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One new NPA board member, Christopher Wilson, was previously B.C. bureau chief for The Rebel, a far-right media outlet founded by Ezra Levant. Wilson is perhaps best known for a 2017 confrontation with then-federal environment minister Catherine McKenna at a Vancouver press conference that became national news. Wilson asked McKenna a question, and before answering, the Liberal politician asked him and his Rebel colleagues to stop referring to her by the insulting label “Climate Barbie.”

“I would like a commitment you will not call me names,” McKenna said. “There are lots of girls who want to get into politics, and it is completely unacceptable that you do this.”

Wilson told McKenna he couldn’t stop others from using the nickname, but insisted he hadn’t used it himself.

“Me, personally, I never have,” Wilson said.

That was not true.

Wilson had repeatedly called McKenna “Climate Barbie” in a Rebel video segment posted earlier that year, and used the disparaging nickname on his Twitter account, which he has deactivated.

Wilson stopped working for the Rebel in December 2017. On Wednesday, Wilson refused to discuss how or why he parted ways with the company, but said: “I’m ready to move on from my time there. … But I just don’t really want to speak ill of anybody involved with the Rebel.”

In a 2017 Rebel story, Wilson blasted “the supposedly conservative NPA,” who he described as “a total and complete disaster in opposition” during Vision Vancouver’s majority on council.