EZRA LEVANT ｜ Davos reveals how far Canada has drifted from press freedom
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Summary
Rebel News returns from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland with a look back at the day-to-day of our time in the Swiss ski resort, and a look ahead to what's in store for the rest of the week.
Transcript
00:00:30.000
Oh, hi, everybody. I'm recording this just before 11 p.m. at night.
00:00:42.000
We're still working. We get up very early in the morning, as you know.
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We take a train from the town of Closters to Davos.
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Then we spend the day walking up and down the promenade looking for VVIPs and oligarchs to talk to.
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We come back to the town we're in called Closters.
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And all the stories that we recorded during the day, the same guys who videotaped them now edit them
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and send them back to Toronto, where at our office we upload them to the web.
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I was talking to a team, and I think this Davos mission is the hardest of all the missions we do.
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We go to some exotic places sometimes at Rebel News, but this isn't just a very far flight away, so we're all jet lagged.
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You're doing a lot of waiting, which is standing around, and then you're basically running to catch up with the oligarchy spot on the street.
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And even, I mean, I hop and puff because I'm not in great shape, but also when you're trying to talk while running, I don't know.
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I think we're all looking forward to going home.
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But we had a lot of success, not just today, but over the past few days.
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And, you know, I've always said that the World Economic Forum has no official power.
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It doesn't pass laws, for example, but it has enormous influence.
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That is, the ideas that are generated here are widely adopted and shared by World Economic Forum members.
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All sorts of quasi-governmental things happen, lobbying, schmoozing for contracts, meetings beyond the gaze of the media.
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Because when you have meetings in Parliament or Congress, there's a record of them, there's minutes, there's a transcript, there's a lobbyist registry, a foreign agent registry.
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There's so many things that are checks and balances, and you have an independent press snooping around, making sure nothing untoward is happening.
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Well, at least we are independent journalists, even though we're given no official access to it.
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There are a few other citizen journalists here, and I think it's fun to see them because it would be too depressing if we were literally the only ones.
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But going to the World Economic Forum is pretty much a rebel news franchise, if I may call it that, that our people love.
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And there's a reason for that, is we come as prepared as we can be to ask tough questions to people from a whole different range of walks of life.
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And over the past few days, Justin Trudeau and Chrystia Freeland were very high on our list.
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Lots of other little people, I don't mean little people, little stories, little interviews along the way.
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But as I was remarking to my colleagues here, and I think I mentioned on the show yesterday, it's sort of crazy that we have to fly halfway across the planet in order to interview our own country's MPs.
00:03:37.700
In one day, I talked to Justin Trudeau, Chrystia Freeland, Francois-Philippe Champagne, and Melanie Jolie, or at least in the space of 24 hours, which is more access to rebel news it's allowed to have of our government in 10 years.
00:03:51.440
And it's insane, and it's a reminder that we are not normal as a country.
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We have restrictions on our press that are not normal, that are not normal.
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I mean, another thing, you saw when I was walking or running down the street talking to Chrystia Freeland, she said, oh, stop harassing me, you're a Putin spy, or whatever she said.
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I could ignore her, and the police were somewhat alarmed.
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They pulled me over when we were done the interview.
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But after we just showed them our ID and they made some phone calls, they said, okay, you can go, just, you know, take it easy.
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And if we had been in Canada, we would for sure have been arrested, possibly taken to jail, handcuffed, and most likely charged with some offense.
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The fact that the police here just said, hey, just make sure everything's okay.
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Like, they were, you probably saw that question I asked the police.
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Like, it was, he was almost slightly surprised I would have to ask.
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This is all being recorded, just for the record.
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I'm sorry, but in none of my interactions with police in Canada over the past five or ten years,
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is that script there even remotely possible that I would say, I believe in freedom of the press.
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Like, it was almost like he was upset that I doubted him.
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I can't imagine the Calgary police, the Edmonton police, the Ottawa police, the Toronto police,
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the RCMP, the OPP, the Quebec police, the Certe to Montreal.
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I can't imagine any of those police forces having as respectful an approach towards civil
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It was interesting because, of course, Donald Trump was here and his speech, his 90-minute
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Mark Carney gave a speech that was well-received by World Economic Forum delegates.
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But as I tweeted, you know, it's a nice speech, very poetic, but how about read that out at the
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How about read that out in one of the car factories in the greater Toronto area?
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When you're losing jobs because you can't get a deal with the United States because you're
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constantly picking ideological fights, sure, giving a lovely speech about, hey, let's
00:07:01.020
all rally together against the big bag in the United States, you'll get an applause.
00:07:06.420
And I talked to the rapper, Will.i.am, who really loved Mark Carney's speech.
00:07:13.680
He was in the band, The Black Eyed Peas, and I really enjoyed talking with him.
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But he's not a normal Canadian looking for work.
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He's a zillionaire rock star who travels the world.
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So he has the luxury of being inspired by Mark Carney's poetry.
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The rest of Canadians have to live in a country where food inflation is amongst the highest
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in the G7, where our economy is weak, where the per capita GDP is weak in part due to mass
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We have a lot of problems and sort of daydreaming about, well, what if Canada was super duper
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And we can't replace the United States as our market.
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It's just not, you know, 80% of our exports go to the US.
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You know, we can't find a replacement for those sales within Canada.
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It may sound good on paper, but it cannot happen.
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First of all, don't believe the statistics that Canada is ramping up on military spending.
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They're doing that by calling certain bureaucratic spending military spending.
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But even if it were true, Canada simply can never match the United States militarily.
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Rather, we should try to be good allies and hammer things out behind closed doors, not
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But Mark Carney, in his own way, has been continuously prickling and poking the United States.
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I think it's because he wants the United States to poke back.
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So there's a wave of anti-Americanism that Mark Carney can ride into a majority government.
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I'm the only one who can take on the evil Donald Trump.
00:09:01.400
That's basically how he won his first election.
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I'm a little bit tuckered myself, although I love these trips.
00:09:12.280
Like I say, it's amazing how many people you can just approach at the World Economic Forum.
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There are some bodyguards, especially around some fancy, super fancy VIPs.
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But even then, you can still talk to the people.
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No one's going to arrest you just for talking to them.
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Without further ado, here's a compilation of some of the videos we put out today.
00:09:36.180
Larry, how are you doing this year in the spirit of dialogue?
00:09:52.240
Obviously, since last year, you've been, I guess, promoted to the co-chair.
00:09:56.460
Is that because if you want a job done right, you might as well do it yourself?
00:10:08.520
What does the spirit of dialogue actually mean, Larry?
00:10:11.740
Is it like pretending you care about the carbon footprint coming here on a private jet?
00:10:16.080
Why is your bodyguard pushing me into the street, sir?
00:10:21.440
Why was the would-be assassin of Donald Trump in one of your corporate videos, sir?
00:10:29.360
Do you feel any responsibility as a Jew in the current climate, where there's a rise in
00:10:35.680
anti-Semitism and people blame Jews for everything, saying they want to control the world, and
00:10:43.100
You're the example every anti-Semite gives, and it's hard to fight.
00:11:00.800
You have all this BS about conversations and dialogue, but underneath it, you're a thug.
00:11:14.060
How do you feel about Donald Trump saying you can no longer buy up residential homes and
00:11:23.060
Do you agree with him that you've been predatory in your pricing for residential houses in America?
00:11:32.100
Have you consolidated power at WEF now that you're the co-chair?
00:11:50.940
The WEF, the biggest pack of hypocrites, evil hypocrites like Larry Fink, who tell us how
00:11:58.220
we've got to live when it comes to your carbon footprint.
00:12:01.220
You've got to eat bugs, but old mate here gets to fly in his private jet.
00:12:06.400
And when that one got tired, he's moved on to the spirit of dialogue.
00:12:35.500
Why do you suddenly not care about climate change here at WEF?
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Why does it seem like nothing here is about carbon footprint?
00:12:45.140
Is that because the AI data centers kind of destroyed that narrative?
00:12:54.480
Why do you force DEI on the companies in which you invest?
00:13:00.360
Isn't that putting your own ideology ahead of shareholder rate of return?
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Your fiduciary duty to get the best rate of return instead of imposing your ideology on
00:13:30.300
When was the last time you flew commercials, sir?
00:13:55.200
What do you think of the defections to Reform UK?
00:14:09.340
Mr. Sunak, do you like Keir Starmer because he makes your poll numbers look good in retrospect?
00:14:18.180
Do you think Nigel Farage will make you a better Prime Minister than you?
00:14:37.520
Are you trying to find support for the Conservatives, which look like they're dying?
00:15:07.540
And anybody who says that there's any simple or obvious or easy answers is a fool or an idiot or both.
00:15:16.060
It's a feast for journalists, though, isn't it?
00:15:22.120
I'm not sure I understand what you mean by that.
00:15:24.140
Well, there's so much to cover, so much to analyze and interpret.
00:15:29.080
Whether or not it's a time for us to do our jobs.
00:15:34.100
It's a time for us to get serious about what's happening.
00:15:38.060
And I'm regretfully that there are no easy solutions.
00:15:42.000
I always remember John Major saying that to me once in an interview.
00:15:47.160
He said, if there are any easy answers, don't you think we'd have found them by now?
00:15:51.100
Do you think in some ways you're a bridge between the UK and the US because you've got a foot in both?
00:16:01.820
And there's sometimes an ideological or philosophical divide.
00:16:08.280
Having been covering transatlantic issues and transatlantic alliances and business for the last 35 years.
00:16:19.280
You know, who the hell knows at the end of the day?
00:16:21.980
Do you think that some of Trump's challenges to the UK are just puffery or do you take them seriously?
00:16:37.800
Look, just this morning I'm reading Scott Besant, US Treasury Secretary, is telling everybody to chill.
00:16:51.300
When you're actually, when the threat is actually being made, what does it actually mean?
00:16:58.240
If you don't take it seriously and it transpires to blow up in your face, should you have taken it more seriously?
00:17:05.560
It's very easy to say, chill, don't take it seriously.
00:17:08.740
It's very easy to say, the president's not serious on this point or it's a negotiating position.
00:17:15.600
But the reality is, even if it is a negotiating position, what is the destruction of trust that's taken place as a result?
00:17:28.540
You look like you need to have one of those for later.
00:17:44.980
Do you think Donald Trump deserves the Nobel Peace Prize?
00:17:49.360
Every time I ask you these softball questions...
00:17:53.920
You just won't do it with me because I'm asking you questions you don't like.
00:17:58.260
What's a Republican doing at a globalist swamp like this anyways?
00:18:17.700
He was a high-ranking congressman in the Republican Party.
00:18:27.160
He was actually on the presidential ticket, and he's been a bit pouty ever since Donald Trump won.
00:18:33.000
When I talked to him last year, he said the same thing.
00:18:44.440
For Rebel News, I'm Ezra Levan with my friend, Bobby Yamini.
00:18:48.220
Why are you so hostile to questions from the press?
00:18:56.640
Or were you maybe just a pre-lobbyist who's bloomed into a lobbyist?
00:19:15.400
How do you think the World Economic Forum is reacting to Trump?
00:19:30.680
So, as Secretary Besson said just this morning in an open press avail,
00:19:37.640
But I wonder why the same people getting upset that the US has an interest in
00:19:42.300
buying Greenland fairly and squarely aren't upset that China and Russia are already there.
00:19:47.000
You know, they want American money for Ukraine,
00:19:49.860
but they don't want America to call the shots in Greenland.
00:19:53.780
Maybe you have to be European to understand how to reconcile that.
00:19:57.840
And the other thing is we love our European allies.
00:20:01.160
The fact is they're still buying Russian oil four years,
00:20:04.400
nearly four years after the invasion of Ukraine.
00:20:06.480
So, as of last year, we were in for $350 billion.
00:20:13.400
Last time I looked at a map, Ukraine is in Europe.
00:20:15.620
So, obviously, many people mispredicted last year at WEF and then the Munich Security Conference
00:20:20.280
that President Trump was going to, quote, abandon Ukraine.
00:20:27.700
He's got his peace board signing an event in two days here.
00:20:34.280
And obviously, the president will be talking about Greenland as well,
00:20:44.780
And as the Arctic continues to melt, there's more passageways.
00:20:50.760
And the president wants to make sure that part of his legacy is bucking up the Western Hemisphere
00:20:55.440
and keeping, as you saw in Venezuela, and keeping China out.
00:20:59.520
We're from Canada, and some Canadians have been worried about what the Greenland approach to our country.
00:21:06.960
What would you have to say to ordinary Canadians?
00:21:14.680
Well, Canada is a great ally of the U.S., and President Trump is highly engaged with Carney.
00:21:26.800
I know it's – but Secretary Besson said just this morning in a forum I attended that he –
00:21:37.020
But the fact is that we're all allies, and I think that there's always going to be –
00:21:42.680
people are always going to complain about President Trump because he has totally upended the elites
00:21:50.880
and the establishment order, and people like to strike back against that.
00:22:04.620
Do you think he's going to sort of fire a few thunderbolts at the folks here?
00:22:13.580
I think he's going to challenge the globalist elite order.
00:22:19.500
And remember, if you're President Trump, and two years ago people were promising, promising, if not hoping,
00:22:29.340
You get to swagger into Davos, and you get to talk about all the great direct foreign investment
00:22:35.300
that he's attracted $18 trillion and counting in his first year.
00:22:38.700
He's going to talk about making housing more affordable and accessible to Americans.
00:22:43.060
He's going to talk about, obviously, economic security, national security,
00:22:47.560
him trying to get more trade deals, more peace deals.
00:22:58.240
And, yes, he has Greenland very much on his mind.
00:23:01.200
And it shouldn't surprise anyone because China's already there.
00:23:09.640
They basically promised all kinds of money and infrastructure and other goodies to some of these countries
00:23:19.000
And then that just all disappears when Maduro is extracted.
00:23:24.740
If I were the Cubans, I'd feel good, too, because the Cuban people.
00:23:30.700
He signed the executive order just a few short days after Maduro was taken out of Venezuela,
00:23:37.200
that there'll be a fund for the oil profits for the Venezuelan people.
00:23:54.080
Not closely, but I mean, he's a friend, you know, obviously.
00:23:57.980
We miss him from GZERO Media, but he's a fantastic guy.
00:24:11.140
He's the boss of the Eurasia Group, which is a lobby group and a government relations group
00:24:20.740
Incredibly, it's where Evan Solomon worked, Jerry Butts, the former senior advisor to Justin Trudeau.
00:24:29.200
And it's where, I think, until this day, Mark Carney's wife works.
00:24:33.680
The first question I asked him was, are you part of Canada's cabinet?
00:24:37.480
Because, really, half of the senior decision makers in Canada's cabinet work for that American.
00:24:45.040
He's a friendly guy, which I think masks just how powerful he is, at least in our country.
00:24:53.100
We have defied the skeptics and critics because the university, four years after its foundation,
00:25:03.060
And anybody who visits our campus can see what fantastic students we have
00:25:09.360
and what a great atmosphere of intellectual freedom we've created.
00:25:13.880
I'm hugely proud of the University of Austin and especially of the students.
00:25:18.460
Right now, it's sort of an entrepreneurial place.
00:25:20.680
The students themselves are building the university.
00:25:23.240
What do you expect it to look like in 25 years when there's a bit more of a culture that's set?
00:25:28.180
I think even sooner than 25 years, in just a few years,
00:25:34.160
I've often said we have, as a role model, the early years of the University of Chicago,
00:25:39.520
which grew extraordinarily rapidly in student numbers in its first 10 years.
00:25:44.880
Ten years from now, I hope we'll have thousands of students
00:25:47.680
and we'll occupy a larger footprint in downtown Austin.
00:25:54.700
Any startup is a challenge, but to do a startup in academia is really difficult
00:26:00.440
because there's a lot of skepticism from the established institutions.
00:26:08.080
But the established institutions have just failed so badly in the last 10 years
00:26:12.020
that they'll all benefit from our kind of competition.
00:26:15.700
We're trying to reinvent the university, reinvent governance,
00:26:18.620
create new rules around the way a university works.
00:26:22.200
And I think within 10 years, people will see that we've been a force for good,
00:26:28.200
I hope you'll allow foreign applicants as well from Canada one day.
00:26:31.940
Well, we were constrained by the accreditors and not allowed to do that at first,
00:26:58.780
What do you guys do to ensure that money doesn't flow on to terrorists in Gaza or the West Bank?
00:27:11.780
Are you confident that none of your money goes to Hamas or Hamas-affiliated groups?
00:27:23.680
Do you think there's going to be peace in the Middle East this year?
00:27:38.100
I know very little about Australia, but I wonder...
00:27:44.860
Well, actually, I have totally different questions than my colleague.
00:27:52.540
Give me a word on the President Trump's speech.
00:27:57.220
Well, all I can say if you're from Canada is as follows.
00:28:03.240
Hey, maybe you have a diplomatic future in Ottawa.
00:28:14.140
Or maybe, do you think being appointed to nuke in Greenland would be a hardship posting these days?
00:28:28.280
Obviously, you're here because of Trump's visit.
00:28:30.800
The President will come in here in a couple of hours.
00:28:34.200
And I was going to talk about how the U.S. is back in business and we're number one.
00:28:38.440
And it can always be a couple of surprises in what the President speaks on today.
00:28:42.120
Now, we've been coming to Davos for five years in a row.
00:28:45.180
And being anti-Trump and anti-Elon Musk is something that I think is the consensus here.
00:28:50.220
So you've got oil and water that are going to be mixed today.
00:28:53.980
Do you think there's going to be people converted to Trump's way of thinking?
00:28:58.920
What's your hunch about the delegates here, the VVIPs?
00:29:01.200
Yeah, I'd push back on that a bit and say that even last night as I was walking around
00:29:05.640
my first night here in Davos, there were a lot of people who are very interested in what
00:29:09.260
the administration is doing, what the President's going to have to say.
00:29:12.340
And in particular, the fact that the U.S. is still the best place in the world to do business.
00:29:16.980
That's the place where all the capital is moving to.
00:29:19.100
And everything that the President does becomes a top of the full front page story the next
00:29:24.660
By the way, there are a lot of Trump supporters here, way more than I would have thought.
00:29:30.260
I know you have a freedom of speech background.
00:29:35.620
Are you worried about the trend in Europe to become more censorious and this battle with
00:29:43.340
So obviously we see what's going on with Ofcom in the U.K., which is a massive issue.
00:29:47.880
And I know the Vice President and the President have both spoken out on this, but very concerned
00:29:51.780
about the EU and where they're going in their efforts to punish some of the American tech
00:29:59.700
I don't think that the bureaucratic oligarchs in the EU are ever going to stop until free
00:30:06.780
But you can count on the Americans to fight that every step of the way.
00:30:11.560
My bandmate, co-founder of the Black Eyed Peas, best friend.
00:30:16.760
One line I've loved for 20 years is, I'm so 2008, you're so 2000 and late.
00:30:23.680
So what we were talking about back then was AI.
00:30:28.340
And the video that came right after that was a song called I'm going to be rocking that
00:30:31.920
body that, you know, low key, high key predicts like text to music before there was LLMs and
00:30:47.240
Until next time, on behalf of all of us here in Davos, Switzerland and around the world,
00:30:52.760
to you at home, good night and keep fighting for freedom.