Justin Time
Old photos and video from the early 2000s showing Trudeau in this racially charged makeup resurfaced in the middle of the 2019 federal election campaign.
What is blackface (or brownface)?
This classic delaying tactic involves an MP talking… and talking… and talking… until the clock runs out or everyone else gives up in exhaustion..
What is a filibuster?
Every new MP, senator, and many public office holders must recite this formal promise of loyalty to the monarch before they can take their seat.
What is the Oath of Allegiance?
This 1964 naval incident off the coast of Vietnam was later revealed to have been significantly exaggerated (or fabricated), yet it still gave Lyndon Johnson the excuse he needed to escalate the war.
What is the Gulf of Tonkin incident?
This early-19th-century war between the United States and British North America featured invasions in both directions and helped solidify a distinct Canadian identity under the Crown.
What is the War of 1812?
In February 2022, Trudeau became the first Canadian prime minister to invoke this rarely used 1988 law in response to the Freedom Convoy protests occupying Ottawa.
What is the Emergencies Act?
If this type of motion succeeds in the House of Commons, constitutional convention normally requires the government to resign or call an election.
What is a confidence motion (or motion of non-confidence)?
This official is the federal head of Canadian military and can open and dissolve Parliament.
Who is the Governor General?
Tens of thousands of young American men, known by this alliterative nickname, crossed the border into Canada during the Vietnam War to avoid conscription, and Ottawa largely allowed them to stay.
What are draft dodgers? (or Vietnam War draft dodgers)
This 1980 presidential candidate campaigned under the slogan “Let’s Make America Great Again,” years before the shorter version became closely associated with Donald Trump.
Who is Ronald Reagan?
This optimistic two-word phrase, borrowed from Wilfrid Laurier, became Justin Trudeau’s signature 2015 campaign slogan promising a more open and radiant Canada.
What is “sunny ways”?
A Member who believes the rules or privileges of the House are being breached stands and interrupts by saying these three words, forcing the Speaker to rule.
What is “Point of Order”?
This famous clause in the Charter lets Parliament or a provincial legislature temporarily override certain rights for renewable five-year periods.
What is Section 33 (or the notwithstanding clause)?
This real-estate developer signed a 99-year lease on the World Trade Center complex just six weeks before 9/11 and later battled insurers in court, arguing the two plane crashes should count as separate events in order to secure a larger payout.
Who is Larry Silverstein?
In 1837 Canadian militia crossed into U.S. territory, seized this American steamboat that had been supplying rebels, set it on fire, and sent it over Niagara Falls — nearly sparking a war.
What is the Caroline (or the Caroline Affair)?
This international charity co-founded by the Kielburger brothers was handed a sole-source contract to run a $900-million student grant program that collapsed amid conflict-of-interest questions involving Trudeau’s family.
What is WE Charity?
This power, exercised by the Governor General on the Prime Minister’s advice, ends a session of Parliament and wipes the Order Paper clean; Justin Trudeau used it in August 2020 during the WE Charity controversy.
What is prorogation (or proroguing Parliament)?
Originally known as the British North America Act, this 1867 law created the Dominion of Canada and remains the foundational core of the written Constitution.
What is the Constitution Act, 1867?
This brother of President George W. Bush sat on the board of a company (Securacom/Stratesec) that held a security contract for the World Trade Center until mid-2000, a connection that conspiracy researchers still point to as far too convenient.
Who is Marvin Bush?
This Quebec city became a major destination for United Empire Loyalists fleeing the American Revolution and, nearly a century later, a temporary haven for Confederate agents — including a key figure in the Lincoln assassination conspiracy who escaped there in 1865.
What is Montréal?
This 2016 Christmas vacation on a private Bahamian island owned by a wealthy spiritual leader resulted in Justin Trudeau becoming the first sitting Canadian prime minister ever found by the Ethics Commissioner to have violated the Conflict of Interest Act.
What is the Aga Khan vacation (or trip to the Aga Khan’s island)?
This ornate ceremonial staff is carried into the House of Commons by the Sergeant-at-Arms at the start of every sitting; without it present, the House cannot legally conduct business.
What is the Mace?
This 1931 British statute gave Canada and the other Dominions full legislative independence from the UK while they remained under the Crown, effectively ending the last formal colonial restrictions.
What is the Statute of Westminster?
This two-time Medal of Honor Marine general testified before Congress in 1934 that a group of wealthy bankers and industrialists had tried to recruit him to lead a fascist coup against President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Who is Smedley Butler?
In February 1933 in Miami, this president-elect survived an assassination attempt when Giuseppe Zangara opened fire at close range; the shots instead fatally wounded Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak.
Who is Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR)?