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    Senate Official Rejects Food Aid Cuts Proposed by Republicans in Megabill

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    The ruling by the parliamentarian sent G.O.P. lawmakers back to the drawing board to cover the costs of President Trump’s domestic policy bill.A top Senate official on Friday night rejected a bid by Republicans to slash federal food aid payments as part of their sweeping legislation carrying President Trump’s domestic agenda, sending party leaders scrambling to find another way to help offset the massive cost of the bill.The measure passed by the House last month and on track to be considered in the Senate next week would cover part of the cost of extending and expanding large tax cuts by cutting social safety net programs including Medicaid and nutrition programs, including SNAP, formerly known as food stamps.Republicans are moving the bill through Congress using special rules that shield it from a filibuster, depriving Democrats of the ability to block it. But to qualify for that protection, the legislation must comply with a rigorous set of budgetary restrictions meant to ensure that it will not add to the deficit. And the Senate parliamentarian, an official appointed by the chamber’s leaders to enforce its rules and precedents, must evaluate such measures to ensure that every provision meets those requirements.Elizabeth MacDonough, the parliamentarian, ruled that the SNAP measure, which would push some of the costs of nutrition assistance onto the states, did not. That sent Republicans back to the drawing board to find another strategy for covering tens of billions of dollars of the bill’s cost.She also said Republicans could not include a provision that would bar immigrants who are not citizens or lawful permanent residents from receiving SNAP benefits, according to Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Budget Committee.The House-passed bill would require all states to pay at least 5 percent of SNAP benefit costs, and more if they reported a high rate of errors in underpaying or overpaying recipients. That provision was estimated to save roughly $128 billion.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Budget Cuts Threaten State Geological Surveys

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      Nearly two dozen state geological surveys depend heavily on federal funds. A proposed budget cut could slow or stop key geologic mapping work.Every spring for the last 31 years, Reed Lewis has traversed Idaho to do what technology still cannot: examine rocks, collect samples and make a map that is critical for mining, oil and gas and other industries. He knows getting an early start is essential, as summer smoke and winter snows limit the days that are useful for gathering data.Dr. Lewis, a geologist for the state of Idaho, is normally in the field by June at the latest. But halfway through the month, he’s stuck at his desk.That’s because amid uncertainty over the federal budget, funds from Washington that pay for geological mapping have not arrived. “It’s starting to be worrisome,” Dr. Lewis said. The concern is widespread; no states have received their 2025 mapping money.What’s more, one line in the Trump administration’s proposed budget could hamstring the ability of states to create basic geologic maps for years to come.Geologists in every state use federal funds to study wildfires, water resources, hazards and to map the locations of mineral deposits and energy sources. In addition to mining and fossil fuel industries, the free and publicly available maps are used by geothermal energy and real estate companies.Private companies might map a small area of particular interest but they generally do not share the information.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Business Lobbyists Scramble to Kill $100 Billion ‘Revenge Tax’

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      Critics contend that the measure will scare off the foreign investment that President Trump wants to attract.Business lobbyists are working to kill a measure in the Republican tax policy legislation that would punish companies based in countries that try to collect new taxes from American firms.The push comes as Senate Republicans are preparing to unveil their domestic policy bill on Monday, which will ultimately need to be passed and merged with the legislation that the House passed last month. That bill imposes a so-called revenge tax on foreign companies that try to enforce the terms of a 2021 global minimum tax agreement or impose digital services taxes on American technology companies.The legislation would substantially increase the tax bills for many foreign companies that operate in the United States, raising more than $100 billion over a decade. Critics argue that the provision would chill foreign investment at a time when the Trump administration is trying to attract international money.“I think the president has been pretty unequivocal on where he stands on wanting more investment into the U.S. from international companies,” said Jonathan Samford, chief executive of the Global Business Alliance, which lobbies on behalf of international businesses in the U.S.Mr. Samford added that the measure “directly contradicts the president’s investment vision.”The legislation is poised to reignite international tax and trade wars that have been on hiatus as policymakers around the world grapple with how to overhaul the global tax system. It has also stoked anxiety among Wall Street investors and is expected to be a topic of discussion as leaders of the Group of 7 countries gather in Canada this week for a summit.Since taking office, President Trump has made clear that he wants nothing to do with a 2021 deal brokered by the Biden administration that aimed to rewrite the rules of how the world’s largest companies would be taxed around the globe. That deal, which was agreed to by the G7, created a new global minimum tax rate of at least 15 percent that companies would have to pay, regardless of their headquarter location. The aim was to prevent countries from lowering their tax rates as a way to attract multinational corporations, creating a “race to the bottom” in taxation that left nations with fiscal shortfalls.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      F.D.A. Looks to A.I. to Enhance Efficiency

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      With a Trump-driven reduction of nearly 2,000 employees, agency officials view artificial intelligence as a way to speed drugs to the market.The Food and Drug Administration is planning to use artificial intelligence to “radically increase efficiency” in deciding whether to approve new drugs and devices, one of several top priorities laid out in an article published Tuesday in JAMA.Another initiative involves a review of chemicals and other “concerning ingredients” that appear in U.S. food but not in the food of other developed nations. And officials want to speed up the final stages of making a drug or medical device approval decision to mere weeks, citing the success of Operation Warp Speed during the Covid pandemic when workers raced to curb a spiraling death count.“The F.D.A. will be focused on delivering faster cures and meaningful treatments for patients, especially those with neglected and rare diseases, healthier food for children and common-sense approaches to rebuild the public trust,” Dr. Marty Makary, the agency commissioner, and Dr. Vinay Prasad, who leads the division that oversees vaccines and gene therapy, wrote in the JAMA article.The agency plays a central role in pursuing the agenda of the U.S. health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and it has already begun to press food makers to eliminate artificial food dyes. The new road map also underscores the Trump administration’s efforts to smooth the way for major industries with an array of efforts aimed at getting products to pharmacies and store shelves quickly.Some aspects of the proposals outlined in JAMA were met with skepticism, particularly the idea that artificial intelligence is up to the task of shearing months or years from the painstaking work of examining applications that companies submit when seeking approval for a drug or high-risk medical device.“I don’t want to be dismissive of speeding reviews at the F.D.A.,” said Stephen Holland, a lawyer who formerly advised the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on health care. “I think that there is great potential here, but I’m not seeing the beef yet.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Budget Eliminates Funding for Crucial Global Vaccination Programs

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      The spending proposal terminates support of health programs that, according to the proposal, “do not make Americans safer.”The Trump administration’s proposed budget for the coming fiscal year eliminates funding for programs that provide lifesaving vaccines around the world, including immunizations for polio.The budget, submitted to Congress last week, proposes to eliminate the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s global health unit, effectively shutting down its $230 million immunization program: $180 million for polio eradication and the rest for measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases. The budget plan also withdraws financial support for Gavi, the international vaccine alliance that purchases vaccines for children in developing countries.Overall, the budget request explicitly follows President Trump’s America First policy, slashing funds for global health programs that fight H.I.V. and malaria, and cutting support altogether to fight diseases that affect only poorer countries.“The request eliminates funding for programs that do not make Americans safer, such as family planning and reproductive health, neglected tropical diseases, and nonemergency nutrition,” the proposal said.Many public health experts said that such thinking is flawed because infectious diseases routinely breach borders. The United States is battling multiple measles outbreaks, prompting the C.D.C. last week to warn travelers about the risks of contracting measles. Each of those outbreaks began with a case of measles contracted by an international traveler.“Every single measles case this year is related to actual importations of the virus into the United States,” said Dr. Walter Orenstein, associate director of the Emory Vaccine Center and a former director of the United States’ Immunization Program.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Some House Republicans Have Regrets After Passing Trump’s Domestic Policy Bill

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      The sprawling legislation carrying President Trump’s domestic agenda squeaked through the House with one vote to spare, but some Republicans now say they didn’t realize what they voted for.When Republicans muscled their sweeping domestic policy bill through the House by a single vote after an overnight debate, they breathed a sigh of relief, enjoyed a celebratory moment at sunrise and then retreated to their districts for a weeklong recess.Not even two weeks later, the victory has, for some, given way to regret.It turns out that the sprawling legislation to advance tax and spending cuts and to cement much of President Trump’s domestic agenda included a raft of provisions that drew little notice or debate on the House floor. And now, Republicans who rallied behind the bill are claiming buyer’s remorse about measures they swear they did not know were included.Last week, Representative Mike Flood of Nebraska admitted during a town hall meeting in his district that he did not know that the bill would limit judges’ power to hold people in contempt for violating court orders. He would not have voted for the measure, he said, if he had realized.And as lawmakers returned to Washington on Tuesday after their weeklong break, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia said that she had been unaware that the mega-bill she voted for would block states from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade.“Full transparency, I did not know about this section,” Ms. Greene posted on social media, calling it a violation of states’ rights and adding that she “would have voted NO if I had known this was in there.”The remorseful statements highlighted the realities of legislating in the modern age. Members of Congress, divided bitterly along partisan lines and often working against self-imposed political deadlines, have become accustomed to having their leaders throw together huge pieces of legislation at the very last moment — and often do not read the entirety of the bill they are voting on, if they read any of it at all. At the same time, the polarization of Congress means that few pieces of legislation make it to the floor or to enactment — and the few “must pass” bills that do are almost always stuffed full of unrelated policy measures that would otherwise have little hope of passing on their own.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Tesla Protesters Claim a Victory as Elon Musk Leaves Trump’s Side

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      The activists behind the Tesla Takedown campaign say they intend to expand beyond protests at the company’s showrooms.Elon Musk left the Trump administration with a White House send-off on Friday. That was a victory of sorts for a group of activists who have spent much of the last four months organizing protests against Mr. Musk’s right-wing politics by targeting his electric car company, Tesla.A day later, on Saturday, hundreds of people showed up at more than 50 Tesla showrooms and other company locations to continue their protests.The campaign at Tesla sites began in February after Joan Donovan, a sociology professor at Boston University, gathered friends to hold a demonstration at a Tesla showroom in Boston, and posted a notice about her plan on Bluesky using the hashtag #TeslaTakedown. She said she had been inspired by a small protest at Tesla’s electric vehicle chargers in Maine soon after President Trump’s inauguration.“That first one on Feb. 15 was me and like 50 people,” Ms. Donovan said. “And then the next week it was a hundred more people, and then a hundred more after that, and it’s just grown.”Tesla Takedown has since expanded into an international movement, staging demonstrations at Tesla factories, showrooms and other locations in countries including Australia, Britain, France and Germany as well as across the United States. The campaign’s U.S. growth has been fueled in large part by anger over Mr. Musk’s leadership of the Department of Government Efficiency, which has slashed government spending and dismissed tens of thousands of federal workers while gaining access to sensitive personal data.Mr. Musk departed the administration after his involvement in politics hurt his companies, especially Tesla. Sales of the company’s cars have tumbled since Mr. Trump took office and the start of protests against the company.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Trump Officials Unveil Budget Cuts to Aid for Health, Housing and Research

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      The new blueprint shows that a vast array of education, health, housing and labor programs would be hit, including aid for college and cancer research.The Trump administration on Friday unveiled fuller details of its proposal to slash about $163 billion in federal spending next fiscal year, offering a more intricate glimpse into the vast array of education, health, housing and labor programs that would be hit by the deepest cuts.The many spending reductions throughout the roughly 1,220-page document and agency blueprints underscored President Trump’s desire to foster a vast transformation in Washington. His budget seeks to reduce the size of government and its reach into Americans lives, including services to the poor.The new proposal reaffirmed the president’s recommendation to set federal spending levels at their lowest in modern history, as the White House first sketched out in its initial submission to Congress transmitted in early May. But it offered new details about the ways in which Mr. Trump hoped to achieve the savings, and the many functions of government that could be affected as a result.The White House budget is not a matter of law. Ultimately, it is up to Congress to determine the budget, and in recent years it has routinely discarded many of the president’s proposals. Lawmakers are only starting to embark on the annual process, with government funding set to expire at the end of September.The updated budget reiterated the president’s pursuit of deep reductions for nearly every major federal agency, reserving its steepest cuts for foreign aid, medical research, tax enforcement and a slew of anti-poverty programs, including rental assistance. The White House restated its plan to seek a $33 billion cut at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, for example, and another $33 billion reduction at the Department of Health and Human Services.Targeting the Education Department, the president again put forward a roughly $12 billion cut, seeking to eliminate dozens of programs while unveiling new changes to Pell grants, which help low-income students pay for college.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Elon Musk ‘Disappointed’ With Major Trump Policy Bill

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      Elon Musk also said the Republican bill, which passed the House last week, would undermine the work of his DOGE group.Elon Musk criticized the far-reaching Republican bill intended to enact President Trump’s domestic policy agenda, saying it would undermine the administration’s own efforts to shrink federal spending.“I was disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decreases it,” Mr. Musk said in an excerpt from an interview with CBS’s “Sunday Morning” that was released late Tuesday.Mr. Musk added that the bill, which is headed to the Senate after squeaking through the House last week, would undermine the work of the Department of Government Efficiency, the White House effort to shrink the federal government that Mr. Trump tapped him to lead.Mr. Trump has urged swift passage of the bill — officially called the One Big, Beautiful Bill Act — which would slash taxes, providing the biggest savings to the wealthy, and steer more money to the military and immigration enforcement. As written, the legislation would cut health, nutrition, education and clean energy programs to cover part of the cost.But Mr. Musk said he was not sold on a bill that has emerged as the president’s top legislative priority. “I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful,” Mr. Musk said. “But I don’t know if it can be both.”A combination of Mr. Trump’s lobbying and compromises struck by Speaker Mike Johnson managed to get the bill through the House, but it faces significant hurdles in the Senate. Republicans hold a only a slim margin in the chamber, and two fiscal conservatives have said they want significant changes on the grounds that the bill lacks concrete measures to reduce the national deficit.Mr. Musk — who spent more than $250 million to help Mr. Trump’s campaign — joined the White House as a “special government employee” to lead the DOGE effort, which Mr. Trump hailed as one of his biggest accomplishments. The effort, which set the lofty goal of slashing $1 trillion from the federal budget but has fallen far short of that goal, has led to clashes with cabinet secretaries and complaints from some lawmakers.Mr. Musk’s support for Mr. Trump has also caused sales to plummet at Tesla, his electric car company, and last week the billionaire said he would spend less time in Washington and more time running his companies. More