How to spot American “dark-money” in Canadian politics

They’ve long targeted our sovereignty. The next federal election has them salivating.

Good morning – Here is your Saturday newsletter.

Now that 2025 has arrived, you may be thinking about this year’s federal election. Our friend Christopher Holcroft has been thinking about it too, and sent us this handy guide to American big-money influence in Canada.

This is a special free issue to kick-off the year. My thanks to everyone who supports PeaceQuest’s peace education work as a paid subscriber.

In peace,

Steve

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This is an abridged version of the full article entitled, “Job One for 2025: Protecting Canada from U.S. Oligarchs,” published December 30, 2024 in The Tyee.

Guarding against the risks of American imperialism — political, economic, cultural — is a central theme of the Canadian experience.

Many of our country’s most important and enduring decisions are a direct consequence of this. Consider the building of our national railway, the creation of the CBC, the establishment of multiculturalism, even the act of Confederation itself.

In recent weeks, returning U.S. President Donald Trump’s musings about Canada becoming the 51st state, including a trolling social media post, have dominated the public discourse and elicited strong reactions from Canadians.

But if annexation threats may be dismissed, for now, as unserious, efforts by American oligarchs to derail the Canadian way must not.

These efforts — by bullying oil tycoons, bombastic tech bros and other brash billionaires — include relentless attacks on the norms, policies and institutions that define our values, distinguish us from Americans and defend our sovereignty.

Privatizing plutocrats and dark-money

While American industrialists have long sought access to our country’s natural resources, and reports of renewed interest in Canada’s abundance of fresh water only reinforce this, an even larger prize is the profits to be gained from the privatization of social programs, the weakening of public safety regulations and the erosion of safeguards on our democracy. Canada’s medicare system alone represents a $300-billion annual public expenditure, offering boundless opportunities for those wishing to privately profit off public illness.

Underpinning the response of the American plutocracy is a sophisticated strategy that enlists the support of compliant Canadians; this incudes American dark-money networks funding Canadian think tanks, U.S.-owned industries backing Canadian lobby campaigns, and an American hedge fund owning a major chain of Canadian newspapers.

Atlas Network

Consider that the Atlas Network, the well-documented group of billionaire ideologues pursuing a libertarian agenda while evading transparency, partners with 11 Canadian think tanks — some of them charities — including the Canadian Constitution Foundation, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, the Fraser Institute, the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, the Montreal Economic Institute and SecondStreet.org to promote discredited views on vaccines, climate change, labour rights, medicare, public education, Indigenous rights and fair taxation.

Heartland Institute

Another American dark-money group, the fossil-fuel-industry-funded Heartland Institute, one of the key organizations behind the democracy-threatening Project 2025 in the United States, has deep connections with Canadian policy organizations the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, Energy Probe, Canadians for Sensible Climate Policy and Friends of Science — all groups spreading disinformation about the threat of climate change and how we can confront it, among other egregious initiatives.

Cato Institute

A third group, the Cato Institute, which was co-founded by fossil fuel magnate Charles Koch, regularly comments on Canadian affairs and partners with the Fraser Institute on a “Human Freedom Index” report. The Cato Institute appeared to be particularly incensed about the Canadian government’s response to the “freedom convoy” insurrection, which, curiously, attracted about half of its funding from American sources and strong public support from conservative U.S. politicians and pundits.

Canada’s pro-Trump corporate media

What nearly all the aforementioned groups have in common is that their messaging routinely appears in Canadian daily newspapers associated with the American-owned Postmedia chain, a business that has run afoul of its regulator.

On its opinion pages, Postmedia publications lead a daily assault on some of Canada’s most defining laws and principles, attacking the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, medicare, reconciliation, tolerance and commitment to inclusion, to say nothing of their fanatical opposition to policies protecting our environment and fighting what one op-ed called the “alleged climate crisis.”

The attacks on Canada’s civic solidarity are deliberate and well devised. These are the same attacks used in the United States by those who delivered Donald Trump the presidency, then returned him to it, to the great benefit of the wealthy elite.

At stake this election

To an unprecedented degree, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre — Canada’s self-declared “candidate for prime minister” — has aligned his messaging, policies and comportment with American oligarchs and their increasingly far-right Republican allies.

Meanwhile, Poilievre’s Conservative party enjoys a significant lead in public opinion polling. Yet, according to these same polls, Poilievre is offside with the views of Canadians on nearly every issue he champions.

The decision Canadians make in the next federal election will be just as historically significant. How our country should respond to a revived threat to our sovereignty is now the ballot question.

The year is coming to a close. Let us resolve to return in the new year to fight for the Canada we love.

Christopher Holcroft is a writer and principal of Empower Consulting. Reach him by email.

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Last week’s poll

Last week I asked you, “Is the public becoming aware of the growing threat of nuclear war?” Nearly two-thirds of respondents said, “No” (63%), while one in four replied, “Yes” (25%).

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Call it what it is: a new nuclear arms race

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Thank you for everything you do for peace.

Steve

Steve Staples with little Nessie