Former Mountie denies leaking prime minister's schedule

A former Mountie and member of prime minister Justin Trudeau's security team denied an allegation he may have leaked the prime minister's schedule in the months leading up to the self-styled Freedom Convoy.

An Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) "Person of Interest" (POI) document, dated January 30, 2022, said a former RCMP officer — whose name and photo are redacted — is "believed to have leaked the prime minister's schedule a few months ago." The OPP cited the RCMP on the allegation. The document does not say to whom the information was allegedly leaked.

The document was tabled publicly as part of the Public Order Emergency Commission inquiry, which is holding hearings in Ottawa to investigate the federal government's decision to invoke the Emergencies Act to end an anti-vaccine mandate protest that gridlocked downtown Ottawa for weeks last winter.

In a statement submitted to the inquiry Friday Daniel Bulford, a 15-year veteran of the RCMP who resigned from the Mounties in December 2021, acknowledged he was the subject of the profile. He denied that he'd leaked any information.

"In the POI Profile made by the Ontario Provincial Police therein it states that it is believed that I had leaked the Prime Minister's schedule some months prior to January 30, 2022. That is categorically false," Bulford said in the statement.

"The first I have ever even heard of this allegation was upon reading the POI Profile on October 21, 2022. At no time have I ever leaked anything to anyone or any tradecraft that I obtained in my duties as a member of the RCMP and the Emergency Response Team."

Bulford said following his testimony that he doesn't know why the document suggested he leaked the schedule.

"I can't say. I suspect [OPP] probably were provided some level of information from the RCMP," Bulford said in response to a reporter's question.

"I can say with 100 per cent certainty I have never done anything that would breach the Security of Information Act, or my oath of secrecy." 

The RCMP has yet not responded to CBC questions about the allegation in the OPP document.

Bulford said in his inquiry testimony that he served as sniper-observer on the RCMP's national division Emergency Response Team for most of his RCMP career. He said the RCMP revoked his security clearance after he spoke out against the federal government's COVID-19 vaccination mandate for Mounties, which went into effect in October 2021, and Bulford resigned from the Mounties in December 2021.

"I knew that I would be subject to disciplinary action, and after I reviewed what my options were in regards to that, I discovered that if I was terminated for misconduct, which I suspected would be the case, I could potentially lose roughly half of my pension transfer value," Bulford said in his tesitmony.

"So I made the decision to resign out of fear that I would not be able to set my family up adequately financial in the future."

Bulford told the inquiry he later joined the self-styled Freedom Convoy protest. He said he was a "volunteer security coordinator" and "police liaison" with the convoy starting on January 26, 2022.