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      Trump’s new ‘gold standard’ rule will destroy American science as we know it | Colette Delawalla

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      Science is under siege.On Friday evening, the White House released an executive order called Restoring Gold Standard Science. At face value, this order promises a commitment to federally funded research that is “transparent, rigorous, and impactful” and policy that is informed by “the most credible, reliable, and impartial scientific evidence available”. But hidden beneath the scientific rhetoric is a plan that would destroy scientific independence in the US by giving political appointees the latitude to dismiss entire bodies of research and punish researchers who fail to fall in line with the current administration’s objectives. In other words: this is Fool’s-Gold Standard Science.According to the order, “Gold Standard Science means science conducted in a manner that is:(i) reproducible;(ii) transparent;(iii) communicative of error and uncertainty;(iv) collaborative and interdisciplinary;(v) skeptical of its findings and assumptions;(vi) structured for falsifiability of hypotheses;(vii) subject to unbiased peer review;(viii) accepting of negative results as positive outcomes; and(ix) without conflicts of interest.”The order mimics the language of an active reform movement in science to increase rigor and transparency of research – a movement commonly called the open science movement, to which some of us are contributors. Science is, by nature, a continuous work in progress, constantly self-scrutinized and always looking for opportunities to improve. We should all be able to celebrate any administration’s investment in improving the openness, integrity and reproducibility of research.But, with this executive order, we cannot.Instead of being about open science, it grants administration-aligned political appointees the power to designate any research as scientific misconduct based on their own “judgment” and includes the power to punish the scientists involved accordingly; this would weaponize government counter to the public interest.The consequences of state-dictated science can be catastrophic. When Trofim Lysenko, a researcher who denied the reality of genetic inheritance and natural selection, won favor with Joseph Stalin and took control of agriculture in the Soviet Union, thousands of scientists who disagreed with him were fired, imprisoned or killed. His disastrous agricultural prescriptions ultimately led to famines that killed millions in the USSR and in China.Science does not proceed by sequentially establishing unassailable conclusions, but rather by steadily accumulating numerous lines of evidence, scrutinizing weaknesses, and pursuing additional evidence. Almost any study, any source of evidence, any conclusion, falls short of meeting every aspect of the White House’s list of best practices. This has nothing to do with laziness, let alone misconduct by individual scientists; it’s simply a consequence of the fact that science is difficult. Scientists constantly grapple with uncertainty, and nevertheless can ultimately arrive at robust, valid conclusions, such as the fact that vaccines do not cause autism, and that the burning of fossil fuels is warming the planet and wreaking havoc on our climate.Under the terms of the executive order, political appointees loyal to the president can willfully find justification to label any research finding as scientific misconduct, and then penalize the researchers involved accordingly. This administration has already appropriated the language of open science to assert control over and deal heavy blows to the scientific ecosystem of the United States – including cancelling thousands of active research grants in climate science, misinformation and disinformation, vaccines, mental health, women’s health, LGBTQ+ health and stem education. Calls to “revisit” decades of work that establish vaccine safety beyond a shadow of a doubt “because the only way you can get good science is through replication”, and demands for unethical vaccine clinical trial practices and additional data, further echo the bad-faith adoption of open science language.Trump has also advanced a congressional budget calling for massive cuts to federal spending on research and development and levied significant retaliation against universities that have not fallen in line with his demands. He has gone so far as to propose a rule change by the office of personnel management that would install policy police at all levels of federal agencies, converting thousands of employees into presidential appointees who can be summarily fired without due process for any arbitrary political reason. This new executive order raises the concern that many of our best scientists would be targeted in Lysenkoist purges. Meanwhile, the threat of such actions is already having a chilling effect on all scientists.Science is the most important long-term investment for humanity. Interference in the scientific process by political arbiters stifles scientists’ freedom of speech and thought. Science depends on unfettered speech – free and continuous discussion of data and ideas. We, like the rest of the scientific community, aspire to achieve greater openness, integrity and reproducibility of research to accelerate discovery, advance treatments and foster solutions to meet society’s greatest challenges. Meeting that objective will not occur by centralizing power over science and scientists according to the whims of any political administration. We see this executive order for what it is: an attempt to sell the US’s future for pyrite.

      Colette Delawalla is a PhD candidate at Emory University and executive director of Stand Up for Science. Victor Ambros is a 2024 Nobel laureate in physiology or medicine at the Chan Medical School, University of Massachusetts. Carl Bergstrom is professor of biology at the University of Washington. Carol Greider is a 2009 Nobel laureate in medicine and distinguished professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Michael Mann is the presidential distinguished professor of earth and environmental science and director of the Center for Science, Sustainability, and the Media at the University of Pennsylvania. Brian Nosek is executive director of the Center for Open Science and professor of psychology at the University of Virginia 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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      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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      Trump’s unfounded attack on Cyril Ramaphosa was an insult to all Africans | John Dramani Mahama

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      The meeting at the White House between Donald Trump and the South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, was, at its heart, about the preservation of essential historical truths. The US president’s claims of white genocide conflict with the actual racial persecution and massacres that took place during the two centuries of colonisation and nearly 50 years of apartheid in South Africa.It is not enough to be affronted by these claims, or to casually dismiss them as untruths. These statements are a clear example of how language can be leveraged to extend the effects of previous injustices. This mode of violence has long been used against Indigenous Africans. And it cannot simply be met with silence – not any more.The Kenyan writer Mzee Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o wrote: “Language conquest, unlike the military form, wherein the victor must subdue the whole population directly, is cheaper and more effective.”African nations learned long ago that their fates are inextricably linked. When it comes to interactions with the world beyond our continent, we are each other’s bellwether. In 1957, the year before my birth, Ghana became the first Black African country to free itself from colonialism. After the union jack had been lowered, our first prime minister, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, gave a speech in which he emphasised that, “our independence is meaningless unless it is linked up with the total liberation of Africa”.Shortly after, in 1960, was the Sharpeville massacre in South Africa, which resulted in 69 deaths and more than 100 wounded. In Ghana, thousands of miles away, we marched, we protested, we gave cover and shelter. A similar solidarity existed in sovereign nations across the continent. Why? Because people who looked like us were being subjugated, treated as second-class citizens, on their own ancestral land. We had fought our own versions of that same battle.I was 17 in June 1976, when the South African Soweto uprising took place. The now-iconic photo of a young man, Mbuyisa Makhubo, carrying the limp, 12-year-old body of Hector Pieterson, who had just been shot by the police, haunted me for years. It so deeply hurt me to think that I was free to dream of a future as this child was making the ultimate sacrifice for the freedom and future of his people. Hundreds of children were killed in that protest alone. It is their blood, and the blood of their forebears that nourishes the soil of South Africa.The racial persecution of Black South Africans was rooted in a system that was enshrined in law. It took worldwide participation through demonstrations, boycotts, divestments and sanctions to end apartheid so that all South Africans, regardless of skin colour, would be considered equal. Nevertheless, the effects of centuries-long oppression do not just disappear with the stroke of a pen, particularly when there has been no cogent plan of reparative justice.Despite making up less than 10% of the population, white South Africans control more than 70% of the nation’s wealth. Even now, there are a few places in South Africa where only Afrikaners are permitted to own property, live, and work. At the entrance to once such settlement, Kleinfontein, is an enormous bust of Hendrik Verwoerd, the former prime minister who is considered the architect of apartheid.Another separatist town, Orania, teaches only Afrikaans in its schools, has its own chamber of commerce, as well as its own currency, the ora, that is used strictly within its borders. It has been reported that inside the Orania Cultural History Museum there is a bust of every apartheid-era president except FW de Klerk, who initiated reforms that led to the repeal of apartheid laws.Both Kleinfontein and Orania are currently in existence, and they boast a peaceful lifestyle. Why had the America-bound Afrikaners not sought refuge in either of those places?Had the Black South Africans wanted to exact revenge on Afrikaners, surely, they would have done so decades ago when the pain of their previous circumstances was still fresh in their minds. What, at this point, is there to be gained by viciously killing and persecuting people you’d long ago forgiven?According to the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, half of the population of South Africa is under 29, born after the apartheid era and, presumably, committed to building and uplifting the “rainbow nation”. For what reason would they suddenly begin a genocide against white people?Ramaphosa was blindsided by Trump with those unfounded accusations and the accompanying display of images that were misrepresented – in one image, pictures of burials were actually from Congo. Trump refused to listen as Ramaphosa insisted that his government did not have any official policies of discrimination.“If you want to destroy a people,” Archbishop Desmond Tutu once said, “you destroy their memory, you destroy their history.” Memory, however, is long. It courses through the veins of our children and their children. The terror of what we have experienced is stored at a cellular level. As long as those stories are told, at home, in church, at the beauty and barber shop, in schools, in literature, music and on the screen, then we, the sons and daughters of Africa, will continue to know what we’ve survived and who we are.Mzee Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o wrote: “The process of knowing is simple. No matter where you want to journey, you start from where you are.” We journey forward with a history that cannot be erased, and will not be erased. Not while there are children dying in the mines of the Congo, and rape is being used as a weapon of war in Sudan.Our world is in real crisis; real refugees are being turned away from the borders of the wealthiest nations, real babies will die because international aid has been abruptly stopped, and real genocides are happening in real time all across the globe.

      John Dramani Mahama is president of the Republic of Ghana

      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

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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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      Trump has ‘never evolved, which is dangerous’, his niece Mary Trump says

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      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.“I can’t say we got closer, because Donald isn’t close with anybody,” she said, but working with him for six months in his office, she got “a little bit more insight”.“He is the only person I’ve ever met who’s never evolved, which is dangerous by the way,” she said. “Never choose as your leader somebody who’s incapable of evolving – that should be one of the lessons we’ve learned, for sure.”She also described the president as “one of the most provincial people I know, and that does not serve us well, at all”.Reading from her book, she described the moment a friend of her father’s, Anna Maria, met Donald for the first time. “When she first encountered Donald, he was a cocky, rude teenager, who was intensely jealous of his older brother, Freddie.“Donald didn’t have any friends, so she felt sorry for him, but whenever they included him, they regretted it. Nobody in Freddie’s circle could bear to be around this arrogant, self-important, humorless kid.“Over the years, Anna Maria watched Donald devolve into an even more arrogant adult with a widening, cruel streak.”In the book she also recounts Donald throwing a baseball at his young nieces and nephews when he was in his 20s and she was eight years old. Her brother bought her a catcher’s mitt for Christmas one year, and she “realised it was probably to protect me from having every bone in my hand broken from Donald throwing a baseball at me as hard as he could”.Mary also told audiences that after Donald’s older sister, Elizabeth, was born, doctors told his mother “that it would be very dangerous for her to have more children” because of her health issues. “She did, and the next one was Donald. About which I will say nothing more,” Mary joked.His mother later became very ill, meaning Donald, “at a very crucial developmental period, did not have his primary caregiver, and the only person left was his dad, the sociopath. So you can imagine how that sort of changed the trajectory of Donald’s life.”Mary is a psychologist whose previous books, Too Much and Never Enough and The Reckoning, also involve her uncle. She distanced herself from him around the time he began his first presidential term in 2017.In 2021, the former president sued her for $100m for giving the New York Times information for its investigation into his finances. The lawsuit sends “a very clear message to me”, she said. “But what if everybody capitulates? Then what? Well, then we lose, and that’s unacceptable.”She added that she does not “understand people who are afraid of Donald, because he’s so pathetic. I would be embarrassed to be afraid of him.” 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