Rebel News journalist Ezra Levant has been banned from entering the UK ahead of a planned rally this weekend, and is suing the government for the move. Prime Minister Carney is once again musing about selling off public assets, including airports and port facilities, to private investors. Supporters of Alberta independence say media pundits are underestimating the number of conservatives who want out of Canada. And the Conservative Party of Canada is calling out the CBC over an elaborate sting operation that appeared to be aimed at discrediting conservative commentator, sitting MP, and John A. Macdonald.
00:03:41.220This is incredibly offensive and unethical.
00:03:45.420At a time when Canadians should be reflecting on and taking pride in our shared history,
00:03:50.580the CBC chose to mislead interviewees under false pretenses in pursuit of a program aimed at discrediting a foundational figure in Canadian history,
00:04:05.440Thomas wants a full public explanation of what the CBC did and why.
00:04:11.220mp aaron gunn was one of the targets of the sting and posted this on x wait until people find out
00:04:19.620how this cbc show tried unsuccessfully to manipulate and deceive a sitting member of parliament on its
00:04:26.420crusade to further attack canada's history and smear the reputation of canada's first prime
00:04:32.420minister aaron welcome to the show thank you for having me tell us how this transpired take us back0.76
00:04:40.660to when you were approached by this uh group aligned with the cbc well before they even tried
00:04:48.500contacting me directly they reached out to uh some former associates of mine back when i was
00:04:53.860actually making documentaries and tried to to bribe to contract to entice them uh to basically
00:05:00.740land me in their words or book me as the feature interview for this new documentary that they were
00:05:06.500working on about Sir John A. Macdonald. And in their words, the documentary that they were
00:05:14.820looking to make was one that was looking to bring balance to the conversation around Canada's first
00:05:19.940Prime Minister to defend his legacy and all things like this. And they didn't get super far
00:05:29.120with these contacts and friends of mine. So then they reached out to our office directly
00:05:34.600um we didn't hadn't heard of this company before the individuals behind it we did some research
00:05:40.860there were websites they seemed like a legit company although they didn't have a very long
00:05:44.680track record or history and the instinct was of course we'd love to talk anyone who wants to talk
00:05:50.400about canadian history and the importance of preserving our identity and national symbolism
00:05:54.720was conversations that i enjoy having but we ended up not doing the interview just because the
00:06:00.260company didn't seem to have any track record and they were so eager to they originally wanted to
00:06:05.180do the interview in Vancouver then they offered to fly their entire crew to Campbell River where
00:06:09.880I live they wouldn't give us really details on who else they were talking to so we ended up
00:06:14.460not proceeding with that interview but a number of other Canadian citizens such as Lindsay Shepard
00:06:19.480a children's author were ensnared in this what turned out to be a very elaborate
00:06:25.120kind of setup of fake companies, fake names, interviewing people under false pretenses.
00:06:34.220They created fake merchandise, and of course, all using taxpayer money. And it's just, you know,
00:06:42.080I always thought journalism was supposed to be about the unvarnished pursuit of the truth and
00:06:45.580holding the powerful accountable. And this instead seems to use taxpayer money to basically try to
00:06:52.560silence and humiliate, I guess, what you might call dissident views and to try to kind of
00:07:00.740mislead and deceive opposition members of parliament? I mean, this may have been an attempt
00:07:06.620at spoofing you, at maybe humor. I mean, I don't know how the CBC is going to justify this,
00:07:16.480but I'm going to assume that that's the direction that they'll say that this was really all about
00:07:22.560you know, making people laugh, but you're suggesting that this was really, uh, much more
00:07:31.260harmful in terms of how it proceeded using essentially means that could be construed and
00:07:39.100could be investigated under, under a fraud, um, investigation. You know, if you look at it,
00:07:44.660because what they said with the, what they presented themselves as turned out to be completely
00:07:50.320false um what what was going through their minds what were they trying to do here
00:07:57.620well look i think it's a it's it was a piece of political propaganda that's another example of
00:08:04.520the taxpayer funded state broadcaster trying to use their resources to target um opposition
00:08:11.180members of parliament or those that hold conservative viewpoints i think that it's um
00:08:18.720Look, if this was a private entity, the other thing is this is, I mean, they're going to say that this was some kind of, you know, spoofing or comedic show.
00:08:28.700Even in their funding application, they refer to it as a form of social action.
00:08:33.680And that might have been their messaging track, but make no mistake, this was a piece of political propaganda.
00:08:38.960They partnered with American producers to try to smear the reputation of Canada's first prime minister and the reputation of anyone who dared defend him or Canada's history for that matter.
00:08:52.980So I think it is completely beneath the already low bar that the CBC had set for itself over the past few years.
00:09:03.620and you know at this time when i thought we're all supposed to be on the the team canada
00:09:09.620bandwagon here they are again trying to discredit canadian history and using
00:09:14.340these kind of low tactics and american media personalities to achieve it and by the way i
00:09:20.720mean just to remind people cbc gets their funding from heritage canada so the entity that's supposed
00:09:27.140to be out there promoting Canada's identity and history is literally funding these smear spoof
00:09:33.780projects in partnership with Americans to take down the father of confederation and any individual
00:09:40.820who was decided to go out there and defend him in public. And spending tens of thousands, I want to
00:09:48.360say hundreds of thousands of dollars. I mean, this sounds like a very elaborate and expensive
00:09:52.940enterprise that the CBC was on. And when people want to know what they've spent that extra 150
00:09:58.860million on, which they got from the current government, they won't say, well, that's none
00:10:03.600of your business. I want to read part of the letter that was sent by your colleague, Rachel
00:10:09.680Thomas. And this was sent to the president of the CBC. This is incredibly offensive and unethical
00:10:17.220at a time when Canadians should be reflecting on and taking pride in our shared history. The CBC
00:10:22.840chose to mislead interviewees under false pretenses in pursuit of a program aimed at
00:10:29.740discrediting a foundational figure in Canadian history, all the while using taxpayer dollars.
00:10:36.540Are you expecting that the president of the CBC will come forward and give you
00:10:41.300some kind of accounting of what was done and justifying it in whatever way she can?
00:10:48.060Well, there needs to be an explanation. Again, if this was a private sector
00:10:52.460company you can disagree and criticize their methods but ultimately we live in a free country
00:10:59.540but this is a taxpayer the taxpayer funded state broadcaster engaging in juvenile behavior like
00:11:07.640this that quite frankly you would you would expect more from a university fraternity than you would
00:11:12.560from what's supposed to be kind of the broadcaster of record so it's unfortunately it's going to be
00:11:20.240We're going to be sending another letter myself to the CBC Ombudsman later today, demanding
00:11:26.420accountability for this, demanding an explanation on who thought this was a good use of taxpayer