Juno News - February 18, 2026


Canada’s population has grown 34.6% since 2000. Now what？


Episode Stats

Length

15 minutes

Words per Minute

201.42735

Word Count

3,067

Sentence Count

212

Hate Speech Sentences

15


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hi, I'm Candice Malcolm, and this is the Candice Malcolm Show. So part of the reason that I
00:00:08.780 launched Juno News and part of the reason that I host this podcast is because I believe in free
00:00:13.200 speech and civic debate. I think we need to have more discussions and more debates about the
00:00:18.060 important issues facing our country, not fewer. And so it's interesting that I hosted a debate
00:00:23.840 in an interview with Daniel Thierry of the Dominion Society earlier this week, and the
00:00:28.680 response was kind of shocking. The number of people, even on the political right, even in the
00:00:32.200 so-called conservative side, who were calling for him to be cancelled, him to be deplatformed,
00:00:37.340 me to be cancelled, me to be deplatformed, just for having conversations about immigration. It was
00:00:42.600 really quite something to see the cancel culture mob come after us. And look, I don't necessarily
00:00:47.200 agree with Daniel Thierry. I disagree with him, even on the very definition of what it means to
00:00:51.680 be Canadians. We had this debate and this discussion. So I don't have to agree with everything the guy
00:00:56.100 says to want to have a discussion and have him on my podcast. Again, I will let the audience decide.
00:01:01.660 That's up to the audience to make up their mind one way or another. It's not up to a journalist
00:01:05.380 to tell you what to believe, what you should and shouldn't believe, right? I'm here to present the
00:01:09.720 facts, present the arguments, and then let you make up your own mind. That is the role of journalism.
00:01:14.480 That's the role of free speech in a free society. And so, you know, it's on the one hand kind of
00:01:19.460 disappointing to see the reaction from some people on the political right and, of course, on the political
00:01:23.720 left. But on the other hand, it was also great to see that we seem to have started a dialogue.
00:01:29.780 Every time I logged on to X this week, a platform formerly known as Twitter, I saw that the top
00:01:35.520 trending discussions on that platform were all around immigration. Partially reaction to Daniel
00:01:41.700 Thierry coming on my show. Partial reaction to Jason Kenney, the former immigration minister,
00:01:46.680 and his overreaction, I think, to the interview. As well as even today, liberals on X on Twitter.
00:01:54.220 are having a similar discussion about Canada's population growth. So this was a top story
00:01:58.380 I saw on my timeline this morning. Canada's population grows by 34% from 2000 to 2024,
00:02:05.420 surpassing the combined growth of other European countries. And so David Coletto, who's a liberal
00:02:10.540 pollster, posted this. It was also posted by Mike Moffitt, who's a liberal economist. And then David
00:02:15.580 Coletto also posted it. But David Coletto writes, to see our population growth in comparative perspective
00:02:20.620 like this is really something. You can see all the countries listed, Austria, Czech, Denmark,
00:02:25.580 Finland, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Slovakia, and Sweden, and how much their
00:02:30.780 populations all grew from 2000 to 2024 versus Canada. So back in 2000, our population was just
00:02:37.260 over 30 million. And today, it's over 41 million. Probably surpassed 42 because this is 2024 numbers.
00:02:44.620 We're now two years out from this. We've added more than 10 million people to our country in the last
00:02:49.020 two decades. That equates to a 34, 34.6%, so 35% growth. Many people see that and just think it's
00:02:56.140 quite shocking. And you can tell why we have so many problems in this country. So many of them,
00:03:01.100 like I said in the preamble to my interview with Daniel Teary, is that so many of the problems in
00:03:06.220 our country are downstream from immigration. Ezra Levant, founder of The Rebel and a free speech
00:03:12.060 activist as well, said this about David Coletto's post. He said, very interesting. I'd like to see the
00:03:17.740 correlation with housing prices and inflation, stagnation and wages, especially for young people,
00:03:22.860 crime, anti-Semitism, and terrorism. And I think that those are some examples of the problems in our
00:03:28.780 country that have come downstream from immigration. So I'm pleased to say that our show is having an
00:03:33.340 impact in the dialogue in the country, that we've gotten a lot of people to think and talk about
00:03:37.820 immigration. Again, that is the very purpose of the show and the very purpose of me launching this
00:03:42.460 network and doing what I do day in and day out. I want more conversations. I want you to take these
00:03:46.300 ideas that we're having on this show and bring them home and have them with your family, with your
00:03:50.620 friends. And really, if we're going to solve the major problems facing our country, we have to be able to
00:03:55.980 talk about them. And on the conservative side, we can't just be shamed into silence. Anytime we
00:04:01.100 deviate too far from the center, we get shamed into coming back and taking the liberal position.
00:04:06.460 I've had enough of it. I don't think we should do that, whether it's on trans and pronouns or the
00:04:11.660 hoax of the unmarked raves or immigration. Conservatives have to stand their ground and not
00:04:16.860 give in to bullying. So I want to go over some of the reaction to the interview, which again, was
00:04:22.780 on the one hand, quite surprising. So here, of course, as I mentioned, Jason Kenney,
00:04:28.300 former immigration minister, former Premier of Alberta, and should be noted, I worked for Jason
00:04:33.020 Kenney. And for a long time, I considered him a friend. And I think that Jason's changed his stripes
00:04:39.580 on many of the things that he talks about and believes in over the last few years in an unfortunate
00:04:44.460 direction. Anyway, so here's what Jason Kenney had to say about my interview with Daniel
00:04:49.420 Teary of the Dominion Society. He wrote, Daniel Teary is a racist. Racism is immoral. It is poison.
00:04:55.340 It is not vitality. It is not conservative. And what the hell does re-migration mean? Forced
00:05:00.060 deportations of people who lawfully immigrated to Canada and are now permanent residents or
00:05:04.700 Canadian citizens, question mark? Bananas. So this was actually in response to Cosmo Georgia. So
00:05:10.860 my colleague and our managing editor here at Juno News, Cosmo Georgia, wrote this. He said,
00:05:15.900 important debate between Candace Malcolm and Daniel Teary on re-migration. There's genuine
00:05:20.060 vitality on the Canadian right right now. Re-migrationists and restrictionists, Alberta
00:05:24.300 sovereignists, Canadian nationalists. We're stronger for it. So he's saying that we're having these
00:05:28.060 debates, right? And we don't all agree, but the fact that we're having these debates makes us
00:05:32.140 stronger. We're having a debate between Alberta sovereignists and Canadian nationalists. We're having
00:05:36.060 a debate between re-migrationists, so that would be Daniel Teary, and more restrictionists,
00:05:40.220 that would be me. So Cosmo is celebrating this, and Jason Kenney is horrified by this and saying
00:05:45.100 he's a racist. And again, you know, we're trying to open the Overton window to have more conversations.
00:05:49.340 And this is an example of Jason Kenney actually trying to close it, because he's saying,
00:05:52.460 no, no, no, Candace, Daniel Teary is a racist. You cannot have that conversation with him.
00:05:56.140 He's poisoning the well. He's saying that people who are talking about re-migration are racist,
00:05:59.900 and therefore you shouldn't talk to them. So we should close the Overton window. Like,
00:06:03.900 restrictionists is as far as you can go. You can't go further. You know, we can have this
00:06:08.380 debate. And, you know, maybe we'll have more of these debates on this show, but really what he's
00:06:13.260 trying to do there is a tactic of cancel culture. And then Jason Kenney posts this in a reply to his
00:06:19.820 own tweet. He says, evidence of racism, just gross. And then the evidence of racism that he has
00:06:25.180 is these images of Daniel Teary at the conservative convention, and he had that picture of Pierre
00:06:30.700 Polyev, and he's saying, conserve what, right? And so from my perspective, what I saw this as is,
00:06:35.500 look, remember when Justin Trudeau was prime minister and he used to play Mr. Dress Up and
00:06:39.740 wear all those silly costumes and pander and pander and pander? And we all made fun of him,
00:06:44.780 right? It was ridiculous and silly. And seeing him wearing Indian clothes in India and dancing
00:06:49.020 and all this stuff, like it was just too much. We didn't like the pandering, right? And so I think
00:06:53.180 it's only fair to say, hey guys, we made fun of Justin Trudeau for pandering. Pierre Polyev does the
00:06:58.780 same thing. He does the same thing. He panders as well. Look, here he is wearing a turban. Here he is
00:07:03.660 dancing in Indian clothes. It's fair game. Is it polite? Is it nice? No, no, it's rude. It's a rude
00:07:11.420 criticism. Daniel Teary is being impolite. He's being rude and he's mocking Pierre Polyev, which
00:07:16.940 makes some people feel uncomfortable. But I don't really see how it's racist. I think that it's saying
00:07:22.940 we don't like it when Canadians dress up in foreign ethnic garb to try to get votes from certain ethnic
00:07:29.740 communities. I don't know. I personally don't think it's racist. Let me know what you think.
00:07:34.300 Let me know in the comments if you think it's racist to make fun of Pierre Polyev for dressing
00:07:38.380 up in Indian clothes. And if you think that Jason Kenney's right, that this is evidence of racism
00:07:43.260 that's just gross. Or if you're like me and you just think it's impolite and it's crass. But I don't
00:07:51.820 see any evidence of racism. And interestingly, guys, there are so much examples, so many examples of
00:07:56.860 real racism in Canada, like real ingrained, institutionalized racism that we point out
00:08:03.740 at Juno News all the time. Check out Melanie Bennett's reporting about how schools in Ontario
00:08:09.580 are trying to eradicate whiteness and that they're training sessions on pulling out white supremacy and
00:08:16.540 dialing in on white people. Look at how many jobs. Jonathan Kaye does a great job exposing this on X.
00:08:21.980 How many jobs in Canada have right in the description that the job is only for minorities,
00:08:26.380 right? That white people shouldn't apply. So there are tons of examples of actual honest-to-goodness
00:08:32.780 race-based bigotry in this country. And it's not in the direction that Jason Kenney is saying here,
00:08:39.420 right? The real institutionalized racism, unfortunately, is against Canadians. And we
00:08:44.780 see that time and time again. That's racism. So for all the racist things to be pointing out,
00:08:48.940 interestingly, Jason points to this. Okay. And it wasn't just Jason Kenney. Lots of other
00:08:54.300 responses from people on the political right. And I don't disregard all of this criticism. Some of it
00:08:58.380 I think is probably pretty accurate. I want to read what Wyatt Claypool had to say. Wyatt is a
00:09:03.420 conservative activist. He's been on the show many times. I like Wyatt a lot. I think he's really smart
00:09:07.580 and really like a up and coming star in the conservative movement online. So Wyatt posted
00:09:13.020 this, Daniel Teary on X versus Daniel Teary on Juno. So he's saying that on X, you know, he looks like this
00:09:18.220 big, masculine, tough guy. And then on Juno with me, he's like this, like crying little puppy dog.
00:09:24.060 I don't know. He says, LOL, he gets service justifying his extremely overheated policy
00:09:28.860 when he actually has to say it and not type it. Wyatt goes on to say, most obnoxious thing he does
00:09:33.980 is pretend everyone outside of Dominion society just wants to learn to live with the problem. No,
00:09:38.540 normal conservatives are perfectly happy to deport large numbers of people overstaying visas, PRs
00:09:43.420 with criminal records, PRs exploiting social services, fake refugees, slash the number of PRs
00:09:47.980 and temporary foreign workers student visas to hand out. Dominion society only survives on the
00:09:52.460 idea that they are the only ones who oppose mass immigration. Vast majorities of conservatives oppose
00:09:57.580 it and want to reverse it as much as possible. We just reject the ethno-nationalist policies of the
00:10:03.020 Dominion society. Canada is a country of values. Now that means some countries will have populations
00:10:08.380 far less likely to be compatible with Canada, but that doesn't mean that individuals may not
00:10:13.260 be a great fit for Canada. Europe, Asia, Africa, et cetera, can be the places of ethnic states where
00:10:19.180 the home base of the certain people groups are maintained as far more pure cultural spaces. So
00:10:25.100 this again goes to the heart of the matter. What does it mean to be Canadian? Is it an ethnic
00:10:28.940 discretion or is it just a country of values that we all share these values? I think this is an
00:10:33.660 interesting conversation and debate. And again, I'm looking forward to facilitating more
00:10:37.900 conversations like this. I'm actually trying to set up a debate between Wyatt Claypool and Daniel
00:10:42.780 Terry, which I think will be really interesting. We can get into a lot of these questions more
00:10:47.340 deeply. Garnet Genis, an MP from Alberta, also was critical of this interview. And I'll read a bit of
00:10:54.620 our exchange on X. So I wrote just in response to all this, it isn't racist to want to end mass
00:10:59.580 migration. It isn't racist to define what it means to be Canadian. And it isn't racist to say that those
00:11:04.380 who don't belong in Canada should be asked to leave. And again, I'm just defending the space,
00:11:09.660 right? Like, let's have this conversation. I'm not saying that Daniel is right or wrong. I'm just
00:11:13.260 saying that by casting him as racist and saying we can't have these conversations, you again,
00:11:17.340 close the Overton window, you prevent meaningful discussion and debate. And you kind of push these
00:11:22.780 conversations into dark corners of the internet. Like people are having these conversations, we can
00:11:26.620 either have them out in the open, or you can force them into dark circles, the internet. But I don't
00:11:30.940 think that that's useful. I think that that ideas deserve sunlight and daylight, and then you can
00:11:35.180 determine what is best. So that's what I wrote on X. Garnett replied, maybe Daniel doesn't care
00:11:40.380 about being called a racist. But if he would like to defend himself against that charge,
00:11:45.420 then he should explain precisely how his plan to expel Canadian citizens from the country would
00:11:49.420 proceed. I wrote in response to that, I said in the interview, he told me that remigration means
00:11:54.460 removing those here illegally, then ending the temporary work programs, then ending special
00:11:59.500 entitlement programs to entice bogus refugees to come and overstay. I don't find that objectionable
00:12:05.580 or even controversial. And then Garnett says in the interview, and he gives a timestamp,
00:12:09.580 he talks about remigration means expelling people who are citizens. He subsequently explains
00:12:13.580 on Twitter that this would involve a single minister exercising discretion over who can stay and who
00:12:18.700 must go. I'm trying to be gracious here, but I think you can see the problem. And then I wrote,
00:12:22.620 citizenship revocation is current law. Harper tried to use it against terrorists. Trudeau wants to
00:12:26.540 defend it against fraudsters. I personally don't think that we need to go that far, but I think,
00:12:30.540 I don't think it's beyond the pale to discuss these things, right? Like if you came to Canada
00:12:34.780 under, you know, under false pretenses and that you didn't actually meet the criteria, then yeah,
00:12:38.860 you should have your citizenship stripped. I was also very critical of Justin Trudeau changing
00:12:42.860 the requirements to become Canadian. He made it way too easy. So just about anyone could become
00:12:47.020 Canadian. We need to reverse that and turn around. I'm not saying that we should take those 12
00:12:50.620 million people that have come in the last two decades and deport them. I think that that's obviously not
00:12:54.060 going to happen. But I am saying that we need to have stricter citizenship roles and take it more
00:12:58.860 seriously. And again, this is all, these are all things that we can have conversations about. There
00:13:05.260 was a bunch more responses, some people that were a bit more hysterical. I won't get into all of them
00:13:10.380 here. I will just say Canadian constitutional lawyer, Josh Dehas, who's also really great and
00:13:15.980 really smart. I've had him on the show before. He writes this, you couldn't even constitutionally
00:13:20.380 re-migrate citizens using Section 33 protect. So Section 6 protects the rights of citizens to
00:13:26.460 remain in Canada. Section 33 doesn't apply. So they're talking about like the legality of whether
00:13:30.460 you could actually strip people's citizenship. And finally, Matt spoke political commentator. He's
00:13:36.300 probably more on the libertarian side. He's a great guy. I've had him on my show before as well.
00:13:39.740 He wrote this about Daniel Terry. He said, this guy is dangerous. This type of thinking is toxic.
00:13:43.500 Conservatives of all types should distance themselves from this agenda without caveat. Okay,
00:13:49.180 Matt spoke also right to criticize and seek to reform our immigration system is critical to
00:13:52.860 debate proportion of people here illegally or visa holders who commit crimes is reasonable to
00:13:57.580 segregate heritage. Canadians read white from other Canadians read non-white who have now legally joined
00:14:03.500 our country and contributed is violent races, not to mention impractical and incorrect diagnosis of
00:14:08.700 the problems of this country. So I think there's probably a lot of validity to what Matt is saying,
00:14:13.180 but it is just one of those things that, you know, we're starting this conversation and at least more and
00:14:18.140 more conservatives now think is the moderate position to just want to deport all the illegal
00:14:22.220 people and to get rid of the fake refugees and to stop the temporary programs, which I think is a win.
00:14:28.620 I want to just point out one other story that is really making the rounds and it's all connected.
00:14:34.140 This is National Post. Canada is now spending 1 billion per year to cover healthcare costs of refugee
00:14:41.820 claimants. This is an absolute nightmare. This is a disaster. A billion dollars for healthcare that goes
00:14:47.740 above and beyond what Canadians receive to refugees, many of them fake, many of them bogus. People are
00:14:53.340 taking advantage of our generosity. We need to have these conversations. Conservatives need to get
00:14:57.980 serious about immigration. All right, folks, that's all the time we have for today. Thank you so much
00:15:01.100 for tuning in. I'm Candice Falcom. This is Candice Falcom Show. Thank you and God bless.