00:02:25.180This is another edition of Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.
00:02:28.560it is Tuesday, February 28th, 2023. Fantastic to have you aboard the show. I was planning to spend
00:02:37.320a considerable amount of the show today talking about the rather feckless denunciation by the
00:02:44.340conservatives of Christine Anderson, who we had as a guest on this program a few weeks ago,
00:02:49.860completely adopting the left-wing narrative about this woman and so far not proffering any evidence
00:02:57.040in support of it. Now I am going to talk about that a little bit later on in the show but I feel
00:03:01.700we need to start with things that are of greater significance first and one of them is going to be
00:03:06.860an extension sadly of a discussion we spent a considerable time on last week on the show and
00:03:12.420that is China's continued meddling in Canada's elections and Canada's democracy. Now I want to
00:03:19.280say first and foremost what I said last week which is that China's election interference is not
00:03:24.900something that we should view in isolation. China is meddling in pretty much every Western
00:03:30.020institution imaginable. You see China's hands all over scientific research, all over the academic0.87
00:03:36.140world, politics, of course, and certainly the media. So the fact that China is also trying to
00:03:43.440interfere in and sway the results of elections should not surprise us. But we have obviously0.82
00:03:49.240a sentimentalism that exists around democracy because elections are very important. Democracy
00:03:54.380is important there should be sentimentalism there which means that we should also be mightily
00:03:59.660offended when we find out in tangible concrete ways not only that China is trying to meddle in
00:04:05.700our elections but they've done so in rather sophisticated ways and the intelligence eyes in
00:04:11.440Canada told the government about this who basically just looked at it and said yeah okay whatever
00:04:15.940so what's happened now is the liberals have been backed into a bit of a corner as we've seen
00:04:21.580Justin Trudeau has been faced with what is fairly concrete proof from a CSIS person or people who are leaking to the Globe and Mail
00:04:30.280that there was a pretty long runway in which CSIS was raising its concerns with the government.
00:04:36.920At one point, as we've learned in the past week, CSIS said to the Liberals,
00:04:41.300you know, this candidate of yours in Toronto, Han Dong, you really, really, really should drop him as a candidate.
00:04:49.080The Liberals apparently said no. He was a candidate. He won a seat. He's now a Member of Parliament and has been oddly nonspecific when it comes to the questions that he's been asked about whether he was the beneficiary of significant support from China's consulate in Toronto.0.85
00:05:08.060In fact, he issued a statement in which he said, no, no, no, this is all false, nothing to see there,
00:05:14.260and managed to not even use the word China in his statement.
00:05:18.020He didn't say, I take China's interference seriously.
00:05:20.820He didn't mention them at all, but claimed that he had nothing to do with whatever it is he's being accused of.
00:05:26.720Justin Trudeau, for his part, has said that anyone raising these questions is a big old dirty racist.
00:08:20.000So let's start off with just the variety of ways in which China does try to exact its control in
00:08:28.160the West. Because I think a lot of the times people have this very Cold War, Soviet-US vision
00:08:34.080of what a spy is. And they imagine, you know, the undercover person that, you know, integrates
00:08:39.020themselves in the community. But espionage and influence are related terms. They're not
00:08:44.160exactly symmetrical and we see in China's case the number of institutions that they tend to
00:08:50.460penetrate through academia, business, politics. It's quite vast. It sure is and it goes starts at
00:08:59.320the at the international level and it goes right down to the municipal levels of various countries
00:09:05.000And they are essentially following a strategy of destabilization so that they can wield influence in countries like Canada.
00:09:17.600So they want to get people in Parliament and in legislatures and in city councils who will make decisions that are favorable to them.
00:09:26.420It's a very clever strategy, I think. Rather than firing a bullet, you insinuate yourself into a country and you get friendly, especially friendly elected representatives who will come up with policies that are very friendly to you.
00:09:42.320So for example, in Canada, they wanted Huawei to have the 5G network, they want to invest in critical minerals, they would like to have various contracts, for example, with the federal government so that they can monitor activity, and they've done very well in Canada, surprisingly well, getting contracts with the RCMP.
00:10:02.320For example, a year or two ago, they were running the visa office in Beijing.
00:10:09.340So anyone applying for visas coming from China would be well known to the Beijing police, who were the owners of the company that were providing the visas.
00:10:20.400So they have a lot of different ways that they will try to insinuate themselves.0.91
00:10:24.580And as you say, universities is a very powerful way, too, because that's how they can steal technology.
00:10:30.220When we're talking about some of the allegations that are at the core of these Globe and Mail and other media reports to do with election interference,
00:10:38.960and I want to be clear here, we haven't seen the reports.
00:10:41.320We're getting this all through, you know, through sources that are talking to the Globe and Mail and Global News,
00:10:46.580and then those reporters are conveying them.
00:10:48.800So even though it paints a very clear portrait, there are still some aspects of this that are unanswered.
00:10:53.980But do we think it's that China is looking at various candidates and parties and saying, you know, we think this person is probably going to align with what we care about as a country, as a regime when these issues pop up?
00:11:07.580Or do you think it's a lot more deliberate than that, where they're going to these people early on in their careers and saying, hey, we can help you along, but we need something in return?
00:11:19.860For sure, there's a lot of communication between people in the consulate and I'm sure in the embassy, but between them and various people in Canada, whether it's universities, they have all sorts of friendship committees, they have trips of people going to China.
00:11:35.520Absolutely, they're looking for contracts, they're looking for inns, they're looking for all kinds of influence.
00:11:43.920I mean, I think that the documents that have been leaked are powerful, and we really should salute whoever is getting this information into the hands of Global News and also the Globe and Mail, because this is extremely important information.
00:12:01.700If we don't have control over our elections, we don't have control over our country.
00:12:07.160And it's clear that something's going on, something very, very serious is going on.
00:12:13.960Part of the problem is that we don't have the tools to find out.
00:12:18.100The committees in Parliament have done a good job trying to get information.
00:12:21.680The problem is that they cannot get it because the NDP are teaming up with the Liberals to stop the disclosure of information through investigations at these various committees.
00:12:35.540And then, of course, the government comes back and says, well, we've got lots of experts and they're reviewing the situation.
00:12:41.280And we can assure you that the election is held.
00:12:46.400It looks like anywhere from 9 to 13 and maybe more conservative seats were lost to the Liberals.
00:12:53.340That would change a lot in the House of Commons and in the committees if those seats had not gone to the Liberals and instead had gone to one of the other parties, but especially to the Conservatives.
00:13:03.180It would have changed the dynamics considerably.
00:13:06.000Yeah, and I do think that the timing of this new ban on TikTok on government devices is obviously not coincidental.
00:13:36.440But, yeah, let's get back to the big thing here.
00:13:38.180And I mean, I realize that the hardest hit by this is Jagmeet Singh, who's having to kiss away now his, you know, 800 and however many thousand followers.
00:13:46.020But in all seriousness, I mean, if this is the extent of our tough on China policy, we're in trouble.
00:13:50.900Yes, absolutely. And I think what the liberals are doing is handing out small things in a piecemeal fashion.
00:13:57.900They also have constructed an election monitoring system, many, many, many committees, so many committees, I was keeping track of them, so many that I started a spreadsheet because there were a lot of committees and a lot of protocols and a lot of initiatives and so on.
00:14:12.400And it creates the aura that they are doing something.
00:14:16.800But in fact, most of these institutions lead back to the prime minister and to the government.
00:14:24.020That when there's a report about something going wrong, who gets that information?
00:15:32.680But what I was saying is that I loathe Trump comparisons
00:15:35.300because I find them overused and rarely effective.
00:15:37.780But, you know, I remember the hand-wringing and pearl-clutching when Donald Trump was criticizing the intelligence community.
00:15:43.640And now we've got Justin Trudeau effectively doing the same thing.
00:15:46.400He's calling the people at CSIS racist indirectly, and I'd say veering on directly.
00:15:51.400And he's also essentially saying that they lied, because his whole line up to this point has been, yeah, I wasn't briefed, I wasn't told.
00:15:58.680And it's as though all of this stuff he's learning about for the first time.
00:16:01.880So he's actually boxed himself into a corner here where he can't say what I think would have been his best defense, which was, yeah, they gave us the intelligence, but it wasn't compelling.
00:16:11.200And we moved on because he basically said, no, we never saw it.
00:16:15.360And now he's forced to just say, oh, now this is you guys are all racist.
00:16:18.880There's nothing there to his response.
00:16:20.740Yeah, and the two documents that were released initially to Global News and then were made public at the PROC or the committee that's dealing with this in the House of Commons, they're publicly available.
00:16:37.260We posted them on our website. You can look at them. They're heavily redacted, but there's still a lot of good information in there to look at.
00:16:43.600So it's very clear that the government knew about this. I mean, you know, this is obviously a major issue.
00:16:50.280it's been a major issue going back to 2010 i am sure that on the first or second day of being in
00:16:56.120office that the prime minister was briefed on this he would have had a national security briefing and
00:17:02.040this had to be on there it is a major issue it has been for over a decade there's no way
00:17:08.440that he could claim not to know all of this information and and i think the documents that
00:17:12.920are coming out show that he did know he was informed his office knew the pco knew they're
00:17:18.440coordinating the receipt of all of this information from all the various committees
00:17:23.440that he's established. So they know for sure what's going on. Patricia Adams of Probe International,
00:17:30.800always a pleasure to talk to you. People can find much of your recent work on this at
00:17:35.340probeopinion.substack.com and they should also subscribe when they're there as well. Patricia,
00:17:40.580thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. And I should say, I mean, we're condensing what is a
00:17:46.460years-long effort by the Chinese regime into, I don't know what that was, a 17-18 minute
00:17:51.480conversation. We're going to follow this more, but as I said last week, it's clear that this is a0.53
00:17:57.760drip, drip, drip, as they say in media. There's more and more coming out about this by the day,
00:18:03.020so it's been, I don't know, five days since the last show, and I have that many more stories
00:18:08.240that I need to condense into this discussion, but I think the takeaway that you need to remember
00:18:12.380here, if nothing else, because oftentimes when the liberals are embroiled in scandal, they want it
00:18:17.780to be muddled. They want to obfuscate. They want it to be something that's so complicated that
00:18:22.180people can't understand it, which was how they weathered the Wee scandal and SNC-Lavalin and all
00:18:27.040of that. What you need to remember is that China has been backing Justin Trudeau since at least
00:18:34.3202013. And this was an important development of this that just came out today, where a Chinese
00:18:39.700businessman wanted to give $200,000 to the Trudeau Foundation conveniently right after Justin Trudeau
00:18:47.560became leader of the Liberal Party. Now, you could obviously donate to the Trudeau Foundation at any
00:18:52.920time. Personally, I would rather light my money on fire and then light myself on fire just in case,
00:18:58.940but you could donate if that's your bag to Justin Trudeau's foundation. Sorry, Pierre Trudeau's
00:19:04.200foundation. Totally different, totally independent, arm's length, etc. But if that's what you want to
00:19:09.600do go for it. But it does strike you as a bit odd, I hope. If you want to donate, having never
00:19:14.680donated to the foundation before, immediately after, the guy who shares a name with the foundation
00:19:19.940becomes the presumptive next Prime Minister of Canada. That was what a businessman connected to
00:19:25.680the Chinese regime and the Chinese consulate did. He gave them $200,000. Oh, the guy at the Trudeau
00:19:33.380Foundation who received that donation is now the guy that's overseeing the report into China's
00:19:38.960interference in the election. So remember that if you remember nothing else. And I would also say
00:19:43.340beyond that, remember that first Justin Trudeau said this never happened. He was never warned.
00:19:48.040He didn't have all this information from Ceasef. And now he's saying, well, it's all a load of
00:19:52.500crap. The information's not real. You've got Gerald Butts on there doing the Globe and Mail
00:19:57.420as fake news shtick, which is as Trumpian as it gets. And this is what we're now seeing from
00:20:03.720Justin Trudeau. So whether it will spell the end of Justin Trudeau, I think people should always
00:20:08.180remain realistic about this because no other scandal has but at the same time we also need
00:20:14.060to realize this is big and you have people that have never said an unkind word about Justin Trudeau
00:20:19.640now that are getting very uncomfortable with how this story is unfolding. Let's talk about the flip
00:20:25.140side of this and some of the big picture discussions that are taking place in Canada
00:20:29.180specifically around the conservative movement. In just a few weeks time the conservatives of
00:20:35.800this country with a small c for reasons that we'll get to in a moment will be descending on
00:20:40.960the nation's capital for not another convoy but the canada strong and free networking conference
00:20:46.740i am going to be back the true north team is going to be there and i'll actually be doing a live
00:20:51.780edition of this show on stage which i hope you will watch either in person or online but the
00:20:58.600president of the canada strong and free network jamil javani is back on the show jamil good to
00:21:03.900talk to you, sir. Welcome. Yeah, great to be back with you, Andrew. And certainly I would encourage
00:21:08.720the audience to be there in person if possible. You can watch the replay online, but I hope you'll
00:21:14.060be there with Andrew and I in Ottawa. There we go. No, that's the better sales pitch, especially,
00:21:18.380I mean, the line for conservatives and libertarians is that, you know, it was illegal for two years to
00:21:22.880gather in person. So you should like, just to spite the people that made it illegal, want to
00:21:26.280gather in person as much as you can here. But this is going to be coming up in Ottawa. And I mean,
00:21:32.080obviously it's a bit interesting when the conservatives are not the ones in government
00:21:36.680because I think a lot of the time, and we saw this in conferences past, there's been leadership
00:21:42.980debates there and oftentimes the people there really try to shape the future of the conservative
00:21:48.780movement. So what's the theme or the tone that you're anticipating? Yeah, well, as you said,
00:21:54.240Andrew, you know, the conference is coming up in just a few weeks, March 22nd to 24th
00:21:58.900in the nation's capital. And I think, you know, the theme of the conference is a very important
00:22:03.840one, given our timing, which is working for the middle class. I think the average family in this
00:22:09.740country looks at our economy, looks at our politicians and says, they're not in it for us.
00:22:14.960This is not working for us, the average person. Life is getting more expensive. Things are getting
00:22:19.700more difficult. Institutions that should have our back don't seem to be advocating for our best
00:22:25.180interests so we're coming together to think about what does it look like to have a government what
00:22:30.300does it look like to make policy what does it look like to have an economy that's working for
00:22:35.100the middle class family and a lot of that andrew to some of what you've been talking about today
00:22:39.980is about looking past the trudeau liberals they are reeling they're not going to be around forever
00:22:45.580at some point the good lord above will have mercy on us and there will be a change in government
00:22:50.940and we've got to be prepared to lead we got to be prepared to do right by the canadian people
00:22:56.220and a lot of why we're getting together in ottawa in a few weeks is to think about what it looks like
00:23:00.460when we have the chance to start making a difference i know the the manning center
00:23:05.260previously and now the canada strong and free network have always made a point of saying this
00:23:09.740is about the conservative movement not the conservative party but let's face it there's
00:23:13.980a ton of overlap there when you look at the speakers list we've got the leader of the
00:23:17.500the Conservatives, Pierre Paliab. We've got Danielle Smith, the Premier of Alberta, people
00:23:21.660like Garnet Janis. So where do you position this conference and your organization in general in
00:23:27.300conservatism? Well, certainly I believe we are still about the conservative movement.
00:23:33.220If you look at the politicians who are invited to grace our stage, they are people who we believe
00:23:39.160care about the conservative movement. There is a difference between the party and the movement.
00:23:43.180and unfortunately, a lot of people in political parties don't care about the movement. We'd all
00:23:48.280be better off if they did, but unfortunately, they don't. So when we look at Pierre Polyev,
00:23:54.340Danielle Smith, Stephen Harper, Garnet Janis, some of these folks, these are people I believe
00:24:00.020want to serve the movement in the role of politics. But there are politicians who have not been
00:24:05.380invited to our stage, Andrew, and for good reason, because they have a track record of not showing
00:24:11.160concern for the grassroots conservatives like the folks listening to us now who make the party
00:24:17.600possible. And that's one thing I always like to remind people. The political parties depend
00:24:22.600on volunteers. They depend on small dollar donors, the people who make up the movement.
00:24:28.520And we need to make sure that the party is accountable to the movement. That's one of
00:24:32.960the reasons why we build relationships with politicians, but ultimately we are independent
00:24:37.600for good reason. Well, and there's also always been a focus on the pragmatic. And I know
00:24:43.500historically best practices, which is more training oriented, has been a separate event.
00:24:48.540But I think a lot of the times it's easy and I think important to sit around and talk about the
00:24:52.420big ideas. But if you don't have people that are interested or capable of putting those ideas into
00:24:56.880fruition, you're not really anything more than a talk shop. Exactly. And that's one thing I
00:25:03.280absolutely love about Preston Manning's legacy. He was one of the co-founders of our organization
00:25:08.58015 years ago, and he continues to be an advisor to me, a mentor to me. And a lot of what he
00:25:14.440encourages us to think about is how do we solve problems? How do we make sure we're not just
00:25:19.960talking, but we're laying out a foundation for how we can create change? And that is the spirit
00:25:25.420of our conference. You know, we do networking because we believe relationships and community
00:25:30.100are important, but we also need to learn from each other. And that's going to be how we solve
00:25:34.440problems. And as I said, start to prepare for a post Trudeau world, because this guy's not going
00:25:40.760to be prime minister forever. And we've got to know what we're going to do to make the country
00:25:44.740better when he's no longer leading us. That actually could have been a good conference
00:25:49.420title preparing for the post Trudeau world. But it's funny, though, because I remember the
00:25:54.500conference in, I think it was 2016, and there was a little bit of wound licking going on. People that
00:26:01.640saw, you know, the conservatives had just been trounced by Justin Trudeau, a liberal majority.
00:26:06.400The party didn't have a leader yet to replace Trudeau. In 2017, the leadership race was ongoing,
00:26:13.640and I remember Ronna Ambrose was very popular. There was the big leadership debate that had like
00:26:18.36097 candidates, and they couldn't, you know, fit them all on stage at once. But I think that
00:26:23.580there's there's a little bit more optimism now than there has been even you know as recently as
00:26:28.480a couple years ago about where things are which is quite helpful i agree and in my view a lot of
00:26:35.240the optimism andrew comes from the fact that we're becoming more confident and apologetic
00:26:41.480about why conservatism is good for canadians there was this time over a few years between
00:26:48.060I would say when Harper lost the election to Trudeau in 2015 and up until last year where it
00:26:54.500felt like we were constantly operating on the defense, constantly apologizing for who we are
00:27:00.040and what we believe in. But now we're starting to be emboldened by the reality that liberal
00:27:04.960ideology is actually failing the average Canadian. And that is why the conservative movement has to
00:27:10.260step up. We've got to be active. We've got to be confident and we've got to show people we can make
00:27:15.400things better. Our ideas work. We are not going to play defense. We're not going to be pushed
00:27:20.200around and bullied by the left. We have a real alternative to put forward. So just to talk about
00:27:26.920one of the challenges in conservatism here, and I know this is about a week old now, but I think
00:27:31.720it's relevant in that you had, and you've been doing a tremendous job, by the way, as president
00:27:36.200of this organization for about a year now, and you had a very, I think, incisive and thoughtful
00:27:42.840discussion on critical race theory in which you had black people speaking about this from their
00:27:48.940own perspectives and as analysts and as people with lived experience, to use the word that
00:27:53.480is so en vogue right now. And then James Moore, a I would presume non-black identifying man,
00:28:00.920a former conservative cabinet minister, tweets out, this is what the Manning Center has devolved
00:28:07.020into, such a shame. And I know you addressed this very eloquently in that discussion, but explain to
00:28:11.580me why you have people in the conservative movement and the conservative orbit in this
00:28:16.880country that think there's something wrong with talking about issues that matter to people.
00:28:22.540Yeah, it's weird because, you know, someone like James Moore, who really should know better,
00:28:27.320he's a cabinet minister in the Harper administration. You know, you would think
00:28:31.780he'd be happy to see black people getting involved in conservative politics. I mean,
00:28:35.760that is what people like James Moore often say. They want more diversity, but then they get upset
00:28:40.800when diversity isn't what they expect it to look like.
00:28:44.440And I think Dr. Lesley Lewis has faced a lot of that same blowback as well.
00:28:50.640I guess, Andrew, there's sort of a charitable interpretation
00:28:52.960of someone like James Moore's criticisms,
00:28:55.800and then there's maybe a less charitable.
00:28:58.000On the charitable side, I'd say maybe he just doesn't know better.
00:29:01.520You know, this is a guy who might pay attention to politics
00:29:03.680but might not understand that there's a lot of differences of opinion
00:29:08.600Maybe he thinks that things like critical race theory are associated with folks that he disagrees with and he doesn't understand how important it would be for conservatives from black communities and other minority communities to want to talk about these issues since it shapes the policies liberals create that affect our kids, that affect our communities, our neighborhoods.
00:29:28.480So if I'm charitable, I'll say maybe he's just ignorant. But I think the more likely interpretation of it is that there is a conservative elite that wants us to play nice and play polite, that anything that might not get them invited to fancy cocktail parties or dinners on Bay Street all of a sudden becomes taboo topics we shouldn't care about.
00:29:50.740But that's exactly why the theme of our conference in March is working for the middle class, because I don't care ultimately for James Moore's approval. And most, I would hope, conservatives, the conservative movement doesn't either. We shouldn't be trying to please James Moore, people at fancy law firms, people on Bay Street, people who are advocating like James Moore does for more business between Canada and China.
00:30:13.500by the way we should be in my view prioritizing the needs of the average mom and dad the average
00:30:19.340worker the average student in this country and if that means that we have to champion issues that
00:30:24.460people like james more get offended by then he's welcome to get offended i could i could care less
00:30:30.060you know i remember when when the conservatives were in government uh the manning conferences at
00:30:35.220the time were you know basically the the rundown and i i'm not at all besmirching it but the rundown
00:30:40.140was oftentimes, you know, this conservative cabinet minister will speak and then this
00:30:43.820conservative cabinet minister will speak and then this conservative. And again, you want to hear
00:30:47.660from them. It's good. Ministers are big celebrities. But what you're saying indirectly, I think, is
00:30:53.220actually quite important here, which is that they should be listening. The politicians and future
00:30:58.040and current for the conservative party should be the ones in the audience, largely listening to
00:31:02.800what other people in the movement are saying if they want to be connected and relevant to the
00:31:07.020grassroots. You're exactly right. And that's part of how we've organized this event. When Premier
00:31:13.640Danielle Smith is on stage, she'll be on stage with a business leader, Jocelyn Bamford. When
00:31:19.820the Honorable Pierre Polyev is on stage, she'll be introduced by a business leader,
00:31:24.340Vesso Sobot. When we welcome MPs on, they will often be speaking with other people as equals
00:31:31.420because we do not put politicians above the movement. And that is a really important
00:31:36.000principle that we live by and as i mentioned before you will notice that there are some
00:31:40.400politicians who are not on our stage and we're very careful about who we invite because we
00:31:44.560believe it's important to invite people to speak to our audience who respect our audience and
00:31:50.160respect the conservative movement at minimum i think conservatives deserve that so no one who
00:31:55.280uh thinks the audience are a bunch of yahoos for example well you know there are some politicians
00:32:01.360who I yeah I would say use words like that and you know it's it can be a little bit discouraging
00:32:07.220and a little bit sad to see but my hope is that you know as we strengthen the movement and we
00:32:12.220build the movement we'll show politicians that you know they really have to spend the time to
00:32:16.480understand us if they want to be elected if they want to be able to do their job well if they want
00:32:21.260to go around claiming to be a conservative then they absolutely need to speak to conservatives
00:32:26.300and not take us for granted. Yeah and I mean I think we could do a whole hour probably a whole
00:32:30.800week of shows on, you know, conservatism in general in this country, but I've always believed
00:32:35.420that capital C conservatives should never be allowed to define small C conservatism. They
00:32:41.500should be a reflection of small C conservatism. And I think the more you have the grassroots0.94
00:32:46.260setting the tone, the better off for the movement, the party and the country.
00:32:51.440I absolutely agree. And you know what, even politicians recognize that. And I know those
00:32:56.400who are listening to us who are watching this, Andrew, will know. You probably get emails asking
00:33:01.760to donate your hard-earned money. You probably get notices asking for you to volunteer for campaigns.
00:33:08.180Politicians need you when they need to get re-elected, and they should also care what you
00:33:13.640think in between those elections as well. It's basic respect. I mean, these relationships should
00:33:18.920not be a one-way street where people come knocking on your door for money and time and volunteering