The scandal surrounding Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump is fueling backlash to an American-owned gas project in Canada, after Prime Minister Mark Carney announced he will try to fast-track Ksi Lisims LNG with public money. 

Both Liberal and NDP politicians pushing the MAGA-backed, Korean-built export terminal are getting nervous – as the release of the Epstein files roils U.S. politics and threatens the reputations of rich and powerful men in the child sex trafficker’s wide-reaching network.

The floating terminal would be built by Samsung Heavy Industries in South Korea but owned and operated by Western LNG, based in Texas. All the project’s investors so far are Wall Street private equity companies, led by Blackstone and Apollo Global Management.

Blackstone’s CEO Steve Schwarzman is a major donor and advisor to Donald Trump. Apollo’s founding CEO Leon Black bankrolled Epstein’s operation to the tune of at least $170 million. Canadians are asking: why would Carney even consider giving these men our tax dollars?

Videos criticizing Carney’s embrace of Western LNG have gone viral in the last week, racking up millions of views across diffferent social media platforms. Here’s one we produced, and another by Australian satirists at The Juice Media.

Carney was warned

 In the leadup to Prime Minister Carney’s fast-track announcement in Terrace on November 13, Canadians made 1,734 phone calls to the offices of key cabinet ministers, warning them not to advance this MAGA billionaire-backed project with public money.

That was on top of 38,267 petition signatures from across Canada. In spite of that, Carney announced he was sending Ksi Lisims LNG to his newly-created Major Projects Office for consideration as a “Project of National Interest”.

If it officially gets that “national interest” designation, Ksi Lisims and the associated Prince Rupert Gas Transmission Pipeline would become eligible for billions in federal subsidies – and exemptions from Canadian laws and environmental regulations under the controversial Bill C-5.

At this point, the Major Projects Office’s timelines and process are unclear. Although Carney’s budget includes new tax breaks for LNG projects, he has not yet declared Ksi Lisims and PRGT in the “national interest,” or committed any specific funding.

Western LNG delays decision

Meanwhile, the project’s Wall Street backers have not made a Final Investment Decision on the gas terminal or the pipeline – so the Korean shipbuilders and the American pipeline contractor are still waiting to start work.

“We’re not far off,” spokesperson Rebecca Scott told Natural Gas Intelligence in an interview . But Western LNG has pushed back the Final Investment Decision to 2026, as it works to secure additional shipping contracts and construction loan financing. 

Ksi Lisims has offtake agreements with Shell’s gas brokerage arm in Singapore and France’s TotalEnergies for one third of the terminal’s capacity. But as LNG imports fall across Asia and new export terminals pop up like mushrooms, buyers have little incentive to lock into long-term contracts at the high prices needed to justify new megaprojects.

That’s where Canadian taxpayers come in. “Having the strong support of the Canadian government helps those discussions,” says Scott. “It takes the factor of political risk out of those discussions and gives some reassurance to the people we’re talking to that the government is a supporter, and they’re going to help us to make sure that we’re a success.”

Carney hinted in his announcement on November 13 that government loans could be coming for First Nations to buy into the project, on top of new LNG tax incentives included in the Liberal budget – and a publicly-funded $6-billion transmission line to supply power to the terminal.

Carney struggles to answer questions

The backlash to Carney’s announcement was immediate. I drove to Terrace with friends and neighbours from along the pipeline route, including Chief Watahayetsxw and Chief Gamlakyeltxw from Gitanyow, Chief Na’moks, Gwii Lok’im Gibuu and Drew Harris from Hagwilget, and a contingent from the Kispiox Valley.

Photo by Graeme Pole, KVCCA

The Indigenous leaders were all stopped on the road by police, where Carney drove past without talking to them. But reporters came out after his announcement and captured their powerful words of warning about Ksi Lisims, which were shared in national newscasts and more than 135 articles across Canada, the U.S., UK and New Zealand.

The Prime Minister’s staff allowed me to attend the event on behalf of Dogwood News, our weekly newsletter. I was waved through the checkpoint by an RCMP commander – past a hovering drone, armed bodyguards and a sniffer dog checking Carney’s podium.

I asked Carney a simple question: “How much taxpayer money are we prepared to invest in a project that is American-owned and foreign built?” He stammered and deflected for more than three minutes, in both official languages, without answering the question.

Political fallout widens

Carney’s senior minister for B.C., former Happy Planet juice CEO and Vancouver “Greenest City” Mayor Gregor Robertson, stood silently behind his new boss, wringing his hands. A day later, constituents plastered a giant sign on Robertson’s office saying “SOLD: to American billionaires”.

Vancouverites are dismayed by Gregor Robertson’s silence on Ksi Lisims LNG.

The reaction from opposition politicians was swift. Conservative house leader Andrew Scheer posted a meme of musician Drake waving away the words “Canadian pipeline” while pointing approvingly at “AMERICAN OWNED PROJECT BUILT IN KOREA”.

BC Green Party leader Emily Lowan appeared on journalist Rachel Gilmore’s podcast the same day Carney spoke, where the two talked about “elbows up for Epstein” and the “disgusting oligarchs” behind the Ksi Lisims project.

And that weekend, B.C. Premier David Eby’s ballroom fundraiser in Victoria was interrupted by activists showering him with paper money, calling him out for subsidizing American billionaires and lying to the public about LNG. 

Resistance builds

Canadians have a crucial window of time, maybe a month or two, to force the Liberals and BC NDP to reconsider their support for this American-owned gas project. Judging by the reaction so far, Carney and Eby have badly miscalculated how Canadians feel about financing this thing.

Giving our tax dollars to billionaire friends of Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein, while families struggle to afford groceries, is a betrayal that could ignite a deep and lasting rage among many voters.

And there are powerful forces, well beyond Mark Carney’s control, that are amplifying the political and financial risks around this project. The contents of the Epstein Files could very well end careers in Washington, D.C. and on Wall Street, upending the Trump administration’s agenda and sparking a power struggle within the MAGA movement.

The looming collapse of the financial bubble around AI stocks could set back some of the exact same investors, like Blackstone, who have bet big on gas-powered data centres. 

At the same time, the explosive growth of renewable energy around the world is disrupting fossil fuel markets and forcing LNG boosters to reckon with a coming glut that could push down prices and make new export projects uneconomic.

Here in B.C. Indigenous communities and Canadians are standing side-by-side in defence of our shared home. As Watahayetsxw made clear, we’ll fight tooth and nail, in the courts and on the land, to stop these predatory American billionaires from stealing B.C.’s public funds and energy resources, polluting clean air and water, and compromising our health for generations. You can support her clan’s resistance efforts here.