US trade court says Donald Trump’s global tariffs are illegal

https://www.ft.com/content/bd6479b2-b7e5-42c2-ae17-779e57b02637

A US court has ruled that Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariff scheme is illegal, in a blow to the White House that could throw the president’s global trade policy into disarray.

The US Court of International Trade found on Wednesday that Trump did not have the authority to use the emergency economic powers legislation that he cited when he imposed sweeping global tariffs last month.

The ruling by the panel of judges is a dramatic twist in the trade wars that Trump has launched since returning to the presidency, and comes as his administration is racing to cut trade deals after suspending the imposition of most of its higher tariffs.

While the Trump administration said it would launch an appeal, the ruling will embolden opponents of the tariffs in corporate America, foreign capitals and the US Congress.

The judgment affects levies imposed on April 2, including a baseline 10 per cent tariff and higher so-called reciprocal duties on many countries, but not sectoral tariffs that he has also imposed on steel and car imports.

S&P 500 futures were up 1.5 per cent on Thursday, while the dollar rose about 0.3 per cent against a basket of six currencies. The Euro Stoxx 50 in Europe was up 0.5 per cent and Japan’s exporter-heavy Nikkei 225 climbed 1.8 per cent.

The court made its ruling in response to two cases brought by small businesses and a group of US states. In the ruling, it said the executive orders in which Trump announced the tariffs “are declared to be invalid as contrary to law”.

https://www.wsj.com/tech/elon-musk-trump-openai-stargate-abu-dhabi-e2689615?gaa_at=eafs&gaa_n=ASWzDAgZoB4BgCHHkOt0mwWD47gnFm9ndkU7cCKUNZB6vt20IjcxTdWQKTEL&gaa_ts=6838b725&gaa_sig=j6Nh3dc9ksvZRdwxggNmU4OafeqfSTlJhSM4Rxc3fkdQZo4O9eJ4cI-XjQSdhbk0wVNsGsVoHSDZDbl7hA9cRg%3D%3D

OpenAI led a group of American technology giants that won a deal last week to build one of the world’s largest artificial-intelligence data centers in Abu Dhabi. Behind the scenes, Elon Musk worked hard to try to derail the deal if it didn’t include his own AI startup, according to people familiar with the matter.
On a call with officials at G42, an AI firm controlled by the brother of the United Arab Emirates’ president, Musk had a warning for those assembled: Their plan had no chance of President Trump signing off on it unless his company xAI was included in the deal, according to some of the people.
Musk had learned just before Trump’s mid-May tour of three Gulf countries that OpenAI Chief Executive Sam Altman was going to be on the trip and that a deal in the U.A.E. was in the works, and grew angry about it, according to White House officials. He then said he would also join the trip, and appeared alongside the president in Saudi Arabia.
After Musk’s complaints, Trump and U.S. officials reviewed the deal terms and decided to move forward. The White House officials said Musk didn’t want a deal that seemed to benefit Altman. Aides discussed how to best calm Musk down, one of the officials said, because Trump and David Sacks, the president’s AI and crypto adviser, wanted to announce the deal before the end of the president’s trip to the Middle East.
Musk didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

After Donald Trump and his White House team unveiled “The MAHA Report: Making Our Children Healthy Again” last week, The New York Times noted, “The document echoes talking points Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has championed for decades.”

That was among the obvious red flags surrounding the report. Kennedy is, after all, notorious for pushing unscientific conspiracy theories and claiming, among other things, that Wi-Fi causes “leaky brain.” Any document reflecting his ideas related to health care policy should reflexively be treated with skepticism.

With this in mind, no one was especially surprised when the White House report started crumbling under scrutiny. The Washington Post reported, “Some of the report’s suggestions ... stretched the limits of science, medical experts said. Several sections of the report offer misleading representations of findings in scientific papers.”

That was last week. This week, NOTUS advanced these concerns, reporting that the administration’s “Make America Healthy Again” report “misinterprets some studies and cites others that don’t exist, according to the listed authors.”

For example, the administration’s document listed epidemiologist Katherine Keyes as the first author of a study on anxiety in adolescents — except she didn’t write it.

“The paper cited is not a real paper that I or my colleagues were involved with,” Keyes told NOTUS. “We’ve certainly done research on this topic, but did not publish a paper in JAMA Pediatrics on this topic with that co-author group, or with that title.”

>https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/trump-administrations-maha-report-cites-nonexistent-scientific-studies-rcna209732

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-administrations-stops-new-student-visa-interviews-rcna209305
The Trump administration on Tuesday stopped scheduling new interviews for international students seeking visas to study in the United States as the State Department prepares for expanded social media screening of applicants, according to an internal cable seen by NBC News.

The directive was widely circulated to all U.S. diplomatic and consular posts abroad and signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Politico first reported the cable.

The move is the Trump administration’s latest strike on higher education in general and international students in particular as it cuts financial support to Harvard and arrests visa-holding students from abroad.

The State Department said it would issue further guidance to consulates and embassies in the coming days.

“Effective immediately, in preparation for an expansion of required social media screening and vetting, consular sections should not add any additional student or exchange visitor visa appointment capacity," the cable said.

The memo also warned of “potentially significant implications for consular section operations, processes, and resource allocations” in a clear indication of the delay likely for student visa applications.

“Consular sections will need to take into consideration the workload and resource requirements of each case prior to scheduling them going forward,” the cable said, adding the priority should be on “services for U.S. citizens, immigrant visas, and fraud prevention.”

It was unclear how the prospective students’ social media would be screened as part of the expanded vetting procedures. The public views and speech of international students have come under increased scrutiny during the Trump administration.

Republican Arkansas becomes the first state to ban price gouging by drug retailers, as they have now signed legislation which prevents drug middlemen, known as Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs), from owning and operating pharmacies.

You may remember this issue from 2024 when Democrats gave a bunch of lip service on the issue and as normal projected it onto Republicans but were unwilling to do anything about it themselves.

Republicans stepped up and banned this abusive practice. CVS is now scared that it can't price gouge insurance and patients anymore
https://www.newsweek.com/cvs-arkansas-pbm-law-closure-risk-2077504
All CVS Locations in One State at Risk Over PBM Law

CVS has told Newsweek that some of Arkansas' only 24-hour pharmacies are at-risk of closure because of new state law signed by Republican Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders last month.

Reports over the weekend suggested the pharmacy giant was looking to close all 23 of its stores in the state, ahead of legislation which prevents drug middlemen, known as Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs), from owning and operating pharmacies.

"All of our 23 Arkansas stores are currently open and will continue to operate for the immediate future. We're doing everything we can to continue to provide pharmacy services to our 340,000+ Arkansas pharmacy patients," a CVS spokesperson said Tuesday morning.

CVS said that passing Act 624, as the bill became known, puts services available to its customers at risk. Those who advocated for the move said they wanted to protect independent pharmacies and stop patients from being abused

Sanders said in April that PBMs "take advantage of lax regulations to abuse customers" as she made Arkansas the first state to ban drug giants from owning pharmacies.

The governor and her Attorney General Tim Griffin said that PBMs had taken advantage of their position as price negotiators to benefit the pharmacies they owned and their shareholders, damaging independents in the process.

Trump says Putin has 'gone absolutely CRAZY,' considering more sanctions on Russia

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/trump-says-putin-has-gone-absolutely-crazy-considering-more-sanctions-russia-2025-05-26/

Summary:
-Russia launches large-scale attacks for three consecutive nights
-Trump says considering more sanctions on Russia
-Trump says Zelenskiy should stop talking the way he does
-Zelenskiy says air attacks are Putin's 'political choice'
-Kremlin suggests Trump is emotionally overloaded

WASHINGTON/MOSCOW/KYIV, May 26 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said Vladimir Putin had "gone absolutely CRAZY" by unleashing a massive aerial attack on Ukraine and said he was weighing new sanctions on Moscow, though he also scolded Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

Trump posted the remark on social media as sleeping Ukrainians woke to a third consecutive night of huge Russian aerial attacks, listening for hours to drones buzzing near their homes and eruptions of Ukrainian anti-aircraft fire.

The Reuters Tariff Watch newsletter is your daily guide to the latest global trade and tariff news. Sign up here.

"Something has happened to him (Putin). He has gone absolutely CRAZY!" Trump said of the Russian president on Truth Social.

"I've always said that he wants ALL of Ukraine, not just a piece of it, and maybe that's proving to be right, but if he does, it will lead to the downfall of Russia!"

Trump also criticised Zelenskiy, posting that the Ukrainian leader "is doing his Country no favours by talking the way he does. Everything out of his mouth causes problems, I don't like it, and it better stop."

The Kremlin, asked about Trump's remark about Putin being "crazy," thanked the U.S. people and Trump for their assistance in launching peace negotiations but suggested Trump and others might be emotionally overloaded.

Biden is dying, poor chap. He now has ass cancer in his bones and it's rated at a 9/10 severity on the ass cancer scale.
Best wishes, Mr President Joe Biden. I wish you all the best. You have one foot in the grave and you're still fighting like hell. I hope you get better soon.
Reflecting, I realize that for about three years now I've been assured by posters on this board that Putin has been dying from an aggressive pancreatic cancer and since he invaded Ukraine he's been just 2 weeks away from dying the entire time.
Ironic now that it seems Biden is going to kick the ol bucket first
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5306816-joe-biden-cancer-diagnosis-well-wishes/
Biden’s cancer diagnosis prompts bipartisan outpouring of support

Former President Biden’s political allies and rivals alike sent a flood of well wishes and tributes to the former president on Sunday following news of his cancer diagnosis, praising him as “a fighter.”

The news of Biden’s health challenges came amid renewed scrutiny of his decision to initially run for a second term despite questions about his mental acuity. Several Democrats over the past week went further than in the past by saying that he should have dropped out sooner. And many members of his party expressed frustration that he was returning to the media spotlight amid an avalanche of negative reporting.

But on Sunday, following the announcement of his diagnosis, Democrats and Republicans — including some of his most vocal critics — all struck a somber and respectful note, praising the former president and wishing him well.

“If there’s one person who knows how to turn tragedy into triumph, it’s Joe Biden,” said Democratic strategist Antjuan Seawright. “I don’t think cancer of any kind will be a match for Joe Biden.”

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pentagon-orders-military-leaders-to-pull-library-materials-dei/
The Pentagon has ordered military leaders to remove and review library materials related to diversity, anti-racism and gender issues within the next two weeks.

The order was sent Friday to leadership and is the latest step in the Trump administration's broad effort to purge so-called diversity, equity and inclusion content from federal agencies.

"The Department's instructional materials should be mission-focused and not promote divisive concepts and gender ideology," Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement.

Military leaders must identify any library materials at their educational institutions that are "potentially incompatible with this core mission" and "appropriately sequester those materials" by May 21, according to the order. The materials will then be reviewed and "an appropriate ultimate disposition" will be determined, it states.

A temporary panel, the Academic Libraries Committee, will provide guidance on process and developed a list of search terms to help identify the materials requiring review. The terms include "affirmative action," "allyship," "anti-racism," "critical race theory," "discrimination," "diversity in the workplace," "gender identity," "transgender people" and "white privilege," among others.

"Those terms and guidance are to assist solely with the preliminarily identification and sequestration of materials to be further reviewed," the order says.

Several military institutions received similar orders in recent weeks to review their materials, including the Naval Academy, which removed hundreds of books on the Holocaust, histories of feminism, civil rights and racism.

https://www.mensjournal.com/entertainment/aziz-ansari-keanu-reeves-good-fortune

Aziz Ansari stars opposite Keanu Reeves in the R-rated comedy Good Fortune, which also happens to be the comedian's directorial debut, a major new career step for the Hollywood funnyman.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Ansari had never met Reeves prior to casting him. Before that, Ansari's only experience with the legendary actor came as a fan, watching Reeves in 1994's Speed—at a drive-in theater—and then 1999's The Matrix. Those two films, Ansari told the outlet, were two of his "formative theatrical experiences."

When Reeves' name came up in casting, Ansari wasn't so sure.

“That guy just seems like he's on a different planet, you know what I mean?" he told Entertainment Weekly. "It doesn't seem like we would be able to interact."

After meeting in London, Ansari proposed an idea to the John Wick star that would rid the awestruck sensation and those crazy jitters about directing someone like Reeves.

“I was like, ‘Hey man, we got to hang out a few times, so I'm not freaked out being around you. You know what I mean?’ So he was like, ‘I get what you mean,'" Ansari recalled to Entertainment Weekly. "So, we hung out, and he came over to my house. I made him Indian food, and we hung out for a while, and he told me all these stories. And then we went to dinner a couple of times, and I tried to really spend time with him to get to know him a little bit so I could become comfortable around him.”

Good Fortune also stars Seth Rogen, who plays the role of wealthy employer, Jeff. Arj (Ansari) is a struggling gig worker and Gabriel (Reeves) is an angel who tries to show Arj that money can't buy happiness. To prove the point, Angel swaps Arj's life with Jeff, which leads to Angel losing his wings as punishment because Arj is, in fact, much happier living it up as rich Jeff.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/05/06/business/tariffs-price-increases-shortages-ports

American consumers are on the cusp of tough choices because of President Donald Trump’s trade war.

Ships now pulling into US harbors from China are the first to be subject to the massive tariffs that America is imposing on most Chinese imports. That means, in a matter of weeks, consumers will face higher prices and shortages of certain items.

Imports from China have fallen dramatically since Trump imposed steep tariffs – particularly since last month, when the tit-for-tat trade war sent the tariff on most Chinese goods up to 145%.

“This week, we’re down about 35% compared to the same time last year, and these cargo ships coming in are the first ones to be attached to the tariffs that were levied against China and other locations last month,” Gene Seroka, executive director of the Port of Los Angeles, told CNN Tuesday. “That’s why the cargo volume is so light.”

The drop-off in imports from China on the boats now coming into port is more than 50%, Seroka said. Many importers have canceled previous orders because US businesses aren’t interested in paying the steep tariff, which can more than double the price of Chinese goods.