Shaun Newman Podcast - #815 - Nathan Romas & Calvin Chrustie

Episode Date: March 18, 2025

We discuss the border crisis, issues stemming from the Charter and international crime groups. Calvin Chrustie is a former senior operations officer with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), where he served for over 32 years, specializing in transnational organized crime, intelligence, and international hostage negotiations. He retired in 2017 as the Officer in Charge of Transnational Organized Crime Major Projects for Greater Vancouver. With extensive experience in complex investigations and crisis management across Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Americas, and Asia, Chrustie led Canada’s International Negotiators Team, handling terrorist and criminal kidnappings. He is trained by the FBI and Scotland Yard in hostage negotiation and received the 2016 International Policing Award from the Canadian Association of Police Chiefs for his work combating transnational crime and kidnappings.Nathan Romas is a Canadian police officer with the Edmonton Police Service (EPS), where he has served in various capacities, including as a patrol supervisor. Beyond his policing role, he is a director with the Edmonton Police Association, advocating for officers’ interests. Romas is also the creator and host of The Quiet Professional, a podcast.Cornerstone Forum ‘25https://www.showpass.com/cornerstone25/Get your voice heard: Text Shaun 587-217-8500Substack:https://open.substack.com/pub/shaunnewmanpodcastSilver Gold Bull Links:Website: https://silvergoldbull.ca/Email: [e-mail] Grahame: [phone]Bow Valley Credit UnionWebsite: www.BowValleycu.comEmail: [e-mail] Use the code “SNP” on all ordersProphet River Links:Website: store.prophetriver.com/Email: [e-mail]

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Make sure to leave a review. Tell a friend. Appreciate it. Now let's get on to that tale of the tape. The first is a Canadian police officer with the Eminton Police Service. He's also the creator and host of the Quiet Professional Podcast, the second former senior operations officer with the Royal Canadian Mountain Police, where he served for 32 years specializing in transnational organized crime,

intelligence, and international hostages in negotiations. I'm talking about Nathan Romis and Kelvin Krusty. So buckle up, here we go. Welcome to the Sean Newman podcast. Today I'm joined by Nathan Romas and Kelvin Krusty. Boys, thanks for hopping on. Thanks for having me. Thank you as well.

Now, gentlemen, neither one of you have been on the podcast before. So what we do here is we got to tell a little bit of the origin story. And I love it when it's told from your perspective. So Nathan, you were the first person I talked to. How about we start with you and then we'll go to Calvin after? Just a little bit of your background so the audience can know who the heck they're listening to today. Yeah. So maybe I'll start with just saying Cal and I share similar origins.

We're both from Winnipeg. So maybe that'll tell you the direction the podcast can go to. I don't know. And we won't hold that against you. I'm originally on the Saskatchewan. So we, you know, we have thoughts on Manitoba. I'm kidding. But I'm a police officer in Canada.

And I will say that my opinions or any views expressed here don't represent the police service. This is me on here by myself. But, yeah, so I'm current serving police officer, worked in patrol and gang unit. and now I'm promoted into a sergeant position, so overseeing some of the fine men and women on the street and what they're doing. And I'm also the creator and host of my own podcast, The Quiet Professional. And one question on the Quiet Professional, if you don't mind before we go to tell. What is the theme of your podcast? You're an active police officer hosting a podcast.

I'm like, okay, what are your topics that you're bringing on? Like, are you talking about real life issues or is it just more of behind the badge? No, so it's kind of an everything and everything. Joe Rogan-esque where we have different guests every week on there, but it can be everything from current events to politics, security. I do have pieces in there about leadership, which is a big topic I've been discussing lately and also mental health. But it's just to help get a lot of people get their messages out. We talk about some of their books, their writing.

That's aside from the current events. So it really does touch on a vast amount of topics, but I try to keep it some themes throughout a couple months, and then I'll switch to something else. So, yeah. And Calvin yourself. Well, Irene from Winni, as noted by Nathan, and very proud of that fact, even though I've lived away from there for 35 years, I've still

refer to myself as hometown, one of a big guy. I, like Nathan, joined the policing profession in 1985, proceeded through numerous functions, but a lot in the organized crime, investigative, and international world. former peacekeeper several times and also was Canada's team leader of terrorist negotiations. So I did a lot of overseas deployments for people kidnapped Canadians. And the last decade and a half or so was in our federal policing program out in Vancouver, working around the world, running what they called federal major projects as the OIC.

targeting money launders, cartels, triads, Iranian networks, drug enforcement, around the world, working extremely closely with the Americans and our other allies. And then in 19 or sorry, 2018 left and went into the private sector running a boutique security intelligence firm called the critical risk. team with several former military, several former intelligence and law enforcement personnel. I know we're going to get into some heavy things, but if you're both from Winnipeg, are you both Jets fans then? Is there any other hockey team, seriously? Oh, there is.

There is. But I mean, you guys are the top in the NHL or tied for the top. I think the castles are now tied. Anyways, that's a fun. Once upon a time, folks, I talk nothing but hockey. I'm just curious too, winning me guys. I'm like, the Jets are doing pretty dang good. Yeah.

My high school buddies and I are going back there to watch the Edmonton Oiler game in April. We're extremely excited to have a little bit of a boys reunion back there and courtesy of some of the Winnipeg Jets management have facilitated us getting some good tickets. So looking forward to it. You know, that's cool. Now, forgive me, you mentioned in there you negotiate. negotiated with terrorists. I've seen a lot of movies,

Calvin. I'm like, what does that mean? That means we worked with the, you know, on behalf of Canadian government under the auspices of the RCMP, but with global affairs, Canadian military, CESIS and others. And we're deployed and engaged, attempting to resolve incidents involving terrorists kidnapping Canadians abroad.

And sometimes it was tough to tell whether they were a terrorist incidents or criminal incidents, but the mandate was for terrorist incidents. And sometimes it was a blurry mandate. And so we would attempt to enter into dialogue with various entities. and try to secure the release of Canadians. It's basically what we did. When, okay, I could spend way too much time on that topic. And I can hear the audience going,

I'll do it, but I know we got a timeframe today. So one of the things we talked about when we were aligning this was talking about the border crisis or the border issue or however you guys want to term it. But essentially, you know, it got highlighted by Donald Trump as you know, fix your border, fix the fentanyl program,

the fentanyl problem. And since then we've had a border czar. We've had, you know, Alberta stationed sheriffs in that range now, creating a buffer zone. We've had, I don't know,

is it two Blackhawks? Is it more Blackhawks? Just curious. When we're talking the border, don't feel like it has to come back to me. I'm just as curious as you two talking about this and seeing anything pops out to me. Just your,

your thoughts and maybe i'll start with calvin on the border and and nathan please hop in at any point yeah so my thoughts are you know a conversation that i always felt extremely comfortable talking about except for the probably in the last month and largely due to the uh emotional issues attached to it currently of uh many on both sides of uh the border I preface my remarks by saying that I don't obviously support the tariffs, you know, and the impact it has on Canadians and where this has been and where this is going in terms of our relationships with the Americans. But I think it's really important for particularly Canadians in terms of understanding the border issues. Well, we may not appreciate the way that it's being articulated in the disrespect associated to some of the narrative coming out of the U.S. Historically, currently, there is a significant problem, I think, within Canada in terms of trans-nostic.

organized crime and the Americans know it. The second point worth mentioning is I've probably been interviewed 10 to 15 times in the last several weeks on the topic by media and I have yet met a investigative journalist reporting on it that has actually read the executive order relative to the issues attached to the border. I thirdly probably is most of the media reporting I've read and most of the public narrative including the political rhetoric that's out there on both sides of the border doesn't really truly reflect the content of the executive order and if one reads the executive order which are really encourage Canadians to take a look at it's a much broader issue than

X, you know, kilos of fentanyl going south of the border. That is not what the order says. That's how it's been framed by politicians, particularly on the south side of the border. And I don't know, well, I'll say my humble opinion that the fact that it hasn't been corrected and clarified in terms of responses, I think is confusing Canadians. and I think in fairness to Canadians, it probably should be provided a better explanation in terms of what's the content

if they haven't read it. But it is worth... If you don't mind, Calvin, you're going to find a guy who hasn't read it on this side. And I'm curious how many listeners have actually read it. You know, there will be some for sure because there's a lot smart people out there that are smarter than me.

I say it all the time. I got an excellent audience that's well read and paying attention a lot of things. But when you say, you know, it's different than what's being talked about in the narrative and the fact that none of the journalists, including myself, have read it. What does it actually say then? So the content of it talks about the concern that Canada has not put the resources and or efforts into security issues.

and a lot of it because it's it's spread out through you know 20 sentences but my synopsis of it relative to transnational organized crime so they talk about synthetic drugs other drugs fentanyl methamphetamine cartels etc so when you start adding all those data points up I'm not sure how anybody equates it to how many kilos goes south of the border. Because when I added those data points up as a professional and somebody that has been in the business for decades, that's not what I assess, what's being articulated legally, diplomatically in the legal order. And I think when you read it, I think it provides substance and tangible actions that if Canadians wanted to, they could possibly and probably should say are real issues, let's address them. Not because somebody south of the border said, you must address them, but they are in the best interest of our kids.

They are in the best interest of the mentally vulnerable. They are in the best interest of our own security. So let's just address them. Irregardless of, you know, being compelled, extorted, or whatever else, I think there's value, you know, for Canadians to take a look at it. And if I could jump in on that, Sean. I do kind of want to echo someone with Cal saying, and there's a conversation I've had offline with them as well.

I think you see too much emotion in a lot of the decisions and the reactions being made by everyone from the average Canadian all the way through the politicians. And it's that lack of critical thinking that taking a second to just step back and remove yourself from the situation and actually gauge what's going on. on the reporting side too because I have a lot of critiques of media because they deal with it almost every day but I don't think the right questions are getting asked or like Cal was saying you know nobody's doing the digging like where is the digging going on and who's asking those questions like what are we trying to get to here is it are we just trying to get a story out for the sake of getting it out Are we just trying to generate headlines or are we actually trying to help people? So I think a lot of that has been missing in the reporting that you see largely from mainstream media.

Now, that's not to say there aren't good people out there. It's just it seems like they either get drowned out or it's few and far between. Yeah, and I just add to Sean's, I think, you know, the issues are lost in clickbait media. and it's sad that the reality is, you know, I've been, you know, working with media for, you know, the last five, six, seven years. And everybody's story is always limited to time. And this is a super complex topic. And everybody tries to go, hey, we've got to do it in 500 words or 422 words or whatever it is. And nobody's really taken the time to fully.

articulate the complexity of it, the seriousness of it, and some of the realities of it. And I think that had somebody, or if somebody does that, it will allow Canadians, it will allow the private sector. It will allow others to get the proper narrative out. And if we get the proper narrative out, maybe we'll get at the beginning of fixing the issue and addressing the issues. Well, here's it, here's a, here's a, here's a question for Nathan, but it's going to be po. It's, I've never had to do this before, folks. You, you go, the right questions aren't getting asked. And I look at this and I'm like, okay, I got, I got like, I got a active officer and I got a former like three plus decades officer underneath me.

Sorry, folks. You can't see what I'm looking at. And I, and I'm like, okay. Well, to an active officer, what is the right question then today to ask of Calvin or, yourself that needs to get out there. So one example that I've brought up and I've talked about this even on social media

openly is there was that record setting drug bust in Toronto. I want to say it was like 350 kilos. They had like shelves of drugs laid out for the media shot. And in the article I read that they knew the drugs were coming

from Mexico. So the drugs crossed two international borders. They went through an entire U.S. country where they've got dozens upon dozens of agencies that could look into this to deal with it, yet they somehow ended up in getting all the way into Canada, this massive load of drugs. Well, when I'm reading the article, and again, this is just taking a step back saying like, well, why, how did that get all the way here? Why didn't they stop it down there?

Why are we waiting until it gets to this point? Now, there could be a million reasons why, but none of that's really fleshed out in there. And as a journalist, I would think, or someone reporting in the room, I'd be like, you knew this was coming from Mexico. Like, did you talk to the DEA? Did you talk to Homeland? Like, nobody was willing to help. Like, that's a part of the story to me. And I think they'd be hard pressed to say that any agency in the U.S.

wasn't interested in 350 kilos or whatever it was. you know, but it's just like where are those questions. So we can do a little more, we can do a little more digging. And they're legitimate questions. I don't think they're going to make anybody angry, right? Like sometimes you see out there, some people don't like to answer stuff, but I think it's a legitimate question. So I guess where I sit then, I'm like, okay, this is kind of like the Jordan Peterson thing on a national scale.

Well, his big thing is, you know, before you go criticizing the world, clean up your room, right? Yeah. And if you're Canada, one of the things I think I'm hearing from the two of you is, well, Nathan, you just said that it crossed two international borders. So there's problems elsewhere. That shouldn't shock anyone. But we do have a problem here in Canada. Do we not? I think so.

I feel safe saying that we definitely have a problem in Canada. somebody in the U.S. has said long before the current administration came in here that, hey, we have a problem. Other countries have said historically, you have a problem. And we know we have a problem. So we've got multiple people, you know, saying, clean up your room, as you put it. And I've used that metaphor before. And I, for myself, I'm just perplexed why we don't. clean up the room because there's obvious you know the first question is hey is a room dirty yes it's dirty okay how do you clean it up and what do we need to do about it oh why don't we just you know I think it's that simple let's just deal with it but I think um you know there's lots of concerning

issues in terms of why we haven't taken the money laundering issues why we haven't taken synthetic drugs issues why we haven't looked at the legal impediments to fix the issues you know on the them come back to the origin of politics canadians not wanting to you know possibly change the law maybe not change the policing uh structures uh maybe because there's uh limited uh resources and i think it comes down to if you admit there's a problem sometimes you're going to have to deal with the problem and i think uh i think we have a problem i think we need to fix the problem and not because the u s said so but because our kids deserve so. Yeah.

I was going to jump in real quick. If just we see the argument is always, they'll say how many kilos they're seizing at the Mexican border. Then they'll talk about the Canadian side. And it's, you know, 40 pounds or whatever kilos they found in like a whole year. But our reaction up here is instantly to say, well, look at Mexico. Well, they're not like, who cares about Mexico? They're addressing us.

and the problems we have up here. So why aren't we, as Cal is saying, why aren't we making change up here, fixing our own house? So whether that's legislatively or we're, we need to look at some of the case law that is out there and reexamine it. And we are, maybe we're not sending down so much hard bricks. Like people like to get those pictures in their head, right?

They like the photos. but we are a part of a supply chain. We are a part of a production chain. And there's been lots of articles on that where we are exporting to other parts of the world. So we're still involved, whether it's that exact, you know, the finished product that sees at the border. It might not be that, but sometimes I think it doesn't get stated properly necessarily what you see on TV from whether it's the president or somebody. but they're not wrong in the general consensus of what they're saying. I think it just has to get framed a little better.

I'm curious if, you know, like one of the journalists who, who, who's been on the show and then you've seen them everywhere when it comes to asking questions and pushing on this, this issue of the Canadian border with Sam Cooper. What do, I assume both you know who that is, but maybe I should just start there. Yeah, we both are familiar with them. What are your thoughts on Sam Cooper then, talking about, you know, the money laundering and everything else being tied into politicians being, you know, basically foreign entities really infiltrating different agencies as high up as the Prime Minister of Canada? I'm a big fan of Sam's investigative reporting, particularly in terms of the importance of the importance of. the triads in terms of their involvement in Canada as being a major threat both in Canada and abroad

and not what Canada's role is but I also think you know that for for me where I see the biggest problem right now in terms of taking this issue on is the the fusion of what Nathan identified of the emotional aspects of it. The other aspect is the politicalization of it. And I think we should get back to basics in terms of the social aspect, in terms of the social impact, park all the political issues because it did not take a political leader or a political party to bring us to this place.

This has been going on since, you know, 30 years plus, you know, since we brought the charter in. And it's created a fertile ground that enables, these national and international threat actors to operate here with very minimal punity. And anybody in my former profession knows that the biggest impediment is the legal framework that we have. And anybody watching the media knows it's probably the most unstated issue. And anybody listening to the politicians know that it's the most unstated issue. but the practitioners, the police that are tasked with doing it, in fairness to them, I think they're doing an exceptional job, but they aren't really empowered to do it.

So you don't send a soldier to a war without giving them a gun and you don't give the police and task them with a mission to go, hey, counter foreign threats, counter foreign transnational organized crime in Canada and go, but we're not going to empower you through a legal framework. There seems to be so much narrative, even from former people, you know, from the 1980s or 1990s that were involved in this game to kind of go, well, the tools are there and they start blaming the police and police leadership and police that. That's not. I went through that transition and, you know, I left in 2018. And when I left in 2018, the police are completely handicapped in terms of leveraging the tools to make. consequences for these entities. And that's why, you know, people look at, oh, hey, were the police better in the 90s than they were in 2018? I don't think so. I think the evolution of the law that they're working with has got to such a point that it has so many constraints on the police.

The police are very difficult, have a very difficult time to say that. And I know probably Nathan's sitting there going, I'm glad Kelvin said that I can't. But I think we have to look at the judicial system as being a huge handicap. That's not to say we don't need more resources, particularly in federal policing. But I think that's an important part of the narrative that hasn't been clearly articulated. I can add on to that. And it's certainly something that I've spoken about a bunch of times on the show as well. But just about us being handcuffed, I think a lot of it, too, is the lack of consultation with the right.

people. So I was actually asking this of our legal advisors the other day and just who exactly writes the laws, right? And this is in the provincial context I was talking, but who writes the laws and who's involved in that? And, you know, the answer never involved anybody at the ground level. So how do they know when they're writing the stuff out, you know, how it's actually going to be implemented and what that'll look like? Like, why aren't we bringing in the right people to do some consultations. There are numerous issues to bring up that we would take a long time, but I guess to kind of keep it short. We just see that there's a lot of issues when it comes to things like implementing the law and then even when it gets to court and when we try to run something through

court, whether they have enough resources, enough time, experience. We have a lot of people who are not experienced in certain types of law, whether it's, um, you're looking at like trademark infringements and stuff. It was a file I worked on where we had nobody in Alberta who could, uh, take on the file. So they had to consult all the way to Ontario. And I think there was like one or two people that even knew about this stuff in all of Canada. But that goes for a lot of other types of crime types, offenses that we deal with. We don't have a lot of the experts that we do need here. Okay.

Calvin, you said something. I'm trying to keep my brain on task this morning. And you said something that I got to ask about. You mentioned, I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, that when the charter of the 1980s was put in place, it laid, and now this is probably my words, laid the groundwork for transnational or transcontinental or however you put it, crime syndicates, crime organizations. Did I hear that correct?

Yeah, I would say it was it, you know, probably didn't get picked up, you know, automatically in terms of somebody sitting there reading it and going, hey, this is great. But the way the court cases rolled out and through the evolution of, you know, the school of hard knocks, I think these transnational networks,

foreign threat actors have recognized, you know, and the words out there, not only on the street, but globally, that Canada provides a low-risk, high-profit capability. So if you're looking at it, like from a mining company, looking at, hey, do I go open a mine in Colombia, or do I open a mine in Venezuela? Well, Venezuela is a lot more unstable. It's a very high risk area due to crime, geopolitical threats, et cetera, et cetera. So do I open a mine and then I do business in Venezuela or do I go somewhere a little more stable like Colombia? So what do the executives do? I'm going to open the mine in Colombia. So what does the triads do? What do the other networks? What do the cartels do?

Okay, let's look. Do I operate in the U.S. in terms of our convergence hubs where we set up shop, you know, in terms of transshipment, distribution, production, etc., etc. Or in the UK or in Australia, or do I do Canada? And I think Canada is seen as a low risk place of these businesses to do it. And if you look at a mining company, whatever their profits are, you know, tens of millions, hundreds of millions or whatever else. But if you look at the Mexican cartels, the triads or there's some of these others, we're talking in the billions and billions and billions. And to not give them the respect that to be able to do that,

and I don't mean respect in terms of ethically, morally, but in terms of their operational capability, if you're moving billions of dollars, you've got some smart people that know how to move that money around, how to generate those profits. And you're going to have people looking at, you know, the issues of risk management, just like any other corporation to do it.

Because these are billions of dollars. And to get advice to go, hey, operate here, operate there. And I think for the last, you know, 30 plus years or whatever it is since the charter, the way the case law has evolved and continues to be evolved, I think it's well known within these networks that, hey, Canada is a pretty safe place. And in fact, I would say that I know that as a fact.

I'm just curious. When it comes to the charter, why specifically that document and not, you know, the 15 years prior to it? Like, what about that point changes the way case law starts to lay out and now, you know, creates a landing strip or whatever analogy you want to put for these crime syndicates where they're like, you know, like today's Canadian, I think I can really understand. Like we have, it feels like, and maybe once again, two cops on the show, maybe you can enlighten me. But it looks like you could get arrested for just about anything and you're out the next day in Canada. That's what it looks like. I'll let you two discuss that if you like. But first, what is it about the charter then that opens the grounds for where we're at today if that's when you're pointing to instead of 1950?

It's not 1950 you're pointing to. you're saying the 1980s, the charter, that's where this all changes. What is it about that? Nathan, do you want to go or do you want me to go whatever works for you? Yeah. So I think one of the things I would say is just when you look at the charter, like it, you know, it gives you those protections against unreasonable search and seizure. It's about privacy.

So when you take like the average Joe out there, they might not be able to afford the expensive lawyers or have the millions and billions of dollars to go into arguing these things, the document does provide protection for everybody, and that's everyone. Now, when you take those organized crime groups and they have the really good lawyers who can make up all kinds of extravagant arguments and stuff, you're also affording that protection to them too. So that's how I would kind of look at it. Do you want to add on, Cal?

Yeah, the second part is when you look at the policing structures in Canada, you know, that are advising government on it, most of them are coming from the municipal provincial policing. There isn't a large representative representation of the federal policing apparatus at these national meetings. And then if there is, they're not always the ones that historically are in the trenches sitting across the table. in Los Angeles in a meeting or in Sydney, Australia, or in Africa or whatever else, when we're working with our partners and the discussions are, we have this case. What are we going to do working with Canada, you Canadians on it? How should we approach this? And then they start assessing risk and cooperation and collaboration. And then in the middle of the conversations, usually at the front end, And actually, in fact, I'd suggest not even at the front end sometimes before we even get at the table.

And sometimes we don't even get into the table because you don't want to talk about it with us, is that we have this legal framework that's incongruent with their legal framework. And a lot of the worlds are partners, legal frameworks different than ours. and a lot of it's based on developing sensitive information through human assets, i.e. human sources, and they provide direction to the sources. They operate in Colombia. They operate in Mexico. Their lives are at risk. They operate in the states or abroad somewhere else. And then they get into going, okay, we're going to do this with you. We want to work with Canada. and then all of a sudden the conversation comes out, well,

our legal framework makes it almost impossible for us as policemen to guarantee that won't have to be disclosed because if you look at the provisions of the Canada Evidence Act, and not to get into the details, but the details is what counts. Is what matter. Yeah. Is that the only person that can protect that and make a decision

is a judge in the trial. well you're sitting there you know with a say a DA agent out of Miami that's a 32 year old guy at the bottom of the food chain who's responsible legally professionally and ethically for the safety and well-being of that asset and his family or her family and goes well do I really want to take that risk and have somebody disclosed in a court process or in an investigative process where it's all this bureaucracy going on that, you know, goes, hey, I got to provide the name here. I got to provide this here. And I don't want to, like I don't understand that big bureaucracy north of the border in terms of I have to put it on this report. They don't operate like that. And, you know, as a former source handler and a former agent handler myself, it poses a lot

of risk to the individuals that are in the system. And aside from the human sources, if they have other. operations with police officers engaged, you know, running under cover covert covert operations in the Middle East or Africa like these are super high risk operations. It's like yeah, but you have to disclose that you know part of the Canadian process. We'll try to keep it, you know, but it's not really our final decision on it. That doesn't go well, you know, in the international policing community and the people, you know, advising, you know, Justice Canada and all the

other people and I've talked to a lot of these people when it was and then when I've been out, they don't understand the nuances of the operations how that applies. They think of it as four lawyers sitting around a table in Ottawa going, here's this theoretical model that I think should work based on reading the policy, procedures, and the legal framework. But when you're in reality and you're sitting in Miami or you're sitting in Columbia, it does not work at all. And we have an international reputation.

Canada does in terms of law enforcement that our partners and allies around the world know that it doesn't give them the confidence to work with us to the degree that we need them to work with us. And I think it was David Asher. He brought this up when he talked on CBC. This was like the early days of the tariffs going on and what exactly it was about. and he brought this up and I mean he is is or I don't know if he still currently is but he was an advisor to Trump

and he worked a few big cases at TD Bank and they're $3 billion fine like he was part of that so he said all that on CBC or Cal gives you better detail the behind the scenes but this is the stuff that's missing out there right we don't get that on a 30 second clip

on CBC so just wanted to point that out. Like this stuff has been mentioned, but it's just not as detailed in the little bits like Cal is giving here have been missing out there. And if I could, Sean, as you're processing with a degree of confusion, maybe,

because it is complex, is that soon as you bring that context up in a room of former lawyers who see the benefits, and don't get me wrong, There's a ton of benefits. I really appreciate the charter. But the world has changed the evolve through globalization.

The sophistication of the threat actors has. The threat itself has escalated, you know, tenfold. And it's not that, hey, let's get rid of the charter. Because the politicians go, oh, somebody's talking to charter. Oh, that equates to electoral, you know, losses if I bring and raise that issue up. But what I think that's all that's required is a genuine conversation with the people that Nathan said, the people that are dealing with these issues in foreign operations with our foreign partners and go, hey, can we modify this 1% of the charter to allow some exemptions or some operational practicality to it? But those little nuances create massive problems in terms of, you know, leveraging theory, the butterfly theory, that that just sparks a whole level of cooperation issues and impediments for us to tackle these. And if you read the executive order that we were talking about at the beginning of the show, you'll see that's how it's framed in there.

You know, they want better cooperation, more of this, more of that. But on the American side, I don't think they quite understand what all these problems are. But being the guy that sat at that table hundreds of times with our foreign partners, it's a real issue. And I think we just have to have a conversation about it and go, hey, we don't have to throw out the whole charter. I admit there's tons of benefits to it. We need to keep it. But should we look at modernizing it, appreciating that was 30, 40 years ago? and the world's drastically changed since and in the best interests of Canadians

and protecting our youth and mentally vulnerable and our national security, do we need to make some modifications? I think that it's absolutely 110%. Yes. Oh, sure. I say on that, I think what people don't realize, and I'm glad Cal actually, he must be reading my mind because he went back to this. When we're talking about like the executive orders and stuff, or even reading through laws, there's the, what I think it's lost on people is there's the

interpretation of it, and then there's the implementation of what that's actually going to look like. So we have people drafting things kind of separate from that and it's missing that part, but also when people go and read, like if you go read the orders, and this is something that Cal does very well, is having some humility to this, is saying like, this is my assessment, but it's not the gospel truth and it's not the end all be all. I think that is missing from a lot of that stuff as well. So it just caution people when they go read it, go read it, try to understand it, but also seek out more knowledge around that.

Like when you read it, how does that actually work? What does it look like if it's implemented? Again, it takes time. And I think, Sean, you know, just to build upon that, because I think that's a super good point is I have rarely met a somebody from the the judicial system or high up in government or even in policing for that matter you know that say has worked in provincial policing or have worked in city policing that understand what I say because it doesn't sound like that big of a deal but if you're in the federal international world working with our partners you see like it's it's it's a problem in

those other policing lines for sure but it's probably more manageable but when you get into the international game uh it's kind of like it's kind of like i hate to say this and i don't mean any less one being better or different but the sophistication of the players the seriousness of the threats that make crime a national security issue, not just a public safety issue. That unless you've been in the game, unless you've been at the table hundreds of times with the DEA or with the Australian Federal Police or with Scotland Yard or working in Africa or the Middle East or wherever else, you know, tackling these high-level threats that are in the profits of the billions with the cartels and others, that's a whole different game.

let's, you know, we'll go back to that's hockey. And some of this other stuff is like ping pong. And you can't compare the two. These guys are so sophisticated, so structured, so intelligent, and so many resources, lawyers, accountants, business leaders, and that behind them. You are not going to outsmart these guys and apply a legal framework from the 80s to these massive, you know. If I may, my brain goes. to solutions, right?

You know, one of the things my wife always gets on me is sometimes I just want to fix a problem instead of listening, you know, and I'm fair. So I'm listening to, you know, one of the things I hear is, and maybe I'm wrong and you guys can clarify this for me, but you're talking about adjusting the charter, right? Because if you do that, then there's ways or, or maybe just adjusting the frameworks. You can work with international organizations to go after the problem. And then I think, okay, well, of all the conversations I've had on here, that's a tall ask. You're not that isn't as simple as you know you get a judge to sign off and all of a sudden you can just walk in and redo the framework It's almost an impossible ask which then leads me to think like this doesn't get solved anytime soon or am I wrong on that? And you're like oh no actually there's a simple thing we can do boom boom boom and and off we're running

Maybe I'll start real quick because I know Cal give a way better answer than I will but I think one of the issues you would have like you're saying there Sean is you know, the public, like how that would even be framed to the public. And I think instantly people would go straight to the conspiracy theory, maybe not so stretched out, but they would instantly think it's like, you know, they're coming for us. And it would take a really strong politician with a lot of fortitude and a lot of willpower to want to make that change.

It's just where do you find that person? So, yeah, go ahead there, Cal. Yeah, I don't think it's, I think politically it's a huge issue. I think legally it's probably a medium-sized issue. But when you have, you know, 50,000 dead kids, you know, with intentional poisoning from fentanyl, I'm not talking accidental. The people that are moving this stuff knowing they're putting fentanyl in it, I mean, at what point does the threshold go? How big of a problem is it?

And I think what we've seen south of the border, they're going, okay, it's crossed that threshold. And they're equal to Canadians in terms of per capita in terms of death. So Canadians may need to go, you know, at some point, when is the political skills, balance going to equate or create a environment where a politician's going to go, okay, I'm going to take this issue on. 50,000 intentionally poisoned kids in the family is devastated by it is too much. Then you add. This 50, sorry, this 50,000, Cal, what are you talking to specifically? So that's the statistics in terms of the number of poisoning of fentanyl and

Canada in the last five years. In the U.S., it's 500,000. So half a million. So if you equate, and I know people find this, and I don't mean to dishonor anyone, but that's the same number of deaths, you know, that came from World War II in Canada. And when we know that there's threat actors that are intentionally peddling this, I think at some point we have to be going, when is too much, too much? And if this was some other type of criminal activity, you know, because a lot of these people that are dying of fentanyl

come from respected families, perhaps have an anxiety disorder, some, you know, functional mental health order that are self-medicating and getting into the, this situation. They're not all bad, nasty people. The vast majority of them, I put in the category of victims and they don't even know what they're taking when they take it versus somebody saying, oh, well, they knew what they're taking. No, they didn't know what they were taking. They were self-medicating thinking it was X or Y or whatever else. They have addiction problems, which usually

are driven by mental health issues. So I think it's not that big of a fix. And I don't think, it's just the drug issues alone this impedes the espionage issues in Canada the foreign the electoral interferes any foreign operation where it's sharing information relative to you know our international partners these legal frameworks have an impact on it so it you know transnational repression i.e foreign states you know threatening the desporic community and others within Canada, all these threat activities from foreign entities, this legal framework impacts it. It's not just the drug trafficking, not just the fentanyl.

And it really equates to the national security. And I think we just have to recognize that no longer our global conflicts, you know, fought through kinetic military means. We saw it in the hearings in Ottawa. There's threats to the judicial or to the political system. there's threats to the youth in terms of, you know, the fentanyl. And the list goes on to industry, to universities. It goes on and on to our whole societies impacted by this legal problem.

So I would say it doesn't even have to get that complicated. So for even your listeners, Sean, at the ground level, just as we see, you know, people always think like the cartelor here, they're always asking that. and if they don't see a face tatted Hispanic person walking around, they don't think that's the cartel then. And it's like, these guys wear suits now, right? Like it's just kind of an out of sight, out of mind thing. Like people have a certain image because of movies and different things in their head. But we even see this like, so I'd say there's some politicians think like that,

much of the public thinks like that. But we even have police officers law enforcement that think like that. And there was an article out several months back now. And it was talking about cartel connected to Red Alert, which is Street Gang in Edmonton. And I remember having conversations with police officers up here who were like, what the hell are you talking about? Like, that's not even a thing. Like, why would the cartel deal with Red Alert? And it's like, you know, it's not a far logical leap, whether it's cartel deal to Hell's Angels who then push it down to the street gang.

But even within policing, we see the lack of awareness and the lack of education on these things and just how, how even in our small little city, you know, the links that are there. Now you expand that to an even greater picture. You want to talk into the geopolitics of it all. It just gets further and further complicated. I'm stuck on. Is there a solution? And I don't know if I don't know if I've heard a good answer. And I don't mean that any heart planning either one of you.

Just to the problem we face because yeah, yeah, fire away. You know what? Maybe I'll say for the solutions thing. I think it's definitely not a black and white thing. It's not a here's your answer and that's it. As all things in law enforcement, it depends. And this here, some people who do really good discussions on this, be like Scott McGregor, Cynthia Alcon.

There's a few other people I've chatted with about this and framing the problems as complicated or complex without getting too deep into the discussion. I think we have to look at this as a complex problem where just changing one thing doesn't guarantee us a solution or the outcome we're looking for. There's a whole constellation of factors that are constantly moving around.

I kind of describe it as like a spider way, overlaid of a spider web and you've got multiple layers of them and you just have to kind of keep it's a problem that'll never go away and you kind of have to just keep steering it in the right direction of where you want it to go and it involves having the right people in the room with the right intentions but yeah it's it's very hard to frame it as well we're just going to do this and then that'll put a cap on it that's I would say that's not possible in a lot of a lot of sense. It's more nuanced,

and is much more in depth, where you're just trying to guide things in the direction you want it to go, and we're doing the best at the point we can. It can get better, but, yeah, I think people just look too much for, like, the definitive answer. I don't think that's possible.

I'm going to go a little against the grain of Nathan, only from the foreign threat activity. To your point, Sean, I think then Canadians, you know, just like any other one, you know, I look at Canadians almost like culturally like teenagers going, I don't want to change. Okay, then suffer the consequences and just accept the realities. You get 25% tariffs. I'm not saying they're not being weaponized, you know, for economic, nefarious purposes. or whatever else.

But this isn't a U.S. issue. This, like when I first became aware, the seriousness of the concerns that was having an impact on another nation, it wasn't Canada, it was Australia. They were just getting crushed. I think there's journalistic reporting that six metric tons of methamphetamine

went from Vancouver to Australia in the last years, you know, reported in the papers. That's just what got caught. So if that's what's going to, caught times out by two three four ten whatever that's a significant amount so if canada wants to be not have consequences you know uh for it i just look back at the last year i've had tv stations news producers from belgium amsterdam france australia the u.s all coming talking

about Canadian problems. Yesterday it was Japan wants to do a TV story on Canada as a problem. This is not a Canada US issue. This is a Canada issue. And so when people say, Sean, this sounds like it's not solvable. I say to Canada, perhaps Canada, take a good look in the mirror and go culturally, culturally, are we a culture that don't know how to know how to fix a problem. Are we a solution free country? Do we not take things seriously? And I say, take a look in the mirror and go, why are we having problems? You know, like a teenager, going, well, why are you picking on me? What? I don't know. Take a look in the mirror and figure out why Australia has issues with you and other countries have articulated this issue historically.

It's not because per me, per me, maybe we just need to fix some things. Other nations, have legal systems, Sean, I share the UK does, Australia does, the US does other free and democratic societies do. So why are we making excuses? Surely there's a fix there somewhere where we can enter into at least the process to reflect on it, to look at it and go, is there a fix? Rather than saying, no, no, it's this Bible-like entity called the charter and nobody wants to touch it. And I say the only don't want to touch it because politically it's not practically i think there's practical solutions in there i think the impediment is politically who wants to go venture have that conversation and go this i think i think our allies would be extremely grateful to us if we went hey you know let's

have a working group you know on the charter in terms of how it impacts like the legal impediment What do the police need? What do the intelligence systems need? What does the military need legally to work in this world that we're living in in 2025, which is very polarized, very dangerous? What do those people that Nathan identified as the operators, forget the executives, remove them from the room? What do they need to do the job to protect and execute their mandate and protect Canadians from these foreign threats? Let's hear about it. And I think, to be quite frank, every other countries or most countries have found solutions. So why are we saying Canada can't find a solution? I think because Canadians probably don't understand there is a problem. So I think part of the solution is education and awareness because I think most Canadians, Sean, don't really understand how serious of a problem this is.

And I think it's a very serious problem. I know I only got a minute or two left. Yeah. But on this show, I'm like, if there's one thing, that these listeners know is there is a problem. And the problem they have is our government is tied up in not getting anything done.

And so when I listen to you to go back and forth, I'm like, huh, we got a country to the south of us that's saying clean up your act or else. And when I listen to you both, I'm like, our issue is, you know, whether it's the charter or just, I don't know what a police offer and say,

give me these things so I can go kick down a door and arrest bad guys and put them away so that they know this isn't allowed in our country, our province, our city. You know, to whatever level you want to put it, I'm good with. But the audience is like, I don't know, I keep watching this. And I'm like, it feels like our government does, you talk political will. I'm like, oh, man, like, I don't know what we can get put through our government at this point. You know, I watch what's going on.

And I just, now I just feel like, nothing's going to get changed anytime soon. So if I may respond to that quickly, we live in a democracy. It's not a spectator sport. So I feel for the politicians that perhaps they don't have the support of the public. The public needs to accept that we live in a democracy. The public, we own this issue. It's not the police that own it. It's not the politicians own it. It's all society. And I think society has to take responsibility for it and start engaging in the democratic processes, including supporting the police, supporting the politicians to make these changes. Democracy, again, is not a spectator sport.

I agree with you, but to me, when I watch, maybe I'm wrong. Once again, I give all the credit to you to. You're the guys who have been in this realm of law enforcement. So, like, forgive me. I'm just a hockey player podcaster who is just continued to level up his game on interviewing a ton of people. But like, to me, to me, it's politicians who keep forcing some of this BS on us. When you talk about drugs, I don't, you know, like, are there people loud about, hey, we need to do this and we need to, this. I see it as politicians doing it.

I think if a politician walked out and said, listen, we're cracking down on crime tomorrow. the the the population as a whole at least here in Alberta be like thank you can we just can we just lock up some bad guys already can we just do that and and get away from all this this nonsense about drugs and and like the criminal element that just seems like it's so prevalent and we can go whichever way you want on that but like to me it looks like it's the governments that are they're putting in not the population that's going we need free drugs we need free drugs we need more fentanyl we need uh laxer rules on people that are doing nefarious things i don't see that from the population but you two are uh law enforcement maybe you can be like sean you're missing this and this and this i'm totally open to it that's one of the interesting things about this conversation might be too too big for the time we have left yeah a whole another discussion we'd have to do on that one. I think the biggest thing on that is at least you know, you're asking the questions and you're putting that information out there and we're moving things in a direction that we need to by having

these these conversations. So yeah. You're right on time. I kept us over. Calvin, appreciate you giving us time today. Same thing, Nathan. Appreciate you guys hopping on today. Thanks, Sean. And maybe we'll continue this discussion at a different time. Yeah. Any night, thanks. Ha ha ha.