(Winnipeg) The appointment of radio presenter Charles Adler to the Senate is being criticized in some quarters, including by a member of the federal cabinet.
Mr. Adler, who spent decades hosting talk radio shows, was appointed to the Senate last weekend by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and will represent Manitoba in the upper house.
Northern Affairs Minister Dan Vandal issued a brief, one-sentence statement saying many Manitobans are better suited than Adler to represent the province.
The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs has called on the premier to revoke the appointment and accused Adler of using grossly offensive language about Indigenous people on air.
The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs (AMC) complained in 1999 that Mr. Adler used terms such as “idiots” to refer to Aboriginal leaders on his radio show on CJOB radio station in Winnipeg.
The complaint was dismissed the following year by the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council, a voluntary self-regulatory body for private broadcasters.
“The CMA has filed formal complaints about Mr. Adler’s vulgar and racist comments in the past, and it is clear that Canada and the Prime Minister turned a blind eye to these offensive views when appointing Mr. Adler to the Senate,” the assembly said in a news release Monday.
“How can any First Nation think that its reviews of legislation impacting reserves, treaties and inherent rights would be even remotely favourable to the Indigenous peoples of those lands?”
The 1999 complaint related in part to a radio segment in which Mr. Adler criticized governance and the lack of jobs on reserves. The complaint also included concerns about another CJOB host in a different time slot.
“I believe in free enterprise, which doesn’t exist on reservations. I believe in law and order, which doesn’t exist. I believe in responsible government, which doesn’t exist there,” Adler reportedly said, according to a transcript of the broadcast included in the council’s decision.
Mr. Adler then spoke of the “idiots” and dictators of the past in countries such as Ukraine, Cambodia and Hungary – where he was born – and then compared job prospects in those countries to living conditions on reservations.
“Nobody behind this microphone is trying to say there are a lot of jobs on the reserves… I just don’t want to support idiots and idiot arguments,” the transcript reads.
The council ruled that CJOB’s broadcasts did not violate its code of ethics. It said criticism of a First Nations government is legitimate commentary, similar to criticism of any other government.
“The present case is no different. Those who occupy positions of power on the reserves can legitimately be described, because of the decisions they make, as ‘idiots’ or ‘intellectually moribund’ by media spokesmen,” the decision reads.
Mr. Adler declined an interview request and said he would not comment.