Thread by @JesseBrown

I always knew that if Canadaland investigated the WE Organization, there was a good chance we would get sued.

That's why each time, before we published a story on WE, I'd ask myself two crucial questions...(thread) pressprogress.ca/craig-kielburg…

Question #1: is this story important enough to be worth the potential trouble?

Question #2: is our reporting solid enough that we can defend every detail of it in court? Because we very well may have to... +

When the answer to both questions was yes, I hit publish and held my breath, expecting to be hauled into court.

But here's the thing - WE Charity never sued. +

They did threaten us, though. Over the years, they've hired lawyer after lawyer to try to intimidate us, promising that we'd face historic consequences if we told the world what we knew about them. But we pushed forward, and they never made good on their threats. +

(One important thing to note is that anyone who sues for libel must face the discovery process. If WE Charity ever sued us, or if Craig or Marc Kielburger sued us, internal documents about their finances would become part of public court proceedings.) +

When reporting for our series The White Saviors, the same familiar process played out. After sending WE detailed questions, their lawyer wrote back with threats. We asked ourselves those 2 crucial questions, and the answer to both was yes. +

So once again, I hit publish. And once again, WE Charity did not sue us.

Marc & Craig Kielburger did not sue us.

Their mom did. +

As listeners of The White Saviors know, Theresa Kielburger is not accused of any illegality or wrongdoing in our podcast. This is explicitly noted in episode one of the show. +

Here's another important detail: we have press freedom in Canada. That means that it is legal to report on public court documents. +

Theresa Kielburger is suing Canadaland for $3 Million. Though claims are often much larger than rulings, $3M is more than our insurance would cover. It's more than everything Canadaland has. So this is literally a fight for the life of our news organization. +

We're here for it. Canadaland will vigorously defend its journalism, which we believe to be accurate, and we are confident that this lawsuit will be dismissed. +

In the meantime, the important thing is that we continue doing what we have done from the start - reporting and publishing. Canadaland will not be intimidated from continuing to report on Craig and Marc Kielburger or on the WE Organization. -30-