The Liberal Party of Canada is off to a shaky start in the new Steveston-Richmond East riding after candidate hopeful Wendy Yuan accused former Member of Parliament Raymond Chan of interfering in the party’s nomination process following concerns raised over fundraising sources in the Chinese community.
“I was stunned to receive an email from the Liberal Party notifying me that they would not give me the green light,” said Yuan, who unsuccessfully ran as a candidate for the Liberals in Vancouver-Kingsway in 2008 and 2011.
The incident has resulted in the riding’s entire executive team resigning from the campaign.
Meanwhile, on Tuesday evening, it was expected that former Richmond MP and lawyer Joe Peschisolido — the sole nominee — would be appointed as the riding’s candidate for the upcoming federal election on Oct. 19.
Now former riding president Peter Xie said he was surprised not to be consulted and noted the late-notice appointment meeting at the Hamilton Community Centre during rush hour was prohibitive to members.
Nevertheless Yuan’s supporters planned a protest.
The Liberals had vowed the nomination process would be open to any member, so long as the nominee met a certain set of standards, details of which are not known publicly. Nominees would then be elected by members at large to become a candidate.
“Each applicant was subject to a robust and rigorous vetting process that includes verification of all claims made on the application,” Liberal spokesperson Olivier Duchesneau told the Richmond News via email, adding Yuan’s application “did not pass through our review process successfully.”
On Monday, in front of a packed conference room of supporters at a local hotel, Yuan said she learned about her denied nominee application on Friday. Peschisolido said he learned about his green-lit application over the weekend, at the same time as Xie.
Over the weekend Yuan said information from a party member named Howard Xu, via a sworn affidavit, “warrants the reversal” of the decision as it “clearly spells out interference with the party’s process” by Chan.
In the affidavit Xu states that he and Chan met on May 16 at a restaurant in Vancouver. There, Xu claims:
“Raymond said to me: “Howard, good news, soon I will have Wendy Yuan disqualified.” I asked: “How?” He replied: “I will make sure Wendy does not pass the green light.” He went on by saying “the Italian guy named Joe Peschisolido is going to be acclaimed.”
Yuan called on party leader Justin Trudeau’s national office to investigate the claims.
“I think it’s very troubling that one individual can have the power to interfere,” said Yuan, whose conference was held in English and Chinese.
“The only reasonable course of action is to set aside the decision of the green light chair with respect to my decision,” said Yuan.
Campaign manager Michael Hillman said Yuan’s statements were offered in the interests of the party, in order to move forward (on Tuesday evening, just before the planned protest, Hillman resigned his post as Membership Chair for the Liberal Party of Canada in B.C. stating "the decision by this Party to not allow a former candidate in two past elections stand before the membership of the Party in the riding of Steveston-Richmond East is, to me, unfathomable.").
Speaking to media on Monday, Yuan said her party’s democratic process had been “rigged.”
Xie told the crowd that it was backroom politics that the party was initially trying to avoid.
“We are very shocked and very disappointed….Even more disappointing is that no reason was given to us or members or to Wendy herself. It’s totally against the leader’s commitments to open nomination,” he said.
On Tuesday, after no apparent solution was found, Xie and the entire executive team resigned from the campaign.
“Mr. Joe Peschisolido hasn’t won neither the confidence of the Steveston-Richmond East Liberal members nor the confidence the members of the local executives,” stated Xie, via Yuan’s campaign manager Sunny Chiu.
The News asked Duchesneau what exactly was wrong with Yuan’s nomination package. It also asked for comments regarding Yuan’s allegations of a rigged process and whether Trudeau would personally review the process.
Duchesneau replied: “The (initial) statement speaks for itself. We do not have any more comments.”
Yuan noted the party had successfully vetted her twice before.
Late Monday night she issued another statement:
“I fail to see how my application this time differs from that of the last two elections I stood for. …They are trying to pick faults, if any, in order to shut me down and cover-up for a more devious reason. That devious reason, many believe, has everything to do with the fact that I wrote to the Party officials and raised my concern about one of LPCBC’s fundraising sources in the Chinese community,” wrote Yuan.
Notably, in another affidavit, whistleblower Xu claims Chan asked Vancouver-area candidates Edward Wong and Steven Kou for $10,000 donations in order to give speeches.
“I will respect the person who did the affidavit,” Yuan told media.
Chan was present at Richmond Centre candidate Lawrence Woo’s inaugural media address in March. He could not be reached for comment via Woo’s manager.
Yuan, an on-and-off resident of Richmond and exporter, said she had signed up about 3,000 new Liberal members over the last two years.
When asked if those members would flip to Conservative candidate Kenny Chiu, Yuan said it was too early to tell.
Steveston has long been a Conservative stronghold. The riding is new as it sheds Delta from its borders and includes more of East Richmond.