British far-right activist Tommy Robinson, who founded the now-defunct anti-Islam English Defence League, was recently arrested in Calgary after being accused of misrepresenting himself in coming to Canada.
When the anti-Muslim and antiimmigration activist from the U.K. known as Tommy Robinson landed in Montreal earlier this month, he rolled his teal suitcase into the arrivals area, straight to the woman with a microphone and camera.
First, a hug. Then, the questions about travelling to Canada.
“Were you scared?” she asks, in the video posted to the social feeds of far-right website Rebel News on June 18. “Of course,” Robinson says with a laugh. “I never thought I was getting in.
“The whole time flying here I didn’t expect to get in,” he continues. “I didn’t even book a hotel!”
The question of whether or not Robinson should be in the country — and what he should be doing if here — has taken on some urgency after he was arrested and then released in Calgary on an immigration offence immediately after the first event of a planned three-stop Canadian tour.
His speaking tour of Calgary, Edmonton and Toronto was his first trip to Canada. If the trip originally flew under the radar, that changed Monday when another video posted to social media showed him being handcuffed outside a hotel in Calgary, by two undercover police officers who say — before driving him away — he has an “outstanding immigration warrant.” A spokesperson for Calgary police confirmed that while they’d assisted in the arrest, it’d been conducted at the instructions of the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA).
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Disgraceful behaviour on Parliament Hill
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