Election-meddling paranoia has now crossed north of the forty-ninth parallel. For the last several weeks, Canadian news media has been dominated by hyperventilating headlines warning that China has been interfering in both elections and the governance of Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party.

Leaked intelligence files suggest that Chinese money has undermined Canadian elections. Liberal candidates seen as sympathetic to China have reportedly received financial support while Conservative candidates critical of China have reportedly had their campaigns sabotaged. This interference is alleged to have taken the form of undeclared donations to elections campaigns, as well as the discreet hiring of Chinese international students in Canada to work on campaigns. There are also claims that campaign contributions made to preferred candidates are being unlawfully reimbursed by Chinese consulates. Then there are allegations that Chinese international students were bussed in to vote in the nomination meeting for Toronto Liberal MP Han Dong in 2019.

So far, there is zero evidence that any of these allegations affected the outcome in any seats during the 2019 or 2021 federal elections. A recent independent report commissioned by the federal government on the those elections found no evidence of successful foreign interference.