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      Judge rebukes Trump officials for not securing return of wrongly deported man

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      A federal judge sharply rebuked the Trump administration and scolded officials on Tuesday for taking no steps to secure the return of a man wrongly deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador, as the US supreme court had ordered in a contentious ruling last week.The US district judge Paula Xinis said that Donald Trump’s news conference with El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, where the leaders joked that Kilmar Ábrego García would not be released, did not count as compliance.“To date nothing has been done,” Xinis said, a day after senior Trump officials also mounted an effort to sidestep the supreme court decision by offering increasingly strained readings of the order to claim they were powerless to bring back Ábrego García.The judge ultimately said she would require the administration to produce details under oath about its attempts to return Ábrego García to US soil in two weeks, an unusually expeditious timeline for discovery that indicated how she intends to move with the case.At issue at the hearing in federal district court in Maryland was the administration’s narrow reading of the supreme court order that compelled it to “facilitate” the return of Ábrego García, who was supposed to have been shielded from being sent to El Salvador.The administration had earlier conceded Ábrego García’s deportation was an administrative error. But it has since taken the position that it is powerless to bring him back beyond removing domestic obstacles, and that courts lack the constitutional power to dictate the president to do more.The lead lawyer for the administration, Drew Ensign, also said in legal filings before the hearing that even if Ábrego García were returned to the US, the justice department would deport him to a different country or move to terminate the order blocking his removal to El Salvador.But the judge rejected the administration’s narrow reading of “facilitate”, noting the plain meaning of the word meant officials needed to secure Ábrego García’s release – and that US immigration and customs enforcement had previously taken a number of positions on its meaning.“Your characterization is not bound in fact,” Xinis said. “I need facts.”The administration argued it had sought to comply with the supreme court’s order when Trump addressed the case and Bukele questioned whether he was supposed to smuggle Ábrego García across the border – which Ensign argued showed the matter had been raised at the “highest levels”.The judge appeared unimpressed by the argument. “It’s not a direct response,” Xinis said. “Nor is the quip about smuggling someone into the US. If you were removing domestic barriers, there would be no smuggling, right? Two misguided ships passing in the night.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe judge told Ábrego García’s lawyers to prepare by Wednesday their questions for the administration about what steps it had taken. She said they could depose up to six officials, including Robert Cerna, a top official at Ice, and Joseph Mazarra, the acting general counsel of the Department of Homeland Security.“Cancel vacation,” Xinis told Ensign. “Cancel appointments. I’m usually pretty good about this in my courtroom, but not this time.”After the hearing, Ábrego García’s lawyer Rina Gandhi called the hearing a win but added they were not yet done. “We have not brought Kilmar home,” she told reporters, “but we will be able to question those involved and get information and evidence as required.”She also accused the administration of acting in bad faith. “This case is about the government unlawfully – and admitting to unlawfully – removing a gentleman from this country, from his home, his family, his children, and taking no actions to fix them as ordered by the supreme court,” Gandhi said. More

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      Senator Chuck Grassley grilled at Iowa town hall over ‘shameful’ Trump policies

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      The Republican senator Chuck Grassley struggled to control a town hall meeting on Tuesday as constituents erupted in anger over border security policies and the Trump administration’s aggressive deportation practices.The 91-year-old Republican lawmaker from Iowa is the latest elected official to get grilled by a packed room of constituents. Attendees in the Republican state were concerned about the treatment of asylum seekers stemming from the president’s approach to immigration enforcement.“I believe very strongly in my Christian faith. I preach on Sundays,” said one attendee, “Turning away people who have come here for asylum is one of the most shameful things we are doing right here.”The attendee pressed Grassley on whether he would take action to ensure the United States better follows international law and upholds “the ideals of our country to be a place of hope for others”.Grassley responded that he would “welcome refugees, I would welcome people seeking asylum”. On Tuesday morning, Trump had posted on Truth Social that border crossings hit an all-time low in March.Tensions escalated further when another constituent accused Trump of ignoring the supreme court order regarding Kilmar Armando Ábrego García. Ábrego’s deportation to El Salvador despite supreme court intervention has become a rallying point for immigration advocates, who cite it as evidence of the administration’s willingness to flout judicial authority.In the White House press conference on Tuesday, the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, called Ábrego a “human trafficker and gang member”.“The president doesn’t care,” one attendee at Grassley’s town hall shouted. “He’s got an order from the supreme court and he’s just said: ‘No, screw it.’”Multiple attendees reminded Grassley, who has held his Senate seat since 1981, of his constitutional oath of office, with one asking whether the senator was acting upon that oath. The crowd grew increasingly frustrated as Grassley attempted to explain his position.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“I’m trying to recapture the constitutional authority of article 1, section 8,” Grassley responded, referencing a bipartisan bill he introduced aimed at addressing what he called “mistakes that Democratic Congress has made in 1963”.Grassley’s confrontational town hall comes as many Republican lawmakers have largely abandoned the practice of holding in-person constituent meetings during their congressional recess. The retreat from public forums follows other heated exchanges where Republican lawmakers faced sometimes abrasive criticism over issues like proposed budget cuts to Medicare and Medicaid and what they see as the erosion of constitutional checks and balances.While Grassley continues his 45th annual 99-county tour of Iowa, only a handful of Republicans, including the representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene and Byron Donalds, have publicly announced plans for similar events. More

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      US’s $2.36tn tourism business fears ‘Trump slump’ over tariff turmoil

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      Batman said business was so-so, and King Kong beat his chest in agreement. But neither could predict that it would improve. Gotham’s caped crusader and his muscular ape neighbour could only hope. As with Times Square’s superhero-themed visitor-photography business last week, so it is with the US tourism business at large.The effect of economic and political turbulence on the number of foreign visitors coming to the US is for now hard to define. But both – whether through tariffs, currency exchange chaos, or fears over political ill-winds – are sending chills through the $2.36tn business, the world’s most powerful travel and tourism market.Warnings that international tourism to the US could be hit by Donald Trump’s effort to re-engineer economic and political relations with the rest of the world are slowly emerging.The federal government’s National Travel and Tourism Office released preliminary figures last week showing visits to the US from overseas fell 11.6% in March compared with the same month last year. According to the data released on Tuesday, international arrivals from China were down nearly 1%. Wolfgang Georg Arlt, the CEO of the China Outbound Tourism Research Institute, called it the “Trump Slump”.The Delta Air Lines CEO, Ed Bastian, also said the company would not expand flying in the second half of the year because of disappointing bookings amid Trump’s unpredictable trade policies after cutting its first-quarter earnings outlook, citing weaker-than-expected corporate and leisure travel demand.“In the last six weeks, we’ve seen a corresponding reduction in broad consumer confidence and corporate confidence,” Bastian told CNBC, adding things “really started to slow” in mid-February.The Las Vegas Visitors and Convention Authority said last week it was projecting a 5% decline in room tax revenue for its upcoming budget – a decline that may reflect Trump’s trade disputes with Canada and Mexico. Those countries account for 2.6 million visitors to sin city, or half of international travel trade.LVCVA’s president, Steve Hill, warned at a budget meeting that short-term projected declines do not make a trend, “although we do expect that this is the start of a decline in international visitation. At some level, the conversation around the tariffs has also alienated some of our potential visitors.”The travel forecasting company Tourism Economics, which late last year projected the US would have nearly 9% more international arrivals this year, along with a 16% increase in spending, revised its annual outlook last week to predict a 9.4% decline in arrivals.The company’s Geena Bevenour said in an email statement that the revised forecast represented “a substantial setback” and eclipsed “the US downside scenario we released in late-February, reflecting a more contentious context for inbound travel and more severe tariff announcements than previously expected.”On the upside, a weakening dollar against sterling, the euro, Japanese yen and Swiss franc could make travel to the US more attractive. Despite the variables, New York this week was full of international visitors, many on Easter break, and others from further afield.A couple from Scotland, who offered their names as James and Zoe, were waiting to board the Staten Island ferry with their two children on Thursday afternoon, and said they weren’t fazed about tariffs or anti-European rhetoric from the White House. Nor had they encountered elevated difficulties at immigration at JFK – aside from the long queues.Notwithstanding their advance booking, the couple said they would not hesitate to return – and had booked a holiday in Florida for next year. “I can see both sides, from a right and left perspective on tariffs and and the US wanting to put its house in order first.”A couple from Belgium, Dave and Gwen Desmet, returning from a boat trip to the Statue of Liberty, said they had been apprehensive at immigration but encountered no problems. But they said that if the trip had not already been booked, they would have waited to better understand the reality of the impact of Trump’s upheavals.“There’s more anxiety,” said Gwen, who said she had advised her son to delete an essay about Donald Trump on his laptop, adding that she was alarmed by changes to US government policy around diversity and gender.Her daughter had worried that it was “not a good time to go to New York”. But her husband, Dave, reasoned that media was “playing a big role” in stirring anxiety and “creating negativity”.Last week, China issued warnings for citizens considering travelling or studying in the US. China’s ministry of culture and tourism cited the “deterioration of China-US economic and trade relations and the domestic security situation in the United States”.American Ring Travel, a tour operator based in California, offers carbon-neutral bus tours of the US that often attract eco-conscious travelers from Europe, said bookings from Germany flattened starting in January after Elon Musk threw his support behind a far-right political party in that country’s federal election.Many travel agents say it may be too early to tell if, beyond visitors from Canada, the US will see its post-Covid gains in foreign tourism wiped out or even reversed.Later this month, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) will release new figures on international travel. Global hotel chains like Hilton Worldwide are seeing share price declines.One high-end travel agent, accustomed to arranging international White Lotus-style luxury holidays for wealthy clients, said he had not seen any changes – yet. But it was still early days. “I think we’re going to feel it soon. People aren’t exhausted yet. But they’re clearly stressed – and will be, especially if their disposable income gets hit,” they said. More

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      Obama condemns Trump’s $2.3bn Harvard funding freeze as ‘unlawful and ham-handed’ – US politics live

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      Good morning and welcome to our US politics blog.Former US president Barack Obama has condemned the education department for freezing $2.3bn in federal funds to Harvard University after the elite college rejected a list of demands from the White House.In some of his most vocal criticism of this Trump administration, Obama praised Harvard, the country’s oldest university, for setting an example for other higher education institutions to reject federal overreach into its governance practices.He wrote in a post on X:
      Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions – rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and mutual respect. Let’s hope other institutions follow suit.
      His comments came after Harvard decided to fight the White House’s demands that it crack down on alleged antisemitism and civil rights violations. It is the first major US university to defy pressure from the White House to change its policies.In a letter to Harvard on Friday, the administration called for broad government and leadership reforms, a requirement that Harvard institute what it calls “merit-based” admissions and hiring policies as well as conduct an audit of the study body, faculty and leadership on their views about diversity.The demands, which are an update from an earlier letter, also call for a ban on face masks, which appeared to target pro-Palestinian protesters; close its diversity, equity and inclusion programs, which it says teach students and staff “to make snap judgments about each other based on crude race and identity stereotypes”; and pressured the university to stop recognizing or funding “any student group or club that endorses or promotes criminal activity, illegal violence, or illegal harassment”.The administration also demanded that Harvard cooperate with federal immigration authorities.Harvard’s president said in a letter that the university would not comply with the Trump administration’s demands to dismantle its diversity programming and to limit student protests in exchange for its federal funding.“No government – regardless of which party is in power – should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” Alan Garber, the university president, wrote, adding that Harvard had taken extensive reforms to address antisemitism.The department of education announced in March that it had opened an investigation into 60 colleges and universities for alleged “anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination”. It came after protests against Israel’s war on Gaza were put on across campuses last year, demonstrations that many Republicans framed as antisemitic.Harvard’s response to the White House’s demands was in sharp contrast to the approach taken by Columbia University, the epicentre of last year’s protests against Israel’s assault on Gaza.The Trump administration cut $400m in grants to the private New York school, accusing it of failing to protect Jewish students from harassment. The school caved in to demands and responded by agreeing to reform student disciplinary procedures and hiring 36 officers to expand its security team.Stay with us throughout the day as we have more reaction to this story and many others.Hugo Lowell is a reporter in the Washington bureau of the Guardian covering Donald Trump and the Justice DepartmentThe Trump administration on Monday misrepresented a US supreme court decision that compelled it to return a man wrongly deported to El Salvador, using tortured readings of the order to justify taking no actions to secure his release.The supreme court last week unanimously ordered the administration to “facilitate” the release of Kilmar Abrego García, who was supposed to have been protected from deportation to El Salvador regardless of whether he was a member of the MS-13 gang.But at an Oval Office meeting between Trump and El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele, Trump deferred to officials who gave extraordinary readings of the supreme court order and claimed the US was powerless to return Abrego García to US soil.“The ruling solely stated that if this individual at El Salvador’s sole discretion was sent back to our country, we could deport him a second time,” said Trump’s policy chief Stephen Miller, about an order that, in fact, upheld a lower court’s directive to return Abrego García…The remarks at the Oval Office meeting marked an escalation in the Trump administration’s attempts to claim uncertainty with court orders to avoid having to take actions it dislikes. In Abrego García’s case, officials appeared to manufacture uncertainty in particularly blatant fashion.And the fact that the US is paying El Salvador to detain deportees it sends to the notorious Cecot prison undercut the notion that the administration lacked the power to return Abrego García into US custody.The case started when Abrego García was detained by police in 2019 in Maryland, outside a Home Depot, with several other men, and asked about a murder. He denied knowledge of a crime and repeatedly denied that he was part of a gang.Abrego García was subsequently put in immigration proceedings, where officials argued they believed he was part of the MS-13 gang in New York based on his Chicago Bulls gear and on the word of a confidential informant.The case went before a US immigration judge, who suggested that Abrego García could be a member of MS-13 and agreed to a deportation order but shielded him from being sent to El Salvador because he was likely to face persecution there by a local gang.The Trump administration did not appeal against that decision, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement has since said in a court filing that Abrego García’s deportation to El Salvador was an “administrative error”. The supreme court also called his removal illegal.You can read the full story here:One of China’s lead officials overseeing Hong Kong has condemned punitive US tariffs on China as “shameless” and attacked American “hillbillies” amid a continuing trade war between Beijing and Washington that has caused turmoil in global markets.Xia Baolong, director of the Hong Kong and Macao Work Office, said Hong Kong has never levied taxes on imports and that the US enjoyed a $272 bn trade surplus in the city over the past decade.US President Donald Trump has increased the levies imposed on China to 145%, while Beijing has set a retaliatory 125 percent toll on American imports – a move not followed by Hong Kong.Imposing tariffs on the city is “hegemonic and shameless in the extreme”, and shows that the US does not want Hong Kong to thrive, Baolong said in a pre-recorded speech at an event to mark the 10th iteration of China’s annual national security education day.He said the US “is the greatest culprit in undermining Hong Kong’s human rights, freedom, rule of law, prosperity and stability.”“It is not after our tariffs – it wants to take our lives,” Baolong was quoted as saying.He added that the sweeping US tariffs would not shake the determination of Beijing and Hong Kong governments and that “victory must belong to the great Chinese people”.“Let those American ’hillbillies’ wail before the 5,000-year-old civilisation of the Chinese nation” he said, adding that anyone seeking to bring China into poverty was an “enemy”.Hong Kong is a former British colony that became a special administrative region of China in 1997. In theory, it is governed under a system known as “one country, two systems”, a constitutional arrangement that promised Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy and rights protections.But it is widely seen to have reneged on the deal, crushing pro-democracy protests and imposing a national security law in 2020 – targeting secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces – which has in effect silenced opposition voices among Hong Kong’s once-vibrant civil society.Hong Kong is subject to the high US tariffs imposed on China as it is no longer considered a separate trading entity by Washington so means is not entitled to favourable trading terms anymore. Trump ended Hong Kong’s preferential trade status following China’s security crackdown on Hong Kong in 2020.As my colleague Martin Belam reports in our UK politics live blog, JD Vance has said the US is optimistic it can negotiate a “great” trade deal with the UK.In an interview with online outlet Unherd, the US vice president told Sohrab Ahmari:
      We’re certainly working very hard with Keir Starmer’s government. The president really loves the UK. He loved the queen. He admires and loves the king. It is a very important relationship. And he’s a businessman and has a number of important business relationships in [the UK].
      But I think it’s much deeper than that. There’s a real cultural affinity. And of course, fundamentally America is an Anglo country. I think there’s a good chance that, yes, we’ll come to a great agreement that’s in the best interest of both countries.
      Unlike China, Britain was spared the most punitive treatment in Trump’s initial tariff announcement on 2 April, but British imports in the US still incur a 10% charge while its steel and car sectors incur a rate of 25%.The UK government has been hopeful of a deal to exempt the UK from Trump’s tariffs.The UK’s chancellor, Rachel Reeves, will aim to continue negotiations for an economic deal with the US later this month when she travels to Washington to attend the International Monetary Fund’s spring meetings with other finance ministers. You can read more about Vance’s comments today in this article by my colleague Rachel Hall.South Korea has announced plans to invest an additional $4.9bn in the country’s semiconductor industry, citing “growing uncertainty” over US tariffs.“An aggressive fiscal investment plan has been devised to help local firms navigate mounting challenges in the global semiconductor race,” the finance ministry said.“To foster a dynamic, private sector-led ecosystem for semiconductor innovation and growth, the government will increase its investment in the sector from 26 trillion won ($18.2bn) to 33 trillion won,” the ministry added.Semiconductors are tiny chips that power just about everything, including computers, mobile phones and cars. They are central to the global economy. The UK, the US, Europe and China rely heavily on Taiwan for semiconductors.But South Korea – Asia’s fourth largest economy – is also a major exporter to the US and concerns about the semiconductor sector have hit the Seoul-listed shares of the world’s largest memory chip maker Samsung, and largest memory chip supplier SK Hynix.The statement of extra investment from South Korea’s finance ministry comes after the Trump administration launched investigations into imports of pharmaceuticals and semiconductors on national security grounds.These industries – so far exempt from the 10% US import charges that began on 5 April – may face tariffs after the probes are complete.US President Donald Trump has directed the US commerce department to conduct a three-week investigation into the imports, during which time public comments on the issue will be heard before a decision is made.Trump said on Sunday he would be announcing a tariff rate on imported semiconductors over the next week, adding that there would be flexibility with some companies in the sector.On 2 April, Trump announced sweeping tariffs on global trading partners, including the 25 percent on South Korean goods, before backtracking and suspending their implementation for 90 days.Even so, “duties targeting specific sectors such as semiconductors and pharmaceuticals, remain on the horizon”, finance minister Choi Sang-mok said during a meeting.“This grace period offers a crucial window to strengthen the competitiveness of South Korean companies amid intensifying global trade tensions,” he added.Good morning and welcome to our US politics blog.Former US president Barack Obama has condemned the education department for freezing $2.3bn in federal funds to Harvard University after the elite college rejected a list of demands from the White House.In some of his most vocal criticism of this Trump administration, Obama praised Harvard, the country’s oldest university, for setting an example for other higher education institutions to reject federal overreach into its governance practices.He wrote in a post on X:
      Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions – rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and mutual respect. Let’s hope other institutions follow suit.
      His comments came after Harvard decided to fight the White House’s demands that it crack down on alleged antisemitism and civil rights violations. It is the first major US university to defy pressure from the White House to change its policies.In a letter to Harvard on Friday, the administration called for broad government and leadership reforms, a requirement that Harvard institute what it calls “merit-based” admissions and hiring policies as well as conduct an audit of the study body, faculty and leadership on their views about diversity.The demands, which are an update from an earlier letter, also call for a ban on face masks, which appeared to target pro-Palestinian protesters; close its diversity, equity and inclusion programs, which it says teach students and staff “to make snap judgments about each other based on crude race and identity stereotypes”; and pressured the university to stop recognizing or funding “any student group or club that endorses or promotes criminal activity, illegal violence, or illegal harassment”.The administration also demanded that Harvard cooperate with federal immigration authorities.Harvard’s president said in a letter that the university would not comply with the Trump administration’s demands to dismantle its diversity programming and to limit student protests in exchange for its federal funding.“No government – regardless of which party is in power – should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue,” Alan Garber, the university president, wrote, adding that Harvard had taken extensive reforms to address antisemitism.The department of education announced in March that it had opened an investigation into 60 colleges and universities for alleged “anti-Semitic harassment and discrimination”. It came after protests against Israel’s war on Gaza were put on across campuses last year, demonstrations that many Republicans framed as antisemitic.Harvard’s response to the White House’s demands was in sharp contrast to the approach taken by Columbia University, the epicentre of last year’s protests against Israel’s assault on Gaza.The Trump administration cut $400m in grants to the private New York school, accusing it of failing to protect Jewish students from harassment. The school caved in to demands and responded by agreeing to reform student disciplinary procedures and hiring 36 officers to expand its security team.Stay with us throughout the day as we have more reaction to this story and many others. More

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      Home Alone 2 director says he fears he will be deported if he cuts Trump cameo

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      Film-maker Chris Columbus says he has come to regard Donald Trump’s cameo in his movie Home Alone 2: Lost in New York as “an albatross” that he wishes to remove.But, Columbus added, he fears the president’s administration would deport him if he followed through with nixing the scene from more than 30 years ago.“It’s become this curse,” Columbus told the San Francisco Chronicle in an interview published Monday. “It’s become an albatross for me. I just wish it was gone.”Though born and raised in the US, the San Francisco resident of Italian ancestry said he worried he would “have to go back to Italy or something” if he erased the cameo.Columbus’s comments – made in advance of a tribute he is scheduled to receive at the 68th San Francisco international film festival on 26 April – revisited a controversy that began in 2020, toward the conclusion of Trump’s first presidency. The director of both Home Alone films told Business Insider that Trump’s cameo in the 1992 sequel was a condition of being able to film inside New York’s Plaza hotel, which Trump owned at the time.Trump, best known at that time as a real-estate development tycoon, “did bully his way into the movie”, Columbus told Business Insider, describing how the cameo was on top of a fee. He claimed Trump told him: “The only way you can use the Plaza is if I’m in the movie.”In late 2023, less than a year before he became president for the second time, Trump went on his Truth Social platform and accused Columbus of lying. He said Columbus’s team was “begging” him to make a cameo and that it ended up being “great for the movie”.Columbus opted against immediately responding to those claims from Trump. Yet in Monday’s interview, the director made it a point to say: “I’m not lying. … There’s no world I would ever beg a non-actor to be in a movie. But we were desperate to get the Plaza hotel.”According to Columbus, his instinct was to cut the cameo and regrets that he changed his mind after viewers at a screening in Chicago “cheered … and cheered and … thought it was hilarious”.“I never thought that was going to be considered hilarious,” Columbus said, referring to the seven-second scene in which Trump gives star Macaulay Culkin’s character directions on the Plaza Hotel. “It’s become this thing that I wish … was not there.”The idea of removing Trump from Home Alone – which made $359m (£280m) to become 1992’s third-highest grossing film – has been tested before.Trump supporters complained in 2019 when a cut of Home Alone 2 screened on Canadian television removed his cameo. Then, in early 2021, Culkin himself said he was “sold” on the concept of digitally removing Trump from the film.Columbus’s remark to the Chronicle that he fretted being ousted from the US if he did trash Trump’s cameo alluded to prominent deportation cases being pursued by the White House.In one instance since he retook the Oval Office, Trump’s administration erroneously deported a man living in Maryland to a mega-prison in El Salvador. And immigration officials under his command have detained academic scholars around the US for deportation proceedings after their support of pro-Palestine protests.The Trump administration has also sought to punish media figures which it considers to have crossed the president. Trump has demanded $20bn from CBS News in a lawsuit over the editing of a 60 Minutes interview with his opponent in the 2024 election, former vice-president Kamala Harris. He also sued the Des Moines Register over an Iowa election poll that turned out to be inaccurate.ABC News recently settled a lawsuit with Trump for $15m over incorrectly saying the president had been found civilly liable for raping E Jean Carroll. A jury had actually found Trump “sexually abused” Carroll but had not raped her.“I can’t cut it,” Columbus – whose other blockbusters include Mrs Doubtfire and the first two Harry Potter films – reportedly said of Trump’s cameo.“If I cut it, I’ll probably be sent out of this country. I’ll be considered sort of not fit to live in the United States.” More

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      US begins inquiry into pharmaceutical and chip imports in bid to impose tariffs

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      The Trump administration is kicking off investigations into imports of pharmaceuticals and semiconductors into the US as part of an attempt to impose tariffs on both sectors on national security grounds, notices posted to the Federal Register on Monday showed.The filings scheduled to be published on Wednesday set a 21-day deadline from that date for the submission of public comment on the issue and indicate the administration intends to pursue the levies under authority granted by the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. Such inquiries need to be completed within 270 days after being announced.The Trump administration has started 232 investigations into imports of copper and lumber, and inquiries completed in the US president’s first term formed the basis for tariffs rolled out since his return to the White House in January on steel and aluminum and on the auto industry.The US began collecting 10% tariffs on imports on 5 April. Pharmaceuticals and semiconductors are exempt from those duties, but Trump has said they will face separate tariffs.Trump said on Sunday he would be announcing a tariff rate on imported semiconductors over the next week, adding there would be flexibility with some companies in the sector.The US relies heavily on chips imported from Taiwan, something the then president, Joe Biden, sought to reverse by granting billions in Chips Act awards to lure chipmakers to expand production in the US.Taiwan’s economy minister, Kuo Jyh-huei, said its government would run simulations for various levels of tariffs on semiconductors and seek talks with the US.Taiwan is home to TSMC, the world’s leading producer of the most advanced chips and a main contributor to the island’s GDP. Speaking to reporters outside parliament, Kuo said he would seek to ensure “fair competition” for the Taiwanese industry.The Taiwanese and US chip sectors are complementary, he added.The investigation announced on Monday will include pharmaceuticals and pharmaceutical ingredients as well as other derivative products, the notice showed.Drugmakers have argued that tariffs could increase the chance of shortages and reduce access for patients. Still, Trump has pushed for the fees, arguing that the US needs more drug manufacturing so it does not have to rely on other countries for its supply of medicines.Companies in the industry have lobbied Trump to phase in tariffs on imported pharmaceutical products in hopes of reducing the sting from the charges and to allow time to shift manufacturing.Large drugmakers have global manufacturing footprints, mainly in the US, Europe and Asia, and moving more production to the US involves a major commitment of resources and could take years. More

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      Trump news at a glance: El Salvador’s Bukele vows to keep wrongly deported man

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      The president of El Salvador said in a meeting with Donald Trump in the White House on Monday that he would not order the return of a Maryland man who was deported in error to a Salvadorian mega-prison.“The question is preposterous,” Nayib Bukele said in the Oval Office on Monday. “How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? I’m not going to do it.”He added: “I don’t have the power to return him to the United States,” and said he would not release the man, Kilmar Abrego García, into El Salvador either. “I’m not very fond of releasing terrorists into the country.”The comments came a day after the Trump administration claimed it was not legally obligated to secure the return of Abrego García, despite the US supreme court ruling that the administration should “facilitate” bringing him back.Earlier this month, the Trump administration acknowledged that Abrego García, an immigrant from El Salvador who was living in Maryland with protected status, was deported to a prison in El Salvador on 15 March as a result of an “administrative error”. In 2019 an immigration judge had prohibited the federal government from deporting him.Trump officials defiant over wrongly deported manThe Trump administration escalated its stubborn defiance against securing the release of a man wrongly deported to El Salvador on Monday, advancing new misrepresentations of a US supreme court order.“The ruling solely stated that if this individual at El Salvador’s sole discretion was sent back to our country, we could deport him a second time,” said Trump’s policy chief Stephen Miller. His remarks went beyond the tortured reading offered by the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, who also characterized the supreme court order as only requiring the administration to provide transportation to Abrego García if released by El Salvador.Read the full storyPalestinian Columbia student activist detained by IceA Palestinian green card holder and student at Columbia University was apprehended by US immigration authorities on Monday, according to his lawyers and a video of the incident. Mohsen Mahdawi, who was a leader of the pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia last spring, was arrested by Ice on Monday morning in Colchester, Vermont, while he was attending a naturalization interview, his lawyer said in a statement to the Guardian.Read the full storyTrump administration sued over tariffs in trade courtA legal advocacy group on Monday asked the US court of international trade to block Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs on foreign trading partners, arguing that the president overstepped his authority. The lawsuit was filed by the Liberty Justice Center, a legal advocacy group, on behalf of five US businesses that import goods from countries targeted by the tariffs.Read the full storyUS begins inquiry into pharmaceutical and chip imports, paving way for tariffsThe Trump administration is kicking off investigations into imports of pharmaceuticals and semiconductors as part of a bid to impose tariffs on both sectors on national security grounds, notices posted to the Federal Register on Monday showed.Read the full storyHarvard will not ‘yield’ to Trump demands over $9bn in cutsHarvard University said on Monday that it will not comply with a new list of demands from the Trump administration issued last week that the government says are designed to crack down on antisemitism and alleged civil rights violations at elite academic institutions.Read the full storyMemo outlines plan to slash US state department budget in halfThe Trump administration is reportedly proposing to slash the state department budget by nearly half in a move that could drastically reduce US international spending and end its funding for Nato and the United Nations, according to an internal memorandum.Read the full storyRepublican supporters of Ukraine put pressure on TrumpRepublican supporters of Ukraine are using the Kremlin’s deadly missile strikes as their latest evidence to convince Donald Trump that he must increase pressure on Vladimir Putin if he wants to reach a ceasefire deal.Read the full storyUS soldier revealed as neo-Nazi TikTok followerAn active-duty serviceman in the US army is openly following a proscribed neo-Nazi terrorist group on social media, one that has vowed to recruit soldiers in preparation for a so-called race war. Experts say examples like this shows how under Pete Hegseth, the Pentagon is allowing extremism to go unchecked.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      A man who broke into Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro’s mansion – where he set a fire – had planned to beat him with a hammer because he hates the politician, according to court documents released on Monday.

      A jury was selected on Monday to hear a retrial of Sarah Palin’s claims that the New York Times libeled her in an editorial eight years ago.

      More than 370 alumni of Georgetown University joined 65 current students in signing on to a letter opposing immigration authorities’ detention of Dr Badar Khan Suri, a senior postdoctoral fellow.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 13 April 2025. More

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      Trump administration sued over tariffs in US international trade court

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      A legal advocacy group on Monday asked the US court of international trade to block Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs on foreign trading partners, arguing that the president overstepped his authority.The lawsuit was filed by the Liberty Justice Center, a legal advocacy group, on behalf of five US businesses that import goods from countries targeted by the tariffs.“No one person should have the power to impose taxes that have such vast global economic consequences,” Jeffrey Schwab, Liberty Justice Center’s senior counsel, said in a statement. “The Constitution gives the power to set tax rates – including tariffs – to Congress, not the President.”The Liberty Justice Center is the litigation arm of the Illinois Policy Institute, a free market thinktank. It was instrumental in the supreme court case Janus v AFSCME in which it successfully fought to weaken public labor unions collective bargaining power.According to the group’s statement, the tariffs case was filed on behalf of five owner-operated businesses who have been severely harmed by the tariffs. The businesses include a New York-based company specializing in the importation and distribution of wines and spirits, an e-commerce business specializing in the production and sale of sportfishing tackle, a company that manufactures ABS pipe in the United States using imported ABS resin from South Korea and Taiwan, a small business based in Virginia that makes educational electronic kits and musical instruments, and a Vermont-based brand of women’s cycling apparel.Representatives of the White House did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.The Trump administration faces a similar lawsuit in Florida federal court, where a small business owner has asked a judge to block tariffs imposed on China. More