Rebel News Podcast - September 20, 2023


EZRA LEVANT | Injustice in Ottawa: The flawed Freedom Convoy trial continues


Episode Stats

Length

36 minutes

Words per Minute

176.04866

Word Count

6,455

Sentence Count

484

Misogynist Sentences

13

Hate Speech Sentences

8


Summary

Tamara Leach's trial has been going on for more than two weeks now, and it's getting worse by the day. She's been charged with one count of inciting mischief, and her co-defendant, Chris Barber, is on trial for the same charge.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello, my friends. Big show today. I'm in the field covering the Tamara Leach trial in Ottawa
00:00:03.720 while all my colleagues were across Canada covering the Million Parent March against
00:00:08.740 Gender Ideology. I was trapped listening to the testimony in the trial while my friends were out
00:00:13.260 there doing the good stuff. We've got so much video footage for you today. I want you to see
00:00:16.840 it, not just hear it. So please go to rebelnewsplus.com. Click subscribe. It's eight bucks a month.
00:00:22.320 And that may not be a lot of money to you, but it really adds up for us. Eight bucks a month
00:00:25.760 gives you the video version. That's rebelnewsplus.com. All right, here's today's podcast.
00:00:45.420 Tonight, big day in Ottawa to Tamara Leach's trial and a nationwide march of a million folks
00:00:51.960 in support of parental rights over gender theory. It's September 20th, and this is the Ezra Levant Show.
00:00:58.080 You've got it for freedom!
00:01:00.940 Shame on you, you censorious bug!
00:01:12.460 Hi, everybody. Ezra Levant here for Rebel News. I'm in Ottawa at the continuing trial of Tamara
00:01:18.820 Leach and her co-defendant, Chris Barber. Behind me, if you can see it, that brutalist building
00:01:24.740 is the very ugly Ottawa Courts building. So instead, I'm going to turn around and have a
00:01:29.640 prettier piece of architecture. There is some gorgeous buildings in Ottawa, so let's look at
00:01:34.380 that instead. In court, I came a little bit early, and I saw Chris Barber arrive
00:01:39.520 with his lawyers, and I saw Tamara Leach arrive with her lawyers.
00:01:43.160 Had a little bit of a chat with him as it came in. And then I went in. The trial was scheduled for
00:01:49.900 10 a.m., but it got off to a slow start and then immediately was bogged down in sort of procedural
00:01:55.400 housekeeping issues. And I started to think, hmm, I thought this trial would be sort of humming
00:01:59.120 along smoothly now as it's been going on for more than two weeks. But I realized what a mess it's been
00:02:05.340 how the prosecution, because they switched Crown prosecutors on this case a few months ago. For
00:02:12.620 the first year, the prosecution was led by an absolutely maniacal, vendetta-driven prosecutor
00:02:21.540 named Moise Karimji, who was so hot-temptered and foul-mooted that I think the Justice Department
00:02:29.120 said, we're going to lose it simply by virtue of this guy's atrocious personality. And so just a few
00:02:36.640 months ago, they sacked Moise Karimji as the prosecutor and put in a new team. But of course,
00:02:43.840 the bulk of the Crown's case had been done. So these new lawyers who, from what I can tell,
00:02:50.240 are sort of normal prosecutors, not motivated by a crazy ideological vendetta. I'm not saying that
00:02:55.840 casually, Moise Karimji, senior donor to the Liberals, just a crazy blogger, tweeter, you know,
00:03:03.040 really a communist. And, you know, it showed good judgment by the Justice Department to knock him off
00:03:10.080 the case. But, you know, the cake was half-baked. And now you've got these two new prosecutors trying
00:03:15.520 to salvage it. It doesn't look good. You know, the Democracy Fund and Rebel News have crowdfunded
00:03:22.880 literally thousands of court cases for people charged with various offenses during the pandemic,
00:03:29.360 during the lockdowns. And hundreds of them have simply been dropped or stayed or withdrawn by the
00:03:36.960 prosecution because there was nothing there. The tickets were issued by police who were being
00:03:41.200 overly aggressive. The laws were poorly thought through and maybe were unconstitutional. Or,
00:03:48.480 you know, on review, it just wasn't worth the government's time to prosecute and to have
00:03:54.080 judges. So, for whatever reason, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of cases have been dropped
00:03:58.480 without trial. And Tamara Leach's case is obviously one such case. I mean, inciting mischief or whatever.
00:04:06.240 And, like, it's just so laughable that you would have two prosecutors, a judge, and dozens and dozens
00:04:14.080 of days in court set aside for an incitement to mischief trial. If it weren't for the political
00:04:20.480 reputation and the fact that the Crown and the prosecutors and Trudeau doesn't want to lose face,
00:04:26.160 this would be one of the hundreds of cases that was withdrawn or abandoned, just like the no-name cases
00:04:32.640 around the country. The only reason this prosecution is proceeding
00:04:36.560 is because Tamara Leach is famous, and because so many politicians have demonized her, so they have
00:04:43.840 to see it through. I actually feel slightly sorry for the prosecutors who have to make that work. I
00:04:50.480 don't think it's working, and that was very quickly evident to me. This trial is sort of broken. And I
00:04:56.880 think this is the third witness, and it's been more than two weeks, and the government says they have
00:05:01.680 20 more witnesses, and if it continues at this laughable pace, this will be a trial that takes
00:05:08.160 the rest of the year. And, you know, there's a judgment call the prosecutors have to make. Is the
00:05:14.320 case, is there a reasonable likelihood of conviction? I'm not sure if that's here. Judging from the witness
00:05:21.200 just sort of rambling on about his personal feelings of the lockdown and the convoy, I don't
00:05:27.040 know if they have a case against her, but the second test is, is it in the public interest?
00:05:32.080 And there is a serious judge on the bench here. She was the same judge that oversaw the prosecution
00:05:38.720 of Vice Admiral Mark Norman. You might remember that case from a few years back. He did something to
00:05:44.240 cross Justin Trudeau. So Trudeau whipped up a case, basically tried to frame Mark Norman, and there was
00:05:52.480 this whole trial, and then there was some prosecutorial misconduct that was discovered
00:05:56.880 halfway through the trial. And so there was a very speedy dismissal, and the government was
00:06:04.320 humiliated. They apologized. I think they paid his legal fees. This same judge oversaw that. So what I
00:06:10.240 like about that is this judge knows the kind of political BS that is sometimes in this tale,
00:06:17.040 and there is no, simply no way that she can't detect that same BS here in this case. And what I want to
00:06:24.000 point out is that the witness who I, I mean, I did listen to this witness. His name was Kim Ayotte. He's
00:06:29.360 the city manager for Ottawa in charge of emergency things. So yes, he was involved with the city's
00:06:37.440 response to the cowboy. Absolutely. But he testified today that he never once had any interactions with
00:06:45.280 Tamera Leach. Never once. I don't think he's ever met her to this day. He had a brief interaction
00:06:50.800 with Chris Barber, the co-defendant, but it was all about how to keep lines of communication open
00:06:56.320 between the city and the truckers, and how to move some trucks away from residential areas to
00:07:01.440 other places. So it was actually a very positive interaction, if I understood his testimony. But for
00:07:08.640 half an hour today, he described a walkabout he did. He just went for a walk,
00:07:14.320 and he went on this street and that street and he saw this truck and he saw that bouncy castle.
00:07:20.720 And the whole time I'm thinking, okay, I'm ready for your point. Okay, this is a trial of two people
00:07:24.960 who are charged with a very specific criminal charge. You have to prove certain elements of
00:07:29.840 the charge, what they did. I'm ready for it. I'm waiting for it. And it never came. It just never came.
00:07:37.680 And he's been going for two or three days now. And he's just sort of meandering. It reminded me of
00:07:43.920 that TV show, I don't know if you've ever heard of it, What We Do in the Shadows. It's a vampire
00:07:49.120 comedy. And it's a very obscure, quirky comedy. And they have these vampires who speak with European
00:07:56.000 accents. And it's very funny. But there's this character in this comedy called Colin Robinson.
00:08:01.120 And they always call him by his first name and last name. And he doesn't look like a vampire at all.
00:08:06.320 He calls himself an energy vampire. And he's just the kind of person that maybe you know of in your
00:08:12.240 office who is just so irritating and speaks so slowly and just says things that you find frustrating.
00:08:20.560 So this character in this comedy, Colin Robinson is an energy vampire. Here's a quick clip to show
00:08:26.320 you what i'm talking about. Are we having a house meeting? No. No. So your gathering here is just a
00:08:36.400 coincidence? Yes. I am what's known as a psychic vampire or energy vampire. Energy vampires drain
00:08:46.640 people's energy merely by talking to them. Actual versus budget year to date? No thanks. You're gonna be at that all day.
00:08:53.280 The power grows stronger in him by the night.
00:09:01.920 I'm just gonna do a quick mega feed and then I'll be right back. Mr. Robinson, are you here?
00:09:06.880 I'm holding up a finger indicating to hold on a second. I'll be right back. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:09:11.200 Evie. Evie. Emotional vent. Oh, hell. It's on, Evie Russell. Oh, it's on. I like your skirt.
00:09:32.560 You should be careful because mauve attracts bees. I was wearing this skirt when my sister got her
00:09:37.360 cancer diagnosis. Cancer isn't usually what kills you. It's the treatment. She was killed by a drunk
00:09:43.840 driver. He was my fiance. Violence often begins at home. Studies indicate. I've never had a home.
00:09:53.200 We don't have to be enemies. Have you ever considered hunting with a partner?
00:09:57.680 The thought has only recently crossed my mind.
00:10:07.920 It is a dick clip. What is that? Hey dudes. It's me, Colin Robinson, your roommate.
00:10:13.920 Yeah, Guillermo's here too. He was running around peeing himself. I didn't pee myself, master.
00:10:18.160 I was walking by this hardware store and I says to myself, Colin, you should go in and see if they have
00:10:23.200 any umbrellas for the well. I made sure to keep the receipt. I'm going to probably take it back.
00:10:27.600 You can do that on non-food items. Is he zapping our energy?
00:10:30.640 He's taking advantage of us. Shut up. Do you not want me to say, I'll go.
00:10:39.440 Just giving you guys guff. Yeah, that's what I thought of when I saw Kim Ayo just and I walked
00:10:45.120 down this street and I walked down that street and I saw a bouncy castle and they were dancing and that
00:10:50.560 was illegal. He literally said it was illegal to dance in Ottawa without a permit. And at that point,
00:10:56.000 the judge herself just had to weigh in and said, are you serious? But what's crazy to me is this guy's
00:11:01.200 just rambling on and they've got 20 odd more witnesses to go. Just they're just going to ramble.
00:11:07.040 I don't even know what they're going to, what they're going to say. Um, because they, I mean,
00:11:12.960 this is not a trial of the whole convoy. This is a trial of two individual people. Um, most famously,
00:11:18.240 Tamara Leach and this guy has never met or talked to or texted or interacted with Tamara Leach.
00:11:24.800 And even as he was saying when I walked down the street, but I didn't gather evidence, I'm
00:11:28.720 I just did it as for observations. Well, if you, if you just said you gathered no evidence,
00:11:34.160 if you didn't take notes, if you, if nothing, why are you giving evidence? If you just said you
00:11:39.760 didn't collect evidence and the evidence is just a general complaint about the truckers. You heard
00:11:45.440 some honking. We know that Walter Cronkite, we know, you know, thanks for the news update. There
00:11:51.280 was honking. We know that. Can you please tell me how that goes to the criminal charge of inciting
00:11:56.000 the shift of Tamara Leach? And I don't know how long this judge is going to let this go because
00:12:00.560 she's a busy woman, a serious woman. There are serious matters in this court to deal with. There
00:12:04.800 are real crimes in the city. There are people in prison awaiting their trial. There are real matters
00:12:10.080 afoot. And to give such prosecutorial resources to, to this laughable case. I mean, I, I thought,
00:12:17.440 am I wrong here? I mean, I don't practice law. I'm a former lawyer, but I don't practice law. Do I
00:12:21.920 really know these things? But I, I spoke to two lawyers who said, yeah, this is crazy. And then I
00:12:28.400 walked in and there was a lady who introduced herself to me and said, she's been coming every day.
00:12:33.600 And I said, well, you certainly must have a lot of patience if you're coming back every day.
00:12:37.760 And she said that she's a former court reporter, like the stenographer who has to listen to all
00:12:42.800 this stuff. And she says, she's never seen anything like it. Let me tell you one more
00:12:47.840 anecdote. I used to know a senior lawyer who practiced defamation law, and he said he was
00:12:53.200 never afraid of the defamation notices that were 20 pages law. He said he was afraid of the ones that
00:12:59.840 were one or two sentences law. He said, because if someone's complaining about one specific thing,
00:13:05.840 odds are they got you. But if they need 20 pages to tell you why you're wrong,
00:13:10.720 odds are they got nothing. And that's what I was thinking about today. They've got more than 20
00:13:16.480 witnesses about how Tamara Leach is guilty, but I'm not sure if any of them have ever even met her.
00:13:23.280 They're just telling these rambling stories like Colin Robinson, the energy vampire. And they're just
00:13:28.800 going on and on and on. And it reminds me of what that senior lawyer said. If you've got the goods,
00:13:33.440 you only need a few sentences. The very fact that they need two dozen witnesses says they don't have
00:13:39.760 anything. And I think it's a sham that this continues as long. I did notice that the judge
00:13:44.800 was starting to lose her patience. And I just can't imagine that she will allow this abomination of a
00:13:50.320 prosecution to continue for the 80 days that will be needed if they stay on this page. I just can't
00:13:56.640 believe that. And I hope that her experience in the Mark Norman case will inform her dealings in this
00:14:03.920 case. Hey, I'm enjoying being in court. I like live tweeting. You know me. I like I was just the other
00:14:08.720 day in court in Lethbridge for Arthur Pavlovsky's case. I love typing as fast as my fingers will fly.
00:14:15.120 I love paying close attention to what the lawyers say and what the judges. I really enjoy it. But I can't
00:14:20.560 say I'm enjoying this because it's there's nothing there. It's like a fog machine. This guy came out.
00:14:26.720 He wasn't saying anything. There was nothing to type. And so I was just left with my own
00:14:31.040 mockery and cynical thoughts on the whole thing. I can only imagine what people who have to pay attention
00:14:36.880 like the lawyers and the judge are thinking we heard from that former court reporter.
00:14:41.200 Anyways, it's lunch break now. So I'll be back after lunch.
00:14:44.800 Hi there. The trial is over for the day, but it will go on for many weeks,
00:14:48.960 maybe even many months. It is going at a snail's pace. I have to say listening to this city bureaucrat
00:14:55.680 testify today. It was excruciating. And I'm not just talking about his tone of voice and his vagueness
00:15:02.160 and his evasiveness. He literally had nothing to say about Tamara Leach. The words Tamara Leach only came
00:15:07.840 up once in the entire day when he confirmed he had never met her, spoken to her, emailed her,
00:15:14.160 texted her. He literally knows nothing about Tamara Leach. And yet she is on trial here. He meandered
00:15:20.880 and talked about all of his deepest thoughts, his personal feelings about the lockdown. At one point,
00:15:25.920 he talked about going for a walk to observe things, but not to collect evidence. Well,
00:15:31.040 why is he giving evidence on that? Lawrence Greenspan, the lawyer for Tamara Leach, the lead
00:15:35.600 lawyer, there's three of them, cross-examined Ayotte. And I didn't understand what was the point of it.
00:15:41.040 I mean, Ayotte really had nothing of substance to say, but what became clear to me is that Greenspan
00:15:46.560 was proving that everything the truckers did when they came into Ottawa was approved by the Ottawa Police
00:15:54.880 Service. Here, listen to what he said in a scrum a moment ago about how, what route they took,
00:16:01.840 where they parked, what they did was all approved by the Ottawa Police. Take a look. You tell me if
00:16:07.520 this is outside the scope of what you feel comfortable answering. I listened to the day's
00:16:13.440 testimony by Kim Ayotte, and I don't know how it touches on the guilt or not guilt of the two accused.
00:16:20.800 It sounds like he's just talking about the convoy. Help me out here. Well, I can't really help you out.
00:16:27.040 That's the job of the Crown is to tie the evidence of this witness and the other ones that have been
00:16:32.640 called and will be called to in support of their charges. That's, that's the Crown's job. And they've
00:16:38.400 got to do it beyond a reasonable doubt. And the only time you heard Tamara Leach's name today was
00:16:44.800 that he had had absolutely no contact with her. So at what point does, do you object or does the judge
00:16:51.200 say, look, we just can't rehash the whole commission of inquiry? We've got to talk about the, the two
00:16:57.360 accused sitting in the, in the dock. Well, it's, you know, it's, it's completely a different matter. I
00:17:03.280 mean, what the commission was looking at is, as you know, is, uh, the propriety of imposing the, uh,
00:17:08.880 emergency measures, uh, act. And what we're talking about here is a, uh, a trial on very specific
00:17:15.600 charges for Tamara and, uh, for Chris. Thanks. Do you see how that's important? If the Ottawa
00:17:22.080 police were working cooperatively with the truckers and approved everything the truckers did, how is
00:17:27.760 that mischief? In fact, one of the most interesting things was that the Ottawa police said to the city
00:17:32.560 bylaw officers, don't issue any tickets without our approval because we've got an agreement here.
00:17:39.600 Look at Lawrence Greenspan say that in the scrum. Let me ask you, what does it mean when the city
00:17:45.360 was not permitted to ticket without the approval of the police? What's the meaning of that?
00:17:50.400 Well, it's, it's, uh, you heard, uh, Mr. Ayotte say that, uh, the city basically was under the, uh,
00:17:59.520 direction, uh, of the Ottawa police service and that they were completely, the Ottawa police service
00:18:04.320 was completely responsible for operations. Uh, and the, uh, and the city of Ottawa police, uh, told,
00:18:10.720 oh, uh, a told bylaw basically, you don't ticket in the red zone unless you have our approval.
00:18:16.080 And they didn't. What does that, what does that mean though? What, what's the political or,
00:18:20.960 or the import to your clients?
00:18:22.320 I guess that's for us to figure out. Stay tuned.
00:18:27.600 I like Lawrence Greenspan. He's a smart lawyer and he's got patience and he's got an attention span,
00:18:34.160 which he's going to need if this is indeed going to go on for weeks or months. But what I don't
00:18:38.640 understand is how it could do so. Look, I understand the prosecution has an empty gas tank here. I
00:18:44.880 understand they want to throw everything at this in the hope that something sticks. And I understand
00:18:49.520 that they are being pushed to do so by their political masters, Justin Trudeau, the police,
00:18:54.960 the mayors, everyone is demonized to Merrill Leach. So they have to push on with this prosecution,
00:19:00.800 even if it has no legal basis. But does the court have to listen to it? And do the prosecutors have to
00:19:06.960 continue on, even if they themselves come to believe that there is no reasonable prospect of
00:19:11.760 conviction and that there really isn't any public interest in him. It's very interesting. I have to
00:19:16.320 say this. I will not be back at this trial if this is how it goes. I'm delighted that I have colleagues
00:19:23.040 with bigger attention spans than myself, but I simply can't bear listening to these, I'm going to
00:19:29.360 swear here, to these bullshitters, these bureaucrats, these, these people who have nothing to say
00:19:36.160 about Tamera Leach because they never interacted with her. I don't give a care about what Kim A
00:19:41.760 Ott, some city bureaucrat, has to say in slow motion for hour after hour after hour, his personal
00:19:48.880 reflections. And I heard a horn honk and I went for a walk and I saw a bouncy castle. I don't care.
00:19:57.440 This isn't a therapy session. This isn't a dear diary. This is a criminal trial of Tamera Leach and her
00:20:03.600 co-defendant, Chris Barber. And the two of them were barely mentioned today. I think Lawrence
00:20:09.200 Greenspan is doing a good job by proving that what little Kim A Ott has to say proves that the
00:20:17.760 convoy was actually lawful. So I think he's done a good job in that. But I myself don't have patience for
00:20:23.280 80 more days of fog. And this is actually a disgrace to the prosecution. You know, in this city in recent
00:20:32.880 weeks, there have been murders. There have been shootings. There was a shooting at a funeral in
00:20:37.520 this town. And in this court, police sit and they wait to testify to talk about a trucker convoy that we
00:20:47.440 all know what happened. They're sitting in here countless hours and countless days to come.
00:20:55.680 I've seen enough to know that this is a political trial, a show trial, a sham trial. There is no
00:21:02.480 public interest here. If Tamera Leach was not famous, this matter would have been withdrawn or stayed
00:21:09.040 months ago. I think what happened is an out of control, maniacal prosecutor named Moise Kashimji
00:21:17.200 put this train in motion. He scared his own bosses that they pulled him off the file and handed it to
00:21:23.840 two slightly less maniacal prosecutors. But they're stuck with it. And I think they feel compelled to
00:21:29.120 see it through because they're so they would lose too much face for them to pull out now. But I say this,
00:21:36.080 I have never been as confident as I am now that Tamera Leach will be acquitted. And even watching this
00:21:44.080 judge slowly lose her patience with the BS of these government witnesses is an amazing thing to see.
00:21:51.760 Every person in this courtroom is getting paid, by the way. The judge, the prosecutors,
00:21:57.360 these government bureaucrats who are testifying, every person except for Tamera Leach and her husband,
00:22:03.120 because the process is the punishment. I think maybe that's it. Maybe the reason the prosecution is
00:22:08.560 calling dozens of witnesses who will take months to go through is simply that this is the sentence.
00:22:16.080 They know she'll be acquitted. They know she'll be vindicated. They know that I think it's 52 days in
00:22:21.840 prison now or 49 days in prison that she served is punishment for a crime she did not commit. So they
00:22:28.800 know that she's going to walk free at the end of this trial. So they're going to make the trial itself
00:22:32.880 the punishment. Taxpayers are being punished a long way along the way. And every other justice-seeking
00:22:40.240 Ottawa and everyone else in this city who says, can I please have some policing for a real crime,
00:22:45.840 they are being taken advantage of too. Anyway, that's my report from here in Ottawa. Maybe I
00:22:50.160 have too short an attention span and I should be listening rapturously when this city bureaucrat gives us
00:22:56.960 his personal take on what it felt like to hear the horns honking. But frankly, I don't give a damn.
00:23:03.360 Luckily, I've got colleagues who will be here to report on the rest of the trial. It's a very
00:23:07.360 important trial for us to do.
00:23:24.400 All right, I'm standing outside the Ottawa courthouse where I was in prison today. No, I wasn't
00:23:28.480 technically in prison, but it sure felt like a prison. I had to hear some bloviating bureaucrat
00:23:33.440 emote all day about how the horn honking made him feel. It had nothing to do with Tamera Leach's
00:23:38.560 trial and everything to do with him expiating his frustration that the peasants came to the capital
00:23:43.840 city and honked their horns at him. Anyways, something else more important and more interesting
00:23:48.400 was going on in this town. I don't know about more important. It's important that Tamera Leach
00:23:52.080 be acquitted and vindicated, which I believe will come. But in Ottawa, in Calgary, in Vancouver,
00:23:57.520 in Edmonton, in Regina, in Hamilton, in Toronto, in Montreal, across this country,
00:24:01.520 we had 14 reporters in seven cities following the Million Person March in support of kids and
00:24:10.160 parental rights against this gender queer extremism that targets kids for... It's just so crazy. And
00:24:17.760 Lincoln, you were there on Parliament Hill. I was trapped in this courtroom today, so I couldn't
00:24:21.680 really follow it. I was retweeting your stuff. Why don't you give our viewers a couple of minutes
00:24:26.000 of updates of what you saw? And then we'll throw to some video clips that you took. So
00:24:30.800 why don't you just tell us, in your own words, what happened? So today we attended the One Million
00:24:35.040 March for Children. And as you mentioned, these were marches that were happening all across Canada. So
00:24:41.120 myself, Robert Krychek, Kian Simone, we were at the Ottawa March, okay? And I have not seen this many
00:24:49.280 people on Parliament Hill since the Freedom Convoy, the Truckers Convoy. I also haven't seen the amount
00:24:56.160 of police that we saw since the Freedom Convoy. Tons and tons and tons of Canadians were there to
00:25:03.360 basically speak out, protest, demonstrate against the indoctrination and sexualization of their
00:25:10.320 children in schools, whether it's the school curriculum, the gender ideology. They're just here to take a
00:25:15.680 stance. And it was welcomed with many counter demonstrators who simply believe that there's
00:25:21.680 nothing wrong with what's going on in our schools. So it was a bit of a contrast. Now, as always,
00:25:28.560 or as usual, people who say they're against hate and against violence, well, they're often the haters
00:25:34.800 and the violent ones. Tell us about some of the physical scuffles that happened on the Hill.
00:25:40.080 Yeah, well, one that happened to myself and to Kian and I was, we saw Jagmeet was...
00:25:48.560 The leader of the NDP. Yeah, Jagmeet, sorry. Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the NDP,
00:25:53.040 was standing with the counter demonstrators. So we wanted to hopefully have a chance to speak to him.
00:25:58.080 So we couldn't get very far. We probably stepped about five feet. Let me just explain. So the counter
00:26:04.480 demonstrators are on one side, the demonstrators are on one side. So the police were splitting them up,
00:26:09.200 tons of police. So we tried to step maybe five feet into the other side, I guess, where we're
00:26:16.160 not welcomed, and we were quickly stopped. Stopped by whom? So one of the counter demonstrators,
00:26:22.000 a lady who basically just told us not to go any further, which was followed by another man who was
00:26:28.160 very, very aggressive. I'm sure we'll be able to show some of the footage, but he got right in our face,
00:26:32.640 asked us what the heck we were doing there, why are we there, grabbed my camera, grabbed it again,
00:26:38.000 and tried to toss my camera down. Luckily, I had it around my neck. If I didn't have the camera on my
00:26:43.280 neck, that thing would have dropped for sure because of the amount of force that was used.
00:26:47.680 So that's the one thing I don't understand. These people, they claim they want rights for everybody.
00:26:53.280 They want to protect their kids, protect, quote unquote, trans kids. But it seems that the
00:26:58.800 demonstrators are the ones that are the peaceful ones. And there's a lot more anger coming from
00:27:03.680 the counter demonstrators. Just my observations. So you say there was a ton of cops and the two
00:27:09.040 sides were kept apart. And that sounds good. Again, I haven't really seen it. I've been in this
00:27:12.320 court all day. But did the police see that Antifa trans guy put hands on you and your stuff? Did the
00:27:20.880 cops see that? No, I don't think any cops saw. I'm not sure for certain, but we were kind of behind a
00:27:26.640 bit of a crowd. So I think we were tucked away. So I don't know if they saw it. Were you hurt? No,
00:27:31.280 we have the footage though. We have my camera angle. We have Kean's camera angle. So we have
00:27:36.800 it all covered, right? So a couple other things to note. There was a few people detained as well
00:27:42.320 at the protest. What were they detained for? So I don't know if they were arrested, detained,
00:27:46.400 but they were definitely taken into police custody for a short period of time. But there seemed to be
00:27:50.240 some sort of a feud between flags being one of the rainbow flags. I'm not sure what type of rainbow flag.
00:27:55.920 I saw that flag get stomped on. Was that one of the things? Yes,
00:27:59.680 which ultimately led to the flag being stomped on and it just led to a kerfuffle. And next thing you
00:28:05.280 know, police were dragging a younger gentleman outside of the protest and they took him away.
00:28:11.200 And ultimately, I don't know if they arrested him or what happened. I guess we might find out.
00:28:15.360 Now, there are some colorful characters on both sides. I think on the pro-family side,
00:28:23.520 the colorful characters, I think, for example, of the young guy, Josh Alexander.
00:28:26.800 Maybe I shouldn't call him a colorful character because that implies that it's a checkerboard
00:28:32.800 color. I mean, there's a principled young man who's been kicked out of his own Catholic school
00:28:36.960 for standing up against a trans ideology. He's routinely physically attacked by the other side,
00:28:42.240 and he sort of takes it as a punching bag. And I've never seen him fight back,
00:28:48.240 which is sort of amazing for him to go in as a kind of sacrificial lamb to prove a point.
00:28:54.800 He's a very interesting young man. Did you see him on Parliament Hill? And if so,
00:28:58.640 was he targeted? Maybe I'm not describing him properly. I like the guy if it's not clear.
00:29:02.880 Tell me what happened to him if you saw anything.
00:29:04.560 I didn't see anything happen to Josh Alexander. I don't think any altercations,
00:29:09.840 any confrontations actually happened with Josh Alexander. But Josh is really a trailblazer in this
00:29:16.800 whole movement. Student activist, kicked out of his high school, has had all sorts of trouble for standing up
00:29:23.520 against the gender ideology that we're seeing being pushed in schools. So kudos to Josh. And we did
00:29:29.680 an excellent interview with Josh. Robert interviewed Josh that you'll be able to see in the full report
00:29:34.240 that we release. Okay, great. And how about other folks? For example, was Billboard Chris there? I think
00:29:39.040 Pastor Henry Hildebrandt was there. Tell me if you saw any other names from the freedom movement.
00:29:43.360 Yep. Well, so we saw Maxime Bernier was the only politician that I saw there. Now, I might be wrong
00:29:53.280 about that. There may have been other politicians. But the only politician that I saw was Maxime Bernier.
00:29:57.760 A lot of people were asking where Pierre Polyev was. A lot of people were asking that wasn't there. I
00:30:03.040 guess people are wondering where he stands on this. So we did also speak to the organizer of the protest.
00:30:08.720 And who was that? I can't remember his name off the top of my head.
00:30:12.000 A student, activist, a Muslim person, I understand. Was that who was? A Muslim activist?
00:30:16.480 Yes. Yes. And I believe he's been running or he's been organizing some of the movements that we're
00:30:20.880 seeing. Well, that's very interesting because in the past, Justin Trudeau has counted on the Muslim
00:30:25.680 demographic as a voting bloc. I see today Trudeau put out a tweet just calling folks transphobes and
00:30:32.960 homophobes. There was a distinct Muslim presence in many of the cities. In fact, there was a video
00:30:38.480 clip. Maybe it was yours. I saw some Mennonites walking next to some Muslim women in hijabs in
00:30:45.040 sort of a common cause. If I was Justin Trudeau, I would be careful about calling anyone who objects
00:30:51.520 to gender ideology a transphobe, a homophobe, because I'm going to guess that that's 80,
00:30:57.120 90 percent of the Muslim community. And Trudeau is basically telling them that they're hateful.
00:31:03.200 Well, yeah, you bring up a really good point that I want to share with the viewers is that
00:31:06.640 this protest, just like the truckers convoy, it's people from all walks of life, all flavors,
00:31:12.880 every single type of person is here. And it's not about vaccines. It's not about anything. This is
00:31:18.000 something that a lot more people are able to jump on board with and stand behind because it's very,
00:31:22.880 very obvious that something really strange and not right is happening in our schools in Canada.
00:31:30.240 You know, the trucker convoy was two things that Trudeau is not. It was ethnically diverse
00:31:35.920 and it was working class. And I sense that this movement here, this parents movement, is ethnically
00:31:44.160 diverse. And it may be working class as well, since the fancy PhD, you need a PhD to believe
00:31:51.120 gender theory. Like there's some things that are so dumb that you have to have a PhD to believe it.
00:31:55.280 So I would imagine that there was some overlap demographically between this and the trucker
00:32:00.960 convoy. And I think it's dangerous business for Trudeau to smear it. When Trudeau starts calling
00:32:06.000 people transphobes or homophobes, you know he's sort of in his go-to panic mode, change the subject,
00:32:11.280 lash out. I don't know if it's working anymore.
00:32:13.200 No, no. And if you're on the ground here, you can really see that the names, the name calling that
00:32:21.520 Trudeau, the labeling that Trudeau, the division that Trudeau tries to create, it's not working.
00:32:28.160 We saw that today. People are very fed up with what's going on with the government and everything
00:32:33.520 that's stemming below because of the federal government, the liberal government. So a lot of
00:32:38.400 people have questions. There's not a lot of answers. And it's kind of a gray area. We don't
00:32:43.360 know if this gender ideology, the sexualization, the indoctrination is going to continue in schools,
00:32:49.600 if there's anybody that's going to be able to put a stop to this. Because right now,
00:32:53.440 it seems like it's full steam ahead. And we don't know what the future has in store.
00:32:57.680 Well, very interesting. And like I say, you were one of 14 journalists that we had deployed
00:33:03.760 across the country, which is actually the largest project we've done since the trucker convoy. When
00:33:08.720 I, if I recall, we actually had like 19 people in the field. It is a huge national movement. It's
00:33:14.880 sometimes I call it the under news. What I mean by that is it's the news that real people talk about,
00:33:20.400 but the regime media, you know, they want to talk about global warming and they want to talk about
00:33:24.720 Ukraine and they want to talk about anything other than what real people are talking about.
00:33:29.120 It's the kind of news that percolates beneath the surface. It's the same way with the trucker convoy.
00:33:32.960 The fancy pants journalists were scared and they stayed up in their towers and they didn't dare come
00:33:38.080 down with the, you know, the ruffians. I think there's a similar, a similar thing going on now.
00:33:45.200 Let me ask you about that. Did you see any regime media by which I mean, CBC, CTV, global,
00:33:52.480 even these days, I put Post Media in their Globe and Mail, Toronto Star. Did you see any regime media?
00:33:57.120 Yep. Mainstream, mainstream media, regime media, legacy media, whatever you want to call them. They
00:34:01.840 were. Oh, you did? Yep. They were on the ground there. Yeah, they were, they were reporting on it.
00:34:07.920 They were in the streets reporting on it. Now, what's going to come out of those reports? I guess we'll
00:34:12.560 have to wait and see. We'll wait and see if there's a narrative that they're trying to push or a narrative
00:34:16.800 created, but I guess time will tell and we'll, we'll see in the days ahead what kind of perspective
00:34:21.520 they're putting on the, on the protest. Well, that's an improvement over their, uh, convoy
00:34:25.680 coverage where they just huddled under their desks and were afraid of the honking. Well, Lincoln,
00:34:29.600 great to catch up with you. Thanks very much. I'm sorry that you were physically aggressed,
00:34:33.840 uh, today, but it thankful God, it sounds like you were more shocked, uh, and surprised than hurt.
00:34:40.160 Is that right? Yeah, it's just the camera. It was just the camera and it was more of a shock
00:34:43.920 than anything because I never had my camera grabbed so aggressively. I was glad you had
00:34:48.160 the strap on around your neck, although I hope that didn't hurt. You know, the, the violence
00:34:51.520 you just suffered there is more violence than the entire truck or convoy committed in its entire
00:34:56.960 duration. The, if any side calls themselves anti-hate, that's generally code that they are
00:35:02.240 actually the haters. They're co-opting that word. Well, listen, my friend, uh, congrats on your work
00:35:07.200 here. And, um, I have a new respect for what you and Robert Krejcik have been doing every day,
00:35:11.680 covering the, the Tamara Leach trial. Uh, I love covering trials. I've done,
00:35:16.080 I've covered trials in different cities actually around the world, including in the UK. I, I love
00:35:20.320 it. I'm a former lawyer myself. I love digging in, but this is one of the most useless trials
00:35:25.920 I've ever seen in my life. The witnesses have nothing to say about Tamara Leach. They, they had
00:35:30.400 no dealings with her. They're just giving rambling, you know, therapy sessions about the convoy. I,
00:35:35.600 I myself couldn't even stand one day of it. So I salute you guys for, for being there day after
00:35:40.240 day, keep it up folks. Uh, um, that's the show for today on behalf of, uh, all of us here in the
00:35:48.320 nation's capital and across the country in seven different cities to you at home. Good night
00:35:53.520 and keep fighting for freedom.
00:36:10.240 , stay here.
00:36:11.440 We'll see you next time.
00:36:24.240 It's been on Wednesday.
00:36:26.160 Bye.
00:36:27.680 Bye.
00:36:33.820 Bye.
00:36:34.600 Bye.
00:36:35.240 Bye.
00:36:35.520 Bye.
00:36:36.760 Bye.
00:36:38.140 Bye.
00:36:38.660 Bye.