As Canada wildfires choke US with smoke, Republicans demand action. But not on climate change
'Instead of enjoying family vacations at Michigan's beautiful lakes and campgrounds, for the third summer in a row, Michiganders are forced to breathe hazardous air as a result of Canada's failure to prevent and control wildfires,' read a statement last week from the state's GOP congressional delegation, echoing similar missives from Republicans in Iowa, New York, North Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Globe and Mail
3 hours ago
- Globe and Mail
To counter Texas, California moves ahead with plan to redraw congressional map
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Thursday his state will hold a Nov. 4 special election to seek voter approval of new congressional map drawn to try to win Democrats five more U.S. House seats in 2026. The move is a direct response to a Republican-led effort in Texas, pushed by President Donald Trump as his party seeks to maintain its slim House majority after the midterm elections. Texas lawmakers are considering a new map that would help them send five more Republicans to Washington. Democrats who so far have halted a vote by leaving the state announced Thursday that they will return home if state Republicans end their current special session and California releases its own redrawn map proposal. Both were expected to happen Friday. Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott is expected to call another special session to push through new maps. Texas House Democrats said in a statement that under the advice of legal counsel, they needed to return to the state to 'build a strong public legislative record' for an upcoming legal battle against a new map. Democrats did not say what day they might return. 'We can't stand back and watch this democracy disappear district by district all across the country,' Newsom said, joined by prominent labour leaders and Democratic politicians. Trump's redistricting fight could spread to other states as California looks to replicate Texas GOP plan California lawmakers must officially declare the special election, which they plan to do next week after voting on the new maps. Democrats hold supermajorities in both chambers, and Newsom said he's not worried about winning the required support from two-thirds of lawmakers to advance the maps. Democrats signalled that they plan to make the campaign about more than maps, tying it explicitly to the fate of American democracy and as an opportunity for voters to reject Trump's policies. 'Donald Trump, you have poked the bear and we will punch back,' Newsom, who is seen as a possible 2028 presidential contender, said at a news conference with other Democrats. The Thursday announcement marks the first time any state beyond Texas is officially wading into the mid-decade redistricting fight, kicking off a national standoff that could spill into more states. A number of Republican-led states appear poised to move forward with their own new maps. In Missouri, a document obtained by the Associated Press shows the state Senate received a $46,000 invoice to activate six redistricting software licenses and provide training for up to 10 staff members Newsom encouraged other Democratic-led states to get involved. 'We need to stand up – not just California. Other blue states need to stand up,' Newsom said. Republicans currently hold an 219-212 majority in the U.S. House, with four vacancies. New maps are typically drawn once a decade after the census is conducted. Many states, including Texas, give legislators the power to draw maps. Some, such as California, rely on an independent commission that is supposed to be non-partisan. The California map would take effect only a Republican state moves forward, and it would remain through the 2030 elections. After that, Democrats say they would return map-making power to the commission approved by voters more than a decade ago. Some people already have said they would sue to block the effort, and influential voices including former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger may campaign against it. Newsom said he's spoken with Schwarzenegger. 'Gavin Newsom's latest stunt has nothing to do with Californians and everything to do with consolidating radical Democrat power, silencing California voters, and propping up his pathetic 2028 presidential pipe dream,' National Republican Congressional Committee spokesperson Christian Martinez said in a statement. 'Newsom's made it clear: he'll shred California's Constitution and trample over democracy – running a cynical, self-serving playbook where Californians are an afterthought and power is the only priority.' California Democrats already hold 43 of the state's 52 House seats, and the state has some of the most competitive House seats. Elsewhere, leaders from red Florida to blue New York are threatening to write new maps. But none have moved as far as Texas and California. Also Thursday, U.S. Border Patrol agents conducted roving patrols outside Newsom's news conference, drawing condemnation from the governor and others. Gregory Bovino, chief of the Border Patrol's El Centro, California, sector, was part of the patrols. 'We're here making Los Angeles a safer place since we don't have politicians that will do that,' Bovino told a reporter with KTTV in Los Angeles. He said he didn't know Newsom was inside nearby.
Winnipeg Free Press
4 hours ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Trump's aggressive push to take over DC policing may be a template for an approach in other cities
WASHINGTON (AP) — The left sees President Donald Trump's attempted takeover of Washington law enforcement as part of a multifront march to autocracy — 'vindictive authoritarian rule,' as one activist put it — and as an extraordinary thing to do in rather ordinary times on the streets of the capital. To the right, it's a bold move to fracture the crust of Democratic urban bureaucracy and make D.C. a better place to live. Where that debate settles — if it ever does — may determine whether Washington, a symbol for America in all its granite glory, history, achievement, inequality and dysfunction, becomes a model under the imprint of Trump for how cities are policed, cleaned up and run, or ruined. Under the name of his Making D.C. Safe and Beautiful Task Force, Trump put some 800 National Guard troops on Washington streets this past week, declaring at the outset, 'Our capital city has been overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals.' Grunge was also on his mind. 'If our capital is dirty, our whole country is dirty, and they don't respect us.' He then upped the stakes by declaring federal control of the district's police department and naming an emergency chief. That set off alarms and prompted local officials to sue to stop the effort. 'I have never seen a single government action that would cause a greater threat to law and order than this dangerous directive,' Police Chief Pamela Smith said. On Friday, the Trump administration partially retreated from its effort to seize control of the Metropolitan Police Department when a judge, skeptical that the president had the authority to do what he tried to do, urged both sides to reach a compromise, which they did — at least for now. Trump's Justice Department agreed to leave Smith in control, while still intending to instruct her department on law enforcement practices. In a new memo, Attorney General Pam Bondi directed the force to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement regardless of any city law. In this heavily Democratic city, local officials and many citizens did not like the National Guard deployment. At the same time, they acknowledged the Republican president had the right to order it because of the federal government's unique powers in the district. But Trump's attempt to seize formal control of the police department, for the first time since D.C. gained a partial measure of autonomy in the Home Rule Act of 1973, was their red line. When the feds stepped in For sure, there have been times when the U.S. military has been deployed to American streets, but almost always in the face of a riot or a calamitous event like the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Trump's use of force was born of an emergency that he saw and city officials — and many others — did not. A stranger to nuance, Trump has used the language of emergency to justify much of what he's done: his deportations of foreigners, his tariffs, his short-term deployment of National Guard troops to Los Angeles, and now his aggressive intervention into Washington policing. Washington does have crime and endemic homelessness, like every city in the country. But there was nothing like an urban fire that the masses thought needed to be quelled. Violent crime is down, as it is in many U.S. cities. Washington is also a city about which most Americans feel ownership — or at least that they have a stake. More than 25 million of them visited in 2024, a record year, plus over 2 million people from abroad. It's where middle schoolers on field trips get to see what they learn about in class — and perhaps to dance to pop tunes with the man with the music player so often in front of the White House. Washington is part federal theme park, with its historic buildings and museums, and part downtown, where restaurants and lobbyists outnumber any corporate presence. Neighborhoods range from the places where Jeff Bezos set a record for a home purchase price to destitute streets in economically depressed areas that are also magnets for drugs and crime. In 1968, the capital was a city on fire with riots. Twenty years later, a murder spree and crack epidemic fed the sense of a place out of control. But over the last 30 years, the city's population and its collective wealth have swelled. A cooked-up emergency? Against that backdrop, Philadelphia's top prosecutor, District Attorney Larry Krasner, a Democrat, assailed Trump's moves in Washington. 'You're talking about an emergency, really?' Krasner said, as if speaking with the president. 'Or is it that you're talking about an emergency because you want to pretend everything is an emergency so that you can roll tanks?' In Washington, a coalition of activists called Not Above the Law denounced what they saw as just the latest step by Trump to seize levers of power he has no business grasping. 'The onslaught of lawlessness and autocratic activities has escalated,' said Lisa Gilbert, co-chair of the group and co-president of Public Citizen. 'The last two weeks should have crystallized for all Americans that Donald Trump will not stop until democracy is replaced by vindictive authoritarian rule.' Fifty miles northeast, in the nearest major city, Baltimore's Democratic mayor criticized what he saw as Trump's effort to distract the public from economic pain and 'America's falling standing in the world.' 'Every mayor and police chief in America works with our local federal agents to do great work — to go after gun traffickers, to go after violent organizations,' Brandon Scott said. 'How is taking them off of that job, sending them out to just patrol the street, making our country safer?' But the leader of the D.C. Police Union, Gregg Pemberton, endorsed Trump's intervention — while saying it should not become permanent. 'We stand with the president in recognizing that Washington, D.C., cannot continue on this trajectory,' Pemberton said. From his vantage point, 'Crime is out of control, and our officers are stretched beyond their limits.' The Home Rule Act lets a president invoke certain emergency powers over the police department for 30 days, after which Congress must decide whether to extend the period. Trump's attempt to use that provision stirred interest among some Republicans in Congress in giving him an even freer hand. Among them, Rep. Andy Ogles of Tennessee drafted a resolution that would eliminate the time limit on federal control. This, he told Fox News Digital, would 'give the president all the time and authority he needs to crush lawlessness, restore order, and reclaim our capital once and for all.' Which raises a question that Trump has robustly hinted at and others are wondering, too: If there is success in the district — at least, success in the president's eyes — what might that mean for other American cities he thinks need to be fixed? Where does — where could — the federal government go next? ___ Associated Press writer Marc Levy in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, contributed to this report.
Vancouver Sun
6 hours ago
- Vancouver Sun
Maine state senator's pitch for western provinces to join U.S. is ‘nonsense,' says ‘enraged' B.C. MLA
VICTORIA — A British Columbia legislator said he went from 'disappointed' to 'enraged' after receiving a pitch from a Republican state senator for Canada's four western provinces to join the United States. Brennan Day, with the Opposition B.C. Conservative Party, said his office had to first confirm the authenticity of the 'nonsense' letter from Maine Sen. Joseph Martin after receiving it last week. Martin's three-page pitch said if B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba were to seek admission to the United States after referendum votes, it would have to be as full American states. Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Sunrise will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. 'This would not be annexation. It would be adoption — welcoming home kindred spirits, who were born under a different flag but who desire to live under our Constitution and accept our responsibilities, customs, and traditions,' he wrote in the letter shared by Day. Martin said in the letter that his appeal is not a 'fantasy of empire' but a 'vision deeply rooted in American tradition' that would give the four provinces a chance to 'leave behind failing ideologies.' 'For too long, Canadian citizens have been subjected to an illusion of freedom administered through bureaucratic means,' he wrote, adding that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, 'while lofty in rhetoric, provides no absolute protection.' He said this was in contrast to the U.S. Bill of Rights. Martin said 'millions of people currently frustrated by central authority, moral decay, and bureaucratic suffocation' would be rewarded by 'liberty' if the four provinces were to join the United States. 'The welcome mat is out,' he concluded. Day said the most shocking part of the letter was its attack on Canadian institutions, like the Charter of Rights, parliamentary government, monarchism, bilingualism, multiculturalism, and the dismissal of those cornerstones as 'political baggage.' Day said in an interview that Martin needed to look at 'how heavy his luggage' is. He said Martin's party was 'hauling around wheeled trunks' of baggage in the United States where the Constitution was 'being torn up by Republicans.' Day said it was not clear why Martin wrote to him, but suspected it might be due to 'rhetoric' coming out of Alberta that led Martin to believe British Columbians would be interested. Martin did not immediately respond to a request for comment left by voice mail and text. Day said he had written a response to Martin, in which he acknowledged that Canada has problems. 'But we don't fix them by surrendering our identity, as you suggest,' Day said in his response. 'We fix them by doing what Canadians have always done — rolling up our sleeves, listening to each other, and finding common ground.' Day said in his interview that the 'overwhelming majority of Canadians' like themselves just as they are. 'We have got a lot of work to do in improving our services, and making sure that we are spending our money wisely, and getting good value for it,' Day said. 'But I don't think anybody here looks south and goes, 'we want more of that.'' Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here .
