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Grant LaFleche

@grantrants.bsky.social

3.6K followers 130 following 380 posts

Investigative journalist, senior writer at The Fifth Estate at CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/fifthestate Formerly Hamilton Spectator, Toronto Star investigations, and the St. Catharines Standard PGP Key: http://bit.ly/3w2s5LY

www.cbc.ca

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · Jul 18

Read our latest investigation, looking at the rise of fascist "fitness" groups called "active clubs".

www.cbc.ca/newsinteract...

Tracking Canada’s fascist fight clubs

CBC’s visual investigations team reveals where some of Canada’s white nationalist 'active clubs' gather to prepare for violence.

www.cbc.ca

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 1d

variety.com/2025/film/ne...

Robin Williams’ Daughter Tells Fans to ‘Stop Sending Me AI Videos of Dad’: It’s ‘Gross’ and ‘Not What He’d Want’

Zelda Williams tells fans not to send her AI recreations of father Robin Williams, calling them "gross."

variety.com

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 4d

www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/news/niagara...

From a rocky introduction to dean of the legislature: Jim Bradley’s storied career

Jim Bradley’s unparalleled political career was hard-nosed but clean

www.stcatharinesstandard.ca

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 5d

We're back! The new season of Canada's premier investigative news program, the fifth estate, starts next week. Here is a sneak peak at what we have been working on:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtYS...

We’re back! Season 51 launches Oct. 9 | the fifth estate

YouTube video by the fifth estate

www.youtube.com

Reposted by Grant LaFleche

Tom Taylor @tomtaylormade.bsky.social · 10d

I hate AI with a passion.
It’s a culmination of so much that is wrong with the world. A theft-machine that puts profit and product over people.
It turns out… I can hate it more.

Culture Crave 🍿 @culturecrave.co · 11d

First look at the AI Stan Lee Hologram at LA Comic Con 🚮

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

“He was a man, take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again.” - Hamlet

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

I do regret letting that call go to voicemail, if only because it would have obviously been the last time I could have spoke with him. I doubt the conversation would have been revelatory for either of us, but I would have enjoyed it anyway.

Because Jim Bradley was decent.

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

The last time he called me was two months ago. I was busy and let the call go to voicemail - but he almost never left a message. He called again two days later, and while I picked up, no one was on the other end of the line. It was a pocket dial.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

He continued to call me after I left the Standard for the Toronto Star, and when I jumped from newspapers to the CBC, he called to congratulate me. He did it because he was decent.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

He was not a saint, nor was he prefect. The council he lead ultimately failed to pursue accountability for what Caslin and company did to the region. He talked tough, but in the end, failed to follow through. But that failure did not undermine his essential decency as a political figure.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

Mr. Bradley did this in his typical, unassuming style. No scandals. No disasters. Or to put it another way, as regional chair he was boring, which is what Niagara needed.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

By 2018, the Region was in a crisis, having suffered through a barrage of scandals under the leadership of then-chair Alan Caslin and his political allies. Caslin and allies were nearly all swept from office in change election, and someone had to pick up the pieces and restore the public trust.

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

Those calls continued when he took the post of Niagara regional chair - something, as I understand it, he had to be badgered into doing. While a political animal to his core, he was not terribly ambitious and never sought political power for its own sake.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

To be clear, we were not friends, but that wasn't the point. He was being decent.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

Sometimes it was with a news tip, other times to grouse about politicians or some news story he found vexsome, probably in the hopes it would spur me to do a story, which it almost never did. Sometimes, it was just to check in and say hello.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

During my nearly 24 years at the St. Catharines Standard, Mr. Bradley would, from time to time, call me out of the blue for an off the record, private chat. I doubt I was the only journalist he did this with. .

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

He didn't waste his breath trying to come up zingy one-liners, never engaged in political stunts, or hurled ugly insults at opposition members.
He was decent.

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

This is not to say Mr. Bradley was above partisanship. He was, after all, a Liberal MPP for most of his impossibly long political career. But even when staking out a partisan side, there was no mendacity to him.

Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

I rather think he believed in decency as a kind of moral and practical philosophy. He believed in truth in much the same way, even when it was not convenient. I am not sure that could be said so easily of any of his predecessors at Niagara's often beleaguered regional government.

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

That does not sound like high praise, but in a political age of corruption, lies, and attacks on the pillars of democracy, it is perhaps the loftiest of praise one could offer. He was decent and in an increasingly indecent age.

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

I covered Mr. Bradley both as an MPP, a provincial government minister and as regional chair. I won't go into his political history here. Rather, I simply want to point out what most other journalists who covered him will also say: Bradley was a decent man.

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 12d

www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/news/breakin...

Breaking: Niagara Region Chair Jim Bradley dead

The St. Catharines representative was admitted to hospital in late August with stroke-like symptoms.

www.stcatharinesstandard.ca

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Reposted by Grant LaFleche

George Takei @georgetakei.bsky.social · 17d

Thank you for coming to my Teddy talk.

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Reposted by Grant LaFleche

Scott Nover @scottnover.bsky.social · 19d

NEW: The Pentagon told journalists it will require them to pledge they won’t gather any information — even unclassified — that hasn’t been expressly authorized for release, and will revoke the press credentials of those who do not obey. @washingtonpost.com

Pentagon demands journalists pledge to not obtain unauthorized material

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is imposing strict new rules that would severely limit the ability of journalists to report on the Pentagon.

www.washingtonpost.com

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 18d

www.nbcnews.com/politics/jus...

'No evidence' found yet of ties between Charlie Kirk's shooting and left-wing groups, officials say

Three people familiar with the federal probe into Kirk’s assassination told NBC News that investigators have yet to find a link between the alleged shooter and left-wing groups.

www.nbcnews.com

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Grant LaFleche @grantrants.bsky.social · 20d

edmontonjournal.com/news/local-n...

Early dropoff in girls' school sports linked to new gender confirmation forms

Province's new requirements are already having impacts on girls' sports in junior high

edmontonjournal.com