OTTAWA

BILLINGS, Mont. — The Trump administration said Wednesday a resumption of coal sales from public lands that had been blocked under former President Barack Obama will result in a negligible increase in greenhouse gas emissions.

Critics accused the administration of producing a flawed analysis of the federal coal program that ignores its broader impacts.

A federal judge last year had faulted the administration for failing to consider potential damage to the environment when former U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke in 2017 lifted a moratorium on coal sales imposed by his predecessor.

U.S. District Judge Brian Morris in Montana stopped short in his April 2019 ruling from halting coal sales but said the Department of Interior had to conduct an environmental review of its decision.

The Trump administration review focused on potential emissions from only four coal leases in Utah and Oklahoma hat were sold after the moratorium was lifted. That’s a small piece of a federal leasing program that accounts for about about 40 per cent of U.S. coal production, primarily from Western states that also include Wyoming, Montana and Colorado. Burning that fuel accounts for about 11 per cent of annual U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, according to previous studies.

Interest in federal leases has slackened considerably over the past decade as many utilities switched to natural gas or renewables and demand for coal plummeted.

In documents released Wednesday, administration officials acknowledged Zinke’s order had hastened the resumption of federal coal sales before a three-year review begun under Obama was complete. But they argued those sales would have resumed regardless.

The Obama administration imposed the moratorium on most federal coal sales in 2016. The move followed concerns that low royalty rates paid by mining companies were shortchanging taxpayers and that burning the fuel was making climate change worse.

"The Zinke order terminated the pause (on coal lease sales) approximately two years ahead of schedule," officials wrote. "Because there is no basis for concluding that the Zinke order would result in a change in the amount of coal production or associated impacts in the long term…there would be no difference in cumulative (greenhouse gas) emissions."

Environmental groups that sued over Zinke’s order said the government’s analysis ignored the broader consequences of continuing the coal leasing program despite its contributions to climate change.

"The suggestion that mining more fossil fuels from our nation’s public lands is not significant would be a joke if it weren’t so sad,"said Jenny Harbine with Earthjustice, which is representing environmental groups and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe in a lawsuit before Morris.

Companies have mined about 4 billion tons of coal from federal reserves in the past decade, contributing $10 billion to federal and state coffers through royalties and other payments.

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Matthew Brown, The Associated Press

MEXICO CITY — President Andrés Manuel López Obrador suggested Wednesday without offering evidence that most of those who die in Mexico’s cartel- and gang-fueled firefights are high on drugs or intoxicated, prompting criticism and questions about whether the claim was accurate.

Speaking to journalists in his morning news conference, López Obrador said rising drug consumption rates must be reversed if the country is to guarantee peace and security after years of rising, record-setting homicide statistics.

"Just so you have the number, 60% of those who lose their life each day, 60% of those killed in clashes, it is shown that they are under the influence of drugs or alcohol, but primarily drugs," the president continued. "Because of that, these ruthless crimes that cause such sadness."

The comments revived a debate seen during the 2006-2012 presidency of Felipe Calderón, who first launched Mexico’s militarized anti-drug offensive. Calderón used to say that the majority of those killed during the drug war were tied to cartels, also without offering evidence, but eventually backed off such rhetoric after criticism from activists and relatives of some victims.

A federal government official clarified later Wednesday that the figure came from López Obrador’s closed-door morning meetings with his security Cabinet and is based on analyses of those killed in clashes between criminal groups and/or with security forces. That suggests he was referring to presumed criminals and not murder victims more broadly speaking. The official, who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, said documentation exists but is not publicly available.

But critics questioned whether there was any scientific basis for such an assertion. While it’s true that sometimes cartel killers get high before doing their bloody business, they questioned whether it was fair to imply drug consumption is an underlying cause of gangland violence. And perhaps due to the ambiguity of López Obrador’s words, many understood them to mean all homicides, leading to accusations of victim-blaming.

Security analyst Alejandro Hope wrote that usually drug consumption is used to characterize perpetrators of murders, not the dead, and that "there is zero evidence" for López Obrador’s assertion.

María Elena Morera, president of the NGO Causa en Comun, called the president’s comment "troubling" and said there is no data to back it up.

"So the president is confused, ill-informed or simply does it to reinforce his posture of revictimizing and not legalizing drugs," Morera said.

López Obrador was asked at the news conference about possible legalization, for example the cultivation of opium poppies or the recreational use of marijuana, and suggested his administration is looking more at legalization for medicinal purposes.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2018 that prohibition of personal use, possession and private cultivation of cannabis was unconstitutional, though lawmakers have not codified decriminalization into law.

Data Civica, a stats-driven NGO working in human rights and citizen empowerment, also said it was concerned by López Obrador’s assertion.

"On the one hand, because drugs and alcohol do not justify a murder, on the other hand because there is no way of knowing that information," Data Civica said via Twitter thread. "In this sense, either the president has access to a database that nobody knows of (and should be public) or he is repeating prejudices."

Mexico recorded 35,588 murders last year, the most since comparable records began to be kept in the 1990s and the latest of multiple consecutive annual highs dating to before he took office in December 2018. The rate of increase in 2019 did slow significantly from that of previous years.

Since Calderón launched the anti-drug offensive in 2006, yearly killings are up more than threefold.

López Obrador espouses a strategy of addressing root causes like poverty and joblessness to try to reduce violence in the country.

"We must make clear that drugs, above all the modern drugs, the chemical drugs, are destructive," the president said Wednesday.

Peter Orsi, The Associated Press

MONTREAL — WSP Global Inc. missed expectations as it capped 2019 with a weaker fourth quarter than in the previous year.

The Montreal-based engineering consultant says its net income attributable to shareholders was $40.5 million for the period ended Dec. 31, down from $43.3 million a year earlier.

Excluding one-time items, adjusted profits fell 4.2 per cent to $56.6 million or 53 cents per diluted share, compared with $59.1 million or 57 cents per share in the prior year.

Net revenues grew 14.3 per cent to $1.76 billion.

WSP was expected to earn 86 cents per share in adjusted profits on $1.77 billion of revenues, according to financial markets data firm Refinitiv.

For the full year, its net income increased to $286.5 million from $248.1 million. Adjusted profits rose 10.7 per cent to $326.7 million or $3.10 per share, up from $295.2 million or $2.83 per share in 2018.

Revenues increased to $6.89 billion from $6 billion.

Analysts had expected adjusted earnings of $3.44 per share on $6.9 billion of revenues.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 26, 2020.

Companies in this story: (TSX:WSP).

The Canadian Press

WASHINGTON — Military students from Saudi Arabia have resumed flight training at U.S. bases, nearly three months after a Saudi trainee shot and killed three U.S. Navy sailors at Naval Air Station Pensacola in Florida.

The U.S. Navy said in a statement that flight training for the Saudi students resumed Tuesday. The training for about 850 Saudis at multiple U.S. bases was suspended December 10, four days after the deadly shooting.

Operational training, such as flying and other non-classroom instruction, was allowed to restart once additional safety restrictions were put in place.

The Navy said new policies prohibit the possession of personally owned firearms by international students and limit foreign nationals to their assigned bases and facilities. International students must agree to the new policies in order to participate in U.S. training.

"The Navy is making every effort to minimize disruptions to our foreign national partners while implementing the revised security initiatives," the Navy statement said.

In addition, a new continuous review process is also being implemented by March 13. That new monitoring, which was ordered by Defence Secretary Mark Esper, is intended to allow U.S. officials to pick up on signs of radicalization or other problematic behaviour that might not have been apparent when the student entered the training program.

The shooting at Pensacola, in which Saudi Air Force officer Mohammed Alshamrani killed three U.S. sailors and injured eight other people, focused public attention on the presence of foreign students in American military training programs and exposed shortcomings in the screening of cadets.

Early last month, the Justice Department announced that 21 Saudi military students were sent home after a review of all Saudi trainees. The 21, including an undisclosed number at Pensacola, had posted jihadist or anti-American sentiments on social media pages or had "contact with child pornography," including in internet chat rooms, officials said. None is accused of having had advance knowledge of the Dec. 6 shooting or having helped the gunman carry it out.

Lolita C. Baldor, The Associated Press

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg is bracing his supporters for a difficult stretch, with the sobering assertion that front-runner Bernie Sanders will likely emerge from next week’s Super Tuesday contests well ahead in the race for delegates.

The disclosure, made in a strategy memo sent to supporters, comes as the former South Bend, Indiana, mayor prepares for the uncertainty of Saturday’s South Carolina primary. After strong finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire, Buttigieg is working to beat expectations in South Carolina, where his pull among African American voters will be tested, while keeping up the fundraising stream that launched him into the top tier.

Despite the challenging stretch leading up to Super Tuesday, there remains a path to the nomination for Buttigieg, his campaign strategists say, though one marked by assumptions about the rest of the field and the candidate’s own performance over the next six critical days.

"The question is, Can he keep the balloon in the air?" said David Axelrod, former senior adviser to President Barack Obama. "So, I think there’s a lot at stake here. This was always going to be the toughest part of the competition for him."

Punctuating his challenge, Buttigieg cancelled a round of morning television appearances in South Carolina on Wednesday and scrubbed a day of Florida fundraising events from his schedule after falling ill with what aides described as flu-like symptoms, the result of a near-nonstop campaign schedule over the past two months.

Buttigieg did make time to speak, as did other candidates, at the National Action Network minister’s breakfast hosted by the Rev. Al Sharpton in Charleston, South Carolina, on Wednesday morning.

After an afternoon of rest, Buttigieg has meetings scheduled Thursday on Capitol Hill with members of the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the centrist New Democratic Coalition, as well as a series of media appearances on March 3 primary state television states.

Buttigieg campaign manager Mike Schmuhl acknowledges that Sanders looks to come out well ahead in the delegate count on Tuesday.

"Bernie Sanders will be the delegate leader after the March 3rd contests, but whether that makes him the prohibitive nominee is highly dependent on Pete’s performance," Shmuhl said in the seven-page memo, which was released to the media and aimed at keeping donors on board.

Chiefly, Schmuhl and other Buttigieg strategists argue that Buttigieg has been the only candidate to beat Sanders. They draw on the near-tie in the leadoff caucuses as proof that Buttigieg can hold down Sanders’ margins of victory in Super Tuesday states — especially swing states such as Colorado, North Carolina and Virginia, but also in Vermont, the senator’s home state. The campaign began airing ads in those states Monday.

"There are several states in there that kind of represent an idea of places where we’re seeing opportunity and also cost efficiency," senior strategist Michael Halle said in an interview.

The path Schmuhl and other strategists sketch relies on unpredictable factors of other candidates quitting the race and a map they argue is more favourable to the Midwestern centrist after March 3.

"Contrary to the media narrative, this race will not be determined on Super Tuesday — but only if Pete has the resources to compete," Schmuhl noted in the memo.

It’s an acknowledgement that Buttigieg also faces a fundraising crunch in a race with former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s unlimited resources and Sanders’ unending stream of online contributions.

Buttigieg raised an eye-popping $75 million last year, no small feat for the former mayor of a city of about 103,000. But having spent twice as much as he raised in the ramp-up to Iowa, he is now in a race against the clock to raise $13 million by March 3. He was only about 40% of the way there Wednesday. However, the campaign said it had raised more than $800,000 online after Tuesday’s debate.

And while the cancellation of Wednesday’s fundraisers in Florida might seem ill-timed, the events’ sponsors had already secured more in contributions than the goals set, aides said, though they declined to say how much Buttigieg had hoped to raise from the three stops.

Buttigieg has fundraisers scheduled for Oklahoma and Texas in the run-up to March 3, when he plans to make stops in North Carolina, Alabama, Texas, Oklahoma and California.

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Associated Press writers Laurie Kellman and Alan Fram in Washington contributed to this report.

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Catch up on the 2020 election campaign with AP experts on our weekly politics podcast, "Ground Game."

Thomas Beaumont, The Associated Press

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — An attorney announced Wednesday that his firm represents more than a dozen people in the University of Michigan sexual abuse case and will hold a news conference with the whistleblower and two other former wrestlers to share their allegations about the late Dr. Robert E. Anderson.

Parker Stinar with Denver-based Wahlberg, Woodruff, Nimmo & Sloane told The Associated Press a former Wolverine wrestler from the 1970s will be among the speakers at Thursday’s news conference. The man, who Stinar didn’t identify, will read parts of a letter he has kept that detail his previous complaints about Anderson and correspondence he received from the university, Stinar said.

"Every victim that we’ve spoken with wants the university to be held accountable," Stinar said. "And equally if not more important, wants to spread awareness so that one voice isn’t silenced until it gets to 100. But that first voice is heard and actions are taken to prevent this from happening ever again."

Also scheduled to speak at the news conference are the whistleblower, who hasn’t yet been identified, and former Olympic and Michigan wrestler Andy Hrovat, the first athlete to publicly say Anderson touched him inappropriately. Hrovat also said last week the physician’s reputation for such conduct was well known among teammates two-plus decades ago.

The revelations echo high-profile sexual abuse allegations made against sports doctors at other universities.

Last week, the university’s president apologized to "anyone who was harmed" by Anderson and offered counselling services. The school says it has started an investigation into Anderson’s behaviour following abuse allegations from five former patients.

Officials have acknowledged some university employees were aware of accusations against the doctor prior to the whistleblower’s 2018 complaint that led to a police investigation.

The university has also hired an independent law firm to investigate claims against Anderson.

"We very much want to get to the bottom of that," school spokesman Rick Fitzgerald said.

Larry Lage And Mike Householder, The Associated Press

VANCOUVER — A hospice society in British Columbia says it is outraged by the province’s decision to stop its funding because it refuses to provide medically assisted death.

Angelina Ireland, president of Delta Hospice, says there wasn’t any consultation between the care facility, Fraser Health and the Health Ministry.

On Tuesday, Health Minister Adrian Dix said Fraser Health will stop paying $1.5 million in annual funding to the Delta Hospice Society next year after giving the organization one year’s notice to end its service agreement without cause.

Ireland says if the government wants to implement medical help in dying then it should create facilities for people who want the procedure.

She says the hospice will look at its legal and other options to continue serving patients and families in their final days.

In announcing the decision to cut off funding to the Delta Hospice Society, Dix said people the right to receive medical assistance in dying where they live and that decision.

B.C. developed its policy after the federal government made it legal in 2016 for patients to get medical assistance in dying under certain circumstances. The provincial policy requires a hospice to allow patients to access medical assistance in dying if its beds are more than 50 per cent publicly funded.

The contract with the hospice society covers 94 per cent of the cost to operate 10 beds at the Irene Thomas Hospice in Delta, near Vancouver.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 26. 2020.

The Canadian Press

PHOENIX — Arizona’s most populous county on Wednesday joined a growing national movement in which areas are declaring themselves Second Amendment sanctuaries and proclaiming support for gun ownership rights.

The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors voted in Phoenix to declare the county a "Second Amendment Preservation County," following dozens of counties nationwide and four others in Arizona that have approved similar symbolic resolutions meant to stave off gun-control policies that could be seen as unconstitutional.

The resolution in Maricopa County, which has about 4.4 million residents, simply says the board supports the right to own guns. The proposal lost some of its edge when the board dropped a stipulation that government funds would not be used to infringe on gun rights.

Supervisor Steve Gallardo, a Democrat, denounced the politically charged resolution. "Let’s think about this. A resolution should not be divisive," he said. "It should not be partisan."

Chairman Clint Hickman countered that multiple constituents had expressed support for the sanctuary designation that was first used in 2018 in Illinois and quickly spread to California, Colorado, New Mexico, Florida, Virginia and other states.

"Sanctuary city" is a term more often associated with cities trying to restrict co-operation with U.S. immigration authorities. Some Second Amendment sanctuary supporters say their decision to use the term was a deliberate knock on Democrats who support immigrant sanctuary cities.

In Arizona, gun owners are already free to carry a concealed firearm without a permit. They can also bypass background checks if they buy their firearms at a gun show. However, federal background checks are required for other purchases.

Minority Democrats in the Arizona Legislature regularly introduce measures to boost gun regulations, including bans on high-capacity magazines and assault weapons, but the bills are routinely defeated.

Gary Larson, a gun owner from Glendale, said he had never spoken at a public forum but felt compelled to comment Wednesday because he fears restrictions that could "clamp down" on his freedoms.

"Protect the rights of gun owners but critique the people who are asking to own guns," Larson said.

Gun-control activists, including members of Moms Demand Action, slammed the resolution as a "black eye" for the county.

"It feels a little bit like fear-mongering," Marie Thearle, a member of the group said during the public comment period.

Garrick McFadden, a former Democratic congressional candidate who is black, said the resolution doesn’t help communities of colour.

"There’s 30 handgun deaths in America each day. But 15 of those people are black people that are killed," McFadden said. "One of the things that needs to be done is reaching out to your constituents, not just the ones that came up to you and said they fear their rights are being infringed."

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Associated Press writer Bob Christie contributed to this report.

Terry Tang, The Associated Press

BILLINGS, Mont. — One of the last and largest wild bison populations in North America has begun its migration out of Yellowstone National Park into southwestern Montana, where they are being hunted and face government-sponsored slaughter as part of a population reduction program.

Hundreds of the animals have moved in recent days into the Gardiner basin along the park’s northern border, Yellowstone spokeswoman Morgan Warthin said. The animals leave the park in winter to graze at lower elevations.

Capturing the bison for possible shipment to slaughter "could happen at any point given the large number of bison in the basin," Warthin said.

Because this year’s migration occurred somewhat late, the park has only a narrow window to capture animals before the weather warms and they return to higher elevations inside the park, Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks regional supervisor Mark Deleray said Wednesday.

State and federal officials want to reduce Yellowstone’s bison herds this winter by up to 900 animals under an agreement intended to shield Montana’s cattle industry from the disease brucellosis. Yellowstone had just over 4,800 bison as of last summer.

The population reduction would come through a combination of hunting, slaughter and placing up to 110 animals into quarantine for potential relocation at a later date.

Native American tribes from Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Washington state with treaty rights in the Yellowstone region are holding hunts that have killed more than 50 bison this year, Deleray said.

Montana’s state-sponsored bison hunting season ended on Feb. 15 with four animals killed.

The slaughter of park bison has long drawn objections from wildlife advocates, members of Congress and some Native Americans. It occurs under a 2000 agreement between the state and federal officials that’s meant to reduce the chances of brucellosis infecting cattle.

The disease causes animals to prematurely abort their young and has been eradicated in the U.S. outside the Yellowstone region.

There have been numerous cases of cattle in the Yellowstone region being infected with brucellosis by diseased elk, but no recorded transmissions from bison.

The Associated Press

EDMONTON — Alberta is to bring in its new budget Thursday while juggling a sluggish economy, multibillion-dollar deficits and escalating conflicts with public-sector workers.

"There continues to be heavy lifting in front of us as a province. But I will say this: we are on track," Finance Minister Travis Toews said Wednesday.

"We will be putting a real focus on job creation," said Toews, who added that a plan remains in place to balance the budget by 2022-23.

In keeping with tradition, Toews displayed for media the footwear he will wear for budget day. He brought out the same thing he wore last year — his size 10 cowboy boots — to signal that the work continues.

Premier Jason Kenney and his United Conservatives won last spring’s election on a promise to boost jobs, grow the economy and revitalize Alberta’s wellspring oil and gas industry.

But the province has shed about 50,000 full-time jobs. And this week Teck Resources decided not to pursue a highly anticipated $20-billion oilsands mine project in northern Alberta.

On top of that, the province has budgeted the benchmark West Texas Intermediate oil price at US$57 per barrel for this year and rising to $63 in two years.

However, global conditions, including reduced demand from China due to the novel coronavirus, have the WTI hovering around the $50 mark, well below what the government has been hoping to take in.

The NDP Opposition has noted that Canada’s six private-sector banks project Alberta’s economy will grow by 1.7 per cent in 2020, a full percentage point lower than the prediction in the UCP’s first budget last fall.

Toews acknowledged the situation. "What we see today out there in the global economy represents the volatility risk that we have in Alberta.

"It just further reinforces the rationale to manage and control what we can control."

Part of that is an ongoing effort to redirect or reduce spending to get more value for money, particularly in big-budget areas such as health and education.

It’s a fight that’s been met with rising anger as the government looks for wage cuts from some public-sector workers, wage freezes and benefit cuts from nurses, and changes to doctors fees and benefits.

NDP finance critic Shannon Phillips, in her prebudget media conference Wednesday, also trotted out footwear: a nurse’s sneakers, a teacher’s high heels, a child’s runners and the work boots of a laid-off oilfield services worker.

Phillips said the footwear represents Albertans who will continue to feel the effects of Kenney’s cuts while the government helps its business friends with a corporate tax cut that will soon be down to eight per cent from 12 per cent.

"I’m expecting to see a plan, unless they actually change direction, that blows a hole in the budget," said Phillips, who added that less revenue will mean even deeper cuts to health and education.

Economist Trevor Tombe said Kenney’s government is in for a squeeze, particularly given that current oil prices and projections into the future are less than what it had planned.

"They’re going to need to respond to a dramatically different fiscal and economic environment than they faced even as early as last fall," said Tombe of the University of Calgary.

The current budget projects a deficit of $8.7 billion on $50 billion in revenue, with debt projected to rise to $72 billion this spring.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 26, 2020

Dean Bennett, The Canadian Press