CALGARY, Alberta (LifeSiteNews) — An upcoming Tucker Carlson live event with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith sold out in record time despite calls by some to have the former Fox News host banned from entering Canada so that the event would be canceled.
Tickets for the event, priced in the $230-and-up range, went on sale November 7 and sold out in a little over a day. The event will take place on January 24 at the Calgary TELUS Convention Centre.
Carlson, who now hosts a show on X (formerly Twitter), will share the stage with Smith as well as former Dragons’ Den star Brett Wilson.
Smith has said she will be speaking to Carlson about the “Alberta story.”
Attempts to cancel the event have not been successful. After news broke of Carlson’s live event with Smith, a petition was started calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to ban Carlson from entering Canada. As of today, the petition, started by Canadian Eugene Blanchard, has 2,672 signatures.
The socialist political opposition in Alberta, the New Democratic Party (NDP) under leader and former Premier Rachel Notley, called on Smith to cancel the event with Carlson, who she said was “not a credible figure.”
Smith defends speaking at event
Smith, while speaking before the Alberta legislature last week after being asked why she is doing the event with Carlson, said she takes “every opportunity to tell the Alberta story.”
“I speak with members from the media, I speak with podcasts, and I ensure that we’re able to tell the world that Alberta is leading the entire world on reducing emissions as well as developing our energy,” she said. “So, I’m going to take those opportunities, unlike the member opposite who kicked people out from the press gallery, out of her press conferences, and who refuses to talk to people across the spectrum. I think this is an opportunity for us to make sure people know the story.”
When the NDP called Carlson a person with “extreme views” and a “racist,” Smith responded that Carlson is an “individual who has the largest podcast audience probably in the world, and that’s an opportunity for us to share the Alberta story.”
She noted that she does not necessarily “agree with every person who interviews me.”
“If I took that approach, I’d never do an interview with the CBC, and in fact I’ve done 15 press conferences and 11 scrums and spoken to the CBC five times this month. I’m going to continue to get our message out,” she said.
As for the former Fox host, he famously said earlier this year that Canada should be “liberated” from the “dictatorship” of the Trudeau regime.
Smith has been in a prolonged battle with the Trudeau government over its extreme green energy policies that target Alberta.
Smith’s political style leans toward libertarianism. She strongly opposed COVID mandates of all kinds, and after winning Alberta’s provincial election earlier this year she promised to stand up for parental rights as well as to cut government bloat by taking away powers from unelected health officials.
After taking over the leadership of the United Conservative Party in October 2022, Smith promised to look at pardoning Christian pastors who were jailed for violating so-called COVID policies while Jason Kenney was premier and for apologizing to those who were discriminated against for not getting the COVID shots.
Earlier this year, an extreme leftist LGBT activist group called on the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to ban Fox News from Canadian airwaves after one of Carlson’s segments aired on the channel.