PJ The Belt - July 24, 2025


Canada Wants 10 YEARS in PRISON for Trucker Convoy - What's Going on？

Alberta & Saskatchewan UNITE for MASSIVE Pipeline - Trump Deal Incoming？! Trump Backs Alberta INDEPENDENCE DEAL？! U.S. Recognition Changes Everything!

Episode Stats


Length

8 minutes

Words per minute

149.22

Word count

1,249

Sentence count

100

People

Also mentioned:
Chris Barber Tamara Leach Chavane Wetscher Trudeau Heather Perkins McVeigh Diane Magus

Harmful content

Toxicity

4

sentences flagged

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Tamara Leach and Chris Barber have been charged with mischief for their role in the largest non-violent protest in Canada s history. They have been sentenced to seven and eight years in prison, respectively, for their part in the 2011 protest that blocked the nation s capital for three weeks.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 This moment, right here, was the last flicker of real national pride in Canada.
00:00:07.880 It gave hope for a better tomorrow to a lot of people, but it's all been going downhill ever since.
00:00:15.400 Back in 2022, something incredible happened in Canada.
00:00:20.160 A movement that shook the world.
00:00:22.880 The trucker convoy.
00:00:24.740 Tens of thousands of Canadians stood up in the largest non-violent civil rights protest in the country's history.
00:00:31.080 It was peaceful, it was powerful, and it was heard across the world.
00:00:36.040 But instead of listening, the Canadian government cracked down.
00:00:40.340 Hard.
00:00:41.320 They enacted martial law on their own citizens, froze their bank accounts, seized their assets, and treated them like enemies of the state.
00:00:50.060 All for demanding their freedoms back during the scamdemic of 2022.
00:00:55.220 And here's the kicker.
00:00:56.680 To this day, the two main organizers of the protests are still being dragged through the courts like political prisoners.
00:01:03.820 The federal government is trying to make an example out of them to discourage any future dissent.
00:01:09.480 So what's happening today with the Freedom Convoy?
00:01:12.100 Let's find out.
00:01:13.260 Very quickly, though, if you enjoy these videos, please do me a solid and subscribe.
00:01:18.420 It's free, and you can always unsubscribe later if you change your mind.
00:01:22.040 Thank you, and back to the video.
00:01:24.320 The Crown has finished sentencing submissions against Tamara Leach and Chris Barber,
00:01:28.600 two leaders of the anti-COVID vaccine mandate protests which gridlocked Ottawa in 2022.
00:01:35.160 Justice Heather Perkins McVeigh heard from the Crown prosecutor
00:01:38.400 on why they're seeking an eight-year term for Barber and seven years for Leach.
00:01:43.500 Assistant Crown Prosecutor Chavane Wetscher underlined the Crown isn't prosecuting the political beliefs or ideas of Leach or Barber,
00:01:51.800 but for their actions in encouraging what the court has found constituted a mass mischief.
00:01:57.740 Wetscher says the sentences sought are on the upper end of the scale,
00:02:01.480 but argued that extraordinary harms caused by the protests require an extraordinary sentence,
00:02:07.320 also saying there's no real precedence for this kind of case.
00:02:11.240 During the trial, the court did find that Barber and Leach were considered leaders among portions of the protesters,
00:02:16.740 but didn't have influence over every single protester or their actions.
00:02:21.340 And the Crown admits that while the two may have come to Ottawa with good intentions
00:02:24.780 and have the legal right to protest, the protest's scale and length was unprecedented.
00:02:30.460 After that, Chris Barber's defence attorney, Diane Magus, argued that far worse protests
00:02:36.200 that resulted in worse violence and worse property damage resulted in relatively short sentences
00:02:41.900 and it would be a legal error to apply a lengthy jail term here.
00:02:46.520 As an example, Magus pointed to the G20 protests in Toronto where stores were ransacked,
00:02:52.800 police vehicles were attacked and people went with the explicit intent of committing violence and property damage,
00:02:58.980 yet the longest G20 sentence came to 21 months.
00:03:03.840 Magus noted that Barber and Leach explicitly advocated for non-violence during the convoy protest
00:03:10.060 and Barber, in fact, attempted at one point to move trucks out of the downtown core,
00:03:14.900 though he was unsuccessful.
00:03:16.200 Magus arguing that this should be considered during sentencing.
00:03:20.140 Sentencing submissions continue this afternoon.
00:03:23.100 Tamara Leach and Chris Barber.
00:03:24.740 Remember, the two faces of the 2022 trucker convoy are still being put through Canada's so-called justice system.
00:03:31.660 And for what?
00:03:32.760 A charge of mischief?
00:03:34.340 Not violence, not destruction.
00:03:37.120 Mischief.
00:03:38.440 Yet they've endured one of the longest trials in recent Canadian history.
00:03:42.540 Now, the federal government wants to lock them up for seven and eight years, respectively.
00:03:47.940 Think about that.
00:03:50.040 Nearly a decade behind bars for organizing a mostly peaceful protest.
00:03:54.900 And it doesn't stop there.
00:03:56.700 The government's also trying to take away Chris Barber's livelihood.
00:04:00.180 His truck.
00:04:01.180 Big Red.
00:04:02.300 That's how he fits his family.
00:04:04.140 And they want to seize it and destroy it.
00:04:06.760 Why?
00:04:07.880 Because he dared to stand up.
00:04:09.440 You might recall, Litch and Barber were two of the organizers of the convoy that rolled into Ottawa at the end of January in 2022.
00:04:17.500 It rocked the nation's capital for three weeks and eventually ended with the Emergencies Act being invoked,
00:04:24.080 with police dragging folks off, and with Barber and Litch being charged and then eventually convicted with mischief.
00:04:32.820 That's it.
00:04:33.460 Mischief.
00:04:33.880 But the Crown, in this case, has put forward sentencing recommendations of seven years for Litch and eight years for Barber.
00:04:41.300 If you didn't think that this was already a politically motivated prosecution, well, think again.
00:04:47.660 Now, I have to point out that nobody gets seven and eight years for mischief.
00:04:51.920 This is a ridiculous request by the Crown Attorney's Office.
00:04:55.360 Let's just call it what it is. 0.76
00:04:57.600 Canada has political prisoners now.
00:04:59.520 In a so-called democracy, Tamara Leach and Chris Barber are being crushed by the full weight of the federal government.
00:05:07.940 Not because they were violent, not because they broke things, but because they dared to speak out against government overreach.
00:05:15.000 This isn't about justice.
00:05:16.740 It's about retribution.
00:05:18.320 Plain and simple.
00:05:19.380 While actual violent protests erupt across the country, vandalism, arson, assaults, you name it,
00:05:27.740 and those involved walk free with barely a slap on the wrist,
00:05:32.220 the peaceful truckers are facing nearly a decade in prison?
00:05:36.020 Make no mistake.
00:05:37.960 This is a warning.
00:05:39.600 The government is trying to destroy their lives to make an example out of them.
00:05:43.820 To send a clear message.
00:05:45.740 Fall in line or else.
00:05:47.340 So ask yourself, if this is how Canada treats peaceful protesters, can you still call it a democracy?
00:05:54.100 The government of the freedom convoy protesters justified?
00:05:58.320 No, not at all.
00:05:59.560 It was Canadians standing up for their rights against the totalitarian regimes that the government was trying to bring down upon them.
00:06:06.140 That thing could have ended very shortly.
00:06:08.960 All Trudeau had to do was come out and talk to the protesters, 0.97
00:06:11.920 but no, he had to go hide underneath his desk and suck his thumb 0.59
00:06:14.980 because he was too afraid to come and talk to the people. 0.85
00:06:18.060 The other political leaders came out and talked to the protesters, 0.99
00:06:20.800 but Trudeau didn't because he was a coward.
00:06:23.140 Crown prosecutors in Ottawa are seeking an eight-year jail sentence for Chris Barber
00:06:29.180 over his involvement in the peaceful freedom convoy protest that took place in Ottawa in 2022.
00:06:37.360 The court is going to hear submissions from Crown prosecutors
00:06:40.560 and from Chris Barber's lawyer on Wednesday, July 23rd and Thursday, July 24th.
00:06:48.280 Even though this protest went on for three weeks,
00:06:52.900 there was no vandalism, there was no violence, there was no uttering threats,
00:06:57.660 there were no cars set on fire, there were no buildings set on fire,
00:07:00.640 and it certainly did inconvenience some residents in Ottawa,
00:07:06.340 but the protest would have ended a lot sooner if the Prime Minister had been willing to meet with the leaders
00:07:14.120 and sit down with them and talk.
00:07:16.900 I'm very grateful on behalf of the Justice Centre, on behalf of Chris Barber,
00:07:21.620 for all of the support these last three years.
00:07:23.860 The Justice Centre is paying for Chris Barber's legal defence.
00:07:28.620 Thanks for your donations, and please continue to donate
00:07:31.380 as we await the court's decision in the weeks ahead.
00:07:35.580 I'm John Carpe. Thanks for listening.
00:07:38.200 All right. Thanks for watching.
00:07:39.740 Thank you for subscribing.
00:07:41.220 Special thanks to those of you who have donated to this project.
00:07:44.200 It is much appreciated, and it helps me continue making videos.
00:07:47.980 See you on the next one. Peace.
00:07:49.640 Peace.
00:07:53.860 Peace.
00:07:55.100 Peace.
00:07:55.980 Peace.
00:07:57.220 Peace.
00:07:58.800 Peace.
00:07:59.060 Peace.
00:08:00.040 Peace.
00:08:01.060 Peace.
00:08:01.780 Peace.
00:08:02.640 Peace.
00:08:17.900 Peace.
00:08:19.540 Peace.
00:08:21.020 Peace.
00:08:21.520 Peace.
00:08:22.200 Peace.