Tensions between Ottawa residents and protesters remained high on Tuesday as a growing protest against Canada’s COVID-19 vaccine mandates stretched beyond a second week.
The protests began in late January, when thousands gathered in Canada’s capital to demand an end to vaccine mandates, masks and lockdowns. Others were, in part, protesting a rule that took effect Jan. 15 requiring truckers entering Canada be fully immunized against the coronavirus. The United States has imposed the same requirement on truckers entering that country.
The Canadian Trucking Alliance said a great number of the protesters have no connection to the trucking industry, adding they have a separate agenda to push. The alliance notes the vast majority of drivers are vaccinated.
Demonstrations have not abated in what turned into Canada’s largest pandemic protest to date, and have spread to other cities across the country.
Protests on Tuesday shut down the Ambassador Bridge, a key artery between Detroit in the United States and Windsor, Canada. Windsor Police said that "limited traffic" was being allowed on the bridge, but urged motorists to "avoid the area and use alternate route."
Michigan's Department of Transportation urged drivers to use alternate routes.
In Canada’s largest city, Toronto, police over the weekend controlled and later ended a much smaller protest by setting up roadblocks and preventing any trucks or cars from getting near the provincial legislature. Police also moved in to clear a key intersection in the city.
Thousands of protesters descended in Ottawa again on the weekend, joining a hundred who remained since last weekend.
Protesters in Ottawa have said they won’t leave until all mandates and COVID-19 restrictions are gone. They are also calling for the removal of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government, though it is responsible for few of the measures, most of which were put in place by provincial governments.
Organizers, including one who has espoused white supremacist views, have raised millions for the cross-country “freedom truck convoy” against vaccine mandates.
Residents of Ottawa are furious at the nonstop blaring of horns, traffic disruption and harassment, as well as the offensive rhetoric displayed across some of the protests.
At the outset of the protests, some people parked on the grounds of the National War Memorial and danced on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier; others carried signs and flags with swastikas and some used the statue of Canadian hero Terry Fox to display an anti-vaccine statement, sparking widespread condemnation.
By Sunday, Ottawa had declared a state of emergency. The mayor pleaded for almost 2,000 extra police officers to help quell the raucous nightly demonstrations staged by the so-called Freedom Truck Convoy, which has used hundreds of parked trucks to paralyze the Canadian capital’s business district.
“Individuals are trying to blockade our economy, our democracy and our fellow citizens' daily lives, it has to stop,” Trudeau, who himself was recently diagnosed with COVID-19, said in a Monday evening speech. “This is a story of a country that got through this pandemic by being united – and a few people shouting and waving swastikas does not define who Canadians are.”
Trudeau has portrayed the protesters as a small but vocal fraction of Canada’s population, which has one of the highest vaccination rates in the world.
"Canadians have the right to protest, to disagree with their government, and to make their voices heard," Trudeau wrote on Twitter Monday night. "We’ll always protect that right. But let’s be clear: They don’t have the right to blockade our economy, or our democracy, or our fellow citizens’ daily lives. It has to stop."
"So far, hundreds of RCMP officers have been mobilized to support the Ottawa Police Services," he added. "We’re also working with municipal partners to further strengthen our response, and we’ll continue to be there with whatever resources are needed to get the situation under control."
But the movement has garnered support from several Republican lawmakers and groups in the United States, including former President Donald Trump, who recently railed against Trudeau as a “far left lunatic” who has “destroyed Canada with insane Covid mandates.”
After crowdfunding site GoFundMe said it would refund or redirect to charities the vast majority of the millions raised by demonstrators protesting in the Canadian capital, prominent U.S. Republicans like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis complained.
But GoFundMe had already changed its mind and said it would be issuing refunds to all. The site said it cut off funding for the organizers because it had determined the effort violated the site’s terms of service due to unlawful activity.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxon tweeted that “Patriotic Texans donated to Canadian truckers’ worthy cause” and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz said on Fox News “government doesn’t have the right to force you to comply to their arbitrary mandates.”
Over the weekend, a group of Alaska truck drivers rallied in support of their counterparts in Canada. More than 100 truck drivers on Sunday drove the 10 miles from Anchorage to Eagle River to support truckers in Canada who have been protesting vaccine mandates in Ottawa, the Anchorage Daily News reported.
Canada’s public safety minister said Monday that U.S. officials should stay out of his country’s domestic affairs, joining other Canadian leaders in pushing back against prominent Republicans who offered support for the protests of COVID-19 restrictions.