Things Musk (and Trump) Did... Day 76 | Blog#42
Into the abyss we fall as Nero gushes about his handiwork
Yesterday’s post
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Yesterday’s news worth repeating
Trump administration to markets: Don't expect a rescue
Why it matters: Investors lost more than $6 trillion Thursday and Friday as stocks sank on President Trump's sweeping new tariff plan.
Major investors like hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman fear markets could be dire on Monday if Trump doesn't do something beforehand to ease up on the trade levies.
Yes, but: Trump's economic team made clear no one should count on any last-minute relief from the reciprocal tariffs that are set to be imposed Wednesday.
"The tariffs are coming. He announced it and he wasn't kidding. The tariffs are coming, of course they are," Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on CBS's "Face the Nation."
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent sounded the same note on NBC's "Meet the Press," when asked if Trump was open to negotiating tariffs.
"No. No, no, no. I think that we are going to have to see the path forward. Because, you know, after 20, 30, 40, 50 years of bad behavior, you can't just wipe the slate clean," Bessent said.
Zoom out: The administration's unified stance Sunday — from Lutnick, Bessent, National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett and senior trade adviser Peter Navarro — was that everyday Americans are less concerned about market fluctuations than the media.
"Americans who want to retire right now, Americans who have put away for years in their savings accounts, I - I think they don't look at the day-to-day fluctuations of what's happening," Bessent said.
Continue reading at Axios
Bessent: "No reason" for markets to price in recession
Americans will benefit more from lower energy prices and interest rates than they will be hurt by falling stock prices as a result of President Trump's tariffs, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday.
Why it matters: Economists broadly fear a global recession, perhaps even a dire stagflationary environment of rising prices and slowing growth, after Trump's sweeping attempt to re-order the world's economy.
What they're saying: "Oil prices went down almost 15% in two days, which impacts working Americans much more than the stock market does. Interest rates hit their low for the year, so I'm expecting mortgage applications to pick up," Bessent told "Meet the Press" host Kristen Welker.
By the numbers: Stocks fell more than 10% Thursday and Friday, wiping out more than $6 trillion in investor assets. But Bessent was adamant the economy will hold up.
"I see no reason that we have to price in a recession," he said.
He also insisted that the day-to-day gyrations of the market weren't relevant over the long term, even for people nearing retirement now.
Continue reading at Axios
Kennedy announces support for measles vaccine amid outbreak
The statement is a surprising turn for the health secretary and comes amid reports of a second child’s death.
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who spent years promoting debunked theories and sowing doubts about the safety of vaccines, on Sunday promoted the measles shot.
“The most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine,” Kennedy wrote on the social media website X.
His post comes amid a resurgence of measles cases and reports that a second child with measles died from the virus. She was not vaccinated and had no underlying health conditions, according to the Texas Department of State Health. The health department reported the first child death of the year on Feb. 26, also in Texas.
The U.S., before this year, had not recorded a measles-related death in a decade.
“As of today, there are 642 confirmed cases of measles across 22 states, 499 of those in Texas,” Kennedy said on social media platform X.
As recently as last month, on television and in an op-Ed, Kennedy was warning people of the alleged dangers of the measles vaccine.
“It does cause deaths every year,” Kennedy said about the MMR vaccine on Fox News. “It causes all the illnesses that measles itself causes, encephalitis and blindness, etcetera. And so people ought to be able to make that choice for themselves.”
Continue reading at Politico
DOGE Is Planning a Hackathon at the IRS. It Wants Easier Access to Taxpayer Data
DOGE operatives have repeatedly referred to the software company Palantir as a possible partner in creating a “mega API” at the IRS, sources tell WIRED.
Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has plans to stage a “hackathon” next week in Washington, DC. The goal is to create a single “mega API”—a bridge that lets software systems talk to one another—for accessing IRS data, sources tell WIRED. The agency is expected to partner with a third-party vendor to manage certain aspects of the data project. Palantir, a software company cofounded by billionaire and Musk associate Peter Thiel, has been brought up consistently by DOGE representatives as a possible candidate, sources tell WIRED.
Two top DOGE operatives at the IRS, Sam Corcos and Gavin Kliger, are helping to orchestrate the hackathon, sources tell WIRED. Corcos is a health-tech CEO with ties to Musk’s SpaceX. Kliger attended UC Berkeley until 2020 and worked at the AI company Databricks before joining DOGE as a special adviser to the director at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). Corcos is also a special adviser to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
Since joining Musk’s DOGE, Corcos has told IRS workers that he wants to pause all engineering work and cancel current attempts to modernize the agency’s systems, according to sources with direct knowledge who spoke with WIRED. He has also spoken about some aspects of these cuts publicly: "We've so far stopped work and cut about $1.5 billion from the modernization budget. Mostly projects that were going to continue to put us down the death spiral of complexity in our code base," Corcos told Laura Ingraham on Fox News in March.
Corcos has discussed plans for DOGE to build “one new API to rule them all,” making IRS data more easily accessible for cloud platforms, sources say. APIs, or application programming interfaces, enable different applications to exchange data, and could be used to move IRS data into the cloud. The cloud platform could become the “read center of all IRS systems,” a source with direct knowledge tells WIRED, meaning anyone with access could view and possibly manipulate all IRS data in one place.
Over the last few weeks, DOGE has requested the names of the IRS’s best engineers from agency staffers. Next week, DOGE and IRS leadership are expected to host dozens of engineers in DC so they can begin “ripping up the old systems” and building the API, an IRS engineering source tells WIRED. The goal is to have this task completed within 30 days. Sources say there have been multiple discussions about involving third-party cloud and software providers like Palantir in the implementation.
Continue reading at Wired
FAFSA had been struggling for years. Then Trump cut the Education Department in half
Families and students are growing nervous about the fate of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) amid President Trump’s massive cuts to the Department of Education and his plans to do away with it entirely.
FAFSA has had a rough few years, starting with a clumsy rollout of revamped forms during the Biden administration that led to a drop in the college aid applications.
But even amid a need to rebuild trust with parents and applicants, the Trump administration has halved the Department of Education, and the agency has seen multiple high-level retirements, including the retirement this week of the chief operating officer for the Office of Federal Student Aid.
As of March 17, the Education Department marked more than 8 million completed FAFSA forms, an increase of 50 percent from those submitted by the same time last year.
“We have concerns that when students and families hear that the Department of Education is being dismantled or shutting down … they might hear, and we have concerns that they take that to mean that there won’t be a FAFSA, that there won’t be a Pell Grant, that as the department goes away, Federal Student Aid goes away,” said Kim Cook, chief executive officer of the National College Attainment Network (NCAN).
“We’ve been working very hard with our members and the message to our students that even if there is disruption or change, Federal Student Aid, FAFSA, Pell Grants continue,” Cook added.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump administration deports gay makeup artist to prison in El Salvador
Andry Hernandez Romero, a gay makeup artist who came to the United States last year in search of asylum, is one of 238 Venezuelan migrants who were flown from the U.S. to a maximum security prison in El Salvador three weeks ago.
President Trump, who campaigned on eradicating the Venezuelan gang known as Tren de Aragua, brokered a deal with El Salvador's president that allows the U.S. to send deportees to the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT.
The Trump administration used the Alien Enemies Act, a law not invoked since World War II, to send many of the Venezuelans there, claiming they were all terrorists and violent gang members.
Lawyers and family members of the Venezuelan migrants told 60 Minutes they've had no contact with the men since they arrived in El Salvador.
"Our client, who was in the middle of seeking asylum, just disappeared. One day he was there, and the next day we're supposed to have court, and he wasn't brought to court," Lindsay Toczylowski, Hernandez Romero's lawyer, said.
Continue reading at CBS News
Today’s news
Democratic News Corner
Exclusive: House Democrats probe Elon Musk's conflicts of interest with NASA
House Democrats Monday launched an investigation into potential conflicts of interest between NASA and Elon Musk, who has inserted himself into the federal government under President Trump.
Why it matters: The billionaire's SpaceX is one of the agency's largest private sector contractors, and Musk has been overhauling federal spending at the helm of DOGE.
Rep Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.) and Rep. Gery Connolly (D-Va.) sent a letter to Iris Lan, NASA's chief legal officer, requesting information and documents by April 21.
They asked how NASA is ensuring that Musk isn't exploiting the agency to enrich himself and his companies, which they said would violate ethics rules for his position as a special government employee.
What they're saying: "At NASA, where Mr. Musk has both benefited from significant contracts and has the potential to receive vast amounts of new business, his defiance of recusal laws and control of operations directly benefit his businesses," the letter said.
"The known conflicts of interest presented by this arrangement are illegal and must be addressed immediately."
SpaceX didn't immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.
Continue reading at Axios
Schatz expands holds to more than 300 Trump nominees
Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) is expanding his holds on President Trump's nominees to include an additional 50 names — along with a batch of bipartisan foreign affairs bills, Axios has learned.
Why it matters: That brings the total number of Trump nominees Schatz has now ground to a halt to more than 300, intensifying his protest of what he calls the White House's "lawlessness."
The fresh holds include former Rep. Anthony D'Esposito (R-N.Y.), Trump's pick to be Labor Department inspector general, and Scott Kupor, tapped to lead the Office of Personnel Management.
The new holds span nominees at more than a dozen Trump administration agencies and departments. Schatz has already placed holds on all State Department nominees.
Schatz also is blocking nine bipartisan bills that recently cleared the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in protest of what he characterized as the committee's lax oversight of the Trump administration.
The big picture: Schatz and Senate Democrats are building up a backlog of Trump nominees that Senate Republicans will eventually want to confirm.
Continue reading at Axios
Ossoff raises record-breaking $11M for Senate reelect
The early fundraising haul is a show of force but represents only a tiny fraction of the expected spending in the race.
Facing a tough reelection in battleground Georgia, Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff raised $11 million in the first quarter of 2025, according to his campaign, which shared the totals first with POLITICO.
Ossoff’s campaign said the haul is the most ever raised by an incumbent in the first quarter of an off-year. POLITICO was unable to identify any Senate campaign that had raised more in an equivalent quarter.
“I’m grateful to the hundreds of thousands of record-shattering supporters who have already joined what will be the biggest and most relentless turnout effort in Georgia history,” the 38-year-old first-term senator said in a statement.
According to the campaign, Ossoff’s average donation during the quarter was $32, coming from 260,000 individual donors and over 155,000 first-time donors. Donations came in from 156 of the state’s 159 counties.
Continue reading at Politico
Democrat Christina Hines launches a congressional bid in Detroit suburbs
The former special victims prosecutor is going for the seat held by Rep. John James (R-Mich.), who is mulling a gubernatorial run.
Democrat Christina Hines kicked off a bid for Congress, landing Democrats a competitive recruit in a purple district in the Detroit suburbs.
“We need people in Washington that we can trust, and I spent my whole life trying to fight for others and to fight for my community, and I’m hoping that I can be a trustworthy person in Congress,” said Hines, a former special victims prosecutor.
She’d been inspired to run after seeing the news that President Donald Trump issued an executive order to wind down the Department of Education.
“My husband and I looked at each other like, ‘yeah, this is not a time to wait. This is not a time to be comfortable,’“ she recalled. “We need a fighter in Congress. And I’ve spent my whole career fighting for people, and I need to step up. We need a fighter here in Michigan’s tent.”
The district, which includes parts of the northern Detroit suburbs in Oakland and Macomb counties, has trended toward Republicans in recent years. Still, Democrats believe this district could be flippable with incumbent Rep. John James (R-Mich.) potentially vacating it for a gubernatorial bid next year to replace term-limited Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. James won the seat in 2022 by half a percentage point and by a handier margin in 2024.
Continue reading at Politico
Democrats put 7-figure investment behind their Musk-focused playbook in Virginia
High off their victory in Wisconsin, the party looks to November.
Democrats are making Elon Musk their top political target in Virginia, hammering the tech billionaire in a new campaign blitz in the systems’ off year elections.
The message channels the anti-Musk playbook Democrats used successfully in Wisconsin last week, where the Democratic-aligned candidate defeated Musk’s choice for the state Supreme course by a nearly 10 percentage point margin.
Building on their victory in Wisconsin, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee is announcing a seven-figure investment in Virginia House of Delegates races, first obtained by POLITICO. The DLCC also rolled out its initial list of “spotlight candidates,” a group of four Democrats in closely divided districts who will now get increased fundraising and visibility from the national group.
Democrats believe they have an even stronger argument against President Donald Trump and Musk’s government-slicing Department of Government Efficiency in Virginia, where the state economy depends heavily on the business of Washington, D.C. and thousands of federal workers are facing layoffs.
“This is where DOGE is on display,” said DLCC President Heather Williams. “Virginia is sort of an epicenter for the DOGE destruction and its impact on workers and communities.”
Continue reading at Politico
Obama tells arts college audience: ‘It’s up to all of us to fix this’
Barack Obama called on Americans to defend their country’s beleaguered values and ideals, telling them it was “up to all of us to fix this.” Speaking to arts college students at Hamilton College in New York on Thursday, Obama said “the most important office in this democracy is the citizen.”
Published 6:24 AM PDT, April 6, 2025
Abbott sets November special election to replace Sylvester Turner in House
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) on Tuesday set the date for a Nov. 4 special election to fill the late Rep. Sylvester Turner’s (D-Texas) House seat, which has been vacant since early March.
A statement from the governor stressed a need to give “sufficient time” for Harris County’s election office to prepare, though the office has pushed back against Abbott’s claims and Democrats have accused him of slow-walking the process to protect Republicans’ slim House majority.
“No county in Texas does a worse job of conducting elections than Harris County,” Abbott said on Monday. “Forcing Harris County to rush this special election on weeks’ notice would harm the interests of voters. The appropriate time to hold this election is November, which will give Harris County sufficient time to prepare for such an important election.”
After Abbott made similar claims last week, Harris County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth responded that her office “remain[s] fully prepared to conduct the Congressional District 18 election as soon as the Governor issues the order.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Democrats reject Johnson-Luna deal to kill proxy voting
The Democratic sponsors of legislation empowering new parents to vote remotely are rejecting a recent alternative from Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) designed to block the proxy vote legislation from reaching the floor.
Over the weekend, Johnson cut a deal with GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (Fla.), who was leading the charge to force floor action on proxy voting. Their compromise would create a system of “vote pairing,” designed to empower pregnant lawmakers and young mothers with some remote voice during the consideration of bills on the floor, though not a direct vote.
The compromise appeased Luna, but not the Democratic sponsors of the underlying proxy vote legislation — Reps. Brittany Pettersen (Colo.) and Sara Jacobs (Calif.) — who are accusing Johnson of watering down their parental-empowerment proposal while abandoning lawmakers with young families.
“The reality is — this outcome does not address the barriers we’ve fought so hard to overcome,” Pettersen said Monday in a statement.
Continue reading at The Hill
Democrats target Trump’s effort to ‘bend our justice system to his will’
Democrats held a rare bicameral forum to examine the Trump administration’s actions targeting Department of Justice (DOJ) staff and major law firms as the party explores how to push back against the Trump presidency.
The forum featured a series of attorneys who were fired or resigned from the Justice Department or have pushed big law firms to respond to a series of executive orders from President Trump targeting firms.
“Donald Trump is taking unprecedented steps to bend our justice system to his will, and his administration is moving systematically and swiftly to dismantle the legal pillars that hold up our democracy,” said Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who organized the panel alongside Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee.
“If Donald Trump and his personal criminal defense lawyers now running the Justice Department succeed, the consequences will be profound.”
It’s clear the forum was on the radar of the Trump administration. The Justice Department was prepared to send U.S. marshals to the home of one of the invitees, Liz Oyer, the former U.S. pardon attorney.
Continue reading at The Hill
National Security
Can Britain live without American intelligence?
Some insiders think it’s time for Britain to dial back the sharing of intelligence with the U.S., long one of the most critical elements of the special relationship.
LONDON — The U.K.’s special relationship with the United States has been stretched on several fronts by President Donald Trump’s new administration, but many in the national security community considered the last bastion to be the countries’ approach to intelligence.
Recently, however, substantial cracks have begun to appear even there.
First, Trump ordered last month that American intelligence not be shared with Ukraine, either by its own spy agencies or by other countries in the Five Eyes security alliance. Then, U.S. national security adviser Michael Waltz inadvertently added a journalist to a conversation on the encrypted messaging app Signal that openly discussed American military action in Yemen, in an eye-opening insight into how lax current officials are with state secrets.
While Trump’s decision on intelligence-sharing with Ukraine was condemned by Kyiv’s allies around Europe, Britain did not retaliate, with U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesperson stressing that Britain’s relationship with the U.S. “on defense, security and intelligence remains inextricably entwined.”
The links between Britain and America’s intelligence networks go so deep that it may be impossible to untangle them, or to replicate the U.S. contribution, according to current and former intelligence officials who have worked across the regions and were granted anonymity to speak candidly to POLITICO about areas of national security.
But the experts say that despite the intricate nature of the relationship, it may be necessary for Britain to begin planning for the previously unthinkable if Trump’s America continues to depart from its oldest alliances and once-shared international aims.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
National Security Daily
Trump says direct Iran talks are on
President DONALD TRUMP dropped a bombshell this afternoon by saying that he has launched direct talks with Iran over the country’s nuclear program but stopped short of giving specifics.
“We’re having direct talks with Iran. It will go on Saturday. We’ll have a very big meeting,” Trump said, as your host and Myah Ward reported. He also said discussions have already started. This weekend’s talks will be held at a “very high level,” Trump said, and U.S. officials would be dealing with Iranians directly and not through any intermediaries. He didn’t disclose where the talks would take place.
Such talks would mark the first significant diplomatic engagement between the new Trump administration and Iran as Washington and its allies grow increasingly alarmed over the prospect of Iran advancing a nuclear weapons program.
“I think everybody agrees that doing a deal would be preferable to doing the obvious,” Trump said at the White House, speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister BENJAMIN NETANYAHU. “And the obvious is not something that I want to be involved with or frankly that Israel wants to be involved with if they can avoid it.”
The obvious he’s referring to being, presumably, military strikes on Iran’s nuclear program.
Trump revealed last month that he sent a letter to Iran’s supreme leader, AYATOLLAH ALI KHAMENEI, offering direct talks over the country’s nuclear program. Iran publicly reacted to the letter with effectively “thanks but no thanks.”
The Iranian mission to the United Nations didn’t respond to NatSec Daily’s request for comment.
Officials in Israel — Iran’s historic regional rival — are wary that if Iran eventually agrees to such talks, it could serve to only bide time for Tehran to strengthen its nuclear program. Additionally, it could offer Iran a window of reprieve to recover some of its steep losses from Israeli offensives against Iran’s proxy militant groups in the region. That includes Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthi militants in Yemen.
Netanyahu, sitting beside Trump in a gold-flecked chair surrounded by a swarm of cameras and microphones, gave a similarly veiled warning to Tehran if diplomacy didn’t work.
“If it can be done diplomatically in a full way the way it was done in Libya, I think that would be a good thing,” Netanyahu said. “But whatever happens, we have to make sure that Iran does not have nuclear weapons.”
Continue reading at Politico’s National Security Daily
Economics
Tariffs will fuel inflation and slow growth, Dimon says
The U.S. economy was already weakening before President Trump's sweeping new tariffs, and those levies will now fuel inflation and slow growth, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon says in his annual letter Monday.
Why it matters: Dimon, for decades one of the most powerful figures in global finance, offered his views not in a vacuum, but in the midst of a global market crisis sparked by the new import tax regime.
What he's saying: "There are many uncertainties surrounding the new tariff policy: the potential retaliatory actions, including on services, by other countries, the effect on confidence, the impact on investments and capital flows, the effect on corporate profits and the possible effect on the U.S. dollar," Dimon writes in the closely watched shareholder letter.
"The quicker this issue is resolved, the better because some of the negative effects increase cumulatively over time and would be hard to reverse. In the short run, I see this as one large additional straw on the camel's back."
The intrigue: Of all the Wall Street banks, JPMorgan was early out of the gate forecasting the newest tariffs were more likely than not to cause a recession this year.
The sell-off weighed on those banks, including Dimon's. JPMorgan stock is down 12% this year, though his competitors have fared much worse.
Between the lines: In his 2024 letter, Dimon laid out a pro-trade message. This year, he acknowledges the U.S. is right to protest, and try to fix, some trade abuses.
Continue reading at Axios
Wall Street titans push back on Trump’s trade war
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon warned that the global conflict could threaten economic alliances that have made the U.S. the world’s most powerful country.
Trump’s tariff war has been a brutal wake-up call for Wall Street traders who had assumed the president would defer to market forces on policy matters. He never hid his plans to impose universal tariffs on major trading partners, but most investors had discounted the likelihood of a full-blown trade war, focusing instead on whatever economic stimulus could come from deregulation, lower energy costs and tax cuts.
Instead, they’re now grappling with a tariff regime that puts not only their bottom lines at risk but the world economic order.
Dimon on Monday told investors that his most serious concern about Trump’s tariffs “is how this will affect America’s long-term economic alliances.” The administration’s protectionist trade agenda could result in retaliation and weaken confidence in the U.S. economy, its markets and the dollar, he said in his letter to shareholders.
“The quicker this issue is resolved, the better because some of the negative effects increase cumulatively over time and would be hard to reverse,” Dimon added. “I am hoping that after negotiations, the long-term effect will have some positive benefits for the United States.”
For now, it’s unclear how quickly those negotiations will yield results that might alter Wall Street’s outlook. While administration officials on Sunday said that as many as 50 foreign governments had reached out to seek new trade deals before tariffs take effect April 9, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick suggested in separate television appearances that those negotiations could take time.
Continue reading at Politico
Panic Monday: World stock markets plunge again as Trump doubles down on tariffs
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Global stock markets extended a severe plunge Monday, fueled by fears that U.S. tariffs would lead to a global economic slowdown. European and Asian shares saw dramatic losses, the leading U.S. index flirted with bear market territory in pre-market trading, and oil prices sagged.
The massive sell-off in riskier assets at the start of the trading week follows President Donald Trump’s announcement of sharply higher U.S. import taxes and retaliation from China that saw markets fall sharply Thursday and Friday.
Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index lost nearly 8% shortly after the market opened and futures trading for the benchmark was briefly suspended. It closed down 7.8% at 31,136.58.
European shares followed Asian markets lower, led by Germany’s DAX index, which briefly fell more than 10% at the open on the Frankfurt exchange, but recovered some ground to move down 5.8% in morning trading. In Paris, the CAC 40 shed 5.8%, while Britain’s FTSE 100 lost 4.9% in the European morning.
U.S. futures signaled further weakness ahead. For the S&P 500, they lost 3.4%, while for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, they shed 3.1%. Futures for the Nasdaq lost 5.3%. If the pre-market futures losses materialize when the U.S. market opens, the S&P 500 will enter bear market territory — defined as a fall of more than 20% from the peak. The index was off 17.4% as of the end of last week
Continue reading at the AP
Historic stock market rout continues, with no end in sight
Markets around the world plunged for a third day on Monday, with no relief from President Trump's tariffs and no apparent end in sight, either.
Why it matters: Investors are losing trillions of dollars. Recession odds are rising — and unlike past market crises, a coordinated policy response has been withheld thus far.
The big picture: In Trump's first term, markets could comfortably rely on the "Trump put," the idea that if they reacted badly enough, he'd reverse whatever policy caused the sell-off.
The Trump put is now clearly all but dead.
"I don't want anything to go down. But sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something," the president said Sunday night.
By the numbers: U.S. stock futures were well off their overnight lows as of about 6 a.m. Monday, but still indicating an open broadly 3% lower.
After the tech-heavy Nasdaq and small-cap benchmark Russell 2000 slipped into "bear market" territory last week, down 20% off their recent highs, the S&P 500 is on the cusp of doing so Monday.
Continue reading at Axios
Markets plummet as Trump team fails to banish global trade war fears
U.S. president maintains hard-line tariff rhetoric.
Financial markets stared into the abyss Monday as fears that a global trade war unleashed by U.S. President Donald Trump will continue to escalate.
The benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 index fell more than 7 percent at the open, on course for its worst day since the panic at the start of the Covid pandemic, while the U.K. FTSE 100 fell more than 5 percent. By mid-morning, they had recouped only a small part of those losses. Crude oil prices, typically a good leading indicator of global economic activity, fell nearly 4 percent to their lowest level in nearly four years before stabilizing.
Chart: Free falling
Europe's benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 index is in sharp decline on the back of the unfolding trade war.
U.S. stock markets — which had already suffered their third-biggest two-day decline in history last week, tumbling Friday after China announced a 34 percent retaliatory tariff on U.S. imports — were marked down nearly 5 percent.
The moves are the result of a weekend of mixed commentary from U.S. officials, from Trump downward, which made clear that the trade war could get worse before it gets better.
Continue reading at Politico
Inflation could hit different this time
When sky-high inflation pummeled Americans in 2022, the labor market was booming and wages were rising, softening the blow.
Now we're in a more vulnerable place.
Why it matters: With economists expecting tariffs to drive inflation, at least in the short-term, the concern is wages won't keep up, leading to lower incomes and real pain for many.
What they're saying: "The pinch from higher prices that we expect in coming months may hit harder than in the post-pandemic inflation spike," wrote J.P. Morgan chief economist Michael Feroli in a note Friday.
ING chief international economist James Knightley said "we are expecting to see negative real wage growth by the summer," in an email commentary after the jobs report last week.
By the numbers: Wage growth cooled to 3.8% in March from 4% the previous month. It's been declining since the fall.
Where it stands: Right now the labor market is in a solid place, but there are worrying signs.
Continue reading at Axios
Behind the Curtain: Trump's dark opening to Golden Age
With markets nosediving across the globe, President Trump played golf, raised money for MAGA and dug in deep on his tariff plans, after warning Americans to buckle up.
"THIS IS AN ECONOMIC REVOLUTION, AND WE WILL WIN," he said on Truth Social on Saturday. "HANG TOUGH, it won't be easy, but the end result will be historic."
Why it matters: For one of the first times in his career, Trump seems more bent on making a point than making a deal. He's confident nations will bend to his will, just as universities and law firms have.
"We don't have a playbook for fully committed Trump," a longtime adviser tells us. "He's always been the ultimate pragmatist — everything was on the table at all times: 'Give me a win and I'll consider anything.'"
CNBC "Squawk Box" on Monday morning: "GLOBAL MARKET MELTDOWN INTENSIFIES."
Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday: "I don't want anything to go down. But sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something."
Behind the scenes: Trump officials say 50+ countries have approached the administration to make tariff deals. But people involved in the process say there's frustratingly little structure or coordination around the negotiations.
A White House official tells us: "The phone lines are open and nations are free to make their pitch on how they will correct for decades of taking advantage of the American consumer. But for businesses looking for certainty, the message is clear: Don't wait, come build in America."
Reality check: There were safe, easy and still fast ways to do all the things Trump is doing, many Republican insiders tell us.
Continue reading at Axios
Silver linings playbook: Market panic edition
oliticians, investors, and CEOs around the world are squarely in panic mode in the wake of Donald Trump's seismic tariff announcement last week.
As ever in the markets, however, one person's panic is another person's buying opportunity. So, here are four bright spots, or silver linings
1. It's not the end of the world
The two previous major crises of this century — the 2008 financial crisis and the 2020 coronavirus pandemic — were both global.
The tariff crisis, by contrast, has its epicenter in Washington, and what's bad for the U.S. could end up kicking the rest of the world into a higher gear.
The fact that the dollar fell rather than rising on news of the tariffs is a sign the market now expects the rest of the world to outpace the U.S. in growth.
How it works: Just as JD Vance's speech at the Munich Security Conference led to unprecedented levels of pan-European fiscal and security coordination, Trump's tariffs are likely to catalyze new deals between and within regions that now trust each other more than they trust Trump.
Ahead of Trump's tariff announcement, for instance, the trade ministers of Japan and South Korea released a joint statement with China, saying that "trilateral efforts" between them were "essential to fostering the prosperity" of the global economy.
Zoom out: The U.S. — with just 4% of the world's population — accounts for more than 29% of its total consumption, per the World Bank.
[…]
4. Keeping things in perspective
Goods only account for about one-third of total U.S. consumption, and imported goods are less than one-fifth of all goods.
By the numbers: Any recession caused by the tariffs will likely be a lot shallower than what we saw in 2009 or 2020.
While nearly all forecasts for U.S. economic growth in 2025 have been scaled back, most remain positive. Goldman Sachs sees 1% growth this year, for instance, while Nomura expects 0.6% growth.
Continue reading at Axios
Note from Rima: this is a four-part look at how financial crises work
China accuses US of unilateralism, protectionism and economic bullying with tariffs
BANGKOK (AP) — China on Monday accused the U.S. of unilateralism, protectionism and economic bullying with tariffs, while calling on representatives of American companies including Tesla, to “take concrete actions” to resolve the tariffs.
Putting “America First” over international rules harms the stability of global production and the supply chain and seriously impacts the world’s economic recovery, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Lin Jian told reporters.
Last week, Trump put an additional 34% tariff on Chinese goods as part of “Liberation Day,” coming on top of two rounds of 10% tariffs already declared in February and March, which Trump said was due to Beijing’s role in the fentanyl crisis. China and other governments retaliated quickly. China announced its own 34% tariff rate on U.S. goods, mirroring Trump’s tariff rate for China.
On Monday, Beijing struck a note of confidence even as markets in Hong Kong and Shanghai tumbled. The People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s official mouthpiece, had strong words. “The sky won’t fall,” it declared, even if the U.S. tariffs have an impact.
Continue reading at the AP
Think twice before bailing out of the stock market, financial advisers say
The huge swings rocking Wall Street and the global economy may feel far from normal. But, for investing at least, drops of this size have happened throughout history.
Stomaching them is the price investors have had to pay in order to get the bigger returns that stocks can offer over other investments in the long term. Here’s a glimpse at what’s behind the market’s wild moves and what experts advise investors young and old to consider:
HOW BAD IS THE MARKET?
Wall Street’s main benchmark, the S&P 500, has lost more than 16% since setting an all-time high on Feb. 19, mostly because of worries about President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Any kind of uncertainty around the economy will give Wall Street pause, but the trade war is making it more difficult for companies, households and others to feel confident enough to invest, spend and make long-term plans.
[…]
STOCKS DO THIS OFTEN?
Regularly enough. The S&P 500 has seen declines of at least 10% every year or so. Often, experts view them as a culling of optimism that can otherwise run overboard, driving stock prices too high.
Before this recent downswing, many critics were saying the U.S. stock market was too expensive after prices rose faster than corporate profits. They also pointed to how only a handful of companies drove so much of the market’s returns. A group of just seven Big Tech companies accounted for more than half of the S&P 500’s total return last year, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.
SHOULD I SELL AND GET OUT?
Anytime an investor sees they’re losing money, it feels bad. This recent run feels particularly unnerving because of how incredibly calm the market had previously been. The S&P 500 is coming off a second straight year where it shot up by more than 20%, the first time that’s happened since baggy pants were last in style before the millennium.
Continue reading at the AP
Axios Markets newsletter
1 big thing: Bleak Monday is upon us
As this newsletter hits your inbox, assets are plunging, almost indiscriminately, all over the world.
Why it matters: It's not too hyperbolic to say people are talking about the original "Black Monday" crash, in October 1987, and wondering how bad today could get.
The big picture: Markets are falling in the face of of dire uncertainty about a new economic world order, one that comes with recession, inflation, and the loss of a reliable trading partner in the U.S.
Hopes of a traditional "Trump put" kept traders holding their breath over the weekend, but when no rescue came Sunday night, there was little to stop the selling.
By the numbers: As you read this...
U.S. stock futures are about 2% lower, well off their overnight lows, though. After the Nasdaq and Russell 2000 fell into bear markets last week, the S&P 500 is on the cusp of doing the same today.
At overnight indications, the S&P 500 was on pace for its second-worst three-day decline ever, behind only the 1987 crash. (Yes, even worse than 9/11, the Great Financial Crisis, the debt crisis, coronavirus pandemic, etc.)
Asian stocks plunged, with Hong Kong's Hang Seng falling 13% and Japan's Nikkei sinking 8%.
European stocks are faring little better, with the Stoxx 600 and most national indices down about 4% in midday trading, also a fair bit off the lows of the morning.
Continue reading at Axios
As markets implode, US trading partners puzzle over whether there’s room for negotiations
BANGKOK (AP) — The impact of U.S. President Donald Trump’sblast of tariff hikes was reverberating across world markets Monday as America’s trading partners puzzled over whether there is room for negotiating better deals.
Several countries said they were sending trade officials to Washington to try to talk through the crisis, which has cast uncertainty over the global economic outlook, hammered markets and left U.S. allies wondering about the value of their ties with the world’s largest economy.
However, Germany’s economy minister, Robert Habeck, was defiant as he arrived at a meeting of European Union trade ministers in Luxembourg, saying the premise of the wide-ranging tariffs was “nonsense” and that attempts by individual countries to win exemptions haven’t worked in the past.
It’s important for the EU to stick together, he said. That “means being clear that we are in a strong position — America is in a position of weakness.”
Continue reading at the AP
Newsom jumps into economic damage control
Here’s what we know so far:
WORLD LEADERS DIGEST — There were no immediate public responses to Newsom from the state’s largest trading partners, including Mexico, China, the United Kingdom and Canada. Diplomats in the state, however, we’re buzzing about his request, as leaders in various world capitals weighed their options.
The governor’s office declined Sunday to share details of any such conversations. “We are actively engaging with our international partners and exploring opportunities to strengthen our shared economic interests,” said spokesperson Izzy Gardon.
Newsom’s message might appear heavily symbolic at first glance because California has no authority to set tariffs on foreign goods. But the state’s economic prowess and Silicon Valley’s status as the center of tech innovation could cause foreign leaders to weigh his plea more seriously — and being on good terms with the Golden State can be an incentive on its own.
While Newsom can’t set tariffs, he and state lawmakers have the power to enact policy changes that ripple across global markets, including through regulations in areas like artificial intelligence, data privacy, clean energy and zero-emissions vehicles.
The notion of a foreign country setting tariffs on America with a state-by-state lens also isn’t unheard of. Canada has already enacted higher retaliatory tariffs to target Republican states and Trump allies, including on oranges and fruit from Florida and household appliances from South Carolina and Ohio (read more from our colleague Mickey Djuric).
BUDDING FOREIGN TIES — That influence has already led California to create its own foreign policy of sorts — and several foreign governments have dramatically expanded their diplomatic presences in the state in recent years, with footprints comparable to embassies in medium-sized countries.
For example, the United Kingdom, European Union and Mexico all have significantly grown their diplomatic corps in the Bay Area, Sacramento and Los Angeles. Singapore, Ireland and Italy have also deployed more on-the-ground diplomats in the state since Newsom took office.
That attention is, in part, a testament to the impact of the state’s own messaging: Both Newsom and former Gov. Jerry Brown have spoken ad nauseam about how California is home to the world’s fifth largest economy. That message has trickled back to foreign capitals.
Newsom’s team has embraced the idea that California is a quasi-country, signing multiple agreements with foreign and subnational governments. In late 2023, Newsom traveled to China on a diplomatic mission and met with President Xi Jinping; he also signed agreements with China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment and at least four regional provinces on climate policy.
The governor traveled to Mexico last year for the inauguration of President Claudia Sheinbaum, and he was one of the first American officials to meet with her after she took office.
Newsom’s office is also currently negotiating potential climate and trade pacts with several European countries, including the U.K., though details of those potential agreements have not been disclosed.
Brown also made a series of international trips and inked foreign agreements, including energy and climate pacts with British Columbia, Wales and regional states in Brazil, Germany and Spain. As governor in 2017, Brown toured Europe and touted the ways California was breaking away from D.C.
IMPACTED INDUSTRIES — The consequences of Trump’s tariffs are still coming into focus, but the harm has been acute for several California-dominated industries.
Almond farmers are especially worried. As our colleague Camille von Kaenel reports, the nut makes up roughly 20 percent of California’s $23.6 billion ag export market (followed by dairy products, pistachios, wine and walnuts) and 2.5 percent of California’s overall exports. Farmers worry they could lose hundreds of millions of dollars if tariffs harm exports and cede market share to competitors, like Australia.
Another industry that could feel extra pain is the state’s electric vehicle sector, as colleague Alex Nieves writes. Batteries, the most expensive component in EVs, are especially vulnerable to price spikes given the industry’s reliance on Chinese imports. EV sales, especially for Tesla, are already lagging due, in part, to CEO Elon Musk’s polarizing role in Trump’s administration.
Continue reading at Politico’s California Playbook newsletter
Live updates: Stocks are making wild swings as markets assess the damage from Trump’s trade war
Stocks are sharply swinging down, up, then down again on Wall Street as markets try to assess the potential damage from President Donald Trump‘s global trade war. European and Asian shares saw dramatic losses, the leading U.S. index is flirting with bear market territory, and oil prices are sagging.
US: In response to a false rumor that Trump was considering a tariff pause, the Dow Jones Industrial Average briefly erased a morning loss of 1,700 points, shot up more than 800 points, then went back to a loss of 629 points. The S&P 500 likewise made sudden up-and-down lurching movements and was down 0.7% in the first hour of trading. The Nasdaq composite was up 0.2%
Follow the live updates at the AP
Trump threatens extra 50% tariff on China, opens door to talks with others
President Trump on Monday threatened to impose an extra 50% tariff on China, but opened the door to talks with other nations on a path to lowering their tariffs.
Why it matters: The administration's steadfast message in recent days has been that the tariffs were coming and there was no way out.
Now, it appears there may be a glimmer of hope.
Continue reading at Axios
White House dismisses rumor that led markets to jump: ‘Fake News’
The White House pushed back on the idea that President Trump is considering a 90-day pause on tariffs as “fake news” after it spread on social media and caused the stock market to jump.
“Wrong. Fake News,” the White House said on X, sharing a post that Trump is reportedly expecting to do a pause.
A White House official also told The Hill “fake news” when asked about the reports.
The social media action began when a user on X, Walter Bloomberg, posted that Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, said Trump is considering a 90-day pause on all countries except China. The post caused major moves on the stock market, with a surge followed by a plunge within seconds.
The report appeared to be an incorrect interpretation of a Hassett interview on Fox News earlier that day. Before markets opened, Hassett was asked if Trump would consider doing a 90-day pause, and he punted on the question.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump threatens additional 50 percent tariffs on China
The move escalates ongoing tit-for-tat retaliation with Beijing that followed the president’s sweeping import tax rollout last week.
President Donald Trump on Monday threatened to impose an additional 50 percent tariff on China, escalating the tit-for-tat retaliation with Beijing that followed the White House’s sweeping import tax rollout last week.
“If China does not withdraw its 34% increase above their already long term trading abuses by tomorrow, April 8th, 2025, the United States will impose ADDITIONAL Tariffs on China of 50%, effective April 9th,” Trump said in a Truth Social post.
China was a primary target of Trump’s sweeping “liberation day” tariffs announced last week. Beijing immediately decried Trump’s tariffs, responding with 34 percent tariffs on U.S. imports, equivalent to the import taxes Trump levied against China last week.
Continue reading at Politico
Goldman Sachs hikes recession probability to 45 percent
Goldman Sachs analysts are again raising the odds of a recession as markets continue to reel in the wake of President Trump’s sweeping tariff actions.
The bank warned in a new report on Sunday that it increased the probability of a recession in the U.S. to 45 percent, just a week after it forecasted odds at 35 percent as fears rise of an impending trade war.
Stocks fell again at the start of the week amid blowback over Trump’s latest move imposing hundreds of billions of dollars in new taxes on foreign goods.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1,400 points, marking a 3.5 percent drop. The S&P 500 index dipped 3.7 percent and the Nasdaq composite also fell 3.7 percent upon the market’s reopening.
World markets have also taken a hit.
Continue reading at The Hill
Markets plummet as Trump team fails to banish global trade war fears
U.S. president maintains hard-line tariff rhetoric.
Financial markets stared into the abyss Monday as fears that a global trade war unleashed by U.S. President Donald Trump will continue to escalate.
The benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 index fell more than 7 percent at the open, on course for its worst day since the panic at the start of the Covid pandemic, while the U.K. FTSE 100 fell more than 5 percent. By mid-morning, they had recouped only a small part of those losses. Crude oil prices, typically a good leading indicator of global economic activity, fell nearly 4 percent to their lowest level in nearly four years before stabilizing.
U.S. stock markets — which had already suffered their third-biggest two-day decline in history last week, tumbling Friday after China announced a 34 percent retaliatory tariff on U.S. imports — were marked down nearly 5 percent.
The moves are the result of a weekend of mixed commentary from U.S. officials, from Trump downward, which made clear that the trade war could get worse before it gets better.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
Axios Macro newsletter
1 big thing: Stagflation fear gives way to recession fear
Just nine days ago, we wrote about the signs pointing to an imminent stagflation. It's time to revise that outlook; now, a plain ol' recession looks more likely.
The big picture: The shifts in global markets since Trump's tariff announcement last Wednesday carry the unmistakable signs of a looming downdraft in economic activity that would bring inflation, interest rates, and job market conditions with it.
In effect, there has been a push-and-pull over whether the inflationary impact of higher import taxes will prove more powerful than the disinflationary impact on economic activity.
When Trump announced tariffs far larger than Wall Street was expecting — and followed up with rhetoric suggesting few off-ramps that might lead to their reversal anytime soon — the smart money tilted toward that recessionary/disinflationary outlook.
State of play: Despite higher import taxes that economists widely believe will push consumer prices up in the near term, bond markets are pricing in medium-term inflation that is lower than anticipated a week ago.
2. Deal or no deal
The trade policy stoking recession fears is fueled by conflicting White House messaging over how long the tariffs will last.
Why it matters: Whether the tariffs are a temporary negotiation tactic or the beginning of a new trade normal will help determine the extent of the new policy's economic blast radius.
The answer, however, seems to depend on which of Trump's top economic officials gets the question — even before this morning's wild series of developments seemingly based on an erroneous tweet amplified by media organizations.
What's new: In the social media post threatening higher tariffs on Chinese goods, Trump said that "negotiations with other countries ... will begin taking place immediately."
It's unclear what such talks will yield. Just yesterday, Trump said tariffs will stick unless trade deficits with key partners disappear.
What they're saying: "This is not a negotiation, this is a national emergency based on a trade deficit that's gotten out of control because of cheating," top Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro told Fox News yesterday.
Continue reading the Axios Macro newsletter
Trump adviser fires back at Bill Ackman: ‘Nuclear winter’ talk ‘completely irresponsible’
White House National Economic Council (NEC) Director Kevin Hassett said in a Monday interview that billionaire hedge fund investor Bill Ackman “should ease off the rhetoric” after he warned that President Trump’s tariffs could lead to a “self-induced, economic nuclear winter.”
In an interview Monday on Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends,” Hassett called the remarks by Ackman, who endorsed Trump for president last year, “completely irresponsible rhetoric.”
“I would urge everyone, especially Bill, to ease off the rhetoric a little bit,” Hassett said in the interview, in response to Ackman’s warning.
Hassett said most of the country’s GDP is not affected by Trump’s new sweeping tariffs, noting imports account for just 14 percent of the GOP, “so 86 percent of GDP is affected by the deregulation and the tax cuts and everything else.”
“Even if you think that there will be some negative effect from the trade side, that’s still a small share of GDP,” Hassett said. “And so the idea that it’s going to be a ‘nuclear winter,’ or something like that, is completely irresponsible rhetoric.”
Hassett maintained that he and others at the White House still think that “these economic responses are exaggerated by critics.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump plows ahead as markets plunge
Republican lawmakers are introducing legislation to challenge the president’s aggressive tariff regime.
President Donald Trump pressed forward Monday with his global trade war as U.S. markets fluctuated wildly and Wall Street leaders and members of his own party pushed back against tariffs.
Trump on Monday threatened to impose additional tariffs on China of 50 percent, reposted clips on social media of his allies expressing support for his tariffs and launched a thinly veiled attack against Republicans who were worried about his sweeping retaliatory tariffs, urging on social media for people not to be “panicans.”
“Don’t be Weak! Don’t be Stupid! Don’t be a PANICAN (A new party based on Weak and Stupid people!),” Trump wrote in a post to Truth Social on Monday. “Be Strong, Courageous, and Patient, and GREATNESS will be the result!”
The term seems to be a play on “Republicans” and comes as global financial markets plummet. The U.S. stock market swung abruptly Monday and experienced one of its largest two-day declines in history last week, and the benchmark Euro Stoxx 50 index plunged over 7 percent this morning, putting it on track to have its worst day since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Continue reading at Politico
EU offers Trump removal of all industrial tariffs
“Europe is always ready for a good deal,” says Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
BRUSSELS — The EU has offered the United States a “zero-for-zero” tariff scheme, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Monday, seeking to avoid a tit-for-tat trade war.
“We have offered zero-for-zero tariffs for industrial goods as we have successfully done with many other trading partners. Because Europe is always ready for a good deal. So we keep it on the table,” she told a press conference alongside Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.
The U.S. and EU came close to scrapping industrial tariffs a decade ago in their discussions of the TTIP — the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership — that was ultimately scuppered by Trump in his first term.
Removing tariffs on industrial products such as cars and chemicals was not seen as controversial at the time — agricultural products and safety standards were a much hotter potato.
Von der Leyen’s renewed offer comes after Trump last week slapped 20 percent tariffs on the EU and a slew of other trade partners, hiking U.S. trade barriers to their highest in more than a century.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
Trump’s tariffs add urgency to Germany’s coalition talks, says Merz
Merz signals a tougher stance on economic policy.
BERLIN — German chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz says Donald Trump’s tariffs, and their ruinous effect on Germany’s stock market, emphasize the need for tax cuts and deregulation.
Germany’s main stock index was one of the worst affected in Europe on Monday, dropping 10 percent before recovering some ground, as investors responded to the president’s announcement of blanket import tariffs that seem set to realign the world economy.
“The situation on the international equity and bond markets is dramatic and threatens to get worse,” Merz said Monday. “It’s more important than ever for Germany to restore its competitiveness. That must be at the heart of coalition talks.”
The German economy’s strength lies in exporting goods such as machinery, chemicals and vehicles, and the United States is a key market. German exports have already become less competitive in recent years due to higher energy prices and other factors, and the 20 percent tariff implemented by the Trump administration is further unwelcome news for industry.
The market shock added new urgency to coalition negotiations between Merz’s center-right Christian Democrats (CDU) and the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), following national elections on Feb. 23.
The CDU came out ahead in the vote but failed to win a majority, forcing Merz into talks with the SPD to form a government. Coalition negotiations were briefly paused Monday as Merz, outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz and SPD leaders held consultations on how to respond to the United States measures, German media report.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
Blackrock's Larry Fink says economy weakening, CEOs see recession
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink warned on Monday that most chief executives would say the U.S. economy is currently in a recession.
Why it matters: Fink, who has extensive CEO contacts as head of the world's largest asset manager, is the latest billionaire to acknowledge the risks of economic turmoil from President Trump's trade wars.
Fink spoke after Trump threatened to further hike tariffs on Chinese goods by an additional 50% if Beijing did not remove previously announced retaliatory levies.
What they're saying: "Most CEOs I talk to would say we are probably in a recession right now," Fink said during a lunchtime appearance at the Economic Club of New York on Monday, according to Bloomberg.
"One thing I would say for sure right now is the economy is weakening," Fink said.
Continue reading at Axios
Trump talks tariffs with Netanyahu as markets melt down
With the world waiting for word from President Trump about whether he will slow his tariff offensive or press full-steam ahead, the White House canceled a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu planned for Monday afternoon.
Netanyahu and Trump are currently meeting. The White House said they would take questions on camera in the Oval Office around 2pm ET.
Why it matters: Netanyahu is the first foreign leader to meet Trump since he launched the global tariff regime. If the two can work out a deal to lift the 17% tariffs Trump slapped on Israel, global markets and other world leaders will see it as a sign the president is willing to be flexible.
State of play: U.S. markets have been swinging wildly Monday on any indication of the direction the trade war might take.
Trump threatened an additional 50% tariff on China if it follows through on plans to retaliate, while also saying negotiations with other countries would begin "immediately."
Continue reading at Axios
House will give Trump ‘space’ on tariffs, Johnson says
The speaker also stopped short of guaranteeing House approval this week of a GOP budget plan.
Speaker Mike Johnson said Monday that the House will provide President Donald Trump with “space” to carry out his massive global tariff regime, even as some GOP lawmakers openly plead with Trump to negotiate off-ramps before the levies kick in on Wednesday.
“We’re going to give him the space necessary to do it, and we’ll see how it all develops,” Johnson told reporters Monday afternoon.
The speaker went on to argue Trump is “engaging and trying to fix” trade deficits.
Continue reading at Politico
Buffeted by Trump’s tariffs, Hill Republicans are desperate for a deal
Key senators encouraged the president to quickly secure trade agreements amid mounting Wall Street losses and rising political anxiety.
Most Republicans on Capitol Hill aren’t yet breaking with Donald Trump over his massive global tariffs. But some of the president’s most loyal supporters are hinting that they want the dealmaker-in-chief to get busy, and fast.
Key senators on Monday encouraged Trump to quickly secure agreements with key trading partners amid mounting Wall Street losses and rising political anxiety inside the GOP following last week’s tariff announcement, which has escalated into an all-out trade war.
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), a staunch Trump supporter but a longstanding free-trade advocate, was among those urging rapid rapprochement: “Trump could go down as the most pro-trade, pro-growth president in modern U.S. history if he uses this moment as an opportunity to reduce trade barriers,” he wrote on X.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), another MAGA loyalist who has voiced concerns about Trump’s tariff strategy, aligned himself with Lee: “At some point, you have to take YES for an answer.”
Continue reading at Politico
Trump says he’s not looking at a pause on tariffs
President Trump on Monday said he’s not considering a pause on tariffs, following an unconfirmed report earlier in the day that he was considering a 90-day pause, which caused the stock market to jump.
“We’re not looking at that,” Trump said when asked if he’s open to a pause.
“We have many, many countries that are coming to negotiate deals with us and they’re going to be fair deals and in certain cases, they’re going to be paying substantial tariffs. They’ll be fair deals,” the president said during a pool spray in the Oval Office alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Continue reading at The Hill
Bessent flew to Florida to lobby Trump on tariff message
Bessent flew to Florida on Sunday to encourage Trump to start putting more emphasis on talking about his endgame.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent flew to Florida Sunday to encourage President Donald Trump to focus his message on negotiating favorable trade deals — or risk the stock market cratering further, according to two people familiar with the conversations, granted anonymity to share details of them.
Bessent, who landed with the president at the White House on Marine One Sunday night, told Trump that markets would remain in peril unless he started putting more emphasis on talking about his endgame with tariffs — winning deals with other countries.
“Bessent’s view was, ‘The markets will keep melting unless you shift,’” one of the people said. “You’re not going to abandon the policy, but you have to talk about negotiating and what the endgame is.”
A second person described the meeting as an opportunity to figure out next steps after 50 countries reached out to open discussions on the U.S.'s new tariff regime after the “shock and awe” of last week’s “Liberation Day” announcement. The purpose of Trump’s April 2 tariff rollout was to create “maximum leverage” over foreign governments, the person added, describing Bessent’s view.
Trump and top administration officials have spent the last several days urging Americans to brace for a long, painful and potentially permanent trade war. Bessent is perhaps the most powerful voice urging Trump to telegraph to anxious Americans that there is an end in sight.
Continue reading at Politico
POLITICO Nightly
The ghosts of Trump’s take-your-medicine theory
BITTER PILL — Not long after the Wall Street crash of 1929, and before the most damaging effects of a global trade war triggered by the infamous Smoot-Hawley tariffs, a U.S. Treasury secretary named Andrew Mellon appealed to the president to impose a stark strategy as a sort of moral reset for a struggling nation.
“Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate,” Mellon advised, as recounted by President Herbert Hoover in his memoirs. The liquidationist approach “will purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down. People will work harder, live a more moral life. Values will be adjusted, and enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people.”
Contrary to popular perception, Hoover rejected the extreme version of that advice. He intervened with a wide variety of government programs to rescue the economy — including tariffs intended to protect American jobs. A deeper downturn resulted. But a central conflict of that moment — whether a laissez faire approach, instead of more government action, would correct the excesses of an earlier era — endures through generations of policymaking.
Now, the Trump administration is generating its own special blend of great-reset language and action in its quest toward President Donald Trump’s “Golden Age of America” — a stew of Mellon-esque liquidationism, government intervention and an aspirational repositioning of the world’s industrial base that has tanked stock markets across the globe.
It started with mass purges of government workers, using Elon Musk’s chainsaw rather than a scalpel. For three months, Trump officials have been slashing federal spending across the government. Immigration restrictions are designed to dramatically slow the pool of inexpensive foreign labor. And now several rounds of sweeping tariffs, announced under emergency authority, are roiling countries and companies around the world.
The sudden shift has sent stocks swooning in the kinds of sharp declines seen only a handful of times since the Great Depression, while generating few outward expressions of concern from Trump and his top officials.
“Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” Trump said Sunday in the aftermath of his “Liberation Day” announcement designed to rapidly reorder the global trading system.
“There’s gonna be a detox period” as the U.S. slashes government spending, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said last month.
Continue reading the Politico Nightly newsletter
Note from Rima: a lot more than what you see here is covered in the newsletter
Brussels eyes 25 percent tariffs in response to Trump
EU considers €22 billion hit on American goods in response to tariffs U.S. president imposed on steel and aluminum last month.
The European Commission is considering slapping tariffs of up to 25 percent on a broad range of exports from the United States in response to tariffs imposed on steel and aluminum by U.S. President Donald Trump, according to an internal Commission document seen by POLITICO.
The EU executive wants to impose a 25 percent duty on a wide range of U.S. exports, including soybeans, sweet corn, rice, almonds, orange juice, cranberries, tobacco, iron, steel, aluminum, certain boats and vehicles, textiles and certain clothes, and various types of makeup.
The total amount of U.S. exports hit by the tariffs is €22.1 billion based on the EU's 2024 imports, according to public Eurostat figures, falling short of the Commission's estimates of hitting €26 billion to "mirror" the damage from Trump's steel and aluminum tariffs.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
‘How Ugly Is This Going to Be?’
A roundtable of POLITICO reporters discuss where Trump’s tariffs may be headed.
Victoria Guida is an economics correspondent at POLITICO and author of Capital Letter, a reported column that probes policies shaping the American economy and is closely read by policymakers and business executives.
President Donald Trump is plowing ahead with his aggressive new tariff regime, rattling markets and sending foreign governments scrambling for an escape route.
Businesses large and small are watching closely to parse whether any reprieve is possible ahead of Wednesday, when the full duties take effect. But so far, the president has given them little to pin their hopes on.
To get a sense of where things stand — economically, politically and diplomatically — we convened a roundtable of POLITICO reporters across the globe to walk us through it.
The discussion featured White House reporter Megan Messerly, Morning Money author Sam Sutton, senior UK trade reporter Graham Lanktree and Ottawa bureau chief Nick Taylor-Vaisey. I moderated it as POLITICO’s economics correspondent.
Amid plenty of uncertainty, one thing we all agreed on: The drama isn’t going away any time soon.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Continue reading at Politico
Trump says EU must buy $350B of US energy to get tariff relief
Brussels’ zero-for-zero tariff offer not enough, U.S. president says, but indicates he’s open to a deal if the bloc commits to closing the trade deficit in goods.
The European Union will have to commit to buying $350 billion of American energy to get a reprieve from Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs, the U.S. president said late Monday, dismissing Brussels' offer of "zero-for-zero" tariffs on cars and industrial goods.
Trump's comments at a White House press conference were in response to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen saying earlier Monday that the EU had offered to drop the bloc's tariffs to zero on cars and industrial goods imported from the U.S. if Trump reciprocated.
Asked by a reporter whether the offer was enough for him to back down, Trump said: "No, it's not."
"We have a deficit with the European Union of $350 billion and it's gonna disappear fast," Trump said. "One of the ways that that can disappear easily and quickly is they're gonna have to buy our energy from us ... they can buy it, we can knock off $350 billion in one week. They have to buy and commit to buy a like amount of energy."
Von der Leyen’s offer came after Trump last week slapped 20 percent tariffs on the EU and a minimum 10 percent levy on other trade partners. In response, financial markets across the world have lost trillions of dollars in value, with European stocks on Monday suffering their biggest one-day falls since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.
"A lot of people say, 'Oh, it doesn't mean anything having a surplus.' It means a lot, in my opinion. It's almost like a profit or loss statement," Trump said.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
Health and Science News
Dr Peter Hotez on BBC TV
FDA "prepared to act" on RFK's request to remove fluoride from drinking water
The Trump administration is formally taking on fluoride in drinking water, with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy planning to tell the CDC to end its longtime recommendation for the practice.
EPA head Lee Zeldin also said his agency is "ready to act."
Why it matters: Public health and dental experts have warned ending the addition of fluoride to drinking water will harm children's teeth.
Driving the news: Zeldin and Kennedy joined Utah lawmakers in a Monday media event to praise the state's first-in-the-nation ban on fluoride in public water systems.
Kennedy later told the AP he planned to assemble a task force to examine the mineral in drinking water and tell the CDC to stop recommending it.
Catch up quick: Kennedy last November called fluoride "an industrial waste associated with arthritis, bone fractures, bone cancer, IQ loss, neurodevelopmental disorders, and thyroid disease."
Continue reading at Axios
Former top vaccine regulator says he blocked RFK Jr. team from database
A former top official at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said he blocked members of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s team from directly accessing a vaccine database over concerns they would rewrite or erase the stored information.
Peter Marks, who headed the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research before being ousted in March, told The Associated Press in an interview published Monday that he agreed to allow Kennedy’s associates to read reports from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) but refused to allow them to directly edit the information.
“Why wouldn’t we? Because frankly we don’t trust [them],” Marks told the AP, using profanity. “They’d write over it or erase the whole database.”
Marks said he sought to work with Kennedy and address his concerns over vaccine transparency but found that the secretary only wanted “confirmation of his misinformation and lies.”
Continue reading at The Hill
POLITICO Pulse
Dems, advocates challenge Trump’s HHS move
LEGAL QUESTIONS LINGER — President Donald Trump wants to move a crucial program for children with disabilities into the Department of Health and Human Services. Special education advocates and Democrats warn that his plan is illegal, Chelsea reports with POLITICO’s Mackenzie Wilkes.
The IDEA program, which serves 7.5 million students under a decades-old law, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act to protect children with disabilities, had been housed in the Department of Education, which Trump dismantled last month. As the Trump administration tries to find a new home for IDEA at HHS, special education advocates insist the president can’t do it without Congress’ approval.
“Unless they do something illegal, they cannot just move special education to HHS,” said Stephanie Smith Lee, former director of the Office of Special Education Programs in George W. Bush’s Education Department.
Advocates for students with special needs and teachers unions have sued to block the closure. In one complaint, the groups argue that “students will be harmed by delays and halts in the flow of IDEA funds” resulting from mass firings and that the program “cannot by law be transferred to another agency.”
“Kids with disabilities are students first,” said Michael Yudin, a principal at the consulting firm Raben and a former assistant secretary for special education in the Obama administration. He warned against “segregating special education out of education,” calling doing so a civil rights violation.
HHS did not respond to a request for comment. Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. posted on the social platform X last month that his department is “fully prepared to take on the responsibility of supporting individuals with special needs.”
“No action has been taken to move federally mandated programs out of the Department of Education at this time,” said Madi Biedermann, deputy assistant secretary for communications at the Education Department, in a statement.
Key context: Democrats in Congress also say Trump can’t legally close the department or move its responsibilities to HHS and that doing so would harm students.
“The Department of Education is the only agency with an existing institutional infrastructure and a staff of subject matter experts dedicated to ensuring equal educational opportunity for children and students with disabilities,” wrote 23 Democrats, including members of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee which oversees both HHS and Education, to Secretary of Education Linda McMahon last week.
Continue reading at Politico Pulse newsletter
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Emergency care is at risk: RAND report
The future of emergency care is getting more precarious, due to more complex cases, lower reimbursements and other stressors faced by emergency departments, according to a new RAND report funded by the Emergency Medicine Policy Institute.
Why it matters: Emergency departments are crucial for responding to life-threatening events like heart attacks and car accidents. But they've also become the safety net for some of society's most difficult problems, including the opioid epidemic, gun violence and severe mental illness.
The big picture: Concern about emergency room care has been on the rise, driven home by frequent overcrowding, understaffing and the ever-expanding nature of the care they're expected to provide.
But don't forget: It also wasn't long ago that emergency room care was at the center of the policy debate over surprise medical bills. Then, Congress' solution was partly aimed at lessening the leverage ER doctors and other providers had with insurers under the threat of large out-of-network bills.
What they found: Several factors have led to the present situation, in which "the viability of emergency care as we know it is at risk," per the RAND report:
Patients increasingly have more complex medical and social needs, and the severity of illness when they show up in the ED has also been on the rise.
ED physician payment levels have been decreasing among government and commercial payers, especially when accounting for inflation.
Continue reading at Axios
HHS cuts felt locally as regional offices close
The reality of deep cuts to Health and Human Services hit home for many last week when half of the department's 10 regional offices closed, leaving 22 states and five territories without a local point of contact for heating assistance, child care programs, Meals on Wheels and more.
Why it matters: In the alphabet soup of federal health agencies, the department's regional offices not only act as a conduit for federal grants and aid, but also forge relationships between health departments, academic institutions and community-based organizations.
"Given that rebuilding trust in public health and science starts locally, this could hamper communications and valuable partnership development," said Anand Parekh, chief medical adviser at the Bipartisan Policy Center, who previously worked at HHS for a decade.
Catch up quick: HHS last Tuesday moved to shutter regional offices in New York, Boston, Chicago, Seattle and San Francisco as part of its stated efforts to streamline and centralize operations.
One Administration for Children and Families staffer in the Boston regional office said the team worked with child care programs, states and tribes in all six New England states.
Shuttering the office could make child care less safe and affordable in the Northeast, the former employee said.
"We're the primary wing that works directly with the grantees, and we maintain those relationships to administer the programs," the employee said. "We're being abruptly cut off from those folks, so the grantees don't know who to contact."
Across the country, the closing of the Seattle regional office cost about 200 jobs and wasn't widely communicated to members of the state's congressional delegation, the Seattle Times reported. It leaves local health departments and providers fending for themselves, according to Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.).
The regional office in San Francisco served the widest geographic area, including three western states, Hawaii and Guam, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands.
State of play: HHS is keeping regional offices in Philadelphia, Denver, Kansas City, Atlanta and Dallas.
Continue reading at Axios
How Kennedy’s cuts to HHS could curb ‘MAHA’ agenda
Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Department of Government Efficiency are reshaping the U.S. health care system, starting with deep cuts to the agencies Kennedy now leads.
Kennedy and his allies argue such moves are needed to change federal culture and improve efficiency in the name of long-term health improvements. But critics question how Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again,” or MAHA, movement can be successful with a weakened federal health department.
In his first public comments about the cuts, expected to impact around 10,000 staffers, Kennedy told reporters the government bureaucracy was too bloated.
“All these programs, all of the CDC, NIH … were not doing their jobs, and there was tremendous redundancy,” Kennedy told reporters Thursday, referring to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). “We’re streamlining the agencies. We’re going to make it work for public health, make it work for the American people.”
Even critics concede the sprawling health department could work better, but they see the Trump administration’s approach of seemingly indiscriminate job cuts as potentially harmful to Americans, including children.
Continue reading at The Hill
Amid Measles Outbreaks, Poison Centers See Uptick in Vit A Exposures in Kids
— RFK Jr. has touted the vitamin for the highly contagious virus
Poison control centers have received more reports of vitamin A exposures than usual -- a trend that lines up with the growing measles outbreaks in Texas and other states.
From Jan. 1 through March 31, "there were 86 pediatric (<20 years) vitamin A exposures reported to U.S. Poison Centers, representing a 38.7% increase in cases over the same period in 2024," America's Poison Centers told MedPage Today. "Despite this increase in case counts, there was no increase in the severity of medical outcomes, with no major effects reported in 2025."
America's Poison Centers also noted that "exposures do not always result in illness or poisoning" and that "cosmetic preparations of vitamin A, like retinol, are included in this category."
In a University of Virginia (UVA) Health briefing on vitamin A toxicity, Christopher Holstege, MD, medical director of UVA Health's Blue Ridge Poison Center in Charlottesville, said that in typical years, poison centers receive 400 to 500 calls about vitamin A exposures, most of which are not significantly toxic.
After HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. touted vitamin A for measlesopens in a new tab or window, Holstege said he has been watching closely to see if unusual reports pop up.
"Vitamin A cannot prevent measles. Vaccines prevent us from getting measles," Holstege noted -- a message echoed by other public health and infectious disease experts.
Continue reading at MedPageToday
CDC's Office of Smoking and Health Eliminated
— Move will "put American lives at risk," former CDC director says
The CDC's Office on Smoking and Healthopens in a new tab or window (OSH) was eliminated in its entirety during the mass layoffsopens in a new tab or window at HHS this week, sources told MedPage Today.
Hundreds of people who worked for the office have lost their jobs, according to someone who worked there until recently.
"Tobacco use is the lowest that it's been, and there's a reason for that -- because we've been working on it," the former worker told MedPage Today.
OSH is housed within the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, which had several divisions and branches on the chopping block, according to listsopens in a new tab or window provided to MedPage Today by CDC employees. That included the division of reproductive health and the division of population health.
Former CDC director Tom Frieden, MD, MPH, said in a post on LinkedIn that the axing of the entire office was "dangerous and misguided."
"If it's not reversed, this would have devastating consequences and put American lives at risk," Frieden wrote.
The FDA also has a Center for Tobacco Products -- though it, too, lost a significant amount of staff in the April Fool's Day layoffs -- but its mission is vastly different from that of CDC's center, Frieden said.
Continue reading at MedPageToday
Five Agencies Being Merged Into AHA: Here's What They Do
— Some raise concerns about disruption in services
The restructuring plansopens in a new tab or window announced by HHS last week included folding five offices into one entity: the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health (OASH).
The new Administration for a Healthy America (AHA) will aim to "more efficiently coordinate chronic care and disease prevention programs and harmonize health resources to low-income Americans," HHS stated. Divisions of the AHA will include primary care, maternal and child health, mental health, environmental health, HIV/AIDS, and workforce, and will be supported by the U.S. Surgeon General and policy team.
Though experts acknowledged there may have been redundancies in the consolidated entities, they also expressed concerns, such as the swift and sprawling nature of workforce cuts, and the potential for fewer resources to negatively affect important services.
Former CMS Administrator Tom Scully, JD, told MedPage Today that although he believes HHS has grown too large and that some areas "could be trimmed back," he also feels workforce cuts being reported across HHS could have been undertaken more gradually and with greater consideration of individual experience and expertise.
Here is a look at the key functions of each entity set to be consolidated under the new AHA.
Continue reading at MedPageToday
Scientists genetically engineer wolves with white hair and muscular jaws like the extinct dire wolf
Three genetically engineered wolves that may resemble extinct dire wolves are trotting, sleeping and howling in an undisclosed secure location in the U.S., according to the company that aims to bring back lost species.
The wolf pups, which range in age from three to six months old, have long white hair, muscular jaws and already weigh in at around 80 pounds — on track to reach 140 pounds at maturity, researchers at Colossal Biosciences reported Monday.
Dire wolves, which went extinct more than 10,000 years old, are much larger than gray wolves, their closest living relatives today.
Continue reading at the AP
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Religious Landscape Study
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Trump pollster finds Medicaid cuts unpopular among Trump voters
“There’s really not a political appetite out there to go after Medicaid to pay for tax cuts,” said Bob Ward, partner with Fabrizio Ward.
A majority of people who voted for Donald Trump oppose potential moves from congressional Republicans to cut Medicaid funding, according to new polling from the firm of Tony Fabrizio, the president’s 2024 campaign pollster.
Two-thirds of swing voters also said they disapproved of slashing the safety-net health program as part of the GOP’s larger effort to pass a party-line package of tax cuts, beefed up border security and increased defense spending.
These findings from Fabrizio Ward, the firm that conducted the survey, come as some Republicans say they oppose cuts to Medicaid to finance that package — but could have few other options than to do just that, given the massive deficit reduction targets lawmakers are facing.
“There’s really not a political appetite out there to go after Medicaid to pay for tax cuts,” said Bob Ward, partner with Fabrizio Ward, in an interview. “Medicaid has touched so many families that people have made up their minds about what they don’t want to see cut.”
House Republicans in particular are weighing substantial changes to Medicaid to help meet an $880 billion savings target as part of the filibuster-skirting reconciliation process. Democrats cite data from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office to argue that savings to reach that lofty goal would need to come from Medicaid, the state-federal health insurance program on which more than 75 million low-income Americans rely.
Continue reading at Politico
Americans deeply divided on tariffs, foreign alliances: Poll
Americans are deeply divided along partisan lines about tariffs and the U.S.’s foreign alliances, according to a new poll.
In the poll from The Wall Street Journal, 77 percent of Republican voters expressed a mostly positive view of tariffs’ impact on the economy and said they help create jobs, while 93 percent of Democrats said they drive higher prices and have a mostly negative impact.
Overall, a majority of the registered voters polled — 54 percent — viewed tariffs negatively and said they did not support President Trump’s tariff plans.
Similar partisan divisions emerged when respondents were asked about the U.S.’s foreign alliances and the aid it provides to other countries.
Eighty-one percent of Republican voters said the country’s allies haven’t shouldered enough responsibility for their own defense and that U.S. tax dollars should no longer be used to defend them, while 83 percent of Democrats said foreign alliances are a source of strength and should be funded by tax dollars. Eighty-one percent of Democrats held a favorable view of NATO, compared to just 31 percent of Republicans.
Continue reading at The Hill
The Courts
Supreme Court lifts orders blocking Trump from deporting Venezuelans under Alien Enemies Act
The matter before the Supreme Court was not whether the Trump administration properly used its wartime power to expel those it accused of being gang members but from where those challenging their removal must launch their suits.
While the order requires those challenging Trump’s use of the Alien Enemies Act to do so in Texas, where they are being detained, the court dealt a blow to the Trump administration’s swift removal of the men without hearings.
The court said Venezuelans they seek to deport must have adequate notice in order to be able to challenge their removal – confronting the administration’s removal of men without giving them the ability to contest their alleged gang ties.
“AEA detainees must receive notice after the date of this order that they are subject to removal under the Act. The notice must be afforded within a reasonable time and in such a manner as will allow them to actually seek habeas relief in the proper venue before such removal occurs,” the court wrote in a per curium order, adding that the decision “confirm[s] that the detainees subject to removal orders under the AEA are entitled to notice and an opportunity to challenge their removal.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Supreme Court says non-citizens dubbed ‘alien enemies’ can challenge deportations — but in Texas, not DC
But the court ruled 5-4 to lift a blanket block on all deportations under Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act.
Venezuelans in the United States labeled by President Donald Trump as “alien enemies” must be given a chance to challenge their deportations before being expelled from the country, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday.
But the justices, in a 5-4 split, scrapped a trial judge’s order that had imposed a sweeping block on all deportations under Trump’s invocation of the two-centuries-old Alien Enemies Act, a war power meant to guard against foreign invasions.
The decision will shift litigation over the issue from a class-action lawsuit in Washington to federal courts in Texas, where the detainees are being held. There, the detainees can file individual petitions challenging their detentions.
Courts in Texas may not be especially receptive to such petitions. Any appeals will be heard by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, the nation’s most conservative federal appeals court.
Still, the Supreme Court’s ruling appears to deal a setback for Trump’s attempt to swiftly deport alleged members of a Venezuelan gang, Tren de Aragua, under powers used only three prior times in U.S. history, most recently in World War II.
Continue reading at Politico
Prosecutors allege retaliation over Menendez brothers resentencing memo
They allege they were demoted to junior positions after they supported resentencing for Lyle and Erik Menendez.
The prosecutors allege they were demoted to junior positions after they supported resentencing for Lyle and Erik Menendez, who were convicted in 1996 of killing their parents in their Beverly Hills home in 1989.
Former District Attorney George Gascón, a progressive who lost his reelection bid to Hochman in the November election, requested resentencing for the brothers last fall — a change that would have removed the “life without parole” element of their sentence, making it 50 years to life in prison. But Hochman reversed course after he took office.
Prosecutors Nancy Theberge and Brock Lunsford allege that Hochman and other supervisors in the district attorney’s office punished them for producing a memo last October supporting Gascón’s resentencing request. Theberge also alleges age and gender discrimination.
“Nancy and Brock followed the law and paid for it with their careers,” Justin Shegerian, an attorney for Theberge and Lunsford, said in a statement. “Their resentencing motion was grounded in fact, supported by the law, and filed with integrity.”
Continue reading at Politico
Appeals court halts Trump independent agency firings, spurring Supreme Court battle
A federal appeals court flipped on President Trump’s firings of two independent agency leaders, temporarily reinstating them Monday and likely setting up a battle at the Supreme Court.
In a 7-4 vote, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit wiped a ruling from a three-judge panel on the court that sided with the government late last month by greenlighting Trump’s firings of Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) member Cathy Harris and Gwynne Wilcox, a member of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).
Monday’s ruling clears the way for Harris and Wilcox to return to their posts, for now, though the Trump administration could now file an emergency appeal at the Supreme Court.
The cases are a key test of the Supreme Court’s 90-year-old precedent that upheld removal restrictions for multimember independent agency boards, which has been recently narrowed. The D.C. Circuit majority emphasized that it is for the Supreme Court to decide whether to overrule its own decision, but the lower courts must follow it until then.
“The Supreme Court has repeatedly told the courts of appeals to follow extant Supreme Court precedent unless and until that Court itself changes it or overturns it,” reads the court’s unsigned ruling.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump asks Supreme Court to block order requiring US to bring back man mistakenly deported to El Salvador
(CNN) — President Donald Trump’s administration urged the Supreme Court on Monday to block a lower court order requiring officials to bring a man who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador back to Maryland.
The emergency appeal over Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national, landed at the high court hours before the 11:59 p.m. Monday deadline established by a lower court judge to return him to the US.
Trump attorneys have conceded in court filings that the administration mistakenly deported the father of three “because of an administrative error,” but said it could not bring him back because he is in Salvadoran custody. His case has added to the already considerable legal scrutiny over White House efforts to deport immigrants without a hearing or review.
Continue reading at CNN.com
Court tosses Biden nursing home staffing standard
A federal judge in Texas on Monday threw out a contentious Biden administration policy that would have required first-ever federal staffing minimums at nursing homes.
The big picture: The Trump administration is unlikely to appeal the decision from U.S. District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, marking a win for nursing home operators, who argued the standards were unworkable amid a shortage of health care labor.
Zoom in: Nursing homes have plenty of failures when it comes to staffing, infection control and oversight, Kacsmaryk's memo vacating the rule states.
But while the policy was "rooted in laudable goals," it goes beyond the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' authority, he wrote.
Continue reading at Axios
Former Wisconsin Supreme Court justice who led 2020 election probe agrees to surrender law license
A former Wisconsin state Supreme Court justice who spread election conspiracies and led an investigation into President Donald Trump’s 2020 loss in the swing state agreed Monday to surrender his law license to settle multiple misconduct violations.
The state Office of Lawyer Regulation filed a 10-count complaint in November against Michael Gableman, accusing him of misconduct during the probe. The state Supreme Court ultimately could revoke Gableman’s law license, although the court rarely administers such a harsh punishment against wayward attorneys.
The OLR and Gableman filed a stipulation with the Supreme Court on Monday in which they agreed an appropriate sanction would be suspending Gableman’s license for three years. A referee overseeing the case and the Supreme Court must approve the agreement before it can take effect.
Gableman acknowledged in the filing that the complaint provides “an adequate factual basis” and that he couldn’t successfully defend himself against the allegations.
Continue reading at the AP
Anti-DEI-Whitewashing
NPS rewrites Underground Railroad history amid DEI purge
The National Park Service is retelling the Underground Railroad story as an episode of "Black/White cooperation," and has removed a photo of abolitionist Harriet Tubman.
Why it matters: The rewriting of abolitionist sites and history, first reported by the Washington Post, comes as the administration is reinterpreting Civil Rights-era laws and history to focus on "anti-white racism" rather than discrimination against people of color.
The big picture: It's the latest Trump administration purge of federal diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
It follows President Trump's order to review monuments toppled in the wake of George Floyd's murder, targeting what he calls a "concerted and widespread effort to rewrite our Nation's history."
That executive order takes aim at what he called a "revisionist movement" that he says has infiltrated the Smithsonian Institution and other federal sites dedicated to America's history.
Zoom in: The National Park Service webpage has removed an introductory quote from Tubman about being a conductor in the secret network and replaced it with postal stamps of white and Black people working together.
The introduction also dropped references to enslavement and instead focused on white/Black allyship during the lead-up to the Civil War.
Continue reading at Axios
Trump fires a top U.S. military official to NATO
Conservative media has targeted Navy Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield for comments she made about diversity.
President Donald Trump has fired one of the top U.S. military officers at NATO headquarters in Brussels, adding greater uncertainty over America’s role in the nearly eight-decade alliance.
Navy Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield, the U.S. representative to NATO’s military committee, was relieved of her duties, according to two NATO officials and a diplomat from a NATO country, who were granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive topic. They did not say why.
The ouster of such a prominent U.S. officer at NATO adds more tension to Washington’s increasingly shaky relationship with the alliance. The administration’s antagonistic rhetoric against longtime NATO allies — including Vice President JD Vance’s criticisms of European cultural issues, Trump’s continued insistence the U.S. should own Greenland, and huge tariffs slapped on some of America’s closest trading partners — are part of a widening rift in the transatlantic alliance.
Reuters first reported Chatfield’s firing.
Chatfield came to the attention of conservative media in 2023, soon after taking the role. Critics labeled her “woke” for comments she made when starting as president of the Naval War College in 2019.
Continue reading at Politico
Amber Ruffin, cut from White House correspondents dinner, will host PEN America gala
Ruffin has said she was cut from the WCHA event after telling organizers that she had no intentions of being evenhanded.
NEW YORK — Comic Amber Ruffin has a new spring gig.
PEN America told The Associated Press on Monday that Ruffin will host the free expression organization’s gala fundraiser on May 15. The comic had been scheduled as a featured speaker April 26 at the White House Correspondents Association’ s annual dinner. But the WHCA rescinded the offer to Ruffin, a blunt critic of President Donald Trump, saying it wanted to focus on journalistic achievement.
In a statement Monday, PEN co-interim CEO Clarisse Rosaz Shariyf praised Ruffin for her “brilliant social commentary, her satire and exceptional talent.”
“She is truly emblematic of the talented creators who we need on stages and in writers’ rooms during a time of unprecedented censorship in this country. We’re both delighted and honored to have her with us,” Shariyf added.
PEN also announced Monday that Wesleyan University President Michael Roth will receive the PEN/Benenson Courage Award for “his unwavering commitment to defending academic freedom, protecting protest rights, and resisting attempts to silence dissent in higher education.” Roth has repeatedly criticized the Trump administration’s threats to end research funding for Columbia University, Harvard University and other schools, with issues cited ranging from fighting antisemitism to whether transgender athletes can participate in sports.
Continue reading at Politico
General News
Sanders on law firms making deals with Trump: ‘Absolute cowardice’
Sen. Bernie Sanders slammed law firms coming to deals with President Trump in an interview that aired Sunday.
“What do you make of the law firms cutting deals?” CBS News’s Robert Costa asked Sanders on “CBS News Sunday Morning.”
“Absolute cowardice,” Sanders responded.
Sanders later added that the firms are “going to sell out their souls to Donald Trump, in order to continue to be able to make money here in Washington.”
Multiple law firms have recently cut deals with the president after pressure from the administration, which has threatened to cut security clearances and government contracts for multiple Big Law companies through a review process. It has also warned through an executive order of the sanctioning of attorneys for “vexatious” lawsuits.
Continue reading at The Hill
Johnson and Trump scramble to show agenda progress amid tariff tumult
The president helped the speaker solve one snag over the weekend. Muscling a budget through the House will be a much taller order.
Speaker Mike Johnson and President Donald Trump were already facing pressure to move forward with their ambitious legislative agenda. Now, with the financial world teetering as a result of Trump’s new global tariffs, progress is becoming essential — and the two men will need to work closely this week to show it.
Johnson on Sunday vowed to push through a reworked budget plan this week, setting off a final sprint toward passage of the GOP’s domestic policy megabill, despite a growing backlash from fiscal hawks in his ranks who view the Senate-approved framework as a prelude to surrender on spending cuts.
On a private call with his GOP members, the speaker specifically cited the market tumult as a reason for the House to move quickly and not try to make changes to the reworked plan. But with Johnson pushing for a Wednesday vote, a band of House GOP fiscal hawks isn’t buying it.
“It’s still going to fail on the floor,” said one who was granted anonymity to speak candidly about the budget plan’s prospects.
That’s where Trump comes in. Leaders believe that they will ultimately be able to muscle the budget measure across the House floor this week with a big hand from Trump, who successfully cajoled GOP holdouts on multiple crucial votes earlier this year — including a recent spending bill, a prior budget vote and even Johnson’s election as speaker.
Continue reading at Politico
Why Trump May Be Making a Big Mistake by Slashing the Department of Education
Former Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, a Republican, is worried about Trump’s plans.
Donald Trump’s move to dismantle the Department of Education is often cast as the culmination of a five-decade-old fever dream among conservatives.
Not all conservatives, Margaret Spellings notes with a chuckle.
As Education secretary under President George W. Bush from 2005 to 2009, Spellings was a lead player in a Republican administration that saw a more muscular role for the Education Department as a way to pursue conservative policy goals.
Now the president of the non-profit Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, the Texan and longtime Bush loyalist worries that Trump’s focus on gutting and reorganizing the bureaucracy — shifting the student loan portfolio to the Small Business Administration, shuttering remaining Bush-era accountability programs, laying off thousands — risks distracting policymakers’ attention from tanking student performance in reading and math, which accelerated during the Covid pandemic.
“We ought to just be on fire about it, but instead we’re going to see: Does the SBA know how to run a student loan portfolio?” Spellings told me in her downtown office, mementos of congressional passage of Bush’s signature “No Child Left Behind” law on the wall. “I’m not hearing a lot about that student performance issue.”
No Child Left Behind — supported not just by conservatives but liberals eager to close achievement gaps for poor and minority students — intensified student testing and sanctioned schools that didn’t meet stringent federal standards. It ultimately proved unpopular across the political spectrum, and considerable authority was sent back to the state and local level in 2015, even before post-Covid cries for more parental control of schools.
That’s why taking aim at the federal Education Department now “is a red herring in a lot of ways.” Spellings said.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Continue reading at Politico
An anti-Trump Republican for governor tries to defy gravity in New Jersey’s primary
Jon Bramnick is running to the right on immigration against his rivals for the GOP nomination.
In a Republican primary for governor dominated by fealty to President Donald Trump, a moderate longshot is trying to make up for his anti-Trumpism by running to the right of his opponents on immigration.
Jon Bramnick, a Republican state senator, is a two-decade Trenton insider with close ties to former Gov. Chris Christie, persona non-grata in Trump world.
But Bramnick is trying something novel by fully embracing an element of Trumpism that is most popular in New Jersey. Even as he boasts his longtime criticism of the president will help him win a general election, Bramnick has put out an immigration platform that’s even more conservative than what’s offered by his higher-profile, pro-Trump rivals, Jack Ciattarelli and Bill Spadea.
“The media always wants to say ‘spoiler,’ ‘moderate’ or ‘never Trump.’ How about just saying, ‘Hey, listen, here’s how the guy did over the last 25 years and evaluate it,’” Bramnick, who’s from Union County, said in a phone interview. “I just don’t think you should come to conclusions until we get a lot closer to June 10. Just watch how things evolve.”
Bramnick is touting a hard-line record on immigration and pushing in the Statehouse to crack down on undocumented immigrants who commit crimes. It could make Bramnick, who is moderate on most other issues, appealing to the more conservative members of his party. Public polling last year showed a majority of New Jersey voters have shifted to the right on immigration since 2022.
Continue reading at Politico
French far right floats toppling government in wake of Le Pen verdict
Threats against Bayrou are increasing a week after Le Pen was effectively banned from running for president.
PARIS — Two high-ranking officials from France’s biggest far-right party publicly opened the door on Monday to bringing down the government a week after Marine Le Pen was convicted of embezzlement and subsequently barred from running for president.
National Rally President Jordan Bardella and party Vice President Sébastien Chenu revealed in separate interviews that the party is contemplating ousting Prime Minister François Bayrou, just four months after backing the French left’s effort to take down his predecessor, Michel Barnier.
Both National Rally politicians framed their party’s decision as a response to Bayrou’s supposed failures to act on their legislative priorities, such as lowering energy prices or adopting a proportional voting system. Bardella told RTL that “this government isn’t doing much” while Chenu accused Bayrou trying to kick the can down the road and “wear out members of parliament.”
The timing of their messaging, however, is unlikely a coincidence. Le Pen last week was found guilty of misappropriating European Parliament funds and hit with an immediate five-year ban on running for public office, which will knock her out of the 2027 presidential election unless an appeals court rules in her favor.
Since the verdict, party officials have focused much of their public messaging on framing the case as a judicial witch hunt against Le Pen, who polling shows as the front-runner for the next presidential election. But the underlying threat of eventually voting to topple the government has lingered.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
Bondi vows to seek death penalty "whenever possible" amid threats to her life
Attorney General Pam Bondi said Sunday she's had death threats for seeking the death penalty for Luigi Mangione, the man charged with murder in connection with the December killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
What they're saying: "I feel like these young people have lost their way," Bondi said on Fox News Sunday in addressing a question from anchor Shannon Bream about some young people's support for Mangione, whose arrest triggered massive debate about the U.S. health care system.
"I was receiving death threats for seeking the death penalty on someone who was charged with an execution of a CEO."
Bondi said President Trump's directive was "very clear" on seeking the death penalty.
"We're going to continue to do the right thing. We're not going to be deterred by political motives," she added. "I've seen a protester walking down the street here 'Free Luigi.' ... this guy's charged with a violent crime, and we're going to seek the death penalty whenever possible."
Continue reading at Axios
As Putin looms, top German lawmaker warns schoolkids must train for ‘disaster situations’
The European Commission also recently unveiled its own preparedness strategy for citizens, while Russia’s war on Ukraine grinds forward.
Students in German schools should undergo crisis training, senior conservative lawmaker Roderich Kiesewetter said Monday, as the specter of war haunts Europe.
“It is absolutely necessary to practice emergency scenarios, as students are particularly vulnerable and especially affected in such situations,” Kiesewetter, who is the deputy chair of the Bundestag’s intelligence oversight committee, told German business newspaper Handelsblatt.
“There should also be basic training on how to behave in disaster situations. This would also be wise and forward-thinking with regard to a possible national service,” he said, adding that this type of training already exists in Finland.
The remarks from Kiesewetter, who hails from the center-right Christian Democratic Union that is preparing to take power in Berlin, come shortly after the European Commission unveiled its own preparedness strategy for citizens as Russia menaces the continent and maintains a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The German interior ministry also called for stronger civil defense education in schools, noting that while educational content is the responsibility of federal states, the national government is prepared to offer support with materials for young people.
Continue reading at Politico Europe
In photos: Midwest, South lashed by days of deadly storms
A "significant" extreme weather system that's lashed the U.S. South and Midwest for days was shifting through the Southeast on Sunday — with forecasters warning of more severe thunderstorms, tornadoes and flooding threats.
The big picture: The National Weather Service said severe weather concerns would persist into Monday across portions of the Southeast from the storm system that's killed at least 18 people since it ramped up Wednesday, with officials in Tennessee confirming 10 storm-related deaths as of Sunday.
See the photo gallery at Axios
Playbook
Playbook: Golfing while the world burns
BELLY-SLIDING INTO HISTORY: Just in case you spent Sunday under a rock — or sobbing into your 401(k) chart — Washington is now home to the greatest goalscorer in NHL history. Alex Ovechkin hit the magic 895 yesterday and fans across the city went wild. POLITICO’s own Capitals super-fan Callie Tansill-Suddath was at the Penn Quarter Sports Tavern and describes an electric atmosphere where supporters wept and random passers-by stood with eyes glued to the screens. “I still don’t know what the final score was,” she texted Playbook last night.
Spotted: FBI chief Kash Patel celebrating inside the UBS Arena in New York, alongside now-former record-holder Wayne Gretsky. (Patel was present Friday night too when Ovi equalled the record ... I guess every job has its perks.)
Next up — Shotime in the White House: Baseball’s World Series champs the LA Dodgers are playing at Nationals Park this evening, and ahead of the game have a date with President Donald Trump (and selected media outlets) at the White House at 11 a.m. So does Shohei Ohtani have a hot take on Japan’s shiny new 24 percent tariff? We should find out soon enough.
In today’s Playbook …
— Donald Trump’s market meltdown continues — how long can this last?
— Bibi Netanyahu at the White House to beg for a better deal.
— Mike Johnson has a massive budget-sized problem to solve.
HOW LOW CAN IT GO? President Donald Trump’s astonishing, tariff-induced market meltdown is still only headed in one direction — and fears are growing about how big this crash could become. Asian stock markets suffered further spectacular losses overnight, in some cases so large they triggered built-in “circuit-breakers” which temporarily halt trading to prevent a wider collapse. The S&P Futures markets also tumbled further yesterday, giving a pretty clear indication of what traders believe is coming when the New York Stock Exchange reopens at 9.30 a.m. It’s hard to think of any example in modern U.S. history when the actions of a president have directly triggered something like this.
By the numbers — Asian horror show: Japan’s benchmark Topix index fell over 9 percent in the first 30 minutes of trading this morning … Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index plunged 8.7 percent in early trading … A circuit-breaker was activated on South Korea’s main board after the Kospi benchmark dropped more than 5 percent …Singapore’s benchmark Straits Times index fell 8.5 percent in the first 20 minutes of trading … Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 fell 6.1 percent … and on it goes. (You can follow all of this and more on the FT’s liveblog of doom.)
All eyes on America: No one really knows how bad (or good!) things might get today. But it’s never a great sign when an NYSE veteran like Jay Woods is posting the circuit-breaker numbers that would halt trading in New York. The Economist’s Wall Street Editor Mike Bird noted last night: “If the S&P 500 closes tomorrow where futures are right now, it will be the biggest three-day selloff in 38 years, a faster drop than any during either the global financial crisis in 2008 or the Covid-19 panic in March 2020.” And to repeat: This one has been actively caused by the president.
And there’s more: Early this morning, Elon Musk tweeted out a video of Milton Friedman waxing poetic about the beauty of international trade, a not-so-subtle suggestion of how he feels about these tariffs.
Continue reading Politico Playbook newsletter
Capitol agenda: Tariff tumult roils GOP agenda
Look for the internal rift to grow in the coming days.
President Donald Trump is doubling down on his trade war as global financial markets melt down and economic calamity looms. It’s going to be a brutal week ahead for Republican lawmakers who are already on edge about owning the policy and are struggling to unify behind Trump’s legislative agenda.
A growing number of Republicans are signing onto bills that would rebuke Trump’s tariff strategy, and some are anxious about the lack of direction from the administration.
Look for the rift to grow in the coming days.
Republican Rep. Don Bacon is set to introduce legislation today that would wrest back Congress’ authority to approve tariffs. Rep. David Valadao, a California Republican, is signaling he’ll support it. In the Senate, six Republicans have signed onto the companion bill led by Sen. Chuck Grassley.
House Ways and Means Republicans held a private call Friday with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, who is set to testify before Senate Finance Tuesday and Ways and Means on Wednesday. Other Republicans are stressed over not having enough information from the White House, and Speaker Mike Johnson is committing to arranging a briefing from the administration.
The rising economic pressure is making it even more urgent for Republicans to show progress behind Trump’s sweeping plans for tax cuts and other legislative priorities.
Continue reading at Politico
CNN to hold town hall Thursday with battleground House members
Four members of Congress representing some of the most competitive House districts will participate in a Thursday town hall on CNN.
Republican Reps. Mike Lawler (N.Y.) and Ryan Mackenzie (Pa.) and Democratic Reps. Jahana Hayes (Conn.) and Derek Tran (Calif.) will participate in the event, the network said in an announcement on Monday. CNN hosts Jake Tapper and Kaitlan Collins will moderate.
Mackenzie and Tran are both freshmen members who defeated incumbents of the opposing party in the 2024 election, with Mackenzie unseating former Rep. Susan Wild (D-Pa.) and Tran defeating Rep. Michelle Steel (R-Calif.).
Lawler is a second-term member who is also considering a gubernatorial run. Hayes is in her fourth term.
Continue reading at The Hill
Note from Rima:
Anderson Cooper will be holding a CNN town hall with Senator Bernie Sanders on Wednesday night at 9:00pm EST
7 GOP senators sign on to bill to check Trump’s trade authority
Seven Republican senators, including Sen. Chuck Grassley (Iowa), the Senate’s president pro tempore, and Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.), the former Senate Republican leader, have signed on to a bipartisan bill that would require Congress to approve President Trump’s steep tariffs on trading partners.
Grassley and McConnell have joined five other Republicans — Sens. Jerry Moran (Kan.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Thom Tillis (N.C.), Todd Young (Ind.) and Susan Collins (Maine) — in supporting the Trade Review Act of 2025.
The legislation would limit Trump’s ability to impose unilateral tariffs without the approval of Congress.
It would require the president to notify Congress of the imposition of new tariffs and increased tariffs within 28 hours and provide an explanation of the reasoning for the action.
It would also require the administration to provide an assessment of the potential impact of imposing or increasing the duty on U.S. businesses and consumers.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump threatens to veto Senate bill limiting his tariff power
The Trump White House has threatened to veto a bipartisan Senate bill that would check President Trump’s authority to impose new tariffs or increase tariffs by requiring Congress to approve them within 60 days.
In a statement of administrative policy circulated to Senate offices Monday, the Trump administration informed lawmakers that it “strongly opposes” the Trade Review Act of 2025.
The administration argued the legislation would “severely constrain the president’s ability to use authorities long recognized by Congress and upheld by the courts to respond to national emergencies and foreign threats.”
“If S. 1272 were presented to the President, he would veto the bill,” the White House budget office warned.
Continue reading at The Hill
Report: Most migrants sent to mega-prison have no apparent criminal record
Three-fourths of the Venezuelan migrants flown from Texas to a notorious maximum security prison in El Salvador three weeks ago had no apparent criminal record, a CBS News 60 Minutes report out Sunday found.
Why it matters: The lack of evidence of a criminal record is consistent with many other immigrant removals under the Trump administration so far and poses serious questions over the deportations to El Salvador, as a judge ordered at least one man returned.
The big picture: The migrants were removed after President Trump invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 last month to accelerate mass deportations of Venezuelan migrants suspected of being gang members.
Civil liberties groups have attacked the move since the deportations came with little to no due process, arguing that the United States is not at war and, therefore, unjustified in its use of the 18th-century wartime law.
By the numbers: The CBS News 60 Minutes report found that 75% of 238 migrants sent to the Salvadoran mega-prison known as the Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) had no traces of a criminal record.
At least 22% of the men on the list have criminal records here in the United States or abroad, but the vast majority are for non-violent offenses like theft, shoplifting and trespassing, the 60 Minutes review found.
Only a dozen are accused of murder, rape, assault and kidnapping.
Continue reading at Axios
Supreme Court pauses order requiring deported Maryland man be returned to U.S.
The Supreme Court on Monday temporarily paused a federal judge's midnight deadline to return a Salvadorian national who was mistakenly deported while the justices weigh the case.
The big picture: Chief Justice John Roberts set a 5pm Tuesday deadline for a response from Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia's attorney after the Trump administration argued the lower court order improperly imposed on the president's foreign policy powers.
The Trump administration had asked the high court to get rid of the Monday deadline set by U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S., repeating their accusations that he's a member of MS-13.
Abrego Garcia, who was legally living in Maryland, has not been convicted of gang-related crimes.
The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals earlier Monday refused to block Xinis' order.
Context: Abrego Garcia was detained by immigration officials and erroneously deported despite a court order saying he could remain in the U.S. because of a likelihood of harm in El Salvador.
He was wrongly told last month by immigration agents that his status had changed.
Continue reading at Axios
Appeals court blocks Trump from removing Dems on labor boards
The D.C. Circuit on Monday blocked President Trump, for now, from firing Democratic members of two different federal labor boards.
Why it matters: The case is widely expected to set up a Supreme Court battle over a president's right to fire members of independent agencies.
It also has implications for both government workers who are appealing mistreatment, as well as private sector employees who report violations to the labor law and try to organize into unions.
Driving the news: In a 7-4 vote, the ruling overturned a previous one from a three-judge panel on the court.
At issue is Trump's abrupt firing of Gwynne Wilcox, a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board; and Cathy Harris who sits on the Merit Systems Protections Board, which serves as judicial body that oversees the federal workforce.
Zoom in: For now, the ruling allows the case to continue with arguments before a three-judge panel, rather than having the merits considered en banc, (by all the courts' judges).
Continue reading at Axios
Rep. André Carson faces likely Dem primary challenge
Rep. André Carson (D-Ind.) could soon join the ranks of veteran House Democrats facing primary challenges as a local Democratic operative eyes launching a bid for his seat this week.
Why it matters: George Hornedo, like other Democratic insurgents, is framing his likely run as a clash of energy as the party's grassroots agitate for their elected officials to be more pugnacious — or step aside.
Hornedo said in a phone interview that Carson "is just holding office and not actually doing anything with it," calling him a "warm body in an empty suit."
"I'm exploring running for this seat because too many people in my community here in Indianapolis are still waiting ... for real leadership," he told Axios.
Zoom in: A former Indianapolis city councilman, Carson, 50, was elected to Congress in 2008 in a special election to replace his grandmother, Julia Carson, following her death.
Continue reading at Axios
Trump says U.S. holding nuclear talks with Iran in surprise announcement
President Trump said Monday that the U.S. had been holding "direct talks" with Iran and that a "very big meeting" involving "very high-level" officials will be taking place this Saturday.
Why it matters: The surprise announcement from Trump follows his repeated warnings that Iran must sign a new nuclear deal or face military strikes.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had ruled out direct talks with the U.S. so long as Trump kept his "maximum pressure" policy in place.
Tehran has not confirmed Trump's claim that talks had already "started" and would soon ramp up.
Trump emphasized that the talks with Iran will be direct — rather than through intermediaries — and take place "at almost the highest level."
What he's saying: "I think everyone agrees that doing a deal would be preferable to doing the obvious. And the obvious is not something that I want to be involved with, or frankly, that Israel wants to be involved with, if they can avoid it," Trump said, speaking from the Oval Office alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Continue reading at Axios
U.S. Catholic bishops end refugee partnerships with federal government
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops on Monday said it would not renew 50-year-old agreements with the federal government to provide children's services and refugee support.
Why it matters: The decision marks the shuttering of one of the country's largest and longest-serving refugee resettlement initiatives. It comes as the Trump administration continues pursuing its immigration crackdown.
The big picture: The USCCB is choosing not to renew contracts that were already paused by President Trump.
The contracts funded services to help refugees, unaccompanied refugee minors, asylees, and victims of human trafficking and torture. The USCCB worked to "ensure that the basic needs of each arriving refugee are adequately met."
What they're saying: "This difficult decision follows the suspension by the government of our cooperative agreements to resettle refugees," Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, president of the USCCB, said in a statement.
Continue reading at Axios
South Sudan contradicts Rubio's reasoning for visa revocation
The government of South Sudan pushed back on Secretary of State Marco Rubio's reasoning for revoking its nationals' visas in a Monday statement.
The big picture: Rubio announced Saturday that the U.S. would revoke all visas held by South Sudanese passport holders and restrict further issuance, citing the "failure" of the African nation's transitional government to accept repatriated citizens in "a timely matter."
Yes, but: The Foreign Ministry of South Sudan said Monday that the U.S. decision stemmed from an incident with a deportee that the nation determined to be Congolese and was not the individual listed on a travel document presented to officials.
During the individual's interview at Juba International Airport, he said he was brought to South Sudan from the U.S. against his will, according to the statement.
The individual, identified as Makula Kintu in the statement, arrived with travel documents under the name Nimeri Garang.
Continue reading at Axios
DOJ planned to send US marshals to ex-employee’s home over Mel Gibson discussion
The Department of Justice (DOJ) was preparing to send U.S. marshals to a former employee’s home ahead of an appearance she is set to make with two high-profile Democrats over restoring actor Mel Gibson’s gun rights.
Correspondence between former Pardon Attorney Liz Oyer and the Justice Department indicates the department planned to dispatch U.S. marshals to deliver a letter seeking to dissuade her from talking at the event about allegations that she was fired for recommending Gibson’s gun rights be restored.
The department was set to send law enforcement to her home between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. Friday to hand deliver her a letter pressing her not to appear at a Monday forum hosted by Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) about the Trump administration’s influence over the Justice Department.
Oyer was able to confirm receipt of the letter electronically, ending plans for its physical delivery, but an attorney for the former Justice Department lawyer called the ordering of armed agents a clear intimidation tactic.
Continue reading at The Hill
Spartz says Ukraine not positioned to keep land in peace talks
Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-Ind.) said in a new interview that Ukraine is not positioned to keep some of its land in peace talks with Russia.
“I just don’t see how they [Ukraine] can be positioned to demand to keep the land. If they would be winning the war, that will be very different,” the Ukrainian-born GOP lawmaker said in an interview with The Telegraph published Monday.
“As I said two years ago, the best thing is to win wars as fast as you can. As long as it takes usually doesn’t end very well for democracies,” Spartz added later, according to The Telegraph.
President Trump in his first few months back in office has pushed to end the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, which recently passed its three-year mark.
Continue reading at The Hill
Trump faces major decisions on ‘forever chemical’ regulations
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is expected to say by Tuesday whether it plans to keep or roll back Biden-era rules that require water utilities to filter out toxic substances known as PFAS from drinking water.
It’s also expected to say by later this month whether it plans to maintain a separate rule that allows the agency to put polluters on the hook to clean up these toxic substances.
Overall, the rules are expected to significantly reduce Americans’ exposure to forever chemicals and the EPA’s decisions could be an early indicator whether the Trump administration will prioritize its promises to deregulate or reduce Americans’ exposure to harmful compounds.
PFAS, which stands for per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a family of chemicals that have been used in a wide variety of everyday products, from nonstick pans to dental floss to waterproof clothing and makeup to sweat-resistant apparel and fast-food packaging.
Continue reading at The Hill
Appeals panel clears way for DOGE access to sensitive personal data at OPM, Education Department
A federal appeals panel on Monday paused an order curtailing the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) access to troves of sensitive personal data from three federal agencies, reopening the floodgates for the cost-cutting advisory board.
In a 2-1 decision, a panel of judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit agreed to stay a Maryland federal judge’s order barring the Department of Education, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and the Treasury Department from disclosing the personal identifying information of roughly 2 million Americans to DOGE while the Trump administration appeals.
Though the Treasury Department is included in the decision, a different court’s injunction covers data there and remains in effect for now.
“The district court misread our precedent in requiring nothing more than abstract access to personal information to establish a concrete injury,” Judge G. Steven Agee wrote in the majority opinion. “The Government has thus met its burden of a strong showing that it is likely to succeed on the merits of their appeal.”
Continue reading at The Hill
2 Senate Republicans urge Trump to take EU tariff deal
A pair of Senate Republicans on Monday urged President Trump to accept the European Union’s offer of “zero-for-zero tariffs” on cars and industrial goods amid the administration’s growing trade wars.
“Let’s take that deal!” Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) wrote on the social platform X from his personal account.
“Much to gain,” Lee added.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) chimed in, writing in response, “Totally agree with @BasedMikeLee.”
“At some point, you have to take YES for an answer,” Johnson wrote.
The senators were responding to a clip of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, saying at a press conference on Monday, “We stand ready to negotiate with the United States.”
Continue reading at The Hill
Bessent: Federal layoffs will help fill factory jobs created by Trump tariffs
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the Trump administration is planning to boost U.S. manufacturing employment with policies meant to steer laid-off federal workers into factories.
In an interview with Tucker Carlson published Friday on the social platform X, the Treasury secretary said he believed the U.S. had enough workers to fill thousands of manufacturing jobs Trump hopes to create through steep import taxes.
“On one side, the president is reordering trade,” Bessent said. “On the other side, we are shedding excess labor in the federal government, and bringing down federal borrowings.”
“That will give us the labor that we need for the new manufacturing,” Bessent continued, arguing artificial intelligence and automation would limit how many workers needed to fill new jobs.
Continue reading at The Hill
A Former GOP Education Secretary Thinks People Will Notice Trump’s Demolition Job
Margaret Spellings says the president’s effort to slash the Education Department is a big mistake.
Donald Trump’s move to dismantle the Department of Education is often cast as the culmination of a five-decade-old fever dream among conservatives.
Not all conservatives, Margaret Spellings notes with a chuckle.
As Education secretary under President George W. Bush from 2005 to 2009, Spellings was a lead player in a Republican administration that saw a more muscular role for the Education Department as a way to pursue conservative policy goals.
Now the president of the nonprofit Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, the Texan and longtime Bush loyalist worries that Trump’s focus on gutting and reorganizing the bureaucracy — shifting the student loan portfolio to the Small Business Administration, shuttering remaining Bush-era accountability programs, laying off thousands — risks distracting policymakers’ attention from tanking student performance in reading and math, which accelerated during the Covid pandemic.
“We ought to just be on fire about it, but instead we’re going to see: Does the SBA know how to run a student loan portfolio?” Spellings told me in her downtown office, mementos of congressional passage of Bush’s signature “No Child Left Behind” law on the wall. “I’m not hearing a lot about that student performance issue.”
Continue reading at Politico
Noem pushes voluntary DHS exits, per email
The Department of Homeland Security offered employees the choice between deferred resignation, early retirement or an immediate buyout, according to an email obtained by Axios Monday evening.
Why it matters: The email from Secretary Kristi Noem is part of a broader push to drastically reduce headcount across the federal government, including at the nation's top cyber defense agency.
What's happening: Noem laid out the voluntary offers in an email with the subject line, "Reshaping the DHS Workforce." Employees have until next Monday, April 14, to decide if they will take the deferred resignation, early retirement offer or buyout.
Those who take the deferred resignation will be offered a "brief period of paid administrative leave to complete key tasks, submit retirement documentation and prepare for departure." Most departures would happen before the end of fiscal year 2025, Noem wrote.
Workers can also choose to do a buyout in which they get a lump sum of $25,000, "or an amount equal to severance pay if lower," per the email.
Eligible employees are also able to participate in an early retirement program, Noem said. Those employees typically will have reduced pensions and health care benefits.
Continue reading at Axios
White House denies a military parade is scheduled for Trump’s birthday
Washington-area officials say the administration has reached out, though.
The White House is denying reports that it plans to hold a military parade in Washington on President Donald Trump’s birthday in June — though local officials have been in contact with the administration about a celebration.
Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser and Takis Karantonis, the chair of Virginia’s Arlington County Board, on Monday confirmed discussions with administration officials about plans for a military parade this summer.
Continue reading at Politico
Democrats question former DOJ officials about Trump administration dealings
The “shadow hearing” is a popular tactic from the minority party.
Former Justice Department officials addressed Congressional Democrats Monday about the Department of Justice’s alleged closed-door dealings in a so-called shadow hearing — one of the few avenues for conducting oversight of the Trump administration afforded to the minority party in a Republican governing trifecta.
Democrats on the House and Senate Judiciary Committees pressed former DOJ pardon attorney Liz Oyer, who was fired from the department, and former federal prosecutor Ryan Crosswell, who resigned in wake of the agency’s decision to drop its corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, about the circumstances of their departures.
Both witnesses appeared willingly before the Democratic lawmakers who, without control of the House or Senate, lack the ability to call official hearings and subpoena uncooperative witnesses.
California Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff, who led the hearing with House Judiciary ranking member Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), said Democrats had pleaded with congressional Republicans to hold oversight hearings around the Trump administration’s actions, but their colleagues had “abdicated that important responsibility.”
Continue reading at Politico
Growing opposition from House conservatives threatens to derail Trump’s agenda
Growing opposition among hardline House conservatives to the Senate’s framework for advancing President Trump’s ambitious legislative agenda is threatening to make this week’s vote one of the heaviest lifts yet for Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).
At least 10 House Republicans have said they will vote “no” on the measure and a handful of others have publicly criticized the resolution, creating an uphill battle for Johnson as he looks to muscle it through his razor-thin majority.
Johnson is eyeing a Wednesday vote on the Senate-approved budget resolution, which would unlock the reconciliation process that Republicans are looking to use to pass tax cuts, border funding and energy policy. The Speaker is actively urging his ranks to fall in line and the White House has begun making calls to House Republicans, a source told The Hill.
But a mounting swell of resistance among fiscal hawks who want commitments on large spending cuts upfront is putting that plan in jeopardy.
Continue reading at The Hill
NASA may consolidate major facilities due to Trump cuts
But the space agency doesn’t expect mass layoffs, the acting administrator says.
NASA may consolidate work in some regional offices, shifting thousands of jobs, but has no plans for massive layoffs or the elimination of major departments, acting administrator Janet Petro said Monday.
The changes in the structure of the space agency’s work force reflect both an effort to cut costs and improve collaboration as the Trump administration pushes ambitious space goals, Petro told POLITICO.
“In the past that was never even allowed to be talked about,” she said in an interview, referring to the consolidation of some work.
Her comments on the sidelines at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs come as Elon Musk’s DOGE has slashed thousands of government jobs and the billionaire pursues his own space ambitions, both independently and as a NASA partner.
But Petro said there are good reasons to consider consolidating some of NASA’s operations.
“I think there would be a lot of stakeholder interest in that,” she said. Such a move could help drive efficiency by improving collaboration between NASA offices working on similar projects, said Petro, who herself heads the Kennedy Space Center.
She did not say how many jobs would be shifted under any possible reorganization plan.
Continue reading at Politico
West Wing Playbook: Remaking Government
Musk’s war against the trade war
Over the weekend, as countries across the globe scrambled to announce counter-measures against the United States in an escalating trade war and Americans held their breath in anticipation of a Monday morning market fiasco, Musk broke from Trump, saying he supported “free trade” with Europe.
“I hope it is agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero-tariff situation, effectively creating a free trade zone between Europe and North America,” Musk said Saturday at an event hosted by the far-right Italian Deputy Prime Minister MATTEO SALVINI. Musk added: “That has certainly been my advice to the president.”
His comments came in sharp contrast to Trump’s own take on the European Union, which he hit last week with 20 percent “liberation day” tariffs on all imports, on top of the 25 percent tariffs he had imposed on steel and aluminum exports last month. “They rip us off. It’s so sad to see. It’s so pathetic,” Trump said of the EU, historically one of the U.S.’s closest allies.
Musk also slammed Trump’s top trade adviser, PETER NAVARRO, responding to an X post about Navarro’s Harvard economics doctorate that “A PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing.”
“He ain’t built shit,” Musk added in a follow-up post, which has since been deleted.
Navarro hit back Sunday, saying on Fox News that Musk is “in Texas assembling cars that have big parts of that car from Mexico, China — the batteries come from Japan or China; the electronics come from Taiwan.”
“We understand what’s going on here,” Navarro added. “Elon sells cars. He’s simply protecting his own interests.”
The tiff underscores a central tension of Musk’s position in Trump’s political movement. “America First” is an ideology that condemns globalism and hopes to usher in a new era of protectionism and isolationism that will jumpstart a stagnated U.S. manufacturing sector. As Sen. BERNIE MORENO (R-Ohio) put it today on X, “factories across Ohio that once employed thousands of autoworkers are sitting empty thanks to decades of bad deals from globalist politicians in DC.”
“What has the globalist economy gotten the United States of America?” Vice President JD VANCE asked last week on Fox News. “Incurring a huge amount of debt to buy things that other countries make for us.”
The issue for Musk is that he is a globalist.
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That work wardrobe you need? Fuhget it for the next four years | Blog#42
If you’re a white collar worker, one of the costs of working is having to maintain a work-appropriate wardrobe, and pencilling in time at your favorite department store at your local upscale mall. No matter what kind of work you do, if you have children, you pencil in a trip to the local mall to buy children’s clothing, with time at their favorite restaurant for a burger and dessert.