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Opinion by Rex Huppke, USA TODAY

It seems clear, based on my years of listening to conservatives holler about liberty, that Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a nanny-state liberal who wants to tell Americans what they can and can’t eat.

In a recent statement, Kennedy said: “I urge every governor to champion legislation that bans ultra-processed foods and dyes in public schools, and submit a waiver to the USDA to remove soda from SNAP.”

Do you want government officials to control the ultra-processed and dye-delicious foods I want my kids to eat?  Sounds like the “K” in “RFK Jr.” stands for “Karl Marx.”

RFK Jr. goes full nanny state on America's school-lunch programs
A recent Kennedy opinion column published right here at USA TODAY, co-written with Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, discussed childhood obesity and concluded this: “As the leaders put in charge of overseeing our nation’s food supply and human services, we have a duty to fix this.”

To make sure I was responding properly to what I assume is communism, I looked back on how my conservative friends responded to health and food-safety initiatives that came up while Barack Obama was president.
A simple math error has resulted in tariffs four times higher than they should be. Conservative economists claim the White House used the wrong elasticity value in their controversial formula.
Story by Katie Hawkinson

Companies across the country are adding a surcharge to customers’ bills in the wake of President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs.

On April 2, Trump announced blanket tariffs of at least 10 percent on nearly every country, in what he called “Liberation Day” for the U.S. Then, on Wednesday he paused these tariffs for 90 days, citing Americans becoming “yippy” and “afraid.”

He only excluded China from the pause and is now engaged in a trade war with Xi Jinping as the U.S. levies 145 percent tariffs on Chinese goods while Beijing has put a 125 percent retaliatory tariff in place.

Now, U.S. business owners say they’re passing along higher prices to customers as Trump’s trade war with China continues and they brace for the end of the 90-day pause.

Sexual wellness brand Dame has added a $5 “Trump tariff surcharge” to all purchases automatically, CBS News reports.

"Our whole industry is in China, so we've already seen the impact," Dame CEO Alexandra Fine told CBS.

"The intention of adding the Trump tariff surcharge as a line item at checkout was to remind people that this is an extra tax on us. I wanted people to understand why it's more expensive — that it's because of political decisions that were made," she added.
Story by Dave Michaels, Richard Vanderford, James Fanelli

Gordon Coburn and Steven Schwartz were on the verge of going to trial on charges of scheming to pay bribes in India when President Trump issued an executive order that put enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act on hold.

It was a bolt of good luck for the former executives for Cognizant Technology Solutions, who had denied wrongdoing. The case had been dragging on for six years. Within two months, a new top prosecutor appointed by Trump dropped it.

“There was a tremendous sense of relief,” said Lawrence Lustberg, a lawyer for Schwartz.

The Trump administration is retreating from some types of white-collar law enforcement, including cases involving foreign bribery, public corruption, money laundering and crypto markets. In some cases, the administration is effectively redefining what business conduct constitutes a crime.

Trump’s executive order in February said bribery prosecutions hurt the ability of American companies to compete overseas, punishing them for practices that are routine in some parts of the world. That pronouncement could upend dozens of cases and investigations.

At the Justice Department, Attorney General Pam Bondi has ordered prosecutors to focus their anti-money-laundering and sanctions-evasion attention on drug cartels and international crime organizations.

A few themes are emerging: Prosecuting executives for wrongdoing that doesn’t have obvious victims is out. The Justice Department is open to arguments that a defendant has been targeted for political reasons, or that some prosecutions undermine economic competitiveness and national-security interests. And political connections within Trump’s world seem to matter.
Story by Janna Brancolini

President Donald Trump’s policies could cost the U.S. economy $90 billion this year in lost tourism and export revenue, according to analysts at Goldman Sachs. Many foreign visitors are avoiding the U.S. over concerns about increased hostility at the border, including reports about European tourists being detained for weeks in U.S. immigration centers.
Story by Mary Papenfuss

Angry voters pelted Iowa’s Republican Senator Chuck Grassley Tuesday with complaints and questions about the Trump administration’s apparent defiance of an order from the Supreme Court.

“If I get a court order to pay $1,200, can I just say no? Because he [Trump] just got an order from the Supreme Court and he just said NO!” said a very perturbed gentleman in the crowd of about 100 at a packed town hall meeting in Fort Madison, Iowa.

He was referring to the Supreme Court order that the Trump administration “facilitate” the return to the U.S. of Maryland dad Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was deported to a notorious El Salvador prison in error.

Now the Trump administration claims it can’t get him back, and apparently hasn’t even tried, despite the order, and even though it’s paying El Salvador $6 million to imprison Abrego Garcia and others shipped out of the U.S.

“Are you going to bring that guy back from El Salvador?” another man shouted to applause from the crowd at the Grassley town hall.

“The president doesn’t care,” still another said. “He’s got an order from the Supreme Court and he’s just said: ‘No, screw it!’”

“Why won’t you do your job, Senator?” one voter shouted.

“We would like to know what you, as the people, the Congress, who are supposed to rein in this dictator, what are you going to do about it?” one man asked Grassley. “These people have been sentenced to life in prison in a foreign country with no due process.”
Federal Judge James Boasberg said he’d found probable cause to hold the Trump administration in contempt of court for showing “a willful disregard” toward his March 15 orders requiring it return to the U.S. the hundreds of Venezuelan migrants it sent to a notorious prison in El Salvador using an 18th-century wartime law. Marc Elias explains what happens now.
Story by Giulia Carbonaro

The deepening of President Donald Trump's trade war with China could push the country—the second-largest holder of U.S. debt—to dump its Treasury holdings, sending mortgage rates skyrocketing for millions of Americans.

While some experts believe that such an escalation is unlikely to happen, China's President Xi Jinping has promised to "fight" the Trump administration's escalation of tariffs "to the end"—and there is a chance he might do so through a very dangerous weapon the country has in its arsenal: more than $760 billion in holdings in U.S. Treasury securities.

Why It Matters
While backing away from other levies on individual countries beyond the 10 percent baseline tariff on all imports to the United States announced earlier this month, Trump has imposed 145 percent tariffs on Chinese goods. China has retaliated with its own 125 percent tariffs on imported American goods.

As tensions grow between the two nations over a budding trade war that has no apparent easy way out, some experts have raised concerns that Beijing may be better equipped to withstand the negative economic shocks caused by the tariffs—and may even be willing to use its Treasury holdings to strike back at Washington and weaken its opponent.
Opinion by John Chrastka, Marilyn Jackson, and Celina Stewart

Imagine walking into your local library to check out a book and finding the shelves stripped bare. Imagine taking your child to a museum, only to find all programs have been cancelled and the doors are locked. Imagine living in a rural community where there is no high school and the only accessible education is provided by a local museum that is now closed, or your only access to the internet is a library that's now shuttered by political decree. Imagine trying to teach a classroom about civil rights, women's contributions to science, or the Holocaust—only to be told those stories are "divisive" and banned.

This is no longer hypothetical. It's the path we're on right now.

Recent executive orders issued by the Trump administration—one misleadingly titled "Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History" and another that guts the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) among other federal agencies—are not just orders on paper.

They are acts of erasure—coordinated, sneaky attempts to cherry-pick our shared stories and decide who matters, censor our classrooms, and strip our communities of the places we go to learn, to connect, and to remember. They are a direct attack on our democracy and our future. They are an insult to the American people who love their museums and libraries, and should decide for themselves what they want to learn.
Story by Stephanie Gauthier

According to a complaint filed by the organization Whistleblower Aid, Daniel Berulis, a former computer specialist at the US government agency National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), recently raised the alarm about a potential serious security breach involving the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk and his team.

EXCLUSIVE: A whistleblower tells Congress and NPR that DOGE may have taken sensitive labor data and hid its tracks. "None of that … information should ever leave the agency," said a former NLRB official.

— NPR (@npr.org) 2025-04-15T10:10:22.927Z

Berulis claims that he observed disturbing things in March 2025, when members of the DOGE team obtained extended access to the NLRB’s internal systems, allowing them to view, copy, and modify sensitive data.

According to the whistleblower, the data in question included files related to ongoing union cases, confidential testimonies, personal information about employees, and sensitive information about business owners.

According to the computer specialist, he immediately observed unusual activity on the NLRB’s computer network, including a significant increase in outgoing data volume, estimated by him to be around 10 gigabytes.
Story by Erkki Forster

Ben Meiselas flamed rival podcaster Joe Rogan during a discussion about whether Kamala Harris should have appeared on Rogan’s show during the 2024 campaign.

“To me, Rogan’s a jerk and he spreads lies,” Meiselas said on a new episode The People’s Cabinet podcast, slamming the pro-MAGA podcaster.

Meiselas co-hosts the left-leaning MeidasTouch podcast with his brothers Brett and Jordan. The show dethroned The Joe Rogan Experience in February to become the top podcast in the country—and has hovered near the top of the charts ever since.

“I don’t think [Harris] should have went on Rogan or any of those right-wing shows,” Meiselas stated. “The moment you go on a Rogan or a Charlie Kirk they are already going to be framing things in terms of issues that really aren’t the issues that need to be discussed.”
Story by Emell Derra Adolphus

Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) foot soldiers paid another visit Wednesday to the federal agency where they were accused of causing a “significant cybersecurity breach.”

A whistleblower at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) made the accusation in an explosive NPR report Tuesday, offering evidence that DOGE took large amounts of data from the agency’s systems and risked a breach by foreign adversaries in the process.

Daniel Berulis, an IT staffer at the NLRB, said he first noticed the “breach” when large amounts of data left the agency’s systems after DOGE staffers—who insisted that their actions not be tracked—gained access. He also claimed to have observed suspicious log-in attempts from an IP address in Russia using DOGE’s new accounts.

A source told Forbes that representatives with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) arrived at the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. Wednesday for a two-hour meeting with leadership.

The topic of the meeting and the identities of the DOGE staffers involved remain unclear.
Story by Liam Archacki

Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) goons at the Social Security Administration were forced to resurrect dozens of immigrants from the dead over the past week.

Elon Musk’s engineers had carried out a scheme to falsely list more than 6,000 immigrants as dead in a Social Security database known as the “death master file,” The Washington Post reported last week. Entry into the file cuts a person off from key financial services, such as receiving benefits and accessing a bank account.

As part of President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration, the goal was to pressure the migrants to “self deport,” The New York Times reported.

Now, almost three dozen of the immigrants have protested the move, demonstrated that they are alive, and won a victory: They are no longer listed among the deceased, the Post reported Friday.

The immigrants, who include a Haitian refugee and a child, have shown up at Social Security offices with driver’s licenses, work orders, and letters from their states declaring them dead.
Story by Melanie Curry

First, it was Trader Joe’s tuna, then Lay’s potato chips, and a bunch of other recalls. And now, I’m hearing that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) might end its food safety inspections. Honestly, I don’t know how much worse this can get.

According to CBS News, federal health officials have confirmed that most of the food safety inspections currently done by the FDA are about to end. These plans aren't set in stone yet and will likely need Senate approval, but it’s still pretty concerning.

So, what’s going on? Basically, routine safety inspections would shift from the feds to the states, meaning the states would handle inspections for products like milk and other foods. The good news is that high-risk foods, like infant formula, will still be federally regulated, according to CBS News.
Story by thedailydigest.com

The denial
Prior to his election in November, Donald Trump categorically denied that he would be using the hard-right Heritage Foundation’s Project 25 as a blueprint for his presidency.

Not on Trump's reading list
“I have nothing to do with Project 25,” he said as Republicans maintained the blueprint was so extreme that it would jeopardize his chances at the polls. “I never read it and I never will. I’ve said 100 times, I know nothing about it.”

"Beyond my wildest dreams"
Yet the chief architect of the ultra-conservative vision for the US, Paul Dans, has told Politico that Trump’s adherence to it is “actually way beyond my wildest dreams.”

A sharp turn to the far right
Dans was pressured to resign from his post at the Heritage Foundation think tank in July last year but is still cock-a-hoop over the direction the country is taking under the Trump administration.
The court didn’t even wait to let Alito write his dissent.
By Mark Joseph Stern

Shortly before 1 a.m. on Saturday, the Supreme Court issued an emergency order halting the Trump administration’s reported efforts to fly Venezuelan migrants to an El Salvador prison before they could challenge their deportation. The court’s late-night intervention is an extraordinary and highly unusual rebuke to the government, one that may well mark a turning point in the majority’s approach to this administration. For months, SCOTUS has given the government every benefit of the doubt, accepting the Justice Department’s dubious assertions and awarding Trump immense deference. On Saturday, however, a majority of justices signaled that they no longer trust the administration to comply with the law, including the court’s own rulings. If that is indeed the case, we are likely careening toward a head-on conflict between the president and the court, with foundational principles of constitutional democracy hanging in the balance.

SCOTUS’s emergency order in A.A.R.P. v. Trump arose out of the government’s unlawful efforts to ship Venezuelan migrants to a Salvadoran prison by invoking the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. On Thursday, lawyers for these individuals told a federal court that the government was preparing to summarily deport them to El Salvador, where they would be indefinitely confined at a notorious detention center. A federal judge in the Southern District of Texas had already blocked their removal—but the government sought to evade this order by busing the migrants into the Northern District of Texas, where the restraining order would not apply. It then gave these migrants “notices,” in English only, declaring that they would be deported immediately, without stating that they could contest their deportations in court. (Officials refused to give these notices, or any other information, to the migrants’ lawyers.) The government intended to fly them out of the country within 24 hours, according to court filings.
Story by Alaa Elassar and Kristin Chapman, CNN

A national day of action against President Donald Trump and his administration has united an outpouring of protesters across the country who are rallying in defiance of what they describe as a relentless assault on democratic institutions and civil liberties.

Over 80 protests were held at state capitols, courthouses and city halls in several states as part of the “50501” demonstrations – short for 50 protests, 50 states, one movement – condemning what they describe as Trump’s executive overreach, including deportations without due process, the dismantling of federal agencies and threats to higher education.

In addition to rallies, Saturday’s day of action saw communities coming together through food drives and donation campaigns, offering support to those most affected by the administration’s policies.

“We are sending a clear and urgent message to the country and to those in power: the people are paying attention, we are organizing, and we will not accept authoritarian overreach, fascist policy, or the dismantling of our rights under the Constitution,” Sarah Parker, one of the 50501’s national coordinators, told CNN.

“The administration’s continued targeting of marginalized communities, the criminalization of dissent, and the erosion of civil liberties demand a response — and this is ours.”
By  PHILIP MARCELO
Updated 5:47 PM PDT, April 19, 2025

NEW YORK (AP) — Opponents of President Donald Trump’s administration took to the streets of communities large and small across the U.S. on Saturday, decrying what they see as threats to the nation’s democratic ideals.

The disparate events ranged from a march through midtown Manhattan and a rally in front of the White House to a demonstration at a Massachusetts commemoration of “the shot heard ’round the world” on April 19, 1775, marking the start of the Revolutionary War 250 years ago.

Thomas Bassford was among the demonstrators at the reenactment of the Battles of Lexington and Concord outside Boston. The 80-year-old retired mason from Maine said he believes Americans are under attack from their own government and need to stand up against it.

“This is a very perilous time in America for liberty,” said Bassford, who was with his partner, daughter and two grandsons. “I wanted the boys to learn about the origins of this country and that sometimes we have to fight for freedom.”
Story by Russell Payne

With tax day come and gone, the Internal Revenue Service is on track to collect less revenue this year than last. Former IRS employees blame cuts by billionaire Elon Musk and Republicans for the decline in revenue, which stands to expand the federal deficit ahead of a debt ceiling deadline this summer.

New weekly filing data from the IRS, released Friday, shows that the agency has received 1.7% fewer total tax returns compared to the same time period last year. The IRS notes a few reasons why the agency might be seeing fewer filings this year, including that multiple states are in a state of emergency and have had the tax deadline for their residents moved to May; other people may have filed for an extension as well.

However, a former IRS employee and the president of the National Treasury Employees Union, Doreen Greenwald, told Salon that, in her view, the reduction in filings and income is largely due to the dramatic cuts to the agency pursued by Musk and President Donald Trump.

“What we've seen is DOGE going to federal agencies across the board, them removing federal employees — federal employees who are trained and skilled in the work that they do to deliver for programs for the American people, they think,” Greenwald said. “Federal employees are an efficient way of doing business. So when you invest in a federal employee, let's say you invest $1 on average, the return is $8 back. If you invest in an auditor that does the complex audits, you see $12 back.”
Story by Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth shared details of a March attack on Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis in a message group that included his wife, brother and personal lawyer, the New York Times reported on Sunday, raising more questions about his use of an unclassified messaging system to share highly-sensitive security details.

Hegseth allegedly shared the same details of the attack that were revealed last month by The Atlantic magazine after its editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, was included in a separate chat on the Signal app by mistake, in an embarrassing incident involving all of President Donald Trump's most senior national security officials.

The Times, citing four sources familiar with the message group, said that second chat included details of the schedule of the air strikes.
Story by STAN CHOE

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks are tumbling Monday as worries about President Donald Trump’s trade war and his criticism of the Federal Reserve cause investors pull further from the United States.

The S&P 500 was 2.1% lower in morning trading and nearly 16% below its record set two months ago. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 726 points, or 1.9%, as of 10:30 a.m. Eastern time, while losses for Tesla and other Big Tech stocks had the Nasdaq composite down a market-leading 2.6%.

Perhaps more worryingly, the value of the U.S. dollar also sank as a retreat continues from U.S. markets. It’s an unusual move because the dollar has historically strengthened during past episodes of nervousness. But this time around, it’s policies directly from Washington that are causing the fear and potentially weakening the dollar's reputation as a pillar of the global economy and one of the safest possible investments.

Trump continued his tough talk on global trade over the weekend, even as economists and investors continue to say his stiff proposed tariffs could cause a recession if they’re not rolled back. U.S. talks last week with Japan have so far failed to reach a deal that could lower tariffs and help protect the economy, and they're seen as a “test case,” according to Thierry Wizman, a strategist at Macquarie.

“The golden rule of negotiating and success: He who has the gold makes the rules,” Trump said in all capitalized letters on his Truth Social Network over the weekend. He also said that “the businessmen who criticize tariffs are bad at business, but really bad at politics,” likewise in all caps.
Story by JERUSALEM POST STAFF

Officials serving both under former US President Joe Biden and US President Donald Trump erroneously publicized classified information to thousands of federal employees, The Washington Post reported on Monday, after viewing internal documents.

The information was shared in a Google Drive folder by General Services Administration (GSA) employees with the whole GSA workforce, according to the report.  

Among the data made privy to the over 11,200 staff were potentially confidential White House floor plans and particulars for a proposed armored door for the White House visitor center.

The information breach triggered a cybersecurity incident report and investigation, according to the report.

This comes amid several security breaches within the Trump administration.
Story by John Bowden

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem reported that her handbag was stolen over the weekend, including her personal security badge for DHS facilities.

Noem, in charge of a federal agency that oversees America’s border security as well as other sensitive matters including counterterrorism efforts, also lost her apartment keys, more than $3,000 in cash, and a number of blank checks to the thief, according to CNN. A number of less-expensive other personal items were also in the bag at at the time, the network reported Monday. Her driver’s license and passport were stolen as well.

According to CNN, an unknown white male was seen taking the bag. Secret Service agents are investigating the incident by reviewing security footage from the downtown Washington D.C. restaurant where Noem dined Sunday evening. It wasn’t immediately clear if Noem was at the table at the time the bag was snatched.
Opinion by Alex Henderson

On Saturday, April 19, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a 7-2 ruling that orders the Trump Administration to temporarily cease the deportations of Venezuelan nationals using the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. The two dissenters were far-right GOP-appointed Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.

The ruling comes at a time when human rights activists are decrying the deportation of Kilmar Abrego García, a Salvadoran man who was living in Maryland legally and is now being held in a Salvadoran prison. President Donald Trump and his allies are claiming that García was a member of the MS-13 gang, but García's defenders and relatives maintain that there is no evidence linking him to MS-13 and stress that he was never charged with anything.

Human rights attorney Jesselyn Radack analyzes the High Court's ruling in an article published by Salon on April 21, arguing that it is "too little too late" — especially in light of the Court's 2024 decision in Trump v. the United States, which said that U.S. presidents are immune from criminal prosecution for "official" acts committed in office but not for unofficial acts.
Travis Gettys

Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas have again tipped their hands and shown that ideology guides their Supreme Court judgments more than legal philosophy, according to a report.

The conservative jurists issued conflicting decisions last week in a pair of cases involving parental rights and gender identity, offering contradictory analyses that Slate columnist Hila Keren said "reveal a position of parental rights for me but not for thee."

"If our Constitution protects parents’ autonomy regarding their children’s upbringing, how can the protection apply only to parents who oppose responsiveness to gender-identity issues?" wrote Keren, a professor at Southwestern Law School. "And if Alito and Thomas are so convinced that courts should hear those parents, why do they sound so eager to allow Tennessee to override parents’ support of their children’s gender identity?"
D. Earl Stephens

Those four words were spoken from an old colleague of mine who now works under constant threat inside the Department of Interior. They illustrate better than I can in 1,000 words what we are watching right now as a racist, America-attacking, convicted felon puffs out his blubbery chest and takes a sledgehammer to our government to appease the billionaire oligarchy who are leading him around by his stuffy nose.

The tough guy from the yacht clubs of New York, is going full Mussolini while he saves America from all the pain he and his white collar gangs on Wall Street have inflicted on the working class for decades.

Let’s not confuse what is really going on here, people …

End of the day, this is nothing but a grotesque attack on the poor, and many of the programs that have been put in place to help, shelter, feed, and just give them a little hope that there is something better. Because if you can take a person’s hope and dignity away, you can hope they’ll just go away, too.

That’s how losers win, and democracies crumble.
The Venezuelan man does not appear on a list of people sent to a prison in El Salvador, and his family and friends have no idea of his whereabouts.
By Miriam Jordan

In late January, Ricardo Prada Vásquez, a Venezuelan immigrant working in a delivery job in Detroit, picked up an order at a McDonald’s. He was heading to the address when he erroneously turned onto the Ambassador Bridge, which leads to Canada. It is a common mistake even for those who live in the Michigan border city. But for Mr. Prada, 32, it proved fateful.

The U.S. authorities took Mr. Prada into custody when he attempted to re-enter the country; he was put in detention and ordered deported. On March 15, he told a friend in Chicago that he was among a number of detainees housed in Texas who expected to be repatriated to Venezuela.

That evening, the Trump administration flew three planes carrying Venezuelan migrants from the Texas facility to El Salvador, where they have been ever since, locked up in a maximum-security prison and denied contact with the outside world.

But Mr. Prada has not been heard from or seen. He is not on the list of 238 people who were deported to El Salvador that day. He does not appear in the photos and videos released by the authorities of shackled men with shaved heads.
Story by Matias Civita

MAGA commentator Tim Pool was granted the first question at the White House press briefing on Tuesday, April 22—an unusual move that has drawn intense scrutiny due to his past affiliation with Tenet Media, a company allegedly tied to covert Russian funding. Pool's prominent appearance at the briefing reignited debates over Kremlin influence in U.S. media and politics, especially given a 2024 Department of Justice indictment accusing Tenet Media of acting as a Russian propaganda front.
Story by Bailey Schulz, USA TODAY

President Donald Trump has high aspirations for his tariffs, going so far as to suggest increased taxes on imports could replace income taxes.

"There's a real chance," he told Fox Noticias on April 15. "There is a chance that the money from tariffs could be so great that it would replace (the income tax).”

The idea may sound appealing, but economists who spoke to USA TODAY say Trump's tariffs would struggle to raise enough money to eliminate income taxes in full.

"A full replacement is absolutely, mechanically impossible. The math just doesn't work,” said Erica York, vice president of federal tax policy at the Tax Foundation, a center-right think tank.

Can tariffs replace income taxes? How much revenue would tariffs generate?
Consumers face an overall average effective tariff rate of 28%, the highest since 1901, according to the Yale Budget Lab.

Estimates for how much money these tariffs will bring in vary. Peter Navarro, Trump’s senior counselor for trade and manufacturing, said they could bring in as much as $6 trillion over the next 10 years, or roughly $600 billion per year. The Yale Budget Lab said the tariffs would bring in less than half that, at an estimated $2.4 trillion over the next decade.
Story by Gabby Allen

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (DC News Now) — A former CIA official faces multiple years in prison for mishandling classified materials and acting as a foreign agent over the course of multiple years.

Dale Britt Bendler, 68, of Miami, Fla., started working as a full-time contractor with the CIA back in 2014. As part of his job, he had Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information (TS/SCI) security clearance.

From July 2017 through at least July 2020, Bendler secretly worked with a U.S. lobbying firm to engage in “unauthorized and hidden lobbying and public relations activities” on behalf of foreign principals — all while still being a full-time contractor at the CIA, the U.S. Attorney’s Office (USAO) detailed in court documents.

Foreign and domestic clients would hire the lobbying firm to help resolve specific issues, often involving the U.S. government or a foreign government.

Typically, the foreign client would hire the firm, and then the firm would, in turn, hire Bendler as a consultant. His rate for some clients was as much as $20,000 per month.

Elon Musk’s social media platform X sued the state of Minnesota on Wednesday, according to CNBC. The lawsuit concerns a newly enacted law banning AI-generated “deepfakes” intended to influence elections, claiming it infringes on First Amendment rights. Musk is a self-described free speech absolutist and dismantled X’s prior moderation policies after acquiring the platform in 2022. At least 22 states have adopted deepfake-related election laws, citing risks of voter manipulation.
Story by Cody Butler

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV/Gray Florida Capital Bureau) - The legislative investigation into the disappearance of a $10 million donation to Hope Florida has concluded.

The two groups that got the money and an attorney involved decided not to show up and testify before the House Health Care Budget Subcommittee. Chair Rep. Alex Andrade, (R) Pensacola, said they have all the information they need.

“I’m not a prosecutor, I’m not the FBI. I know what I need to frame my policy decisions going forward,” Andrade said.

Andrade said he expects to file bills in next year’s legislative session addressing the issues he’s seen with Hope Florida.

The Foundation, which is the charity arm of First Lady Casey DeSantis’ welfare-assistance program, hasn’t filed its taxes with the IRS, and the legislature wasn’t notified of the Medicaid settlement reached around the time the $10 million donation was made.

“Certainly, more accountability of state agencies to provide additional reporting. Maybe adding criminal penalties,” Andrade said.
By Sarah N. Lynch

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -FBI Director Kash Patel on Friday said federal agents arrested a Wisconsin judge on obstruction charges in a message Patel posted on X and later deleted.

In the post, which Reuters saw before it was deleted, Patel said there was evidence of the judge "obstructing an immigration arrest operation last week."
"They marked them as dead."

Elon Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency is cutting off Americans from the Social Security benefits they're supposed to be receiving by writing them off as dead — even though they're very much among the living, the Daily Beast reports.

"We have people who did not receive benefits come in every day with their ID and say, 'I'm not dead, I'm alive!" Rennie Glasgow, a claims technical analyst and fifteen-year veteran of the Social Security Administration who works at the agency's office in Schenectady, New York, told the Beast.

These clerical zombies are the collateral damage of DOGE's meddling with the SSA's "Death Master File," a comprehensive list of deceased individuals who should no longer receive benefits. Musk, who has called Social Security the "biggest ponzi scheme of all time" and has spread outrageous claims of mass benefits fraud, ordered millions of people who were "probably" dead to be moved to the list, the Washington Post reported, in order to make it more accurate.

"[DOGE staffers] went into the system and they killed off people," Glasgow told the Beast. "About four million people, they marked them as dead. But they're not sure if those people were supposed to be marked as dead, so they're sending us an email saying, 'If these people come into the office with their identification, you can reinstate them.'"
Heard on All Things Considered
By Greg Allen

MIAMI — Fla. Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is on the defensive over questions about how $10 million in state money came to be used to fund a political campaign.

In two terms as governor, DeSantis has enjoyed strong support from the Republican-controlled legislature. But now, Republicans in the state House of Representatives say the alleged misuse of funds may warrant a criminal investigation.

The allegations involve $10 million that was paid to Florida by Centene, a company that provides managed care to Medicaid recipients. The money was part of a $67 million settlement by the company after it was charged with overbilling taxpayers for medications. Ten million dollars of the settlement was paid directly to a non-profit group, Hope Florida. That's a charity founded by Gov. DeSantis' wife, Casey, to help people move off government assistance into community-based programs.

An investigation by state lawmakers found that after receiving it, Hope Florida transferred the $10 million to two "dark money" political groups — groups that aren't required to disclose their donors. The two groups then sent some $8.5 million to a political committee that was campaigning against an amendment to legalize recreational marijuana in the state. It was a group controlled by DeSantis' then-chief of staff, now Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier.
By BEN SHIMKUS, CONSUMER REPORTER FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

Subaru, which sold 68,043 cars in Canada in 2024, is reshuffling its supply chain in response to escalating car trade scuffles.

The company sold over 17,700 American-built vehicles in Canada last year, making up 26 percent of its 2024 sales.

But the Japanese automaker’s Canadian division will slash US imports to just 10 percent by the 2026 model year, representing thousands of cars and millions of dollars lost.

The biggest impact will be on the American-built Outback. The popular car will no longer ship north after 2026.

Instead, it will feature a 'made in Japan' badge.

Subaru Canada's CEO, Tomohiro Kubota, said the move will 'minimize the impact of the counter surtax,' according to Automotive News Canada.

For Subaru, it’s cheaper to build and ship cars out of Japan than deal with the political whiplash of US trade policy.
Story by Madeline Sherratt

ICE agents did not have a warrant when they detained Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil, court documents have said.

Khalil, 30, was stripped of his green card and arrested in front of his then-eight-month-pregnant wife in New York City on March 8. He was transferred to an ICE detention center in Louisiana, almost 1,300 miles away. There have been international calls for his release since then, with Khalil even denied the right to attend the birth of his child on April 21.

But amid ongoing backlash the Department of Homeland Security is now arguing a warrant was not needed before the arrest, alleging Khalil was a “flight risk” in claims his supporters branded ‘absurd’.

“Khalil was encountered by ICE officers and identified as a removable alien,” a DHS spokesperson said. “When he tried to walk away, he was arrested.

“An administrative arrest warrant was executed at the time of his booking, as is the custom. Khalil is arguing in immigration court that an arrest warrant is necessary prior to the arrest of a removable alien. There's no legal basis for that position.”

Khalil’s arrest in March was prompted by his involvement in a series of protests against Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. On the night of his arrest, ICE agents said they were acting on State Department orders to revoke Khalil’s student visa.

In a document filed in Newark federal court, a lawyer for the DHS said agents conducting surveillance of Khalil were notified he could be removed from the country ‘because his presence or activities would have serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States’.
Story by Victor Tangermann

Billionaire Elon Musk's effort to rid the government of purported "waste and fraud" has been a dismal failure.

With his so-called Department of Government Efficiency, the richest man in the world has done little to actually save money, cutting his ambitions from an originally promised $2 trillion in savings to a mere $150 billion earlier this month — a figure that remains highly untrustworthy.

Worse yet, Musk's DOGE could actually be costing the government far more than it saves — an astronomical waste of taxpayer money that's resulted in immense and needless pain and suffering.

As the New York Times reports, mass firing and then re-hiring thousands of public sector workers could cost upward of $135 billion this fiscal year alone. And the Internal Revenue Service, which has lost thousands of its employees due to the cuts, is expected to collect a staggering $500 billion less this year following the bloodletting, a loss that dwarfs Musk's limited savings.

That's in addition to the mountain of lawsuits and appeals Musk's indiscriminate gutting of agencies has triggered. According to the NYT, 30 out of the roughly 200 lawsuits related to the Trump administration's agenda implicate DOGE.

"Not only is Musk vastly overinflating the money he has saved, he is not accounting for the exponentially larger waste that he is creating," nonprofit Partnership for Public Service chief executive Max Stier told the newspaper. "He’s inflicted these costs on the American people, who will pay them for many years to come."
Story by Harry Thompson

Donald Trump's former communications director Anthony Scaramucci has issued a stark warning as he fears the president could declare martial law. Speaking to Saxo on behalf of the Daily Star, Scaramucci suggested that Trump might declare martial law to cling to power if he runs for a second term.

Despite his short stint in the administration, which ended after he criticized cabinet members, Scaramucci has since become an outspoken critic of Trump.

He acknowledged it wasn't likely but couldn't dismiss the "worst case" scenario based on Trump's past actions: Trump attempting to maintain control by disrupting the democratic process. This speculation has been fueled by the emergence of Trump 2028 caps online.

Now a broadcaster and host of The Rest is Politics US, as well as a former Goldman Sachs executive, Scaramucci elaborated on his concerns: "The worst case scenario [is] he declares martial law, he creates enough havoc in the country, economic destabilisation, and he declares martial law and he cancels an election. That would be the worst case."
Story by Jai Hamid

China told the White House on Friday to quit spreading lies about trade negotiations. The Chinese foreign ministry said there are no talks happening, no meetings planned, and no communication underway with the US on tariffs.

This came after President Donald Trump told reporters that the two countries were having discussions. Beijing called that false and told him to stop confusing the public.

According to Reuters, foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said during a press briefing that “The United States and China are not engaged in consultations or talks on the tariff issue.” Guo also said he didn’t know anything about whether China might exempt some American imports from tariffs.

Beijing says talks don’t exist and tells US to stop misleading people
Guo’s comments weren’t the only ones. Commerce ministry spokesperson He Yadong also said nothing was happening.

“At present there are absolutely no negotiations on the economy and trade between China and the US,” he told reporters in Mandarin. He also said that any statements about progress should be dismissed.

“If the US really wants to resolve the problem, it should cancel all the unilateral measures on China,” he added. The US tariffs on Chinese goods now stand at 145%. In response, China has put a 125% tariff on American imports. These numbers weren’t just announced overnight.
When all the cost and the lost in productivity are added up it will end up costing tax payers more than he saved.

Story by Aimee Picchi

Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, says it has saved $160 billion through its push to root out wasteful or fraudulent government spending. But that effort may also have come at a cost for taxpayers, with a new analysis from a nonpartisan research and advocacy group estimating that DOGE's actions will cost $135 billion this fiscal year.

The analysis seeks to tally the costs associated with putting tens of thousands of federal employees on paid leave, re-hiring mistakenly fired workers and lost productivity, according to the Partnership for Public Service (PSP), a nonpartisan nonprofit that focuses on the federal workforce.

PSP's estimate is based on the $270 billion in annual compensation costs for the federal workforce, calculating the impact of DOGE's actions, from paid leave to productivity hits. The $135 billion cost to taxpayers doesn't include the expense of defending multiple lawsuits challenging DOGE's actions, nor the impact of estimated lost tax collections due to staff cuts at the IRS.
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