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Canadian gas company TC Energy announced Wednesday that it had terminated its Keystone XL pipeline project after President Biden revoked a key permit on his first day in office because of concerns over the pipelines impact on climate change.

This decision by TC Energy concludes a 13-year battle surrounding the building of the pipeline and represents a victory for environmental groups that have been calling attention to the harmful effects of processing oil-sands crude oil since the Keystone project was first proposed in 2008.

In its press release Wednesday, TC Energy said it will continue to coordinate with regulators, stakeholders and Indigenous groups to meet its environmental and regulatory commitments, ensure a safe termination and exit from the Project.

The proposed 1,179-mile pipeline would have eventually carried 830,000 barrels (35 million gallons) of tar sands oil from Hardisty, Alberta, to Steele City, Neb. Its construction was stalled in 2015 by then-President Barack Obama but resuscitated in 2019 by then-President Donald Trump, who signed a presidential permit that allowed TC Energy to effectively construct, connect, operate and maintain pipeline facilities ... for the import of oil from Canada to the United States. Since construction began last year, only about 300 miles of pipeline has been built.

Pipes for the Keystone XL in a yard in Alberta, Canada. (Jason Franson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Bidens decision in January to cancel the cross-border permit for the project was the final blow. The Keystone XL pipeline disserves the U.S. national interest. ... Leaving the Keystone XL pipeline permit in place would not be consistent with my Administrations economic and climate imperatives, Biden announced in an executive order signed on his first day in office.

In addition to the pipelines generation of excessive carbon dioxide emissions, Keystone XL would have cut through the Ogallala Aquifer, a source of water for those living in the High Plains, which includes many Native American communities.

Opponents of the pipeline, including environmental activists and tribal leaders, celebrated TC Energys decision.

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Larry Wright Jr., chairman of the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska, said in a Thursday statement: On behalf of our Ponca Nation, we welcome this long overdue news and thank all who worked so tirelessly to educate and fight to prevent this from coming to fruition. Its a great day for Mother Earth.

In another statement, Fort Belknap Indian Community president Andy Werk said, We were not willing to sacrifice our water or safety for the financial benefit of a trans-national corporation. We are thrilled that the project has been canceled.

A pipeline-resistance training camp in the San Juan Islands, off Washington state. (Tim Exton/AFP via Getty Images)

Former Vice President Al Gore joined the chorus of those applauding the pipelines demise, tweeting, Congratulations to the Indigenous communities & activists who for a decade have said #NoKXL. We must continue to put the planet and its people ahead of polluters by saying no to #ByhaliaPipeline, #DAPL, #MVP, #Line3 & other reckless fossil fuel pipelines.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., also celebrated on Wednesday. The Keystone XL pipeline was a giveaway to foreign oil lobbyists that put our communities, environment, and tribal lands at risk, she tweeted. Im glad its dead, and Im grateful to everyone who fought to make this day happen.

For many Republicans, however, the pipeline was seen as a way to create much-needed energy sector jobs.

President Biden killed the #KeystoneXL Pipeline & with it, thousands of good-paying American jobs, Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., tweeted. On Inauguration Day @POTUS signed an executive order that ended pipeline construction & handed 1000 workers pink slips. Now 10x that number of jobs will never be created.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, has repeatedly criticized Biden over his decision to revoke the permit for the pipeline.

Keystone XL is a project that right now, today, has 1,200 good-paying union jobs. And in 2021, the Keystone pipeline was scheduled to have more than 11,000 jobs, including 8,000 union jobs, for contracts worth $1.6 billion, Cruz said during a Senate hearing in January.

A 2014 State Department report dissected those numbers, revealing that out of the 11,000 jobs Cruz cited, only 35 to 50 would have been permanent; the remainder would have been temporary construction jobs as the pipeline was being built.

In March, a coalition of attorneys general from 21 states sued the Biden administration for rescinding the pipelines permit. In their complaint they said: The pipeline would have a negligible impact on the climate but significant impact on the economy and American energy independence.

A depot used to store pipes for the planned Keystone XL oil pipeline in Gascoyne, N.D., in 2017. (Terray Sylvester/Reuters)

As the 2022 midterm elections approach, Republican lawmakers have made clear that the demise of Keystone XL will resurface as an issue on which they will attempt, despite a robust economy, to pummel Democrats as job killers.

Many Republicans are also attempting to portray Biden as a hypocrite over his decision to ease sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, operated by a German citizen with close ties to Vladimir Putin.

After facing insurmountable opposition, the company behind the Keystone Pipeline abandoned the project today, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy tweeted Wednesday. Thousands of jobs destroyed and our energy independence jeopardized. Meanwhile, President Biden is meeting with Putin next week to tell him he can keep his pipeline.

Along with 10 other Senate Republicans, Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, introduced the Defending Keystone Jobs Act, which would require the Biden administration to submit a report to Congress detailing the number of jobs lost as a result of the canceled pipeline.

An Enbridge Energy pipeline drilling pad near the Minnesota-Wisconsin border. (Jim Mone/AP)

Despite this backlash from Republicans, the termination of the pipeline is a notable victory for those trying to hasten the U.S. transition away from fossil fuels and a model for the battle that lies ahead. Earlier this week, hundreds of activists from environmental and tribal groups blocked access to the site where the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline is being built in northern Minnesota. TC Energys withdrawal from Keystone XL has given hope to opponents.

The termination of this zombie pipeline sets precedent for President Biden and polluters to stop Line 3, Dakota Access, and all fossil fuel projects, Kendall Mackey, campaign manager of 350.orgs Keep It in the Ground campaign, said in a statement.

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Liberals celebrate the demise of the Keystone XL pipeline, but conservatives promise to keep the issue alive - Yahoo News

House Leader PabloRodriguezsaid today the Liberal government isdeterminedto pass four key pieces of legislation before summer and it's willing to use all necessaryparliamentary manoeuvresto get it over the finish line.

With just 10 days left before the House of Commons rises for a months-long break, there is little time remaining to get those four bills the budget legislation, C-6 (the conversion therapy ban), C-10 (reforms to the Broadcasting Act) and C-12 (the net-zero emissions bill) through both chambers of Parliament.

And with a possible fall federal election on the horizon, the government is eager to rack up legislative victories to pad its record before asking voters for another term.

Rodriguez could invoke time allocation to get bills through a tool used to curtail how long memberscan study, debate or propose amendments togovernment legislation. The Liberals alsohave pitcheda motion to keep the Commons in business late into the evening for the remainder of the sitting.

Last week, the Liberals' election campaignco-chairsdeclared a "state of electoral urgency" and suspended the normal rules to allow the party to nominate candidates quickly a sign that party operatives are preparing for an election that could come at any time in this minority Parliament.

MPsalso haveunanimously agreed to hold a "take-note debate" in the Commons on June 15 to allow members who aren't running again to "make their farewell speech."

But Rodriguez denied today that the government's legislative demands are motivatedby the prospect of animminent election call.

"We don't want an election. We want bills. No election bills. Bills to help children from the LGBT community, bills to help our artists, our cultural sector, bills to protect the environment,"he said.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has saidrepeatedly that"nobody wants an election before the end of this pandemic."

WATCH:'We don't want an election,' says Liberal governmentHouse leader

Asked why some of these bills couldn't be held back for Parliament's scheduled return in the fall,Rodriguez said the Liberals were elected in 2019 with a mandate to pass progressive legislation and accused the opposition Conservatives ofworkingto block bills that have some support from the other parties.

"I cannot overstate the urgency of this," he said, adding that further delays threaten gay and lesbian kids who may be subjected to "conversion therapy," a practice many experts agree is harmful.

He said punting action on climate change by delaying C-12 which would force current and future federal governments to set binding climate targets to get Canada to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 would be irresponsible.

"Is there a more urgent topic than the environment?" he said.

Rodriguez said the Tories are deliberatelyrunning out the clock on the net-zero bill. Conservative environment criticDan Albas, meanwhile,has said he's simply asking legitimate questions at committee meetings.

The Conservativesalso say they haveissues with the individualsthe governmenthasappointed to a net-zero advisory panel, saying the oil and gas industry was left out while "climate activists" were leftin charge.

The Tories also arefiercely opposed toBill C-10, legislation the government says ismeant to make digital streaming services pay for the creation, production and promotion of Canadian content.

If passed, Bill C-10 would make online streaming platforms that operate in Canada like Netflix, Spotify, Crave and Amazon Prime subject to the Broadcasting Act, allowing the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to impose regulations on them.

But the Conservatives maintain the legislation is too heavy-handed and threatens "Canadians' fundamental rights and freedoms" because it would give the CRTC the power to regulate posts that millions of Canadians upload every day to social media platforms.

Rodriguez said the Conservatives have been spreading "lies" about C-10.

"It forces the web giants to pay their fair share. Who can be against that? The Conservatives. The Conservatives have been spreading lies about the bill. This must end. The bill must move ahead," he said.

Conservative House leader Gerard Deltell said it's hypocritical of the Liberals to accuse the Tories of stalling anything when it was Liberal MPs who filibustered committees probing various government scandals, including the WE Charity affair and the government's handling of sexual misconduct in the armed forces.

"Without a shadow of a doubt, the Liberals are the real kings of the filibuster," Deltell said, adding Liberal MPs have filibustered for 167 hours at five different committees since Parliament's return last fall.

Deltell said it's ultimately the government's responsibility to get its legislation through Parliament, and it's the job of the opposition parties to oppose. "They call the shots," he said.

The government's decision to prorogue Parliament at the height of the WE Charity affair last summer was what led to the most significant legislative delays, Deltell said.

"When you make the reset, you're burning a lot of time in the House of Commons," he said.

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As election talk ramps up, Liberal government draws a line in the sand on legislation - CBC.ca

"Watters' World" host Jesse Watters slammed the liberal media and Dr. Anthony Fauci on Saturday for pushing various "lies" throughout 2020.

JESSE WATTERS: Did you ever date somebody for a while, and after you break up, you realize the whole relationship was fake? Everything she told you was bull? All your big moments were meaningless? That's 2020. We got catfished last year. All the lies were designed to install Biden. The media actually broke itself dragging Joe across the finish line. The press died from all the lies. That's one of the side-effects of Trump derangement syndrome. Now that Biden's been installed, the truth is finally coming out. It has a way of doing that. And it's stunning.

The doctor now under fire for lying about funding the Wuhan lab. Fauci rallied scientists to dismiss the lab leak theory while he was scrambling behind the scenes to wipe his fingerprints from it. But dont you dare criticize Fauciwho was wrong on masks, gain of function, lockdowns, and Hydroxychloroquine. He doesnt take criticism well.

This is what liberals do when they face fair criticism. They assume a grand identity that cant be attacked. This is an attack on women, this is an attack on Blacks, this is an attack on the media, an attack on science. No, no-no. Its not an attackits a criticism of just you. Deal with it like a man

The astonishing thing about all of this is that the media will confess their sins. Deep down theyre ashamed of their dishonestyonly a sociopath wouldnt be.

WATCH JESSE WATTERS' FULL MONOLOGUE HERE:

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Jesse Watters blasts liberal media for pushing lies in 2020 to help Biden win the election - Fox News

Photo: Ng Han Guan/AP/Shutterstock

As we sift through the lab-leak debacle, the good news is that the healthy antibodies in the system are still strong enough to overcome the groupthink that produced the original error. News media are investigating a hypothesis they once dismissed, and the government has announced an investigation to find the truth.

The bad news is that the problem is turning out to be worse than it initially seemed and worse still, the source of the failure is not going away. The implications of this episode are much broader than understanding the source of the pandemic. It is a question about whether institutions like the media and government can withstand the pressure of ideological conformity.

A recent Washington Post story, looking back at the governments response to viruss origination, reported that many officials refused to explore the lab-leak hypothesis because it was associated with right-wing politics. For some of the officials who were privately suspicious of the Wuhan lab, Trumps and Navarros comments turned the lab-leak scenario into a fringe conspiracy theory, the Post found, It became nearly impossible to generate interest among health experts in a hypothesis that Trump had turned into a political weapon, they said.

That is an extraordinarily damning admission. Health experts who understood all along that it was entirely possible that the virus emerged from a lab simply refused to examine the hypothesis because it had become associated with the likes of Donald Trump.

Katherine Eban, writing in Vanity Fair, has written a lengthy expos drawing out the failure in detail. One State Department officialwrote that his team was warned not to investigate the origins of the pandemic because it would open a can of worms. Miles Yu, the State Departments principal China strategist, tells Eban, Anyone who dares speak out would be ostracized. After former CDC head Robert Redfield said he believed the virus originated in a lab, he tells Eban I was threatened and ostracized because I proposed another hypothesis.

In retrospect, the error is clear enough all along. The origins of the pandemic were always murky, and the strongest reason to dismiss lab-leak out of hand that the Wuhan lab supposedly had airtight security protocols was more rumor than fact. Whats more, the notion that the theory was racist was always transparently dubious. A story in which the virus emerged from failed safety protocols at the Wuhan lab is not inherently more racist than a theory in which it emerged from a wet market. (If anything, blaming the pandemic on Chinas people for eating bats lends itself much more easily to racism than blaming Chinas government for lax security at its research labs.)

Journalists make mistakes, especially operating in a chaotic atmosphere dominated by the ceaseless jabberings of a pathological liar with a giant megaphone. Whats concerning is that, even faced with undeniable proof of the error, many people still refuse to concede it.

An article in Nature warns against a a divisive investigation into the viruss origins. Remarkably enough, given that it comes from a scientific journal, the article does not directly question the possibility that COVID did escape from a lab. Instead, it warns that the investigation is fueling online bullying of scientists and anti-Asian harassment in the United States, as well as offending researchers and authorities in China whose cooperation is needed. One scientist who reports this bullying is Canadian virologist Angela Rasmussen, who in 2020 had developed a high-profile Twitter presence laced with confident dismissals of lab-leak hypothesis as a conspiracy theory that was steeped in racist stereotypes.

When scientists are openly arguing against the study of a scientific hypothesis, for non-scientific reasons, something has gone haywire. In this case, that something seems to be a hothouse atmosphere centered around social media, that has cultivated an ethos of moral fervor and political homogeneity.

Personally I think that when a public figure is a known racist liar its fine to treat their evidence-free statements as racist lies, insisted podcaster Michael Hobbes. If David Duke gives a speech about rising urban crime rates its not the medias job to report the most plausible version of his argument. Writer and University of Minnesota Law School fellow Will Stancil called renewed attention to the lab-leak hypothesis the latest example of hybridization between the right-wing fever swamps and the white guys who run journalism.

The notable aspect of these statements is not the conclusion but the logic that produced it. That journalists dismissed a plausible theory, because they associated it with people who have noxious beliefs, does not strike them as a problem, but a correct epistemological model.

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Jonathan Last, an apostate conservative writing for the Bulwark (a new magazine that serves as a kind of refuge for Republican and conservative intellectuals unable to stomach Donald Trump), recently made an observation about conservatives taunting the mainstream media for dismissing the lab-leak hypothesis. Yes, Last allowed, many outlets got the story wrong by describing the hypothesis that COVID-19 escaped from the lab in Wuhan, rather than the nearby wet market, as a false, racist conspiracy theory, when in truth they never really knew the viruss origins. But most of those outlets have since corrected their error and treated the issue as a live scientific mystery. When has conservative media ever engaged in anything like this sort of self-correction? Is Fox News running self-flagellating segments questioning, say, the networks promotion of hydroxychloroquine as a proven COVID treatment? The very thought is a punchline.

This asymmetry between the mainstream news media and the conservative media that was created to oppose it has long been a source of satisfaction for we liberals. Modern journalism, like think tanks and the bureaucracy, grew out of a Progressive Era belief in disinterested expertise. Guided by the principles of scientific inquiry, these institutions would follow the truth wherever it led.

The conservative movement built a counter-Establishment to oppose this network, but the alt-institutions of the right mimicked the hallowed liberal Establishment only in form. The Heritage Institution, the Washington Times, and Fox News were not mirror images of Brookings, the New York Times, and CBS News they were parodies of them. Liberals had a phrase to describe this imbalance: the hack gap. The Republican Party had an army of partisans at its disposal, unburdened by any fealty to any scientific or professional norms save the advancement of the conservative movement. The liberal media might make mistakes, and bureaucracies may produce wrong conclusions, but at least they aspire to norms of fairness and impartiality that the right-wing counterparts merely sneer at.

Openness to evidence is the historical strength of American liberalism. This is why, for all the errors liberals have committed since the Progressive Era, a capacity for self-correction has given continued vitality to their our creed. The lab-leak fiasco ought to be a warning sign of what happens if the urge to not be defeated or manipulated by the right turns into an emulation of its methods. The only thing worse than having a hack gap would be not having one.

Analysis and commentary on the latest political news from New York columnist Jonathan Chait.

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The Groupthink That Produced the Lab-Leak Failure Should Scare Liberals - New York Magazine

A new study from researchers at Ohio State University suggests American conservatives are more likely than liberals to fall for political misinformation that circulates on social media.

The driving force? False information skews to favor Republicans, and the confirmation bias we all experience makes them more inclined to believe it.

The studypublished this week andauthored by Ohio State professors Kelly Garrett and Robert Bond found conservatives were more prone to accept falsehoods, less inclined to believe true statements and less able totell the difference between truth and lies.

For example, 41% of Republicans believed thefalse claim that Hillary Clinton colluded with Russia and sold partof the U.S. uranium supply in exchange for donations to the Clinton Foundation. Just 2% of Democrats said it was true.

Researchers distilled both true and false claims from viral news stories on social media and asked around 1,200 participants to assess them. Sources included major news networks, partisan news sources and satirical news sites such as The Onion and The Babylon Bee.

The survey took place over six months in 2019, meaning it predated the onslaught of misinformation peddled by politicians and social media users during the 2020 election cycle.

"Holding accurate political knowledge is fundamental to democracy, and ideological differences in citizens understanding of empirical evidence about politically important topics are potentially destabilizing to democracy itself," the authors wrote. "Effective decision-making depends on having a common understanding of the reality to which citizens and lawmakers must collectively respond."

Separately, groups of five Republicans and five Democratsrecruited online classified the 240 statements used in the studyas being better for one party or neutral. Of those, about 45% of the false claims were considered to benefit Republicans while 23% benefited Democrats.

One false statement that favored Republicans said British protesters were stockpiling human urine and plannedto douse former President Donald Trump with it during hisvisit to the U.K. A false statement that a Georgianew abortion bill requiredan investigation of any woman who miscarries was seen as benefiting Democrats.

Meanwhile, the majority of true claims 65% were seen as benefiting Democrats compared to just 10% benefiting Republicans.

Read the full study:Conservatives susceptibility to political misperceptions

Garrett said the study doesn't necessarily prove that conservatives are more biased than liberals, because all participants believed statements that boosted their political party and rejected those that didn't. But claims that benefitedRepublicans were more likely to be false, while true statements frequently furthered Democratic interests.

Thisputs conservatives at a disadvantage because they're ultimately exposed to more misinformation, Garrett said, and confirmation bias makes them more inclined to buy what they see. It's not clear why false information is more favorable toRepublicans.

"Conservatives consistently poor performance in distinguishing truths from falsehoods appears to be largely explained by the fact that widely shared falsehoods were systematically more supportive of conservatives political positions," the authors wrote.

Garrett said it's important for news organizations to continue fact checking and encouraged people to think critically about the content they share on social media. The study also called on policymakers and technology companies to find ways to guard against misinformation.

Haley BeMilleris a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

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OSU study: Conservatives more susceptible to misinformation than liberals - The Columbus Dispatch