Your World Tonight - Olympian on the run, private health care in Alberta, combatting ticket scalping, and more

Episode Date: November 19, 2025

He’s a former Canadian Olympian — and one of the FBI’s most wanted fugitives. And the U.S. is now offering $15 million for information leading to the arrest of Ryan Wedding. RCMP Commissioner Michael Duheme was in Washington for a joint news conference with U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, after seven Canadians were arrested — seven people officials say have ties to a criminal organization headed by Wedding.And: Premier Danielle Smith says doctors in Alberta will soon be able to work in both the public and private health care systems simultaneously.Also: The UK wants to combat scalping tickets to concerts and other shows.The new rules will ban reselling tickets for a profit.Plus: Alberta nearing a federal deal to build an oil pipeline to B.C. coast, Russia unleashes one of its worst attacks inside Ukraine, the Epstein files, AI earnings, and more.

You know that feeling when you reach the end of a really good true crime series? You want to know more, more about the people involved, where the case is now, and what it's like behind the scenes. I get that. I'm Kathleen Goldhar and on my podcast Crime Story, I speak with the leading storytellers of true crime to dig deeper into the cases we all just can't stop thinking about. Find Crime Story wherever you get your podcasts.

This is a CBC podcast. Ryan Wedding is a modern-day iteration of Pablo Escobar. This Justice Department and this FBI will work with our Canadian counterparts to bring him to justice. Wedding Crashers, police on both sides of the border, making more arrests, raising the reward, and ramping up their hunt for the former Olympic snowboarder, accused of heading a deadly drug ring and still on the run. Welcome to Your World Tonight. I'm Susan Bonner.

It is Wednesday, November 19th, just before 6 p.m. Eastern, also on the podcast. Health care shouldn't be about blind and outdated ideologies or politics. It should be about providing all Albertans with access to the best health care possible when and where they need it. Alberta's premier calls it the cure for long and painful surgical wait times. model unlike anywhere else in this country that would allow doctors to work in public and private medicine at the same time, parallel practice, and concern about a two-tiered system. He may have placed 24th in the Olympics, but former Canadian snowboarder Ryan Wedding is one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives, accused of ordering murders.

and trafficking massive amounts of cocaine. Today, some of North America's top law enforcement officials announced the arrest of people allegedly connected to Wedding while insisting they are closing in on him. Sarah Levitt has the latest. Make no mistake about it. Ryan Wedding is a modern-day iteration of Pablo Escobar. He's a modern-day iteration of El Chapo Guzman.

FBI director Cash Patel not holding back on the former Canadian Olympic snowboarder, turned alleged drug kingpin, Ryan Wedding. The net tightening around one of the U.S. top 10's most wanted fugitives and his network in an investigation coined as Operation Giant Slalom. The United States Department of Justice announcing today the arrest of 10 alleged associates of wedding, seven in Ontario, Quebec and Alberta.

Another is already in custody and one is still on the run. You do not get to be a drug kingpin and evade the law. Among those arrested, Toronto area defense lawyer Deepak Paradkar. This all in connection with the murder of a key witness in a sprawling FBI case against wedding. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi described wedding today as the leader of a transnational criminal enterprise and the largest distributor of cocaine in Canada from Mexico through the United States. His organization is responsible for importing approximately 60 metric. tons of cocaine a year into Los Angeles via semi-trucks from Mexico. To put that in perspective,

60 metric tons is approximately the weight of 40 standard cars. Bill Assaley, the first assistant U.S. attorney at the Central District of California, alleged it was lawyer Paradkar who told associates... His lawyer advised them to kill this witness. His lawyer told him if he killed this witness, the case would be dismissed. That lawyer is now in custody, and he'll be extradited and brought to justice here in the United States. The salee also saying at the time of Paradkar's arrest, the lawyer initially refused to leave his home. Paradkar once held an Instagram account under the name Cocaine Lawyer. The DOJ alleges a Canadian website now removed was used to contract out the hit against the witness. Wedding,

who is still on the run, is facing more charges, according to Pam Bonner. We're unsealing a new indictment, charging wedding with two additional counts of witness tampering and intimidation, murder, money laundering, and drug trafficking. The RCMP assisted in the arrests yesterday. Michael Duem is the commissioner and says Wedding works closely with several Mexican gangs, including the Sinaloa cartel. Ryan Wedding is still operating somewhere in Mexico. This has given a serious impact to the organization. The State Department has also raised the reward for any information leading to weddings' arrest from $10 million U.S. dollars to $15 million. Sarah Levitt's CBC News, Montreal. In a first for Canada, doctors in Alberta will be allowed to work in public and private health care simultaneously.

The province says it will cut weight times and allow patients to get quality care quicker. But as Sam Sampson reports, some say it could reshape the system in favor of the wealthy. Because health care shouldn't be about blind and outdated ideologies or politics. It should be about providing all Albertans with access to the best health care possible. In a seven-minute video released on social media Wednesday, Alberta Premier Daniel Smith promises to modernize the province's health care system, specifically with a new way to address long wait times for elective surgeries.

We're calling it the dual practice surgery model. The province says it will introduce legislation to allow doctors to work for both the private, and public health care systems, so a surgeon could do publicly funded surgeries during work hours and then take on privately paid for surgeries in their off time. We need to find a solution that results in lower weight times for surgeries, doctors empowered to perform more surgeries than they can now, and no more extra taxes or fees for taxpayers. More than 80,000 Albertans are waiting for elective surgeries.

Right now, Alberta contracts private surgical clinics to provide things like hip and knee replacements on an outpatient basis. But Patrick Fafard says this is different. He's a professor emeritus of the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. This says that physicians can use public hospitals, publicly funded hospitals, to deliver care to patients, and those patients will pay the physician, the surgeon directly.

This has never been done before. Despite the premier's promise that this will cut down public wait times, Fafar worries the new system could actually drain public resources since there might be more money in private surgeries. And then there's a bigger, more societal impact of this. Are we comfortable as a country with the fact that we have two parallel streams and that some people with additional means can gain access in a way that the rest of us cannot? Doctors would still be required to do a certain number of public surgeries every year.

The province promises no public money will fund these private surgeries. In fact, the premier says this is a. solution since there's no public funds to pay for all the surgeries needed in the first place. To say, yeah, you know, we have a demand and we just can't meet it through public funding. Kind of feels like admitting failure of the Canada Health Care Act, to be honest. That's one red flag Dr. Keith Wolston-Home picked up from the video. He's an orthopedic surgeon in Red Deer. Among others, he's not sure which of his colleagues actually has extra time to do more surgeries. I can also tell you that nobody wants to work in the hospital on evenings

and weekends as it is, because it's hard work and nobody wants to work at night time. Wollstone Holmes says he doesn't necessarily think this new system could be good or bad. He needs more details to decide. Sam Sampson, CBC News, Edmonton. Now to a plan that could transform Canada's energy sector. It's already causing tension between provinces. Alberta says it's nearing a federal deal to build an oil pipeline to the coast of British Columbia. But the proposal still has plenty of herd.

including buy-in from BC. Olivia Stefanovic reports. Canada is one of the very few countries in the world who can develop natural resources in a sustainable and responsible way. On the question of green lighting a new oil pipeline, finance minister Francois Philippe Champagne says the federal government can grow the economy while protecting the environment.

Some of his liberal colleagues are more skeptical. People in my community are proud of the coast, out of our coastal economy and committed to protecting it. Especially those from British Columbia, including Victoria MP Will Greaves and Patrick Weiler, MP for West Vancouver Sunshine Coast, see to sky countries. It's going to have to have

provincial buy-in and indigenous support. That remains an obstacle. I think at this point, we continue to make our position clear. Ravi Kellyn is BC's Minister of Jobs and Economic Growth. His government recently signed a declaration with coastal First Nations, asking Ottawa to uphold a ban on oil tankers off the province's north coast. Having discussions about a hypothetical project that has no private sector proponent at this time, it actually distracts from all the good work we could be doing together.

But CBC News has learned Ottawa is considering making an exemption to that rule, along with changes to industrial carbon pricing and the industrial emissions cap, all part of a reset in relations with Alberta Premier Daniel Smith. Yes, I think the Prime Minister fully understands and has the same sense of urgency that I do. Smith's office says it's been meeting with the Prime Minister's office since June, and they're now entering the final stages of a Memorandum of Understanding, or MOU, to make a new oil pipeline viable. And the way you show Albertans that the country works again

is that you ensure that their product isn't landlocked and that there aren't unfair rules that are preventing investment. A senior government official says Ottawa is over. to approving a new oil pipeline if Alberta does the consultation work required. Well, it's certainly disappointing hearing that the tanker ban will be bypassed. But Terry TG says there's still strong opposition. He's the regional chief of the BC Assembly of First Nations. You know, government needs to be careful on how it proceeds in terms of inclusion of First Nations and how decisions are made, especially in major projects.

Alberta's Indigenous Relations Minister continues to visit coastal First Nations in an attempt to earn their support in the event the province can create the conditions for a new oil pipeline and find a proponent. Olivia Estefanovich, CBC News, Ottawa. Coming right up, real talk about artificial intelligence as concern about a market tech bubble widens. And in Ukraine, more than two dozen.

and people killed in Russian drone and missile strikes across the country. Later, we'll have this story. British authorities say they're cracking down on marked up concert and sports tickets, outlawing charging a higher resale price than originally paid, but here in Canada... Yeah, it's not going to work. The fact of the matter is that you may not be the only one that wants to see Taylor Swift in the city of 3 million people with 45,000 tickets sold. I'm Ines Hidari in Calgary, coming up on your world tonight, why Canadians probably shouldn't expect high-demand concert tickets

to have lower prices anytime soon. The financial markets faced a critical test today. It came in the form of NVIDIA's after the bell earnings and questions about an AI bubble with repercussions for pension holders in Canada. Senior business correspondent, Peter Armstrong, is in Toronto. Peter, what did we learn today? Well, Susan, we learned that if there is an AI bubble that's going to pop, it's not going to pop today.

If this was, as they call it, a make or break moment, boy, did NVIDIA ever make it. Earnings exceeded just about every expectation. And remember here, NVIDIA has become almost like a proxy for AI. They make the exact kind of chips that drive AI. So if it's doing well, demand for AI in general is doing well. And the concern is that they just couldn't possibly keep up with the expectations and the momentum. But for today, at least, it didn't just keep up, Susan, it beat those expectations. Revenue was up $35 billion.

That's 17% better than the previous quarter, up 94% from a year ago. But, Peter, what are the markets watching here that perhaps there's just unsustainable amount of steam? Yeah, that's not just what the markets are worried about. Now it's what they're worried about yesterday. is what they will be worried about again tomorrow. The fear, of course, is that AI and these companies adjacent to them, the chipmakers like Nvidia, they just can't keep up with the momentum. So much of the growth we've seen in stock markets

has been in this small handful of technology companies that if they start to lose ground, the broader markets could very quickly be in for a serious correction. And, Peter, it's been observed that what's going on in today's market feels eerily similar to the market leading up to the 1999 tech bubble bursting. It is. And I talk to a lot of people about that because you can sort of feel it. But one point was made to me, Susan, that unlike the dot-com bubble where you had pre-revenue companies, companies weren't even making money, the companies we're talking about today are very profitable. They've got global distribution. AI is going to help their business. But if somehow AI ends up being a flop, it's not like Amazon or Microsoft are going to suddenly go out of business. This is an American company traded on an American index. How much should this matter to Canadians? Look, the problem here is that with a bubble, when it pops any bubble, it generally has such a big blast radius that other companies get caught up in the sell off whether they should or not.

Remember also Canadian pension funds, they hold an awful lot of Nvidia stock. The Canadian pension plan has like $8 billion in Nvidia stock. So after today, it's almost like we've had to reset the clock, reset those expectations, wait now for the next round of earnings, results, see where we're at. Are we starting to match up with those expectations or are these companies even saying at a little bit we invested too much in one sector need to pull back and what impact will that have? We'll talk to you again.

Thank you, Peter. You bet. CBC senior business correspondent, Peter Armstrong, in Toronto. At least 25 people were killed and dozens more wounded at one of the worst Russian attacks on Ukraine in years. Drones and missile struck targets across the country overnight, including an apartment building.

It comes as Ukraine's president travels to Turkey, looking to resuscitate peace talks. Chris Brown has more on the developments. A nine-story apartment building in the city of Ternopil took a direct hit from the Russian attack, collapsing the top floors and leaving people buried under concrete rubble. My son is still in the apartment on the ninth floor, said Aksana Kobel. He said, Mom, everything's going to be fine, don't worry, but he hasn't been heard from since. From time to time, at rescuers stopped and listened for sounds of life, bringing out one survivor in the bucket of a crane.

But as more debris was removed, the death toll soared. There are now 25 people dead, 17 of the survivors in hospital are children, said Interior Minister Ihor Clemenko. Russia has hit cities in Western Ukraine in the past, but rarely this hard, using more than 476 drones and 48 missiles. NATO jets in Romania also scrambled after some of the drones briefly entered the country's airspace. There were other ugly scenes in eastern Ukrainian cities such as Harkev, where dozens of people were hurt in attacks there. Ukraine has suffered significant setbacks in the ground war as well. Russian troops are now inside the strategic city of Pokrovsk, after one of the most ferocious battles since Vladimir Putin's all-out invasion

began almost four years ago. Still, for all of Ukraine's challenges, Putin's tactical wins remain far from adding up to anything close to a strategic victory. His troop losses have been immense, and Ukraine's long-range attacks have dealt repeated blows to Russia's oil production, and its economy. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky was in Turkey for talks with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. We talked substantively about diplomacy,

said Zelensky. Russia must understand there can be no reward for waging war and committing killings. Reuters and Britain's Financial Times are reporting the U.S. is again pushing Ukraine to surrender territory to Russia in Donbatch. that Putin's troops have not yet conquered and to cut the size of its army,

neither of which Zelensky has said Ukraine will ever do. Ukraine's president will now return to Kyiv, where the U.S. administration has sent two top Pentagon officials to continue the discussions. Chris Brown, CBC News, London. Israeli airstrikes hit targets in Gaza and Lebanon. The military says it's targeting Iran-backed Hezbollah on the border in South Lebanon.

Israel accuses Hezbollah of trying to rearm since the two sides agreed to a U.S.-backed ceasefire last year. In Gaza, the health ministry says Israeli airstrikes have killed 25 people. The IDF says it was responding to militants, opening fire on Israeli forces in Conunis. No soldiers were injured in that incident. After months of calling it boring stuff and a democratic hoax, the U.S. president is expected to approve. a bipartisan bill making the Jeffrey Epstein files public. The documents could include names of the sex traffickers' rich and powerful associates,

but it still isn't clear what will see the light of day and what will stay secret. Katie Simpson reports from Washington. This feels like a victory, a long overdue victory. There is a sense of hope among some of Jeffrey Epstein survivors that finally there may be accountability. Any farmer says she was 16 years old when the sexual abuse started. She is optimistic. Whatever new documents are released will expose Epstein's vast sex trafficking operation. In terms of names of people that not only participated in these crimes, but the people that enabled the crimes and the people that funded the crimes.

Anytime now U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to sign the Epstein Files Transparency Act into law. It means the Department of Justice will have 30 days to prepare and release months. most non-classified documents, including but not limited to, investigation notes, flight logs, and banking records. Attorney General Pam Bondi suggesting the DOJ is willing to comply. We will continue to follow the law with maximum transparency while protecting victims. Victim names and personal details are among the materials that are supposed to be redacted or withheld. Also, the DOJ does not have to release files that could compromise ongoing investigation. Dave Leventhal, an American journalist who has long covered the Epstein case, says that

exception is significant, since Trump just ordered new investigations targeting prominent Democrats. There could be an argument by the government. Certain information cannot be released in the Epstein files because of an ongoing investigation. That's likely to be highly controversial because it's an easy thing for the government to say. The newly ordered investigations contradict a memo published by the DOJ and FBI in July. The agencies had declared there was no evidence to justify additional investigations into uncharged third parties. At the time, authority said it was one of the reasons why no further Epstein files needed to be made public.

Without citing specifics, the Attorney General now says something has changed. Information that has come forward. Information. There's information that new information, additional information. Lawmakers say they'll be watching the DOJ's actions closely. Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal says he's concerned authorities will not follow through. There is no credibility in this Justice Department, which is why our oversight and scrutiny will be so important. With so much public pressure on the Trump administration to act, some survivors say that support gives them comfort as they wait for answers.

Katie Simpson, CBC News, Washington. This is Your World Tonight from CBC News. If you want to make sure you stay up to date and never miss one of our episodes, follow us on Spotify, Apple, wherever you get your podcasts. Just find the follow button and lock us in. Too late for the Taylor Swift tour and too far away to help Toronto Blue Jays fans

who paid thousands to get into the World Series. But it's one of the first. most aggressive efforts yet to combat ticket reselling. The UK wants to make it illegal to mark up prices above face value. A crackdown Canadian sports and music fans have wanted to see and are still waiting for. Anise Hidari reports. $1,800. Dude, those tickets were $20. Weeks ago on TikTok, this Blue Jays fan wasn't happy with World Series ticket prices. He was looking at a reseller. website. This feels like it should be illegal because $5,000 for nosebleeds.

It might be illegal soon, at least in the United Kingdom. That country says it will ban reselling the tickets to concerts, shows and sporting events at increased prices. Daniel Gumble is with UK music, which represents that industry. He says they support targeting websites that sell access for way more than a ticket's face value. This is to target those sites and make sure that they aren't able to. although those resellers aren't able to post tickets on their hugely inflated prices. Yeah, it's not going to work. But Canadian music industry expert Eric Alper is skeptical, both of whether it will work in the UK

and whether we could see something like that work at home. He says a law like this doesn't change supply and demand. The fact of the matter is that you may not be the only one that wants to see Taylor Swift in the city of 3 million people with 45,000 tickets sold. It's the overwhelming opinion of economists that these sort of laws, really don't protect consumers in any sort of significant way. Victor Matheson is a professor of economics at the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts. He studies the money in sports, and he says there may be an unintended consequence

when laws like this come to play. This is just more likely that the Bruce Springsteins or the Toronto Blue Jays or the bare naked ladies of the world are going to go out there and just charge more for the tickets in the first place. The other reason Canadians might not see savings. governments here just might not do anything. The UK tends to be ballsyer from a competition standpoint. Bass Bedner is managing director of Toronto-based policy group, the Canadian Shield Institute.

In Canada, I'm not sure if it's that we're polite sometimes or just have an aversion to any kind of market intervention. But let's be real, the resale market is not a free market. It's a highly moderated market where prices are largely determined and calibrated by Ticketmaster. As for the UK law, It's unclear yet how it will address the claims that online bots buy up tickets before anyone else can. Economist Victor Matheson says either way, don't expect to pay less. I'd certainly much rather see Taylor Swift make money out of a Taylor Swift concert than a Russian bot farm. Don't say I didn't say I didn't warn you.

Because if resellers can't charge more, artists could, as long as someone's willing to pay. And he's hit RECBC News, Calgary. Finally tonight, it is a huge achievement for a small country as next year's FIFA World Cup approaches a tiny Caribbean nation has earned a spot on soccer's biggest stage. Obispo gets the header out. Curacao have done it for the first time in their history. Curacao are World Cup bounds. The island country of Curacao tying Jamaica last night in Kingston. the draw was enough to finish first in the qualifying group and clinch a berth in the World Cup.

A first for Curacao, which becomes the smallest country to ever play in the tournament. Based on the capacity of most World Cup venues, in theory, about half of Curacao's inhabitants could fit inside the stadium, population just 156,000, roughly that of Colonna B.C. or Cambridge, Ontario. We are the smallest country to ever make it to the World Cup.

We will show everyone that we are small, but we are big at heart. I didn't expect this because I thought Jamaica was a strong team, but we did it. Finally, we did it. Sitting off the coast of Venezuela, Curacao is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The team relies heavily on players born and raised in the Netherlands. Prior to Curacao getting in, Iceland had been the smallest country. to play in the World Cup, qualifying in 2018, with a population of about 350,000.

Thanks for joining us. This has been your world tonight for Wednesday, November 19th. I'm Susan Bonner. Talk to you again. Go to cBC.ca slash podcasts.