Don't be fooled： Gerald Butts is “going to keep running the Liberal operation”
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
174.4175
Summary
Justin Trudeau's right hand man Gerald Butts says he did nothing wrong, but resigns anyway. I don't think that's true. And if he did do nothing wrong why did he resign? I go deep on that in this episode of Rebels by the Million.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
Hello, Rebels by the Million. You're listening to a free audio-only recording of my show,
00:00:05.200
The Ezra LeVance Show. Today, we go through Gerald Butts' resignation. I say two things.
00:00:10.880
Number one, I don't think he really resigned. I think he's still going to run this show.
00:00:15.160
In fact, the liberals say he might even run their campaign. And number two,
00:00:18.600
if he did nothing wrong, why did he resign? I go deep on that. I hope you watch it,
00:00:25.500
as well as listen to it. And that's the thing. If you're listening to this podcast,
00:00:30.000
I think he should watch it, too. I play all these video clips. You've got to see the video clips.
00:00:35.820
You just have to become a premium content subscriber. That's what we call these long-form
00:00:39.160
TV-style shows. You get access to my show. It's on every day. Other great TV-style shows like
00:00:44.020
David Menzies, Sheila Gunn-Reed. It's only eight bucks a month to subscribe. Or if you subscribe
00:00:49.000
for the whole year in events, you get two months free. And just for podcast listeners, you can get
00:00:53.360
10% off by entering the coupon code PODCAST when you subscribe. Just go to therebel.media
00:00:58.760
slash shoes to become a member. And hey, give us a good review if you like it.
00:01:03.620
Without further to do, let me present to you today's free audio-only version of my show.
00:01:12.480
Tonight, Gerald Butts, Trudeau's right-hand man, says he did nothing wrong but resigns.
00:01:17.740
I don't believe either part of that, do you? It's February 19th, and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.
00:01:23.040
Why should others go to jail when you're a biggest carbon consumer I know?
00:01:28.820
There's 8,500 customers here, and you won't give them an answer.
00:01:32.900
The only thing I have to say to the government about why I publish it is because it's my
00:01:44.180
Gerald Butts, Justin Trudeau's principal secretary, resigned yesterday. Here's a tweet by Trudeau's
00:01:50.300
executive director of communications and planning, Kate Purchase, with Butts' full statement.
00:01:57.080
It was a lengthy, self-serving statement, as you can see, saying he did nothing wrong,
00:02:03.500
and he was a saint, and he never had an impure thought, and he didn't know anyone else in
00:02:09.500
the government who ever has, but he's resigning anyways because of some anonymous accusation.
00:02:15.620
Yeah, sure. Let me read part of it. Recently, anonymous sources have alleged that I pressured
00:02:23.340
the former Attorney General, the Honorable Jolie Wilson-Raybould, to assist SNC-Lavalin with
00:02:28.580
being considered for a deferred prosecution agreement. I categorically deny the accusation
00:02:33.960
that I or anyone else in his office pressured Ms. Wilson-Raybould. We honored the unique role
00:02:41.120
of the Attorney General. At all times, I and those around me acted with integrity and a singular
00:02:46.240
focus on the best interests of all Canadians. I love me. Oh, I added those last three words, sorry.
00:02:54.440
Is that really what happened? That this was all just an anonymous rumor, all this stuff we've been
00:03:00.140
talking about for weeks now? It's all fake. There was no pressure on Jolie Wilson-Raybould? No,
00:03:05.960
no, no, no, no. The former Attorney General? No, no. Everything's fine. The federal lobbyist registry
00:03:12.500
actually shows that, in fact, there was enormous pressure brought to bear. SNC-Lavalin, a corrupt
00:03:18.680
Quebec engineering firm, caught paying $48 million in bribes in Libya to scam government contracts.
00:03:25.160
They really were being prosecuted, and the lobbyist registry really shows that SNC-Lavalin
00:03:30.580
lobbied just about everyone in the Liberal government, including a bunch of cabinet ministers,
00:03:34.980
including Gerald Butts personally, and they say right there on the lobbyist registry that they
00:03:39.640
are lobbying to have the criminal charges dropped against them. 50-plus meetings. Yeah, that's
00:03:45.060
pressure. And remember, Trudeau never denied putting pressure on Jolie Wilson-Raybould. He just used
00:03:51.500
really weird lawyerly language to say he never directed her to take a particular decision. Remember this?
00:03:58.260
The allegations in the Globe story this morning are false. Neither the current nor the previous
00:04:05.580
Attorney General was ever directed by me or by anyone in my office to take a decision in this
00:04:13.880
matter. The allegations reported in the story are false. At no time did I or my office direct the current
00:04:24.200
or previous Attorney General to make any particular decision in this matter? But not necessarily direct,
00:04:30.620
Prime Minister. Was there any sort of influence whatsoever? Yeah. As I've said, at no time did we
00:04:37.400
direct the Attorney General, current or previous, to take any decision whatsoever in this matter.
00:04:44.720
That was Trudeau's first alibi, and I don't think anyone in the country believed it. So he went
00:04:49.980
through a whole bunch more alibis, you'll recall. He said Jody Wilson-Raybould was obviously fine with
00:04:56.260
everything, because after all, she was still in his cabinet. In our system of government, of course,
00:05:03.760
her presence in cabinet should actually speak for itself.
00:05:07.520
Huh. Yeah. Well, the day Trudeau said that, Raybould Wilson quit. She obviously saw it and said,
00:05:14.820
yeah, no. And she hired a former Supreme Court judge as her lawyer. So fancy that. Now, Trudeau
00:05:21.120
tried out several more weird excuses. He said it was all Scott Bryson's fault. See, Scott Bryson was a
00:05:27.780
cabinet minister who quit because of another scandal that actually involves interference in the courts,
00:05:32.840
too. And so obviously, Trudeau had to move Jody Wilson-Raybould out of the Justice Department
00:05:37.460
because of the cabinet shuffling. I mean, obviously.
00:05:43.280
We move forward with the cabinet shuffle. One of the senior members of our team stepped down,
00:05:51.920
and we had to move things around on the team. If Scott Bryson had not stepped down from cabinet,
00:06:00.940
Jody Wilson-Raybould would still be Minister of Justice and Attorney General.
00:06:08.940
Really? Did anyone in the country believe that? So it was essential that Scott Bryson remained in
00:06:15.240
cabinet or Jody Wilson's whole career was there? That doesn't even make sense. Who wrote that? Did he
00:06:20.400
come up with that? I bet he came up with that by himself. It's that dumb. And then there was this
00:06:25.820
gorgeous question and even gorgeser answer. I've tried this question out when I'm asked about chores
00:06:32.300
around the home. Look at this and tell me if you think this is an excuse. You might put it in your
00:06:36.840
personal repertoire of excuses. Mr. Can you just tell us the reasons that Mr. Wilson-Raybould gave you
00:06:42.700
for why she decided to resign from cabinet? Do you want me to answer that question in English?
00:06:48.240
I'm just trying to remember. Okay. As a government, we take very seriously our responsibility to grow
00:06:56.580
the economy, to invest in jobs, to invest in a strong future for Canadians. That's exactly what we do.
00:07:02.520
Oh, that is so perfect. Sweetheart, it's 11 p.m. You're just getting home from work now. Where
00:07:10.580
the heck were you? You weren't answering your calls. Ooh. Do you want me to answer that in English?
00:07:21.020
Have you been drinking? It's 11 o'clock. You're just coming. Have you been drinking?
00:07:25.400
Um, what's the line? I've been working at, like, that's just so amazing, that excuse-ology from
00:07:32.640
Justin Trudeau. I have absolutely got to, Ezra, you didn't take the garbage out this week. We missed
00:07:37.900
garbage pickup day. Now it's going to stick around for another week and stink. Why didn't
00:07:41.680
you take the garbage out? Um, do you want me to answer in English? Um, what's my line? That
00:07:50.920
is so amazing, that excuse. Would you not say that is the best answer you've ever seen in
00:07:57.840
politics? And Trudeau, after going through all these alibis, after first denying that he
00:08:02.920
talked about this with Jody Wilson-Raybould, and then admitting that, well, okay, maybe, okay,
00:08:07.900
fine. Okay, fine, we did talk about it, but I didn't pressure her. His story seemed to
00:08:12.420
change again and again. Do you want me to answer in English? He was asked about a parliamentary
00:08:17.340
investigation, and he said, oh, yeah, how's up for MPs to decide? But then the liberals
00:08:21.680
shut that down at his direction. Can I show you this? Look at this. Some Trudeau liberals
00:08:27.820
started telling journalists, off the record, they were so brave, that Jody Wilson-Raybould was
00:08:32.680
getting a bit happening for an Aboriginal woman. Um, and that, uh, maybe that's really the
00:08:39.460
problem here. And they moved in to blame the victim, attack the whistleblower mode. One
00:08:44.660
of Trudeau's Montreal cronies, some idiot, I'm sorry, I gotta say it, named Anthony Housefather.
00:08:51.040
He got really weird, and he thought he'd help the boss, because the, um, do you want me to answer
00:08:57.020
in English? Wasn't really working. So Anthony Housefather said, Jody Wilson-Raybould was fired
00:09:03.280
because apparently just a month ago, they discovered that no one had detected this.
00:09:10.740
She doesn't speak French too well. Yeah, that's the ticket. Remember this?
00:09:14.400
There's millions of reasons that people can be shuffled from one position to another,
00:09:19.980
um, including the fact, for example, that there's a lot of legal issues coming up in Quebec,
00:09:24.700
and the prime minister may well have decided he needed a justice minister that could speak French.
00:09:30.220
Hmm. So they apparently didn't, didn't know that she didn't speak French when they hired her,
00:09:36.520
and they apparently didn't know she didn't speak French until, amazingly, she rejected their
00:09:43.080
pressure to drop charges against SNC-Lavalin, and then they really needed to fire her because she
00:09:48.660
didn't speak French, and I guess all the translators are gone for the day. Yeah, the liberals have not
00:09:53.620
had this bad a week since Trudeau's India fashion show, but that's the thing, that India fiasco was
00:10:00.160
bad, and of course they brought along a convicted terrorist in Trudeau's entourage to India, so it was
00:10:05.120
bad, it was embarrassing, probably cost us dearly in terms of trade and diplomatic allies, same with the
00:10:11.080
current China fiasco. China still is holding two Canadians hostage over there, sounds like they're
00:10:16.180
going to execute a third Canadian, so that's awful. But other than some fashion crimes in India,
00:10:24.260
there were no crimes committed there by Justin Trudeau, no crimes that I know of. But how about
00:10:29.800
pressuring an attorney general to drop criminal charges against SNC-Lavalin? Is that a crime?
00:10:37.220
I mean, to remind you of the obvious, SNC-Lavalin is a company that's used to bribing their way
00:10:43.700
through any problematic politicians in Libya, 48 million. Oh, in Canada too. Look at this clip of
00:10:48.940
our friend Solomon Friedman, a senior criminal lawyer in Ottawa, explaining to CTV's Don Martin
00:10:53.660
that SNC-Lavalin is so corrupt and does this so many times that they are legally not eligible to be let
00:11:00.700
off the hook in any special remediation agreement. It's just not applicable. That's what SNC-Lavalin was
00:11:06.840
lobbying for to be let off the hook for prosecution. But that's not what the law allows, according to
00:11:11.020
our friend Solomon. Well, one of the reasons that all of this smells so much is that, I mean, first
00:11:16.800
of all, the deferred prosecution regime in and of itself smells. But if you look at it and you look
00:11:21.840
at what does it take to qualify, you start going through, there are a list of factors. So one of the
00:11:25.860
things is, has the company or its representatives been convicted in the past? Guess what? They have.
00:11:31.240
How high up, in terms of the company hierarchy, does the corruption go? Well, in the case of SNC-Lavalin,
00:11:37.780
to the very top. How serious are these allegations or previous convictions? Well, they're bribing
00:11:43.460
officials to get the Montreal hospital project, right? So when you look at this list of factors,
00:11:49.360
have reparations been made, really? Have the people of Libya been made whole for the hundreds of
00:11:53.640
millions of dollars that were stolen from the citizens to enrich the Gaddafis? Of course not. So SNC-Lavalin
00:11:59.240
would never qualify for one of these arrangements by the letter of the law.
00:12:04.780
Huh. So it would take friends in high places to make that happen?
00:12:08.400
Maybe a little undue influence, maybe some pressure, maybe some directing, all those things
00:12:12.000
that we're hearing about. It's not a surprise when you look at the law. This is not a law
00:12:15.600
that a company like SNC-Lavalin, given their past track record, could ever qualify for.
00:12:22.300
Hmm. So was there any corruption here? I mean, criminal corruption. I mean, we know
00:12:26.780
there was unethical political behavior. We know there was cronyism. But was there an actual crime
00:12:33.320
committed? Well, we had a two-year criminal trial of Mike Duffy over some expense claims
00:12:38.180
that Nigel Wright, Stephen Harper's chief of staff, voluntarily paid back to the government
00:12:42.040
for him. Would you say that this SNC-Lavalin business is more or less severe than that? And by the
00:12:49.820
way, Mike Duffy was acquitted, of course. Here's a question that I haven't seen asked by any media
00:12:54.380
party journalists. Has anyone in the prime minister's office been contacted by the RCMP
00:13:00.680
about any of this? Any staff? Have they asked any questions of the 50-plus people that SNC-Lavalin
00:13:07.860
lobbied? Including, by the way, David Lamedi, the Montreal MP that Trudeau just appointed as
00:13:13.240
its new attorney general and justice minister. Now, I ask that because I'm not sure if it makes
00:13:18.260
sense that Gerald Butz would just resign for no reason, that I did nothing wrong and so I must
00:13:24.840
resign? Would he do that? We know he's the de facto prime minister. Just weeks after the government
00:13:31.900
was elected, liberal MPs reported that Trudeau himself told them to take anything coming from
00:13:37.280
Gerald Butz as if it were from Trudeau himself. Trudeau said, do what Gerald Butz says as if I
00:13:46.440
myself said it? That's incredible. That kind of blank check delegation, Stephen Harper would never
00:13:52.600
have said that about anyone. There's only one prime minister who has that authority, but Stephen
00:13:58.560
Harper would never have delegated that to his staff, or Trudeau did, because with Trudeau, it's just a
00:14:04.660
shortcut because Butz is micromanaging and making all the decisions anyways. And remember, Justin Trudeau
00:14:09.880
himself later confirmed this with the ethics commissioner when he was taking the bribe from the Aga Khan for
00:14:15.940
that secret $200,000 family vacation on Billionaire Island in the Bahamas. I don't actually think the
00:14:21.880
Aga Khan was trying to bribe Trudeau. I think it was sort of the other way around. Trudeau was trying
00:14:25.400
to get free stuff. Trudeau's excuse was that he couldn't have been lobbied or subject to corruption
00:14:31.100
or a bribe because Trudeau actually never knows what the substance of any details of anything are.
00:14:37.020
He's just there to shake hands and slap backs and build relationships. The real work is done by others,
00:14:42.000
as in Gerald Butz, as in Justin Trudeau said, I can't be guilty of a conflict of interest because
00:14:46.760
I go through life so clueless. He actually made that argument. You can read that yourself.
00:14:52.000
So back to Gerald Butz, the de facto PM, why did he resign again?
00:14:57.560
If he did nothing wrong and nobody did anything wrong, then why leave?
00:15:02.260
Why was Jody Wilson-Raybould fired as a justice minister and the attorney general if nothing was
00:15:07.420
wrong? Sorry, I don't believe that Scott Bryson line. And then why did she quit as veterans minister
00:15:12.220
if nothing was wrong? And why is she still consulting with a former Supreme Court justice as her lawyer
00:15:19.080
if nothing's wrong? Sounds like a lot's wrong. And why Gerald Butz himself? He was one of those
00:15:25.860
lobbied by SNC-Lavalin. Sorry, this resignation doesn't actually answer any questions. It asks
00:15:32.820
more questions. And like I say, the liberals will brazen anything out. They're not weak like
00:15:37.500
conservatives. They don't fire cabinet ministers for drinking $16 orange juices like Stephen Harper
00:15:43.260
did. Today, the news is that Harjeet Sajam, the defense minister who's the new veterans minister
00:15:48.400
to, he racked up $161,000 worth of personal photography. As in, that's how much tax dollars
00:15:59.420
he spent on having people take handsome pictures of him on the job as a politician. Our veterans
00:16:05.300
have to sue for benefits, but apparently the Department of Defense has all the money in the
00:16:09.120
world for selfie shots for that glory hound. Do you think Harjeet Sajam will quit over it
00:16:15.640
or be fired over it like Bev Oda at her $16 orange juice? That's $10,000 $16 orange juices
00:16:22.940
if you can. Of course not, because liberals never explain and never apologize. So why would
00:16:28.900
Gerald Butz quit? No apology, of course, no contrition, no taking responsibility, adamant
00:16:35.340
that he's as pure as the driven slush. Then why? Why did he quit? We know that Gerald Butz
00:16:41.540
is pretty much the opposite of clean when it comes to graft or grifting. As Vivian Krause
00:16:46.520
herself has documented, Gerald Butz literally stayed on the payroll of an anti-oil lobby firm
00:16:51.820
called the World Wildlife Fund even after he went to work for Trudeau. He got paid more
00:16:56.380
than a third of a million dollars U.S. As in, he was taking money from an anti-oil lobby
00:17:02.140
group and not disclosing it publicly while he went to work for Trudeau in Ottawa. That's
00:17:08.060
shocking. Imagine if someone was working for a party leader and being paid a third of a million
00:17:12.740
bucks on the side by an oil company and keeping it secret. Or even moving from Toronto to Ottawa
00:17:18.360
to officially become Trudeau's principal secretary. Gerald Butz billed taxpayers $127,000 just to move
00:17:27.260
down the highway. It's a four-hour drive. $127,000. And he hid that from the public and he covered it up
00:17:35.840
when people tried to find out through access to information. And then he attacked reporters who
00:17:39.600
reported it. And then he grudgingly repaid part of it. So he says. Do you see what I mean? He wasn't
00:17:45.560
clean. He wasn't above corruption. He was the ambassador of grift. He was the leader of entitlement
00:17:52.600
personally. He was the one who approved Trudeau putting not one but two personal family nannies
00:17:59.500
on the public dime. Who does that? Trudeau's a millionaire. Why can't he pay for his own nannies?
00:18:05.660
Gerald Butz approved the trip to Billionaire Island. And then he quarterbacked the legal defense.
00:18:10.720
It lost. Of course, Trudeau has been convicted of breaking the Conflict of Interest Act again and
00:18:15.040
again and again with no consequence, of course. So if the prime minister's best friend since college,
00:18:21.000
his personal buddy, and his principal secretary, look at them with their sandals there.
00:18:26.180
If Gerald Butz was personally on the take in the ways I've just described, if he's cashing
00:18:33.260
checks from lobbyists, as the manner I've just described, if he's paying himself 127 grand
00:18:37.760
moving expenses, what did he have moved by Rolls-Royce or something? If he's approving Trudeau's
00:18:45.680
personal indulgences, he is the one who set the tone for corruption, set the standard for corruption,
00:18:51.720
showed the tolerance for corruption. Is it any surprise that SNC-Lavalin
00:18:55.300
that thought they could play with the Canadian government just like they played in Libya?
00:19:00.360
Oh, and the moral preening. I just have to read you one more excerpt from his self-serving letter.
00:19:05.660
I also need to say this, and I know it's a non sequitur, our kids and grandkids will judge us
00:19:10.540
on one issue above all others. That issue is climate change. I hope the response to it becomes the
00:19:15.300
collective, non-partisan, urgent effort that science clearly says is required. I hope that happens soon.
00:19:20.380
What? What? What? Well, you know he was a global warming lobbyist, right? You know he was paid to take that
00:19:29.440
position by the World Wildlife Fund. You know they kept paying him even when he went to Trudeau's office.
00:19:34.320
But what a bizarre thing to put in a resignation letter, except, number one, to switch the subject,
00:19:39.200
and number two, to show how moral he is. And sure, if maybe he broke a few eggs along the way,
00:19:44.880
well, you have to to make an omelet. Except, of course, the only thing his global warming crusade
00:19:49.780
has done is lay off Canadian workers. It hasn't changed the weather. It hasn't moved the dial on
00:19:55.300
Canada's global warming emissions, if that's what you care about. They're flat.
00:19:59.420
Donald Trump has reduced America's far more than Canada, and he's not even trying.
00:20:04.280
This is just more moral preening from Gerald Butts that excuses everything. Yeah, he's throwing a bone
00:20:11.320
to his lobbyist friends. Gerald Butts will do anything for his lobbyist friends. I mean, I've shown you
00:20:16.280
this document before. It's the U.S. Rockefeller Brothers Fund campaign against the oil sands. They call them
00:20:21.700
the tar sands. And you can see all the Canadian front groups that they were paying. You can see the
00:20:27.520
World Wildlife Fund in the top right corner. That was Gerald Butts' lobby group. And you can see Greenpeace
00:20:32.180
at the bottom. And you see the Sierra Club in the bottom right. And the Pembina Institute in the
00:20:36.660
bottom right. Butts placed all of his fellow lobbyists from these groups in high places in
00:20:42.860
Trudeau's government. He appointed Marlo Reynolds, the head of Pembina. That's the chief of staff to
00:20:48.300
the environment minister now. Butts appointed the head of the Sierra Club to be the chief of staff to
00:20:54.420
the minister of energy now. He appointed the former president of vice president of the Tides
00:21:01.680
Foundation to be deputy director of policy for the PMO. So he's all about placing lobbyists in high
00:21:09.620
office. They are his personal friends. They all took foreign money together, as you can see in that
00:21:15.300
document. Oh, and they were all being investigated together by the CRA, the Canada Revenue Agency,
00:21:20.360
for violating the Income Tax Act by laundering political donations through their charity numbers
00:21:25.380
for political work. And then one day, Gerald Butts simply ordered the Canada Revenue Agency to stop
00:21:30.720
their audits. Just order them. Just stop it. Hey, guys, just stop auditing my friends, he said.
00:21:35.960
And the CBC cheered this news, of course. And Gerald Butts later proposed to change the law,
00:21:40.780
of course. But his friends had all broken the law. They were being audited and found to have broken
00:21:46.380
the law. And the law, I mean, the Income Tax Act. But Gerald Butts simply told the CRA to back off.
00:21:51.560
And they did. And the media cheered. And that's your saint. That's your innocent as a lamb public
00:21:56.200
servant. Gerald Butts was corrupt. Oh, it was gross how many conservative insiders were on Twitter
00:22:03.180
praising Gerald Butts today for being such a hardworking public servant. We salute him.
00:22:10.000
But he wasn't a public servant. He was a very private servant, very highly paid political partisan.
00:22:15.400
who double-dipped as an anti-oil sands lobbyist even when he worked in Ottawa.
00:22:20.840
He was the chief corrupter of Ottawa personally, and for his friends, and for his allies.
00:22:31.660
Along with Chief of Staff Katie Telford, Mr. Butts has been at Mr. Trudeau's side since he ran for the
00:22:37.520
Liberal leadership in 2013, and was a key architect of the party's election victory in 2015. The two top
00:22:43.900
aides had planned to take a leave of absence from the PMO this summer to run the October
00:22:50.840
election campaign. A senior government source said no decision had been made on a replacement
00:22:56.420
for Mr. Butts. The source did not know whether Mr. Butts would now play a formal role in the campaign.
00:23:01.360
Oh, so Gerald Butts was going to leave the PMO anyways in just, what, three months from now?
00:23:08.500
And he was going to run the campaign. He was going to quit anyways. And he still might?
00:23:17.820
Everything with these people is a lie. They've changed their alibi a half dozen times about
00:23:25.240
Jody Wilson-Raybould. Now I hear that Wilson-Raybould met with the cabinet today,
00:23:29.560
but she still won't talk to the journalists outside. Who knows what they've said to her,
00:23:34.840
what they've offered to her. We probably won't ever know. The media's attention span here is
00:23:39.060
almost spent. I mean, take this just for an example. Here's just an example. Here's Bill Morneau,
00:23:45.380
the finance minister who was also convicted of violating our ethics codes. Here he was today
00:23:50.940
commenting on Gerald Butts. Well, what I can say is I have an enormous amount of respect for Jerry
00:23:56.380
Butts, and I know Jerry has an enormous amount of respect for Canadian institutions. My sense is
00:24:01.740
that he's decided, and I think appropriately, to defend himself against, you know, people saying
00:24:08.200
things that just aren't true. Well, hang on. Gerald Butts said he doesn't have anything to
00:24:15.260
defend himself about, that he did nothing wrong, but Bill Morneau said Butts quit to defend himself,
00:24:19.940
which is it. What did that mean? But hang on. Bill Morneau himself was personally lobbied by SNC
00:24:26.080
Lavalin just a few months ago with his chief of staff in the room, as you can see. He was personally
00:24:34.100
lobbied. And they meant more than once. Why didn't a single journalist ask Bill Morneau that? What did
00:24:42.000
Bill Morneau do after that lobbying meeting? Did he follow up with anyone? I mean, you can't blame a
00:24:49.020
guy for taking a meeting, but did he do anything? Did he follow up with the prime minister, with the
00:24:55.720
justice minister? Did he act? Did he run an errand for SNC-Lavalin? Zero curiosity from the media party.
00:25:02.860
We're almost done this whole story, aren't we? They're almost through this. The media is getting sleepy.
00:25:09.060
You're getting sleepy. Unless the RCMP does something, I think Stephen Harper probably
00:25:16.140
would have lost the last election, or at least lost a majority, whether or not that Mike Duffy
00:25:21.060
trial had happened. But the RCMP's showy trial against Mike Duffy, which resulted in an acquittal,
00:25:27.000
was enough to feed the media to destroy Harper and give Trudeau a majority. Harper's corrupt.
00:25:31.240
Harper's a scandal monk. No, he's not. Oh my God. The RCMP could investigate these fiascos,
00:25:37.100
and they might lay charges if SNC-Lavalin did what they normally do, which is to
00:25:41.960
bribe people and corrupt the system. If Trudeau's cronies act like they normally act, if Gerald
00:25:48.320
Butts took the same fond view of corruption as he usually does, but unless that happens,
00:25:53.660
unless the RCMP investigate and lay charges, and it might, but unless it does, I'm not sure
00:26:00.500
what else would have spooked Gerald Butts so badly, but unless that happens, this story's
00:26:05.940
done, folks. And if you think for a moment that Gerald Butts isn't going to continue to
00:26:10.920
run the whole liberal operation, both in the party and in government, I don't think you've
00:26:14.520
been paying attention to him or his cronies. Stay with us for more from Parliament Hill next.
00:26:42.520
Oh, look at me. Do I look like a white supremacist? No. I am a Canadian, and that's how we roll.
00:26:57.520
There you have it. That's our Kian Bexty, who has been riding on the United We Roll convoy
00:27:06.080
all the way from Alberta. Today, they reached Ottawa. Now, I see that the usual suspects on the
00:27:11.860
left are denouncing the convoy as racist or Nazi or whatever, which is just baffling. I think Kian
00:27:18.860
made a great point by going to that black supporter and saying, are you a white supremacist? Because
00:27:24.300
after all, that's what Bob Ray says, the disgraced former NDP Premier of Ontario. That's what
00:27:29.040
Maclean's Magazine says. That fellow there seemed to disagree. Well, joining us now live via Skype
00:27:36.080
from in front of Parliament Hill is Kian Bexty himself. Kian, great to see you, and welcome to
00:27:43.120
Thank you. It's good to be here. It's a little cold, though.
00:27:46.220
Now, you have made the lengthy journey all the way from Red Deer. How long was it in terms
00:27:53.040
of days and hours, and do you know how many kilometres it was, too?
00:27:58.060
We left last Wednesday, I believe it was, and it was over 3,000 kilometres. I was checking
00:28:03.880
Google Maps every now and then. It was basically a several thousand-kilometre-long parade. It was
00:28:12.180
one of the most spectacular things I've ever witnessed. The support across the country for
00:28:16.320
this convoy was unbelievable. People lining up and down the streets to see this parade,
00:28:22.440
basically. It was great to see the supporters, but it was also great to see people who were neither
00:28:28.000
supportive or unsupportive of Alberta's oil sands and the West's oil and gas industry.
00:28:33.880
They just came out to see the message, and I think they heard it loud and clear.
00:28:37.800
Yeah, I mean, we were just playing some of your footage from along the way.
00:28:41.480
I saw some fireworks. Was that just coincidental, the fireworks, or was that actually in support
00:28:48.280
It was absolutely in support of the convoy. I couldn't believe it. I was in the bus for the
00:28:52.200
first half of the trip, and in the second half of the trip, I was in what they called the rover
00:28:56.220
vehicle, which was leading the convoy by about four kilometres, scouting out what the road looked
00:29:01.020
like so that all the truckers could be aware and prepared, and also was picking up donations along
00:29:05.800
the way. And we got to, I can't remember what the name of the town was. It's on my Twitter.
00:29:11.280
And there was just a crowd of about 20 people standing there in the total dark, and they were
00:29:15.500
holding boxes of apple fritters, and we just pulled over. I said a few words to the crowd about how
00:29:21.340
important Alberta's oil and gas industry was to the west, and also to the east. And we took some
00:29:27.440
pictures, got back in our car, and got ready to go. And then all of a sudden, fireworks started
00:29:31.540
going off, and there was flares set off on the sides of the roads, lined along the snow ditches.
00:29:38.180
And then the convoy came through, and we got some video there. It was honestly one of the most
00:29:42.680
amazing moments of my life, actually, to see that happen. It was beautiful.
00:29:46.780
Well, that's incredible, and there's some mighty impressive trucks there. Now, you guys actually
00:29:51.180
arrived on Parliament Hill today, and then it got a little bit strange. I saw on your Twitter feed
00:29:58.340
the police cordoned off Parliament Hill, said you could only stand in the snow drift, but the hard-left,
00:30:06.580
violent, masked Antifa thugs had this well-protected, well-shoveled place to stand. We'll show a picture
00:30:15.660
from your Twitter. It was so weird, and I thought, since when is that a thing? And then I want to
00:30:23.020
show a clip. You were safe across the entire country. You went in small towns and big cities,
00:30:29.660
but on the most policed square mile in Canada, Parliament Hill, you were assaulted. You personally
00:30:35.800
were assaulted by Antifa, and police just sort of let it happen. Here, we'll play a clip of that right
00:30:41.340
now. Can you tell me, can you tell me why you're here? Hey, get that guy, get the police.
00:30:55.000
That guy just f***ing assaulted me. He just threw my phone on the ground and smacked my arm, and my
00:31:05.400
phone's busted. Um, Kian, what did police do? I mean, thankfully you weren't actually hurt. I think
00:31:11.360
you were more sort of startled, and maybe your phone is damaged, but, like, there were a lot of cops.
00:31:17.100
There's a lot of cops right there. They would have known the convoy was coming. I know the convoy
00:31:21.460
was in touch. Did the police do anything? There was about 40 police officers on the street right
00:31:27.720
there, right around me. There was heavy police presence, and right next to me, within four
00:31:33.680
meters of this happening, uh, there was a female police officer who was standing there. As you can
00:31:38.840
see in that video, I approached her immediately after, uh, and they stood there as this thug sunk
00:31:44.360
back into the crowd. Um, this is the first time anything like this has ever happened to me. It's the
00:31:49.180
first time I've ever been up close and personal with these Antifa thugs. I was a little bit
00:31:53.300
unimpressed, but what I was really disappointed with was the inaction from the police officers.
00:31:58.940
I went and spoke to them afterwards and asked how I go with, go ahead with filing a report
00:32:03.140
to them, and they said, do it over the phone. I understand it's busy, but what's the point
00:32:07.700
of having this heavy police presence there if they're not willing to go into this middle of
00:32:12.440
this Antifa crowd and pluck that little juvenile delinquent out of it, who, who damaged my property
00:32:19.360
and punched my hand. It's a hundred dollars of damage, by the way, to replace my phone. It's
00:32:24.280
a little bit disappointing. Um, so, you know, the police did a good job keeping, uh, the party
00:32:31.240
separate after that happened. Actually, they kind of kicked into high gear after that. But when,
00:32:36.020
when that event went down, uh, there was just no action. I was kind of disappointed.
00:32:40.660
Well, we'll cover the cost to, to fix your phone. Um, and if folks want to chip into any of the
00:32:46.380
costs, including obviously you had to pay for your own hotels along the way and cell phone service
00:32:51.920
and meals. Um, the ride itself, uh, was provided by the convoy, but we covered those things. If folks
00:32:58.220
want to see all your footage and if they want to chip in, we'll, we'll obviously cover the damage
00:33:02.580
to your phone key and, uh, folks can go to rebelconvoy.com. Um, who met and spoke with the
00:33:10.560
convoy. I saw a few clips today. It looked like both the conservative party and Maxime Bernier's,
00:33:17.580
uh, in person attended. Did Andrew Scheer attend also?
00:33:23.360
Andrew Scheer was there. He gave, uh, I only caught the first section of his speech there.
00:33:28.400
It was, you know, they both did a good job. Maxime and Andrew Scheer, Maxime and Andrew Scheer,
00:33:32.940
both spoke to the crowd, talked about scrapping bill C48, uh, and 69 scrapping the carbon tax.
00:33:39.400
You know, they're sort of on the same team with that. They both rallied the crowd, but you could
00:33:42.960
see, you could actually see a line of division in the crowd. Um, some people were berating Maxime
00:33:47.740
Bernier saying that he's destroying the conservative movement, a bunch of, uh, well, that's their own
00:33:52.880
opinion, I suppose. Um, and then the other group was so happy to see Maxime, very excited. Uh, Andrew
00:33:59.700
Scheer, like I said, I wasn't there at the end of that speech to hear how people, how he was received,
00:34:04.080
but they both had a very similar message and the crowd, uh, was applauding and cheering all the way
00:34:10.080
through. Well, I'm glad, I'm glad both were there. Um, Maxime Bernier and Andrew Scheer, uh, to be
00:34:17.080
candid, Andrew Scheer in the past has turned his nose up a bit at grassroots events like this. And
00:34:21.960
in fact, Scott Moe, the premier of Saskatchewan has been a big booster of this convoy. Jason Kenney,
00:34:28.280
uh, a little bit of a reluctant supporter. In fact, he, he made one tweet and then he chided,
00:34:34.100
uh, the, the convoy. I, I, I don't understand what's going on there, but it looked like a great
00:34:39.820
trip. Now, obviously those trucks have to drive back. I understand you'll be flying back from
00:34:44.620
Ottawa. Um, what happens next? It looked great. Um, you did some great coverage. There was a little
00:34:51.300
bit of mainstream media coverage. The CBC smeared it, of course. Um, what happens next for this movement?
00:34:58.280
Well, uh, the convoy is departing Ottawa, I believe tomorrow. Uh, there, there was initially
00:35:06.060
planned that this rally would be held twice. I haven't heard confirmation, uh, and it's going
00:35:10.300
to be held today. Well, it already was held today and tomorrow it will be held again. That was the
00:35:14.500
initial plan. I don't know if that's going to happen again. Uh, today was, but from what I talked
00:35:20.180
to the convoy leaders, uh, today was a success for them. I mean, it was a huge success. I don't know if
00:35:25.140
they need a repeat, uh, tomorrow. Maybe they will, maybe they won't. I have to confirm
00:35:28.740
that. Uh, but after they leave, they're going to, they told me they were going to be traveling
00:35:32.640
back through every town that they came through originally, thanking them for thousands of
00:35:37.780
dollars of donations that they provided the, the apple fritters, the pizzas. Um, there was
00:35:42.580
one town that just set up an impromptu barbecue. It was donated by a construction company in
00:35:47.180
Sault St. Marie, uh, Sault St. Marie. Uh, so they're just going to go say thank you on
00:35:51.480
behalf of all of Alberta, on behalf of all the oil sands and oil sands employees. Um,
00:35:58.180
on, on behalf of the entire, all of Western Canada, really, they're going to go pay their
00:36:02.660
respects and say thanks. Yeah. Well, listen, we're so glad that you were on the trip, not
00:36:07.520
only for your journalism, but also representing the rebel because we of course support the
00:36:12.320
oil and gas industry. Uh, I think we helped light the fire on this issue even two years
00:36:17.900
ago when we had our big stop the carbon tax rally, um, at the Alberta legislature in December
00:36:23.540
of 2016. I think that's when the, uh, center of gravity in the conservative movement was
00:36:28.780
well, maybe we better go along with this carbon tax. Preston Manning was talking about a carbon
00:36:33.340
tax. Michael Chung, Patrick Brown, we're talking about carbon tax. So I feel like we have a little
00:36:39.020
bit of a role that we played here and you're continuing in that good tradition. So thanks very
00:36:43.660
much for that. Kian. No problem. It was a pleasure. All right. Well, and by the way,
00:36:47.840
I want to let our viewers know, and I told you this personally on the phone earlier, Kian,
00:36:51.800
if we can find the identity of that Antifa thug who assaulted you, we will sue him both in civil court
00:37:00.780
and we will press the police to press criminal charges against him because it's unacceptable. And I
00:37:07.200
think it's really gross how the left wing thinks that they can just punch conservative reporters,
00:37:13.020
conservative activists, just as a matter of course. And by the way, I think that,
00:37:16.960
that the political left has normalized that even Gerald Butts and, and these critics call implying
00:37:24.280
that the convoy was Nazi or whatever they said, they've basically given license to people to be
00:37:29.440
violent. If we find the identity of that thug who hits you, I promise you, we will hold them to
00:37:34.260
account. I appreciate that as it means a lot. I think we have some leads. I took a lot of footage
00:37:40.720
and there was cameras rolling everywhere. Uh, I saw a few Ottawa press gallery reporters taking
00:37:46.460
pictures of the exact location. I'm going to follow up with them. Uh, to be fair, I looked at
00:37:51.940
his Twitter and it's almost entirely, uh, in opposition to this convoy calling this convoy of
00:37:57.620
racist. So my, uh, I don't have high expectations, but there was a lot of convoy attendees that had
00:38:03.800
their cameras out. So we'll follow up with them. All right. Good luck. Thanks so much for taking the
00:38:08.160
time. That's Kian Bexty who joined us via Skype from a cell phone. As you can tell right there
00:38:13.840
on Parliament Hill, you can see the center block in the background. Well, I'm delighted that we
00:38:19.580
covered that and Kian gave up the last four or five days on that convoy. You can see all of his
00:38:24.740
reports at rebelconvoy.com. Stay with us more ahead on the rebel.
00:38:38.160
Hey, welcome back to my monologue yesterday about the CBC story that 9 million troll tweets
00:38:43.500
influence Canadians on politics. Karen writes, exclamation points. Yeah, that's exactly what
00:38:50.520
Gerald Butt said. Paul writes, it's the Canadian version of Russian collusion. These Trudeau
00:38:56.660
liberals are getting desperate. Yeah. Well, I, I followed up with the, one of the CBC reporters who
00:39:04.180
did that story. I was very surprised that he answered me and maybe I should do a follow up
00:39:08.380
video. He sent me every single name he tested for what the trolls engaged with. And the only
00:39:16.660
journalists he tested were on the right. The only scandals he word checked were ones that would suit
00:39:22.780
the narrative that Russians are trying to interfere. Like the whole thing was a setup. The whole thing
00:39:27.740
was a setup. I should probably go deep on the subject, but neither the CBC report nor the Twitter
00:39:33.680
data are accurate. Both are fake news spin. And Twitter still hasn't gotten back to me about why
00:39:39.160
they won't let me see my own data. I think they're liars. I'm sorry. On my interview with Joel
00:39:44.660
Pollack, Robert writes, I think Joel Pollack has the right take on the border wall. I tell you, if that
00:39:50.320
thing's not built, Trump's done. Not only is he done from his base that will be demoralized, but
00:39:54.420
obviously millions more illegal migrants will come in and they vote Democrat for all the free stuff.
00:39:59.960
On the resignation of Gerald Butts, Jan writes, I think Butts is taking the fall for JT. They need
00:40:06.260
to keep JT in there. Butts is on his speed dial. Yeah, don't think for a second that Gerald Butts
00:40:11.160
is going to retire now to, you know, the island of Elba or something. It's just not going to happen.
00:40:17.960
On the Venezuela videos, Marg writes, I was very interested in Venezuela, but I couldn't find any
00:40:22.640
meat in the videos the reporter presented. No background info, just fluff. If there was more
00:40:27.300
in-depth coverage, I didn't find it. And the two-minute clips didn't draw me to search for it.
00:40:32.600
Marg, I appreciate your criticism and I think there's some truth to it. The lady who was down
00:40:37.800
there, Annika Ernstein Rothstein, if I'm saying her name right, actually haven't had the pleasure to
00:40:42.920
meet her in person. I've interviewed her via Skype before. When I saw her down there, I contacted her
00:40:48.540
online and said, whoa, give us some vids. I think she was a little new at it. And I think she was
00:40:55.780
sort of figuring it out. And she didn't know go too long, go too short, go too deep or not. I think
00:41:00.680
it was just nice having someone there. And she certainly had the right attitude. But I do agree
00:41:04.880
with you. The videos was a little bit short. And hey, grounds for improvement. And maybe that's why
00:41:09.580
our people didn't really support that crowdfunding initiative. But I give Annika full marks for the
00:41:14.420
courage to go to Venezuela in the middle of what could be a civil war. I mean, it's one of the most
00:41:19.640
dangerous cities in the world, Caracas, even in peacetime. So I was really glad she went. I'm glad she did
00:41:24.540
videos for us. But I think you're right. I think the videos could have been a little meatier.
00:41:29.240
Speaking of which, this morning, our new British reporter, Janice Atkinson, had an exclusive
00:41:36.880
interview with Marine Le Pen of France. So we should have that up for you in a couple days. We just
00:41:42.680
got to make sure we get the translations correct. How's that for an exciting world story? Until next
00:41:47.440
time, on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home, good night and keep