From Australia to Washington D.C. the COVID pandemic has been used by governments around the world to enforce their will on normal citizens and violate human rights under the claim of public safety. In many instances beating down civilians using law enforcement, forcing them out of their jobs and even going as far as placing individuals in detention centers. The rise of tension between government authorities and ordinary civilians will certainly live in the minds of many for years to come. While in Canada, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau nearly self-proclaimed himself as dictator.
The Freedom Convoy led by ordinary citizens in Canada has demonstrated one of the most powerful messages to any government saying please end COVID tyranny. It was a mostly peaceful protests against the Liberal government’s vaccine mandate which was broken up by law enforcement brutal assault. While Trudeau called the demonstrators racist and fascist, his police officers trample an old Native American woman with their horses among other civilians.
Mr. Trudeau refused to meet with Freedom Convoy organizers or protesters in Ottawa. His invisibility during long stretches became a frequent topic of political chatter. Interim Conservative leader Candice Bergen told him in Parliament to “stop hiding,” and longtime Liberal strategist Scott Reid tweeted on Feb. 7: “It’s damned odd that the PM is nowhere to be seen.”
Instead of finding ways to defuse this tense situation, Mr. Trudeau’s approach was to throw more gasoline on the fire. The absentee prime minister would infrequently grace the nation with his presence to mock and smear his opponents. He flippantly called the Freedom Convoy protesters a “small fringe minority” who held “unacceptable views.” And after Melissa Lantsman, a Conservative member of Parliament and descendant of Holocaust survivors, grilled Mr. Trudeau about his handling of the truckers’ protest, his response was to denounce Conservatives who “stand with people who wave swastikas.” (This referred to a tiny number of sightings of the Nazi symbol in the crowd, some of them clearly meant as an overwrought criticism of the government, not a statement of sympathy for National Socialism.)
A line can be drawn from Mr. Trudeau to his father, Pierre Trudeau (1919-2000), who served as prime minister from 1968 through 1979 and again from 1980 through 1984.
Justin Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act on Feb. 16. This never-before-used statute defines a national emergency as an “urgent and critical situation of a temporary nature that (a) seriously endangers the lives, health or safety of Canadians and is of such proportions or nature as to exceed the capacity or authority of a province to deal with it, or (b) seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada and that cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.”
Under Mr. Trudeau’s decree, police had the authority to push back crowds on foot or with horses, use pepper spray, enter trucks and other vehicles by whatever means necessary, and make arrests en masse. That’s what they did.
At the same time, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland announced the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada would be expanded to monitor funds raised by the Freedom Convoy through GoFundMe and cryptocurrency. Banks would also be able to freeze accounts of people suspected of contributing to this protest, without a court order. This has caused both average citizens and business owners embarrassment and potential harm to their livelihoods.
While some Canadians supported Ottawa’s decision out of frustration with the protests and blockades of border crossings like the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, others were furious. Mr. Trudeau was criticized for abandoning civil liberties, free speech and the right to protest. He’s been called a “tyrant,” “totalitarian” and “dictator.” The Canadian Civil Liberties Association took the prime minister and his government to court last week. Left-leaning newspapers like the Toronto Star have condemned him.
The Emergencies Act of 1988 replaced a statute known as the War Measures Act. The only prime minister to invoke that latter law in peacetime was the elder Trudeau.
This occurred during the 1970 October Crisis. The Front de libération du Québec, or FLQ, a group of militant separatists who wanted to create an independent socialist Quebec, kidnapped British Trade Commissioner James Cross and Quebec Labour Minister Pierre Laporte. When CBC reporter Tim Ralfe asked Pierre Trudeau how far he would go in suspending civil liberties to maintain order, the prime minister infamously said: “Just watch me.”
The Trudeau Liberals depicted the FLQ as a homegrown terrorist organization. They invoked the War Measures Act to give law authorities the ability to interrogate anyone suspected of being involved. Nearly 500 people were arrested. The FLQ murdered Laporte and freed Cross after 59 days in captivity.
Trudeau, like his son, was questioned for his commitment to civil liberties and individual rights and freedoms, including by the CCLA. Yet there’s a real difference between invoking the statute against a violent terrorist group and invoking it against a largely peaceful gathering of people tired of COVID-19 restrictions and lockdowns.
With the federal government’s overreach in attempting to use agencies to enforce vaccines mandates, and mayors like Eric Adams who persist with the enforcement of vaccine mandates on private and public workers, many are concerned on how far are they willing to go? How vulnerable is democracy in the United States?
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