Premier Doug Ford has declared a state of emergency in the province of Ontario in response to the ongoing Truckers for Freedom protests taking place in Ottawa and along the Canada-US border.
During a press conference Friday, Ford called the protests a “siege” and “illegal occupation.”
“I call it a siege because that’s what it is. It’s an illegal occupation. This is no longer a protest,” Ford said.
“My message to those still in Ottawa [and] to those at our border crossings – please go home.”
By entering a state of emergency, Ford says he will convene with his cabinet to enact orders to crack down on the protesters.
Ford says it will be illegal to block the movement of goods, people and services along critical infrastructure such as border crossings and the 400 highways. Fines for non-compliance will be up to $100,000 or up to a year in prison.
Reports Thursday said that Ford had turned down opportunities for trilateral talks with protesters for the third time, which would have seen him sit down with convoy organizers and federal and municipal counterparts to hash things out.
On Thursday, the Ontario government also secured a court order to freeze access to millions of dollars donated to the Freedom Convoy through crowdfunding platform GiveSendGo.
In response, GiveSendGo said it would not abide by the Ontario government’s court order.
“Canada has absolutely ZERO jurisdiction over how we manage our funds,” the Christian crowdfunding platform tweeted.
“All funds for EVERY campaign on GiveSendGo flow directly to the recipients of those campaigns, not least of which is The Freedom Convoy campaign.”
The GiveSendGo page had raised $8.7 million US as of Friday, the Freedom Convoy’s 20th day.
