On Day 2 of the Emergencies Act Inquiry, federal bureaucrat Zexi Li claimed that living through the Freedom Convoy felt like being in “The Purge.” The public servant also complained about seeing urine and defecation in the snow.
“I just remember feeling like it was such a surreal sight. It almost felt like you were in something like The Purge because it, though I didn’t often see direct acts of violence there was a certain chaos on the streets,” she told the Public Order Emergency Commission.
Later, in response to questioning from a lawyer, Li acknowledged that she “may” have told the protesters to “go back to where the f*** you are from.”
Downtown Ottawa resident Victoria De La Ronde said she experienced “Phantom Honking” after the Freedom Convoy left the city.
“The long term effects are loss of hearing, loss of balance, some vertigo triggered by the sound of any horn, now triggered by certain music as the music was very loud, and the physical trigger — when I get a smell of gas — both my throat and lungs start to feel infected,” she said.
“I had also a phantom horn blowing as an experience for a number of weeks after.”
Ottawa City Councillor Mathieu Fleury said the trucks in Ottawa during the Freedom Convoy were “weapons.” He also said there were a number of “microaggressions.”
“You couldn’t live, you couldn’t live in that space,” he said. “It was nonstop noise, nonstop pollution.”
Meanwhile, the Vanier Ottawa Business Improvement Area (BIA) head said UberEats were unavailable in downtown Ottawa during the convoy, resulting in Ottawa residents posting evidence of their UberEats receipts.
As well, BIA reps admitted Ottawa businesses chose to close shop during the Freedom Convoy rather than risk a fine for serving maskless customers. Representatives speaking at the Emergency Act Inquisition said businesses that stayed open saw increased revenue.
Ottawa invoked the act in February for the first time in Canadian history to deal with Freedom Convoy demonstrators who were peacefully protesting COVID-19 restrictions like vaccine mandates in the nation’s capital.
At Thursday’s hearing of the Emergencies Act inquisition, two liberty organizations said the Trudeau Liberals were “not justified” in invoking the legislation to grant themselves extreme power
