'I'm not going to allow you to continue': Mayor of Cambridge, Ont., interrupts teen's Pride speech

A picture that shows Cambridge, Ont., city manager Jan Liggett interrupting a teenager's spoken communication during a congratulate case is making waves.

Sophie Mills was asked to address Cambridge's Pride flag-raising event on Monday at city hall.

Mills, who uses they/them pronouns, watched a council meeting on Oct. 14 and decided to rewrite part of their speech to comment on how Ward 6 Coun. Adam Cooper’s controversial Facebook post in January 2025 made them feel.

The post include a meme that showed a person with blue hair screaming toward the camera. "He took my pronouns! I have to live in reality now!" was written on the image, alluding to U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order ending many policies protecting 2SLGBTQ+ rights. 

In the video showing Mills giving a speech, a seated Liggett stands up, walks toward Mills and pulls the microphone away from them.

"Sophie, I'm not going to allow you to continue. This is disrespect," Liggett said, speaking into the microphone.

"Can you remove that part from your speech please. [Cooper] has already gone through what he needs to go through and I don't think it's helpful."

In October 2025, council said Cooper would need to complete sensitivity training, after the integrity commissioner determined he violated council's code of conduct.

Here's the moment a Cambridge teen's Pride speech was interrupted

“That was my first big opportunity for speaking and it was scary because I had no control there. I am a teenager, I'm a child and she is an elected official," Mills said about the mayor.

Mills's mother, Julia, shared the video on Instagram, drawing comments of support.

Cooper's meme, which was posted on Facebook on Jan. 22, 2025, promptly drew the attention of members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community, who called it hate speech and transphobic.

The post was later deleted from the councillor's page. 

But Cooper defended the post, saying, "Dude, respect others opinions. Be better than your comment."

The integrity commissioner’s report found, “While the councillor has defended the meme as a form of political debate that used humour to assert a point, we instead have determined that the meme within the Facebook post, in the context in which it was posted, demeaned a specific group of individuals so as to make them feel secondary or devalued.”

Mills made another speech later Monday. A video shows them at Grand River Pride’s separate flag-raising event at Lower Main St. In Cambridge.

“It was more powerful,” Mills said of their second speech. “I was able to take my time and have a more meaningful speech because I'm able to have those pauses without being worried that I'm going to get censored and silenced.

“I was given the space to say my whole speech.”

Bryan Causarano-Bolton, co-founder of Grand River Pride, reacted to what he saw in the video involving Mills and Liggett by saying, “I'm both shocked and not surprised.

“Shocked because I couldn't believe that the mayor was at it again. I couldn't believe the mayor was taking away somebody's right to freedom of speech. But also not surprised because that's just been the relationship with the mayor's office and the Pride community,” he continued.

Causarano-Bolton also said Grand River Pride has been “really struggling” with their relationship with the city, citing its lack of transparency behind Cooper’s reprimand and sensitivity training.

“We would love to be able to continue our relationship with City Hall,” Causarano-Bolton said. “But until we see those changes, until the mayor apologizes for her actions against the community and against Sophie, I just don't know how that would look.”

Mills believes they don't deserve what happened.

“I have lived here forever. I'm very involved in the community. I've volunteered at city hall before. I am part of the youth advisory committee. I help kiddos because I love kiddos,” they said.

“I'm an active member of this community and this is not the community that I deserve.”

Reporter/Editor

---

---