(LifeSiteNews) — The Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) on Monday condemned Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s invoking of the Emergencies Act (EA) as both unfounded and dangerous.
“The federal government has not met the threshold necessary to invoke the Emergencies Act. This law creates a high and clear standard for good reason: the Act allows government to bypass ordinary democratic processes. This standard has not been met,” wrote the CCLA in a tweet.
According to the CCLA, “The Emergencies Act can only be invoked when a situation ‘seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada’ & when the situation ‘cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.’”
The CCLA highlighted the danger the Emergencies Act could pose to civil liberties: “Governments regularly deal with difficult situations, and do so using powers granted to them by democratically elected representatives. Emergency legislation should not be normalized. It threatens our democracy and our civil liberties.”
Yesterday, the Trudeau government invoked the Emergencies Act (EA) for the first time in Canadian history, with the stated intention of dealing with the Freedom Convoy border crossing blockades.
“The blockades are harming our economy and endangering public safety,” Trudeau told a news conference. “We cannot and will not allow illegal and dangerous activities to continue.”
The Act allows the Canadian Government to “suspend or freeze personal or corporate accounts they believe are being used to fund illegal protests,” Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland said at the news conference, according to CNN.
LifeSiteNews’ Kennedy Hall also noted that Section 19 of the Emergencies Act says that public assembly, travel rights, and even the use of certain property could be restricted if it goes into effect.
The EA replaced the older War Measures Act in 1988, used by Trudeau’s father to respond to a domestic militaristic threat posed by a Quebecois nationalist group that was kidnapping and killing politicians.
As Hall pointed out, “In this case, Justin Trudeau is not invoking war powers, but rather seeking to justify using federal powers to squash a freedom movement that is engaging in civil disobedience peacefully.”
The provincial premiers of Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec, and Alberta have all opposed the use of the EA, “calling it unnecessary,” Rebel News noted.
The CCLA’s condemnation of the EA came only “an hour after the New York Times published an article describing Trudeau’s actions as a move to “temporarily suspend civil liberties,” according to Rebel News.
The newspaper later retracted the description, tweeting, “An earlier tweet incorrectly suggested that Trudeau would temporarily suspend civil liberties. We deleted the incorrect tweet.”