Latest news with #AndrewMiller
Vancouver Sun
3 days ago
- Business
- Vancouver Sun
Trump could crush Canada's softwood exports. Here's how a new crisis could play out
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Canada-U.S. softwood lumber trade relationship has dealt with ups and downs, disputes and resolutions, for decades . Anxiety for Canadian exporters is reaching a fever pitch again as the U.S. threatens to more than double softwood lumber duties and add even steeper tariffs under a national security investigation. Canadian foresters, mills, and governments that enjoy taxes, economic spinoffs and stumpage fees from Crown land will feel the pain if they lose too much access to the massive U.S. market. But larger producers have been preparing for just this kind of contingency and have cleverly hedged their bets, building capacity in the U.S., where they can sell as much as they want to Americans, tariff-free. Canadian firms will soon receive word from the U.S. Commerce Department's Sixth Administrative Review (AR6) of U.S. countervailing and anti-dumping duties on Canadian softwood lumber exports, with the rate expected to jump from around 14 per cent to roughly 34 per cent. For Canfor, the Vancouver-based lumber giant selected as a mandatory respondent in the AR6 review, it will be even worse. Its duties are calculated based on its own shipments and prices, not an industry average, like it is for other companies. Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. A welcome email is on its way. If you don't see it, please check your junk folder. The next issue of Sunrise will soon be in your inbox. Please try again Interested in more newsletters? Browse here. 'Canfor's rate will be 45 per cent, plus or minus a per cent,' said Andrew Miller, chairman of Oregon-based Stimson Lumber and chair of the U.S. Lumber Coalition. 'So they'll get a kick in the teeth from the next round of duties.' Then there's the threat of tariffs from President Donald Trump's ongoing national security investigation of Canadian lumber imports under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act , which he ordered in March and is due late this year. Currently, lumber shipments are exempted from Trump's baseline tariffs, because they're covered by the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade deal (USMCA), but that could soon change based on the findings of the 232 probe. National Post breaks down the position of the two countries, what the impacts could be, and how Canadian producers are trying to mitigate the potential damage of punitive trade barriers. The U.S. Lumber Coalition is playing for keeps. It backs higher anti-dumping duties and tariffs for what it sees as a subsidized domestic industry. It claims Canadian producers don't pay market rates for stumpage because their forests are publicly owned and provincial governments set the stumpage rates, while U.S. producers face higher market rates. But it doesn't stop there: the U.S. coalition also wants to see Canada's U.S. market share significantly chopped. Miller isn't shy about the goals: 'A countrywide quota with no exemptions and no carveouts, and a single-digit market share' for Canadian lumber. Today, Canada has a 25 per cent market share, with exports of 12 billion feet of softwood lumber to the U.S. each year, according to the coalition. Softwood lumber accounts for about 7.5 per cent of Canadian exports; in 2023, the U.S. was the destination for 68 per cent of those forestry products . The whole industry is worth about $33.4 billion in sales annually and employs more than 200,000 workers across Canada, according to a report this year from RBC. If Trump stacked a 20 per cent tariff on top of the existing duties, driving down some of Canada's approximately 12 billion board feet of annual softwood exports to the U.S., Miller believes the U.S. industry could almost immediately replace at least two billion feet worth through quick operational changes. Incremental mill upgrades over three years could then add another three to four billion feet of production, he said. 'I really believe that within three years we would have replaced, through U.S. production of lumber, about half of what Canada currently exports to the U.S.,' he said, nodding to Trump's comments earlier this year about the U.S. not needing any Canadian lumber . The coalition is pushing for a tariff rate from the Section 232 investigation that starts at 15 to 20 per cent and goes higher from there. That, Miller explained, will incentivize U.S. sawmill owners struggling with thin margins to hire more people and invest in upgrades, bolstering U.S. production. This week, provincial leaders offered ways to settle the dispute. B.C. Premier David Eby said Canada is willing to consider a quota on exports to the U.S. for the first time , and New Brunswick Premier Susan Holt also said quotas are on the table as an option for trade negotiations. Miller, head of the American coalition, was far from impressed by Eby's comments. A quota might stabilize the market and secure jobs for Canadian workers, he said, but 'at whose expense?' His answer: 'U.S. mill workers.' '(Eby) is not serious about a settlement that is satisfactory to the coalition. He is floating a political trial balloon designed to derail the implementation of the AR6,' he said. Kurt Niquidet, president of the BC Lumber Trade Council, refused to comment on what his organization prefers by way of a solution. He said options included quotas, tariffs, or a hybrid approach. But he was clear that the industry wants Ottawa to resolve things with the U.S. quickly. 'We think that the federal government should be making this issue a priority and looking for a negotiated settlement,' he said. Niquidet argues that the U.S. already has 'housing affordability issues' and taxing or restricting Canadian lumber could only make things worse. 'If the trade measures are too punitive, it just serves to drive up the prices and the costs of lumber in the U.S.,' he said. That's why the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), the trade association based in Washington, has been leading the charge to fight the duties and potential tariffs. It has repeatedly warned the White House that tariffs would only '(slow) down the domestic residential construction industry' at a time when Trump has vowed to address the country's 'severe housing shortage and affordability crisis.' In recent years, tariffs have increased the average home price by nearly US$11,000 because of recent tariffs, according to the April 2025 NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index, when the average home sticker price is just north of US$400,000. There are also about 3.5 million Americans who work in the residential housing sector, and millions more working in commercial and industrial construction. The NAHB has actively shared its concerns as part of the Section 232 investigation process and expressed concern that the U.S. lumber supply cannot meet the needed demand on its own anytime soon. Niquidet agrees. He said claims by the U.S. industry and the president that American producers can make up for lost Canadian supply are 'just not true.' The twist in all this is that a growing number of producers in the U.S. are actually Canadian-owned. Vancouver-based West Fraser started buying and investing in U.S. sawmills back in the early 2000s to diversify its assets and shore up supplies threatened in Canada by mountain pine beetles and wildfires. Others — including Canfor, Resolute and Interfor (whose U.S. operations are bigger than its Canadian ones) — followed suit in part to avoid trade barriers, the trend only accelerating in Trump's first term, when he imposed 20 per cent tariffs on Canadian softwood exports. Today, estimates are that Canadian lumber firms control as much 40 per cent of softwood lumber production capacity in the American South. In most cases, they've kept local families and employees in place, seamlessly taking over and often modernizing while keeping afloat many sawmills that might've otherwise gone under. When asked about the paradox of Canadian firms buying up U.S. sawmills, Miller doesn't have any concerns. 'A dollar invested in a U.S. sawmill is a dollar invested in a U.S. sawmill employing U.S. citizens operating that sawmill, cutting trees and shipping them,' he said. 'We don't care who operates them. You know, it's a free market.' (However, Miller said if foreign owners ever wanted to join the U.S. Lumber Coalition, which advocates against imports, it wouldn't allow them to.) The U.S. president has also repeatedly told foreign manufacturers that if they want to escape punitive trade measures, they should invest on U.S. soil and help ramp up domestic American production. '(Trump would) take that as a big victory,' Miller said of the lumber takeovers by Canadians. 'That's what he wants,' National Post tmoran@ Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark and sign up for our daily newsletter, Posted, here .
Yahoo
6 days ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
England take 2-1 series lead over India with thrilling win while Australia bowl out West Indies for 27 to complete sweep
CNN World Sport's Patrick Snell and UK Editor of ESPNcricinfo Andrew Miller reflect on a dramatic day in Test cricket.
Yahoo
07-07-2025
- Yahoo
Marion County man arrested on 300+ counts of sexual abuse: WVSP
FAIRMONT, (WBOY) — A man was arrested in Marion County on Wednesday and charged with more than 300 felony counts of incest and sexual abuse. According to a release from the West Virginia State Police, troopers with the Fairmont Detachment arrested 50-year-old Andrew Miller in Marion County on July 1 for 3 felony counts of possession of use of minors in filming sexually explicit conduct. Skylar Neese's killers not up for parole in 2025 The following day, he was served arrest warrants while in jail for an additional 104 felony counts of incest, 104 felony counts of sexual abuse by parent or guardian, and 104 felony counts of 1st degree sexual abuse for a total of 315 sexual-related crimes. According to the West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation website, Miller was booked into the North Central Regional Jail at 11 p.m. on July 1. As of July 6, he is being held there on a $200,012 cash bond. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Herald Scotland
30-06-2025
- The Herald Scotland
Man who abused children in Lanarkshire jailed for 15 years
Jurors heard how at least one boy tried to raise the alarm as to what was happening, but that the accusations were "brushed under the carpet". The abuse occurred at three different children's homes in Lanarkshire, which cannot be named for legal reasons. Stanton - now 73 - had been the manager at one and a carer at the other two between 1985 and 1994. Read More: He had denied the accusations during a trial at the High Court in Glasgow. But, he was found guilty of 11 charges after the jury heard distressing accounts of how the victims had suffered over the years. Following the verdicts, it emerged the predator was previously jailed for jailed for 13 years in 1996 for historical abuse of boys at a children's home in Merseyside. In 2021, he convicted of attacks on two other youngsters at the same establishment around that time. Stanton has also been jailed possessing indecent images of children and breaching a Sexual Offences Prevention Order. He was today/yesterday sentenced for these latest crimes by Judge Andrew Miller at the High Court in Aberdeen. The trial last month was told how Stanton was physically abusive to a boy as he repeatedly unleashed his violent temper. He then carried out sex attacks on a teenage girl including at a campsite in Dumfries. Stanton preyed on another victim while she was initially asleep. A then boy recalled how he was only young at the time, but knew what was happening was "not right". He was left feeling "scared" of Stanton. One resident was molested while in a tent. This boy had alerted a member of staff at the time, but he was "not believed". The now man said he and others were "vulnerable to be in a place of safety". But, he added reports of such matters appeared to be "brushed under the carpet". Another boy was also left terrified of Stanton who gave him money to effectively buy his silence. A further victim remembered speaking to staff, but "nothing was done". In his closing speech to jurors, prosecutor Scott McKenzie said one then resident recalled Stanton as initially being "nice" and that he had never previously had anyone show him any attention. But, the violent bully soon showed his "true colours" by repeatedly punching and kicking him. One girl was aged around seven when Stanton targeted her - he went on to rape this youngster. The final victim on the indictment had only been at the children's home where Stanton was then based for two nights, but he was still able to take advantage of her. She has been left suffering from "flashbacks". Stanton was convicted of charges of rape, numerous indecent assaults, lewd and libidinous behaviour as well as physical attacks.
Yahoo
20-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Clint Frazier picks White Sox over Yankees for best clubhouse experience
Clint Frazier picks White Sox over Yankees for best clubhouse experience originally appeared on Athlon Sports. Clint Frazier didn't hesitate. Asked which experience he'd rather relive—the regimented life as a New York Yankee or the chaotic freedom of the 2023 Chicago White Sox—Frazier didn't flinch. Advertisement 'White Sox all day, dude,' he told former Chicago catcher A.J. Pierzynski on the Foul Territory podcast. 'If the Red Sox got a documentary, the White Sox are so much more deserving of it… That was the most fun I've ever had.' It was a telling moment from a player who arrived in New York with outsized expectations and left with a resume shaped as much by drama as production. Frazier was the headlining return in the 2016 deadline trade that sent All-Star reliever Andrew Miller to Cleveland. A former first-round pick and top-25 prospect, he was supposed to be part of the Yankees' next core. At times, he looked the part. In 228 games over parts of five seasons in the Bronx, he hit .239 with 29 home runs, a .327 OBP and a .434 slugging percentage. Former New York Yankees outfielder Clint Frazier. © Vincent Carchietta-Imagn Images But it never quite worked. He clashed with the New York media, didn't produce consistently and struggled with injuries—particularly a series of concussions and vertigo that derailed his 2018 and 2021 campaigns. Advertisement Frazier often chafed under the Yankees' strict culture. He grew a beard under his COVID mask in 2020 as a quiet protest against the team's grooming policy and later admitted he was 'highly offended' when the Yankees scrapped the rule in 2025—long after he was gone. 'I felt like I was one of the guys there that certainly was trying to push the envelope,' he said. 'So when they got rid of it … that felt personal.' He also said he felt the prank that the Yankees veterans like Brett Gardner, CC Sabathia, Aaron Hicks and Dellin Betances played on him in 2019 was "cruel." They faked a letter to say he got a deal with the Jordan brand. It came at the same time of his three-error game against the Red Sox on ESPN's Sunday Night Baseball when he blew off the media and then blew up at the media days later for asking about it. Frazier hasn't played in the majors since 2023, but it's clear which clubhouse left the deeper impression. The Yankees gave him the stage. The White Sox gave him the fun. Advertisement Related: Max Fried Reveals Which Yankees Star Made Him Nervous Related: A Key Yankees Arm Is Close to Returning but Will the Role Stay the Same This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jun 19, 2025, where it first appeared.
