Ezra Levant exposes Canada’s security and intelligence corruption, comparing it to the U.S. where FBI agents like Peter Strzok faced no consequences for spying on Trump’s campaign. Levant highlights RCMP’s refusal to charge Trudeau over SNC-Lavalin bribes or spying on trucker protests, while CBC’s report on U.S. conservative threats ignores left-wing extremism and media bias. At Davos, Rebel News journalists—including Avi Yamini, Jack Pesobic, and Sophie Corcoran—were detained by WEF Police, revealing mainstream media’s complicity as sponsors. Calgary spent $75K on climate influencers, redacting contracts under Section 16.1, suggesting systemic censorship to shield environmental agendas. Levant argues independent journalism uncovers real threats while establishment outlets prioritize political narratives over accountability. [Automatically generated summary]
Tonight, I think we all know how corrupt the U.S. security and intelligence industry is.
Well, you see how bad Canada's has become.
It's May 24th.
This is the Esmond Red 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 is government.
But why?
is because it's my bloody right to do so.
Did you know that Hillary Clinton's campaign lawyer is being prosecuted right now?
Probably going to go to jail.
That's my amateur assessment.
For lying to the FBI, for giving them false information about Donald Trump in an attempt to have them investigate Trump to embarrass him and to spread that embarrassment in the news media.
What?
Well, you didn't know that that bombshell trial was going on right now?
It's not just any trial.
It's the result of a government investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham.
And it's already proved that the U.S. government was spying on Donald Trump's political campaign.
What?
That's not on the CBC each night or the Globe and Mail?
It's not.
I checked.
You'd think it would be covered around the clock.
I mean, here's just a randomly selected bombshell moment from the trial.
I could have chosen from five clips.
Here, take a look at this one.
Fox News Alert on the trial of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussman.
Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign manager, Robbie Mook, testified today that Clinton herself approved the idea of giving the Alpha Bank story to a reporter as part of the Trump-Russia narrative.
As you'll remember, that suggested that there were connections between Alpha Bank and the Trump campaign server.
The FBI looked into that and found nothing suspicious.
David Spunt is live outside the federal courthouse in Washington with more.
David?
Hi, Kaylee.
Good afternoon.
There was a little bit of surprise in the courtroom when Robbie Mook, the 2016 Hillary Clinton campaign manager, just answered a question casually that she personally approved sending that story to the media.
As you mentioned, it deals with an allegation or an accusation about the Trump organization, not the Trump campaign, but the Trump organization having a back channel to a Russian bank named Alphabank, which has some ties to the Kremlin, some Russian oligarchs that are close with Vladimir Putin.
So to give everyone a little bit of a backstory on this story, because it is complicated, there are a lot of twists and turns.
Hillary Clinton had a campaign attorney named Michael Sussman.
He is on trial right now behind me in federal court because in 2016, September 2016, he went to his friend who happened to be the general counsel at the FBI, a man named James Baker, and Sussman said, James, or Jim rather, I have some information linking the Trump organization to a Russian-based bank via a back channel, via a computer server.
James Baker took the information at the FBI.
The FBI investigated.
They found out there was nothing to it, Kaylee, as you mentioned.
Hillary Clinton's team at the campaign also found out about that information.
And we are learning today via Robbie Mook, the campaign manager.
She personally was briefed on this allegation about the Russian Bank and Trump organization.
And she said, okay, go ahead, give it to the media.
And that's where we are right now.
Sussman is charged with one count of providing a false statement to the FBI.
The trial's been going on for a week.
It's expected to continue another week.
But again, definitely a little bit of a surprise in the courtroom, I think, from not only the government, but the defense when Robbie Mook went ahead and admitted that Clinton herself gave the go-ahead for disseminating that story, which turned out to be false.
Oh, nothing.
Just that Hillary Clinton approved a shopping around of false perjury-filled documents about Trump, including giving it to the FBI.
No big whoop.
I mean, they're all in on it.
The CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency.
I would never have said that before in my whole life.
I would have called any skeptics or critics either kooks or paranoids or conspiracy theorists or probably communists or anti-Americans.
I would have said those things myself.
But they really were all in on the plan to keep Donald Trump out of office by spying on him and leaking the so-called dirt on him.
As the left-wing critic at Glenn Greenwald points out, it's very, very weird that every senior FBI and CIA man, whether he's doing his career in the, when he's done, rather, doing his career in the military industrial complex, gets a job afterwards as a pundit on CNN or some other network.
In the past, they tried to influence the news, subtly, but not directly.
Seriously, even the ones caught doing atrocious things.
Here's Peter Strzok, former senior FBI agent, spying on Trump.
His text amongst his colleagues came out.
Turns out he was having an affair with another FBI agent, but that's not my point.
He's allegedly a cop, a neutral cop, allegedly working for the law, but he was actually campaigning against Trump using his law enforcement powers.
Here's Senator Lindsey Graham reading out some of Strzok's texts.
March 16th, 2016.
I cannot believe Trump is likely to be an actual serious candidate for president.
July the 21st, 2016, Trump is a disaster.
I have no idea how destabilizing his presidency would be.
August the 8th, 2016, three days before Strzok was made, Debde acting in charge of the counterintelligence divisions of the FBI.
He's never going to become president, right?
Page to Strzok.
No, no, he won't.
We'll stop him.
These are the people investigating the Clinton email situation and start the counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign.
Compare them to Mueller.
August the 15th, 2016.
Strzok.
I want to believe the path you threw out for consideration in Andy's office that there's no way he gets elected, but I'm afraid we can't take that risk.
It's like an insurance policy in the unlikely event you die before you're 40.
August 26th, 2016.
Just went to the Southern Virginia Walmart.
I could smell the Trump support.
October the 19th, 2016.
Trump is a fucking idiot.
He's unable to provide a coherent answer.
Sorry to the kids out there.
These are the people that made a decision that Clinton didn't do anything wrong and a counterintelligence investigation of the Trump campaign was warranted.
We're going to, in a bipartisan way, I hope, deal with Russia.
But when the Mueller report is put to bed, and it soon will be, this committee is going to look long and hard at how this all started.
Do you see what I mean?
Fox News Threat to Canada00:16:21
So, yeah, they're all in on it.
None have gone to jail.
They've all landed rich TV gigs, including Strzokmer.
They're still lying.
There's a trial on right now that's getting next to zero media coverage, at least in Canada, not much in America either.
Hillary was just implicated by name by her own lawyer, but nothing.
Thanks for letting me tell you that, by the way, because I want to put it to you that Canada is sort of the same these days.
You know, because Brenda Lucky, the head of the RCMP, that's the equivalent of the FBI down there.
She's just as in the pocket as James Comey was.
He was the former head of the FBI.
Brenda Lucky was handpicked by Trudeau to run the RCMP.
She owes her career to him.
She simply won't allow charges to be laid against him.
Not for using, not for taking a bribe in the form of a free vacation to the Bahamas from the Aga Khan.
Not for interfering with the prosecution of SNC Lavaland and trying to bully the justice minister, Jody Wilson-Raybold, into dropping the charges against his friends.
Yeah, our military industrial espionage, deep state is politicized and corrupt too.
Here's a story.
They literally deployed a military aircraft to spy on the truckers in Ottawa.
That's against the law, by the way.
They lied about it, but they did it.
Other than a story in the Ottawa Citizen and a few small echoes, it really went unmentioned.
But the real shock is that not a single person involved, no one on that spy plane, no one involved with planning or executing that mission.
No one on the civilian side said, what are we doing using Canadian armed forces to spy on a civilian peaceful protest just because they are honking their horns at Trudeau?
That's my point.
They're all in on it, just like the FBI and the CIA are all in on it.
They're corrupt and partisan.
They're anti-Trump.
And here's my proof.
Look at this story in Trudeau's CBC state broadcaster today.
Just astonishing.
The story, Canada should rethink relationship with U.S. as democratic backsliding worsens.
Security experts say.
What?
Rethink our relationship with the United States in favor of whom?
China?
Should we just ignore the world's longest undefended border and our geographical location?
What does it even mean?
Although I suppose it's not the world's longest undefended border anymore.
Try crossing it if you're not jabbed.
But seriously, I'll read more.
Former national security advisors, CISIS directors, say U.S. could become a source of threat and instability.
Really?
Canada's intelligence community, that's an oxymoron, will have to grapple with the growing influence of anti-democratic forces in the United States, including the threat posed by conservative media outlets like Fox News.
It says a new report from a task force of intelligence experts.
Oh, I get it.
So they love America.
They all go down to New York to catch some Broadway shows.
They all go down to Florida for the sun.
But it's the conservative political opinions that they hate.
Not China that actually kidnapped two Canadian men and held them for a thousand days.
China that's about to swallow up Taiwan, China, that's stealing our industrial secrets, stealing things from our biolabs, that's building up its military.
No, no, no.
That's not the threat to Canada.
Fox News is the threat to Canada.
Let me read.
The United States is and will remain our closest ally, but it could also become a source of threat and instability, says a newly published report written by a task force of former national security advisors, former Canadian Security Intelligence Service directors, ex-deputy ministers, former ambassadors, and academics.
Members of the group have advised both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and former Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
Now is the time for the federal government to rethink how it approaches national security, their report concludes.
Imagine believing that.
Imagine writing it and calling it a national security document.
These people are just like James Comey and the other crooks down south, except in America, their judicial system works and wrongdoers are occasionally rooted out and brought to justice.
Tell me the last time that happened in Canada.
The last time that happened when Jody Wilson-Raybold tried to root out corruption from Trudeau and Gerald Butts, who were trying to get their friends at SNC Leveland off the hook, it was Jody Wilson Raybel who was fired, not the crooks.
I'll read you some more from this CBC story.
We believe that the threats are quite serious at the moment, but they do impact Canada, said report co-author Vincent Rigby, who until a few months ago served as the national security advisor to Trudeau.
We don't want it to take a crisis for the government of Canada to wake up.
Okay.
At least we know this is a liberal document, but he controlled things.
He changed the national security apparatus.
Trudeau is changing what we look for.
We're not looking for terrorists anymore, non-Islamic terrorists, not eco-terrorists, whatever.
They're looking for truckers now and for U.S. TV hosts.
Now, let me read.
Thomas Juneau, co-director of the task force and associate professor at the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa, said that while Canada's right-wing extremism is homegrown, cross-border connections between extremist groups are alarming.
There are growing transnational ties between right-wing extremists here and in the U.S.
The movement of funds, the movement of people, the movement of ideas, the encouragement, the support by media, such as Fox News and other conservative media, he said.
What extremists?
The only ones they seem to mention are the peaceful trucker protests, where every single allegation of violence turned out to be false.
He pointed to state senator Doug Mastriano's recent win in the Republican primary for governor of Pennsylvania.
Mastriano is a well-known proponent of the lie that election fraud caused former President Donald Trump's loss in 2020.
There are serious risks of Democratic backsliding in the U.S.
And at this point, that is not a theoretical risk, Juneau said.
So all of that is a serious threat to our sovereignty, to our security, and in some cases, to our democratic institutions.
We need to rethink our relationship with the United States.
So because some Republican that these liberals don't like won a primary election, democratic institutions are at risk because the election didn't go the way the liberals wanted.
And the CBC says, they just say, they just assert that it's a lie, L-I-E, that there was an election fraud.
Not that it's an error, not that it's an opinion, not that it's a matter contested.
They have decided it's a lie that there was election fraud in 2020.
Was there election fraud in 2020?
I mean, surely there was some.
There always is in a large nation.
That's quite some.
It is a lie that there was election fraud against Trump.
Is this a news report or a Democratic Party talking points?
It's so weird.
The word Fox News, by the way, is in this CBC story seven times.
I checked.
During the convoy protest, Fox host Tucker Carlson, whose show draws in millions of viewers each night, called Trudeau a Stalinist dictator on air and accused him of having suspended democracy and declared Canada dictatorship.
Now, you might think that that's a bit much.
I might have, until Trudeau brought in martial law, seized bank accounts without legal process.
Deployed riot police with guns to clear out unarmed peaceful truckers, shot our reporter Alexa in the leg.
Yeah, I think Stalinist uh is strong, but I can see it.
I can understand it.
But look at what they're saying here.
Because Tucker Carlson called Trudeau Stalinist because he said that about our prime minister, our precious one.
So Tucker Carlton is, therefore, a military and security risk to Canada.
So Canada needs to, I don't know, to get Stalinist on him, I guess.
It's just crazy on top of crazy.
Let me read more.
Calls for a new national security strategy.
When we think about threats to Canada, we think about the Soviet military threat.
We think about al-Qaeda.
We think about the rise of China.
We think about the war in Ukraine.
All of these are true, but so is the rising threat to Canada that the U.S. poses, said Juneau.
Actually, there is no more Soviet Union, so I think he's wrong in saying that the Soviets form a threat.
That's completely new.
That calls for a new way of thinking and a new way of managing our relationship with the U.S.
Yeah.
I don't like Tucker Carlson, so let's build a new military security spy strategy around our TV pundit tastes.
That's not a report from a serious country.
But then again, you already knew that.
I got a copy of this underlying report that the CBC cites with such glee.
The first thing I noticed is that the CBC sort of doctored the report a bit.
I mentioned that this CBC story contains the word Fox, as in Fox News.
It's seven times on the page.
I checked.
The report that they're reporting on mentions the word Fox just once in passing.
It's still nuts to mention a conservative media outlet as a risk to your country, but it shows that the CBC cannot be trusted at all and that they have some bizarre rivalry with Fox and Tucker Carlson, at least in their own mind, because I don't think Carlson even knows the CBC exists.
Tucker isn't even mentioned in the report itself, but he's mentioned twice by the CBC, and his picture is in the CBC story, too.
Don't you think that's a bit weird?
The report by the deep state lists the top risk to Canada as great powers, Russia and China.
I think that's right.
Even Trudeau's people who wrote this thing aren't crazy enough to say that Tucker Carlson is a bigger threat than them.
They sure downplay Islamic terrorism.
Boy, I hope they're right on that.
They'd probably say that Tucker Carlson works for Russia.
That's probably how they'd square on that.
But there is this crazy paragraph that the CBC did use as a jumping off point for their article.
I'm just going to read the crazy.
It also quickly became apparent that there were ties between far-right extremists in Canada and the United States.
There was, moreover, open support from conservative media, including Fox News and conservative politicians in the United States.
This may not have represented foreign interference in the conventional sense since it was not the result of actions of a foreign government, but it did represent, arguably, a greater threat to Canadian democracy than the actions of any state other than the United States.
It will be a significant challenge to our national security and intelligence agencies to monitor this threat since it emanates from the same country that is by far our greatest source of intelligence.
They're talking about the truckers.
They're saying bizarrely here, they just said that Russia and China were the threat, but here they're saying the truckers are the greatest threat to Canada in the world.
Now, what they said is simply factually not true.
There were no ties between the truckers and foreign actors.
There just weren't.
A sliver of the GoFundMe funds were raised from Americans.
As you know, those funds never actually got to the truckers.
The CBC grudgingly apologized for this conspiracy.
Do you remember this one?
I do ask that because, you know, given Canada's support of Ukraine in this current crisis with Russia, I don't know if it's far-fetched to ask, but there is concern that Russian actors could be continuing to fuel things as this protest grows, but perhaps even instigating it from the outset.
Well, again, I'm going to defer to our partners in the public safety, the trained officials and experts in that area.
Yeah, that was fake, of course, fake news.
Having U.S. politicians speak out against Trudeau imposing martial law hardly as a threat to Canada.
It's actually nice that some politicians care about democracy in Canada.
It's sort of opposite day when the guy suspending civil liberties, Justin Trudeau, is called the Democrat and peaceful protesters who care about Canadian civil liberties are called the greatest threat to Canada in the world.
Just dumb.
You know, it's not serious when they say global warming is a national security threat and their proof is a scary red and orange map.
The authors lie again, saying the truckers were part of an ideologically motivated violent extremism poses a growing threat to Canadian national security.
The disruptive protests in Ottawa, Windsor, Emerson, and Coots in early 2022 validated concerns that experts had been voicing for years.
Cases are mounting of threats directed at Canadian politicians, officials, and vulnerable groups, individuals, and groups who adhere to a diffuse range of violent far-right ideologies have become better organized and emboldened in the wake of the events of early 2022.
What violence?
The most serious offense for which charges were laid in the entire Ottawa trucker protest was incitement to mischief.
That's it.
Nothing violent.
Not even mischief itself.
I'm not sure how you can be charged with inciting mischief.
If it never was incited, no weapons were found in the entire Ottawa trucking convoy.
That arson claim, as you know, turned out to be a hoax.
But these authors put the truckers in with terrorists, violent far-right ideologies.
Is it far-right, by the way, to say my body, my choice?
I thought that was liberal.
Or give me my privacy, or let me travel by plane or train in my own country, or don't segregate me.
Is that far right?
They keep saying right and far right again and again because that's where they're looking for evil.
The words left-wing never actually appear in the entire report.
Neither does the word environmentalist or eco-terrorists.
Look at this, from just a few weeks ago.
There really are eco-terrorists in Canada.
Attack on Coastal Gaslink left workers terrified.
The company said 20 people surrounded and attacked workers.
RCMP are investigating and had to make their way through downed trees, wire, boards with spikes, and other obstacles to get to the location.
That's terrorism.
Wonder why it wasn't mentioned in the report.
Even Toronto's Globe and Mail covered this eco-terrorist attack on a natural gas pipeline construction website.
More violence in one nightmare than by all the trucker protests combined total ever.
But eco-terrorists are not mentioned in the report.
Look, it's not a serious report by serious people.
I'll tell you what it is.
It's the Liberal Party platform rewritten as a national security document.
Yes, there are a few national security things in the report, but the heart of it is Trudeau's own partisan grudges.
He hates conservatives.
He hates the truckers.
Challenges of Trust00:08:48
He doesn't really like the more vocal parts of America.
Not a word about threats on the left.
So not surprisingly, their recommendations are not actually national security recommendations.
They're Trudeau's policies dressed up as national security recommendations, like his plan to restrict social media.
Here, the deep state says they need to do a lot more spying on what Canadians are saying online.
Let me read to you.
One of the key challenges in this area, however, is collection of social media posts.
Who in the government should be responsible for monitoring social media, different parts of the national security community, have the partial mandate to do so.
The rapid response mechanism at Global Affairs Canada, for example, monitors and analyzes potential cases of foreign interference, including by observing content shared through social media.
But as we saw during the protests across Canada early 2022, when protest organizers were openly telegraphing their intent on various social media platforms, government mandates are strictly limited.
This impedes and sometimes prevents the ability of national security agencies to do their work.
What work would they have with a peaceful protest?
And here's the recommendation.
Here's the recommendation of these experts.
Devote greater resources to open source intelligence to the national security community.
I mean spying on you.
Gathering and analyzing open source intelligence and then incorporating it into the broader intelligence collection and analysis process is complex.
It requires specific skill sets, which, despite recent improvements, are often lacking.
This requires the hiring of analysts with the necessary skills, e.g., imagery analysis, as well as a broader cultural change to remove analysts away from a mindset that still often perceives such intelligence as inferior to classified intelligence.
So they're saying we need to spy on citizens more, spy on what they're saying on Facebook and Twitter more, on Canadian citizens, for their political beliefs.
That's what the truckers were about.
There is no question that the world is changing rapidly and getting more dangerous in new ways than ever before.
When we look at the prevalence of misinformation, of disinformation, the way social media has been weaponized both by foreign actors and by people within Canada pushing extremist views, trying to foment anger and discord, whether it's extremist ideology and right-wing terrorism on the rise in Canada, or whether it's examples like the illegal protests we saw in the winter.
There are a whole new set of challenges that we need to be responding to.
And that's why we're working closely with our national security agencies, working closely with organizations like the Canadian Security Establishment Communications to make sure that we are able to respond to these new realities.
We need to do it, however, in a way that continues to defend freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom to protest, to legally protest, while at the same time, we're taking on more tools to keep Canadians safe.
Because increasingly, we're seeing that things that start online end up having impacts on the real world.
Now, I'm sure they would pick up the odd criminal threat on Twitter or Facebook, but, and I'm no expert here, I'm guessing that criminals generally don't tweet their plans out in public.
The tweeting and the Facebooking is more done by regular people, regular citizens.
Yeah.
No, Trudeau's Brain Trust doesn't really think Americans are our top national security threat.
They think Canadians are.
Stay with us for a while.
I do lots of media.
Friendly media.
No, I do.
The ones that are here invited.
I'm doing no media at this time.
Can we sit down and I'll make a time with you and answer some actual tough questions?
You can make a request for a meeting and so you can deny it.
I never do.
My one question is, can the Canadian oil and gas sector survive the net zero approach that's being promoted here?
As I said, I never do.
If you want an interview with me, like everybody else, you make a request and we can have it.
And will you accept that?
like everybody else if I can fit it in, okay?
How do you justify, how does the UN climate Envoy justify the massive carbon footprint here today?
To set this up, this fake city for a week event?
How did you get here?
Did you fly?
You walked?
Did you come on a private jet?
Of course not.
No, so how do you justify this?
Look at all of this.
For one week event, the carbon footprint is huge.
Don't you think that's a bit hypocritical?
Drop it.
No?
Look, there's lots of progress being made.
But look, I'm not doing a stand-up interview, okay?
Why not?
You're walking that way anyways.
I think people around the world, you know, this year they say regaining trust.
That's the whole purpose.
I do lots of media.
Friendly media.
No, I do.
No, God, no.
The ones that are here invited.
I'm doing no media at this time.
Can we sit down and I'll make a time with you and answer some actual tough questions?
You can make a request for a meeting.
So you can deny it.
Look, as I say, as with everyone else, you can do the same thing as with the guy from True North.
He's a good guy, but I'm a good guy.
I'm sure you're a good guy as well.
All people are good.
It's absolutely right.
But the whole world is looking at this now going, you're a pack of hypocrites and you're at the top of the chain there.
What would you answer people?
Just give me one answer to the people.
Take care, sir.
That's our Viewer's Choice award-winning journalist, Avi Yamini, trying to get a straight answer from Mark Carney, the former governor of the Bank of Canada, the Bank of England, a UN climate diplomat, and perhaps a future leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.
You probably saw our friend Andrew Lawton ask some questions first.
Then Avi Yamini took over.
There is a gaggle of Canadian journalists in Davos, but they are all of the independent variety.
Six journalists are coming from Rebel News, including the aforementioned Avi, his friend Rukshan Fernando from Melbourne, Australia, two Brits, our own Lewis Brackpool, and Sophie Corcoran, a young lady just ripping it up on social media in that country.
Two Americans also.
And Savannah Hernandez, who is a great field journalist too.
Team of Six and our friend Andrew Lawton.
I put it to you that you just saw more journalism by Avi and Andrew with Mark Carney than the entire media party combined have ever put to them, man.
And joining us now from the Airbnb outside of Davos, Switzerland is Avi Yamini.
Avi, great to see you.
You've been working so hard and it's late at night over there.
So thanks for staying up to do this interview.
Give me a report.
You're there in the Airbnb.
There's six of you.
Tell me a little bit about what your day is like because you've got to schlep into the city.
You've got to sort of split up.
Tell me how you've been doing it.
So we drive about an hour and a half from the Airbnb because this terrain's pretty intense and they've blocked the main road, the highway for security reasons.
And, you know, if you have a business on that highway, well, too bad.
And so we're forced to drive through the Alps, the mountains, and we've just arrived back here.
It's supposed to take about an hour.
I think it's taken us closer to two just because of the intense clouds and fog.
So we were driving probably a kilometer an hour at one point.
We drive in there and then spent the day in town on the promenade looking for, I guess, elitists to challenge on their ideas and break their safe space.
Ambushing Journalism00:14:46
Here's one.
You buttonholed a very senior executive at Microsoft.
Let's take a look at that.
You're from Microsoft.
Is that right?
Why is Microsoft wearing like a UN pin?
Rebel News, Avi from Rebel News.
Well, because we do a lot of work on the SDGs.
Yeah, we address things like skilling and climate change, internet access for everyone.
And I happen to be an SDG advocate myself for appointed by the UN Secretary General.
And this is...
I'll get you into your thing.
Okay.
Yeah.
One more question.
This year they're saying that this is about regaining trust.
Why do you think so much of the world has lost trust in the WEF?
Well, the first thing I would say is we live in a world where I think people question much more everything around them.
And questioning can be a challenge.
But questioning, I think, is also an opportunity, mostly to provide people with better information, more information.
And that's one of the things that the World Economic Forum does.
But that doesn't answer the question why people miss trust.
And specifically, Bill Gayton.
Okay, that's all right.
There we go.
Microsoft UN looks like they're one organization.
There you go.
So you've got to move fast.
I guess they're all wearing name tags with different kind of access.
A lot of these tech and journalist executives are there not to sort of report on it, but to participate in it, to sponsor it, to try and get business deals, to lobby for things.
Like they're all insiders there, right?
100%.
And what I keep saying is that these guys don't practice what they preach at all, what they want the rest of the world to do, except for one thing.
This segregated society and this class system that they've created in Davos, where they put their name tag.
In fact, it's all color-coded so you know who's more important than who, which has been a blessing for any investigative journalist, any real journalist that's there trying to track down the most important figures and those that are really running the show.
It's been great.
I dare say that they may cut their segregation from next year because they certainly handed us one where we're able to, and thanks to the help of Andrew Lawton there from the True North, that we've really worked hard on tracking him down.
There was a moment where another Rebel News alumnus, Jack Pesobic, was in town and he was surrounded by Swiss police with guns.
I shouldn't say Swiss police because they actually had patches that said World Economic Forum Police, which is frankly the most terrifying thing I've ever heard.
And it wasn't until Savannah Hernandez from our team came there and started shining a light of scrutiny on these cops that Jack was let go.
I won't play the whole thing, but look at this and look at this lady saying, I have a reason for detaining him.
I won't tell it to you.
Turn the camera off.
It's quite something.
Take a look.
I don't think so.
It's pretty heavy.
Excuse me, can I ask you while you're detaining this journalist?
Can you put the phone away, please?
Can I ask you why you're detaining this journalist?
I don't answer your question.
Is it not able to report here?
Please please.
Excuse me?
Okay.
Can I ask you guys why?
Yeah, can you please stop filming?
Then we can talk.
Why do I need to stop filming?
Because I ask you to.
It's my personal right because I don't like to be filmed because it's a ride in Switzerland.
If I don't want to detain you.
But should I ask why he's being detained then?
I won't point the camera at you then.
I won't film you, but I would like to know why this journalist is being detained on public property.
What's detained?
Can you explain that?
How come he's being surrounded right now?
is he allowed to leave the area we're we're just making a normal police control uh because you know it's with everything is very sensitive he specifically was targeted uh There is a reason because we have to have a reason to control a person.
What was he doing?
Yeah, World Economic Forum Police.
That's actually what their badges say.
Just crazy times.
I have a theory, Avi, that you and the rest of the six on the Rebel team, plus Jack Pesobic, plus Andrew Lawton.
So that's eight independent journalists.
You've done more journalism than has ever happened at Davos before.
I think they're going to change the rules next year.
I think they're going to find some way to try and keep you guys out again.
100%.
You see their reaction when we do confront and more than anything is utter shock.
How dare somebody walk up to me and ask me a question?
And they basically tell you, just get in, send me an email and we'll make a time to do a proper sit-down interview.
And it's obvious they're not going to follow up on that because I'm happy to do that.
In fact, the WHO, the WHO, exactly the WHO special envoy, he was really, he was so shocked at the end that all he could do was even turn to Rukshan at the end because he'd realize I've asked him questions, frankly,
that every normal person who has suffered under COVID tyranny in the last two years would ask.
Anything a regular person would ask.
But he was so shocked, like physically shaken up, visibly shaken up.
And he realized that he had nowhere to go with me.
And I said to him, I'll email him, which I did, email him to give him the opportunity to sit down and do the interview and finish it properly so it wasn't on the run.
So he didn't feel like I threw what he called ambushing questions.
But he went to Rukshan and basically tried to guilt trip him and pat him and said, I hope you feel good with yourself that you're doing this.
You're part of this ambushing journalism.
I'm just, you know, that is what journalism is supposed to be.
But these guys feel so safe and protected.
Why?
Because they've built this place where it's just, you know, all the journalists there in Davos want to be in the club.
And they know that if you actually question them properly, if you do your job, you're not going to get an invite next year and you're not going to be part of the elite.
You know, something we don't have to worry about, Ezra, because thanks to you and the supporters that we have, we're only accountable to the truth and we'll keep chasing it.
Yeah, all our reports are at WEF, World Economic Forum, WFreports.com.
It's like when Mark Carney was asked about private jets, he's, oh, just leave that aside, put that aside.
Sorry, that's not a substantive answer.
That is not an acceptable answer for Mr. Global Warming when he's asked how he travels.
Let's show that World Health Organization diplomat because both the World Health Organization and the World Economic Forum are meeting at the same time in the same country.
So there's lots of cross-pollination.
Here's that interview, the one where you describe he says, I hope you feel good about yourself.
Well, I hope you do, Avi, because you're doing more journalism than the rest of the media party put together.
Here's that video.
I'm an envoy on behalf of WHO.
Avi Mini for Rebel News in Davos, Switzerland at the World Economic Forum.
Moments ago, I managed to track down one of the special envoys for the WHO's response to COVID-19.
Now, I'm not going to put his full interview yet because I hope viewers can understand, and I hope this is not cut out, that I've been ambushed in the street.
And I'm responding to this gentleman's, I don't even know his name.
Aviamini.
I'm responding to his questions because I believe that it is my duty to attempt to communicate.
Sorry, I appreciate that.
I don't mean to be fast, so that's why I get it.
I'm late for a meeting.
It's just that you are asking questions that I can't answer.
All right, thank you for your time.
I apologize.
I would like to say to those of you who are watching this, you know, I would be very happy to be interviewed normally about this.
Can I get a copy?
I don't have any cards left, Abraham.
Where can I catch you to continue this interview?
Let me just write it down.
I mean, I want to show one more because we actually, um, you actually.
Before you get, before you get to that, Ezra, I want the audience to know that that is just, that is 30 seconds because I am a man of integrity and a man of my word.
And I promised him I'll email him to let him have the opportunity for a sit-down.
And I have emailed him.
And in fact, I've also tagged him on Twitter to make sure he knows that that opportunity is there.
And I'm even willing to meet him in Geneva at the World Health Organization Assembly.
But if not, I am running with what we have.
And I promise the viewers that there is a few newsworthy elements to the interview with him.
And some of it's going to be shocking, including him just a bit of a preview, is that he actually condemned any mandates.
That's one thing he did say.
So there is an interview.
And maybe that's why he's so nervous for it to go out because he kind of went against the grain at one point in it.
Maybe I forced him into it.
I don't know.
The audience will decide.
WEFREPORTS.com, it's going to come out.
I dare say he's not going to answer me.
So we will run with the interview I got with him on the street then.
I want to show one more thing.
You saw the different media companies as massive sponsors.
I can only imagine how many hundreds of thousands or possibly even millions of dollars that these sponsors pay to have their names plastered everywhere for the world's oligarchs, Wall Street Journal.
I think I saw CNBC, obviously Google, YouTube, et cetera, different banks, accounting firms.
Here's the New York Times.
Wasn't there to report.
I'd like to have a thoughtful investigative report by the New York Times.
No, no, no, no.
They're not there to the report.
They're there as a sponsor, which tells me you cannot get an honest report from the New York Times because they're literally advertisers.
Here, I'd like to show your interaction with this lady who I understand is a deputy editor there.
Take a look.
Rebecca, how are you doing from the New York Times?
Can I ask you a quick question?
It's Avi from Rebel News.
How is the public meant to believe that the New York Times is here to actually ask the tough questions when you're here as an invited guest?
How are people meant to rely on the mainstream media?
If you wouldn't mind, we just, if you could give us, you know, thank you.
You don't want to explain to people why we should trust the mainstream media?
No, of course, no comment.
There we go.
So that's the point here is in Davos, you have the mainstream media that are not here to report the truth.
They are here as part of the event, invited guests with their white name tags.
Now, you're more polite than me.
I think I would have asked one more round of questions, but you know, you left good enough alone.
I think you made your point that these folks have nothing to say.
These folks who like to hold others to account refuse themselves to be accountable.
Absolutely.
And I think it's important, you know, to find balance between what people try to say.
You're harassing innocent people.
I'm there to do my job.
I'm there to make a point, to show the world what the truth.
And the truth is that the mainstream media is not unbiased.
They are actually part of the story that they're supposed to be there reporting on.
And an active part.
And in fact, worse than that, like you said, they spend hundreds of thousands, probably even millions of dollars to be a part of it.
So how can we get objective journalism there?
We can't.
They can say whatever they want about us.
But the fact is that WEF do not own us.
The viewers do.
Well, you made the longest journey.
You and Rukshan came all the way from Melbourne, Australia, which is quite a journey.
Our Americans traveled far.
Our Brits not quite as far, but still it's a schlep.
You've got a couple more days in the continent without giving away any of our journalistic moves because we don't want to telegraph to the bad guys what we're up to next.
How much longer are you in the country?
We'll be here till Friday, where both the WEF and WHO end their meetings, their respective meetings, both in Davos and Geneva.
To be fair, now that I, myself and Rukshan, we got here early because we need to get over the jet lag.
And we witnessed the construction of this fake town and what must be the enormous carbon footprint from these people that are telling us how to live our life to be better people.
But there's a part of me that wishes that I probably should stay just to see the destruction, the wrecking ball that will go through Davos when everybody leaves.
Because, you know, if the setup is anything to go by, Ezra, I have a feeling because these are not the nicest people in the world.
I don't think they care much for the town of Davos or Geneva or wherever they're setting up for the cameras.
It's all when the cameras, when the mainstream media cameras are there, the cameras that have paid hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars to be there, when they move on, when they're not there, whether it's before or after, it is an absolute disgrace what goes on there.
Well, Avi, I couldn't be prouder of you and the rest of the team, some of whom I know more than others.
You know, we have some pretty new teammates there, including Sophie Corcoran, a very young lady from the UK who we've only just met, and Jeremy LaFredo, our newest hire in New York.
So how has it been working with these journalists from three different continents, three different styles, different, I mean, you're the most seasoned of the group.
Sophie's the most junior, and there's everyone in between.
How are you guys getting along?
Working Across Continents00:03:06
And are you learning from each other?
Are you becoming friends?
Absolutely.
It's been every time we do something like this, Ezra, it's a learning experience.
I remember in Hong Kong, even before I was officially with Rebel, I met some of the Rebel team there and we worked alongside each other.
I think every time, if you don't learn something from whether it's the most experienced or the newest team members, then you're doing something wrong.
Everybody's got something to offer and it's been amazing.
It's been tough.
It's been long days, tiring, but I wouldn't give it up for anything.
It's been amazing.
And I want to thank everybody that's supporting the work here because whilst it is hard, it's an honor, but it's also an experience of a lifetime that I'll never forget.
And hopefully we shine a light in a place that's quite dark.
Well, you sure have.
Listen, you mentioned the Airbnb.
You mentioned the van that you're going back and forth.
Of course, you guys have to eat.
There's lots of little expenses.
Keep those receipts.
And I sent this message to the other reporters to keep those receipts because we don't want you out of pocket.
And we're crowdfunding the Airbnb and other things that we didn't disclose.
I'll mention it now that we're coming to an end.
We had a lawyer, a Swiss lawyer that we hired and had on standby because I was worried that what happened to Jack would happen to our team.
It's happened before.
So, you know, we did a lot of preparations behind the scenes.
We had the flights, the taxi, the car.
So keep all those things because obviously we want to reimburse you and the other journalists.
I think it's money well spent.
I think our viewers are so interested in this subject that this is something they really value.
Folks, if you're watching and you haven't gone to wfreports.com yet, you should go there, see all the work from the six journalists.
And if you want to chip in to help cover the cost for these guys, maybe even buy them a beer when they're in the Swiss Alps.
That's the closest thing it'll be to a vacation.
These guys are not on holidays.
I can assure you that.
They travel economy class.
But if you want to chip in, go to wfreports.com.
Avi, say hi to the rest of the team and have a good night.
I know it's super late over there.
Thank you, Ezra.
Thanks for everything, man.
Okay, right on.
Good night.
Cheers.
Well, there you have it, our friend Avi Yamini, our Chief Australia correspondent and two-time back-to-back winner of our Viewers' Choice Awards.
Stay with us.
more ahead.
Hey, welcome back.
You're led.
Letters to me, Marie Jean Garry says, excellent interview.
Hope a bunch more people get it real soon.
Are you talking about my interview with Manny Monogrino?
I like that guy.
It's great to see him again.
Paul Baddock says, amazing that they don't even have to explain the current rationale.
All other laws or policies have to have an explanation, especially if a charter issue.
Accessing Calgary's Influencer Spending00:05:00
You know, there were so many things done wrong legally, judicially, legislatively, medically, statistically, policing, journalism.
Everything failed.
Everything failed.
You know, there's some amazing videos our teams are getting out of Davos.
You got to check out the website, WEFREPORTS.com.
And Jeremy LaFredo, our New York reporter, makes the point that the theme of Davos is building back trust, but they don't know why they lost it.
They don't know what they did wrong because they can't admit they did anything wrong.
They want to build back trust, but they refuse to come to grips with what they did to destroy the trust in the first place.
Aurorshack says, what shocks me is how the conservatives are not mentioning this Pfizer documents at all.
You know, I myself haven't dug deep into them, although we've criticized Pfizer many times.
Maybe I should take a look at the papers.
Well, that's our show for today.
Until tomorrow, let me leave you with our video of the day from Sheila.
Calgary is stonewalling Rebel News on how much money bureaucrats blew on climate change influencers.
It really bugs me that our government spends money on these like TikTokers and Instagram models to talk politics.
It just, it feels like a weird, corrupt bribe, and Calgary won't disclose it.
Here's Sheila's video on that.
I'll see you tomorrow.
Just a few weeks ago, actually at the end of April 2022, Rebel News filed for access to information regarding the amount of money the city of Calgary is spending on third-party social media influencers to push the government's agenda on a whole host of issues.
We hadn't even quite asked for the names of the people or companies they were contracting with.
We just wanted to know the bulk numbers, the costs, and if the numbers were outrageous, then that's when we were going to dig down and file a second access to information request or maybe a third or even a fourth to get all the details of the contracts.
Again, we would only do that if the numbers were ridiculous and if the spending was insane.
You see, unlike the city of Calgary, we're trying to be frugal over here because these sorts of investigations cost money and precious time.
And we even have a researcher who helps us carry them out.
We try to be strategic and follow the breadcrumbs if indeed there is a breadcrumb trail at all.
And here somebody left me a whole bakery in the woods.
What I can tell you is that over the course of January 1st, 2020, up until April 25th, 2022, the city of Calgary has spent nearly $75,000 hiring paid tweeters and Instagrammers to talk about all sorts of things like Labor Day, Canada Day, tomorrow's Chinatown, their toolkit for COVID, and a climate program, just to name a few.
But if you look right here in 2022, I cannot tell you the specific numbers of the contracts for a whole bunch of these things, and in particular, the climate program.
You know, that's really the one I'm interested in.
The city's redacted it for some reason while also publishing the data on other programs.
I think that's odd, don't you?
Now I want to know how much that money was, and now I want to know who they paid it to.
We are going to appeal those redactions.
And just to be clear, those 16.1 redactions, that's the section of the information law they're using to justify blacking things out.
That's the disclosure harmful to business interests of a third party clause.
So if the city tells us how much money they blew on so-called influencers, it would be harmful to the business interests of the influencers.
How could it be harmful?
They haven't even told us the names of the paid tweeters and Instagrammers.
So how could it harm them?
The amount of money spent by the city on influencers, particularly on the issue of climate change in the heart of oil country, should not be a trade or state secret, especially when the city has no problem giving away other information on other influencer contracts on other issues.
For example, apparently it's harmful to find out how much Calgary taxpayers were paying for climate change postings, but not for Canada Day ones.
What's the difference?
So today I'm just showing you the first part of an access to information investigation that is just getting started.
If you'd like to help me find out how much money the city of Calgary actually paid to climate influencers to push their climate scare agenda, and now you can help me find out exactly who they paid it to, you can do that by topping up our investigations fund at rebelinvestigates.com.
You know, we don't take any money from Justin Trudeau to hold governments to account, and that means all levels of government.
We're proudly independent and supported by our viewers at home.
So thank you.
These people don't get to spend taxpayer money in secret.
And I think the new mayor of Calgary, Giodi Gondek, best learn that sooner rather than later for the sake of Calgarians.
I am going to drag this information out of them.
Now we can do it the easy way or we can do it the hard way.