Western Canada: The Trudeau controversy all started with a yearbook photo

Good morning, it’s James Keller in Calgary.

The controversy that has engulfed Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau’s re-election campaign has its roots in a yearbook that has been sitting in a Vancouver private school for nearly two decades.

On page 109 of West Point Grey Academy 2001 yearbook is a photo of Mr. Trudeau, then a 29-year-old teacher at the elite private school on Vancouver’s west side, in brownface. He is wearing a costume turban. His face and hands are covered in dark makeup.

The photo, which was first uncovered by Time magazine, was the first of three images to surface in the past week that showed Mr. Trudeau in blackface or brownface dating to the 1980s. The pictures have derailed his campaign and forced Mr. Trudeau to repeatedly apologize, explain how he found himself engaging in a mimicry that has long been condemned as racist, and admit that he cannot remember if there were any other instances.

The event in the yearbook photo was taken at fundraising gala for the school in a downtown Vancouver hotel. The theme of that year’s event, which raised $160,000, was Arabian Nights.

The yearbook photos show Mr. Trudeau’s peers also wearing Aladdin-themed costumes, though he is the only one in brownface.

Staff members who were at the party have spoken out about the event and have said they didn’t remember thinking much of Mr. Trudeau’s outfit at the time.

Vancouver realtor Wayne Hamill, who attended the gala with his then-wife Vicki, said Mr. Trudeau’s outfit did not strike him as unusual given the theme of the party.

“I recall thinking, ‘Wow – he’s really into it’ – but it wasn’t in a negative way,” Mr. Hamill told The Globe and Mail.

Sunny Khurana, who attended the gala as a parent of students at the school, said he didn’t feel offended by Mr. Trudeau wearing racist makeup at the fundraiser and even posed for a photo with Mr. Trudeau and another turbaned Sikh.

“We never felt he was trying to look down on anybody or he was demeaning to anybody. It never came across like that,” he said.

But Mr. Trudeau has acknowledged that his actions were racist and hurtful, and he said his "layers of privilege” as a wealthy white man meant that he didn’t see that racism.

He has been widely condemned by his political opponents and commentators, who have rejected Mr. Trudeau’s claim that society was so dramatically different 18 years ago that blackface was not as offensive as it is today. He has faced calls to resign as the photos fuelled embarrassing headlines around the world.

This is the weekly Western Canada newsletter written by B.C. Editor Wendy Cox and Alberta Bureau Chief James Keller. If you’re reading this on the web, or it was forwarded to you from someone else, you can sign up for it and all Globe newsletters here. This is a new project and we’ll be experimenting as we go, so let us know what you think.

Around the West

E-SCOOTERS: E-scooters have quickly become ever-present in downtown Calgary and Edmonton, since pilot projects in both cities launched this past summer. But their wild popularity has also caused a raft of problems, as users get into conflict with pedestrians, riders end up in hospitals and sidewalks become cluttered with scooters. Carrie Tait looks at the conflict and how this summer’s experience will likely lead to changes next year.

ASSISTED DYING: A B.C. woman has dropped her legal challenge of assisted-dying laws after learning she qualifies for the procedure. Julia Lamb, 28, who uses a wheelchair and requires nearly around-the-clock care, filed the challenge over the federal government’s decision to limit assisted dying to patients whose deaths are “reasonably foreseeable.”

ALBERTA INQUIRY: An environmental group is threatening to sue the Alberta government if it does not change the terms of reference for a public inquiry targeting opponents of the oil sands. EcoJustice has given the province 30 days to meet a list of demands, though the threat was immediately dismissed by Premier Jason Kenney.

HOMELESS ENCAMPMENT: A homeless encampment in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside has prompted the city’s police department to repeat its warnings that the situation is not safe. Campers remain in Oppenheimer Park despite an earlier attempt to evict them and find appropriate housing.

STEPHAN TRIAL: An Alberta mother and father who treated their ill son with herbal remedies rather than get him medical attention have been acquitted in the boy’s death.

TRANS MOUNTAIN: The B.C. government insists it won’t use a recent court decision that ordered it to reconsider the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion to obstruct the project. The NDP government, which opposes the pipeline project, says it will review the environmental certificate as it was ordered to do by the court, but it also acknowledges that the expansion doesn’t need provincial approval to proceed.

LEGISLATURE SPENDING SCANDAL: B.C.'s Auditor-General has found “weaknesses and gaps” in spending oversight for top officers at the legislature that allowed for hundreds of thousands of dollars in questionable expenses to go unchecked.

THIRD-PARTY ADVERTISERS: A prominent third-party election advertiser that is supporting the federal Conservatives is largely funded by a Calgary-based company and people connected to it. Canada Proud was among 18 groups that submitted interim financial reports this past week, and the documents provide details about who is financing a group that was the subject of a Globe and Mail investigation.

JODY WILSON-RAYBOULD: Former Liberal cabinet minister Jody Wilson-Raybould has published a new book on reconciliation titled From Where I Stand, in which she argues Canada must move away from the “awful, colonial” piece of legislation known as the Indian Act. Kristy Kirkup interviewed Ms. Wilson-Raybould about the book, which she said was not a campaign tool as she runs as an Independent in Vancouver.

FOOD: Alexandra Gill reviews Vancouver’s Saku, a Japanese restaurant that has been generating lots of buzz but is ultimately not worth the long lineups.

Opinion

Jordan Stanger-Ross on an apology to Japanese-Canadians in B.C.: “The history of internment has been remembered as a story of federal wrongdoing. And it should be. The Canadian government failed to uphold ideals of citizenship and equality. But the exposure of state misconduct cannot stop there.”

Adrienne Tanner on campaign finance for local elections: “But if changes are to be made, why not require year-round disclosure for donations to political parties, candidates and third-party influencers?”

Jody Wilson-Raybould on reconciliation: “The Canadian government lost an opportunity during the Forty-Second Parliament. Yes, progress was made on Indigenous issues. But we still cannot say with confidence that the ship’s course has been shifted sufficiently to turn it in a new direction – away from denial and toward unqualified recognition.”