The Good
Judge frees Columbia student activist Mohsen Mahdawi, who was detained by ICE during his citizenship interview, whom Trump administration wants to deport (Politico)
“Even another day of detention is not to be tolerated,” the judge said.
The Ugly
US Army plans military parade for Dear Leader Trump’s birthday in June (AP)
Detailed Army plans for a potential military parade on President Donald Trump’s birthday in June call for more than 6,600 soldiers, at least 150 vehicles, 50 helicopters, seven bands and possibly a couple thousand civilians, The Associated Press has learned.
The planning documents, obtained by the AP, are dated April 29 and 30 and have not been publicly released.
The Trump Administration is stockpiling on toilet pager, rations, and other emergency supplies, in anticipation of the empty shelves retailers are expecting, caused by the trade and tariff wars they have created (Rolling Stone)
SignalGate fall guy » Trump ousts National Security Adviser Mike Waltz (WSJ)
Trump and senior administration officials, including White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, had been frustrated with Waltz even before the Signal debacle. Waltz hired aides that his critics said didn’t appeal to Trump’s MAGA base.
Marco Rubio to be interim National Security Adviser (CBS)
The Trump administration has discussed with Libya and Rwanda the possibility of sending migrants to those two countries
Bloomberg » “We are actively searching for other countries to take people from third countries,” said U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
CNN » The proposals mark a dramatic escalation in the administration’s push to deter people journeying to the United States and remove some of those already here to countries thousands of miles away, some of which have checkered pasts.
ICE invades the wrong home, steals their life savings, and then leaves (The New Republic)
In Oklahoma City Thursday, about 20 federal immigration agents raided the wrong home, forcing a woman out of the house with her three daughters, not even leaving them enough time to get dressed, and then seized their phones, laptops, and life savings.
The woman had only moved into the house two weeks earlier, after relocating to Oklahoma from Maryland. The armed agents told the woman, identified by local TV station KFOR as “Marisa,” that they had a search warrant, but the named suspects on the warrant didn’t live in the house and weren’t connected to anyone in the family.
“We just moved here from Maryland,” Marisa said. “We’re citizens. That’s what I kept saying. We’re citizens.”
The agents, who identified themselves as U.S. marshals, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and FBI agents, didn’t seem to care, waking the family up, forcing them outside in their underwear, ransacking the house, and taking the family’s belongings as “evidence.”
Trump’s favourite drive-thru, McDonald’s reports first-quarter sales declined more than expected globally, particularly in the United States as economic worries and high prices continue to pressure consumers. (Global News)
GM says Trump tariffs will cost the US$4 to $5 Billion (Bloomberg / Quartz)
The last boats without crippling tariffs from China are arriving. The countdown to shortages and higher prices has begun (CNN)
Some of the last cargo ships carrying Chinese goods without crippling tariffs are currently drifting into US ports. Come next week, though, that will change.
Cargo on ships from China loaded after April 9 will carry with them the 145% tariff President Donald Trump slapped on goods from that nation last month. Next week, those goods will arrive, but there will be fewer ships at sea and they will be carrying less cargo. For many importers, it is too expensive to do business with China.
Yet China is still one of America’s most important trading partners. It’s where we get most of our clothes, footwear, electronics and microchips, which power appliances, thermostats and anything else that beeps.
The Authoritarian’s family business signs Qatari golf resort deal (AP)
The Trump family company struck a deal Wednesday to build a luxury golf resort in Qatar in a sign it has no plans to hold back from foreign dealmaking during a second Trump administration, despite the danger of a president shaping U.S. public policy for personal financial gain.
The project, which features Trump-branded beachside villas and an 18-hole golf course to be built by a Saudi Arabian company, is the first foreign deal by the Trump Organization since Donald Trump took office and unlike any done in his first term. Back then, he forswore foreign deals in an extraordinary press conference surrounded by stacks of legal documents as he pledged to avoid even the appearance of conflict of interest.
Trump on possible toy shortage: “Maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30” (Axios)
Trump appeared to acknowledge Wednesday that toy shortages are possible as his tariff hikes ripple through the economy.
American retailers are growing worried that the president’s trade war and increased volatility will lead to empty shelves, higher prices and store closures as Chinese imports screech to a halt.
The CEOs of Walmart, Target and Home Depot privately warned him last week about the likelihood of product shortages and price spikes.
Trump is attempting to stave off claims that his trade war is based on a false emergency and therefore illegal. The 78-year-old Republican issued the tariffs after asserting in an executive order that US trade deficits had become a major threat to national security and military readiness.
The US Senate appears on track to once again reject tariffs imposed by Trump’s sweeping tariff agenda (Politico)
Both Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska indicated they would support a disapproval resolution, despite efforts by leadership and the administration to soothe concerns about the economic uncertainty that the tariffs have unleashed.
“It is not perfect, I think it’s too broad,” Collins told reporters of the disapproval effort. “But it sends the message that I want to send — that we really need to be far more discriminatory in imposing these tariffs.” Murkowski told CNN she would also back the measure Wednesday.
Collins and Murkowski joined Kentucky Republicans Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell to help approve a resolution disapproving of the Trump administration’s tariffs on Canada earlier this month. Paul is a sponsor of the new measure to overturn the global tariffs; McConnell has not yet said how he will vote but has repeatedly criticized Trump’s tariff moves in recent weeks. His office did not respond to a request for comment.
The Canada measure has not been taken up in the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson has moved to block floor consideration of any disapproval resolution. The White House has said Trump will veto any disapproval that reaches his desk.
