Donald Trump

Subterms

    More stories

    • 138 Shares149 Views

      in US Politics

      From friends to foes: how Trump turned on the Federalist Society

      by

      The world’s attention last week was gripped by Donald Trump’s abrupt fallout with the tech tycoon Elon Musk. Yet at the same time, and with the help of a rather unflattering epithet, the president has also stoked a rift between his Maga royal court and the conservative legal movement whose judges and lawyers have been crucial in pulling the US judiciary to the right.The word was “sleazebag”, which Trump deployed as part of a lengthy broadside on Truth Social, his social media platform. The targets of his wrath were the Federalist Society, an influential conservative legal organization, and Leonard Leo, a lawyer associated with the group who has, in recent years, branched out to become one of the most powerful rightwing kingmakers in the US.In his post, Trump said that during his first term “it was suggested that I use The Federalist Society as a recommending source on Judges. I did so, openly and freely, but then realized that they were under the thumb of a real ‘sleazebag’ named Leonard Leo, a bad person who, in his own way, probably hates America, and obviously has his own separate ambitions. He openly brags how he controls Judges, and even Justices of the United States Supreme Court – I hope that is not so, and don’t believe it is!”Founded in 1982, the Federalist Society is an important player in the conservative movement. Many conservative lawyers, judges, law students and law clerks are members of the group, attend its events or run in its general orbit. Republican presidents use its recommendations to pick judges for vacant judicial seats.In the days following Trump’s Truth Social harangue, people in the conservative legal world, which is centered in Washington DC but spans law schools and judge’s chambers across the country, are wondering what this rift portends. Is this a classic Trump tantrum that will soon blow over? Or does it speak to a larger schism, with even the famously conservative Federalist Society not rightwing enough – or fanatically loyal enough – to satisfy Trump?“I don’t think this will blow over,” Stuart Gerson, a conservative attorney and a former acting US attorney general, said. “Because it’s not an event. It’s a condition … He thinks judges are his judges, and they’re there to support his policies, rather than the oath that they take [to the constitution].”In recent months, Trump has been stymied repeatedly by court rulings by federal judges. His rage has been particularly acute when the judges are ones whom he or other Republican presidents appointed. The Maga world has turned aggressively against Amy Coney Barrett, for example, after the supreme court justice voted contrary to the Trump line in several key cases.The immediate cause of Trump’s recent outburst was a ruling by the US court of international trade against his sweeping tariffs on foreign goods. In this case, his anger appears to have had less to do with the judges than with the fact that a group of conservative lawyers and academics, including one who co-chairs the board of the Federalist Society, had filed a brief in the case challenging his tariffs.Trump is probably also aware that the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), an anti-regulation, pro-free market legal group affiliated with Leo and the billionaire Charles Koch, has sued, separately, to stop the tariffs.John Vecchione, an attorney at the NCLA, noted that the Federalist Society is a broad tent, with conservative jurists of many different inclinations and factions, including free marketeers and libertarians who do not subscribe to Trump’s economic nationalism. Members often disagree with each other or find themselves on different sides of a case. This February, a federal prosecutor affiliated with the group, Danielle Sassoon, resigned after she said the Trump administration tried to pressure her to drop a case.The “real question”, Vecchione said, is what diehard Maga lawyers closest to Trump are telling him.“Are they trying to form a new organization? Or are they trying to do to the Federalist Society what they’ve done to the House Republican caucus, for instance … where nobody wants to go up against Trump on anything?” he said. “I think that some of the people around Trump believe that any right-coded organization has to do his bidding.”A newer legal organization, the Article III Project (A3P), appears to have captured Trump’s ear in his second term. The organization was founded by Mike Davis, a rabidly pro-Trump lawyer, and seems to be positioning itself as a Maga alternative to the Federalist Society. On its website, A3P claims to have “helped confirm” three supreme court justices, 55 federal circuit judges and 13 federal appellate judges.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionDavis recently asserted in the Hill that the Federalist Society “abandoned” Trump during his various recent legal travails. “And not only did they abandon him – they had several [Federalist Society] leaders who participated in the lawfare and threw gas on the fire,” Davis said.Although Leo was a “a close ally” of Trump during his first term, the Wall Street Journal reported, Trump and Leo “haven’t spoken in five years”.Leo has responded to Trump’s outburst delicately. In a short statement, he said he was “very grateful for President Trump transforming the federal courts, and it was a privilege being involved”, adding that the reshaping of the federal bench would be “President Trump’s most important legacy”.Yet this Tuesday, a lengthy piece in the Wall Street Journal – pointedly titled “This Conservative Is Doing Just Fine, Thank You, After Getting Dumped by Trump” – argued that Leo is “unbounded by the pressures of re-election or dependence on outside money”, and is the “rare conservative, who, after being cast out of Trump’s inner circle, remains free to pursue his own vision of what will make America great again”. In 2021, a Chicago billionaire gave Leo a $1.6bn political donation, thought to be the largest such donation in US history. As a result, Leo has an almost unprecedented power in terms of dark-money influence.The article also noted that much of Leo’s focus has shifted to the entertainment industry, where he is funding big-budget television series and films that channel conservative values.Vecchione thinks that Trump’s tendency to surround himself with sycophants and loyalists will work against him.“If you have a lawyer who only tells you what makes you happy, and only does what you say to do, you don’t have a good lawyer,” Vecchione said. “That’s not a good way to get lawyers. Not a good way to get judges, either.” More

    • 175 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Stop bending the knee to Trump: it’s time for anticipatory noncompliance | David Kirp

      by

      During the first 100-plus days of his presidency, Donald Trump has done his damnedest to remake the US in his image. Fearing Hurricane Donald, a host of universities, law firms, newspapers, public schools and Fortune 500 companies have rushed to do his bidding, bowing before he even comes calling. Other institutions cower, in hopes that they will go unnoticed.But this behavior, which social scientists call “anticipatory compliance”, smoothes the way to autocracy because it gives the Trump regime unlimited power without his having to lift a finger. Halting autocracy in its tracks demands a counter-strategy – let’s call it anticipatory noncompliance.Examples of anticipatory compliance are legion.Goodbye, academic freedom: Trump means to impose his anti-intellectual ideology on higher education. He is using unproven allegations of antisemitism and claims of discriminatory diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs as an excuse to punish top-ranked private universities – initially hapless Columbia, then other schools including Harvard, Princeton, Cornell and Northwestern – by withholding billions of dollars in federal grants. My own university, the University of California, Berkeley, anticipates that it will be added to this list when Trump turns his attention to nationally renowned public universities.“Be afraid” is the message for every university – threats to withhold funds from schools that use “woke” language have prompted some that aren’t even under the gun to censor themselves, excising words like “race”, “gender”, “class” and “equity” from course titles and curriculums.Anticipatory compliance also affects the actions of public schools. Worried that, because of their alleged “wokeness”, they will lose the federal dollars that deliver extra help to those who need it most, school systems have altered their curriculum to whitewash the historical record and restrict the literature available to students. Adieu, Toni Morrison and Rosa Parks.Goodbye, free press: Disney and Meta shelled out a combined $40m to settle baseless libel lawsuits brought by Trump, and Paramount is negotiating to make Trump’s spurious 60 Minutes lawsuit disappear.On the eve of the 2024 election, Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder and the owner of the Washington Post, pulled an editorial endorsing Kamala Harris, to stay in Trump’s good graces. So did the Los Angeles Times, whose owner is a billionaire businessman.Goodbye, legal representation: Nine leading law firms succumbed to blackmail to get rid of the president’s executive orders that punished a few firms for displeasing him. Collectively, they agreed to provide more than $1bn worth of pro bono legal work to causes of Trump’s choosing. Now they’re being asked to defend the coal industry and tariffs, which surely isn’t what they expected.What’s more, some top-drawer firms have stopped providing pro bono work on immigration lawsuits and other hot topic issues. Instead, they are putting their talent at Trump’s disposal, neutering themselves while the White House makes mincemeat of the rule of law.Hello, toadying: To curry favor and avoid ridicule in a Trump tweet, dozens of major companies, ranging from Amazon to Pepsi, are treating the president as if he were king, reducing or abandoning their DEI programs without being specifically threatened.Those who bend the knee rationalize their actions as simply a prudent survival strategy. But that’s delusory, for the historical record shows that anticipatory compliance paves the road to autocracy. Bullies like Trump always demand more from their supplicants – more money, more abandoning principles, more loyalty-oath behavior. Anticipatory compliance feeds the beast, showing authoritarians how much they can get away with.Here’s the good news – anticipatory noncompliance is on the rise. Challenges to Trump’s unconstitutional actions have emerged in higher and K-12 education, the legal profession and the corporate world. The citizenry is now making its voice heard.Spearheaded by Harvard’s defiant pose, a growing number of colleges and universities are pushing back against Trump’s outrageous demands. A recent statement from hundreds of college administrators declared that “we speak with one voice against the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education”. Faculty senates in the Big 10 Academic Alliance crafted a “mutual defense compact”; behind the scenes, the presidents of about 10 elite private universities are deciding what red lines they won’t cross.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionRather than meekly comply with Trump’s monarchical demand that public schools eliminate DEI initiatives or risk losing federal funds, 19 states have gone to court, contesting the administration’s contorted reading of civil rights law.The CEOs that scaled back their companies’ diversity programs misread the market and have suffered the consequences. Diversity is a popular goal that many investors and consumers take into account in their decisions. When Target rolled back DEI, the company had to confront a consumer boycott and a 17% stock drop. Meanwhile, corporations like Costco and Apple, which have stood firm, are on buyers’ and investors’ good guy list.Several law firms refused to cave in the face of Trump’s blackmail tactics, instead taking the administration to court. Not only is that the right thing to do; it could turn out to be the profitable course. The judges are unequivocally on their side. And when Microsoft dropped a firm that surrendered to Trump, signing on with a firm that’s taking the administration to court, it signaled that virtue may be financially rewarded.After months of quiescence, with the populace overwhelmed by the tsunami of outrages, popular opposition is emerging. On May Day, tens of thousands of demonstrators participated in nearly 1,000 anti-Trump demonstrations.Restoring democracy is no easy task, for it is infinitely easier to destroy than rebuild. It will take a years-long fight that deploys an arsenal of tactics, ranging from mass demonstrations and consumer boycotts to litigation and political organizing. It’s grueling work, but if autocracy is to be defeated there’s no option. “Not everything that is faced can be changed; but nothing can be changed until it is faced,” observed James Baldwin, in a 1962 New York Times article. A half-century later, that message still rings true.What’s giving me hope nowCourts have stood firm in their defense of the rule of law, pushing back against Trump’s power-grab executive orders. Americans are participating in mass demonstrations nationwide and voting for Democratic candidates in local elections. What’s more, Americans are voting with their wallets – spurred by a consumer boycott, the value of Tesla shares has plunged by close to $700bn from its peak a year ago.

      David Kirp is professor emeritus at the Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley More

    • 125 Shares159 Views

      in US Politics

      How can Trump use the national guard on US soil?

      by

      Donald Trump said on Saturday he’s deploying 2,000 California national guard troops to Los Angeles to respond to immigration protests, over the objections of the California governor, Gavin Newsom.Here are some things to know about when and how the president can deploy troops on US soil.The laws are a bit vagueGenerally, federal military forces are not allowed to carry out civilian law enforcement duties against US citizens except in times of emergency.An 18th-century wartime law called the Insurrection Act is the main legal mechanism a president can use to activate the military or national guard during times of rebellion or unrest. But Trump didn’t invoke the Insurrection Act on Saturday.Instead, he relied on a similar federal law that allows the president to federalize national guard troops under certain circumstances.The national guard is a hybrid entity that serves both state and federal interests. Often, it operates under state command and control, using state funding. Sometimes national guard troops will be assigned by their state to serve federal missions, remaining under state command but using federal funding.The law cited by Trump’s proclamation places national guard troops under federal command. The law says this can be done under three circumstances: when the US is invaded or in danger of invasion; when there is a rebellion or danger of rebellion against the authority of the US government; or when the president is unable to “execute the laws of the United States”, with regular forces.But the law also says that orders for those purposes “shall be issued through the governors of the States”. It’s not immediately clear whether the president can activate national guard troops without the order of that state’s governor.The role of the national guard troops will be limitedTrump’s proclamation says the national guard troops will play a supporting role by protecting US immigration officers as they enforce the law, rather than having the troops perform law enforcement work.Steve Vladeck, a professor at the Georgetown University Law Center who specializes in military justice and national security law, says that’s because national guard troops can’t legally engage in ordinary law enforcement activities unless Trump first invokes the Insurrection Act.Vladeck said the move raises the risk that the troops could end up using force while filling that “protection” role. The move could also be a precursor to other, more aggressive troop deployments down the road, he wrote on his website.“There’s nothing these troops will be allowed to do that, for example, the ICE officers against whom these protests have been directed could not do themselves,” Vladeck wrote.Troops have been mobilized beforeThe Insurrection Act and related laws were used during the civil rights era to protect activists and students desegregating schools. Dwight Eisenhower sent the 101st airborne to Little Rock, Arkansas, to protect Black students integrating Central high school after that state’s governor activated the national guard to keep the students out.George HW Bush used the Insurrection Act to respond to riots in Los Angeles in 1992 after the acquittal of white police officers who were videotaped beating Black motorist Rodney King.National guard troops have been deployed for a variety of emergencies, including the Covid pandemic, hurricanes and other natural disasters. But generally, those deployments are carried out with the agreements of the governors of the responding states.Trump is willing to use the military on home soilIn 2020, Trump asked governors of several states to deploy their national guard troops to Washington DC to quell protests that arose after George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis police officer. Many of the governors agreed, sending troops to the federal district.At the time, Trump also threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act for protests following Floyd’s death in Minneapolis – an intervention rarely seen in modern American history. But then defense secretary Mark Esper pushed back, saying the law should be invoked “only in the most urgent and dire of situations”.Trump never did invoke the Insurrection Act during his first term.But while campaigning for his second term, he suggested that would change. Trump told an audience in Iowa in 2023 that he had been prevented from using the military to suppress violence in cities and states during his first term, and said that if the issue came up again in his next term: “I’m not waiting.”Trump also promised to deploy the national guard to help carry out his immigration enforcement goals, and his top adviser, Stephen Miller, explained how that would be carried out: sympathetic Republican governors would send troops to nearby states that refused to participate, Miller said on The Charlie Kirk Show in 2023.After Trump announced he was federalizing the national guard troops on Saturday, the defense secretary Pete Hegseth said other measures could follow.Hegseth wrote on the social media platform X that active-duty Marines at Camp Pendleton were on high alert and would also be mobilized “if violence continues”. More

    • 213 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Trump news at a glance: ‘This is not justice’ – the uprising over Ice raids on LA

      by

      Donald Trump’s homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, on Saturday pushed back against the protesters opposing immigration raids in Los Angeles: “A message to the LA rioters: you will not stop us or slow us down. @Icegov will continue to enforce the law. And if you lay a hand on a law enforcement officer, you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”Stephen Miller, an immigration hardliner and the White House deputy chief of staff, described the protests as a “violent insurrection”. During protests at a federal detention facility in downtown LA, David Huerta, a senior union official, was arrested in a police response that included teargas and flash-bangs. Hospitalised for his injuries, Huerta released a statement: “Hard-working people, and members of our family and our community, are being treated like criminals. We all collectively have to object to this madness because this is not justice.”Following are the key Trump administration stories of the day:National guard pitted against LA immigration raid protests The Trump administration will deploy the national guard to immigration protests in Los Angeles, the border czar, Tom Homan, said on Saturday, as an immigration crackdown in the area erupted into mass protests with police in riot gear deploying teargas at bystanders. Arrests by immigration authorities in Los Angeles come as Donald Trump and his administration push to fulfil promises to carry out mass deportations across the country.Read the full story‘Very serious consequences’ if Musk switched to DemocratsTrump warned Elon Musk on Saturday that he faces “very serious consequences” if he funds Democratic candidates following the pair’s epic public bust-up. He said in an NBC News interview to be broadcast on Sunday: “If he does, he’ll have to pay the consequences for that. He’ll have to pay very serious consequences if he does that.” Trump said he had no intention to speak to Musk and no wish to repair his relationship with Musk. “I’m too busy doing other things.”Read the full storyVance plays down ‘Elon flying off the handle’JD Vance said Elon Musk was making a “huge mistake” going after Donald Trump. “I hope that eventually Elon comes back into the fold. Maybe that’s not possible now because he’s gone so nuclear … Look, it happens to everybody. I’ve flown off the handle way worse than Elon Musk did in the last 24 hours … I actually think if Elon chilled out a little bit, everything would be fine.”Read the full storyTravel ban ‘racist and hostile’, says Iranian governmentTehran denounced the US travel ban on Iranians and citizens of 11 other mostly Middle Eastern and African countries, saying it was a sign of a “racist mentality”. Donald Trump signed the executive order on Wednesday. Alireza Hashemi-Raja, an Iranian foreign ministry official responsible for Iranians abroad, said the measure – which takes effect on 9 June – “indicates the deep hostility of American decision-makers towards the Iranian and Muslim people”.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      Lauren Gambino profiles Kristy Noem, Donald Trump’s homeland security secretary: “Noem leads the sprawling department at the heart of the president’s hardline vision to carry out the largest deportation campaign in American history.”

      An international neo-Nazi terrorist organization calling itself the Base is continuing to build in the US and planning a new paramilitary training event – as the FBI under Trump appointee Kash Patel has signalled it is no longer prioritizing investigations of far-right extremism. Ben Makuch reports
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 6 June 2025. More

    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Trump warns Musk of ‘very serious consequences’ if he backs Democrats

      by

      Donald Trump warned Elon Musk on Saturday that he faces “very serious consequences” if he funds Democratic candidates following the pair’s epic public bust-up this week.The warning, delivered in an interview with NBC News scheduled to broadcast on Sunday, follows days of feuding and threats after Musk called Republicans’ budget legislation an “abomination”.Trump told interviewer Kristen Welker his relationship with the tech mogul was over and warned Musk against choosing to fund Democrats after spending close to $300m in support of Trump’s re-election last year.“If he does, he’ll have to pay the consequences for that,” Trump told NBC News. “He’ll have to pay very serious consequences if he does that,” he added.Trump was also asked whether he had any wish to repair his relationship with Musk. “No,” he said. Asked whether he thought their relationship was over, he said: “I would assume so, yeah,” and said he had no plans to speak with his erstwhile sidekick.“I’m too busy doing other things,” Trump said, adding: “I have no intention of speaking to him.”But he predicted that the spat had helped to unify the Republican party around him, saying the “party has never been united like this before. It’s never been. It’s actually more so than it was three days ago.”Musk’s opposition to the Republican budget bill, formally the “one big beautiful bill act”, would not, he predicted, affect its passage through Congress. The bill narrowly passed the House and is now under consideration in the Senate. However, some conservative Republicans share Musk’s concerns about the need for significant spending cuts and are considering making changes.The bill extends Trump’s 2017 tax cuts and includes new spending for border security and the military. Republicans aimed to offset these costs with cuts to programmes such as Medicaid, food stamps and green-energy tax credits.Projections from the congressional budget office and independent analysts indicate that the bill would add between $2.3tn and $5tn to the deficit over the next 10 years. White House officials contend that the economic growth generated by tax cuts will offset the increased spending.Still, Trump told NBC he is “very confident” that the bill will pass the Senate before 4 July.“I think, actually, Elon brought out the strengths of the bill because people that weren’t as focused started focusing on it, and they see how good it is,” Trump said. “So in that sense, there was a big favor. But I think Elon, really, I think it’s a shame that he’s so depressed and so heartbroken.”He also accused Musk of being “disrespectful to the office of the president”.“I think it’s a very bad thing, because he’s very disrespectful. You could not disrespect the office of the president,” he said.Earlier, Musk deleted a post from X, the social media platform he owns, that asserted links between Trump and disgraced US financier Jeffrey Epstein.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionQuestioned about the inflammatory post, Trump said: “That’s called ‘old news’, that’s been old news, that has been talked about for years. Even Epstein’s lawyer said I had nothing to do with it. It’s old news.”Musk has also retracted a threat to begin “decommissioning” SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft used by Nasa to ferry astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station.The original threat came after Trump suggested he might cancel SpaceX’s federal contracts. On Saturday, the president said he hadn’t given the subject any more thought.“I’d be allowed to do that,” he said, “but I haven’t given it any thought.”Earlier on Saturday, JD Vance told interviewer and comedian Theo Von that Musk was making a “huge mistake” going after Trump, but downplayed Musk’s attacks as being made by an “emotional guy” who got frustrated.“I hope that eventually Elon comes back into the fold. Maybe that’s not possible now because he’s gone so nuclear,” the vice-president said.But he added: “Look, it happens to everybody. I’ve flown off the handle way worse than Elon Musk did in the last 24 hours.”“I actually think if Elon chilled out a little bit, everything would be fine,” Vance said.David Smith contributed reporting More

    • 150 Shares119 Views

      in US Politics

      JD Vance says Elon Musk’s attack against Trump is a ‘huge mistake’

      by

      JD Vance said Elon Musk was making a “huge mistake” going after Donald Trump in a storm of bitter and inflammatory social media posts after a falling-out between the two men.But the US vice-president, in an interview released on Friday after the very public blowup between the world’s richest person and arguably the world’s most powerful, also tried to downplay Musk’s blistering attacks as an “emotional guy” who got frustrated.“I hope that eventually Elon comes back into the fold. Maybe that’s not possible now because he’s gone so nuclear,” Vance said.Vance’s comments come as other Republicans in recent days have urged the two men, who months ago were close allies spending significant time together, to mend fences.Musk’s torrent of social media posts attacking Trump came as the president portrayed him as disgruntled and “CRAZY” and threatened to cut the government contracts held by his businesses.Musk, who runs electric vehicle maker Tesla, internet company Starlink and rocket company SpaceX, lambasted Trump’s centerpiece tax cuts and spending bill but also suggested the president should be impeached and claimed without evidence that the government was concealing information about Trump’s association with infamous pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.“Look, it happens to everybody,” Vance said in the interview. “I’ve flown off the handle way worse than Elon Musk did in the last 24 hours.”Vance made the comments in an interview with “manosphere” comedian Theo Von, who last month joked about snorting drugs off a mixed-race baby and the sexuality of men in the US navy when he opened for Trump at a military base in Qatar.The vice-president told Von that as Musk for days was calling on social media for Congress to kill Trump’s “big, beautiful bill”, the president was “getting a little frustrated, feeling like some of the criticisms were unfair coming from Elon, but I think has been very restrained because the president doesn’t think that he needs to be in a blood feud with Elon Musk”.“I actually think if Elon chilled out a little bit, everything would be fine,” he added.Musk appeared by Saturday morning to have deleted his posts about Epstein.The interview was taped on Thursday as Musk’s posts were unfurling on X, the social media network the billionaire owns.During the interview, Von showed the vice-president Musk’s claim that Trump’s administration hasn’t released all the records related to sex abuser Jeffrey Epstein because Trump is mentioned in them.Vance responded to that, saying: “Absolutely not. Donald Trump didn’t do anything wrong with Jeffrey Epstein.”“This stuff is just not helpful,” Vance said in response to another post shared by Musk calling for Trump to be impeached and replaced with Vance.“It’s totally insane. The president is doing a good job.”Vance called Musk an “incredible entrepreneur”, and said that Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency”, which sought to cut government spending and laid off or pushed out thousands of workers, was “really good”.The vice-president also defended the bill that has drawn Musk’s ire, and said its central goal was not to cut spending but to extend the 2017 tax cuts approved in Trump’s first term.The bill would slash spending but also leave about 10.9 million more people without health insurance and increase debt by $2.4tn over the decade, according to the nonpartisan congressional budget office.Musk has warned that the bill will increase the federal debt and called it a “disgusting abomination”.“It’s a good bill,” Vance said. “It’s not a perfect bill.”He also said it was ridiculous for some House Republicans who voted for the bill to later object to some parts and claim they hadn’t had time to read it.Vance said the text had been available for weeks and said: “The idea that people haven’t had an opportunity to actually read it is ridiculous.”Elsewhere in the interview, Vance laughed as Von cracked jokes about famed abolitionist Frederick Douglass’s sexuality.“We’re gonna talk to the Smithsonian about putting up an exhibit on that,” Vance joked. “And Theo Von, you can be the narrator for this new understanding of the history of Frederick Douglass.”The podcaster also asked the vice-president if he “got high” on election night to celebrate Trump’s victory.Vance laughed and joked that he wouldn’t admit it if he did.“I did not get high,” he then said. “I did have a fair amount to drink that night.”The interview was taped in Nashville at a restaurant owned by musician Kid Rock, a Trump ally. More

    • 238 Shares109 Views

      in US Politics

      ‘I’m paranoid all the time’: surveillance and fear in a city of immigrants as White House ramps up deportations

      by

      Two months after fleeing death threats in Colombia, Juan landed a construction job in New York. But on his first day, the bulky GPS monitor strapped to his ankle caught the manager’s attention. It wouldn’t fit inside standard work boots. The boss shook his head. “Come back when you’ve resolved your status,” he said.Since arriving in the US with his teenage daughter to seek asylum, Juan has lived in a state of constant anxiety. “It feels like I committed a crime, like they’re going to arrest me at any moment,” he said, speaking near the migrant shelter where they now live in Queens. Juan started wearing oversized pants to hide the monitor, a style he finds uncomfortable. “I’m paranoid all the time,” he said.Genesis, a 25-year-old from Panama, lives in the same shelter as Juan with her two-year-old. She has worn an ankle monitor for more than 18 months. “When I go to the park with my son, other parents don’t want their kids to play with him,” she said. The stigma of the monitor, she added, makes her feel like a bad mother. Genesis fled after members of Tren de Aragua, a transnational criminal group from Venezuela, threatened her life there, she said.Juan and Genesis are among the more than 12,000 immigrants in New York enrolled in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) schemes called Alternatives to Detention (ATD) and the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program (ISAP).View image in fullscreenMost of them are asylum seekers from Central or South America who came to the city seeking safety and the chance to work, according to a recent report from the American Bar Association, a national group of lawyers. They don’t have any criminal convictions, yet without legal status, they live under constant surveillance as their cases wend their way through the badly backed-up US immigration court system.Under ATD-ISAP, people can be monitored through GPS ankle bracelets, wrist-worn trackers, telephone check-ins or a mobile app called SmartLINK.The number of undocumented people under electronic monitoring related to their lack of immigration status alone is believed to have more than doubled since 2021, when the number in the US was about 85,000, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (Trac) at Syracuse University, although the organization “advises the public to be extremely cautious” about data on this from Ice.Ice’s internal budget for ATD-ISAP has increased from $28m in 2006 to nearly $470m by the end of 2024.While attention in the second Trump administration has been on detention and deportation, electronic monitoring is still a significant factor in many immigrants’ lives and has been increasingly so in recent years.Ice promotes ATD-ISAP as a “humane and cost-effective” alternative to detention, but while it is certainly better than being locked up, lawyers and advocates argue it embeds unnecessary state control into homes, workplaces and public spaces, trapping people in cycles of fear, stigma and instability.View image in fullscreenThose assigned body-worn monitors often report skin irritation, discomfort and the need for frequent charging. When the battery runs low, the device emits a loud alert that draws unwanted attention. “People made comments while I was working at McDonald’s. I’m not a criminal,” Genesis said. Even routine activities like showering can trigger connectivity issues, leading to phone calls from ISAP officers or sudden demands for in-person check-ins.SmartLINK, by contrast, requires participants to submit geotagged selfies, typically once a week, rather than being tracked continuously throughout the day.ATD-ISAP is managed by BI Incorporated, a subsidiary of the private prison giant Geo Group. In 2020, Donald Trump’s first administration awarded the company a five-year, $2.2bn contract.Regardless of the type of surveillance assigned, participants remain under acute risk of arrest and deportation. Some have started the asylum application process; others came relatively recently from Texas when that state was bussing asylum seekers to Democratic-led cities, and so far are merely trying to find their footing, perhaps a lawyer and some advice about starting the process to get papers and a work permit.View image in fullscreenThey are expected to report in person to the ISAP office with little notice. The office is located in a basement near Ice’s 26 Federal Plaza headquarters in lower Manhattan. Appointments are usually scheduled during working hours, forcing many to miss work, arrange childcare or lose out on daily wages, all while being in terror of arrest and summary detention.On weekday mornings, people can be seen lining up outside the building while anxious loved ones wait nearby. “It’s very difficult to have a normal life,” said a man from Guatemala whose wife has been monitored for three years. He asked to remain anonymous. “We can’t even leave the city,” he added.Some people enrolled in the ADP program were arrested amid record enforcement earlier this week, NBC reported, in a national ramping-up of efforts on the orders of senior Trump administration officials, including in New York.The effects of surveillance aren’t limited to those being tracked. Entire neighborhoods are feeling its presence.Liliana Torres, a psychologist who offers weekly mental health support in Spanish to newly arrived immigrants, said that cameras, patrol cars and even the sound of sirens regularly spark panic among her clients. “Everyday elements of the city become triggers,” she said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThis fear is especially felt in areas of the city such as Corona, home to New York’s largest Latin American immigrant community. Local business owners reported a noticeable drop in customers the first few months of the Trump administration.View image in fullscreen“People think they’re going to take all of us,” said a nail salon worker who asked to remain anonymous due to concerns around her legal status. “But we can’t afford to stay home. We have to work.”Vendors at Corona Plaza say police presence has increased in recent months, especially since the launch of Operation Roosevelt last fall, a citywide crackdown on unlicensed vending and sex work. The measures disproportionately affected undocumented residents. Neighbors and advocates worry the heightened enforcement signals deeper coordination between the New York police department and federal immigration authorities.“There’s a noticeable uptick in the use of digital surveillance tools, including social media monitoring and data-sharing with local agencies,” said Veronica Cardenas, an immigration attorney who left her role as an Ice prosecutor in 2023 after witnessing first-hand the treatment immigrants receive. “More people who would have previously been considered low priority are now at risk.”View image in fullscreenFear spreads online, too. “We see people on TikTok saying Ice is coming when it isn’t,” said Niurka Meléndez, founder of Venezuelans and Immigrants Aid (VIA), a volunteer-run group that connects asylum seekers to legal and social services. “Or worse, spreading confusion about immigration law.”VIA has been leading a regular event called Miracle Mondays at the St Paul & St Andrew United Methodist church in Manhattan since 2022. Once considered sanctuary spaces, churches are no longer off limits to Ice, prompting VIA to take extra precautions. Event locations are now shared privately via WhatsApp, rather than being posted publicly on social media.In response to growing fears, the Venezuelan-led group has also started organizing legal clinics in neighborhoods such as Corona to reach those too afraid to attend the church. At one such event in March, dozens of Latin American migrants gathered to ask lawyers from the New York Legal Assistance Group how they could regularize their immigration status.“If I give birth here and they deport me, will they keep my baby?” asked Stefani, a Venezuelan woman eight months pregnant. One lawyer responded cautiously, explaining that while she would have the right to bring her baby with her, the government can still act in ways that disregard the law. Lawyers also handed out one-page notices saying that individuals with pending asylum cases cannot be detained without due process.View image in fullscreenLocal community groups such as Ice Watch have adapted to this new climate by educating communities about their rights. Ice Watch tracks immigration enforcement and sends real-time alerts via encrypted Signal chats across the five boroughs. Its members also conduct training to teach people how to recognize Ice agents, document encounters and support those being targeted. Social workers, English teachers activists and small business owners are often among those who attend.For Juan, who fled Colombia after gang members shot his father in the head, life in New York has come at the cost of constant paranoia and a sense that genuine safety remains out of reach. His 16-year-old daughter notices everything. “She sees how I live and blames herself,” he said. At times, they’ve talked about returning to Colombia, but the risk of being kidnapped and tortured by mobsters is very real for him and his family.“I fear something worse than death could happen if I go back,” Juan said.Despite the stress, he holds on to small signs of progress, such as watching his daughter attend school and slowly but steadily pick up English. “I need to give her at least the option to have a better life than I had,” he said. More

    • 200 Shares99 Views

      in US Politics

      Federal prosecutor reportedly quit over concern Ábrego García indictment was politically motivated – as it happened

      by

      A career federal prosecutor resigned in protest the same day that charges were filed against Kilmar Ábrego García, following an investigation that apparently began after the mistaken deportation of the Maryland resident became a legal and political headache for the Trump administration, ABC News reports.Ben Schrader, announced his resignation as the chief of the criminal division at the US attorney’s office for the Middle District of Tennessee in a LinkedIn post on 21 May, the same day the indictment of Ábrego García was signed by the acting US attorney for that district.Sources told ABC News that Schrader stepped down because of concerns that the case was being pursued for political reasons.“Earlier today, after nearly 15 years as an Assistant United States Attorney, I resigned as Chief of the Criminal Division at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee”, Schrader wrote on LinkedIn that day. “It has been an incredible privilege to serve as a prosecutor with the Department of Justice, where the only job description I’ve ever known is to do the right thing, in the right way, for the right reasons. I wish all of my colleagues at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Nashville and across the Department the best as they seek to do justice on behalf of the American people.”At a news conference on Friday, the attorney general, Pam Bondi, refused to say exactly when the investigation that led to the charges was opened, but she told reporters that the indictment was based on “recently found facts” about a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, and that “thanks to the bright light that has been shined on Ábrego García, this investigation continued”.The indictment was signed by Robert McGuire, who has been the acting US attorney in Nashville since December, and three senior prosecutors from the justice department’s Joint Task Force Vulcan, which was created during the first Trump administration “to dismantle MS-13”.This brings our live coverage of the second Trump administration to a close for the day. Here are some of the latest developments:

      Kilmar Ábrego García, a Maryland resident who was deported to El Salvador in violation of a court order, was returned to the United States and charged with the criminal smuggling of undocumented immigrants inside the United States.

      Ben Schrader, a career federal prosecutor, reportedly resigned in protest the same day that charges were filed against Ábrego García, following an investigation that apparently began after the mistaken deportation became a legal and political headache for the Trump administration.

      Donald Trump suggested that court orders to his administration to return Ábrego García to the US was a sign that “the judges are trying to take the place of a president that won in a landslide”.

      One day after his feud with Elon Musk exploded Trump claimed that he was far too busy to think about the billionaire donor who had accused him of sex crimes and called for his impeachment. That claim was undermined by the fact that Trump spent a chunk of his morning on the phone with at least three television reporters, gossiping about Musk.

      Two federal appeals court judges appointed by Trump overturned a lower court ruling to allow him to resume punishing the Associated Press for continuing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico by that name instead of the new one Trump gave it.
      Two judges appointed by Donald Trump to a federal appeals court ruled in his favor on Friday, allowing him to resume blocking the Associated Press from covering him at events in the Oval Office, on Air Force One and in his Mar-A-Lago club.The 2-1 ruling was written by US circuit judge Neomi Rao, who served in Trump’s first administration, and joined by fellow Trump appointee Gregory Katsas.The divided ruling by the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit temporarily blocks an order by another Trump appointed judge, US district judge Trevor McFadden, who had ruled in April that the Trump administration had to allow AP journalists access to events while the news agency’s lawsuit moves forward.The AP sued after Trump banned the news organization for refusing to follow him in referring to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.The court left in place part of a lower-court order that required Trump to give AP access to events held in larger spaces, like the East Room of the White House.The Department of Homeland Security conducted raids on multiple locations across Los Angeles on Friday, clashing with the crowds of people who gathered to protest.Masked agents were recorded pulling several people out of two LA-area Home Depot stores and the clothing manufacturer Ambient Apparel’s headquarters in LA’s Fashion District.There has not yet been confirmation of how many people were taken into custody, but initial estimates provided by news helicopter reports shows roughly two dozen people were loaded into white vans and taken away.Armed agents clad in heavy protective and tactical gear, including some who wore gas masks, could also be seen pushing individuals and trying to corral large groups that congregated to challenge the raids, and smoke grenades were reportedly thrown near the crowds. Pepper spray was used as the federal officers attempted to clear the area.Speaking to reporters on Air Force One on Friday, Donald Trump suggested that some sort of unspecified action needed to be taken against federal judges who ordered his administration to bring the wrongly deported Maryland resident Kilmar Ábrego García back from El Salvador.Trump continued to insist that the supreme court’s order requiring his administration to bring Ábrego García back to the United States was incorrect. “He should’ve never had to be returned”, Trump said. “Either way it’s a total disaster – this is a pretty bad guy.”In comments posted on YouTube by the Washington Post, Trump seemed to give insight into the political calculation behind his administration’s decision to bring Ábrego García back, as the supreme court had ordered, but first indict him on new criminal charges.“I could see a decision being made” Trump said, “‘bring him back; show everybody how horrible this guy is’”.He then returned to his outrage at federal judges for not allowing him to deport people like Ábrego García who have been accused of crimes without giving them an opportunity to challenge the evidence against them in court.“Frankly, we have to do something, because the judges are trying to take the place of a president that won in a landslide” Trump said. “And that’s not supposed to be the way it is”.Trump seems convinced that Ábrego García is so obviously a gang member that there is no need for a trial. However, the president demonstrated in April that he is deeply confused about at least one piece of the supposed evidence.In a social media post in mid-April, Trump held up a photograph of the tattoos on Ábrego García’s hand, symbols that one corner of the internet is convinced represent the letters and numbers M,S,1 and 3, to signify that he is a member of the gang MS-13.In an interview with Terry Moran of ABC News two weeks later, though, Trump revealed that he had been confused by the photograph, which added the letters and numbers as a form of annotation. “He had MS-13 on his knuckles, tattooed”, Trump insisted to Moran. When Moran pointed out that the letters and numbers had been added to the photograph he held up to illustrate what people thought the four symbols represented, Trump made it clear that he had mistaken the annotation for part of the tattoo. “Go look at his hand”, Trump said.Now that Ábrego García is back in the United States and will be in court, new photographs of his hand will soon be available for Trump to inspect.During a brief news conference on Air Force One, en route to his golf course in New Jersey, Donald Trump told reporters that he has been far too busy to spend any time thinking about Elon Musk, his top donor and former aide who called for him to be impeached on Thursday.“Honestly, I’ve been so busy working on China, working on Russia, working on Iran, working on so many things, I’m not thinking about Elon” Trump said. “I just wish him well.”The president’s comment, one day after Musk accused him of having been involved in his late friend Jeffrey Epstein’s sex crimes, oddly echoed Trump’s response to a question about Epstein’s longtime companion, Ghislaine Maxwell, in 2020 when she was arrested and charged with helping Epstein recruit and sexually abuse girls.Back then, when Trump was asked during a coronavirus briefing in the White House if he expected Maxwell “to turn in powerful men”, he responded: “I don’t know, I haven’t really been following it too much. I just wish her well, frankly.”“I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach, and I guess they lived in Palm Beach. But I wish her well, whatever it is.”Maxwell was convicted in 2021 and sentenced to 20 years in jail the following year. Her prosecution was led by Damian Williams, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York. Williams later oversaw the indictment on New York’s mayor, Eric Adams, on corruption charges that were later dropped by the Trump administration.On Friday, Williams left the law firm Paul Weiss to join Jenner & Block, moving from a firm that struck a deal with Trump to one that fought him in court.Trump’s claim that he was far too busy on Friday to concern himself with Musk’s criticism was slightly undermined by the fact that he spent much of his morning at the White House talking about Musk to multiple reporters on the phone. When Jonathan Karl of ABC News called the president at 6:45 am, Trump picked up to talk about Musk and called him “a man who has lost his mind”. Trump also took time to tell Bret Baier of Fox, “Elon has totally lost it”. Trump also spoke to CNN’s Dana Bash, to insist: “I’m not even thinking about Elon, he’s got a problem, the poor guy’s got a problem”. Bash said that Trump also told her he wishes Elon well.Donald Trump, who is again enjoying a long weekend at one of his golf courses, took a moment to respond, obliquely, to Elon Musk’s unsourced claim on Thursday that the Trump administration has not released all of the files from the sex-trafficking investigation into Jeffrey Epstein because Trump is implicated in his late friend’s crimes.During an Air Force One flight to New Jersey on Friday, Trump shared a comment from David Schoen, a lawyer who defended the president at his second impeachment trial in 2021, over the January 6 riot.“I was hired to lead Jeffrey Epstein’s defense as his criminal lawyer 9 days before he died”, Schoen wrote on Musk’s social media platform X on Thursday. “He sought my advice for months before that. I can say authoritatively, unequivocally, and definitively that he had no information to hurt President Trump. I specifically asked him!”Following Musk’s post on Thursday, which was viewed more than 200 million times (according to Musk’s company), Schoen also wrote on the billionaire’s platform: “I can tell you unequivocally as someone who would know that President Trump never did anything wrong with Jeffrey Epstein.”A career federal prosecutor resigned in protest the same day that charges were filed against Kilmar Ábrego García, following an investigation that apparently began after the mistaken deportation of the Maryland resident became a legal and political headache for the Trump administration, ABC News reports.Ben Schrader, announced his resignation as the chief of the criminal division at the US attorney’s office for the Middle District of Tennessee in a LinkedIn post on 21 May, the same day the indictment of Ábrego García was signed by the acting US attorney for that district.Sources told ABC News that Schrader stepped down because of concerns that the case was being pursued for political reasons.“Earlier today, after nearly 15 years as an Assistant United States Attorney, I resigned as Chief of the Criminal Division at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee”, Schrader wrote on LinkedIn that day. “It has been an incredible privilege to serve as a prosecutor with the Department of Justice, where the only job description I’ve ever known is to do the right thing, in the right way, for the right reasons. I wish all of my colleagues at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Nashville and across the Department the best as they seek to do justice on behalf of the American people.”At a news conference on Friday, the attorney general, Pam Bondi, refused to say exactly when the investigation that led to the charges was opened, but she told reporters that the indictment was based on “recently found facts” about a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, and that “thanks to the bright light that has been shined on Ábrego García, this investigation continued”.The indictment was signed by Robert McGuire, who has been the acting US attorney in Nashville since December, and three senior prosecutors from the justice department’s Joint Task Force Vulcan, which was created during the first Trump administration “to dismantle MS-13”.In a new statement, Senator Chris Van Hollen, the Maryland Democrat who visited Kilmar Ábrego García in El Salvador, reiterated the point he made after his trip in April, when he said that he was “not defending the man” but “defending the rights of this man to due process”.Here is Van Hollen’s new statement:
      “For months the Trump Administration flouted the Supreme Court and our Constitution. Today, they appear to have finally relented to our demands for compliance with court orders and with the due process rights afforded to everyone in the United States. As I have repeatedly said, this is not about the man, it’s about his constitutional rights – and the rights of all. The Administration will now have to make its case in the court of law, as it should have all along.”
      This restates what Van Hollen said in an interview with ABC News in April, of the Trump administration: “Here’s where they should put their facts: they should oput it before the court. They should put up or shut up in court.”El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, joined the White House in attacking Senator Chris Van Hollen on social media with a post on Elon Musk’s X in which he referred back to a staged photograph of the Maryland senator’s meeting Kilmar Ábrego García in April.Referencing the release of Ábrego García from custody in El Salvador on Friday, Bukele wrote: we work with the Trump administration, and if they request the return of a gang member to face charges, of course we wouldn’t refuse.”He added: “No more margaritas under custody”.On his return from El Salvador in April, however, Van Hollen accused the government of El Salvador of creating the hoax he called “Margarita-gate”, by placing a pair of cocktail glasses on the table between himself and Ábrego García as they met to make it look as though they were enjoying drinks.Those photographs were posted on X by Bukele, along with a caption that downplayed the seriousness of the situation by falsely claiming that the senator and the wrongly deported man had been “sipping margaritas” as they met.But the senator said that the drinks were placed there during the meeting by someone from the Salvadoran government before the photographs were taken and that neither he nor Ábrego García had touched them. Van Hollen pointed out that there was visual evidence for this in the photographs: the rims of both glasses were covered in salt or sugar, but it was clear from the images that neither glass had been drunk from, since the rims were undisturbed.The US supreme court on Friday permitted the so-called ‘department of government efficiency’, or Doge, a team set up by former Trump aide Elon Musk to take a chainsaw to the federal workforce, broad access to personal information on millions of Americans in Social Security Administration data systems while a legal challenge plays out, Reuters reports.At the request of the Justice Department, the justices put on hold US district judge Ellen Hollander’s order that had largely blocked Doge’s access to “personally identifiable information” in data such as medical and financial records while litigation proceeds in a lower court. Hollander found that allowing Doge unfettered access likely would violate a federal privacy law.The court’s brief, unsigned order did not provide a rationale for siding with Doge. The court has a 6-3 conservative majority. Its three liberal justices dissented from the order.White House officials have wasted no time in using the newly announced criminal charges against Kilmar Ábrego García to attack Democrats who objected to his deportation without due process in violation of a previous court order.Writing on Elon Musk’s social media platform X, the White House’s official account dedicated to partisan “rapid response” resurfaced an April post from Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat whose constituents include Ábrego García’s wife, to suggest that he should now be ashamed of having stood up for the undocumented Maryland resident’s due process rights.“A grand jury found his full-time job was human smuggling, Chris,” the White House account commented. “He spent his entire life abusing people – including women and children. This is who you spent so much time defending. Shame on you.”The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, also using the platform owned by a former Trump aide who called for the president to be impeached just yesterday, claimed that the indictment against Ábrego García “proves the unhinged Democrat Party was wrong, and their stenographers in the Fake News Media were once again played like fools”.Apparently unaware that the allegations have yet to be tested in court, the president’s chief spokesperson insisted that “Democrat lawmakers” including Van Hollen, “and every single so-called ‘journalist’ who defended this illegal criminal abuser must immediately apologize to Garcia’s victims”.At a news conference, the US attorney general, Pamela Bondi, just announced that Kilmar Ábrego García, a Maryland resident who was deported to El Salvador in violation of a court order, has been returned to the United States and charged with criminal charges related to smuggling undocumented immigrants inside the United States.Bondi said that the US government presented an arrest warrant for Ábrego García to El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele.She also said that the grand jury indictment on 21 May was based on recently discovered facts and that the grand jury “found that over the past nine years, Ábrego García has played a significant role in an alien smuggling ring.”“Upon completion of his sentence, we anticipate he will be returned to his country of El Salvador”, Bondi said.Bondi suggested that Ábrego García was involved in other crimes, based on what unnamed co-conspirators allege, but he was only indicted on two counts related to the alleged smuggling.In response to a reporter’s question, Bondi said that Ábrego García would serve a prison sentence in the US if convicted, on charges that carry a possible sentence of 10 years, and then be deported to El Salvador again.We are waiting for the start of a livestreamed justice department news conference, which is expected to deal with the indictment of Kilmar Ábrego García, a Maryland resident who was deported to El Salvador and is reportedly on his way back to the United States to face new criminal charges stemming from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee which prompted officers to suspect that he might have been transporting undocumented migrants.The criminal indictment, which was filed on 21 May, accuses Ábrego García of being “a member and associate” of the Salvadoran gang MS-13 and charges him with taking part in a conspiracy to transport undocumented immigrants inside the United States.The reportedly imminent return to the United States of Kilmar Ábrego García, a Maryland resident who was deported to El Salvador in violation of a court order that he should not be sent there because he had a reasonable fear of persecution in that country, comes nearly two months after the attorney general, Pamela Jo Bondi, insisted that it would never happen.“He is not coming back to our country” Bondi told reporters at a news conference on 16 April. “President Bukele said he was not sending him back. That’s the end of the story.”Asked if she could provide evidence that he was a member of the MS-13 gang, Bondi said only that the allegation was contained in a 2019 court hearing.Kilmar Ábrego García, the Maryland man unlawfully deported to El Salvador, is on his way back to the US where he will face criminal charges, ABC News is reporting, citing sources.A federal grand jury has indicted Ábrego García for allegedly transporting undocumented migrants within the US, according to the report.The outlet, citing sources, reports that a two-count indictment, filed under seal in federal court in Tennessee last month, alleges that Ábrego García participated in a years-long conspiracy to transport undocumented migrants from Texas to the interior of the country.Among those allegedly transported were members of the Salvadoran gang MS-13, according to the report. The alleged conspiracy spanned nearly a decade, according to the report.A US trade delegation including three cabinet officials will meet with trade representatives from China in London on Monday “with reference to the trade deal”, Donald Trump has announced.He posted on Truth Social:
      I am pleased to announce that Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, and United States Trade Representative, Ambassador Jamieson Greer, will be meeting in London on Monday, June 9, 2025, with Representatives of China, with reference to the Trade Deal. The meeting should go very well. Thank you for your attention to this matter!
      It comes a day after Trump and Chinese president Xi Jinping held a “very good” phone call during which they discussed “some of the intricacies of our recently made, and agreed to, Trade Deal”, Trump said.Trump also said Xi had invited him to visit China, an invitation he aid he reciprocated.Xi said of the call that a “consensus has been reached”, adding that the two sides “should enhance consensus” as well as “reduce misunderstanding, strengthen cooperation” and “enhance exchanges”. “Dialogue, cooperation is the only right choice for China and the US,” the Chinese president said.Elon Musk may believe his money bought the presidential election and the House of the Representatives for the Republicans. But he is discovering painfully and quickly that it has not bought him love, loyalty or even fear among many GOP members of Congress on Capitol Hill.Faced with the choice of siding with Musk, the world’s richest man, or Donald Trump, after the two staged a public relationship breakdown for the ages on Thursday, most Republicans went with the man in the Oval Office, who has shown an unerring grasp of the tactics of political intimidation and who remains the world’s most powerful figure even without the boss of Tesla and SpaceX by his side.The billionaire tech entrepreneur, who poured about $275m into Trump’s campaign last year, tried to remind Washington’s political classes of his financial muscle on Thursday during an outpouring of slights against a man for whom he had once professed platonic love and was still showering with praise up until a week before.One after another, Republican House members came out to condemn him and defend Trump, despite having earlier been told by Musk that “you know you did wrong” in voting for what has become Trump’s signature legislation that seeks to extend vast tax cuts for the rich.Troy Nehls, a GOP representative from Texas, captured the tone, addressing Musk before television cameras:
      You’ve lost your damn mind. Enough is enough. Stop this.
      It chimed with the sentiments of many others. “Nobody elected Elon Musk, and a whole lot of people don’t even like him, to be honest with you, even on both sides,” Jeff Van Drew, a New Jersey congressman, told Axios.“We’re getting people calling our offices 100% in support of President Trump,” Kevin Hern, a representative from Oklahoma, told the site.
      Every tweet that goes out, people are more lockstep behind President Trump and [Musk is] losing favour.
      Republicans were balancing the strength of Trump’s voice among GOP voters versus the power of the increasingly unpopular Musk’s money – and most had little doubt which matters most.“On the value of Elon playing against us in primaries compared to Trump endorsing us in primaries, the latter is 100 times more relevant,” Axios quoted one unnamed representative as saying.The Trump administration is preparing to make good on the president’s threat to strip “large scale” federal funding from California, an effort that could begin as early as Friday, according to CNN.The report says agencies have been directed to start identifying grants the administration can withhold from the state. A whistleblower reportedly told a congressional committee that the administration was planning to cut all research grants to California.The White House has not commented on the plans. The timeline remains speculative, and it is unclear what grants would be targeted.Trump has repeatedly threatened to cut federal funding as a way to force states, institutions and universities to comply with his agenda. Last week, he said California could lose “large scale” funding “maybe permanently” if the state continued to allow transgender athletes to participate in girls’ and women’s sports.The declaration appeared to be in reference to a transgender track-and-field star from southern California. On Saturday, she won two gold medals and a silver, which she shared with other teen athletes under a new rule by the state’s high school sports body.Trump had also repeatedly threatened to withhold federal disaster aid, assailing the state’s Democratic leaders for their handling of the wildfires that devastated Los Angeles earlier this year.More from House speaker Mike Johnson, who has told CNBC he has been texting with Elon Musk and hopes the dispute is resolved quickly.He said of the “big, beautiful bill”:
      I don’t argue with [Musk] about how to build rockets and I wish he wouldn’t argue with me about how to craft legislation and pass it.
      Johnson earlier issued a warning: “Do not second-guess and don’t ever challenge the president of the United States, Donald Trump.”He had also projected confidence that the Trump-Musk dispute won’t affect prospects for the tax and border bill. “Members are not shaken at all,” he said. “We’re going to pass this legislation on our deadline.” More