Protesters delay the debate in Toronto involving Bannon, former Trump strategist; several arrests made

TORONTO – The police had to intervene to delay the start of the debate in Toronto with Steve Bannon, the former strategist who helped Donald Trump win the White House victory.

The video posted on social media showed agents outside the city center using batons to restrain the crowd, and the police tweeted that there had been "several arrests".

The organizers of the debate explained the delay of about half an hour stating that they were anticipating the protests and wanted to make sure everyone was safe.

Bannon was introduced while he defended political populism against conservative commentator David Frum.

Critics, who accuse Bannon of being a white supremacist, wanted the debate to be dropped.

The event of an hour and a half in a downtown auditorium was complete, but the theater was barely half full at the scheduled time.

In order for the debate to take place, even late, members of the public were seated even after the debate began.

Protesters, some holding placards lamenting racism, shouted "Shame on you!" and "Nazi!" as people tried to make themselves heard, reducing a woman who was embarking on the debate to the brink of discussion.

"We will work diligently as a group to ensure that the evening goes smoothly," said Rudyard Griffiths, chair and moderator of the debate. "This will ask us to wait a bit."

The debate was to take place just before the mid-term congressional legislative elections in the United States to be held in the United States on November 6. According to the organizers, about 2,700 people were paid to attend the meeting, while several thousand others were viewed live.

The proposal that the two men were to debate, with Bannon in favor and Frum opposed, was: "The future of Western politics is populist, not liberal."

Bannon, 64, former executive chairman of the Breitbart News Right, helped Trump win the 2016 presidential election and was chief strategist at the White House for eight months until August 2017. Relations deteriorated after the president suggested that Bannon had "lost his head". describe Trump's son as "treasonable" and "unpatriotic". Bannon later returned to his comments but left his post at Breitbart in January.

Some critics have described him as racist and antisemitic, as he has rejected epithets.

Friday's event – which is part of the ten-year-old Munk debates – was announced just days after Bannon was dropped from the list of New Yorker Festival speakers this month after a strong reaction and threats of boycotts by other guests. Critics in Canada also oppose what he can say on the pretext that he feeds the hatred of disadvantaged groups.

In spite of this failure, Griffiths emphasized what he called the importance of allowing a vigorous discussion on topical issues in order to allow the public to form its own idea.

"A civil and substantive public debate on the big issues of our time helps us all to better understand the challenges our society faces and what can be done to solve them," Griffiths said.

Frum, 58, editor of Atlantic magazine, is a former speechwriter for the former United States. President George W. Bush. The Canadian-American is also the author of the recent book "Trumpocracy," which severely criticizes the current US president as a threat to democracy itself.

"We are living the most dangerous challenge that the free world has been confronted by the free government of the United States," wrote Frum.

The organizers said that audience members each paid up to $ 100 to attend the debate, although some dealers asked for the value several times on Friday. Aurea, the charitable foundation behind the event, said it supported public policy organizations that, among other things, advanced free markets and the protection of democratic values.