Thursday evening, an Ontario, Canada, court effectively froze access to monetary donations to truckers and other Canadians participating in the Freedom Convoy protest in Ottawa, Canada, and elsewhere, through a government order. The Freedom Convoy, a group of more than 50,000 truckers protesting the COVID-19 vaccine mandates and restrictions throughout the Canadian government, raised more than $8 million through the online crowd resourcing platform GiveSendGo after GoFundMe kicked the group off of its own platform last Friday. Now, that money is in limbo as neither truckers nor donors can gain access to it, per the court order.
“BREAKING: The Ontario government says it has effectively frozen all donations made to the trucker convoy through GiveSendGo,” Canadian talkshow host Andrew Lawton tweeted Thursday. “It is now a criminal offence to have any ‘dealing’ with money from donations through this platform.”
BREAKING: The Ontario government says it has effectively frozen all donations made to the trucker convoy through GiveSendGo. It is now a criminal offence to have any "dealing" with money from donations through this platform. pic.twitter.com/EhWWqe1V6J
— Andrew Lawton (@AndrewLawton) February 10, 2022
CBC Canada confirmed the story:
A statement from Premier Doug Ford’s office on Thursday said Attorney General Doug Downey brought the application for the order, under 490.8 of the Criminal Code, to prohibit anyone from distributing donations made through the website’s “Freedom Convoy 2022” and “Adopt-a-Trucker” campaign pages.
Ivana Yelich, spokesperson for the premier, said the order “binds any and all parties with possession or control over these donations.”
The donations have not been seized by the government, merely frozen, but seizure could be the next step.
“This is the section of the criminal code that the Ford government is using to freeze the funds,”Brian Lilley of the Toronto-Sun explained via Twitter. “Note, they have been frozen, not seized at this point, in accordance with a ruling today by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice.”
This is the section of the criminal code that the Ford government is using to freeze the funds.
Note, they have been frozen, not seized at this point, in accordance with a ruling today by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice. #cdnpoli #onpoli #FreedomConvoy2022 #FreedomConvoy pic.twitter.com/xWMsi9x6MW— Brian Lilley (@brianlilley) February 10, 2022
This decision by the Ontario government highlights why attorney for the Freedom Convoy Keith Wilson recently discussed the importance of Bitcoin as another viable solution for the protesters in Canada and elsewhere, as pointed out by The Post Millennial:
“With respect to bitcoin, what we’ve witnessed… what the world has witnessed is the power of government to manipulate the flows of peoples hard-earned dollars, to advance a government’s objectives and to seek to defeat the will of individuals in their democratic process.”
“I have been following bitcoin very closely, it’s a decentralized platform for people to exchange their hard-earned value with someone else for theirs,” Wilson continued.
“It bypasses the constraints and arbitrary controls of government. This is the perfect example of why fiat currency is in trouble.“
The truckers in Ottowa are not the only group protesting via semi-truck nor are they alone in being targeted by their government. As The Daily Wire reported on Thursday, similar protests have cropped up in France with authorities already saying they are not welcome in Paris.
Elsewhere in Canada, truckers have blocked some of the busiest roads between the U.S. and Canada. On Thursday, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer called on Canadian authorities to remove individuals blocking the Ambassador bridge between Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario.
It is unclear how long the GiveSendGo donations will remain frozen.
This article has been expanded after publication to include additional information.