OTTAWA — Right-wing influencer Lauren Chen stayed mum on Tuesday as she appeared virtually before a House of Commons committee studying Russian political interference in Canada.
Chen said in a terse opening statement that she wasn’t willing to answer the committee’s questions while possibly subject to a criminal investigation in the United States.
“After consulting with counsel… I have concluded, on their advice, that answering questions from this committee could reasonably provide a, quote, ‘link in the chain’ toward a possible indictment against me,” Chen told the committee.
Chen was released from testimony 50 minutes into the hearing, scheduled for two hours, after answering a battery of questions with the refrain, “for the reasons already given, I have no comment.”
Chen’s appearance at the committee ended with a fizzle when MPs moved unanimously to refer her to the House for breach of privilege, a motion that freed her from the hot seat.
Chen was issued an order to appear before the committee last month after her name surfaced in connection to an American criminal complaint targeting two employees of Russian state broadcaster RT.
The complaint doesn’t directly name Chen but makes several references to a company widely believed to be Tenet Media, an outlet co-owned by Chen and husband Liam Donovan.
The defendants stand accused of funnelling $10 million to the company, named in the complaint as “U.S. Company-1”, to publish pro-Russia content across various English-language social media channels widely used in both Canada and the U.S.
Chen and Donovan are both Canadians but ran Tenet Media out of Nashville, Tenn.
Aengus Bridgman, the director of McGill University’s Canadian Election Misinformation Project, said that the controversy surrounding Chen shows how tightly connected Canadian and American social media ecosystems are.
“Canada, being so closely tied to the U.S., is highly susceptible to Russian disinformation campaigns targeting Americans,” Bridgman told the National Post.
Shortly after dismissing Chen, the committee announced it was ordering Donovan and Tenet Media personality Lauren Southern to appear in Ottawa before Nov. 29.
National Post
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