Allard’s Alaska Freedom Convoy Should Be a Rallying Cry for Progressives
The same group of individuals who railed against COVID-19 citywide shutdowns for nearly two years and opposed vaccine mandates have shut down streets in Ottawa.
Initially centered on vaccine demands enforced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government, the Canadian protests have recently expanded to include more significant rallies against general pandemic laws such as vaccination mandates, shutdowns, and mask requirements. The hashtag, #FreedomConvoy, went viral on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, as well as the messaging app Telegram — a social media platform often used by members of the far-right and ultra-conservatives who have been kicked off their mainstream counterparts.
James Bauder, one of the Canadian convoy's main organizers, has previously shown sympathy for QAnon and has repeatedly shared the hashtag "#WWG1WGA" — the rallying cry for the movement. He has also promoted conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Bauder has called COVID-19 a "political scam" and, according to VICE, has blamed George Soros, Bill Gates, and vaccine-maker Pfizer for creating the virus.
Now, copycat activists in the United States are eager to follow the example of the "Freedom Convoy." Brian Brase, co-organizer of a planned convoy to Washington, D.C., told Fox News that it violated human rights to be mandated to take the COVID-19 vaccine.
Facebook, who labeled QAnon a "violence-inducing conspiracy network" in October 2020, said in a statement provided to Fox News that they had shut down the U.S. convoy's associated Facebook page for "repeatedly violating our policies around QAnon." The company has removed several other convoy pages from its service for violations of its terms of service.
Anchorage Assemblyperson Jamie Allard's "Alaska Freedom Convoy" was precisely what we knew it would be — a rallying cry for Alaska's far-right movement that has entrenched itself in a private and hidden network of affiliated social media groups. Its members, encouraged by rhetoric and conspiracy theories, have waged a political war against what they often call the 'radical socialist Marxist leftist' members of the Anchorage Assembly.
Last Sunday, as a stream of vehicles left Cabela's parking lot, which served as the home base for Allard's "Alaska Freedom Convoy," I snapped a photograph of a vehicle that prominently displayed the rallying cry for the dangerous QAnon conspiracy theory movement.
"Freedom, Where We Go One, We Go All," the sign read, ominously painted in the colors of the American flag.
The windows of some other vehicles that participated in Allard's convoy had been painted with the acronym F.I.B (Federally Immune Bandits), purportedly demonstrating an individual's right to choose vaccinations is more important than the government's right to protect its citizens.
The Anchorage Daily News published five paragraphs about Sunday's event and printed photographs of vehicles adorned with flags.
The picture is bigger than that.
On the same day as Allard's event, Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson declared a state of emergency and told a local radio station that the situation in Ottawa was "completely out of control." Yesterday, Ottawa police announced that seven more people had been arrested, more than 60 criminal investigations had been opened, and hundreds of tickets had been issued with police citing criminal mischief, property damage, hate crimes, and other offenses.
New Democratic Party (NDP) leader Jagmeet Singh also said yesterday that Canada needed to begin investigating foreign interference and support for an anti-government protest in the country's capital.
"It is clear that this is not a protest; this is an act to try to overthrow the government, and it is getting funded by foreign interference, and we need to investigate and stop that – stop the flow of that foreign interference, particularly coming from the [United] States," said Singh.
Bruce Heyman, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Canada under former President Barack Obama, tweeted on Saturday, "Under no circumstances should any group in the USA fund disruptive activities in Canada. Period. Full stop."
Mark Carney, former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England wrote an opinion piece Monday suggesting that anyone sending money to the Canadian convoy was "funding sedition" and that it was time to follow the money flooding into Canada in support of the Freedom Convoy.
"The involvement of foreign governments and any officials connected to them should be identified, exposed, and addressed," he wrote.
As Canadian officials say that the evidence is beginning to demonstrate that the disruptive and threatening "Freedom Convoy" occupation of Ottawa is being funded and supported by far-right activists in the United States, it seems implausible that Anchorage Assemblyperson Allard and Alaska Representative David Eastman would continue encouraging Alaskans to donate to the convoy even after GoFundMe shut down the original fundraiser citing evidence from law enforcement that the demonstration had now become an occupation — but that's what they're doing. Incredibly, nobody is asking either one of them why.
The likely answer, at least in Allard's case, is that as a candidate for state office, she's selfishly using the turmoil in Canada to bolster her political aspirations, just as we've seen her do with the members of Save Anchorage, encouraging them to rally around whatever political cause she or the Bronson administration wants to inflict upon the city. Having a following of individuals who think nothing of wearing Holocaust imagery on live television or run down to an assembly meeting to yell and scream is a helpful resource for a member of the far-right to have, especially if your goal is to portray a false image that your viewpoint is representative of the entire city.
Allard, shoring up her base with people who think nothing of publicly displaying yellow stars and those proud to display the QAnon rallying cry, should be just the motivation progressives need to send every one of the Save Anchorage-backed candidates running for Anchorage Assembly back into their holes in April.
