WARNING: This story contains disturbing language.
A Conservative senator from Nova Scotia was seen on video mocking Ottawans’ response to recent protests, saying he was fed up with their rights and “six-figure salaries and weeks of 20 hour work.
In the video recorded near Parliament Hill, Senator Michael MacDonald expressed his support for the protesters who occupied Ottawa for more than three weeks.
“It’s a cross section of Canadians who said we’re tired of bullying, duplicity and lies,” he said.
Reached on Sunday evening, MacDonald said the video was taken on Wednesday evening as he returned from dinner and had been drinking. He said he asked the person with the camera not to record.
“I’m mortified,” he told CTV News.
He said he would apologize to the Senate on Monday.
“I’m going upstairs to take my medicine,” he said. I have always been a responsible senator. I let down a lot of people.
In the video, MacDonald said he wanted protesters out of Windsor, Ont., and other places where they interfere with transportation, “but in Ottawa, I don’t want them to leave,” he said. -he adds.
He poked fun at Ottawa residents’ response to the protests, saying, “Oh, I hear that all the time – ‘They’re in our city’ – This is the f—— city of everybody.”
“It’s the capital of the country. It’s not your g—— city just because you have a six-figure salary and you work 20 hours a week,” he says.
Among those in Ottawa earning six-figure salaries are senators, like MacDonald, who receive a base salary of $160,000 a year and can serve until age 75.
The video appears to have been recorded by someone sympathetic to the protests.
MacDonald thanked the recorder for having “the courage and the decency” to come to Ottawa.
MacDonald also described his own wife as “a Karen” because she wanted the protesters out.
A “Karen” is a derisive term often used online to describe someone who complains about COVID-19 vaccination and mask mandates. In fact, Senator MacDonald’s wife’s name is Marilyn, according to her Senate biography.
“I’m so sick of the rights of this country and this f—— city,” he added, “and their b——- nonsense, calling people like bigots and racists and everything. It’s so unfair.”
In October, MacDonald became the first Conservative caucus member to call for a leadership review of former leader Erin O’Toole.
He will also vote in the Senate on the Liberal government’s bill invoking the Emergencies Act in response to the protest in Ottawa and elsewhere, should it pass the House of Commons.
MacDonald has spent most of his career working in provincial and federal politics and served as Vice President of the Conservative Party of Canada until he was appointed to the Senate in 2009 on the advice of the Premier of time, Stephen Harper.
Wow, Conservative Senator Michael MacDonald was caught giving a two-minute rant in support of the illegal occupation.
“My wife is a scared Karen. “Oh, I just wish they would go away”
Admit that his family is afraid of the occupants and encourage them. pic.twitter.com/4r8fMR9E8U
— Lindsay Hunter (@LindsayHunter1) February 20, 2022
Comments are closed.