New Canadians, non-traditional demographics boost minor hockey uptake in B.C.President Joe Biden on Monday announced that he is commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 people on federal death row, converting their punishments to life imprisonment just weeks before President-elect Donald Trump, an outspoken proponent of expanding capital punishment, takes office. The move spares the lives of people convicted in killings, including the slayings of police and military officers, people on federal land and those involved in deadly bank robberies or drug deals, as well as the killings of guards or prisoners in federal facilities. It means just three federal inmates continue to face execution. They are Dylann Roof, who carried out the 2015 racist slayings of nine Black members of Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina; 2013 Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev; and Robert Bowers, who fatally shot 11 congregants at Pittsburgh’s Tree of life Synagogue in 2018, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S history. “I’ve dedicated my career to reducing violent crime and ensuring a fair and effective justice system,” Biden said in a statement. “Today, I am commuting the sentences of 37 of the 40 individuals on federal death row to life sentences without the possibility of parole. These commutations are consistent with the moratorium my administration has imposed on federal executions, in cases other than terrorism and hate-motivated mass murder.” Reaction to the president's end-of-year act of clemency was strong, particularly among those who were victimized by Roof. Michael Graham, whose sister Cynthia Hurd was killed by Roof, wants him to die for his crimes and was thankful Biden kept him on death row. He said Roof’s lack of remorse and simmering white nationalism in the U.S. means he is the kind of dangerous and evil person the death penalty is intended for. “This was a crime against a race of people who were doing something all Americans do on a Wednesday night – go to Bible study,” Graham said. “It didn’t matter who was there, only that they were Black.” Felicia Sanders, who shielded her granddaughter while watching Roof kill her son Tywanza and her aunt Susie Jackson sent her lawyer, Andy Savage, a text message that called Biden's decision to not spare Roof's life a wonderful Christmas gift. The Biden administration in 2021 announced a moratorium on federal capital punishment to study the protocols used, which suspended executions during Biden's term. But Biden actually had promised to go further on the issue in the past, pledging to end federal executions without the caveats for terrorism and hate-motivated, mass killings. While running for president in 2020, Biden's campaign website said he would “work to pass legislation to eliminate the death penalty at the federal level, and incentivize states to follow the federal government’s example.” Similar language didn't appear on Biden's reelection website before he left the presidential race in July. “Make no mistake: I condemn these murderers, grieve for the victims of their despicable acts, and ache for all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss,” Biden's statement said. “But guided by my conscience and my experience as a public defender, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, vice president, and now president, I am more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level.” He took a political jab at Trump, saying, “In good conscience, I cannot stand back and let a new administration resume executions that I halted.” Trump, who takes office on Jan. 20, has spoken frequently of expanding executions. In a speech announcing his 2024 campaign, Trump called for those “caught selling drugs to receive the death penalty for their heinous acts.” He later promised to execute drug and human smugglers and even praised China's harsher treatment of drug peddlers. During his first term as president, Trump also advocated for the death penalty for drug dealers. There were 13 federal executions during Trump's first term, more than under any president in modern history, and some may have happened fast enough to have contributed to the spread of the coronavirus at the federal death row facility in Indiana. Those were the first federal executions since 2003. The final three occurred after Election Day in November 2020 but before Trump left office the following January, the first time federal prisoners were put to death by a lame-duck president since Grover Cleveland in 1889. Biden faced recent pressure from advocacy groups urging him to act to make it more difficult for Trump to increase the use of capital punishment for federal inmates. The president's announcement also comes less than two weeks after he commuted the sentences of roughly 1,500 people who were released from prison and placed on home confinement during the COVID-19 pandemic, and of 39 others convicted of nonviolent crimes, the largest single-day act of clemency in modern history. The announcement also followed the post-election pardon that Biden granted his son Hunter on federal gun and tax charges after long saying he would not issue one, sparking an uproar in Washington. The pardon also raised questions about whether he would issue sweeping preemptive pardons for administration officials and other allies who the White House worries could be unjustly targeted by Trump’s second administration. Speculation that Biden could commute federal death sentences intensified last week after the White House announced he plans to visit Italy on the final foreign trip of his presidency next month. Biden, a practicing Catholic, will meet with Pope Francis, who recently called for prayers for U.S. death row inmates in hopes their sentences will be commuted. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which has long called for an end to the death penalty, said Biden's decision is a “significant step in advancing the cause of human dignity in our nation” and moves the country “a step closer to building a culture of life.” Martin Luther King III, who publicly urged Biden to change the death sentences, said in a statement shared by the White House that the president "has done what no president before him was willing to do: take meaningful and lasting action not just to acknowledge the death penalty’s racist roots but also to remedy its persistent unfairness.” Madeline Cohen, an attorney for Norris Holder, who faced death for the 1997 fatal shooting of a guard during a bank robbery in St. Louis, said his case “reflects many of the system's flaws” and thanked Biden for converting his sentence to life in prison. Holder, who is Black, was sentenced by an all-white jury. “Norris’ case exemplifies the racial bias and arbitrariness that led the President to commute federal death sentences,” Cohen said. Donnie Oliverio, a retired Ohio police officer whose partner was killed by one of the men whose death sentence was converted, said the execution of "the person who killed my police partner and best friend would have brought me no peace." “The president has done what is right here,” Oliverio said in a statement also issued by the White House, “and what is consistent with the faith he and I share.”After a disappointing COP29, here's how to design global climate talks that might actually work

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The get-together last week of Elon Musk, Nigel Farage and Reform UK’s treasurer, Nick Candy, wasn’t just a gathering of Donald Trump fans. It was a meeting of minds. Immigration, culture wars and shrinking the public sector all feature highly on their political agendas, developed under the umbrella of Trump’s Maga vision. “We only have one more chance left to save the west and we can do great things together,” said Farage afterwards. It also revived speculation that Musk could donate as much as $100m to Reform UK, even if there are signs that such a move might actually be opposed by voters. A ban on wealthy foreign nationals being able to give large sums of money to British political parties was backed by 55%, according to a survey by Survation for the campaign group 38 Degrees. Asked specifically about Musk, two-thirds (66%) said he should not become influential in British politics. Even among Reform UK voters, 51% did not want to see Musk become influential. Money aside though, the ideological common ground between Musk and Reform UK is clear in some areas. Musk is a vocal critic of US immigration policy, making him a natural ideological bedfellow with Reform UK. Referring to the US-Mexico border this year, he said “unvetted immigration at large scale is a recipe for disaster” and called for a “secure southern border”. However, he also called for “greatly expediting legal immigration”, reflecting US tech industry concerns about labour needs. Immigration is a core concern for Farage and Reform UK. Its top pledge in its manifesto-style “contract” with voters during the UK general election this year was to freeze all “non-essential” immigration. The second pledge was to detain and deport illegal immigrants, including sending arrivals on small boats “back to France”. Musk – whose grinding of an anti-government axe dates back to his own feelings that regulations have hampered his car making and space rocket businesses – has been given licence by Donald Trump to cut $500bn from the US federal budget. He and fellow billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy are heading a new Department of Government Efficiency , or Doge – named with a winking nod to Musk’s cryptocurrency of choice, dogecoin. Farage has been quick out of the gates to endorse this. Trump’s plans to radically slash the US public sector and appoint Musk to “sack vast numbers of people” were a blueprint for what needed to happen in the UK, the Reform UK leader said last month. Tim Bale, a professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London, said part of Reform UK’s appeal to Musk is its “disruptor” status, echoing the character of a serial entrepreneur who does not shy away from confrontation. “The main appeal of Reform for Musk is that they are disruptors and he likes disruptors,” he said. “He just likes the fact they are shaking things up.” Musk has told of making a vow to “destroy” what he describes as “the woke mind virus” after his estrangement from his trans daughter, Vivian Wilson. The topic is one that the billionaire has repeatedly returned to during tweets, waging other culture wars on diversity regulations. Farage placed issues and arguments around gender on the very first page of his party’s general election manifesto earlier this year, referring to a “divisive ‘woke’ ideology” that he claimed had captured public institutions. Reform UK pledged to ban what it calls “transgender ideology” in schools within the first 100 days of government. It also pledged to replace the Equality Act and says it would scrap diversity, equality and inclusion rules. “Clearly, Musk has got a bee in his bonnet about the trans issue in particular and the so-called woke mind virus in general, and that dovetails well with the Reform UK position on the culture wars,” said Bale. As the chief executive of the world’s leading electric car brand, Musk has strong environmental credentials. But Musk has made more ambivalent noises about green issues recently. In a discussion with Trump on X in August, Musk said it was “wrong” to vilify the fossil fuel sector. In terms of existential threat, Musk has also shown more interest in low birth rates and artificial intelligence as problems requiring the world’s attention. This was a change from his view in 2018 when he said that climate change was “the biggest threat that humanity faces this century”. Reform UK advocates rolling back environmentally friendly policies. It has pledged to scrap the UK’s 2050 net zero target – where the UK removes as much carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as it emits – because it is “crippling our economy”. The party also pledges to fast-track North Sea oil and gas licences, as well as doing more to enable fracking. Musk has moved from being an initial supporter of Ukraine to a more ambiguous position, which has included trolling the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. In 2022, the billionaire sparked outrage when he floated a “peace plan” in which he argued that Ukraine should adopt a neutral status and drop a bid to join Nato. While Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service was used to help Ukraine after Russia’s February 2022 invasion, there was also controversy last year when it emerged that Musk had refused a Ukrainian request to activate the system to assist in a surprise offensive. Farage has faced criticism over his claims that Ukraine could not defeat Russia and his questioning of a US decision to authorize Kyiv to use long-range missiles. Past comments by the Reform UK leader, such as that the EU and Nato had “provoked” Russia’s invasion of Ukraine by expanding eastwards, have also put him at odds with other mainstream political parties in the UK.US budget airlines are struggling. Will pursuing premium passengers solve their problems? DALLAS (AP) — Delta and United Airlines have become the most profitable U.S. airlines by targeting premium customers while also winning a significant share of budget travelers. That is squeezing smaller low-fare carriers like Spirit Airlines, which filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday. Some travel industry experts think Spirit’s troubles indicate less-wealthy passengers will have fewer choices and higher prices. Other discount airlines are on better financial footing but also are lagging far behind the full-service airlines when it comes to recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic. Most industry experts think Frontier and other so-called ultra-low-cost carriers will fill the vacuum if Spirit shrinks, and that there's still plenty of competition to prevent prices from spiking. Bitcoin ticks closer to $100,000 in extended surge following US elections NEW YORK (AP) — Bitcoin is jumping again, setting another new high above $99,000 overnight. The cryptocurrency has been shattering records almost daily since the U.S. presidential election, and has rocketed more than 40% higher in just two weeks. It's now at the doorstep of $100,000. Cryptocurrencies and related investments like crypto exchange-traded funds have rallied because the incoming Trump administration is expected to be more “crypto-friendly.” Still, as with everything in the volatile cryptoverse, the future is hard to predict. And while some are bullish, other experts continue to warn of investment risks. Australia rejects Elon Musk's claim that it plans to control access to the internet MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — An Australian Cabinet minister has rejected X Corp. owner Elon Musk’s allegation that the government intends to control all Australians' access to the internet through legislation that would ban young children from social media. Treasurer Jim Chalmers said on Friday that Musk’s criticism was “unsurprising” after the government introduced legislation to Parliament that would fine platforms including X up to $133 million for allowing children under 16 to hold social media accounts. The spat continues months of open hostility between the Australian government and the tech billionaire over regulators’ efforts to reduce public harm from social media. Parliament could pass the legislation as soon as next week. Oil company Phillips 66 faces federal charges related to alleged Clean Water Act violations LOS ANGELES (AP) — Oil company Phillips 66 has been federally indicted in connection with alleged violations of the Clean Water Act in California. The Texas-based company is accused of discharging hundreds of thousands of gallons of industrial wastewater containing excessive amounts of oil and grease. The U.S. Department of Justice announced the indictment on Thursday. Phillips is charged with two counts of negligently violating the Clean Water Act and four counts of knowingly violating the Clean Water Act. An arraignment date has not been set. A spokesperson for the company said it was cooperating with prosecutors. US regulators seek to break up Google, forcing Chrome sale as part of monopoly punishment U.S. regulators want a federal judge to break up Google to prevent the company from continuing to squash competition through its dominant search engine after a court found it had maintained an abusive monopoly over the past decade. The proposed breakup floated in a 23-page document filed late Wednesday by the U.S. Justice Department calls for Google to sell its industry-leading Chrome web browser and impose restrictions designed to prevent Android from favoring its search engine. Regulators also want to ban Google from forging multibillion-dollar deals to lock in its dominant search engine as the default option on Apple’s iPhone and other devices. What you need to know about the proposed measures designed to curb Google's search monopoly U.S. regulators are proposing aggressive measures to restore competition to the online search market after a federal judge ruled that Google maintained an illegal monopoly. The sweeping set of recommendations filed late Wednesday could radically alter Google’s business. Regulators want Google to sell off its industry-leading Chrome web browser. They outlined a range of behavioral measures such as prohibiting Google from using search results to favor its own services such as YouTube, and forcing it to license search index data to its rivals. They're not going as far as to demand Google spin off Android, but are leaving that door open if the remedies don't work. Stock market today: Wall Street gains ground as it heads for a winning week NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks gained ground on Wall Street, keeping the market on track for its fifth gain in a row. The S&P 500 was up 0.4% in afternoon trading Friday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 351 points and the Nasdaq composite rose 0.2%. Retailers had some of the biggest gains. Gap soared after reporting quarterly results that easily beat analysts' estimates. EchoStar fell after DirecTV called of its purchase of that company's Dish Network unit. European markets were mostly higher and Asian markets ended mixed. Treasury yields held relatively steady in the bond market. Crude oil prices gained ground. Apple and Google face UK investigation into mobile browser dominance LONDON (AP) — A British watchdog says Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers. The watchdog's report Friday recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year. The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker’s tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. The CMA’s report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers “the clearest or easiest option.” Apple said it disagreed with the findings. German auto supplier Bosch to cut 5,500 jobs in further sign of carmakers' woes FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Germany's technology and services company Bosch is cutting its automotive division workforce by as many as 5,500 jobs in the next several years, in another sign of the headwinds hitting the German and global auto industries. The company cited stagnating global auto sales, too much factory capacity in the auto industry compared to sales prospects and a slower than expected transition to electric-powered, software-controlled vehicles. Some 3,500 of the job reductions would come before the end of 2027 and would hit the part of the company that develops driver assistance and automated driving technologies. About half those job reductions would be at locations in Germany. At least 15 people are sick in Minnesota from ground beef tied to E. coli recall U.S. health officials say at least 15 people in Minnesota have been sickened by E. coli poisoning tied to a national recall of more than 160,000 pounds of potentially tainted ground beef. Detroit-based Wolverine Packing Co. recalled the meat this week after Minnesota state agriculture officials reported multiple illnesses and found that a sample of the product tested positive for E. coli O157:H7, which can cause life-threatening infections. Symptoms of E. coli poisoning include fever, vomiting, diarrhea and signs of dehydration.

X Financial Reports Third Quarter 2024 Unaudited Financial Results