Public Safety Committee on March 3rd, 2022

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

You knew the law was being broken in a variety of different ways in Ottawa. Your platform says that GiveSendGo is not a place for hatred, abuse, disrespect, profanity, meanness, harassment or spam. You knew there were reports, documented on video, of supporters of this convoy spewing hate, threatening violence, inciting people to rebel against the government and against the citizens of Ottawa.

Would your platform not have reasonably shut that down?

[Jacob Wells]

I'll reiterate that GiveSendGo does not condone violence of any form. We believe there's more power in the unity of peaceful protest. As in any polarized situation, we recognize there will be a few individuals and groups who might intentionally try to incite violence and hijack a movement.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

How many are okay, then? How many bad apples are okay in a bunch?

[Jacob Wells]

We already have processes in place with law enforcement to take care of bad actors who are actually committing acts of violence.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

How did you do that in this case? When you read hateful speech and when there were people who were speaking about overthrowing the government, inciting violence, did you shut those funds down? Did you prevent them from accessing the funds?

[Jacob Wells]

Again, the Canadian government did not reach out to us—

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I'm asking about your terms of use, sir, the terms of use on your site.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, that line of questioning is very important, and we're all very passionate about this, but I think it's getting a bit abusive. I would just ask the member to take a breath, ask his questions, but this is getting a bit too much. It's bordering on abusive at this point. I'd just ask him to take a breath.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Okay, you can resume your questioning.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

The breath has been taken. Now let me ask you again.

Your site explicitly says about prohibited activities and campaigns the following

You may not use the GiveSendGo service for activities that violate any law, statute, ordinance or regulation related to...(c) items that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity, (d) items that promote hate, violence, racial intolerance, or the financial exploitation of a crime.

That's a pretty broad set of parameters. Is this on the basis of statute that is created by law, or at the discretion of GiveSendGo?

[Jacob Wells]

There's discretion around campaigns. As people have previously mentioned, this was an ongoing situation that was evolving quite rapidly. There is discretion within GiveSendGo to understand and make determinations upon whether those things are actually happening, in conjunction with local law enforcement or federal officials, none of which took the time to actually reach out to us and make us aware of those things.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Having now seen what you have seen, knowing what you now know, would you allow this type of funder to take place again?

[Jacob Wells]

It's something we take on a case-by-case basis. We have to navigate each one of these individually. The campaign itself was by a distinct group of individuals.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Thank you very much.

I now invite Ms. Michaud to take the floor, for six minutes.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here, Mr. Wells. We appreciate it.

I'm going to strive for a different tone, but a number of things you said worry me. I got the impression that, in the United States, where you are, the freedom convoy wasn't at all covered or perceived in the way that we here in Ottawa saw and experienced it.

I want to hear what you have to say about that. The way you spoke made it seem as though the movement was completely acceptable, as though you had no reason to raise a red flag and put a stop to the fundraising campaign.

I want to hear how you perceived that whole movement.

[Jacob Wells]

Americans, obviously, are different from Canadians in some respects. The perception we had over here, at least that I had, was that there was a protest going on against the overreaches of what some people believed the Canadian government to be involved in.

We believe that protest is fundamental to democracy and it needs to be upheld. Our own vice-president of the United States, two years ago, when navigating the protests happening throughout the U.S., and even around the world, said that peaceful protests and peaceful protesters need to be defended. We recognize that freedom is fundamental to all good things, but there are also ramifications to freedom. There's a tension and a balance. We try to navigate it as best we can.

What we were saying and feeling, coming out from what we were observing, was that this was a largely peaceful protest, with an attempt to marginalize it by a fringe percentage of the group that was trying to tarnish the whole thing. That's typically not how we operate, taking fringe elements to then broad stroke large movements.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I agree with you that protests are lawful and fundamental to democracy. However, when a protest becomes unlawful and turns into an occupation, as the freedom convoy did, certain questions have to be asked. I'm not familiar with the laws in the United States, but in Canada, blocking a public roadway is illegal. When a protest has ties to the far right, it's worrisome. Certain questions have to be asked.

You said that you weren't contacted by the Government of Canada or Canadian law enforcement and that you weren't told to put a stop to the fundraiser. At a certain point, GoFundMe decided to do just that on its own initiative. I would say the majority of Canadians think that was the right decision, albeit a bit late.

If neither the Government of Canada nor Canadian police forces contacted you, did you hear from the Ontario Superior Court of Justice? I would think you heard about the injunction ordering that the convoy's funds be frozen.

[Jacob Wells]

I think there were news reports coming out that made mention of some of those Ontario court rulings. I can say that I did hear about it through the news.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

That wasn't a strong enough sign for you to think that it may be appropriate to stop the campaign, which was clearly funding a movement that was becoming disproportionately large—

[Jacob Wells]

Again, I do think some of the terminology around this needs to be accurate, and obviously broad-stroking movements such as “occupations” and militaristic things, which were definitely not the case in these situations, just tend to polarize situations even more.

This, as we've mentioned, was an ongoing situation that was rapidly evolving, and we try to do the best with the foundation. I mentioned this before that our foundation is that the freedoms we have in western society came at a very high price and we won't trample on those lightly. Those freedoms came from the blood of men and women who died to give us freedom.

For us to just trample on people's freedoms because it's uncomfortable to some people, that's something we are very hesitant to do. We look at that because it's respectful of the sacrifices that have been made by men and women who have given up their safety for the sake of us to live in freedom.

We want to see that continue to happen. We want people to have freedom. We believe it as a core ethic for all good things. That's how we posture ourselves as a platform of hope and freedom for people.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I'm curious as to how you can determine what constitutes freedom for a group of Canadians who are calling for that freedom, without really knowing what they are asking for or what the federal measures are that they are protesting against. You make it sound as though you were acting in good faith, as though you didn't really know what was going on and as though it was appropriate to keep it all going. You criticized GoFundMe for deciding to end—

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

I'm sorry, Ms. Michaud.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I'll try to pick up this conversation later. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

We now move to the last speaker of this first round of questioning, Mr. MacGregor. You have six minutes, and the floor is yours, sir.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Wells, for appearing before our committee. As I'm sure you can imagine, this is still a very sensitive topic for our country, and I think in the weeks and months ahead we as an entire country will be trying to peel away the layers to figure out how we got to this place. I do appreciate the fact that you did come before our committee.

From GiveSendGo's perspective, do you feel it is important to abide by and respect Canadian law?