Trudeau spent $6,218,499 in failed bid to win UN Security Council seat

An access to information request by the Canadian Taxpayer Federation found that the Trudeau Liberals spent the equivalent of $80,227 for every vote that Canada won in its bid for the United Nations Security Council last year.

In all, Canada spent $6,218,499 in the four-year lead-up to the UN Security Council vote on June 17, not including $2,446,026 worth of operational expenses, reports Blacklock's Reporter.

"Wasting millions of dollars for a seat on the UN’s security council would be bad enough, but spending over $8.6 million to finish in third shows that this campaign was a big swing and a miss for taxpayers," said Franco Terrazzano, Federal Director of the CTF. "The amount the government spent on each vote is more than many Canadians earn each year."

Canada never had a realistic shot at beating out the two eventual winners, garnering just 108 votes behind Norway and Ireland, who had 130 votes and 128 votes, respectively. The two countries have been running for the Security Council bid for over a decade.

Trudeau's vote total was lesser than that of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who managed to collect more votes for the same position in 2010, receiving 114 votes to Trudeau's eventual 108.

Trudeau's failure came after years of courting world leaders from countries both small and large: "Since November 2019 the Minister held well over one hundred bilateral meetings and phone calls with counterparts where Canada's UN Security Council campaign was consistently one of the topics raised," staff wrote in the Inquiry of Ministry.

As put by JJ McCollough for The Washington Post: "The Trudeau administration's quest to achieve its prize often has the pushy feel of an Olympic bid, or a Hollywood studio desperate to secure a Best Picture Oscar. There's a glitzy government website, a social media blitz and goodies for foreign dignitaries, including "everything from key chains to wild Sockeye smoked salmon."