Three prosecutors fought Tamara Lich’s U.S. travel request, judge leaves house-arrest conditions unchanged
Tamara Lich’s U.S. travel request ends in a stalemate, but Rebel News is expanding her role as she joins the board of directors while her house arrest nears its end.
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Article by Rebel News staff.
Tonight on The Ezra Levant Show: Tamara Lich’s sentence-variation hearing ends without a standing right to work in the United States, and why Rebel News is putting her on its board of directors.
Lich had asked the court to loosen her house-arrest conditions so she could travel for Rebel News work in the U.S., including talk-show appearances and other speaking dates. The Crown opposed that request and sought tighter limits. A hearing that would usually have been brief ran for months. Justice Heather Perkins-McVey left the core conditions in place. International trips remain possible only by individual application.
After the ruling, Lich described the result as a draw: no added restrictions, and no general permission to work across the border.
The order still sits uneasily beside that of co-defendant Chris Barber, a long-distance trucker whose conditions allow regular U.S. runs. In court, the judge said there was no evidence before her that Barber had been crossing successfully, despite having written that travel into his order. Barber has continued those runs without incident.
Inside Canada, Lich has kept working for Rebel News — conferences, interviews with political leaders, street interviews, and events such as the Canada Strong and Free Conference. A sequel to her bestseller Hold the Line is close to finished.
That employment was the ground on which the Crown fought the U.S. travel request. Three prosecutors appeared on the file. A counsel new to the defence was brought in to cross-examine Ezra Levant. Lich tied that show of force to the priorities of Ontario’s attorney general and Premier Doug Ford’s government, and compared her 18 months of house arrest with penalties given to drug traffickers, violent offenders and sexual offenders.
Levant testified and filed an affidavit on Lich’s duties at Rebel News. Much of the cross-examination went to his own criticism of the courts rather than to her work. The judge said he was entitled, as a journalist and a private citizen, to attack the justice system, then listed comments from his tweets and reporting in her reasons. Levant has not withdrawn those comments, including that the trial was sloppy, that the process became the punishment, and that Lich is a political prisoner.
The house-arrest portion of the sentence is nearly finished. A curfew will remain. Ordinary errands such as shopping should no longer require permission each time.
Rebel News is also changing Lich’s formal standing. Its board is presented as a roster of people who represent the outlet’s public identity. Chief reporter Sheila Gunn Reid and video lead Efrain Monsanto already sit on it. Weeks ago in Medicine Hat, Levant asked Lich to join in a symbolic capacity, calling her a role model for peaceful activism and a stand-in for what Rebel says it is. The interview was withheld until after the ruling.
Once the decision was out, Rebel released the tape. Lich accepted, tracing a line from viewer, to friend, to member of the team.
COMMENTS
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Bruce Atchison commented 2026-09-17 23:45:37 -0400Judge Oyvay more like. What a prideful woman. Judges are supposed to be unbiased and impartial. This unjust judge is neither. I hope history will record her as one huge loser.
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Bernhard Jatzeck commented 2026-09-17 22:13:37 -0400Meanwhile, Dear Leader goes gallivanting about Europe once again. He’s spent considerably more time there than in Parliament. (Yes, Mr. Carney, we actually have one in this country.)
Then again, he considers us Canadian peasants “icky”. -
George Vaughan commented 2026-09-17 20:43:19 -0400Men and women throughout history have sacrificied greatly for freedom. Tamara courageously joined their ranks, and we thank her. More brave souls will follow, as the enduring struggle for FREEdom has never been, is not currently, and never will be FREE. Millions of dollars spent on a public persecution, disguised as a mischief charge, clearly demonstrate the freedom struggle. Meanwhile, the lying architect of evil, Crime Minister Justdebt Freedough, jaunts freely around the world and dances like a juvenile in a Katy Perry video. Crazy world.
