It's obvious that Conservatives were involved in the "Freedom convoy" from the beginning - Part 1
The so-called “Freedom Convoy” was never a grassroots protest. Not with a Trump Advisor and a former conservative Premier advising them.
I posted this over on Twitter, where it has had 100,000 views.
The so-called “Freedom Convoy” was not a spontaneous protest. To start, the convoy had many of the same organizers who organized the 2019 "United We Roll Convoy" - Yellow Vests Canada, whose 100,000+ FB page was filled with death threats:
Facebook reviewing comments about killing Trudeau on Canadian ‘yellow vests’ page - National | Globalnews.ca The Yellow Vests Canada group has gathered more than 100,000 members on Facebook since it launched a month ago.
While the 2019 convoy was notionally about pipelines and the carbon tax, Yellow Vest groups also referred to conspiracy theories that suggested that a “global migration pact” - an agreement to try to get countries to coordinate on refugees- would mean that people who criticized Islam could go to jail.
This conspiracy theory was one of several referenced by Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer as well as now-Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.
Danielle Smith: UN Migration Pact part of the plan to extinguish Canadian identity - Calgary | Globalnews.ca"When Trudeau told the New York Times that Canada was 'the first post-national state,' I wasn't sure what he meant," writes radio host and blogger Danielle Smith. "But I never thought it would mean ex…
Canada’s immigration policies must not be dictated by UN migration pact: Scheer - National | Globalnews.ca Andrew Scheer is criticizing Justin Trudeau's plan to sign a UN migration pact, saying Canada's immigration policies should not be dictated by an international agreement.
The 2019 convoy was notable because of the high-profile support of Conservative leader Andrew Scheer, PPC leader Maxime Bernier, and Conservative Senator David Tkachuk said to “Roll over every liberal left in the country.”
Pat King, who has made multiple videos threatening violence, was a driver and organizer, and so was Tamara Lich.
The 2019 Convoy was also covered by Keean Bexte, a Rebel News Reporter who has worked for CPC MPs and who also ran a website selling Rhodesian military paraphernalia, covered & fundraised from the event.
So did Faith Goldy, a Rebel News Reporter who broadcast from a white supremacist “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville in which protestors were killed.
Here’s Faith Goldy interviewing Andrew Scheer.
The Rebel plays an important role.
It is a global source of extremist right-wing disinformation. It was founded by Ezra Levant & Hamish Marshall, who worked for Stephen Harper, Andrew Scheer, the Manitoba PCs & well the 2019 CPC Campaign, and campaigns in Australia and the U.K.
A Federal Court recently ruled that The Rebel is not a journalism outlet, since it produces almost no original content (1%) and has no pretense of balanced coverage.
From 2015 to 2017, Hamish Marshall was one of three board members for The Rebel. Correspondents have included: Gavin McInnes, who founded the Proud Boys in 2016, a far-right militia group that was at Jan 6.
https://www.adl.org/blog/proud-boys-bigotry-is-on-full-display
McInnes grew up in Ottawa & founded Vice Magazine with a government grant. McInnes left Vice in 2008. After a failed attempt at shock comedy, McInnes drifted as a correspondent for a series of far-right outlets. As a Rebel Media correspondent, McInnes posted a video called “Ten things I hate about Jews.”
McInnes was at the storming of the U.S. Capitol. In December, Proud Boys in Washington, DC were wearing shirts that read “6MWE” - Six Million Wasn’t Enough, suggesting that even more Jews should have been killed in the Holocaust.
https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/proud-boys-bigotry-full-display
Keean Bexte promoted the “Yellow Vests Convoy” in Ottawa. Bexte was a recruiter for the Manning Centre for Democracy & staffer for a CPC Alberta MP, & called for ending birthright citizenship in Canada at a CPC policy convention.
Rebel Media reporter worked for white supremacist web store Keean Bexte identified as one of the operators of Fireforce Ventures
Bexte ran “FireForce Ventures” a website that sold Rhodesian military paraphernalia from a time when Zimbabwe was ruled by a white supremacist government.
Bexte’s FireForce partners included Canadian Military & another CPC staffer, Adam Strashok. Strashok ran Jason Kenney’s call centre during his United Conservative Party (UCP) leadership run.
Meet the Canadian soldiers behind a white supremacist military surplus store Investigation connects Canadian Forces members to Fireforce Ventures, a web store glorifying the era of white rule in Rhodesia
In fact, one of Bexte's correspondents, Kat Kanada is one of the people who has been linked with being paid for spreading Russian propaganda. Bexte was the guy who harrassed Justin Trudeau on the beach.
Other Rebel correspondents include Katie Hopkins, banned by multiple platforms for hate, but hired by The Rebel; Tommy Robinson, a far-right ex-convict from the UK.
A point about Ezra Levant's credibility: he has been successfully sued on a number of occasions. He had to apologize for defaming George Soros in a column for the Sun newspapers; in another case, a court found that Levant “spoke in reckless disregard of the truth.”
Ezra Levant ordered to pay $80,000 in libel suit; judge cites ‘reckless disregard for the truth’ Judgment says the Sun Media personality ‘took little or no responsibility for the accuracy’ of certain statements he published on his personal blog.
Levant worked for Sun TV, created as a "Fox News Canada" and headed by Korey Teneycke. Teneycke worked at CAPP - Canada's oil producers, Stephen Harper’s Dir. of Communications, then at Sun. For his part, Levant was a guest a number of times on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News in 2021.
So, all of the organizational and promotional appartus for the Convoy was already in place in 2019 and a couple of months later, the Conservative Party and oil executives and expert strategists met to discuss how to beat the Liberals. The list is pretty remarkable. https://archive.is/Ok5CB#selection-2079.41-2079.103
“Michael Binnion, CEO of Questerre Energy Corp.; Patrick Ward, CEO of Painted Pony Energy Ltd.; Perpetual Energy Inc. CEO Susan Riddell Rose; and her husband, Mike Rose, head of Tourmaline Oil Corp. [who are] governors of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP)
Federal Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer delivered a keynote address. His national campaign director, Hamish Marshall, and veteran Conservative organizer Mark Spiro spoke on a panel about “rallying the base” by using friendly interest groups that operate independently of the party.
One session at the conference focused on deploying “litigation as a tool” to silence environmental critics and featured U.S. opposition researcher Mike Roman, who served as special assistant and director of special projects and research under Donald Trump until last year. He spoke alongside Arthur Hamilton, a lawyer with Quebec-based Resolute Forest Products, the agenda showed. Mr. Hamilton is also a lawyer for the federal Conservative Party.
Another panel was dubbed “Paths to federal election victory" and was led by an executive for polling firm Ipsos Public Affairs who was introduced by CAPP president Tim McMillan.
Note the presence of Mike Roman, who worked as an organizer for Trump and has been indicted for his role in election crimes.
“POLITICO first reported on Friday that Roman, who ran Election Day operations for Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign, was the one who delivered false elector certificates to the chief of staff to a Pennsylvania congressman, Rep. Mike Kelly, in an attempt to get them to Vice President Mike Pence. It was Kelly’s staff that delivered the list to the office of U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin).
Roman is Assistant Chair, and Stephen Harper the Chair of the IDU - the International Democratic Union.
Who Is Mike Roman? The Trump Indictee with Canadian Ties | The TyeeCharged with US election crimes, Roman strategized with Scheer and helped Harper push a global right-wing agenda.https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/09/06/Mike-Roman-Canadian-Ties/
April - May - June 2020
By April - just a couple of weeks after the pandemic was declared, there were already gatherings and protests by people who were spreading misinformation, arguing that COVID was a hoax. Close to that time, armed militias in Michigan had stormed the state legislature.
July 2, 2020
Cory Hurren, 46, drove from Swan River Manitoba to Ottawa, then drove his truck through the gates of Rideau Hall. Curren was charged with 22 offences, including threatening to cause death and bodily harm. He had bought into right-wing conspiracy theories.
There were various other attempts to push ideas and studies that were really junk science, or science that was essentially corrupted by junk economics. That includes the Great Barrington Declaration.
The convoy was being planned for months. In a video posted in August, organizer Pat King talked about “real bullets” and says that people have no idea what is headed their way.
The Convoy was also built on huge numbers of fake and stolen accounts. Whoever actually did it didn't want anyone to be able to trace it back to them:
Further, the Facebook Groups used to promote the occupation were traced to a company in Bangladesh.
The Canadian ‘Freedom Convoy’ is backed by a Bangladeshi marketing firm and right-wing fringe groupsA Bangladeshi firm appears to have played a key role in promoting the Ottawa protest online, and Grid has found increasing evidence of fringe conspiracies and violent extremism throughout the movement…