riding near the U.S. border, doesn’t want to talk about the man, recently released from police custody, who is charged with uttering threats against him, four months after the same man was also charged for threatening Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
In the past several weeks, protesters have turned up at the homes of Justice Minister Arif Virani and Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly. They are not keen to talk about it, either.
“I am very concerned to be frank,” said RCMP deputy commissioner Mark Flynn in an interview with the Star.
“We’ve seen a shift from people protesting or appearing … at Parliament Hill, minister’s offices, constituency offices, et cetera, to where we are now seeing people go to their residences and start taking actions at their residence.”
Behavioural analysts at the RCMP who are tracking the trend say it is one of the “indicators of someone moving towards violence” when a harasser gets physically closer to the object of their ire.
Flynn says there’s “a lot more” of it and traces the shift as having happened over “the last couple of years,” a period that includes the COVID-19 pandemic, the anti-vaccine and anti-establishment movements that gave rise to the 2022 convoy protests, as well as Russia’s war on Ukraine. Societal tensions have only escalated since war broke out in the Middle East.
The threats are affecting politicians in all provinces, across genders, across political party lines, and at all levels of government, said Flynn.
Individuals may claim a right to free speech, and that their actions are merely protest.
But Flynn said, in his opinion, “they are doing it to intimidate” the family and the MP — an escalation that has a corrosive effect on democratically elected representatives.
Sometimes graffiti is sprayed, or windows broken, beer bottles tossed on lawns, cars or pickup trucks waving “F—- Trudeau” flags do slow-rolls in front of homes, or family members and neighbours are taunted.
An MP or their family might spot someone sitting for hours outside their home in a parked car or truck, only to be replaced by another car doing another shift once the legal parking time is up, and before anyone can be ticketed.
An MP has had their tires slashed. There have been at least two incidents of arson the Star is aware of.
On April 1, a B.C. MP’s office window was smashed by an axe-wielding protester, and a stick of baloney was shoved through the broken glass, according to NDP MP Charlie Angus, who has written about a “staggering escalation in intimidation” he has personally experienced.
Liberal MP Julie Dabrusin’s constituency office was vandalized this week with red paint, simulated dead babies in blood-soaked shrouds laid at her office door, and a sign that read, “Julie your hands are red, 20000 children dead.” She didn’t post photos of it — “I don’t want to give them any oxygen” — but someone else did.
It’s the third time Dabrusin’s riding office has been vandalized since Oct. 7. Dabrusin says her office had never been vandalized before the war in the Middle East broke out.
Both Dabrusin, who is Jewish, and fellow MP Omar Alghabra, who is Muslim, say they’ve had occasions where a person has approached them at their homes to make personal appeals in immigration cases, people Alghabra described as “desperate” and thinking an MP is their last hope.
Dabrusin and Alghabra say those cases feel different than what is happening now, with passions inflamed by the war in the Middle East.
Liberal MP Pam Damoff says she is quitting politics because of the threat and misogyny she has faced, a decision that hit home for some of her colleagues.
It prompted others to wonder if she wasn’t exaggerating because polls show the Liberals have a tough fight for re-election anyway.
Both things can be true at the same time.
It is also true that this has been happening for a while now.
The street where Premier Doug Ford lives in Etobicoke was the scene of almost weekly protests during the pandemic by demonstrators opposed to lockdowns.
Trudeau has faced an unprecedented level of threat.
In July 2020, a man rammed a truck through the gates of Rideau Hall, where the governor general and prime minister live, and set out on foot with three loaded firearms and a knife before getting into a 90-minute standoff with RCMP officers.
Yet at the federal level, the rising threats have become so alarming that more than six weeks ago, an executive Commons committee approved more money for panic buttons, more sophisticated security and alarm systems at MPs’ riding offices and homes, and for more sweeping open-source monitoring of the deluge of online hate and threats.
Many MPs no longer have an open-door policy at their riding offices, requiring constituents to book appointments ahead, online or by phone, fearing intimidation and harassment of staff.
Last week, Sergeant-at-Arms Pat McDonell told a Commons committee the rise in harassment of MPs, including indirect “threat behaviour” — that is intimidating but may not cross a criminal threshold of a direct threat to someone’s personal safety — rose from eight cases in 2019 to 530 in 2023.
But it’s worse than that.
By some accounts, the Commons has tracked more than 1,200 incidents of death threats, trespassing or vandalism to property, but it’s not clear over what precise timeline, or even if that is the latest number. It is not data the Commons will publicly release, and McDonell declined to comment for this article.
Numbers aside, what it means for MPs is clear.
“Doxxing” of politicians from all parties has increased. That’s when the private information of an MP or their children, including home addresses, have been published for protesters to target.
In at least one case, a person of concern showed up at the office of an MP’s spouse.
In cases of a direct or feared imminent threat, the RCMP ensures close protection for a cabinet minister or MP. Usually, followup falls to local police forces.
Flynn won’t talk about specific incidents, although he doesn’t know if there is firm evidence to support concerns that talking about them publicly makes matters worse.
He said he agreed to speak for this article because ”we as a society have to do something to combat this and ensure that as a society, we send a very clear message that this behaviour is not acceptable.”
Echoing comments of RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme, Flynn said it may be time for legal reform.
He suggests lawmakers could specifically prohibit protest at elected officials’ homes, but he acknowledged political decision-makers must strike a difficult balance between their security with the right to freely protest and express views.
The Trudeau government has proposed an online harms bill to toughen laws against online hate, but it has come up against sharp criticism for going too far.
Not all MPs are convinced a law to specifically protect politicians is required.
Some, like Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner, say, “It’s not just an MP issue. It’s an entire societal issue.”
Other public and private figures receive threats and harassment too, and police seem unable to apply current criminal harassment laws to stop it, she said.
Rempel Garner was at the heart of one of the very first cases in Canada where a court in 2016 convicted an individual for criminal harassment and threats posted in 2013 online. She’s not interested in posting about threats, or endlessly talking to media about the online intimidation she receives.
“I choose not to platform their behaviour because it detracts from my ability to do my job,” she said, “and I’m not a victim.”
But Rempel Garner supports anything that would help police act quickly or persuade judges to levy stiff penalties for threatening behaviour — which she suggests is the only effective deterrence.
Meanwhile, when it comes to personal security, MPs are left to cope on their own.
Reluctant to talk about the threats, some are worried they cannot protect their families while they are away at work in Ottawa. Others don’t want to jeopardize ongoing police investigations, or legal proceedings that are underway. Often they are afraid talking will only make matters worse, and police have advised them just that — don’t go public.
NDP MP Charlie Angus believes going public “does make it worse. You attract more threat.”
“I also think MPs don’t want to look weak and vulnerable, and some of the people I know, you know, they’re pretty quiet. They don’t pick a lot of public fights like me. And they faced serious, serious threats. But I feel like unless we keep talking about it, someone is going to get seriously hurt.”
Four years ago, Angus said, “nobody threatened me.”
Now the New Democrat receives threats weekly, and has been told some posts are “AI-generated” or campaigns mounted by bots — which further complicates the task for an MP who wants to track patterns of escalation.
When it comes to serious threats, even where charges are laid, Angus is dismayed at how the justice system fails to deal with it.
In 2022, a man who made bizarre QAnon-style allegations and threatened Angus was charged with public libel, an “obscure” offence, Angus said. A prosecutor settled the case, he said, after the accused agreed to a two-year restraining order, although the judge observed the offender likely deserved jail time.
Just last week, Angus was stunned to learn an unrelated criminal case involving someone who threatened him had collapsed.
A prosecutor stayed charges of uttering death threats even though Angus and his staff had documented the menacing and escalating behaviour they experienced, via phone records and voice recordings.
Yet a Crown attorney told a judge that critical police evidence had been lost.
“It’s just been a sort of a black hole, and nobody had reached out to us,” Angus said. “And nothing against the House of Commons, but MPs deal with all this on their own.”
Angus is not running for re-election — not because of the current climate, he said, but because after 20 years in Parliament, it is time for him to move on.
He says he’ll miss dealing with the public and used to love that about the job.
“I just love the availability. Everybody knows where I am and knows where I’d be. It’s like the randomness of meeting people is what was always fun.
“And now with randomness, you never know what the random element is.”
