Rebel News Podcast - February 23, 2026


EZRA LEVANT ｜ Danielle Smith challenges Ottawa as immigration tensions reach boiling point


Episode Stats

Length

40 minutes

Words per Minute

160.60435

Word Count

6,548

Sentence Count

401

Misogynist Sentences

7

Hate Speech Sentences

21


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.200 Huge show today. Danielle Smith sets a new standard for immigration reform with her five
00:00:04.940 powerful questions that she's going to put to a referendum of Albertans in October.
00:00:09.840 Then we'll ask Michelle Rempel-Garner, the federal conservative immigration critic,
00:00:14.400 what she thinks about it. Huge show today. Thank you for tuning in. But first, I want you to
00:00:19.240 get the video version of this podcast by going to rebelnewsplus.com. It's eight bucks a month,
00:00:25.500 which may not sound like a lot to you, but it sure adds up for us. It's how we pay our bills
00:00:29.100 because we don't take a dime from the government, and it shows.
00:00:47.900 Tonight, Danielle Smith sets a new standard for immigration reform, and Michelle Rempel-Garner
00:00:54.220 gives us her view on it. It's February 23rd, and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.
00:00:59.100 You party for freedom!
00:01:02.100 Shame on you, you censorious bug!
00:01:14.440 Well, for decades, immigration was something you weren't really allowed to talk about,
00:01:19.060 other than to nod along and say everything was fine. I remember even the Conservative Party of Canada
00:01:24.220 in, I think it was the 2021 election, the leader, when grilled by Rosemary Barton, said,
00:01:29.980 oh, he just agrees with everything Justin Trudeau says. Can we please move on? It was terrifying.
00:01:36.920 There was this political consensus that you couldn't challenge mass immigration, but I think that's
00:01:42.020 falling apart. And last night, I think we heard one of the most bracing challenges to the immigration
00:01:49.140 status quo, ever, by someone in a position of power. Without further ado, let me play for you
00:01:55.300 an excerpt from Danielle Smith's address to the province last night, where she said there's going
00:02:01.940 to be referendum questions on immigration. And don't go away, because after I play those,
00:02:07.980 I'm going to bring on Michelle Rempel-Garner, the Conservative Party of Canada's immigration critic,
00:02:13.600 to get her reaction to the declarations. Actually, not really declarations, because it's putting it
00:02:19.380 to the people, to the referendum questions of Alberta. Here, take a look.
00:02:23.520 The changes we need to make to immigration are a significant departure from the status quo,
00:02:28.320 and therefore, I am seeking a referendum mandate from Albertans to implement them.
00:02:32.200 On October 19th, 2026, we will hold a provincial referendum primarily focused on how Albertans
00:02:38.400 want our government to deal with the issue of immigration, as well as steps we can take as a
00:02:42.940 province to strengthen our constitutional and fiscal position within a united Canada.
00:02:47.840 These were, far and away, the issues most strongly identified by Albertans during last year's
00:02:53.240 Alberta Next panel town halls and online submissions. And in my view, it is time to act on them.
00:02:58.660 The fact is, Alberta taxpayers can no longer be asked to continue to subsidize the entire country
00:03:04.040 through equalization and federal transfers, permit the federal government to flood our borders with
00:03:08.620 new arrivals, and then give free access to our most generous in the country social programs to
00:03:13.220 anyone who moves here. This is not only grossly unfair to Alberta taxpayers, but also financially
00:03:18.820 crippling, and undercuts the quality of our health care, education, and other social services.
00:03:23.760 The October 19th referendum will therefore include the following questions.
00:03:27.540 Number one, do you support the government of Alberta taking increased control over immigration
00:03:33.320 for the purpose of decreasing immigration to more sustainable levels, prioritizing economic
00:03:38.780 migration, and ensuring Albertans have first priority to new employment opportunities?
00:03:44.120 Number two, do you support the government of Alberta introducing a law mandating only Canadian
00:03:49.800 citizens, permanent residents, and individuals with an Alberta-approved immigration status will be
00:03:55.060 eligible for provincially funded programs such as health, education, and other social services?
00:04:00.840 Number three, assuming that all citizens and permanent residents continue to qualify for social
00:04:06.400 support programs as they do now, do you support the government of Alberta introducing a law requiring
00:04:12.120 all individuals with a non-permanent legal immigration status to be resident in Alberta for at least 12 months
00:04:18.780 before qualifying for any provincially funded social support programs?
00:04:23.320 Number four, assuming that all citizens and permanent residents continue to qualify for public health care and
00:04:28.860 education as they do now, do you support the government of Alberta charging a reasonable fee or premium to
00:04:34.540 individuals with a non-permanent immigration status living in Alberta for their and their families' use of the
00:04:40.360 health care and education systems?
00:04:41.840 Number five, do you support the government of Alberta introducing a law requiring individuals to provide proof of
00:04:48.920 citizenship, such as a passport, birth certificate, or citizenship card, to be eligible to vote in a provincial election?
00:04:55.960 There you have it. Now, just to clarify, I sort of misspoke when I said that was her manifesto. No, those are the
00:05:01.720 questions that are going to be put to Albertans in a vote. But if any poll over the last 10 years is accurate, I think each of
00:05:09.540 those questions will be resoundingly approved by the people of Alberta. That's my
00:05:14.020 prognostication. Joining us now via Skype is the official opposition critic for
00:05:20.420 immigration, also known as the shadow cabinet minister. Michelle Rempel-Garner joins us now.
00:05:25.360 Thank you so much for taking the time. You're so busy. I appreciate it.
00:05:29.500 Thanks for having me, as always.
00:05:31.140 Very interesting comments by Danielle Smith, the premier of Alberta. And to put it to the people is quite a dramatic move,
00:05:38.360 because I think that lets the people be the bad guy for challenging the consensus, not Danielle Smith herself.
00:05:47.040 Well, like, look, I'll just speak from the federal perspective.
00:05:52.040 It's been incredibly frustrating to watch the liberals completely ruin Canada's immigration system for
00:05:59.820 everybody, for Canadians, for people who want to come to Canada to build a better life and play by the rules.
00:06:05.380 And, you know, they've brought too many people in too fast for housing, health care and jobs to keep up.
00:06:12.600 That's just the reality. And I it's not just Premier Smith that is expressing concerns about that fact.
00:06:20.060 It's premiers of all different political stripes across the country.
00:06:23.200 And I think what you're seeing now, and not just in Alberta, is provincial governments challenging the lack of federal leadership
00:06:31.580 in fixing the situation that they created. Right.
00:06:35.220 We have an extremely weak immigration minister right now.
00:06:38.460 And that's why the federal conservatives we've been putting forward.
00:06:41.340 I know I've been on your show before.
00:06:42.580 There are a lot of really bold and common sense proposals to restore order to Canada's immigration system,
00:06:50.500 because, yeah, like we haven't seen any action or even acknowledgement from the liberal government
00:06:56.720 that they led Canada to this place.
00:07:00.200 And now, of course, you see provincial governments, advocacy groups and, of course,
00:07:04.320 the official opposition saying, look, there needs to be there needs to be action.
00:07:08.240 And now it's kind of like over to you, Mark Carney.
00:07:11.700 You know, constitutional immigration is a federal matter, obviously, has to do with our borders.
00:07:17.600 So for a province to wade into it is interesting.
00:07:21.280 But she's not saying that she can stop immigration.
00:07:24.840 What she can say is the things that are within the provincial jurisdiction, health and education and provincial voting,
00:07:31.840 she can take a stand on.
00:07:33.840 Do you support her proposed use of those provincial powers to alter how mass immigration affects Alberta?
00:07:43.020 Well, you know, again, I'd point to other provinces as well, too.
00:07:46.300 Actually, municipalities, you know, Olivia Chow, partly a conservative,
00:07:51.300 proposed having to raise property taxes in response to the number of bogus asylum claimants
00:07:57.440 that were flooding into the greater Toronto area over the last several years
00:08:00.820 under the federal liberal government's, you know, abysmal immigration policies.
00:08:06.180 Then you had, you know, we famously had the immigration minister in front of committee this year,
00:08:11.700 and she said, well, I don't consider health care when setting immigration levels.
00:08:16.080 She said something to that effect.
00:08:17.860 She sort of implied it.
00:08:19.480 And, of course, health care is a provincial responsibility.
00:08:22.700 So when you have a federal government taking policy that's within their jurisdiction,
00:08:28.320 but that massively impacts provincial jurisdiction, like health care, for example,
00:08:33.160 or to a certain extent housing, you are going to see people push back.
00:08:38.060 And so, again, I would just say how I've tried to address this issue in my role as shadow minister
00:08:45.040 is come up with concrete solutions to see the federal government reverse some of these policies
00:08:51.360 that have led to this sort of tension.
00:08:53.120 Like, you know, we talked about birthright citizenship.
00:08:56.020 We've talked about major reforms to the asylum system so that people who are abusing the asylum system
00:09:01.900 can't get better health care benefits than Canadians do, for example.
00:09:05.800 I could literally spend two hours talking to you about the proposals that we've put forward.
00:09:09.920 But I think that you are going to see not just like, you know, I know that Premier Smith
00:09:14.880 is going to get a lot of attention because she's a conservative premier talking about immigration.
00:09:19.400 But frankly, it's been liberal premiers as well, too.
00:09:22.220 And it's incumbent upon the liberal government and Mark Carney to take some of the suggestions
00:09:26.360 that conservatives have put forward at the federal level to reform the system,
00:09:30.240 but also, Ezra, massively bring down immigration levels, come up with a plan to remove
00:09:34.940 the nearly three million people who have expired or expiring visas this year.
00:09:39.920 Temporary needs to mean temporary.
00:09:42.320 And yeah, it's a giant mess.
00:09:44.220 But we will continue as a federal conservative party to push for reforms to bring back order
00:09:50.000 and fairness.
00:09:51.220 You know, I saw an interesting debate online the other day between Candace Malcolm, the boss
00:09:56.280 of Juno News, and Jason Kenney, the former premier of Alberta and former federal immigration
00:10:01.980 minister.
00:10:02.600 And I think he was fairly well regarded as an immigration minister.
00:10:05.900 He cracked down on some fraud, even though I would say the gross numbers were large.
00:10:10.200 And they were quarreling over a debate that Candace Malcolm had had with someone from the
00:10:15.840 Dominion Society, which is, I don't know if it's all right.
00:10:19.900 It's sort of one degree of separation from some racist guys in Diagolons.
00:10:26.020 So I think that Jason Kenney was chiding her for that.
00:10:29.320 But she said, look, the idea of sending home millions of people whose right to be here has
00:10:35.080 expired.
00:10:35.900 That's not racist at all.
00:10:37.380 There's nothing racial about your visa running out and you having to go home.
00:10:43.020 And there was a real argue-bargue between the two of them.
00:10:45.960 And, you know, we don't want to be racial.
00:10:48.660 You could be an outstanding, loyal, patriotic Canadian of any color, of any religion.
00:10:54.660 I truly believe that.
00:10:56.680 But the idea of sending home three million people whose visas have expired will naturally
00:11:02.780 touch people from foreign countries.
00:11:06.400 Jason Kenney felt uncomfortable with that.
00:11:08.820 Do you have the stamina and the tenacity to call for the deportation of three million souls,
00:11:16.400 many of whom will be visible minorities, even if you're called racist like we saw in that
00:11:22.560 online debate?
00:11:24.240 Yeah.
00:11:24.480 So I don't know, and I didn't follow any of the discourse that you talked about, but I'll
00:11:29.620 just talk to the federal conservatives' position on the issue of 2.9 million visas, either expired
00:11:38.660 or expiring, on top of at least 500,000 undocumented persons in Canada.
00:11:43.520 So the principles that we've been putting forward is this.
00:11:47.120 If you are in Canada on a temporary visa, temporary means temporary under our law, and at the end
00:11:53.140 of your visa, you need to leave.
00:11:55.160 And the reality is, is the federal liberal government brought in way too many people without a plan
00:12:03.060 to ensure that they leave at the end of their visas to the point where they've even said
00:12:10.400 they don't even know if they can track them.
00:12:12.200 So of course, conservatives, as we always do, are going to call for the law to be upheld.
00:12:17.620 The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, Ezra, states that when somebody's visa expires,
00:12:23.720 they need to do what?
00:12:24.480 They need to leave.
00:12:25.360 That's the law.
00:12:26.240 And conservatives, I've been calling for this since I was reappointed as shadow minister for
00:12:31.680 immigration.
00:12:32.920 And it was one of the first questions I actually asked Lena Diab in the House of Commons last
00:12:37.040 May, was, do you have a plan to remove these people?
00:12:40.500 And the answer was, well, I don't know.
00:12:42.780 And so, of course, we're going to continue to push for that.
00:12:46.640 And frankly, I think that if the liberals don't deal with that, we're going to have a massive
00:12:52.300 level of problems.
00:12:54.180 Everything from, you know, we see AI disrupting the workforce.
00:12:58.220 I wrote about that this week.
00:13:00.940 You know, how are they setting, why are they issuing hundreds of thousands of more temporary
00:13:04.860 permits when they don't have a plan to have millions of people with expired visas to leave?
00:13:10.260 And the other thing I'd say is this, Ezra, you've seen people from across the country who
00:13:16.180 are on expired visas, you know, going to different rallies and whatnot, asking to stay.
00:13:22.240 And I think the liberals lied to them, too.
00:13:23.840 The liberals said, well, they kind of winked in a nod.
00:13:25.640 It was like, oh, yeah, you can stay here.
00:13:27.740 Right.
00:13:28.040 Yeah.
00:13:28.400 And it just goes to show what a crisis of humanity this is.
00:13:33.820 But the Conservative Party's position that we are continuing to maintain is the law says
00:13:38.540 that if you are here on a temporary visa, you need to leave.
00:13:41.720 And now it is incumbent upon the liberal government to come up with a plan to get people to do so.
00:13:46.320 This is it's just common sense.
00:13:47.920 It's what the law says, and it's what Canadians expect.
00:13:50.680 So that's what we're focused on.
00:13:53.080 You know, I think you're right.
00:13:53.880 I think some of these folks who came over were lied to by immigration.
00:13:57.520 Consultants, frankly, were lied to by some of these diploma mills who said, come here
00:14:01.880 as a student, stay forever.
00:14:03.940 And there's all sorts of tricksters showing them tricks to get around the system.
00:14:08.420 Here's what I keep trying to wrap my head around.
00:14:10.700 In the United States under Joe Biden, the number I keep hearing that came in was 13 million.
00:14:15.360 Now, they came in illegally, unlike the legal entry of students and temporary workers here.
00:14:22.200 13 million.
00:14:23.700 That country's 10 times bigger than ours.
00:14:26.000 So that would be like 1.3 million.
00:14:28.640 We're dealing with a number twice as big as the Americans.
00:14:33.140 And it's tough for them.
00:14:34.420 I mean, look at ICE going to try and find individual people.
00:14:38.700 It's causing friction in the streets.
00:14:41.320 Do you think Canadians have the stomach for that?
00:14:45.780 Or do you think it's the way Danielle Smith is suggesting, don't use muscle, just turn
00:14:50.600 off the flow of the free stuff.
00:14:53.540 And many of them will go home on their own.
00:14:55.980 Like ICE is a heavy handed way you could say compared to just no more free stuff, which
00:15:01.560 Alberta is saying.
00:15:02.500 What do you think?
00:15:03.040 Well, I guess I'd just look at our own context, but maybe start, if you'll indulge me, with
00:15:09.880 the United Kingdom.
00:15:11.540 You know, a stat that really woke me up last year was there's a lot of debate in the United
00:15:17.240 Kingdom right now on immigration.
00:15:19.880 It's, I think, the top voter issue.
00:15:22.080 I know that you covered that politics a lot.
00:15:25.180 But there's actually more per capita and absolute asylum claim numbers or asylum claims made in
00:15:31.740 Canada over the same period that there were in the United Kingdom.
00:15:36.320 And look at how big the debate is there, right?
00:15:39.180 Here's the reality.
00:15:40.180 Like, I think the Canadians, you know, we had a consensus on immigration that it was durable
00:15:47.020 across different levels or across different political stripes for many years, up until
00:15:52.260 the Liberals took power about 10 years ago.
00:15:55.640 And then what happened was the Liberals brought in too many people too fast for housing, health
00:16:00.380 care and jobs to keep up.
00:16:02.420 So, you know, for me, I think that the average Canadian, average permanent resident look around
00:16:08.220 and go, well, wait, we have a youth jobs crisis.
00:16:11.640 Why are we still bringing in massive levels of temporary foreign workers or foreign students
00:16:17.780 on work permits?
00:16:19.600 Why are we allowing bogus asylum claimants to stay in Canada for years?
00:16:23.520 Why are we allowing non-citizens who've been convicted of serious crimes in Canada to avoid
00:16:29.540 deportation because they're getting more lenient sentences by judges by virtue of their immigration
00:16:34.820 status?
00:16:35.680 These are all questions that Canadians have that I've tried to respond to with private members'
00:16:40.920 bills, amendments to bills.
00:16:42.720 But we've seen the Liberals just completely ignore this.
00:16:46.500 And I will say this, public opinion polling has shown that immigration is the number one
00:16:52.880 issue that the Liberals are weak on.
00:16:55.260 And it's because they've refused to listen to common sense Canadians across a political
00:16:59.260 stripe that are like, yeah, we will be open and welcoming to immigrants, but not in these
00:17:03.780 numbers and not under these conditions.
00:17:06.400 And so restoring order through common sense proposals, I think, is something that everybody's
00:17:12.540 expecting us to do and everybody's expecting Mark Carney to do.
00:17:16.620 So, you know, I don't think that anybody who's saying, we don't have the housing, health care
00:17:22.540 and jobs to keep up with the numbers that the Liberals are allowing are unreasonable.
00:17:27.320 In fact, they're right.
00:17:28.920 And restoring that principle is something that, of course, conservatives stand behind at the
00:17:33.600 federal level.
00:17:35.260 I got two really quick snappers and then I'll let you go.
00:17:37.480 I really appreciate you spending so much time with me.
00:17:39.300 So here's the first one, which came out of left field to me, is the Liberal government
00:17:44.920 proposing that we bring in foreign nationals to be our soldiers.
00:17:50.400 And I just thought the word mercenary jumped into my head.
00:17:53.620 I mean, they say there would be background checks and security checks.
00:17:56.720 What do you think of the idea of bringing in foreigners because we're not able to recruit
00:18:00.160 soldiers from Canada?
00:18:02.400 Well, I think that serving in Canada's armed forces is a wonderful opportunity for any Canadian
00:18:08.580 but I think that where the Liberal government should first be asking is why more Canadians,
00:18:14.460 that we have a youth jobs crisis in Canada, aren't choosing the armed service or being
00:18:19.360 processed into the armed service or armed forces as an option.
00:18:25.520 That's where I would start.
00:18:26.900 I don't think that they have good answers on that.
00:18:29.700 Just as a sort of stay tuned, spoiler alert on this, I do have questions for the government
00:18:36.700 on this.
00:18:38.580 But I mean, you know, our Conservative leader, Pierre Polyev, has been very blunt about the
00:18:47.140 fact that Canada needs to restore a warrior culture within the armed forces as opposed to
00:18:52.900 the woke culture that we've seen.
00:18:54.320 I think that's part of it.
00:18:55.480 But let's start with Canadians who want to serve and then I have questions on the other
00:19:02.360 part.
00:19:02.840 So stay tuned on that.
00:19:03.900 Maybe an appearance for another show.
00:19:05.980 Last question and thanks again.
00:19:08.180 You know, I agree with you that immigration is the number one issue.
00:19:11.000 And by the way, I think it impacts many other issues from housing to crime.
00:19:15.940 And by the way, crime within immigrant communities as we see out there in Surrey, for example.
00:19:20.620 Now, the Liberals are smart and if they believe in anything, they believe in winning.
00:19:24.200 And Mark Carney, who was the, you know, zero emissions guy for the longest year, he shocked
00:19:31.560 everyone, including the Conservatives, by scrapping the carbon tax.
00:19:35.640 The one thing you wouldn't have expected, he did to win.
00:19:40.120 And I think that was a major reason that he won.
00:19:43.460 Not all, but as part of it.
00:19:44.660 Do you think the Liberals, if they're staring at the kind of public opinion that you've referenced
00:19:50.940 that I agree in, do you think they would ever adopt your ideas?
00:19:56.980 Or do you think they're just too beholden to, you know, machine politics based on ethnic
00:20:03.020 vote banks?
00:20:03.880 And this is how they talk, by the way.
00:20:06.120 Do you think this is something they could flip?
00:20:08.380 Because it's such a powerful issue.
00:20:10.580 Maybe they'll pull a carbon tax move on you.
00:20:12.920 What do you think?
00:20:14.360 Well, I will say this.
00:20:15.560 They're going to have an opportunity to answer your question in just a few short weeks.
00:20:19.540 So I have a private member's bill in front of the House of Commons.
00:20:22.600 It's a very simple one-line amendment to the criminal code that would prohibit judges from
00:20:29.700 using somebody's immigration status to give them a more lenient sentence if they've been
00:20:35.300 convicted of a serious crime to avoid deportation, which is a very standard practice right now.
00:20:40.500 So there is a bill in front of the House of Commons.
00:20:43.240 It's my bill.
00:20:43.880 There'll be a vote on that in just like a couple of weeks, basically.
00:20:47.360 So they're going to have an opportunity to answer your question with their feet, whether
00:20:52.840 or not they're going to vote for that or not.
00:20:54.820 When we debated this bill in the House a couple of weeks ago, or sorry, last month, one of
00:21:01.720 the senior liberals, they got up and said, well, it's not like any judge is giving special
00:21:07.200 consideration to rapists.
00:21:09.320 And then I got up in the House of Commons the next day and talked about how a judge gave
00:21:13.800 special consideration to somebody, a non-citizen who had raped and impregnated a 13-year-old
00:21:19.220 girl twice.
00:21:20.940 So these cases are happening.
00:21:23.540 And I would just say, in answer to your question, let's look and see what the liberals do in
00:21:30.540 response to my common sense bill, which I think Canadians of any political stripe agree
00:21:35.360 with.
00:21:36.140 Are they going to listen to very far left special interest groups or lawyers who profit off of
00:21:42.560 the system?
00:21:43.360 Or are they going to uphold the rule of law and the spirit of Canada's immigration law?
00:21:47.660 So stay tuned to that.
00:21:49.300 I would love to be on your show again after that vote happens.
00:21:52.780 And I would encourage liberals who are watching this to be like, look, if you actually care
00:21:56.400 about this country, or even as Ezra said, if you care about winning, this is a no-brainer
00:22:00.980 bill that I hope that they'll support.
00:22:03.620 All right.
00:22:04.240 Well, I look forward to seeing that result.
00:22:05.900 Thanks again for spending so much time with us.
00:22:07.540 Very interesting.
00:22:08.280 I agree with you.
00:22:09.320 This is the number one issue, even if it's not always on the front page, and even if it's
00:22:14.000 sort of hidden or downplayed by the regime media, I think this is the number one subject
00:22:19.300 of the under-news, as Mickey Kaus would say, the news that people talk about, even if they're
00:22:24.680 not allowed to.
00:22:25.400 Michelle Garner-Remple, thanks so much for spending time with us.
00:22:28.740 Thank you for having me.
00:22:29.540 Three quarters of a million dollars.
00:22:38.080 That's how much.
00:22:40.580 The former Chilliwack school trustee and staunch critic of gender ideology in school, Barry
00:22:46.640 Newfield in British Columbia, was just slapped with by the province's Human Rights Tribunal.
00:22:53.880 He has to pay $750,000 to the Chilliwack Teachers Association, in short, for not believing in
00:23:04.520 trans people.
00:23:05.680 At least that's the allegation.
00:23:07.640 I have the full document.
00:23:09.960 It's a large ruling.
00:23:11.340 It's going to take some time to go through.
00:23:13.500 And I'll link that in the written article for this report, which you can find in the description
00:23:17.620 box.
00:23:17.980 But for now, hear my interview with Mr. Newfield himself about his reaction to such a massive
00:23:25.660 penalty and what's next.
00:23:27.800 Well, I was pretty sure I was going to lose because the BC Human Rights Tribunal is not
00:23:33.640 a fair, just system.
00:23:35.700 And I knew that the teachers were asking for $750,000.
00:23:40.160 I was a little surprised that the tribunal went along with it.
00:23:44.060 But you know what?
00:23:44.680 It's actually turned out to be a good thing.
00:23:46.660 If they had only fined me $75,000, nobody would have been interested.
00:23:53.380 And all those protesters outside wouldn't have been yelling at me as much.
00:23:58.200 But $750,000 really made a lot of people sit up and take notice.
00:24:04.040 What the heck?
00:24:05.080 Why are they doing this to this guy?
00:24:07.900 And Twitter has gone crazy.
00:24:10.780 I've come to the attention of some major movers and shakers in the United States.
00:24:19.440 And of course, I talked to my lawyer this morning.
00:24:25.680 This is my first public statement after it happened.
00:24:28.700 We are filing an application for a judicial review.
00:24:33.360 It's sort of like an appeal.
00:24:36.480 But, you know, when I was desperate and I didn't have any lawyer at all, my first day in front
00:24:43.200 of the tribunal, the only representative I had was Carrie Simpson.
00:24:46.700 She's an activist from Langley.
00:24:49.160 And now all sorts of law firms are willing to represent me and take me on.
00:24:58.440 But, you know, when one thing I was down and out, James Kitchen believed in me and I'm sticking with him.
00:25:05.520 But there are others that are going to jump in and help.
00:25:08.560 Lisa Bildy, who represented Amy Hamm with the Nurses Professional Association, is going to help out.
00:25:18.080 Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms may be an intervener.
00:25:23.280 The Democracy Fund may be an intervener.
00:25:27.540 So we're going to have quite a team when we head in there.
00:25:31.840 But, of course, the BC Teachers Federation will also have their buddies in there.
00:25:36.240 And in the past, they've been joined by EGAL and probably the Attorney General of British Columbia.
00:25:46.680 Certainly the Human Rights Office.
00:25:54.760 Cassary Govender, I believe her name is.
00:25:58.100 So normally a judicial review of a human rights tribunal takes only about half a day in court.
00:26:03.620 But this file is so massive, there's so much material, that my lawyer thinks it could be up to three days.
00:26:13.780 The first day, he will argue my case.
00:26:18.620 The second day, the BC Human Rights Tribunal will argue their side of it.
00:26:23.060 And the third day will be a chance for each of the interveners to put in their views on the matter.
00:26:33.680 The only thing that the court looks at is if there was any errors in law.
00:26:40.420 And I was an officer of the court for 25 years.
00:26:44.560 I could not believe the legal shoddiness that the tribunal used.
00:26:52.220 They refused to allow witnesses to speak.
00:26:55.280 They shut down testimony before it was done.
00:27:01.460 They made arbitrary decisions that had no basis in law or there was no rule book or precedent set.
00:27:10.080 They were flying by the seat of their pants.
00:27:12.600 And we could tell that they had already made up their mind what they were going to decide.
00:27:17.280 They were just going through the motions.
00:27:19.140 Now, I want to circle back to some of what seemed outrageous as part of how they came to their decision.
00:27:26.460 I'm going to actually just read from it.
00:27:28.280 This part here, it says,
00:27:29.460 The BC Human Rights Tribunal says that if a person elects not to believe that gender identity is separate from sex assigned at birth,
00:27:40.500 then they do not believe in trans people and that this is a form of existential denialism.
00:27:50.300 What do you think when you hear that?
00:27:53.520 Well, they explained it to me very carefully.
00:27:55.380 I said very clearly, there are only two sexes, male and female.
00:28:00.660 There's nothing else.
00:28:02.120 And they said, well, then you are denying the existence of the many other genders and the non-binary people who are neither gender.
00:28:11.420 And I said, no, I believe they exist, but I think they're deluded.
00:28:18.820 You're either male or female.
00:28:20.320 And they took that as a hateful remark.
00:28:25.040 Now, what's interesting is it's exactly what the President of the United States believes and has said publicly.
00:28:31.100 So I'm in pretty good company there.
00:28:35.860 And I would say that 90% of all ordinary Canadians would believe the same.
00:28:41.860 But they are determined.
00:28:45.060 They are on the cutting edge of a new social justice movement.
00:28:52.320 And they are putting people's feelings as more important than physical safety or physical well-being.
00:29:04.060 Keeping people's feelings safe is the most important thing for them.
00:29:10.120 Well, earlier you mentioned this report.
00:29:12.360 You said the people outside there.
00:29:13.840 That's because there's a protest happening outside of an event that's different.
00:29:18.780 And we're covering that separately.
00:29:20.700 But you're right.
00:29:21.400 When I asked the protesters, why are they protesting this Action for Canada event?
00:29:26.520 One of the ladies brought up your name.
00:29:28.880 Let's show that interaction.
00:29:30.240 Well, you said you were here kind of in part because you wanted me to talk to Mr. Neufeld.
00:29:35.120 What did you want me to ask him?
00:29:36.680 I wanted to ask him how is he going to pay the $750,000 ruling?
00:29:41.200 Well, I'll have to wait until the end of the month when my ship comes in.
00:29:44.960 Yeah.
00:29:45.700 Yeah.
00:29:46.540 Right.
00:29:47.980 Good luck to you.
00:29:48.820 Okay.
00:29:49.640 I hope you get a lot of donations tonight.
00:29:52.280 Oh, they're not giving anything to me.
00:29:54.240 Well, do you think that was a fair judgment?
00:29:56.320 I mean, like 11 years ago.
00:29:58.540 Yeah, very fair.
00:29:59.260 I just want to say something.
00:30:00.280 Like 11 years ago when someone said, hey, what's your gender?
00:30:03.560 They'd usually say man, female.
00:30:05.460 Nobody thought it was hateful to do so.
00:30:07.100 And now the ruling is saying, you know, if you believe that identity is attached to biological sex, you're denying trans people.
00:30:14.680 Do you think that's a bit extreme?
00:30:16.280 You don't think that if you've gone...
00:30:18.300 Actually, you know what?
00:30:18.940 I already know how you feel.
00:30:20.060 So it's not the point.
00:30:21.820 I'm asking how you feel about that.
00:30:23.280 How I feel is that it's a fair judgment because the actual fine is only a portion of that $750.
00:30:29.160 The rest is legal fees.
00:30:31.060 He cost the court in time and money and dragged it out.
00:30:35.200 It didn't need to cost this much to anybody.
00:30:37.700 He could have come out of this a lot less under in debt than he will be.
00:30:42.820 Do you believe we should have the right to go through courts and things like that or to have free speech?
00:30:48.000 Yes, I do believe in the court process.
00:30:50.740 But I also believe in showing up when you're supposed to and not dragging things out.
00:30:56.040 And I think when you hold, when you are an elected official, you have a responsibility to your constituents.
00:31:03.480 And he broke that.
00:31:04.660 And that's, as an average citizen, say what you want.
00:31:07.680 When you're an elected official, you're serving somebody else.
00:31:11.140 She was basically saying you deserve to pay every cent of that penalty because you've dragged things through the process.
00:31:17.720 What do you make of that?
00:31:18.640 I certainly didn't drag things through it.
00:31:21.100 They were slow.
00:31:22.620 They'd have one hearing and then we'd have to wait a year and a half for them to get back to it.
00:31:27.520 Frankly, since this diversity, inclusion and equity thing has happened in all the human resources offices,
00:31:37.860 the Human Rights Tribunal is absolutely swamped with the most crazy and bizarre complaints.
00:31:46.840 I'm sure you're familiar with Jessica Yanov or Jessica Simpson and the crazy complaints that they accepted.
00:31:57.620 So they're swamped with all this nonsense.
00:32:01.860 And I'm just going to stop you there.
00:32:03.780 Two of those complaints are actually against Rebel News.
00:32:06.920 Jessica Serenity Simpson, also known formally as Jonathan Yaniv,
00:32:13.280 had already had the attempt to say that what we reported on this individual, a very violent individual,
00:32:21.880 a criminal, convicted many times but slap on the wrist, assaulted our reporters, threatened my family.
00:32:30.280 We've brought this type of news to you.
00:32:32.700 And in a real court, the court said, no, there's nothing defamatory here.
00:32:36.700 They're practicing journalism.
00:32:37.780 And this is a matter of public interest.
00:32:40.600 So now this individual is getting to go through this court that's giving you this huge penalty
00:32:45.960 with two cases against us for our journalism.
00:32:49.560 And what's so crazy about that is Section 7 of BC's Human Rights Code,
00:32:54.660 for which Simpson is coming at us for, doesn't say whether or not we're getting the facts right.
00:33:00.140 It's not about that.
00:33:00.960 It's about whether or not anything we report on an individual who's been, for example,
00:33:05.620 sexually inappropriate and text message with minors.
00:33:09.180 If we report on something that could cause, you know, people to be hateful or have contempt,
00:33:15.440 that is actually what they are assessing.
00:33:18.200 It's very concerning.
00:33:19.820 What do you think is the main issue over and above the massive penalty,
00:33:25.220 but the fact that you could get hit so hard from simply having a belief that was very mainstream,
00:33:31.520 potentially still mainstream?
00:33:32.860 What's the big message that that sends?
00:33:36.820 You know, I think they're aware.
00:33:39.040 There's no way I can, in my lifetime, ever come up with three quarters of a million dollars.
00:33:44.200 But it sets a precedent.
00:33:46.520 And there are a lot of people that believe the same as me, that own a house, have a good job.
00:33:52.400 And since the precedent has already been set, you get nailed with three quarters of a million dollars.
00:33:58.080 That will scare a lot of people into shutting up and not speaking out against this gender ideology.
00:34:04.680 I feel like I've sort of been called to do this.
00:34:08.960 I could have shortened the process by settling out of court.
00:34:12.260 But what I would have to do would be to lie, to say that I was wrong.
00:34:20.300 Initially, the complaint was a little different, you know.
00:34:23.280 Initially, the complaint was that I was creating a toxic work environment for their workers.
00:34:28.080 Well, anybody who knows anything about how school districts work, trustees don't go into classrooms and tell teachers what to do and criticize them for their gender behavior or whatever.
00:34:40.540 We sit in an office and we formulate policy.
00:34:45.040 And once the policy is done, we hand it to the superintendent and he makes sure that it happens in the classroom.
00:34:52.600 So we have no direct contact with teachers.
00:34:57.340 And so there's no way I could have contributed to a toxic environment in the classroom.
00:35:02.380 And then about three years in, they decided to amend their complaint that I was guilty of hate speech.
00:35:11.400 And of course, the hate speech, the only way they can define that is by me saying there's only male and female.
00:35:19.820 So they've done a very good job of scaring a lot of people into silence.
00:35:24.480 But on the other hand, they've stirred up a lot of people to agree with me.
00:35:29.240 I have never heard so many people publicly say that they agree with me and publicly make statements on social media and meetings with opinions that agree with me.
00:35:42.440 So I feel like I was put here for this reason.
00:35:46.240 It's important that I appeal the decision and make every effort to overturn it because there are going to be a lot of people after coming after me.
00:35:58.540 That will be affected by this decision.
00:36:02.440 It's not just, I'm not doing it just for Barry Neufeld.
00:36:07.160 I'm doing it for children.
00:36:09.440 One of the reasons they feel so strongly about this is that many adult people who have transitioned,
00:36:20.380 they think that I was always intended to be a girl, but I was born with male sex parts.
00:36:31.480 And what they need to do is find children that will say earlier and earlier, I was born in the wrong body.
00:36:39.640 And that's why they keep pushing this gender ideology on younger and younger children.
00:36:45.200 It's to make themselves feel better about themselves that, you know, it wasn't the trauma or all the other things that happened to me in my life.
00:36:56.480 I was born this way.
00:36:57.460 And so I need to find some little kids that, that also think that they were born this way.
00:37:03.840 I do not believe that we, anybody is born in the wrong body.
00:37:08.740 I believe in a creator and I believe that God doesn't make mistakes.
00:37:13.700 And if you're born with boys parts, you're always going to be a boy.
00:37:17.880 If you're born with girls parts, you're always going to be a girl.
00:37:21.240 Do you have any fear saying that?
00:37:22.720 And would you have done anything differently now after receiving this penalty?
00:37:27.960 I've made a few mistakes along the way, but they minor and they're off the topic.
00:37:32.040 No.
00:37:32.880 When I first heard about this in the summer of 2017, I knew I could not abide it.
00:37:40.660 I knew I had to speak out and I knew I could never back down.
00:37:45.140 Um, I was, uh, offered, uh, um, a settlement and I was covered by indemnity insurance.
00:37:53.700 It wouldn't have cost me anything.
00:37:55.240 All I would had to do is say publicly, uh, an apology and say that I was wrong.
00:38:01.200 And I could not do that.
00:38:03.040 I just couldn't feel that I couldn't live with myself.
00:38:07.220 If I told a public lie like that, I talked to, um, my lawyer, James Kitchen this morning.
00:38:12.620 Uh, it's the first time we had a chance to talk since the decision came down and, uh, we're
00:38:18.800 both very determined that we're going to apply for a judicial review.
00:38:22.720 That's kind of like an appeal and it may take as long as three days.
00:38:28.440 Um, uh, James will, um, argue on my behalf, but also there's some, um, freedom organizations
00:38:36.540 that may step in and help us.
00:38:38.540 Uh, one of them is the free speech union represented by Elisa Bildi and, um, also the justice center
00:38:46.920 for constitutional freedoms.
00:38:48.540 I've worked with them in the past near the beginning of my troubles and the democracy fund.
00:38:55.580 And we're hoping we can, uh, um, interest some other, um, organizations that stand up for
00:39:04.400 traditional family values.
00:39:05.820 Now you're not giving up on the fight.
00:39:07.720 You said it's very important that you try and appeal this and you just had a talk with
00:39:13.380 your lawyers.
00:39:13.900 You said, this is your first statement that you're going to make.
00:39:16.460 Tell us what's happening.
00:39:17.740 What's next with the fight?
00:39:19.820 Well, um, you were there the day that I turned myself into a court on another matter.
00:39:28.560 Uh, and that stirred up so much interest that, uh, donations started to come in and my lawyer
00:39:35.420 is completely paid off for everything he's done so far.
00:39:38.840 And we have a few thousand dollars extra for this appeal.
00:39:42.680 Um, I've been very humbled by, uh, billboard Chris.
00:39:47.580 He's been tweeting out the, uh, uh, how to support me.
00:39:51.460 Uh, there's a link on my webpage, which is Barry Neufeld, all one word, B-A-R-R-Y-N-E-U-F-E-L-D.com.
00:40:00.620 And on there, you'll find a link to the Rights and Freedoms Fundraising Society.
00:40:06.880 And, uh, uh, you can, um, you can e-transfer money.
00:40:12.580 You can pay by credit card.
00:40:15.180 Uh, you can mail a check.
00:40:16.940 The address is there.
00:40:18.940 Or, uh, I don't really want the money passing through my hands because I'm not doing this
00:40:25.340 for the money.
00:40:25.840 I'm doing this to try and protect future generations from this toxic ideology.
00:40:33.120 You heard how you could support Mr. Neufeld.
00:40:36.180 And also, if you have it in you and you want to protect our journalism in the same area with
00:40:41.780 the same tribunal, please go to stopyaniv.com.