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Story by Reanna Smith

Footage of Kamala Harris repeatedly warning that Donald Trump would impose a "sales tax" that would "devastate" Americans has resurfaced in the wake of the president's sweeping new tariffs announced on Wednesday.

Trump sent shockwaves around the world when he had a mental collapse in a 'Biden-esque senile moment' while following through with his tariff threats on his so-called "Liberation Day," imposing a 10% baseline tax on imports from all countries and higher tariff rates on dozens of nations - including a 34% tax on imports from China and 20% on the European Union. Stock markets have plummeted as global leaders say the tariffs are a “major blow to the world economy.”

Trump says the import taxes, ranging from 10% to 49%, would do to US trading partners what they have long done to the US as he maintained that they will draw factories and jobs back to America. But during her 2024 presidential campaign, Harris warned they would cost American families $4,000 a year.
Story by Ed Mazza

“Daily Show” correspondent Michael Kosta gave President Donald Trump a reminder of a key promise on tariffs made during the 2024 campaign.

Trump campaigned vigorously on tariffs, calling it “the most beautiful word” and insisting that Americans wouldn’t pay for them.

That changed after he became president.

In February, he admitted tariffs may cause “a little pain” for consumers. Last month, he said he “couldn’t care less” if tariffs raised the price of foreign cars. And his administration and allies have been saying for weeks that consumers should brace for higher prices.
Story by David Kurtz

Make America Gilded Again
President Trump’s determination to impersonate William McKinley and return America to the turn of the last century conveniently writes women and people of color out of public life and celebrates the extreme inequality of the robber baron era. But it also perversely papers over the dawn of an American imperialism that – as deeply flawed as it was – led ultimately to the creation of a global economic and security order that has been highly favorable to the United States.

The disastrous tariffs that Trump proudly unveiled in the Rose Garden take a sledgehammer to the tentpoles of a U.S.-centered trade and financial system that accrued often invisible benefits to American consumers, businesses, diplomats, and war fighters.

Make America Great Again somehow means in Trump’s mind returning to a time before America stood astride the world stage. His lack of awareness mirrors the country’s chronic obliviousness to how good we have had it in the post-WWII era. A key element of privilege is not recognizing it.

The damage will be so vast and foreseeable that it’s hard not to veer into wondering about Trump’s motives in unleashing this much destruction on his own country. But as with the simultaneous destruction of American science and medicine, research and development, and civic and governmental capacity, taking away things in order to extort more power, privilege, and baubles remains the best explanation for Trump’s rampage. There is no public good, only what is good for Trump.
Story by Kimberley Richards

Elon Musk is continuing to defend the work of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, recently claiming in an interview with Fox News that his initiative is “the most transparent organization in government ever.”

The billionaire SpaceX founder was slammed online after he made the stunning claim during a Tuesday appearance on “The Five” when host Jessica Tarlov pressed him about any conflicts of interest he may have in his role with DOGE and as a close adviser to President Donald Trump. Musk’s companies have received billions of dollars in federal government contracts over the years.

Both Trump and Musk have been strongly criticized by voters and elected officials for a lack of transparency in DOGE’s devastating methods for ostensibly reducing “waste, fraud and abuse” in government despite Musk — who was not elected to office by American voters — repeatedly insisting that DOGE has been transparent with its conduct.

DOGE has proposed major cuts in government, causing mass layoffs and the dismantling of federal agencies since Trump took office in January. And Trump and Musk have left many feeling uncertain about their futures with mixed messaging on the administration’s crusade against benefit programs like Social Security, which Musk has described as a “Ponzi scheme.” He’s also spewed several unfounded claims of widespread fraud within the agency.

Among the many uncertainties that have surrounded DOGE’s operations are questions about staffers and their qualifications, their access to sensitive data and even Musk’s official title within the initiative, to name a few.
Story by Travis Gettys

One of Elon Musk's DOGE team members gained access to highly sensitive data involving thousands of children, including their mental health and therapy records.

The Unaccompanied Alien Children portal (UAC) contains extremely detailed records about minors who enter the U.S. alone, and the database contains reports of trauma such as physical or sexual abuse, in addition to photos, immigration records and addresses of their family members, reported The Guardian.

“I certainly would be concerned about Doge access to the portal – why it was used, which child information was accessed and for what purpose? Were mental health records accessed?” said former heath and human services official Jen Smyers. “These are the most vulnerable children in their most vulnerable moments.”
Sarah K. Burris

President Donald Trump has been ordered to pay £626,000 in legal fees after a lawsuit he brought in England was thrown out of court, said The Guardian.

Trump sued Orbis Business Intelligence, a consulting firm founded by Christopher Steele, who penned an extensive memo that claimed Trump was conspiring with Russia to win the 2016 election. The dossier also alleged that as a result of those relationships in Russia, Trump was "compromised."

The dossier made waves after accusations — which Trump denies — that he participated in "perverted" sex acts.
Story by Victor Tangermann

Just before announcing a major escalation in his tariff war on Wednesday evening — followed by a major stock market wipeout the following morning — president Donald Trump freed up the sale of his Truth Social shares.

As the Financial Times reports, Trump Media and Technology Group (TMTG) revealed that it was planning to sell more than 142 million shares in a late Tuesday filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Most notably, the shares listed in the document include Trump's 114-million-share stake, which is worth roughly $2.3 billion and held in a trust controlled by his son Donald Trump Jr. Other insiders, including a crypto exchange-traded fund, and 106,000 shares held by US attorney Pam Bondi were also included in the latest filing.

While the filing doesn't guarantee any future sale of shares, investors weren't exactly smitten with the optics. Shares plunged eight percent in light of the news, according to the FT, and are down over 45 percent this year amid Trump's escalating trade war.

The timing of the SEC filing is certainly suspect. Trump's "liberation day" tariff announcement on Wednesday triggered a major selloff, causing shares of multinational companies and stock futures to crater.

Trump also vowed in September that he wasn't planning to sell any of his TMTG shares, which caused their value to spike temporarily at the time.
Story by Matt Laslo

WASHINGTON — Fear, trepidation and loathing are now, seemingly, America’s top exports. Just ask Senate Republicans.

A day after President Donald Trump slapped a 10% tariff on most every U.S. import from the Rose Garden, some in the GOP are freaking out.

“I can't stand talking to more than one person,” Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS) scolded a congressional reporter Thursday afternoon before answering Raw Story’s tariff question while waiting for a Capitol underground tram to arrive. “I would have expected more targeted tariffs to meet the needs of where countries are taking advantage of us, and perhaps a more modest approach in the amounts.”

The tariffs have some Senate Republicans publicly complaining. That’s new.

While a mere four Senate Republicans voted against Trump’s Canadian tariffs Wednesday eve, that measure was largely symbolic. On paper, at least.

In reality, there’s a crack in the facade. And some Senior Republicans — a number that will grow if the markets keep nose-diving and U.S. allies keep fuming — have had enough already and are vocally opposing Trump’s tariffs.
Story by Molly Olmstead

Amid the flurry of executive orders from the White House in early February, it was easy to miss one of the more seemingly random ones, titled “Addressing Egregious Actions of the Republic of South Africa.” In the order, President Donald Trump chastised the South African government for its “hateful rhetoric” and “shocking disregard of its citizens’ rights” in “seiz[ing] ethnic minority Afrikaners’ agricultural property without compensation.” The order declared an end to foreign aid to South Africa and a promise to “promote the resettlement of Afrikaner refugees escaping government-sponsored race-based discrimination.”

Now, with reporting from the New York Times, we know that the government has made good on its promises. On Sunday, the Times reported that while virtually all other refugee resettlement programs have been shuttered, the administration has established a “Mission South Africa” program, with multiple teams working in Pretoria, South Africa, to help settle Afrikaners in the U.S.

For an administration that doesn’t typically express concern about refugees or matters of global human rights, this sounded like an odd fixation. But the Afrikaners—descendants of largely Dutch colonial settlers—have long been a white population with an odd amount of political relevance in the American far right. The perceived persecution of the Afrikaners, who controlled South Africa’s major institutions until the end of apartheid, circulated as a white supremacist meme for decades; in the Trump era, it has been rehabilitated as a legitimate political grievance.
Story by Adam Lynch

While Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Gen-Z-aged software programmers are firing federal employees (including veterans), a computer code appears to have been responsible for the laying off of 30 medical-related employees, including more than 10 laboratory leaders, at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS). NINDS’ office of Human Resources scrambled to quickly re-hire the wrongly fired staff this week after a coding error mislabeled employees with incorrect position codes.

“NIH leadership has informed us that the individuals below should be contacted ASAP and told immediately return to work,” the HR email stated. Among reinstated employees are three senior scientists and staff in the Office of Research Training and Career Development, as well as people in the Office of the Scientific Director and facilities. One of the employees also included Richard Youle, who claimed a 2021 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences after showing how clearing out damaged organelles discourages Parkinson’s disease.

“I am infuriated at the inefficiency of the time wasted by staff running around having to respond to these events, heartbroken for the emotional cost for hardworking, dedicated civil servants and scientific trainees just starting their careers,” an anonymous NINDS employee told The Transmitter.
Story by Morgan Music

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick is defending President Donald Trump's tariff plan amid a stock market freefall, urging Americans to "trust Trump" to handle the economy despite his history of business bankruptcies.

"Let Donald Trump run the global economy. He knows what he's doing. He's been talking about it for 35 years," Lutnick said on CNN following the market's sharp decline. "Let him fix it. It's broken."

Lutnick's comments came as the S&P 500 plunged 4%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 1,600 points, down 3.98%. The Nasdaq Composite dropped 5.97% and the S&P 500 fell 4.84% in response to Trump's new tariff policies that investors fear will spark a global trade war.

Whether Trump's policies will "fix" the economy or further destabilize it remains to be seen—but critics aren't buying Lutnick's sales pitch. Social media users quickly mocked Lutnick's faith in Trump, pointing to the president's history of business failures.
Story by Alain Sherter

Stocks in the U.S. opened sharply lower on Friday, extending a slide from the previous trading session triggered by President Trump's announcement of sweeping new tariffs on U.S. imports earlier this week.

The S&P 500 fell 144 points, or 2.5%, to 5,252 as of 9:34 a.m. EST. The Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbled 1,006 points, or 2.5%, and the Nasdaq Composite slid 3.1%.

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The indexes' free-fall Thursday was their biggest one-day drop since 2020, with more than $2 trillion in investor wealth erased from the S&P 500. The S&P 500 and Dow each sank more than 4% yesterday, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq plunged nearly 6%.

Drops of this magnitude aren't unheard of on Wall Street, but they're rare. Over the last 25 years, the S&P 500 has fallen 4% in a single day 38 times, according to Adam Turnquist, chief technical strategist for brokerage firm LPL Financial.
Story by Carl Gibson

Nearly all Republicans are lining up in support of President Donald Trump's newly announced tariffs on essentially all imported goods, despite the sharp downturn in financial markets. But journalists at the Washington Post have discovered that some of those same Republicans cheerleading the president's new import taxes were huge critics of the approach just a few years ago.

On Thursday, JM Rieger, who is a video journalist for the Post, tweeted a supercut of several high-profile Republicans in Congress that showed them criticizing tariffs as economic policy in years past, followed immediately by them heaping praise on Trump in the wake of Wednesday's sweeping new trade duties. Post journalists included quotes from Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and James Lankford (R-Ark.) along with House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) and Rep. Roger Williams (R-Texas).

Expand article logo Continue reading

"For years, Republicans in Congress warned against tariffs," Rieger tweeted. "Now, those same Republicans are downplaying massive tariff increases from President Donald Trump."
Story by Jennifer Bowers Bahney

President Donald Trump has been working at breakneck speed to eliminate federal programs, prompting an opinion columnist with The Washington Post to ponder, "Is there anything Trump won't destroy?"

Columnist Dana Milbank used the metaphor of Trump wielding an ax to chop down not only a 200-year-old magnolia tree at the White House, but the very Constitution on which the United States was founded.

Trump announced this week that he was getting rid of the tree planted by Andrew Jackson because, he wrote, it had become “a very dangerous safety hazard.” Milbank conceded that the explanation was "plausible," but what was Trump's justification for paving the storied Rose Garden into a “stone surface”?
Story by S.V. Date

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump skipped the return of the remains of four soldiers who died in a training exercise to Dover Air Force Base on Friday and instead spent millions of taxpayer dollars to attend a dinner for one of his business interests and to play golf.

The bodies of the four members of the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division — Sgt. Jose Duenez Jr., 25, of Joliet, Illinois; Sgt. Edvin F. Franco, 25, of Glendale, California; Staff Sgt. Troy S. Knutson-Collins, 28, of Battle Creek, Michigan; and Pfc. Dante D. Taitano, 21, of Dededo, Guam ― were returned to Delaware for their “dignified transfer” ceremony Friday morning. They died when their 70-ton armored M88 towing vehicle sank in a bog in Lithuania last week.

While the ceremony took place on the Air Force base tarmac, Trump was 900 miles south at his golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida, across the Intracoastal Waterway from his Palm Beach country club.

A Trump administration official, on condition of anonymity, said that “the families requested no media at the transfer” and that the “White House is respecting their request for privacy today and has been working on correspondence to the families.”

However, presidents in the past have attended dignified transfers while their accompanying press pools have been held in a location away from the ceremony. The White House did not respond to a query about why that did not happen in this case.
Story by Debadrita Sur

President Donald Trump will skip the dignified transfer of the bodies of four American troops who tragically died during a military training exercise in Lithuania - with Pete Hegseth set to attend.

In a statement on Friday, ahead of the soldiers' return, Karoline Leavitt told Newsweek: "The Secretary of Defense will represent the Administration at the dignified transfer for the four brave U.S. service members who tragically died during a training exercise in Lithuania."

Instead, he is at his private club in Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida. He is scheduled to attend a candlelit dinner for MAGA Inc., an allied political organization, on Friday evening. He spent Thursday in Miami at a different one of his golf courses, where he attended a Saudi-funded tournament.
Ingraham and contributor Raymond Arroyo incited "racial stereotypes" about the congresswoman during a Fox News segment, one expert said.
By Kimberley Richards

Fox News host Laura Ingraham recently referred to Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) as “street” while criticizing the congresswoman’s remarks about Attorney General Pam Bondi.

During a Wednesday segment of “The Ingraham Angle,” Ingraham and Fox News contributor Raymond Arroyo each took jabs at the representative as they discussed her comments at a House Judiciary Committee hearing earlier that day, in which Crockett accused Bondi of attacking her right to free speech. (Bondi had previously told Crockett to “tread very carefully” when it comes to her criticisms of Elon Musk — and Crockett wasn’t having it.)

Arroyo unabashedly labeled Crockett, who is Black, the “Madea of Capitol Hill” — seemingly a reference to filmmaker Tyler Perry’s famous boisterous Southern character, who is also Black. He also referred to Crockett as a “Desperate Housewife.”

Ingraham then said that the congresswoman had communicated in a “very different” way with her during a past interview.

“And now she’s going very ... street,” Ingraham said as she swayed her head side-to-side. “I’ma do this, and I’ma do — it all seems like just a TikTok challenge or something. It’s very odd.”
Story by Adam Lynch

A federal judge ruled today that the Trump administration, including U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, violated his court order to unfreeze Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) relief to at least 19 states. The judge says the administration appears to be making a “covert” effort to punish states who oppose Trump’s oppressive immigration practices.

The New Republic reports U.S. District Judge John McConnell issued an injunction in March on behalf of 23 states suing the White House after the administration moved to pause FEMA aid to states. The Obama era judge ruled the hold-up “fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of our government.”

The federal reluctance applies only to states with Democratic attorneys general, and McConnell found the Trump administration ignored his March court order, with at least 19 states submitting “undisputed evidence” they were not receiving FEMA funds appropriated by Congress. Hawaii reported that FEMA had yet to respond to its $6 million request and subsequent $500k reimbursement for climate-related wildfires. The state of Oregon, meanwhile, reported that FEMA had yet to respond to a request for $129.4 million in federal funds for wildfires, severe winter storms, flooding, and mudslides.
Jenny Kleeman

Graphic artist Rebecca Burke was on the trip of a lifetime. But as she tried to leave the US she was stopped, interrogated and branded an illegal alien by ICE. Now back home, she tells others thinking of going to Trump’s America: don’t do it

Just before the graphic artist Rebecca Burke left Seattle to travel to Vancouver, Canada, on 26 February, she posted an image of a rough comic to Instagram. “One part of travelling that I love is seeing glimpses of other lives,” read the bubble in the first panel, above sketches of cosy homes: crossword puzzle books, house plants, a lit candle, a steaming kettle on a gas stove. Burke had seen plenty of glimpses of other lives over the six weeks she had been backpacking in the US. She had been travelling on her own, staying on homestays free of charge in exchange for doing household chores, drawing as she went. For Burke, 28, it was absolute freedom.

Within hours of posting that drawing, Burke got to see a much darker side of life in America, and far more than a glimpse. When she tried to cross into Canada, Canadian border officials told her that her living arrangements meant she should be travelling on a work visa, not a tourist one. They sent her back to the US, where American officials classed her as an illegal alien. She was shackled and transported to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) detention centre, where she was locked up for 19 days – even though she had money to pay for a flight home, and was desperate to leave the US.
Carl Gibson

One Republican U.S. Senate candidate running on his private sector experience is now being scrutinized for a deal in which he sided with wealthy investors over his own would-be constituents.

NBC News reported Tuesday that Tim Sheehy — who is running against Sen. Jon Tester (D-Montana) in a competitive Senate race — has yet to explain why jobs his company promised to Montanans have yet to materialize. The outlet reported that his aerial firefighting business, Bridger Aerospace Group, convinced Gallatin County, Montana commissioners in 2020 to use the county's credit rating to raise $160 million in a bond issue. That money would then be used to help the company expand, creating local jobs in the process.

Bridger executives ultimately won over county leaders, who unanimously voted for Bridger's proposal. But four years later, that money has been spent without any benefit to the county.

According to NBC, $134 million of that $160 million (more than 83%) ended up in the pockets of the New York-based private equity firm Blackstone Group in 2022. And while Bridger pledged to build two new hangars in Gallatin County, only one hangar has actually been built, and its workforce has actually declined rather than grown as promised.
Ailia Zehra

President Donald Trump's deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller reportedly disrupted a lunch gathering Thursday for GOP Senate chiefs of staff to defend Trump's controversial tariff policy with a confusing and "arrogant" presentation.

Politico reported that the arguments made by Miller, who is also Trump's homeland security adviser, alluded to the British Empire and left the aides asking one another, “What on Earth was that?".

However, members of the GOP have warned the decision to impose tariffs would be bad not just for the economy but for their chances in future elections.

Senator Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), who benefited from the backlash against former President Barack Obama during the 2010 and 2014 midterms, cautioned that Republicans could face a similar outcome in 2026, the year he is due for re-election.

In an interview with Politico published Thursday, Tillis said the GOP may be up against a "storm" next year due to President Donald Trump's decision to impose sweeping tariffs on United States imports.
Story by Jon Shelton

West Texas has been gripped by a measles outbreak for the past several weeks and as a result of misinformation passed on by Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., it now faces a second, related health problem: Vitamin A toxicity — or hypervitaminosis A — in infants and children.

The situation appears to be the direct result of bogus medical information pedaled by the vaccine-skeptic secretary himself.

Kennedy recently said that although the measles vaccine is the best defense against the highly contagious and potentially fatal infection, he emphasized that getting inoculated was a "personal choice."

Kennedy, whom President Donald Trump appointed to be the nation's top health advisor, suggested, "vitamin A can dramatically reduce measles mortality," or even prevent measles infections.

Kennedy recently directed the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to update measles guidance to promote vitamin A use in fighting the infection.
By DAVE COLLINS

Opponents of President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk rallied across the U.S. on Saturday to protest the administration’s actions on government downsizing, the economy, human rights and other issues.

More than 1,200 “Hands Off!” demonstrations were planned by more than 150 groups, including civil rights organizations, labor unions, LBGTQ+ advocates, veterans and elections activists. The protest sites included the National Mall in Washington, D.C., state capitols and other locations in all 50 states.

Protesters assailed the Trump administration’s moves to fire thousands of federal workers, close Social Security Administration field offices, effectively shutter entire agencies, deport immigrants, scale back protections for transgender people and cut federal funding for health programs.

Musk, a Trump adviser who owns Tesla, SpaceX and the social media platform X, has played a key role in government downsizing as the head of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency. He says he is saving taxpayers billions of dollars.

Speaking at the Washington protest, Paul Osadebe, a lawyer for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and a labor union steward, criticized Trump, Musk and others in the administration for not valuing the work federal employees do in creating “a baseline of economic security and power for working people.”
Story by Liam Archacki

President Donald Trump was blindsided by news that Elon Musk would be briefed on secret plans for a potential war with China at the Pentagon in March, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal.

The paper reported on Friday that Trump was “unhappy” when he found out that Musk was set to get the briefing and “frustrated” that he hadn’t received advance notice, especially given Musk’s business interests in the region.

The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Beast’s request for comment on the Journal‘s report.

News of the planned briefing broke ahead of Musk’s meeting with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, sparking outcry from the president’s critics, who pointed to Musk’s business in China as a major conflict of interest.

The reports altered what the two men wound up actually discussing. Despite still touching on China, the conversation didn’t include any classified information.

Although Trump publicly dismissed the report as “fake news” and claimed there was never any plan for Musk to be briefed on a China war plan, behind closed doors, he was upset that he had been caught off guard.
Experts say the arrest is part of a pattern of criminalizing pregnancy that has accelerated since the fall of Roe v. Wade.
By Bracey Harris

On March 20 in rural Georgia, an ambulance responded to an early morning 911 call about an unconscious, bleeding woman at an apartment. When first responders arrived, they determined that she’d had a miscarriage. That was only the start of her ordeal.

Selena Maria Chandler-Scott was transported to a hospital, but a witness reported that she had placed the fetal remains in a dumpster. When police investigated, they recovered the remains and Chandler-Scott was charged with concealing the death of another person and abandoning a dead body. The charges were ultimately dropped; an autopsy determined Chandler-Scott had had a “natural miscarriage“ at around 19 weeks and the fetus was nonviable.

Still, Chandler-Scott’s arrest comes at a time when a growing number of women are facing pregnancy-related prosecutions in which the fetus is treated as a person with legal rights. And her experience raises troubling questions about miscarriages that happen in states with strict abortion laws, women’s health advocates say. How should remains be disposed of? And who gets to decide?

Georgia’s six-week abortion ban, the Living Infants Fairness and Equality (LIFE) Act, provides any fetus with a heartbeat legal recognition under the law.
Story by Tom Boggioni

In a column published on Saturday, Washington Post political analyst Aaron Blake noted a description of Donald Trump by an anonymous White House official that he feels should have received more attention.

Describing it as scary, Blake noted it not only may have a bearing on Trump's attitude about the sweeping tariffs he is putting in place but also for what it says about how his second term could play out.

Specifically, he cited a report from the post that included the Trump, administration insider bluntly stating, "[Trump's]... at the peak of just not giving a f--k anymore. Bad news stories? Doesn’t give a f--k. He’s going to do what he’s going to do. He’s going to do what he promised to do on the campaign trail.”
CBS News

Opponents of President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk rallied across the U.S. on Saturday to protest the administration's actions on government downsizing, the economy, human rights and other issues.

More than 1,200 "Hands Off!" demonstrations were planned by more than 150 groups, including civil rights organizations, labor unions, LBGTQ+ advocates, veterans and elections activists. The protests were taking place at the National Mall in Washington, D.C., state capitols and other locations in all 50 states.

What is the "Hands Off" movement?
Protesters are assailing the Trump administration's moves to fire thousands of federal workers, close Social Security Administration field offices, effectively shutter entire agencies, deport immigrants, scale back protections for transgender people and cut federal funding for health programs.

Musk, a Trump adviser who owns Tesla, SpaceX and the social media platform X, has played a key role in government downsizing as the head of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency. He says he is saving taxpayers billions of dollars.

Speaking at the Washington protest, Paul Osadebe, a lawyer for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and a labor union steward, criticized Trump, Musk and others in the administration for not valuing the work federal employees do in creating "a baseline of economic security and power for working people."
Story by Matthew Chapman
Raw Story

A federal judge in Rhode Island accused the Trump administration of "covertly" withholding funds for Federal Emergency Management Agency disaster relief programs from states that didn't vote for him, Courthouse News reported on Friday.

"In March, U.S. District Judge John McConnell issued a preliminary injunction in favor of 23 states that sued the government over its plan to implement a broad pause to state aid," noted the report.

McConnell, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, "ruled that the plan 'fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of our government,' and ordered the Trump administration to 'immediately end any funding pause' until further notice."

However, per the report, 19 states, all with Democratic attorneys general, provided "undisputed evidence" that the Trump administration has since then continued to withhold FEMA aid.

"Oregon claimed that more than $120 million in disaster relief assistance for winter storms, flooding, landslides, wildfires and flood mitigation remains frozen by FEMA. Hawaii said that the agency still hasn’t answered a roughly $6 million request for aid to rebuild after the 2023 wildfires in Maui," noted the report.
Story by Anders Anglesey

The mystery of how The Atlantic journalist Jeffrey Goldberg was added to a top secret Trump administration group chat has been solved at last.

Donald Trump's national security adviser Mike Waltz invited the journalist into the Signal group chat discussing strikes in Yemen after he mistakenly saved his number under the contact of another person he meant to include, it has been reported. The misstep, according to three sources, emerged following an internal investigation by the White House. Mr Trump is said to have considered firing Mr Waltz over the blunder, although he was more angry over the fact he had Mr Goldberg's number rather than revealing details about the strikes.

The Guardian reports Mr Waltz earned a reprieve after taking responsibility for the blunder. Mr Trump was said to not want to give The Atlantic the satisfaction of forcing out a member of his cabinet.
Story by Corbin Bolies

The Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) intrusion into the Social Security Administration (SSA) has sent staffers panicking.

“Until they get rid of DOGE and the person in office right now, and the Republicans actually get a backbone and stand up for something for once in their lives, things are just going to be complete chaos,” one worker told The Guardian. “That’s really the best word to describe SSA right now, just complete, utter chaos."

The Social Security Administration (SSA) administers benefits to nearly 69 million Americans a month, amounting to $1.6 trillion in benefits. DOGE architect Musk has claimed the entire agency amounted to a “Ponzi scheme.”

Staffers told The Guardian that DOGE’s plans to cut 7,000 jobs, close offices, and alter the SSA’s computer code could risk millions of beneficiaries not getting their benefits in time if it collapses.

“They couldn’t understand the coding, so everything they said SSA was doing illegally, they weren’t,” the source said. “They don’t know what they’re doing.”
By  DAVE COLLINS

Crowds of people angry about the way President Donald Trump is running the country marched and rallied in scores of American cities Saturday in the biggest day of demonstrations yet by an opposition movement trying to regain its momentum after the shock of the Republican’s first weeks in office.

So-called Hands Off! demonstrations were organized for more than 1,200 locations in all 50 states by more than 150 groups, including civil rights organizations, labor unions, LBGTQ+ advocates, veterans and elections activists. The rallies appeared peaceful, with no immediate reports of arrests.

Thousands of protesters in cities dotting the nation from Midtown Manhattan to Anchorage, Alaska, including at multiple state capitols, assailed Trump and billionaire Elon Musk ‘s actions on government downsizing, the economy, immigration and human rights. On the West Coast, in the shadow of Seattle’s iconic Space Needle, protesters held signs with slogans like “Fight the oligarchy.” Protesters chanted as they took to the streets in Portland, Oregon, and Los Angeles, where they marched from Pershing Square to City Hall.

Demonstrators voiced anger over the administration’s moves to fire thousands of federal workers, close Social Security Administration field offices, effectively shutter entire agencies, deport immigrants, scale back protections for transgender people and cut funding for health programs.
Story by Jason Lemon

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's remarks about Americans monitoring their retirement accounts sparked backlash on social media on Sunday after he suggested that people aren't monitoring "day-to-day fluctuations."

Newsweek reached out to the Treasury Department for comment on Sunday.

Why It Matters
President Donald Trump announced new tariffs last week on what he dubbed "Liberation Day, with the plan including a universal 10 percent tariff on all imports from countries and higher tariffs, up to more than 40 percent, on dozens of others. The stock market reacted negatively to the news, which directly impacts Americans' pensions and 401(k)s.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average shedding more than 1,500 points on back-to-back days for the first time ever. The average plunged more than 2,200 points on Friday after dropping over 1,600 on Thursday.

What to Know
Bessent appeared for a Sunday morning interview with NBC News' Meet the Press hosted by Kristen Welker. In the interview, Welker pressed the Trump administration official over the economic fallout from tariffs and how that's impacting ordinary Americans hoping to retire.
Story by Jon Queally

Congressman Ro Khanna is raising the alarm over mass layoffs in the U.S. economy resulting from the failed economic policies of President Donald Trump, including over 4,000 factory workers who lost their jobs this week due to firings or plant closures.

On Thursday, automaker Stellantis, citing conditions created by Trump's tariffs, announced temporary layoffs for 900 workers, represented by the United Auto Workers (UAW). "The affected U.S. employees," reportedCNN, "work at five different Midwest plants: the Warren Stamping and Sterling Stamping plants in Michigan, as well as the Indiana Transmission Plant, Kokomo Transmission Plant and Kokomo Casting Plant, all in Kokomo, Indiana."

In a social media thread on Saturday night, Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.)—a lawmaker who has advocating loudly, including in books and in Congress, for an industrialization policy that would bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States—posted a litany of other layoffs announced recently as part of the economic devastation and chaos unleashed by Trump as well as conditions that reveal how vulnerable U.S. workers remain.

"This week," Khann wrote, "19 factories had mass layoffs, 15 closed, and 4,134 factory workers across America lost their jobs. Cleveland-Cliffs laid off 1,200 workers in Michigan and Minnesota as they deal with the impact of Trump's tariffs on steel and auto imports."

"We need jobs and currently at this time, the majority of the companies that we work with and represent our members at are not hiring." —Mark DePaoli, UAW

For union leaders representing those workers at Cleveland-Cliffs, they said "chaos" was the operative word. "Chaos. You, know? A lot of questions. You've got a lot of people who worked there a long time that are potentially losing their job," Bill Wilhelm, a servicing representative and editor with UAW Local 600, told local ABC News affiliate WXYZ-Channel 7.
Story by Tom Boggioni

Retirees and other beneficiaries of funds distributed by the Social Security Administration (SSA) are having major problems accessing their online accounts since staffers from Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have assumed control of the agency

According to a report from the Washington Post, access to accounts has been unavailable for hours extending into days after new software was installed, with a message popping up reading "Online Service Not Available" and ending there.

As the Post's Lisa Rein, Hannah Natanson and Elizabeth Dwoskin are reporting, "Even when the site is back online, many customers have not been able to sign in to their accounts — or have logged in only to find information missing. For others, access to the system has been slow, requiring repeated tries to get in."
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