John Bolton - The Keith Wilson Interview - The Debates, The Signatures, The Way To Win

00:00:00.000 Hi, it's John and welcome to the channel. It is Wednesday, May the 6th. Great to have

00:00:07.660 you along. This is being recorded on Tuesday, May the 5th. Wonderful to have you here with

00:00:12.460 the big blue mug of coffee, which I tip to you. I've been wanting to have this guy back

00:00:16.100 on the channel for a long time now, and it's a real honor to have my next guest, lawyer

00:00:23.400 Keith Wilson is with me today. Great to have you here today. Thanks so much for doing this

00:00:27.880 and lots to talk about. Um, so again, thank you very much. Uh, good to be on John. Okay. So I,

00:00:35.140 I used this quote the other day, um, by Winston Churchill. This is not the end. This is not the

00:00:41.040 beginning of the end, but perhaps this is the end of the beginning. I love that quote. I love it.

00:00:47.540 Uh, Churchill said that, and we're kind of at the, the end of the beginning. We're starting over

00:00:52.720 again, new day today, perfect time to have you on. As people are seeing this, it's two days ago

00:00:57.640 that the petitions were handed in.

00:00:59.780 But I wanted to get your thoughts

00:01:01.700 on the petition submission the other day

00:01:04.560 and maybe the number right off the top

00:01:07.480 and we can get right down to it.

00:01:10.220 Well, I mean, it's a remarkable achievement

00:01:15.140 given the conditions that everybody faced.

00:01:18.280 We had the craziest winter.

00:01:21.200 You know, record snowfall in many regions.

00:01:23.800 uh in you know we all thought i thought that the last two weeks at least we get nice weather

00:01:29.640 and we got two blizzards yeah i know and and not only that the most troubling aspect and i wasn't

00:01:38.660 necessarily put off by the fact that the process was rigorous my wife's canvasser and so i you know

00:01:46.160 like so i was like well show me your instructions and show me all these vetting process like wow

00:01:51.620 this is rigorous like this is like commissioner of oath level uh standards yeah and so so that

00:01:58.500 was significant but the most disturbing part and i experienced it uh myself with people talking to

00:02:04.820 me was the fear was the fear of signing the petition they wanted to sign it they're going

00:02:10.800 to vote yes in october but they're worried that their name would appear on a being on a list yeah

00:02:16.580 and uh that they'd get their bank accounts frozen or their business would be harmed or they'd be

00:02:21.320 fired from their job um and they didn't trust elections alberta to keep the you know to protect

00:02:28.660 their identity or somebody would get their hands on it that after having signed the signed the

00:02:33.800 petition and but then that was followed immediately by an emotion of like shame mixed with sadness

00:02:41.880 that they would say to me i can't believe our country's got to the point where i fear putting

00:02:49.440 my name on a petition, a petition for a legal process at every level. So that to me was remarkable

00:02:57.880 and I think really affected the number. But, you know, and the number two is a little bit of a

00:03:05.280 wake-up call. I had a number of people coming up to me saying, oh, I think the number is going to

00:03:09.080 be 800,000 and it's going to be at least 600,000. I'd say, no, it's not. You know, we get into these

00:03:14.960 echo chambers. And we really got to remind ourselves at all times that because of how we

00:03:20.360 exchange information, because of social media, we are in echo chambers and try and get outside of

00:03:25.140 your echo chamber and listen and learn. Yeah. I do want to mention people are going to want

00:03:29.860 to know about the debate the other night. So I'm going to bring that up and I'm going to talk to

00:03:32.840 you about that before we go. But you brought up the rigorous sort of training they had to go

00:03:37.400 through. Is there a purpose behind that? Because there's trying to tie this in with the Centurion

00:03:44.280 project thing and that the list was used to put people's names on this and and obviously these

00:03:50.000 people had to they had to apply to be a canvasser with their information they had to get a badge

00:03:55.620 they had to be responsible for that badge they had to be responsible for the petitions they had

00:03:59.340 to ask for identification and they had to sign off on these petitions are you are you surprised

00:04:06.600 that this is getting tied in with what happened mid midweek last week a little bit i mean i've

00:04:12.960 tried to game out and i don't have any backside behind the scenes information i've never spoken

00:04:18.080 with david parker um i don't fully understand how this centurion project was supposed to work i

00:04:24.040 never have i had people explain it to me and i'm still a little murky on it i don't know there's

00:04:28.160 nothing nefarious about it on its face it's just political organizing all the political parties do

00:04:32.580 it the ndp is doing it and then she's doing it right now the unions do it like yeah there's

00:04:36.640 nothing novel here but i don't know enough about it and i don't want to prejudge what's going to

00:04:41.020 happen with the investigations but what I do know is when I think about all the checks and

00:04:46.340 balances that are in place I just don't see how it could have really changed the outcome of the

00:04:52.180 petition even including the timing of it it just came in at the end and even if it was sooner

00:04:56.360 because you have to have a person in front of you present you with identification and then

00:05:04.120 Elections Alberta when they're allowed to do the verification is going to go through the list and

00:05:09.520 you know I think you've signed you told everybody you signed John so they're going to phone you and

00:05:15.300 they're going to say did you sign the petition and you're going to say yes and they're going to say

00:05:19.540 thank you very much right so if they phone if there's a whole bunch of names on there

00:05:24.800 and people were forged or something they're going to phone you know John Smith and say did you sign

00:05:30.640 he's going to say no and then they're going to go okay well we'll delete that one and they're

00:05:33.820 probably going to they're now going to know that it was the same canvas they'll know all the sheets

00:05:38.580 that that canvasser did there's 7 000 canvassers you know it is statistically likely that there

00:05:45.800 might have been a few bad apples in there you get a group of 7 000 people together you're going to 0.99

00:05:49.760 get an idiot right um so i just can't see this this is a big hullabaloo at the end of the day 0.98

00:05:58.100 um and it's a distraction but we're going to encounter a lot of that yeah and and a lot of 0.99

00:06:04.820 the narrative right now, story in the Calgary Sun, data breach investigations ensnares Alberta

00:06:10.400 separatist movement. The CBC, I think that the data breach means that there will be a lot of

00:06:16.180 questions about the integrity of that list of signatures, says University of Alberta political

00:06:22.660 science professor Lori Thorlikson. That's what she told the CBC. And the timing was kind of

00:06:28.320 suspicious. I know the other side was saying they knew about this a week ago. Why didn't they act

00:06:32.340 sooner did they wait in order to dump this just before we handed in the petitions i mean we can

00:06:37.140 be conspiracy theorists keith but it does seem kind of odd that it happened just before um we

00:06:44.020 signed we handed in the petitions yesterday well it could be i don't know but here's what i when i

00:06:50.900 when i go up to the 30 000 foot level john and i say okay where are we in the process and what

00:06:55.180 impact does this have regardless of outcome regardless of outcome of the investigation

00:06:59.780 regardless of outcome of this court challenge

00:07:06.680 that we could get a ruling on any day

00:07:09.280 and more likely within a week

00:07:11.260 is I don't see it as being a consequential

00:07:16.460 and let me explain why

00:07:17.760 whoever's idea it was to put photographs on those boxes

00:07:24.180 the boxes of signatures showing the real people

00:07:27.300 the real Albertans in incredibly difficult conditions at various locations across this

00:07:34.480 province set up in their pop-ups that was real that wasn't staged like that that that that really

00:07:41.720 happened so where am I going with this um I was really I I couldn't be at the event yesterday I

00:07:48.620 was in client meetings all day in my office but um uh I saw the I saw the videos uh uh and I was

00:07:56.280 fortunate to read to watch mitch sylvester's speech and i listened carefully to the letter

00:08:03.760 that he's presented or is presenting i guess might have presented it by now but he read a letter that

00:08:09.120 he has had written to the premier and in that letter he i was pleased to see that he emphasized

00:08:15.900 the challenging conditions and not only that the psychological fear that albertans are facing which

00:08:21.000 is just terrible uh condemnation of the state of canada yeah and why we have to separate um but

00:08:28.440 also he went on to talk about having sworn a statutory declaration and i thought that was very

00:08:34.300 wise um and presenting that to the premier and uh and i thought okay that's smart um because

00:08:42.600 i'm sorry keys let me just yeah okay i was just going to ask you explain what that does so yeah

00:08:47.040 what does that do for people who don't understand that and maybe you can explain it a bit better

00:08:50.980 to me as well sure no problem thanks yeah um so what that does is it gives evidence

00:09:01.140 to the premier and to the the politicians the elected officials the mlas of what the numbers

00:09:10.900 were right so it didn't all these numbers didn't go into a black box so to speak right because we

00:09:15.880 saw on some of the videos i saw how and you were there how they sealed these boxes so he was able

00:09:22.580 to ensure that it was public what was in those boxes which is over 300 000 people signed and

00:09:29.920 the threshold's 178 000 so clearly it was met and even if 5 000 or 10 000 of those signatures were

00:09:36.120 somehow funny business it's still there's no scenario under which the threshold wasn't lawfully

00:09:42.700 met right so if this gets bogged down with the courts and uh things get appealed or turned down

00:09:51.100 and appealed and appealed again uh it gives political justification a political rationale

00:09:58.860 for the premier and her government to say we're moving forward with a referendum i realize you

00:10:04.020 know one of the things people would be really clear on the government at any time and i'm

00:10:12.360 be able to demonstrate this very easily the government at any time on its own initiative

00:10:16.480 has the ability to announce a referendum and i can provide proof there's going to be nine other

00:10:23.400 questions in october there was no citizen initiative calling on the provincial government

00:10:29.080 the smith government to set questions on immigration on the senate and so on the cabinet

00:10:37.460 and the government have that authority on their own under the referendum act and in fact even in

00:10:43.140 the court challenges brought by a few first nations chiefs without consultation with their

00:10:49.500 communities on their own initiative probably seeking favor from ottawa um uh all of their

00:10:58.740 lawyers acknowledged that nothing that's happening in this court case in any way restricts the

00:11:04.100 constitutional authority of the government of Alberta to call a referendum on independence

00:11:08.680 whenever it wants that's part of the constitutional framework of Canada set by the Supreme Court of

00:11:13.080 Canada the 1998 reference case so what what a citizen initiative act process is is a way of

00:11:20.180 signaling government that you know coal mining in the eastern slopes is important and we want

00:11:25.740 you to do something about it um uh thomas lukasic uh i think canada should alberta should stay in

00:11:34.120 canada he says so here i want a referendum on staying in canada i mean of course he does a

00:11:39.680 sleight of hand and doesn't tell the truth to people about what they actually signed but that's

00:11:43.220 what they signed yeah yeah in other words the government didn't need the smith government

00:11:49.340 doesn't need this petition to call a referendum on independence on in october 19th the government's

00:11:56.300 already got enough indication when you combine the statutory declaration that mr vester's provided to

00:12:01.520 the premier confirming the numbers over 300 000 and that he saw that with his own eyes under oath

00:12:07.040 swears it and you've got the lakasic the the the runway is laid and the the jet of independence

00:12:16.980 can take off now. So I don't lose sleep over these court challenges. I don't lose sleep over

00:12:26.580 the hype from the leftist media, the paid federal government media. Remember, whenever you see a

00:12:34.880 news talker on CTV and CBC, they are paid by the federal government. They are fundamentally the

00:12:40.800 same as the news talker in North Korea, but they don't have quite the enthusiasm down.

00:12:46.980 right it was it was a great day yesterday the pictures you saw in those boxes were pictures

00:12:53.060 that were sent to me they were good for you they sent them to me and and and and it was very

00:12:59.000 effective and i loved seeing them there i see mitch stand behind those boxes was really something

00:13:03.460 you made i mean fox news had it everybody had pictures there it was really outstanding so

00:13:07.800 yeah it was a great day yesterday but the thing is the thing is we don't

00:13:11.180 maybe this is an indication how people don't trust government here in canada and how canada

00:13:16.880 phone we don't trust we don't seem to trust the courts anymore keith i mean uh it wasn't shakespeare

00:13:21.760 said the law is an ass with all due respect sir but um what can we what can we expect from this

00:13:28.640 judge um i think that maybe when this case when they were discussing this case we were hoping it 0.79

00:13:36.160 would have been dismissed out of hand but we have to wait for this decision so you're pretty confident

00:13:43.040 that we're going to be that this this is going to be ruled on the side of state for alberta and not

00:13:47.120 these no i'm not saying that uh what i'm saying is it doesn't matter okay okay no seriously that's

00:13:53.720 what i'm saying it doesn't matter i have no idea what the judge is going to rule i do know the law

00:13:57.920 and there's no reasonable basis for the judge to to interfere with this process and without taking

00:14:04.800 everybody the deep end of the pool just to deal with one point in particular the 1930 natural

00:14:10.700 resources transfer agreement transferred all of the crown land in alberta right the first some of

00:14:16.720 the first things we signed an agreement with the crown all right well first of all there's two

00:14:21.020 crowns there's the crown in the right of canada and there's a crown in the right of alberta so

00:14:24.240 which one did you sign with you know all right okay well the one of the things the treaties say

00:14:29.340 is that the um is that the rights that the crown has can be assigned to someone else

00:14:38.620 And in 1930, that's exactly what happened in Alberta and in Saskatchewan, actually, with the 1930 Natural Resources Transfer Agreement. And all of the land base, but for the 1.3% of the land in Alberta, where the treaty, where the First Nations are, so there's 48 First Nations, their little reserves comprise 1.3% of the land base.

00:15:03.460 that's it that land was owned and is owned by the federal government not even the first nation

00:15:09.300 i don't agree with that but that's the way it is yeah and then there's all of the crown land

00:15:14.780 under the jurisdiction of the federal government at the time and in 1930 they transferred it to

00:15:21.660 the provincial government and nothing changed for the first nations all of the treaties continued

00:15:28.340 to be honored they put the federal government put a clause in the 1930 transfer agreement

00:15:33.860 natural resource transfer agreement that the province had to respect the traditional hunting

00:15:39.220 fishing and gathering rights and trapping rights of first nations that's why under alberta's hunting

00:15:46.180 laws if you're a first nation you don't need a hunting license right yeah so um it's a demonstrated

00:15:54.580 proof that the governmental jurisdiction of the land base covered by the treaties can go from one

00:16:02.180 government to another and nothing changes for the first nations that's one of the options here

00:16:08.820 upon independence is um uh nothing will change so when you you know one of the points people

00:16:18.220 will make who are up you know trying to shut down independence is they'll say well you need their

00:16:25.660 consent will you only you know john if i'm asking you to do nothing different today than you were

00:16:33.100 planning on doing and not going to change what you are going to do for the rest of the day in

00:16:37.580 any way and you continue to be free to do whatever you decide to do do i need to get your consent no

00:16:44.060 no no i'm not changing anything right no not at all at the end of the day uh to give it a more

00:16:50.620 tight answer um i think there's no legal basis for the court to interfere but the court might

00:16:58.060 find something they seem to sometimes as we saw with justice fees be he predicated his decision

00:17:06.060 on the notion that there would be a change with certainty and there's that's simply not just not

00:17:11.820 there's no evidence of that so i don't know what they're going to decide the important point to me

00:17:17.260 is it doesn't change anything uh even the first nation chiefs lawyers acknowledge that the the

00:17:23.640 premier continues to have the right regardless of what the court rules to call a referendum on

00:17:28.220 independence she has more than enough mandate to do so you now have over 700 000 albertans who

00:17:34.560 have signed documents saying they want an independence vote uh in october so i think

00:17:40.640 we're going to have a referendum. I think it's a certainty that we'll have a referendum on

00:17:45.220 independence on October 19th. And I remember you saying that I think long before Christmas,

00:17:48.840 we're going to have one next year. Maybe I can just ask you to speculate, why do the chiefs

00:17:53.880 want to do this? What's their reason behind this? If what you say is true, and I believe that it is

00:17:59.420 because you're a lawyer. So why would they want to keep it? Why did they want to take us to court

00:18:04.200 over this? Any idea? Why would the court take the case if this is the truth? And what you're saying

00:18:08.960 is the truth and again i believe that i believe that it is i wish the chiefs would spend more

00:18:14.240 time worrying about their people um you just it's just heartbreaking to go through any reserve

00:18:19.500 to see the poverty we know the abuse statistics are off the scale for child abuse um the criminality

00:18:27.180 is off the scale the addictions are off the scale uh the majority the murder rate for indigenous

00:18:33.760 women is off the scale and uh most of the murderers of them are first nations yeah uh their life

00:18:41.000 expectancy is low this is an absolute tragedy and it's avoidable um and i just wish those few

00:18:50.040 chiefs or being political activists for ottawa would seem to have more concern and more focus on

00:18:58.040 matters closer to home but that's only a choice they can make i have no idea what their motivation

00:19:03.260 is but i think it's misplaced maybe maybe we can move on to strategy now knowing what you just said

00:19:08.540 because we certainly have to convince people to all people even indigenous people to say yes and

00:19:14.000 i know from talking to some of the canvassers they've had a lot of indigenous people come up

00:19:18.080 and sign because they want to change because of the reasons you just said there um what do we do 0.98

00:19:25.600 now um you know it's been kind of seat of your pants the way we've been doing things over the

00:19:31.660 last little while. It's worked out quite well. I was very complimentary of Mitch Sylvester. I think

00:19:35.200 he has a real talent for motivating people, volunteers. They really like Mitch. They trust

00:19:40.620 Mitch. He's a good guy. But we're into a different territory now. This is different.

00:19:47.080 Things have ramped up. There's a science coming at us. There's a science. Political campaigns,

00:19:52.740 huge, lots of money coming here. As I've said, federal money is coming in here to stop people

00:19:57.540 from saying from saying yes in this uh referendum and we're paying for it keith the people in alberta

00:20:02.840 will be paying for this so what do we have to do a lot of different people involved here

00:20:08.040 can we get a cohesive message and a game plan together to win this thing what would you do

00:20:14.040 what's the first thing you would do well i first of all i'd be realistic about our situation

00:20:19.180 and that is you know the polling i've seen uh that i trust um and the polling of others that

00:20:29.760 i think is credible is all saying the same thing i had assumed wrongly incorrectly that there was

00:20:37.080 a mushy middle there's not i don't believe that to be true yeah um uh so you know we've got a i

00:20:44.180 thought it was a third strongly in favor of independence and a third strongly opposed and

00:20:49.980 a third undecided and that's not what we got we've got a third in favor generally speaking

00:20:55.680 and then we've got two-thirds uh or around 60 percent that are are strongly opposed and that's

00:21:04.280 a very serious situation so um i think we need to get out of our echo chamber and we need to stop

00:21:10.960 uh celebrating our uh just focusing on celebrations and telling us we got one another we got this in

00:21:17.540 the bag because we don't at all um we can and i'm certain of that i'm certain of it because

00:21:25.340 by every objective measure it makes sense for alberta to be independent we'll be the most

00:21:32.040 successful prosperous country in the world that's clear from the data from our geography from our

00:21:38.320 our natural endowments and we also know the trajectory of Canada is dark dystopian bad

00:21:47.120 poverty you know poor loss of opportunity misery so we got to do this and we can and it's the right

00:21:55.600 thing to do so I think everybody's got to have a serious discussion with themselves about the

00:22:02.820 challenge in front of them and prepare for it um and recognize though on the one hand we don't have

00:22:10.200 much time on the other hand we have lots of time yeah what do i mean by that a normal political

00:22:15.000 campaign is an eternity it's a month we've got five so what i think should happen is people should

00:22:24.720 not do as we'd see some people do from time to time say do you support independence no well then 0.99

00:22:34.320 you're an idiot right you love communist china you know we can't do that that is not how you 0.99

00:22:41.320 win people over you you're not going to win them over that plays nice to the base that plays nice 1.00

00:22:47.480 to those of us who have already decided that this is the right thing to do that does not move a

00:22:53.520 single one of that 60%. It pisses them off. It entrenches them. So we got to stop. We need to

00:23:02.160 focus more on how we can help those people see what we see. And I think we need to do that

00:23:12.040 methodically. And first, by getting them to see certain things. Because if maybe you can,

00:23:19.360 you know look at your your your your circles and we've already started divide into camps

00:23:25.880 right there's certain settings i go into and all i'm going to bring up is the weather sports and

00:23:33.520 you know some viral video on youtube about some kid with a dog or something right yeah that's it

00:23:40.660 no real substantive discussion but maybe try and see if they say something like boy i'm really i

00:23:47.820 don't like how the government in ottawa is doing x just start with that one and reach a common place

00:23:56.140 with them you know somebody said to me um uh by analogy uh imagine john uh you're back in your

00:24:05.420 late teens or early 20s and you're looking for the love of your life that you want to spend the rest

00:24:10.580 of your life with the lady you want to marry and you're at some social event and you see this woman

00:24:16.100 across the room you've never met her before you don't know what her name is and you rush over to

00:24:22.040 her and you say this is what i think we should do on our honeymoon yeah right you haven't even 0.99

00:24:28.840 introduced yourself she's gonna be like whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa yeah she'll blow a whistle so

00:24:35.560 people come running to help yes you'll suddenly find out what mace smells like right yes um whereas

00:24:43.720 hi I'm John you know yeah I was noticing uh blah blah blah right yeah and then you know oh what

00:24:51.720 brings you to this event now you have something in common right we really need to realize that's

00:24:57.600 the process we're going through in the next five months you're you're talking about the carrot

00:25:01.640 instead of the stick here right you know you want to draw people you want to kind of lead them along

00:25:06.120 but I do get concerned because we were talking about the mushy middle we've got to get the people

00:25:11.920 the mushy middle because the people at this end will always vote yes. And the people at this end

00:25:16.960 are never going to vote yes. Now we find out there's a lot of people who are in that never

00:25:22.240 going to vote yes side. So there's a real challenge here. And I'm convinced we can

00:25:28.400 bring some of those people over. I really am. But there's a lot of people to bring over in five

00:25:34.880 months, Keith. And it does concern me because we thought they were lost causes prior to Ezra Levant

00:25:41.040 doing the polling and i think that's what you're referring to right yeah and i don't know that i

00:25:45.260 would say um just a nuance here that's important they didn't say never they said strongly opposed

00:25:51.960 yeah okay yeah so i think within that group uh of the 60 percent and we have to get you know 30

00:26:00.220 percent of them to move uh loosely speaking um there's probably three groups there's the nevers

00:26:08.340 you know there's the uh the tomaclacastic types um and then yeah the elbows up uh and then

00:26:17.920 there's uh within them there's the ones that have just kind of said yeah now yeah now they haven't

00:26:25.440 really given it a lot of thought um and the landscape's going to continue to change like

00:26:32.580 this you know first carney says no we're abandoning and we're ending our relationship 0.99

00:26:37.620 with the united states which just is so ridiculously obscenely stupid and then he says uh 0.98

00:26:44.260 we're going to align with china communist china which is frightening and now he's like we're going 0.99

00:26:51.620 to become the next european country yeah you know and and try and contend with all that over 0.98

00:26:57.140 regulation that's the stupidest highly competitive markets with very low margins and we're going to 0.92

00:27:02.180 to have the added shipping cost and shipping on net zero you know and brussels brussels will run 0.99

00:27:09.800 our country in essence yeah what happens that's ridiculous yes so and he just keeps going and

00:27:15.580 going and going and things are going to get worse he keeps spending worse inflation's going to keep

00:27:20.380 getting higher uh our dollar's going to keep getting worth less which means you work hard

00:27:25.900 and your money becomes worth less right yeah and so um i think what we have to do is realize that

00:27:34.700 within the strongly opposed there's ones we're never going to move but there's a big chunk of

00:27:40.720 them that are movable we have to be gentle and understanding and empathetic and compassionate 0.99

00:27:47.500 and not shout at them and not tell them how stupid they are um but rather appeal to cause 0.99

00:27:55.540 them to feel this is the right thing to do? Okay, so you're involved here in the independence 1.00

00:28:05.440 movement. A lot of people are very happy that you're involved. They trust you. They like you

00:28:10.060 very much. We've got Mitch. We've got Jeff. We've got others involved here. Structurally, what has

00:28:15.980 to happen to get the strategy? Having a whole bunch of people involved is not bringing everybody

00:28:22.780 together with the cohesive message. Does there have to be some type of a summit? Sit down,

00:28:29.200 hash things out over the weekend. Folks, leave your egos at the damn door. We're all working 1.00

00:28:34.260 on the same thing here. We all want Alberta independence. Let's work together on this,

00:28:40.000 because there are those egos right now that are getting in the way in places,

00:28:44.120 and we can't be that way, because time's a waste in Keith. Do we have to do something like that?

00:28:49.640 does somebody have to say let's sit down and hash this out we got a couple of days or a week let's

00:28:54.540 do it now i think it makes sense i hadn't thought about that but i think that makes a lot of sense

00:29:00.060 uh and and another reason why it makes sense is um we're in a unique period right now and a lot

00:29:07.600 of people may not realize this which is on saturday the official period for the petition

00:29:14.740 ended um so we're not in a petition campaign period and no referendum question has been set

00:29:22.200 by the provincial cabinet um on independence so um we're not in a referendum campaign period what

00:29:31.000 that means is that any group of individuals can engage in free political advocacy and they're

00:29:37.420 not constrained by the very restrictive rules um uh of elections alberta so now would be the time

00:29:45.680 to have those types of discussions and for people who believe in independence and the that the

00:29:51.260 importance of it for the future and for the future of their kids and grandkids to seize this

00:29:56.020 opportunity of the window of time we're in where we're in a period of free political expression

00:30:01.000 unconstrained by elections alberta and their their complex laws and rules uh to have those

00:30:06.960 kinds of discussions for sure. Yeah. Okay. I, I, I am on a limited zoom plan. I get 40 minutes.

00:30:12.880 I'm going to have to come, have you come back again. I've got about 10 minutes left. Um, I,

00:30:17.320 I want to ask you this. We've got all these people who have, they've got like this amazing

00:30:23.900 energy. They've been out there for four months. Your wife has been out there, as you said,

00:30:27.280 and they want to do more stuff. What do we do with these people right now? How can we, um,

00:30:31.720 utilize this energy uh that they have what would you suggest they do and how can we get them get

00:30:38.200 keep them busy so they stay engaged well i think um you know i think there's only going to be limited

00:30:44.600 limited return from town halls they still need to occur yeah but we're not going to reach a lot of

00:30:50.520 the people that are in that strongly opposed category are never going to go to a town hall

00:30:54.520 meeting we have to deal with that reality right um and a lot of people who go to town hall meetings

00:31:01.000 you've been to a few i've been to a few you see them at every town hall yeah and you know that

00:31:06.600 they're going to vote for independence even if you kidnap their dog so um no matter what they're

00:31:11.800 going to vote so we need to be realistic about that we need to use different reach out techniques

00:31:17.960 um i really think we need you know every campaign every political campaign always has a flyer

00:31:24.360 none of the groups have prepared any kind of flyers as far as i'm aware like just simple

00:31:28.040 things like that um and uh i think we need to look at buying traditional ad space uh on on radio

00:31:37.740 on billboards uh just like political parties do and other groups do you know and uh when they're

00:31:45.200 trying to influence public opinion and draw attention to their cause whether it's like PETA

00:31:51.260 or greenpeace or whatever other organization out there they use all of these different

00:31:58.160 techniques to reach people with their message so i think the various groups that are out there

00:32:04.800 need to shift their posture and i suspect many are working on it to do more traditional political

00:32:13.100 issue campaigning yeah there um when i was talking about a summit i mean there are there

00:32:18.520 expertise needed here. You need a media buyer that knows what to buy, where to buy it, who to direct

00:32:23.740 it to. You need, um, a media representative or a promo, a promotions person that's going to be

00:32:29.380 getting your message out on a regular basis. These are things that, you know, um, these are things

00:32:34.080 that are needed. And I think these things need to be discussed in order for us to be successful

00:32:38.380 moving forward is, is a lot of stuff. You want to donate. Yeah. Oh yeah. And now's a good time

00:32:43.280 to do that. Hey, because I don't think we're limited to what we can give. Are we? That's

00:32:47.140 that legally that's correct boy that and your name doesn't appear on a list ah yeah so i mean

00:32:54.260 that's the big one a lot of people wanted to donate but they were worried about having their

00:32:57.800 name on a list again and having their bank account frozen and everything else so we're in a unique

00:33:01.880 period of time and we have been since midnight on saturday yeah and the groups need to move

00:33:07.580 so um if you were to go to alberta prosperity project right now they have a donate button and

00:33:13.100 you were to give this $50,000, you could do that right now. Could you do that? Legally? Yes.

00:33:19.600 Do that. Listen to Keith, give the money right now. Cause that's up until, uh, up until the

00:33:24.580 cabinet issues, uh, ordering council, uh, under the referendum act, setting a question on

00:33:30.320 independence. Okay. Yeah. Now's the time to do it. If you'd like to make a donation for goodness

00:33:34.860 sakes, do that. Um, I want to ask you about the debate. Um, I've got a few minutes left here.

00:33:39.940 I know that you're very limited in what you can say.

00:33:43.020 You've got another one coming up, and everybody in the world is going to be watching that one on the 25th.

00:33:47.260 What can you tell us about the debate you had with Jason Kenney the other night?

00:33:51.240 Sure.

00:33:51.560 Well, last Friday, I had a debate with Jason Kenney at a conference called Civitas.

00:33:56.960 They hold it every year at different cities across Canada.

00:34:01.620 And it was sort of a political who's who crowd in the conservative movement.

00:34:06.960 Literally who's who, a few hundred people.

00:34:09.940 um and uh one of the rules that i was told that uh in order to participate in the debate it had

00:34:18.200 to be following katham house rules which or child house rules which means you can't talk about who

00:34:24.840 said what um and like treat it as confidential so to speak yeah yeah uh and so there was a number

00:34:30.960 of requests for media to attend i said i don't have a problem i could for all i care i'd rather

00:34:35.920 it be broadcast actually this is important civic discussion that's occurring so I was fully

00:34:40.720 supportive of openness but that's not what the organizers wanted and I had to respect that so

00:34:46.080 I can't really comment too much other than I can tell you I was very pleased with how it went

00:34:52.340 I was I'm usually always my own worst critic and focus on what I didn't like about what I did and

00:35:01.980 i uh i felt really good about the night um and you know one of the most remarkable things that

00:35:11.180 still seems to be consistent is those who are saying that alberta should stay in canada have

00:35:17.580 no they they will agree that the voting structure is wrong and we don't have fair democratic

00:35:24.660 representation they will agree that we're being economically exploited through equalization they

00:35:31.360 will and that's wrong and needs to change they will agree that um there's unfairness and uh

00:35:37.820 predatory targeted policies to harm our economy and hold us back they'll agree that we have no say

00:35:44.840 over these catch and release laws or immigration and so on but then they offer no plan on how to

00:35:52.500 change them and the only plan as i always point out that has any realistic chance in the real world

00:36:00.040 is independence because then we're in control and we have power uh we have power to protect

00:36:05.640 our interest as albertans so um uh that's about all i can say is is i felt felt good about how

00:36:12.440 the evening went and it got really sporty at times very respectful but pretty intense and i expect

00:36:19.000 the next debate which will be in calgary put on by the aristotle society at the grand theater on

00:36:24.480 May 25th, Monday, May 25th, will be extremely sporty and very, very invigorating. And I'm

00:36:31.960 looking forward to it. And I probably won't sleep the night before, not out of fear, but out of

00:36:38.260 excitement. It'll be like when I was a kid and it was Christmas Eve. And the legacy media is going

00:36:45.420 to be there. I've had inquiries from Bloomberg out of New York, so there'll be some American media

00:36:49.540 there. All of the Canadian media will be there. It's going to be videotaped. There is some

00:36:55.000 discussion that it'll be live streamed. Unfortunately, the tickets sold out in a day

00:36:59.760 and a half. So the tickets have sold out. But I'm looking forward to that debate. This is a very

00:37:06.780 important discussion to have. I think Jason Kenney, former Premier Kenney, former federal minister

00:37:13.740 under the Harper government is well positioned to make the Federalist cause. And I'm hoping

00:37:20.000 people who are in that strongly opposed category show up in the audience. And I'm going to try

00:37:28.180 really hard to get them to see the advantages for Albert independence.

00:37:33.580 Terrific. I've got about two minutes left. You very deftly told us nothing about it by giving

00:37:38.660 us plenty of information. I kind of read more into that maybe than I should have. But I appreciate

00:37:43.280 you saying that and i'm looking forward to that coming up just i do have about 90 seconds right

00:37:48.340 now i i jason levine i was on with him this morning he said he said 50 50 kenny backs out

00:37:53.760 before this because there's a lot at stake for him uh and would you answer do you think that

00:37:58.260 would ever happen uh i don't know i mean he knows what he's getting into right he knows what he's

00:38:04.780 getting into yeah uh because i you know uh he knows how it went i don't know i don't know i

00:38:11.260 think he's probably going to try and proceed. Okay. Uh, but I think he's going to prepare

00:38:15.520 differently. Yeah. Yeah. Well, listen, I, I, I wish we had more time. I generally like to keep

00:38:21.500 these kind of short because I think people are more likely to look at them, but this was a great

00:38:25.440 discussion. I think people are going to watch this whole one. We'll have you back on again real

00:38:29.040 soon. It was a real pleasure to talk to you. You're an important person, Mr. Wilson, you're

00:38:33.380 important person moving forward. And everybody knows that, uh, we're counting on you to help

00:38:37.780 us through this to get our Alberta independence. And it is a real pleasure and it's an honor to be

00:38:43.180 able to talk to you here. So thank you very much. Every single one of us is important. And I thank

00:38:48.240 you very much for having me on, John. If you like this video, please give it a thumbs up,

00:38:52.380 subscribe to the channel, ring the bell for notifications. And if you'd like to share it,

00:38:55.840 do that as well. I will see you in the next one.

John Bolton - May 06, 2026

The Keith Wilson Interview - The Debates, The Signatures, The Way To Win

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript