One of the architects of the debunked “foreign-funded anti-pipeline protester” controversy is now representing a journalist claiming he was forced to resign from CBC News.

Former CBC News host Travis Dhanraj has retained lawyer Kathryn Marshall, noted spokesperson for the Ethical Oil Institute, as his counsel. Dhanraj’s public break with CBC has added fuel to the conservative movement’s war against Canada’s public broadcaster. Dhanraj has alleged CBC was intolerant of conservative politics.

Marshall was previously known for helping popularize the myth of foreign interference in Canada’s pipeline debates. As spokesperson for Ethical Oil she appeared on national broadcasts alleging “foreigners, foreign groups, and foreign special interests” made concentrated efforts to shut down Canada’s energy industry. The campaign drew attention to a few environmental groups who received individual donations from U.S. foundations, but never produced evidence of a conspiracy to landlock Canadian oil.

Marshall has developed extensive connections within Canada’s conservative movement for more than a decade, emerging as a campaigner with the Fraser Institute, working extensively with far-right influencer Ezra Levant, and more recently appearing alongside a Conservative MP at the Canada Strong and Free Network conference in 2022. She is married to Rebel News cofounder and former Conservative campaign chair Hamish Marshall. Both appear in a map of Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s sphere of influence, published by DeSmog earlier this year. Kathryn Marshall has also posted on social media about working for Alberta’s right-wing Wildrose Party during the 2012 election.

Defunding CBC has become a key plank of Canada’s conservative movement in recent years, and was one of Poilievre’s campaign promises during the federal election in April. Poilievre appeared on the Candace Malcolm Show where he reiterated his desire to defund CBC and appeared to suggest his interest in extending government subsidies to right-wing media outlets like Juno News and Rebel News.

Myth of ‘Woke Bias’

Dhanraj became the latest cause célèbre of the defund movement after issuing an internal note to CBC staff claiming he was being forced to resign because of what he alleges is a “workplace culture defined by retaliation, exclusion, and psychological harm.” Dhanraj further claimed that asking “hard questions” about “tokenism masquerading as diversity,” “problematic political coverage,” and “the erosion of editorial independence” would end one’s career. He claimed his resignation was not voluntary. As of this writing, Dhanraj does not appear to have actually resigned from CBC News, nor has he been fired. According to the National Post, the CBC has not accepted Dhanraj’s resignation.

CBC News reported Kathryn Marshall said Dhanraj plans to sue the public broadcaster. Marshall told the Toronto Star that Dhanraj intends to file a complaint to the Canadian Human Rights Commission. The Star also reported Marshall saying that the CBC presented Dhanraj with an “ultimatum that was so unconscionable and morally wrong, there was no way he was going to say yes.” Dhanraj left earlier this year. CBC News reported that in since-deleted social media posts, Dhanraj said “When the time is right, I’ll pull the curtain back. I’ll share everything…. I’ll tell you what is really happening inside the walls of your CBC.”

CBC News refuted the allegations of bias, noting that Dhanraj stopped appearing regularly at the end of 2024 and was on leave.

The idea that Dhanraj was cancelled by the CBC either for his own conservative views or because he wanted to bring on conservative guests has since become the dominant narrative of the so-called “Dhanraj Affair.” The issue has become fodder for Canada’s right-wing, with coverage far exceeding the amount of information available.

The issue has been covered extensively by the National Post, flagship national newspaper of the Postmedia newspaper chain, which has run at least seven articles on the subject since first reported July 7. The issue has also received extensive coverage from the Toronto Sun, a tabloid sister paper of the Post also owned by Postmedia. Postmedia is owned by an American hedge fund and often platforms Canada’s conservative movement and the oil and gas sector.

The Dhanraj issue has also been covered by other right-wing outlets such as the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, The Hub, Rebel News, and Juno News. In the case of the latter, recent articles suggest Dhanraj was silenced for “pushing back against bias,” and that the CBC’s “woke bias is killing real journalism.” Juno also claimed that Alberta Premier Danielle Smith cited the Dhanraj situation as proof of the CBC’s “media bias.”

Narrative Over Facts

Kathryn Marshall has extensive experience developing right-wing talking points that make national waves at the expense of fact-based discourse. When she appeared on Power & Politics with Evan Solomon in 2012, Marshall repeated claims of “puppet groups” with radical agendas, while refusing to acknowledge the radical impacts of climate change. When Solomon pointed out that most companies operating in Canada’s oil sector are foreign owned, Marshall doubled down about a “hijacked” public process. When asked if Northern Gateway developer Enbridge funded her interest group Ethical Oil, she refused to answer the question.

Mainstream Canadian newspapers helped propagate the myth of foreign funded anti-pipeline protesters along with right-wing sites like Rebel News. Postmedia papers regularly circulate material from anti-regulation and/or pro-fossil fuel lobby groups like the Fraser Institute and Macdonald-Laurier Foundation, both of which have ties to the Koch Family Foundations. Postmedia papers and their columnists are some of the leading sources of climate change denial in Canada, in addition to regularly advocating expanded fossil fuel production and opposition to environmental regulations. 

Rebel News, started by Ezra Levant and Hamish Marshall, played an outsized role in spreading the anti-environmental conspiracy, and is similarly taking the lead in the push to defund CBC.

Levant and the Marshalls’ influence on climate discourse could offer clues on where today’s “woke bias” discourse is headed.

As reported by DeSmog in 2012, Hamish Marshall had at that time registered 32 websites, nearly all of which were connected to EthicalOil.org, the Conservative Party of Canada, and the Wildrose Alliance Party. Kathryn Marshall’s personal website was hosted on the same server.

In addition, Hamish Marshall created the Ethical Oil Institute’s first website. 

Currently, Hamish Marshall works with One Persuasion, a marketing, advocacy, and research firm that worked for the Pierre Poilievre campaign in the 2025 Canadian federal election. As previously reported by DeSmog, Hamish Marshall was one of Poilievre’s campaign insiders. During his time working as a top Conservative Party campaign aid, Hamish Marshall both used a Rebel News office and was seen fraternizing with Rebel personalities, despite the fact that the group had been banned from covering Conservative Party events.

DeSmog contacted Kathryn Marshall to confirm these points, request an opportunity to speak with Dhanraj, and discuss her connections to the conservative movement, including her husband’s work with the Conservative party. Marshall declined to answer the questions, which she characterized as “misogynist.”

Kathryn Marshall routinely praises her husband’s advocacy for conservative causes as much as his appearances on Canadian far-right media.

Dhanraj and his lawyer have yet to provide specific examples of bias at CBC News.

The idea that the CBC News “cancelled” Dhanraj actually predates the media storm that came about after Dhanraj’s memo was “leaked” to the press in early July.

Toronto Sun columnist Brian Lilley (also formerly of the Rebel) first mentioned it in his column from February 18.

Lilley stated that Dhanraj had been “yanked off the air with zero explanation” and while he was unable to get any additional information from CBC or Dhanraj, Kathryn Marshall spoke on the latter’s behalf. Without providing any additional context or detail, Marshall told Lilley that Dhanraj had stepped away “due to systemic issues” at CBC. Marshall added “CBC isn’t very welcoming of diversity, at least not when it comes to certain political perspectives.”

As recently reported by the Breach, a comprehensive 2010 analysis of CBC News’ content found that the public broadcaster generally covered the Conservative Party more favourably than either of its main private sector television competitors in Canada, CTV News and Global News.