Alberta
Firm handshakes, hard lines: Trudeau, Biden to talk protectionism, Haiti, migration
WASHINGTON — He’s hell-bent on restoring blue-collar American manufacturing to its former glory, considers free trade a dirty word and wants Canada to wade voluntarily into a failed, gang-ravaged state that’s a quagmire waiting to happen.
To be sure, Joe Biden is no Donald Trump. But he doesn’t always make it obvious.
The U.S. president arrives in Ottawa tonight on a whirlwind 24-hour visit — a significantly less elaborate itinerary than first envisioned in the Prime Minister’s Office — two full years since becoming commander-in-chief.
“This will be the first true, in-person bilateral meeting between the two leaders in Canada since 2009,” said White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby.
The first year of Biden’s term focused on rebuilding Canada-U.S. relations following Trump’s divisive term in office. The second focused on meeting obligations, “including prioritizing orderly and safe migration through regular pathways,” Kirby said.
“Now, heading into the third, this visit is about taking stock of what we’ve done, where we are and what we need to prioritize for the future.”
While he’s far less undiplomatic and publicly combative than his both-barrels predecessor, Biden’s first two years in the Oval Office produced more than enough political headaches for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
Friday’s meetings may not offer much remedy.
High on Canada’s wish list will be frank talk on Buy American, the age-old protectionist doctrine resurrected by every 21st-century president short of George W. Bush and one of Biden’s favourite domestic political messages.
“The president is very committed to policies that create jobs in the United States, and we don’t take issue with that policy,” said Kirsten Hillman, Canada’s ambassador to the U.S.
“What we say is … when you apply it to Canada and deeply integrated Canada supply chains, it does not serve your policy purpose. It does the exact opposite.”
Fully 60 per cent of the physical goods that Canada sells stateside “go into the manufacturing of other products,” and much the same is true of what Canada buys from the U.S., she added.
“So if we start carving each other out of our supply chains, the economic impact on jobs in our own country is going to be enormous. We’re shooting ourselves in the foot, essentially — both countries.”
Canada is also likely to be playing defence on Haiti, the impoverished, quake-ravaged Caribbean nation on the island of Hispaniola that has devolved into a failed state since the 2021 assassination of president Jovenel Moïse.
Roving gangs of marauders now control more than half of Port-au-Prince, the capital city of a country in the grips of a cholera outbreak with little access to medical help, a near-total lack of public security and a powerless interim government.
The Biden administration, its hands full with Russia’s war in Ukraine, the rise of China and other great-power concerns, wants Canada — home to a large diaspora of French-speaking Haitians, mostly in Quebec — to take a lead role.
“It’s a fair amount of pressure,” said Carleton University professor Stephen Saideman. “The reality is that Trudeau doesn’t want to do this, and so he comes up with whatever arguments he can to deflect this.”
“I am hopeful … that Canada will be able to step in and take some leadership in Haiti, because that will matter in Washington,” said Gordon Giffin, who served as Bill Clinton’s envoy to Ottawa from 1997 to 2001.
“Taking that one off of our menu would be a big help to the U.S. administration.”
Though it might seem simplistic at the highest levels of intergovernmental relations, the quid pro quo approach is foundational to how countries get along and manage various irritants in the relationship, he suggested.
“I do think it’s a prototypical example of the United States saying, ‘We need you to help us out on this one,'” Giffin told a panel hosted by the Americas Council and the Council of the Americas.
He recalled the frequent interactions between his old boss and Jean Chrétien, who was prime minister while Clinton was in the White House and a man Giffin described as “the consummate dealmaker.”
Chrétien “looked for places where Bill Clinton needed a little bit of help,” Giffin said.
“I would very quickly hear, ‘OK, we’re going to do this, Gordon, but for that, I need this,'” he said in his best Chrétien drawl. “I’m sorry, that’s just human nature, and it’s part of the deal.”
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby would not say Wednesday whether Biden intends to make a direct demand of Trudeau on Haiti.
“They share a concern about the dire situation down there from a security and humanitarian perspective — this is not something that is unfamiliar to either the prime minister or the president,” Kirby said.
“As for a multinational force or anything like that, I don’t want to get ahead of the conversation here. But as we’ve said before, if there’s a need for that, if there’s a place for that, that’s all going to have to be worked out directly with the Haitian government and with the UN.”
Kirby also played down expectations on another big Canadian ask: renegotiating the Safe Third Country Agreement, a 2004 treaty between the two countries that many blame for a recent spike in irregular migration.
On issues of migration, “we’re well aware of Canadian concerns. We have concerns of our own,” Kirby said. “It’s a hemispheric, shared regional challenge. So I have no doubt that they’ll discuss it.”
Senior government officials in Ottawa say the discussion on Haiti will involve the two leaders, but not Haitians themselves. Trudeau has so far focused on sanctions, helping Haitian authorities with surveillance support to track gang activity, and building a political consensus on how the West can best help.
Saideman, who has previously worked with the U.S. Department of Defense, said Ottawa is trying to avoid that at all costs. “This government does not want to suffer tremendous costs or cement tremendous risks.”
He noted that Canada’s largest deployment is currently in Latvia and Ottawa has agreed to expand its presence to shore up that country’s border with Russia.
Saideman said it would be impossible to expand that force while leading an intervention in Haiti, particularly because each deployed unit generally requires a second unit undergoing training and a third recovering from the previous rotation.
In addition, gang violence would be significantly more risky than past missions aimed at preventing clashes between warring armies, such as in Bosnia or Cyprus.
“I’m not saying we shouldn’t do it, but I can see why the government is cautious about it,” said Saideman, who is director of the Canadian Defence and Security Network.
“In Haiti, this has not been the first rodeo,” he said. “The previous missions didn’t fix things, didn’t lead to a lasting solution.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 23, 2023.
— With files from Dylan Robertson in Ottawa
James McCarten, The Canadian Press
Alberta
Alberta court upholds conviction of Pastor Artur Pawlowski for preaching at Freedom Convoy protest
From LifeSiteNews
Lawyers argued that Pastor Artur Pawlowski’s sermon was intended to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, but the statement was characterized as a call for mischief.
An Alberta Court of Appeal ruled that Calgary Pastor Artur Pawlowski is guilty of mischief for his sermon at the Freedom Convoy-related border protest blockade in February 2022 in Coutts, Alberta.
On October 29, Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Gordon Krinke sentenced the pro-freedom pastor to 60 days in jail for “counselling mischief” by encouraging protesters to continue blocking Highway 4 to protest COVID mandates.
“A reasonable person would understand the appellant’s speech to be an active inducement of the illegal activity that was ongoing and that the appellant intended for his speech to be so understood,” the decision reads.
Pawlowski addressed a group of truckers and protesters blocking entrance into the U.S. state of Montana on February 3, the fifth day of the Freedom Convoy-styled protest. He encouraged the protesters to “hold the line” after they had reportedly made a deal with Royal Canadian Mounted Police to leave the border crossing and travel to Edmonton.
“The eyes of the world are fixed right here on you guys. You are the heroes,” Pawlowski said. “Don’t you dare go breaking the line.”
After Pawlowski’s sermon, the protesters remained at the border crossing for two additional weeks. While his lawyers argued that his speech was made to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, the statement is being characterized as a call for mischief.
Days later, on February 8, Pawlowski was arrested – for the fifth time – by an undercover SWAT team just before he was slated to speak again to the Coutts protesters.
He was subsequently jailed for nearly three months for what he said was for speaking out against COVID mandates, the subject of all the Freedom Convoy-related protests.
In Krinke’s decision, he argued that Pawlowski’s sermon incited the continuation of the protest, saying, “The Charter does not provide justification to anybody who incites a third party to commit such crimes.”
However, defence lawyer Sarah Miller pointed out that that Pawlowski’s sermon was protected under freedom of speech, an argument that Krinke quickly dismissed.
“While the appellant is correct that peaceful, lawful and nonviolent communication is entitled to protection, blockading a highway is an inherently aggressive and potentially violent form of conduct, designed to intimidate and impede the movement of third parties,” he wrote.
Pawlowski was released after the verdict. He has already spent 78 days in jail before the trial.
Pawlowski is the first Albertan to be charged for violating the province’s Critical Infrastructure Defence Act (CIDA), which was put in place in 2020 under then-Premier Jason Kenney.
The CIDA, however, was not put in place due to COVID mandates but rather after anti-pipeline protesters blockaded key infrastructure points such as railway lines in Alberta a few years ago.
Clean Energy Fuels CEO Andrew Littlefair, Tourmaline CEO Mike Rose, and Mullen Group chairman Murray Mullen attend the opening of a new Clean Energy/Tourmaline compressed natural gas (CNG) fuelling station in Calgary on Oct. 22, 2024. Photo courtesy Tourmaline
From the Canadian Energy Centre
New compressed natural gas fueling stations in Grande Prairie and Calgary join new stop in Edmonton
Heavy-duty truckers hauling everything from restaurant supplies to specialized oilfield services along one of Western Canada’s busiest corridors now have more access to a fuel that can help reduce emissions and save costs.
Two new fuelling stations serving compressed natural gas (CNG) rather than diesel in Grande Prairie and Calgary, along with a stop that opened in Edmonton last year, create the first phase of what proponents call a “natural gas highway”.
“Compressed natural gas is viable, it’s competitive and it’s good for the environment,” said Murray Mullen, chair of Mullen Group, which operates more than 4,300 trucks and thousands of pieces of equipment supporting Western Canada’s energy industry.
Right now, the company is running 19 CNG units and plans to deploy another 15 as they become available.
“They’re running the highways right now and they’re performing exceptionally well,” Mullen said on Oct. 22 during the ribbon-cutting ceremony opening the new station on the northern edge of Calgary along Highway 2.
“Our people love them, our customers love them and I think it’s going to be the way for the future to be honest,” he said.
Heavy-duty trucks at Tourmaline and Clean Energy’s new Calgary compressed natural gas fuelling station. Photo courtesy Tourmaline
According to Natural Resources Canada, natural gas burns more cleanly than gasoline or diesel fuel, producing fewer toxic pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change.
The two new CNG stops are part of a $70 million partnership announced last year between major Canadian natural gas producer Tourmaline and California-based Clean Energy Fuels.
Their deal would see up to 20 new CNG stations built in Western Canada over the next five years, daily filling up to 3,000 natural gas-fueled trucks.
One of North America’s biggest trucking suppliers to businesses including McDonald’s, Pizza Hut, Subway and Popeye’s says the new stations will help as it expands its fleet of CNG-powered vehicles across Canada.
Amy Senter, global vice-president of sustainability with Illinois-based Martin Brower, said in a statement that using more CNG is critical to the company achieving its emissions reduction targets.
For Tourmaline, delivering CNG to heavy-duty truckers builds on its multi-year program to displace diesel in its operations, primarily by switching drilling equipment to run on natural gas.
Between 2018 and 2022, the company displaced the equivalent of 36 Olympic-sized swimming pools worth of diesel that didn’t get used, or the equivalent emissions of about 58,000 passenger vehicles.
Tourmaline CEO Mike Rose speaks to reporters during the opening of a new Tourmaline/Clean Energy compressed natural gas fuelling station in Calgary on Oct. 22, 2024. Photo courtesy Tourmaline
Tourmaline CEO Mike Rose noted that the trucking sector switching fuel from diesel to natural gas is gaining momentum, notably in Asia.
A “small but growing” share of China’s trucking fleet moving to natural gas helped drive an 11 percent reduction in overall diesel consumption this June compared to the previous year, according to the latest data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
“China’s talking about 30 percent of the trucks sold going forward are to be CNG trucks, and it’s all about reducing emissions,” Rose said.
“It’s one global atmosphere. We’re going to reduce them here; they’re going to reduce them there and everybody’s a net winner.”
Switching from diesel to CNG is “extremely cost competitive” for trucking fleets, said Clean Energy CEO Andrew Littlefair.
“It will really move the big rigs that we need in Western Canada for the long distance and heavy loads,” he said.
Tourmaline and Clean Energy aim to have seven CNG fuelling stations operating by the end of 2025. Construction is set to begin in Kamloops, B.C., followed by Fort McMurray and Fort St. John.
“You’ll have that Western Canadian corridor, and then we’ll grow it from there,” Littlefair said.
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