Enemies of the state: Exposing CSIS’s ‘Native extremism’ program and Canada’s imaginary Indigenous terrorist
Monday, April 13, 2026 from 4:30 pm to 6:00 pm
- In-person event
- 4400, Richcraft Hall, Carleton University
- 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON, K1S 5B6
Brett Forester in conversation with Ellen Gabriel
How much time and effort has Canada spent spying on Indigenous activists? In 2022, Brett Forester of CBC Indigenous in Ottawa set out to answer that question. It proved easy enough to ask but nearly impossible to answer. It took three years, four formal access to information requests, one informal request, three complaints to the federal information commissioner and one court challenge, but after all this wrangling we can begin to confirm the long-suspected truth: Snooping on Indigenous peoples has been a priority for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service almost since its inception.
After reviewing more than 1,000 pages of declassified documents, Forester found surveillance that began in Labrador in 1988 with Cold War paranoia about Soviet meddling had by 1998 evolved into a national counterterrorism project monitoring Indigenous dissent as a form of domestic extremism. In this talk, Forester will explain why and how this came to be, as he offers a behind-the-scenes look at his investigation into more than a decade of CSIS’s self-styled “Native extremism” operations.
Bios
Ellen Gabriel, also known as Katsi’tsakwas, is a Mohawk activist and artist from Kanehsatà:ke Nation (Kanehsatà:ke Quebec) – Turtle Clan, known for her involvement as the official spokesperson, chosen by the People of the Longhouse, during the 1990 Siege of Kanesatake and Kahnawake. She recently published a book–When the Pine Needles Fall: Indigenous Acts of Resistance- where she documents her life leading up to the resistance, as well as her experiences after that event.
Brett Forester is an Anishinaabe journalist with the CBC News Indigenous unit in Ottawa. Brett is an experienced broadcaster who worked previously as host and producer of APTN’s weekly political talk show Nation to Nation. He has also occasionally guest hosted CBC’s Power & Politics since joining the public broadcaster in 2022. He is a proud member of the Chippewas of Kettle and Stony Point First Nation in southern Ontario. His visual storytelling and written reporting focuses on politics, national affairs, human rights and the law.