The Alberta Roundup with Isaac Lamoureux - Arrested for protesting drag queen story hour (Ft. Pastor Derek Reimer)

00:00:00.000 Hey everyone, welcome back to the Alberta Roundup. I'm your host Rachel Emanuel. I hope that you

00:00:13.880 guys are having a great week so far. We are going to do something a little bit different

00:00:17.820 on today's episode. We're having our first ever guest on the Alberta Roundup. We will

00:00:23.360 be speaking with Pastor Derek Reimer. For those of you who've been following the news

00:00:27.540 or have listened to some of my previous podcasts, Derek Reimer was arrested in Calgary after

00:00:32.400 protesting at a drag queen story hour. He's facing multiple charges from Calgary police

00:00:38.380 and he's now out on bail. So we caught up to him and we spoke with him about what led to

00:00:43.280 his arrest and the conditions of his bail and what this means for Alberta and Calgary moving

00:00:47.880 forward. I'm joined now by Pastor Derek Reimer. Hey Pastor Reimer, thank you so much for joining

00:00:53.380 us today. You're actually the very first guest ever on the Alberta Roundup. So we're very excited

00:00:57.860 to have you on the show today. So many people are aware of your story. You were arrested a couple

00:01:03.020 weeks ago after sort of protesting a drag queen story hour at a public library in Calgary. I'm

00:01:09.040 wondering if you can walk us through the process. What led you to go to that event? What happened

00:01:13.160 while you were there? And then what followed that led to your arrest? Yeah, absolutely. I went to my

00:01:19.820 first drag protest in December. I just felt compelled by the Holy Spirit moving into January.

00:01:27.700 I started doing my homework and researching and finding out how frequent these events were and I

00:01:32.220 was disturbed of how many adult events were taking place, but then how many are involving children. So

00:01:38.400 I thought, okay, let's focus on the ones where it's not just consenting adults, which still the Bible

00:01:44.080 would forbid that, but when it's involving the innocent, not just myself, but there's a team of us

00:01:49.660 that felt really compelled to move in this direction, to take action. I formed a ministry

00:01:54.880 called, like separate from Mission 7 Ministries that I'm the founder of. This one is called

00:01:59.140 Exposing Darkness. It's inspired by Ephesians 5.11 and have no fellowship with the unfruitful works

00:02:04.100 of darkness, but rather expose them. So I take the approach also of 2 Timothy 4.2, where it says to

00:02:10.700 convince, rebuke, and exhort, which in the Greek it means to tell a fault, to warn, and to invite.

00:02:17.540 To tell a fault of the sin, to warn of God's judgment on that sin, to invite them into a

00:02:22.340 relationship with Jesus Christ. So sort of organizing protests with Seton in particular,

00:02:28.780 we just decided and strategized that we will go in there and just one at a time, we'll go in and

00:02:33.840 rebuke and just speak truth and preach Jesus. And then when one gets removed, then the other one

00:02:40.240 will take their place. So I went last and I just had it in my head that, hey, I'm going to preach and

00:02:45.760 expose as much as I can. And even if I get removed, I still want to preach and just exercise my freedom

00:02:52.220 of speech. So when cops get there, you can see in the video that they asked me to leave. And I thought,

00:02:57.100 okay, that jegs it up. Noah needs to be arrested needlessly. He's already here. So I just peacefully

00:03:02.800 left. We went outside and we continued our church service, which we do with counter-protesters and

00:03:07.020 anybody who's watching us, you know, singing songs, parodies, and preaching. Invite them into a

00:03:11.860 relationship with Christ, but exposing also darkness and wickedness, saying that a holy God is not okay

00:03:16.580 with this type of behavior. So moving forward, cops came to my residence, you know, about a half week

00:03:24.340 later, they wanted me to go to a cop shop with them. I couldn't get legal counsel on the phone that

00:03:30.840 morning. So I just said, you know, I'm not comfortable with that. I'm not going to go. He said

00:03:33.820 he'll issue some warrants. And yeah, he held up to that promise. The next day I called and he confirmed

00:03:39.620 that. So I was just kind of hanging out, waiting to be arrested. I went for a prayer walk and Rebel

00:03:45.960 News is just kind of hanging out with me the last day or two. And sure enough, early on in my prayer

00:03:51.160 walk, they scooped me up and they took me into a cop shop at Spy Hill, right by the Remax Center.

00:03:57.900 Saw Justice of the Peace. And it was a long bail hearing. It's about an hour and a half at the

00:04:04.700 recess. It was very contested. It was very interesting for the guards there. One guy,

00:04:11.540 he didn't even want to take his break because he wanted to see what was going to take place.

00:04:14.880 Another guard called it a nail biter that a lot of people knew of why I was in there.

00:04:20.200 Obviously, because of the media, I was granted bail. But, you know, the Lord said to me before

00:04:24.820 those papers got made up, what's more important to you, your freedom or preaching my word?

00:04:29.000 So getting to those bail papers, I didn't sign because I knew that I'd be right back in there.

00:04:34.540 That weekend, we had three protests that weekend alone. I knew going out, I'll just be at these

00:04:40.120 protests. I'll be right back at jail. Why sit this initial process? I already sat 12 hours. I said,

00:04:45.740 just take me to the Remax Center. Sat there the weekend. And, you know, just due to some urgent

00:04:51.800 health matters that I, they, the jail couldn't care for me. They had to take me to an outside

00:04:58.520 hospital. So they couldn't assure me when they could do that. So I just made the tough decision.

00:05:02.740 I signed those bail papers, didn't want to. And now just working on getting those conditions

00:05:08.640 loosen. I know people are wondering what those conditions are. I have in front of me, it says

00:05:13.460 that you must have no contact with by means of text, email, social media, or through a third party

00:05:17.960 with the identified gay community member. You must not attend or within 200 meters of any gay 1.00

00:05:25.900 community event, drag event. So my lawyer is bothered with the word indirectly, there directly

00:05:33.700 or indirectly. To me, these conditions is like saying, don't do your ministry. Don't do what

00:05:39.560 God has told you to do. And it's just, it's just not feasible. So today I had a bail hearing

00:05:48.660 to loosen these conditions and it got adjourned to another week or two. So I'm going to have

00:05:54.480 a meeting with my lawyer tomorrow. And it's just kind of taken a day by day. You know,

00:05:58.860 there's still protests. We still have the conviction and we're just letting God lead us

00:06:03.200 through this. And he's our defender. He goes before us and we're just believing that we're

00:06:07.940 going to have a mighty victory. We don't know how it's all going to look though.

00:06:12.360 So I just want to back it up a little bit. One of the things that the Calgary police is saying

00:06:16.400 is they're saying that when you actually entered that protest at the library, it was a sort

00:06:21.480 of a dry clean story hour that you made, you know, homophobic and transphobic slurs.

00:06:27.480 You've yourself just said now that you were speaking truth and you were speaking wisdom

00:06:31.480 to the audience there. What exactly did you say? And can you see how any of that would

00:06:35.940 be, you know, transferred as a sort of a hate crime or are they completely taking your

00:06:39.840 words out of context?

00:06:41.760 Right. I can see that with a secular world where they hate me. And it's a light versus

00:06:46.660 darkness. It's a spiritual battle. And, you know, people that are of the darkness that 0.98

00:06:51.160 don't believe in Jesus, they hate Jesus and they hate truth. They hate everything about

00:06:54.220 the Bible. So I just came in there saying, don't pervert the children. Don't expose them

00:07:00.020 to the sexualization. And I just continued to preach Bible verses like homosexuality is 1.00

00:07:05.580 a sin. First Corinthians six, those that want to live this lifestyle won't inherit the

00:07:09.560 kingdom, but God is faithful and just to forgive us of all of our sins, cleanse us of all

00:07:12.900 unrighteousness. And just that kind of rhetoric preaching where it's, hey, this isn't okay

00:07:18.120 to a holy God. We love you guys and we want you guys to inherit our life, but you've got

00:07:22.380 to turn away from this perversion. And it's not just me. There was a team of us where we

00:07:26.620 felt, again, compelled to expose and rebuke and reprove and to invite them into the gospel

00:07:31.920 of Christ. And we're going to continue to do that.

00:07:35.180 Something else that I'm sure many of my viewers are aware of, this is a video that went viral

00:07:39.100 online. It was a video of a man being dragged out of a drag queen story hour and being tackled

00:07:44.440 to the ground by one of the attendees. That video was circulating online and people were saying that

00:07:48.640 that was actually you in the video who was being tackled to the ground. I'm wondering if that's

00:07:52.660 correct. Were you tackled to the ground at any point during the protest or was it, as you

00:07:56.640 mentioned, you sort of just left when the police asked you to leave?

00:08:00.760 Right. So the drag queen story hour was in like a little blast room. So I went in there and just

00:08:07.160 started preaching on Jesus and saying, you know, turn away from this perversion. Don't expose your

00:08:10.980 kids to this. The parents came at me very aggressively and even violently. And they

00:08:17.040 started grabbing at me, two or three of them, and just holding me out. I was clutching on the walls,

00:08:21.640 just trying to hold myself up, regain my balance. And then you guys kind of catch it at the tail end

00:08:26.380 there where I'm gripping that glass door and they just violently throw me out on my back. And you

00:08:32.040 know what? I thought good when that happened. In terms of that, I want everybody to see that

00:08:37.820 they're hateful, they're violent. And as a Christian, I want to really display that we are set

00:08:45.000 apart, that we are holy people of the Lord, that we're not coming in violence. We don't need to come

00:08:49.600 in threats. We just come preaching the truth. And again, I can see how people take that as hate

00:08:54.200 speech. We don't hate people, but we're hating the same. That's contaminating people. And we're not

00:09:00.840 afraid to speak that truth. My understanding that despite you being violently thrown to the

00:09:07.860 ground, as you just mentioned, you were not violent yourself. Those people, those attendees,

00:09:12.600 those parents are not going to face any charges. The Calgary police saw no reason to charge them or to

00:09:18.520 arrest them. Does that surprise you? Do you feel that is an unfair sort of portrayal and application

00:09:24.660 of the law? Or is this pretty much what you expect in today's secular society, as you mentioned,

00:09:29.540 as a Christian going into that room, you are hated and you're treated differently as a result?

00:09:34.860 A hundred percent. That is the double standard. Everybody can see, like you said, the video goes

00:09:39.860 viral. The only person that was abused and assaulted was me. And I even chose, you know,

00:09:47.280 just as a Christian man, you know, I'm not going to pursue as of now any charges towards them and I

00:09:52.940 forgive them. And I just want to rise above that. I was on a mission to expose and to invite

00:09:57.680 into the gospel. And this is how people react. And also, I want the world to see that and how

00:10:04.940 we're going to continue at our peaceful disposition. But, you know, Mayor Gondek and the city,

00:10:10.460 they're coming against us and they're trying to pin us with a brush that we're full of hate and

00:10:15.020 hate motivated, hate crimes and transphobic and all of these terms and slurs and definitions.

00:10:21.460 It's like, you know what? I'm not surprised at all. And that's going to keep coming. But you know,

00:10:27.380 the Bible talks about too, when they slander you, when they defame you. So those that desire to live 0.98

00:10:32.840 godly in Christ Jesus, we will suffer persecution. And I just rejoice. And I'm kind of worthy to suffer

00:10:37.420 for Jesus name's sake. And I'm just going to continue on this path.

00:10:41.020 I just wanted to touch a little bit on some of the charges that you're facing. So it's my

00:10:45.060 understanding that you're facing eight charges, which the Calgary police are calling hate motivated

00:10:49.780 crimes. And six of those charges actually fall under the city's harassment bylaws.

00:10:55.000 And those could each carry up to six months in jail per charge and an additional $10,000 charge.

00:11:01.380 Let me know if any of that's changed since you've been released on bail or if those are in fact still

00:11:05.480 the charges that you're facing. I'm also wondering, you know, is this something that

00:11:09.140 you're fearful of? Are you fearful that you're going to have to spend time in jail over

00:11:12.820 preaching on your convictions? And are you worried about also the monetary fines that are

00:11:17.540 potentially coming along with this incident, you know, an incident of you, as I just mentioned,

00:11:21.780 really just preaching your convictions, something that should be protected under the Charter of

00:11:25.640 Rights and Freedoms? You know what, even with Mission 7, as we're getting attacked and we have

00:11:31.580 a plethora of fines that the bylaw officers throw at us, and I'm just pleading not guilty. And it was

00:11:36.760 either like $50 to plead guilty or to go to trial and found guilty $2,500. You know, the Lord just said to

00:11:44.500 me, you know, can you plead guilty? I was like, no, like I'm not guilty of this. And

00:11:48.660 he just said, give me an opportunity to show up. So that's why I want, it's applied to me,

00:11:53.740 but it's applied to every Christian believer too. We just got to be obedient to what the Lord is

00:11:57.620 calling us to. And we just got to give him an opportunity to show up. And what's more important

00:12:01.600 to us, our freedom or preaching God's word, being obedient to him. So yeah, the numbers can be scary.

00:12:08.700 You know, the giants, the mountains can be scary with the wind and the waves, you know,

00:12:12.520 spiritually speaking at the jail time, but I'm not looking at that. I'm looking at my God and how

00:12:17.780 he's taken me through this. He's going to carry me through it. And just like he showed up with

00:12:21.580 Hebrew boys in the fire, he's going to show up for me too in the fire. And he's delivered me 0.85

00:12:25.520 throughout the COVID era and the pandemic and, and, you know, rebel news has supported us and

00:12:30.760 supplied a lawyer and God's just working through many different entities and people to support

00:12:34.860 and just to help take care of us. So no, I'm not, not really worried about that. And I'm just

00:12:39.600 excited to see how he's going to show up in this battle as well.

00:12:43.420 You mentioned before this interview, and this is something perhaps you're not comfortable

00:12:47.340 chatting about now, in which case, I totally understand that we wanted to get this interview

00:12:51.320 done a little bit earlier. It's actually Tuesday when we're filming, this interview won't be

00:12:54.960 aired until Saturday. And one of the reasons we wanted to get it done early is because you

00:12:58.880 mentioned that you're fearful you were going to be arrested again. I'm wondering if that's

00:13:02.580 because you haven't been able to loosen up some of the charges that you're facing or sorry,

00:13:06.940 your bail restrictions rather, and your conditions about not being able to attend these protests.

00:13:11.460 Are you still planning on attending protests in the coming weeks or even abide by the conditions

00:13:15.960 of your bail restrictions until you're able to get them loosened, if not removed?

00:13:20.420 Right. Like, like I mentioned, I feel compelled to sign for health reasons that the jail can provide

00:13:27.420 for me. The conviction is still there. The love of the Lord and being obedient to him is still there.

00:13:34.600 There's still, um, drag events. There's still almost sexual events that are taking place in 0.84

00:13:40.960 this city. Exposing darkness is still here. We're still a team. We're still strategizing. We're still

00:13:46.380 planning. And, uh, I'll just say that we're trying to get a little bit, uh, more clever and strategic

00:13:52.860 moving forward. But yes, we do plan to, um, attend. We do plan to, uh, carry out God's will

00:14:00.680 as he's called us to do it. Yeah. Something else that's going on today is that Calgary City Council

00:14:07.180 is currently discussing two proposes from the city's administration that would essentially make

00:14:11.940 it harder for people like yourself to protest, drag Green Story Hour, and other, you know,

00:14:16.320 trans and gay events. Um, one of the proposals seeks to amend the city's harassment bylaws to

00:14:21.240 include intimidation, uh, which is rather vague and, and, you know, concerning as to what that would

00:14:25.880 exactly look like in practice. And then the city also wants to add an additional bylaw, which would

00:14:30.760 keep what they're calling specified protesters, a hundred meters from public spaces during these

00:14:36.700 types of events. And so protesters would have to be a hundred meters removed from say a public

00:14:41.140 library or a public pool when they're protesting drag Green Story Hour. Now the city is moving very

00:14:46.440 quickly on getting this passed. They want to have these amendments passed quickly and in places

00:14:50.720 quickly as soon as possible, even as early as Tuesday. What do you make of this happening so

00:14:55.140 quickly after the incident with you? Do you think that it's a direct fallout to your arrest and

00:14:59.920 your protest at the Drag Queen Story Hour? And also how will this impact your work in exposing 0.72

00:15:05.640 darkness? One of the ministries that you've started? Yeah, well, this is definitely linked to our

00:15:12.160 protests and I would call this an entrenchment on the charter rights and freedoms that we have under

00:15:18.960 the constitution. And that is already arising in the city council meeting. I was just listening to it

00:15:24.260 before we started this interview and I'm going to finish it afterwards. And then myself and the

00:15:30.260 team, we're going to have a call tonight. We want to talk about and discuss what's taking place,

00:15:34.920 what has transpired and what we want to do moving forward. But by no means are we going to back off

00:15:41.620 and just, you know, close down the ministry because, you know, the government here and they're acting like

00:15:48.900 dictators, it seems like we're, it doesn't matter about the constitution, doesn't matter about our

00:15:53.540 rights. And that's for all Calgarians that now they want to keep people a hundred meters away from

00:15:59.400 a venue. And that's, there's all kinds of implications and problems with this, which is

00:16:02.820 arising now. So like I said, we're going to review our options and continue on following the Lord's will.

00:16:11.160 Great. Just the last question I wanted to answer here before I let you go. You mentioned that

00:16:14.700 Rebel News is supplying a lawyer for you, for my viewers who are listening today and want to get

00:16:19.140 in touch with you or want to show their support. Is there any way that they can do that?

00:16:23.660 Absolutely. And I would direct people towards Rebel News as they are supplying a lawyer and they are

00:16:27.880 very costly. If you feel just on your heart that you want to support me and the ministry,

00:16:34.520 Mission 7 Ministries is my website. My email is on there, derich at mission7ministries.com.

00:16:41.080 I would appreciate any support, but you know, prayers is massive. And that's like even today,

00:16:46.500 getting attached to several of just things in my personal life and just out of nowhere.

00:16:51.360 But yeah, prayers and donations. But also I just want to finish off too, and this is what I do,

00:16:55.400 is all the interviews, just a call to action where we can all do something. You can call your

00:17:00.060 counselors, you can sign petitions, you can peacefully protest. Like there's many options that we can do

00:17:05.140 here. And just, I think even just making people aware of this pervert grooming hour that's taking place

00:17:10.300 in our cities and not just Calgary, but all over the world. Guys, let people know what's going on

00:17:15.120 and let's make a change. Let's push back against perversion and darkness. You don't have to just

00:17:19.700 be a Christian to have a conviction about this. Anybody with any morality or decency knows that 0.99

00:17:24.860 this is just wrong and wicked. So let's unite and let's push back against this together.

00:17:30.140 Derek, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it. And I know my viewers will

00:17:34.000 as well, and we will all be following this story with interest in the coming weeks.

00:17:37.620 Thank you. God bless. Hey guys, so shortly after that interview was filmed on Tuesday,

00:17:42.640 Pastor Rymer was actually arrested again on Wednesday. Rebel News has a video. We'll play

00:17:47.720 that for you now.

00:17:48.740 Mr. Rymer, you are currently under arrest for breaching your 200-meter no-go condition.

00:17:55.740 200-meter? Yep, yep.

00:17:56.740 It's 200-meter.

00:17:57.740 No, unfortunately.

00:17:58.740 Excuse me, you can walk 200-meter.

00:18:01.740 How are you called too late? Have you helped by these 200 meters?

00:18:04.740 You stand, sir.

00:18:05.740 He has no way to help you here. 200-meter.

00:18:08.740 Where's the measuring tape? Excuse me, we're in the parking lot that's so far approved.

00:18:13.720 This is not lawful. This is not lawful.

00:18:16.720 Listen, we don't have a measuring tape. We're down here.

00:18:19.720 This is not lawfully unlawful. We're not to say anything. Anything you say

00:18:23.720 if you give any evidence against you? You can call a lawyer.

00:18:26.720 What are the exact meters from that library?

00:18:28.720 You can call a lawyer. You can call a lawyer.

00:18:30.720 I have four exact meters for distance from the library to where we are right now.

00:18:34.720 You can call a lawyer. You can call a lawyer. You can call a lawyer. You can call a lawyer.

00:18:47.720 And as he's being arrested there, you can hear one Calgary police officer tell Reimer he's being arrested

00:18:52.720 for breaching his 200-meter no-go condition, assuming that's the condition of his bail release there.

00:18:58.720 And moving back to Calgary City Hall, the council did end up approving an amendment to an existing bylaw.

00:19:03.720 That amendment was to add intimidation to the harassment.

00:19:06.720 So you can now be ticketed if you're found guilty of intimidation while protesting outside an event.

00:19:11.720 And then, of course, the other bylaw is that specified protesters are going to have to remain 100 meters away from public facilities while they're protesting events.

00:19:19.720 Thank you so much for tuning in to this exceptionally important episode of the Alberta Roundup.

00:19:24.720 Please comment in the section below what you thought about this new style.

00:19:27.720 Did you like the interview format? And do you hope to see more interviews on the Alberta Roundup?

00:19:32.720 If so, please let me know some of the guests that you would like to see and I will do my best to pick some of the best ones and have them on the show.

00:19:38.720 I really appreciate your support. I hope that you guys have a great rest of your week.

00:19:42.720 If you're able to, please consider supporting independent media over at donate.tnc.news.

00:19:47.720 I will see you guys next week Saturday. Have a great week and God bless.

The Alberta Roundup with Isaac Lamoureux - March 18, 2023

Arrested for protesting drag queen story hour (Ft. Pastor Derek Reimer)

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