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Article by Rebel News staff

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Tonight on The Ezra Levant Show: the minutes Ottawa hoped you’d never see. Trudeau’s old censorship panel is back under Mark Carney. They’re telling government it should police the internet, including memes, private messages, and speech they admit is lawful.

Private meeting minutes reveal that the same panel behind Justin Trudeau’s Online Harms Act is back at it. Remember Bill C-63? Trudeau’s great censorship bill, which included the possibility of life in prison for certain speech offences and gave a proposed Digital Safety Commission the power to fine American social media companies six per cent of their global revenue. That bill died on the order paper in January 2025 when Trudeau resigned and Parliament shut down. A lot of people thought that was the end of it. Maybe Mark Carney would be different. Maybe his government would leave Trudeau’s censorship agenda behind. It didn’t.

In March, Carney’s government brought back the same expert advisory group that helped write the blueprint for C-63. Marc Miller, now Minister of Canadian Identity and Culture, invited all twelve members of the 2022 panel, along with their facilitator. Eleven accepted. One, Université de Montréal law professor Pierre Trudel, declined “due to prior engagements.” The others returned, including Bernie Farber, Lianna McDonald, Amarnath Amarasingam, Emily Laidlaw and Heidi Tworek. Farber said he was “honoured to be once again considered for a reemergence of our team on online hate.” Our team.

What happened in that meeting was not announced in a press release. It took an Access to Information request to uncover the minutes, and what they reveal is remarkably clear. Farber told Miller that social media platforms “should not be allowed to police themselves. The government should do it.” He also wanted to impose “costs to platforms for allowing this level of hatred.” This is Bernie Farber, the same activist who tried to smear Canadian truckers with an antisemitic flyer that was later traced back to Miami.

Then there was Amarnath Amarasingam, who said C-63’s focus on incitement to violence was “too narrow.” He wanted the government to consider memes, coded language and what he called “lawful but awful” content. The minutes record the panel calling for “further reflection on how this content should be addressed.” Notice the wording. Lawful content. They knew it was lawful, and they still wanted Ottawa to figure out how to address it.

Laidlaw identified another limitation in C-63: it did not cover private messaging. That means direct messages, WhatsApp, Signal and email. And then there was Heidi Tworek, whose advice was less about the substance of the legislation and more about how to sell it. “Framing is critical,” she said. “This is not about limiting freedom of expression, but about enabling it.” The department’s own summary listed this as a point of “high consensus”: frame the legislation as enabling freedom of expression. That is quite a choice of words. Frame it. Not make it. Frame it.

The panel also agreed to operate under the Chatham House Rule, meaning comments could not be publicly attributed to individual participants. The department would handle the media. They made clear that the group itself was “not secret.” Apparently, the secret was what they were saying.

Now, there is a legitimate child-protection issue buried in these discussions. Lianna McDonald, from the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, raised sextortion, deepfake child pornography and grooming on gaming platforms. These are serious crimes, and they should be prosecuted. But that is also how this agenda gets packaged. Lead with the children, and then quietly expand the definition of harmful content behind them.

Three months after that Teams call, Bill C-34, the Safe Social Media Act, appeared. C-63 with a new coat of paint. The Digital Safety Commission is back, along with seven categories of “harmful content,” including “content that foments hatred.” The proposed penalties are enormous: five per cent of a company’s gross global revenue or $20 million, whichever is greater.

And the companies in the crosshairs include Meta, YouTube, Rumble and X. These are American companies with American owners, operating under the First Amendment at home. Yet Ottawa wants the power to punish them based on what happens on their platforms in Canada, potentially taking a percentage of revenue earned around the world. The Trump administration has already warned the British government about precisely this kind of legislation, arguing that it creates a disproportionate compliance burden for American companies. 

Miller’s speaking notes for the meeting said: “This meeting is about listening.” He was listening. Just not to you. Not to the civil libertarians, not to the journalists, and not to ordinary Canadians who think the government should stay out of lawful speech, whether that speech is a meme, a private message or something the government simply considers offensive.

The bill is now at second reading. Parliament returns this month, and this fall you will hear a lot about protecting children online. And we should protect children. But every time you hear that argument, remember what the government’s own meeting minutes recorded on page ten: “The government should do it.” That is the real question. Do you want the government to do it?