TORONTO—The so-called “Freedom Convoy” of Canadian truckers that has snarled traffic in the streets of major cities in the country from coast to coast the last several days is increasingly being exposed as a truckload of conspiratorial, white supremacist, and fascist-leaning BS.
Though conservative politicians and propagandists have given the protest the thumbs-up and tried to portray it as a spontaneous working-class demonstration against an elitist government, the clear links between convoy organizers and international far-right networks indicate it is nothing of the sort.
Instead, it is a Canadian expression of the same global phenomenon that has seen extremist big money interests parading in the guise of fake populism in one country after another.
Far-right backers from U.S. and Europe
Confederate flags and banners with neo-Nazi symbols flutter in skies turned black by the smoke-billowing exhaust stacks of the big rigs, while Trump-imitating chants, such as the oh-so-creative “Make Canada Great Again,” alternate with the cacophonous sound of air horns.
“This is far from a ‘freedom’ convoy,” the Communist Party of Canada said in a statement this past weekend. “This is a convoy of hate which has threatened and attacked the civilian populations in Ottawa and everywhere it has passed through.”
The Canadian Anti-Hate Network says that if you look at the convoy’s organizers and promoters, “you’ll find Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, racism, and incitements to violence.” The group has completed an exhaustive run-down of all the key movers behind the convoy and found that it’s the same group of far-right extremists who’ve been pushing conspiracies and anti-labor causes since long before the pandemic.