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Tag: Donald Trump

  • The Supreme Court’s Complicated Takedown of Trump’s Tariffs

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    The case that the Court decided, Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump and Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, was the consolidation of two lawsuits, brought by small businesses and states, challenging Trump’s use of IEEPA. IEEPA is a powerful tool; its provisions include a long list of commerce-related actions, such as imposing export restrictions and quotas, that a President can take in the case of a national emergency. The problem for Trump is that “tariffs” is not on the list. Neither are related terms, like “duties” or “customs.” The entire world-market-upsetting tariff scheme—under which, Roberts wrote in the majority decision, Trump asserted that “the independent power to impose tariffs on imports from any country, of any product, at any rate, for any amount of time”—was built on nothing more than the awkward placement of the word “regulate” a couple of lines away from the word “importation.” And, as Roberts stated and a six-Justice majority found, “Those words cannot bear such weight.”

    Justice Elena Kagan, in a concurrence joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, tallied up nine verbs in IEEPA (such as “investigate,” “block,” “direct”) and eleven objects related to foreign commerce (“acquisition,” “withdrawal,” “transfer”), meaning that there are “99 actions a President can take to address a foreign threat.” But, if the action in question, “regulate . . . importation,” really meant “impose tariffs,” it would be the “the odd man out,” in Kagan’s words, because “exactly none of the other 98 involves raising revenues.” IEEPA has been used, by various Presidents, more than seventy times, for example, to impose sanctions on Iran and Cuba; none has used it for tariffs.

    This question of revenue was highly significant to the Justices, because tariffs are a kind of tax, and, in our constitutional system, the power to tax is a central aspect of Congress’s power, not the President’s. (In 2012, the statute creating Obamacare survived a major constitutional challenge because the Court decided, in a landmark decision also written by Roberts, that the individual mandate to acquire health care was a form of tax.) The presumption is that, if Congress gave the President the ability to impose tariffs, as it sometimes does, it would make it reasonably clear that it was doing so. But IEEPA does not look like any kind of a tax law. In the oral arguments for the case, D. John Sauer, Trump’s Solicitor General, tried to get around the problem by contending that Trump’s tariffs shouldn’t really be thought of as taxes at all—a position that was met with near-mockery from even some of the conservative Justices.

    And Trump’s new tariffs have raised a great deal of revenue—almost two hundred billion dollars’ worth, according to an estimate by economists at the Penn-Wharton Budget Model for Reuters. But Roberts’s opinion says nothing about whether or how that money might be refunded. “While the Supreme Court’s decision was pending, hundreds of importers filed suit at the Court of International Trade, seeking refunds of the tariffs paid,” Mark Wu, a professor of international trade law at Harvard Law School, told me. “Those cases were stayed, but with the decision handed down, those cases can now proceed.” Trump, on Friday, wondered why the Court hadn’t put in a sentence telling him whether to “keep the money or don’t keep the money.” He added, “I guess it has to get litigated for the next two years.” A moment later, Trump upped that estimate to five years.

    The lack of guidance on refunds may be an indication that Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump was not a simple case for the Justices, despite the lopsided outcome. There are seven separate opinions, adding up to a hundred and seventy pages. The principal dissent, by Brett Kavanaugh—whom Trump, on Friday, thanked for “his genius”—is more than sixty pages. Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas joined Kavanaugh; Thomas also wrote a dissent in support of broad tariff powers for Presidents. And even the Justices who agree with one another are in some ways at odds. Roberts only mustered a majority for part of his opinion; midway through, the three liberals peeled off, meaning that, although there is a 6–3 majority on striking down the tariffs, there is no full consensus on the reasoning or its implications. Specifically, the liberals declined to join the section in which Roberts wrote that Trump’s tariffs are unlawful because they do not meet the demands of something called the “major questions doctrine.”

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    Amy Davidson Sorkin

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  • Mar-a-Lago suspect Austin Tucker Martin was angry over Epstein files—report

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    The armed man who was shot and killed by Secret Service agents after entering the secured perimeter of President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Sunday morning was angry about the Jeffrey Epstein files, according to co-workers and a text message obtained by TMZ.

    The man, identified as 21-year-old Austin Tucker Martin of North Carolina, sent a message to a co-worker on February 15 where he said “evil is real and unmistakable” while referring to the files, TMZ reported.

    He also wrote: ”The best people like you and I can do is use what little influence we have. Tell other people about what you hear about the Epstein files and what the government is doing about it. Raise awareness,” according to the message obtained by the outlet.

    According to TMZ, Martin’s co-workers at Pine Needles Lodge & Golf Club said he became fixated on Epstein after the Justice Department’s latest release of records from its investigative files on the late convicted sex offender. They said Martin, who TMZ reported was a Trump supporter, was disturbed by what he viewed as a government cover-up and regularly spoke about powerful people “getting away with it.”

    Newsweek has not independently verified the contents of the text message or the accounts provided by Martin’s co-workers to TMZ.

    Martin was confronted by two Secret Service agents and a Palm Beach County sheriff’s deputy near the north gate of the property holding what officials described as a shotgun and gas canister.

    Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said Martin was ordered to drop the items. He put down the gas canister but “raised the shotgun to a shooting position,” Bradshaw said at a brief press conference on Sunday.

    The two agents and the deputy “fired their weapons to neutralize the threat.”

    This is a developing story. More to follow.

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  • ‘It’s hidden’: Female genital mutilation and the secret shame of Minnesota’s Somalis

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    More than half a million women and girls in the United States are living with the physical and psychological scars of female genital mutilation — including many in Minnesota, home to a large Somali community from a country where roughly 98% of women have undergone the procedure, according to United Nations data.

    Yet despite a state law that makes performing the procedures a felony, Minnesota has never secured a single criminal prosecution under its law — raising questions about enforcement, and whether cases could be going on undetected.

    Female genital mutilation, or FGM, involves the cutting or removal of parts of a female’s genital organs, typically for cultural rather than medical reasons. The practice is irreversible.

    “It’s hidden — it’s a cultural practice, and who is doing the cutting could be a family member or a doctor who is also in that same culture,” Minnesota Republican state Rep. Mary Franson told Fox News Digital, noting it may be carried out within tight-knit communities. She said the secrecy surrounding the practice makes it exceptionally difficult to detect and confront.

    MINNESOTA ‘ON THE CLOCK’ AS HHS THREATENS PENALTIES OVER CHILDCARE FRAUD SCANDAL

    Razor blades often used before carrying out female genital mutilation. (REUTERS/James Akena)

    For some within Minnesota’s Somali community, the issue is less about public crime statistics and more about private silence — a practice survivors say is carried in secrecy, shame and fear.

    The lack of prosecutions comes amid broader scrutiny of how Minnesota agencies handle oversight failures, including high-profile welfare and daycare fraud cases in which prosecutors allege billions of taxpayer dollars were siphoned off while warning signs went unaddressed. Investigators and watchdogs later concluded that officials were reluctant to probe deeply in culturally sensitive contexts — a reluctance, critics say, allowed large-scale violations to persist in plain sight.

    The estimate of more than half a million survivors in the United States comes from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s most recent national analysis, published in 2016.

    Together, the scale of the issue and the difficulty of detection have raised questions about whether Minnesota’s ban on FGM is being effectively enforced when the crime is often carried out in secrecy.

    Ayaan Hirsi Ali headshot

    Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born activist and author who survived FGM, recalled the harm the practice has had on her and the need for accountability. ((Photo by Leonardo Cendamo/Getty Images))

    Survivor warns of lasting harm

    Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born activist and author who survived FGM, described the lasting physical and psychological damage she endured and called for legal accountability.

    “Female genital mutilation is violence against the most vulnerable — children,” Hirsi Ali told Fox News Digital. “It causes infection, incontinence, unbearable pain during childbirth and deep physical and emotional scars that never heal. Religious or cultural practices that deliberately and cruelly harm children must be confronted. No tradition can ever justify torture.”

    Hirsi Ali, who founded the AHA Foundation as a means to end FGM, said that the pressure placed on parents in these groups to enforce the practice poses an overwhelming risk to girls.

    “Only legal accountability can help reduce that risk,” Hirsi Ali said. “I survived female genital mutilation and I carry its scars with me. But I refuse to accept that another girl in America must endure what I did in Somalia.”

    ‘I remember being held down’

    Zahra Abdalla, a Minnesota-based Somali survivor of female genital mutilation, told Fox News Digital that the practice survives in secrecy, shielded by family pressure and silence.

    Abdalla, who spoke to Fox News Digital on camera but asked that her face be blurred, said she was between six and seven years old when she was forcibly restrained in a refugee camp in Kenya while adult women in her community carried out the procedure without anesthesia, using a razor blade.

    “They tied my hands and my legs,” Abdalla said. “I remember being held down. I remember the pain — and knowing I could not escape.”

    Abdalla said she was “lucky” because she fought back during the procedure, kicking one of the women who was pregnant at the time. The disruption, she said, caused the cutting to stop before it was fully completed. She said the wound was later washed with salt water. 

    “That pain — I thought I was going to pass out,” she said.

    Medical instruments, gloves and cotton used in medicalised female genital mutilation procedures.

    Tools used to perform medicalized female genital mutilation (FGM) procedures are displayed in Kisii, Kenya in 2023. (Simon Maina/AFP)

    The damage followed her into adulthood, she said, later requiring surgery and, in her view, contributing to multiple miscarriages. She also said intercourse was very difficult. 

    She said the practice is often driven by marriage expectations, adding that in some communities men are reluctant to marry women who have not undergone the procedure.

    “It’s tied to dowry. It’s tied to marriage,” she said, referring to the financial and social expectations placed on families when arranging marriages. “It’s tied to what men expect,” she said. “Families believe it protects a girl’s value.”

    She said silence remains one of the biggest barriers to enforcement. She is the executive director of the nonprofit Somaliweyn Relief Agency (SRA), which seeks to raise awareness about the practice.

    “You don’t talk about it,” she said. “You’re told to stay quiet.”

    While she said she cannot confirm specific cases inside Minnesota, she said she believes some families take girls back to Somalia during school breaks to have the procedure performed.

    No prosecutions despite felony law

    Her warning mirrors how some of the only known U.S. cases have surfaced.

    In a high-profile federal case in Michigan in 2017, prosecutors alleged that two young girls were taken from Minnesota to undergo female genital mutilation. The case later collapsed because the judge ruled that Congress did not clearly have the constitutional authority, at the time, which expanded federal jurisdiction in cases involving interstate or international travel.

    That ruling prompted Congress to strengthen the statute, a change signed into law by President Donald Trump in 2021 under the Stop FGM Act, which expanded federal jurisdiction in cases involving interstate or international travel.

    Two women wearing traditional Muslim clothing walking on a sidewalk in Minneapolis.

    Women wearing traditional Muslim clothing walk along a sidewalk in Minneapolis. The city is home to a large Muslim population. (Michael Dorgan/Fox News Digital) (Michael Dorgan/Fox News Digital)

    However, a Fox News Digital review of publicly available Minnesota court records, enforcement announcements and professional licensing disciplinary records found no documented prosecutions or sanctions tied to FGM. The Minnesota Attorney General’s Office said prosecutions for state crimes like female genital mutilation are handled by county attorneys and did not identify any FGM cases. County prosecutors contacted for this story also did not identify any prosecutions.

    Those provisions, however, have not resulted in documented criminal prosecutions.

    Minnesota criminalized female genital mutilation in 1994, classifying the practice as a felony.

    The Minnesota Department of Health told Fox News Digital that it does not track specific data on female genital mutilation, underscoring how difficult the practice is to monitor or enforce.

    Global context, local uncertainty

    Around the world, FGM is most prevalent in parts of Africa and the Middle East.

    Somalia has among the highest prevalence rates in the world, with United Nations data estimating roughly 98% of women ages 15 to 49 there have undergone the procedure. The United Nations, World Health Organization and UNICEF classify FGM as a human rights violation rooted in efforts to control female sexuality and enforce gender inequality, and the UN observes an annual day of awareness in February to combat the practice globally.

    Those figures describe conditions in Somalia and are not proof the procedure is occurring in Minnesota, but they help explain why risk is acknowledged even as the practice remains difficult to detect.

    Medical experts say the procedure can cause chronic pain, severe bleeding, infections, urinary problems, sexual dysfunction, childbirth complications and, in some cases, death. Because it permanently alters genital tissue, the harm cannot be undone. Survivors often require repeated medical care and carry lasting psychological trauma.

    Critics say the gap between the law and enforcement is fueled by silence. 

    Survivors often do not report the practice out of fear, stigma, family pressure or concern about involving authorities — even when mandatory reporting laws exist. Medical professionals, particularly OB-GYNs, are often the first to encounter adult survivors, placing clinicians near the center of any enforcement effort that has yet to materialize.

    MINNESOTA FRAUD WHISTLEBLOWER SAYS ‘LACK OF GUARDRAILS WAS PRETTY SHOCKING’

    The CDC has not released a newer national estimate, and there is no data on the number of people in Minnesota who are victims. However, a CDC-supported Women’s Health Needs Study conducted from 2019 to 2021 included Minneapolis as one of four U.S. metro areas documenting a significant survivor population.

    The study did not track where procedures occurred or whether anyone was charged, underscoring how little the public knows about enforcement.

    Fox News Digital also contacted multiple Minnesota clinics that provide reproductive and women’s health services asking whether clinicians encounter patients with physical evidence of female genital mutilation. None responded.

    President Donald Trump

    The AHA Foundation said it is pushing for President Donald Trump to sign an executive order to make combating female genital mutilation a national priority. (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

    Lawmakers push task force amid accountability questions

    Some Minnesota state lawmakers have introduced legislation this session to establish a “task force on prevention of female genital mutilation” — a step that Rep. Mary Franson said reflects concerns raised by women in the community that the practice may be occurring or going undetected in Minnesota.

    Franson said the legislation was prompted by concerns raised by women in the Somali community. The bill’s chief author is Rep. Huldah Momanyi-Hiltsley, a Democrat of Kenyan heritage, and it is co-sponsored by Franson along with Democratic Reps. Kristin Bahner, Kristi Pursell and Anquam Mahamoud, who is Somali-American. None of them responded to multiple Fox News Digital requests for comment. 

    Franson said she became a focal point of opposition once she became publicly associated with the bill.

    “The bill was brought forward by women in the Somali community. I was the chief author, but then Democrats told one of the DFL women that if I carried the bill, they would not support it,” Franson said. “Of course, it’s because they believe I am a racist.”

    Franson, who is white, first introduced FGM-related legislation in 2017 that would have classified the practice as child abuse and clarified parental accountability. That effort stalled and never became law.

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    At the federal level, Congress criminalized female genital mutilation in 1996 and later expanded federal jurisdiction in 2018 under legislation signed by then-President Donald Trump, explicitly covering cases involving interstate or international travel.

    Even so, prosecutions nationwide have remained rare, with the only widely cited state-level conviction occurring in Georgia in 2006, where a woman was convicted under Georgia state law for performing FGM on a minor.

    In Minnesota, where the practice has been a felony since 1994, there is no public record of a single criminal prosecution — raising an unavoidable question: with laws on the books and a documented survivor population, who is responsible for enforcing the ban, and why have prosecutions not followed?

    Michael Dorgan is a writer for Fox News Digital and Fox Business.

    You can send tips to michael.dorgan@fox.com and follow him on Twitter @M_Dorgan.

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  • Trump’s FCC Chair Wants Networks to Run Nationalistic Content and Pledge Loyalty for America’s Big Bday

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    Until now, current chair of the Federal Communications Commission Brendan Carr has mostly been in the news for his role in weaponizing the FCC to serve the aims of this administration.  In December, he testified to Congress that his office is, erm, actually “not formally an independent agency,” right before removing the word “independent” from the mission statement on the agency’s website. More recently, he continued his tradition of threatening late-night hosts by again harassing CBS about Colbert and desperately trying to make enforcement of the “equal-time rule” a cudgel worth fearing.

    But Carr’s not always playing the heel. He wants you to know he’s got a fun side too and is showing that off by helping to plan what is sure to be this summer’s most legendary party. In a statement on Friday, he let his (proverbial) hair down and offered broadcasters strongly worded suggestions about what gifts the nation (and President) would most like to receive in commemoration of the “big 2-5-0.”

    “As America’s 250th anniversary approaches, it is important to reflect on the ideals and events that have defined our past while keeping an eye towards our country’s bright future,” said Carr. “I am calling on broadcasters to pledge to provide programming that promotes civic education, national pride, and our shared history.” Who among us doesn’t want more civic education?

    Demonstrating exactly why he’s a Tier 1 operator in President Trump’s Salute to America 250 Task Force, Carr went on to provide numerous suggestions for how networks could best hug the flag on this most momentous of occasions.

    According to Carr, they could air “PSAs, short segments, or full specials specifically promoting civic education, inspiring local stories, and American history.” Ooh. Remember VH1’s Pop-Up Video? What about something like that for “daily ‘Today in American History’ announcements highlighting significant events that took place on that day in history? Or how about shoehorning in a highlight of one of our lovely National Parks “during regular news programming?” Would it be coherent? Maybe. Patriotic? Absolutely. And would it kill you guys to get back to starting each broadcast day with the ‘Star Spangled Banner?’” Heck, he’d even settle for the Pledge of Allegiance. Carr’s just that chill a dude.

    But when Carr passes you the aux on July 4th, he doesn’t wanna hear none of that pinko Bad Bunny or Billie Eilish ish you usually play. This semiquincentennial bash is only bumping bangers by American OGs. I’m talking Gershwin, Copland, Ellington. And if you really wanna see Carr get sturdy with it, hit ‘im with the John Philip Sousa.

    Carr closed out his statement by asking those networks down to patriotically clown on Independence Day to swear their fealty and commitment to the above requests by joining his Pledge America Campaign. Carr said he looks forward to broadcasters “taking the Pledge and fulfilling their public interest mandate” before noting that this is all completely voluntary, of course.

    Time will tell what amazing displays of jingoism await us this summer. But it America’s birthday is anything like that lit parade they had last year to the U.S. Army’s 250th anniversary—brought to you by Coinbase—we’re all in for an unforgettable experience.

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    Justin Caffier

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  • US deported gay asylum-seeker to third country where homosexuality is illegal

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    DAKAR, Senegal — Being gay in Morocco is illegal and punishable by up to three years in prison. But it was the violence from her family that forced Farah, a 21-year-old gay woman, to flee the country.

    After a long journey to the United States and a third-country deportation by the Trump administration, however, Farah said she is now back in Morocco and in hiding.

    “It is hard to live and work with the fear of being tracked once again by my family,” she told The Associated Press, in a rare testimony from a person deported via a third country despite having protection orders from a U.S. immigration judge. “But there is nothing I can do. I have to work.”

    She asked to be identified by her first name only for fear of persecution. The AP saw her protection order and lawyers verified parts of her account.

    Farah said that before she fled, she was beaten by her family and the family of her partner when they found out about their relationship. She was kicked out of the family home and fled with her partner to another city. She said her family found her and tried to kill her.

    Through a friend, she and her partner heard about the opportunity to get visas for Brazil and fly there with the aim of reaching the United States, where they had friends. From Brazil, she trekked through six countries for weeks to reach the U.S. border, where they asked for asylum.

    “You get put in situations that are truly horrible,” she recalled. “When we arrived (at the U.S. border), it felt like it was worth the trouble and that we got to our goal.”

    They arrived in early 2025. But instead of finding the freedom to be herself, Farah said she was detained for almost a year, first in Arizona, then in Louisiana.

    “It was very cold,” she said of detention. “And we only had very thin blankets.” Medical care was inadequate, she said.

    She was denied asylum, but in August she received a protection order from an U.S. immigration judge, who ruled she cannot be deported to Morocco because that would endanger her life. Her partner, denied asylum and a protection order, was deported.

    Farah said she was three days from a hearing on her release when she was handcuffed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and put on a plane to an African country she had never visited, and one where homosexuality is illegal: Cameroon. She was put in a detention facility.

    “They asked me if I wanted to stay in Cameroon, and I told them that I can’t stay in Cameroon and risk my life in a place where I would still be endangered,” she said. She was flown to Morocco.

    Most deportees had protection orders

    She is one of dozens of people confirmed to be deported from the U.S. by the Trump administration to third countries despite having legal protection from U.S. immigration judges. The real number is unknown.

    The administration has used third-country deportations to pressure migrants who are in the U.S. illegally to leave on their own, saying they could end up “in any number of third countries.”

    The detention facility in Cameroon’s capital of Yaounde, where Farah was held, currently has 15 deportees from various African countries who arrived on two flights, and none is Cameroonian, according to lawyer Joseph Awah Fru, who represents them.

    Eight of the deportees on the first flight in January, including Farah, had received a judge’s protection orders, said Alma David, an immigration lawyer with the U.S.-based Novo Legal Group who has helped deportees and verified Farah’s case. The AP spoke to a woman from Ghana and a woman from Congo, who both said they had protection orders, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.

    Another flight on Monday brought eight more people. Three freelance journalists reporting on the deportations to Cameroon for the AP were briefly detained there.

    Deporting people to a third country where they could be sent home was effectively a legal “loophole,” said David.

    “By deporting them to Cameroon, and giving them no opportunity to contest being sent to a country whose government hoped to quietly send them back to the very countries where they face grave danger, the U.S. not only violated their due process rights but our own immigration laws, our obligations under international treaties and even DHS’ own procedures,” David said.

    The U.S. Department of Homeland Security earlier confirmed there were deportations to Cameroon in January.

    “We are applying the law as written. If a judge finds an illegal alien has no right to be in this country, we are going to remove them. Period,” it said, and asserted that the third-country agreements “ensure due process under the U.S. Constitution.”

    Asked about the deportations to Cameroon, the U.S. State Department on Friday told the AP it had “no comment on the details of our diplomatic communications with other governments.” It did not reply to further questions.

    Cameroon’s Foreign Ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment.

    ‘Impossible choices’

    Farah was one of two women from the first group of deportees to return to Morocco.

    “They were given two impossible choices,” David said, and asserted that claiming asylum was not clearly presented as one of them. “This was before the lawyer had access to them.”

    She said International Organization for Migration staff in the facility did not give them any indication that there was a viable option other than going back to their home countries.

    Fru said he has not been granted access to the deportees. He said the assistant to the country director for the IOM, a U.N.-affiliated organization, told him he must apply to speak to them. Fru plans to do that Monday.

    The IOM told the AP it was “aware of the removal of migrants from the United States of America to some African countries” and added that it “works with people facing difficult decisions about whether to return to their country of origin.” It said its role is providing accurate information about options and ensuring that “anyone who chooses to return does so voluntarily.”

    The IOM said the facility in Yaounde was managed by the authorities in Cameroon. It did not respond to further questions.

    African nations are paid millions

    Cameroon is one of at least seven African nations to receive deported third-country nationals in a deal with the U.S. Others include South Sudan, Rwanda, Uganda, Eswatini, Ghana and Equatorial Guinea.

    Some have received millions of dollars in return, according to documents released by the State Department. Details of other agreements, including the one with Cameroon, have not been released.

    The Trump administration has spent at least $40 million to deport about 300 migrants to countries other than their own, according to a report released last week by the Democratic staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

    According to internal administration documents reviewed by the AP, 47 third-country agreements are in various stages of negotiation.

    In Morocco, Farah said it was hard to hear U.S. officials refer to people like her as a threat.

    “The USA is built on immigration and by immigrant labor, so we’re clearly not all threats,” she said. “What was done to me was unfair. A normal deportation would have been fair, but to go through so much and lose so much, only to be deported in such a way, is cruel.”

    Copyright © 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

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    AP

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  • All About the White House UFC Fight on Trump’s Birthday

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    When The Wall Street Journal asked White what connects MAGA and the UFC, he gave a one-word answer: “Testosterone.”

    Okay, sure. Also, Trump and White have been friends for years, and their business and political interests are deeply intertwined.

    In the early aughts, mixed martial arts was banned in most states and the UFC was struggling to book big venues. (A few years earlier, Senator John McCain had famously denounced the sport as “human cockfighting.”) But Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City agreed to host UFC events and celebrity businessman attended them, giving the organization exposure and legitimacy.

    “Nobody took us seriously,” White has said repeatedly. “Except Donald Trump.”

    As the UFC’s popularity skyrocketed and Trump entered politics, the two men occasionally supported each other’s ventures (for example, one of the UFC’s biggest stars appeared on The Celebrity Apprentice, and White spoke at the 2016 Republican National Convention). But Trump made White and the UFC central to his 2024 bid in an attempt to attract young male voters. White connected Trump with “manosphere” podcasters and influencers, and the CEO played a visible role in the campaign, speaking at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally and his 2024 victory party.

    White isn’t wrong about “testosterone” — or, rather, hypermasculinity — being a big part of all this. As Karim Zidan explained in The Guardian, UFC White House is the “natural climax of a partnership in which the UFC has become the stage for Maga mythology”:

    Fascist Italy used rallies, parades and sports events to project strength and unity. Sports, especially combat sports, were used as tools to cultivate Mussolini’s ideal masculinity and portray Italy as a strong and powerful nation. Similarly, Trump has relied on the UFC to project his tough-guy image, and to celebrate his brand of nationalistic masculinity. From name-dropping champions who endorse him to suggesting a tournament that would pit UFC fighters against illegal immigrants, Trump has repeatedly found ways to make UFC-style machismo a part of his political brand.

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    Margaret Hartmann

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  • WATCH: Top 5 most memorable moments in American State of the Union history

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    President Donald Trump will deliver his first official State of the Union address of his second term Tuesday night before a joint session of Congress at the Capitol, as viewers watch for viral moments and headline-grabbing exchanges like those that have defined past speeches.

    Here are the top five moments from past State of the Union addresses.

    1. Reagan surprises the crowd with first-ever acknowledgment of a guest in the audience

    It’s become commonplace in recent years for presidents to acknowledge guests in the audience during SotU addresses, but President Ronald Reagan’s 1982 address was the first time the practice was rolled out. 

    Reagan’s speech came just weeks after Air Florida Flight 90 crashed into Washington’s 14th Street Bridge over the Potomac River shortly after taking off in an accident that killed 78 people. 

    NANCY PELOSI SAYS SHE HAD ‘NO INTENTION’ OF TEARING UP TRUMP’S 2020 STATE OF THE UNION SPEECH

    President Trump will deliver the State of the Union this week after decades of viral moments from previous speeches. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters/Bloomberg via Getty Images; MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images)

    Three people survived the crash thanks to civilians on the ground who rushed to their aid, including Congressional Budget Office assistant Lenny Skutnik, who stripped off his shoes and clothes and dove into the frigid waters.

    Reagan honored Skutnik in his speech, which made honoring people in the crowd a common theme in the years to come. 

    “Just two weeks ago, in the midst of a terrible tragedy on the Potomac, we saw again the spirit of American heroism at its finest — the heroism of dedicated rescue workers saving crash victims from icy waters,” Reagan said. “And we saw the heroism of one of our young government employees, Lenny Skutnik, who, when he saw a woman lose her grip on the helicopter line, dived into the water and dragged her to safety.”

    2. Speaker Pelosi tears up Trump’s 2020 speech

    Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sparked a social media firestorm and cemented herself in State of the Union infamy in February 2020 when she stood up and tore Trump’s speech into pieces after he had finished.

    When Fox News asked Pelosi afterward why she did it, she responded, “Because it was the courteous thing to do considering the alternatives.” She added, “I tore it up. I was trying to find one page with truth on it. I couldn’t.”

    Pelosi’s outburst came on the heels of Trump’s first impeachment trial, which ended in a Senate acquittal the day after the speech.

    “Speaker Pelosi just ripped up: One of our last surviving Tuskegee Airmen. The survival of a child born at 21 weeks. The mourning families of Rocky Jones and Kayla Mueller. A service member’s reunion with his family. That’s her legacy,” the White House tweeted after Pelosi tore up the speech, referencing individuals who Trump mentioned during his address.

    3. Rep. Joe Wilson ‘You lie!’ outburst at President Obama

    One of the most remembered moments from a State of the Union address came in 2009 when South Carolina Republican Rep. Joe Wilson interrupted President Barack Obama’s address, which at the time was far less common than it later became. 

    HOW TO WATCH PRESIDENT TRUMP’S 2026 STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS TO CONGRESS LIVE

    Lenny Skutnik

    First Lady Nancy Reagan applauding Leonard Skutnit, as his wife looks on, during President Reagan’s State of the Union address. Skutnik rescued people from the icy Potomac River following the crash of Air Florida flight 90.  (Getty)

    “There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants,” Obama said, talking about his controversial Obamacare plan. “This, too, is false. The reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.”

    “You lie!” Wilson shouted from his seat on the Republican side of the chamber, causing widespread yelling from other members in the audience.

    Wilson later apologized to Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel. 

    “This evening, I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the president’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill,” Wilson said in a written statement. “While I disagree with the president’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the president for this lack of civility.”

    4. Rep. Boebert heckles Biden over Afghanistan withdrawal during 2022 address

    “You put them in, 13 of them,” GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert shouted at Biden as he talked about Afghanistan veterans who ended up in caskets due to exposure to toxic burn pits. Boebert was referencing the 13 U.S. service members killed during Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. 

    Boebert was wearing an outfit that said “Drill Baby Drill” in opposition to Biden’s energy policies and her outburst drew some boos from the audience.

    At another point, Boebert and Greene started chanting “build the wall” when Biden was talking about immigration. 

    5. President Biden blasts GOP lawmakers in 2023 address, prompting jeers from Republicans in the crowd

    “Some of my Republican friends want to take the economy hostage — I get it — unless I agree to their economic plans,” Biden said to Congress, prompting a shake of the head from then-GOP House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in the background and shouts from the crowd and shots of other Republicans shaking their heads. 

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    Bidens state of the union

    President Joe Biden delivers the State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress as Vice President Kamala Harris and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., listen on February 7, 2023. (Jacquelyn Martin-Pool/Getty Images)

    “Instead of making the wealthy pay their fair share, some Republicans, some Republicans, want Medicare and Social Security to sunset,” Biden continued, which caused an even more pronounced shake of the head from McCarthy, who mouthed “no” as Republicans continued to jeer. 

    “I’m not saying it’s the majority,” Biden continued, which resulted in even more boos from the raucous crowd. 

    “Let me give you — anybody who doubts it, contact my office. I’ll give you a copy — I’ll give you a copy of the proposal,” Biden continued to say over increasingly louder shouting from the crowd. 

    “That means Congress doesn’t vote — I’m glad to see — no, I tell you, I enjoy conversion,” Biden said, apparently meaning to say “conversation.”

    Biden’s speech continued to devolve from there as Republican outrage interrupted him on multiple occasions. 

    Andrew Mark Miller is a reporter at Fox News. Find him on Twitter @andymarkmiller and email tips to AndrewMark.Miller@Fox.com.

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  • Trump raises his new global tariffs to 15% after Supreme Court’s strike down

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    President Trump raised his new, global tariffs to 15%, one day after the Supreme Court struck down many of his punishing taxes. Willie James Inman reports on the impact on American businesses and whether there could be refunds issued.

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  • Trump approves disaster assistance to DC to help with sewage spill into Potomac River – WTOP News

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    President Donald Trump has approved emergency assistance to D.C. to help the city address a sewage system leak that dumped at least 250 million gallons of raw sewage into the Potomac River.

    WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has approved emergency assistance to Washington, D.C., to help the city address a sewage system leak that dumped at least 250 million gallons of raw sewage into the Potomac River.

    The Federal Emergency Management Agency announced Trump’s approval on Saturday, allowing FEMA to provide equipment and resources to help with the response to the Jan. 19 spill after a pipeline ruptured.

    D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser had requested the federal help on Wednesday and declared an emergency.

    Trump’s approval of the disaster relief request comes after he criticized the handling of the spill, blaming local Democratic leaders and focusing especially on Maryland’s Democratic Gov. Wes Moore.

    At a dinner later at the White House for governors, where no Democrats were spotted, Trump brought up the spill and said, “We have to clean up some mess that Maryland and Virginia have left us. We’re going to be cleaning it up. It’s unbelievable what they can do with incompetence.”

    He said in his social media posts criticizing the response that local officials had not asked for emergency help and he intended to step in.

    However, the federal government was already involved in the repair and assessing the impact of the leak through the Environmental Protection Agency.

    The 72-inch (183 centimeter) pipeline, known as the Potomac Interceptor, burst on Jan. 19, sending 250 million gallons of untreated sewage into the Potomac River just north of Washington in the first five days.

    The leak is largely under control, but it could take months to repair the pipe fully. The local water utility, DC Water, along with the EPA, has been working to repair the leak and monitor the impact on the river.

    Officials have said the area’s drinking water is safe, but people who use the Potomac River for recreation are being cautioned not to have direct contact with the water.

    Copyright
    © 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.

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  • The Supreme Court’s landmark tariff decision is the latest defeat ‘piercing President Trump’s seeming invincibility’ | Fortune

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    President Donald Trump’s trade war isn’t over, despite the Supreme Court striking down his global tariffs, but the legal setback adds to the growing wall of resistance.

    The last two months represent a stunning reversal from the first year of his second term when lawmakers, CEOs, foreign governments, and the high court itself deferred to the president—even as he sought to tear down the existing world order.

    The 6-3 ruling against Trump’s levies under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act earned the six justices in the majority a severe tongue lashing. In a press briefing on Friday, he said they were a “disgrace to our nation,” adding that they’re “fools and lapdogs for the RINOs and the radical left Democrats.”

    He combined his insults with bravado over his ability to enact a fresh set of tariffs under separate laws, and he quickly followed through by imposing a 10% global duty that he hiked to 15% just a day later.

    “Still, the importance of this judgment is another step in piercing President Trump’s seeming invincibility,” wrote Kurt Campbell, a longtime diplomat and national security official who is also chairman of the Asia Group.

    “We have seen a series of domestic actions, including the withdrawal of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement from Minneapolis, various Republicans separating from the White House on domestic legislation and now the Supreme Court basically hollowing out the most important plank on President Trump’s economic vision.”

    In a note on Friday, he also pointed out that Congress had already pushed back on his tariff agenda. In fact, several Republicans joined Democrats in the House of Representatives to revoke Trump’s import taxes on Canada, though the vote earlier this month was largely symbolic.

    Campbell predicted that lawmakers on Capitol Hill from both parties will reaffirm the Supreme Court decision, making it difficult for the Trump to pass any legislation meant to reinforce his tariff authority. 

    “This is significant at a time that the president seeks to head into midterm elections with a head full of steam,” he said.

    Biggest ruling since New Deal was struck down

    Trump’s rush to establish alternate tariffs clashes with his attempts to address the affordability crisis, which helped Democrats win off-year elections in 2025 and is shaping up to deliver control of at least one chamber of Congress in 2026.

    If Democrats do take over Congress, it will severely limit Trump’s maneuvering room as they seek to rein in his administration’s spending and policies, especially in areas like immigration.

    The Supreme Court’s tariff decision could signal that the judicial branch may join the legislative branch in drawing a line against the executive branch.

    Harvard law professor and Bloomberg columnist Noah Feldman called the ruling a turning point and compared it to the high court striking down President Franklin Roosevelt’s first New Deal in 1935.

    “It took almost a decade, but Chief Justice John Roberts and the Supreme Court finally found a way to stand up to President Donald Trump’s executive power overreach, striking down the tariffs that are the signature initiative of his presidency,” he wrote on Friday.

    Epstein files, Jerome Powell, Greenland

    For months, cracks have been forming in Trump’s support. After Democrats scored big election victories in November, Congress ordered the release of the Epstein files on near-unanimous votes with broad GOP approval. In December, heavy redactions and the Justice Department’s failure to disclose all of the records by the deadline added to the tension.

    At the start of the new year, Trump seemed to be riding high after the U.S. military pulled off a stunning raid that captured Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, despite grumblings that another foreign intervention strayed from his “America first” motto.

    Then a series of events in rapid succession quickly unwound his aura of invincibility. A week after the Maduro raid, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell issued a defiant video statement that revealed he was facing a Justice Department criminal investigation related to a renovation project at the central bank’s headquarters.

    That rallied support for Powell on Capitol Hill, including from key Republicans who want to preserve central bank independence.

    A week after that, Trump announced tariffs against several NATO countries unless they supported his bid to seize control of Greenland. Canada and Europe held firm on protecting the semi-autonomous Danish territory, and Trump backed down.

    And the following week, federal agents shot to death a second U.S. citizen in Minnesota during Trump’s deportation campaign in the state.

    Silicon Valley workers expressed their anger, and Minnesota-based CEOs pleaded for de-escalation. Democrats in Congress stiffened their opposition to an appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security, leading to a partial government shutdown. Meanwhile, more Republicans voiced some uneasiness with federal agents’ tactics.

    Eventually, Trump dispatched his border czar, who ousted the Border Patrol’s Greg Bovino and announced an end to the Minnesota surge.

    At the time, the swirl of events added up to a tipping point for Trump.

    “Starting to feel like we are in the midst of a historic hinge moment here,” political scientist Lee Drutman, a senior fellow at the New America think tank, posted on X last month.

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  • Donald Trump’s Pantomime United Nations

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    The current membership of the board is a motley mix. It includes prominent countries already invested in bringing stability to Gaza—Turkey, Egypt, Jordan, the Gulf monarchies. The White House has also roped in governments involved in other alleged Trump-led peace initiatives, such as those of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, and Kosovo. Governments of participating countries such as Vietnam, Cambodia, Kazakhstan, and Indonesia may see membership as a low-stakes way to boost their geopolitical clout. And then there are Trump’s fellow-travellers who have no obvious skin in the game beyond a desire to gratify the President, such as Argentina’s President, Javier Milei, a libertarian firebrand, and the Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, Europe’s most prominent illiberal nationalist.

    Trump dispatched invitations to dozens of countries to join the Board of Peace, but he has been mostly rebuffed or kept at arm’s length by the U.S.’s traditional allies. European skepticism only deepened after Trump sought to include Russia and Belarus in the project. (Russia has yet to announce its decision, whereas Belarus agreed, though Belarusian officials said they did not receive visas from the U.S. to attend the meeting on Thursday.) In January, the French President, Emmanuel Macron, and his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, issued a joint call for the defense and strengthening of the U.N. in the face of Trump’s enterprise. Pope Leo XIV made a similar pitch for the U.N. in declining Trump’s invitation.

    Sitting in the room during the meeting on Thursday, a European official in attendance was bemused by the succession of leaders voicing their admiration for Trump, especially after a number of top European politicians have been mocked for their own attempts to ingratiate themselves with the U.S. President over the past year. “One cannot only blame Europeans flattering you-know-who,” the official told me. “We’re not even the worst ones.”

    Board-membership terms last three years (conveniently running out just as Trump’s term does). A government can pay a billion dollars for a permanent seat, but it’s unclear to most diplomats whether this experiment will exist or matter beyond Trump’s time in office. Two Presidents I spoke to in the aftermath of the Davos ceremony downplayed any expectation of financial contributions or commitments. The President of Kosovo, Vjosa Osmani, instead cast her small nation’s participation as an act of historical redemption, thanking Washington for its leading role in Kosovo’s struggle for independence from Serbia. “It was the helping hand of the United States of America that came to our rescue,” she told me. “Now, twenty-six years later, we are giving back and we are helping carry that peace forward.”

    The Armenian President, Vahagn Khachaturyan, told me that he hoped that the board could help “enhance confidence” in the U.N. system by boosting peacemaking efforts. He lamented that “principles of coexistence are very often violated, and the United Nations is not often able to prevent those violations,” gesturing to the perennial problem of the Security Council, where one of the five veto-wielding powers—in recent history, chiefly Russia and the U.S.—can block significant resolutions to address conflicts such as Russia’s war in Ukraine or Israel’s war in Gaza.

    But Trump and his lieutenants rarely speak of principles and seem far more interested in establishing an arena where only the U.S.’s veto counts. You could hear their ideological animus this past weekend, at a major security conference in Munich. Elbridge Colby, the U.S. under-secretary of defense for policy, scoffed at the “hosannas and shibboleths” that constitute talk of shared values and paeans to the rules-based order. Rubio poured scorn on the U.N., saying that “on the most pressing matters before us, it has no answers and has played virtually no role.”

    Thant Myint-U, a Burmese-British historian whose grandfather U Thant was the U.N.’s third Secretary-General, said that, “despite all of its failings,” the U.N. “has been a big part of eighty years of unparalleled peace and prosperity in human history.” He warned that if the Board of Peace picks up momentum, it may “set the stage for a much broader collapse of the whole U.N. architecture that we’ve had since 1945.”

    There’s plenty of reason to believe that the board may not be much more than a Trump vanity project of dissonant parts and vague goals that will fade from view amid the rolling dramas of his Presidency. But, as the U.S. plays spoiler within an international system in which it was once the linchpin, no other world power seems especially eager to pick up the slack. Thant Myint-U said, “At a time when Washington is challenging the very fundamentals of the U.N., both through the Board of Peace but also through aid cuts and funding cuts and everything else, no other country is saying, We’re either going to make up financially for the missing U.S. contributions, or we’re going to really invest politically in renewing and strengthening the U.N.”

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    Ishaan Tharoor

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  • US military strikes another alleged drug boat in eastern Pacific, killing 3

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    WASHINGTON — The U.S. military said Friday that it has carried out another deadly strike on a vessel accused of trafficking drugs in the Eastern Pacific Ocean.

    U.S. Southern Command said on social media that the boat “was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations.” It said the strike killed three people. A video linked to the post shows a boat floating in the water before bursting into flames.

    Friday’s attack raises the death toll from the Trump administration’s strikes on alleged drug boats to at least 148 people in at least 43 attacks carried out since early September in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean.

    President Donald Trump has said the U.S. is in “armed conflict” with cartels in Latin America and has justified the attacks as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs. But his administration has offered little evidence to support its claims of killing “narcoterrorists.”

    Critics have questioned the overall legality of the strikes as well as their effectiveness, in part because the fentanyl behind many fatal overdoses is typically trafficked to the U.S. over land from Mexico, where it is produced with chemicals imported from China and India.

    The boat strikes also drew intense criticism following the revelation that the military killed survivors of the very first boat attack with a follow-up strike. The Trump administration and many Republican lawmakers said it was legal and necessary, while Democratic lawmakers and legal experts said the killings were murder, if not a war crime.

    Copyright © 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

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  • Murky outlook for businesses after tariff ruling prompts countermoves by Trump

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    NEW YORK — Businesses face a new wave of uncertainty after the Supreme Court struck down tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump under an emergency powers law and Trump vowed to work around the ruling to keep his tariffs in place.

    The Trump administration says its tariffs help boost American manufacturers and reduce the trade gap. But many U.S. businesses have had to raise prices and adjust in other ways to offset higher costs spurred by the tariffs.

    It remains to be seen how much relief businesses and consumers will actually get from Friday’s ruling. Within hours of the court’s decision, Trump pledged to use a different law to impose a 10% tariff on all imports that would last 150 days, and to explore other ways to impose additional tariffs on countries he says engage in unfair trade practices.

    “Any boost to the economy from lowering tariffs in the near-term is likely to be partly offset by a prolonged period of uncertainty,” said Michael Pearce, an economist at Oxford Economics. “With the administration likely to rebuild tariffs through other, more durable, means, the overall tariffs rate may yet end up settling close to current levels.”

    Efforts to claw back the estimated $133 billion to $175 billion of previously collected tariffs now deemed illegal are bound to be complicated, and will likely favor larger companies with more resources. Consumers hoping for a refund are unlikely to be compensated.

    The fight against tariffs continues

    With Trump’s unyielding position on tariffs, many business are braced for years of court battles.

    Basic Fun, a Florida-based maker of toys such as Lincoln Logs and Tonka trucks, last week joined a slew of other businesses in a lawsuit seeking to claw back tariffs paid to the government.

    While company CEO Jay Foreman is concerned about any new tariffs Trump may impose, he doesn’t think they will affect toys. Still, he said, “I do worry about some type of perpetual fight over this, at least for the next three years.”

    The new 10% tariff Trump announced Friday immediately raised questions for Daniel Posner, the owner of Grapes The Wine Co., in White Plains, New York. Since wine shipments take about two weeks to cross the Atlantic, he wonders if a shipment arriving Monday will be affected.

    “We’re reactive to what’s become a very unstable situation,” Posner said.

    Ron Kurnik owns Superior Coffee Roasting Co. in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, across the border from Canada. In addition to U.S. tariffs, Kurnik faced retaliatory tariffs from Canada for much of last year when he exported his coffee.

    “It’s like a nightmare we just want to wake up from,” said Kurnik, whose company has raised prices by 6% twice since the tariffs went into effect. While he’s pleased with the Supreme Court’s ruling, he doesn’t think he will ever see a refund.

    Industries pine for more stability

    A wide array of industries, including retail, tech and the agricultural sector, used the Supreme Court ruling as an opportunity to remind Trump of how his trade policies have affected their businesses.

    The Business Roundtable, a group that lobbies on behalf of more than 200 U.S. companies, released a statement encouraging the administration to limit the focus of tariffs going forward to specific unfair trade practices and national security concerns.

    In the retail industry, stores of all stripes have embraced different ways to offset the effects of tariffs – from absorbing some of the costs themselves, to cutting expenses and diversifying their supply network. Still, they have had to pass on some price increases at a time when shoppers have been particularly sensitive to inflationary pressures.

    Dave French, executive vice president of government relations for The National Retail Federation, the nation’s largest retail industry trade group, said he hoped lower courts would ensure “a seamless process” to refund tariffs. That issue wasn’t addressed in Friday’s ruling.

    For the technology sector, Trump’s tariffs caused major headaches. Many of its products are either built overseas or depend on imports of key components. The Computer & Communications Industry Association, which represents a spectrum of technology companies employing more than 1.6 million people, expressed hope that the decision will ease the trade tensions.

    “With this decision behind us, we look forward to bringing more stability to trade policy,” said Jonathan McHale, the association’s vice president for digital trade.

    Farmers, who have been stung by higher prices for equipment and fertilizer since the tariffs went into effect, and reduced demand for their exports, also spoke out.

    “We strongly encourage the president to avoid using any other available authorities to impose tariffs on agricultural inputs that would further increase costs,” said American Farm Bureau Federation President Zippy Duvall.

    Industries that aren’t feeling any relief

    The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act did not give the president authority to tax imports, a power that belongs to Congress. But the decision only affects tariffs imposed under that law, so some industries will see no relief at all.

    The decision leaves in effect tariffs on steel, upholstered furniture, kitchen cabinets and bathroom vanities, according to the Home Furnishings Association, which represents 15,000 furniture stores in North America.

    At Revolution Brewing in Chicago, the aluminum they use for cans costs as much as the ingredients that go inside them because of tariffs Trump has placed on metals that are not affected by the Supreme Court ruling. While the cans are made in Chicago, the aluminum comes from Canada, said Josh Deth, managing partner at the brewery.

    Tariffs have been just one challenge for his business, which is also affected by volatile barley prices and a slowdown in demand for craft beer.

    “Everything kind of adds up,” he said. “The beverage industry needs relief here. We’re getting crushed by the prices of aluminum.”

    Reaction overseas

    Italian winemakers hard-hit by the tariffs greeted the Supreme Court decision with skepticism, warning that the decision may just deepen uncertainty around trade with the U.S.

    The U.S. is Italy’s largest wine market, with sales having tripled in value over the past 20 years. New tariffs on the EU, which the Trump administration initially threatened would be 200%, had sent fear throughout the industry, which remained even after the U.S. reduced, delayed and negotiated down.

    “There is a more than likely risk that tariffs will be reimposed through alternative legal channels, compounded by the uncertainty this ruling may generate in commercial relations between Europe and the United States,” said Lamberto Frescobaldi, president of UIV, a trade association that represents more than 800 winemakers.

    Elsewhere in Europe, initial reaction focused on renewed upheaval and confusion regarding costs facing businesses exporting to the US.

    Trump’s tariffs could hit pharmaceuticals, chemicals and auto parts, said Carsten Brzeski, an economist at ING bank. “Europe should not be mistaken, this ruling will not bring relief,” he said. “The legal authority may be different, but the economic impact could be identical or worse.”

    ___

    Anne D’Innocenzio in New York; Dee-Ann Durbin in Detroit; Michael Liedtke in San Francisco; David McHugh in Frankfurt, Germany; Jonathan Matisse in Nashville, Tennessee; Adrian Sainz in Memphis, Tennessee; and Nicole Winfield in Rome contributed to this report.

    Copyright © 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

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  • How Justice Alito’s Retirement Might Upend the Midterms

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    Photo: Chip Somodevilla//Getty Images

    This week, there’s been a lot of attention focused on the U.S. Supreme Court, thanks to its stunning decision blowing up the rationale for Donald Trump’s tariff agenda. In his bitter remarks about the decision, the president went out of his way to praise dissenters Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Brett Kavanaugh.

    It’s Alito who could make some additional political news later this year. To understand why, you must step back to 2018, when Trump faced his first midterm election as president and the dynamics looked grim. He had lost the popular vote in 2016. His job-approval ratings had been underwater from the second week of his term in office. One of his two big first-term initiatives, legislation to repeal and replace Obamacare, had ended in dismal failure. And unsurprisingly, his party wound up losing 40 net U.S. House seats and control of that chamber.

    But at the same time, Republicans actually posted a net gain of two U.S. Senate seats and increased their majority from a fragile 51-to-49 margin to a more robust 53 to 47. Why? Well, according to many GOP spin-meisters, it was to a significant degree owing to “Kavanaugh’s revenge,” as CNBC reported at the time:

    Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., both credited the so-called Kavanaugh effect for Republican victories in key Senate races against red-state Democrats.

    Graham, in a thread of tweets Wednesday morning, said that the constituents of those Democratic incumbents who voted against Kavanaugh “held them responsible for being part of a despicable smear campaign orchestrated by the left.”

    The ”#KavanaughEffect,” Graham said, should be renamed ”#KavanaughsRevenge” …

    Republicans in critical states for the party were “highly offended” by the Democrats’ conduct during the confirmation proceedings, McConnell said, and the fallout from the process acted “like an adrenaline shot” for GOP turnout.

    Graham, as you may recall from his feral attacks on Senate Democrats during the Supreme Court confirmation hearings for Brett Kavanaugh, chaired the Judiciary Committee during that confirmation fight and contended that accusations of sexual assault against the soon-to-be Justice were blatantly unfair — nay, villainous. So it was natural for him to claim the hearings enraged both Republicans and swing voters and saved the Senate (an interpretation that also inflated his own importance, as it happens).

    It was a dubious interpretation of the midterms at the time, but the important thing is that many Republicans believed it. And that could feed a parallel development going into the 2026 midterms: a possible retirement by Kavanaugh’s senior and very right-wing colleague Samuel Alito.

    Alito has been on retirement watch for a while now. He’s 75 years old (and will turn 76 on April 1) and recently celebrated 20 years on the Supreme Court. And as the intrepid Court watcher Joan Biskupic noted in 2024 after he twice lost an initial majority on a case, Alito’s influence within the Court has been slipping, leaving him visibly frustrated:

    Alito has long given off an air of vexation, even as he is regularly in the majority with his conservative ideology. But the frustration of the 74-year-old justice has grown increasingly palpable in the courtroom. He has seldom faced this level of internal opposition.

    Overall, Alito wrote the fewest leading opinions for the court this term, only four, while other justices close to his 18-year seniority had been assigned (and kept majorities for) seven opinions each.

    His unique year in chambers was matched by the extraordinary public scrutiny for his off-bench activities, including lingering ethics controversies and a newly reported episode regarding an upside-down flag that had flown at this home in January 2021, after the pro–Donald Trump attack on the US Capitol. 

    There is also evidence that Alito’s wife, Martha-Ann, would like him to step down from the bench so that both of them can openly express their political opinions.

    Thus, there’s been speculation, mostly from the political left, that an Alito retirement could happen before or immediately after the current Supreme Court term. The Nation’s legal expert Elie Mystal, then Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick and Michael Joseph Stern, drew attention to the odd timing of a new Alito book. Here’s the clue on which Mystal focused:

    [T]he book is scheduled to be released October 6, 2026. That’s a curious date. The Supreme Court starts its 2026–27 term on October 5, the first Monday of October. Alito’s book is set to drop the next day.

    It sure feels like Alito doesn’t plan on having a real job the Tuesday his book launches and instead thinks he’ll be free to run around the country promoting it.

    There’s also a political reason Alito might want to step down at this particular moment. He clearly cares about his legacy on the Court and wants to solidify the conservative majority for which he and Justice Clarence Thomas have served as the point of an ideological spear. Trump is leaving office in 2029, and it’s possible Republicans will lose their Senate majority in November. Confirmation of anyone remotely like Alito would be impossible with a Democratic Senate and difficult with a smaller majority than Republicans currently enjoy.

    Add in the “Kavanaugh’s revenge” theory of 2018, and you can see why Republicans might really want to press for an Alito retirement and then a good, savage Senate confirmation fight over a controversial nominee to succeed him, possibly 40-somethings like Andrew Oldham or Emil Bove, both Trump-nominated Circuit Court judges. If Alito was to retire at the end of the current term (perhaps announcing the retirement earlier), then the shape of the future Supreme Court could become a base-mobilizing issue for the GOP, all right — but potentially also one for Democrats.

    That leads us back to the idea that poor Kavanaugh’s persecution by Democrats “saved the Senate” in 2018. The alternative explanation is that Republicans had an insanely favorable Senate landscape that year in which three Democrats who lost (Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, and Claire McCaskill of Missouri) were doomed from the get-go by the rapidly rightward trends of their states, and a fourth, Florida’s Bill Nelson, lost by an eyelash in another red-trending state after being massively outspent by then-Governor Rick Scott.

    Even if you believe the Kavanaugh fight provided Republicans with a net benefit in 2018, there’s no reason to assume the same thing will happen in 2026, a year in which the Senate landscape is far less favorable to the GOP than it was in 2018 (according to the Cook Political Report, four of the seven competitive Senate races this year are on GOP turf). We also don’t know how the confirmation hearings for an Alito successor will turn out.

    But between Alito’s motives for retiring, the GOP’s fear that it could lose control of the confirmation process, and the “Kavanaugh’s revenge” mythology about 2018, don’t be surprised if there’s a Supreme Court fight this summer or fall. Democrats would be happy to bid farewell to the author of the infamous decision reversing Roe v. Wade. Even if it hurts rather than helps their midterm prospects, Alito’s right-wing fans will be happy to welcome a younger version of the cranky conservative onto a life-time seat on the Court.


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    Ed Kilgore

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  • Trump loves cheap gas—but a military conflict in Iran could nearly double your price at the pump | Fortune

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    The largest U.S. military buildup since the 2003 Iraq invasion is aimed at Iran, and the outcome of a tense standoff could mean the average price at the pump falls to $2.50 per gallon or spikes astronomically to $5 in the case of war, geopolitical and energy analysts told Fortune.

    The reason for the extreme range of potential impacts is the Strait of Hormuz offshore of Iran. The narrow, 104-mile strait is the main choke point separating the Persian Gulf—and the daily flow of nearly 20 million barrels of oil—from the Indian Ocean and global energy markets. Most of the crude oil from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates must pass through the strait.

    “The stakes are so high,” said oil forecaster Dan Pickering, founder of the Pickering Energy Partners consulting and research firm. “The biggest risk to a disruption would be from Iran if they’re backed into a corner and have nothing to lose.”

    The Middle East “playbook” for conflicts over the last 20 years is to avoid targeting oil infrastructure, Pickering said, including during the so-called Twelve-Day War between Israel and Iran last June that culminated with the U.S. dropping bunker-buster bombs on Iranian nuclear sites.

    However, a desperate Iran could bomb or plant mines throughout the strait, creating a blockade. Iran also could target its neighbors, especially Saudi Arabia and the UAE. “All bets are off if the Supreme Leader (86-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei) decides it’s truly a fight for regime survival,” said Matt Reed, vice president of the geopolitical and energy consultancy Foreign Reports. 

    Reed said the situation today is “more alarming” than last summer because the U.S. and Iran seem far apart on any redefined nuclear deal—President Donald Trump pulled out of the previous nuclear agreement in 2018—and Iran already is under pressure as the regime violently tries to subdue civil unrest.

    “Iran is infinitely more desperate today. It’s facing an existential fight, potentially, which means it’s more inclined to lash out if only to raise the cost of U.S. intervention,” Reed told Fortune. “Back against the wall, the regime in Tehran may choose to strike its oil-rich Arab neighbors because they’re easy targets and everyone stands to lose from a massive oil price shock.”

    “The odds of diplomatic breakthrough are fading by the day,” he added. “Both sides are repeating the same tired talking points we heard a year ago.”

    Pricing out a conflict

    The U.S. benchmark for oil was hovering above $66 a barrel as of Feb. 20—up almost $10 per barrel already just from Iranian tensions. That premium suggests energy markets see a roughly 25% chance of a major Middle Eastern conflict, Pickering said.

    So, the odds still favor a peaceful outcome or a more modest military conflict with some initial strikes that force stronger negotiations.

    After all, Trump is focused on energy affordability during a midterm election year, and he has always desired bringing U.S. oil prices down to $50 per barrel—below the $60 threshold most oil producers need for profitability. The $50 level would pull the average retail price of a gallon of regular unleaded fuel down closer to $2.50. The current average gasoline price is $2.93 per gallon and rising, according to AAA.

    The numbers point to Trump wanting a deal with Iran, Pickering said. But OPEC also is talking about hiking its volumes again—led by the Saudis and the UAE—which could help partially offset a more modest military conflict, he added.

    Nothing would offset a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which is simply unsustainable over a long period for global energy markets, said Claudio Galimberti, chief economist for the Rystad Energy research firm.

    A contained Iran conflict would push oil prices up by another $15 to $20 per barrel, above $80, Galimberti said. Any impact to the strait would force a spike above $100 per barrel, potentially sending gasoline closer to $5 per gallon.

    On the other hand, a peace deal would push the U.S. benchmark below $60 per barrel. And a broader deal that would remove sanctions from Iranian oil and allow it to export to more markets could bring prices down another $5, closer to Trump’s desired $50 per barrel, Galimberti said. After all, global energy markets are currently oversupplied, and adding more Iranian barrels would trigger very low oil prices.

    “We don’t discount the fact that you could have a diplomatic resolution and a new nuclear deal,” Galimberti told Fortune. “It does look like it’s a little bit of a long shot.”

     The bottom line is “everyone in the world wants to avoid” blocking the Strait of Hormuz, he said. But either a desperate Iran or an accidental errant bomb changes the equation.

    As Pickering added, “Iran’s ability to wreak havoc is pretty high if it decides to take that step. It’s a really big step, because then you’ve poked the bear.

    “They didn’t take that step when bombs were literally falling in June.”

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    Jordan Blum

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  • Trump imposes 10% tariffs on all countries after Supreme Court struck down earlier tariffs

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    President Trump signed a proclamation Friday night that will impose 10% tariffs on most foreign imports to the United States, just hours after the Supreme Court struck down a set of sweeping global tariffs that were issued under a different legal authority. 

    The new tariffs take effect Monday and will be in place for 150 days, according to a White House fact sheet. Some foreign goods are exempted from the 10% duties, including certain food imports, critical minerals, electronics and cars. Goods from Canada and Mexico that are covered by a 2018 trade deal also aren’t subject to tariffs. 

    “It is my Great Honor to have just signed, from the Oval Office, a Global 10% Tariff on all Countries, which will be effective almost immediately,” the president wrote in a Truth Social post.

    The move comes as Mr. Trump tries to resurrect the worldwide regime of steep tariffs and trade deals that form a core part of his economic agenda. Most of his tariffs hinged on a law called the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, which the Supreme Court ruled Friday cannot be used to impose tariffs.

    Friday’s tariffs were issued under a different law: Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. That legal provision lets the president impose duties of up to 15% for 150 days to deal with “large and serious” balance-of-payment issues.

    The new levies are similar to the 10% baseline tariff rate Mr. Trump rolled out on goods from dozens of U.S. trading partners starting last spring. He argues that blanket tariffs are necessary to address trade deficits and revive American manufacturing, but many economists warn that the costs of tariffs are largely borne by consumers.

    Many trading partners faced higher rates under Mr. Trump’s previous tariffs, including a set of “reciprocal” tariffs on a litany of countries, and levies on many goods from China, Canada and Mexico that were linked to drug trafficking concerns. Some countries negotiated down those rates as part of broader trade deals. But those measures relied on the Trump administration’s interpretation of IEEPA, which was struck down by the high court on Friday.

    It’s not clear whether the administration will try to reinstate those higher tariff rates. Asked whether his trade deals still stand, Mr. Trump told reporters Friday: “Some of them stand. Many of them stand. Some of them won’t, and they’ll be replaced with the other tariffs.”

    Mr. Trump also directed U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer’s office to open investigations into “certain unreasonable and discriminatory acts, policies, and practices that burden or restrict U.S. commerce” under Section 301 of the Trade Act, the White House said. That law allows the government to impose tariffs and other measures to correct unfair trade practices.

    Greer said in a statement late Friday he expects the Section 301 probes “to cover most major trading partners.” He said they will be conducted on an “accelerated timeline” and could result in tariffs.

    In:

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  • Minneapolis and Chicago mayors to deliver unofficial rebuttals to Trump’s State of the Union address

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    Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson will join several other Democratic elected officials and well-known actors in giving unofficial responses to President Trump’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, according to a news release about the event.

    Organizers are calling the “State of the Swamp” a boycott of Mr. Trump’s address. Frey and Johnson are expected to join Democratic U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer, actors Robert De Niro and Mark Ruffalo, journalists Don Lemon and Jim Acosta and several others at the event. It’s scheduled to take place at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. 

    Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger will deliver the official Democratic response to Mr. Trump’s speech, according to party leaders in Congress.

    “There are moments in our country’s history when leadership is measured not by party loyalty, but by moral clarity. This is one of those moments,” Frey said in the release. 

    Johnson added, “Donald Trump’s vision for America runs counter to the hopes and aspirations of the working people who wake up every single day and make our cities run.”

    Minneapolis and Chicago have both faced an influx of federal agents as part of a nationwide immigration crackdown by the Trump administration. Organizers, without expanding, cited the cities as faces “of the resistance to lawless actions” of the administration.

    Border czar Tom Homan said on Sunday that more than 1,000 immigration agents have left Minnesota since he announced the end of Operation Metro Surge, and several hundred more were expected to leave in the coming days.

    Johnson last month signed an executive order directing members of the Chicago Police Department to investigate and document any alleged illegal activity by federal immigration agents. Police will preserve and provide evidence of felony violations to the Cook County State’s Attorney. 

    Defiance.org, which is organizing the event, is a club for people “willing to take peaceful, lawful, defiant action to defend democracy” from Mr. Trump, according to its website.

    WCCO is reaching out to Frey’s office for comment.

    Marissa Sulek and

    Jeramie Bizzle

    contributed to this report.

    In:

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    Nick Lentz

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  • Immigration experts share how to push back against Trump’s actions

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    MARBLEHEAD — A panel of local immigration experts shared how people can push back against President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, including donating to legal defense funds for immigrants or volunteering to accompany local immigrants to court hearings.

    During a panel discussion on immigration enforcement Tuesday night, experts said people can also challenge local police departments’ use of security technology from companies such as Flock Security, which allows Immigration and Customs Enforcement to access license plate data collected by local law enforcement.

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    By Caroline Enos | Staff Writer

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  • FCC Calls On Broadcasters To Mark America’s 250th With Patriotic Content; Chairman Brendan Carr Cites Lack Of A ‘Schoolhouse Rock!’

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    The FCC called on broadcasters to mark the 250th anniversary of the United States with more “patriotic, pro-America” content, as Chairman Brendan Carr urged stations to pledge commit to programming that “promotes civic education, national pride, and our shared history.”

    Carr’s announcement on Friday appeared to harken back to the Bicentennial of 1976, citing Schoolhouse Rock!, the ABC Saturday morning interstitials that educated children about civics. He also said that an option for broadcasters would be to start each broadcast day with the Pledge of Allegiance or The Star Spangled Banner.

    The FCC chairman also laid out other options, including PSA and segments on civics and American history; highlighting local historical sites; airing music from composers like John Philip Sousa, Aaron Copland, Duke Ellington or George Gershwin; and providing announcements on “this day in history.”

    The latter suggestion also was a feature of a half century ago, when CBS presented a series of historical segments called Bicentennial Minutes that ran each night for more than two years. Everyone from network stars to President Gerald Ford narrated the interstitials.

    Playing the National Anthem used to be a regular feature of a station’s sign on and sign off, but started to disappear as outlets went to 24 schedules, although some have returned to the practice in recent years.

    Carr is calling his effort the Pledge America Campaign, with the agency noting that broadcasters can voluntary indicate their commitment but that it would be “consistent with their longstanding public interest obligations.” The agency described the campaign as something that “enables broadcasters to lend their voices in support of Task Force 250 and the celebration of America’s 250th birthday by airing patriotic, pro-America content that celebrates the American journey and inspires its citizens by highlighting the historic accomplishments of this great nation from our founding through the Trump Administration today.”

    Stations have to show how they operated in the public interest when their licenses come up for renewal, with the latest round set for 2028.

    Carr said in a statement, “This type of programming is more relevant than ever, as surveys show that civics education is in rapid decline.  And classic programming such as Schoolhouse Rock! is now only found in online archives.  Broadcasters are uniquely positioned to help address these concerning developments by providing programming that celebrates the remarkable story of American Independence while also tailoring it to the specific needs of their local communities, in furtherance of their public interest obligations.”

    “That is why I am inviting broadcasters to pledge to air programming in their local markets in support of this historic national, non-partisan celebration.”

    The sole Democrat on the FCC, Anna Gomez, has been critical of Carr, calling his investigations of networks shows like The View and Saturday Night Live ways to try to pressure broadcasters to limit content that President Donald Trump dislikes. This week, Carr said that they are looking at an “enforcement action” against The View for violation of the Equal Time Rule. Gomez told reporters that “the threats are the point, the harassment is the point, because the commission is not going to survive appeal if it actually takes action against these broadcasters, because what it is doing is a violation of the First Amendment.”

    In a post on X, Gomez wrote of the America 250 pledge, “Nothing is more American than defending our constitutional rights against those who would erode our civil liberties. If broadcasters choose to participate in this FCC campaign, they can do so by defending their First Amendment rights and refusing government interference.”

    Schoolhouse Rock! ran in the 1970s and 80s, with one of the most remembered segments, I’m Just A Bill, debuting in 1976 as segments were presented tied to the Bicentennial.

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    Ted Johnson

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  • The ‘alternative scenario’ of an even bigger national debt disaster is in play after the Supreme Court ruled Trump’s tariffs illegal | Fortune

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    The Supreme Court ruled Friday that President Donald Trump’s extensive use of tariffs during his first year back in office were illegal. The court responded to escalating protests from small businesses saddled with higher costs and a large portion of Americans who are skeptical as to the benefits of Trump’s tariff regime. But by striking down part of Trump’s trade agenda, the judges might send America’s ever-widening deficit soaring even higher.

    The national fiscal outlook is already on an unsustainable trajectory. As the Congressional Budget Office projected earlier this month, federal debt is set to reach 120% of GDP by 2036, but that forecast assumes current policies will remain in place. A perfect storm of other factors could align to send debt climbing to even greater heights.

    One of those forces is the fate of Trump’s tariffs. The severity of America’s fiscal path has been somewhat “mitigated” in part by tariff-driven revenue, according to a report published Thursday by the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB). Removing this revenue stream would contribute to an “alternative scenario,” one with an even steeper debt burden than the one projected by the CBO. 

    Assuming Trump’s tariffs are not replaced, and certain government spending programs are either made permanent or revived, the deficit would reach nearly $4 trillion, debt could climb to 131% of GDP in 2036, and the additional interest burden would hit $820 billion, according to the report. 

    The mechanism by which vanishing tariff revenues fuel the deficit is straightforward but massive in scale. Currently, the CBO’s baseline fiscal projections are softened by the assumption that significant revenue from tariffs unilaterally imposed by the Trump administration will continue to flow into the Treasury. But the administration’s legal foundation for these collections crumbled before the court. Most of these tariffs were authorized under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a tool that has never before been used to implement tariffs and that the U.S. Court of International Trade already ruled illegal last year. 

    If the administration fails to replace the revenue with other taxes or offsets, the CRFB estimates that federal revenue would fall by $1.9 trillion through 2036. This loss represents roughly 0.5% of the nation’s total GDP over the next decade. While the administration could theoretically attempt to use alternative trade maneuvers to replicate the tariffs, there is no guarantee such a transition would be seamless or legally bulletproof.

    That lost revenue would presumably be evident immediately. The government is now on the hook to refund $175 billion of its tariff revenue, according to recent analysis by  the University of Pennsylvania’s Penn-Wharton Budget Model. But the costs would be even greater over the long run. Losing $1.9 trillion in expected income does more than just widen the immediate gap between spending and revenue; it triggers a compounding interest effect that worsens the overall debt. 

    When the government loses a primary revenue stream like tariffs, it must borrow more to cover its existing obligations. Under the report’s alternative scenario, this loss of revenue, combined with the permanent extension of temporary tax provisions from Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act and a potential revival of enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies, which expired earlier this year, would raise the deficit by $4.2 trillion over the next decade. This deficit, worsened by higher interest costs, could risk crowding out other forms of essential spending as the federal government becomes increasingly consumed by its own debt burden.

    “The alternative scenario does not account for dynamic effects on interest rates and the economy, which could worsen the fiscal outlook by pushing the economy further into a debt spiral,” CRFB researchers wrote in the report.

    The report outlines a more upbeat scenario, where debt rises more slowly than in the CBO’s forecast. In this version, lawmakers would either allow temporary tax policies to expire or fully offset their costs, while also ensuring that tariff revenues are either preserved by the courts or replaced by new legislative measures. Coupled with reforms to stabilize trust funds like Social Security, this path could see debt stabilize at a much lower 111% of GDP by 2036. 

    For now, however, the nation’s fiscal health remains on a deteriorating path. Removing Trump’s tariffs might be greeted favorably abroad and by most Americans, given that up to 90% of tariff costs are now paid for by American companies and consumers, according to a recent New York Fed report. But striking down the tariffs without replacements could come with hidden costs further down the road, as the alternative scenario of an even greater debt burden gets closer to becoming the new reality.

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    Tristan Bove

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