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Opinion: Did Jagmeet Singh really ‘side with Trump’ over the Trudeau video?

jagmeet-singh

A lot of people are setting their hair on fire over the leaked video of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau making comments about Donald Trump.

The video, captured during a reception at Buckingham Palace, shows Trudeau chatting with the president of France and the prime ministers of the United Kingdom and the Netherlands about Trump's long impromptu press conferences. Shot by the host broadcaster at this week's summit of NATO leaders, the video shows Trudeau most clearly, at a distance but fully facing the camera.

"I watched his team's jaws drop the floor," Trudeau says in the recording, eyes wide in imitation. He later said he was talking about Trump's unexpected announcement that the United States will host the next G7 leaders' summit at Camp David, an idea Trump had previously raised but not finalized.

This prompted Trump to call Trudeau “two-faced.”

Burnaby South MP and federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh spoke to media on Wednesday about the incident and made this comment (the full 30-second video is embedded in this post.

“He certainly says some things in public and then says things very differently in private,” Singh says in the video.

This comment has prompted a lot of federal Liberal supporters to attack Singh, saying he “sided with Trump” and is somehow betraying his country. 

But is that really what this is?

If you’ve follow Singh at all, you’ll know that he has absolutely criticized Trump over numerous issues. The idea of him “siding” with Trump is asinine.

What Singh really is doing is saying that Trudeau should perhaps be more openly critical of Trump.

Although, I also think the Trudeau thing is overblown. What Trudeau said is more factual about an incident that happened at the summit than it is criticism, although even if he was hammering Trump, so what?

I didn’t even think it was worth Singh’s time addressing it, but it certainly wasn’t “siding” with Trump. The insinuation is that somehow Singh has cast himself alongside a monster and that is a really big stretch from highly partisan people.

Folks, the election is over. Let’s move on to having parties working together to get things done.

- Chris Campbell, Burnaby Now, with files from The Canadian Press