Journal Staff
Residents of Sarnia-Lambton donated at least $14,000 to the crowdfunding website GiveSendGo to support the Freedom Convoy protest in Ottawa last month.
Data obtained by DDoSecrets and shared with The Journal indicate more than 140 individuals from Sarnia-Lambton gave donations ranging from $5 to $1,500 to back the Ottawa protest.
DDoSecrets, or Distributed Denial of Secrets, is a non-profit whistleblower site for news leaks that obtained the hacked data on Feb. 13.
Two campaigns on GiveSendGo - “Freedom Convoy 2022” and “Adopt-a-Trucker”- raised $8.4 million (US) and $540,000 (US) respectively before the website went down on Feb. 13.
GiveSendGo became the go-to donation portal after another U.S.-based crowdfunder, GoFundMe, raised $10 million but cancelled its campaign, citing “the promotion of violence and harassment” in Ottawa.
After the federal government invoked the Emergency Act, police moved in to clear the Ottawa protest zone and arrested at least 170 people.
In Lambton County, those opposed to COVID-19 restrictions used tractors, trucks and other vehicles to block part of Highway 402 near Forest Road. The six-day blockade ended on Feb. 14.