A man who has been protesting since the beginning of the pandemic has publicly apologized to the Cobourg Police for insults directed towards them last Saturday in front of Victoria Hall.
Josh Clausen is one of the leaders of a group called Northumberland Rise-Up that has been been protesting the lockdowns since the beginning of the pandemic early in 2020.
Clausen along with other people have been meeting in Cobourg each Saturday from 12 p.m. to 3 p.m. in front of Victoria Hall protesting the lockdown.
But on Saturday, April 10, 2021 police officers handed out seven tickets and two individuals were issued a provincial summons under the Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act some of the protestors hurled insults at the officers.
Cobourg Police Chief Paul VandeGraaf held a press conference on Monday condemning the actions of the protestors.
On Thursday, April 15, 2021 Today’s Northumberland spoke with Clausen about what took place last weekend.
“To the citizens of Cobourg, and the Cobourg Police Service, Northumberland Rise-Up does apologize from the bottom of our hearts.”
“Times like this they are challenging for everybody. We are obviously on one side of the fence while people are on the other. We’ve been going down there for over a year with very few incidents. Unfortunately last Saturday we had a couple of us, including myself lose our tempers.”
Clausen says they have a right to protest and admits they were in defiance of the lockdown, “and we will continue to make our presence known, but we will find a way to comply.”
Clausen states the group has always been against the lockdown.
“We know that there are many people who support us and there are many people against us.”
Clausen said the group is trying to educate members of the public, but weekly they get, “berated. Called unbelievable names. We are given death threats.”
“For the most part we are peaceful, well informed individuals that just want to advocate freedoms that these lockdowns are not working.”
“This is now the third time around. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome.”
Clausen knows that “damage has been done” with what took place last weekend but states, “we will work very hard to reestablish our presence within the community to be more positive.”
Clausen states Northumberland Rise-Up invites people to interact with the protestors to learn about their stance instead of going by and insulting them.
“Please, feel free to stop and have an intelligent conversation with us. We have a lot of good people in our group that would give you something to think about.”
Clausen has reached out to Cobourg Police to personally apologize this week and will also be doing so face-to-face to the officers this coming Saturday when the group is back down at Victoria Hall.
“I still want to maintain good community relations with our police. When you look at protests going on around the world, across the country they are violent, police are in riot gear. What’s going on in Toronto has been chaos to some extent.”
“We don’t want that in Cobourg. We are a small community. We do understand that police are doing their job.”
“Without them (police)., things would be a lot different around here and we do appreciate them.”
If police enforce the EMCPA, Clause has advised the members to contest the ticket in court after they receive it.
“We don’t want to be disrespectful towards the police.”
“Last week was a breaking point for a lot of us with the announcement of the new lockdown measures.”
Clausen said he hopes there is a good turnout this weekend to get their message across to the public.
“I am hoping from the police end if we are complying that they are going back to their educational approach. We’re not looking to be criminals. We’re not criminals. We just want to express our freedoms which are chartered that even with the emergency measures in place there is a way we can comply.”
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
