On Friday, February 6th, Vancouver mayor Ken Sim alleged in a briefing to Chinese-speaking media that COPE city councillor Sean Orr had handed out illegal drugs to people in the street on Christmas Day.
This allegation was only brought to public attention on February 24th when repeated on WeChat by Councillor Lenny Zhou.
Within two days, it emerged that the comment had originated with Sim.
Orr adamantly denied this outrageous and unfounded allegation, calling it “absolutely defamatory.” He questioned the source of the information and pointed out that he was not even in Vancouver on Christmas Day. He was visiting family on the Sunshine Coast.
Now caught, the mayor immediately apologized to Orr but refused to say where and how he had received this information and why he had decided to accept it without taking any steps to verify its accuracy.
When cornered by media at an unrelated event the next morning, Sim was single-minded in saying he had apologized to Orr – but would add nothing else, no matter what was being asked. The entire spectacle was a bizarre repetition of non-answers by the mayor.
The media, quite understandably, kept asking what Orr had been asking – where did Sim get this information and why did he not take any steps to ensure it was true before using it to tarnish another politician. The mayor would not elaborate.
Sim’s refusal to be held accountable for such despicable and outrageous behaviour was clearly unbecoming in a mayor, or for that matter in any individual, and simply repeating that he had apologized did nothing to quell the criticism.
Sim finally gave in on Tuesday, March 3rd and at a hastily called press conference, explained that he had based the allegation against Orr on a photo someone had shown him, owning that he had never verified the accuracy of the photo, should not have repeated what he thought he saw, and that he was wrong.
Sim then answered questions, but not for long. After a total of about five minutes, he bolted from the room. He at least said that he would send out copies of his explanation and a retraction to all media, including versions in Cantonese and Mandarin.
Orr responded by saying that Sim’s explanation and apology didn’t go far enough – that they didn’t address the harm to his reputation and character, didn’t address the harm done to the Chinese community, and didn’t set out a plan to prevent further incidents. He noted that the alleged photograph could have come from AI-generated toxic social media that is used to continually harass him.
Orr from the start has rejected Sim’s conduct, calling it ‘‘embarrassing” and observing, “I can only assume that it’s a personal attack to defame my character.” COPE Co-Chair Sam Smart has been more succinct: “They’re not sorry they did it, they’re sorry they got caught.”
The incident has become the talk of the town and has been covered by media across the country. People who do not usually follow municipal politics are talking about it.
My prediction is this – that the business community and financial supporters will finally recognize that Sim has absolutely no viable prospect of being re-elected, and they will mount a pressure campaign for him to resign.
That will open the door for ABC to regroup and run a fresh face as their mayoral candidate. Alternatively, it is possible, if less likely, that some ABC Councillors, embarrassed by the mayor’s egregious behaviour, will abandon the party even before Sim leaves. Some former ABC members have already joined Kareem Allam’s Vancouver Liberals.
Ken Sim has brought this on himself. It is now only a matter of time until he announces his departure from the mayor’s chair.
Daily atmospheric CO2 [Courtesy of CO2.Earth]
Latest daily total (March 02, 2026): 429.41ppm
One year ago (March 03, 2025): 427.38ppm
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