We’re starting this newsletter off with an update on an important bridge.

The head of Canada’s largest municipal advocacy group says the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge is a “promising” sign for Canada-U.S. relations amid ongoing trade tensions.

“We want this thing open, it makes it safer, it makes it cheaper for crossing, it’s going to allow us to get the goods and services across,” said Tim Tierney, president of Federation of Canadian Municipalities in an interview with iPolitics. 

The announcement comes as Prime Minister Mark Carney confirmed Tuesday that the long awaited bridge connecting Windsor and Michigan will open by the end of this week.

Ahead of the cabinet meeting, Carney called the crossing both “a symbol” and a “fact of cooperation” between Canada and the U.S., a significant contrast to earlier threats from U.S. President Donald Trump to “block” bridge’s opening unless the U.S. was “compensated.”

For municipal leaders, the bridge’s opening served as “good news” as tariff tensions remained one of the biggest concerns from a recent annual conference in Edmonton, Tierney said.

Sydney Ko’s got this one. 

Also, a Liberal MP says she and her parliamentary colleagues will take part in a delegation to Taiwan this fall, despite a warning from China’s envoy that such visits are “hurtful” to relations with Beijing.

MP Judy Sgro, chair of the Canada-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Group, told The Canadian Press Liberal and Conservative MPs in the group will visit the self-governing island the week of Oct. 11.

“It’s extremely important to do these kind of exchanges,” Sgro said, adding Taiwan is “a beacon of hope in that part of the world for democratic principles.”

In an interview with The Globe and Mail in April, Chinese Ambassador to Canada Wang Di was quoted as saying that Canadian parliamentarians have official status and so any engagement with Taiwan is “hurtful” to efforts to establish stronger bilateral ties.

New Zealand’s foreign ministry said last week Beijing had banned four MPs from entering China for a year and demanded an apology after they visited Taiwan.

The Canadian Press has more. 

The Parti Québécois is threatening to withdraw Quebec from the federal government’s proposed high-speed rail network if the party wins the October provincial election.

PQ Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon says he can’t justify to Quebecers that their money be spent on what risks becoming a “financial fiasco.”

Although he did not explain how Quebec would withdraw from the project, the PQ leader’s opposition could create a serious obstacle for federal plans to start building the line before 2030.

St-Pierre Plamondon says the Bloc Québécois has estimated the project will end up costing $200 billion and that Quebecers’ share would be $40 billion.

However, the federal corporation overseeing the 1,000-kilometre rail line linking Toronto to Quebec City estimates it will cost between $60 billion and $90 billion.

CP’s got this one too. 

In Other Headlines

Internationally

The world’s largest banks committed $906bn in financing to the fossil fuel industry last year, an “unfathomable” increase in investment locking in years more of coal, oil and gas production as the world continues to overheat, a new report has found.

The surge in new fossil fuel lending, up $64bn or nearly 8% on 2024, shows that the world’s largest 65 banks are making decisions incompatible with international agreements to restrain rising global temperatures, according to the coalition of environmental groups behind the new analysis.

JPMorgan Chase is again the world’s leading financier of fossil fuels, according to the annual Banking on Climate Chaos report, after pushing $58bn to the sector last year – up 13% from 2024.

Bank of America committed the second largest amount to fossil fuels last year, followed by Japanese banks MUFG and Mizuho Financial. Citigroup, another US bank, rounds out the top five, with Barclays, at number eight, the highest placed British bank.

The Guardian has more. 

NASA on Tuesday revealed the four astronauts who will join the next Artemis mission — a key, two-week flight that will aim to test out various technologies considered vital to putting astronauts back on the surface of the moon for the first time in more than 50 years.

The crew, set to launch as soon as late 2027, includes three NASA astronauts — first-time space flier Andre Douglas, record-setting astronaut Frank Rubio, and veteran flier and test pilot Randy Bresnik — as well as Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano with the European Space Agency.

Artemis III is designed to serve as a precursor mission to a moon landing, testing out how the NASA-built Orion spacecraft will dock with a lunar lander. The primary goal of the flight, the space agency says, is to “reduce risk” heading into an actual lunar touchdown, which NASA hopes will take place as soon as 2028.

In order to reach the moon’s surface, astronauts will have to complete such a move while in lunar orbit. But for Artemis III, NASA is aiming to test the maneuver much closer to home, sticking to low-Earth orbit, or LEO, the area closest to our home planet and the same region where the International Space Station operates.

Read more from CNN. 

In Other International Headlines

The Kicker

While Canada and U.S. may be easing a bit of tension with the opening of Gordie Howe International Bridge, another cross-border partnership appears to be going really well.

Former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau joined singer Katy Perry on the red carpet at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival on Monday, ahead the premier of her film, Katy Perry: The lifetimes Tour – Live from Paris. 

“I saw the show three times but I wasn’t paying attention to anything but Katy, so I’m looking forward to seeing the show now for the first time,” Trudeau said.

More from CBC.