At Tuesday’s town hall in Nova Scotia, the audience pulled no punches when asking questions of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as he kicked off his town hall tour across Canada.
One woman in the audience even asked him how it felt to be found guilty of a federal crime.
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Decked out in a white T-shirt with the Canadian flag across her chest and a matching baseball cap, the woman asked Trudeau, “I was just curious as to how you feel about being the first prime minister being found guilty of a federal crime.”
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Trudeau showed off his skills in these situations but joked, ”As you can see, we thoroughly vetted the questions before showing up tonight.”
He then asked for clarification from the audience member.
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She went on to point out Trudeau’s relationship with Aga Khan, whose island Trudeau visited, before adding,” And if he is a lobbyist, and you are giving money to his foundation, you probably shoudn’t take bribes from him.”
Trudeau was not found guilty of committing a crime. In fact, Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson found he violated a federal ethics regulation by taking a helicopter to the Aga Khan’s private island.
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Trudeau answered by first pointing out that the fact that the ethics commissioner found him guilty shows that “the system works.”
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He then promised, “Every single one of my vacations will be cleared in advance with the ethics commissioner because its really, really important to me, to highlight that we follow the rules.”
He also said that if he could turn back the clock, he would have handled the situation differently.
“If I had to do it all again, I would have worked with the ethics commissioner from the outset, even though this was a friend, and we would have followed the recommendations that the ethics commissioner gave on this, whatever they were,” Trudeau told the audience.
“And you can be sure, moving forward, that’s exactly what will happen.”
Trudeau’s next town hall will be Wednesday afternoon at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont. His tour will then continue westward.
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