When Elliot Gluck recently tried to figure out how to vote in the upcoming Canadian election from abroad in Israel, he was left scratching his head. The 23-year-old Vancouver native, currently interning at a green tech company in Tel Aviv, knew there had to be a better way to help his fellow Canadians exercise their democratic rights.
So the political science graduate spent a few days last week creating a new website, IsraelVotes.ca, which is already live. His goal is to make it easier for those eligible voters among the estimated 40,000 Canadians currently living in Israel to receive their ballots and cast their votes in what he’s calling “one of the most consequential elections in recent memory,” scheduled for April 28.
Gluck’s website is non-partisan and completely free, and facilitates ballot delivery, including to and from the Canadian embassy in Tel Aviv. He joins Ellin Bessner on The CJN Daily to explain his motivations, discuss the nasty antisemitic comments he’s received online, and why it matters that Jewish Canadians make their voices heard later this month.
Transcript
Transcripts are AI-generated and may contain errors.
Ellin Bessner: That’s what it sounded like just 10 days ago when Canada’s newly elected Liberal leader, Prime Minister Mark Carney, called a snap election. With the campaign period just over five weeks long, the minimum permitted, the polls are now showing Carney’s Liberals leading Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives, thanks to a bump in popularity since Justin Trudeau stepped down last month as Prime Minister.
Campaign teams on all sides are feverishly working to get out the vote, as it’s called, making sure every eligible Canadian votes, no matter where they live.
Elliot Gluck is 23. He’s a Vancouver native currently on a five-month internship with a tech startup through the Masa Israel programme, and he’s one of nearly 40,000 Canadians living in Israel. He’s also eligible to vote, but for him and many like him around the world, that means voting by mail in advance. Perfectly legal since 2019 when the Supreme Court ruled any registered Canadian anywhere can vote no matter how long they’ve been away from the country, if they ever lived in Canada at some point and can receive the ballot in time to fill it in and send it back to Canada before the polls close on April 28.
Gluck felt the Elections Canada official website explaining all the instructions is too cumbersome, and he worried it would discourage expats like him from even bothering to vote. So he built his own, last weekend. He calls the website IsraelVotes.ca. It’s in English, French, and Hebrew. It’s to help Canadian Jews in Israel navigate the mail-in voting process, for free.
While some critics of voting abroad wonder why people who don’t live in Canada full-time should have a say, Gluck believes it’s critical, especially for Canadian Jews after October 7th to do so in this election, when they’ve been facing spiking antisemitism. Although he swears he is nonpartisan and wouldn’t divulge who he’s going to vote for, 10 days in, his project has already received some negative antisemitic pushback, but that’s not discouraging him.
Elliot Gluck: I’m not going to let people who want to harass me throw me off my mission of making sure that Canadians are able to exercise their democratic right.
Ellin Bessner: I’m Ellin Bessner, and this is what Jewish Canada sounds like for Wednesday, April 2, 2025. Welcome to the CJN Daily, a podcast of the Canadian Jewish News, made possible in part thanks to the generous support of the Ira Gluskin and Maxine Granovsky Gluskin Charitable Foundation.
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You might say that Gluck’s site, IsraelVotes.ca, is similar to other third-party operations. For example, Democrats Abroad do it to help American expats navigate the voting process in US elections. Although Gluck created it specifically for Israel, it’s actually the same process anyone from Canada can use if they’re not going to be able to vote in person on the day.
Gluck says his website’s all above board, isn’t affiliated with any party or lobby group, even though I’ve seen some Conservative Party supporters sharing it on social media. Meanwhile, CIJA, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, has launched its social media campaign this week to help and encourage Canadian Jews living abroad to register and vote via Elections Canada. Their campaign is called More Than Just a Vote, and their website is JewishCanadaVotes.ca.
This is Gluck’s second time voting in a Canadian federal election. He turned 18 in time to cast his ballot in 2021, when Justin Trudeau won his last election with a minority victory. Elliot Gluck joins me now from Tel Aviv.
Welcome to the CJN Daily for your first time.
Elliot Gluck: Thank you for having me, Ellin. It’s great to be here.
Ellin Bessner: Well, it’s really great to meet you. I’m so glad to find out more about how you got this idea.
Elliot Gluck: Yeah, so basically on Sunday last week, I saw the news articles coming through my phone that were saying that Mark Carney was about to call an election. I’ve been kind of away from the Canadian news for a little while, and curiously, I just looked up what does the polling data look like? I saw that, wow, this is going to be a really close election. Immediately, since I’ve been in Israel for three months now, my mind kind of went, oh, how many Canadians are there living in Israel?
The gears start turning. I find out that there’s an estimated 35,000 Canadians living in Israel, and I realized that with elections this close, you win these elections in the margins and a voter block like that could potentially have an impact on the outcome of the election. I figured, given my background academically in political science and, technically, in computer programming, there was a unique area where I could help contribute to get out the vote and try to make Canadians living in Israel’s voices heard.
Ellin Bessner: Okay, so talk to me a bit about your unique set of skills. Sounds like from the movie “Taken”, but you know, when you looked at the Canadian Elections Canada website, what went through your mind when you tried it?
Elliot Gluck: Well, first of all, just finding the website is quite difficult. In order to get to the position where you need to actually get to the online form, it’s probably at least five pages that you have to go through, answering different questions and flicking through different sub-links within different pages. Just discovery was already a key issue.
The second one was that there are a number of what I would describe as dark patterns, which is what we call in the tech industry things that are put in with the purpose to make it more difficult to use. Now, I don’t know if that’s the intention of Elections Canada or not, but I see it as dark patterns, where there are really some limitations on using the website that aren’t entirely clear from the get-go that you have to really understand in order to use. For example, you have a hard limit on 2.5 megabytes for uploading your documents to the website. What I’ve seen come through my website is that a lot of people have images or scans of their documents that are larger than that because computer files these days are pretty large. Additionally, a lot of addresses in Israel have dashes or slashes, and now a lot of those special characters aren’t able to be used properly on the website. These are limitations that don’t really have much place in the modern technology stack.
I just figured “How many people who already have gone through the process of navigating Elections Canada’s website and getting to this point are just going to give up because of these various roadblocks that are put in front of them?” So if there’s a system that I could create that’s much more user-friendly and basically eliminates as many barriers and reduces the friction to as close to zero as possible, we could really make a significant impact on getting people to vote. I’ve had people register who were born as early as the 1940s and 1930s, and they’ve been able to use my website. I don’t know if they would be able to figure out Elections Canada’s website.
Ellin Bessner: Is your website legit? Are you getting pushback from them? Are they allowed to use yours? I don’t actually know.
Elliot Gluck: I mean, I haven’t had any issues come come forward through my inbox yet.
Ellin Bessner: You know, because people would want to be like, “Oh, I don’t know if I can use this. I can only go with the one from the government”. You know what I mean? Like, they’d be worried that it wouldn’t be legit.
Elliot Gluck: Absolutely. Well, I provide a number of different options on the website for people. I have a system that’s semi-automated that basically allows you to register directly with Elections Canada through our website, and we send off your information for you. But there’s also an option where you can self-register, and you can tick that box. We send you a link via WhatsApp to the Elections Canada website with detailed instructions on how to fill it out, and people who are more comfortable with that option choose to use that option, and it works fine.
Ellin Bessner: And how long did it take for you to build this website?
Elliot Gluck: Took me three days.
Ellin Bessner: Wow. And has this ever been done before in other elections?
Elliot Gluck: You know, speaking from experience in the United States, I know there are many different organizations in the US that do similar work. I’m not sure if anything has been done specifically in Canada or specifically targeting expat communities. I’m not sure if there’s other projects that do this. I know living through elections in the United States, they have massive voter drive campaigns. I went to university in the United States where I studied political science, and it’s easy for them in the United States because they know every time when their election is going to be. It makes it a little bit more difficult for us in Canada because our elections could happen whenever. So having that ability to work quickly is something that I think is very valuable for this project. But additionally, I know from experience, again, like I was saying with the voter registration drives in the United States, there’s been a lot of systems where depending on what state you’re in, it can be remarkably easy to get registered to vote because there are plenty of third-party systems that want to help you and get you registered to vote.
Ellin Bessner: How do you know Canadians in Israel want to vote?
Elliot Gluck: I’d say the way I know Canadians want to vote is first of all, based on the traction we’ve been getting on our website. We’ve been getting a lot of positive messages and a lot of signups. It seems like this is an area where a lot of people weren’t even, in many cases, aware that they can vote from Israel. I had a cousin of mine from Toronto who made Aliyah that was telling me his whole idea about how he kind of never wanted to vote before in Canada, about how with this election being so important, he really feels the need and the desire to vote now and how the desire is there. The fact that the website is being used and is gaining traction, I think is telling enough of that.
Ellin Bessner: We don’t have online voting, so you have to physically get a ballot and then mail it in or whatever or drop it off somewhere. How does it work for Israel?
Elliot Gluck: Yeah, so that’s correct. All the voting is done through mail-in ballots. Once you get registered and your registration is confirmed by Elections Canada, they will send a ballot with a return address envelope by DHL, so a very good courier. It moves pretty quickly. My ballot’s coming in sometime at the end of this week, and from there you get your ballot, you fill it out, and you can return it either by courier, like DHL, for example, or through Israel Post. There are some concerns about going through the regular postal system because of the, you know, airmail. The war has complicated logistics in and out of the country.
Ellin Bessner: Right. I mean, Air Canada isn’t flying yet.
Elliot Gluck: However, DHL, again, they operate their own logistics, and they’ve been very, very consistent with getting mail to and from Israel. It makes sense that that’s the partner that the Canadian government is working with to get ballots over. Once they’re over here, the option is kind of up to the voter as to how they get it back. We’re putting together right now a guide on returning your ballot and looking at all the different options that are available. If you do not want to have a ballot mailed directly to you, or if you don’t have an address, then you can request the embassy receive your ballot and you can have it be available to pick up there. It is a bit of a different process because you have to reach out in advance to the embassy and request them to do that. But once that is done, then you’ll be able to get a ballot mailed there and then return it from the embassy. That’s a bit of a more involved process. And that’s another process where you can check that off on our website, and we will help navigate you through that process as best we can.
Ellin Bessner: The election’s in four weeks, so what’s the absolute cutoff time that people can do this before it doesn’t matter anymore because they won’t get it?
Elliot Gluck: My cutoff I would put on two weeks from now. So right now, it’s the week beginning March 30th, so the week beginning April 12th, I would say, is the last point to get registered. And then you’re assuming it takes a week to arrive in Israel, which oftentimes it’s shorter, but, you know, we’re assuming that’s going to take a longer amount of time, and then a week to get it filled out and then a week to have it mailed back. That’s kind of my conservative estimate. I’d really like to get everyone registered within the next two weeks.
Ellin Bessner: Can I ask you, are you saying who you would like to vote for and why?
Elliot Gluck: I don’t really want to be there telling people who I think should be voted for. My main goal is just to provide the tools for Canadians in Israel to be able to make their own decisions and make their voices heard. So while I have my own opinions, I don’t think it’s necessary for me to share that.
Ellin Bessner: The reason I ask is because the article I read in The Times of Israel, and some social media posts that I’ve been seeing, are using your article as a way to support Pierre Poilievre and the Conservatives. So I’m wondering if you’re aware that that is how it’s so far being shared?
Elliot Gluck: Whatever meaning or opinions people want to pull out of my project, they can feel free to discuss or consider. But there is a disclaimer at the bottom of my website. It says this is strictly nonpartisan, and I think it’s important that regardless of your political views and how you feel about any of the candidates for Parliament, I think the main problem is to get people up to vote. And so I don’t want to express any personal political opinions. I have no endorsements or issues to bring up. I just want to get people registered and voting.
Ellin Bessner: And is there any connection that you had with CIJA or any Canadian political lobby groups for this project?
Elliot Gluck: This is all my own doing. I studied political science mainly as a gateway to potentially going to law school down the line. I may go to law school at some point, but political organizing is not really something that I’ve done before. But I think it’s something that I took on in this case because I think, one, this is a very important election, and number two, I think it’s an area where a real impact could be made.
And I think that Canadian expats in Israel, should make their voices heard because I think it could be a very powerful voting block. I’ve got a lot of Canadian family that live here in Israel, and that’s really been my primary method of outreach. It’s been very successful so far because if you know one Canadian, they know a number of other Canadians, who know other Canadians. That’s the coolest thing, I think, about being in Israel specifically. You’ve got a lot of concentric circles, and it allows projects like this, that are important, to spread very quickly.
Ellin Bessner: These people are not all in one riding. They’re spread. I’m sure they’re from all parts of the country. We’re only 400,000 Jews in Canada plus 40,000. How is it going to make a difference?
Elliot Gluck: Well, looking at the polling data, I think that given the closeness of this election — you know, hindsight’s 20/20 — I can’t say with certainty about what effect this website will have on the outcome of the election. But I think primarily, the biggest goal and the most important thing is that throughout the various ridings, this can be a significant voter block. If there are a couple ridings won by a margin of a few thousand votes, and seats are able to be flipped through that, then that’s a tremendous impact. But again, I don’t know if that’s going to happen until after the election.
Ellin Bessner: I had a thought, and it’s a negative thought, because being here in Canada, we know that anybody who comes out connected to Israel or doing anything that is connected to Canada-Israel gets harassed online and gets called a Zionist, which is not pleasant.
Elliot Gluck: I’ve had a little bit of it. But, you know, growing up in communities, in places like Seattle, it’s nothing that I’m not used to. I don’t let it scare me. You know, I think this is more important work. I’ve received a few nasty messages, but nothing compared to the amount of love and support that I’ve received so far. As far as what comes, come as it may, but it’s not going to throw me off.
Ellin Bessner: All right. Is there anything that you would like our listeners to understand about what you’re getting out of this project?
Elliot Gluck: It’s been quite the adventure so far. I mean, it’s been only a week since I really began work on the project, and just seeing the response and the positive reaction to the website has been really good. It helps motivate me and lets me know that this is meaningful and impactful work that could potentially make a real difference. So, that’s the one thing I would leave off with — the impact on me. If you are in Israel, please visit IsraelVotes.ca and find out how you can get registered to vote.
Ellin Bessner: Elliot, it’s been really great to talk to you. Congratulations, Kol HaKavod for what you’re doing, and please let us know how it’s going closer to the election.
Elliot Gluck: Thank you very much for having me on.
Show Notes
Related links
- Elections Canada’s website also explains about how to vote in Canadian elections if you are Canadian abroad, no matter how long you’ve lived outside of Canada.
- When Canada originally barred citizens living in Israel from voting from abroad, in The CJN, from 2015.
Credits
- Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
- Production team: Andrea Varsany (producer), Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
- Music: Dov Beck-Levine
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