We’re starting tonight’s newsletter with a look at gas prices has brought down inflation rate.

The annual rate of inflation eased back below three per cent in June as motorists paid less to fill up the gas tank, Statistics Canada said Monday.

Inflation slowed to 2.8 per cent in June, down from the recent high of 3.2 per cent in May and a tick lower than most economists were expecting.

The agency pointed to a 10 per cent drop in the cost of gasoline month-over-month to explain the decline.

Gas prices surged over the spring mostly because of conflict in the Middle East, but a tentative peace agreement between the United States and Iran took pressure off global oil prices over the course of June.

Taking gas prices out of the equation, StatCan said inflation was unchanged at 2.2 per cent from May to June.

Renewed hostilities between the nations have pushed prices at the pump higher again in recent weeks. TD Bank senior economist Leslie Preston said in a note to clients Monday that rising gas prices in July means the June drop likely won’t be repeated, but she still thinks inflation has peaked for 2026.

The Canadian Press has more. 

Also, the U.S. ambassador to Canada says Alberta and Saskatchewan could make the “most compelling” case to meet the oil needs of the United States.

Pete Hoekstra says the U.S. needs to find three to four million more barrels of oil per day over the next decade and that Canada is one of the best places to get it.

He says members of U.S. President Donald Trump’s cabinet were eager to sign a deal last year for more Canadian oil but that the president wanted negotiations to continue because the U.S. has other options.

Hoekstra made the comment in Edmonton at the Pacific Northwest Economic Region’s annual summit.

Many politicians and industry officials on both sides of the border are scheduled to speak at the conference.

CP’s got more. 

Provincially, Premier Doug Ford was already expected to reshuffle his cabinet this summer. Now, a series of ministerial departures, combined with the growing political fallout from expense controversies and other unresolved issues, has turned what was expected to be a modest refresh into what could become the government’s biggest mid-mandate shakeup in years.

The immediate catalyst is straightforward. The departures of former Treasury Board president Caroline Mulroney, followed by Tourism, Culture and Gaming Minister Stan Cho’s resignation and Sport Minister Neil Lumsden have created vacancies that must be filled.

But according to several Progressive Conservative sources and longtime observers of the government, the shuffle has become significantly more complicated because Ford now has to balance promotions with political risk.

The biggest wildcard may not be who deserves a promotion, but who can safely be promoted.

Several government insiders said recent reporting into ministerial expenses has forced the Premier’s Office to become much more cautious about elevating ministers or parliamentary assistants before thoroughly reviewing potential vulnerabilities.

CP’s got this one too. 

In Other Headlines

Internationally

Elsewhere, even by the brutal standards of militant settler violence in the West Bank, the raid on Deir Jarir late on Sunday night that killed two Palestinians and left another in hospital with a gunshot wound was extreme.

Palestinians in the town said settlers from a nearby outpost arrived after 9pm on Sunday claiming that they were searching for stolen livestock. Israeli soldiers and police soon joined them, protecting them as they sought to take several villagers’ sheep by force.

But when villagers raised the alarm and a crowd gathered, soldiers shot two men, beginning a night of three successive raids by settlers from nearby outposts and Israeli soldiers that lasted until after 2am, according to Palestinian residents of Deir Jarir.

Saber Ajaj, a relative of one of the victims, 53-year-old Odeh Farajna, said he found him moments after he had been shot through the chest. Farajna, a member of the village council, owned a flower shop and helped with the stonework at the local graveyard.

The Guardian has more. 

Paramount’s owners were planning to have secured firm control of Hollywood rival Warner Bros. Discovery by the end of this week in a blockbuster deal that has the blessing of President Trump’s Justice Department.

A federal judge has instead ground the process to a halt, at least for now. And her ruling Monday in response to a lawsuit filed by a dozen states suggests Paramount may have some tough sledding ahead in order to get the deal through.

In the ruling, U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín granted a 14-day temporary restraining order to pause the acquisition. The Democratic attorneys general allege Paramount’s purchase of Warner Bros. would reduce competition, hurting filmgoers along with TV and news consumers and especially those who create the entertainment and other content they rely on.

The $111 billion deal would put under the same corporate roof Paramount and Warner’s movie and television studios, streamers Paramount+ and HBO Max, the nation’s most-watched broadcast outlet in Paramount’s CBS, 50 cable TV channels, not to mention both CBS News and CNN.

Read more from NPR. 

In Other International Headlines

The Kicker

Have you ever been on a mental health stroll, while using Google maps, and accidentally stumble across a meteor crater?

That’s what happened to Quebec man Joël Lapointe, who found what he thought was a “suspicious pit” in the province’s Côte-Nord region while he was wandering with Google Maps in 2024.

Back then, Lapointe was just trying to plan a camping vacation before spotting the site on his screen. Later researchers confirmed that the unidentified spot was a 390-million-year-old meteor crater.

More from the Weather Network.