Front Burner

Politicians, staffers and intelligence officials have been testifying in Ottawa over the last several weeks in a public inquiry into foreign interference in Canadian elections in 2019 and 2021. While many details remain classified, it appears from the testimony that China, India and even Pakistan made attempts. But did those attempts have meaningful impacts?

CBC senior parliamentary reporter Janyce McGregor explains what the inquiry has shown about Canada's ability to recognize and repel foreign interference in its elections — and what that could mean for the next one.

For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts 

Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Abortion is a topic that many analysts believe could present the biggest threat to Donald Trump’s political comeback. This week, he made two major statements that attempted to put distance between himself and the issue.

But what does it mean that Trump is now running away from a policy Republicans spent decades fighting for?

Today, CBC Washington correspondent Alexander Panetta joins us for a look at a problem Trump helped create, and what it could mean for the November presidential election.

Tesla is having its worst year since the pandemic. The company is selling fewer cars, and its stock is plummeting.

And it’s not just Tesla. We’re seeing a cool down in North America’s EV industry as a whole.

Why is this happening? And as Canada pours billions of dollars into the industry, will that bet pay off? Senior CBC business reporter Peter Armstrong explains.

After 20 years representing Timmons, Ontario, federal NDP MP Charlie Angus announced last week that he’s leaving politics. Angus has also spent much of his career fighting for indigenous rights, particularly for Indigenous children. He’s also served in the critic role for labour, agriculture and digital issues.

Today, Charlie Angus on his career and departure from politics, as well as the future of the NDP and the popularity of Pierre Poilievre.

The Israeli military has been using an artificial intelligence tool to identify human targets for bombing in Gaza, according to a new investigation by Israeli outlets +972 Magazine and Local Call. 

Intelligence sources cited in the report allege that the AI system, called Lavender, at one stage identified 37,000 potential targets — and that approximately 10 per cent of those targets were marked in error. The sources also allege that in the early weeks of the war, the army authorized an unprecedented level of “collateral damage” — that is, civilians killed — for each target marked by Lavender. 

The investigation was also shared with the Guardian newspaper, which published their own in-depth reporting. 

Israel disputes and denies several parts of the investigation.

Today, the investigation’s reporter, Yuval Abraham, joins us to explain his findings.

On Monday, an Israeli military airstrike hit an aid convoy from World Central Kitchen. The IDF killed 7 workers, including Canadian veteran Jacob Flickinger, and said it was a “mistake” and “misidentification.”

So why didn’t the extensive steps WCK says it took to coordinate its movements stop the IDF from firing on them? And what does this breakdown of the way aid is delivered during war mean for getting help to Gazans on the brink of famine?

David Miliband is the CEO of the International Rescue Committee, a humanitarian group partnering to deliver aid and medical help to Gazans. He says it’s time for a “paradigm shift” in how we think about aid during conflict.

For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

In the last year alone, the Canadian government has poured billions of dollars into the electric vehicle industry. Wrapped up in that is the production of aluminum, a lightweight and recyclable material that EV car manufacturers want.

In Quebec, aluminum is big business. Rio Tinto, one of the largest manufacturers of aluminum in the world, has several plants there. It often advertises the product as green.

But a new investigation by Radio-Canada’s Enquête calls that into question.

Investigative producer Gil Shochat is here to talk about how it’s brought to light the environmental cost of this industry in Quebec, and deep into the Amazon.

In a Canadian first, four Ontario school boards are taking the companies behind Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat and TikTok to court, alleging the platforms are knowingly harming students and disrupting the ways schools operate. 

The claims haven’t been proven in court, and all three companies say they do their best to keep young people safe online.

Our guest today has been speaking for years about the kinds of issues raised in the Ontario school board lawsuits. In 2021, Frances Haugen quit Facebook, took tens of thousands of internal documents and leaked them. She later testified to the U.S. Congress, and alleged the company’s products were harming children.

Today, we’ve got Haugen on the podcast to discuss the Ontario school board lawsuits, the harms she believes these companies are causing to children, and what she thinks should be done about it.

A previous version of this episode included an anecdote about a boy who was bullied, and later took his own life after videos of his bullying were posted online. That anecdote has been removed. In fact, the boy was murdered by two other boys, in an attack that investigators say was planned on social media, and was triggered by an online conflict in a chat group. 

 At a time when major sports leagues are embracing online betting, the MLB’s biggest star and a player for the Toronto Raptors are now involved in gambling investigations.

So what do we know about Shohei Ohtani and Jontay Porter? How could gambling partnerships be impacting fans and athletes? And have these leagues opened a Pandora’s box of betting culture that could threaten the future of their sports? 

Declan Hill is an associate professor of investigations at the University of New Haven, an expert on match fixing and corruption, and the author of CrimeWaves on Substack.

Not only did Pornhub become a massive moneymaker, it also helped push porn into the spotlight by using data, clever PR, and the power of celebrity. How did Pornhub make itself a household name? 

This is episode 2 of The Pornhub Empire: Understood. Hosted by Samantha Cole.

More episodes are available here.