Juno News - Maxime Bernier speaks out after arrest in Manitoba

00:00:00.000 you're tuned in to the andrew lawton show

00:00:03.520 they say a picture is worth a thousand words not sure how many pictures a video is worth

00:00:13.400 but i do want you to take a look at this because what you will see

00:00:16.600 is more insane than how i could ever imagine describing it for you

00:00:22.280 afternoon sir yes with the rcmp yeah i can get you step out of the vehicle i'm gonna place you

00:00:28.540 under arrest right now yeah right now you're under arrest under the provincial health orders

00:00:38.680 okay so if you can just put your hands behind your back face towards the vehicle

00:00:41.300 okay give me one hand here i'll just use the same as you okay

00:00:46.000 the other hand do you have any weapons or anything on you sir

00:00:51.340 weapon no no weapon only my words anything like that sorry anything on you that's gonna hurt me

00:00:57.340 or anything like that no no anything without you only my words only my philosophy only what i

00:01:02.060 believe in okay all right come on over this way i'll explain a few things that you hear right away

00:01:06.600 in that video people's party of canada leader maxime bernier arrested by the rcmp in rural manitoba

00:01:20.780 not just given a ticket or a fine for violating some lockdown restriction but as you can see

00:01:25.520 ordered out of his vehicle frisked handcuffed put in the back of a police car and then taken to jail

00:01:32.380 where he stayed for the better part of friday afternoon late into the evening was eventually

00:01:38.080 released on bail but as we'll talk about shortly you can never get that time back time that your

00:01:43.840 liberty has been taken away time you've been forced to spend behind bars maxime bernier's been

00:01:49.260 unapologetic about this he says he has a right to stand up for his constitutional freedoms let's talk

00:01:54.400 about that with him now maxime bernier people's party of canada leader joins me on the line maxime

00:01:59.680 good to talk to you thanks for coming on thank you andrew now you're back home now so they didn't

00:02:05.280 detain you for too long correct yes eight hours that was long enough and one thing that people would

00:02:12.840 have seen there and heard there in the video that i thought was very clever and very important which was

00:02:17.620 that they asked you when they're doing the arrest if you had any weapons and you said only my words

00:02:22.680 explain that yeah first of all because it's uh it's not about covid anymore it's about political

00:02:28.920 repression as you know just uh thursday before i started my tour in manitoba friday morning i was

00:02:37.080 arrested friday at two o'clock p.m and released around 11 o'clock p.m the same day but it was all

00:02:45.580 about you know not the the premier of manitoba mr pallister didn't want me to be there and actually

00:02:53.340 he did a press conference the day before thursday and he said if maxime bernier is coming here his wallet

00:03:00.300 will be affected so he he he doesn't want and and political opposition and so you know i did uh my

00:03:12.200 goal to do uh meetings with people in little town in manitoba i started at 11 o'clock little town there

00:03:19.520 and i had a meeting outside in a park and with my partisan and uh and the members of the people's

00:03:27.740 party of canada and my goal was as a politician to be ready for the next election i'm campaigning

00:03:33.900 all across the country and as you know the people's party of canada is the only party uh against

00:03:39.800 these draconian lockdowns so i i spoke with them and i answered their questions we were 15 there and

00:03:47.540 just after that event the first one in the morning friday the police came and gave me two tickets and

00:03:54.500 they said if you do another rally you have a chance to be arrested so after that i knew that i was

00:04:01.860 taking a chance and i called my lawyer and he told me maxime it's it's your constitutional rights to

00:04:08.660 travel across the province and to speak europe politicians and you have to explain your platform

00:04:14.580 you have to gain support and we understand that so i decided to do the second event in a little village

00:04:21.060 uh saint pierre jolly about a thousand people maybe an hour south of winnipeg and we did that rally in a

00:04:29.780 park and at that time i think we were eight including myself outside social distancing and i was speaking to

00:04:38.740 them and actually the uh kovid 19 uh held orders in manitoba they they're not allowing a meeting outside

00:04:49.700 more than five person so and after that rally police came and you saw it in the video and they arrest me

00:04:58.020 and handcuffed me and treated me like a criminal uh just because you know i was exhausting i was speaking

00:05:05.780 my freedom of speech my freedom of assembly and actually i was the only one all the other person

00:05:11.940 over there didn't have any tickets they were not in jail that was motivated by the premier of alberta

00:05:21.140 and and to try to stop me to campaign i was supposed to have a big rally a real open to the public

00:05:28.420 uh and so but the police released me around 11 11 30 p.m friday night and they were very direct that i

00:05:47.620 was not welcome and i must take the first flight back to montreal that's what i did uh early saturday

00:05:54.260 morning so so that's that's crazy that now a politician cannot speak in in in a province of

00:06:01.860 our country it's like being in china if your plan was to fight this and to take these tickets to court

00:06:09.220 eventually and to stand up for your rights why not go ahead with the saturday rally why did you decide to

00:06:14.740 to basically go along with what the province wanted and go back home yeah first of all because

00:06:20.420 actually i will be back in manitoba i will campaign in manitoba as soon as i would be able to do that

00:06:27.140 second i need to appeal in from the court one of the conditions for me was to uh bail uh 100 000

00:06:34.740 dollars to be sure for them to be sure that i'll be in manitoba july the 27th and i will i will do that

00:06:42.420 uh contestation in court and and we will we will win that for sure so and also the other risk for me was

00:06:51.940 to be back in jail for more than eight hours until the 27 uh june 27 and i don't have time for that

00:07:01.380 you know we'll be in an electoral campaign maybe early this so far so and i had a plan to campaign

00:07:07.460 all across the country the risk was too high for me to be in jail for a longer time and and i had the

00:07:14.660 full agenda during the summer time one interesting aspect of this is that they accused you of violating

00:07:21.460 the the gathering restrictions and also of violating the province's provincial quarantine so if anyone

00:07:28.100 goes from out of the province to manitoba they say they have to isolate for for 14 days unless they're

00:07:33.460 given an exemption and and i actually wanted to do some filming of a documentary i'm working on in manitoba

00:07:39.220 and specifically didn't because of that policy although we are supposedly in canada guaranteed free

00:07:45.620 movement between provinces this has been a hallmark as old as confederation was that something you were

00:07:51.140 very aware of going into it that you know within provinces provinces don't have the right to put up barriers

00:07:57.780 yeah absolutely yes because the uh the civil servant at the head of the department of health in manitoba

00:08:05.860 sent me later the day before saying that i'm not welcome and if i'm going there i need to quarantine

00:08:12.660 like you just said for 15 days and my answer was public to that i tweeted uh just after that that you

00:08:19.700 know i have a constitutional rights to travel across this country and i will i will be there and that's why

00:08:27.460 you know uh they they arrest me but that's unconstitutional illegal and all that is not based on science

00:08:34.980 anymore it's based on complaint compliance it's an authoritarian government in uh in manitoba and

00:08:43.620 and i will fight that in court july 27th so let's talk about the politicians that are putting this

00:08:52.180 forward we have not seen in ontario where i live anyone as of i'm that i'm aware of offhand jailed

00:08:58.740 for this but in alberta which has conservative premier jason kenney we've seen pastors behind bars

00:09:04.260 in manitoba which has a premier who positions himself as a conservative brian pallister we have

00:09:10.260 seen you jailed why is it that we're seeing these from conservative governments that are traditionally

00:09:16.980 supposed to be the most freedom-loving governments the most freedom-loving politicians you're absolutely

00:09:22.500 right about that i hope i can have the answer of your questions and if you look at in bc it's an ndp

00:09:29.620 government and they were the freest uh province or in all the country i was there before and i was able

00:09:36.740 to eat in a restaurant inside uh without any uh uh recognition measures and being free to do what you

00:09:44.580 want to do in a bc government in in in an ndp government sorry bc so i really don't understand

00:09:52.260 and speaking about alberta i know personally jason kenny i was sitting with him around the cabinet table

00:09:59.300 when i was a conservative minister when he was a minister he was a real conservative at that time

00:10:05.860 now i don't recognize him i i think all these are premiers and you can include the the premiers of

00:10:11.860 quebec logo they are following the establishment medical experts and and they don't want to have 0.99

00:10:19.300 any other point of view uh and this they scared the population in the beginning and actually in quebec

00:10:25.940 as you know andrew they spent more than 135 million dollars last year to uh to on advertising on

00:10:34.900 covid19 it was pure propaganda more than every order provincial uh governments in this country so

00:10:42.980 with all that money that they spent the fear and i think they they they enjoy also their authoritarian

00:10:49.620 powers i really don't understand why it's supposed to be conservative uh government that are uh that are

00:10:57.620 doing these uh lockdowns and it is also worth noting that right now we have justin trudeau overseas

00:11:04.420 elbow to elbow shoulder to shoulder with with all of these world leaders but also let's go back to

00:11:09.700 last year justin trudeau took a knee at a black lives matter protest in ottawa which was an illegal

00:11:16.580 protest he took a knee there surrounded by his own police officers the rcmp they didn't arrest him but

00:11:23.060 the rcmp in manitoba arrests you and not only arrests you by giving you a ticket but but actually

00:11:29.140 handcuffed and put to jail and the double standard is incredibly incredibly stark here they don't like

00:11:35.860 they don't like the opposition they don't like what i'm saying and it's why i said that you know

00:11:40.420 the only weapon is my words i'm a politician and what i believe and they don't like that because

00:11:47.220 they're not they're not following our constitution and they don't want that to be well known uh they

00:11:52.740 they prefer to keep their their authoritarian powers with that uh health or with these health orders uh 0.54

00:11:59.940 so so i i feel like uh not being in canada uh it's sad it's sad that this is happening in 2021 in our

00:12:09.700 country and if you look around the world like you just said in us it's all open you can do the majority

00:12:16.340 of the states are open no more lockdowns uh in other countries also but here in canada we are one

00:12:22.340 of the worst um it's uh we need to fight and i don't understand that we don't have any opposition

00:12:29.700 in provincial uh parliaments or legislatures and also in in ottawa the official opposition

00:12:36.820 are not opposing that they are not doing their job uh it's um it's it we are in a crazy world

00:12:44.340 well when ontario mpp randy hillier was charged at queen's park i believe it was a few months ago

00:12:51.140 i had said that an opposition politician being charged for protesting the government is a story

00:12:57.860 you'd expect to see in belarus in china in russia but it's happening in canada they went one step

00:13:04.500 further with you and actually put you in jail again opposition politician jailed not a headline we

00:13:10.660 would expect to see in canada but you are right to point out that this is very political the people

00:13:16.340 that are prosecuted are people who protest against the government uh absolutely absolutely and they

00:13:23.460 don't they don't want us you know we are uh dissident and and they don't want any dissident and they will

00:13:32.020 they will have to deal with it and i'll be back in manitoba i'll be back on the road this week uh you

00:13:37.940 know it's too important it's not about maximum it's not about the people's party of canada it's about our

00:13:44.020 ideas or values or freedom and i i hope that a lot of people will look at it twice you know we are in

00:13:51.700 canada and we cannot take for granted our freedoms anymore people must realize that and they must do

00:13:57.380 the fight and i will certainly cover that when you are back in court so thanks for coming on maxine

00:14:02.420 bernier leader of the people's party of canada always a pleasure max thank you andrew have a nice day

00:14:07.540 thanks for listening to the andrew lawton show support the program by donating to true north at www.tnc.news

Juno News - June 16, 2021

Maxime Bernier speaks out after arrest in Manitoba

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