Opinion | A convoy that looks like a political vanguard

The caravan was about eight miles long as it moved from Indiana into Ohio, and it’s sure to grow as it nears the Capital Beltway. The convoy is expected to arrive outside of Washington on Saturday; organizers announced Thursday that the convoy would stop short of D.C. rather than proceed into the city as originally planned.

The rolling protest comes roughly five weeks after a similar convoy made its way from the western provinces of Canada to the capital city of Ottawa in Ontario. That convoy began as a movable expression of popular objections to continued covid restrictions in Canada. But it quickly turned into a general protest against that nation’s political elites that nearly shut down Ottawa’s urban core.

I suspect a far less confrontational form of that twin protest will unfold this weekend. Milder in part because of events: Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, rising prices and President Biden’s lackluster State of the Union address have all diverted attention away from the convoy’s steady progress eastward.

Coverage of the People’s Convoy hasn’t been robust because this isn’t a repeat of Ottawa, much less Jan. 6; these truckers aren’t storming or blockading anything.

All they are doing is trying to send a message that it’s time to end covid-era restrictions on personal freedom. The convoy’s organizers stress in every communication that it is a “peaceful and unified transcontinental movement,” spokesperson Lynne Kristensen emailed me, from somewhere near Columbus, Ohio.

When I asked, “What’s this all about, anyway?,” she replied: “From the beginning, the core principles of the People’s Convoy have been restoring the freedoms and liberty that overreaching government mandates have taken away over the past two years.”

“While mask mandates start to end and people believe they are regaining their freedoms, the People’s Convoy knows these are overdue back steps [and] should not be considered a win,” she continued. “The request from the People’s Convoy is not only to end the National State of Emergency, which led to these unscientific and illogical mandates, but is also demanding government accountability through full and transparent congressional hearings. This situation and gross abuse of power should never be allowed to happen again.”

Indiana and Ohio police officials reported that the convoy is a colorful mix of tractor-trailer trucks, passenger vehicles, campers and RVs — numbering, according to officials in Ohio, around 550 vehicles in all. That is still quite a parade. Not since the “Tractorcade” snarled Jimmy Carter’s Washington in the late 1970s over farm policy has the capital been set to see so many big rigs.

“It’s time to remind the government, not just here in the U.S. but across the world, that they work for us.” Brian Brase, one of the organizers, said. “This convoy, and these truckers, believe in freedom and your right to do, to think, to act and say what you feel. At this point, it is the civic duty of the American people to stand up. Freedom takes sacrifice, and since it’s been lost, it is this convoy that will begin to stand up and take it back.”

One of those heading this way is a friend of mine from church named Jeff Hanson, who has had a remarkable career in commercial real estate before helping to organize this convoy. Jeff never struck me as political; that he is now a grass-roots activist is a signal among all the noise about the sea change underway in U.S. politics. I’ve also been struck by the thousands of people who gathered on highway overpasses to cheer on those who made the trip. “The People’s Convoy is a grass-roots movement that has the power to effect change for tens of millions of Americans,” Jeff explained. He told me that the nation’s poor and marginalized populations “are suffering the most as a result as the most abusive government overreach in the history of our nation.”

Even if they won’t head towards downtown D.C., these rolling demonstrators will be heard; congressional representatives are now expected to travel beyond the Beltway to meet and huddle with them. One thing is certain: The convoy has made the silent American voter easy to find and hear. Reporters should seek them out; they are friendly and talkative. And they will be heard again in November, because they are the future of U.S. politics.