Ottawa mayor will not apologize, give in to demands by Pride Parade protestors

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Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe said he will not apologize nor give in to the demands set by Queers 4 Palestine – Ottawa after the group blocked the Pride parade shortly after it started on Sunday afternoon.

In a news conference on Monday morning, Sutcliffe called the protest inappropriate and said blocking a parade is not a proper way to discuss issues and advocate for important causes.

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He also refused to apologize for not participating in the Capital Pride parade last year after the non-profit issued a statement in support of Palestine.

“I don’t think we want to have a situation where anybody can just block a parade — especially Capital Pride — put a bunch of demands on the table, and the parade doesn’t move forward unless people get into those demands. I don’t think that’s acceptable,” Sutcliffe told reporters.

“I don’t think that’s a proper way to advocate or discuss the issues that are important to those people…. If you start licensing people to block parades and other events and say we’ll do whatever you ask, where does it end?”

What happened during the protest?

His comments come a day after the pro-Palestinian activist group blocked the Pride Parade on Wellington Street near O’Connor Street shortly after it began on Sunday afternoon.

Queers 4 Palestine – Ottawa (Q4P-O) were invited by Parade Grand Marshall Miss Patience Plush to march alongside her, and stopped the parade to protest against Capital Pride silently dropping its statement in support of Palestine, made in 2024.

Members were dancing and singing peacefully while waving banners and Palestinian flags. A giant pink-and-black banner read “all of us or none of us” and “Stonewall was an intifada.”

Q4P-O also issued a list of demands to Sutcliffe and Capital Pride.

According to a pamphlet handed out to participants on Sunday, Q4P-O want Capital Pride to host a BDS (boycott, divestment, sanctions) town hall and support the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. The BDS movement is a Palestinian-led movement which aims to use economic pressure to force corporations, banks and other entities to withdraw support from Israel.

The group also called on Sutcliffe to “apologize for last year’s boycott (of the parade) and the call to defund Pride” and “commit to stand with (protesters) and all oppressed peoples, including Palestinians.”

““We will not leave until our elected officials and Capital Pride come down and meet our demands,” said Masha Davidovic, a member of Queers for Palestine-Ottawa group.

What did Capital Pride say?

The parade was dissolved by Capital Pride an hour after it was stopped. In a statement on social media on Sunday evening, the organization said rerouting the parade was not possible and Q4P-O members refused to have a meaningful discussion with officials.

“As a community organization, we strive to engage with our community members in good faith and to balance the various interests and demands that are made of us while also organizing one of the largest festivals in our city,” the post read.

“Throughout the summer, we had several meetings with Q4P along with other community groups to discuss the issues that are important to them.

“Unfortunately, the group refused to have a meaningful discussion about how to move forward. After over an hour of attempting to resolve the stoppage, it became clear that Q4P was unwilling to engage in a good faith conversation and was insistent on misrepresenting our discussions.”

The Ottawa Citizen reached out to Capital Pride with a request for comment but did not receive a response in time for publication.

Where does the mayor stand now?

Sutcliffe said Monday he will not meet those demands and instead said “the ball is now in Capital Pride’s court.”

“I don’t feel any sort of apology is warranted. Last year, the City of Ottawa made a decision, and I made a personal decision, not to participate in the Pride Parade. I participated in a bunch of other events during Pride Week to demonstrate my solidarity with the 2SLGBTQ+ community. I’m always going to be, and I have always been a supporter of the community. I’m a supporter of equal rights,” he said.

He also added it is up to Capital Pride to make sure they can deliver an event that everyone can participate in.

“We’ve worked very closely with them over the last few weeks. There were a couple of obstacles, actually, that they needed to overcome in order for this year’s event to go ahead, including some pretty significant obstacles that we my office work with them on to try to resolve so this year’s event could go ahead,” Sutcliffe said.

“So we’re always happy to work with Capital Pride to help them in any way possible to make sure the event can proceed. But again, it’s their event. It’s up to them to make sure that they can deliver an event for the community and for all those who are participating.”

What is Queers 4 Palestine’s response?

Davidovic told the Ottawa Citizen in an interview Monday that the parade stoppage was previously agreed on with Miss Patience Plush.

She said she was surprised that Capital Pride decided to cancel the rest of the parade because the group was under the impression that they would be able to march in protest down Bank Street.

Q4P-O and other community members decided to stick to that plan anyway after the Pride parade was dissolved.

“The decision was made to halt the march until Capital Pride and the mayor came to be accountable to their community, and to speak with their village and publicly commit supporting the village and our solidarity values, instead of using the day as a photo-op without any accountability,” Davidovic said.

“This was a moment of our village stopping and claiming the street and claiming our space. This is a beautiful day where we were there. We were dancing, chanting. There were performers and drag performers. Last year’s grand marshal was with us dancing. The grand marshal from the year before that was there as well. It was a beautiful and energizing atmosphere of celebration and pride and joy and protest.”

She also criticized Sutcliffe’s refusal to apologize for withdrawing support for Pride last year and said he is not being an ally to the LGBTQ2S+ community.

“An ally is meant to uplift and amplify the voices of the people that they’re in allyship with — the voices of the village — and that’s what Mark, very publicly, refused to do yesterday,” Davidovic said.

“For us, what we basically saw was the most powerful man in the city, who is not a member of our community, refusing to talk to the 2SLGBTQIA+ people who were actually leading the parade and also refusing to leave. … That’s very concerning, and it raises very serious questions about why he’s there in the first place, and why he has so much to say about what Pride should or shouldn’t be, and what it should or shouldn’t have.”

She also raised concerns about Capital Pride’s statement, saying the organization has chosen to side with the mayor.

“It’s very hard to understand why Capital Pride is aligning themselves with the mayor to smear and attack their own community for actually enacting those values that we all share behind closed doors. It looks like they’ve been pressured, and that’s not going to be acceptable for us.”

Davidovic said Q4P-O will continue to hold both organizations accountable by continuing to present the demands.

“This was a day of pride and joy and protest in a time when there are more and more attacks on our community’s rights. Queer and trans protests and hard-won victories aren’t just in the past, they’re in our present and in our future,” she said.

“This weekend really exposed that the protest is still necessary because big, well-funded organizations like Capital Pride, who claim to speak for the community, are subjected to this intense pressure from non-queer and trans funders, politicians and figures like Mark Sutcliffe.”