Tausi Insider

Indigenous communities on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border are trying to build an alliance with U.S. Congress and the Biden administration in hopes of pressuring Ottawa into a bipartisan effort to confront toxic trans-border mining runoff. Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press In a city of pinstripes and partisan power brokers, Mike Allison sticks out like a sore thumb. He’s in the wrong place – and he knows it. “I shouldn’t be here,” the denim-clad Indigenous elder suddenly says, fighting tears beneath the brim of his trademark cowboy hat. “I should be out on the land, working with my kids, teaching them values. I should be teaching them kids how to work with the environment, not fight for it.” Instead, the Upper Similkameen Indian Band councillor is in a downtown D.C. boardroom, gearing up for a second day of meetings with State Department officials, bureaucrats, diplomats and members of Congress. Fighting for the environment is exactly what Allison, whose British Columbia First Nat...

Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault takes part in a news conference in Ottawa, on Sept. 15. Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press The federal government is blocking development of Glencore’s Sukunka open-pit metallurgical coal mine project located near Tumbler Ridge, B.C. Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault says the scientific evidence gathered in assessing the proposal showed that its negative impacts were significant and could not be mitigated. The project assessment by British Columbia raised concerns about southern mountain caribou and its critical habitat, grizzly bear mortality and the discharge of mercury and selenium. Glencore had proposed the construction and operation of an open-pit mine that would have produced three million tonnes of hard coking coal per year for export to overseas markets. The mine life of the project was expected to be more than 20 years. The government says the decision does not prevent Glencore, or others, from submitting new project proposals and does...