The Daily Show's Jordan Klepper takes the pulse of Ottawa's Freedom Convoy trucker blockade
"Three weeks ago, north of the border, a new kind of protest emerged," Jordan Klepper said on Thursday's Daily Show. "So I traveled to Ottawa, expecting to find some Canada nice, but their messaging was a bit more coarse. These trucks shut down businesses and made roads impassible," paralyzing "Canada's eighth-best city" and drawing the ire of residents and a slow-building response from authorities.
Klepper — who has spent the last few years traveling around and interviewing supporters of former President Donald Trump, QAnon conspiracy theorists, and anti-vaxxers — did find some reluctant "Make North America Great Again" sloganeers and one guy in a QAnon hat, but the protesters he encountered in Ottawa were mostly preoccupied with threats to what they called freedom. He did point out some cross-border "cultural appropriation" — like Nazi Germany comparisons — but also a lot that could only be called Canadian.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Why is the Pentagon taking over the military’s independent newspaper?Today’s Big Question Stars and Stripes is published by the Defense Department but is editorially independent
-
How Mars influences Earth’s climateThe explainer A pull in the right direction
-
‘The science is clear’Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
Why Greenland’s natural resources are nearly impossible to mineThe Explainer The country’s natural landscape makes the task extremely difficult
-
Iran cuts internet as protests escalateSpeed Reada Government buildings across the country have been set on fire
-
US nabs ‘shadow’ tanker claimed by RussiaSpeed Read The ship was one of two vessels seized by the US military
-
Maduro pleads not guilty in first US court hearingSpeed Read Deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores pleaded not guilty to cocaine trafficking and narco-terrorism conspiracy
-
Iran’s government rocked by protestsSpeed Read The death toll from protests sparked by the collapse of Iran’s currency has reached at least 19
-
Israel approves new West Bank settlementsSpeed Read The ‘Israeli onslaught has all but vanquished a free Palestinian existence in the West Bank’
-
US offers Ukraine NATO-like security pact, with caveatsSpeed Read The Trump administration has offered Ukraine security guarantees similar to those it would receive from NATO
-
Hong Kong court convicts democracy advocate LaiSpeed Read Former Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai was convicted in a landmark national security trial
