Ezra Levant’s The Rebel faces a $5,500 Alberta election fine for criticizing Rachel Notley’s government, risking injunctions or shutdown—despite denying wrongdoing. Legal battles mirror past clashes over Islamic extremism censorship, with Levant vowing defiance until "death" while urging support at standwitherebel.com. Meanwhile, a 2018 London acid attack on gay men by Turkish Muslim assailants (e.g., Hussain O’Nell) was downplayed as homophobic, sparking accusations of media bias. Levant contrasts Vancouver’s climate emergency rhetoric with ignored sewage crises in Quebec and Victoria, questioning political priorities. The episode frames free speech struggles as existential for independent journalism. [Automatically generated summary]
Tonight, a gang of nine men wait outside a gay nightclub, beating up anyone who comes out and spraying acid in their faces.
So what did the judge do?
What did the media do?
It's January 18th, and this is the Ezra Levant Show.
Why should others go to jail when you're the biggest carbon consumer I know?
There's 8,500 customers here, and you won't give them an answer.
The only thing I have to say to the government is because it's my bloody right to do so.
There's a bar in London, England, on the east side of the city, in a neighborhood called Hackney.
I've never been there, but the bar is called the Dalston Superstore.
It doesn't look much super on the outside.
It looks a bit run down, actually, but it looks a little bit colorful and lively.
As you can see from this photo, there are those gay pride rainbow flags hanging outside.
Now, during the day, it's a restaurant.
The photos online make it look pretty good.
The food looks good, British fare, bit gourmet, you know, looks tasty, frankly.
That's it during the day.
It's an artsy cafe.
At night, it's a gay bar.
And the place apparently gets jam-packed.
Again, I'm just going by photos on the internet.
I'm going to show you some photos.
Now, this is not pornography, but it's pretty gay.
If you're gay in Hackney, it sure looks like the place to go.
I don't know how many gays live in Hackney.
I think it's a changing neighborhood.
I looked at the ethnic demographics of Hackney.
It's always been a bit poor, I think.
It used to be pretty Jewish, actually, back in the day.
But the story of Hackney is the story of all London and the story of the United Kingdom.
White flight, or more accurately, Muslim immigration.
Obviously, whites are no longer the majority in Hackney, but if I'm reading the census data correctly, the black population is also shrinking as a percentage.
What's growing is the Muslim population, or how they insist on referring to it in the UK, the Asian population.
Now, I don't know when I hear the word Asian, I think of China, you know, the world's most populous country, or maybe Japan or Korea or Taiwan or Vietnam, or India, which, by the way, is largely Hindu, some Sikhs there too.
But in the United Kingdom, they use the word Asian as a code word for Muslim, which is weird because one is a continent and the other is a religion.
And Hackney is becoming more and more Muslim, of course, including Turks and Kurds.
And you've got this super gay, artsy cafe and music venue with raging transvestite parties going on right in the middle of the neighborhood.
Now, if you were a doe-eyed liberal, you'd call that diversity.
You'd say, isn't that wonderful?
Hackney is the best place in the world.
Diversity, and everyone's getting along.
But it's not really working out that way, is it?
Because oil and water don't really mix.
You can't put oil and water together and say that's diverse.
They don't get along.
And here's a story from Hackney six years ago.
That woman there wearing the full face obscuring niqab, she didn't want to take off her niqab when she was testifying in court.
So that's Hackney too, not just the gay superstore.
In fact, it's a much, much bigger part of Hackney than the riot of color and exposed flesh that's the Dalston superstore.
And so I don't think it will surprise you one bit that one day, late at night, a gang of Turkish Muslim men went outside the Dalston superstar in the wee hours of the morning.
Dalston Homophobic Attack00:12:49
We're talking 3-4 a.m., whatever.
After there was some all-night party at the gay club.
And they waited on the street nearby, just across the street.
And as the gay men emerged from this club, the gang of Turkish Muslims jumped out and beat them mercilessly.
And then when they were down, they took a bottle of acid that they had brought with them for this occasion.
I mean, seriously, who does that?
And sprayed the gay men in the face and eyes with acid.
That's what they did.
Here's how it was reported when it happened last year in the Evening Standard newspaper.
Dalston acid attack.
Witnesses described moment thugs hurled liquid over screaming victims.
All right, let me read some of it.
So this was the report right after the crime, but obviously before the trial.
This is right after it happened.
Ready?
Witnesses have described the moment attackers hurled acid at screaming revelers near a nightclub in East London.
Three men aged 17, 22, and 27 were injured after a noxious substance was thrown over them in Dalston in the early hours of Sunday.
Their injuries are not life-threatening.
However, it is not known if they will be life-changing, police said.
Well, I think simply being attacked brutally by a Muslim gang on the streets of London for being gay, I'm going to guess that would change a guy's life whether or not his face was scarred forever, but I don't know.
Let me read some more.
Two men appeared to target people in Kingsland High Road just after 5 a.m., one witness said.
The man who asked not to be named told the standard he woke to hear a commotion outside a friend's flat close to the popular gay venue, Dalston Superstore.
He described the moment a car stopped in the middle of the road and two men jumped out and started beating people.
I'll read some more.
The 26-year-old witness said they were punching at people walking either side of the road.
One man was being kicked as he lay on the floor.
The people were terrified.
They weren't fighting back.
The men are then said to have taken water bottles from the car and began squirting passersby with a noxious substance.
He added, my first thought was, why are they squirting water?
But then I realized it was acid.
You know, that's a thing in London.
People carry around acid.
Like, I don't mean like just vinegar, like burning, burning chemical acid.
They carry it around in bottles to spray at each other and run away.
It happens every day there.
Here's more.
The man who says he had left the club shortly before the attack said they sped off.
That's a typo in the article, as he attempted to contact the police.
The witness had originally believed the victims had been leaving Dalston Superstore.
However, a spokesman for the venue said that the police have confirmed that they were not customers and that the venue was shut at the time of the attack.
Oh, here's my favorite line.
Scotland Yard are not currently treating the incident as a homophobic attack.
They're not.
Then it's not a homophobic attack, eh?
Nothing to do with the gay club, because after all, it was closed, so it couldn't have.
All right, okay, fast forward to today.
Here's the news.
After the trial, so they caught the guys and they tried them and they convicted them and they sentenced them.
Let me read the news.
This is from the Hackney Gazette, which is the local paper.
Dalston homophobic acid attack.
Gang of cowardly thugs jailed over truly shocking bank holiday assault.
Oh, well, so it was homophobic.
Huh, funny.
The Scotland Yard said it wasn't.
And it was a gang, not just one or two.
And did you see that gang there?
It's not, what's the word?
It's not really a diverse gang, is it?
Let me read some more.
CCTV, that's close circuit TV, showing a cowardly thug launching a homophobic acid attack on strangers in Dalston last year, has been released after he was today jailed for 17 years.
17 years, that's a pretty long sentence.
But I know that like in Canada, that means he'll be back on the streets in five years.
But still, it's a fairly solid sentence.
I'll read some more.
Hackney man Hussain O'Nell, 24, and his gang of eight wingmen targeted their first victim in Shacklewell Lane at 5 a.m. on Monday the 5th, a bank holiday.
I love that.
Oi, he's an acne man.
Mate, oi, mate, he's an acne lad.
Salt of the earth, he is, gov. And look at him.
Jim off the block of Prince Philip himself.
He's a hackney.
Put the picture up again.
Just put it up again.
Show what these hackney men look like.
Oi, he's an acne man.
Gov. Yeah, no, no, he's not a hackney man.
Let me read some more from the Hackney Gazette.
They stamped and kicked him as he curled up in a ball on the ground and covered his face.
So this was a brave gang.
Nine-on-one.
Kicking a man when he's down.
Oi, that's an acne way.
After an argument, he had gone to speak to one of the men as the group sat in cars in Alvington Crescent, but he was quickly surrounded.
Now I went on Google Maps and Alvington Crescent.
It's just one block away from the gay club.
Don't tell me this had nothing to do with the gay club.
I'll read some more.
Then they beat up another man who had started filming the attack on his phone after leaving a club.
Gee, what club was that?
While the first victim ran off, the second victim's friends intervened and a huge brawl erupted.
What were they all doing on the street at that hour?
I don't know if it was 2.30, 3.34, 5 a.m.
What are you doing on the street at that hour?
I really think they were coming out of the club or milling around after coming into the club, but let me read some more.
During this, O'Nell, that's the hackney man, squirted a corrosive substance from a plastic bottle into the second victim's face and eyes while targeting others who tried to step in.
He suffered a fractured eye socket and was lucky to escape with his eyesight intact.
His recovery was described by doctors as miraculous.
Another person suffered burns to their tongue.
Look at these hackney lads.
They don't believe in diversity though, do they?
I don't know.
It's not a very diverse group.
They got in their car at that hour with a plan.
They prepared these bottles of acid in advance.
This wasn't a spur-of-the-moment spontaneous thing.
They went to the gay club with acid in their car.
This was a plan.
How is that different from a terrorist attack, really?
The suspects then, let me read some more.
The suspects then got into three cars and drove from the scene shouting homophobic comments at members of the group and claiming that they run hackney.
Oi mate, we'll get you again.
So they shouted homophobic comments, but I thought that Scotland Yard, that's their version of the FBI over there, I thought that Scotland Yard specifically said it wasn't a hate crime.
That's what they said at the time, didn't they?
Now I mentioned the one thug, the hackney man, got a 17-year sentence, but others got far less.
A couple of the acid throwers got 14 years, so they'll be out in three.
But look at the rest of the sentences.
30 months, 27 months, nine months, two years, 18 months.
You know, 18 months, he'll be out by summertime.
And let me read here.
Turgut Attakan, 23 of Roman Road, was sentenced to 18 months for violent disorder, suspended for two years.
Do you know what that means?
That means he doesn't go to jail.
He's just got to be on good behavior for two years and he doesn't serve a day in jail.
Our friend Tommy Robinson got a 13-month sentence for doing journalism.
Not for spraying anyone with acid.
And he served 10 weeks of that in solitary confinement.
We only got him out because we helped appeal.
Turgut Attakan participates in an acid attack and a brutal beating, gang beating outside a gay nightclub.
And he's told, oh, be a little bit more better behaved and you'll be fine.
No days in jail for you.
Really?
Now, have you heard of this story?
If you're in Canada or the United States, of course you have not.
But if you're a Brit, I doubt you have either.
Here's a Google News search of the word Dalston.
It's nothing.
Two small local papers, the Hackney Gazette and its sister paper, the Newham Recorder, same story.
And the Evening Standard, the paper that reported on the original crime and said that Scotland Yard said it was definitely not a homophobic hate crime.
They don't seem to be interested anymore.
So you got the Hackney paper and its sister paper.
How can that be?
You've got a gang that loads up with weapons, bottles of acid.
It's a shocking weapon.
They're camped out near a gay club in the wee hours.
There's three cars worth.
This is organized.
They attack and beat people and spray acid on gays, spray acid on someone who comes to help.
They specifically insult them for being gay.
And that's non-news?
That's just not even interesting.
Hey, dumb question.
If it were a gang of alt-right white Brits, non-Muslims, do you think that would make news?
You know, soccer hooligans, what they call football hooligans, as they call it in the UK.
If they were in any way, say, linked to Tommy Robinson, let's say, I mean, it would never happen.
Let's say you have three cars, guys who look like Tommy, and they did this to a gay club.
Do you think there'd be any news coverage?
Teeny tiny bit maybe?
What if they were wearing red Donald Trump Make America Great Again hats or UKIP or something?
Do you think it would make a little teeny tiny bit of news?
Do you think the BBC would maybe do a workup on all nine criminals checking out their Facebook pages, interviewing their friends, seeing what politicians they liked, interviewing family camping outside their houses, reviewing everything they've ever written on social media?
Do you think there would be debates in Parliament about solidarity banners on the internet, people putting little Stand with Dalston signs on?
Do you think the Eiffel Tower would be lit up in rainbow colors?
But it wasn't football hooligans.
It's Islam.
And the United Kingdom is more afraid of criticizing Islam than they are afraid of gay bashing gangs.
I mean, of course.
Look, the United Kingdom is silent in the face of massive rape gangs that targeted white schoolgirls as young as 11, 1,400 girls raped in one town.
If they can tolerate that, of course they're not going to care about gay men.
And that Hackney Gazette, that's one of the few papers who wrote about it.
Look at this.
Someone tweeted to them why they never mentioned the word Islam in their story.
And look at the Hackney Gazette's reply.
How do you know what religion they are?
Well, mate, because they're Turks.
Almost 99% of Turks are Muslim.
And the names of these men were Muslim names, Hustain, Mustafa.
One of them was named Mehmet, which is how the Turks say Muhammad.
So yeah, that's how we know what religion they are.
Imagine the journalistic in curiosity.
How do you know?
How do you know?
Yeah, because they're Turkish Muslims with Muslims' names.
When a reader made that very point, they clapped back again.
They said, yawn, yawn.
We're not going to start guessing people's religions.
Just so ignorant racists or something to cut out and stick on their walls.
It wasn't determined, wasn't deemed relevant by the court that sent them, so it's not relevant.
Bye!
Oh, okay.
Hey, guys, it's not relevant.
The Hackney Gazette just said so, and they totally, totally owned you there.
And look, Scotland Yard said so.
I mean, sure, they said a homophobic story, but so what?
I mean, just because somebody else, ala Akbar, doesn't mean they're Muslim, right?
That's what the Hackney Gazette would say.
And more to the point, no one else is even saying anything at all.
Now, I'm not even, I'm not sure if I'd call this a cover-up.
I mean, there were arrests and prosecutions and convictions and sentences, but there was also a lot of silence and not a lot of people talking about a lot of denial, no politicians speaking out that I've seen, no solidarity marches that I've seen.
How long do you think until stories like this are no longer coming to us from Hackney, East London, but are coming to us from Montreal or Mississauga or Minneapolis?
Or do you think maybe they already are here, but our versions of Scotland Yard and our Hackney Gazettes think those facts are not relevant.
Fighting Back Against Fines00:14:59
Stay with us for more.
I've got some news for you.
Welcome back.
Well, earlier today, we announced something that happened to us a few days ago.
In short, we were prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced and fined by the government of Alberta without us even being there.
They had a secret hearing.
We still have not seen any complaint against us.
But a new position called the Alberta Elections Commissioner.
That's not Elections Alberta that runs the election.
This is a new partisan appointment by Rachel Notley, sort of a hunter-killer of her enemies, who's already gone after the Taxpayers Federation, a pro-life group.
Alberta can't wait that, I think that's Prem Scenes Group.
They're coming for us.
And even though when they first sent us a letter last month, we immediately replied with our lawyer saying we're ready to engage with you, they did not even let us know there was a hearing.
We weren't there.
And we still don't know who the complaint was, but we know this, that we have been fined $5,500, and that can only go up.
In fact, the fines permissible against companies are up to $100,000.
And the reason for this fine is because we express the view that Rachel Notley and her team must be fired.
And we express it in various formats and formulas, radio ads, billboards, books, website emails, videos.
And so they've declared us not to be journalists, but rather a political campaign organization akin to a political party.
And they're coming to shut us down.
Joining us now to talk about this is our friend Sheila Gunreed.
Hey, Ezra, thanks for having me.
Well, Sheila, you are really a key reason they want to shut us down.
You've been the most effective critic of Rachel Notley through your journalism.
You have exposed a hundred stories about the NDP that the mainstream media has not, would not, could not, whatever.
They tried to stop you in rougher ways.
I mean, here's just a quick reminder for our people when they dispatched a sheriff with a gun to stop you.
Let's play that for a second.
So there should be no problem coming up.
Sorry, what is that?
Sorry, what?
That was illegal, of course.
Just one more reminder.
I'm sorry to bring you these memories, which may be unhappy, Sheila, but that was followed up by this bizarre letter we got from Alberta Justice.
Let's put that on screen for a second.
I'll read it to you.
It says, this was written to our lawyer.
Our clients, that's referring to Rachel Notley, our clients' position remains that your client, the rebel, and those who identify as being connected to your client are not journalists and are not entitled to access media lockups or other such events.
Thank you for writing.
So they actually sent us a letter saying we were banned from public property, public events, because in their opinion, Rachel Notley and her team says we're not journalists and so we're banned.
Now that was illegal as well and that was laughed off too.
But I guess this is take three, Sheila, and they're serious this time.
Well, it might even be take four.
If you go back to November, I believe, of 2017, the NDP sort of tipped their hand about what they would be doing to us in the coming year or in the lead up to the next election.
I think that's when we got our first letter from Elections Alberta saying that they had gotten a complaint, although they didn't give us any details about what that complaint was, that we were in violation of elections law.
Of course, we had our lawyer send them a letter back and we never heard from them again until now.
I think it just speaks to how running scared the NDP are, the fact that they're attacking us.
They've attacked the Taxpayers Federation, Prem Singh's, Alberta Can't Wait, and pro-life groups.
You don't see any unions on that list.
You don't see Progress Alberta or Press Progress who do much of the same sort of thing that we do with regard to opinion, journalism, and activism.
They are not being fined here.
It is just conservative groups and mainly us as their most effective opposition.
Yeah, I mean, I have been a battler in the court of public opinion for 20 years.
You have been active really with a megaphone for the last three and a half years.
So your focus has been on Rachel Notley.
You're our Alberta bureau chief.
You've been on that file.
You wrote the book, The Destroyers, which they hated.
That went to number one on Amazon.ca National Bestseller.
You wrote the book on David Suzuki.
And now you have an ally in southern Alberta, Kian Bexty, who checks in with you and works with you.
So you are, I think, their most proximate enemy.
They don't like me, but I'm sort of geographically out of mind, out of sight.
They hate you, Sheila, and I think you're so likable.
I mean, you know, I'm a super fan of yours, but your heart is in Alberta.
You got bona fides in the oil patch, you got bona fides in agriculture, and you are loved by the grassroots.
I see it when I'm out there in Alberta.
Rachel Notley and her people are despised by Albertans.
That's why they see you.
I mean, they think we're a threat, but I think they're really coming for you, Sheila.
I just think that's really what it is.
Well, thank you for your kind words to start with.
But, you know, I think you might be right.
And I think this time, they are using the deep pockets of the bureaucracy and their new elections commissioner bureaucracy to sort of jerry rig these rules against us.
We really have three options here.
We can just sort of comply with what Rachel Notley says is the law and shut up.
We can keep doing what we're doing and keep getting these fines levied against us till we ultimately go broke and go out of business.
I think that's what the NDP is expecting us to do.
But we do have one more option, and that is to keep doing what we're doing and fight back.
And, you know, the government has really misjudged us if they thought that we weren't going to fight back.
Every time they come at us, we fight back and we win, even when they try to stack the Whole process against us, just like they did when they banned me from the legislature and sent that letter saying that none of us were actually journalists.
They had that panel or that investigation that they convened with a former journalist named Heather Boyd.
They basically interviewed all of our enemies to see if they could get them to say that we weren't journalists.
But in the end, they just can't get around the Constitution.
So Rachel Notley wants a fight.
She's got it.
Yeah.
Now, I want to point out one thing.
I mean, I don't want to litigate this in the media.
We've got a really great lawyer, Fred Kozak.
And I don't say he's just a great lawyer because he's our lawyer.
He is so well regarded in the legal community.
He is so eminently reasonable.
Frankly, I think we're lucky to have him as a lawyer.
He has very fancy clients, Global Mail, Edmonton Journal, CBC even.
So I'm actually grateful to him for taking our case.
When he says we've got a case, and I don't want to get into any legal advice he's given us, that gives me confidence.
And he's going to fight like hell.
Today we serve them notice.
Let's put this letter up on the screen.
Today this letter went out from Fred Kozak, our lawyer in Alberta, to the government of Alberta saying that we intend to appeal both the conviction and the fine of $5,500.
So we're not going to mess around.
I should tell you, Sheila, that Fred, very reasonable fella, reached out.
Like when we first got that threat letter over Christmas, Fred immediately wrote back and said, all right, can you show us the complaint?
What exactly are the details?
Who complained?
What did they complain about?
By the way, you know we're journalists covered by the journalist exemption.
And he had a back and forth with these hunter killers of Rachel Notley's office, and they pretended to be reasonable.
For example, and I'm just going to tell you this, and I've made a larger video on this at the website standwitherbel.com, but Fred said, all right, can you give us, if you want us to answer the case against us, can you give us a copy of the complaint?
Duh.
How can we possibly answer it?
And they wrote back saying, sure, we'll get back to you on January 15th.
So we said, okay, on January 15th, we'll have to see what the charge is against us.
They convicted us, Sheila, on January 14th.
So they said, okay, we'll give you, not really disclosure, but we'll show you the complaint against you.
We'll show you the case against you so you can reply.
We'll talk to you on the 15th.
And we all said, okay, fine.
And Fred Kozak said, fine.
And then they went ahead and convicted us on the 14th.
We didn't even know that we were on trial then.
We didn't even know the, we still don't own the complaint against us.
We didn't have a chance.
Like, that's insane.
That's against the law, by the way.
The law specifically says that we have the right to reply before any conviction.
Yeah, you know, as I was thinking of this, I found it very reminiscent of the Accurate News and Information Act brought in by Bible Bill Eberhardt back in the 30s.
Back then, if journalists didn't print what the government wanted, then they had to print a rebuttal on behalf of the government if something the journalists printed was found to be inaccurate by the legislature.
And if journalists didn't comply, they were levied fines by a panel without trial, without any sort of involvement in the process of thousands of dollars.
That's what we're seeing right now.
We're doing things that are not approved by Rachel Notley's government, and they're levying fines against us without our participation in the process.
And I think it is very, very interesting in the coming days and weeks to see who stands with us here.
And we know that back then, the Edmonton Journal actually was honored by the Pulitzer Committee for their work to overturn that law.
And in the interest of freedom of speech, they were actually one of the only journalistic organizations outside of the United States at the time to receive that honor.
And Alberta's newest senator is Paula Simons.
She is a former Edmonton Journal journalist.
Let's see how independent she really is from that liberal caucus.
We'll see whose side she stands on here soon enough.
You know, that is a great point.
And of course, a $5,500 fine, while a pain in the neck, that's not going to destroy the rebel.
But the law specifically provides for $100,000 fines, and it even gives unlimited powers to apply for injunctions.
That could possibly be to shut down our website, for example.
I mean, an injunction could be anything.
So you're so right.
I mean, we know that our competitors don't like us because we're competitors.
We eat their lunch.
We're not taking government cash like they all are.
But it'll be interesting to see if they can separate their personal distaste for our politics and our personalities from what Rachel Notley is doing here.
Even if they don't like our coverage of Notley or David Agen or whatever, how do they feel about the government fining media companies without even inviting them to the trial?
And by the way, one of the investigators, Sheila, who's investigating us, used to work for the Human Rights Commission, the same folks who took me to issue for publishing the Danish cartoons of Mohammed.
So it's no surprise that they're cutting legal corners.
We have to fight back.
Like the idea of paying this fine is unthinkable to me, not because it's $5,500.
I can assure you we're going to spend a lot more than $5,500 on this law firm.
It's that I cannot give money to the government because we did a video or a billboard or a book or whatever.
There's just no way we're going to pay a $5,500 charge for having an opinion and expressing it lawfully in a free country.
And there's just no bloody way, even if we were wrong, which we're not, that we would allow this kangaroo court to convict us without us even being there when they told our lawyer they would give us the information and they lie.
There's just no way.
I mean, I don't want to wrap up the rebel.
I don't want it to be torpedoed with a $100,000 fine.
I don't want it to be shut down.
But neither would I ever run the rebel that was submissive to Rachel Notley, Justin Trudeau, or any other politician.
I think Rachel Notley is about to make an international embarrassment of herself yet again.
She ended up in making international headlines when she threw me out of the legislature.
She ended up making international headlines when she sent a legal letter saying that her opinion was that I'm not a journalist and that that should be the law of the land now.
And she's about to make an international idiot of herself when she says that journalists are in contravention of the law when they do things that are critical of the government.
That is what this comes down to.
And this just isn't a fight about us.
Sure, we're the targets.
But this is really a fight about and not just our friends on the right.
So not just the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, not just our friends at Alberta Can't Wait.
This isn't even a fight to allow pro-life groups to speak their mind about the government censoring them.
This is a fight to separate journalists from being under the thumb of the government.
Some journalists, of course, they like that because everything they write is really an audition for a job with Rachel Notley's government.
But we have to do this to maintain our journalistic independence.
Choosing Risk for Truth00:03:14
And this is a fight that we have to fight and win.
Yeah.
Well, I want to say to our viewers, and anyone who's watching this, obviously, is a subscriber to our $8 a month premium content, and I thank you for that support.
We can survive a $5,500 hit, but we're not going to pay that.
So I'm choosing not to take the easy way out.
I'm choosing to take probably a $30,000 legal appeal.
And what I don't want to have happen, but might well happen, is that we get fined $100,000.
That's what the law permits.
And maybe another $100,000 for the next time we do it.
And I have to say that if we don't win this legal fight, we will be out of business.
I could not come up with $100,000 to pay a fine.
We just don't have it.
I would rather fight and die than not fight, though.
And this is live free or die.
Those are really the only two paths here, Sheila, because I'm not going to pay the submission tax.
I'm not going to pay the $5,500.
I can't do that.
I won't sign the check.
My hand won't do it.
So we're either going to fight and win, or we're going to fight and die.
And for folks who believe that this is a fight worth fighting, they can go to standwitherebel.com.
Last word to you, my friend, because you are the pointy edge of the spear out there.
I suppose I am.
This really is a fight for my ability to be honest with our viewers, too.
I will not have my opinions censored by the government.
You pay me for my honest opinion, and I give it every single day about Rachel Notley or Justin Trudeau or the culture war.
And if we don't win this fight, there's really not a role for someone like me in Alberta media.
So if our viewers want to see us going, we really need their support here.
Yeah.
Well, the website where we have both their letter announcing that we were convicted at a trial we weren't even invited to, I mean, that's as bad as the Human Rights Commission.
And our lawyer's response today saying we're going to appeal.
People can find both of those legal documents at standwitherebel.com as well as more facts on this and a special 10-minute video I made going through the history of it.
Sheila, thanks for fighting.
I have to say, and I said this in the video, that this decision that I am making, and it's me alone, I've had the advice of our lawyers, and they said, and I won't give away legal confidences, but this, to choose to fight is to choose risk.
The zero risk way out of that is to pay the $5,500 and submit.
There's no risk if you do that.
And we're going to turn four years old on February 15th.
That's going to be the fourth birthday of the Rebel.
And I want to live to see that day and many other birthdays also.
But I also know that by choosing to fight, we are risking the entire operation.
We are risking every penny we have and every penny we don't have.
We are risking injunctions.
We are risking everything.
And that's what it's come down to.
This is the fight.
They chose it, not us, but we will meet it.
Vancouver's Climate Emergency00:04:51
And what can I say?
I hope we live on, Sheila.
If we don't, I want to let you know that meeting you and getting to work with you and supporting your own journalism has been one of the proudest things that we've done here at the Rebel and something I'll always look back on as a great achievement, even if the Rebel is to be killed over this battle.
Your role in our company has been one of the favorite things for me.
Oh, thanks, boss.
But you know what?
They don't call us the Rebel for nothing.
So these fights are made for us.
And Rachel Notley has a track record of losing to me and to you.
So here's to that.
Yeah.
All right, if folks want to chip in, and I hope you will because we've got to pay the lawyers, please go to standwitherebel.com.
All right, stay with us.
your letters to me next.
Hey, welcome back.
On my monologue yesterday about Vancouver's City Council declaring a climate emergency.
Ian writes, The only climate emergency in Vancouver and in Canada is the political climate.
There's some truth to that.
I mean, you can't say certain things in this country, can you?
I just think if someone says it's an emergency and they're not acting like it, you shouldn't believe them.
If someone is in the house saying, fire, there's a fire, fire, I'm just going to go have a nap now, fire.
You don't believe there's a fire, because if there's really a fire, you're running out of the house.
You know, you're getting the pets, you're getting your keys, wallet, and phone, you're going.
If these folks are saying climate emergency, we're all going to be flooded, but they're living right on the waterfront like David Suzuki.
It's not an emergency.
Ron writes, I thought things would improve at Vancouver's local government once the nuttiest mayor in their history, Gregor Robertson, resigned.
Ho, there is an almost unlimited supply of nutty mayors in Vancouver, each one nuttier than the next.
AJ writes, why do we never hear about a raw sewage emergency from those hypocrites?
Hey, that's a great point.
That really would be an emergency.
And I know that sounds super gross, and I really don't like talking about raw sewage.
I'm sorry I'm even saying that word.
But as you know, 100 municipalities in Quebec every year dump, ugh, I can't even say it without gagging, hundreds of billions, or billions rather, of liters of raw sewage in their rivers.
I'm just thinking of that.
I shouldn't think about that.
That's so gross.
And Victoria, the most eco-woke city in Canada, I put it to you, where Elizabeth May, the head of the Green Party, she's the member of parliament from just north, just north of Victoria, if I know my map there.
She's from Salt Spring Island or whatever.
Just like the hippiest place in Canada.
They pour their sewage untreated right into the sea.
So that, in my mind, is an emergency.
Like if you want to go swimming, fishing, or, I don't know, and drink seawater, but you go fishing and you go swimming, and that's an emergency.
If there's like untreated poop in the water, that's an emergency.
It's weird how Quebec and Victoria are allowed to get away with that, but pristine high-tech pipelines aren't.
Oh well.
Folks, may I encourage you to see my longer treatment of the Alberta charges against us at standwitherebel.com.
If it was just $5,500, I would hate paying that, but a pen.
But it's not about that.
It's about submitting to their determination that we're not journalists, that we're some campaign organization, and they can tell us what we can say and in what medium and what mode, and that they don't have to give us due process.
I find it bizarre that they have contracted a special contract with a former human rights commission officer.
To me, that's really, really weird.
And I don't believe in coincidences anymore when it happens like that.
I've chosen to fight.
Maybe you think that's reckless.
Obviously, Alberta can't wait.
The Taxpayers Federation and the Pro-Life Group have complied and are paying their fine.
I just don't think I'm built that way.
I'm 46 years old.
I'm not going to bend now.
If I haven't bent in 46 years, I'm not going to bend now.
I'm not going to bend.
I'm going to break.
Either I break or I win.
How can I?
I mean, come on.
I fought the Human Rights Commission on the Danish cartoons matter for 900 days.
If I didn't give in to Islamic extremists and that censorship, then how could I possibly give in to Rachel Notley?
I mean, am I made of any stuff?
Do I have any shoulders?
And the answer is, I'll die trying.
Maybe you can help me win so I don't have to die because I'd prefer to continue.
And if you want to help, go to standwithithebel.com.
But for now, let's just enjoy the weekend.
Keep watching our videos.
There's a lot of interesting stuff on the Rebel these days.