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OTTAWA — Indigenous Services Minister Mandy Gull-Masty was noncommittal when asked about criminalizing residential school denialism after a group linked with white nationalism reportedly staged a demonstration in the B.C. interior.
Roseanne Casimir, chief of Tk̓emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation, said a group of masked individuals dropped a banner from an overpass in Kamloops, B.C. on Sunday questioning reports of human burials at the former sites of residential schools.
Read more:
- Indigenous Peoples grappling with claims downplaying history of residential schools
- Why do people wear orange on Truth and Reconciliation Day?
- A heartbreaking history: How Saskatchewan students learn about residential schools
The banner demonstration happened just days ahead of the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, a day to honour the children who attended residential schools and to remember the ones who never came home.
More than 150,000 Indigenous children were forced to attend residential schools, the last of which closed in 1996, and thousands of children died in the institutions.
NDP MP Leah Gazan has a private member’s bill currently before the House of Commons which would criminalize as hate speech condoning, denying, downplaying or justifying residential schools.
Some First Nations chiefs have asked the Liberal government to introduce its own similar bill — which would be more likely to pass — but Gull-Masty would not commit to that today.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 28, 2026.
Alessia Passafiume, The Canadian Press
