Politics

U.S. President Donald Trump’s commerce secretary said the tariffs on Canada and Mexico are still coming Tuesday, though he appeared to suggest there could be changes to the original 25 per cent plan. Howard Lutnick said in an interview on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures that there would be tariffs on Canada and Mexico starting on the announced March 4 date, though Trump would determine at what levels.“There are going to be tariffs on Tuesday on Mexico and Canada,” he said. “Exactly what they are, we’re going to leave that for the president and his team to negotiate.”The secretary’s comments come just three days after the president said his threatened 25 per cent tariffs against both countries were going ahead as scheduled. ...

Descrease article font size Increase article font size Halifax votes are set to go to the polls this April after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a by-election to fill the seat vacated by Andy Filmore. Filmore resigned from the seat in August 2024 to run for mayor of Halifax, a position he won in the regional municipality’s October election.The by-election, set to take place April 14, will be a lengthy one at 44 days. The longest a by-election can be is 50 days, though it can be held as quickly as at least 36 days after the writ is dropped.Federally, Halifax has bounced back and forth between the Liberals and NDP since 1988. Filmore held the seat since the Liberals’ landslide victory in 2015. Prior to that, the NDP’s Megan Leslie held it a...

Less than a week after rallying to show support for their fellow Ukrainians on the three-year anniversary of the war with Russia, Anna Tselukhina and her organization are preparing to come together again. The Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC) will host what it is calling an emergency rally Sunday afternoon in downtown Calgary in response to the Friday meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump, Vice-President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.During the testy and heated exchange in front of cameras in the Oval Office, Trump told Zelenskyy to make a deal with Russia to end the war in Ukraine or “we’re out.”Trump and Vance also accused Zelenskyy of “gambling with World War III” and told him he must be more grateful for U.S. assistance in the fight against Russia’s three-y...

Anita Anand, minister of transport and internal trade, says she’s changed her mind and will run in the upcoming federal election. In January, Anand said she would not run for the Liberal party leadership and would not seek re-election as she considered returning to her former life as an academic.Anand, who was first elected in 2019, said last month that the prime minister’s decision to move on inspired her to do the same.But she said Friday U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade threats are pushing her to stay on as she rallies the provinces to drop internal trade barriers.She said that when she made her decision to step away, Canada was not in the “existential crisis” it’s in now. She said she made her decision before U.S. President Donald Trump was inaugurated. Story continues below...

As the U.S. grapples with soaring egg prices, that country’s agriculture secretary says “temporary import options” will be on the table. In an op-ed written for the Wall Street Journal, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins outlined her plan to lower the price of eggs – a key issue for American voters in an election that saw Donald Trump return to the White House.In the op-ed, Rollins noted that the average price of a dozen eggs had skyrocketed 237 per cent, from US$1.47 in January 2021 to US$4.95 last month. Rollins outlined several measures that the Trump administration would take, including combating avian flu, which she said has resulted in the culling of 166 million egg-laying hens since 2022.Among the measures she proposed was importing more eggs.“We will consider temporary impor...

By Staff The Canadian Press Posted February 28, 2025 12:29 pm 1 min read Descrease article font size Increase article font size The Quebec government might extend its ban on religious symbols to members of school staff other than teachers. Education Minister Bernard Drainville says he wants to strengthen secularism in schools by passing legislation on gender equality and on expanding the scope of the religious symbol ban for public employees. Get daily National news Get the day's top news, political, economic, and current affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox once a day. ...

Large numbers of public servants working in the federal government’s three biggest departments aren’t following Ottawa’s three-days-per-week office work rule, federal data shows. The federal government’s latest remote work mandate, which took effect in early September, requires all staff employed under the Treasury Board to work on-site a minimum of three days a week. Executives are expected to work in the office four days a week.The Canadian Press asked for compliance rates from a number of federal departments, including the three with the largest workforces — the Department of National Defence, the Canada Revenue Agency and Employment and Social Development Canada.Of those three, Defence, which employs about 28,700 people, saw the lowest rate of compliance with the three-day rule, especi...

Ukraine’s leader will meet with President Donald Trump in Washington on Friday at a pivotal moment for his country, one that hinges on whether he can persuade Trump to provide some form of U.S. backing for Ukraine’s security against any future Russian aggression. During his trip to Washington, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s delegation is expected to sign a landmark economic agreement with the U.S. aimed at financing the reconstruction of war-damaged Ukraine, a deal that would closely tie the two countries together for years to come.Though the deal, which is seen as a step toward ending the three-year war, references the importance of Ukraine’s security, it leaves that to a separate agreement to be discussed between the two leaders — talks that are likely to commence Friday.As Ukrainian fo...

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Thursday declined to weigh in on U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated calls to make Canada the 51st state, before Trump cut off the U.K. leader’s answer entirely during a joint press conference. Starmer was asked whether he or King Charles III was concerned about Trump’s rhetoric toward a Commonwealth member at the end of a visit to the White House that included multiple meetings on issues like trade and the war in Ukraine.The British leader said the topic of Canada did not come up during those talks and sought to highlight the historic friendship between the United Kingdom and United States.“I think you’re trying to find a divide between us that doesn’t exist,” Starmer said.After continuing with his answer for a moment, Trump interrupted with “that...

By David Baxter The Canadian Press Posted February 27, 2025 3:41 pm Updated February 27, 2025 4:10 pm 1 min read Descrease article font size Increase article font size Prime Minister Justin Trudeau rejected NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh’s call for the federal government to bar U.S. President Donald Trump from coming to Canada for the G7 summit this June. At an event in Montreal Thursday, Trudeau said he sees the idea of banning Trump as an “irresponsible” approach to governance and relationships with other nations. ...