After being publicly mocked on social media, the Canada Revenue Agency deleted a post on X featuring the famed animated Minions.
X users called the Thursday morning post a waste of the tax dollars that the organization is responsible for collecting.
The post included a gif of a dancing Minion from the popular children’s movie series Despicable Me speaking the fictional language of Minionese with a hashtag referencing the newly released movie Despicable Me 4.
“Bello banana! Bapple Choppa Mooka-laka ooh-na-na! #CdnTax #DespicableMe4” the post read.
A follow-up post indicated the message was supposedly about the Canada Child Benefit.
“Oops, the minions were at it again! What they meant was: The kids wearing you out? At least applying for the #CanadaChildBenefit is easy – AND you can do it one-handed on your phone.”
Canadians did not respond kindly to the joking nature of the post.
“No, you are not hallucinating,” Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre posted on X. “This is the kind of wacko stuff Trudeau’s tax department is busy posting to make you forget they are taking more of your money than ever before.”
Then he called Canadians to sign a petition to “axe the taxes and the weird posts.”
“Like, who approved this?” one user said. “Do they really think Canadians find it funny to hand over 50% of our pay cheques to CRA? And even more now with Carbon Taxes and increased Capital Gains? Get rid of ALL of these MINIONS, starting with Justin Trudeau.”
The federal director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, Franco Terrazzano, also had a few choice words in reaction to the post.
“This is perfect proof that we have too many bureaucrats with too much time and taxpayers’ money on their hands,” he said in an email to True North.
On X, the B.C. director for the CTF echoed the sentiment.
“Ya know, it certainly seems fitting the CRA is promoting a movie about minions who serve a supervillain,” one user said.
Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner also piled on, pointing out the problems Canadians face with wading through the CRA bureaucracy as it is – only to find out that they are spending the money they are responsible for taking from Canadians on silly memes.
“It’s extremely hard to reach your agency for help. Canadians are being taxed up the wazoo while their cost of living spirals out of control. Can’t wait to see the comms approvals chain on this one,” she said.
From her indications, the CRA can likely expect a few freedom of information requests over this one.