Things Musk (and Trump) Did... 04-22-25 | Blog#42
Some Dems still can't find their rudder...
Yesterday's post
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Yesterday’s News Worth Repeating
Leaked Budget Document Confirms Axed CDC Offices
— Two key CDC journals also on the chopping block
A leaked HHS budget documentopens in a new tab or window confirms that a number of CDC offices are eliminated in their entirety, as the Trump administration sets out to refocus the agency on infectious diseases.
It also proposes to eliminate two CDC journals: Emerging Infectious Diseases and Preventing Chronic Disease. Funding for CDC's flagship weekly journal, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reportopens in a new tab or window, however, would be preserved.
The administration wants to "refocus CDC on emerging and infectious disease surveillance, outbreak investigations, preparedness and response, and maintaining the Nation's public health infrastructure," according to the document, which was first sharedopens in a new tab or window by MedPage Today editor-in-chief Jeremy Faust, MD.
"Realigning our focus to better address infectious disease outbreaks and leveraging data to drive more efficient responses is not inherently a bad thing -- in fact, it's necessary," one current HHS executive told MedPage Today. "We must significantly improve our ability to protect Americans from future outbreaks. However, the pace and scale of these changes, combined with limited expert input on what capabilities are needed now and in the near future, raise serious concerns."
The National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion would be eliminated, ending all programs in the center, according to the document. MedPage Today previously reported that entire teams and divisions within this center were eliminated in the April Fool's Day layoffs, including the Division of Population Healthopens in a new tab or window, the Office of Smoking and Healthopens in a new tab or window, and teams in the Division of Reproductive Healthopens in a new tab or window.
Funding for CDC's Global Health Center is also eliminated, according to the document.
Continue reading at MedPageToday
Today's news
Democratic News Corner
Newsom on Democrats: ‘I don’t know what the party is’
SAN ANSELMO, Calif. – California Gov. Gavin Newsom is accusing the Democratic Party of not yet performing a thorough autopsy on what went wrong in its devastating loss of the White House and Senate majority in November.
In an exclusive sit-down interview with The Hill on Monday, Newsom said that if the party wants to find its way back from the wilderness, it has to be willing to look inward at what led to the losses – and the failure to win back the House majority.
“We have not done a forensic of what just went wrong, period, full stop,” Newsom said. “I don’t think it, I know it. I mean, to the extent that I’m marginally part of this party, I represent the state larger than 21 state populations combined and I can assure you there’s not been a party discussion that I’m aware of that has included the state of California.
Later in the interview, Newsom said he wasn’t sure what the Democratic Party truly represents, who is leading it or where it wants to go.
“I don’t know what the party is,” he said. “I’m still struggling with that.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Why Dems ‘keep talking about due process’ in the case of man mistakenly deported to El Salvador
Democrats are lining up to defend Kilmar Abrego Garcia, despite immigration politics traditionally favoring Republicans.
Democrats have a plan for fighting President Donald Trump over the most high-profile deportation case in recent history: Don’t make it about immigration.
As the party lines up to defend Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland resident mistakenly deported to El Salvador by the Trump administration, Democrats are emphasizing due process and the rule of law — side-stepping the thornier intricacies of immigration policy that have served as a drag on their party for years.
It’s part of a calibrated approach that Democrats are betting will keep the debate focused on the Trump administration’s refusal to bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States, after a federal judge ordered them to “facilitate” his return and the Supreme Court upheld the decision. In interviews with nearly a dozen Democratic lawmakers and strategists, they said the real-life implications of Trump’s deportation of the native Salvadoran offer an opening to turn what could be an esoteric argument about democratic rights into a vivid cautionary tale.
Continue reading at Politico
Moderates couldn’t beat Barbara Lee — but they’re not done
A network of wealthy interests swung hard and missed. But they say they’re here to stay.
OAKLAND, California — Former Rep. Barbara Lee was still trailing a moderate challenger on election night when a progressive ally stepped to the mic and highlighted the larger stakes in the mayoral contest.
“These big-money people, they are here to stay,” Oakland City Council Member Carroll Fife warned a crowd of Lee supporters in downtown Oakland, who had gathered as polls closed in a special election to replace the recalled former mayor. “They want to take your city from you, take your voice from you.”
Lee prevailed in the end, vaulting past her more centrist Democratic opponent, Loren Taylor, as late-arriving votes broke decisively for the longtime progressive standard-bearer. Her unity-focused message, widespread name recognition, and formidable political coalition propelled her across the finish line. She takes office in May.
Continue reading at Politico
Jeffries leading delegation to Denmark to discuss ‘geopolitical status of Greenland’
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) is leading a bipartisan congressional delegation to visit Denmark amid U.S. tensions with the nation and its territory Greenland, he announced Tuesday.
Jeffries said lawmakers will discuss “the continued importance of the NATO alliance and the geopolitical status of Greenland.”
Reps. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.), Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.), Marilyn Strickland (D-Wash.), Greg Landsman (D-Ohio) and Laura Friedman (D-Calif.), and Del. Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen (R-American Samoa) will join Jeffries on the trip.
The group is also scheduled to stop for talks in the United Kingdom and Middle East during a time of “global uncertainty.”
President Trump has expressed a desire to annex Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of Denmark, calling it an “absolute necessity” for national security to combat the presence of China and Russia in the region. Leaders in Greenland and Denmark have sharply pushed back.
Jeffries in January also criticized what he characterized as Trump’s “obsession” with the idea of the U.S. taking over Greenland.
Continue reading at The Hill
Schumer demands details on DOGE savings claims
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) is demanding proof of the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) savings claims, accusing DOGE and the linked Office of Personnel Management (OPM) in a letter of “stubbornly refus[ing] to release any information” about at least one of the canceled contracts that allegedly cut federal spending by millions.
“The lack of cooperation from both agencies is troubling,” Schumer wrote in the letter to OPM Director Charles Ezell on Tuesday. “The public has a right to access documents concerning DOGE’s reported savings. Such documents must be readily available to ensure these claimed savings are real, legitimate and truly beneficial to taxpayers.”
DOGE, effectively led by tech billionaire Elon Musk, has posted a “Wall of Receipts” online listing nearly 8,500 government contracts that it says it canceled for a combined savings of $30 billion.
Schumer specifically cited DOGE’s claims that more than $318 million in savings came from canceling a request for bids on a contract to “provide human resources” through OPM. OPM hasn’t supplied documents to show that it was seeking proposals for such a contract, and one doesn’t appear in federal databases of solicitations, The New York Times reported on April 13.
Continue reading at The Hill
Warren pressed over defense of Biden’s mental acuity in podcast interview
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) maintained in a recent interview that she shared what she “believed to be true” when defending then-President Biden’s mental acuity during the 2024 presidential race.
Warren was pressed about her past comments in an interview on the “Talk Easy with Sam Fragoso” podcast, where the host asked the Democratic senator if she had any “regret” over defending Biden’s mental ability.
“I said what I believed to be true,” Warren said in the interview released Sunday.
“You think he was as sharp as you?” Fragoso responded.
“I said I had not seen decline, and I hadn’t, at that point,” the Massachusetts Democrat replied.
Continue reading at The Hill
National Security
‘Signalgate 2.0’ is ‘indefensible’: Former NATO chief
Former NATO Supreme Allied Commander James Stavridis on Monday called Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s reported sharing of military information in a group chat with family members “indefensible.”
“He’s a former major in the U.S. Army. He was trained throughout his time as a junior officer to protect and guard the nation’s secrets. He’s got to know that he has failed to do that,” Stavridis told CNN’s Boris Sanchez on “CNN News Central.”
“And let’s face it Boris, if Signalgate 1.0 was a release to a group of high-ranking officials, which it was, and got leaked inadvertently to a member of the media, so we saw exactly what was on it. Here we are at Signalgate 2.0, where evidently, if the reporting is correct, very similar level, but now it’s going to unclassified individuals who lack the need to know any of this. So, it’s gone from outrageous to truly egregious. And it’s conduct that, frankly, is indefensible,” he added.
Continue reading at The Hill
Schiff asks National Archives to investigate Trump officials’ Signal use
Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) asked the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) to investigate Trump administration officials’ use of Signal and other third-party messaging applications.
Schiff, a frequent critic of President Trump, urged NARA to make sure the messages sent over the encrypted messaging app by Trump officials are preserved and warned that, apart from national security concerns, utilizing Signal “creates profound risk of non-compliance with document preservation.”
“I write to request that the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) take immediate action to preserve records and pursue remedial measures in connection with the use of Signal and other commercial messaging applications and email by Trump Administration Officials,” Schiff wrote in a four-page Monday letter.
Continue reading at The Hill
Fired Pentagon adviser says foreign policy views cost him position
A top Pentagon adviser, who was fired last week alongside two other top Defense Department (DOD) officials, said during a recent interview that his foreign policy views, particularly regarding the Middle East, played a part in losing his role at the Pentagon.
Dan Caldwell, who served as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s senior adviser and was terminated as part of the department’s ongoing probe into information leaks at the Pentagon, said on Tucker Carlson’s podcast that his opposition to the U.S.’s potential attack on Iran facilitated his ouster.
“And of course, I have some views about the role of America in the world, you know, as we discussed, little controversial, all of us in our ways threatened really established interests,” Caldwell said on “The Tucker Carlson Show” that aired on Monday. He was referring to Colin Carroll and Darin Selnick, the two other top DOD political appointees who were ousted last week.
“We threatened a lot of established interests inside the building and outside the building,” the Marine Corps veteran who deployed to Iraq added.
Continue reading at The Hill
Hegseth says staffers found leaking ‘will be prosecuted’ amid Pentagon chaos
The Defense secretary has faced increased scrutiny as reports of disorder engulf the Pentagon.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said staffers found to be leaking from within the Pentagon “will be prosecuted,” as the embattled Cabinet secretary seeks to fend off reports of turmoil from within his department.
Hegseth’s push to investigate leaks at the DOD comes as he faces heightened scrutiny for disarray under his leadership at the Pentagon and is part of a broader administration effort to quash leaks across government agencies.
“We’re going to investigate and when we investigate, we’ll take it anywhere it leads,” Hegseth told Brian Kilmeade of “Fox and Friends” on Tuesday morning, referencing “a series of serious leaks at the Pentagon” that had prompted a Defense Department investigation, including information related to Panama Canal plans and Elon Musk’s visit to a Pentagon briefing.
“When that evidence is gathered sufficiently — and this has all happened very quickly — it will be handed over to [the Justice Department], and those people will be prosecuted if necessary,” Hegseth said. (Hegseth was previously a “Fox and Friends” host before taking the top Pentagon job.)
Chaos at the Pentagon has quickly spiraled in recent days, with three top officials who were removed in relation to leak probes claiming that they “have not been told what exactly we were investigated for, if there is still an active investigation, or if there was even a real investigation of ‘leaks’ to begin with.”
Continue reading at Politico
Hegseth's siege mentality
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is locked in open warfare with his own Pentagon, a hotbed of distrust and dysfunction that commands the most powerful military on the face of the Earth.
Why it matters: No Trump Cabinet official has endured more turmoil in less time than Hegseth, who survived a nasty confirmation battle only to be burned — again and again — by leaks, blunders and now backlash from his own handpicked aides.
President Trump so far is standing firmly behind Hegseth, a former Fox News host tapped to lead a radical overhaul of the largest and most complex agency in the U.S. government.
But inside the Pentagon, the knives are out — testing Trump's tolerance for chaos when it's not his own.
Zoom in: Hegseth, whose on-camera talent helped endear him to Trump, lashed out Monday when asked about new reports that he shared sensitive military plans in a second Signal chat with his wife, brother and personal lawyer.
Just days earlier, three top Pentagon officials — including two of Hegseth's closest aides — were fired after an investigation into alleged leaks. All three vigorously deny the accusations.
"What a big surprise that a few leakers get fired and suddenly a bunch of hit pieces come out from the same media that peddled the Russia hoax," Hegseth said at the White House Easter Egg Roll.
"This is what the media does," he continued, turning to look directly into the camera.
Continue reading at Axios
Hegseth pulled strike information from secure military channel for Signal posts: Report
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth pulled information he shared on Signal group chats from secure messages from a top American general in the Middle East, NBC News reported Tuesday.
The sensitive military details, which he shared using his personal phone, were initially sent to Hegseth by U.S. Central Command head Army Gen. Michael Erik Kurilla minutes before U.S. fighter jets took off for strikes against the Iranian-backed Houthis, three U.S. officials told NBC News.
Using a secure U.S. government system, Kurilla sent details about when the American fighters would take off and when they would hit their targets, keeping Hegseth in the loop.
Two sources told NBC that Hegseth less than 10 minutes after receiving the information sent some of it to two Signal group chats — one composed of Trump administration Cabinet officials, their designees, and, mistakenly, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic; and another that included Hegseth’s family and personal lawyer, among others in his inner circle.
Hegseth shared the information on Signal days after an aide warned him to take caution and not send sensitive information on unsecure communications systems, two people told NBC.
Continue reading at The Hill
Inside the vicious rivalries tearing apart Pete Hegseth’s Pentagon
A feud between the secretary’s advisers and his chief of staff created backbiting and distrust that has erupted into the open.
When President Donald Trump chose Pete Hegseth for Defense secretary, incoming officials knew they’d need to surround the inexperienced Fox News host with accomplished staff who could handle the nation’s largest bureaucracy. Hegseth would be the show horse, they figured, and others at the top would keep the Pentagon on track.
What happened was the opposite. Hegseth surrounded himself with advisers who quickly turned into vicious rivals for power — whose bitter brawl has now unraveled into revenge power plays, surprise firings, accusations of leaking and embarrassing headlines that are blowing up the Pentagon, distracting from Trump’s agenda and possibly jeopardizing Hegseth’s job.
Many administration feuds are driven by ideological or factional differences, splitting old-school conservatives from MAGA headliners and “America First” activists. That does not appear to be the case here: This one is all about personality conflict, according to interviews with nine current and former Defense Department officials as well as others close to the feud, granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive political issue. Hegseth’s closest advisers privately jockeyed for influence, creating festering distrust and gamesmanship that has rocked the world’s premier defense agency.
The extent of the feud, which has been previously unreported, helps explain the chaos that has eclipsed the Defense Department in recent weeks. And it affirms skeptics’ concerns that Hegseth lacked the management experience to run a large organization.
“There’s just a lot of tension, there’s a lot of bad blood,” said a person with knowledge of the feud. “And there’s a lot of people trying to assert dominance in an area where it’s very hard to do without cutting somebody else.”
Continue reading at Politico
Economics
Trump tariffs will throttle US, global economies: IMF
Century-high tariff levels imposed by President Trump are expected to take a bite out of global economic growth this year, International Monetary Fund (IMF) economists said Tuesday.
The IMF downgraded its projection for global gross domestic product (GDP) growth to 2.8 percent growth in 2025, down from a forecast of 3.3 percent in January.
U.S. growth projections were marked down to 1.8 percent growth from 2.7 percent growth, and expectations for the output of advanced economies were pulled down to 1.4 percent from 1.9 percent.
The markdown reflects “tariff rates to levels not seen in a century and a highly unpredictable environment,” IMF economists said.
Following the announcement of Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs on April 2, additional China-specific tariffs on April 9, and various other trade taxes that have gone into effect since January, the U.S. effective tariff rate is now at about 25 percent.
The IMF said global economic conditions had nearly normalized following the pandemic disruptions starting in 2020 that led to a wave of global inflation and political unrest, but trade policies were ushering in a new era of uncertainty.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump edges closer to crossing the market's reddest line
President Trump is toeing an economic red line that few before him have dared even consider crossing.
Why it matters: The mere possibility that Trump could erode the Federal Reserve's independence has been enough to unnerve investors and tank the stock market.
Trump risks plunging the global financial system into crisis if that threat becomes a reality and he attempts to remove Fed chair Jerome Powell or undermine his authority.
Driving the news: Trump demanded "major loser" Powell preemptively cut interest rates "NOW," in a post on Truth Social on Monday.
Last week Trump said Powell's "termination cannot come fast enough;" his top economic advisor Kevin Hassett also told reporters the White House was investigating whether firing the Fed chair was an option.
Late Monday, the Republican head of the House's Fed task force told Axios that Congress needed to protect the central bank's independence. "I don't know that we need any extra excitement in the markets right now," Rep. Frank Lucas said.
What they're saying: "Were Powell to be fired, the initial reaction would be a huge injection of volatility into financial markets, and the most dramatic rush to the exit from US assets that it is possible to imagine," Michael Brown, a market analyst at brokerage firm Pepperstone, wrote in a recent note.
The big picture: It's easy to imagine why a president would want low interest rates and cheap money policies that help juice the economy.
Continue reading at Axios
Where the most young adults live with their parents
Chart: Share of those ages 25 to 34 living with their parents, as of 2023
California and Texas are home to the major U.S. metro areas with the greatest shares of young adults living with their parents, a recent analysis finds.
Why it matters: While living at home as a young adult is sometimes viewed negatively as a "failure to launch," it can also reflect economic realities, cultural preferences, caregiving needs, and other factors.
The big picture: Nearly 18% of U.S. adults aged 25-34 were living in a parent's home as of 2023, per a Pew Research Center analysis of census data.
That's down a bit after steadily increasing from 2000-2017, a period marked by multiple financial crises that changed the leaving-home calculus for many young adults.
Zoom in: Vallejo, California (33%), Oxnard, California (32.8%) and Brownsville, Texas (30.5%) have the highest shares of young adults living with their parents among U.S. metros with at least 250,000 residents, per Pew.
Lincoln, Nebraska (2.9%); Springfield, Missouri (6.7%) and Utica, New York (7.8%) have the smallest shares.
Between the lines: Metros with more white young adults than average tend to have lower-than-average shares of young adults overall living with their parents.
Continue reading at Axios
White House is ‘close’ on Japan, India tariff agreements — but expect them to be light on specifics
One person close to the White House said that it “may take months to hammer out the final deals.”
The White House is closing in on general agreements with Japan and India to stave off massive U.S. tariffs, but they are likely to leave many of the thorny details to be hashed out at a later date.
In the absence of full-fledged trade deals, administration officials are working to ink what three people close to the White House described as “memorandums of understanding” or a broad “architecture” for future deals. They were granted anonymity to discuss the details of internal deliberations.
It “may take months to hammer out the final deals,” said one of the people, conceding, “these things are complicated.”
It’s the clearest sign yet of how President Donald Trump and his top economic officials plan to tackle the gargantuan task they have bitten off: negotiating individual agreements with more than 60 trading partners to head off the steep tariffs the president has threatened to impose in early July. And it shows an awareness within the White House that they need to do more to reassure businesses and financial markets that they have an endgame in sight for the trade wars that have rocked the global economy — and could inflict even more pain in the coming months.
Continue reading at Politico
Tesla earnings plunge 71 percent in first quarter
Tesla’s quarterly earnings dropped by 71 percent, the company announced Monday, marking the latest sign of bad news for Elon Musk’s electric vehicle manufacturer as scrutiny of the tech billionaire persists.
The electric vehicle company reported a 9 percent decline in revenue for the first three months of this year. Its earnings totaled $409 million, down from $1.4 billion in the first quarter of last year, the company said.
Tesla’s stock closed Tuesday afternoon at $238 a share, a nearly 37 percent drop from the beginning of the year.
It is expected to host an earnings call with investors at 5:30 pm EDT.
Continue reading at The Hill
Democratic state treasurers to Tesla: Musk is distracted as stock sinks
Eight Democratic state treasurers on Tuesday pressed the chair of Tesla’s board about the company’s faltering performance, raising questions about whether Elon Musk is devoting enough time to his electric vehicle (EV) firm amid his work in the Trump administration.
In a letter to Tesla Chair Robyn Denholm, the treasurers voiced concerns that the company’s recent difficulties indicate “deeper governance and leadership challenges” that could ultimately impact their states.
“CEO Elon Musk continues to divide his attention across multiple companies and a high-profile advisory role within the federal government,” they wrote. “These external commitments raise serious questions about whether Tesla’s leadership is fully engaged in addressing the company’s core challenges.”
The added, “If Tesla falters, the effects won’t be confined to shareholders—they will ripple through regional economies, workforce pipelines, and public confidence in the energy transition.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Stocks close with gains as White House signals trade progress with China
U.S. stock markets closed with solid gains Tuesday as traders bought into the idea that President Trump’s trade war with China could cool down.
Markets were up in the morning, but momentum really picked up Tuesday afternoon after several media outlets revealed comments from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who told a private meeting of investors in Washington that he expects a “de-escalation” in the trade war between the U.S. and China.
“No one thinks the current status quo is sustainable,” Bessent said at the event hosted by JPMorgan Chase, according to multiple reports.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt declined to elaborate on those comments during a Tuesday briefing, but she said the administration is “doing very well in respect to a potential trade deal with China.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump: I have ‘no intention’ to fire Powell
President Trump on Tuesday said he has no intention to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, after he has escalated his criticism over the independent agency’s decision to not lower interest rates.
“The press runs away with things. No, I have no intention of firing him. I would like to see him be a little more active in terms of his idea to lower interest rates. This is a perfect time to lower interest rates,” Trump said, adding that he “never did” have an intention to dismiss Powell.
“If it doesn’t, is it the end? No, it’s not. But it would be good timing,” he added. “But no, I have no intention to fire him.”
Trump called Powell a “major loser” Monday and suggested the Fed’s previous rate cuts were aimed at helping former President Biden, fueling investor concerns in recent days.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump says tariff on China will ‘come down substantially’ from 145 percent
President Trump said Tuesday that the hefty tariff rate on China will significantly be reduced after he negotiates with Chinese President Xi Jinping, expressing optimism about a trade deal.
“145 percent is very high. It won’t be that high, it’s not going to be that high… it won’t be anywhere near that high,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “It will come down substantially, but it won’t be zero.”
The overall tariff level currently imposed on China is 145 percent, which remained in place after Trump delayed the “reciprocal” tariffs on other trading partners for 90 days and reduced them to 10 percent.
“We’re going to be very nice. They’re going to be very nice, and we’ll see what happens. But ultimately, they have to make a deal because otherwise they’re not going to be able to deal in the United States,” Trump said, referring to China.
He cited his relationship with Xi as his reason for being optimistic about a deal. The White House earlier on Tuesday said that it was “setting the stage for a deal with China,” seeking to reassure nervous financial markets and investors that progress with Beijing could be imminent.
Continue reading at The Hill
White House says it’s not targeting green groups’ tax status
The comments follow speculation that the Trump administration would seek to revoke environmental groups’ tax-exempt status.
The White House is not drafting or considering an order targeting nonprofit organizations’ tax-exempt status, a White House official said Tuesday.
The comments come after rumors swirled in energy and environmental policy groups in recent days that President Donald Trump might attempt to revoke green groups’ tax-exempt status, potentially on Earth Day.
Asked Tuesday whether the president was considering any actions to target nonprofit organizations, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters she would check in with the White House policy team.
In response to a request for additional comment, a White House official told POLITICO’s E&E News later Tuesday in an email, “No such orders are being drafted or considered at this time.”
Environmentalists’ concerns were amplified when Trump suggested last week that Harvard University should lose its tax-exempt status after the school defied the administration’s demands.
Continue reading at Politico
Judge halts shutdown of Voice of America
The judge is ordering the Trump administration to immediately restore all employees and contractors to their news programs.
A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to restore Voice of America, saying the effort to gut the 80-year-old government-funded news service likely violated the law and Constitution.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth said the administration’s rush to dismantle the VOA and related news organizations funded by the U.S. Agency for Global Media resulted in the suspension of hundreds of journalists and employees. It put some overseas correspondents at risk of being deported to their home countries, the judge noted. And Lamberth said the silencing of VOA — for the first time in 80 years — also deprived hundreds of millions of listeners of a reliable source of news in parts of the world that lack a free press.
Lamberth said the administration offered virtually no justification for the draconian cuts, suggesting it was working to comply with President Donald Trump’s March 14 executive order requiring a significant scaling back of the agency. Yet the cuts were so bone-deep, Lamberth said, that they likely violated even Trump’s command that the programs continue to operate at legally required minimum levels of service.
“They took immediate and drastic action to slash USAGM, without considering its statutorily or constitutionally required functions as required by the plain language of the [executive order], and without regard to the harm inflicted on employees, contractors, journalists, and media consumers around the world,” Lamberth said. “It is hard to fathom a more straightforward display of arbitrary and capricious actions than the Defendants’ actions here.”
Continue reading at Politico
Trump says he won't play hardball with China on trade
The Trump administration on Tuesday signaled the possibility of cooling trade tensions between the U.S. and China.
Why it matters: Investors are hoping for deals that might roll back the steep tariffs on Chinese goods that are expected to roil the global economy.
Driving the news: President Trump, in an Oval Office news conference, told reporters he did not intend to play hardball with China in making a trade deal.
He also indicated that the ultimate tariff on China won't be 145%, though it won't fall all the way to zero, either.
Zoom out: His comments follow two earlier headlines from his administration that, collectively, suggest a somewhat softer stance.
"We're doing very well with respect to a potential trade deal with China," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters earlier Tuesday.
"The president and the administration are setting the stage for a deal with China," Leavitt added. "Everyone involved wants to see a trade deal happen and the ball is moving in the right direction."
Continue reading at Axios
Health and Science News
RFK Jr. eyes reversing CDC’s Covid-19 vaccine recommendation for children
He has raised doubts about the need for kids to get vaccinated against the disease.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is weighing pulling the Covid-19 vaccine from the government’s list of recommended immunizations for children, two people familiar with the discussions told POLITICO.
The directive under consideration would remove the Covid shot from the childhood vaccine schedule maintained by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and widely used by physicians to guide vaccine distribution, marking Kennedy’s most significant move yet to shake up the nation’s vaccination practices.
Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaccine activist, has previously questioned the need for kids to get the shot, raising doubts about its safety and citing studies showing healthy children face an extremely low risk of death from Covid.
Eliminating the vaccine from the CDC schedule would not bar kids from receiving it. But the change would represent an extraordinary intervention by Kennedy to override the agency’s scientific decision-making and reverse a recommendation backed by the CDC and a slate of independent advisers just three years ago.
The removal would also likely influence vaccination procedures across the nation. Pediatricians rely on the CDC schedule to determine which vaccines they should give children and when to administer them, in order to protect against a range of common infectious diseases.
Continue reading at Politico
Measles outbreak in Texas climbs to more than 600 cases
Texas officials said Tuesday there have been 624 confirmed measles cases in the state since late January. The number reflects 27 additional cases since their last update on April 18.
“Sixty-four of the patients have been hospitalized. This number is the total number of people hospitalized over the course of the outbreak. It is not the current number of people in the hospital,” according to a release from the Texas Department of State Health Services.
“There have been two fatalities in school-aged children who lived in the outbreak area. The children were not vaccinated and had no known underlying conditions,” it noted.
Continue reading at The Hill
RFK Jr. set to announce a plan to ban certain artificial food dyes
The Trump administration is set to unveil a plan to remove petroleum-based synthetic dyes from the country’s food supply, ramping up pressure on food companies, according to a media advisory sent by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on Monday.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Marty Makary will provide additional details Tuesday, the agency said.
Kennedy has made removing artificial dyes from food a key priority from the day President Trump tapped him for the role.
He recently traveled to West Virginia to promote the state banning certain food dyes from school lunches, including those that are approved by the FDA, like yellow No. 5 and No. 6, and red No. 40.
Continue reading at The Hill
Clinics begin closing as Trump admin continues freeze on family planning funds
Dozens of medical providers have struggled to stay afloat since more than $65 million dollars for the Title X family planning program was withheld on April 1.
Clinics around the country that provide contraception and other reproductive health services to low-income patients are running out of funds as they await word from the Trump administration on tens of millions of dollars in grants frozen last month.
Dozens of medical providers from California to Maine, including nine Planned Parenthood affiliates, have struggled to stay afloat since more than $65 million dollars for the Title X family planning program was withheld on April 1 — a funding freeze the Trump administration said was aimed at enforcing executive orders on diversity and immigration. Federal officials gave the groups 10 days to submit detailed records showing they don’t discriminate in hiring or in patient care, but those who did so by the deadline said they have not received a response.
“It’s been radio silence,” said Sarah Stoesz, the interim CEO of Utah’s Planned Parenthood chapter. “For some inexplicable reason, they are taking a meat axe to the healthcare system in America.”
Utah is one of seven states to lose all Title X funding, along with California, Hawaii, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, and Montana. The National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, which represents most Title X grantees, estimated that 846,000 patients will lose access to services if the funding isn’t restored.
The Trump administration did not respond to questions about the status of the funds.
Continue reading at Politico
As Trump administration champions IVF, it cuts key CDC staff
President Trump has called himself the "fertilization president," but DOGE-directed cuts this month decimated Centers for Disease Control staff who track the safety, cost and outcomes of the nation's fertility clinics.
Why it matters: The CDC had been a source of unbiased information for families contemplating IVF or other assisted reproductive technologies, including estimates of of their chances for success.
Zoom in: The six-person Reproductive Technology Surveillance and Research Team, which operates under a congressional mandate dating to 1992, was a casualty of the cuts, a former CDC employee tells Axios.
The team functioned as a clearinghouse for information and conducted research research about how to increase access and reduce costs.
The Women's Health and Fertility Branch was also completely eliminated, and most of the CDC's Division of Reproductive Health was slashed.
"How does cutting this program support the administration's position?" the CDC employee said. "If [Trump] really wants to expand IVF access, that was exactly what we're trying to do, and we can only help support this position. It's really frustrating and and strange."
Industry experts have also expressed alarm at the loss of the oversight tool.
Continue reading at Axios
The push for women to have more children has a powerful ally: Trump
The White House is emerging as a powerful ally of the burgeoning movement of people who want women to have more children, but there's little emphasis on the unique level of danger that birth poses in the U.S.
Why it matters: The U.S. population is aging, presenting complex economic and health care challenges that "pro-natalists" argue should be addressed through raising fertility rates. At the same time, the country is facing an ongoing maternal mortality crisis and a politically fraught debate over women's reproductive health that's had widespread ripple effects.
The pro-natalist movement is splintered into factions with different views, including some with restrictive definitions of what constitutes a family. There's also infighting over exactly how women should be reproducing — with debate around IVF and genetic screening.
Some of its most controversial adherents hold racist views that encouraging white people to have more babies could help maintain the race's stability.
Driving the news: The White House is soliciting ideas about how to get more Americans to marry and have more babies, the New York Times recently reported.
Continue reading at Axios
Republican senator asks Kennedy to restore HHS staff that worked on coal miner health
In a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) pushed back on decisions that cut an office and workers seeking to support coal miners’ health.
“I believe in the President’s vision to right size our government, but I do not think eliminating the NIOSH coal programs and research will accomplish that goal,” wrote Capito, referring to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
“I am concerned that the [reductions in force] at NIOSH will undermine the vital health programs important to so many West Virginians. I urge you to bring back the NIOSH employees immediately so they can continue to support our nation’s coal industry,” she added.
Continue reading at The Hill
Florida Medicaid regulator offers explanation of scrutinized $10M Hope Florida donation
The donation garnered headlines as state lawmakers began inquiries over the program’s finances.
TALLAHASSEE, Florida — Florida’s top Medicaid regulator on Tuesday sought to explain that a $10 million donation made to a nonprofit associated with first lady Casey DeSantis’ community-based assistance program was not made with Medicaid dollars recouped in a much larger cash settlement.
Amid heightened scrutiny Hope Florida has received over whether it improperly received money intended for the state, the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration’s general counsel sought to clarify the original intent of the money in a Tuesday letter to legislative leaders.
Questions about the program have also led Gov. Ron DeSantis to lash out at state House leaders throughout most of this year’s legislative session, accusing them of colluding with Democrats to kill a program that he has described as a cheaper alternative to publicly subsidized assistance programs that has already helped 30,000 people. And the battle now has pitted a key House Republican against the state’s attorney general.
The Centene Corp. and the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration agreed to a $67 million cash settlement last year over a claim that the state Medicaid program was charged too much for prescription drugs. The agreement, finalized at the end of September, included a $10 million donation made by Centene to the nonprofit arm of Hope Florida, a community-based assistance program that subsequently distributed the grant to groups that campaigned against a recreational pot ballot measure that failed last year.
Continue reading at Politico
Polling- Surveys
Trump approval rating slips amid concerns about moves to expand influence: Survey
President Trump’s approval rating slipped in a Reuters/Ipsos poll that showed concerns with moves by the president to expand his influence.
In the poll, 42 percent said they backed how Trump is doing in his job, 1 point below a Reuters/Ipsos poll from three weeks ago. Right after his inauguration in January, 47 percent said they backed Trump’s job execution.
Eighty-three percent of those polled said they believed the president should follow federal court rulings the president opposes, at a time when Trump is battling the courts over his deportations, including over a mistakenly deported man. Just 13 percent said the opposite.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll also found pushback against a statement that reads “it’s okay for a U.S. president to withhold funding from universities if the president doesn’t agree with how the university is run,” with 57 percent disagreeing.
Continue reading at The Hill
The Courts / Legal
Watchdog declines to pursue cases involving fired probationary federal workers
The Office of the Special Counsel (OSC) told fired probationary employees it would no longer pursue complaints they were wrongfully terminated, a reversal that comes after the Trump administration fired the head of the agency.
In an email to those who had filed claims with the agency, the OSC said it “plans to take no further action” on some 2,000 complaints.
The Trump administration in February ordered the firing of probationary workers, or those hired in the past year or two years, depending on their agency.
While probationary workers are easier to fire than other civil servants, they still have workplace protections and must be fired for cause.
The Trump administration told workers they were being fired for performance reasons, even as it embarked on sweeping firings impacting more than 20,000 workers.
Continue reading at The Hill
Military authorized to detain undocumented immigrants in New Mexico
American troops now have the authority to detain and search undocumented migrants in New Mexico, a role service members have not held before at the southern border, U.S. Northern Command said Monday.
Northcom said troops “have been delegated the authority” to conduct security support operations in the New Mexico National Defense Area (NMNDA), a zone that runs along the U.S.-Mexico border now considered part of the Army’s Fort Huachuca in Arizona.
The authorization means service members can now temporarily detain and search trespassers, provide medical assistance and implement crowd control on the military-controlled land until appropriate law enforcement can take custody of an individual, according to a statement from Northcom, the command leading military efforts in the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration.
Troops also may assist with setting up temporary barriers, signage and fencing if requested, Northcom said.
Continue reading at The Hill
Judge blocks Adams from authorizing ICE office on Rikers Island
A judge on Monday temporarily blocked New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) from permitting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to establish an office on Rikers Island.
New York State Supreme Court Justice Mary Rosado said city officials should halt any efforts “towards negotiating, signing, or implementing any Memoranda of Understanding with the federal government regarding federal law enforcement presence on Department of Correction property.”
A hearing at the New York Supreme Court — which is a trial-level court in the state, not its high court — is scheduled for April 25, when both Adams and the New York City Council will be heard. The council initiated a lawsuit intending to block ICE from operating on Rikers Island. Rosado is then expected to extend, modify or vacate the temporary restraining order.
Adams signed an executive order on April 8 seeking to enter an agreement with the federal agency in an effort to allow ICE to carry out immigration enforcement efforts on the island, which houses New York’s largest jail.
The mayor said the collaboration could help combat the presence of foreign criminal gangs including Tren de Aragua and MS-13, both of which have been the focus of President Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Continue reading at The Hill
Appeals court scouts middle ground on Trump transgender military ban
A federal appeals court panel looked for middle ground Tuesday on President Trump’s executive order effectively barring transgender people from serving openly in the military, expressing skepticism of the ban but unease over a nationwide block on its implementation.
Trump’s order, penned in January, declared that transgender service members can’t meet the “rigorous standards” necessary to serve, an extension of the culture war rhetoric the president made a hallmark of his campaign.
The Defense Department’s subsequent policy ordered the military to remove service members with gender dysphoria and to pause integration of new transgender recruits.
Continue reading at The Hill
Tesla settles wrongful death case involving one of its EVs
Tesla has settled a wrongful death case with the estate of a man who was killed in a crash involving one of the company’s electric vehicles (EVs).
Elon Musk’s EV company reached an agreement with the estate of Clyde Leach and his wife Donna Leach to dismiss the lawsuit, according to a court filing Monday. The filing did not disclose the details of the settlement.
Leach died in 2021 when his Tesla Model Y “suddenly accelerated forward,” driving off the road and into a nearby gas station, according to the initial complaint. The collision caused an “uncontrollable fire” that consumed the vehicle “within seconds.”
Leach’s estate argued that Tesla was aware of situations in which its vehicles suddenly accelerated and had released several safety features, including automatic emergency braking and a system to distinguish unintentional pedal movements.
“In response to receiving notice of these incidents, Tesla misrepresented that it had designed systems which would prevent these foreseeably dangerous situations and that ‘[t]here is no ‘unintended acceleration’ in Tesla vehicles,’” the complaint reads.
Continue reading at The Hill
Federal prosecutors in Eric Adams case resign after being put on administrative leave
The Manhattan prosecutors accused DOJ of requiring them to “express regret and admit some wrongdoing” in their handling of the case in order to be reinstated.
NEW YORK — Three of the Manhattan federal prosecutors who worked on the criminal case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams resigned Tuesday, accusing the Justice Department of trying to force them to admit wrongdoing in connection with their resistance to dropping the charges.
“The Department has decided that obedience supersedes all else, requiring us to abdicate our legal and ethical obligations in favor of directions of Washington,” the prosecutors wrote in a letter to Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. “That is wrong.”
The prosecutors, Celia Cohen, Andrew Rohrbach and Derek Wikstrom, had been placed on administrative leave in February after they, along with the then-acting Manhattan U.S. Attorney Danielle Sassoon, balked at accepting the Justice Department’s orders to drop the five-count corruption case against the Democratic mayor.
Sassoon, along with at least five others in New York and Washington, resigned in protest. They said the Justice Department was abandoning the case in exchange for the mayor’s support for President Donald Trump’s policy objectives, particularly on immigration enforcement. U.S. District Judge Dale Ho eventually dismissed the charges and excoriated Justice Department officials’ rationales for abandoning the case.
Continue reading at Politico
Jury finds New York Times did not defame Sarah Palin
A jury in New York ruled Tuesday that The New York Times did not defame former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) with an editorial about gun violence in 2011.
Tuesday’s ruling comes nearly three years after a separate jury found the Times not liable for damages over the op-ed, which linked her to the deadly 2011 shooting in an Arizona parking lot that injured then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).
Palin testified at a trial Monday that death threats against her increased and she felt “defenseless” after the Times editorial about gun violence said her PAC had contributed to an atmosphere of violence, according to The Associated Press.
Hours after the editorial was published, the Times corrected inaccuracies it contained, noting a previous version had “incorrectly stated that a link existed between political rhetoric and the 2011 shooting.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump ordered to give some Venezuelans 21 days’ notice before deportations
A federal judge in Colorado ordered the Trump administration on Tuesday to provide Venezuelan migrants detained there 21 days’ notice before deporting them under the Alien Enemies Act.
The order only applies to migrants housed within the state, but it nonetheless deals a blow to the administration, which in some cases elsewhere was providing migrants 24 hours’ or less notice before seeking to remove them under a law it has used to transport migrants to a prison in El Salvador.
U.S. District Judge Charlotte Sweeney also ordered the Trump administration to provide the notice “in a language the individual understands.”
Her ruling comes after lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which is representing a number of Venezuelan migrants the Trump administration has sought to deport, asked the Supreme Court to leapfrog lower courts in taking up that case.
Continue reading at The Hill
Minnesota files preemptive lawsuit against Trump on transgender sports ban
When Bondi announced the administration’s lawsuit against Maine last week, she warned that Minnesota and California could be next.
ST. PAUL, Minnesota — Democratic Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison filed a preemptive lawsuit Tuesday against Republican President Donald Trump seeking to block his administration from acting against Minnesota in the way it’s taking on Maine under a federal push to ban transgender athletes from girls and women’s sports.
“Minnesota brings this lawsuit to stop President Trump and his administration from bullying vulnerable children in this state,” Ellison said at a news conference, quoting the opening line from the lawsuit naming Trump and his attorney general, Pam Bondi.
When Bondi announced the administration’s lawsuit against Maine last week, she warned that Minnesota and California could be next. The administration’s lawsuit followed weeks of feuding between Trump and Democratic Gov. Janet Mill of Maine that led to a clash at the White House when she told Trump, “We’ll see you in court.”
With this case, Ellison is trying to beat Trump and Bondi to the courthouse.
Continue reading at Politico
Adams and Homan deepen partnership between local law enforcement and ICE
Mayor Eric Adams and border czar Tom Homan showcased their alliance with the indictment of 27 migrants allegedly tied to Tren de Aragua.
NEW YORK — New York City Mayor Eric Adams and President Trump’s border czar Tom Homan ratcheted up their case Tuesday for cooperation between local law enforcement and federal immigration officials when they announced the indictment of 27 alleged Tren de Aragua members and associates on racketeering, narcotics, sex trafficking and robbery charges.
Their announcements came after Adams moved to open a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office on Rikers Island.
“We have taken them down and we will continue to fight violent transnational crimes with the full force of the law,” Adams said during a press briefing at a federal office building in Manhattan. “It’s good to have partners in the federal agencies who are joining us in this priority on how important it is to keep our city safe.”
A judge blocked ICE from setting up on Rikers after the City Council sued Mayor Adams, alleging that the mayor adopted Trump’s hard-line immigration policies as a “quid pro quo” in return for moving to drop criminal bribery charges against him.
If the judge continues blocking the ICE office, Homan warned that not opening it could put other immigrants in jeopardy of arrests.
Continue reading at Politico
Judge castigates Trump administration for ‘bad faith’ in Abrego Garcia’s deportation case
A federal judge said Tuesday that the Trump administration is ignoring court orders, obstructing the legal process and acting in “bad faith” by refusing to provide information about the steps they have taken, if any, to free a mistakenly deported Maryland man from an El Salvador prison and return him to the U.S.
“For weeks, Defendants have sought refuge behind vague and unsubstantiated assertions of privilege, using them as a shield to obstruct discovery and evade compliance with this Court’s orders,” U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis wrote an the order Tuesday. “Defendants have known, at least since last week, that this Court requires specific legal and factual showings to support any claim of privilege. Yet they have continued to rely on boilerplate assertions. That ends now.”
She gave the administration until 6 p.m. Wednesday to provide those details.
The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration nearly two weeks ago to facilitate Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s return to the U.S. from a notorious Salvadoran prison, rejecting the White House’s claim that it couldn’t retrieve him after mistakenly deporting him.
Continue reading at the AP
Anti-DEI-Whitewashing
Nothing to see here, yet.
General News
Gingrich believes Trump has taken a tax hike on the wealthy off the table
Some Republicans have been flirting with such a move to pay for President Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill.”
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich believes that President Donald Trump has officially axed the idea of raising income taxes on the highest-earning Americans, citing a missive from Trump he said he received.
“It’s pretty clear that that conversation should now be over,” Gringrich said in an interview Tuesday, amid a hot debate among Republicans over whether such a tax hike should be used to help fund Trump’s wide-ranging policy agenda.
Gingrich posted a note on X that he said was from Trump, in which the president appeared to suggest that any tax increase, no matter how small, could doom Republicans’ electoral prospects.
“George Bush said, ‘READ MY LIPS, NO NEW TAXES,’ then proceeded to give a rather small Tax increase, and was obliterated,” the note said, referring to former President George H.W. Bush, who went on to broker a tax hike deal in 1990 with the then-Democratic-controlled Congress. “While I love the idea of a small increase, the Democrats would probably use it against us, and we would be, like Bush, helpless to do anything about it.”
Continue reading at Politico
Wife of Mahmoud Khalil says he was denied temporary release for birth of son
Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University graduate who has been detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was denied permission from attending the birth of his first child, several reports confirmed Monday.
Khalil’s attorneys wrote on Sunday to Melissa Harper, the director of ICE’s field office in New Orleans where he is being held, requesting for a two-week release from detention to be with his wife when she delivered their son, CNN reported.
About 30 minutes later, Harper denied the request and said she was dismissing the furlough “after consideration of the submitted information and a review” of Khalil’s case, the outlet reported.
According to a statement shared online, Khalil’s wife, Dr. Noor Abdalla, said she welcomed their son into the world alone.
“This was a purposeful decision by ICE to make me, Mahmoud, and our son suffer,” she said.
Continue reading at The Hill
Woodward: Hegseth ‘radiates unseriousness’
Veteran journalist Bob Woodward said Monday that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth “radiates unseriousness” amid controversy over a second Signal chat in which he shared sensitive military information with family members and a personal lawyer.
“So, you want that position to be … filled by somebody who’s very serious, very competent, very focused on that mission, protecting the homeland, protecting the United States,” Woodward told MSNBC’s Jen Psaki in an interview Monday, while discussing the Defense secretary’s role.
“And having known and dealt with 16 of them, there is — you can have somebody like Gen. [James] Mattis, who was … probably the most serious person to ever work in Washington,” he continued. “And then, you know, the current secretary of Defense … is — it’s just too jokey. It’s too unserious. And he kind of radiates unseriousness.”
Woodward added, “And that’s — that’s a shame for him, for President Trump and for the country.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Al Gore compares Trump administration to Nazis
Former Vice President Al Gore compared the Trump administration to the Third Reich in Germany on Monday while giving remarks at a kickoff event for San Francisco’s Climate Week.
“I understand very well why it is wrong to compare Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich to any other movement. It was uniquely evil, full stop. I get it. But there are important lessons from the history of that emergent evil,” Gore, a Nobel Peace Prize awardee, told attendees.
“It was [Jürgen] Habermas’s mentor, Theodor Adorno, who wrote that the first step in that nation’s descent into hell was, and I quote, ‘the conversion of all questions of truth into questions of power,”’ Gore said, quoting the famed German philosopher and social theorist.
“He described how the Nazis, and I quote again, ‘attacked the very heart of the distinction between true and false.’ End quote. The Trump administration is insisting on trying to create their own preferred version of reality,” he added.
Continue reading at The Hill
Shouting, pointed DOGE questions at Donalds town hall
Rep. Byron Donalds’s (R-Fla.) raucous town hall Monday evening featured a mix of cheers, shouting and pointed questions around the work President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has been doing to curb spending and overhaul the federal workforce.
Donalds, who launched a gubernatorial campaign in late February to replace the term-limited Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), defended the Trump administration’s approach on a range of issues, including Social Security, DOGE layoffs and the president’s sweeping tariff agenda.
The Florida Republican, who has been endorsed by Trump in his bid for governor, had a number of tense exchanges with attendees at the event in Estero, Fla., with the lawmaker asking, “do you want to yell, or do you want to hear?” CNN reported.
He stood in defense of DOGE’s work and pointed to previous remarks from former President Obama, who he said also wanted to examine federal government inefficiency while in the Oval Office.
“We actually have to let the DOGE actually finish its work. What they are examining right now is inefficiency in the federal system,” Donalds said Monday night at Estero High School.
Continue reading at The Hill
Scott stays silent as his minority business legacy crumbles under Trump
Sen. Tim Scott has been a huge proponent of helping minority businesses and underserved communities access capital.
Senate Banking Chair Tim Scott (R-S.C.) has spent years boosting a federal program to support minority-owned businesses. President Donald Trump’s administration dismantled it in a matter of weeks.
Scott, along with other Republicans, was integral to congressional efforts to permanently authorize the Commerce Department’s Minority Business Development Agency, expand its services into rural areas and leverage the program to help minority-owned businesses during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Now, the program, which funds grants to business owners and provides technical assistance, support and mentorship, has had 100 percent of its staff, about 50 people, placed on administrative leave or redistributed within the Commerce Department, according to a Commerce employee and a Democratic staffer granted anonymity to discuss personnel matters.
For years, Scott has prioritized efforts to expand access to capital and economic mobility for underserved communities, like the one he says he grew up in, and minority businesses, like his own Main Street insurance agency. The MBDA dates back to the Nixon administration and was one outlet for this mission. But Scott has stayed silent publicly about the gutting of the agency.
Continue reading at Politico
Karen Bass unveils her ‘very difficult budget’ for LA
The Los Angeles mayor kept an upbeat tone in her annual State of the City address, but her proposed budget offered a reality check.
LOS ANGELES — Call it the Karen Bass special: a shot of optimism, followed by a bitter budget chaser.
That was the incongruous combination the Los Angeles mayor debuted on Monday, when she presented an upbeat outlook in her annual State of the City address, only to drop a gloomy spending proposal that could result in 1,600 layoffs.
The bracing split-screen is a result of the city’s cascade of disasters: historically devastating wildfires, a perennial homelessness crisis and a bleak budget outlook made worse by global economic upheaval. It lays bare the daunting climb awaiting Bass, whose flat-footed initial fire response has left her more politically vulnerable than ever as she seeks reelection in 2026.
Throughout her midday speech, Bass recounted Los Angeles’ woes in her typically sunny cadence, presenting the challenges as an opportunity to further transform the nation’s second-largest city.
“The state of our city is this: Homelessness is down, crime is down. These are tough challenges and they show that we can do so much more,” Bass said. “We still have a long way to go. We need a citywide turnaround, and we need a fundamental overhaul of city government to deliver the clean, safe and orderly neighborhoods that Angelenos deserve — and to reverse decades of failure on homelessness.”When it came to the city’s fiscal crisis, though, Bass kept it simple and blunt: “Los Angeles, we have a very difficult budget to balance.”
Continue reading at Politico
White House asked FERC’s Phillips to step down
His exit from the commission will leave a 2-2 partisan split, and allow President Donald Trump to tap a replacement commissioner.
FERC Commissioner Willie Phillips, a Democrat who chaired the agency under President Joe Biden, was asked to step down from the agency by the White House, he told POLITICO on Tuesday.
“I heard from the White House, and they expressed their interest that I step aside,” he said. “It’s something that’s not a surprise to me. In fact, I had already planned to do so.”
Phillips will step down effective immediately, he said. He had already informed his team and Chair Mark Christie, whom he praised for his leadership.
His exit from the commission will remove the Democrats’ majority on the commission, leaving a 2-2 partisan split, and allow President Donald Trump to tap a replacement commissioner.
But Phillips was widely seen as a consensus builder who regularly voted alongside Democrats and Republicans during his time as chair and as commissioner. And his latest push for FERC to be more aggressive in finding ways to get data centers connected to the grid more quickly was actually more in line with the more in line with the White House’s stance than the agency’s Republican minority.
Continue reading at Politico
State Department releases reorganization plan
The organizational chart released Tuesday does not go as far as versions previously reported.
The State Department released its plans for reorganizing the agency Tuesday, a first step toward reducing what the Trump administration says is an inefficient foreign affairs operation.
“In its current form, the department is bloated, bureaucratic, and unable to perform its essential diplomatic mission in this new era of great power competition,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement.
An organization chart released to the public shows that the ultimate plan for trimming the State Department does not go as far as versions previously reported, but it still eliminates several human rights-focused bureaus. Future changes to the plan are also still possible.
Among the bureaus and offices the administration plans to cut are the Office of Global Women’s Issues and its Diversity and Inclusion Office, which were expected given the Trump administration’s focus on eliminating such programs from the federal government. State also expects to eliminate some offices previously housed under the undersecretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights, though it is expected that much of their work will continue in other sections of the department.
The State Department also will eliminate the office of the director of the Foreign Service Institute, which provides language training and other educational support for career foreign service officers.
Continue reading at Politico
Meet the 8 MAGA Outlets Disrupting the White House Briefing Room
The AP is on the outs, but these new MAGA media stars are on the rise.
Ian Ward is a reporter at POLITICO.
Francis Chung is a POLITICO staff photographer.
As she left the James S. Brady Briefing Room in early April, Natalie Winters, the newly minted White House correspondent for Steve Bannon’s War Room, tried to describe the relationship between the White House press corps’ old guard and the “new conservative media” who’ve entered the briefing room in the early days of the second Trump administration.
“You know when you’re at a party and you see someone who you don’t technically know, but you know them like through a friend from social media, and it’s that awkward question of, like, ‘Do I say hi or do I not?’” Winters told me. “It’s a room full of that, except you know the people because you bash them on TV.”
Not that she particularly minds the confrontation. Since securing credentials to cover White House events in January, Winters has distinguished herself as the enfant terrible of the “new media” set, the collection of non-traditional — and mostly MAGA-aligned — outlets that the Trump administration has welcomed to the White House as part of its campaign shake up the briefing room. “We’re the rising power,” Winters said.
Most of the members of the new media have adopted Trump’s hostile relationship to the mainstream media, but Winters goes further than most in her animosity: She has accused other White House reporters of taking part in “CIA psy-ops,” and she believes the liberal media is actively fomenting a “color revolution” against Trump. “They can criticize what we’re doing [at War Room] as, like, state regime propaganda or whatever,” she said as we walked along the National Mall. “But at the end of the day, I’m like, ‘Who’s running cover for the state?’”a
Continue reading at Politico
Von der Leyen: World is ‘lining up’ to work with Europe amid Trump’s trade war
In exclusive comments to POLITICO, the European Commission president touted the EU as a safe haven in an unpredictable world.
BRUSSELS — Countries are ready to work with reliable trade partners in Europe after United States President Donald Trump's blanket trade tariffs upended global markets, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told POLITICO.
"In a more and more unpredictable global environment, countries are lining up to work with us," the Commission president said without naming Trump or the U.S.
In recent weeks she has spoken to leaders from Iceland, New Zealand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Canada, India and the United Arab Emirates who were looking for "strong, reliable partners."
The global order is "shifting more deeply than at any time since the Cold War ended," von der Leyen added.
Trump announced the reciprocal tariffs on April 2 — hitting the EU with a 20 percent levy and most of the rest of the world with a baseline tariff of 10 percent. As financial markets melted down a week later, Trump suspended the higher tariffs for 90 days to open the way for talks on a trade deal.
In the EU's case, it is still paying that 10 percent rate, as well as 25 percent on exports of steel, aluminum and cars — while the U.S. and China have hit each other with triple-digit tariffs. If Trump reimposes those reciprocal tariffs, global merchandise trade could shrink by 1.5 percent this year, with North America hardest hit, the World Trade Organization forecasts.
Continue reading at Politico
Trump’s ‘chaos’ strategy vs. the global economy | Playbook Daily Briefing
America's fact fight fades
Chart: Minutes cable news spent covering misinformation and disinformation
America's obsession with countering mis- and disinformation has withered as society grows skeptical of institutions once trusted with facts.
Why it matters: Professional fact-checking went mainstream during the first Trump administration, but it's since become politicized.
Americans are less enthusiastic about policing information today than they were two years ago, and the trend is bipartisan, per Pew Research Center.
State of play: Institutions once seen as critical to providing facts about history and current events, such as public schools and news media, are experiencing record-low trust levels, in addition to financial challenges.
A February YouGov poll found that U.S. citizens are far more likely to trust information coming from the Trump administration "a great deal" or "a fair amount" (44%) than they are the news media (28%).
In 2017, that gap was much smaller, with 43% of Americans saying they trusted the Trump administration "a great deal" or "a fair amount" on facts, compared to 38% for the news media.
By the numbers: Mentions of the terms "misinformation" and "disinformation" across the country's three biggest cable news networks, MSNBC, Fox News and CNN, have declined considerably since the pandemic, according to data from Stanford's Cable TV News Analyzer.
Continue reading at Axios
Bluesky rolls out blue check verifications
Bluesky is adding blue checks to "authentic and notable accounts" in a system that's reminiscent of one that Twitter had before Elon Musk ended it on the platform that's now called X.
The big picture: "Bluesky will proactively verify" such accounts and "display a blue check next to their names" because "trust is everything," per a Monday blog post by the decentralized microblogging platform.
Continue reading at Axios
Trump Energy secretary: Clean energy tax credits a ‘big mistake’
Energy Secretary Chris Wright railed against clean energy tax credits on Tuesday, defending the Trump administration’s efforts to increase manufacturing powered by coal, natural gas and oil.
His criticism of financial incentives for citizens’ use of renewable energy came during a morning appearance on Fox Business’s “Varney & Co” and coincided with Earth Day — which is typically hailed as a time to champion environmental protections.
“I think it’s a big mistake,” Wright told host Stuart Varney, referring to energy tax credits.
“That term ‘clean energy’ is just a marketing term. There’s no clean energy. All energy sources involve trade-offs,” he continued. “Solar and wind take over 100 times more land, 10 times more steel and cement and heavy materials to produce. There’s no clean energy; there’s just different trade-offs.”
Continue reading at The Hill
‘Insulting’: Amid workforce reductions, DOT offers employees tips on personal branding, managing emotions
The new “Career Transition Learning Series” is intended to help guide “employees through the transition from the federal sector to alternate industries.”
With layoffs looming at the Transportation Department — possibly as soon as next month — the agency has begun offering workshops for employees on topics such as ways to improve their personal brands and how to manage strong emotions around losing their jobs, according to a memo reviewed by POLITICO.
This “Career Transition Learning Series,” communicated to DOT employees by the Office of Human Resource Management last week, includes sessions on things like elevating your personal brand, where employees will “learn practical tools to effectively leverage your personal brand and navigate career transitions with confidence.”
And there are scheduled sessions on helping workers translate their federal experience to the private sector, mastering interviewing skills and even ones that focus on “coping with downsizing and job loss” and “managing strong emotions.” The managing strong emotions session makes the point that “preventing emotional outbursts is key to a productive workplace.” The overview is billed as an opportunity to “recognize emotional cues” and to incorporate strategies to “manage and prevent strong reactions.”
DOT did not respond to a request for comment.
Continue reading at Politico
Rubio not attending Ukraine talks in London
Secretary of State Marco Rubio will not be attending peace talks with Ukrainian and European officials in London this week, the State Department announced, citing logistical issues.
“As we know, Secretary Rubio is a busy man,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said Tuesday.
“While the meetings in London are still occurring, he will not be attending, but that is not a statement regarding the meetings. It’s a statement about logistical issues in his schedule.”
The London talks come after Rubio and Steve Witkoff, President Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, met with European leaders in Paris last week about efforts to bring the fighting in Ukraine to an end.
Keith Kellogg, a retired lieutenant general serving as Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine and Russia, will be participating for the U.S. in the upcoming meetings.
Continue reading at The Hill
EPA firing 280 staffers who fought pollution in overburdened neighborhoods
These staffers worked in an area known as environmental justice, which helps communities that face a disproportionate amount of pollution exposure, especially minority or low-income communities.
The EPA has framed its efforts to cut these programs — including its previous closure of environmental justice offices — as part of a push to end diversity programming in the government. Supporters of the agency’s environmental justice work have pointed out that Black communities face particularly high pollution levels and that the programs also help white Americans, especially if they are poor.
“EPA is taking the next step to terminate the Biden-Harris Administration’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Environmental Justice arms of the agency,” an EPA spokesperson said in a statement.
Continue reading at The Hill
Rubio targets democracy and human rights bureau in State Department shakeup
Secretary of State Marco Rubio is eliminating his department’s main bureau focused on democracy and human rights as part of a reorganization of the agency’s operations announced Tuesday.
Rubio said the moves are aimed at reducing bloat at the State Department, consolidating operations and eliminating programs the administration sees as advancing a liberal agenda. Civil rights advocates say the programs are important to promoting U.S. values of freedom and democracy.
The cuts reportedly eliminate about 17 percent of the agency’s total number of offices, with Rubio looking to further downsize the number of employees based in the U.S. by 15 percent, according to The New York Times.
The largest cut focused on the Office of the Undersecretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights, which housed seven bureaus related to migration, democracy, religious freedom, criminal justice, drug trafficking and more.
Continue reading at The Hill
Florida bill would let homeowners use ‘reasonable force’ against drones
Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would permit homeowners to use “reasonable force” against drones — likely sparked by last year’s uptick in sightings of mysterious unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
The measure, sponsored by state Sen. Keith L. Truenow (R) last month, was placed on the Florida Senate’s legislative calendar on April 16.
Constituents across the U.S. have signaled discontent with the federal response, prompting more questions on where the drones originated and how they could be regulated. The Biden administration stressed that the UAVs were not a threat to national security or operated by foreign adversaries.
President Trump earlier this year said he would look into the drone spotting, but he ruled they were “not the enemy” and likely authorized by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) or belonged to hobbyists.
The Sunshine State legislation seeks to change property owners’ guidelines for unmanned aircraft that remain suspended above their own land. It has already cleared several committees despite potential conflicts with federal law.
Continue reading at The Hill
Will your student loans be sent to collection? What to know about Education Department changes
If you haven’t been making payments on your federal student loans, you could soon find yourself sent to collection with your wages garnished following the return of a Department of Education program.
The department announced Monday that it would restart collections in two weeks, on May 5, a process that has been on hold since the start of the COVID pandemic. While the Education Department has warned that defaulted borrowers could be sent to collections, it has offered tips to help those impacted “get back into repayment.
Here’s what to know.
When are student loans in default?
According to the Education Department, more than 5 million borrowers are in default. Another 4 million are in “late-stage delinquency” and could enter default status in a few months.
If you miss a payment on your federal student loans, even by a day, you are delinquent, the Federal Student Aid office explains. As soon as you repay the past due amount (or change a payment plan, or enter deferment or forbearance), you are no longer delinquent.
Continue reading at The Hill
Elon Musk says he's taking a step back from DOGE after Tesla "blowback"
Elon Musk said Tuesday that he will take a major step back from his work as the leader of the Department of Government Efficiency.
Why it matters: The Tesla CEO has become a close and outspoken ally of President Trump, but his government-slashing work via DOGE has sparked a damaging backlash on Tesla.
The big picture: Musk said on Tesla's earnings call that "my time allocation to DOGE will drop significantly" likely starting in May, declaring the effort "mostly done."
"I'll have to continue doing it for I think the remainder of the President's term just to make sure the waste and fraud that we stopped does not come roaring back, which it will do if it has the chance," Musk said.
"I think I'll continue to spend a day or two per week on government matters for as long as the President would like me to do so and as long as it would be useful," he added.
Musk also acknowledged "some blowback" on Tesla due to his Trump ties, saying there's been "a few bumps in the road," but said the company's future is still bright.
Continue reading at Axios
The Republican response to Hegseth’s controversies: Publicly defend, privately seethe
GOP lawmakers worry about bucking the president but the public show of good will could expire.
Most Republicans aren’t willing to denounce Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth over alleged security lapses and allegations of mismanagement, but privately, some in the GOP are increasingly worried.
“My boss is livid,” said a Republican staffer granted anonymity because they were not allowed to speak publicly. “He defended Hegseth the first time around to be a team player, but the second time he’s not — because sending classified info to your wife and personal lawyer is something completely different. If any staffer, lawmaker or agency employee did this, they would be in major legal trouble.”
With President Donald Trump offering full-throated support for Hegseth and dismissing the latest bad headlines as overblown, many Republicans — at least publicly — have closed ranks around the embattled Defense secretary, whose confirmation required party leaders to spend considerable political capital.
But the anger, just below the surface, suggests the good will toward Hegseth could expire if the incidents keep piling up, even, potentially, among some of Hegseth’s original backers during his bruising confirmation fight and the fallout from the first leaked Signal chat.
Since then, the Defense Department has endured a high-level staff purge, a scathing opinion piece from a former senior staffer in POLITICO and fresh revelations that Hegseth shared sensitive details of military operations in a Signal chat with his wife, brother and personal lawyer.
For the most part, Republican lawmakers are publicly downplaying the controversies and turning their ire on the media and internal leakers.
Continue reading at Politico
EPA fires, reassigns 455 environmental justice staffers
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will fire 280 staffers who worked on tackling pollution in overburdened and underserved communities and will reassign another 175.
These staffers worked in an area known as environmental justice, which helps communities that face a disproportionate amount of pollution, especially minority or low-income communities.
The EPA has framed its efforts to cut these programs — including its previous closure of environmental justice offices — as part of a push to end diversity programming in the government.
Supporters of the agency’s environmental justice work have pointed out that Black communities face particularly high pollution levels and the programs also help white Americans, especially if they are poor.
“EPA is taking the next step to terminate the Biden-Harris Administration’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and Environmental Justice arms of the agency,” an EPA spokesperson said in a statement.
Continue reading at The Hill
Musk says time spent on DOGE will drop next month as Tesla sales plunge
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on Tuesday he plans to spend less time working on the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiatives to focus more on the electric vehicle manufacturer, which saw its sales plummet in the first quarter.
“Starting probably in [the] next month, May, my time allocation to DOGE will drop significantly,” Musk said on a Tesla earnings call Tuesday evening. “I’ll have to continue doing it for, I think, the remainder of the president’s term just to make sure that the waste and fraud doesn’t come roaring back, which we’ll do, if it has the chance.”
The tech billionaire said he will likely spend one to two days of the week on “government matters” for “as long as the president would like me to do so and as long as it is useful,” but noted the major work of establishing DOGE is done.
May 30 marks the end of Musk’s special government status and dozens of Democratic lawmakers called on Trump earlier this month to confirm Musk will leave his role in the administration by that date.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump's "final offer" for peace requires Ukraine to accept Russian occupation
The U.S. expects Ukraine's response Wednesday to a peace framework that includes U.S. recognition of Crimea as part of Russia and unofficial recognition of Russian control of nearly all areas occupied since the 2022 invasion, sources with direct knowledge of the proposal tell Axios.
Why it matters: The one-page document the U.S. presented Ukrainian officials in Paris last week describes this as President Trump's "final offer." The White House insists it's ready to walk away if the parties don't make a deal soon.
Trump's proposal would require major concessions from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who previously ruled out accepting Russia's occupation of Crimea and parts of four regions in eastern Ukraine.
And while Russian President Vladimir Putin has reportedly offered to freeze the current front lines in order to reach a deal, he has previously rejected other elements of the U.S. framework, such as a European peacekeeping force on Ukrainian territory.
A source close to the Ukrainian government said Kyiv sees the proposal as highly biased towards Russia: "The proposal says very clearly what tangible gains Russia gets, but only vaguely and generally says what Ukraine is going to get."
What Russia gets under Trump's proposal
"De jure" U.S. recognition of Russian control in Crimea.
Continue reading at Axios
More House members want out of their "broken" chamber
Two House members launched bids for U.S. Senate on Tuesday — and more of their colleagues in the lower chamber may soon follow in their footsteps.
Why it matters: To some lawmakers, the large number of House members seeking higher office in recent election cycles reflects what they see as the institution's growing dysfunction.
"The House is broken, doesn't pass legislation, doesn't work anymore," said one House Democrat, calling the lower chamber "just a big comms shop."
Former Rep. Dan Kildee (D-Mich.) told Axios he has heard "increased frustration" from his former House colleagues, who are chafing under four years of Republican control.
Driving the news: Reps. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) and Andy Barr (R-Ky.) both launched campaigns for open U.S. Senate seats in their states.
Unlike Rep. Chris Pappas (D-N.H.), who appears to be on a glide path for the Senate nomination in his state, Stevens and Barr are both entering what will likely be bitterly contested primaries.
They likely won't be the last: At least three House Democrats are sizing up Sen. Dick Durbin's (D-Ill.) seat if he retires.
Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) is seen as likely to challenge Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan for her state's Senate seat.
Zoom out: It's not just the Senate. Three House Republicans and two Democrats are currently running for governor.
Continue reading at Axios
West Virginia senators fight DOGE cuts that hit coal miners
West Virginia's GOP senators are urging top Trump officials to undo DOGE cuts that threaten the health and safety of their state's coal miners.
Why it matters: It's a clear example of how the fast-paced, deep cuts in federal spending are hitting even rural, GOP communities — and creating crises for the lawmakers who represent them.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) sent a letter to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Tuesday asking him to undo some of the thousands of layoffs at the agency that are part of the DOGE cuts.
The issue is specifically at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in Morgantown, West Virginia, a main hub for the safety and health of coal miners and other workers.
"It is my understanding that the [Reduction in Force] impacted every employee in these important programs," Capito wrote. "I urge you to bring back the NIOSH employees immediately so they can continue to support our nation's coal industry."
Between the lines: Sen. Jim Justice (R-W.Va.) also called the cuts to NIOSH "problematic," and told Axios he has spoken with several Trump officials about the issue, but not RFK Jr.
Continue reading at Axios
New York City union breaks with labor trend to back Adrienne Adams over Cuomo for mayor
DC37, the city’s largest municipal union, also supported Zohran Mamdani and Zellnor Myrie.
NEW YORK — The city’s largest municipal union is breaking with its labor counterparts in rejecting Andrew Cuomo’s bid for mayor, instead endorsing a slate led by City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams.
District Council 37, which represents 150,000 New Yorkers who are predominantly Black and Latino, selected Adrienne Adams as its top pick, followed by state Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani and state Sen. Zellnor Myrie.
The decision marks a significant departure from the near-unanimous support Cuomo has earned from New York City unions — large and small, public and private — since announcing his run last month.
“We’re proud to endorse these pro-worker candidates in the June primary and look forward to getting out the vote in support of their campaigns,” Henry Garrido, executive director of the union, said in a statement. “At a time when workers’ rights are being ripped apart at the federal level, it’s more important than ever to elect local candidates who will fight for working families and the services we all rely on.”
Adrienne Adams needs the support: She got into the race late, has yet to raise enough money to qualify for matching funds and is in single digits in the polls.
Continue reading at Politico
As controversies pile up, Trump allies increasingly turn on one another
WASHINGTON (AP) — The infighting and backstabbing that plagued President Donald Trump’s first term have returned as a threat to his second, with deepening fissures over trade, national security and questions of personal loyalty.
The latest turmoil threatens to engulf the Pentagon, where Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has pushed out top advisers and faces fresh controversy over sharing sensitive information about airstrikes in Yemen outside of classified channels. A former Pentagon spokesperson who was ousted last week wrote in Politico that Trump should fire Hegseth for presiding over a “full-blown meltdown.”
Hegseth lashed out on Tuesday on Fox News Channel, where he was a weekend host before joining Trump’s administration, by faulting the people who used to work for him.
“Those folks who were leaking, who have been pushed out of the building, are now attempting to leak and sabotage the president’s agenda,” he said.
Continue reading at the AP
The top producer at ’60 Minutes’ has quit. He says he can no longer run the show as he always has
NEW YORK (AP) — With his show involved in a bitter dispute with President Donald Trump, the top executive at the storied CBS News show “60 Minutes” abruptly resigned on Tuesday while saying he’s losing the freedom to run it independently.
Bill Owens, executive producer of television’s most popular and influential newsmagazine since 2019, said in a note to staff that it has “become clear that I would not be allowed to run the show as I have always run it, to make independent decisions based on what was right for ’60 Minutes,’ right for the audience.”
“The show is too important to the country,” he wrote. “It has to continue, just not with me as the executive producer.”
Trump sued “60 Minutes” for $20 billion last fall, claiming it deceptively edited an interview with his Democratic election opponent Kamala Harris. CBS denied it had done anything to give an advantage to Harris, and released the full transcript of its interview.
When Trump took office for his second term, his Federal Communications Commission chairman, Brendan Carr, announced CBS would be investigated for the same issue.
Continue reading at the AP
Congressional delegation visits grad student, PhD student held in ICE detention
A Congressional delegation traveled to Louisiana on Tuesday to demand the release of Rümeysa Öztürk, a PhD student at Tufts University, and Mahmoud Khalil, a 2024 Columbia University graduate, and to examine conditions at their separate detention facilities.
It’s the first time a delegation has visited with either detainee. The visit was first reported by CNN.
Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) shared on X that he was heading to Louisiana to demand the release of Ozturk, one of his constituents.
Markey was joined by fellow Democrats, Reps. Troy Carter (La.), Bennie Thompson (Miss.), Ayanna Pressley and Jim McGovern (Mass.).
Ozturk’s arrest and detention sparked widespread concern after immigration officers in plain clothes detained her on March 25 and placed her in an unmarked van. She was sent from Massachusetts to New Hampshire, then Vermont and finally to Louisiana.
Her student visa was terminated, and attorneys argue that her due process rights are being violated. Just days ago, a federal judge ordered Ozturk to be transferred back to a detention facility in Vermont.
Continue reading at The Hill
Economic Analysis
Economist Jared Bernstein
Economist Dean Baker
Economist Mike Konczal
When Reality Isn't Bad Enough: Trump’s Fake ‘Private-Sector Recession’ of 2024
In which we dive into the labor market of 2024 and the question of whether an increase in health care jobs is evidence of or justification for a recession.
“Were we in a secret labor market recession in 2024? Was the labor market experiencing a ‘private-sector recession’ as the Trump administration took over? No. But as the reality of Trump's disastrous trade war and the growing threat of an actual recession set in, we’ll hear more of this excuse from Trump officials. It’s wrong—and worse, the Trump team's current actions represent the most harmful response possible to any underlying economic slowdown.”
The Federal Reserve vs. the Tariff Shock: What If It Isn’t Transitory?
As global supply chains fray and the economy veers towards recession, the Federal Reserve faces a different spin on a recent problem — one it can’t fully fix.
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Opinion: Thanks, George! Biden II would, indeed, have been a disaster... | Blog#42
Jake Tapper got himself an interview with George Clooney, the man who single handedly tanked Joe Biden’s bid for reelection last year, so late in the cycle that it is doubtful that any Democrat would have had the time to run a proper campaign. Clooney, an old hand at fundraising for Democrats, must have known it and decided to accuse Biden of what we all knew: old age, thereby forcing the party to turn against him and get him to exit left. Tapper was very delicate with Clooney, never once asking a tough question or getting Clooney to apologize to the rest of us. If anything, Tapper was the googoo-eyed fan boy interviewer.