Justin Trudeau responds to groping allegations: ‘I don't remember any negative interactions’
The Canadian PM has faced questions over an editorial in a community newspaper in 2000 that describes him groping a reporter at a music festival and later apologising
In between snapping selfies with steelworkers for Canada Day on Sunday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau came up against some uncomfortable questions.
At an event for steel and aluminium workers at Regina, a reporter asked Trudeau, 46, to address allegations that he had groped a young journalist at a music festival in British Columbia 18 years ago.
The self-described feminist, who has said he has “no tolerance” for sexual harassment, said he did not recall such a thing.
“I remember that day in Creston well. It was an Avalanche Foundation event to support avalanche safety. I had a good day that day. I don’t remember any negative interactions that day at all,” he said, nodding and smiling to reporters.
The allegations first appeared in a community paper called the Creston Valley Advance in 2000. An unsigned editorial suggests that Trudeau, then a 28-year-old teacher, groped a young, female Advance reporter covering the Kokanee Summit Festival in Creston, British Columbia.
My recollections of the conversation were that she came to me because she was unsettled by it