The following article is a broad timeline of the course of events surrounding the Canada convoy protest, a series of protests and blockades in Canada in early 2022. The protest, which was called the Freedom Convoy () by organizers, was "first aimed at a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for cross-border truckers" when the convoy of hundreds of vehicles, including semi-trailers, headed towards Ottawa, Ontario the nation's capital, starting on January 22. The protesters quickly changed their messaging to include demands that all COVID-19-related public health restrictions be lifted.
By late January and early February, the professional trucking industry and labour groups, such as Canadian Trucking Alliance (CTA), Teamsters Canada, Canadian Labour Congress, had published statements distancing their members from the convoy protest.
By January 29, when the convoy converged in what became known as the red zone in Ottawa, there were estimates of from 8,000 to 18,000 pedestrian protesters at its peak on the first weekend and hundreds of vehicles, including 18-wheelers that were parked directly on Wellington Street, in front of the Prime Minister's office.
In spite of an injunction by a judge and the invocation of three levels of states of emergency, municipal, provincial, and federal, protesters temporarily refused to end blockades and the occupation of the red zone. On February 14, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act.
Over the weekend of February 17 to 20, a large joint-operation police presence in Ottawa arrested about 200 organizers and protesters, laid 389 charges, issued fines, removed the heavy trucks and trailers with 79 vehicles towed away, seized 36 license plates, and dismantled encampments across the city. Action was taken against thirty-six commercial vehicles by the Ministry of Transportation. By February 20, the area surrounding the Parliamentary Precinct, occupied by protesters for three weeks, was fenced off by police after it has been secured by a series of police advances pushing the crowd away from Parliament Hill. A heavy police presence remained.
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All times specified or approximated given in Eastern Time, or UTC-5:00:
Preceding events 2020 January 25: The first "presumptive" case of COVID-19 was reported in Canada. May 30: The first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada, lasted 175 day, peaked on day 127, May 30, 2020, with 35,040 active cases, and ended 48 days after the peak with 35,040 active cases and 8,839 deaths.These figures are from the article Timeline of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada.
2021 January 10: The second wave, lasted 230 days, peaked on January 10, day 17, with 85,595 active cases. The second wave was the deadliest of the five waves with 13,312 deaths. There were no vaccinations available at that time. April 18: Vaccination campaigns began during the third wave, which peaked on April 18 with 89,884 cases. Vaccination campaigns began during this wave. While the number of cases increased slightly, the number of deaths, 2,569 decreased during the third wave. September 26: The Delta wave reached its peak on September 26 with 51,747 cases. It was during the fourth (Delta) wave that vaccine mandates and passports began to be considered as free vaccinations were widely available across Canada. The lowest number of deaths, 2,569 occurred during the fourth wave because of the high uptake on vaccinations and the weakening of strains and mutations thereof. October: New United States Department of Homeland Security regulations, released in October 2021, were regarding cross-border travel between the Canada and the United States and were based on guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. To prevent supply chain disruptions, the DHS allowed for a window of four monthsuntil January 22, 2022for Canadian truckers to get fully vaccinated against COVID-19. November 19: The Public Health Agency of Canada announced upcoming adjustments to Canada's border measures. This would include the requirement for essential service providers, including truck drivers, to be fully vaccinated after January 15, 2022. The announcement clarified that unvaccinated or partially vaccinated foreign national truck drivers would be prohibited from entering Canada after that date. Unvaccinated Canadian truck drivers could enter Canada but would have to quarantine for two weeks. According to the Canadian Press and CBC, as of January 22, the mandates would impact an estimated 26,000 unvaccinated truckers of the 160,000 truck drivers who regularly cross the border in both the United States and Canada. When asked in the House of Commons to produce data linking truckers to COVID-19 infections in Canada, neither the minister of health Jean-Yves Duclos nor the chief public health officer Theresa Tam were able to do so. December: Pat King, a native of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario who would become an organizer of the convoy, said of public health measures: "The only way this is going to be solved is with bullets." Mid-December: Canada Unity posted the Memorandum of Understanding on their website and sent copies to the Governor General of Canada and the Canadian Senate. until its February 8 retraction. One of the main organizers behind the convoy, Canada Unity (CU), acknowledged that they had planned to submit their signed "memorandum of understanding" (MoU) to the Senate of Canada and Governor General Mary Simon, described in the MoU as the "SCGGC". The MoU which was signed by James and Sandra Bauder and Martin Brodmann, was posted on the Canada Unity website in mid-December 2021 and publicly available Bauder, whose name is at the top of a CTV News' list of "major players" in the convoy, is the founder of Canada Unity. CTV cited Bauder saying that he hoped the signed MoU would convince Elections Canada to trigger an election, which is not constitutionally possible. In this pseudolegal document, CU called on the "SCGGC" to cease all vaccine mandates, reemploy all employees terminated due to vaccination status, and rescind all fines imposed for non-compliance with public health orders. If this failed, the MoU called on the "SCGGC" to dissolve the government, and name members of the CU to form a Canadian Citizens Committee (CCC), which is beyond the constitutional powers of either the Governor General or the Senate. The original MoU contained no specific mention of cross-border truckers as it had originally been drafted and delivered over a month earlier, but then was reissued for the protest.
2022 January 9: The fifth (Omicron) wave reached a peak with the number of active cases reaching a record high of 443,676.These figures are from the article "Timeline of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada." January 13: CBC radio reports the government has mandated that all truck drivers crossing the border must be vaccinated, reversing previous provisions for truck drivers. <CBC News post January 13, 2022> The Ontario Provincial Police report by 'Project Hendon'OPP investigations into "illegal activity or threats to public safety" related to the protestswas shared with other police agencies. The Hendon report mentioned the Freedom Convoy for the first time. January 15: The January 15 enforcement of the vaccination requirement applies to truckers who are entering Canada at international border crossings. Since January 15, unvaccinated American cross-border truckers have been denied entry into Canada. Canadian truckers who are not fully vaccinated "have to show proof of a negative PCR test collected within 72 hours of arriving at the border"; they also "need to quarantine after arrival". January 20: A January 20 OPP intelligence report said that due to the number of people that were both "financially invested" as well as "ideologically invested" in the truck convoy, they could include a large number of protesters with the potential of gridlocking Parliament Hill area "for an extended period". A Globe and Mail article reported that in January, the OPP had warned that the convoy had "no end date". More than a half dozen OPP intelligence reports were produced in January, according to documents tabled on October 19 during the Rouleau Inquiry's public hearings. January 21: The OPP began to hold daily teleconferences on Project Hendon. January 22: A reciprocal vaccination requirement for the cross-border trucking industry has been in place since January 22, when the United States enforced theirs, affecting unvaccinated American truckers returning to the United States. Unvaccinated Canadian truckers are denied entry to the United States. The first convoy departed Prince Rupert, arriving in Prince George in the evening.
Convoy January 23–27 January 23, 2022: A convoy left from Delta with supporters gathering along Highway 1, the Trans-Canada Highway. January 24: In Saskatchewan, police in Regina reported that there were supporters greeting a convoy of about 1,200 vehicles as it drove through the Regina. Emails uncovered and shared in February with the media by Distributed Denial of Secretsa public interest non-profit transparency organizationincluding those dated on January 24 and January 27, source indicated that James Bauder was the Ottawa Police Service's main contacts for "planning and logistics" for the Ottawa "occupation". Garrah has been described as one of the convoy organizers; Bulford, who is a former RCMP officer, who is associated with the anti-vaccination "Mounties for Freedom" group, has been described as a convoy "spokesman." The emails included three possible plans for the occupation, two of which were legal. Plan C, which would entail "We occupying "anywhere and everywhere we can possibly go" was not legal as if including occupying "[r]oadways, highways, Parliament, public properties and NCC parking lots" which reflects the actual events. January 25: Chris Garrah's email to the Ottawa Police Service contained a list of 16 "top convoy organizers" with their names and contact information. Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) who were in contact with another convoy through Kenora, Ontario, reported that 200–300 vehicles were involved. The convoys consisted of three main routes across Canada, which would converge for the Ottawa protest on the weekend. January 26: According to the October 17, 2022 testimony of Steve Kanellakos, Ottawa's city manager, during the Rouleau inquiry, Steve Ball, President of the Ottawa Hoteliers Association wrote to city officials saying that a message purportedly on behalf of the Canada United Truckers Convoy, was looking for hotel rooms for an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 members for a period of up to 90 days financed by the $3 million raised through crowd funding. Ball reported that the Convoy contact described how they would "leave their trucks in place, chain them together, and attempt to block all accesses to the city." The Ottawa Police Service expected an estimated 2,000 demonstrators in Ottawa by January 28 weekend. The OPP estimated approximately 400 vehicles had entered Ontario from the Manitoba border as part of the eastbound convoy. In a phone interview Jason LaFace, one of the road captains of the convoy, said he was involved in assisting the senior organizers of the Convoy. Laface said the convoy team had an MOU delivered to the Senate and GG which garnered close to 500,000 signatures requesting to open an joint committee investigation into the unlawful manadates and with full transparency communicate with Canadians." He compared mask mandates which forced him to wear a mask in grocery stores to "living in Nazi Germany". He concluded by saying Trudeau was a criminal. The Toronto Star reported on a Kitchener Today interview with LaFace, in which he said that the convoy was "no longer about the mandate." It was "about Canada...about our rights and how the government's been manipulating the population and oppressing us all the time." January 27: