BC Conservative leader apologizes for comments linking health-care workers to war crimes

The leader of the BC Conservative Party has now apologized for his response to a question about whether he supports prosecuting health-care workers for their actions during the COVID-19 pandemic, in the same way Nazi leadership were tried after the Second World War.

In June, John Rustad was interviewed by anti-vaccine workers in a video posted online including several controversial comments, including whether he supported “Nuremberg 2.0,” a notion promoted by COVID-deniers and far-right groups online. The video was posted to YouTube in July and the comment was first highlighted by Press Progress.

After mishearing “Nuremberg” as “new and bigger,” Rustad went on to say, “Nuremberg 2.0, ah yes” and that “that's something sort of outside the scope in terms of jurisdiction of British Columbia but if, you know, we would certainly be participating with other jurisdictions.”

Hours after the story was posted online, Rustad posted on social media that he “misunderstood the question,” even though he’d sought clarification on the video, so CTV News asked whether he was actually confused when he replied.

“My comments in around that relating in any way, relating the two, I apologize for that,” he said. “I know that has offended some people and that certainly was not my intent.”

Swift denunciations

The BC General Employees’ Union, which represents some of the workers who lost their jobs after they refused to get vaccinated, was unequivocal in their denunciation of Rustad’s comments.

“It's as absurd as it is appalling,” said BCGEU president, Paul Finch. “What we're talking about here is a far-right fringe conspiracy theory that is saying that medical professionals should be treated like war criminals coming out of World War II.” 

NDP leader David Eby, who’s repeatedly highlighted the “strange” comments Rustad and some of his candidates have made on social media before the election, has repeatedly praised what he describes as the heroism of health-care workers during the pandemic. 

“To be entertaining suggestions that we would put public health officials, doctors, and nurses who ran vaccine programs, who responded in the depth of the pandemic, on trial similar to Nazi war criminals – is shameful, it's bizarre,” he responded when asked about the latest controversy.

Public safety policy lost in controversy

Rustad tried to change the subject when asked to clarify whether he supported the idea of health-care workers going on trial.

“Right now in British Columbia we have so many issues to address: people are dying in our streets from drugs, people are dying in our streets from crime. We have a huge affordability problem, we have a housing crisis,” he told reporters. “There's so much we need to be doing, that's what we're going to be focussed on.”

On Monday morning, he spoke alongside a downtown Vancouver candidate about his “tough on crime” approach, reiterating his interest in involuntary treatment for drug use and mental illness and his desire to establish mandatory minimum sentencing. 

Rustad added that he wants to establish “a new statutory court to deal with minor offences” and that he intends to publish recordings of court proceedings online so that the public can better understand the functioning of the justice system. This comes on the heels of his announcement that he will “end tent cities,” though it’s unclear how that would work.