The torrent of online threats against public officials has led some Canadians to believe they can threaten, encourage and cheer on political violence with impunity, newly released government documents warn.
Canadian intelligence officials say threatening rhetoric is increasingly seen as a legitimate way to express frustrations, grievances and dissent, fueling a rise in often violent threats against elected and public officials.
The documents raise further questions about how social media companies, police and political parties should respond to online violence, with security officials warning it can lead to physical harm in the real world.
“Vulnerable individuals, particularly those experiencing personal or economic stress, can be heavily influenced by disinformation campaigns and conspiracy theories that focus on symbols of authority, including political figures and uniformed personnel,” reads a memo prepared ahead of Canada Day celebrations in 2022.
“These narratives may inspire an act of violence,” the memo says.
Global News obtained dozens of threat assessments prepared between May 2022 and June 2023 by the Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre (ITAC), a federal body that brings together experts from all of Canada’s intelligence and security agencies.
Several of the assessments conducted in December 2022 highlight the sense of impunity apparently felt by those posting threats and other violent content online.
“The high and sustained volume of violent anti-authority rhetoric online against public officials has fostered a culture in which people feel they can threaten, incite and celebrate political violence online without consequence,” ITAC concluded.
Global News previously reported that threats facing Canadian public officials have decreased after increasing during the COVID-19 pandemic, with attacks now considered “unlikely” according to more recent government documents.
Still, governments and law enforcement agencies continue to grapple with social media platforms and the false, divisive or hateful content they often amplify, including ridicule of political opponents, cruel attacks on one’s personality and threats to personal safety.
As threats to elected officials mount, RCMP Commissioner Mike Duheme has encouraged the federal government to consider drafting new legislation to make it easier for police to lay charges.
Threats and harassment are already criminal offences, but Duheme said the behaviour reported to police often does not meet the Criminal Code’s threshold for bringing charges.
That assessment holds true for former Conservative senator Vern White, who served as deputy commissioner in the RCMP and as Ottawa police chief before his stint as an MP.
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“There is a level of risk that one is expected to have to endure before the Crown and maybe even the police say, ‘Well, you know what? That has crossed the criminal threshold,’” White said of threats directed at elected officials.
“If it were a company, an individual, a doctor or a law firm, I would probably act more quickly and try to do something.”
White says there is no doubt that elected officials face more threats today than they did a decade ago, recalling the insults he saw hurled at his fellow lawmakers.
“After COVID, people were yelling things in their faces on the streets, things I never saw in my first six or seven years in the Senate. They were never raised,” he said.
“After the pandemic, I think we saw a level of acceptance, even by the general public, that you could harass or lecture anyone you wanted,” White said.
Several Liberal, Conservative and NDP MPs have said they — and their staff — often have to deal with a barrage of hate messages, including death threats.
Liberal MP Pam Damoff announced earlier this year that she would not seek re-election due to the “threats and misogyny” she has experienced, describing politics as increasingly “hyper-partisan”.
Global News reviewed more than two dozen profanity-laced messages that Damoff’s office said were left for him, either by email or phone.
“I’m coming for you,” one caller threatened in a voicemail, saying he was upset that Damoff’s “rude bitch” assistant had hung up on him.
“What you just did to me right now is what you needed. It’s all done,” the caller said.
Damoff said she reported “a couple” of incidents to local police but was told they did not “cross the line,” an experience she said is shared by some of her House colleagues.
“The message they get is that we are going to rape your wife,” Damoff said. “I’m sorry, that’s not right and the police should be able to act accordingly.”
Justice Minister Arif Virani has rejected a suggestion by the RCMP commissioner that new legislation is needed to better respond to threats against politicians.
“I think there are strong tools, for example in the Penal Code,” Virani said last month, adding that the federal government already provides police with resources to do their job.
But Damoff says there appears to be “some kind of disconnect” preventing a more forceful response to the threats and intimidation she and others have faced.
“If the Minister of Justice believes there are adequate laws in place, I think there should be some training with police services across the country and working with the RCMP to make sure they understand what’s going on,” he said.
In June, Quebec adopted a law allowing fines of up to $1,500 for anyone who intimidates or harasses a municipal or provincial politician, despite concerns that the legislation could threaten freedom of expression.
White sees Quebec’s new law as “a step in the right direction” and said Ottawa MPs should consider passing similar legislation.
“It could be a bit of a wet cloth for politicians about what they are allowed or permitted to say,” he said, suggesting it could help stamp out hyper-partisan rhetoric that can lead to calls for violence.
“If there is no civility at the top, how can we expect others to have it as well?”
As politics grows angrier, uglier and further removed from past norms of civility, experts say social media companies must do their part.
“We rely on social media to self-manage, and they can and should do much more to improve the safety of everyone in these spaces,” said Emily Laidlaw, a law professor at the University of Calgary and holder of the Canada Research Chair in Cybersecurity Law.
Earlier this year, the federal government introduced its Online Harms Act, which would require social media companies to mitigate the risk that users of their platforms could be exposed to harmful content, including incitement to violence.
Laidlaw says that while the proposed legislation will have a “tremendous impact” on improving the online ecosystem for elected officials, the bill could go even further.
“There could be changes made to reinforce particular vulnerabilities when it comes to elected officials and other high-profile people who are on social media,” he said, suggesting that social media companies could be required to explain the specific steps they are taking to mitigate risks against at-risk individuals.
Laidlaw is not alone in calling out social media companies for failing to police the content they host on their platforms.
Speaking to a parliamentary committee in May, the official in charge of security at the House of Commons said social media companies were ignoring calls from his office reporting malicious or harassing posts directed at MPs.
“Social media platforms either don’t heed our call or they heed our call and say they’ll investigate and that’s the end of it,” said Patrick McDonell, sergeant-at-arms and corporate security officer for the House of Commons.
The committee heard that McDonell’s office has been overwhelmed by reports of threats targeting MPs, mostly online, and that harassment by members of the public has increased by between 700 and 800 per cent in the past five years.
McDonell said his office opened 530 files on threats against MPs in 2023, up from eight in 2019.
“We have reached the point where we are massively filing reports of harassment of parliamentarians online,” he said.
“There is so much.”
Meta, TikTok and X did not respond to Global News’ request for comment.
— With files from The Canadian Press
