More than a week into a protest impeding travel to the United States border, Alberta reached out to the federal government with a request for help.
In a letter obtained by CBC News sent to federal Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino and Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair, Alberta’s Minister of Municipal Affairs Ric McIver wrote that the province was “currently experiencing significant issues” in regards to travel to the border.
“Despite our best efforts to resolve this ongoing issue, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) have exhausted all local and regional options to alleviate the week-long service disruptions,” McIver wrote in the letter, which is dated Feb. 5.
According to the letter, the RCMP had attempted to secure appropriate heavy-duty equipment required to remove vehicles and other items, such as trailers and tractors, from the area.
Attempts to secure heavy-duty equipment providers across Western provinces and the United States failed, according to Alberta’s minister of municipal affairs, leading to the province seeking aid from the federal government. (Submitted by Brad Smith)
Those attempts to secure those services from providers across Western provinces and the United States failed, the letter said, largely due to the result of “private industry concern over negative consequences.”
As such, McIver wrote, the province was requesting federal assistance that included providing equipment and personnel to move dozens of semi-tractor trailers, as well as personal and recreational vehicles, from the area.
“As this complex and dynamic situation continues to impede the free and safe movement of not only Albertans, but also of critical goods and services vital to both the Canadian and American economy, we are looking to the Government of Canada for assistance,” McIver wrote.
On Saturday, Premier Jason Kenney said Alberta would launch a court challenge against the federal government’s invoking of the Emergencies Act.
“As we’ve demonstrated here in Alberta at Coutts and Ontario did at the Windsor Ambassador bridge, provincial law authorities are able to deal with illegal road blockades,” Kenney said in a video posted to Twitter.
In a video posted to Twitter on Saturday arguing against the invocation of the Emergencies Act, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney said provincial law authorities are able to deal with illegal road blockades. Two weeks prior, his minister of municipal affairs called for aid from Ottawa due to a lack of resources. (Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press)
Lori Williams, a political science professor at Mount Royal University, said Kenney’s challenge against the Emergencies Act is undercut by the province requesting that same kind of help two weeks ago.
“It looks hypocritical, it looks contradictory,” she said. “It’s entirely OK to question the Emergencies Act, and there are a lot of questions to be asked about the Emergencies Act.
“But when there’s no indication whatsoever that provincial jurisdiction will be trampled on, and there are at least two challenges to that act being launched by other groups, he had been much better off expressing concern and leaving it to someone else to take that issue forward.”
In a statement, a spokesperson for Alberta’s acting minister of justice and solicitor general said the province asked for assistance “in part because local Alberta RCMP remains under the control of the federal government.”
“The use of the Emergencies Act was never something that Alberta asked for, or required,” said Alex Puddifant in an email.
“Its use is unjustified, and sets a dangerous precedent. The Coutts situation required federal resources — not the use of legislation that suspends civil liberties.”
Emergencies Act
In invoking the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said doing so would give the federal government temporary powers to handle the ongoing blockades and protests.
“It is now clear that there are serious challenges to law enforcement’s ability to effectively enforce the law,” Trudeau said during a news conference.
The Emergencies Act grants cabinet the ability to “take special temporary measures that may not be appropriate in normal times,” including power to assume jurisdiction from the provinces and municipalities.
The federal government must determine that an emergency “exceeds the capacity or authority” of provinces to deal with those issues.
The blockade of the border lasted more than two weeks. An RCMP raid of trailers in the early morning hours on Feb. 14 led to officers seizing guns, body armour, a large quantity of ammunition and high-capacity firearm magazines.
PARIS (AP) — French judicial authorities are investigating the disappearance of two Paralympic athletes from Congo who recently competed in the Paris Games, the prosecutor’s office in the Paris suburb of Bobigny confirmed on Thursday.
Prosecutors opened the investigation on Sept. 7, after members of the athletes’ delegation warned authorities of their disappearance two days before.
Le Parisien newspaper reported that shot putter Mireille Nganga and Emmanuel Grace Mouambako, a visually impaired sprinter who was accompanied by a guide, went missing on Sept. 5, along with a third person.
The athletes’ suitcases were also gone but their passports remained with the Congolese delegation, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation, who asked to remain anonymous as they were not allowed to speak publicly about the case.
The Paralympic Committee of the Democratic Republic of Congo did not respond to requests for information from The Associated Press.
Nganga — who recorded no mark in the seated javelin and shot put competitions — and Mouambako were Congo’s flag bearers at the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games, organizers said.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A linebacker at Division II West Virginia State was fatally shot during what the university said Thursday is being investigated by police as a home invasion.
The body of Jyilek Zyiare Harrington, 21, of Charlotte, North Carolina, was found inside an apartment Wednesday night in Charleston, police Lt. Tony Hazelett said in a statement.
Hazelett said several gunshots were fired during a disturbance in a hallway and inside the apartment. The statement said Harrington had multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. Police said they had no information on a possible suspect.
West Virginia State said counselors were available to students and faculty on campus.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with Jyilek’s family as they mourn the loss of this incredible young man,” West Virginia State President Ericke S. Cage said in a letter to students and faculty.
Harrington, a senior, had eight total tackles, including a sack, in a 27-24 win at Barton College last week.
“Jyilek truly embodied what it means to be a student-athlete and was a leader not only on campus but in the community,” West Virginia State Vice President of Intercollegiate Athletics Nate Burton said. “Jyilek was a young man that, during Christmas, would create a GoFundMe to help less fortunate families.”
Burton said donations to a fund established by the athletic department in Harrington’s memory will be distributed to an organization in Charlotte to continue his charity work.
West Virginia State’s home opener against Carson-Newman, originally scheduled for Thursday night, has been rescheduled to Friday, and a private vigil involving both teams was set for Thursday night. Harrington previously attended Carson-Newman, where he made seven tackles in six games last season. He began his college career at Division II Erskine College.
“Carson-Newman joins West Virginia State in mourning the untimely passing of former student-athlete Jyilek Harrington,” Carson-Newman Vice President of Athletics Matt Pope said in a statement. “The Harrington family and the Yellow Jackets’ campus community is in our prayers. News like this is sad to hear anytime, but today it feels worse with two teams who knew him coming together to play.”
DETROIT (AP) — Joe Schmidt, the Hall of Fame linebacker who helped the Detroit Lions win NFL championships in 1953 and 1957 and later coached the team, has died. He was 92.
The Lions said family informed the team Schmidt died Wednesday. A cause of death was not provided.
One of pro football’s first great middle linebackers, Schmidt played his entire NFL career with the Lions from 1953-65. An eight-time All-Pro, he was enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1973 and the college football version in 2000.
“Joe likes to say that at one point in his career, he was 6-3, but he had tackled so many fullbacks that it drove his neck into his shoulders and now he is 6-foot,” said the late Lions owner William Clay Ford, Schmidt’s presenter at his Hall of Fame induction in 1973. “At any rate, he was listed at 6-feet and as I say was marginal for that position. There are, however, qualities that certainly scouts or anybody who is drafting a ballplayer cannot measure.”
Born in Pittsburgh, Schmidt played college football in his hometown at Pitt, beginning his stint there as a fullback and guard before coach Len Casanova switched him to linebacker.
“Pitt provided me with the opportunity to do what I’ve wanted to do, and further myself through my athletic abilities,” Schmidt said. “Everything I have stemmed from that opportunity.”
Schmidt dealt with injuries throughout his college career and was drafted by the Lions in the seventh round in 1953. As defenses evolved in that era, Schmidt’s speed, savvy and tackling ability made him a valuable part of some of the franchise’s greatest teams.
Schmidt was elected to the Pro Bowl 10 straight years from 1955-64, and after his arrival, the Lions won the last two of their three NFL titles in the 1950s.
In a 1957 playoff game at San Francisco, the Lions trailed 27-7 in the third quarter before rallying to win 31-27. That was the NFL’s largest comeback in postseason history until Buffalo rallied from a 32-point deficit to beat Houston in 1993.
“We just decided to go after them, blitz them almost every down,” Schmidt recalled. “We had nothing to lose. When you’re up against it, you let both barrels fly.”
Schmidt became an assistant coach after wrapping up his career as a player. He was Detroit’s head coach from 1967-72, going 43-35-7.
Schmidt was part of the NFL’s All-Time Team revealed in 2019 to celebrate the league’s centennial season. Of course, he’d gone into the Hall of Fame 46 years earlier.
Not bad for an undersized seventh-round draft pick.
“It was a dream of mine to play football,” Schmidt told the Detroit Free Press in 2017. “I had so many people tell me that I was too small. That I couldn’t play. I had so many negative people say negative things about me … that it makes you feel good inside. I said, ‘OK, I’ll prove it to you.’”
