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      Top Russian security official dismisses Trump’s ‘playing with fire’ warning to Putin – US politics live

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      Top Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev, responding to Donald Trump’s warning that Vladimir Putin is “playing with fire”, said on Tuesday the only truly bad thing to worry about was World War Three.“Regarding Trump’s words about Putin “playing with fire” and “really bad things” happening to Russia. I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!” Medvedev wrote on X.Margo Martin, special assistant to President Donald Trump, posted a video on X, of the president calling Savannah Chrisley to announce his pardon of her parents, Todd and Julie Chrisley.Martin posted, “President Trump calls @_ItsSavannah_to inform her that he will be granting full pardons to her parents, Todd and Julie Chrisley!”The stars of the reality TV series Chrisley Knows Best rose to fame for showcasing their lavish lifestyle and tight-knit family.In 2019, the Chrisleys were indicted by a federal grand jury on 12 counts of bank and wire fraud, tax evasion and conspiracy, all of which they have denied.The reality stars began their prison sentences in January 2023. Their original sentences, which were 12 years and seven years, respectively, were reduced in September 2023.The possibility of halting abortions in Missouri has resurfaced after the state’s supreme court sent a case back to the lower court for reconsideration.The court ruled today that a district judge had used the wrong legal standard in decisions made in December and February. Those rulings had temporarily allowed abortions to continue in Missouri for the first time since the state’s near-total ban took effect following the US supreme court’s overturning of Roe v Wade in 2022.The high court ordered Judge Jerri Zhang to vacate her previous rulings and reassess the case using the proper legal framework it outlined.The state argued in its March petition that Planned Parenthood failed to prove women were harmed in the absence of the temporary blocks. Instead, officials said Zhang’s rulings left abortion clinics “functionally unregulated” and women with “no guarantee of health and safety.”A judge in Washington struck down an executive order targeting law firm WilmerHale, marking the third ruling to overwhelmingly reject President Donald Trump‘s efforts to punish firms he perceives as enemies of his administration.US District Judge Richard Leon, an appointee of Republican President George W Bush, said Trump’s order retaliated against the firm in violation of US constitutional protections for free speech and due process, Reuters reports.WilmerHale is the former home of Robert Mueller, the Republican-appointed special counsel who led a probe into Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election and Trump campaign ties to Moscow. Trump has derided the investigation as a political “witch hunt.”Leon barred federal agencies from enforcing the 27 March executive order against WilmerHale, a 1,100-lawyer firm with offices in Washington, DC and across the country.The Associated Press is reporting that the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to halt an order allowing migrants to challenge their deportations to South Sudan, an appeal that came hours after the judge suggested the Trump administration was “manufacturing” chaos and said he hoped that “reason can get the better of rhetoric.”Judge Brian Murphy in Boston found the White House violated a court order with a deportation flight to the chaotic African nation carrying people from other countries who had been convicted of crimes in the U.S. He said those migrants must get a real chance to be heard if they fear being sent there could put them in danger, he said.In an emergency appeal, the federal government argued that Murphy has stalled its efforts to carry out deportations of migrants who can’t be returned to their home countries. Finding countries willing to take them is a “a delicate diplomatic endeavor” harmed by the court requirements, Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote.Murphy, for his part, said he had given the Trump administration “remarkable flexibility with minimal oversight” in the case and emphasized the numerous times he attempted to work with the government, according to an order published Monday night.“From the course of conduct, it is hard to come to any conclusion other than that Defendants invite a lack of clarity as a means of evasion,” the Boston-based Murphy wrote in the 17-page order.Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville announced he is running for Alabama governor in 2026.The Alabama lawmaker launched his campaign website today, and he’s set to officially announce his campaign this afternoon on Fox News.In 2016, he was still working as the University of Cincinnati’s head football coach, and he previously coached at Auburn University in Alabama. In 2020, he won a seat representing Alabama in the United States Senate, his first stint into elected office.Tuberville is looking to succeed term-limited Republican Governor Kay Ivey. He is immediately the frontrunner to win the seat in the deeply-Republican state. The move also sets up an open Senate race in Alabama in the midterms.The senator has been flirting with the idea of going for the governor’s seat for some time now, and was already backed by several groups before announcing his candidacy. GOP groups like the Club for Growth preemptively backed him, and other would-be Republicans candidates like lieutenant governor Will Ainsworth opted out of the race.Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened to “maybe permanently” strip federal funding to California if the state continued to allow transgender athletes to compete in girls’ and women’s sports.In an early post on social media, Trump assailed California Governor Gavin Newsom, accusing him of defying an executive order the president signed earlier this year by continuing to “ILLEGALLY allow MEN TO PLAY IN WOMEN’S SPORTS”.“I will speak to him today to find out which way he wants to go???” Trump said of Newsom. “In the meantime I am ordering local authorities, if necessary, to not allow the transitioned person to compete in the State Finals. This is a totally ridiculous situation!!!”As of midday on the west coast, it remained unclear if the president and the governor had spoken. Nor was it clear what federal funds Trump was threatening to withhold from the state.The White House did not immediately respond to a request for clarity.The president’s post appeared to reference a transgender high school student who recently won the regional girls’ long jump and triple jump competition.Also on Tuesday, the California Interscholastic Federation, the state’s governing body for high school sports, announced that it would pilot an entry process for this weekend’s track and field championship. It said it was extendinga spot to “any biological female student-athlete” who would have qualified in a competition where a transgender athlete secured qualifying marks.In the inaugural episode of his podcast, Newsom said it was“deeply unfair” for transgender athletes to compete in women’s sports. On Tuesday, a spokesperson for his office said the federation’s new policy was “a reasonable, respectful way to navigate a complex issue without compromising competitive fairness” and that Newsom was “encouraged by this thoughtful approach”.Newsom has not responded publicly to the president’s taunt. Until now, Trump has largely avoided the public clashes with Newsom that were commonplace during his first term. Newsom in return has done little to antagonize the president, seeking federal aid to help Los Angeles recover from the devastating fires earlier this year.California law allows transgender students to compete in sports consistent with their gender identity. According to the governor’s office, the number of transgender high school student athletes in California’s 5.8 million student public school system is fewer than 10.The Trump administration has asked the supreme court to intervene in its attempt to rapidly deport migrants to countries other than their own, Reuters is reporting.We’ll bring you more on this as we get it.

      Top Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev, responding to Donald Trump’s warning that Vladimir Putin is “playing with fire”, said that the only truly bad thing to worry about was World War Three. “Regarding Trump’s words about Putin “playing with fire” and “really bad things” happening to Russia. I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!” Medvedev wrote on X.

      Israeli troops opened fire near thousands of hungry Palestinian people as a logistics group chosen by Israel and backed by the US to ship food into Gaza lost control of its distribution centre on its second day of operations.

      The Trump administration has ordered US embassies worldwide to immediately stop scheduling visa interviews for foreign students as it prepares to implement comprehensive social media screening for all international applicants. A Tuesday state department cable instructs consular sections to pause adding “any additional student or exchange visitor (F, M, and J) visa appointment capacity until further guidance is issued” within days.

      The Trump administration is set to order federal agencies to cancel all government contracts with Harvard University worth an estimated $100m, dramatically escalating the president’s assault against America’s most prestigious university.

      King Charles III delivered the “speech from the throne” to open Canada’s parliament, in which he made no direct reference to Donald Trump but was closely watched for implicit criticisms of the US president and his dramatic recasting of the US relationship with Canada. In the speech, which emphasized Canadian values, sovereignty and strength, Charles hailed Canada as “strong and free” and said Canadians can “give themselves far more than any foreign power on any continent can ever take away”.

      The White House has lost confidence in a Pentagon leak investigation that Pete Hegseth used to justify firing three top aides last month, after advisers were told that the aides had supposedly been outed by an illegal warrantless National Security Agency wiretap. The extraordinary explanation alarmed the advisers, who also raised it with people close to vice-president JD Vance, because such a wiretap would almost certainly be unconstitutional and an even bigger scandal than a number of leaks. But the advisers found the claim to be untrue and complained that they were being fed dubious information by Hegseth’s personal lawyer, Tim Parlatore, who had been tasked with overseeing the investigation.

      NPR, the US public broadcaster that provides news and cultural programming to more than 1,000 local stations, has filed a federal lawsuit against Trump’s administration, challenging an executive order that cuts federal funding to the public broadcaster as an unconstitutional attack on press freedom.

      Robert F Kennedy Jr unilaterally announced that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would remove Covid-19 booster shots from its recommended immunization schedule for healthy children and pregnant women, in an unprecedented move from a US health secretary.

      Donald Trump’s media company said that institutional investors will buy $2.5bn worth of its stock, with the proceeds going to build up a bitcoin reserve. About 50 institutional investors will put up $1.5bn in the private placement for common shares in Trump Media and Technology Group, the operator of Truth Social and other companies, and another $1bn for convertible senior notes, according to an announcement from the company.

      Trump threatened to withhold federal funding if California did not stop a transgender girl in high school from competing in state track and field finals, and said he would discuss it with governor Gavin Newsom.

      The United States warned Americans against traveling to Venezuela, emphasizing a growing risk of wrongful detention in the country where there is no US embassy or consulate.

      A federal judge has issued an order temporarily barring the US transportation department from withholding federal funding from New York as the Trump administration seeks to kill Manhattan’s congestion pricing program.
      Top Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev, responding to Donald Trump’s warning that Vladimir Putin is “playing with fire”, said on Tuesday the only truly bad thing to worry about was World War Three.“Regarding Trump’s words about Putin “playing with fire” and “really bad things” happening to Russia. I only know of one REALLY BAD thing — WWIII. I hope Trump understands this!” Medvedev wrote on X.Israeli troops have opened fire near thousands of hungry Palestinians as a logistics group chosen by Israel and backed by the US to ship food into Gaza lost control of its distribution centre on its second day of operations, my colleague Emma Graham-Harrison reports from Jerusalem.An 11-week total siege and an ongoing tight Israel blockade means most people in Gaza are desperately hungry. Hundreds of thousands walked through Israeli military lines to reach the new distribution centre in Rafah on Tuesday.But the newly established Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which uses armed American security contractors, was not prepared for them and staff at one point were forced to abandon their posts.“At one moment in the late afternoon, the volume of people at the SDS [secure distribution centre] was such that the GHF team fell back to allow a small number of Palestinians in Gaza to take aid safely and dissipate,” the foundation said in a statement.The Israeli military said it fired “warning shots” near the compound to restore control. It was not immediately clear if there had been any injuries among people trying to get food.On Sunday, Jake Wood, the founding director of the GHF, resigned, my colleague Lorenzo Tondo reported, saying that it would not be possible for the group to deliver aid “while also strictly adhering to the humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and independence”.The UN and major humanitarian organisations had already refused to work with the GHF on the grounds that doing so would compromise values that are key to reaching civilians in all conflict zones, and put both their teams and recipients of aid in Gaza at risk.They also warned that a newly formed group with no experience would not be able to handle the logistics of feeding over 2 million people in a devastated combat zone.The dangerous chaos on Tuesday appeared to confirm many of those fears. The GHF said its decision to abandon the distribution centre “was done in accordance with GHF protocol to avoid casualties”.And here’s Joseph Gedeon’s story on National Public Radio, the US public broadcaster that provides news and cultural programming to more than 1,000 local stations, filing a federal lawsuit against the Trump administration, challenging an executive order that cuts federal funding to the public broadcaster as an unconstitutional attack on press freedom.Here’s my colleague Leyland Cecco’s story on King Charles III’s speech to Canada’s parliament, in which he made no direct reference to Donald Trump but was closely watched for implicit criticisms of the US president and his dramatic recasting of the US relationship with Canada.Health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr has announced that the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would remove Covid-19 booster shots from its recommended immunization schedule for healthy children and pregnant women.Legal experts said the Trump administration appointee’s decision, which Kennedy announced on social media, circumvented the CDC’s authority to recommend such changes – and that it is unprecedented for a health secretary to unilaterally make such a decision.“I couldn’t be more pleased to announce that as of today, the Covid vaccine shot for healthy children and healthy pregnant women has been removed from the CDC’s recommended immunization schedule,” Kennedy said in the announcement.Kennedy claimed the Biden administration last year “urged healthy children to get yet another Covid shot despite the lack of any clinical data to support the repeat booster strategy in children”.The secretary was flanked by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner – Dr Marty Makary – and the head of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Dr Jay Bhattacharya. Neither the head of the FDA nor of the NIH would typically be involved in making vaccine administration recommendations.Bhattacharya claimed the announcement was “common sense and good science”.Removing the booster shot from the recommended immunization schedule could make it more difficult to access – and it could affect private insurers’ willingness to cover the vaccine. About half of Americans receive healthcare through a private insurance company.Such a unilateral change is highly unusual if not unprecedented for a typical US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary. And it could leave the HHS department open to litigation.Donald Trump’s media company has said that institutional investors will buy $2.5bn worth of its stock, with the proceeds going to build up a bitcoin reserve.About 50 institutional investors will put up $1.5bn in the private placement for common shares in Trump Media and Technology Group, the operator of Truth Social and other companies, and another $1bn for convertible senior notes, according to an announcement from the company.Trump Media said it intended to use the proceeds for the creation of a “bitcoin treasury”. The effort mirrors the president’s moves to create a “strategic bitcoin reserve” for the US government.Trump, who referred to cryptocurrencies in his first term as “not money”, citing volatility and a value “based on thin air”, has shifted his views on the technology. During his campaign, he became the first major candidate to accept donations in the form of cryptocurrency. Since assuming office, he has launched his own cryptocurrency.Last week, Trump rewarded 220 of the top investors in one of his other cryptocurrency projects – the $Trump memecoin – with a swanky dinner luxury golf club in northern Virginia, spurring accusations that the president was mixing his duties in the White House with personal profit.During an event at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida during his presidential campaign in May 2024, Trump received assurances that crypto industry backers would spend lavishly to get him re-elected. He spoke at the major bitcoin event during his campaign, and JD Vance, the vice-president, is slated to speak at the conference this week.Earlier we reported that Donald Trump has threatened to withhold federal funding if California did not stop a transgender girl in high school from competing in state track and field finals, and said he would discuss it with governor Gavin Newsom.Reuters reports that in his social media post, Trump appeared to be referring to AB Hernandez, 16, who has qualified to compete in the long jump, high jump and triple jump championship run by the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) at a high school in Clovis this weekend.The CIF is the governing body for California high school sports, and its bylaws state that all students “should have the opportunity to participate in CIF activities in a manner that is consistent with their gender identity”. California law prohibits discrimination, including at schools, based on gender identity.Trump referred in his social media post earlier today to California’s governor as a “Radical Left Democrat” and said: “THIS IS NOT FAIR, AND TOTALLY DEMEANING TO WOMEN AND GIRLS.” He said he was ordering local authorities not to allow the trans athlete to compete in the finals.Under the US and California constitutions, state and local officials and individuals are not subject to orders of the president, who can generally only issue orders to agencies and members of the federal government’s executive branch.Trump threatened that “large scale Federal Funding will be held back, maybe permanently,” if his demands are not met. Such a move would almost certainly lead to a legal challenge by California, which has already sued over multiple Trump administration actions it says are illegal or unconstitutional.Trump also referred to comments Newsom made on his podcast in March when the governor also said he believed competition involving transgender girls was “deeply unfair”.A spokesperson for Newsom declined to comment on Trump’s remarks, but referred to comments Newsom made in April when he said overturning California’s 12-year-old law allowing trans athletes to participate in sports was not a priority.“You’re talking about a very small number of people,” Newsom told reporters. Out of the 5.8 million students in California’s public school system, there are estimated to be fewer than 10 active trans student athletes, according to the governor’s office.A CIF spokesperson did not respond to Reuters’ questions, and Hernandez could not be immediately reached for comment.The United States has warned Americans against traveling to Venezuela, emphasizing a growing risk of wrongful detention in the country where there is no US embassy or consulate.“US citizens in Venezuela face a significant and growing risk of wrongful detention,” the State Department said in a statement. It has assigned Venezuela its highest travel alert – Level 4: Do Not Travel.It cites risks including torture in detention, terrorism, kidnapping, unfair law enforcement practices, violent crime, civil unrest and inadequate healthcare.Venezuela’s authoritarian president Nicolás Maduro tightened his grip on power yesterday as his ruling party yesterday celebrated its “overwhelming victory” in regional and parliamentary elections, which were boycotted by the majority of opposition parties – who called the elections a “farce”. Turnout was below 15%.Meanwhile last Monday, the US supreme court allowed the Trump administration to end Biden-era protections that had allowed some 350,000 Venezuelan immigrants to remain in the United States. The decision lifted a federal judge’s ruling that had paused the administration’s plans, meaning temporary protected status holders are now at risk of losing their protections and could face deportation. Joe Biden, had granted the status to Venezuelans due to political and economic strife in their home country.A federal judge has issued an order temporarily barring the US transportation department from withholding federal funding from New York as the Trump administration seeks to kill Manhattan’s congestion pricing program, according to NBC New York.US district judge Lewis Liman held the hearing one day before transportation secretary Sean Duffy has warned the government could begin withholding federal government approvals for New York projects.New York launched its first-in-the-nation program in January, charging most passenger vehicles a toll of $9 during peak periods to enter Manhattan south of 60th Street, in a bid to cut congestion and raise funds to improve mass transit.King Charles and Queen Camilla have now departed the National War Memorial in Ottawa, Canada and are on their way back to the airport.After Charles’s speech in the Senate, the pair attended a wreath laying ceremony at the National War Memorial.Donald Trump has “never evolved” and “isn’t close with anybody”, according to Mary Trump, the US president’s niece and a vocal critic of his business and political career.The daughter of Donald’s older brother, Fred Trump Jr (nicknamed Freddie), Mary Trump told the Hay festival in Wales – where she was discussing her latest book about the Trump family, Who Could Ever Love You – that she no longer has relationships with anyone in her family apart from her daughter.She described herself as “the black sheep of the family”, calling her grandfather, Fred Trump, Donald’s father, “literally a sociopath”, and adding: “Cruelty is a theme in my family.”She explained that much of her understanding of her uncle comes from when she was in her 20s and Donald hired her to ghostwrite his second book. She said:
      He is the only person I’ve ever met who’s never evolved, which is dangerous by the way … Never choose as your leader somebody who’s incapable of evolving – that should be one of the lessons we’ve learned, for sure. More

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      Trump administration orders US embassies to stop student visa interviews

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      The Trump administration has ordered US embassies worldwide to immediately stop scheduling visa interviews for foreign students as it prepares to implement comprehensive social media screening for all international applicants.A Tuesday state department cable instructs consular sections to pause adding “any additional student or exchange visitor (F, M, and J) visa appointment capacity until further guidance is issued” within days.The directive, first reported by Politico and now confirmed by the Guardian, could severely delay visa processing and hurt universities – many of which Donald Trump accuses of having far-left ideologies – that rely heavily on foreign students for revenue.“The department is conducting a review of existing operations and processes for screening and vetting of student and exchange visitor visa applicants,” the cable reads. Officials plan to issue guidance on “expanded social media vetting for all such applicants”.The freeze is a further escalation from current screening measures, which have primarily targeted students who participated in pro-Palestinian campus protests. Since March, consular officers have been required to conduct mandatory social media reviews looking for evidence of support for “terrorist activity or a terrorist organization” which could be as broad as showing support for the Palestinian cause, according to a cable obtained by the Guardian at the time. That directive required officers to take screenshots of “potentially derogatory” content for permanent records, even if posts were later deleted.The new expansion would apply social media vetting to all student visa applicants, not just those flagged for activism. Under the screening process, consular officers would examine applicants’ posts, shares, and comments across platforms such as Instagram, X, and TikTok for content they deem to be threatening to national security, which has since been tied in to the Trump administration’s stance on combating antisemitism.Rubio told senators last week that his department has revoked visas numbering “probably in the thousands at this point”, up from more than 300 reported in March. “I don’t know the latest count, but we probably have more to do,” he said.There are more than one million foreign students in the United States, contributing nearly $43.8bn to the US economy and supporting more than 378,000 jobs in 2023 to 2024, according to NAFSA. The visa freeze threatens to compound existing challenges facing higher education institutions already experiencing declining international enrollment.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe state department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. More

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      NPR sues Trump administration over funding cuts it says violate first amendment

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      National Public Radio, the US public broadcaster that provides news and cultural programming to more than 1,000 local stations, has filed a federal lawsuit against Donald Trump’s administration, challenging an executive order that cuts federal funding to the public broadcaster as an unconstitutional attack on press freedom.The lawsuit, which landed on Tuesday in federal court in Washington, argues that Trump’s 1 May executive order violates the first amendment by targeting NPR for news coverage the president considers “biased”.“The intent could not be more clear – the executive order aims to punish NPR for the content of news and other programming the president dislikes,” NPR’s CEO, Katherine Maher, said in a Tuesday statement. “This is retaliatory, viewpoint-based discrimination in violation of the first amendment.”NPR, which Maher describes as non-partisan news, was joined by three Colorado public radio stations in seeking to have the order permanently blocked and declared unconstitutional.The executive order instructs federal agencies to “cease Federal funding for NPR and PBS” and eliminate indirect sources of public financing. The White House defended the move, claiming NPR and PBS “have fueled partisanship and left-wing propaganda with taxpayer dollars”. The White House cited a few examples it said demonstrated bias, including editorial decisions around coverage of transgender issues, the Hunter Biden laptop story and Covid-19’s origins.Trump’s criticism of public broadcasting notably intensified after a former longtime NPR editor wrote a viral article in the Free Press claiming the organization had become too progressive and left-leaning, with some of the article’s subject matter making it into the executive order as well. Maher herself has also been caught in the crossfire, with past posts about “white silence” in the wake of the George Floyd murder getting spotted on social media, before she was in journalism and ran NPR.The lawsuit describes the order as “textbook retaliation and viewpoint-based discrimination” that threatens “the existence of a public radio system that millions of Americans across the country rely on for vital news and information”.NPR says its funding structure has evolved since its 1970 founding. Today, member station fees comprise 30% of its funding, corporate sponsorship provides 36%, while just 1% comes directly from federal sources. The non-profit media organization now employs hundreds of journalists whose work is broadcast by local stations across the United States – and vice versa puts a national spotlight on local news stories with on-the-ground context and reporting – and is part of the White House press corps.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“NPR has a first amendment right to be free from government attempts to control private speech as well as from retaliation aimed at punishing and chilling protected speech,” Maher said in the statement. More

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      A hidden measure in the Republican budget bill would crown Trump king | Robert Reich

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      If enacted, Donald Trump’s Big Ugly Bill as it emerged on Thursday from the House of Representatives would result in the largest redistribution of income and wealth in American history – from the poor and working class to the rich.Hidden within the bill is also a provision that would allow Trump to crown himself king.For months now, Trump has been trying to act like a king by ignoring court rulings against him.The supreme court has told Trump to “facilitate” the return of Kilmar Ábrego García, a legal resident of the United States who even the Trump regime admits was erroneously sent to a brutal prison in El Salvador.Trump has done nothing.Lower federal courts have ordered him to stop deporting migrants without giving them a chance to know the charges against them and have the charges and evidence reviewed by a neutral judge or magistrate – the minimum of due process.Again, nothing.Judge James Boasberg, chief judge of the federal district court for the District of Columbia, issued a temporary restraining order preventing the Trump regime from flying individuals to the prison in El Salvador without due process.Judge Boasberg has found that the Trump regime has willfully disregarded his order.Is there anything that the courts can do in response to Trump’s open defiance of judges and justices?They have only one power to make their orders stick. They can hold federal officials in contempt, and enforce such contempt citations by fining or jailing them.It’s a radical remedy, rarely used. But several federal judges are at their wits’ end.Boasberg said that if Trump’s legal team does not give the dozens of Venezuelan men sent to the Sallvadorian prison a chance to legally challenge their removal, he’ll begin contempt proceedings against the administration.In a separate case, the US district court judge Paula Xinis has demanded that the Trump administration explain why it is not complying with the supreme court order to “facilitate” the release of Ábrego García.Xinis has even questioned whether the administration intends to comply with the order at all, citing a statement from the. homeland security chief, Kristi Noem, that Ábrego García “will never be allowed to return to the United States”.According to Xinis, “That sounds to me like an admission. That’s about as clear as it can get.”So what’s the next step? Will the supreme court and lower courts hold the administration in contempt and enforce the contempt citations?Trump and his Republican stooges in Congress apparently anticipated this. Hidden inside their Big Ugly Bill is a provision intended to block the courts from using contempt to enforce its orders. It reads:skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“No court of the United States may use appropriated funds to enforce a contempt citation for failure to comply with an injunction or temporary restraining order if no security was given when the injunction or order was issued …”Translated: no federal court may enforce a contempt citation.The measure would make most existing injunctions – in antitrust cases, police reform cases, school desegregation cases and others – unenforceable.Its only purpose is to weaken the power of the federal courts.As Erwin Chemerinsky, UC Berkeley School of Law dean and distinguished professor of law, notes, this provision would eliminate any restraint on Trump.“Without the contempt power, judicial orders are meaningless and can be ignored. There is no way to understand this except as a way to keep the Trump administration from being restrained when it violates the Constitution or otherwise breaks the law …“This would be a stunning restriction on the power of the federal courts. The Supreme Court has long recognized that the contempt power is integral to the authority of the federal courts. Without the ability to enforce judicial orders, they are rendered mere advisory opinions which parties are free to disregard.”In other words, with this single measure, Trump will have crowned himself king.If it is enacted, no Congress and no court could stop him. Even if a future Congress were to try, it could not do so without the power of the courts to enforce their hearings, investigations, subpoenas and laws.The gross unfairness of Trump’s Big Ugly Bill is bad enough. It would worsen the nation’s already near-record inequalities of income and wealth.But the provision inside the bill that neuters the federal courts is even worse. It would remove the last remaining constraint on Trump, and thereby effectively end American democracy.

      Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com More

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      She compared motherhood in four countries. The US isn’t looking good

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      When Abigail Leonard saw the news that the Trump administration was considering handing out $5,000 “baby bonuses” to new mothers, she realized that she had already received one.A longtime international reporter, Leonard gave birth to three children while living in Japan, which offers a year of parental leave, publicly run daycare, and lump-sum grants to new parents that amount to thousands of US dollars. But it was not until moving back to the US in 2023 that Leonard grasped just how robust Japan’s social safety net for families is – and, in comparison, just how paltry the US net feels.Not only is the US the only rich country on the planet without any form of national paid leave, but an uncomplicated birth covered by private insurance tends to cost families about $3,000, which, Leonard discovered, is far more than in most other countries. The federal government also spends a fraction of what most other wealthy countries spend on early education and childcare, as federally subsidized childcare is primarily available only to the lowest earners. Middle-class families are iced out.View image in fullscreenLeonard traces the effects of policies and disparities like these in her new book, Four Mothers, which follows the pregnancy and early childrearing experiences of four urban, middle-class women living in Japan, Kenya, Finland and the US. Published earlier this month, Four Mothers provides a deeply personal window into how policy shapes parents’ lives. And it has emerged as an increasingly rightwing US seems poised to embrace the ideology of pronatalism and policies aimed at convincing people to have more kids.Pronatalism is deeply controversial, in no small part because its critics say pronatalists are more concerned with pushing women to have kids than with ensuring women have the support required to raise them.“Being ‘pronatal’ – designing policy to increase the birthrate – is not the same thing as being pro-woman,” Leonard notes in Four Mothers’ introduction. A $5,000 check would not have been enough to help any of the moms profiled in the book. Instead, the women relied on – or longed for, in the case of the US – extensive external support, such as affordable maternity care, parental leave and access to childcare.“The book is an implicit comparison of the rest of the world to the US, and parenthood is so much harder here in many ways,” Leonard said in a phone interview with the Guardian. “People are so accepting that things can be privatized and that government can be torn down and that there won’t be any repercussions to that. We don’t think about how integral government policy is to our lives, and for that reason can’t imagine how much more beneficial it could be.”View image in fullscreenIn the US, resistance to increasing government aid in childrearing has long gone hand in hand with a commitment to upholding a white, traditional view of the American family. At virtually every juncture, rightwing groups have been galvanized to stop sporadic efforts at expanding support. During the second world war, Congress allocated $20m to a universal childcare program that could help women work while men fought in the war effort. The program was so popular that people protested in the streets to keep it even after the war ended, according to Leonard. But the program was dismantled after political disputes over how to run the program, as southern states demanded that the daycares be segregated.In 1971, Congress passed the Comprehensive Child Development Act, which would have created a national system of federally subsidized daycare centers. Inflamed by the idea that the bill would encourage women to work outside the home, church groups organized letter-writing campaigns against the bill. Rightwing pundits, meanwhile, claimed the bill was “a plan to Sovietize our youth”. Richard Nixon ultimately vetoed the bill, calling it “the most radical piece of legislation” to ever cross his desk.Today, Leonard writes, corporations have an entrenched interest in keeping childcare from becoming a public good in the US. Private equity is heavily invested in childcare companies. Wealthy corporations, especially big tech companies, can also use their generous paid leave policies to lure in the best talent.“I talked to a congressman who was telling me he was trying to get some of these companies on board to back a national paid leave policy, and they were saying: ‘We don’t want to do paid leave because then we give up our own competitive advantage.’ It’s so cynical,” Leonard said. “These are companies that have been able to create this image around themselves of being feminist and pro-family. Like: ‘They’re great places to work for women. They help fund fertility treatments!’”She continued: “They’ve feminist-washed themselves. They’re working against a national policy that would benefit everyone and that ultimately would benefit our democracy, because you wouldn’t have this huge inequality of benefits and lifestyles.”‘A grind’The US has become far more accepting of women’s careerist ambitions over the last 50 years – especially as it has become more difficult for US families to sustain themselves on a single income – but balancing work and family life is still often treated as a matter of personal responsibility (or, frequently, as a personal failing).View image in fullscreenTo improve mothers’ lives, Leonard found, a commitment to flexible gender norms – in the home and at work – must be coupled with a robust social safety net.Each of the women in Four Mothers struggled with male partners who, in various ways and for assorted reasons, failed to provide as much childcare as the mothers. Sarah, a teacher in Utah, was married to an Amazon delivery driver who got zero parental leave. Sarah was entitled to three months of leave, at partial pay, but only because her union advocated for it. Although Sarah and her husband chose to leave the Mormon church, she found herself longing for the community that the church provided because it offered some form of support and acknowledgment of motherhood.Finland perhaps fares the best in Leonard’s book. The country, which gives parents about a year of paid leave, invests heavily in its maternal care system and has some of the lowest infant and maternal mortality rates in the world; it even offers mothers prenatal counseling where they can discuss their own childhoods and how to break cycles of intergenerational trauma. (The US, by contrast, has the highest maternal mortality rate of any wealthy country.) Finland is also the only industrialized nation on the planet where fathers spend more time with their children than mothers do. (The difference is about eight minutes, “about as even as it can be”, Leonard wrote in Four Mothers.) Parents are also happier than non-parents in Finland – which is routinely ranked as the happiest country in the world – while the inverse is true in the US.View image in fullscreenStill, the birth rate is on the decline in Finland, just as it is in Japan and the US. It is not clear what kinds of pronatalist policies, if any, induce people to have kids. Nearly 60% of Americans under 50 who say they are unlikely to have children say that’s because “they just don’t want to”.“The pronatal argument here – that’s really focused on people who make the choice not to have children. That is not only cruel and mean, but it’s also ineffective, because people who don’t want to have kids probably aren’t going to have kids and none of this stuff is going to make a difference,” Leonard said.That said, had she been building her family in the US rather than Japan, Leonard doesn’t know if she would have had three children. Given the cost of US childcare, “it would have been more of a grind”.“I just think it’s harder and more expensive here. So it was somewhat easier to have that third child there,” Leonard said. “It’s not because they gave me a $5,000 baby bonus.” More

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      Trump news at a glance: Harvard threatened with more cuts as foreign universities seek to attract students

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      Donald Trump delivered the traditional presidential Memorial Day speech at Arlington national cemetery and also attacked judges on social media, talking up his own achievements and threatening Harvard University with further cuts to its funding.Trump posted on his social media platform: “I am considering taking Three Billion Dollars of Grant Money away from a very antisemitic Harvard, and giving it to TRADE SCHOOLS all across our land.”Harvard has launched legal actions over what it said was Trump’s attempt to “gain control of academic decision-making” at the university and his administration’s threat to review about $9bn in federal funding. Last week the Trump administration announced it would revoke federal permission for the institution to enrol international students. A federal judge issued an injunction within hours, temporarily blocking such a ban.Here’s what’s been happening.Former Harvard president urges people to ‘speak out’ against threats to US democracyA recent former president of Harvard University has urged people to “speak out” in defence of “foundational threats” to values such as freedom, autonomy and democracy in the US.Drew Gilpin Faust, the first female president of Harvard, also warned of US constitutional checks and the rule of law being “at risk” under the current administration, even as Donald Trump issued a fresh threat against the elite university as it seeks to repel his assaults on its independence and funding.Read the full storyHong Kong targets ‘top talent’ as Harvard faces international student banHong Kong’s education bureau has called on the city’s universities to “attract top talent” by opening their doors to those affected by the Trump administration’s attempt to ban Harvard from enrolling international students.Harvard has launched legal action against the ban but done little to assuage concerns among students thrown into limbo. Experts have warned the US the ban could be a boon for foreign institutions looking to attract talent.Read the full storyTrump peppers Memorial Day speech with boasting and partisan attacksDonald Trump honoured the sacrifices of US military veterans in the traditional presidential Memorial Day speech at Arlington national cemetery, but also peppered his address on Monday with partisan political asides while talking up his own plans and achievements.The US president laid a wreath and paid tribute to fallen soldiers and gave accounts of battlefield courage as tradition dictates. But Trump also veered off into rally-style personal boasting and brief partisan attacks during the solemn event.Read the full storyTourists from countries badly hit by Trump tariffs are staying away from USHolidaymakers in countries hit the hardest by Trump’s trade tariffs are taking the US off their list for trips abroad, according to online travel booking data.Hotel search site Trivago has seen double-digit percentage declines in bookings to the US from travellers based in Japan, Canada and Mexico. The latter two countries were the first on Trump’s tariff hit list when he announced tariffs of 25% on 1 February.Read the full storyTrump and Pete Hegseth inspiring Islamic State recruitment propagandaExperts have told the Guardian that Islamic State is capitalising on Trump’s dismantling of the international order, his affinity for the Benjamin Netanyahu government in Israel and most of all his appointment of Pete Hegseth as Pentagon chief, using it in propaganda for recruitment.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      Former government officials have told the Guardian that Trump’s quid pro quo approach to foreign policy has more in common with his predecessors than it first appears. Where he does differ, they argue, is in his shameless abandonment of moral leadership and use of the US presidency for personal gain.

      Cuts to AmeriCorps – the US agency for national service and volunteerism – were among the harshest doled out by Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge). Those cuts are already disrupting LA wildfire recovery.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 25 May 2025. More

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      Tourists from countries badly hit by Trump tariffs are staying away from US

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      Holidaymakers in countries hit the hardest by Donald Trump’s trade tariffs are taking the US off their list for trips abroad, according to online travel booking data.Findings from the hotel search site Trivago also suggest that UK and US travellers are increasingly choosing domestic holidays amid concerns over an uncertain economy.The company has seen double-digit percentage declines in bookings to the US from travellers based in Japan, Canada and Mexico. The latter two countries were the first on Trump’s tariff hitlist when he announced tariffs of 25% on 1 February.Canadians in particular were incensed at Trump’s repeated suggestions that its northern neighbour would be better off annexed as the 51st state of the US.According to Trivago’s findings, which were shared with PA Media, demand among Germans was also “down heavily”, with hotel bookings in the US showing a single-digit percentage decline.Germany is the largest economy in the EU, which Trump has repeatedly threatened with increased tariffs, most recently saying on Sunday he had “paused” a 50% tax he intended to introduce next month.There has not been a significant change in the numbers of UK holidaymakers travelling to the US. The UK has so far faced some of the lightest tariffs globally and last month struck a “breakthrough” trade deal with the US.Businesses operating in its $2.6tn tourism industry are becoming increasingly concerned about a “Trump slump” due to the turmoil the president’s tariff war is causing on the global economy.Last month, the federal government’s National Travel and Tourism Office released preliminary figures showing visits to the US from overseas fell by 11.6% in March compared with the same month last year.Bookings made via Expedia-owned Trivago also show that Americans are spending less on their trips, while there is higher demand for cheaper hotels and lower star categories.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump has levied tariffs on more than 180 countries, but has paused many of his tariffs for periods of up to 90 days while governments seek to negotiate deals.Recent booking data shows that in the UK there has been a 25% year-on-year leap in demand for domestic travel for the important months of July to September.“In times of uncertainty, people stay closer to home,” said Johannes Thomas, chief executive of Trivago.Trivago’s research has shown that London is the top destination for British tourists, followed by Edinburgh, where demand is up by nearly 30%, then York, Blackpool and Manchester. More

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      Trump peppers Memorial Day speech with personal boasting and partisan attacks

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      Donald Trump honored the sacrifices of US military veterans in the traditional presidential Memorial Day speech at Arlington national cemetery, but also peppered his address on Monday with partisan political asides while talking up his own plans and achievements.The US president laid a wreath and paid tribute to fallen soldiers and gave accounts of battlefield courage as tradition dictates, from prepared remarks, after saluting alongside his vice-president, JD Vance and defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, who both served in Iraq.But Trump also veered off into rally-style personal boasting and brief partisan attacks during the solemn event.“Those young men could never have known what their sacrifice would mean to us, but we certainly know what we owe to them. That valor gave us the freest, greatest and most noble republic ever to exist on the face of the earth,” he said of those killed in military service.Then he went on: “A republic that I am fixing after a long and hard four years. That was a hard four years we went through.”The president continued with an anti-immigration statement that chimes with his agenda, though without directly mentioning his predecessor, Democratic president Joe Biden who served between Trump’s first term and the Republican’s return to the White House this January.“Who would let that happen? People pouring through our borders unchecked. People doing things that are indescribable and not for today to discuss,” Trump said.It was a nod to his Truth Social platform on Monday morning where he posted a tirade against judges who hold up his deportation aims, chiefly because of his ignoring due process obligations, as “monsters” and again attacked undocumented immigrants, using sweeping disparagements.At Arlington, he added, to cheers from supporters in the crowd: “We will do better than we’ve ever done as a nation, better than ever before. I promise you that.”Drawing attention to airmen lost in a raid over Vietnam and to a soldier lost to a suicide bombing in Iraq, while family members listened to the speech at the cemetery on the outskirts of Washington DC, Trump said: “These warriors picked up the mantle of duty and service, knowing that to live for others meant always that they might die for others. They asked nothing. They gave everything. And we owe them everything and more.”“The greatest monument to their courage is not carved in marble or cast in bronze – it’s all around us, an American nation 325 million strong, which will soon be greater than it has ever been before,” he said. “It will be.”He also used the solemn occasion to promote the celebration next month of the US army’s 250th anniversary, which he said “blows everything away, including the World Cup and including the Olympics, as far as I’m concerned”.Both events – the soccer World Cup next year, and the next summer Olympics in 2028 – are set to be held in the US within the span of Trump’s second term.Trump said: “We have the World Cup and we have the Olympics. I have everything. Amazing, the way things work out. God did that – I believe that,” he remarked of the timing. He added that “in some ways I’m glad I missed that [consecutive] second term” because then he wouldn’t have been president for these milestones.He then returned to honoring fallen soldiers.Trump also said on Monday he is considering taking a further $3bn of grant money away from Harvard University and giving it to trade schools across the US, while a former president of Harvard and current professor there, Drew Gilpin Faust, warned that American freedoms and democracy were at risk.At Arlington, Hegseth referenced men who sacrificed their lives for the nation but made no reference to women. Hegseth has systematically and bluntly attacked all diversity efforts in the US military. Vance, however, noted that the national cemetery is the “eternal resting spot for our nation’s sons and daughters”.Trump has previously attracted heavy criticism for various actions and remarks that were disrespectful to fallen and wounded military veterans. More