Head of Canada’s spy agency announces he’s stepping down from the job

David Vigneault, director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), announced Thursday he’s stepping down from the spy agency’s top job after seven years of service.

In a media statement, Vigneault said being CSIS director “has been a privilege” and “one of the most challenging and rewarding period[s] in my career.”

Vigneault’s tenure has seen CSIS confront allegations of foreign interference by the Chinese and Indian governments — allegations which reportedly have led to tensions between security officials and the federal government.

According to a report released in May by the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency, CSIS and the prime minister’s national security adviser clashed on the threat of foreign interference in 2021.

The same report also said CSIS struggled with the question of how to report on foreign interference without being accused itself of interfering in Canadian elections.

In a separate interim report, Justice Marie-Josée Hogue, who is overseeing the public inquiry into foreign interference, wrote that CSIS can be “circumspect with details when informing others of the intelligence it has gathered and the conclusions it has drawn.”

Justice Hogue’s final report is due in December.

At the end of 2023, Vigneault told CBC News that CSIS is being “challenged” by new threats that are affecting the intelligence agency’s recruitment and budget.

During his time as CSIS director, Vigneault also has had to deal with the fallout from allegations of rape and harassment linked to the agency’s British Columbia office.

One CSIS officer has said she was raped nine times in 2019 and 2020 by a senior colleague while in surveillance vehicles. A second officer has said she was later sexually assaulted by the same man, despite the fact that CSIS officers were warned not to pair him with young women.

After a report detailing the allegations was published by The Canadian Press, Vigneault said the accusations of a “toxic workplace” cannot be taken lightly. He promised reforms and said the culture at the agency allowed “inappropriate behaviours” to “fester.”

Vigneault also has said CSIS would release public reports on harassment and wrongdoing in the agency.

The reporting by The Canadian Press has not been independently verified by CBC News.

Throughout his tenure, Vigneault has been outspoken about the need to modernize CSIS’s enabling law, the Canadian Security Intelligence Act, which was written in 1984.

The federal government has since taken steps to modernize the act by passing Bill C-70, a wide-ranging bill to combat foreign interference.

The bill changes how CSIS applies for warrants, updates the rules on who CSIS can brief and launches a long-awaited foreign influence transparency registry.

In a social media post on X, formerly Twitter, Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc said that Vigneault has spent his “entire career in the service of Canadians — keeping them, and our national interests, safe from those seeking to harm them.”

“David, my friend, thank you for all that you have done for our country,” LeBlanc added.