India foreign interference probe summons Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown to appear before MPs

After turning down an invite from MPs looking into possible foreign interference, Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown has been officially summoned to appear in Ottawa.

In October, Brown was asked to appear before MPs on the House of Commons public safety and national security committee, which is studying alleged “electoral interference and violent criminal activities” carried out in Canada by agents of the Indian government.

The Brampton mayor declined that invite, but has now been summoned to appear before the committee in a vote on Thursday.

“It’s not to say that there’s wrongdoing, it’s just a matter of getting the witness here,” said Liberal MP Randeep Sarai of the motion to summon Brown.

The summons stems from a Conservative Party of Canada leadership race.

A report released in June by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) contained a redacted paragraph that detailed alleged Indian interference in a Conservative leadership contest.

A specific year of when the contest took place was not mentioned, however, Pierre Poilievre won the most recent bid in 2022 after Brown was disqualified by the party’s leadership committee, citing “serious allegations of wrongdoing by the Patrick Brown campaign.”

INsauga.com has reached out to Brown multiple times since the October invitation and the summons. He declined comment on the invitation and was not immediately available for reaction on Friday.

The committee heard that Brown declined an invitation and never replied to follow-up contacts.

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Conservative MPs on the committee objected to Brown’s summons and voted against it, with Manitoba MP Raquel Dancho calling it a “sledgehammer of a tool to use on someone who I don’t believe is being accused of anything.”

“I wonder, perhaps, Mr. Brown is just guilty of being a member of the Conservative party and running for leadership and they wish to punish him,” she said of Liberal MPs on the panel, calling the move “politically motivated.”

She called it “an abuse” of a summons, but the committee heard there is precedent to subpoena subjects who are unresponsive to request or have declined invitations.

The vote passed 7-4 to summon Brown to testify.

While no allegations have been levelled at Brown by the public safety and national security committee, the CPC’s leadership body said in 2022 his campaign “did not satisfy concerns about their compliance with our Rules and Procedures and/or the Canada Elections Act.”

Brown has been outspoken about alleged foreign interference in Brampton being carried out by the Sri Lanka High Commission.

He made the allegations following a protest in Brampton over the Tamil Genocide Memorial being built – a monument honouring the victims in Sri Lanka’s bloody civil war.

“There’s a lot of attention on India and China, there’s been less attention on Sri Lanka,” Brown told INsauga.com in September, referring to a report earlier this year that found India, Pakistan and Iran engaged in foreign interference in Canada.

The mayor has previously said he’s been briefed by the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) on the potential of foreign interference in Brampton, but could not disclose specifics due to security reasons.