Fred Hahn, president of the Ontario Canadian Union of Public Employees, speaks at a press conference at Queen's Park, in Toronto, on July 16, 2018.MARK BLINCH/The Canadian Press
The board of Canada’s largest public-sector union has asked its general vice-president to resign in light of a video he posted to social media earlier this month that sparked accusations of antisemitism.
The Canadian Union of Public Employees national executive board, in a letter circulated to its related organizations on Wednesday, said it asked Fred Hahn to step down as general vice-president for Ontario.
Mr. Hahn, who last year also faced calls to resign after celebrating the “power of resistance” when Hamas militants killed Israeli civilians on Oct. 7, had not responded to CUPE’s demand by early Wednesday evening, according to the union.
Mr. Hahn’s social-media activity this month stirred backlash from political and cultural players in Ontario. Premier Doug Ford called Mr. Hahn “disgusting,” and an organization dedicated to Holocaust education and antisemitism programs praised CUPE’s national executive board for demanding the union leader leave his post.
CUPE’s national executive board on Tuesday passed a motion that said it “lost confidence” in Mr. Hahn’s ability to represent the union, according to its Wednesday letter. It pointed to a video Mr. Hahn posted on Facebook on Aug. 11 and “the impact it has had on CUPE members and the national union.”
Mr. Hahn did not return messages seeking comment. He also serves as the president of CUPE Ontario, which did not return a message seeking comment on whether its board is considering mirroring the national executive board’s response. Mr. Hahn was elected president of the provincial organization in May.
Mr. Hahn deleted the video, noting in an Aug. 18 Facebook post that he understood it “caused pain for some who viewed it.”
He added: “I have removed it from my feed because I deeply regret any such reaction.”
Mr. Hahn said he posted the video to draw attention to what he believed to be a “double standard” at the Olympics: Russian athletes could not participate in the Summer Games under their own flag because of Russia’s war in Ukraine, while competitors from Israel were able to represent their country.
“My intent was never to associate Jewish people with the violence enacted by the state of Israel. It remains my strongly held view that it is a terrible mistake, and anti-Semitic, to conflate abhorrent actions by the state of Israel with Jewish humanity or identity,” he wrote.
Karine Fortin, a spokeswoman for CUPE, said Tuesday’s board meeting was triggered by Mr. Hahn’s delay in removing the video. The CUPE executive and a lot of members believed it was antisemitic, she added.
“This is not a decision we take lightly,” CUPE said in a statement Wednesday.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford on Wednesday said Mr. Hahn had been “a bully for 20 years.” The Premier praised his Labour Minister, David Piccini, for confronting the union leader in an exchange shared on social media this week and urged the union to discipline him.
Mr. Ford said he was getting messages on his phone from CUPE members calling Mr. Hahn’s comments disgusting.
“He’s a disgusting human being,” the Premier told an unrelated news conference in St. Catharines, Ont. Mr. Ford said Mr. Hahn had made “bigoted comments” that were unacceptable in multicultural Ontario.
“I encourage the workers next time, next time a vote comes, vote this character out, because, in my opinion, he’s just a terrible, terrible human being,” Mr. Ford said.
Late Wednesday, Mr. Ford posted on the social-media site X that he supported the CUPE board’s call and urged Mr. Hahn to step aside.
There are roughly 750,000 CUPE members across the country, including about 300,000 in Ontario.
The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center backed CUPE’s request that Mr. Hahn step down and pressed the labour leader to leave the Ontario branch as well.
“We welcome the CUPE national executive board’s decision to demand Fred Hahn’s resignation, which sends a clear message that antisemitism and the toxic environment he created for Jewish CUPE members are no longer acceptable,” Michael Levitt, the FSWC’s president, said in a statement.
“Given his long-standing antisemitism and the repeated harm he’s caused to the Jewish community, it’s also time that he resign from his role as president of CUPE Ontario and end this ongoing embarrassment, once and for all.”