The grievances of conspiracy theorists and “Freedom Convoy” supporters have cast a long shadow across Canadian politics in 2022 — one that hangs over the capital as Parliament returns from its summer recess.
OTTAWA — Anger, delusion and distrust: ingredients for a troubled democracy — and you can find all three in a darkened shed behind the deconsecrated church of St. Brigid’s.
One morning in late August, Brian Derksen strode into that shed with his little dog, Eli. Derksen wore a leather jacket, and the sunglasses pushed into his grey hair had bright orange flames on the armbands.
By now, the 59-year-old with the gruff voice is recognizable as a proud holdout of the so-called “Freedom Convoy” protests that clogged the streets around Parliament Hill last winter. Having dubbed himself “the trucker that never left,” Derksen is a fixture of the movement’s remnants in the capital, a small but chippy group that has settled into a contested tenancy of a historic former Catholic church in Ottawa’s Lowertown.
The Star is working hard today to make sure you know the Convoy=Poilievre=Hitler but worse!
