Carol Ann Tanoush shares her experience at United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII)
In April, a group of Cree youth went to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in New York. The youth presented a panel on the 50th anniversary of the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement. The Global Indigenous Peoples Caucus was also happening at the same time. Carol Ann Tanoush and her peers nominated her to co-chair the event and she was also the moderator of their panel. We spoke with about her experience at the United Nations.
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Globe and Mail
28 minutes ago
- Globe and Mail
Donald Trump and Gavin Newsom are complicated combatants
One is the quintessential New Yorker, the other, the archetypical Californian. One has yanked the Republicans rightward, the other is the personification of the leftward lurch of the Democrats. One was criticized for insensitivity after tossing paper towels to hurricane victims at a Puerto Rico relief centre, the other was pilloried for poor judgment for dining indoors at the swanky French Laundry restaurant in Napa Valley in defiance of his own COVID restrictions. To make this personal: One of them has hair the colour of Kraft French Salad Dressing, the other possesses hair that resembles salt and pepper spilling out of a Peppermill Tremblay dispenser. And one of them almost was the father-in-law of the television news personality Kimberly Guilfoyle, for a time engaged to Donald Trump Jr. The other is the ex-husband of Kimberly Guilfoyle, whom he divorced in 2006. President Donald Trump and Governor Gavin Newsom of California − entangled in a battle over migrants, civil liberties and crime − are a complicated set of combatants. Urback: Donald Trump campaigned on eroding democracy. Now, he's just fulfilling his promises Mr. Trump, the one with the populist identity, is a graduate of the Ivy League's University of Pennsylvania (with an endowment of US$22.3- billion and with a Nov. 15 football game against Harvard, which Mr. Trump is hoping to cripple financially). Mr. Newsom, the one with the elitist identity, is a graduate of Santa Clara University (with an endowment of US$1.5-billion and hasn't played America collegiate football since 1992). Mr. Trump has suggested that Mr. Newsom might be imprisoned, reprising and revising one of his favourite lines from the 2016 presidential election ('Lock him up'). In response, Mr. Newsom has channelled Clint Eastwood in Sudden Impact ('Go ahead. Make my day.') Mr. Trump is playing his role as it were in a reality television show (American Ninja Warrior). Mr. Newsom, governor of the state with countless sound stages and movie lots, seems caught in an episode of reality television himself (Survivor). 'These two are always on stage and aware of it,' said Martin Kaplan, a former studio executive who is director of the University of Southern California's Norman Lear Center, which examines the interchange between entertainment, society and politics. 'These are people who do their best to make the spotlight follow them.' Now the two are in the spotlight in a dramatic dispute over both values and tactics. Mr. Trump argues that the violence in Los Angeles is an insurrection that threatens civil peace and that requires both the National Guard, a state-based military force, which Mr. Trump mobilized over the objection of the Governor, as well as the deployment of the Marines, who arrived in the city Tuesday. Mr. Newsom believes that Mr. Trump has exaggerated the dangers − 'fanned the flames,' is his characterization − and is using it as a blunt instrument to extend executive power in a situation that state and local personnel can handle. 'The L.A. Police Department, the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department, and 434 other police agencies in L.A. County are well-equipped to handle this peacefully and effectively without interference from the federal government,' said Robert Saltzman, a former member of the Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners. 'Things were calm before the federal government got involved. Since then, they've done nothing but create problems.' Mr. Newsom considers the President a tyrannical threat to democratic principles. Mr. Trump considers the Governor a blue-state progressive and − to resuscitate a phrase Richard Nixon once employed to describe Ramsey Clark, Lyndon B. Johnson's attorney-general − a conscientious objector in the war against crime. 'The very incompetent 'Governor,' Gavin Newscum, and 'Mayor,' Karen Bass, should be saying, 'THANK YOU, PRESIDENT TRUMP, YOU ARE SO WONDERFUL,' Mr. Trump said on his Truth Social platform. 'WE WOULD BE NOTHING WITHOUT YOU, SIR.' Democrats feel quite the opposite. 'Newsom is trying to calm the situation down and Trump is trying to stir things up and portraying all of L.A. in combat,' said Robert Shrum, a veteran Democratic political consultant. 'That's entirely false.' Opinion: For Trump, the L.A. protests are an opportunity to wield power and spread fear The conflict between them − which both believe is but the first front of a wider war over migrants and civil liberties − has immense political implications. Mr. Newsom knows the President is an effective foil in a state Mr. Trump lost three times in a row; Hillary Clinton defeated him in California by a two-to-one margin in 2016. Mr. Trump knows the Governor has presidential ambitions. Both know this episode is the political equivalent of a drama performance in New Haven, Conn., which over the years has provided trial runs for such Broadway shows as Oklahoma! and My Fair Lady. Speaking of the prospect of arresting Mr. Newsom, Mr. Trump said, 'I think it's great. Gavin likes the publicity.' Mr. Newsom clearly is portraying himself not only at the centre of a storm but also as a national leader − an important moment for him and for a party that, after the 2024 defeat of then-vice-president Kamala Harris, herself a former California attorney-general, has been adrift. 'This is about all of us. This is about you,' Mr. Newsom said, addressing residents of other states. 'California may be first, but it clearly will not end here. Other states are next. Democracy is next.' He said Mr. Trump 'wants to be bound by no law or constitution, perpetuating a unified assault on American tradition.' Their conflict is itself part of an American tradition. When Governor Orval Faubus mobilized the Arkansas National Guard to prevent integration of the Little Rock Central High School, President Dwight Eisenhower sent in the 101st Airborne Division. John F. Kennedy federalized the National Guard in Mississippi and did so twice in Alabama to enforce school desegregation. But after the 1965 'Bloody Sunday' violence at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., Governor George Wallace told Mr. Johnson that the state 'is unable and refuses to provide for the safety and welfare' of civil-rights activists. In this occasion, the governor and president both deployed military forces. There is no such agreement today in California.
CTV News
an hour ago
- CTV News
U.S. Judge says government must release Columbia University protester Mahmoud Khalil
Student negotiator Mahmoud Khalil is seen at a pro-Palestinian protest encampment on the Columbia University campus in New York, April 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File) NEWARK, N.J. — A U.S. federal judge has ruled that the government must release Mahmoud Khalil, the former Columbia University graduate student whom the Trump administration is trying to deport over his participation in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. Khalil, a legal U.S. resident, was detained by federal immigration agents on March 8 in the lobby of his university-owned apartment, the first arrest under President Donald Trump's crackdown on students who joined campus protests against the war in Gaza. He was then flown across the country and taken to an immigration detention center in Jena, Louisiana, thousands of miles from his attorneys and wife, a U.S. citizen who gave birth to their first child while he was in custody. Khalil's lawyers challenged the legality of his detention, accusing the Trump administration of trying to crack down on free speech. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio says he has the power to deport Khalil because his presence in the U.S. could harm foreign policy. U.S. District Judge Michael Farbiarz had ruled earlier that expelling Khalil from the U.S. on those grounds was likely unconstitutional. In a new ruling Wednesday, the judge said that Khalil had shown that his continued detention is causing irreparable harm to his career, his family and his free speech rights. Farbiarz gave the government until Friday to appeal the decision. He also required Khalil to post a $1 bond before he is freed. 'The court's decision is the most significant vindication yet of Mahmoud's rights,' said Ramzi Kassem, co-director of CLEAR, a legal nonprofit and clinic at the City University of New York that represents Khalil. 'But we aren't out of the woods until Mahmoud is free and back home with his wife and child.' Lawyers and spokespersons for the Justice Department, which are handling the case, didn't immediately respond to an email seeking comment. The judge's decision comes after several other legal residents targeted for their activism won custody in recent weeks, including another Palestinian student at Columbia, Mohsen Mahdawi, a Tufts University student, Rumeysa Ozturk, and a Georgetown University scholar, Badar Khan Suri. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has cited a rarely used statute to justify the deportation of Khalil and others, which gives him power to deport those who pose 'potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.' Khalil isn't accused of breaking any laws during the protests at Columbia. The government, however, has said that noncitizens who participate in such demonstrations should be expelled from the country for expressing views that the administration considers to be antisemitic and 'pro-Hamas,' referring to the Palestinian militant group that attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Khalil, a 30-year-old international affairs graduate student, had served as a negotiator and spokesperson for student activists at Columbia University who took over a campus lawn last spring to protest Israel's military campaign in Gaza. The university brought police in to dismantle the encampment after a small group of protesters seized an administration building. Khalil is not accused of participating in the building occupation and wasn't among the people arrested in connection with the demonstrations. But images of his maskless face at protests, along with his willingness to share his name with reporters, have made him an object of scorn among those who saw the protesters and their demands as antisemitic. The White House accused Khalil of 'siding with terrorists,' but has yet to give any evidence for the claim. The Trump administration has said it is taking at least $400 million in federal funding away from research programs at Columbia and its medical center to punish it for not doing enough to fight what it considers to be antisemitism on campus. Some Jewish students and faculty complained about being harassed during the demonstrations or ostracized because of their faith or their support of Israel.
CBC
an hour ago
- CBC
Green MLAs want quicker action on glyphosate report
Three and a half years after a report recommended tighter restrictions on glyphosate spraying, some lawmakers say the pace of implementation has been too slow. "It's clear that not a lot of work was done on it in that time," Green MLA Megan Mitton said. "There were some things completed and some things very recently completed, but I would have liked to see more progress." The report by the legislature's committee on climate change and environmental stewardship made a number of recommendations on the future of herbicide spraying in the province. It followed extensive hearings with scientists, foresters, Health Canada researchers, First Nations, industry and the public. The recommendations included larger setbacks from dwellings and watercourses, that N.B. Power phase out aerial glyphosate spraying and an analysis of potential alternatives. In an update to the committee, Christie Ward, the assistant deputy environment minister, said 11 of 20 recommendations have been "completed" to date, while the remaining nine are underway. Some MLAs pointed out, however, that what the department has implemented is not what the initial report actually recommended. "When you went through the recommendations of the committee that were unanimously adopted, you pointed to a number of those recommendations that were marked as completed, which were not implemented as recommended," David Coon told department staff Wednesday. "So essentially you rejected those recommendations." For example, the report called for setbacks from dwellings to increase to one kilometre from 500 metres. Ward said permits for aerial glyphosate spraying issued last year increased setbacks to 500 metres from 155 metres. Instead of the minimum 100-metre setback from watercourses recommended in the report, ground application requirements were moved to 30 metres from 15 metres, and aerial spraying requires a minimum distance of 65 metres. Ward said that the department has spent time trying to understand the intent of the committee's recommendations and to carry out the spirit of them, even those based on a misunderstanding of the regulations that already existed. "These recommendations are complex in some cases, many of them require rigorous scientific review, they also require a baseline of information, so you know where you're starting from and where you need to get to," she said. "There's been a lot of work done in the background to really understand all aspects of the pesticide program." But Mitton said she'd prefer a more direct answer from the department on whether the committee's recommendations have been followed. "When the auditor general has a report, there's a response from the department and then there's an update," she said. "I almost feel like we need a bit more of a formal process, or to bring them in more often, to keep that accountability going because I don't accept some of those answers as a checkmark." Environment Minister Gilles LePage backed up his staff, noting the report, which he helped prepare as an opposition member of the committee, did err at times in its understanding of existing regulations. However, LePage agreed with other comments over the pace of action on the report over the last few years. "In the past six years, I think there was a lack of work on that file, and that's why it's part of my mandate," he said. "I was part of the evolution of pesticides in this province, with the research on this committee, and I take it personally, and we are going to focus on pesticides even more than the previous government." LePage's mandate letter from Premier Susan Holt includes two mentions of herbicide spraying. One is to implement all recommendations from the committee's report. The other is to investigate alternatives to pesticide and herbicide use and "re-evaluate the safety of glyphosate with new and comprehensive data specific to New Brunswick." "We're looking daily and monthly on the impacts of how it's done," he said. "But don't forget, our regulations are very strong and very rigid for application and for use."
