Right-wing Extremists Co-opt Canada’s ‘Freedom Convoy’

Interview with David Hoffman, associate professor of sociology at Canada's University of New Brunswick, conducted by Scott Harris

Over the past month, the so-called “Freedom Convoy” of truckers and their supporters engaged in militant protests over opposition to vaccine mandates, blocking vital U.S.-Canadian border supply routes and causing chaos in Canada’s capital city, Ottawa. Anti-vaccine activists in France and New Zealand have organized similar movements, and there are reports that U.S. groups are now planning their own convoys.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the rarely used Emergencies Act on Feb. 14th that allowed police intervention to free transportation routes, tow vehicles and arrest nearly 200 protesters blocking Ottawa’s streets.  Canadian police also arrested 11 people after discovering an arsenal of weapons among protesters at the U.S. border in Alberta.

After convoy protesters displayed Confederate and Nazi flags, exposing the extremist and white supremacist elements within the movement, polls found most Canadians supported the police action to prevent further disruption caused by protesters. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with David Hoffman, associate professor of sociology at Canada’s University of New Brunswick, who examines the involvement of extremists in the Freedom Convoy, and significant support they’ve received from U.S. right-wing groups, conservative media and Republican politicians.

DAVID HOFFMAN: It initially started off as an anti-mandate, anti-vax protest. But about two weeks ago, a small contingent of far-right protesters began to wave Nazi flags, stand up in front of crowds and proudly say they were white supremacists to cheering crowds and so on and so forth.

And other far-right extremist propaganda and symbology found its way to the streets of Ottowa, which shocked and obviously upset many Canadians. And since that point, it has largely been one of the main focus points for the Canadian media and as well as scholars such as myself. Since the far-fight in Canada — and when I say far-fight, I’m talking about the extreme of the extreme — they essentially have co-opted the movement and taken away the narrative, the original narrative of anti-vaxx and anti-mandates, which was the core of that protest and have turned it to other far-right issues. 

And as time went on, the moderates, the moderate voices were pushed aside and the protest was dwindled down to several hundred individuals, to which Prime Minister Trudeau and the federal government enacted what’s called the Emergencies Act, which is legislation that allows the government to take certain exceptional action to dealing with the protests and police forces have descended and arrested as you mentioned, around 200 individuals and have carted away 70 or 80 trucks, I believe; that number may be wrong. 

And it’s it seems at least for the time being that the protest is quote, unquote over. 

SCOTT HARRIS: Professor Hoffman, tell our listeners a bit about the actual and suspected U.S. support for this Freedom Convoy movement, including the media support from outlets like Fox News. As far as I’ve been reading, these groups online have collected at this point over $10 million in donations. A lot of those dollars coming from United States individuals and groups.

DAVID HOFFMAN: Last count that I heard, although it’s variable depending on who’s doing the count, it was 18 million which is, as you mentioned a part of it, not all of it — but a good chunk, definitely in probably the seven to $7 million to $8 million range coming from the United States.

It started with a GiveSendGo and a number of others of these kind of Kickstarter-like (crowdfunding) support sites that essentially the idea is they were meant to fuel and buy supplies for the convoy. And the Ontario government, which is the province where Ottawa is located, the Superior Court blocked the website’s ability to actually disburse the funds, and essentially mainly targeting foreign donations for the same reason that anyone in any sovereign nation would be upset over foreign interference in civil or legislative or in this case, public disturbance.

This is obviously a cause for alarm for people who study this. It is a way for the far right, not only in Canada, but elsewhere to galvanize support, public figures. I mean, even before you called for this interview, I was reading about Candace Owens saying that, you know, she’s obviously engaging in hyperbole, this far-right commentator stating that the U.S. should invade Canada, too, or send troops to support the truckers.

And this financial support is all part of the larger narrative that not only the far right in the U.S. wants to push, but the far right globally, wants to push. What they see here is a movement that champions anti-federalist, anti-government rhetoric that they use to galvanize their support, which is why it’s captured the minds, imaginations and causes so many figures in North America, both in Canada and in the U.S. to dip into their wallets. This is a cause that resonates with the far right and it’s reflected in the amount of financial support that came or attempted to come from the United States.

When a far-right group protest or defaces a monument, or disrupts civil society like this convoy did, it’s important for the community, the larger Canadian community to make it very, very clear through to nonviolent action that this type of rhetoric, this type of ideology, this type of disruption is not tolerated nor should be tolerated.

Listen to Scott Harris’ in-depth interview with David Hoffman (26:15) and see more articles and opinion pieces in the Related Links section of this page.

 

 

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