COVID-19
Canada’s border agency says low risk of COVID spreading via paper used to justify ArriveCAN
From LifeSiteNews
The controversial app, which was initially slated to cost taxpayers $80,000 but ended up costing over $50 million, is currently under investigation over allegations of corruption related to government contracts.
Despite Canadian federal authorities at the time admitting the risk of getting a COVID infection from paper forms was low, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) said it was that fear that spurred the creation of the federal government’s $59.5 million scandal-ridden ArriveCAN travel app.
The admission was made by the CBSA’s vice-president Jonathan Moor on April 3, during a testimony at a House of Commons public accounts committee meeting.
“We were told we could catch COVID from touching documents,” said Moor. “Our number one priority initially working with that was to get the electronic form up and running.”
Despite Moor’s claims, Canada’s Public Health Agency’s deputy chief public health officer, Dr. Howard Njoo, had told reporters at the start of the COVID crisis that there was no evidence the coronavirus could be transmitted via paper.
“For postal workers, I am not quite sure what the risk would be,” said Njoo on March 23, 2020. “The risk is not really out there. There should be no chance of interaction.”
The agency noted at the time that proper hand-washing was enough for federal workers who handled a lot of paperwork.
Despite the agency itself admitting there was no risk of virus transmission via paper forms, Moor on March 26, during testimony at the House of Commons government operations committee, again claimed getting infections from paper was a reason ArriveCAN was needed.
“A lot of the individual Border Services officers really were very reluctant to touch paper because the Public Health Agency had said you can catch Covid from touching paper, so the necessity to get a paperless process in place was really important,” said Moor.
Moor, during testimony, also defended his agency’s work on the travel app, but admitted, “We know we made mistakes.”
This prompted Bloc Québécois MP Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné to say to him, “Mr. Moor, all the countries in the world had to deal with that crisis and very few of them thought to have $60 million for an app like ArriveCAN.”
“In some self-respecting countries there are internal controls,” she added.
She then asked Moor if he thought he did a “good job,” to which he replied, “I do believe I did my job well during the pandemic.”
“This is a time where people were crossing the border to return back to Canada when we were told we could catch COVID from touching documents,” he said.
Besides the risk of getting infected from paper as being a reason for needing to create ArrriveCAN, the CBSA had also suggested other reasons why it was needed. In a report from 2023, it claimed that the app had saved travelers “five minutes” of time at border crossings, however, this claim was disputed by the Customs and Immigration Union.
The CBSA has also claimed that ArriveCAN “saved lives,” which is a claim it has recognized as being uncertain.
“The Agency cannot quantify the exact number of lives indirectly saved through ArriveCan,” it told MPs on December 7, 2023.
Canadians were told ArriveCAN was supposed to have cost only $80,000, but the number quickly ballooned to $54 million, with the latest number showing it cost some $59.5 million.
As for the app itself, it was riddled with tech glitches along with privacy concerns from users.
ArriveCAN was introduced in April 2020 by the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and made mandatory in November 2020. The app was used by the federal government to track the COVID jab status of those entering the country and enforce quarantines when deemed necessary.
When the app was mandated, all travelers entering Canada had to use it to submit their travel and contact information as well as any COVID vaccination details before crossing the border or boarding a flight.
In February, LifeSiteNews reported that Conservative Party of Canada MPs accused the CBSA of lying to Parliament over sweetheart contracting approvals concerning ArriveCAN.
Troubled Travel apps’ creation is currently under investigation
Canadian Auditor General Karen Hogan announced an investigation of ArriveCAN in November 2022 after the House of Commons voted 173-149 for a full audit of the controversial app.
The House of Commons Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates (OGGO) is investigating how various companies such as Dalian, Coaradix, and GC Strategies received millions in taxpayer dollars to develop the contentious quarantine-tracking program.
LifeSiteNews reported that an investigation into ArriveCAN by Alexander Jeglic, the government’s procurement ombudsman, revealed that three-quarters of the contractors who were paid to work on ArriveCAN did not do anything in building the scandal-plagued app.
The CBSA was tasked with building the ArriveCAN app, and thus far, the investigation’s report singles out GC Strategies, saying the two-man company did not prove that its list of subcontractors was qualified to work on the app.
The procurement ombudsman’s report also found “numerous examples” in which GC Strategies “had simply copied and pasted” required work experience that was listed by the government for its contractors.
The report also noted that it was unusual the government used criteria for the app’s tender that were “overly restrictive and favoured” GC Strategies, which won the contract bid despite the fact no other bids were submitted.
Last year, LifeSiteNews reported on two tech entrepreneurs testifying before the committee that during the development of the ArriveCAN travel app they saw firsthand how federal managers engaged in “extortion,” “corruption,” and “ghost contracting,” all at the expense of taxpayers.
The Vigilant Fox
“What is likely to happen,” Fauci says, “is the emergence of another respiratory disease.”
“It may be another coronavirus, because we know that coronaviruses, really, mostly in bats, have the capability of binding to receptors that are in humans.”
“It could be another flu,” Fauci continued. “We’re dealing with H5N1 now, which is bird flu, which has taken the somewhat disturbing step of infecting mammals, namely cows and cats and other mammals, which means it’s adapting itself more to a human.”
“So my concern, Walter, is that whenever that happens, the next outbreak will be of a respiratory disease that’s easily transmissible, that has a significant degree of morbidity and mortality,” Fauci said.
When asked if the cuts at HHS and “our attitude towards science” are making the situation “a little bit more dangerous,” Fauci replied, “Oh, absolutely!”
VIDEO: @TheChiefNerd
#4 – Dr. Oz drops bombshells on the massive waste, fraud, and abuse bleeding Medicare and Medicaid.
Oz explained that people are unknowingly signed up for coverage, illegal schemes are funneling taxpayer dollars to those who aren’t eligible, and the same patient can be billed in multiple states with no federal oversight catching it.
It also turns out that 230,000 Americans were enrolled in Obamacare plans without even knowing it.
His reaction at the end of this clip says it all.
VIDEO: @McCulloughFund
While you’re here, don’t forget to subscribe to get this top 10 list emailed to you each week.
#2 – Jenny McCarty reveals chilling encounter after speaking out on vaccine issue.
• After going public about her son’s autism and the vaccine link, Jenny McCarthy received a private visit from a man with a warning.
• He claimed to work for a top-level PR firm and said he was approached by a government agency.
• His job? To create a campaign to discredit her and label her “anti-vaccine.”
• He said he turned down the offer—because his own child had gone through the same thing.
•The man warned her that they would find someone else to do it and use the media to come after her hard.
• McCarthy was stunned and asked him to repeat everything—she said she had chills all over her body.
• When she asked why they’d attack her despite her not being anti-vaccine, he replied, “Doesn’t matter.”
• According to him, they had the media on their side and would do whatever it took to bury her message.
“We gave $13 to $15 billion a year to human traffickers. That’s what this system did,” Antonio Gracias lamented.
Gracias’ team combed through voter rolls in four states and uncovered thousands of non-citizens not only registered to vote, but in many cases, actually voted.
“We looked at the voter rolls in four states, and we found thousands of these people [non-citizens] on the voter rolls, and we found many of those people had voted. In one state in particular, well over a thousand voted.”
His conclusion?
“I think this [Biden’s border policy] was a move to import voters.”
VIDEO: @KanekoaTheGreat
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COVID-19
Maxime Bernier slams Freedom Convoy leaders’ guilty verdict, calls Canada’s justice system ‘corrupt’
From LifeSiteNews
The leader of the People’s Party of Canada says Tamara Lich and Chris Barber were victims of a ‘political witch hunt.’
The leader of the People’s Party of Canada (PPC) ripped Thursday’s federal court ruling that found Freedom Convoy leaders Tamara Lich and Chris Barber guilty of mischief, saying the court siding with the government amounted to a “political witch hunt.”
“It is disheartening to learn that two of the heroes of the Freedom Convoy, @LichTamara and @ChrisBarber1975, have been found guilty of mischief in the longest and one of the costliest trials in Canadian history,” Maxime Bernier wrote Thursday on X.
“This clearly was a political witch hunt.”
Bernier added that in his view the reality is that Canada’s justice system is “corrupt.”
“Trudeau and his ministers who illegally invoked the Emergencies Act and violated basic rights will go unpunished,” he noted.
“Our justice system is corrupt to the bones.”
On Thursday, Justice Heather Perkins-McVey, the federal judge overseeing the mischief trial, delivered her verdict, finding both Lich and Barber guilty of mischief.
Perkins-McVey seemed to agree with the Crown’s case that Lich and Barber’s influence on the Freedom Convoy constituted public mischief but did dismiss the Crown’s Carter Application accusing Lich and Barber of conspiracy outright.
Lich and Barber both faced six charges each, those being charges of mischief, obstruction, intimidation, and counseling others to commit mischief and intimidation. After the court reconvened Thursday afternoon, Lich was acquitted of four of her six charges, with the fifth charge, counseling to commit mischief, being stayed by the judge.
As for Barber, the court found him guilty of mischief as a principal offender and as an aider and abettor. It also found him guilty on the charge of violating a court order.
As for sentencing, the court will reconvene on April 16 at 1:30 p.m. EST, at which time it will say when a date and time for sentencing will be held.
Lich and Barber both face a possible 10-year prison sentence. LifeSiteNews has reported extensively on their trial.
The Lich and Barber trial concluded in September 2024, more than a year after it began. It was only originally scheduled to last 16 days.
Lich and Barber were arrested on February 17, 2022, in Ottawa for their roles in leading the popular Freedom Convoy protest against COVID mandates. During COVID, Canadians were subjected to vaccine mandates, mask mandates, extensive lockdowns and even the closure of churches.
Despite the peaceful nature of the protest, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government invoked the Emergencies Act to clear out protesters, an action a federal judge has since said was “not justified.” During the clear-out, an elderly lady was trampled by a police horse and many who donated to the cause had their bank accounts frozen.
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