(Jacob Bruns, Headline USA) A Canadian Court has ruled that the country’s prime minister, Justin Trudeau, took unjustified actions against Canadian truckers who protested the liberal nation’s stringent lockdowns in February of 2022, the Guardian reported Tuesday.
Justice Richard Mosley called Trudeau’s actions as Prime Minister “unreasonable and illegal” in a recently released decision.
At the time, Trudeau enacted the Emergencies Act, bequeathing himself limitless powers to crush his political opposition.
Trudeau used military-style force along with financial powers, having his government tell institutions to freeze all assets and personal bank accounts associated with Freedom Convoy participants.
According to the ruling, the Freedom Convoy posed enough of a threat to warrant some government action, but did not trigger the Emergencies Act that Trudeau used so eagerly to crush his political opponents.
“While the Court recognized that the occupation of downtown Ottawa and the blockades of the ports of entry were matters of serious concern calling for government and police action, the threshold of national emergency required by the Act was not met,” Mosley wrote in his ruling, noting that Trudeau could have had recourse to several other less severe laws.
At the time, the Prime Minister justified his decision by arguing that, in enacting the Emergency Act, he would only use it a little bit.
“We are not preventing the right of people to protest legally,” he said. “The act is to be used sparingly and as a last resort.”
Trudeau’s administration will fight the ruling.
In the wake of the court’s decision, Chrystia Freeland, the deputy prime minister, noted that the Canadian government would appeal the ruling, arguing that she and the rest of the administration acted to protect the Canadian people.
“The public safety of Canadians was under threat, our national security, which includes our national economic security was under threat,” she said. “It was a hard decision to take.”
