The federal Conservative Party has removed the now famous photo of a shirtless Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a Tofino wedding, after the photographer served the party a cease and desist order for illegally using her photos as part of a social media campaign.
Marnie Recker claims the ads, which appeared on the Conservative Party’s social media platforms earlier this month, disrespect her work. She claims the party illegally stole and altered the copyrighted image and used it to attack the Liberal Party. The photo was posted Aug. 8 with a caption that reads, “Canada lost 110,000 jobs recently. And the Prime Minister is still on vacation.”
Recker hired a lawyer, who served the party a cease and desist letter on Tuesday. The images have since been removed.
Cory Hann, director of communications for the Conservative Party, said Thursday that it’s unfortunate that there’s more interest in a shirtless photo of the prime minister than the number of jobs lost in Canada in the last two months.
“Canadians need a plan for jobs, instead they’re getting vacation photos of Mr. Trudeau. And that’s what our post highlighted,” he said, in an email.
The prime minister was photographed shirtless while taking a break from surfing and simultaneously photobombing a couple getting married on a Tofino beach on Aug. 6.
Recker, a Vancouver Island wedding photographer, tweeted the photo of Trudeau with his surfboard standing several metres away from the bride. The photo quickly went viral online.
– With a file from The Canadian Press
