President Donald Trump has said that the “termination” of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell “cannot come fast enough,” one day after Powell warned that Trump’s tariffs were “highly likely” to cause inflation and may put the Fed in a “challenging situation.”
Trump has been pushing Powell to cut interest rates, something the chair has been hesitant to do. This comes as the European Central Bank cut its interest rates on Thursday, infuriating the president.
“The ECB is expected to cut interest rates for the 7th time, and yet, ‘Too Late’ Jerome Powell of the Fed, who is always TOO LATE AND WRONG, yesterday issued a report which was another, and typical, complete ‘mess!’” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Too Late should have lowered Interest Rates, like the ECB, long ago, but he should certainly lower them now. Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!”
Meanwhile, Americans now trust Democrats with the economy over Republicans for the first time in years, amid ongoing uncertainty over Trump’s on-again, off-again tariff strategy.
Gold prices began to slip in early trading on Thursday but remain up a significant 40 percent over 12 months, with investors continuing to flock to the safe-haven bullion.
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Key Points
- Republicans less trusted on economy than Democrats for first time in years
- Trump administration says Harvard could lose right to enrol foreign students
- Why gold is seen as ‘safe haven’ investment
- Fed chair says Trump trade war risks higher inflation
- A federal judge temporarily limits DOGE’s access to Social Security systems
- Democratic senator meets with Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador
Democratic senator meets with Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador
04:01
,
Kelly Rissman
Senator Chris Van Hollen has finally met with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the mistakenly deported Salvadoran father Donald Trump’s administration is fighting to keep inside a brutal El Salvador jail.
The senator from Maryland traveled to El Salvador this week to ensure Abrego Garcia’s safety and help secure his release.
After he was initially denied a meeting or a chance to speak with the Maryland father, the senator posted a photo on social media late Thursday night that shows him sitting with Abrego Garcia at a table in what appeared to be a dining room.
Alex Woodward has the story.
Nearly $1 billion of DOGE ‘savings’ vanish overnight
04:00
,
Gustaf Kilander
Ariana Baio writes:
The Department of Government Efficiency’s website quietly removed nearly one billion dollars in what it claims to have “saved” through canceled contracts, grants or leases this past week.
In the latest example of altering figures on the agency’s website, staffers at DOGE seemingly updated its claimed savings overnight on Tuesday, erasing approximately $962 million, according to NOTUS.
The largest of the disappeared cuts made this week, identified using the Wayback Machine, appears to be a $1.1 billion contract with the Acacia Center for Justice. The group provided legal services for unaccompanied immigrant children who enter the U.S. DOGE initially claimed the termination would save $367 million, but now the contract isn’t listed at all.
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A federal judge temporarily limits DOGE’s access to Social Security systems
04:00
,
Kelly Rissman
A federal judge in Maryland temporarily blocked the Department of Government Efficiency from accessing a Social Security Administration system that holds personally identifiable information.
“This Order does not preclude SSA from providing members of the DOGE Team with access to redacted or anonymized data and records of SSA,” the judge wrote in a Thursday order.
U.S. District Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander wrote: “For some 90 years, SSA has been guided by the foundational principle of an expectation of privacy with respect to its records. This case exposes a wide fissure in the foundation.”
The preliminary injunction came just hours before the judge’s March 20 temporary restraining order blocking access was set to expire. She heard arguments on Tuesday over whether to extend the TRO.
It also comes days after the New York Times reported that the Trump administration was “repurposing Social Security’s ‘death master file’ in an effort to pressure immigrants to ‘self deport.” More than 6,000 names of migrants whose legal statuses had been revoked had been added to the file as of last week, according to the outlet.
El Salvador's president posts photos of Kilmar Abrego Garcia during senator meeting
03:18
,
Kelly Rissman
Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s president, posted photos of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man who was removed by the Trump administration to a megaprison in the country.
Abrego Garcia has “miraculously risen from the ‘death camps’ & ‘torture,’ now sipping margaritas with Sen. Van Hollen in the tropical paradise of El Salvador!” he wrote Thursday evening, alongside photos of the Salvadoran man meeting with Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen.
Earlier this week, after multiple court orders demanded Abrego Garcia’s return, Bukele said at the White House that he didn’t have the “power” to return him.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, miraculously risen from the “death camps” & “torture”, now sipping margaritas with Sen. Van Hollen in the tropical paradise of El Salvador! pic.twitter.com/r6VWc6Fjtn
— Nayib Bukele (@nayibbukele) April 18, 2025
‘I can’t protect my unborn baby from HIV’: The stark reality of Trump’s aid cuts
03:16
,
Gustaf Kilander
Bel Trew writes:
Leaning in pain against the wall of her one-room hut, Hadja, a mother of three, worries about who will look after her children if she dies.
The 27-year-old was unknowingly infected with HIV by her husband before falling pregnant in her village in southern Uganda. Since the US made devastating cuts to its global HIV programmes in January, slashing funding, she has struggled to access her lifesaving medication – drugs that would crucially prevent the transmission of the virus to her baby.
“When you go to the government hospital, they don’t give you the medicine. There are days we go to the hospitals and there are no doctors, days when they don’t have drugs,” she says, explaining that she earns just £1.50 a day making and selling pancakes – far too little to afford antiretroviral medication on her own.
“Our lives depend on medicine – without it, our lives are shortened. If I die, my children will suffer.”
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Maryland senator meets with Kilmar Abrego Garcia
03:03
,
Kelly Rissman
Senator Chris Van Hollen met with Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a man who was removed from Maryland to El Salvador and kept there despite court orders demanding his return.
The senator posted a photo of him talking with Abrego Garcia, one day after he was denied a meeting.
I said my main goal of this trip was to meet with Kilmar. Tonight I had that chance. I have called his wife, Jennifer, to pass along his message of love. I look forward to providing a full update upon my return. pic.twitter.com/U9y2gZpxCb
— Senator Chris Van Hollen (@ChrisVanHollen) April 18, 2025
Mike Myers asks 'will there always be a Canada' in ad for Mark Carney
02:30
,
Gustaf Kilander
Canada is forever.
— Mark Carney (@MarkJCarney) April 17, 2025
pic.twitter.com/SVdOOkhOUS
Trump suggests firing of Fed chair is coming – but he doesn’t have the power to remove him
01:45
,
Gustaf Kilander
Ariana Baio writes:
President Donald Trump lashed out at Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Thursday morning, suggesting that his “termination” is coming soon - despite having no power to enforce this.
The outburst come less than a day after Powell warned that Trump’s tariffs were “highly likely” to cause inflation and could put the Fed in a “challenging situation” where it’s trying to balance growth and manage inflation.
Powell’s speech suggested the Fed does not plan to cut rates anytime soon – something Trump has been pushing him to do.
Meanwhile, the European Central Bank moved to slash its interest rates on Thursday, further angering Trump.
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The climate crisis truth that Trump’s re-election helped expose
01:00
,
Gustaf Kilander
Mike Berners-Lee comments:
After three decades of Cop climate meetings, the carbon emissions curve is still rising year-on-year. In other words, every year we are making the climate worse by a larger amount than we did the year before. The climate Cops have been perverted almost from the beginning by the cynical, well-funded, and highly effective action of vested business interests. However you look at it, action on climate change has always been pitiful compared to what the scientists have been saying is needed.
Clutching at straws, many well-intentioned wishful thinkers who say we have been making progress, point to the possibility that the steepness of the curve looks to have been declining. But that was before “drill, baby drill”.
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Sen. Warren weighs in on Trump's 'termination' comments
Friday 18 April 2025 00:45
,
Kelly Rissman
Trump can’t legally fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren told CNBC after the president said his termination “cannot come fast enough.”
Powell began his second four-year term in 2022 and cannot legally be removed until his term ends, the senator argued. She acknowledged that Trump has tested the Constitutional limits in recent weeks before launching into a hypothetical fallout that could occur if Powell was terminated.
Warren warned that if he was fired by the president, “it will crash the markets in the United States.” It’s important that the Federal Reserve makes decisions independent from politics, she said.
“We understand that if the New York Stock Exchange, if interest rates in the United States are subject to a president who just wants to wave his magic wand, this doesn’t distinguish us from any other two-bit dictatorship around the world,” she said.
Elizabeth Warren on CNBC explains why Trump illegally firing Jerome Powell would wreck the economy and take the US down a fast track toward dictatorship pic.twitter.com/7BdyCPh3WC
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 17, 2025
Supreme Court to hear landmark case that could end birthright citizenship for kids of undocumented migrants
Friday 18 April 2025 00:35
,
Gustaf Kilander
Ariana Baio and Mark Sherman write:
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear arguments in the case regarding President Donald Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship for children born in the U.S. to certain immigrants
In a brief order on Thursday, the justices declined to lift a temporary pause, which three lower court judges ruled on, that prevents Trump’s executive order from taking effect nationwide.
They have scheduled arguments for May 15.
Birthright citizenship automatically makes anyone born in the United States an American citizen, including children born to parents in the country illegally. The right is enshrined in the 14th Amendment.
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Trump extends federal hiring freeze
Friday 18 April 2025 00:19
,
Kelly Rissman
In an executive order signed Thursday evening, President Donald Trump extended the hiring freeze of federal employees within the executive branch.
“I hereby extend through July 15, 2025, the freeze on the hiring of Federal civilian employees within the executive branch, as initially directed in the Presidential Memorandum of January 20, 2025,” the order says.
The original order was set to expire on Saturday.
Ryanair boss issues warning over Trump’s tariffs for aviation industry
Friday 18 April 2025 00:15
,
Gustaf Kilander
Amelia Neath writes:
Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has warned the budget airline could delay deliveries of Boeing aircraft if they become more expensive amid the impact of Donald Trump’s tariffs.
“If tariffs are imposed on those aircraft, there’s every likelihood we may delay the delivery,” Mr O’Leary told the Financial Times.
Ryanair is due to receive another 25 aircraft from Boeing from August, but he said they are not needed until “kind of March, April 2026.”
“We might delay them and hope that common sense will prevail,” he added.
The US president imposed the steepest American tariffs on imports in over a century, with a baseline tariff on imports to the US of 10 per cent.
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DHS threatens to bar Harvard from enrolling international students unless it shares protest info
Thursday 17 April 2025 23:55
,
Gustaf Kilander
Josh Marcus writes:
The Trump administration has threatened to pull Harvard University’s ability to enroll international students unless the school shares information about these students’ disciplinary records and participation in protests.
It marks the latest escalation in the White House’s crackdown on the Ivy League university over an alleged failure to address campus antisemitism, an effort critics say is a thinly veiled attempt to exert undue influence over the prestigious university.
In a letter to the university on Wednesday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused Harvard of creating a “hostile learning environment” for Jewish students.
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US-UK trade deal could impact relations with China, ex-spy chief warns
Thursday 17 April 2025 23:30
,
Gustaf Kilander
Mathilde Grandjean has this story:
The UK “would be in trouble” if it was to agree a trade deal with the US at the expense of China, a former spy chief has claimed.
Nigel Inkster, the former deputy head of MI6, issued the warning after White House officials said they believe a trade deal with the UK could be agreed “within three weeks”, according to the Telegraph.
The UK is hoping a deal can help stave off the full brunt of US President Donald Trump’s sweeping 10% tariffs on all goods imported to the US.
But Mr Inkster said a US-UK deal could negatively impact Britain’s relationship with China, which is a “critical supplier” of pharmaceuticals in both the UK and the US.
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Appeals court warns of mounting ‘crisis’ over Trump’s refusal to ‘facilitate’ Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s return
Thursday 17 April 2025 23:00
,
Gustaf Kilander
Alex Woodward writes:
Donald Trump’s attempt to “stash away” residents of the United States in a brutal prison in El Salvador “without due process” should be “shocking” to Americans’ “intuitive sense of liberty,” according to a panel of federal appeals court judges.
A three-judge panel in Washington, D.C. on Thursday denied the Trump administration’s emergency request to block a court order to enforce a Supreme Court ruling for the government to “facilitate” the release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a wrongfully deported Salvadoran immigrant who was living in Maryland.
A blistering order written by Ronald Reagan-appointed appellate judge J. Harvie Wilkinson said “the government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order.”
The government claims that “it has rid itself of custody” of Abrego Garcia and “there is nothing that can be done,” according to the order.
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Trump calls Harvard a 'disgrace'
Thursday 17 April 2025 22:46
,
Kelly Rissman
Asked about why he has moved to change Harvard University’s tax status, Trump said in the Oval Office Thursday: “Because I think Harvard is a disgrace. They are obviously anti-semitic, and all of a sudden they are starting to behave.”
He noted that to his understanding, no final decision has been made about the Ivy League school’s status.
Earlier this week, the president suggested on Truth Social that Harvard should lose its tax-exempt status if it “keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting ‘Sickness?’”
Earlier on Thursday, the Trump administration threatened the university’s ability to enroll international students unless the school shares information about any of their disciplinary actions “as a result of making threats to other students or populations or participating in protests.” The school must comply by April 30.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem wrote a letter to the university, accusing the school of creating a “hostile learning environment” for Jewish students
“Harvard bending the knee to antisemitism — driven by its spineless leadership — fuels a cesspool of extremist riots and threatens our national security,” she wrote in the letter.
Inside the brutal mega-prison where Trump administration has wrongly sent Maryland father
Thursday 17 April 2025 22:45
,
Gustaf Kilander
Marcos Alemn, Regina Garcia Cano, Alex Brandon write:
The Trump administration has acknowledged mistakenly deporting a Maryland man with protected legal status to a notorious El Salvador prison.
However, the government is arguing against returning the man to the United States because of his alleged gang ties and the lack of power it has over decisions made by the Central American nation.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia was deported to El Salvador by the Trump administration in March, despite a court order preventing his removal from the US.
The Trump administration has accused Garcia of human trafficking – but has not shared any evidence to that effect.
Read more:
Trump talks TikTok
Thursday 17 April 2025 22:34
,
Kelly Rissman
The president expects to reach a deal with China over the social media platform in the coming weeks.
“We’ll just delay the deal until this works out one way or another,” he said. The president predicted the TikTok controversy could conclude within the next three or four weeks.
Trump said to think of America as a “big beautiful department store” that every country “wants a piece of.” China could always walk away and say “we’re not going to shop at the store of America.”
While RFK Jr. warns of an ‘autism epidemic’, his department cut research money to reduce autistic suicides
Thursday 17 April 2025 22:25
,
Gustaf Kilander
Eric Garcia writes:
On Wednesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. spoke about the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s new report that showed the number of children who received an autism diagnosis had increased from 1 in 36 to 1 in 31.
Kennedy said that the numbers showed that autism had become an “epidemic,” though the actual report from the CDC suggested that the increase in diagnoses came largely as a result of advances in screening.
“This epidemic denial has become a feature in the mainstream media. And it's based on an industry canard,” he told reporters on Wednesday.
But just one month before, Kennedy’s department cut a grant that would have helped reduce suicide among autistic LGBT+ people.
Read more:
Putin praises Elon Musk as visionary: ‘Such people rarely appear in the human population’
Thursday 17 April 2025 22:00
,
Gustaf Kilander
Felix Light writes:
Vladimir Putin has drawn a parallel between Elon Musk and a key figure in the Soviet space race, Sergei Korolev, praising the SpaceX founder as a visionary.
Speaking on Russia's space policy at a student meeting, Putin reportedly described Musk, a key adviser of President Donald Trump, as "absolutely crazy about Mars," according to state news agency TASS.
Putin reportedly invoked the legacy of Korolev, the engineer behind Yuri Gagarin's historic 1961 spaceflight, to highlight the rarity of people like Musk.
TASS quoted Putin as saying: "Such people rarely appear in the human population, charged with a certain idea.
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Trump foresees trade deal with China in 'next three or four weeks'
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:57
,
Gustaf Kilander
REPORTER: How much time will it take for a trade deal with China?
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 17, 2025
TRUMP: I would think over the next three or four weeks pic.twitter.com/qvA9S3yt9i
Trump calls Harvard 'a disgrace' amid tax fight
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:49
,
Gustaf Kilander
Reporter: If that was wrong, why are you considering changing the tax status of Harvard?
— Acyn (@Acyn) April 17, 2025
Trump: Because I think Harvard is a disgrace… they are obviously anti-semitic.. Tax exempt status is a privilege pic.twitter.com/O8ksdv3yrT
Trump administration takes aim at Harvard's international students and tax-exempt status
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:45
,
Gustaf Kilander
Annie Ma, Jocelyn Gecker, and Collin Binkley write:
President Donald Trump's administration has escalated its ongoing battle with Harvard, threatening to revoke the university's ability to host international students as the president called for withdrawing Harvard’s tax-exempt status.
The Department of Homeland Security ordered Harvard late Tuesday to turn over “detailed records" of its foreign student visa holders’ "illegal and violent activities” by April 30. International students make up 27% of the campus.
The department also said it was canceling two grants to the school totaling $2.7 million.
The moves deepen the crackdown on Harvard, which on Monday became the first university to openly defy the administration’s demands related to activism on campus, antisemitism and diversity. The federal government has already frozen more than $2 billion in grants and contracts to the Ivy League institution.
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Tears on my MyPillow: Weeping pro-Trump conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell tells judge he has no money to pay fines: ‘I’m in ruins’
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:30
,
Gustaf Kilander
Rhian Lubin writes:
Donald Trump supporter and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell sobbed to a judge that he is “in ruins” and cannot pay a court-ordered $50,000 fine.
Lindell has been ordered to pay voting software company Smartmatic the hefty fine over false claims he made about the company flipping the 2020 election for Joe Biden. It is one of a number of lawsuits Lindell faces over false election claims.
Now the troubled CEO claims that he doesn’t even have 5 cents left to pay the company the $56,396 he owes.
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Trump suggests Jimmy Carter ‘died a happy man’ knowing Biden was a worse president
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:15
,
Gustaf Kilander
Justin Baragona writes:
Donald Trump declared during an Oval Office meeting with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni that President Joe Biden’s tenure in office was so terrible that Jimmy Carter “died a happy man” knowing that there was someone “worse” than him.
“And then you had like the last administration, the only thing they were good at was cheating in elections,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “That‘s about all they could do. They couldn‘t do anything. They were useless. They were incompetent.”
He added: “Worst administration in the history of our country. Worse than Jimmy Carter. Jimmy Carter died a happy man. You know why? Because he wasn‘t the worst. President Joe Biden was.”
Read more:
Appeals court denies Trump admin attempt to block court order
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:07
,
Alex Woodward
An Appeals court has denied the Trump administration’s attempt to block a court order to “facilitate” Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s return.
80-year-old Reagan-appointed appeals court judge J. Harvie Wilkinson wrote the Fourth Circuit’s opinion, with Obama appointee Stephanie Thacker and Clinton appointee Robert Bruce King:
The relief the government is requesting is both extraordinary and premature.
While we fully respect the Executive’s robust assertion of its Article II powers, we shall not micromanage the efforts of a fine district judge attempting to implement the Supreme Court’s recent decision.
It is difficult in some cases to get to the very heart of the matter. But in this case, it is not hard at all.
The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is the foundation of our constitutional order.
Further, it claims in essence that because it has rid itself of custody that there is nothing that can be done.
This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear.
Court order
Fundraising shows something clear: Democratic voters want fighters
Thursday 17 April 2025 21:00
,
Gustaf Kilander
Eric Garcia writes:
Last month marked the end of the first quarter for 2025, which begins the fundraising season ahead of the 2026 midterm cycle. At this point, Democrats hope to ride on Donald Trump’s growing unpopularity to win back the Hosue of Representatives and maybe even win some Senate seats if they get lucky.
But there have been increasing questions about what the Democratic Party’s opposition will look like in the wake of its worst defeat in 20 years. Some have talked about the possibility of a Democratic Tea Party where they will be more confrontational toward Trump, or whether they should work in a more conciliatory manner
Of course, it’s hard to tell what kind of Democrats voters want since primaries will not take place until next year. If reports to the Federal Election Commission filed this week show anything, however, the verdict is clear: Democratic voters want fighters.
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