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North America Regional Hub: Addressing Anti-Government and Anti-Establishment Hate in Times of Crisis — A conversation with Manitoba Municipalities

Publication Date:

15/04/2025

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Event Reports

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Attacks Against Elected OfficialsCanadaconspiracy narrativesDisinformationManitobaMisinformation

— 11 minutes reading time

This report provides a summary of discussions during the event and does not necessarily reflect the views of the Strong Cities Network Management Unit, Strong Cities members, event sponsors or participants.

Summary

On 14 April 2025 in Winnipeg (Manitoba, Canada), the Strong Cities Network North America Regional Hub convened 100 mayors, reeves, councillors and municipal administrators from across 40 municipalities in Manitoba to discuss harassment and hate-motivated violence, disruptions to council meetings and measures they have put in place to address these challenges. 

Denys Volkov, Executive Director of the Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM), opened the meetings and was followed by presentations from Eric Rosand, Executive Director of the Strong Cities Network, Dr. Ardith McGeown-Plant, Executive Director at the Centre for Social Science Research & Policy at the University of Manitoba (CSSRP) and Dr. Royce Koop, CSSRP Academic Director. The convening then featured a conversation on two topics: Understanding Threats to Councillors and Council Meetings – Hate, Harassment, Dis/Misinformation and Disruptions, and The Role of Councils, Councillors and Municipal Leaders in Preventing and Responding to Hate, Harassment and Disruptions – Good Practices and Lessons Learned. Participants shared personal testimony about the verbal abuse and threats of physical violence they experience while serving in local office and exchanged useful preventative practices they employ alongside the challenges they face in navigating these threats. They also identified areas where training and other support are needed to enhance their prevention and response capabilities.    

The event was organised as a contribution to the development of a new Strong Cities toolkit to support municipal leaders across the province as they look to contend with rising levels of anti-government and anti-establishment hate. It was held in partnership with AMM and CSSRP on the margins of AMM’s Annual Spring Convention. 

Key Themes

1. The spike in and rising intensity of anti-government and anti-establishment sentiments in municipalities across Manitoba is being fuelled in large part by online misinformation, disinformation and conspiracy narratives. These false narratives lead to councils wasting time responding to factually inaccurate questions, and they motivate more forceful, intentionally disruptive behaviour.  
2. Smaller municipalities have experienced coordinated council disruptions from groups originating outside of their community. These incidents are organised for the sole purpose of disrupting the function of local government and are often not directly tied to the opinions of local community members.  
3. Differences of views about specific policy issues being considered or having been decided by local councils are a significant motivating factor for verbal abuse, threats of violence and council disruptions. In many cases, decisions on seemingly mundane issues, for instance, those about public parks, road access and land development, have been the source of council harassment.   
4. Municipalities would benefit from tools, training and peer learning opportunities in this area, as a lack of human and financial resources, technical expertise and guidance hamper the ability of municipal governments to prevent and respond to these threats and challenges. While select municipalities have taken actions, more support, including through cross-municipality cooperation, is needed to contend with the multifarious threats they face effectively.  

The spike in and rising intensity of anti-government and anti-establishment sentiments in municipalities across Manitoba is being fuelled in large part by online misinformation, disinformation and conspiracy narratives 

Municipal leaders discussed the role of social media in spreading anti-government narratives and how, by allowing anonymity it makes it more difficult to hold those responsible accountable. Moreover, the rapid spread of these messages online can make it seem as though an entire community is oriented against the municipal council, obfuscating that, in reality, it is just a few agitators driving the narrative. Participants frequently expressed how challenging they felt it was for municipal councils and government officials to respond to or quell the spread of misinformation online.  

Council representatives shared that because online agitators’ identities cannot be accessed, it is difficult to know a) if they are a member of their community or if they are an outside agitator or b) if they have a legitimate issue with local governance or if they merely want disruption for disruption’s sake. Discussion pointed to a handful of examples of local governments seeking legal action against Facebook account owners for their posts, but participants noted that this is only possible when the posts violate laws, not when they simply spread misinformation. This left some participants wondering if their local government should pursue identifying account holders through their own means.    

In general, participants said that when individuals can be identified, they often have no interest in seeking redress for their complaints. Rather, the feeling was that online agitators’ only interest was to make the lives of council members worse and to disrupt the function of local government. This feeling of bad faith engagement was disheartening to many in the room.  

Municipal leaders cited numerous downstream effects of online misinformation, including abusive language, character assassinations, threatening emails and letters and council disruptions. In some instances, members of the community will come to council sessions to voice grievances about policies they heard about online that, in reality, have been misrepresented or do not even exist. Municipal councillors especially lamented the amount of council session time lost to these non-germane public comments as they can prevent the council from conducting other business. In other instances, individuals who have been radicalised by online misinformation attempt to disrupt council proceedings through unruly or threatening behaviour. These in-person incidents add to the already immense volume of abuse municipal leaders face online.  

Smaller municipalities have experienced coordinated council disruptions from groups originating outside of their community

Beyond the impact of misinformation, participants reported experiencing organised disruptions in the council chambers by groups whose intended purpose is to inhibit the function of local government. The names of some of these groups were familiar to a number of the participants, who shared that these groups possessed deep-seated resentment of and antipathy towards the government and the establishment at large. The view was also expressed that some agitators found community in opposing the local government, which serves as a countervailing force to the spread of social isolation. These anti-government and anti-establishment sentiments were identified as the driving force behind council chamber sit-ins, death threats to council members and mayors and other vociferous responses to government policies that some (mis)interpret as expanding the government’s reach.  

Participants shared examples of out-of-town protestors at a council meeting vastly outnumbering the number of residents, sometimes by a factor of 50 to one. This form of disruption is especially difficult for local leaders to manage as they have limited tools to manage the agitators since they are not members of their community. Since these disruptions are for disruptions’ sake and not tied to legitimate claims, some participants were left feeling that they could ‘do no right’ as they would receive negative responses to any action they took, regardless of its impact on the community.  

Some potential preventative measures were discussed, with much of the focus on increased transparency, including through the release of documents like budgets, so that agitators have a harder time riling up the public. As one participant explained, if the public has access to the real facts and figures, it is harder for anti-government forces to rally them to their side through false narratives. One positive effect of this approach is that it can reduce the amount of attention agitators receive for their disruptive behaviour, thus making it less attractive to undertake in the first place.  

Differences of views about specific policy issues being considered or having been decided by local councils are a significant motivating factor for verbal abuse, threats of violence and council disruptions 

When asked what factors seemed to drive hostility to local government, participants responded that anger in response to policy decisions and legislation was the most frequent motivating factor. Participants provided numerous examples of disproportionate responses from members of the communities to seemingly unpolarising decisions, like those about public parks, access and land development.  

For example, many municipal leaders reported spikes in harassment relating to the Winnipeg Metropolitan Region’s Plan20-50 land use growth plan. The plan (which was intended to coordinate major regional infrastructure projects and has since been reimagined) activated some residents’ concerns of government over-reach and clashed with others’ belief in ‘rugged individualism’, as some participants put it. Responses to this plan led to disrupted council meetings, protests, verbal abuse and death threats. Participants appreciated that some in the community were upset by the plan and wanted to voice their disagreement, but they strongly disagreed with the way in which some residents chose to do this, and they felt powerless to prevent this belligerent response.  

Municipal leaders who have served since before social media was invented noted that this type of aggressive, targeted response feels unique to the social media era. Disputes that would have been handled civilly in the past, today get blown out of proportion. Multiple participants expressed a desire to return to an information environment without social media so that individuals did not feel empowered by the distance the internet provides to launch ad hominem attacks. Others worried that since anti-government hate is now so commonplace, communities have become desensitised to it and do not recognise it for the threat that it is.  

In instances where hate, harassment and disruptions run unchecked, participants reported the hostile environment driving some councillors to leave their municipalities, instead choosing to serve elsewhere, and it has discouraged some from running for office altogether. It was noted that this environment can be especially difficult for women serving in public office, who can face increased hate and abuse due to their gender.   

A few solutions aimed at lessening the blowback policy decisions received were discussed, and they mainly consisted of increasing communication with the community. Clear, plain language communications strategies have been adopted by some municipalities, which make it less likely that new policies will catch residents by surprise, so they have more time to understand why changes were made, but other municipalities felt that even ‘wall to wall communications’ were not enough to curb the spread of misinformation.  

Municipalities would benefit from tools, training and peer learning opportunities in this area, as a lack of human and financial resources, technical expertise and guidance hamper the ability of municipal governments to prevent and respond to these threats and challenges

Pointing to limited human, financial resources and technical expertise (e.g., some municipalities only have a handful of municipal staff and others find appropriating resources for this work politically challenging), participants asked for assistance in preventing and responding to hate directed at their local governments, including in situations where an aggressive and threatening response seems inevitable, regardless of what position the council adopts on the particular issue at hand. Discussions highlighted how empowering and supporting municipal leaders to prevent and respond to hostile actors, not only protects these officials but also helps safeguard the function of government as well by allowing them to make policy without fear of retribution.  

Beyond increasing available resources, participants said that municipalities would benefit from enhanced peer-to-peer learning and sharing opportunities on these issues, so they have a better understanding of what strategies and tactics other municipalities have pursued and what has worked and what has not. Equipped with this knowledge, they will be in a better position to identify not only the different options to consider but also which approaches to prioritise in their specific municipality.  

For instance, some municipalities were struggling with how to handle the anti-government hate and harassment (and misinformation) that is increasingly found in public comment sections on municipality-managed social media accounts and which fuels or exacerbates the divide around a pending or recent council decision. Some have removed the public comment sections or stopped posting information about council actions. Discussions highlighted the need to balance free speech, protect the safety of public officials, curb the spread of harmful misinformation and the government’s responsibility to communicate with residents.  

One local leader shared their municipality’s robust social media engagement plan, which included proactively modelling positive engagement online by responding to misinformation with a light-hearted formulaic post in order to encourage others in the community to rally against the misinformation.  Although other participants were excited by this plan, they said their municipalities lacked the staff to develop, let alone implement it. 

Some promising practices on reducing council disruptions were also shared.  These included making eye contact when attendees entered the room, making ground rules clear at the beginning of meetings and restricting public comments at those meetings to the topics on the agenda. However, some participants expressed some scepticism at being able to adopt all of these practices or knowing which ones to prioritise.  

Throughout the discussions, participants underscored the need for guidance on which specific practices should be applied in which contexts, so that municipalities can deploy their limited resources efficiently and effectively.  Further, they requested centralised resources to help respond to misinformation on social media as well as communications training for municipal staff to take advantage of these resources and implement response strategies.  

Next Steps

Strong Cities will use these insights along with the results from the forthcoming CSSRP survey of AMM members to produce a toolkit to support local elected officials and local governments in Manitoba in preventing and responding to this harassment, threats and disruption.  Following the release and dissemination of the toolkit across the AMM membership, Strong Cities will explore with AMM and CSSRP the possibility of offering implementation training and other support to interested municipalities.  

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Contact

For more information on the Strong Cities North America Regional Hub, please contact [email protected].

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