00:01:04.320It's like, you know, I don't know if you guys watch basketball, but it's like the Boston Celtics hosting the Washington Wizards on their home court.
00:01:11.060And they're losing or the Leafs losing to the Winnipeg Jets in the Scotiabank Arena.
00:01:16.400I don't know if that's a good analogy, if the Jets are good or not.
00:01:37.360That's exactly what I'm trying to articulate here.
00:01:39.600But Claude Clark and Aria, you know, they can provide us with a lot of entertainment before, is it March 7th that they're picking the new leader?
00:02:08.360My name's Isaac Lamoureux, and I'll be hosting Off the Record today.
00:02:11.420I'm here with my colleagues, Cosmin Georgia and Noah Jarvis.
00:02:15.380So, yeah, we're going to start off with, of course, the looming U.S. tariffs, which has been leading the news headlines over the past few weeks because it's an issue that still hasn't been dealt with.
00:02:26.260That being President-elect Donald Trump's proposed 25% tariffs, which is set to take effect when he's sworn in or directly thereafter on January 20th, which is the day of his inauguration.
00:02:39.960So we've seen lots of different responses from Canadian leaders, specifically recently from Poilievre, who proposed retaliatory tariffs.
00:02:49.560And we've seen similar measures proposed by some premiers, like Doug Ford.
00:02:56.340But other premiers have taken a different stance, like Alberta Premier Daniel Smith, who completely said, we don't want to retaliate with oil and gas.
00:03:05.440We want to find a way to work together with Trump and make this happen.
00:03:08.740And we've seen a rift develop between Smith and Trudeau and even the other premiers now.
00:03:16.160What do you guys think of the developments going on with these tariffs as we get closer and closer to the inevitable date of January 20th?
00:03:23.960So it was in a recent interview that Pierre Polyev essentially said that if he's elected prime minister, he's willing to use retaliatory tariffs.
00:03:34.420Now, it's not very clear what that would look like, but I spent a little bit of time digging up what are the major exports that the U.S. sends to Canada that could be a potential target for tariffs.
00:04:31.600We're such an intertwined allies and economies that when one side gets impacted, the other will.
00:04:40.820You might look back at the 2008 financial crisis with Stephen Harper, right, where Canada was able to avoid much of that catastrophe that the U.S. faced.
00:04:50.160And that's one instance where we were able to sort of decouple.
00:04:54.200But I think at this point with our trade relationship, we are so intertwined that when Trump introduces these tariffs, he will be also facing pressure from some of these industries back home to sort of soften up and perhaps come to the negotiating table with a conciliatory approach.
00:05:11.460Yeah, Trudeau and Canada's premiers also recently held a meeting, and we saw them come out with a joint statement, which only the government of Alberta opposed.
00:05:24.420But we've also seen some federal ministers, like, for example, Melanesia Lee, saying that, oh, we'll just threaten to cut off oil.
00:05:33.860But we've seen Smith explain that it's not that simple because to cut off American oil from Alberta, you'd also have to cut off Ontario and Quebec.
00:05:43.920So, yeah, Noah, did you see anything out of that premier's meeting that you found interesting?
00:05:49.980Yeah, I thought it was very interesting that Daniel Smith came so aggressively against the joint statement that the premiers and the federal government had issued.
00:06:00.760And it's really because, as you guys have mentioned, energy.
00:06:05.200Alberta, they do not want to impose restrictions on their ability to export oil and natural gas to the United States.
00:06:13.100Specifically, they don't want to shut down their oil pipelines.
00:06:16.820And that makes a lot of sense, not only for the Albertan oil and gas sector.
00:06:21.880I mean, if you are shutting down oil sales to the United States, that means that you're not really generating any revenue.
00:06:29.180And your employees and your economy in general will suffer.
00:06:34.160And not only that, but provinces like Ontario and Quebec, they rely on pipelines that go through the United States to supply and help to power those economies.
00:06:45.240So the Ontario economy and the Quebec economy will definitely suffer, will definitely have to deal with either energy shortages or an increase in the price of energy because there is a lack of supply there.
00:06:56.980So it's not in the interest of Canada to cut off these pipelines that go down to the United States, especially the ones that have to go to the United States to go back up to Canada.
00:07:08.200And I think that Premier Smith has to advocate for her province's interests.
00:07:15.260And it makes sense that at the Premier's meeting, she is doing so.
00:07:19.440However, if Canada wants to take the approach of really going after American consumers,
00:07:26.260then one of the things that Canada probably has to consider is an export tax on Canadian oil and natural gas.
00:07:35.120However, this is something that Premier Smith has also came out against.
00:07:38.240She put out a post on Twitter and basically it shows that the Aubertin government has no sort of plans to help the Trudeau government or any government in Ottawa in making oil and gas more expensive for American consumers.
00:07:57.680Now, this is a challenge because Canada, a lot of our exports to the United States are in the energy sector, about 33%.
00:08:07.640So this means that we'd have to place tariffs on things like automobile parts, cars.
00:08:15.100You'd have to place them on chemical products, mineral exports.
00:08:19.300You'd have to place them on, say, aluminum exports.
00:08:21.560And these are all things that the United States definitely does require.
00:08:27.640But there's also the question of elasticity, whether or not the United States has the ability to supplant Canadian exports with their own domestically produced products or from stuff that is imported from around the world.
00:08:42.980So it's definitely something that the provinces and the federal government have to juggle.
00:08:47.620And it doesn't look as if coming out of that premier's meeting that the premiers and the federal government are coordinated in their efforts.
00:08:55.300Just if I could jump off that, who would the United States be getting oil from?
00:08:59.880Well, they would be getting oil from Maduro's Venezuela and such.
00:09:04.040So it's obviously quite sketchy and suspect, the sources of oil that they might be willing to transition to.
00:09:11.280But I mentioned Stephen Harper earlier a little bit, and I wanted to bring him up again.
00:09:16.920You know, I talked about his handling of the 2008 financial crisis.
00:09:20.480But Stephen Harper actually chimed in on the current discussion.
00:09:25.260You know, he's made his rare, you know, several-month foray into Canadian politics.
00:09:31.580He seems to be sort of out of view most of these days.
00:09:35.180But he does provide some input, and we have a clip of that.
00:09:39.860And I think it's important because he also does bring up oil.
00:09:42.700But he also has quite a lot of good things to say about the U.S.-Canada economic and trade relationship.
00:09:51.240Incoming President Trump has focused a lot on Canada in the last several weeks, threatening tariffs of 25%, unless there's a curb of the flow of drugs and migrants.
00:10:00.600He talked about spending, that the U.S. spends, according to President Trump, about $200 billion a year protecting Canada.
00:10:08.920Went on saying he doesn't need, the U.S. doesn't need Canada's lumber, cars, or dairy, and maybe even Canada should be a 51st state.
00:10:15.760A lot out there just in a couple weeks.
00:10:20.360You know, what's your reaction to all of that?
00:10:21.900Well, I must admit some degree of surprise.
00:10:28.520You know, we've always, and I was, you know, ran a, in fact, our Conservative Party is a very, you know, pro-American, pro-Western party.
00:10:37.020I was probably the most pro-American prime minister in the history of our country.
00:10:42.520I view our relationship with the United States as one of Canada's great assets.
00:10:48.740You are our closest neighbor, our vital security partner, and, you know, not just our friend and shared comrade in the propagation of the values of the free and democratic world everywhere.
00:11:04.700And I've always viewed this as a tremendous partnership.
00:11:10.620I understand that, you know, Donald Trump may want some changes in trade arrangements, but I must admit to being shocked by some of the things he said.
00:11:31.580Canada, it is true that Canada presently has a modest trade surplus with the United States.
00:11:38.920The reason, Gabe, we do is because you buy so much of our oil and gas.
00:11:44.060So Harper sat down for a podcast-like interview with Gabe Groisman for about 30 minutes, and I watched the entire interview and wrote an article on it.
00:11:51.880And throughout the majority of the interview, it was Harper going through all the recent statements made by Donald Trump and kind of whether he disagreed with him or agreed with him.
00:12:00.700And while he disagreed with many or most of them even, he did, of course, find common ground with Trump on the border crisis, talking about the issues there and even criticizing President Joe Biden for how he's handled the border and what's led it to get to the point where it is with drugs, crime, migrants, illegal migrants, that is, overflowing through it.
00:12:24.160But I'm curious, though, guys, to ask what you thought of Harper's position with Canada's relationship with the United States and maybe how that compares to how Trudeau or the Liberals have positioned Canada.
00:12:37.340I mean, Harper's really spent a lot of time talking about how the importance, of course, of the Canada-US relationship and how we're allies, trading partners, et cetera.
00:12:45.760Yeah, what did you guys take away from that?
00:12:49.120I thought Harper's insights were, you know, very important.
00:12:53.260And I think, you know, it really highlighted one of the main problems that the Trudeau government has delivered on the footsteps of Canadians over these past nine years.
00:13:02.340And it's that they have positioned Canada in a unique position to where we are just unable to adequately respond to the threat that the tariffs from the United States pose on Canada and our economy.
00:13:17.200The Harper government, they did a really good job in trying to expand trade relationships with other countries.
00:13:22.780They signed dozens of free trade agreements with the countries around the world.
00:13:27.580It doesn't mean, you know, we particularly do a lot of trade with, like, the Philippines or, like, you know, Congo or whatever.
00:13:33.540But that does mean that we have the opportunity to trade with these countries.
00:13:38.780But the Trudeau government, they did not really articulate much of an interest in, you know, developing these trade relationships.
00:13:44.680Sure, they developed some trade relationships with the Asian countries, but they didn't really do a good job at expanding on the Harper legacy.
00:13:52.480And they also hampered the oil and gas industry, as Harper mentioned.
00:13:56.500And they had done everything in their power to basically regulate Canada's economy and tax Canada's economy into a position where we're just not growing.
00:14:08.620So it makes it really hard for us to then respond to, you know, 25% tariffs from the United States.
00:14:16.080And what Harper really emphasized is that, you know, these tariffs are not exactly a good idea for either country.
00:14:22.560They're going to increase prices in the United States, and they're going to be very harmful for Canadian manufacturers and American manufacturers,
00:14:28.880especially, say, in the automobile sector, where these economies are very integrated.
00:14:32.980So we should really be seeking to deepen the economic partnership that we have with the United States, and that would be in the best interest of all of our citizens.
00:14:44.980You know, deepening our trade or getting rid of trade barriers, deepening our labor mobility and the ability for Canada to bring in high end talent, not from, you know, countries that don't share a common culture with Canada,
00:15:00.820but from the United States, which shares a pretty culture that's quite common in Canada.
00:15:06.740So Harper's insights really show how Canada really did not put itself in a good position to deal with these tariffs in the past nine years,
00:15:15.320and why, you know, these tariffs really are not in our interest.
00:15:18.960And I think, you know, if that Harper economic sense were in the prime minister's office these past few years,
00:15:25.180it would have made a big difference in responding and how we could respond to the tariff threats.
00:15:33.300Cosman, did you want to add anything from the Harper interview?
00:15:36.380Anything you took away that might be of interest?
00:15:38.260Well, he did say he was the most pro-U.S. prime minister, and I do agree with that, probably in some good ways, some bad ways, some controversial ways.
00:15:49.960You know, he continued Canada's presence in Afghanistan.
00:15:53.840He also adopted some of the similar policies imposed in the U.S. with like the Patriot Act,
00:16:00.300and he created, he emboldened and gave more powers to Canada's security establishment.
00:16:04.880And some people view that as controversial.
00:27:38.200And we're talking about certain ridings.
00:27:40.260There's a handful of ridings that were within a few dozen votes.
00:27:44.600So if you're not at least questioning whether the process was run properly, I think that's like the democratic thing to do to say, let's make sure we got this right, that the people's vote was counted properly, and that there was no mucking about in the process of it.
00:28:05.180Right. And to say that any criticism that there is no such thing as human error and any criticism of ballot counting and the way the election is conducted is anti-democratic is ridiculous.
00:28:19.060It is the democratic thing to do to have scrutiny of elections.
00:28:24.060Now, what we're talking about here specifically, I think the most convincing argument that the BC Conservatives have put forward relates to the Surrey-Guildford riding, which was won by the BC NDP candidate by a margin of 22 votes.
00:28:44.140And what they're alleging is that there is a group home where there's people with dementia, with different mental health concerns.
00:28:53.500It's called Argyll Lodge, and they're alleging that there were some voter irregularities here.
00:29:00.960And now they filed the candidate, the Conservative candidate for that riding has filed a legal complaint.
00:29:07.400And Elections BC is looking into it, and they have several affidavits from residents at this center or lodge, which claim that they received mail-in ballots without actually requesting them when there was a ballot location directly across the street from this facility.
00:29:32.040And they're not prevented from leaving the facility, they have free roam, they can exit the facility and go vote if they wanted to.
00:29:40.240There are also allegations that some of the residents didn't even know there was an election happening.
00:29:46.240There are allegations that there are people who cast mail-in ballots who don't have their wits about them, they suffer from mental health concerns, confusion, etc.
00:29:55.420There are allegations that they were told to mark the X in the box, quote-unquote, on these mail-in ballots.
00:30:03.360And there are also allegations that some of them felt pressure that if they didn't cast this mail-in ballot, they might not be treated fairly at this facility.
00:30:12.620And also, there is Elections BC data that shows that the manager in question of this location is a BC NDP donor in 2023.
00:30:26.560Now, I would like to add for the record that the manager has said that there is no wrongdoing, and they've disputed the claims that the BC Conservatives have made.
00:30:37.860There has been no court to actually overturn any election results yet.
00:30:44.040That particular writing actually went into a judicial recount, and the Supreme Court of British Columbia certified the voting results.
00:30:54.840But the question is, was the BC Supreme Court aware of this particular facility?
00:31:01.420I don't think so, because this is the first time it's been brought up.
00:31:04.760So, an investigation has been launched by Elections BC.
00:31:08.900The BC Conservative leader, John Rustad, has made several recommendations to bring forward more evidence.
00:31:16.200And essentially, they've also filed a complaint with the RCMP to investigate violations of the BC Elections Act.
00:31:26.060So, all of this combined, it is quite a bomb to throw into the election, whether it will actually turn into a by-election, which I think might be the outcome they hope for is a by-election in this specific writing to do it over again.
00:31:45.440People aren't certain, and it's not obvious that the courts will actually be willing to take that step to relaunch an election just so soon after it happens.
00:32:00.500So, again, if it does happen, we're talking about a very slim majority for the NDP.
00:32:06.000They lose one seat, and it's pretty much game over for them.
00:32:10.260So, yeah, a lot happening in British Columbia, and it makes one wonder whether, you know, I've seen on social media, a lot of people were concerned about how the elections, BC, ran the last election.
00:32:24.060They took so long to certify votes and count mail-in ballots.
00:32:27.680And is there enough faith in mail-in ballots, right?
00:32:31.540Like, I would throw that question to you guys.
00:32:36.220Well, for example, we know, in Alberta at least, there's been a lot of developments around election integrity, not just mail-in ballots, but, for example, electronic tabulators have been the main point of discussion.
00:32:50.840And Smith and her government have been steadfast in their view that hand-counted ballots from voting stations are the main, the best way forward.
00:33:01.120But, Cosman, I just wanted to ask quickly, because you only alluded to this.
00:33:03.760If this, say, an investigation occurred and there was wrongdoing found and this rioting flipped, what would that mean for the provincial government in BC?
00:33:12.980Yeah, so they won with a slim majority.
00:33:15.140They had to, essentially, nominate somebody to be Speaker of the House because nobody else wanted to do it.
00:33:23.780So that leaves them with very little wiggle room.
00:33:27.300They've had to create a coalition with the Green MLAs, and I think there's two that were elected, which gives them majority status.
00:33:37.660And, you know, they'll have to negotiate and do certain things that the Greens ask of them to continue being in power.
00:33:46.480But whether they will actually last a full mandate of four years, that's yet to be seen.
00:33:52.220We're talking about a situation where somebody misses, you know, they don't, they hit the snooze button too many times and they don't show up for a crucial vote.
00:34:01.580Or, God forbid, you know, somebody gets in an accident, somebody passes away, somebody is ill, you know, somebody goes on maternity leave, right?
00:34:11.060There are so many circumstances that could push this government into a non-confidence vote, which would surely be triggered by the BC Conservatives triggering another election in British Columbia.
00:34:24.320And that would leave, you know, the official opposition, John Rustad, when he was elected, he promised to trigger election as soon as possible.
00:34:36.320And, Noah, what do you think about the whole mail-in ballots situation?
00:34:40.900Should elections just be at voting stations and hand-counted?
00:34:46.140I think the simpler an election is conducted, the better.
00:34:49.600A lot of people definitely distressed when, you know, you have to mail in your ballots, when you're punching a vote into a machine, you know, electronic voting systems.
00:35:01.160These sort of intermediaries to, you know, the voter and the actual election results really is harmful to the trust, you know, in elections.
00:35:10.660And we saw that in the United States in the 2020 election where, because of COVID-19, they had to conduct an election where a lot of ballots were mailed in.
00:35:20.060And the Republicans, they brought up a lot of concerns with these mail-in ballots, so much so that it basically caused a mini-political crisis in that country.
00:35:29.500Now, we haven't had, you know, the same level, same level of concerns as we have, that they have in the United States.
00:35:37.460Alberta, they have worked towards making some electoral reforms, but there's definitely concerns with, say, ballot harvesting.
00:35:45.420You know, if you have parties going around basically offering to collect ballots and mail them in on behalf of the voter, you know, there could be some nefarious going on with, you know, ballot harvesting.
00:35:57.260You could have ballots that get damaged in the mail.
00:36:00.380You know, what if someone decides during election season to pour a cup of coffee down a Canada Post bin?
00:36:06.140Now you have a bunch of ballots that get ruined.
00:36:09.440You know, there are serious things that can be done to just interfere with an election when there are mail-in ballots.
00:36:15.940I, you know, I'm not, like, the smartest guy in Canada, and I was able to come up with a way to tarnish a bunch of ballots in five seconds.
00:36:22.980So I'm pretty sure, you know, much more devious and much more intellectual people can come up with ways to, you know, go about rigging an election or, at the very least, messing with the integrity of an election.
00:36:34.860Now, there's no real, concrete, definitive evidence to say that the B.C. conservatives are right on this issue when it comes to the election being illegitimate in this rioting.
00:36:47.980But when you have mail-in ballots, when you have electronic tabulators, when you have these sort of intermediaries between the voter and the election results, you're going to create more and more distrust.
00:37:00.420And, you know, there are real serious Democratic consequences to this.
00:37:06.000So I hope that Elections B.C. does everything they can in their power to ensure the validity of the election results and hope that we have the we get a result that results in the Democrat, the Democratic process being played out to its conclusion.
00:37:22.420Conclusion and voters being enfranchised to make sure that they are actually, you know, being able to vote for the people that are ruling over them rather than just, you know, giving blind hope in and blind faith in Elections B.C.
00:37:38.780If I may just bring this back to the liberal leadership, that was a situation where the party was facing so much scrutiny over their membership rules, right?
00:37:50.600We have the Liberal Party of Canada essentially only requiring proof of residence within Canada.
00:37:58.080You don't have to be a permanent resident.
00:37:59.720You don't have to be a Canadian citizen to become a Liberal Party member.
00:38:04.720All you have to do is prove that you somehow have spent time in Canada and they were forced because of all the scrutiny from the Elections Canada, you know, past campaigners from just the media and political world itself and security establishment to revise those rules, at least for the Liberal leadership race, where if you want to vote in the Liberal leadership, you now have to prove that you're a Canadian citizen.
00:38:33.760Or a permanent resident because of the implications and all of the unanswered questions we have to this day regarding foreign interference in Canada's elections.
00:38:45.900You know, we have claims about Chinese seniors being bussed by the consulate to independent MP Handong's writing when he was nominated for the Liberal candidacy in the last election.
00:39:03.840There are powers trying to influence our election and the more stringent and secure the voting process is, the more confidence you inspire in the average voter.
00:39:18.700Yeah, and just briefly, the last thing we'll maybe touch on here, Cosmin, I'm curious, with the federal election looming, do you think Canadians nationwide should have similar concerns and whether there's anything the Liberals or Elections Canada, for example, could implement to make sure that our elections are the most secure that they can be?
00:39:41.920Well, there will definitely be a discussion about foreign interference, naturally, given all of the claims that have been put out there in just the last year or so.
00:39:52.740You know, there's an inquiry into the foreign interference, the Prime Minister refuses to release the list of his MP of the MPs who are accused of being under the influence knowingly or unknowingly of foreign powers.
00:40:08.340Will those MPs? Will those MPs run again? We have no idea, right? There is a very plausible scenario where the, you know, what is it, 11 or 12 MPs named on that list are running for re-election.
00:40:21.540We don't know. Voters don't know. And when they go to the ballot, vote for that candidate, they have no clue.
00:40:27.280And I think that raises a huge problem because there will be, in the informed voter, that question in the back of their mind, is this individual a foreign agent or at least under the influence of a foreign agent, whether they are or not?
00:40:45.060You know, it could be a perfectly legitimate candidate who has, you know, his own writing or her own writing's best interests at heart.
00:40:54.140But the voter, knowing what we know about the list of MPs, could still be asking those questions about a perfectly legitimate candidate unless the government clears the air, which they have shown absolutely no intention of doing.
00:41:08.760All right. Again, my name's Isaac Llamour. I'm happy to be joined by my colleagues, Cosmin Jirja and Noah Jarvis. And remember, everything you heard today was off the record.
00:41:23.640How'd that go? First time hosting? Not bad, eh?
00:41:27.080Yeah, pretty good job. I think, yeah, no, I think the first time Andrew...