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      Trump news at a glance: Musk exits White House after facing pressure to recommit to his businesses

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      The honeymoon between Donald Trump and Elon Musk appears to be over, after the tech billionaire announced his official exit from the White House to get back to business.Musk’s term as a special advisor to the president was due to expire this month, but his announcement that he was wrapping up follows a rash of social media posts and interviews, in which Musk criticised Trump’s tax spending bill, known as “One Big Beautiful Bill Act”.Musk has come under increasing public pressure over his time leading the department of government efficiency (Doge), in which he slashed thousands of jobs, resources and public spending, but he has continued to defend his efforts.The billionaire had for weeks been signalling his intent to spend less time in Washington and more on his businesses, Tesla, SpaceX and xAI. It’s a drastic turnaround for the world’s richest person, who plowed $200m into Trump’s campaign and dedicated most of the last year to promoting Trump and far-right ideology online, as Nick Robins-Early writes.Musk spent this week focused on a SpaceX launch – which lost control of its Starship prototype rocket – and gave a round of high-profile media appearances, all of which featured him emphasizing his dedication to his companies or attempting to explain away his Doge shortcomings.Here are the key stories at a glance:Musk says the Doge mission ‘will only strengthen’Musk thanked Trump in a social media post announcing his official White House exit for “the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending”, adding, “The DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.”Trump announced he was going ahead with negotiating the tax spending bill that Musk criticized, which would allow him to deliver on campaign promises, including tax cuts for individuals and corporations, an end to clean energy incentives and the construction of a wall along the border with Mexico.Read the full storyUS federal court blocks Trump from imposing sweeping tariffsA federal trade court on Wednesday blocked Trump from imposing sweeping tariffs on imports under an emergency-powers law. The ruling from a three-judge panel at the New York-based court of international trade came after several lawsuits arguing Trump has exceeded his authority, left US trade policy dependent on his whims and unleashed economic chaos.Read the full storyTrump laments size of ‘much too big’ airplane gifted by QatarTrump’s big, beautiful new plane from the government of Qatar has arrived – but the US president has a problem with it: it’s too big. The Qataris have given the president a Boeing 747-8, a stretch model of the jumbo that is more than 18ft longer than the much older 747-200B that flies as the current Air Force One.Read the full storyRFK Jr threatens ban on scientists publishing in top journalsRobert F Kennedy Jr has threatened to ban government scientists from publishing in the world’s leading medical journals, which he branded “corrupt”, and to instead create alternative publications run by the state.“We’re probably going to stop publishing in the Lancet, New England Journal of Medicine, Jama and those other journals, because they’re all corrupt,” the US health secretary said on the Ultimate Human podcast. He accused the publications of being controlled by pharmaceutical companies.Read the full storyDoctors fear ‘devastating’ effect after RFK Jr order on Covid boostersAdvocates for pregnant people said they are alarmed by Robert F Kennedy Jr’s unprecedented and unilateral decision to remove Covid-19 booster shots from the recommended immunization schedule.Read the full storyUS vows to ‘aggressively’ revoke Chinese students’ visasThe secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said the US will “aggressively” revoke visas of Chinese students, one of the largest sources of revenue for American universities, in the latest attack on the country’s higher education institutions.Read the full storyFamily of child in US medical care fights deportation to MexicoThe family of a four-year-old girl who is receiving life-saving treatment in the United States are fighting against deportation, as her medical team warns she will likely die “within days” if forced to return to Mexico.Read the full storyUS distances itself from Gaza Humanitarian FoundationThe Trump administration is distancing itself from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation as questions swirl over its leadership, funding, ties to Israeli officials and links to private US security firms.Reports and leaked video of its operations to bring food aid to Gaza depicted scenes of chaos, with crowds storming a distribution site and Israeli military officials confirming they had fired “warning shots” to restore order. Gaza health officials said at least one civilian had been killed and 48 injured in the incident.Read the full analysisWhat else happened today:

      A judge released a Russian-born scientist and Harvard researcher from immigration custody as she deals with a criminal charge of smuggling frog embryos into the US.

      RFK Jr and Mehmet Oz are attempting to save more than 300 ostriches in Canada that the government had ordered killed over fears of avian flu.

      The US said it will refuse visas to foreign officials who block Americans’ social media posts as Trump’s administration wages a new battle over free expression.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened on 27 May 2025. More

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      Judge says Trump’s bid to deport Mahmoud Khalil is unconstitutional

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      The Trump administration’s bid to deport Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University student and pro-Palestinian activist, is likely unconstitutional, a US judge has said.In a lengthy order issued Wednesday, Judge Michael Farbiarz wrote that the government’s primary justification for removing Khalil – that his beliefs may pose a threat to US foreign policy – could open the door to vague and arbitrary enforcement.Still, Farbiarz stopped short of ordering Khalil released from a Louisiana jail, finding his attorneys had not sufficiently responded to another charge brought by the government: that Khalil did not properly disclose certain personal details in his permanent residency application.The judge said he planned to issue an order shortly outlining next steps in the case.Khalil, a legal US resident, was detained by federal immigration agents on 8 March in the lobby of his university-owned apartment, the first arrest under Donald Trump’s widening crackdown on students who joined campus protests against Israel’s war in Gaza.He has been held for nearly 12 weeks at an immigration detention center in Jena, Louisiana, missing the birth of his first child and his recent graduation from Columbia University.Attorneys for Khalil argue his detention is part of a broader attempt by the Trump administration to suppress constitutionally protected free speech.In letters sent from the jail, Khalil has maintained that his arrest was “a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza”.The federal government has not accused Khalil of breaking any laws. Instead, they have submitted a memo signed by the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, arguing that Khalil’s presence in the US may pose a threat to US foreign policy interests.The government has offered the same justification to detain other pro-Palestinian activists, including another student at Columbia, Mohsen Mahdawi; a Tufts University student, Rümeysa Öztürk; and a Georgetown University scholar, Badar Khan Suri. All three have won their custody in recent weeks as they continue to fight their cases.In Khalil’s case, the government also said he withheld information from his residency application about his involvement in some organizations, including a United Nations agency that resettles Palestinian refugees and a Columbia protest group.The judge on Wednesday said attorneys for Khalil had not properly responded to those allegations, but would be permitted to address the issue in the future.Nico Perrino of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression called it a “mixed ruling” on Khalil’s motion for a preliminary injunction, because the judge wrote that he “is likely to succeed on his First Amendment claim, but likely to lose on a residency application issue. For that reason, the judge denied the request for a preliminary injunction, pending further briefing on the First Amendment issue.”Farbiarz’s ruling marked the first time a federal judge had weighed in on the constitutionality of Trump’s use of a law granting the US secretary of state the power to seek the deportation of any non-citizen whose presence in the country is deemed adverse to US foreign policy interests.The Newark, New Jersey-based judge said the law, known as section 1227, was vague because people would have no way of knowing what might get them deported.“An ordinary person would have had no real inkling that a Section 1227 removal could go forward in this way – without the Secretary first determining that there has been an impact on American relations with another country,” Farbiarz said in a 101-page ruling.Khalil and his supporters say his arrest and attempted deportation are violations of his right to freedom of speech under the US constitution’s first amendment. Farbiarz has blocked officials from deporting Khalil while his challenge to the constitutionality of his arrest plays out.He wrote that he would not rule for now on whether Khalil’s first amendment rights had been violated.In a statement, Khalil’s legal team said it would give Farbiarz the additional argument he sought as quickly as possible.“Every day Mahmoud spends languishing in an Ice detention facility in Jena, Louisiana, is an affront to justice, and we won’t stop working until he is free,” his lawyers said. More

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      US distances itself from Gaza food delivery group amid questions over its leadership, funding

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      After a rollout trumpeted by US officials, the US- and Israeli-backed effort that claimed it would return large-scale food deliveries to Gaza was born an orphan, with questions growing over its leadership, sources of funding and ties to Israeli officials and private US security contractors.The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation had said it would securely provide food supplies to the Gaza Strip, ending an Israeli blockade that UN officials say have led to the brink of a famine.Instead, early reports and leaked video of its operations that began this week have depicted a scene of chaos, with crowds storming a distribution site and Israeli military officials confirming they had fired “warning shots” to restore order. Gaza health officials said at least one civilian had been killed and 48 injured in the incident.In a statement, GHF downplayed the episode, claimed there had been no casualties, and said it had distributed 14,550 food boxes, or 840,262 meals, according to its own calculations.But GHF had no experience distributing food in a famine zone, and as of Wednesday, its leadership remained opaque, if not deliberately obscure. A number of executives and board members have refuted links to the group or stepped down, including Jake Wood, the ex-Marine who previously headed the group. When he resigned on Sunday, he said that it “is not possible to implement this plan while also strictly adhering to the humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence, which I will not abandon”. The group named John Acree, a former senior official at USAID, as its interim executive director.Both a Geneva-based company and a Delaware-based company tied to the organisation are reportedly being dissolved, a GHF spokesperson told an investigative Israeli media outlet, increasing speculation over its initiators and sources of funding. The New York Times has reported that the idea for the group came from “Israeli officials in the earliest weeks of the war” as a way to undermine Hamas.And the US state department has also distanced itself from GHF’s operations, with a spokesperson saying she could not speak to the group’s chaotic rollout or what plans could be made to extend aid to hundreds of thousands more people in Gaza who would not receive aid.“This is not a state department effort. We don’t have a plan,” Tammy Bruce, the state department spokesperson, said during a briefing on Tuesday when asked about plans to extend aid deliveries to those in the north of the Gaza Strip. “I’m not going to speculate or to say what they should or should not do.”She added that any questions about the group’s work should be addressed solely to the group.“The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has an email,” Bruce said. “You can – they should be reached out to, and that’s what I’d recommend regarding plans to expand, plans to make assessments of what’s worked and what hasn’t at this point and what changes they might make. And what the goal is – clearly the goal is to reach as many people as possible.”But when contacted by the Guardian, the group said it couldn’t provide a representative for an interview and did not immediately respond to inquiries about its current leadership, where it was registered or its links to US security contractors.The group did defend its food distribution, denying Palestinian crowds had been fired upon or that anyone had been injured at its distribution sites.A statement sent to the Guardian from GHF said that under its protocol “for a brief moment the GHF team intentionally relaxed its security protocols to safeguard against crowd reactions to finally receiving food”.The group in part blamed the “pressure” on the distribution site due to “acute hunger and Hamas-imposed blockades, which create dangerous conditions outside the gates”.The statement did not address Israel’s role in preventing deliveries of aid.“Unfortunately, there are many parties who wish to see GHF fail,” the group said.The UN and other humanitarian organisations have refused to work with GHF, arguing that doing so would compromise efforts to reach civilians in all conflict zones, and put at risk both their teams and local people.“Yesterday, we saw tens of thousands of desperate people under fire, storming a militarized distribution point established on the rubble of their homes,” said Jonathan Whittall, the head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.Others have described the effort as an attempt to use deliveries of aid as a political weapon.Kaja Kallas, the European Union’s top diplomat, said that the bloc opposed the “privatisation of the distribution of humanitarian aid. Humanitarian aid cannot be weaponized.” More

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      Republican Iowa congresswoman booed at town hall over Trump policies

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      Constituents booed Republican congresswoman Ashley Hinson at a town hall in her Iowa district Wednesday when she praised Donald Trump’s tax-and-spending plan and spoke approvingly of the “department of government efficiency’s” (Doge) efforts to downsize the federal government.It was the latest instance of a Republican lawmaker being taken to task at a public event over their support for Trump’s policies, and came days after Hinson had voted for the the One Big Beautiful bill when it passed the House of Representatives. The wide-ranging bill will extend tax cuts enacted during Trump’s first term, create new deductions for tips, overtime and car loan interest and fund mass deportations, while slashing federal social safety net programs.Hinson drew a chorus of boos when she told the audience in the town of Decorah that she was “proud” to have voted for the bill. “This is your time,” she said over the din. A similar outburst occurred from the audience at mention of Doge, which Hinson said she had received positive feedback about during an event elsewhere.The crowd broke into cheers when a constituent who identified himself as Steve Peterson referred to Trump’s acceptance of a jet from Qatar and promotion of his own memecoin and asked Hinson: “Could you help me understand why you are silent about this corruption?”“I think it’s really unfair to imply that I like to see corruption in Washington DC. I reject that premise wholeheartedly. I am here answering your questions in public because I care about transparency,” replied Hinson, who added that the jet was acquired from Qatar “ethically”.First elected in 2020, Hinson’s north-east Iowa district leans towards the GOP, but has been represented by Democrats in the past. At least one attendee at her town hall identified herself as a Democrat, and the county party noted that Hinson would be holding events in the district on Wednesday.Similar scenes have played out at town halls held by Republican lawmakers in Iowa and elsewhere. The state’s long-serving senator Chuck Grassley was grilled last month by constituents over his support for Trump’s hardline immigration policies, while in Georgia, police used a stun gun on two people during a town hall held by Marjorie Taylor Greene, a fervent Trump supporter.Democrats hope the public discontent is a sign that voters are ready to sweep them back into the majority in the House next year, and the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, which coordinates House campaigns, reportedly advised lawmakers to stop holding town halls.Hinson was not alone in facing questions over her support for Trump’s Big Beautiful bill, which passed the House narrowly and awaits consideration by Senate Republicans.On Tuesday, Mike Flood, a Republican congressman, faced a raucous crowd at his town hall in Seward, Nebraska, and admitted he was not aware that the bill contained language that could prevent federal judges from enforcing injunctions or restraining orders, several of which have been issued against Trump administration policies.“I am not going to hide the truth. This provision was unknown to me when I voted for that bill,” said Flood, who added he had expressed his disapproval to senators. More

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      Musk is pivoting from DC and Doge’s failures – and wants investors to know

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      Elon Musk really wants the public – and investors – to know that he’s leaving Washington DC behind.In a series of interviews and social media posts this week, Musk has criticized Donald Trump’s marquee tax bill and emphasized his recommitment to leading SpaceX, Tesla and the artificial intelligence company xAI. The world’s richest person claimed that he was back to working around the clock at his companies – to the point of sleeping in conference rooms and factory offices once again.Musk has been telegraphing a pivot back to his businesses for months, but in recent appearances, he has repeatedly distanced himself from his unpopular stint in Washington while proclaiming that his new sole focus is his tech empire. It is a drastic turnaround for Musk, who spent most of the last year constantly at Trump’s side promoting far-right ideology online, appearing on stage at political rallies and pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the Republican party.The shift, which comes amid public and investor backlash against Musk’s political ambitions, was apparent this week as SpaceX launched and lost control of its Starship prototype rocket. Musk gave a round of media appearances to the Washington Post, Ars Technica, CBS News Sunday Morning and a YouTube aerospace influencer, all of which featured him emphasizing his dedication to his companies or attempting to explain away the shortcomings of his heavily criticized “department of government efficiency”.“The federal bureaucracy situation is much worse than I realized,” Musk told the Washington Post on Tuesday. “I thought there were problems, but it sure is an uphill battle trying to improve things in DC, to say the least.”Musk additionally told the Post that Doge had been turned into a “whipping boy” that was criticized for anything that went wrong under the Trump administration. In Ars Technica, Musk admitted: “I think I probably did spend a bit too much time on politics.”Bashing Trump’s tax billThe turn from Trump’s self-appointed “first buddy” back to the familiar territory of space travel and tech has taken place as Doge faces numerous legal challenges and remains widely unpopular.Although Musk successfully seeded the government with his allies and helped gut regulators that would oversee his companies, Doge’s central promise to slash $2tn worth of fraud and waste has been an obvious failure. Doge’s cuts, while devastating to government services, humanitarian aid and the federal workforce, have amounted to little in terms of actual budget savings. Much of the savings it has claimed on its “wall of receipts” have also turned out to be false, including the cancellation of an $8bn contract that in reality was an $8m contract.Musk’s answer for Doge’s shortcomings appears to be casting the blame on some of his familiar foes: politicians and bureaucrats. In doing so, however, he has increasingly split with the Republican party – though notably stopped short of any criticism of Trump himself.Musk’s split with Congressional Republicans has been starkest on X, the social media platform that he owns. Musk’s posts have fully leaned into the narrative that Doge’s actions were successfully reducing waste, but that Congress hamstrung its operations through actions like approving Trump’s tax bill, which is expected to add $2.3tn to the deficit.Musk told CBS that he was “disappointed to see the massive spending bill, which increases the budget deficit …  and undermines the work that the Doge team is doing”.Now, Musk claims, he will focus on saving humanity through technologies like self-driving cars, interplanetary rockets and humanoid robots – exactly the products his companies need investors to believe in.“I have come to the perhaps obvious conclusion that accelerating GDP growth is essential,” Musk posted on Friday in response to a thread calling the GOP bill “disastrous” and demanding term limits on Congress. “Doge has and will do great work to postpone the day of bankruptcy of America, but the profligacy of government means that only radical improvements in productivity can save our country.”In a separate exchange, he replied to a conversation between two users with large followings who routinely praise his leadership and business acumen.“I think Elon is realizing that, despite the promises made by the new administration and a Republican-controlled Congress – and all the campaign platforms they ran on – the current incentive structures and entrenched special interests in government make it nearly impossible to enact any meaningful, long-term changes to address the many big issues we face,” one pro-Musk account posted.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“DOGE has done incredible work, but the GOP has failed to actually implement any of the cuts,” another prominent Musk-booster replied.“Yeah (Sigh),” Musk responded to the thread.Musk goes back to selling the futureWhat became clear throughout Musk’s time in Washington was that the public did not enjoy seeing him and many in the Trump administration did not like working with him. Numerous polls showed his overall popularity declining even as people supported the premise of reducing government inefficiencies. Musk’s prominent involvement in a Wisconsin supreme court election intensified opposition to his influence, while international demonstrations made him the face of the administration. Musk also found few friends within the Trump administration, with report after report of heated clashes with senior officials and some Republican political operatives warning his brand had become too toxic for the party.The pushback against Musk affected his businesses, causing Tesla sales to plummet to the point that the company’s board reportedly began considering replacing him as CEO. While Musk denied those claims, in recent weeks he has very loudly reaffirmed his dedication to leading his businesses.“Back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms,” he posted on Saturday. “I must be super focused on 𝕏/xAI and Tesla (plus Starship launch next week), as we have critical technologies rolling out.”While only a few weeks ago Musk’s posts on X were a nonstop stream of invectives against Democrats, fringe theories about immigration and demands to gut the judicial system, his online output has also changed. His posts this week have been heavily focused on SpaceX’s ambitions to go to Mars and Tesla’s self-driving car program, stopping only occasionally to promote attacks against “the woke mind virus” or feud with the government of his native South Africa.As Musk moves away from full-time politics and tries to win back investor confidence, he has also doubled down on his habit of making grandiose predictions of how his technologies will transform the world. Echoing a long list of previous claims that have missed deadlines and so far failed to come to fruition, he has promoted new endeavors like Tesla’s humanoid robots as crucial to the future of civilization.“Once you have humanoid robots, the actual economic output potential is tremendous. It’s really unlimited,” Musk said on stage at the Saudi-US Investment Forum on 13 May. “Potentially, we could have an economy 10 times the size of the global economy, where no one wants for anything.”Rather than dwell on a year of missed targets and intense backlash, Musk is back to selling a future where anything is possible. More

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      Trump confirms he’ll be negotiating his signature tax bill after Musk criticism

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      Donald Trump said he will be negotiating his signature tax bill after Elon Musk publicly criticised the president’s spending plan, saying it “undermines” cost-cutting efforts that the world’s richest man once spearheaded.Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Trump acknowledged the bill “needs to get a lot of support” in Congress, adding “we have to get a lot of votes”. The president also said he was “not happy about certain aspects of it, but I’m thrilled by other aspects of it” and confirmed he would be negotiating the legislation.The remarks come after Musk said he was “disappointed to see the massive spending bill, which increases the budget deficit … and undermines the work that the Doge team is doing” in comments made to CBS as part of a longer interview due to run on its Sunday morning programme this weekend.Musk had been leading the “department of government efficiency” (Doge) since January, which was given the task of cutting state spending. He later announced in April he would be stepping back from the Trump administration after Tesla’s earnings plunged, and spending millions of dollars in a supreme court race that his Republican candidate ultimately lost.Musk now appears to be hitting out at Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which was narrowly approved last week by the House of Representatives.The bill pushes ahead with a number of Trump’s campaign promises, including extending tax cuts for individuals and corporations and ending clean energy incentives enacted under Joe Biden.It also involves about $1tn (£741bn) in cuts to benefits aimed at supporting struggling households, including a health insurance scheme for low-income families, Medicaid, and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) food stamps.However, the bill also funds the construction of a wall along the border with Mexico, as well as staff and facilities for mass deportations of undocumented immigrants. Even when taking cuts into account, the bill is expected to add about $2.3tn to the deficit, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.Musk told CBS: “I think a bill can be big, or it can be beautiful. But I don’t know if it can be both. My personal opinion.”The comments will fuel rumours of a growing rift between the billionaire and the US president, whom Musk helped bankroll last year. In total, Musk’s super political action committee donated $200m to Trump’s presidential campaign before the November election, which many credit with helping to return Trump to the White House.Musk also has business interests at stake, with Trump’s bill due to end a $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles and to impose a $250 annual registration fee for owners. The Tesla boss has previously called for an end to those incentives, although that was months before the EV maker’s earnings started to wobble.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionLast month, Tesla reported a 71% drop in first-quarter profits to $409m, compared with $1.39bn in the same period in 2024. Tesla’s stock has also suffered, with the company losing about a quarter of its market value since Musk took a top spot in Trump’s administration at the start of the year.Musk’s criticism is likely to fuel opposition by hardline Republicans, who threatened to block Trump’s legislation as it passes through the US senate unless the president rolls out deeper cuts that would reduce the national debt. One key senator, Rand Paul from Kentucky, told Fox News Sunday that the bill’s cuts were “wimpy and anaemic” and would “explode the debt”.However, Trump has already been treading on politically sensitive territory by supporting a bill that makes big cuts to programmes he promised to protect. He pledged multiple times on the campaign trail last year that he would not touch basic safety nets, including Medicaid.Some of the president’s “make America great again” supporters, including the former White House strategist Steve Bannon, have also warned against such a move, with one Missouri senator, Josh Hawley, saying that cutting health insurance for the working poor would be “politically suicidal”. More

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      Family of four-year-old who would ‘die within days’ fighting deportation from US to Mexico

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      The family of a four-year-old girl who is receiving life-saving treatment in the United States are fighting against deportation, as her medical team warns she will likely die “within days” if forced to return to Mexico.Deysi Vargas, her husband and their daughter – whom lawyers identified by the pseudonym Sofia – came to the US in 2023, receiving permission to enter the US on humanitarian grounds to seek medical care. Sofia suffers from short bowel syndrome, requiring specialized care that includes IV treatments for 14 hours a day. She has seen significant improvement since arriving in the US and obtaining care at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, her mother said.But in April, Donald Trump’s administration terminated the family’s legal status and ordered them to self-deport, which would have grave consequences for Sofia.“Sofia’s doctors have been clear she will die within days,” Gina Amato, the directing attorney of Public Counsel’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, which is representing the family. “Deporting this family under these conditions is not only unlawful – it constitutes a moral failure that violates the basic tents of humanity and decency.”View image in fullscreenThe family’s attorney has sought to have the administration reverse its decision and restore humanitarian parole, a temporary status granted to people on urgent humanitarian grounds, citing Sofia’s dire need for care. The family has not received a response.The legal status the family previously received saved Sofia’s life, her mother said at a press conference on Wednesday, as her curly-haired daughter sat nearby, feet dangling off a chair while she played with stickers. Sofia was born with her condition and, while in Mexico, was hospitalized constantly and did not improve, Vargas said.“Now with the help she’s received in the United States, my daughter has an opportunity to get out of the hospital, know the world and live like a normal girl of four years,” she said through a translator.Sofia currently receives nutrition intravenously as well as through a feeding tube, Amato said, but that treatment is not available abroad because the equipment cannot be taken outside the US. While her condition has significantly improved, Sofia cannot yet survive without the treatment she receives from the hospital, her mother said.Humanitarian parole was made for people like Vargas and Sofia, the family’s lawyer, Rebecca Brown, said, adding that she came to the US legally – applying to enter the country and waiting until her application was approved before entering. If the government conducted an individualized assessment, as required by law, they would see the need for Sofia to remain in the US, Brown said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAmato argued the case was a symbol of “the recklessness of this administration’s deportation policies”.“To suddenly yank away that welcome mat, take away Sofia’s lifesaving care and quite literally risk her life is a cruel betrayal of our nation’s values and an affront to our shared humanity,” Amato said, adding that the government’s policies are endangering many immigrants seeking refuge. “These are people coming to us for protection and instead we’re sending them to die.” More

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      Trump is stretching his pardon power – to the delight of his Maga acolytes

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      Donald Trump pardoned the hosts of a reality TV show convicted of defrauding banks to fund their luxurious lifestyle in the same week that he pardoned a sheriff who accepted bribes from businessman in order to make them into law enforcement officers.The latest pardons build on Trump’s pattern of granting clemency to people who align with him politically and who he believes were part of a justice system weaponized against conservatives, particularly Trump supporters.Trump, who was himself prosecuted by the federal government and state governments, is stretching US presidential pardon power beyond its norms, much to the delight of his Make America Great Again (Maga) acolytes and conservative lawmakers, who previously took former president Joe Biden to task for his last-minute pardons of his family members and allies.Trump started his second term with a massive act of clemency: granting pardons and commutations for all those convicted for their roles in the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, including some who had engaged in violence that day.Since then, he has pardoned a host of people convicted of fraud or public corruption, as well as a group of anti-abortion protesters who blocked access to a clinic.Those pardoned include the former governor of Illinois who now calls himself a “Trump-ocrat”, the founder of the Silk Road darknet online market, two police officers convicted for their roles in the death and coverup of a young woman, a former state senator in Tennessee, the founder of an electric vehicle company, a nursing home executive and a woman who collected money for a police memorial who used the money for herself instead.On Wednesday, he pardoned a labor union leader who pleaded guilty to failing to report gifts from an advertising firm. James Callahan was general president of the International Union of Operating Engineers when he accepted at least $315,000 in tickets to sporting events and concerts and other amenities from a company that the union used to place ads.The moves to pardon people convicted of fraud and public corruption charges shows how the justice department is de-emphasizing these kinds of cases, NBC News reports. The pardons come alongside dropped public corruption cases, most notably one against New York City’s mayor, Eric Adams.“Pardoning a sheriff who took cash for deputy badges is just the latest in a string of actions this president has taken to undermine any effort to hold officials accountable to the public they are sworn to serve,” Stacey Young, a former justice department official, told NBC News.In several instances, the convicted or their attorneys made appeals to Trump by saying they were politically prosecuted for their views.The lawyer for Julie and Todd Chrisley, the reality TV stars pardoned on Wednesday, had put together binders to show the Trump administration why his clients should be granted clemency, the New York Times reported. Alex Little wrote in these documents that the Chrisleys’ conviction “exemplifies the weaponization of justice against conservatives and public figures, eroding basic constitutional protections”.Paul Walczak, a former nursing home executive, was pardoned by Trump for misusing employee tax money to fund his lifestyle, after his mother had attended a $1m per person fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago in April, the New York Times reported. In his bid for a pardon, he had brought up his mother’s political connections, saying her role in raising money for Trump and boosting conservative causes motivated the Biden justice department to go after him.The office of the pardon attorney is typically run by a career appointee, not a political appointee chosen for their adherence to the president’s agenda. Presidents at times go outside the pardon attorney’s office for the less routine pardons, often for their political allies, as Biden did when he pardoned his family members. There are criteria the justice department would follow when considering a typical pardon application, including showing rehabilitation and remorse, though the president decides whether to act on their recommendation.Liz Oyer, the former pardon attorney who was fired for refusing to recommend gun rights restoration for actor Mel Gibson, told Newshour that Trump’s use of pardons are “not at all how pardons normally work”. His pardons show a pattern of people who have shown political loyalty or who are wealthy and well-connected, Oyer said.“In the current administration, there is no path forward that we know of right now for ordinary people to be considered for clemency,” Oyer told Newshour. “And the other thing that’s really striking and shocking is that the president is granting clemency to individuals who owe tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution and fines and other financial penalties. And it’s never been done by any other president.”Now, though, a political appointee is in charge. Ed Martin, the recently appointed pardon attorney, is a staunch Trump ally who advocated for pardons for January 6 defendants before he took a role in the administration. Trump also appointed a “pardon czar” in February who will recommend people for clemency.Politico reported this week that, in Martin’s first week on the job, he was reviewing an application for a full pardon for Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the far-right militia group who received a commutation from Trump as part of the January 6 clemency, but not a full pardon. Martin has said he will investigate Biden’s preemptive pardons issued just before he left office.Some in Maga world are now pushing for federal pardons for Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis police officer convicted in the killing of George Floyd, and Tina Peters, a Colorado election clerk convicted for allowing unauthorized access to election machines as part of a quest to find voter fraud. Both of these cases involve state crimes, Peters exclusively, but have become cause celebre for Trump allies, who want to see the administration pressure for their release. More