In mid-August 2011, Karygiannis's former Conservative opponent Harry Tsai, among others, signed a collective letter on behalf of the Taiwanese Canadian Association of Toronto, requesting that Bob Rae remove Karygiannis from his multicultural critic's post. The letter cited his poor attendance of the House of Commons and bad treatment of Canada's Turkish and Macedonian community as reasons to be considered unfit. According to Tsai, Karygiannis contacted him by telephone saying he did not care about what they had written and expressing content that the authors of the letter "had been able to write in English". In his public response, Karygiannis denied making such a comment and complained that the letter was signed in part by "Turks and Macedonians, who don't like it, because I am Greek, and they have problems with Greeks." As for Tsai's discontent, Karygiannis explained it by the Conservative candidate's feelings after having got "his butt kicked" during the election.