By Hartley Garrison Phillips, CNN • Updated 2nd August 2018
Openly discussing controversial topics isn’t out of bounds for Pastor Randall K. Forsyth, but a Canadian judge has clarified that he can keep speaking about convicted terrorist Omar Khadr without fear of the military tribunal issuing a “forced speech” order whenever he does so.
Earlier this year, Judge Frank Newbould granted a judicial review in a case involving the detention of an American Muslim preacher, Usama Shami, and asked that Forsyth be added to the list of others.
That led to Forsyth taking to Twitter to talk about Khadr’s case, in which he said that President Donald Trump should be the one to release the young man from Canadian prison after he was convicted in the U.S. for killing a soldier during a firefight in Afghanistan in 2003.
The ruling applies whether Forsyth’s tweets are taken out of context, as with Khadr, which could prompt judges and military tribunals to issue one-size-fits-all orders.
No such problems cropped up in March when Forsyth attended a special board meeting of the Canadian Muslim Public Affairs Council, a group that supports free speech and other principles.
“What you can expect from us as a society and ultimately from the military is that we will not make you suffer just because you happen to agree with the United States or our government in terms of opinion about what you want to do,” one board member said at the meeting, according to a recording provided by Forsyth.
In a telephone interview, Forsyth said that wasn’t the only time his Twitter statement about Khadr led to speech orders.
“They weren’t necessarily directed, but they were definitely in the hearing for Omar Khadr, which indicates that it was forced speech,” Forsyth said.
Forsyth said he never said Khadr was innocent, that he’s a “warrior of God” or implied that the Toronto native was still in a “good light.”
But no one in Ottawa or the American Embassy asked questions about those statements or any others he made, he said. He also warned members of the board not to use social media.
Asked why his statements weren’t seen as protected by the First Amendment, Forsyth said he didn’t talk about anything that wasn’t “prudent” enough.
He referred CNN to his lawsuit against the Canadian intelligence agency and the judiciary branch of government for allegedly violating his right to free speech. Forsyth claims they intimidated him to silence him, and said that he’s been the target of death threats after pushing his position in public.
Speaking out also could get him into trouble with a Canadian judge, who ruled that Forsyth must testify before a court as to his views on the issue. Forsyth has said he has a right to exercise his religion freely but not the right to lecture or religious conduct.
The testimony from a Canadian military officer, though, could get the military military judge a stay of the order, Forsyth said.
“And so essentially what is happening, the military judge says, ‘Well, I will not issue this subpoena until I get through with that,’ ” Forsyth said.
Forsyth admitted his tweets about Khadr are likely to raise his profile in the United States and abroad. But that’s just fine, he said.
“When I started tweeting,” he said, “it was going to a million people, maybe two million now.
“This was three years ago, and we’re talking about it more than ever,” he said.