Rebel News Podcast - EZRA LEVANT ｜ Interview with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith

00:00:00.000 tonight a feature interview with alberta premier danielle smith

00:00:18.960 it's july 6th and this is the ezra levant show

00:00:22.000 shame on you you sensorious bug

00:00:28.260 danielle smith was re-elected premier just over a month ago it was a touch and go election there

00:00:43.460 was a point in time where the ndp socialists led by rachel notley were actually in the lead

00:00:48.880 i've never seen such a media pile on in my life well maybe since stockwell day was the public

00:00:55.600 enemy number one of the media party more than a decade ago oh the cbc tried hard to get danielle

00:01:02.960 smith confecting a story a pure fabrication that she had written an email or her staff had written

00:01:09.880 an email threatening pressuring prosecutors to drop lockdown cases it was a total lie the cbc at first

00:01:17.160 claimed they had seen the emails then admitted they hadn't seen them but swore they exist and

00:01:22.540 literally only now after the election do they admit they made the whole thing up it's atrocious

00:01:29.780 and i asked the premier about that there's a lot of things to know and to think about with alberta

00:01:36.160 it's an important province in its own right and it is also for generations being the idea factory

00:01:42.180 of canada at least one of the idea factories it's been a populous place a freedom oriented place in fact

00:01:49.640 if you look at the alberta motto it's fortis et liber which in latin means strong and free both

00:01:55.480 parts of that are important justin trudeau doesn't believe in alberta being strong and free neither did

00:02:00.620 his father pierre trudeau pierre trudeau brought in the national energy program the goal was not to

00:02:06.680 destroy the energy industry but to nationalize it like castro would or the soviets would justin trudeau

00:02:13.480 has a different approach he wants to tax the oil industry too of course but unlike his merely

00:02:19.020 communist father justin trudeau actually wants to turn it off at least true workers party socialists

00:02:25.720 like his father believe in work justin trudeau talks about a just transition off the oil patch which

00:02:32.200 means unemployment uh i'll get to the interview in a moment i just stepped out of mcdougall center which

00:02:39.340 is the premier's office here in calgary it's nice to talk to the premier about other things besides

00:02:46.080 oil and gas and the election she brought up on a solicited the uh censorship bills brought in by 0.99

00:02:53.500 justin trudeau and pablo rodriguez and before him stephen gilbeau she's very alert to issues of free

00:03:00.520 speech because she herself is a former journalist and because i think she truly cares about liberty what's

00:03:05.800 also interesting she's willing to call out the regime media who have supported trudeau's censorship

00:03:11.940 i thought it was an interesting meeting i think i had a chance to get most of the questions in

00:03:17.800 that i wanted to i was grateful for her time i think that the world's socialists are not yet done

00:03:24.900 attacking alberta if they had managed to re-elect the socialist rachel notley the doors of the castle

00:03:33.500 the drawbridge would have been let down the gates thrown open and the barbarians would have stormed 1.00

00:03:37.700 in as they did in 2015 but just because the united conservative party candidate of daniel smith won

00:03:44.960 the election with a majority of the vote and a majority of the seats doesn't mean the hard left

00:03:50.740 is done with alberta trudeau still has it in his crosshairs and so do ngos around the world whether

00:03:57.840 it's the rockefeller brothers or the world economic forum and i talked to her a little bit about that

00:04:03.300 how do you protect alberta against these unelected unaccountable global forces i also talked about how

00:04:10.000 left-wing city councils are trying to make alberta uh left-wing uh in matters outside their jurisdiction

00:04:18.620 so it was a good conversation i'm still chewing it over in my mind i'd like your thoughts on it

00:04:22.920 are there questions you would have asked that i didn't are there answers she gave that you were

00:04:28.540 unsatisfied with and if i have the chance to interview her again in a period of time

00:04:33.140 what questions would you like me to put i suppose i'll ask those closer to the time at hand so

00:04:38.560 here it is my sit down with alberta's premier danielle smith

00:04:42.740 premier great to see you congratulations on your win thank you nice to see you as well

00:04:57.240 44 percent of albertans voted for the ndp you still won but 44 percent voted for a socialist party

00:05:05.260 is alberta losing its albertaness it's not we got 50 almost 53 percent of the vote and when i look back

00:05:12.000 at voting in especially when there's been changed governments when law he got elected he got just

00:05:17.380 over 40 percent of the vote when klein got elected he got over just 40 percent of the vote and i think

00:05:22.200 what i have to what i take from that is i've got a little bit of proving that i need to do to be able

00:05:26.160 to increase the the margins certainly have some proving to do in calgary but i i feel a pretty pretty

00:05:32.420 confident that we've got a strong mandate it's it's very unusual for a government to get elected with

00:05:37.300 a clear majority we got a large number of people who turned out we got over 50 percent so i'm

00:05:41.900 going ahead with my mandate what do you think the key ballot question was when people were voting

00:05:47.400 what was the issue or personality trait or what was on their mind that they checked danielle smith

00:05:53.780 instead of rachel noling i think that what the ndp wanted to make it about was a series of of lies

00:05:59.340 saying that we were going to make people pay for a family doctor that we were going to steal their

00:06:03.060 pension and we were able to say well you can vote for that which is clearly not going to happen or

00:06:08.900 you can vote for us and make sure that your job is protected the economy is protected and i think

00:06:14.100 that the ndp made a major blunder when they promised that they were going to increase corporate income

00:06:19.320 taxes again that to me gives me confidence that people see through what an ndp government has to

00:06:24.920 offer because if you remember when they got elected in 2015 they were straight up about it that they were

00:06:29.500 going to hit corporations and they were going to hit high income earners and they did and then what

00:06:34.460 happened we ended up with a massive flight of capital decrease in the economy took years for us

00:06:39.220 to be able to get that investment back the fact that they had to hide it didn't want to come clean

00:06:43.920 on it didn't do the analysis of how much jobs would be lost or how much investment would be lost

00:06:49.120 i think that albertans were able to see through that they didn't want to go back to that

00:06:53.080 people from other provinces are coming to alberta are you getting the freedom oriented entrepreneurial

00:06:59.040 class or are you getting sort of refugees from socialism who are bringing some of those socialist

00:07:04.320 ideas with them like in the states a lot of californians move to texas and there's a saying

00:07:09.580 don't california my texas are the ontarians and others coming here are how would you describe them in

00:07:16.680 terms of their political culture the ones i meet uh and because i do a lot of events and do photo

00:07:21.120 lineup and the number of people who tell me i'm here from ontario or i'm here from manitoba i'm here

00:07:25.100 from bc i would say that it's probably a mix but i i think that what we're putting out there is what

00:07:31.160 alberta has always put out there that we are a place where you can be free to start a start a

00:07:36.960 business employ people keep more of what you earn uh raise a family practice your faith in your own

00:07:43.320 way and we try to take a uh just we'll leave you alone we want to be able to get out of your business 0.80

00:07:48.140 but make sure that we create an environment for you to prosper and i think people are responding to

00:07:51.460 that it also helps that we have a relatively low cost of housing as well i know it's still

00:07:56.320 um an issue because as people come in and we don't have the housing stock it is pushing prices up

00:08:01.500 but you compare that to vancouver you compare that to toronto where young families can't even dream of

00:08:06.260 being able to own a home and so i think that that's another factor as well i think one of the

00:08:11.860 turning point last question about the election i think a turning point was the debate and my theory for

00:08:17.160 that is people saw an unfiltered version of you for an hour or so that was not editorialized or cut

00:08:24.080 into clips by a cbc producer and so they could compare really seeing you with how you were being

00:08:31.000 demonized by the media party that's my theory is that when they finally saw you without the filter of

00:08:37.520 the cbc they liked you what do you think about my theory there oh i i think you're right i think

00:08:43.940 people tuned in because they were given an image of what i was like and i think what happened is it

00:08:50.220 didn't match when they saw that i was reasonable and i knew the policies i wanted to run on i was

00:08:56.800 confident and i think that contrasted with uh with my opponent who was clearly running to be official

00:09:02.640 opposition leader again she was not running to be premier but one of the things i get told all the

00:09:08.160 time is you're not at all the way the media depicts you and i think that's an indictment of the

00:09:13.020 media the the media's job is to depict a person fairly and accurately and with balanced and i would

00:09:20.080 say that that that the the mainstream media has failed on that and i you know i encourage them to

00:09:24.940 go back to journalistic principles and maybe they'll actually manage to attract back some viewers and

00:09:30.020 audience if they did so but i i just can't believe that the mainstream media have decided that they

00:09:35.000 aren't interested in um in giving content for 53 percent of the population that voted for me

00:09:40.860 they should be interested in having that balanced discussion where you've got content that um that

00:09:46.640 matters to those who are more on the progressive side of the spectrum and have content that's on the

00:09:50.760 conservative side of the spectrum they they i think unfortunately have gone a different path

00:09:54.860 and i think it's showing in the in the lack of support that they're getting you said my opponent

00:09:59.480 and it sounded like you were referring to rachel notley yeah i put it to you that your real

00:10:04.240 opponent was not the ndp party but the media party the cbc in particular and this is not because of

00:10:10.800 my own grudge with the cbc i have never maybe since the time of stockwell day seen an assassination

00:10:17.480 attempt through media like i have the cbc in january said that you or your office had sent emails

00:10:25.200 threatening and pressuring prosecutors to drop certain prosecutions they swore on a stack of bibles it was

00:10:32.220 real the government the civil service the neutral civil service examined more than a million emails

00:10:39.060 none were found every prosecutor every single one testified they had not received such an email

00:10:45.280 everyone in your office testified and a former judge marguerite trussler said there was no evidence at all

00:10:52.020 this was all before the election for six months the cbc held on to that lie only yesterday july 5th

00:11:00.220 did the cbc write a grudging correction that those emails never existed how do you deal with wicked

00:11:08.520 liars like that i'm full of rage for that's not journalism they were your chief opponent i put it to

00:11:15.160 you they were your chief opponent well and it's frustrating too because what do they get a billion

00:11:18.780 and a half dollars from the federal government and so they have the ability to do those kinds of

00:11:24.280 stories stick with them as long as they did lie and then as you point out grudgingly acknowledge

00:11:30.360 that they lied and retract the story i feel vindicated because at least we managed to get

00:11:35.460 them to acknowledge that their story was just frankly untrue it's now the election

00:11:38.660 that is election interference by a government agency run by justin trudeau tell me i'm wrong

00:11:44.840 it's election interference an opportunity and we tried to give them the opportunity to acknowledge

00:11:50.080 especially after we did the email review that uh that the emails didn't exist and they chose not

00:11:54.800 to well let me ask you a question i remember when the cbc sued the conservative party of canada

00:11:59.320 and if i recall it was andrew sheer who was the leader at the time and he still went on cbc shows

00:12:03.980 yeah and i thought have you no self-respect they're suing you and you're going on the show so let me ask

00:12:09.280 you premier smith the cbc lied about you for six months a wicked lie that did great damage to the

00:12:17.120 reputation of prosecutors in alberta claimed that they were corrupt in some way they aimed for you

00:12:23.980 they also had collateral damage in the justice department do you think you should still deal with

00:12:30.980 the cbc as a news agency or do you think you should deal with them as a kind of trudeau super pack

00:12:36.320 well they certainly smeared everyone they smeared me they smeared all my office staff they smeared the 0.65

00:12:40.580 independent public service they smeared the crown prosecutors and they gave ammunition to my

00:12:44.620 opponents to smear me some more i mean i'm the ndp should also apologize because the ndp also

00:12:49.920 they're still going to do sit downs with the cbc like they came to kill you the i'll have to talk 0.55

00:12:56.000 to my team about that yeah i mean you know what i've done i i mean i i will take their questions

00:13:00.620 in a um uh mediated forum because i do a lot of press conferences and i think that's fair because i want

00:13:06.560 to be the type of person who will take questions from from everyone but it is i mean they're i do i do have

00:13:13.140 to consider if they're if they aren't prepared to be fair accurate and balanced um if they're really

00:13:18.440 only interviewing me in order to get ammunition to be the official opposition i'm going to have to

00:13:23.720 keep that in mind every time i answer a question from the cbc in the last election you had some

00:13:28.080 independent news outfits rebel news true north western standard key and bexty's counter signal so

00:13:35.040 we weren't as big as the raging media but there was a counter force tell me your thoughts on this

00:13:41.580 trend of independent citizen journalism compared to the um i'm calling it the regime media well i

00:13:48.440 think that the the mainstream media as they like to call themselves traditional media um i think that

00:13:54.000 they've created a market for uh for alternative voices because they've been so unbalanced i mean

00:13:59.520 i got into media back in the 1990s and my boss at the time said that that was the mantra of media

00:14:04.480 to be fair to be accurate to be balanced and i've seen precious little of that over the last number

00:14:09.100 of years but what happens is that the alternative media are now providing that balance which is why

00:14:13.480 i'm watching what has happened with this new internet regulation bill they have at the federal

00:14:18.240 level because that worries me that worries me that that's really aimed at outfits like yours

00:14:23.840 and true north and western standard and counter signal to regulate them the same way the crtc is

00:14:29.440 regulated or to deny the ability to to get the kind of revenues and coverage that you otherwise would

00:14:34.880 and i think that what i've just gone through with the cbc demonstrates that you got to go to a second

00:14:41.040 source when you read something in the mainstream media it used to be the other way it used to be

00:14:44.680 read something on alternative media and you go to mainstream media for validation they've created

00:14:49.000 an environment where now you have to question what's in the mainstream media and see if it's

00:14:53.020 validated in alternative sources which is why i'm of the view that we need to have as many

00:14:57.820 independent media outlets as possible to make sure everybody's getting the full picture

00:15:01.500 glad you're paying attention to these i call them censorship bills yeah through c18 trudeau just

00:15:07.760 nuked access to facebook and instagram for independent media for all media i think he did huge damage

00:15:13.680 and c11 regulates the internet as if we were broadcasters this just popped into my mind because

00:15:20.800 you and i knew each other before you were in politics and so we would talk as commentators but now you

00:15:26.120 actually have the levers of power justin trudeau is treating websites as if it's a federal jurisdiction

00:15:34.160 i don't know if it is is it really a broadcasting uh enterprise i don't i don't think the the bna act

00:15:42.840 contemplates trudeau in ottawa regulating websites yeah i know the ndp when they were in office

00:15:50.480 used all the levers of power the left when they get in office they they ransack the place they you

00:15:56.540 they pull every lever even if even if it's a long shot they use their political capital i wonder if

00:16:04.520 you as premier with your new mandate concerned about freedom of speech which you always have been

00:16:08.680 might have a role in defending media freedom by blocking the feds do they really have jurisdiction

00:16:16.480 i don't maybe there's a constitutional challenge to what they're doing in c11 and c18 on charter

00:16:22.260 grounds but maybe on bna act grounds how dare they regulate enterprises like that do you think that

00:16:28.760 way do you think all right i'm gonna do everything i can push all the buttons i can use our justice

00:16:34.380 department use our constitution power to push back instead of just a slow retreat which conservatives

00:16:39.920 usually do maybe to push back the question would be how to do it so i could propose something and i

00:16:46.060 don't know if this would work but it does seem to me that if there was some way of us creating an

00:16:51.280 island in alberta for broadcasters to be able to establish themselves here and for us to be able

00:16:57.800 to allow for private contracts to take place so you could sign a deal with facebook and you could sign

00:17:02.840 a deal with google and your content would be covered we have property and civil rights under the

00:17:07.940 charter of rights or under the constitution would that be a contract that we would be able to enforce

00:17:12.340 now would that mean that you'd be able to broadcast to the rest of the country i don't know

00:17:15.640 but is there some way that we can create an environment here that would allow for more media

00:17:21.380 companies to establish it because i talked to somebody who's i think was a former colleague from

00:17:25.580 of yours at sun mark patrone and he has already established a an outfit in florida because he wants

00:17:34.480 the freedom of being able to operate in florida and broadcast into canada so uh if he has to go all

00:17:40.400 the way to florida why can't we keep people closer to home would we be able to do this in alberta i don't

00:17:44.240 know the answer to that at the moment i'm dismayed to see that it's actually been some of the biggest

00:17:49.140 media outlets who've been pushing this along i mean post media was cheering it along and so i have to

00:17:54.500 to see what kind of impact it's going to have but clearly having google say that you're not going to

00:18:00.120 be able to search for stories online i mean i i get a morning media clippings and when the store this

00:18:06.160 came out i said how the heck are we going to get media clippings in the morning if we're not able to

00:18:10.240 use google to search what is what is out there so there's there's a real problem and and that is not

00:18:15.760 that is not in the best interest of the public it's not the best interest of consumers not the best

00:18:19.320 interest of even accountability and oversight of government so i'll see whether there is some kind

00:18:26.080 of meeting of the minds with facebook and google or if we're going to have to do more but i'm i'm

00:18:30.600 looking for suggestions about what we might be able to do i'm i'm always prepared to uh to challenge

00:18:35.920 the federal government if they if they've stepped over the line in areas of our jurisdiction i just

00:18:40.320 need to do a little bit more work on that in the united states quite often states challenge federal

00:18:47.060 laws for constitutional reasons for legal reasons there and certain governors are very activist in

00:18:53.940 in the courts they just like i said flipping every switch even if they don't work in the end

00:18:58.020 we don't really have a lot of that in canada except for i think quebec is more aggressive

00:19:03.860 justin trudeau's coming to town can i just comment on that though i mean i and we we have done the

00:19:11.400 same thing we've put a challenge forward on bill c69 the no more pipelines law we're challenging as

00:19:17.320 well the plastics being labeled toxic but here's the thing on this particular issue look how many

00:19:22.340 years it's taken for it to be seen if we wait four years how many of these uh independent media are

00:19:27.520 going to still survive so i want to watch it and see if there's a federal resolution to this because

00:19:32.020 they are now talking about unintended consequences but we need to to make sure that that we have a

00:19:37.440 robust media environment in our province glad you told me about these reminded me about these other

00:19:42.020 challenges you're doing especially the war on plastic that's crazy it's not just that the war on carbon

00:19:47.820 the war on nitrogen now for our farmers where are these ideas coming from because i've never heard

00:19:53.300 a real person on the streets say we got to regulate nitrogen we got to shut down farmers and food

00:19:59.380 where are these ideas coming from because trudeau is one is a guy who's pushing them but where do

00:20:04.220 they come from i i have to i have to believe that it's almost like he's taking the worst idea

00:20:09.540 in the worst jurisdiction and then trying to adopt all of them here because look what's happening in 0.99

00:20:15.140 the netherlands with our with farmers and the fertilizer ban so one of the things that what what i'm

00:20:20.760 trying to do part of the reason i i passed the sovereignty act in the fall was to just draw a clear line

00:20:26.420 and say we have a constitution and it matters and our country is not supposed to operate this way

00:20:32.000 we're not a unitary state you don't get to make edicts in areas of our jurisdiction and so that

00:20:37.420 caught the attention of of eastern canada i'm not quite sure why it was so controversial quebec does

00:20:41.420 it all the time and nobody even bats an eye you see that saskatchewan is now doing the same thing as

00:20:46.340 well with saskatchewan first back and we have a number of provinces every time i go to a western

00:20:50.480 premier's conference or council of the federation everybody is frustrated about the level of federal

00:20:55.860 interference into their jurisdiction so i think we've started a conversation and the question will

00:21:01.220 be whether they're going to back off so part of my approach and i'm going to be seeing the prime

00:21:07.260 minister this week is i've kind of got three bottom lines number one is the best way to reduce emissions

00:21:13.920 is to reduce higher polluting fuels in the rest of the world and so if we can export our clean lng

00:21:19.460 and reduce coal and wood and dung and reduce all of the pollutants that are associated with it we

00:21:25.180 should get some credit for that and there's an ability to get credit for that so that's number

00:21:28.320 one number two is we can't have an emissions cap their proposal of having an emissions cap of

00:21:33.700 reducing emissions 42 percent on oil and natural gas by 2030 unachievable and i've told them that

00:21:38.920 it means that we would have to shut in production which is a violation of our constitution we get to

00:21:43.840 determine the development of our resources and number three the net zero power grid maybe it could be

00:21:48.820 done in ontario and manitoba and quebec and british columbia and good for them that they're able to get

00:21:53.940 there because they've got vast hydro and nuclear resources we don't we're 90 percent reliant on

00:21:59.880 hydrocarbon fuels same saskatchewan similarly reliant same with new brunswick and nova scotia

00:22:05.100 this is the reason the constitution gives electricity generation to the provinces because every province

00:22:10.840 has different conditions so i'm prepared to work towards what a lower emissions power grid would look

00:22:16.640 like but 2035 also unachievable those are the three things i'll be raising with the prime minister

00:22:20.740 we'll see whether or not we've had a breakthrough that's great i know we've got to wrap up because

00:22:24.660 you have such a busy day but i have one last short question and it goes to jurisdiction again

00:22:29.060 i know that the cities of calgary and edmonton sometimes color outside the lines like their jobs

00:22:35.860 is garbage pickup policing etc traffic i see people from edmonton and calgary going on foreign junkets to

00:22:44.480 the c40 mayor's conference to talk about climate action and the rockefeller uh brothers they have

00:22:54.040 some resiliency climate fund and that feels like it's not their jurisdiction they're they're going

00:23:00.820 to foreign places where there's no scrutiny they're not doing their business in their city halls

00:23:04.680 with the whatever checks and balances are there they're taking foreign funding going to foreign

00:23:10.040 meetings run by activist groups it's like mini world economic forums and i wonder if there's a

00:23:15.920 place for the province to say you guys can make your mistakes in matters that are of your own

00:23:22.680 jurisdiction if you want to screw up your policing or your transit we don't like it but you were elected

00:23:28.620 yeah but you were not elected to meddle around in foreign affairs or or in environmental jurisdiction

00:23:34.880 or climate emergencies at what point do you say threats to our albertaness aren't just coming from

00:23:43.160 trudeau outside his jurisdiction it's coming from the calgary and edmonton city halls outside their

00:23:49.480 jurisdiction have you ever thought about that there's a couple things one i would say is we've already

00:23:53.180 demonstrated to the cities that we believe that their laws have to stay within their own jurisdiction

00:23:58.280 and that they can't be offside with ours and i'll give the example of the approach that we've taken

00:24:02.780 to firearms regulation we've told the cities no you can't come through with handgun bans no you can't

00:24:07.960 use your police forces to confiscate firearms on behalf of the trudeau government so there's a couple

00:24:12.680 of ways in which we've told them that that's not in alignment with our policing priorities our policing

00:24:17.240 priorities are border security gun smuggling drug smuggling organized crime and dealing with this

00:24:22.740 terrible opioid crisis so that's one way that we've demonstrated if they go too far or they intend to go

00:24:29.080 in that direction we're just going to say no the the i'll have to watch and see if there are other

00:24:34.580 areas that we're going to have to intervene and at the moment working on creating lower emissions power

00:24:42.700 fair enough bringing in hydrogen buses fair enough those are those are all things that i think are

00:24:47.220 on side with how we want to build out our hydrogen economy now as well but the uh the question will be

00:24:54.000 is if they take a step that begins to violate the rights of albertans if it's offside with our

00:24:59.580 province-wide plan we we have the ability to to step in and intervene and we've demonstrated that we

00:25:03.960 will when we think the the issue is serious enough great to see you again thanks for taking so much time

00:25:08.820 well that's our show for today i'd love your thoughts on my questions her answers and suggestions for

00:25:27.700 next time you can send those to ezra at rebelnews.com until next time on behalf of all of us at rebel news

00:25:35.040 here in calgary good night and keep fighting for freedom

00:25:39.320 you

Rebel News Podcast - July 06, 2023

EZRA LEVANT ｜ Interview with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith

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