Closing summary
We are winding down our live coverage of the day in US politics, but will return on Friday to bring you up to the minute descriptions of a scheduled Trump-Musk press conference and other unscheduled events. In the meantime, here are a few of today’s leading developments:
A federal appeals court granted the Trump administration’s request to keep Donald Trump’s tariffs in place, for now, one day after a trade court ruled that they are almost all illegal and must be stopped.
Trump attacked the judges who ruled against him on Wednesday, including one he appointed himself, and suggested that he had been misled by a powerful Republican activist who recommended judges to him in his first term.
Trump announced that Elon Musk is leaving the White House on Friday, but suggested that his work in “helping” the administration will continue. “This will be his last day, but not really, because he will, always, be with us, helping all the way”. Musk recently criticized the focus of Trump’s legislative agenda, the massive spending and tax cut bill that will increase the federal deficit by trillions.
One day after the nonprofit news site NOTUS discovered that at least seven of the studies cited in a new report from health secretary Robert F Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” commission do not exist, the report was quietly edited to remove at least some of the fiction.
RFK Jr's 'MAHA' report quietly edited to remove made-up sources
One day after the nonprofit news site NOTUS discovered that at least seven of the studies cited in a new report from health secretary Robert F Kennedy’s “Make America Healthy Again” commission do not exist, the report was quietly edited to remove at least some of the fiction.
One of the invented sources was a paper supposedly written by Dr. Katherine Keyes and published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics under the title “Changes in mental health and substance use among US adolescents during the COVID-19 pandemic”.
Keyes, who does exist, is an epidemiology professor at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, but she confirmed to ABC News that no paper with that title was ever written by her. JAMA Pediatrics told the broadcaster that it had published no such paper.
A search of the commission’s report on Thursday shows that the reference to Keyes and the imaginary paper has been removed from the document.
At least one other imaginary paper, supposedly published by the American Academy of Pediatrics, has also been removed from the report.
“Minor citation and formatting errors have been corrected, but the substance of the MAHA report remains the same”, Andrew Nixon, a spokesperson for the health department told ABC News.
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Trump says Friday will be Musk's last day, 'but not really, because he will, always, be with us'
Donald Trump announced on Thursday that Elon Musk is leaving the White House, but suggested that his work in “helping” the administration will continue.
In a post on his social media platform, the president invited his fans to tune in on Friday for another Oval Office press conference with Musk. “This will be his last day, but not really, because he will, always, be with us, helping all the way”, Trump wrote. “Elon is terrific!” he added.
Musk’s departure marks the end of his tenure as a special government employee, a role that comes with a built-in time limit of no more than 130 days of government service during any period of 365 consecutive days.
It also comes amid tensions over his public criticism of the massive spending bill Trump is trying to get through Congress. In an interview broadcast this week, Musk told David Pogue of CBS News that he was disappointed by the bill, which is projected to add nearly $4 trillion to the federal deficit, mainly through sweeping tax cuts for the rich. That spending, Musk said, undermines the work his so-called department of government efficiency has been doing to reduce federal spending.
“I was like disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not decrease it, and undermines the work that the Doge team is doing,” Musk said. “I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful, but I don’t know if it can be both”.
The budget-cutting and downsizing team Musk called the “department of government efficiency”, to invoke a meme, earned a reputation for making headline-grabbing claims about supposedly wasteful spending it had discovered, almost all of which proved to be either wildly exaggerated or simply untrue.
Although the administration says that the effort to radically shrink the government will continue without Musk, one member of the team, software engineer Sahil Lavingia, told Reuters on Thursday that it will more likely “fizzle out” and “die wih a whimper” once Musk leaves. “So much of the appeal and allure was Elon.”
Lavingia said he expected Doge staffers to “just stop showing up to work. It’s like kids joining a startup that will go out of business in four months”.
Lavingia, who blogged about being fired from the team after 55 days for talking to the media, said that he was given close to no guidance when he was sent to work at the Department of Veterans Affairs.
“I got dropped into the VA with an HP laptop. What are we supposed to do? What is the road map?” Lavingia said he asked, to no avail. “I felt like I was being pranked.”
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Trump denounces court finding that his tariffs are illegal
After a relatively long (for him) period of silence on his social media platform following his huge loss at the US court for international trade on Wednesday, Donald Trump resumed posting through it on Thursday, with a 500-word screed attacking the three judges who ruled against him.
Trump’s post began by noting that the order to unwind the tariffs had been paused temporarily by an appeals court, but then turned to baseless speculation that the three judges on the federal trade court must have been motivated by hatred for him.
“Where do these initial three Judges come from? How is it possible for them to have potentially done such damage to the United States of America? Is it purely a hatred of ‘TRUMP?’ What other reason could it be?” the president asked, without noting that he had appointed one of the judges himself in 2018.
Trump’s curiosity as to what could possibly explain the decision did not, apparently, extend to reading any of the 49-page explanation written by the court because he does not deal with any of the legal issues raised in the opinion in his post.
Instead, Trump focuses on blaming the conservative activist Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society for recommending judges that have not allowed the president to break the law.
“The ruling by the U.S. Court of International Trade is so wrong, and so political!” Trump wrote. “Hopefully, the Supreme Court will reverse this horrible, Country threatening decision, QUICKLY and DECISIVELY.”
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Trump nominates far-right blogger to lead government agency that protects whistle-blowers
Donald Trump announced on his social media platform on Thursday that he is nominating the former Gateway Pundit blogger Paul Ingrassia to head the United States Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal ethics agency that protects whistle-blowers and enforces the Hatch Act.
The Hatch Act, a law that forbids executive branch employees from taking part in political activities while engaged in their official duties, is rarely enforced, but the ethics agency determined in 2019 that Trump’s adviser Kellyanne Conway had “repeatedly violated” the law by making political statements as a White House official and urged the president to fire her.
Trump did not act on that recommendation, but one of his first acts when he returned to power was to fire the special counsel, Hampton Dellinger. By law, Dellinger, who was confirmed by the Senate in 2024, was supposed to serve a five-year term and could only be “removed by the president only for inefficiency, neglect of duty or malfeasance in office”.
Dellinger was fired by email on 7 February without any indication as to why. He fought the dismissal in court, but ultimately dropped his suit after an appeals court cleared the way for Trump to remove him.
Ingrassia, a far-right lawyer and writer, has been the White House Liaison for Homeland Security since February. Before that, as the White House Liaison for the Department of Justice, Ingrassia when he went to the D.C. jail in Washington on the first day of Trump’s second term to welcome pardoned Trump supporters who had been convicted of crimes for their part in the January 6 riot.
According to his LinkedIn account, Ingrassia, who obtained a law degree from Cornell between stints as a writer for the Daily Caller and the Gateway Pundit blog, has twice been a fellow at the ultraconservative Claremont Institute think tank.
Ingrassia has claimed to be Trump’s favorite writer, and, as CNN reported, he published a discredited theory during the 2024 Republican primary claiming that Nikki Haley was not eligible to be president because her parents were not yet US citizens when she was born in South Carolina.
Ingrassia’s false claim, which was featured on Gateway Pundit, and shared by Trump, built on the spurious reasoning of another former Claremont fellow, John Eastman, who tried to argue in 2020 that Kamala Harris was not born a citizen in California because her parents were not citizens at the time.
CNN also reported that a the Twitter feed of a podcast Ingrassia co-hosted with his sister in 2020 called for “secession” if Trump’s legal challenges to the election he lost failed and even urged Trump “to declare martial law” to remain in office.
Border Patrol held family of six trying to leave US in windowless cell for 24 days, ACLU says
A pregnant mother from Africa who has been waiting for her asylum claim to be heard since last year was detained by immigration officials in Washington state in a windowless cell for 24 days, along with her partner and the couple’s four children, the Washington branch of the American Civil Liberties Union told Oregon Public Broadcasting.
The family had been living in Seattle while their asylum claim was processed but decided last month to cross from Blaine, Washington, into Canada, as the Trump administration’s crackdown on undocumented immigrants ramped up. They were taken into custody by immigration officials and held in a single room in the Blaine Border Patrol Station from 26 April 26 to 20 May.
“They were detained because they were attempting to leave the country, which is what they thought the government wanted from them” David Montes, an ACLU Washington staff attorney, told OPB.
The six-person family had to share a single open toilet in the room. The mother, who is diabetic, is still breastfeeding her youngest child: an 11-month-old who was born in Washington state and is a US citizen under the birthright citizenship provision of the US constitution Donald Trump is trying to cancel.
“They had no ability to contest that they were being detained”, Angelina Godoy, of the University of Washington’s Center for Human Rights, told OPB. “They were just held — essentially kidnapped — and released by the government when they decided to do so.”
A border patrol spokesperson told the broadcaster the agency generally tries to process people it detains within three days.
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Like Trump, White House economic adviser Hassett claims big things are coming in about two weeks
According to Reuters, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett just told reporters that he expects some trade deals to be struck in the next week or two, and that he has been briefed on three such deals that were “about to happen”.
Hassett, the news agency notes, “declined to identify which countries might be involved”.
Earlier on Thursday, Hassett assured Fox Business that trade deals were imminent. “I saw, last week at the end of the week, three that were basically ready for the president’s decision” Hassett told Mario Bartiromo, one of Trump’s favorite hosts. “I don’t know if people have had that conversation with him yet, but yes, there are many, many deals coming and there are three that are, basically look like they’re done”.
But while Hassett’s statements continue to be treated as news, it is difficult to know how seriously to take his claims, given that it has now been exactly two weeks since he told the conservative talk radio host Andrew Wilkow: “We’ve got 24, 25 more deals that we’ll announce probably over the next two weeks.”
It is of course possible that Hassett will be proven right, this time, but another possibility is that the president’s economic advisor has adopted Trump’s favorite dodge of telling reporters that some sort of breakthrough is always just two weeks away.
As Bloomberg News reported in 2017, Trump insisted early in his first term that a range of problems were about to be solved in “two weeks”.
That March, for instance, Trump promised Tucker Carlson that his claim to have been wiretapped by the Obama administration was about to be proven correct. “I think you’re going to find some very interesting items coming to the forefront over the next two weeks”, he said. In early April 2017, Trump said: “We’re going to make an announcement in two weeks” on an infrastructure package. When no such package had materialized three weeks later, Trump said: “We’ve got the plan largely completed and we’ll be filing over the next two or three weeks”. The sweeping upgrade to US infrastructure did not arrive until Joe Biden was president.
In June of 2017, Bloomberg noted that it had been “15 weeks since Trump promised an aviation infrastructure proposal in two weeks”. Eight years later, Trump’s latest transportation secretary is currently promising to solve that same problem.
In the summer of 2020, as he ran for reelection during the pandemic, Trump told Fox News that he was about to make good on his promise to replace Obamacare and reform the nation’s immigration system. “We’re signing a health care plan within two weeks, a full and complete health care plan”, Trump said. “The decision by the Supreme Court on DACA allows me to do things on immigration, on health care, on other things that we’ve never done before. And you’re going to find it to be a very exciting two weeks”, he added. No such plans were ever signed.
The pattern has continued into Trump’s second term.
“Do you trust President Putin?” Trump was asked by a reporter last month.
“I’ll let you know in about two weeks,” he replied. Pressed to elaborate on what he expected to happen in two weeks, Trump evaded the question. “Two weeks or less,” he said.
Five weeks later, when Trump was asked yesterday if the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, actually wants to end the war in Ukraine, he replied: “I can’t tell you that, but I’ll let you know in about two weeks, within two weeks”.
“It’ll take about a week and a half, two weeks” Trump said.
“That is the classic Donald Trump ‘two week’ response to a question about a deadline or a timeline”, the ABC News correspondent Karen Travers told viewers. “We’ve heard this from him before when it comes to the Russia-Ukraine negotiations. He already put a two week deadline on that for the two sides to reach a peace agreement. That deadline came and went”.
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In his remarks to reporters a few minutes ago, Trump’s chief trade adviser Peter Navarro tried hard to cast the legal challenges to the retaliatory and trafficking tariffs imposed unilaterally by the president as both political and illegitimate.
To that end, Navarro urged reporters to report his false claims that the 12 states that filed suit were all Democratic states representing coastal elites, and that the five importers that told the court the new import taxes posed a grave threat to their businesses all sold “crap from China”.
“A detail that you should put on your stories: I mean, how did this suit come about? Twelve states of this union sued and every single one of them is a blue state, from the left coast of Oregon and Washington to New York and Connecticut on the elitist coast”, Navarro said, wrongly. In fact, Washington was not a party to the suit, while Arizona and Nevada, states that both voted for Trump in the 2024 election and are not on either coast, were parties to the suit. Colorado, Illinois and Minnesota, which joined the suit, are also not coastal states.
“The other parties to the suit were a bunch of importers who buy a bunch of cheap, subsidized crap from China”, Navarro added, also incorrectly.
The five owner-operated businesses that sued are: VOS Selections, a wine importer; FishUSA, Inc, which sells sportfishing tackle and related gear, from Canada, South Korea and Kenya, as well as China; Genova Pipe, which manufactures ABS pipe in the US using imported resin from South Korea and Taiwan; MicroKits LLC, which makes educational electronic kits and musical instruments in the US using imported components; and Terry Precision Cycling, which specializes in women’s cycling apparel.
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White House will find a way to impose tariffs even if it loses in court, Navarro says
Speaking to the media outside the White House, Trump’s chief trade adviser Peter Navarro said the administration “will respond forcefully” to the US trade court’s ruling on Trump’s tariff agenda and plans to “fight this all the way up the chain”.
The administration would seek to enact tariffs through other means if it ultimately loses the court fights over its trade policy, Navarro continued.
You can assume even if we lose, we will do it another way.
He said the tariffs would remain in place for now following a court stay and that the administration is still in talks with other countries to continue trade negotiations.
On the federal appeals court’s ruling on Thursday that Trump’s tariffs can stay in place, for now, Raffi Melkonian, a federal appellate lawyer based in Houston, explains on social media that the temporary administrative stay of the order blocking the tariffs from the US court of international trade “does *not* mean the Court will block the order for the entire appeal”.
The text of the appeals court’s order says this: “The request for an immediate administrative stay is granted to the extent that the judgments and the permanent injunctions entered by the Court of International Trade in these cases are temporarily stayed until further notice while this court considers the motions papers.”
Of the 11 judges who approved the temporary stay, allowing Trump’s dozens of retaliatory and trafficking tariffs to remain in place, three were appointed by Republican presidents – one by George H.W. Bush and two by George W. Bush – and the other eight by Democratic presidents – one by Bill Clinton, five by Barack Obama and two by Joe Biden.
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US court of appeals temporarily reinstates Trump's tariffs during appeal
An appeals court has agreed that Trump’s tariffs could remain in place pending an appeal hearing by the Trump administration.
A US trade court ruled yesterday that the tariff regime was illegal in a dramatic twist that could block Trump’s controversial global trade policy.
If the administration loses the appeal, it is expected to take the case to the supreme court.
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Here is my colleague Lauren Aratani’s story on the Federal Reserve’s rare, strongly worded statement today, which came after chair Jerome Powell spoke with Donald Trump at the White House this morning.
She writes: “That the Fed, which tends to be extremely reserved with public statements, issued the brief memo shows that officials are aware of Trump’s pressure campaign [to lower interest rates] and are standing firm on the Fed’s independence.”
US will not tolerate Chinese 'exploitation' of universities or theft of research, says state department
The United States will not tolerate “exploitation” of American universities by the Chinese Communist Party or theft of US research and intellectual property, state department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said on Thursday.
Bruce told reporters in a briefing the department will look seriously at Chinese students in the United States who are deemed a threat or a problem, after secretary of state Marco Rubio announced Washington would start “aggressively” revoking visas.
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Asked what changes Trump wants to see in the “big, beautiful bill”, Leavitt says Trump is looking at recommendations from colleagues in the Senate.
Those negotiations are continuing, she says, but Trump’s “priorities in the bill are non-negotiable in terms of the tax priorities he wants to see - the large tax cuts, the border investments that is currently in this bill - he is not going to allow them to go away”.
Trump's cabinet will work with Doge employees after Musk's exit, White House says
Trump’s cabinet will collaborate with staff from Doge across various federal agencies to advance ongoing efforts, Leavitt says.
She says cabinet secretaries have been “working hand in hand with Elon Musk, and they’ll continue to work with the respective Doge employees who have onboarded as political appointees at all of these agencies”.
Asked who Doge’s new leader is, Leavitt says: “The Doge leaders are each and every member of the president’s cabinet and the president himself who is wholeheartedly committed to cutting waste fraud and abuse in our government.”
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Leavitt says she believes the number of immigrants who have “self-deported” so far is “in the thousands”.
Leavitt says the administration hopes Russia and Ukraine will hold direct talks in Istanbul next week.
She cannot confirm at this time if the US will participate.
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White House says Trump has 'other legal authorities' to implement tariffs
Top US officials have been in touch with their counterparts in other countries to discuss the trade court ruling against Trump’s tariff agenda, Leavitt says.
The White House is reviewing other avenues for the Trump trade policies, she says, adding that Trump spoke to Japan’s leader earlier today to discuss the issue.
Leavitt says the president has “other legal authorities he can use to implement tariffs” and the Trump administration “is willing to use those”.
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White House thanks Elon Musk for his service
Leavitt says of Elon Musk, who quietly departed from his role at the White House last night: “We thank him for his service. We thank him for getting Doge off the ground and the effort to cut waste, fraud and abuse will continue.”
She dodges several times a request to comment on what Trump makes of Musk’s comments that were reported yesterday criticising Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” for increasing the US budget deficit and undermining Doge’s cost-cutting efforts. Later that day Trump said he would be negotiating the bill as he wasn’t pleased with some aspects of it, but he hasn’t commented further on Musk’s criticisms.
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Leavitt says Jill Biden was “complicit in the cover-up” of former president Joe Biden’s declining health.
I think, frankly, the former first lady should certainly speak up about what she saw in regards to her husband and when she saw it and what she knew.
This was a clear cover-up and Jill Biden was certainly complicit in that cover-up. There’s documentation, video evidence of her clearly shielding her husband away from the cameras.
They were just on The View last week, still saying everything is fine. She’s still lying to the American public, she still thinks the American people are so stupid they’re going to believe her lies and frankly it’s insulting and she needs to answer for it.
White House says discussions on US proposal for Gaza ceasefire are 'ongoing'
Leavitt says discussions on US special envoy Steve Witkoff’s new proposal for a ceasefire in Gaza are “ongoing”.
She says Witkoff and Donald Trump submitted a ceasefire proposal to Hamas that had been “backed and supported” by Israel, confirming earlier reports in the Israeli media.
Israel signed off on this proposal before it was sent to Hamas.
I can also confirm that those discussions are continuing, and we hope that a ceasefire in Gaza will take place so we can return all of the hostages home.
Earlier we reported that Hamas said it had received the proposal and is studying it.
Leavitt does not comment on reports that Trump is poised to make an announcement on the deal. She tells reporters:
If there is an announcement to be made, it will come from the White House - the president, myself, or special envoy Witkoff.
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Leavitt implores Senate Republicans to pass the “big, beautiful bill” to enact Trump’s tax cuts.
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Leavitt says Trump’s legal justification for tariffs was grounded in common sense.
“Ultimately the supreme court must put an end to this,” she says.
The judges “brazenly abused their judicial power to usurp the authority of President Trump”, Leavitt says.
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White House calls trade court ruling on tariffs judicial overreach
Karoline Leavitt is briefing reporters now.
She calls last night’s ruling which blocked Trump’s sweeping tariffs “another example of judicial overreach”.
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Jerome Powell pushes back against Trump on interest rate cuts, unusually blunt Fed statement says
Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell pushed back against Donald Trump’s demands for interest rate cuts during a face-to-face meeting today, according to an unusually blunt statement from the central bank.
At the White House, Powell stressed “that the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming economic information and what that means for the outlook,” the Fed said.
Trump, who has attacked Powell repeatedly over the Fed’s decision to not lower interest rates, recently said he has no intention of trying to fire Powell, whom he has called a “major loser”. But the possibility of a firing has unsettled financial markets that bank on an independent Fed’s ability to do its job without political interference.
Earlier this month, Powell kept interest rates on hold and cautioned that the president’s tariff regime was likely to raise prices, weaken growth and increase unemployment in the US if maintained.
The statement goes on to say that Powell maintained that the Fed “will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based solely on careful, objective, and non-political analysis”.
The full statement reads:
At the President’s invitation, Chair Powell met with the President today at the White House to discuss economic developments including for growth, employment, and inflation.
Chair Powell did not discuss his expectations for monetary policy, except to stress that the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming economic information and what that means for the outlook.
Finally, Chair Powell said that he and his colleagues on the FOMC will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based solely on careful, objective, and non-political analysis.
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Trump administration to ask supreme court to intervene on ruling blocking tariff regime
The Trump administration intends to ask the US supreme court to immediately pause what it characterised as a bid by “activist judges” to block Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs, my colleagues Dominic Rushe and Kalyeena Makortoff report.
A US trade court ruled the US president’s tariffs regime was illegal on Wednesdaya dramatic twist that could block Trump’s controversial global trade policy.
The ruling by a three-judge panel at the New York-based court of international trade came after several lawsuits argued Trump had exceeded his authority, leaving US trade policy dependent his whims and unleashing economic chaos around the world.
On Thursday, the Trump administration filed for “emergency relief” from the ruling “to avoid the irreparable national-security and economic harms at stake” The administration will appeal only if a federal court declines to temporarily pause the tariff ruling.
Until this morning, the US Court of International Trade (CIT) was not an institution many UK readers had probably heard of – a search of our archive threw up only a handful of mentions.
One of those mentions was about a ruling the court made in 2003 – Toy Biz. Inc. (later known as Marvel Toys) v. United States – concerning the importation of X-Men figures, and if they were classed as toys or dolls –an important distinction if the correct tariff was to be put on them.
The court ruled that – much to the chagrin of the young boys, mainly – that X-Men figures were “non-human creatures” and should therefore be classed as toys not dolls, as argued by Toy Biz. If they had been classed as dolls, they would have carried a higher tariff rate, according to US import regulations.
The court’s decision effectively halved the tariff rate, from 12 percent tax to 6.8%, and Toy Biz were also reimbursed what they had previously paid at a higher rate.
Netanyahu tells families of hostages held in Gaza that Israel has accepted new US ceasefire proposal, reports Israeli media
Israel’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu has told families of hostages held in Gaza that Israel has accepted a new ceasefire proposal presented by Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, Israeli media is reporting.
Palestinian militant group Hamas said earlier that it had received the new proposal from mediators and was studying it.
As we’ve been reporting, Trump is facing the biggest challenge yet to his trade policies after a US federal court ruled that his “liberation day” tariff plan is illegal. In the latest twist in the US president’s erratic global trade war, the ruling could unpick border taxes announced early last month. However, the White House has filed a notice of appeal. My colleague Richard Partington has this explainer unpacking why the court has blocked Trump’s tariff regime – and whether he can get around it.
A US federal judge will issue an injunction blocking the Trump administration’s efforts to prevent Harvard University from enrolling international students.
The university was in court seeking to extend a temporary order blocking the Trump administration from revoking the school’s right to host international students.
The judge, Allison Burroughs, had issued an emergency block last week after the administration abruptly announced it would cancel Harvard’s ability to host international students – the latest and most severe escalation in the administration’s battle against higher education institutions.
As graduation ceremonies were under way on campus, lawyers for the university argued in federal court in Boston that the revocation announced by the government last week violates the US constitution’s free speech and due process rights as well as procedural law regulating government actions.
In a packed court room with several international students in attendance, Burroughs said she wanted to “maintain the status quo” while the case makes its way through the courts.
Beijing has continued to respond angrily to the Trump administration’s decision to “aggressively” revoke visas of Chinese students in the US.
“The US decision to revoke Chinese student visas is fully unjustified,” China’s ministry of foreign affairs spokesperson, Lin Jian, said on X.
The move seriously hurts the lawful rights and interests of international students from China and disrupts people-to-people exchanges between the two countries.
He said China “firmly opposes” the decision and that it has protested to the US, adding:
This politically motivated and discriminatory move exposes the hypocrisy behind the US’s claims of freedom and openness. It will further damage the image and reputation of the US itself.
Secretary of state Marco Rubio said the state department has notified Congress of a “broad organization” plan to create a “more agile Department, better equipped to promote America’s interests and keep Americans safe across the world.”
A statement from Rubio on Thursday reads:
Since my first day as Secretary, I have said that this Department must move at the speed of relevancy and, in April announced a broad reorganization of the Department to better achieve that goal. Today, we took the next step in that process by notifying Congress of how we plan to do that.
Harvard University’s commencement ceremony is under way as a federal judge said she will order an injunction blocking the Trump administration from immediately revoking the university’s ability to enrol foreign students.
Harvard president Alan Garber did not directly addressing the Trump administration’s threats during his address to graduates, but received a rousing applause when he referenced the university’s global reach, noting that it is “just as it should be”, Associated Press reports.
Republicans and close allies of Donald Trump are railing against a federal judicial panel who blocked a wide swath of the US president’s tariffs Wednesday night, including those against China.
Some attempted to frame the decision as part of a broader fight between the Trump administration and US justice system.
Trump has frequently complained about legal decisions that don’t go his way, attacking judges on social media in ways that have alarmed civic society experts.
“The judicial coup is out of control,” Stephen Miller, White House deputy chief of staff, wrote on X. Conservative influencer Laura Loomer also called it a “judicial coup” on social media.
In a statement to Fox News, White House spokesperson Kush Desai said: “It is not for unelected judges to decide how to properly address a national emergency,” adding:
The administration is committed to using every lever of executive power to address this crisis and restore American Greatness.
Judge to issue 'broad' injunction to preserve status quo in Harvard case
Reuters is reporting that Burroughs said she wants to issue a “broad” injunction to preserve the status quo while the new administrative process in the Harvard case plays out.
Earlier we reported that the Trump administration had signaled that it might back off plans to immediately revoke Harvard University’s ability to enroll foreign students and would instead employ a lengthier administrative process.
According to a court filing, Reuters reported, the Department of Homeland Security sent Harvard a notice of intent yesterday to withdraw the university’s certification under the federal Student and Exchange Visitor Program. Harvard has 30 days to respond.
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US district judge Allison Burroughs said she plans to issue an injunction blocking the Trump administration from immediately revoking Harvard’s ability to enroll foreign students, Reuters is reporting.
In a hearing that began at 10am ET, the judge was due to decide whether to extend the temporary restraining order she slapped on Trump’s attempt to revoke Harvard’s ability to accept international students last Friday. She had issued that order mere hours after the Department for Homeland Security announced the revocation.
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Hamas say they have latest US proposal for ceasefire
Hamas says it has received US special envoy Steve Witkoff’s new proposal for a ceasefire in Gaza from mediators.
The statement from the militant group says the proposal is now being studied.
Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid earlier urged prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept a ceasefire.
“Israel must publicly and immediately accept the outline published this morning by American mediator Steve Witkoff,” Lapid posted on X.
“I remind Netanyahu: He has a full safety net from me to accept the outline, even if [National Security Minister Itamar] Ben-Gvir and [Finance Minister Bezalel] Smotrich try to torpedo it.”
You can follow all the latest developments on our Middle East live blog:
US backs Syria-Israel non-aggression agreement, US envoy to Syria says
US envoy for Syria, Thomas Barrack, has said that the United States believes peace between Syria and Israel is achievable, suggesting it should commence with a non-aggression agreement and a definition of borders and boundaries.
Syria and Israel have been at war for the better part of a century. Since former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad was ousted in December 2024, tensions reignited, and Israel has perpetrated hundreds of military attacks against its long-time enemy.
Despite the ongoing fighting, Barrack said in remarks to Saudi channel Al Arabiya on Thursday that the conflict between the two countries was a “solvable problem”. He thinks that Syria and Israel could “start with just a non-aggression agreement, talk about boundaries and borders” to create a new relationship.
While touring the Gulf earlier in May, Donald Trump eased sanctions on Syria, saying he hoped the country would normalise relations with Israel.
Barrack also said that Trump would declare that Syria is not a state sponsor of terrorism.
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Supreme court sides with Utah railway challenged by environmentalists
The supreme court has bolstered a Utah railway project intended to transport crude oil, ruling against environmental groups and a Colorado county that had challenged its federal approval, Reuters reports.
The 8-0 ruling overturned a lower court’s decision that had halted the project and had faulted an environmental impact statement issued by a federal agency called the Surface Transportation Board in approving the railway as too limited in scope.
A coalition of seven Utah counties and an infrastructure investment group are seeking to construct an 88-mile (142-km) railway line in northeastern Utah to connect the sparsely populated Uinta Basin region to an existing freight rail network that would be used primarily to transport waxy crude oil.
The case tested the scope of environmental impact studies that federal agencies must conduct under a US law called the National Environmental Policy Act, enacted in 1970 to prevent environmental harms that might result from major projects. The law mandates that agencies examine the “reasonably foreseeable” effects of a project.
The supreme court heard arguments on 10 December in the case, which has been closely watched by companies and environmental groups for how the ruling might affect a wider range of infrastructure and energy projects.
Environmental reviews that are too broad in scope can add years to the regulatory timeline, risking a project’s viability and future infrastructure development, according to companies and business trade groups.
The Surface Transportation Board, which has regulatory authority over new railroad lines, issued an environmental impact statement and approved the railway proposal in 2021.
The Center for Biological Diversity and other environmental groups sued over approval, as did Colorado’s Eagle County, which noted that the project would increase train traffic in its region and double traffic on an existing rail line along the Colorado River.
The US court of appeals for the District of Columbia circuit ruled in favor of the challengers in 2023, concluding that the environmental review inadequately analyzed the effects of increased oil production in the basin as well as downstream, where the oil would be refined.
The Biden administration had backed the railway coalition in the case, as did the state of Utah.
Fifteen other states supported the challengers. Colorado said its economy relies on outdoor recreation, and that the project raises the risk of leaks, spills or rail car accidents near the Colorado River’s headwaters.
Conservative justice Neil Gorsuch recused himself from the case after some Democratic lawmakers urged his withdrawal because businessman Philip Anschutz, his former legal client, has a financial interest in its outcome.
Japan’s prime minister Shigeru Ishiba said that he exchanged views on tariff issues with Donald Trump by phone today.
Ishiba said the talks were “meaningful” as the two leaders further deepened their understanding of each other’s views.
This was their second call this month, following one on 23 May, as a fourth round of tariff negotiations between the two nations is set to take place.
We’re now getting lines from Reuters that the supreme court has unanimously ruled against environmental groups and a Colorado county that challenged the approval of a railway project in Utah.
And, slightly anticlimactically, that’s the only ruling for today.
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We’re expecting at least one supreme court opinion this morning, starting any minute now, and we don’t know yet on what subject this will be – so I’ll bring you all the latest as we get it.
Elon Musk’s muted formal departure from the Trump administration last night was “an inglorious end to what had initially looked to be one of the most consequential White House appointments in generations”, writes Politico this morning.
As he unceremoniously slinked off out of the White House to nurse his business interests bruised by his chaotic foray into politics, Musk – who once called himself Trump’s “first buddy” – did not even have a formal conversation with the president before his “off-boarding” began, Reuters reported last night, citing a White House official who added that his exit was decided “at a senior staff level”. Ouch.
Here’s an extract from this morning’s Playbook giving a whistle-stop tour of Musk’s time in the White House.
Musk obliterated USAID over a single weekend and sent a wrecking ball through numerous other agencies - but while GOP hardliners were delighted by some of his activities, others were so poorly conceived they looked like sheer vandalism - and the damage will be felt for years to come. Many cuts were swiftly reversed, either by dawning reality or the courts.
Crucially, Musk failed on his own terms, getting nowhere near his much-vaunted $1tn savings target and making little impact on America’s debt and deficit crises. It seems likely Doge will be remembered more as a chaotic missed opportunity than as a transformation of the federal government, and it’s telling that Musk exits complaining about the “uphill battle” of reform. As the Playbook Podcast puts it this morning: “He came in with a chainsaw; he went out with a tweet.” It’s got to hurt.
And then there’s the politics. Polls showed Musk was a disaster with the public, including millions of Trump’s own fans. He was swiftly removed from view after his hubris helped blow up the GOP’s chances in a judicial election in Wisconsin. The final straw was the impact on his own business interests, with Tesla suffering a collapse in popularity among the rich coastal liberals at the core of its customer base. After bleak Q1 sales stats were made public, Musk began shuffling back to the day job. “I probably did spend a bit too much time on politics,” he reflected this week.
128 DAYS later … We’ll always have the memories. Who can forget the chainsaw … the cheesehead … the gloating about wood chippers … the oddball presser with “Lil X” in tow … the Tesla sales show outside the White House … the “tech support” T-shirt … the “legion of babies” … “Big Balls”… all those despairing tweets from former lovers … and so much more.
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White House adviser confident tariff ruling will be overturned and says three trade deals nearly done
White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett has said there are three trade deals nearly done and he expects more despite a court ruling blocking Donald Trump from imposing his sweeping tariff regime.
“There are many, many deals coming. And there were three that basically look like they’re done,” Hassett said in an interview with Fox Business Network.
Hassett dismissed a US court of international trade ruling yesterday that blocked most tariffs and found Trump had overstepped his authority as the work of “activist judges”. He said he was confident the administration would win on appeal.
The administration’s view is that numerous countries will open up their markets to American products in the next month or two, Hassett said.
“If there are little hiccups here or there because of decisions that activist judges make, then it shouldn’t just concern you at all, and it’s certainly not going to affect the negotiations,” Hassett said.
There were three deals ready for Trump’s review at the end of last week, Hassett said.
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Trump administration signals it may use administrative process against Harvard
The Trump administration has signaled that it might back off plans to immediately revoke Harvard University’s ability to enroll foreign students because of several concerns, including its alleged failure to police antisemitism on campus, and would instead employ a lengthier administrative process.
According to a court filing, Reuters reports, the Department of Homeland Security sent Harvard a notice of intent yesterday to withdraw the university’s certification under the federal Student and Exchange Visitor Program. Harvard has 30 days to respond.
The notice came ahead of a scheduled court hearing on whether to extend a temporary ban on the revocation announced by the Trump administration last week.
Here’s the clip of Donald Trump lashing out at a reporter who asked him about claims that he chickens out of tariffs.
“Wall Street analysts have coined a new term called the ‘TACO’ trade. They’re saying ‘Trump Always Chickens Out’ on your tariff threats,” the reporter asked.
Trump called it a “nasty question” and insisted that he wasn’t chickening out on tariffs, rather: “It’s called negotiation.”
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David Smith is the Guardian’s Washington DC bureau chief
Employees of Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge) own lucrative stock in companies that stand to directly benefit from their work gutting federal agencies, Democratic senators have alleged.
The potential ethics violations merit an investigation by the justice department and other oversight bodies, urges a letter co-authored by senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Jack Reed of Rhode Island and obtained by the Guardian.
The senators state:
We write regarding new reports that Doge employees at the treasury, Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) have been engaged in the dismantling of these agencies while holding hundreds of thousands of dollars of stock in private companies benefitting from these individuals’ efforts to eliminate key programs, staff, and policies.
Doge was launched in January with a mission to cut wasteful spending, slash federal regulations and improve government software and IT systems. It has about 79 appointed employees and 10 seconded from other agencies. Many are young software engineers who worked for Musk’s companies and have no prior government experience.
You can read the full story here:
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As relations between Moscow and Washington deteriorate over the war in Ukraine, ties between the US and the new Syrian government are continuing to improve, ending more than a decade of diplomatic freeze.
The US’s new envoy for Syria, Thomas Barrack, was in Damascus on Thursday, where the American flag was hoisted outside of the long-shuttered ambassador’s residence in the Syrian capital.
“Tom understands there is great potential in working with Syria to stop Radicalism, improve Relations, and secure Peace in the Middle East,” Trump said, according to a post on the state department’s X account.
Washington hasn’t formally reopened its embassy in Damascus, which closed in 2012 after protests against the government of then president Bashar Assad, met by a brutal crackdown, spiraled into civil war.
But Barrack’s visit and the raising of the flag were a significant signal of warming relations, which has seen the US announce the lifting of crippling sanctions on Syria.
Assad was unseated in December in a lightning rebel takeover led by Ahmad al-Sharaa, the former leader of an Islamist insurgent group who now leads Syria.
Sharaa, a former militant who fought against US forces in Iraq and had a $10m US bounty on his head until December 2024, has launched a charm offensive to portray himself as a reformed, modern politician who respects minority rights in his country.
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Yesterday, US president Donald Trump appeared to set a two-week deadline for his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to prove he was serious about wanting to end Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Despite mediation efforts, the Kremlin has dismissed the US’ 30 day unconditional ceasefire proposal and Trump seems to be losing patience with Putin, who he had been reluctant to criticise in the first few months of his return to office.
After Russia launched some of the heaviest attack on Ukraine to date, Trump was asked on Wednesday if he thought Putin wanted to end the war.
“I can’t tell you that, but I’ll let you know in about two weeks,” Trump told reporters.
Trump’s latest comments came after he called Putin “CRAZY” over the weekend following a mass Russian air attack on Kyiv, and warned that Moscow risked new sanctions over its continued drone and missile assaults.
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Democrat launches investigation of Trump’s 'meme coin dinner' - report
The most senior Democrat on the House judiciary committee, Jamie Raskin, has reportedly launched an investigation into the private dinner that Donald Trump hosted for top investors in his meme coin, a novelty crypto token with no inherent value that has generated millions for the president and his family as buyers vie for access.
Here is an extract from the Washington Post’s story:
Rep. Jamie Raskin demanded Trump turn over the names of the guests who attended last week’s gala after pouring millions of dollars into the president’s crypto venture.
The Maryland congressman also pressed the president to disclose what steps he used to determine the source of the funds used to purchase the meme coin, citing concerns that some of the money could have come from foreign governments seeking to influence the White House.
“Publication of this list will also let the American people know who is putting tens of millions of dollars into our President’s pocket so we can start to figure out what — beyond virtually worthless memecoins — they are getting in exchange for all this money,” Raskin wrote in a letter, which was first reported by the Washington Post.
Ethics experts and Trump’s political opponents say the meme coin dinner was the starkest example to date of Trump’s willingness to blur the lines between his for-profit business interests and his office…
The White House has said the dinner poses no conflict of interest, because the president’s assets are in a blind trust managed by his sons.
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A federal judge will consider on whether to further block the Trump administration from revoking Harvard university’s ability to enroll international students (see post at 10.38 for more details).
At a hearing in Boston, US district judge Allison Burroughs will weigh whether to extend a temporary order she issued last Friday that blocked the US department of homeland security from carrying out the revocation it issued a day earlier.
Harvard argues the Trump administration is retaliating against it for refusing to cede to its demands to control the school’s governance, curriculum and the “ideology” of its faculty and students.
The Trump team says Harvard’s hiring and admissions practices discriminate against conservatives and that it wants to safeguard civil rights and free speech.
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Trump orders agencies to cut all federal ties with Harvard
Joseph Gedeon is a politics breaking news reporter based in Washington
The Donald Trump administration is set to order federal agencies to cancel all government contracts with Harvard University worth an estimated $100m.
A planned directive first seen by the New York Times set to circulate to agencies on Tuesday instructs officials to terminate existing deals and seek new suppliers, marking what the White House describes as a total break with Harvard after decades of collaboration.
The order comes by way of the General Service Administration (GSA) and affects contracts across nine federal departments, from health research to executive training programs.
Agencies must report back by early June on which agreements they plan to axe, according to the letter.
You can read the full story here:
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While the Trump administration is targeting Chinese student’s visas, it continues to crackdown on universities it sees as not bending to its ideological will.
Trump has, for example, sought to pressure Harvard, the most prestigious of the American universities, into compliance on a range of issues.
These include tighter control over the university’s curriculum, information about foreign students and moves to curb protests against Israel’s assault on Gaza, which the Trump administration characterises as antisemitic.
The White House threatened to bar foreign students from Harvard in April, after the university refused to cave into pressure to alter its admissions, teaching and recruitment policies. The US education department froze about $3bn $2.3bn in federal funds to Harvard, something the university is challenging in court.
Since April, the administration has also attempted to ban the university from enrolling foreign students – a move temporarily blocked by federal courts.
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US's move to start revoking Chinese student visas is discriminatory, Beijing says
Beijing has angrily responded to the US’s plan to revoke visas from Chinese students, in what is seen as another effort by the Trump administration to restrict foreign students’ entry to American schools over claims they may somehow threaten domestic security.
“The US has unreasonably cancelled Chinese students’ visas under the pretext of ideology and national rights,” China’s foreign ministry spokesperson, Mao Ning said.
“China firmly opposes this and has lodged representations with the US.”
She added:
Such a politicised and discriminatory action lays bare the US lie that it upholds the so-called freedom and openness.
China is the second-largest country of origin for international students in the US, behind only India. In the 2023-2024 school year, more than 270,000 international students were from China, making up roughly a quarter of all foreign students in the US.
It is not clear how many of the Chinese students studying in the US could be affected by the latest move, which comes amid the ongoing trade war between Beijing and Washington.
US will ‘aggressively’ revoke visas of Chinese students, secretary of state says
The Trump administration has said it will “aggressively” revoke visas of Chinese students, one of the largest sources of revenue for American universities, in the latest attack on US higher education.
The announcement by secretary of state Marco Rubio came after China criticised his department’s decision a day earlier to suspend visa appointments for students worldwide at least temporarily…
The US will “aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students, including those with connections to the Chinese Communist party or studying in critical fields,” Rubio said in a statement.
“We will also revise visa criteria to enhance scrutiny of all future visa applications from the People’s Republic of China and Hong Kong,” he said.
You can read the full story here:
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Elon Musk leaving role in the Trump administration
Now some news away from the tariff court ruling.
Elon Musk is leaving his role in the Trump administration as a “special advisor” to the president after spearheading a tumultuous drive to shrink the size of the US government as part of the department of government efficiency.
Musk’s term in his role was due to expire this month, but the world’s richest man’s announcement that he was getting back to business follows a rash of social media posts and interviews, in which Musk criticised Trump’s tax spending bill.
“As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending,” Musk wrote on X.
“The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.”
The billionaire had for weeks been signalling his intent to spend less time in Washington and more on his businesses, Tesla, SpaceX and xAI. It’s a drastic turnaround for Musk, who plowed $200m into Trump’s campaign and dedicated most of the last year to promoting Trump and far-right ideology online, as Nick Robins-Early writes.
The White House has 10 days to complete the process of trying to halt the tariffs, which were imposed to reverse the US’s massive and longstanding trade deficits, although most of these levies are currently suspended anyway.
Any legal challenge to the ruling will have to be heard at the US court of appeals for the federal circuit in Washington DC, and ultimately the US supreme court.
Over the last few months, Trump has introduced a confusing and evolving slate of tariffs against specific countries – such as China - and industries that the president says are negatively impacting America’s trade.
Many of his harshest tariffs have been paused, however, and some exemptions have been made as countries around the world have launched charm offensives to try to curry favour with the US president.
What has the global market reaction been like?
Financial markets, on the whole, have cheered the ruling. The US dollar rallied following the court’s order, surging against currencies such as the euro, yen and the Swiss franc in particular. Wall Street futures rose and equities across Asia also rose.
The UK’s FTSE 100 blue chip index has ticked up 0.1%, while the German Dax rallied 0.9%. France’s CAC 40 has risen 1%. Trump’s “liberation day” tariffs, in contrast, shook global financial markets and caused massive uncertainty.
You can read the latest market reaction in our business live blog.
What was actually said in the federal court ruling?
Here is what the three-judge panel at the New York-based court of international trade said when it blocked Donald Trump from imposing sweeping global tariffs on imports.
“The Worldwide and Retaliatory Tariff Orders exceed any authority granted to the President by IEEPA to regulate importation by means of tariffs,” the court wrote, referring to the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act that Trump cited to justify the tariffs.
“The court does not pass upon the wisdom or likely effectiveness of the president’s use of tariffs as leverage. That use is impermissible not because it is unwise or ineffective, but because (federal law) does not allow it,” the panel said in the decision.
The court also blocked a different set of levies the Trump administration imposed on China, Mexico and Canada, for what the White House said was in response to the unacceptable flow of immigrants and synthetic opioids across the US border.
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Trump administration appeals US trade court tariff ruling as aide labels it a 'judicial coup'
Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics and the second Trump administration.
The main news this morning is that a Manhattan-based court has blocked the president’s sweeping tariffs on global imports from coming into effect - a huge blow to an integral pillar of his plan for economic growth.
The US court of international trade said yesterday that Trump lacked the authority to use the emergency economic powers legislation that he cited when he unveiled additional taxes on foreign-made goods on what he called “liberation day” last month.
Tariffs usually require the approval of Congress - but the US president argued he had power to act because it was a “national emergency”.
The Trump White House filed an appeal against the judgment minutes after it was handed down.
“President Trump pledged to put America first, and the administration is committed to using every lever of executive power to address this crisis and restore American greatness,” Trump’s spokesperson Kush Desai said.
Trump’s powerful deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, reacted to the federal court ruling by posting on X that “the judicial coup is out of control”.
We will have more reaction to the ruling from court of international trade in New York and other US politics stories throughout the day so stick with us.
