Prior to the September 30 rally in Quebec, Storm Alliance founder and president
Dave Tregget was voicing some concerns about people getting involved who had their own agendas:
There was nothing any more specific, but ARC has become used to reading cryptic comments being made by the far right suggesting internal tensions and infighting between groups.
But on the day of the September 30 event, it would be hard to argue that the Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle were not the most successful attracting perhaps several hundred members of the Storm Alliance and allied La Meute:
You know, for all the snark about antifascists who wear masks and the accusations of cowardice and criminality, I can't help noticing there are quite a few Storm Alliance members wearing masks.
Funny that, eh?
I should mention that while the Storm Alliance and La Meute did show up in large numbers, they were met with an equally large number of anti-fascist protesters.
Storm Alliance president
Tregget later posted celebratory video:
As it is in French and I remain hopelessly monolingual, a friend of the blog kindly agreed to provide a synopsis:
Ok starts by saying yesterday was a big success. He still has adrenaline from it. Worked on that for 3 months And it was an incredible success ... historic! He then launches into recounting the day.
Claims that nearly 400 stormers where there (his words). They had several plans for the day but went with one and worked with the Sûreté du Québec to pull it off.
The Storm Alliance had 40 guys on security (Steve Woods it sounds like is the guy he thanks for organizing security): "We sent a calvary and we had 350 about people charge ahead."
Goes on to bitch about the media: "We're no longer concerned about what media says about us. That will be the last time they're allowed in our rally. We won't talk to them any more. They aren't capable of reporting truth." Specifically singles out a student reporter from Concordia for sucking.
Talks about what he claims were the demographics of the protest: "We had people there from 17-18 years old to 81. Full middle class, average people who are sick of the current political climate and who want to advance a nation." He then thanks Robert Proulx who did, "internal security." Tregget thanks to the exec of Storm Alliance: "It's been a rough 3 months. And they imploded three times." Je finishes up by stating that future rallies will be peaceful and high security and trashed the Sûreté du Québec.
Now one thing that we know Tregget has tried to avoid any connection to racism. One of the reasons why he broke away from the SoO was because of the ties to Finland as well as the growing extremism within the Quebec SoO that he used to lead; much of the Quebec SoO now seems to have been absorbed into the extremist Northern Guard. But if his goal was to present the Storm Alliance as a group opposed to racism, he has has certainly failed. Two examples:
Both Chantal Duchesneau and Shawn Beauvais-MacDonald are also profiled in this brief video:
The Storm Alliance seems to be planning more events.
ARC and supporters will be keeping as close an eye on them as we can with support from our friends in Quebec.