US Senator Rand Paul urges truckers to ‘clog up [American] cities’

American Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky has expressed his optimism for anti-vaccine protesters in trucks to "clog up [US] cities" amid a warning by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that a convoy of anti-vaccine truckers may soon begin in the country.

"I’m all for it," said Paul, a vocal critic of masking and vaccine mandates during an interview with conservative news outlet Daily Signal. "I hope the truckers do come to America, and I hope they clog up cities."

"Civil disobedience is a time-honored tradition in our country, from slavery to civil rights to you name it. Peaceful protest, clog things up, make people think about the mandates," the US lawmakers further added while discussing the Canadian “Freedom Convoy” protest effort against vaccine mandates and other pandemic restrictions that saw trucks and other vehicles blocking roads and portions of the busiest US-Canada border crossing for several days.

Paul’s remarks also followed an NBC News report that similar trucker convoy may develop for this weekend’s Super Bowl American football match in Los Angeles, marking a key and very popular sport event in the country. According to the report, another trucker convoy may potentially emerge in Washington, DC as well coinciding with US president’s State of the Union address in early March.

This is while the DHS issued a bulletin earlier in the week warning US law enforcement agencies that a convoy of truckers protesting vaccine mandates, similar to protests in Canada, could begin soon in the US, noting that the convoy could "begin in California as early as mid-February and arrive in Washington, DC as late as mid-March."

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The Republican senator further went on to blame the Biden administration for instituting nation-wide mandates and sparking the protest efforts against mandatory vaccines and masks.

“And some of this, we started,” Paul emphasized. “We put [COVID-19] mandates on truckers coming across the border from Canada so then they put mandates on, and the truckers are annoyed. They’re riding in a cab by themselves, most of them for eight, 10-hour long hauls, and they just want to do what they want to do. It’s their own business.”

“It’d be great, but the thing is, it wouldn’t shut the city down because the government workers haven’t come to work in two years anyway,” added the conservative US legislator. “I don’t know if it’ll affect DC. It’d be a nice change. We’d actually have some traffic.” 

Paul also went on to criticize House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for closing down the United States Capitol for “God knows what reason,” pointing out that both in-person office work and tourism have dwindled in the nation’s capital.  

“I hope they clog up cities,” the Kentucky Republican said of the truckers. “And we’re seeing a break in the dam now. Several Democratic governors are finally sort of relinquishing.”

“What they’re finding is, moms and dads are upset about this,” the senator added. “They’re not just Republican. Everybody’s upset about this. They’re annoyed that their little kids have to be in a mask.”

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