You typed a comment about Canada’s broken borders, and someone reported it as hate. According to the Edmonton Police Service (EPS), that’s an investigatory offence, even if it’s not a crime.
Last week, the Edmonton Police Service (EPS) posted a dramatic video overlaid with censored online comments: “Send them back home.” “Canada needs deportation.” “Hang him.”
The accompanying message declared: “Online hate isn’t ‘just a comment.’ It hurts real people and harms real communities. Hate has no home here.” Viewers were then directed to a ‘hate’ reporting portal.
While the post has since been deleted after massive public backlash, the timing is no coincidence.
It follows Bill C-9, the Combatting Hate Act, which received Royal Assent on June 18, 2026, with key provisions having come into force on July 18.
The legislation strengthens Criminal Code hate-propaganda rules, defines “hatred” as an “intense and extreme” emotion of vilification and detestation, creates a new offence for displaying certain terrorism or hate symbols, establishes a stand-alone hate-crime offence, and criminalizes intimidation or obstruction near places of worship, schools, and cultural sites.
EPS wasted no time in jumping on the new laws’ bandwagon with their video that blurred the line between actual criminal hate speech and everyday political opinion, while soliciting reports of non-criminal “hate-motivated incidents.”
Conservative MP and lawyer Roman Baber pushed back hard. “No, Edmonton Police, you have no jurisdiction to limit online speech unless a criminal law is broken,” he wrote in a widely shared post.
“The criminal offence of hate speech is limited to the definition articulated by the Supreme Court almost 40 years ago. Not what others find offensive.”
Hellbound and Down 