Conservative MP says York University Student Centre blocked his campus discussion event
Alberta member of Parliament Garnett Genuis is claiming an attack “on free speech” after the York University Student Center (YUSC) rejected a request for him to bring his public discussion forum to the campus on Friday.
Starting last fall, Genuis, the Conservative Party of Canada’s shadow minister for employment, has been visiting select universities where he has asked students whether they are better or worse off than their parents’ generation and discussed youth unemployment and economic issues facing young Canadians.
In an interview with National Post, Genuis said the York University Campus Conservatives, a registered student organization, had applied for this week’s event on his behalf, but were denied because they didn’t want the 38-year-old MP speaking to students “outside of a closed classroom.”
“And that’s not really acceptable to me,” he said.
“The events we’ve been doing have been in public areas so that students can stop by and talk and I think it’s unreasonable that they’re not allowing it to happen.”
In an emailed statement to National Post, YUSC executive director Jason Goulart said their decision was “not politically motivated in any way” and was not approved because their application failed to satisfy booking policies to which all internal and external groups must adhere, “regardless of content or affiliation.”
“The organizers of this particular event simply did not provide enough detail for us to adequately assess the type of programming, appropriate channels and venue required,” he stated, noting the student group or Genuis are free to reapply at any time.
The YUSC is a legal entity separate from York itself, with its own staff and board of directors comprised of students, stakeholders and university representatives.
Genuis first identified the school’s student union, the York Federation of Students, as the party responsible for making the decision when he posted about the cancelled event Wednesday night on X .
He clarified and made the distinction in a follow-up X post on Thursday.
One further point of precision. The decision not to allow the event was made by the York University Student Centre that apparently controls the relevant access points. This is a body notionally controlled by students (not the administration) but technically distinct from the York… https://t.co/fDdZhDFWsf
— Garnett Genuis (@GarnettGenuis) January 8, 2026
Union president Somar Abuaziza told National Post in an email that the organization “was not made aware of this event until receiving media inquiries” regarding Genuis’s statement. Goulart also explained that the YFS was not involved.
Genuis has held his forum at universities in four provinces so far, including stops at St. Francis Xavier in Antigonish, N.S., on Tuesday and another Thursday at Dalhousie in Halifax . None of those visits, he insisted, were met with any controversy or any hostility towards him directly. While students have presented a broad range of differing political views, he said the discourse was always respectful.
Genuis didn’t speculate on any other YUSC motive for cancelling, but said freedom of speech and freedom of association don’t seem to be afforded appropriate respect by “political elites.”
“Sometimes there’s this idea out there that people need to be protected from disagreement,” he said. “I think that’s a silly idea, and that, especially on campus, people should be seeing and hearing and encountering a broad range of different points of view.”
York itself has had a policy on free speech in place since 2018 which states that all invited guests may express views within the law without fear of intimidation. It also recognizes that freedom of speech is not absolute and does not protect hate speech, harassment, threats or conduct that violates the law or the school’s safety policies.
“Preservation of free and open exchange of ideas and opinion for and by all members of the community through respectful debate, including robust rights to protest and express dissent, are central to the mission of York University,” the policy reads.
“Attempts to prevent such free inquiry, whether from other members of the University community or from external groups, are inconsistent with this mission.”
Genuis will conclude this portion of his discussion tour on Friday afternoon at Toronto Metropolitan University’s George Vari Engineering and Computing Centre. Promoting the event on X , he invited “any aspiring censors in the city to come by and see what good political conversation looks like.”
Meanwhile, I will be doing an event tomorrow at TMU! Looking forward to the conversations.
— Garnett Genuis (@GarnettGenuis) January 8, 2026
And I want to extend a special invitation to any aspiring censors in the city to come by and see what good political conversation looks like. pic.twitter.com/VBPPMQHoGO
He promises more events are coming to campuses in Alberta and B.C. soon. He also vows to return to York University.
As for the answer to his question about being better or worse off, young people have “overwhelmingly” responded with the latter, citing the impossibly high price of housing and employment challenges.
“On the job side, a lot of concern about challenges and uncertainties around accessing jobs, a kind of credential inflation reality where young people feel that they need to get more and more qualifications for jobs that in the past didn’t require the same level of qualification,” he explained.
In October, Genuis took the lead in announcing the Conservative Youth Jobs Plan , which includes proposals to “unleash the economy, fix immigration, reform training programs and build homes where jobs exist” to help young Canadians find employment.
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