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COVID-19

Judge agrees with Tamara Lich’s counsel that saying ‘hold the line’ was not a call to insurrection

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

What the Freedom Convoy leader told truckers in the Ottawa anti-COVID jab mandate protest ‘could mean, stay true to your conscience and convictions,’ Judge Heather Perkins-McVey said on Day 29 of the trial

During the trial of Freedom Convoy leaders Tamara Lich and Chris Barber earlier this week, Lich’s legal counsel argued that her use of the rallying cry “hold the line” during the 2022 protests did not imply she was calling for people to engage in illegal activity.

Attorney Eric Granger said that his client had continually called for peaceful protests in her public statements, noting her social media presence as proof.

Granger then said that Lich’s “hold the line” statement could be interpreted in many ways.

Judge Heather Perkins-McVey agreed, saying, “It could mean, stay true to your conscience and convictions. “

On February 17-18, 2022, video footage emerged of Lich and Barber’s arrest by members of the Ottawa Police Service (OPS).

While being led away, Lich told truckers in the Ottawa anti-COVID jab mandate protest to “hold the line.”

On Day 29 of the trial, which took place on Tuesday, Granger again made it a point to the court that Lich and Barber should not be considered co-conspirators in their criminal trial.

As noted in a Day 29 trial update by The Democracy Fund (TDF), which is crowdfunding Lich’s legal costs, Granger referred to the court a video posted by Lich on February 16, 2022, in which she “appealed for love, respect, and prayers for police officers.”

“Drawing attention to a text exchange between Lich and Barber on February 17, 2022, Granger highlighted apparent disagreements between them regarding the statements made in the video,” the TDF noted.

The trial is currently at the stage when the defense counsel for Lich and Barber take turns calling witnesses before the court.

On Monday, which was Day 28 of Lich and Barber’s trial, the defense argued that a Crown request to make criminal charges against one leader apply to the other leaders should not be allowed because  there is no evidence the pair worked in a conspiratorial manner.

The defense teams for Lich and Barber told the court they intended to bring forth two applications, the first being a call to dismiss the Crown’s “Carter application.”

The Crown’s so-called “Carter Application” asks that the judge consider “Barber’s statements and actions to establish the guilt of Lich, and vice versa,” TDF stated.

TDF noted that this type of application is very “complicated” and requires that the Crown prove “beyond a reasonable doubt” that there was a “conspiracy or plan in place and that Lich was a party to it based on direct evidence.”

Lich and Barber can’t be treated as a ‘single’ entity, lawyer argues

In court on Tuesday, Granger again emphasized the need for caution in treating “Lich and Barber as a single entity,” as noted by the TDF.

He told the court that he questioned the Crown’s “allegations of conspiracy, particularly in light of Barber’s diverse statements.”

He made it a point that there is no evidence Lich broke the law before her arrest. He argued that trying to interpret Lich’s “hold the line” statement as a call for violence is purely speculation, given that she has a known calm persona.

When it came to connecting Lich with Barber, Granger said there is no evidence “of Lich’s and Barber’s participation in Ottawa coexisting,” as noted by the TDF.

Multiple convoys took to Ottawa organized by various individuals. Granger told the court that the Crown’s evidence fell short for it to make a case for use of the Carter application and urged the court to dismiss it.

Barber’s lawyer stresses that evidence shows protests were peaceful and there was no ‘conspiracy’ 

Barber’s lawyer, Diane Magas, began her submissions before the court Tuesday and called into question the Crown’s material submissions concerning the date when an alleged agreement to conspire between Lich and Barber took place.

She noted the different legal definitions of riot and unlawful assembly, “arguing that the evidence overwhelmingly contradicted any tumultuous activity during the convoy protest,” as mentioned by the TDF.

“She highlighted numerous text messages and social media statements made by Barber and Lich, with no indication of an agreement for unlawful purposes. She asserted the legality of actions such as setting up a GoFundMe account and obtaining fuel for trucks. Magas emphasized the peaceful nature of the protests and the absence of evidence linking Barber and Lich to any unlawful plan.”

Magas again stressed that when looking at text exchanges and Barber’s public statements, and the fact he had cooperated with police, there was no agreement between the two to engage in an unlawful purpose.

Lich and Barber are facing multiple charges from the 2022 protests, including mischief, counseling mischief, counseling intimidation and obstructing police for taking part in and organizing the anti-mandate Freedom Convoy. As reported by LifeSiteNews at the time, despite the non-violent nature of the protest and the charges, Lich was jailed for weeks before she was granted bail.

Last week, on Day 27 of the trial, Lich and Barber’s legal counsel argued that the Crown to date has not been able to prove the organizers participated in a conspiracy to break the law or encourage others to break the law, and that therefore the case should be tossed altogether. The defense’s application came after the Crown abruptly decided to end its case last Monday, telling the court it would not call forth any new witnesses.

In early 2022, the Freedom Convoy saw thousands of Canadians from coast to coast come to Ottawa to demand an end to COVID mandates in all forms. Despite the peaceful nature of the protest, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government enacted the Emergencies Act on February 14.

During the clear-out of protesters after the EA was put in place, one protester, an elderly lady, was trampled by a police horse, and one conservative female reporter was beaten by police and shot with a tear gas canister.

Lich and Barber’s trial has thus far taken more time than originally planned. LifeSiteNews has been covering the trial extensively.

COVID-19

Rand Paul vows to target COVID-19 cover-up, Fauci as Senate Homeland Security Committee chairman

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Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) speaks to reporters

From LifeSiteNews

By Doug Mainwaring

“I think we’re on the cusp of, really, the beginning of uncovering what happened with COVID”

Rand Paul is set to become chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee beginning in January, putting him in a position to more doggedly investigate the government’s role in covering up the truth about the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I chose to chair this committee over another because I believe that, for the health of our republic, Congress must stand up once again for its constitutional role,” Paul told the New York Post. “This committee’s mission of oversight and investigations is critical to Congress reasserting itself.”

“I think we’re on the cusp of, really, the beginning of uncovering what happened with COVID,” the Kentucky senator said. “The biggest item of the COVID cover-up is that for years, we’ve known there is this dangerous research.”

“We are going to, hopefully, have a friendlier administration, and we’re hoping that there will be a friendly person at (the Department of Health and Human Services), and we’re hoping they’ll be friendly at (the National Institutes of Health),” he added.

With President-elect Donald Trump’s appointment yesterday of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Paul has likely gotten his wish.

The Bluegrass State senator has long suspected that the accepted official narrative asserting that the COVID-19 virus did not originate in a Wuhan, China lab was intended to obscure the U.S. government’s role in developing the virus and conducting dangerous “gain of function” experiments with the deadly virus.

Paul recently told Fox News that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and HHS “have refused to turn over the documents as to why Wuhan got this research money and why it wasn’t screened as dangerous research. I’m looking forward to getting those (documents), mainly because we need to try to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”

“The cover-up went beyond public statements. Federal agencies and key officials withheld and continue to conceal crucial information from both Congress and the public,” Paul said in his opening remarks at a Senate hearing in June dedicated to COVID’s origins. “This has been a deliberate, prolonged effort to deceive the committee about certain gain-of-function research experiments that the agencies have been withholding. What we have found as we’ve gone through this is at every step there’s been resistance.”

“So the hearing today is to try and find out whether or not we can get to the truth,” Paul said at the time. “Do we know for certain it came from the lab? No, but there’s a preponderance of evidence indicating that it may have come from the lab. Do we know viruses have come from animals in the past? Yes, they’ve come from animals in the past. But this time, there’s no animal reservoir. There’s no animal handlers with antibiotics. There’s a lot of reasons why there are indications that this could have come from the lab.”

And it seems that Sen. Paul has infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci, the man who quickly emerged as a central figure at the very start of the pandemic, in his sights as well.

Paul and Fauci have long had a combative relationship as exemplified in several committee hearings over the last few years.

Paul has said multiple times that Dr. Fauci should “go to prison” for lying to Congress.

A year ago, Paul told Fox News’ Sean Hannity that “We now have proof in Anthony Fauci’s own words, we have his emails.”

“In public he’s saying, ‘Oh, if you say it came from the lab, you’re a conspiracy theorist, you’re crazy, it’s a fringe theory,’” Paul said. “But in private, he’s saying, ‘We’re very concerned because the virus appears to be manipulated. And we’re also very concerned because we know they’re doing gain of function research in Wuhan.’”

A post on X by an RFK Jr. parody this morning said, “Dear Dr. Fauci, I’m still looking for you.”

Sen. Paul reposted it, saying, “I bet we find him.”

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COVID-19

Peer-reviewed study finds over 1,000% rise in cardiac deaths after COVID-19 shots

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From LifeSiteNews

By Calvin Freiburger

A new study published in the Journal of Emergency Medicine by a team of McCullough Foundation doctors reports significant links ‘between excess fatal cardiopulmonary arrests and the COVID-19 vaccination campaign.’

A new peer-reviewed study reports that it has found a more than 1,000 percent increase in heart-related deaths among a large pool of people who have taken the COVID-19 shots.

On October 24, the Journal of Emergency Medicine published a study by a team of McCullough Foundation doctors who reviewed the annual reports of cardiopulmonary arrests, survival rates, and emergency medical services (EMS) incidents from King County, Washington, from 2016 to 2023. The county presented a “unique opportunity” for analysis because nearly the entire population (an estimated 98%) had received at least one COVID shot dose.

“As of August 2nd, 2024, there have been approximately 589,247 confirmed COVID-19 cases in King County,” the study found.

“In 2021-2022, Total EMS attendances in King County sharply increased by 35.34% from 2020 and by 11% from pre-pandemic years. Cases of ‘obvious death’ upon EMS arrival increased by 19.89% in 2020, 36.57% in 2021, and 53.80% in 2022 compared to the 2017-2019 average. We found a 25.7% increase in total cardiopulmonary arrests and a 25.4% increase in cardiopulmonary arrest mortality from 2020 to 2023 in King County, WA.”

“Excess fatal cardiopulmonary arrests were estimated to have increased by 1,236% from 2020 to 2023, rising from 11 excess deaths (95% CI: -12, 34) in 2020 to 147 excess deaths (95% CI: 123, 170) in 2023,” the study continued. “A quadratic increase in excess cardiopulmonary arrest mortality was observed with higher COVID-19 vaccination rates. The general population of King County sharply declined by 0.94% (21,300) in 2021, deviating from the expected population size. Applying our model from these data to the entire United States yielded 49,240 excess fatal cardiopulmonary arrests from 2021-2023.”

The authors concluded that there was a “significant ecological and temporal association between excess fatal cardiopulmonary arrests and the COVID-19 vaccination campaign,” but allowed that “COVID-19 infection and disruptions in emergency care during the pandemic” could be an alternative explanation.

To more fully understand the problem, they called for “continuous monitoring and analysis of cardiopulmonary arrest data to inform public health interventions and policies, especially in the context of vaccination programs,” as well as for the “U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention COVID-19 vaccination administration data [to] be merged with all death cases so that the vaccine type, dose(s), and date of administration can be analyzed as possible determinants.”

The study adds to a large body of evidence linking significant risks to the COVID shots, which were developed and reviewed in a fraction of the time vaccines usually take under the first Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed initiative.

The federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) reports 38,068 deaths, 218,646 hospitalizations, 22,002 heart attacks, and 28,706 myocarditis and pericarditis cases as of October 25, among other ailments. U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) researchers have recognized a “high verification rate of reports of myocarditis to VAERS after mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccination,” leading to the conclusion that “under-reporting is more likely” than over-reporting.

All eyes are currently on former President Donald Trump, who last week won his campaign to return to the White House and whose team, which will be helmed by prominent vaccine critic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his nominee for secretary of Health and Human Services, has given mixed signals as to the prospects of reconsidering the shots for which he has long taken credit. At the very least, Trump has consistently opposed jab mandates and is expected to fill more federal judicial vacancies with jurists similarly inclined.

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