Controversial Okanagan MLA has a ‘journalist’ on her payroll

Former BC Conservative and now One BC MLA Tara Armstrong’s brief time in the legislature since the provincial election last fall has been mired in controversy. The latest involves Armstrong paying a communications advisory who sets himself out as a journalist.

Armstrong is the MLA for Kelowna-Lake Country-Coldstream. She was elected as a BC Conservative, left the party to sit as an independent in solidarity with Vancouver-Quilchena MLA Dallas Brodie who was kicked out of the Conservative party for mocking residential school survivors.

Armstrong has hired Wyatt Claypool as a communications advisor, but he still reports on Armstrong and the new One BC party formed with Brodie. Claypool is a contributor and host for the National Telegraph which calls itself an “independent news blog”.

“I started working for then independent MLA Tara Armstrong. She is now one of two MLAs alongside Dallas Brodie, who have formed the one BC party that is meant to actually have a conservative voice inside the legislature,” Claypool said in YouTube video.

Okanagan College communications professor and former journalist Edward Henczel said that reporting on your own employer crosses a line, regardless of whether or not they’re a politician.

“I’m a bit appalled. Journalists ideally strive to be impartial, but that’s obviously not the case here,” he said. “It’s just another nail in the coffin of respectable journalism.”

The National Telegraph’s YouTube channel has posted several videos of Claypool supporting Armstrong. Claypool makes it clear that he works for Armstrong, but the MLA isn’t as transparent when she promotes his content on social media.

One BC’s spokesperson Tim Thielmann confirmed in an email that Claypool is on contract as a communications advisor with the party, but didn’t elaborate on what that role entails.

Claypool’s social media profile doesn’t mention that he’s a political staffer but says he’s a journalist and describes him as the “Host of The National Telegraph. Baptist. Zionist. Neoconservative.”

Henczel said a lot of journalists transition into public relations work, but they don’t frame their publicity as journalism.

“I could see reporting fairly on 100 other topics. But on the one dealing with one of your employer, I just don’t see how that could happen. To me, that crosses the line into public relations,” he said. “There’s a very distinct line between a journalist and a public relations practitioner.”

Claypool has been directly involved in politics before when he was disqualified from the nomination race for the Conservative Party of Canada in Calgary Signal Hill last year, which he claims was unfair.  

Claypool defends Armstrong, from her campaign against Indigenous rights to the allegations from BC Conservative leader John Rustad that former party members like her and Brodie are blackmailing BC Conservatives.

“John Rustad is riding a very fine line between crazy accusations that make him seem like old Uncle Joe Biden not knowing what he’s talking about,” Claypool said in a video for The National Telegraph. “We over at One BC have not blackmailed anyone. We have not bribed anyone.”

Claypool did not respond to requests for comment.