00:01:36.680Catherine is an employment lawyer, human rights lawyer, founder of Marshall Law, and she is
00:01:41.040representing Travis Danrush in his case against the CBC.
00:01:44.620I had her on last July when this case just came into the news and we talked about what was to
00:01:50.400come. And so I'm very excited to have her back today. So Catherine, welcome to the program.
00:01:54.480Thank you so much for being here. Thanks for having me. Okay. So, I mean, why don't you help
00:01:59.160us understand what has happened between, you know, we had you on the show back in July and we were
00:02:04.600talking about how, you know, there's a lot still to come. So what has happened between that time
00:02:09.360where I first interviewed you, I think you had just started representing Travis, to this point
00:02:13.560today where he was invited to give that explosive testimony earlier today well we've now officially
00:02:18.920sued the cbc so we launched our human rights complaint against the cbc news they have responded
00:02:25.300in a very uh predictable manner by denying everything deflecting the blame saying they
00:02:31.080didn't do anything wrong the usual and today travis gave some very explosive testimony in
00:02:37.840parliament where he was able to say a lot of things candace because he was protected by
00:02:42.980parliamentary privilege. He could actually name names. He could disclose information that
00:02:48.440normally the CBC would definitely be trying to sue him for. And we know that the CBC wanted him
00:02:54.920to sign a gig order. They wanted him to sign an NDA. That was a huge part of what they did to him
00:03:00.820and retaliated against him. So I think today was probably the CBC's worst nightmare.
00:03:05.740Well, absolutely deserve every minute of it. Just from that testimony, we've got a few more clips.
00:03:11.640So I just want to give the audience a bit of background on Travis Danraj.
00:03:15.520So he's a veteran broadcast journalist with over two decades of experience, starting in Alberta, where he was Global News's first Queen's Park bureau chief, so he came back to Toronto.
00:03:23.420He joined CBC in 2021. He hosted a show called Marketplace, and he was heading that program until early 2024.
00:03:31.060In January 2024, Danraj became the host of the newly launched primetime show, Canada Tonight, on CBC News.
00:03:37.260He then went on medical leave just a few months later in July 2024, initially citing health reasons, but he later revealed it was driven by the cultural pressures and that toxic work environment.
00:03:49.720He briefly returned back, but then he was replaced in early 2025.
00:03:54.460And then that sort of explosive news story came out in the summer where he said he was not working there.
00:03:58.760The CBC sort of insisted that he was still working there.
00:04:01.120And it turned out that he had this court case coming at her since he's launched a very successful podcast called Can't Be Censored.
00:04:09.200And I noticed that he was streaming his testimony live and he had thousands and thousands of viewers.
00:04:13.920So congratulations to him for keeping his voice.
00:04:17.880But we heard today that he had always wanted to be a CBC journalist.
00:04:21.520But then when he got to CBC, he realized that CBC had really changed.
00:04:24.700He talks about his show Canada Tonight being pulled off the air.
00:04:28.300And he claims that he was sort of like treated as a token brown guy, basically tokenism on the airway.
00:04:34.740And, you know, he was he was bullied for basically asking Catherine Tate, the CBC, the head of the CBC to come on his show.
00:04:41.160So here is a clip of what that looked like.
00:04:44.140Now, many Canadians know the story about one of my tweets.
00:04:46.840In April 2024, I publicly stated that Canada Tonight had requested an interview with then CBC president Catherine Tate and the request was declined.
00:05:24.980wow so he actually contradicts the statement given by the president of the cbc pretty damning
00:05:32.260um stuff there catherine uh do you have any comment about that yeah i mean it was all part
00:05:38.300of the cbc's um cloak and digger approach they like to conceal a lot of things they definitely
00:05:44.440don't operate like a normal corporation it's very cult-like um there's a lot of secrecy there's a
00:05:50.960of control at the top by a very small group of people. And a lot of the things that we found out
00:05:56.620in Travis's case was done through ATIPS. And we couldn't believe some of the things that we
00:06:02.520discovered, but there'll be more that will come out, Candace. This case is going to go to a hearing.
00:06:07.580We will eventually have our day in court. There'll be people who testify. We have former
00:06:13.720CBC employees who really are dying for their chance to testify and speak about what they
00:06:20.480experience, which is very similar to what Travis experienced. So I think really what Canadians are
00:06:26.420seeing is the veil being lifted off of this giant corporation that gets so much of our taxpayer
00:06:32.540dollars, but operates in this very bizarre way. And it is very cult-like, Candace, because they
00:06:40.040also didn't want Travis to leave. This is the weird thing. They wouldn't accept his resignation.
00:06:45.600even when he said I'm leaving I'm resigning they're like no you're not and they were giving
00:06:50.800media statements saying he was still an employee when he had publicly resigned it didn't make any
00:06:57.220sense I remember that it's such a weird sort of like we own you you can't leave kind of situation
00:07:02.000well unbelievable I have another clip here I want to show you Dan Raj notes that his firing will
00:07:09.180have a chilling effect on others who might want to come out and criticize management and become
00:07:13.480whistleblowers. I mean, you're telling us that there are other whistleblowers yet to come
00:07:16.920forward. Here's what Travis had to say earlier today about whistleblowers.
00:07:20.640Now, inside the newsroom, the message was unmistakable and did not need to be spoken.
00:07:25.560I raised concerns. I challenged centralized control and bias. I fought for real diversity
00:07:30.440and equal standards. I tried to do my job as a journalist. Within months, I was pulled off the
00:07:36.280air, disciplined, restricted from speaking, stripped of my primetime program, and eventually
00:07:41.160out altogether. Now, if you were still working there, would you feel safe raising similar
00:07:46.760concerns? This is how silence becomes culture. It's how whistleblowers are intimidated.
00:07:53.920Public institutions do not weaken from scrutiny. They weaken when they avoid it.
00:07:59.100So what do you think about what he had to say there?
00:08:03.880I mean, he's absolutely right that there's a lot of fear for being a whistleblower.
00:08:07.980And we have another case that my law firm, Marshall Law, launched involving Carl Johnston.
00:08:13.980He will be testifying at a future committee hearing for this same committee that's been reporting on these issues.
00:08:23.820And, you know, he talks about there being a crying room in one of the CDC offices where employees are encouraged to go there to cry when they've been intimidated, bullied or abused.
00:08:34.240this is part of the normal culture at CBC. The NDA thing, that's all normal. They try and force
00:08:41.840those down so many people's throats. I mean, this is all normal at CBC, of course, but it's not
00:08:48.080normal in the real world. I have seen hundreds of workplaces as an employment lawyer. I've never
00:08:56.120seeing stuff like this um so you know travis is doing something very brave to speak out like that
00:09:05.080i mean that's scary for most people in media well you know canis there's a there's that fear of
00:09:10.360being blacklisted it's it's very real um and we've also heard from other cases and other whistle
00:09:18.200blowers who are coming forward that cbc does have a no hire list that they keep on record
00:09:26.120of the list of people who are not allowed to be hired at the CBC. And it's very openly talked
00:09:33.260about. There's emails. I'm in possession of emails. I reference it. I'm not surprised at all.
00:09:39.720Well, it sounds like it wasn't just internally, right? We know that they really loathe certain
00:09:43.940people who are independent-minded or independent-spirited, as Travis bravely proved. And
00:09:48.720just again, folks, he testified in front of a heritage committee. So this wasn't in front of
00:09:53.380court. This wasn't to do with his own case. This was just an opportunity that he had because I
00:09:57.860believe a conservative invited him to testify and it gave him the ability to sort of like,
00:10:02.500you know, like pull back the curtain a little bit and unveil some of the nastiness that happens at
00:10:07.700the state broadcaster. But this is just the beginning and hopefully his case will go to
00:10:11.540court, the Human Rights Tribunal, and then we'll just hear more and more. But, you know, it's not
00:10:15.860just a blacklist of people that won't be hired there. Based on his testimony, it sounded like
00:10:21.220They iced out having even conservative guests on his program.
00:11:16.920Conservative MP Kerry Dioit was asked specifically if he was allowed to have Pierre Paulyev on, and this is what Travis Danaroj had to say about that.
00:11:26.680You mentioned at one point that CBC management actually prevented you from interviewing Conservative leader Pierre Paulyev on your show.
00:15:16.020But if this is a pattern, right, you have to, if your staff on your own show are raising this, if people are leaving the program, you have to look a little bit deeper into it, as opposed to pulling me off the air for saying it's unfortunate the president didn't come on the show.
00:15:38.380I mean, it's really uncomfortable and disturbing to hear that in secret behind closed doors, this is these are the things that were being said about the Canadians that these journalists were covering and their stories, their job is to be objective.
00:15:55.620And the fact that these really malicious comments are being made behind those closed doors is very troubling.
00:16:04.540And it, of course, leads to other questions like, well, what else is being said?
00:16:08.660And, you know, thank goodness we have ATIPS.
00:16:16.200That's, you know, it doesn't matter what your view on the convoy is to to say that about a certain demographic of people when you don't even know them and you don't know their background or their, you know, the shoes they've walked in is deeply offensive.
00:16:31.360100 percent. So help us understand the ATIP process.
00:16:33.900I know when you're working in government, all of your emails are subject to this kind of disclosure and they could be ATIP.
00:16:39.740But does the same thing apply to members of the CBC?
00:16:43.380like their texts their emails are all available if if they're a tipped in the correct way
00:16:48.980yeah so because cbc is a crown corporation they are subject to the access to information laws so
00:16:54.980we were able to a tip them we ate of them all the time and um now you're going to get heavily
00:17:00.740redacted emails but we've received so many emails and i have to say the things that they put in
00:17:07.300emails it's like they don't even care they know they're being a tempted but i think they probably
00:17:12.180the arrogance is they think that they're impervious to any kind of repercussion right
00:17:18.300that they'll never get held to account so you can just file like a regular ATIP
00:17:25.820and to CEC and you will get information it will be redacted but we have been able to find a lot
00:17:33.020of things through that mechanism that we would never have been able to get any other way
00:17:38.200interesting interesting so has there been any response i've been sort of monitoring and looking
00:17:43.520to see whether the cbc i should to their credit they they did live stream it on their on their
00:17:47.280youtube page i think juno news had more live viewers than the cbc but uh you know i don't
00:17:52.860think they wanted live viewers i think that they would prefer that people weren't watching it and
00:17:55.940they certainly didn't air it on their actual uh news network despite travis denrush daring them
00:18:01.380and and telling them that they that they should um have you seen any response or have you heard
00:18:05.820anything from the CBC yet? Not from today, but you'll, this is the first time I'm going to share
00:18:11.500this publicly. It'll be on your show. Um, and I think this is really, when we talk about the
00:18:17.580arrogance and just the attitude that they have in their state of defense, the CBC, which they
00:18:24.680recently filed a few weeks ago, they claim that Travis has only launched his lawsuit in order to
00:18:33.340quote-unquote, embarrass certain journalists at the CDC, that he has done this all in bad faith.
00:18:42.860It's absurd. The idea that someone would fight like Travis was doing internally,
00:18:49.660like he was going through all the channels internally. He was trying to save this job.
00:18:54.300He was trying to do his job. He then finally manages to leave. They still don't let him leave.
00:19:00.940they claim he can't resign and then they force him into litigation and to have them claiming
00:19:09.160that he did all of this just to embarrass a couple of journalists I think tells you everything you
00:19:16.280need to hear about where their mindset is. Wow that that is quite shocking and not surprising
00:19:22.100though because this is exactly how the CBC operates. Okay Catherine so what are the next
00:19:26.900steps. What's next for Travis Danraj and when will we be finding out more about this incredibly
00:19:32.060explosive, unbelievable tell-all from Travis Danraj? Well, we've just filed a reply to their
00:19:39.260statement of defense and the CBC is asking the Canadian Human Rights Commission to dismiss
00:19:44.360Travis's entire claim on the basis that they claim it's just a bad faith effort to embarrass
00:19:50.860a couple of journalists. And they're also claiming that, you know, he could have gone to the union,
00:19:56.440And even though the union, by the way, was in bed with the CBC and was complicit in a lot of the bad things that happened to Travis.
00:20:03.960So we're going to be waiting to hear the outcome of that preliminary motion.