Reactionaries are Trying to Silence Critical News with the Court
Another independent outlet faces legal challenges for their reporting
Earlier this year, The Narwhal and photojournalist Amber Bracken's lawsuit against the RCMP for wrongful arrest reached the courts in British Columbia . This was the first high-profile case in 2026 concerning the right of outlets to report, but it was, unfortunately, not the one to set the tone. While this case remains ongoing, many others have been launched or reached significant stages. Independent outlet The Maple has been targeted by a "lawfare attacks" by pro-Zionist individuals and institutions, hoping to wield the law to either removing their critical reporting or severely damage the publication financially. While those efforts appear not to be progressing as well as proponents would hope, other severe attacks on the press have reached significant stages.
Caylan Ford, former United Conservative Party candidate in Alberta, recently concluded court sessions after launching a $7.65 million defamation lawsuit against the Toronto Star, CBC, the Broadbent Institute and four other defendants, including PressProgress and its editor-in-chief Luke LeBrun. While the case continues, the Canadian Association of Journalists have launched an open letter urging the province of Alberta to implement anti-SLAPP legislation (full disclosure, I submitted my name to this petition). SLAPP is short for Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation, making anti-SLAPP a catch-all term for legislation that allows dismissal of lawsuits launched to silence critics in the news and public sphere. Even Alberta's Progressive Tory Party, led by former UCP minister Peter Guthrie, announced support for anti-SLAPP legislation in the province.
Consequences of these attacks, even if the ruling favours the defendants, are severe. Emma Arkell, labour reporter at PressProgress announced on July 27 that her position would be eliminated and she would be laid off. While she did not say it directly, she remarked in a thread on Bluesky that PressProgress "has been put in a pretty dire financial situation because of a major lawsuit," so this decision is not wholly surprising. What continues to be unsurprising is that far-right online outlet Juno News is publishing smug analysis of Arkell's layoff.
Rather than taper off, it seems that this trend of using lawsuits and court systems to silent dissent of critical news coverage is accelerating. Earlier this week, The Grind, a Toronto newspaper that focuses on local culture and news, announced it was being sued by Jonathan Karten. Karten, an IDF reservist soldier, received coverage in The Grind when he was invited to speak at Toronto Metropolitan University by a student group and subsequently removed protestors physically from the venue. In their article explaining the timeline, editor Dave Gray-Donald explains that the initial legal notice arrived in December of 2025. Despite offering to look into specific issues they had to Karten's lawyer, correct as necessary and include comments from Karten, they were not accepted. It's important to note that this was the second time The Grind attempt to get comment from Karten. The lawsuit is seeking $1.3 million in damages.
Scott Martin
These tactics are hardly new. I covered the coalescing of both institutional and public right-wing attacks on news outlets earlier this year, including most of the cases I laid out above. But The Grind's case reveals something troubling. The publication claims they offered to include comment from Karten multiple times and Karten still proceeded with the lawsuit. Unlike Alberta, Ontario does have anti-SLAPP legislation, so only time will tell if the courts recognize this case meets those requirements for dismissal. However, preliminary information suggests this may be the case. Unfortunately, being deemed as worthy of dismissal under anti-SLAPP laws does not mean there are no consequences. Lawyers are expensive. Legal processes are time-consuming. There is inevitably a toll imposed on these outlets even in the best case scenario of a favourable outcome.
That being said, when discussing lawsuits against news media organizations, it's necessary to mention the recently concluded result of Theresa Kielburger's defamation lawsuit against CANADALAND. As a part of a settlement, CANADALAND founder Jesse Brown issued a courtroom apology to the mother of the WE Charity co-founders and a payment of $885,000 in financial compensation. Besides the fact this payout is extremely high for the result of a defamation case in Canada, it shows that not all lawsuits against news organizations are necessarily meant to silence. But the uptick in lawsuits against news organizations correlates specifically with a right-wing outlook targeting independent outlets publishing critical perspectives. In many cases, these outlets are covering stories that larger, legacy outlets do not.
It's important to push back against lawsuits such as these while understanding the motivations and arguments within the broader context of news operating in Canada. Note the reporting that most targets of these lawsuits are engaging in and what purpose it serves to extract time, money and energy from these outlets. What's truly concerning is that, unless legacy outlets are specifically named in lawsuits, there seems little interest in actually covering this trend.
