Trump, Donald J

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      The Second Trump Administration Is About Ideology, Not Oligarchy

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      The Democrats, casting about for an anti-Trump narrative, have found a word: “oligarchy.” It was part of Joe Biden’s farewell address; it’s central to Senator Bernie Sanders’s barnstorming; it shows up in the advice given by ex-Obama hands. It aspires to fold together President Trump’s self-enrichment, Elon Musk’s outsize influence, the image of Silicon Valley big shots at the inauguration with a familiar Democratic criticism of the G.O.P. as the party of the superrich.I don’t want to pass premature judgment on its rhetorical effectiveness. But as a narrative for actually understanding the second Trump administration, the language of “oligarchy” obscures more than it reveals. It suggests a vision of Trumpism in which billionaires and big corporations are calling the shots. And certainly, the promise of some familiar Republican agenda items — like deregulation and business tax cuts — fits that script.But where Trump’s most disruptive and controversial policies are concerned, much of what one might call the American oligarchy is indifferent, skeptical or fiercely opposed.Start with the crusade against wokeness and D.E.I., a fight spreading beyond the federal bureaucracy to everything (state policymaking, university hiring) influenced by federal funding. Is this a central oligarchic agenda item? Not exactly. Sure, some corporate honchos were weary of activist demands and welcomed the rightward shift. But before the revolts that began with politicians like Ron DeSantis and activists like Christopher Rufo, the corporate oligarchy was an ally or agent of the Great Awokening, either accepting new progressivism’s strictures as the price of doing business or actively encouraging D.E.I. as both a managerial and a commercial strategy.Capital, in other words, is flexible. It can be woke or unwoke, depending on the prevailing winds, and it will adapt again if anti-D.E.I. sentiment goes away.Next, consider Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency, with its frantic quest to slash contracts, grants and head counts at government agencies. Is this oligarchy? No doubt some corporations stand ready to fill spaces left open by the public-sector retreat. But the American corporate sector as a whole is deeply enmeshed with governmental contracting, heavily invested in public-private partnerships, accustomed to cozy lobbying relationships and eager to take advantage of government largess.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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      The Trump administration moved to end a program for migrants from 4 Caribbean and Latin American nations.

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      The Trump administration said Friday that it was ending a Biden-era program that allowed hundreds of thousands of people from four troubled countries to enter the United States lawfully and work for up to two years.The program offered applicants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela the opportunity to fly to the United States and quickly secure work authorization, provided they passed security checks and had a financial sponsor. They were allowed to stay for up to two years, which could be renewed.Billed “legal pathways” by the Biden administration, the program was first introduced for Venezuelans in 2022, and was expanded to nationals of the other three countries the following year.By the end of 2024, more than 500,000 migrants had entered the United States through the initiative, known as the C.H.N.V. program, an abbreviation of the countries covered by it.The work permits and protection from deportation conferred under the program’s authority, called parole, would expire on April 24.The program’s termination had been expected. On President Trump’s first day back in office, he ordered the Homeland Security Department to take steps to end it.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 Endorses Brad Schimel in Wisconsin Supreme Court Race

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      The president threw his support to Brad Schimel, the conservative candidate in a race for control of the battleground state’s top court. Elon Musk has spent millions of dollars on the contest.After weeks of appeals from Wisconsin Republicans, President Trump on Friday night endorsed Brad Schimel, the conservative candidate in a hard-fought contest that will decide control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court.“All Voters who believe in Common Sense should GET OUT TO VOTE EARLY for Brad Schimel,” Mr. Trump posted on his social media site. “By turning out and VOTING EARLY, you will be helping to Uphold the Rule of Law, Protect our Incredible Police, Secure our Beloved Constitution, Safeguard our Inalienable Rights, and PRESERVE LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.”The endorsement of Judge Schimel was hardly surprising, but Wisconsin Republicans had eagerly awaited Mr. Trump’s intervention, hoping for a burst of conservative energy in their bid to upend the State Supreme Court’s 4-to-3 liberal majority.Judge Schimel, a Waukesha County judge, has long been a Trump loyalist, repeatedly defending the president in public and dressing as him for Halloween last fall. Last weekend, Judge Schimel posed for a photo in front of a towering inflatable representation of Mr. Trump at a Republican Party dinner in Wisconsin.Judge Schimel faces Susan Crawford, a liberal Dane County judge, in an April 1 election that has already broken spending records for a judicial contest. A super PAC funded by Elon Musk, the billionaire White House aide, has spent $6.6 million on canvassing and get-out-the-vote operations to back Mr. Schimel. The group has also promised $100 for any voter in Wisconsin who signs a petition “in opposition to activist judges,” an attempt to identify and turn out conservative voters.For weeks, Judge Schimel and his allies have beseeched Mr. Trump to get involved in the race. Judge Schimel told a private group of supporters that he had asked Mr. Trump’s political aides to hold a rally on the judge’s behalf in the state. Former Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican, said in a recent interview that he had asked the White House to send Mr. Trump to Wisconsin.Judge Crawford’s campaign did not seem impressed by Mr. Trump’s endorsement.“Schimel has spent his entire career on bent knee to right-wing special interests,” said Derrick Honeyman, a campaign spokesman. “We assumed he had this endorsement locked up months ago.” More

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      How a Major Democratic Law Firm Ended Up Bowing to Trump

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      Paul Weiss was targeted by an executive order from President Trump. Its chairman, who had worked against Mr. Trump during his first term, then went to the Oval Office and cut a deal.Since President Trump’s first term, Brad S. Karp, the chairman of the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, championed himself as a bulwark against what he saw as an unlawful and unpredictable presidency.Mr. Karp, who has a long history of fund-raising for Democrats, sought to unite major law firms in “a call to arms” to fight Mr. Trump in court on issues like his administration’s policy of separating migrant children from their parents. He publicly said lawyers were obligated to defend the rule of law.He hosted a “Lawyers for Biden” fund-raiser in 2023, and one of his top partners prepared Vice President Kamala Harris for her debates with Mr. Trump.So it was not surprising that Mr. Trump targeted Paul Weiss with an executive order last week that created a potential existential threat for the firm, although the order was legally dubious and undercut fundamental principles of the justice system. In response, Mr. Karp began discussions with another big firm about presenting a unified and bipartisan front and challenging the order in court.But on Wednesday, Mr. Karp walked into the Oval Office around 8:30 a.m., leaving behind the adversarial approach.Now, he wanted to make a deal.A day later, Mr. Trump announced that Mr. Karp had agreed to pledge $40 million in pro bono legal services to issues the president has championed, including a task force being run by the Justice Department aimed at combating antisemitism “and other mutually agreed projects.”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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      Paul Weiss Deal With Trump Faces Backlash From Legal Profession

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      Some lawyers said the deal was driven by profit. Others said it was enabling autocracy. One said the move had prompted her to quit her legal job in disgust.All over the legal world, lawyers on Friday were talking about the deal that Paul Weiss, one of the nation’s most prominent law firms, had made with President Trump to escape an onerous executive order that would have prevented it from representing many clients before the federal government. To avoid the hit to its business, the firm agreed to do $40 million worth of pro bono work for causes favored by the White House.It was a striking development in the White House’s broad retribution campaign against big law firms that represented lawyers or prosecutors in the criminal cases against Mr. Trump before the 2024 election.Paul Weiss’s move was a particular point of contention because of the firm’s standing in the legal community. The firm has long been dominated by Democrats and prided itself on being at the forefront of fights against the government for civil rights.“They have all the resources they need to fight an unlawful order,” said John Moscow, who was a top prosecutor at the Manhattan district attorney’s office under Robert Morgenthau. “The example they are setting is to surrender to unlawful orders rather than fight them in court.”Lawyers at firms both large and small took to social media to denounce the firm.“Absolutely shameful and spineless behavior,” one lawyer posted on X.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 Administration Halts Funding for Legal Representation of Migrant Children

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      The Trump administration notified aid organizations across the country on Friday that it would cancel a contract that funds the legal representation of more than 25,000 children who entered the United States alone, a decision that leaves them vulnerable to swift deportation.In a memo reviewed by The New York Times, the government instructed more than 100 nonprofits to immediately cease their work representing the minors. It terminated a contract that was up for renewal on March 29.Advocates said the move would fast-track the children’s court cases, to their disadvantage, because many would be left without counsel in adversarial immigration proceedings. Children as young as 2 who are survivors of trafficking, trauma and abuse, and who are often too young to understand their legal rights, would be returned to countries where they could face harm, the advocates said.“Children cannot be expected to navigate the harsh and complicated immigration legal system without an attorney,” said Ashley Harrington, managing attorney for the children’s program at Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network in Colorado.“This brazen, heartless act endangers children’s lives,” she said.The nonprofit represents about 200 minors, including three siblings, ages 7 to 13, who fled to the United States from Honduras alone last year after their parents were killed by gang members.The number of children who have crossed the southern U.S. border each year without a parent or legal guardian has increased sharply in the last decade or so, reaching 128,000 in the 2022 fiscal year, according to government data. Most of them are from Central America.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 Administration Dropped Policy Prohibiting Contractors From Having Segregated Facilities

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      A bus station in Durham, N.C., in 1940.Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group, via Getty ImagesIn 1962, removing a restroom sign at Montgomery Municipal Airport in Alabama, in compliance with a federal court order banning segregation.Associated PressThe Trump administration has removed a longstanding directive from the civil rights era that explicitly prohibited federal contractors from allowing segregated facilities, the latest move to eradicate diversity, equity and inclusion policies from government operations that has drawn fierce rebuke.The removal of the segregated-facilities policy was included in a memo last month from the General Services Administration, which manages federal property and oversees procurement for the federal government. The memo, which applies to all civilian federal agencies, was among the many directives from agencies aiming to purge safeguards put in place in the 1960s to comply with executive orders issued by President Trump on race and gender identity. In his first days in office, Mr. Trump directed agencies to rid themselves of “harmful” and “wasteful” diversity policies, and “gender ideology extremism.”The memo, which came to light after it was reported by National Public Radio this week, drops several clauses from the G.S.A.’s Federal Acquisition Regulation, which is used to solicit contracts for services and supplies. The memo said the wording was “not consistent with the direction of the president.” Among the deletions is a policy, last updated in 2015, that stipulated federal contractors couldn’t have “segregated facilities,” such as waiting rooms, work areas, restrooms, lunchrooms and water fountains.The Civil Rights Act of 1964 still bars discrimination, and segregated facilities, in the United States. But civil rights groups have feared that Mr. Trump’s war on D.E.I. programs has signaled the federal government’s willingness to retreat from enforcing it.Dariely Rodriguez, the acting co-chief counsel for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said that like Mr. Trump’s revocation of a decades-old order issued by President Lyndon B. Johnson barring discrimination in hiring for government contractors, the stripping of the segregation provision “weakens the very safeguards that promote equity and inclusion across multiple sectors, including workplaces.”“The Trump administration’s actions are pressure-testing our democracy, eroding more than 60 years of progress,” Ms. Rodriguez said.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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      Why the Pentagon Scuttled Its Briefing of Elon Musk on China War Plans

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      “You wouldn’t show it to a businessman,” President Trump said in denying that Elon Musk was to be briefed on top-secret plans in the event of war with China.Over the past 24 hours, my colleagues’ report that Elon Musk was set to be briefed on the military’s top-secret plans in the event of war with China has shaken Washington. It even seemed to take President Trump by surprise.Musk’s planned visit to a secure room in the Pentagon was called off after The Times published its article on the visit, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.This morning, Trump denied the briefing had been planned. But he also made clear that he thought Musk should not have access to such war plans.“Certainly, you wouldn’t show it to a businessman who is helping us so much,” Trump said. He added, “Elon has businesses in China, and he would be susceptible perhaps to that.”I called Eric Schmitt, a Times national security reporter, who kindly stepped into one of the few Pentagon hallways where you can actually get cell service, and asked him to bring us up to speed.JB: Let’s start at the beginning. What did you learn yesterday about what was originally planned?ES: The Pentagon was scheduled to give a briefing to Musk this morning on the classified war plan for China. We were told it was going to be in this secure conference room called the Tank, which is typically where you’ll have very high-level military briefings with members of the Joint Chiefs or senior commanders. The idea that a civilian like Elon Musk, who’s not in the chain of command, would be getting any briefing in the Tank — much less on highly sensitive war plans for China — was certainly unusual, and it was alarming to some people.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