{"id":699518,"date":"2026-05-28T14:43:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-28T14:43:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/699518\/"},"modified":"2026-05-28T14:43:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T14:43:15","slug":"lawyers-ask-attorney-general-to-review-premiers-comments-about-kitchener-encampment-ruling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/699518\/","title":{"rendered":"Lawyers ask Attorney General to review Premier&#8217;s comments about Kitchener encampment ruling"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Attorney General of Ontario has been asked to take action against Premier Doug Ford for <a href=\"https:\/\/kitchener.citynews.ca\/2026\/05\/22\/premier-doug-ford-calls-judges-ruling-on-ontario-encampment-cockamamie\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">comments<\/a> he made about the recent ruling on the Victoria Street encampment in Kitchener.<\/p>\n<p>A group of lawyers, spearheaded by University of Ottawa legal scholar Martha Jackman, have reportedly sent a letter to the office of Attorney General Doug Downey.<\/p>\n<p>In that letter, the group asked Downey to review comments Premier Ford made this month about the Ontario Superior Court\u2019s decision to block the Region of Waterloo from clearing the encampment at 100 Victoria St.<\/p>\n<p>Ontario Superior Court Justice Michael Gibson ruled that the region\u2019s site-specific bylaw to clear the encampment and make way for the construction of the Kitchener Central Transit Hub violated the charter rights of the residents, and therefore could not be enforced. <\/p>\n<p>In the aftermath of this decision, the Premier called the decision \u201ccockamamie,\u201d adding, \u201cSo for what, 30 people, they\u2019re going to hold up millions and millions of riders, communities and everything.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI wish I could get [the judge\u2019s] address. I\u2019ll send 15 encampments in his backyard and see how he likes it. The craziest decision I\u2019ve ever heard. But there are a lot of crazy decisions coming from our courts lately,\u201d said Ford.<\/p>\n<p>The letter sent to the Attorney General alleges that those comments \u201crepresent a serious attack on the constitutional principle of judicial independence and raise profound concerns regarding judicial security and the administration of justice in Ontario.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The group is asking Downey to take action and make a public statement about Ford\u2019s comments. <\/p>\n<p>\t\tKeep it Factual<\/p>\n<p>Add CityNews Kitchener as a trusted source on Google to see more local stories from us.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=kitchener.citynews.ca\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/>\n\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"add-trusted-source-badge\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1778322800_456_google-trusted-badge.png\" alt=\"Add as a preferred source on Google\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Attorney General of Ontario has been asked to take action against Premier Doug Ford for comments he&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":648610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-699518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699518"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699518\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/648610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}