Two of our esteemed gubernatorial candidates, the cowboy and the dilettante, apparently could not find ties for the first debate Wednesday night, showing up with dress shirts casually unbuttoned.
Mr. Middleground sported a scruffy sorta-beard, apparently unable to pay for a razor in the midst of California’s affordability crisis. It’s a trademark look that always makes me think if this doesn’t work out, he’ll opt to live on a boat in some not-too-expensive slip by the Bay.
The billionaire wore Nikes instead of dress shoes, a sartorial nod perhaps to his bid to be the outsider-fighter. Or maybe his feet just hurt.
The last two contenders were remarkably unremarkable.
Why start with fashion? Honestly, it might be the most interesting, and telling, bit of insight that came from this first (of three) chances for our next governor to let us know who they are and what they’re made of. If the debate showed us anything, it’s that none of these candidates are hiding follow-me charisma or an excitement-inducing political vision for our collective future.
Yes, there were a few decent jabs here and there about Tom Steyer’s money, Katie Porter’s temper, Matt Mahan’s tech ties and Chad Bianco’s far-right world view. But even those were predictable.
Still, in between the yawns, there were a couple of answers worth noting, ones that might actually give us insight into how the Democratic candidates differ (Despite all the hype, it seems increasingly unlikely that two Republicans will come out of the primary, and even more unlikely that in a Democratic vs. Republican race, the Democrat would lose in blue California.)
I’ll start with a surprising place where I agreed with Steve Hilton, the Republican endorsed by President Trump.
The candidates were asked if they would support a ban on social media for kids under age 16. This is a quickly accelerating idea not beloved by tech companies. Australia and Indonesia already have bans in place. Other countries, including France and Portugal, have them in the works. Florida banned children under 14 from opening social media accounts on their own last year.
And a Los Angeles jury last month dealt a blow to Meta and YouTube when it found the platforms had damaged the mental health of a young woman with their addictive features.
Hilton took the ban question a step further, saying it “misses the point.” He has long argued that it isn’t just social media that is the problem, but having kids staring at a digital device for hours a day instead of interacting in the real world. It was one of the most genuine answers of the night.
“We’ve got to get to the heart of the problem, and that’s the devices and the screens,” he said. “I think that every parent in their heart knows that it’s wrong.”
While Steyer and Xavier Becerra, the former California attorney general, both said they would support such a ban, the remaining three candidates hedged or said they would not. Porter said no to a ban under age 16, but said she “might consider a different ban,” without being specific.
Mahan, who is backed by significant tech money, and Bianco both said they believed requiring parental consent was the way to go (though Mahan said he would ban devices in schools).
As Becerra pointed out, “kids have died as a result of their use of social media,” so it’s a place where policy matters. And if a candidate doesn’t see government’s role in controlling the dangers of social media, what will happen with artificial intelligence?
The candidates also had differences in how they would handle homelessness and the related crisis of housing affordability, though the devil was often buried in the details.
At least for Democrats. For Bianco, the difference was stark.
“We are not dealing with homeless. So stop calling it homeless,” he snapped at the moderators. “It has nothing to do with homes. This is drug- and alcohol-induced psychosis, mental illness.”
Of course, this is wrong. Last year, the UC San Francisco Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative released the results of the state’s most comprehensive survey of homeless people. It found that for most people living on our streets, “the cost of housing had simply become unsustainable.” It also found an increasing percentage of those folks were older — almost half were over the age of 50 — and had become homeless after a hardship such as an illness or a job loss.
“It’s also families who are fleeing intimate partner and domestic violence,” Porter said. “It’s people who are double and tripled up. It’s people who are living in their cars on our college campuses. Homelessness comes in a lot of different forms.”
Most of the Democratic candidates seemed to understand this and embraced the increasingly popular idea of putting more money into helping people stay housed after a hardship, instead of trying to get them housed after they lose their place.
“How can I help you keep your home?” Becerra said. “Because it costs me so much more money to pick you off the streets, provide you with the assistance in the shelter, than it does to keep you in the home.”
But the issue of homelessness is also where daylight emerged between the candidates. Steyer said he and his wife had helped finance low-barrier homes, not just shelter spaces, where people do not need to be addiction-free and where they can bring pets — two issues that are common hindrances for moving folks off sidewalks voluntarily.
Mahan, the mayor of San José, who often touts his city’s success at moving people indoors, agreed that emergency and interim housing was critical, but also voiced support for forcing folks to accept help. Last year, San José passed an ordinance he backed that some say criminalizes homelessness — a person can be cited twice for refusing shelter, and a third refusal within 18 months can lead to an arrest.
“When shelter was available, we required that people come indoors,” Mahan said, adding, “We have to be able to mandate treatment.”
It’s a controversial position, but also one that is increasingly popular. Gov. Gavin Newsom has backed mandated treatment, in a lighter form, with his CARE Court (which is technically voluntarily). And the movement to require people to accept a shelter space or face arrest is growing on the right and even the Democratic-middle.
But there is a fine and dangerous line with mandated treatment and shelter requirements that is often pushed further and further to the side in favor of the clean, safe streets argument. Whenever we start locking folks up — whether it’s in mental wards or immigration detention centers or jails — we should be careful that expediency isn’t trumping ethics.
Of course, the debate would not be complete without the Democratic candidates’ position on our president, speaking of ethics.
Steyer was gleeful that Trump has come after him on social media, a point of pride that he is a relevant figure in the fight against MAGA. He also said he would abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement if he could, which he can’t.
Becerra highlighted his many lawsuits as California’s attorney general during Trump’s first term, and pledged to keep fighting. Porter leaned into her time in Congress and her efforts to help Democrats in other races win.
Mahan took a different route, pledging to fight when necessary, but adding, “We need a partnership, and we need to find common ground with this administration on certain issues.”
Newsom learned the hard way that common ground is what Trump says it is, and shifts without warning or reason.
So what’s the takeaway from all this?
Boring dad; feisty mom; rich do-gooder; striving newcomer; MAGA one; MAGA two.
None of them hit it out of the park, but no one struck out. Maybe next time.
Democrats on Wednesday celebrated an election win in Virginia that could put them slightly ahead in the national redistricting competition that President Trump triggered in an attempt to preserve his party’s House majority in this year’s midterms, but it will not be the final round.
Now that it’s been approved by voters, the new Virginia map will have to clear additional legal hurdles. On Wednesday, the state attorney general’s office said it would immediately appeal a ruling earlier in the day from a judge in rural southern Virginia who ordered that the results of Tuesday’s vote not be certified.
Ultimately, the Virginia Supreme Court will decide whether Democratic lawmakers violated procedural rules when they referred a constitutional amendment to the ballot authorizing the new U.S. House districts that could help Democrats win as many as four additional seats in the state. If so, that could invalidate the map voters narrowly approved Tuesday.
What happens next in Florida also will matter.
The state’s Republican-controlled Legislature is to meet in a special session next week that GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis called in part to draw a new map to expand the party’s congressional majority there. The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to issue an opinion by the end of June in a Louisiana case that could overturn a key provision of the Voting Rights Act and lead to redrawn political maps across the South, though almost all of those could not happen until 2028.
After voters passed the Virginia amendment, Democrats could tentatively claim that they netted 10 seats nationally from the mid-decade redistricting, compared with the nine that Republicans claim. Even if things swing again in the GOP’s favor, the net result of Trump’s campaign would be at best an incremental increase in the number of GOP-leaning House seats at a time when his approval rating is dropping and Republican anxiety over losing control of Congress in November is rising.
“We have successfully blunted Trump’s attempt to completely hijack the midterms,” said John Bisognano, president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee.
Many Republicans agreed.
“The GOP will now lose net seats across the country. If you’re going to pick a fight, at least win it,” Ari Fleischer, who was a spokesman for President George W. Bush, posted on the social media site X after the Virginia vote. “All this was foreseeable and avoidable. We should not have started this fight.”
Adam Kincaid, executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust, argued that it is too soon to declare one party a victor.
“It’s an ongoing process with many legal challenges pending, and it’s far too early for sweeping statements on the final outcome,” he said.
Trump on Wednesday tried to undermine the Virginia result by leveling groundless accusations of fraud similar to ones he made after losing the 2020 presidential election. He called the Virginia vote “RIGGED” and “Crooked” in a post on his social media site and added, “Let’s see if the Courts will fix this travesty of ‘Justice.’”
Redistricting spread from Texas to other states
Redistricting is typically done every 10 years after each census, unless ordered by a court. But last summer, Trump pushed a redrawing in Texas, prodding the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature to add up to five winnable House seats for his party. Trump then began pressuring other Republican-run states to follow. Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio have since created more GOP-leaning seats in addition to Texas.
Democrats began to fight back, even though they were more constrained because several Democratic-controlled states had maps drawn by independent commissions rather than lawmakers and governors.
To counter Texas, California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, pushed the Democratic-controlled Legislature to place a redistricting initiative on last fall’s ballot. After voters overwhelmingly approved it, the measure will replace a commission-approved map with one that could gain Democrats five seats.
Democrats reclaimed the Legislature and governor’s office in November in Virginia and swiftly moved to replicate California’s move with an even more aggressive redistricting plan. It replaces a congressional map imposed by a court after the last census that had resulted in a 6-5 edge for Democrats with one that could allow Democrats to win as many as 10 seats.
“We are not going to let anyone tilt the system without a response,” state Senate President L. Louise Lucas said at a news conference Wednesday.
Courts could still have a say on redistricting
In Washington, U.S. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York warned Florida Republicans, who have been openly nervous about redrawing their district boundaries and potentially spreading their core voters too thin before an election that appears to be trending against them.
“Our message to Florida Republicans right now is, ‘F around and find out,’” Jeffries said.
House Majority Forward, the nonprofit arm of the super political action committee aligned with House Democrats, has spent nearly $60 million to push back against Republicans’ redistricting efforts. Some $40 million of that was on the Virginia campaign.
Another obstacle in Florida is an anti-gerrymandering constitutional amendment that was approved by state voters in 2010. It is likely that any new Florida map would trigger significant litigation, although six of the state Supreme Court’s seven justices were appointed by Republicans.
Nicholas Stephanopolous, a Harvard law professor, said a challenge for DeSantis is that the Florida amendment forbids drawing lines for purely partisan purposes, so he has to find some other excuse for revising the map. “Even with that sort of acquiescent state supreme court, I don’t think it’s a done deal,” Stephanopolous said.
The Virginia move comes with its own legal issues. Republicans have challenged the process that Democrats used to place the measure on the ballot and the state Supreme Court opted to wait for the vote before even scheduling arguments in the case. It is unclear when a ruling could come.
Wednesday’s ruling stopping certification came from a separate case that Republicans filed with the same lower court judge, whose initial ruling against the initiative was put on hold by the state supreme court.
“The ballot box was never the final word here,” Terry Kilgore, the Virginia House Republican leader, said in a statement after Tuesday’s vote. “Serious legal questions remain about both the wording of this referendum and the process used to put it before voters.”
The biggest legal wild card is held by the U.S. Supreme Court. Its conservative majority could throw out a requirement under the Voting Rights Act that in areas with a large minority population, mapmakers draw districts that are more favorable to the election of minority candidates.
That provision has led to the creation of several majority-minority congressional seats, especially in the South. Without it, Republicans in conservative states could shrink the number of U.S. House seats winnable by Democrats even further.
But it’s unlikely that any state other than Louisiana, which brought the lawsuit the high court will rule on, would be able to adjust its congressional lines in time for November even if the court eliminates that provision, known as Section Two. That’s because the November election is already officially underway in most states and candidate filing deadlines — and, in some cases, primary elections — have already passed.
Riccardi and Lieb write for the Associated Press. AP writers Lisa Mascaro and Leah Askarinam in Washington contributed to this report.
WASHINGTON — Many of the groups that helped elect Donald Trump as president again are deeply unhappy with his performance, according to a new AP-NORC poll.
Trump’s return to the presidency was fueled by a wide-ranging coalition that built on his loyal base of supporters. Now that Trump has been in the White House for more than a year, the survey of more than 2,500 U.S. adults from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that many key groups — including Hispanic adults, younger adults and men — are increasingly dissatisfied with his presidency.
The poll was conducted from April 16 through Monday, as oil prices fluctuated and Americans spent more at the gas pump.
It’s a particularly bad moment for Trump, a Republican whose economic approval slumped over the past month as the Iran war drives prices higher. But AP-NORC polls show that discontent has been building among critical segments of the population over the past year.
Trump’s overall approval among Hispanic adults has fallen 16 percentage points since March 2025, and his support has declined by 9 percentage points among men.
And while Trump’s base is still largely behind him — most Republicans approve of his performance — there are signs that his second term may not be living up to their expectations.
Here’s what polling shows about Trump’s current status with four important groups:
Hispanic adults
Hispanic Americans have grown increasingly discontented with Trump over the past year.
About one-quarter of Hispanic adults approve of how he’s handling the presidency in the new poll, down from about 4 in 10 in March 2025.
That decline has been visible since late last year — suggesting that it’s not just the war in Iran or recent spikes in gas prices that are leaving this group unhappy.
Trump’s restrictive immigration approach may be playing a role. Only about one-quarter of Hispanics approve of his handling of immigration, down from 36% at the beginning of his term.
His immigration tactics appear to be particularly unpopular among younger Hispanics — a group with which he made gains in 2024. Only 18% of younger Hispanic adults approve of his performance on immigration, compared with 40% of Americans overall.
There is also broad discontent about the state of the U.S. economy among Hispanics. Only about one-quarter of Hispanic adults approve of how Trump is handling that issue, and about 2 in 10 say they approve of his approach to the cost of living. Few Hispanic adults, about 2 in 10, describe the nation’s economy as “good.”
Young adults
Trump’s overall approval with Americans under age 45 has slid over the past year, falling from 39% in March 2025 to 28% in the latest poll.
Younger women have a particularly dim view of Trump’s handling of the economy.
Only about 2 in 10 women under age 45 approve of how Trump is handling the economy, including only 7% of younger Hispanic women who approve of his economic approach. More young men, about 3 in 10, approve of him on this issue.
Trump’s struggles among young adults extend to other groups, too. Only about one-third of white adults under age 45 approve of his overall performance, compared with 45% of white adults age 45 or older.
A downtick among men
Trump made broad appeals to men throughout his 2024 campaign, and most male voters backed Trump in the presidential election over Democrat Kamala Harris. In particular, he made slight but significant gains with Black and Hispanic men, who were drawn by his vows to revitalize the economy.
Since he reentered office, though, American men have become slightly less likely to approve of his performance, declining from 47% at the start of his second term to 38% in the most recent poll.
There are signs that Black men, in particular, aren’t seeing Trump’s economic promises pan out. Black men are more likely than white or Hispanic men to disapprove of Trump’s approach to the presidency, as well as his approach to the economy, the cost of living and Iran. Only about 1 in 10 Black men say they approve of how Trump is handling the cost of living, and roughly 2 in 10 approve of how he’s handling the economy.
Hispanic men, too, have a relatively dim view of Trump’s overall performance. About 3 in 10 approve of how Trump is handling the presidency, regardless of their age. That support is stronger among white men, with about half approving of Trump.
While young Republicans are frustrated, MAGA still backs Trump
Trump has benefited from Republicans’ loyalty for years, but there are recent signs of frustration even within his base.
Roughly two-thirds of Republicans approve of Trump’s job performance. That is down slightly from 82% near the start of his second term and is generally in line with the GOP low point from his first term.
But only about half of Republicans overall approve of Trump’s approach to the cost of living, and a majority of Republicans under age 45 disapprove of him on that issue.
Trump is still buoyed by the support of his MAGA base, even as he faces backlash from conservative media figures on some of his recent actions in Iran.
About 9 in 10 MAGA Republicans — those who consider themselves supporters of the “Make America Great Again” movement — approve of Trump’s job performance, and a similar share approve of his handling of Iran.
It’s a good sign for Trump that his most robust supporters are still in his corner, but not all Republicans identify with MAGA. About half of Republicans, 54%, say they consider themselves MAGA supporters.
Among non-MAGA Republicans, Trump’s approval is much lower, at 44%.
Sanders and Thomson-Deveaux write for the Associated Press. The AP-NORC poll of 2,596 adults was conducted April 16-20 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 2.6 percentage points.
These incidents came a day after U.S. forces boarded an Iran-linked oil tanker in the Indian Ocean and highlighted that regardless of diplomacy, shipping remains a target for both sides. Meanwhile, Iran made veiled threats against the telecommunications cables running under the Strait. All this is happening as Tehran says it won’t return to the bargaining table until the U.S. ends its blockade of Iranian ports. We’ll discuss that more later in this story.
The first attack in the Strait on Wednesday took place shortly before midnight EDT about 15 nautical miles northeast of Oman, according to UKMTO.
“The Master of a Container Ship reported that the vessel was approached by 1 IRGC gun boat, no VHF challenge that then fired upon the vessel which has caused heavy damage to the bridge. No fires or environmental impact reported. All Crew reported safe.”
Nour News, a website affiliated with Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) opened fire on the Epaminodes, after it had “ignored the warnings of the Iranian armed forces,” the BBC reported.
A second incident took place about three hours later eight nautical miles west of Iran, UKMTO stated.
“A master of an outbound cargo ship reports having been fired upon and is now stopped in the water,” the organization explained in an alert. “Crew are safe and accounted for. There is no reported damage to the vessel. UKMTO is aware of high levels of activity in the SoH area and encourages vessels to report any suspicious activity.”
It is unclear at the moment which ship was attacked in that incident. UKTMO did not name the vessel. However, in addition to claiming they fired on the Epaminodes, Iranian officials say they also struck the Euphoria, which MarineTraffic said is a Panamanian-flagged container ship, and the MSC-Francesca, also a Panamanian-flagged container ship, according to MarineTraffic.
The Epaminodes and MSC-Francesca were also seized for “endangering maritime security by operating without the necessary permits and tampering with navigation systems,” the IRGC claimed, stating the vessels have been “directed to the coast of Iran.”
🚨Update: The two vessels are currently in the territorial waters of the Islamic Republic of Iran for inspection of their cargo, documentation, and related records. https://t.co/aXbSZLSNFa
— IRIB (Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting) (@iribnews_irib) April 22, 2026
The disposition of the vessels and crews is not currently known. U.S. Central Command could not confirm any of these incidents.
A Sentinel-2 satellite image captured today shows what looks like a swarm of IRGCN fast attack craft sailing north of the strait of Hormuz near Kargan coast, according to open source investigator Mehdi H on X.
The image shows what appears to be at least 33 boats. It is unclear if there is any connection between these craft and the shipping attacks. The IRGC has invested heavily in its fleet of small boats for decades as TWZ has explored in the past. Some of these vessels are armed with short-range anti-ship missiles, as well as artillery rockets and other weapons. They can also be used to lay naval mines. These fleets are extremely hard to find and fix, and do not need large ports to operate from. While CENTCOM says it has destroyed well over 150 Iranian ships, the IRGC still has many remaining small boats.
Sentinel-2 satellite image today shows what looks like a flotilla of IRGCN fast attack crafts sailing north of strait of Hormuz near Kargan coast. At least 33 boats can be seen in what looks like a show of force enforcing the strait closure by Iran. Geo-location: 26.899,56.824 pic.twitter.com/smNuM0y6D3
As we noted earlier in this story, in addition to attacking and capturing ships on the Strait, Iran pointed out the vulnerability of telecommunications cables running under it.
“The Strait of Hormuz is not only a crucial route for oil and gas transportation; this narrow waterway is also one of the most important internet chokepoints in the region and the world,” the IRGC-linked Tasnim news agency noted on Wednesday. “According to submarine network data, at least 7 main communication cables of the Persian Gulf countries pass through this route; while more than 97% of the world’s internet traffic is transferred via these fiber optic cables laid under the sea.”
“Cables such as FALCON, AAE‑1, TGN‑Gulf, and SEA‑ME‑WE connect a significant part of the region’s digital communication to major data centers in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia,” the outlet added. “These infrastructures are the backbone of data transfer, e-commerce, cloud services, and online communications in the Persian Gulf countries.”
“The concentration of many internet cables in a narrow passage makes the Strait of Hormuz a vulnerable point for the region’s digital economy,” Tasnim posited, calling it “a place where cables, after passing through the strait, connect to coastal landing nodes and major regional data centers.”
New post from Iran state media Tasnim about major undersea Internet cables in the Strait of Hormuz
“The concentration of a large number of internet cables in a narrow passage has made the Strait of Hormuz a vulnerable point for the region’s digital economy” pic.twitter.com/JE0o4qcCC6
Though the fighting may be paused, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the economic pressure on Iran continues.
.@PressSec on Iran: “There’s a ceasefire with the military and kinetic strikes, but Operation Economic Fury continues and… we are completely strangling their economy through this blockade. They’re losing $500M/day… He’s satisfied with that as we await their response.” pic.twitter.com/SdtLveF1ZH
The aircraft carrier USS George H. W. Bush is set to arrive in the Middle East in about three to five days after sailing around the southern tip of Africa, Fox News Chief National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin stated on X.
The timing, she noted, coincides with Trump’s extending the ceasefire deadline by that same timeline.
3rd aircraft carrier USS Bush arrives in Middle East after detour around southern tip of Africa in next 3-5 days as Trump extends the ceasefire with Iran by “3-5 days.” https://t.co/MymBLABmlE
The Washington Post reports that the Pentagon has told Congress it could take six months to fully clear the Strait of Hormuz of mines deployed by the Iranian military.
The publication added that any such operation is unlikely to be carried out until the U.S. war with Iran ends.
This “assessment that means the conflict’s economic impact could extend late into this year or beyond,” the newspaper added.
“The timeline — met with frustration by Democrats and Republicans alike, two of these people said — is the latest sign that gasoline and oil prices could remain elevated long after any peace deal is reached,” the Post noted.
EXCLUSIVE: It could take six months to fully clear the Strait of Hormuz of mines deployed by the Iranian military, and any such operation is unlikely to be carried out until the U.S. war with Iran ends, the Pentagon has informed Congress — an assessment that means the conflict’s…
Israel’s N12 News reported on X that Trump has given Iran a deadline of Sunday.
Two Israel Air Force technicians from Tel Nof Airbase, near Ashdod, will be charged with spying for Iran during Operation Roaring Lion, Israel’s public broadcaster KAN News reported on Wednesday.
“The two technicians, who worked on IAF F-15 fighter jets, handed over documentation of the engine diagrams, as well as photographs showing the face of a flight instructor, which is against military censorship rules, The Jerusalem Post reported.
“They were also asked to gather information about former IDF chief Lt.-Gen. (ret.) Herzi Halevi and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir,” the publication noted. “Authorities are considering whether to increase the charges on one of the technicians to treason, rather than the lower charge of espionage.”
Report: Two Israel Air Force technicians from Tel Nof Airbase will be charged with spying for Iran during Operation Roaring Lion. They provided sensitive military documents and photos. Written by @JamesGennhttps://t.co/KA8lLh9672
The New York Post said Trump told them that another round of negotiations with Iran may take place later this week. At issue is the future of Iran’s highly enriched uranium, its supply of ballistic missiles, support of proxies like Hezbollah and the Houthis, and ultimate disposition of the Strait of Hormuz.
“‘Good news’ about a second round of talks between the US and Iran may be coming as soon as Friday,” the publication said Trump and Pakistani sources told it on Wednesday.
“Sources in Islamabad touted positive mediation efforts with Tehran, renewing the possibility of more peace talks within the next ‘36 to 72 hours,’” the newspaper added. “Asked about this possible breakthrough by The Post, Trump, in a text message, said: ‘It’s possible! President DJT.’”
Well, guess I’m not going anywhere just yet!
President Trump and Pakistani sources today told me good news about a fresh round of talks between the US and Iran is “possible” as soon as Friday.https://t.co/5TdF0kRgO7
Trump “plans to give the Iranians a limited timeframe to come up with a unified proposal to get diplomatic negotiations back on track,” CNN reported, citing two sources familiar with the internal discussions. “The administration does not want to indefinitely extend the ceasefire, the sources said, and does not want to give Iran time to drag out talks further.”
President Trump plans to give the Iranians a limited timeframe to come up with a unified proposal to get diplomatic negotiations back on track, two sources familiar with the internal discussions tell me.
The administration does not want to indefinitely extend the ceasefire, the…
“Trump is willing to give another three to five days of ceasefire to allow the Iranians to get their shit together,” one U.S. source briefed on the matter told Axios. “It is not going to be open-ended.”
Trump’s negotiators “believe a deal to end the war and address what’s left of Iran’s nuclear program is still achievable,” the outlet added. “But they also worry they may not have anyone in Tehran empowered to say yes.”
Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei “is barely communicating,” Axios posited. “The IRGC generals now in control of the country and Iran’s civilian negotiators are openly at odds over strategy.”
“We saw that there is an absolute fracture inside Iran between the negotiators and the military — with neither side having access to the supreme leader, who is not responsive,” a U.S. official told the news organization.
Axios added that though Vice President JD Vance was all set to go to Pakistan for the second round of negotiations, he instead found himself waiting for the IRGC generals now in control of Iran to let parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Sayed Abbas Araghchi travel to Pakistan to meet him. However, while the Iranians appeared to have given Pakistani mediators the green light for talks, by Tuesday morning, that signal was gone, replaced by a demand that the U.S. lift its naval blockade.
“Trump is willing to give another three to five days of ceasefire to allow the Iranians to get their shit together,” one U.S. source briefed on the matter said. “It is not going to be open-ended.”https://t.co/QdZWaZPYL3
As we have previously noted, Trump extended the ceasefire deadline yesterday, but gave no specific date for when fighting could resume. In a Truth Social post, he said he did so to give time for the fractured Iranian leadership to come up with a response to U.S. demands and that the ongoing blockade of Iranian ports would remain in effect.
The official Iranian IRIB news outlet denied Tehran has taken any official position on Trump’s ceasefire extension or future negotiations.
🚨 IRIB EXCLUSIVE “Iran has NOT yet announced an official position on Trump’s claim about extending the ceasefire. Rumors about Iran’s formal agreement are #not_accurate, and no statement has been issued by Iranian officials.”
— IRIB (Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting) (@iribnews_irib) April 22, 2026
The Iranians say the future of negotiations depends on the status of the ongoing blockade of its ports.
Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani stated that Tehran is prepared to negotiate immediately after the United States ends its naval blockade, emphasizing that Washington must first halt its “ceasefire violations.”
He added that while Iran is prepared to negotiate, it is also prepared for war.
Iran Ready for Talks Once US Lifts Naval Blockade, Envoy Says
Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani stated that Tehran is prepared to negotiate immediately after the United States ends its naval blockade, emphasizing that Washington must first halt its “ceasefire violations.” pic.twitter.com/GOxEO8yqzS
Citing data from the Vortexa cargo tracking group, Financial Times is reporting that “at least 34 tankers with links to Iran have bypassed the US blockade since it began.”
CENTCOM, which on Tuesday said the US Navy had directed 28 vessels to turn back to Iranian ports since the blockade was enacted, told us the assertion that dozens of ships bypassed the blockade “is not true.”
Good morning, Asia. While you were sleeping, one of our most-read stories reported that dozens of ships have managed to circumvent the blockade since it began — despite Donald Trump declaring it a ‘tremendous success’. https://t.co/TI52fxy7VQpic.twitter.com/BkOeMke1pR
The Pentagon on Wednesday pushed back on the assertion that the Iranian-linked oil tanker Tifani was seized by the U.S., however, it may be a matter of semantics.
“Seized wouldn’t be accurate at this time,” a Pentagon official told us. “So the way it works is after interdiction the U.S. has 96 hours to determine next steps. That’s where the rest of the interagency comes in. It varies by ship and situation what the solution would be. At this point DoW’s finished its role with just the interdiction.”
“During that 96-hour period, State would make the determination it’s stateless and work through diplomatic channels on where to take it,” the official added. “DHS and Coast Guard could be the ones to escort it. DoE gets involved for the oil, treasury for the sanction, DoJ for the legal elements and warrant. It really is a large, complex coordination effort across the interagency.”
The exact current disposition of the vessel is unclear. We have reached out to the White House for more details.
U.S. forces on Tuesday boarded the Iranian-linked oil tanker M/T Tifani. (Pentagon)
With Iran partially reopening its airspace, the U.S. State Department stated that any U.S. citizens still in the country “should leave Iran now, monitor local media for updates, and consult with commercial carriers for additional information on flights out of Iran.”
Americans seeking to depart Iran “may also depart by land to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Türkiye, and Turkmenistan. U.S. citizens should not travel to Afghanistan, Iraq, or the Pakistan-Iran border area,” the warning added. “Be aware that the Iranian government may prevent U.S. citizens from departing or charge an ‘exit fee’ for departures from Iran. U.S.-Iranian dual nationals must exit Iran on Iranian passports.”
Iran: As of April 21, Iran’s airspace has partially reopened. U.S. citizens should leave Iran now, monitor local media for updates, and consult with commercial carriers for additional information on flights out of Iran. Americans seeking to depart Iran may also depart by land to… pic.twitter.com/yvVIqO0XoJ
During the course of Epic Fury, the U.S. has run through a large amount of advanced munitions, CNN reported.
The list includes about 50% of Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptors, 50% of its Patriot interceptors, 45% of its Precision Strike Missiles, 30% of its Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise Missiles (TLAMs), 20% of its Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff (JDAM) munitions and 20% of its Standard Missiles (SM-3 and SM-6).
Approximate estimates of percentages of U.S. munitions expended in Iran war, per @CNN : 50% THAAD interceptors 50% Patriot interceptors 45% Precision Strike Missiles 30% Tomahawk missiles 20% Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles 20% Standard Missiles (SM-3 and SM-6) https://t.co/1A9TH0zpr5
Given the expenditure of costly defensive munitions used to swat down much cheaper Iranian drones, the U.S. military has introduced Ukrainian counter-drone technology in recent weeks at a key U.S. air base in Saudi Arabia, Reuters reported, citing five people with knowledge of the matter.
“The deployment of a Ukrainian command-and-control platform called Sky Map at Prince Sultan Air Base, which has not previously been reported,” is another sign of Ukrainian battlefield technological advances after more than four years of full-on war with Russia.
WASHINGTON — Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger met privately with President Trump and administration officials Wednesday to press for federal support and yet-unpaid wildfire recovery funding as the region continues to rebuild from the 2025 fires.
“This afternoon we met with President Trump and Administration officials to advocate for families who lost everything,” Bass and Barger said in a statement. “We had a very positive discussion about FEMA and other rebuilding funds as well as the support of the President to continue joining us in pressuring the insurance companies to pay what they owe — and for the big banks to step up to ease the financial pressure on L.A. families.”
Barger said the two leaders had a “high-level discussion” with the president in the Oval Office, sharing stories about what fire survivors are experiencing day to day. She added that “we left details behind with the President,” but did not specify whether Trump made any funding or policy promises during the meeting.
“First and foremost, today’s meeting was to thank the President for his initial support of infusing federal resources to expedite debris removal, as well as his recent tweet about insurance companies, which have already proven fruitful,” she said in a statement provided to The Times.
Bass was similarly reserved about the discussions, telling reporters that “we will follow up with the details,” but signaled progress is being made on federal support.
“I think what’s important is that we certainly got the president’s support in terms of, you know, what is needed, and then the appropriate people were in the room for us to follow up. And that was Russ Vought, who is the head of the Office of Management and budget,” Bass told KNX on Wednesday.
The meeting comes on the heels of a yearlong standoff between California leaders and the Trump administration over wildfire recovery funding, disaster response and whether the federal government should have a say in local rebuilding permitting.
California leaders, led by Gov. Gavin Newsom, have accused the Trump administration of withholding billions in critical wildfire aid, prompting a lawsuit over stalled recovery funds. Officials allege political bias in the delay of billions of dollars from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Newsom visited Washington in December. When he made his rounds on Capitol Hill, he met with five lawmakers, including three who serve on the Senate and House appropriations committees, to renew calls for $33.9 billion in federal aid for Los Angeles County fire recovery.
But the governor said he was denied a meeting with FEMA and would not say whether he had attempted to meet with Trump to discuss the issue.
Bass, meanwhile, appears to have found a path to the president on a subject that has been paramount for her community.
The fruitful meeting comes after Trump lobbed insults at the mayor at a news conference earlier this year, where he called her “incompetent” for how she handled last year’s wildfire recovery efforts. He alleged that under Bass’ leadership, the city’s delay in issuing local building permits will take years when it should have taken “two or three days.”
California officials, including Newsom, have urged the Trump administration to send Congress a formal request for the $33.9 billion in recovery aid needed to rebuild homes, schools, utilities and other critical infrastructure destroyed or damaged when the fires tore through neighborhoods more than 15 months ago.
What Bass and Barger’s meeting with the president ultimately produces remains to be seen.
The billions in recovery aid have not yet materialized, but the meeting could potentially give those discussions new momentum.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment about the meeting.
Earlier this month, Trump criticized insurance provider State Farm on Truth Social for its handling of the devastating Los Angeles County wildfires. He accused the insurance giant of abandoning its policyholders when tragedy struck.
“It was brought to my attention that the Insurance Companies, in particular, State Farm, have been absolutely horrible to people that have been paying them large Premiums for years, only to find that when tragedy struck, these horrendous Companies were not there to help!” Trump wrote.
But the rebuke didn’t come out of the blue. It stemmed from a controversial February visit to Los Angeles by Trump administration officials.
Trump tapped Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin in an effort to strip California state and local governments of their authority to permit the rebuilding of homes destroyed in the Eaton and Palisades fires.
Within the week, Zeldin was in Los Angeles, bashing Newsom and Los Angeles officials at a roundtable with fire victims and reporters, saying that residents were suffering from “bureaucratic, red tape delays and incompetency” and that leadership was “denying them … the ability to rebuild their lives”.
After these meetings, Trump directed Zeldin to investigate the insurers’ responses. State Farm, facing roughly $7 billion in fire-related claims, is also under formal investigation by California’s insurance commissioner over its handling of the crisis.
Despite tensions with the administration, Bass and Barger appeared confident that progress was being made on the insurance and funding issues.
“Our job is to fight for our communities,” their joint statement concluded. “When it comes to this recovery, our federal partners are essential, and we are grateful for the support of the President.”
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it seized two ships and damaged a third after the vessels “ignored repeated warnings.” British maritime monitors confirmed the incidents, describing one cargo ship left disabled in the water and another that took heavy damage to its bridge.
“Disrupting order and safety in the Strait of Hormuz is considered a red line for Iran,” the Iranian Navy Command said in a statement.
Hours before, President Trump confirmed he would maintain the naval blockade in the gulf, but agreed to give Iranian leaders additional time to agree on a new peace proposal, he wrote in a Truth Social post.
“Based on the fact that the Government of Iran is seriously fractured, not unexpectedly so and, upon the request of Field Marshal Asim Munir, and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, of Pakistan, we have been asked to hold our Attack on the Country of Iran until such time as their leaders and representatives can come up with a unified proposal,” Trump wrote Tuesday.
More than a dozen American warships have prevented exports from leaving Iranian ports since peace talks in Islamabad failed earlier this month. The tactic has greatly constrained Iranian oil exports — about 90% of which flow through the Strait of Hormuz — contributing to rising inflationary pressure.
The restrictions could wipe out roughly $435 million in daily economic activity, according to Miad Maleki, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Oil exports, Tehran’s primary revenue source, have halted. At the same time, Iran has been unable to import food or industrial goods. As a result, the blockade is expected to empty Iran’s war coffers and sharply accelerate inflationary effects on its people.
Trump is betting that the strategy will force Iran’s fractured negotiating team — which appears to be split between parliamentary moderates and hard-liners within the Revolutionary Guard — to agree on a “unified” peace proposal.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said Wednesday the president extended the ceasefire agreement to allow Iran to get their “act together,” and emphasized that Trump has not given Iran a “firm deadline” to respond yet.
“President Trump will ultimately dictate the timeline and he will do so when he feels it is in the best interest of the United States and the American people,” Leavitt told reporters.
Though she declined to specify who the administration is negotiating with in Iran, Leavitt said the president was “generously offering a bit of flexibility” to the regime so that they can come up with a unified response.
“This is a battle between the pragmatists and the hard-liners in Iran right now,” Leavitt told reporters at the White House.
That division was visible earlier this week when plans for a second round of talks in Islamabad collapsed after Iranian officials failed to confirm participation and instead introduced new preconditions under pressure from hard-line factions.
Iranian Parliament Speaker Bagher Ghalibaf initially signaled a willingness to attend talks, but was overshadowed by Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Maj. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi, who insisted that the United States lift its blockade before discussions could begin. A report by the Institute for the Study of War said Vahidi sought to derail negotiations rather than secure meaningful economic relief.
“One challenge with the ongoing negotiations is the divided nature of Iran’s negotiating team,” the report said, adding that “[Trump’s] reference to a ‘unified’ proposal appears to imply that previous proposals were not unified in some way.”
And while hard-liners continue attempts to derail diplomacy with continued demands and attacks in the strait, moderates in Iran continue to push for peace.
This week, prominent Sunni cleric Moulana Abdol Hamid called a “fair agreement” the only viable path forward and warned that those who seek to block negotiations would bear responsibility for the “homeland’s devastation.”
Benjamin Radd, a political scientist at UCLA who studies Iran, said the dispute is a sign of a larger power struggle for control of Tehran’s government.
“There are clear divisions within the leadership,” Radd said in an interview. “Right now, it’s the IRGC faction that has all the power. They have the guns, they have the weapons. What they don’t have is the diplomatic connections and experience dealing with the United States.”
Radd pointed to the economic toll of the U.S. blockade as a key driver of tension inside Iran.
“They’re facing a huge domestic crisis,” he said. “They’re not able to replenish their own needs. Nothing can get in or out of the country. They can’t make any money.”
The consequences of the U.S. strategy could push the more moderate Iranian leaders to strike a deal on nuclear enrichment or a reopening of the strait in exchange for the United States lifting the blockade, Radd said.
“That would start rebuilding some sort of trust,” Radd said. “And then we’re seeing the IRGC is basically steadfast, refusing to do any of this.”
With renewed Israeli attacks in Lebanon killing at least three people Wednesday, despite a 10-day ceasefire agreement, Iranian leaders are preparing for the possibility that talks with the United States will fail altogether.
“Iran has prepared for a new phase of fighting,” the IRGC-affiliated Tasnim News Agency reported this week, citing military redeployments and updated target lists.
Meanwhile, Iranian Judiciary Chief Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejei warned that renewed U.S. or Israeli strikes were likely. Iran Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei made a similar statement in a news briefing Wednesday. He announced the country’s armed forces were “on high alert” and ready to defend against any threat, while being open to Pakistan’s mediation efforts.
He did not confirm if the government was participating in a second round of negotiations.
“Diplomacy is a tool for ensuring national interests and security,” he said, “and we will take the necessary steps whenever we conclude that the necessary and logical grounds exist to use this tool to achieve national interests.”
Until then, it appears both Washington and Tehran will continue brinkmanship in the strait.
On Wednesday morning, the IRGC released a statement confirming it seized the two cargo ships and identified them as the MSC Francesca and the Epaminondas. It claimed the MSC Francesca was linked to Israel and accused both of “jeopardizing maritime security by operating without necessary permits and tampering with navigation systems.”
A third ship, the Euphoria, which sails under the Panamanian flag and is owned by a company based in the United Arab Emirates, was fired upon early Wednesday while heading east out of the Strait of Hormuz, according to Vanguard, a maritime intelligence firm.
The Euphoria later resumed sailing toward the Gulf of Oman, according to Lloyd’s List.
In Lebanon, Amal Khalil became the fourth journalist killed by Israeli fire since hostilities with the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah intensified on March 2.
Khalil’s body was reported to have been found under the rubble of a house where she and freelance photographer Zeinab Faraj were sheltering, according to their colleagues.
Khalil and Faran were in the southern Lebanese town of Al-Tayri, covering developments there when an Israeli attack targeted the vehicle in front of them, killing its occupants.
The two journalists then sheltered in a house but were hit by Israeli fire once more, according to a statement from the Lebanese Health Ministry.
When Red Cross crews scrambled to the area to rescue the trapped journalists, they were targeted with a sound bomb and machine-gun fire.
The Israeli military said it was not preventing rescue teams from reaching the area and that the incident was under review. It acknowledged targeting a vehicle it said had come out of a structure used by Hezbollah and was heading toward Israeli troops.
The Red Cross reached the house by the early evening local time, and rescued Faraj, who is reported to be in stable condition after undergoing surgery for a head wound, according to her colleagues.
Times staff writers Ana Ceballos in Washington and Nabih Bulos in Beirut contributed to this report.
United States President Donald Trump has described the Iranian leadership as “seriously fractured” as he announced an extension to a ceasefire.
Trump said on Tuesday that the ceasefire would be extended to allow more time for negotiations and appeared to be suggesting that Iran’s leadership is in disarray.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
He added that the US naval blockade on the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian ports would remain in place.
Three weeks ago, Trump claimed the US military campaign had succeeded in its goal of forcing a change in Iran’s government and the US was now dealing with “a whole new set of people” in charge of the country.
On April 11, Iran sent a delegation led by parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf to Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, to begin talks with the US.
So is Iran’s government “fractured”? We take a look at the key Iranian stakeholders and power centres in Iran and how their approach to US negotiations may differ.
Who are the key figures in Iran, and are they ‘fractured’ over talks with the US?
Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei
Khamenei is the second son of former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli air strikes on Tehran on the first day of the war on February 28. Mojtaba Khamenei was selected as Iran’s new supreme leader on March 8, according to state media reports.
The 56-year old has never run for office or been elected but has for decades been a highly influential figure in the inner circle of his father, cultivating deep ties with the the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Observers said the younger Khamenei’s ascension is a clear sign that more hardline factions in Iran’s establishment have retained power and could indicate that the government has little desire to agree to a deal or negotiations with the US in the short term.
Since his ascension, however, Mojtaba Khamenei has not been seen in public. On March 13, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth claimed Iran’s new supreme leader had been wounded in US-Israeli strikes.
An April 11, a Reuters news agency report that quoted three people close to the supreme leader’s inner circle said Khamenei was still recovering from severe facial and leg injuries suffered in the air strike that killed his father. The sources were quoted as saying he was taking part in meetings with senior officials through audioconferencing.
Al Jazeera could not independently verify these claims.
According to state media reports, Khamenei has been active in making decisions on the war.
In a message read on Iranian state TV on April 18, Khamenei warned that the Iranian navy was ready to inflict “new bitter defeats” on the US and Israel as tensions escalated in the Strait of Hormuz.
Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf
Ghalibaf, 64, has served as Iran’s parliamentary speaker since 2020.
He was commander of the IRGC air force from 1997 to 2000. After that, he served as the country’s police chief. From 2005 to 2017, he was the mayor of Tehran.
Ghalibaf stood in elections for president in 2005, 2013, 2017 and 2024. He withdrew his bid for president before the election in 2017 when Hassan Rouhani won a second term.
Last month in the early days of the US-Israel war on Iran, it was suggested that Ghalibaf was the Trump administration’s “pick” to lead the country after the war ended. He has also been the main Iranian official leading negotiations with Washington since they began on April 11 in Pakistan.
In an overnight post on X on Tuesday, Ghalibaf wrote that Iran is “prepared to reveal new cards on the battlefield” after Trump threatened Tehran with “problems like they’ve never seen before” if the two-week ceasefire ended this week without a deal.
Ghalibaf expressed anger at Trump for “imposing a siege and violating the ceasefire”.
“We do not accept negotiations under the shadow of threats, and in the past two weeks, we have prepared to reveal new cards on the battlefield,” he said.
The ceasefire was supposed to have ended on Wednesday, but shortly before its expiration, Trump extended it until Iran “can come up with a unified proposal”.
Within Iran, however, Ghalibaf’s willingness to engage in negotiations with the US has been criticised by some people who have accused him of “betrayal”.
According to a report on Monday by the Iran International TV channel, some critics of Ghalibaf have said on social media platforms in Iran that the parliamentary speaker’s suggestion that peace talks with the US were progressing was “worrying”.
“There is no good in negotiation except harm,” one critic said.
But Ghalibaf has defended undertaking negotiations with the US. In a televised interview on Saturday, he said diplomacy does not mean “a withdrawal from Iran’s demands” but is a way to “consolidate military gains and translate them into political outcomes and lasting peace”.
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
Iran’s military power structure is often described as opaque and complex.
The nation operates parallel armies, multiple intelligence services and layered command structures, all of which answer directly to the supreme leader, who serves as the commander in chief of all the armed forces.
The parallel armies comprise the Artesh, Iran’s regular army, which is responsible for territorial defence, defence of Iran’s airspace and conventional warfare, and the IRGC, whose role goes beyond defence and includes protecting Iran’s political structure.
The IRGC also controls Iran’s airspace and drone arsenal, which has become the backbone of Iran’s deterrence strategy against attacks by Israel and the US.
After the US and Israel struck Iran and killed Ali Khamenei, the IRGC promised revenge and launched what it called “the heaviest offensive operations in the history of the armed forces of the Islamic Republic against occupied lands [a reference to Israel] and the bases of American terrorists”. Since then, it has struck US military assets and infrastructure across the Gulf region.
Some experts said Iranian officials negotiating with the US are more closely aligned with the IRGC than other leaders and groups.
In an interview with Al Jazeera on March 25, Babak Vahdad, a political analyst specialising in Iran, noted that Iran’s appointment of Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr as secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council suggested Iranian negotiations would become more tightly aligned with the IRGC’s priorities. Zolghadr is a former IRGC commander and has been secretary of the advisory Expediency Council since 2023.
But Javad Heiran-Nia, who directs the Persian Gulf Studies Group at the Center for Scientific Research and Middle East Strategic Studies in Iran, said a divide between the IRGC and Iran’s negotiating team was plain to see.
Iran has attacked three cargo ships in the Strait of Hormuz since Trump announced the ceasefire on April 6 and said the US naval blockade will remain.
“The attack on tankers during the ceasefire demonstrates the IRGC’s dominance over the diplomatic team and its disregard for their positions,” he told Al Jazeera.
IRGC members attend an exercise in southern Iran on February 16, 2026 [Handout/IRGC via West Asia News Agency and Reuters]
Paydari Front
Heiran-Nia pointed to the role of the Paydari Front (Steadfastness Front), whose members are hardliners within Iran’s political structure who are deeply committed to preserving the original principles of the 1979 Islamic revolution and the absolute power of the supreme leader. This group, he said, has been using the negotiations to cement its position within the power structure and among its support base.
He added that the Paydari Front has also been questioning the negotiations.
“In Iran’s current political climate, various groups are trying to raise their weight, both within the power structure and in public opinion. Of course, the Paydari Front’s efforts are more meaningful in relation to their own support base rather than trying to influence other segments of society because their hardline approach holds no appeal for other social classes,” he said.
The influence this group could have over the progress of talks is debatable, however, he added.
“If a deal is reached, it will likely have a sovereign character. The establishment will impose its own narrative, and the IRGC will accept it. In the meantime, the hardliners will attack the administration of [President] Masoud Pezeshkian and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf over the deal. However, it is unlikely that this will spread to the decision-making body of the establishment,” he added.
Lori Chavez-DeRemer seemed at first to be a good Trump hire as Labor secretary. Wow, were we wrong
It has long become clear that those of us who saw a glimmer of hope in President Trump’s appointment of Lori Chavez-DeRemer as secretary of Labor got snowed.
It wasn’t just, or even chiefly, the miasma of sleaze and corruption that seemed to surround her wherever she went. Or her slavish sucking up to Trump in public, notably at a Cabinet meeting in which she pleaded with Trump to send his immigration goons into Portland, Ore., to “crack down.” (“Thank you for what you’re doing with your agents on ICE,” she said at the August 2025 session.) Fun fact: She had represented a Portland suburb as a Republican for a single House term.
No. It was the gulf between the expectations, even among Democrats, that she might be a decent pick for the job, and the reality.
We fought against sweatshopsWe took on big co. rporations that were cheating their employees. We kept workers safe.
— Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich, recalling his departments accomplishments under Bill Clinton
After all, she had been one of only three Republicans in the House to vote in favor of the so-called PRO Act, which would significantly strengthen collective bargaining rights. (The measure passed the House in 2019 and 2021 but hasn’t gotten out of committee in the current Congress.)
As I reported after her nomination, labor activists and pro-labor politicians made encouraging noises about her. Among them was Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.): “It’s a big deal that one of the few Republican lawmakers who have endorsed the PRO Act could lead the Department of Labor,” Warren said. “If Chavez-DeRemer commits as Labor secretary to strengthen labor unions and promote worker power, she’s a strong candidate for the job.”
Get the latest from Michael Hiltzik
Commentary on economics and more from a Pulitzer Prize winner.
By continuing, you agree to our Terms of Service, which include arbitration and a class action waiver. You agree that we and our third-party vendors may collect and use your information, including through cookies, pixels and similar technologies, for the purposes set forth in our Privacy Policy such as personalizing your experience and ads.
She received an explicit endorsement from Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. “Her record suggests real support of workers & their right to unionize,” Weingarten tweeted. “I hope it means the Trump admin will actually respect collective bargaining and workers’ voices from Teamsters to teachers.”
The betting was that Chavez-DeRemer would be, at the very least, an upgrade from Trump’s previous appointee as Labor secretary during his first term. That was Eugene Scalia, son of the late Supreme Court justice, who had been a lawyer for big corporations fighting unions and resisting workplace regulations.
The most commonly expressed doubt about Chavez-DeRemer was whether she would have the fortitude to maintain a pro-labor stance in the face of the open hostility to workers displayed by Trump and the rest of his administration.
Within months, the answer was clear, and it was no. In May, she ceased enforcing a Biden administration rule that had discouraged businesses from designating their workers as independent contractors, depriving those workers of the legal protections and wage and hour benefits they would have received as employees.
The budget she submitted to Congress last year would slash her agency’s discretionary funding by more than 35%, to $8.6 billion from $13.2 billion, and cut its workforce by nearly 4,000 full-time workers, or more than 26%. In July she announced a plan to rescind 63 regulations that had been designed to help workers.
With language that sounded cribbed from the MAGA playbook, she said her goal is to “eliminate unnecessary regulations that stifle growth and limit opportunity.” Most of the regulations facing the guillotine related to worker health and safety protections.
Brief as it was, Chavez-DeRemer’s tenure wasn’t the first time that the Department of Labor was ill-served by its management. Republican presidents have displayed a decades-long tendency to fill the top spot with political cronies or pro-business activists masquerading as worker advocates, or worse.
Frances Perkins, Franklin Roosevelt’s Labor secretary, recalled having to clean up the agency — not just morally and ethically, but with broom and bucket, when she took over from William Nuckles Doak, Herbert Hoover’s appointee.
The Labor Department was located in a converted apartment building, its interior dark and foreboding, its shadowy corners occupied by silent, hulking men whom Perkins mentally labeled “cigar in the corner of the mouth types. Stale ashtrays and spittoons were everywhere, along with wastebaskets surrounded by mounds of misaimed and crumpled papers. (Its current Washington quarters are in the Frances Perkins Building.)
Doak didn’t seem inclined to leave the premises. Perkins got rid of him by sending him to lunch and packing up his personal effects while he was out.
Perkins’ first step as secretary was to disband an anti-immigrant squad that shook down foreign-born laborers for cash and helped employers harass labor organizers. She set a high standard for the agency, pushing forward legislation establishing the 40-hour workweek and the National Labor Relations Board — and also creating Social Security.
Many of Perkins’ Democratic successors have watched sadly as their efforts have been undone with a change in administrations. Robert Reich, who served under Bill Clinton (and is now an emeritus professor of public policy at UC Berkeley and an assiduous blogger), wrote Tuesday of having loved the agency’s mission: “to protect and raise the standard of living of working Americans.”
With Reich at Labor, the Clinton administration raised the federal minimum wage in 1997 from $3.35 an hour, where it had been stuck since 1980, to $5.15 (albeit still a cheeseparing $10.69 in today’s buying power). “We fought against sweatshops,” Reich recalled. “We took on big corporations that were cheating their employees. We kept workers safe.”
That the agency has been “treated like crap is an insult to generations of hardworking DOL employees, to American workers, to America,” Reich wrote.
Under Trump, the Department of Labor has become just another pro-business front pretending to advocate for workers. Genuine labor advocates are infuriated by its decline, which has proceeded under Republican and Democratic administrations alike.
The budget for its all-important wage and hour division, which enforces laws governing the minimum wage, overtime and prohibitions on child labor, has shrunk by 26% over a decade, according to David Weil, who headed the division under Obama and whose appointment by Biden to head the division was derailed by opposition from Big Business.
“There were 1,050 investigators working for the agency when I had the honor to lead it in the Obama administration,” Weil, who is a professor of social policy and management at Brandeis University, wrote last year. “It has barely over one-half that number now. The agency had 63 times more investigators per workplace in 1939 than in 2024.”
Trump poses as a pro-worker force, but his policies are atrocious for the laboring class. His Labor Department “walked away from a rule that expanded overtime protections to millions of workers,” Weil observed.
“While Congress’s ‘big beautiful bill’ boasts its worker-friendly removal of taxes on overtime, that provision benefits only a small slice of workers and revoking the overtime regulation further reduces the number of workers eligible for overtime protections when working long hours,” he wrote. “Or take the administration’s attack on low-paid workers whose employers hold federal contracts, by rescinding a $15 minimum wage for contractors covered by a Biden-era executive order, which benefited construction workers, purportedly a key Trump constituency.”
The Labor Department plays a role not only in regulating current workplace conditions but looking ahead at the “long-term prospects of our labor markets,” Weil told me Tuesday. “For example, the discussion of ‘affordability’ is rooted not only in rapidly rising price levels but also the low level of long-term earnings growth. Equally, our beliefs about the future prospects of employment and opportunity for college-educated workers are being upended by the potential impacts of AI.”
He added, “Questions like these require that the Labor Department be led by serious and knowledgeable individuals who place the interests of workers as their focus. So far, this administration has shown contempt for this mission,” as is shown by the decline and fall of Chavez-DeRemer.
Sometimes, the departure of an underperforming executive or official presages improvements ahead. That hasn’t been the pattern under Trump, and sadly, it’s not likely to happen at Labor.
April 22 (UPI) —Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell‘s term is nearing its end and President Donald Trump is pushing for his replacement but an investigation into Powell may hold up the appointment of a new chair.
The Justice Department opened an investigation into Powell over the renovation of the Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington, D.C., which Trump claims has exceeded $3 billion. The renovation was not the beginning of Trump’s feud with Powell but it has added to his effort to oust the chairman before the end of his term.
Powell’s term as chairman of the Federal Reserve will end in May but he will remain on the Board of Governors until January 2028.
Typically when a Fed chair’s term ends, they resign. However, Powell said he plans to stay put until a replacement is appointed.
At least one lawmaker, Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said he would not vote on a new chairman until the investigation into Powell is over.
The Justice Department alleges that Powell made false or misleading statements to Congress about the cost of the renovation project at the Federal Reserve headquarters during his testimony to the House Committee on Financial Services in June.
Powell’s testimony was part of his semiannual report to Congress on monetary policy.
Following the hearing, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., submitted a request to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi for Powell to be investigated for perjury and making false statements. Luna said that Powell denied there would be “luxury features” included in the renovations, including a “VIP dining room, premium marble, water features and a roof terrace garden.”
Luna added that Powell “falsely claimed that the Eccles building ‘never had’ a serious renovation.” She notes that the building underwent renovations in 1999 and 2003.
“These are not minor misstatements,” Luna said. “Chairman Powell knowingly misled both Congress and executive branch officials about the true nature of a taxpayer-funded project. Lying under oath is a serious offense — especially from someone tasked with overseeing our monetary system and public trust.”
No charges have been formally filed against Powell. The challenge the Justice Department faces in convicting Powell of perjury or false statements is in proving that he willfully, knowingly made statements he knew to be false at the time.
Powell, who was Trump’s nominee for chairman in 2017, has said that the investigation into him and the Federal Reserve renovation is “pretext” to punish him for not following Trump’s direction to lower interest rates.
“No one, certainly not the chair of the Federal Reserve, is above the law, but this unprecedented action should be seen in the broader context of the administration’s threats and ongoing pressure,” Powell said in a video message in January. “This is about whether the Feed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions — or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.”
Last month, federal prosecutor George A. Massucco-LaTaif told Chief U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg that the Justice Department does not know of any evidence that a crime has been committed in the Federal Reserve renovation project.
“We do not know at this time,” Massucco-LaTaif said. “However, there are 1.2 billion reasons for us to look into it.”
The fissure between Powell and Trump began and has continued over the Federal Reserve’s decision to maintain elevated interest rates in response to inflation. Trump has repeatedly called on the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates, saying the United States should “have the lowest interest rate in the world.”
All along the Federal Reserve continues to hold an elevated interest rate, currently between 3.5% and 3.75%, in an effort to tame inflation. Its target rate of inflation is 2% on an annual basis.
Trump has nominated Kevin Warsh to succeed Powell. Warsh served on the Fed’s board for five years after being appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006.
“I have known Kevin for a long period of time, and have no doubt that he will go down as one of the great Fed chairmen, maybe the best,” Trump posted on social media in January. “On top of everything else, he is ‘central casting,’ and he will never let you down.”
Warsh faced his first hearing on the path toward confirmation on Tuesday when he testified before the Senate Banking Committee. Questions by senators centered on the Federal Reserve’s independence, something Trump’s influence has called into question.
Presidents have butted heads with the Federal Reserve throughout its history, as monetary policy can reflect on how the U.S. population views the president’s performance. A president has never tried to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve.
The Federal Reserve is a non-partisan, independent agency made up of a board of governors posted in Washington, D.C., and 12 regional banks located across the United States.
Independence is key to the Federal Reserve’s function, keeping it from choosing policy based on the political goals of those occupying the White House and other branches of government.
Trump has not attempted to fire Powell yet but he did attempt to fire Fed board Gov. Lisa Cook. The attempt was unsuccessful as the U.S. Supreme Court intervened in October and ruled that she can remain at her post on an interim basis, at least for 2026.
The president does have some authority over choosing or designating a new Federal Reserve chair, Peter Shane, a constitutional law scholar in residence at NYU Law School, told UPI. However, a president must demonstrate a good reason for doing so.
There are two mechanisms in place that are meant to protect the independence of the Federal Reserve and its chair from political influence.
First, there is Supreme Court precedent. In 1935, the high court made a ruling in the landmark case Humphrey’s Executor vs. the United States. In this case, the court ruled that President Franklin D. Roosevelt could not fire the commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, another independent agency, without cause.
The ruling affirmed that the authority to remove the head of any independent agency falls to Congress.
Second, there is the Federal Reserve Act. President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 to decentralize the control over monetary policy in the United States. This established the Federal Reserve and set its independence as a foundational feature of its existence.
The Federal Reserve Act makes the Federal Reserve independent in setting monetary policy without the influence of the president or Congress.
Congress has the ability to change the Federal Reserve Act. It did so in 1977 with the Federal Reserve Reform Act.
This amendment, signed into law by President Jimmy Carter, codified the objectives of the agency and established a requirement for the board of governors to report to Congress in hearings twice a year. It also added the requirement of Senate confirmation hearings for the chairman and vice chairman of the board of governors.
Last year, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., introduced the Federal Reserve Board Abolition Act, calling for the board of governors of the Federal Reserve and all Federal Reserve banks to be abolished.
“Americans have suffered under crippling inflation and the Federal Reserve is to blame,” Massie said in a statement.
Since being introduced in March 2025 the bill has not progressed beyond being referred to the House Committee on Financial Services.
FBI Director Kash Patel speaks during a press conference at Department of Justice Headquarters on Tuesday. The Trump Administration announced charges against the Southern Poverty Law Center, which the government alleges funneled over $3 million toward white supremacist and extremists groups. Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo
Steve Hilton is a former Fox News host who has unexpectedly emerged as a leading candidate in the race for governor with a message that California is a failed state in need of radical reform.
But his sudden rise in California politics comes a decade and a half after he pitched the U.K. Conservative Party with a very different idea: Britain could learn a lot from the Golden State.
Back in 2010, when Hilton was a top strategist during David Cameron’s rise to power as Conservative prime minister, he looked to Silicon Valley’s high-charged ethos of techno-optimism and green innovation for inspiration as he sought to revitalize the ailing Conservative Party and the U.K.
Splitting his time between London and the Bay Area — his wife worked for Google — Hilton was instrumental in getting California companies to invest in the U.K. and persuading Google to open its first wholly owned and designed building outside the U.S. in London. So infatuated was he with California that one British political commentator dubbed the Cameron administration’s philosophy ”Thatcherism on a surfboard.”
But Hilton is now utterly unsparing in his criticism of California.
After moving to the Bay Area full time, teaching at Stanford University and hosting Fox News’ “The Next Revolution,” Hilton is running as a Republican on a platform of “Making California Golden Again.”
To the dismay of many Democrats, the 56-year-old British immigrant, a supporter of President Trump who dubs California “America’s worst-run state,” is ahead in multiple polls in a crowded race with no front-runner.
Even after former Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell dropped out April 12 after multiple women accused him of sexual assault, Democrats are struggling to unite around one candidate. And Trump’s endorsement of Hilton this month almost seems to guarantee Hilton will secure enough Republican votes to make it past the June primary.
Hilton accuses Democratic leaders of turning the state into the “Wuhan lab of modern leftism.” As Democrats amassed power in Sacramento, seizing control of statewide offices and the Legislature, he argues, California government has become “a massive, bloated, bureaucratic nanny state,” so overregulated and poorly run, it is failing its people.
“We have the highest poverty rate in the country in California, tied with Louisiana, which is shameful, really, for a state that prides itself on being the home of innovation and opportunity,” he told The Times. “We’re ranked by U.S. News and World Report 50 out of 50 for opportunity. The performance of California, when measured against the rest of the country, is really dire.”
Most California voters rank affordability and cost of living as important as they weigh whom to elect as governor. But whether Hilton can persuade them that Democrats are responsible for the state’s problems, or make inroads as a Republican aligned with Trump on immigration and abortion, is unlikely in a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly two to one.
Many Californians who do not watch Fox News know little about Hilton. Even some of Britain’s political observers who followed Hilton for years admit it’s been a struggle at times to make sense of his political odyssey.
Dubbed a “barefoot revolutionary” for his habit of striding around Downing Street without shoes, Hilton was credited with pulling the Conservatives into the 21st century and ushering in a more green, socially liberal strain of British conservatism. He helped turn around their image by highlighting climate change and supporting gay marriage.
Fraser Nelson, a columnist for the Times in London, said Hilton had been seen in Britain as a figure closer to Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom than to Trump.
“When he popped up on Fox, it was like somebody reborn,” Nelson said. “Somebody who seemed to be on the left of politics was somehow on the Trumpish right. We thought it was like a joke. I’m not saying he is not sincere, just … the political journey of Steve Hilton … to being Newsom’s nemesis is something to behold.”
Born in London to Hungarian refugees who fled their homeland during the 1956 revolution, Hilton grew up in a household without much money.
After studying at Oxford University, a life-changing experience for a son of immigrants, Hilton worked at Conservative Party headquarters and as an ad executive on the Conservatives’ 1997 election campaign. When Labour’s Tony Blair won in a landslide, Hilton co-founded a consulting firm, Good Business, advising corporations on how to make money by investing in social and environmental causes.
In 2001, Hilton voted Green. But he returned to the Conservative fold in 2005 to try to detoxify the Tory brand. As an author of the party’s 2010 manifesto, he came up with Cameron’s “Big Society” agenda, which sought to scale back the state and hand more power to local communities. Critics, however, argued that the focus on local control was a fig leaf for austerity and dismantling the welfare state.
When Cameron won in 2010, Hilton infuriated colleagues in the coalition government, the British pressreported, proposing a stream of wacky ideas: scrapping maternity leave, abolishing job centers, even buying cloud-bursting technology so Britain would have more sunshine.
Hilton ultimately became disillusioned with Westminster, deciding U.K. politics was stymied by excessive bureaucracy. In 2012, he moved full time to the Bay Area.
Hilton says he was drawn to California because of its “rebel spirit.”
But what he liked about California was the specific Silicon Valley ethos of disruption that emphasized meritocracy and risk-taking, not the state’s ascendant liberal identity politics.
Hilton settled in California precisely when Democrats were consolidating their political and cultural power. Just months after his move, Democrats gained full control of the Legislature with a two-thirds supermajority.
Meanwhile, populism was rising across the U.S. and Britain.
On the 2016 Brexit referendum on whether the U.K. should leave the European Union, Hilton was firmly pro Leave.
Hilton also disagreed with many fellow conservatives on Trump. In November 2016, George Osborne, chancellor of the exchequer under Cameron, watched the U.S. election on Hilton’s couch in Atherton, Calif. “Steve was the only person in the room who said, ‘I think Donald Trump’s going to win,’” Osborne said. “I think he identifies with Trump, although they’re obviously very different. … The outsider challenging the system.”
After the election, Hilton joined Fox News as a contributor and in 2017 was given his own Sunday night show, “The Next Revolution.” Produced out of Los Angeles, it explored populism in the U.S. and globally.
Like many conservatives, Hilton became agitated in 2020 by the COVID-19 lockdowns and Black Lives Matter protests that swept U.S. cities.
Early in the pandemic, Hilton invited Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of health policy at Stanford, to discuss COVID-19 after his study in Santa Clara County indicated the virus was more widespread and less deadly than initially thought. Bhattacharya argued the best path forward was not a general lockdown, but focused protection of the vulnerable. California leaders went on to impose some of the nation’s most stringent lockdowns.
After Joe Biden defeated Trump in November 2020, Hilton repeated Trump’s false allegations of voter fraud on air and called for an investigation.
Hilton became a U.S. citizen in 2021. Asked how his worldview changed in 2020, Hilton said: “I don’t think it changed. I think it actually enhanced my skepticism of centralized bureaucracy and it made me even more determined to dismantle it in California, because you saw all the worst features of it in California.”
In 2023, Hilton left Fox to launch a supposedly nonpartisan policy group, Golden Together, to develop “common sense” solutions to California’s problems. Two years later, he published “Califailure: Reversing the Ruin of America’s Worst-Run State,” a screed against Democrats. He accused them of spending “their time — and taxpayers’ money — pushing increasingly fringe race, gender, and ‘climate’ extremism instead of attending to the basics of good governance.”
A month later, Hilton announced he was running for governor “to make this beautiful state, that we love so much, truly golden again.”
On the campaign trail, Hilton has pledged to slash taxes, make housing more affordable and bring the cost of gas down to $3 a gallon. But how he plans to achieve some of these goals is controversial.
Hilton advocates scaling back environmental regulations. State agencies such as the California Coastal Commission and the California Air Resources Board, he argues, are a “massive roadblock” to housing development.
To lower gasoline prices, Hilton would ramp up California domestic production of oil and natural gas and reduce regulations on refineries.
Hilton would likely struggle to persuade a majority of voters to roll back environmental protections. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, about 55% of Californians think stricter state environmental regulations are worth the cost, while 43% believe they hurt the economy and jobs market.
Hilton is also at odds with most Californians on major issues from immigration to abortion.
If elected, he would foster more local cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and rescind state healthcare to undocumented immigrants. He would work with states such as Louisiana to extradite California doctors accused of prescribing and mailing abortion pills to women in states where abortion is illegal. He would also establish a Covid Accountability Commission to examine officials’ decisions during the pandemic.
Asked if Newsom and other Democrats could face prosecution, Hilton said: “They need to be held accountable for these crimes.”
With Trump in the White House, 2026 is a difficult year to mount a right-wing populist campaign for California governor, said Christian Grose, a professor of political science and public policy at USC.
“That message of ‘Newsom and the Democrats have been a disaster for California,’ that’s like, if you’re running in South Carolina,” Grose said. “It’s a caricature of California. While many California voters think there have been problems and the state is not doing as well, a Fox News presentation for East Coast viewers … that’s not going to win 50%.”
To make inroads past the primary, Grose said, Hilton would need to focus on governance and affordability and ditch the anti-Democratic red meat: “He has to massively soft pedal the kind of Fox News conservative stuff.”
Hilton’s Republican rival in the race, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, has questioned Hilton’s MAGA credentials, raising his green advocacy in the U.K. to cast him as an unprincipled opportunist.
Hilton, however, said he considers himself a “very strong environmentalist.” The problem, he argued, is the movement has become too narrowly focused on climate change and CO2 reduction. As crude oil production within California has fallen in recent decades and refineries have closed, he questioned California importing the bulk of its oil from as far away as Iraq and Ecuador.
“We are shipping oil halfway across the world in giant supertankers that run on bunker fuel, the most polluting form of transportation you can think of, rather than producing in Kern County and sending it in a nice, clean pipeline to the refineries in Long Beach,” Hilton said. “It’s total insanity. We are increasing carbon emissions in the name of climate change.”
Some political observers in the U.K. argue that Hilton’s questioning of California’s policy isn’t necessarily intellectually inconsistent.
“Perhaps in 2010 we needed more environmental policies,” Nelson said. “Perhaps in 2026 they’re doing more harm than good.”
Nor is it so odd, he argued, that Hilton now views California with a more critical eye.
“Even from a distance, when you look at California, there’s so much going fundamentally wrong,” Nelson said, citing its energy policy, homelessness and the exodus of residents to other states. “I’m not surprised by that, and I think it’s entirely consistent with Steve Hilton in 2010.”
Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report
Former Fox News host and ex-Trump advocate Tucker Carlson is feeling remorse for the role he and others played in publicly promoting Donald Trump as a candidate and as the president.
“In very small ways, but in real ways, you and me and millions of people like us are the reason this is happening right now,” Carlson said Monday on his podcast, “The Tucker Carlson Show.” He was chatting with Buckley Carlson, his brother and a former Trump speechwriter, about the erosion of conservative values within the Republican Party under Trump.
“I do think it’s a moment to wrestle with our own consciences,” Carlson said. “You know, we’ll be tormented by it for a long time. I will be, and I want to say I’m sorry for misleading people. It was not intentional, and that’s all I’ll say.”
After nearly 10 years of yammering nightly about the greatness of Trump, Carlson picks now to cut the conversation short?
There’s a lot more to say, but this time, it’s about Carlson’s too-little, too-late mea culpa. His claim that he did not intentionally mislead the public is in itself misleading. While Carlson promoted Trump and the Big Lie ad nauseam on his prime-time Fox News show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” he was privately disparaging the president and discrediting Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
His off-camera thoughts were revealed when internal communications between Fox staffers went public in 2023 due to Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox News for knowingly broadcasting false claims that its machines rigged the 2020 election. Texts and emails from Carlson and other high-profile hosts suggested they knew Trump’s election fraud claims were unfounded, yet they still pushed the “rigged” narrative on air.
In one such example, Carlson texted that Trump needed to concede, and agreed that “there wasn’t enough fraud to change the outcome” of the election, according to the filing. Yet three nights later, he was on air claiming that there were “legitimate concerns” about election integrity. There were several more communications from Carlson where he expressed doubt about Trump’s claims. But in the public eye, he continued to assail the election results and the legitimacy of Biden’s win.
The Fox News host also privately scorned the first Trump presidency as a “disaster,” then turned around and stumped for Trump in 2024, praising him as a “national leader” at the Republican National Convention and campaigning with him in Arizona just days before the election.
If that’s not intentionally misleading the public, then what is?
Perhaps Carlson should have heeded his initial instincts about Trump. Before gaining notoriety with his Fox show, he posted on the website Slate about Trump in 1999, referring to him as “the single most repulsive person on the planet.”
Today the podcaster is among a growing number of right-wing influencers who have turned on their former leader. Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones want to push Trump out of office by invoking the 25th Amendment. Carrie Prejean Boller, who was a Trump-appointed member of the Religious Liberty Commission up until February, simply called him an “evil psychopath”.
Carlson has criticized the Trump administration’s decision to go to war in Iran, calling it “absolutely disgusting and evil” in March, and later said it was the “single biggest mistake” of Trump’s presidency. And when Trump demanded on Truth Social that Iran “open the F—– Strait, you crazy bastards,” Carlson said the post was “vile on every level” and “the most revealing thing the president has ever done. … Who do you think you are? You’re tweeting out the F word on Easter morning?” Carlson said in his podcast.
But Carlson is hardly the only American with buyer’s remorse. A recent NBC poll found that Trump is facing the lowest job approval rating of his second term, largely due to strong disapproval of how the president has handled inflation and the cost of living. Carlson, unlike the rest of the country, rode the MAGA wave to prosperity. His show kicked off in 2016, within weeks of the election, and he rose to prominence on the fervor of Trumpism. Supporting Trump was a family business. From his brother, a Republican operative who previously wrote speeches for Trump, to his son, who worked until recently in Vice President JD Vance’s press office.
Now Carlson is making his way back into the conversation by opposing the man he once claimed to revere.
He is asking for forgiveness for backing a faulty product, while also claiming to be a victim of its beguiling charms. “You and I and everyone else who supported him … you wrote speeches for him, I campaigned for him. We’re implicated in this for sure,” Carlson told his brother on the podcast. “It’s not enough to say, ‘Well, I changed my mind,’ or ‘Oh, this is bad. I’m out.’”
True, that’s not enough. Carlson should apologize for misleading the public, intentionally.
Kevin Warsh, the man nominated to lead the Federal Reserve, the world’s most important financial institution, told the US Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday that he had made no secret agreements with the White House over interest rate policy, defending his professional integrity.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
He said he would act independently if confirmed to succeed Jerome Powell, despite continued public pressure from US President Donald Trump for lower borrowing costs.
The question of that independence was put sharply to him during the hearing, when Republican Senator John Kennedy asked whether he would be Trump’s “human sock puppet”. Warsh replied: “Absolutely not.”
His comments came amid broader concerns on Capitol Hill about the future direction of the central bank, with lawmakers divided over his past record and approach to monetary policy.
Warsh insisted that the President had never asked him to commit to any specific interest rate path and said he would not have agreed to such a request.
The hearing highlighted the significant pressure facing the Federal Reserve as it maintains its independence while addressing inflation, which remains at 3.3%.
Just hours before the session began, US President Donald Trump stated in a CNBC interview that he would be disappointed if Warsh did not immediately implement rate cuts.
This current friction suggests that the White House may struggle to secure the necessary votes to confirm Warsh before Powell’s term as Fed Chair expires on 15 May.
Democratic opposition and Republican dissent
Democratic senators were particularly vocal in their scepticism, accusing Warsh of shifting his economic stance to suit the political climate.
US Senator Elizabeth Warren labelled the nominee a “sock puppet”, suggesting his installation would facilitate an “illegal takeover” of the institution.
Critics also pointed to his historical record, alleging that he favoured higher rates during Democratic administrations but has become more dovish under Republican leadership.
US Senator Ruben Gallego cited reporting from the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), which claimed the President had previously urged Warsh to reduce borrowing costs. Warsh responded by stating that such reports were based on inaccurate sources and reiterated that the independence of the Fed is “essential” for economic stability.
Despite Trump’s backing, the nomination also faces a critical roadblock within the Republican Party.
US Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from North Carolina, reiterated his refusal to support Warsh as long as a Department of Justice investigation into Jerome Powell continues.
The probe, led by Assistant US Attorney Jeannine Pirro, is examining whether Powell committed perjury during testimony last year regarding the budget of a Federal Reserve building renovation project.
Tillis and other Republican colleagues have expressed their support for Powell, arguing that the investigation is meritless. According to Tillis, he will not vote for a successor until the “investigation is dropped,” a stance that effectively freezes the nomination in a closely divided committee.
Federal prosecutors have reportedly continued their efforts to access Fed records as recently as last week, even after a judge previously found no evidence to support the charges.
Legal and ethical hurdles
The proceedings also delved into Warsh’s personal financial interests and the logistical challenges of a potential leadership transition.
US Senator Elizabeth Warren raised questions about the nominee’s investments in private entities, including SpaceX and Polymarket, noting that the specific size of these holdings had not been fully disclosed to the public.
Warsh defended his position by stating that the Office of Government Ethics has already approved his plan to divest all assets within 90 days of his confirmation.
Compounding the uncertainty is the unique situation involving Jerome Powell.
Unlike most departing Chairs, Powell has indicated he intends to remain on the Federal Reserve’s governing board until his separate term ends in 2028, or until the perjury investigation is concluded.
This could create an awkward power dynamic where the former Chair sits alongside his successor, a scenario not seen in Washington since the late 1940s.
While US President Donald Trump has threatened to remove Powell from the board entirely, legal experts suggest such a move would be difficult, particularly given recent US Supreme Court precedents relating to the protection of Fed governors from political dismissal.
On March 28, a sunny Saturday in southwestern Utah, Jack Hoopes and his wife, Lorna, brought their homemade signs to the local “No Kings” rally.
The couple joined a crowd of 1,500 or so marching through the main picnic area of a park in downtown St. George. Their signs — cut-out words on a black background — chided lawmakers for failing to stand up to President Trump and urged America to “make lying wrong again.”
After about an hour, the two were ready to go home. They got in their silver Volvo SUV, but before pulling away, Jack Hoopes decided to swing past the demonstration, which was still going strong. He tooted his horn, twice, in a show of solidarity.
That’s when things took a curious turn.
A police officer parked in the middle of the street warned Hoopes not to honk; at least that’s what he thinks the officer said as Hoopes drove past the chanting crowd. When he spotted two familiar faces, Hoopes hit the horn a third time — a friendly, howdy sort of honk. “It wasn’t like I was being obnoxious,” he said, “or laying on the horn.”
Hoopes turned a corner and the cop, lights flashing, pulled him over. He asked Hoopes for his license and registration. He returned a few moments later. A passing car sounded its horn. “Are you going to stop him, too?” Hoopes asked.
That did not sit well. The officer said he’d planned to let Hoopes off with a warning. Instead, he charged the 71-year-old retired potato farmer with violating Utah’s law on horns and warning devices. He issued a citation, with a fine punishable up to $50.
Hoopes — a law school graduate and prosecutor in the days before he took up potato farming — is fighting back, even though he estimates the legal skirmishing could cost him considerably more than the maximum fine. The ticket might have resulted from pique on the officer’s part. But Hoopes doesn’t think so. He sees politics at play.
“I’ve beeped my horn for [the pro-law enforcement] Back the Blue. I’ve beeped my horn for Black Lives Matter,” Hoopes said. “I’ve seen a lot of people honk for Trump and for MAGA.”
He’s also seen plenty of times when people honked their horns to celebrate high school championships and the like.
But Hoopes has never heard of anyone being pulled over, much less ticketed, for excessive or unlawful honking. “I think it’s freedom of expression,” he said.
Or should be.
Jack and Lorna Hoopes made their own protest signs to bring to the “No Kings” rally in St. George, Utah.
(Mikayla Whitmore / For The Times)
St. George is a fast-growing community of about 100,000 residents set amid the jagged red-rock peaks of the Mojave Desert. It’s a jumping-off point for Zion National Park, about 40 miles east, and a mecca for golf, hiking and mountain-bike riding.
It’s also Trump Country.
Washington County, where St. George is located, gave Trump 75% of its vote in 2024, with Kamala Harris winning a scant 23%. That emphatic showing compares with Trump’s 59% performance statewide.
St. George is where Hoopes and his wife live most of the time. When summer and its 100-degree temperatures hit, they retreat to southeast Idaho. The couple get along well with their neighbors in both places, Hoopes said, even though they’re Democrats living in ruby-red country. It’s not as though they just tolerate folks, or hold their noses to get by.
“Most of my friends are conservative,” Hoopes said. “Some of the Trump people are very good people. We just have a difference of opinion where our country is going.”
He was speaking from a hotel parking lot in Arizona near Lake Havasu while embarked on an annual motorcycle ride through the Southwest: four days, a dozen riders, 1,200 miles. Most of his companions are Trump supporters, Hoopes said, and, just like back home, everyone gets on fine.
“Right?” he called out.
“No!” a voice hollered back.
Actually, Hoopes joked, his charitable road mates let him ride along because they consider him handicapped — his disability being his political ideology.
Hoopes is not exactly a hellion. In 2014, he and his wife traveled to Africa to participate in humanitarian work and promote sustainable agriculture in Kenya and Uganda. In 2020, they worked as Red Cross volunteers helping wildfire victims in Northern California.
Virtually his entire life has been spent on the right side of the law, though Hoopes allowed as how he has racked up a few speeding tickets over the years. (His career as a prosecutor lasted four years and involved three murder cases in the first 12 months before he left the legal profession behind and took up farming.)
He’s never had any problems with the police in St. George. “They seem to be decent,” Hoopes said.
A department spokesperson, Tiffany Mitchell, said illicit honking is not a widespread problem in the placid, retiree-heavy community, but there are some who have been cited for violations. She denied any political motivation in Hoopes’ case.
“He must’ve felt justified,” Mitchell said of the officer who issued the citation. “I can’t imagine that politics had anything to do with it.”
And yes, she said, honking a horn can be a political statement protected by the 1st Amendment. “But, just like anything else, it can turn criminal,” Mitchell said, and apparently that’s how the officer felt on March 28 “and that’s the direction he took it.”
The matter now rests before a judge, residing in a legal system that has lately been tested and twisted in remarkable ways.
Jack Hoopes’ case is now before a judge in St. George, Utah.
(Mikayla Whitmore / For The Times)
As he left an initial hearing earlier this month, Hoopes said his phone pinged with a fresh headline out of Washington. Trump’s Justice Department, it was reported, was asking a federal appeals court to throw out the convictions of 12 people found guilty of seditious conspiracy for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
“We have a president that pardons people that broke into the Capitol and defecated” in the hallways and congressional offices, Hoopes said. “Police officers died because of it, and yet I get picked up for honking my horn?”
Hoopes’ next court appearance, a pretrial conference, is set for July 15.
Amid a standoff with the pope and criticism for an AI image of himself as Jesus, US President Donald Trump has read a Bible passage about punishment and national repentance as part of a Republican-led marathon event.
President Trump said the US would extend the ceasefire until Iran presents a proposal and talks are concluded, but a naval blockade of its ports continues.
Published On 22 Apr 202622 Apr 2026
President Donald Trump said the United States is extending the ceasefire until Tehran submits its latest proposal with conditions for ending the war, and until negotiations conclude, keeping diplomacy open while maintaining pressure on Iran.
However, Trump said the US naval blockade on Iran would remain. Iran has insisted that the blockade represents a violation of the ceasefire, and has said it will not negotiate under the “shadow of threats” or while the blockade remains in place, underscoring the fragile and uncertain path to talks.
Meanwhile, violence continues across the region, with Israeli settlers killing two people, including a child, in the occupied West Bank, and Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon wounding civilians and damaging homes despite a 10-day ceasefire.
In Iran
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said oil production across the Middle East could be targeted if attacks were launched from Gulf neighbours’ territory.
The US is continuing its naval blockade of Iranian ports despite the truce, a move Iran says undermines the ceasefire.
An adviser to Iran’s parliamentary speaker said the ceasefire extension could be a “ploy to buy time” for potential military escalation.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the US naval blockade as an “act of war” and a violation of the truce.
War diplomacy
Tehran open to diplomacy: Reporting from Tehran, Al Jazeera’s Almigdad Alruhaid said there was no official response to Trump’s ceasefire extension, but officials signalled openness to talks. The US blockade of the Strait of Hormuz is seen as a violation of the truce, with commanders saying forces are fully prepared to respond to any escalation.
US sanctions widened: The US imposed new sanctions linked to Iran’s weapons programmes, while the European Union is moving to expand its own measures.
Talks planned in Washington, DC: The US is set to host ambassador-level negotiations between Israel and Lebanon, as Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam pushes for a full Israeli withdrawal from the country’s territory as Beirut’s main objective.
In the Gulf
Trump said a potential currency swap with the United Arab Emirates is “under consideration”, adding Washington would support the Gulf ally if needed, after reports the idea was raised with US officials amid concerns the war could strain the UAE’s economy.
In the US
The US president said he was extending a ceasefire with Iran to give more time for negotiations, but would maintain the naval blockade of Iranian ports.
Reporting from the White House, Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher said Trump has shifted between conciliatory and hardline rhetoric, linking the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz to forcing Iran to negotiate, while warning of military action if negotiations fail.
The mixed messaging has unsettled markets, but some analysts argue the strategy shows calculated pressure and a willingness to wait for Iran’s response.
In Israel
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the country has been strengthened by its campaigns against Iran and its allies, claiming joint efforts with the US weakened Tehran’s capabilities and boosted Israel’s regional position, opening the door to new alliances.
In Lebanon
Prime Minister Salam said on Tuesday that Lebanon needed $587m to address the conflict’s ongoing humanitarian fallout amid a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
Tensions remain high as Israel and Hezbollah accuse each other of breaching the truce. Israel said rockets were fired at its troops in southern Lebanon and that it responded with strikes, while Hezbollah said its attacks were retaliation for Israeli shelling and ongoing strikes on Lebanese areas.
Oil and global economy
Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz remains severely limited, raising concerns over global oil flows.
In a social media post, President Trump announced an extension of the ceasefire in the war on Iran, but with the US blockade still in place. Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher says there are signs of movement as Trump shifts towards discussing a ‘unified proposal’.
Washington, DC – Requests for legal support related to pro-Palestine advocacy remained high in the United States last year, as President Donald Trump threatened activists and universities with penalties.
In an annual report released on Tuesday, Palestine Legal, an organisation that “supports the movement for Palestinian freedom in the US”, said it received 1,131 queries for legal support in 2025.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
The figure is below the record 2,184 requests the group received in 2024, when pro-Palestine protests swept US campuses — and were regularly met with crackdowns from both school administrators and law enforcement.
Despite universities enacting new restrictions on protests across the country, the figures from 2025 show that pro-Palestine advocacy has persisted, according to Dima Khalidi, the executive director of Palestine Legal.
“Our 2025 year-end report shows that while universities have largely cowered and caved to coercive pressure from the Trump administration and its pro-Israel supporters, student activists for Palestinian and collective freedom remain a model of moral conviction and courage,” Khalidi said.
“Even when facing punitive consequences for speaking out, they are holding the line of dissent against injustice from the US to Palestine, because they understand the cost of surrender for all of us.”
Palestine Legal said that the “overwhelming majority of requests” for legal support came from university students and faculty in 2025, but a growing number, 122, were categorised as “immigration and border-related”.
The group received 851 requests from people or organisations targeted for their Palestine-related advocacy, as well as 280 more asking for legal guidance on conducting advocacy.
Despite the drop from 2024, the rate of complaints last year remained 300 percent higher than in 2022, the year before Israel began its genocidal war in Gaza on October 7, 2023.
Since then, at least 72,560 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza.
Pressure campaigns
In 2024, Trump campaigned for a second term in the White House in part on a pledge to crack down on the pro-Palestinian protest movement, which sought to shine a light on the human rights abuses unfolding during the war.
He has framed such protests as anti-Semitic, and since his inauguration in 2025, he has led a campaign to penalise schools that played host to pro-Palestinian activism.
To date, five universities have struck deals with Trump after he threatened to withhold billions in federal funding. They include Columbia University, where a pro-Palestine encampment and resulting police crackdown drew international attention.
Columbia eventually reached a $200m settlement with the Trump administration and moved to make several policy changes it said were aimed at combatting anti-Semitism.
Rights groups have condemned such policies as conflating pro-Palestine advocacy with anti-Jewish sentiment. They also warn that Trump’s actions risk dampening free speech, a protected right under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
All told, nearly 80 of the students who took part in Columbia’s protests faced serious academic discipline, including expulsions, suspensions, and degree revocations, as of July 2025.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration used immigration enforcement to target pro-Palestine protesters and advocates, including scholars like Rumeysa Ozturk, Mohsen Mahdawi, Badar Khan Suri and Mahmoud Khalil.
To date, the deportation proceedings against Ozturk, who was in the US on a student visa, and Mahdawi, a US permanent resident detained at his citizenship hearing, have been abandoned.
Ozturk has since voluntarily returned to her native Turkiye after completing her doctoral studies at Tufts University.
The government is still proceeding with deportation efforts against Khan Suri, a Georgetown University researcher, and Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate and permanent US resident.
Separately, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) raided five homes connected to pro-Palestine activists at the University of Michigan in April 2025, sparking outrage. Federal authorities seized properties, but no arrests were made.
Legal victories
Despite the restrictive climate across the country, Palestine Legal hailed a string of legal victories in 2025 that upheld the right to pro-Palestinian protest.
Last August, for instance, a federal court dismissed a complaint that sought to penalise UNRWA USA, a non-profit that supports the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), under the Antiterrorism Act of 1990.
A separate lawsuit launched by Palestine Legal and the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) charged that the University of Maryland had tread on the free speech rights of students by banning Students for Justice in Palestine (UMD SJP). That case resulted in a $100,000 settlement.
Meanwhile, federal judges have sided with Harvard University and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), in their challenges to the Trump administration’s defunding efforts.
“The fights that Palestine Legal and our partners have waged affirm that the Trump administration, universities, and Israel advocacy groups cannot, without consequence, run roughshod over growing demands to respect and protect Palestinian rights,” Palestine Legal said at the conclusion of its report.
“The developments throughout 2025 made crystal clear that if we allow our right to stand for Palestinian freedom to be trampled, all of our fundamental rights will be in jeopardy in the face of an authoritarian slide.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s nominee to chair the Federal Reserve said Tuesday that he never promised the White House that he would cut interest rates, even as the president renewed his calls for the central bank to do so.
“The president never once asked me to commit to any particular interest rate decision, period,” Kevin Warsh, a former top Fed official, said under questioning by the Senate Banking Committee. “Nor would I ever agree to do so if he had. … I will be an independent actor if confirmed as chair of the Federal Reserve.”
Warsh’s comments came just hours after Trump, in an interview on CNBC, was asked if he would be disappointed if Warsh didn’t immediately cut rates and responded, “I would.”
The comments underscore the challenge faced by Warsh, 56, a financier and former member of the Fed’s board of governors whom Trump named in January to replace the current Fed chair, Jerome H. Powell. Democrats on the committee accused Warsh of flip-flopping on interest rates over the years, supporting higher interest rates under Democratic presidents and advocating rate cuts during Trump’s time in office. Investors are watching the hearing closely to see how Warsh balances Trump’s demands with worsening inflation, as the war in Iran pushes up the price of gasoline.
Higher inflation typically leads the Fed to raise rates, or at least keep them unchanged, rather than cut them. When the Fed changes its key rate, it can affect mortgages, auto loans and business borrowing.
Yet Warsh’s account was challenged by Sen. Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat, who said that Wall Street Journal reporting last year found that Trump had urged Warsh to reduce borrowing costs.
“Who’s lying here? Is it you or the president?” Gallego asked.
“I think those reporters need better sources,” Warsh responded.
For all the back and forth, the hearing didn’t appear to advance Warsh’s nomination, which has been delayed by a Justice Department investigation into the Fed and Powell, over brief testimony Powell gave last June before the same panel about a building renovation.
Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican on the committee, reiterated Tuesday he wouldn’t vote for Warsh until the investigation is dropped. With the committee closely divided and all Democrats opposed to his nomination, Tillis’ opposition is enough to bottle it up in committee.
“We have got to get rid of this investigation,” Tillis said, “so I can support your nomination.”
Tillis has previously said that all seven Republicans on the committee have signed a letter stating that Powell did not commit a crime when he testified before the panel last June. Federal prosecutors, led by U.S. Atty. Jeanine Pirro, are investigating his testimony for potential perjury, though a judge said last month they offered no evidence to support the charge when he threw out subpoenas Pirro had issued.
Prosecutors from her office as recently as last week sought access to the Fed’s building project but were turned away, revealing that the Trump administration has not reversed course despite opposition from members of his own party that are essential to Warsh’s confirmation.
In his opening remarks, Warsh told the Senate Banking Committee that one of his top goals would be to fight inflation, which remains elevated at 3.3% annually.
“Congress tasked the Fed with the mission to ensure price stability, without excuse or equivocation, argument or anguish,” Warsh said. “Inflation is a choice, and the Fed must take responsibility for it.”
Warsh would be in a tough spot if confirmed. Inflation is worsening, making it much harder for the Fed to implement the interest rate cuts Trump so desperately seeks. The conflict could also slow the economy, as well as hiring. And if Warsh ultimately becomes chair, he may very well find his predecessor, Powell, still sitting on the Fed’s governing board, an uncomfortable arrangement that hasn’t occurred since the late 1940s.
Warsh said the Fed’s political independence is “essential,” and that the central bank wasn’t threatened when “elected officials — presidents, senators, or members of the House — state their views on interest rates.” Trump has repeatedly urged Powell to cut the Fed’s key rate from its current level of about 3.6% to as low as 1%, a view almost no economist shares.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, said that Trump has not just stated his opinions on rates, but has sought to fire a Fed governor and is investigating Powell.
“The Senate should not be aiding and abetting Donald Trump’s illegal takeover of the Fed by installing his chosen sock puppet as chair,” she said Tuesday.
Warren also noted that Warsh has not disclosed all of his financial holdings, which include investments in startups and private companies, or the size of those financial stakes. For example, Warsh has said he has holdings in SpaceX and Polymarket, but has not said how large those investments are.
Warren charged that Warsh is not in compliance with ethics requirements. Warsh argued that the Office of Government Ethics has signed off on his plan to sell all his assets within 90 days of his confirmation.
The turmoil could make a potential transition from Powell to Warsh an unusually turbulent one for the world’s most pivotal central bank, which has historically experienced smooth transfers of power. Should the change in leadership prove particularly bumpy, it could unnerve markets and lift longer-term interest rates.
Powell’s term as chair ends May 15. He said last month that he would remain as chair until a successor is named. Powell also is serving a separate term as a member of the Fed’s governing board that lasts until January 2028. Fed chairs typically leave the board when their terms as chair end, but Powell said last month he would remain on the board, even if a new chair is approved, until the investigation is dropped.
Trump said he would fire Powell if he attempted to remain at the Fed. Yet Trump’s previous attempt to remove a Fed governor, Lisa Cook, has been tied up in court. During oral arguments in January, a majority of justices on the Supreme Court appeared to lean toward leaving Cook at the Fed.
April 21 (UPI) — Uncertainty over Iran peace talks put Vice President JD Vance’s trip to Pakistan on hold Tuesday, as Iranian officials were silent on whether they intend to take part in the talks at all.
The New York Times reported that talks could, however, restart at any time. Officials in Tehran were divided on whether to take part in negotiations while the United States held firm on its embargo on ports in Iran, Axios reported.
President Donald Trump said earlier in the day that he expects to reach a deal with Iran in negotiations to end the war on Tuesday, but if no deal is made, he is prepared to resume bombing.
The two-week cease-fire Trump agreed to is set to expire on Wednesday, with the Strait of Hormuz remaining a centerpiece to the conflict between the United States and Iran.
“What I think is that we’re going to end up with a great deal,” Trump said in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday. “I think they have no choice. We’ve taken out their navy. We’ve taken out their air force. We’ve taken out their leaders, frankly. It is regime change, no matter what you want to call it. Which is not something I said I was going to do but I’ve done, indirectly maybe, but I’ve done it.”
Trump said the United States’ blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has been a “tremendous success,” adding that “we totally control the strait.”
The president added that he does not want to extend the cease-fire, noting that negotiations will take place near the time the two-week cease-fire ends.
If a deal is not agreed to on Tuesday and Wednesday, Trump said, “I expect to be bombing,” and “we are raring to go.”
“We’re totally loaded up. We have so much of everything; much more powerful than it was four or five weeks ago,” Trump said. “We caught a ship yesterday that had some things on it, which wasn’t very nice. A gift from China perhaps, I don’t know.”
Trump claimed that Iran has executed 42,000 protesters in the last two months, a number that has not been verified, though former Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said thousands were killed earlier this year.
On social media, Trump shared a post saying the Islamic Republic is “preparing to hang eight women.” Trump called on Iranian leaders to release the women.
“I would greatly appreciate the release of these women,” Trump wrote. “I am sure that they will respect the fact that you did so. Please do them no harm! Would be a great start to our negotiations!”
Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. speaks during a House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies hearing on the budget for the Department of Health and Human Services in the Rayburn House Office Building near the U.S. Capitol on Thursday. Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo
The scriptural passage that President Trump plans to read Tuesday evening in a livestreamed Bible-reading marathon dates back to the depiction of an ancient event — but it’s one that carries a highly charged significance in the current religious and political climate.
It has long been quoted and promoted by those who believe America was founded as a Christian nation and should be one. It’s from the seventh chapter of 2 Chronicles, a book in the Hebrew (Old Testament) portion of the Bible.
The 14th verse — the one most often quoted — says:
“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”
Trump is among hundreds who are taking turns reading the entire Bible aloud over the course of a week. Most of the readings are taking place at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, though Trump’s is coming by video from the Oval Office.
A passage often quoted at National Day of Prayer events
The Chronicles passage has for decades been a major theme at annual National Day of Prayer events. Organizers of the America Reads the Bible marathon invited Trump to read from it. “It’s a powerful statement that he decided to read that passage,” said Bunni Pounds, founder of Christians Engaged, which organized the project.
The passage has been recited over the decades at countless rallies, services and events, often organized around the disputed belief that America was created as a Christian nation and needs to repent of its sins and return to God. The passage has particularly been associated with annual events commemorating the National Day of Prayer, which has taken various forms since the mid-20th century and became fixed by law on the first Thursday in May since the 1980s.
The verse is set in a context far from modern America — during the reign of King Solomon in ancient Israel some 3,000 years ago. Solomon is presiding over the dedication of the first temple in Jerusalem, and in a lengthy prayer he asks for divine mercy if a future generation sins, is punished with military or natural disaster and then repents. In the key passage, God replies with a promise of restoration.
Critics say the passage is used out of context
But the use of the passage in modern settings has its critics.
The Chronicles passage is “a popular verse among Christian nationalists and has been for quite some time,” said Brian Kaylor, a Baptist pastor and president and editor-in-chief of Word&Way, a progressive site covering faith and politics.
He said its use has taken on a partisan and polarizing tone, often used in tandem with a promotion of a belief in a Christian America in an increasingly diverse country.
“This verse is not about the United States,” said Kaylor, author of “The Bible According to Christian Nationalists: Exploiting Scripture for Political Power.” It is “a promise made to one particular person in one particular moment. It doesn’t really work to pull it out of context and apply it to whatever you want to.”
But many have done so recently and in decades past, either saying America has a divinely ordained destiny similar to ancient Israel’s or simply that they believe every nation has a duty to follow God and repent when needed.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower took the oath of office in 1953 with his hand on a Bible opened to the 2 Chronicles passage. President Ronald Reagan quoted the passage in a proclamation declaring 1984’s National Day of Prayer. A speaker at the 2024 Republican National Convention also quoted it.
The National Day of Prayer, while officially nonsectarian, has long been drawn particular promotion and participation from evangelical Christians. Readings of the “If my people” passage has been a staple of such events.
Politicians, others joining in the Bible-reading marathon
Evangelicals — a loyal Republican voting bloc for decades — have formed a crucial part of Trump’s electoral base. His rallies have featured a fusion of Christian and national symbols and rhetoric, featuring songs like “God Bless USA” and T-shirts with slogans like “Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president.”
Many other Republican politicians are taking part in the Bible reading, along with celebrities, pastors and others. And Trump isn’t the only one reading a passage significant to his office or mission.
Mike Huckabee, a Baptist pastor and U.S. ambassador to Israel, is reading from a Genesis passage in which God says he will bless those who bless Abraham — a passage popular with many evangelicals who believe they have a biblical mandate to support Israel.
David Barton, whose Wallbuilders promotes belief in America as a Christian nation, will read from a passage that gave his organization its name, in which Nehemiah rebuilds the broken walls of Jerusalem.
WASHINGTON — The Southern Poverty Law Center says it’s the subject of a criminal investigation by the Justice Department and faces possible charges over its past use of paid informants to infiltrate extremist groups.
The civil rights group made the announcement on Tuesday, saying President Trump’s administration appears to be preparing legal action against it or some of its employees.
“Although we don’t know all the details, the focus appears to be on the SPLC’s prior use of paid confidential informants to gather credible intelligence on extremely violent groups,” CEO Bryan Fair said in a statement.
The Justice Department had no immediate comment.
The SPLC previously paid informants to infiltrate extremist groups and gather information on their activities, often sharing it with local and federal law enforcement, Fair said. It was used to monitor threats of violence, he said, adding that the program was kept quiet to protect the safety of informants.
“When we began working with informants, we were living in the shadow of the height of the Civil Rights Movement, which had seen bombings at churches, state-sponsored violence against demonstrators, and the murders of activists that went unanswered by the justice system,” Fair said. “There is no question that what we learned from informants saved lives.”
He said the organization “will vigorously defend ourselves, our staff, and our work.”
The SPLC, which is based in Montgomery, Alabama, was founded in 1971 and used civil litigation to fight white supremacist groups. The nonprofit has become a popular target among Republicans who see it as overly leftist and partisan.
The investigation could add to concerns that Trump’s Republican administration is using the Justice Department to go after conservative opponents and his critics. It follows a number of other investigations into Trump foes that have raised questions about whether the law enforcement agency has been turned into a political weapon.
The Southern Poverty Law Center has faced intense criticism from conservatives, who have accused it of unfairly maligning right-wing organizations as extremist groups because of their viewpoints. The SPLC regularly condemns Trump’s rhetoric and policies around voting rights, immigration and other issues.
The SPLC came under fresh scrutiny after the assassination last year of conservative activist Charlie Kirk brought renewed attention to its characterization of the group that Kirk founded and led. The SPLC included a section on that group, Turning Point USA, in a report titled “The Year in Hate and Extremism 2024” that described the group as “A Case Study of the Hard Right in 2024.”
FBI Director Kash Patel said last year that the agency was severing its relationship with the SPLC, which had long provided law enforcement with research on hate crime and domestic extremism. Patel said the SPLC had been turned into a “partisan smear machine,” and he accused it of defaming “mainstream Americans” with its “hate map” that documents alleged anti-government and hate groups inside the United States.
House Republicans hosted a hearing centered on the SPLC in December, saying it coordinated efforts with President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration “to target Christian and conservative Americans and deprive them of their constitutional rights to free speech and free association.”
Binkley and Richer write for the Associated Press.
Virginia voters on Tuesday are deciding whether to ratify an unusual mid-decade redrawing of U.S. House districts that could boost Democrats’ chances of flipping control of the closely divided chamber, as the state becomes the latest front in a national redistricting battle.
A proposed constitutional amendment backed by Democratic officials would bypass the state’s bipartisan redistricting commission to allow use of new congressional districts approved by state lawmakers in this year’s midterm elections.
The referendum, which needs a simple majority to pass, tests Democrats’ ability to push back against President Trump, who started the gerrymandering competition between states after successfully urging Texas Republicans to redraw congressional districts in their favor last year. Virginia is the second state, after California last fall, to put the question to voters.
It also tests voters’ willingness to accept districts gerrymandered for political advantage — coming just six years after Virginia voters approved an amendment meant to diminish such partisan gamesmanship by shifting redistricting away from the legislature.
Even if Democrats are successful Tuesday, the public vote may not be the final word. The state Supreme Court is considering whether the redistricting plan is illegal in a case that could make the referendum results meaningless.
Virginia Democrats are following California’s lead
Congressional redistricting typically is done once a decade after each U.S. census. But Trump urged Texas Republicans to redistrict ahead of the November elections in hopes of winning several additional seats and maintaining the GOP’s narrow House majority in the face of political headwinds that typically favor the party that is out of power during midterms.
The Texas gambit led to a burst of redistricting nationwide. So far, Republicans believe they can win up to nine more House seats in newly redrawn districts in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio.
Democrats think they can win up to five more seats in California, where voters approved a mid-decade redistricting effort last November, and one more seat under new court-imposed districts in Utah. Democrats hope to offset the rest of that gap in Virginia, where they decisively flipped 13 seats in the state House and won back the governor’s office last year.
Voters focus on fairness, with different perspectives
The stream of voters was steady Tuesday at a recreation center in the Old Town area of Alexandria, Virginia.
Matt Wallace, 31, said he votes regularly but this election has additional emphasis.
“I think the redistricting issue across the country is unfortunate, that we’ve had to resort to temporary redistricting in order to sort of alter our elections across the country,” Wallace said. He said he voted for the Democratic redistricting amendment “to help balance the scales a bit until things get back to normal.”
Joanna Miller, 29, said she voted against the redistricting measure, “because I want my vote to count in a fair way.” Miller said she was more concerned about representation in Virginia than trying to offset actions in other states.
“I want my vote and my representation to matter this fall,” she said.
Political parties made a big push in Virginia
Leaders of both major parties see Tuesday’s vote as crucial to their chances to win a House majority in the fall. Trump weighed in via social media Tuesday morning, telling Virginians to “vote ‘no’ to save your country!”
Former Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, rallied with opponents of the measure Monday night, calling the redistricting plan “dishonest” and “brazenly deceptive.” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day that a vote to approve the redraw “will serve as a check and balance on this out-of-control Trump administration.”
A committee supporting the Democratic redistricting effort had raised more than $64 million — three times as much as the roughly $20 million raised by opponents, according to finance reports filed less than two weeks before the election.
The back-and-forth battle over congressional districts is expected to continue in Florida, where the Republican-led legislature is scheduled to convene April 28 for a special session that could result in a more favorable map for Republicans.
A lobster-like district could aid Democratic efforts
In Virginia, Democrats currently hold six of the 11 U.S. House seats under districts that were imposed by the state Supreme Court in 2021 after a bipartisan commission failed to agree on a map based on the latest census data.
The new plan could help Democrats win as many as 10 seats. Five are anchored in Democratic-heavy northern Virginia, including one shaped like a lobster that stretches into Republican-leaning rural areas.
Revisions to four other districts across Richmond, southern Virginia and Hampton Roads dilute the voting power of conservative blocs in those areas. And a reshaped district in parts of western Virginia lumps together three Democratic-leaning college towns to offset other Republican voters.
The Virginia redistricting plan is “pushing back against what other states have done in trying to stack the deck for Donald Trump in those congressional elections,” Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger said during an online rally last week.
Ads for the “yes to redistricting” campaign featuring former President Barack Obama have flooded the airwaves.
Opponents have distributed campaign materials citing past statements from Obama and Spanberger criticizing gerrymandering, but those were before Trump pushed Republican states to redraw their congressional maps in advance of this year’s midterms.
Democrats “were all against gerrymandering before they were for it,” Virginia Republican Party Chairman Jeff Ryer said.
Virginia court weighs whether lawmakers acted illegally
Virginia lawmakers endorsed a constitutional amendment allowing their mid-decade redistricting last fall, then passed it again in January as part of a two-step process that requires an intervening election for an amendment to be placed on the ballot. The measure allows lawmakers to redistrict until returning the task to a bipartisan commission after the 2030 census.
In February, they passed a new U.S. House map to take effect pending the outcome of the redistricting referendum. Republicans have filed multiple legal challenges against the effort.
A Tazewell County judge ruled that the redistricting push was illegal for several reasons. Circuit Court Judge Jack Hurley Jr. said lawmakers failed to follow their own rules for adding the redistricting amendment to a special session.
He ruled that their initial vote failed to occur before the public began casting ballots in last year’s general election and thus didn’t count toward the two-step process. He also ruled that the state failed to publish the amendment three months before that election, as required by law.
If the state Supreme Court agrees with the lower court, the results from Tuesday’s vote could be rendered moot.
Lieb writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Gary Fields in Virginia and Lisa Mascaro in Washington contributed to this report.
Commentary: 90 minutes, 6 gubernatorial candidates, zero big moments — but some differences that matter
Two of our esteemed gubernatorial candidates, the cowboy and the dilettante, apparently could not find ties for the first debate Wednesday night, showing up with dress shirts casually unbuttoned.
Mr. Middleground sported a scruffy sorta-beard, apparently unable to pay for a razor in the midst of California’s affordability crisis. It’s a trademark look that always makes me think if this doesn’t work out, he’ll opt to live on a boat in some not-too-expensive slip by the Bay.
The billionaire wore Nikes instead of dress shoes, a sartorial nod perhaps to his bid to be the outsider-fighter. Or maybe his feet just hurt.
The last two contenders were remarkably unremarkable.
Why start with fashion? Honestly, it might be the most interesting, and telling, bit of insight that came from this first (of three) chances for our next governor to let us know who they are and what they’re made of. If the debate showed us anything, it’s that none of these candidates are hiding follow-me charisma or an excitement-inducing political vision for our collective future.
Yes, there were a few decent jabs here and there about Tom Steyer’s money, Katie Porter’s temper, Matt Mahan’s tech ties and Chad Bianco’s far-right world view. But even those were predictable.
Still, in between the yawns, there were a couple of answers worth noting, ones that might actually give us insight into how the Democratic candidates differ (Despite all the hype, it seems increasingly unlikely that two Republicans will come out of the primary, and even more unlikely that in a Democratic vs. Republican race, the Democrat would lose in blue California.)
I’ll start with a surprising place where I agreed with Steve Hilton, the Republican endorsed by President Trump.
The candidates were asked if they would support a ban on social media for kids under age 16. This is a quickly accelerating idea not beloved by tech companies. Australia and Indonesia already have bans in place. Other countries, including France and Portugal, have them in the works. Florida banned children under 14 from opening social media accounts on their own last year.
And a Los Angeles jury last month dealt a blow to Meta and YouTube when it found the platforms had damaged the mental health of a young woman with their addictive features.
Hilton took the ban question a step further, saying it “misses the point.” He has long argued that it isn’t just social media that is the problem, but having kids staring at a digital device for hours a day instead of interacting in the real world. It was one of the most genuine answers of the night.
“We’ve got to get to the heart of the problem, and that’s the devices and the screens,” he said. “I think that every parent in their heart knows that it’s wrong.”
While Steyer and Xavier Becerra, the former California attorney general, both said they would support such a ban, the remaining three candidates hedged or said they would not. Porter said no to a ban under age 16, but said she “might consider a different ban,” without being specific.
Mahan, who is backed by significant tech money, and Bianco both said they believed requiring parental consent was the way to go (though Mahan said he would ban devices in schools).
As Becerra pointed out, “kids have died as a result of their use of social media,” so it’s a place where policy matters. And if a candidate doesn’t see government’s role in controlling the dangers of social media, what will happen with artificial intelligence?
The candidates also had differences in how they would handle homelessness and the related crisis of housing affordability, though the devil was often buried in the details.
At least for Democrats. For Bianco, the difference was stark.
“We are not dealing with homeless. So stop calling it homeless,” he snapped at the moderators. “It has nothing to do with homes. This is drug- and alcohol-induced psychosis, mental illness.”
Of course, this is wrong. Last year, the UC San Francisco Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative released the results of the state’s most comprehensive survey of homeless people. It found that for most people living on our streets, “the cost of housing had simply become unsustainable.” It also found an increasing percentage of those folks were older — almost half were over the age of 50 — and had become homeless after a hardship such as an illness or a job loss.
“It’s also families who are fleeing intimate partner and domestic violence,” Porter said. “It’s people who are double and tripled up. It’s people who are living in their cars on our college campuses. Homelessness comes in a lot of different forms.”
Most of the Democratic candidates seemed to understand this and embraced the increasingly popular idea of putting more money into helping people stay housed after a hardship, instead of trying to get them housed after they lose their place.
“How can I help you keep your home?” Becerra said. “Because it costs me so much more money to pick you off the streets, provide you with the assistance in the shelter, than it does to keep you in the home.”
But the issue of homelessness is also where daylight emerged between the candidates. Steyer said he and his wife had helped finance low-barrier homes, not just shelter spaces, where people do not need to be addiction-free and where they can bring pets — two issues that are common hindrances for moving folks off sidewalks voluntarily.
Mahan, the mayor of San José, who often touts his city’s success at moving people indoors, agreed that emergency and interim housing was critical, but also voiced support for forcing folks to accept help. Last year, San José passed an ordinance he backed that some say criminalizes homelessness — a person can be cited twice for refusing shelter, and a third refusal within 18 months can lead to an arrest.
“When shelter was available, we required that people come indoors,” Mahan said, adding, “We have to be able to mandate treatment.”
It’s a controversial position, but also one that is increasingly popular. Gov. Gavin Newsom has backed mandated treatment, in a lighter form, with his CARE Court (which is technically voluntarily). And the movement to require people to accept a shelter space or face arrest is growing on the right and even the Democratic-middle.
But there is a fine and dangerous line with mandated treatment and shelter requirements that is often pushed further and further to the side in favor of the clean, safe streets argument. Whenever we start locking folks up — whether it’s in mental wards or immigration detention centers or jails — we should be careful that expediency isn’t trumping ethics.
Of course, the debate would not be complete without the Democratic candidates’ position on our president, speaking of ethics.
Steyer was gleeful that Trump has come after him on social media, a point of pride that he is a relevant figure in the fight against MAGA. He also said he would abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement if he could, which he can’t.
Becerra highlighted his many lawsuits as California’s attorney general during Trump’s first term, and pledged to keep fighting. Porter leaned into her time in Congress and her efforts to help Democrats in other races win.
Mahan took a different route, pledging to fight when necessary, but adding, “We need a partnership, and we need to find common ground with this administration on certain issues.”
Newsom learned the hard way that common ground is what Trump says it is, and shifts without warning or reason.
So what’s the takeaway from all this?
Boring dad; feisty mom; rich do-gooder; striving newcomer; MAGA one; MAGA two.
None of them hit it out of the park, but no one struck out. Maybe next time.
Source link
Democrats win in Virginia but it won’t be the final say in a national redistricting competition
Democrats on Wednesday celebrated an election win in Virginia that could put them slightly ahead in the national redistricting competition that President Trump triggered in an attempt to preserve his party’s House majority in this year’s midterms, but it will not be the final round.
Now that it’s been approved by voters, the new Virginia map will have to clear additional legal hurdles. On Wednesday, the state attorney general’s office said it would immediately appeal a ruling earlier in the day from a judge in rural southern Virginia who ordered that the results of Tuesday’s vote not be certified.
Ultimately, the Virginia Supreme Court will decide whether Democratic lawmakers violated procedural rules when they referred a constitutional amendment to the ballot authorizing the new U.S. House districts that could help Democrats win as many as four additional seats in the state. If so, that could invalidate the map voters narrowly approved Tuesday.
What happens next in Florida also will matter.
The state’s Republican-controlled Legislature is to meet in a special session next week that GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis called in part to draw a new map to expand the party’s congressional majority there. The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to issue an opinion by the end of June in a Louisiana case that could overturn a key provision of the Voting Rights Act and lead to redrawn political maps across the South, though almost all of those could not happen until 2028.
After voters passed the Virginia amendment, Democrats could tentatively claim that they netted 10 seats nationally from the mid-decade redistricting, compared with the nine that Republicans claim. Even if things swing again in the GOP’s favor, the net result of Trump’s campaign would be at best an incremental increase in the number of GOP-leaning House seats at a time when his approval rating is dropping and Republican anxiety over losing control of Congress in November is rising.
“We have successfully blunted Trump’s attempt to completely hijack the midterms,” said John Bisognano, president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee.
Many Republicans agreed.
“The GOP will now lose net seats across the country. If you’re going to pick a fight, at least win it,” Ari Fleischer, who was a spokesman for President George W. Bush, posted on the social media site X after the Virginia vote. “All this was foreseeable and avoidable. We should not have started this fight.”
Adam Kincaid, executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust, argued that it is too soon to declare one party a victor.
“It’s an ongoing process with many legal challenges pending, and it’s far too early for sweeping statements on the final outcome,” he said.
Trump on Wednesday tried to undermine the Virginia result by leveling groundless accusations of fraud similar to ones he made after losing the 2020 presidential election. He called the Virginia vote “RIGGED” and “Crooked” in a post on his social media site and added, “Let’s see if the Courts will fix this travesty of ‘Justice.’”
Redistricting spread from Texas to other states
Redistricting is typically done every 10 years after each census, unless ordered by a court. But last summer, Trump pushed a redrawing in Texas, prodding the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature to add up to five winnable House seats for his party. Trump then began pressuring other Republican-run states to follow. Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio have since created more GOP-leaning seats in addition to Texas.
Democrats began to fight back, even though they were more constrained because several Democratic-controlled states had maps drawn by independent commissions rather than lawmakers and governors.
To counter Texas, California’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, pushed the Democratic-controlled Legislature to place a redistricting initiative on last fall’s ballot. After voters overwhelmingly approved it, the measure will replace a commission-approved map with one that could gain Democrats five seats.
Democrats reclaimed the Legislature and governor’s office in November in Virginia and swiftly moved to replicate California’s move with an even more aggressive redistricting plan. It replaces a congressional map imposed by a court after the last census that had resulted in a 6-5 edge for Democrats with one that could allow Democrats to win as many as 10 seats.
“We are not going to let anyone tilt the system without a response,” state Senate President L. Louise Lucas said at a news conference Wednesday.
Courts could still have a say on redistricting
In Washington, U.S. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York warned Florida Republicans, who have been openly nervous about redrawing their district boundaries and potentially spreading their core voters too thin before an election that appears to be trending against them.
“Our message to Florida Republicans right now is, ‘F around and find out,’” Jeffries said.
House Majority Forward, the nonprofit arm of the super political action committee aligned with House Democrats, has spent nearly $60 million to push back against Republicans’ redistricting efforts. Some $40 million of that was on the Virginia campaign.
Another obstacle in Florida is an anti-gerrymandering constitutional amendment that was approved by state voters in 2010. It is likely that any new Florida map would trigger significant litigation, although six of the state Supreme Court’s seven justices were appointed by Republicans.
Nicholas Stephanopolous, a Harvard law professor, said a challenge for DeSantis is that the Florida amendment forbids drawing lines for purely partisan purposes, so he has to find some other excuse for revising the map. “Even with that sort of acquiescent state supreme court, I don’t think it’s a done deal,” Stephanopolous said.
The Virginia move comes with its own legal issues. Republicans have challenged the process that Democrats used to place the measure on the ballot and the state Supreme Court opted to wait for the vote before even scheduling arguments in the case. It is unclear when a ruling could come.
Wednesday’s ruling stopping certification came from a separate case that Republicans filed with the same lower court judge, whose initial ruling against the initiative was put on hold by the state supreme court.
“The ballot box was never the final word here,” Terry Kilgore, the Virginia House Republican leader, said in a statement after Tuesday’s vote. “Serious legal questions remain about both the wording of this referendum and the process used to put it before voters.”
The biggest legal wild card is held by the U.S. Supreme Court. Its conservative majority could throw out a requirement under the Voting Rights Act that in areas with a large minority population, mapmakers draw districts that are more favorable to the election of minority candidates.
That provision has led to the creation of several majority-minority congressional seats, especially in the South. Without it, Republicans in conservative states could shrink the number of U.S. House seats winnable by Democrats even further.
But it’s unlikely that any state other than Louisiana, which brought the lawsuit the high court will rule on, would be able to adjust its congressional lines in time for November even if the court eliminates that provision, known as Section Two. That’s because the November election is already officially underway in most states and candidate filing deadlines — and, in some cases, primary elections — have already passed.
Riccardi and Lieb write for the Associated Press. AP writers Lisa Mascaro and Leah Askarinam in Washington contributed to this report.
Source link
Some key groups moved toward Trump in 2024. Here’s what they think now, according to AP-NORC polls
WASHINGTON — Many of the groups that helped elect Donald Trump as president again are deeply unhappy with his performance, according to a new AP-NORC poll.
Trump’s return to the presidency was fueled by a wide-ranging coalition that built on his loyal base of supporters. Now that Trump has been in the White House for more than a year, the survey of more than 2,500 U.S. adults from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that many key groups — including Hispanic adults, younger adults and men — are increasingly dissatisfied with his presidency.
The poll was conducted from April 16 through Monday, as oil prices fluctuated and Americans spent more at the gas pump.
It’s a particularly bad moment for Trump, a Republican whose economic approval slumped over the past month as the Iran war drives prices higher. But AP-NORC polls show that discontent has been building among critical segments of the population over the past year.
Trump’s overall approval among Hispanic adults has fallen 16 percentage points since March 2025, and his support has declined by 9 percentage points among men.
And while Trump’s base is still largely behind him — most Republicans approve of his performance — there are signs that his second term may not be living up to their expectations.
Here’s what polling shows about Trump’s current status with four important groups:
Hispanic adults
Hispanic Americans have grown increasingly discontented with Trump over the past year.
About one-quarter of Hispanic adults approve of how he’s handling the presidency in the new poll, down from about 4 in 10 in March 2025.
That decline has been visible since late last year — suggesting that it’s not just the war in Iran or recent spikes in gas prices that are leaving this group unhappy.
Trump’s restrictive immigration approach may be playing a role. Only about one-quarter of Hispanics approve of his handling of immigration, down from 36% at the beginning of his term.
His immigration tactics appear to be particularly unpopular among younger Hispanics — a group with which he made gains in 2024. Only 18% of younger Hispanic adults approve of his performance on immigration, compared with 40% of Americans overall.
There is also broad discontent about the state of the U.S. economy among Hispanics. Only about one-quarter of Hispanic adults approve of how Trump is handling that issue, and about 2 in 10 say they approve of his approach to the cost of living. Few Hispanic adults, about 2 in 10, describe the nation’s economy as “good.”
Young adults
Trump’s overall approval with Americans under age 45 has slid over the past year, falling from 39% in March 2025 to 28% in the latest poll.
Younger women have a particularly dim view of Trump’s handling of the economy.
Only about 2 in 10 women under age 45 approve of how Trump is handling the economy, including only 7% of younger Hispanic women who approve of his economic approach. More young men, about 3 in 10, approve of him on this issue.
Trump’s struggles among young adults extend to other groups, too. Only about one-third of white adults under age 45 approve of his overall performance, compared with 45% of white adults age 45 or older.
A downtick among men
Trump made broad appeals to men throughout his 2024 campaign, and most male voters backed Trump in the presidential election over Democrat Kamala Harris. In particular, he made slight but significant gains with Black and Hispanic men, who were drawn by his vows to revitalize the economy.
Since he reentered office, though, American men have become slightly less likely to approve of his performance, declining from 47% at the start of his second term to 38% in the most recent poll.
There are signs that Black men, in particular, aren’t seeing Trump’s economic promises pan out. Black men are more likely than white or Hispanic men to disapprove of Trump’s approach to the presidency, as well as his approach to the economy, the cost of living and Iran. Only about 1 in 10 Black men say they approve of how Trump is handling the cost of living, and roughly 2 in 10 approve of how he’s handling the economy.
Hispanic men, too, have a relatively dim view of Trump’s overall performance. About 3 in 10 approve of how Trump is handling the presidency, regardless of their age. That support is stronger among white men, with about half approving of Trump.
While young Republicans are frustrated, MAGA still backs Trump
Trump has benefited from Republicans’ loyalty for years, but there are recent signs of frustration even within his base.
Roughly two-thirds of Republicans approve of Trump’s job performance. That is down slightly from 82% near the start of his second term and is generally in line with the GOP low point from his first term.
But only about half of Republicans overall approve of Trump’s approach to the cost of living, and a majority of Republicans under age 45 disapprove of him on that issue.
Trump is still buoyed by the support of his MAGA base, even as he faces backlash from conservative media figures on some of his recent actions in Iran.
About 9 in 10 MAGA Republicans — those who consider themselves supporters of the “Make America Great Again” movement — approve of Trump’s job performance, and a similar share approve of his handling of Iran.
It’s a good sign for Trump that his most robust supporters are still in his corner, but not all Republicans identify with MAGA. About half of Republicans, 54%, say they consider themselves MAGA supporters.
Among non-MAGA Republicans, Trump’s approval is much lower, at 44%.
Sanders and Thomson-Deveaux write for the Associated Press. The AP-NORC poll of 2,596 adults was conducted April 16-20 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 2.6 percentage points.
Source link
Iran Ramps Up Attacks On Ships In The Strait Of Hormuz After Trump Ceasefire Extension (Updated)
The TWZ Newsletter
Weekly insights and analysis on the latest developments in military technology, strategy, and foreign policy.
Though President Donald Trump on Tuesday declared an extension to a ceasefire with Iran, the Islamic Republic continues to attack shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. At least two ships were fired on by Iran, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO). Iranian officials say the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) seized those ships and fired on another.
These incidents came a day after U.S. forces boarded an Iran-linked oil tanker in the Indian Ocean and highlighted that regardless of diplomacy, shipping remains a target for both sides. Meanwhile, Iran made veiled threats against the telecommunications cables running under the Strait. All this is happening as Tehran says it won’t return to the bargaining table until the U.S. ends its blockade of Iranian ports. We’ll discuss that more later in this story.
The first attack in the Strait on Wednesday took place shortly before midnight EDT about 15 nautical miles northeast of Oman, according to UKMTO.
“The Master of a Container Ship reported that the vessel was approached by 1 IRGC gun boat, no VHF challenge that then fired upon the vessel which has caused heavy damage to the bridge. No fires or environmental impact reported. All Crew reported safe.”
Nour News, a website affiliated with Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) opened fire on the Epaminodes, after it had “ignored the warnings of the Iranian armed forces,” the BBC reported.
Epaminodes is a Liberian-flagged container ship, according to MarineTraffic.com.
A second incident took place about three hours later eight nautical miles west of Iran, UKMTO stated.
“A master of an outbound cargo ship reports having been fired upon and is now stopped in the water,” the organization explained in an alert. “Crew are safe and accounted for. There is no reported damage to the vessel. UKMTO is aware of high levels of activity in the SoH area and encourages vessels to report any suspicious activity.”
It is unclear at the moment which ship was attacked in that incident. UKTMO did not name the vessel. However, in addition to claiming they fired on the Epaminodes, Iranian officials say they also struck the Euphoria, which MarineTraffic said is a Panamanian-flagged container ship, and the MSC-Francesca, also a Panamanian-flagged container ship, according to MarineTraffic.
The Epaminodes and MSC-Francesca were also seized for “endangering maritime security by operating without the necessary permits and tampering with navigation systems,” the IRGC claimed, stating the vessels have been “directed to the coast of Iran.”
The disposition of the vessels and crews is not currently known. U.S. Central Command could not confirm any of these incidents.
A Sentinel-2 satellite image captured today shows what looks like a swarm of IRGCN fast attack craft sailing north of the strait of Hormuz near Kargan coast, according to open source investigator Mehdi H on X.
The image shows what appears to be at least 33 boats. It is unclear if there is any connection between these craft and the shipping attacks. The IRGC has invested heavily in its fleet of small boats for decades as TWZ has explored in the past. Some of these vessels are armed with short-range anti-ship missiles, as well as artillery rockets and other weapons. They can also be used to lay naval mines. These fleets are extremely hard to find and fix, and do not need large ports to operate from. While CENTCOM says it has destroyed well over 150 Iranian ships, the IRGC still has many remaining small boats.
As we noted earlier in this story, in addition to attacking and capturing ships on the Strait, Iran pointed out the vulnerability of telecommunications cables running under it.
“The Strait of Hormuz is not only a crucial route for oil and gas transportation; this narrow waterway is also one of the most important internet chokepoints in the region and the world,” the IRGC-linked Tasnim news agency noted on Wednesday. “According to submarine network data, at least 7 main communication cables of the Persian Gulf countries pass through this route; while more than 97% of the world’s internet traffic is transferred via these fiber optic cables laid under the sea.”
“Cables such as FALCON, AAE‑1, TGN‑Gulf, and SEA‑ME‑WE connect a significant part of the region’s digital communication to major data centers in the Middle East, Europe, and Asia,” the outlet added. “These infrastructures are the backbone of data transfer, e-commerce, cloud services, and online communications in the Persian Gulf countries.”
“The concentration of many internet cables in a narrow passage makes the Strait of Hormuz a vulnerable point for the region’s digital economy,” Tasnim posited, calling it “a place where cables, after passing through the strait, connect to coastal landing nodes and major regional data centers.”
UPDATES
Our coverage for the day has concluded.
UPDATE: 7:56 PM EDT –
Though the fighting may be paused, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the economic pressure on Iran continues.
The aircraft carrier USS George H. W. Bush is set to arrive in the Middle East in about three to five days after sailing around the southern tip of Africa, Fox News Chief National Security Correspondent Jennifer Griffin stated on X.
The timing, she noted, coincides with Trump’s extending the ceasefire deadline by that same timeline.
The Washington Post reports that the Pentagon has told Congress it could take six months to fully clear the Strait of Hormuz of mines deployed by the Iranian military.
The publication added that any such operation is unlikely to be carried out until the U.S. war with Iran ends.
This “assessment that means the conflict’s economic impact could extend late into this year or beyond,” the newspaper added.
“The timeline — met with frustration by Democrats and Republicans alike, two of these people said — is the latest sign that gasoline and oil prices could remain elevated long after any peace deal is reached,” the Post noted.
Israel’s N12 News reported on X that Trump has given Iran a deadline of Sunday.
Two Israel Air Force technicians from Tel Nof Airbase, near Ashdod, will be charged with spying for Iran during Operation Roaring Lion, Israel’s public broadcaster KAN News reported on Wednesday.
“The two technicians, who worked on IAF F-15 fighter jets, handed over documentation of the engine diagrams, as well as photographs showing the face of a flight instructor, which is against military censorship rules, The Jerusalem Post reported.
“They were also asked to gather information about former IDF chief Lt.-Gen. (ret.) Herzi Halevi and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir,” the publication noted. “Authorities are considering whether to increase the charges on one of the technicians to treason, rather than the lower charge of espionage.”
The New York Post said Trump told them that another round of negotiations with Iran may take place later this week. At issue is the future of Iran’s highly enriched uranium, its supply of ballistic missiles, support of proxies like Hezbollah and the Houthis, and ultimate disposition of the Strait of Hormuz.
“‘Good news’ about a second round of talks between the US and Iran may be coming as soon as Friday,” the publication said Trump and Pakistani sources told it on Wednesday.
“Sources in Islamabad touted positive mediation efforts with Tehran, renewing the possibility of more peace talks within the next ‘36 to 72 hours,’” the newspaper added. “Asked about this possible breakthrough by The Post, Trump, in a text message, said: ‘It’s possible! President DJT.’”
Trump “plans to give the Iranians a limited timeframe to come up with a unified proposal to get diplomatic negotiations back on track,” CNN reported, citing two sources familiar with the internal discussions. “The administration does not want to indefinitely extend the ceasefire, the sources said, and does not want to give Iran time to drag out talks further.”
“Trump is willing to give another three to five days of ceasefire to allow the Iranians to get their shit together,” one U.S. source briefed on the matter told Axios. “It is not going to be open-ended.”
Trump’s negotiators “believe a deal to end the war and address what’s left of Iran’s nuclear program is still achievable,” the outlet added. “But they also worry they may not have anyone in Tehran empowered to say yes.”
Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei “is barely communicating,” Axios posited. “The IRGC generals now in control of the country and Iran’s civilian negotiators are openly at odds over strategy.”
“We saw that there is an absolute fracture inside Iran between the negotiators and the military — with neither side having access to the supreme leader, who is not responsive,” a U.S. official told the news organization.
Axios added that though Vice President JD Vance was all set to go to Pakistan for the second round of negotiations, he instead found himself waiting for the IRGC generals now in control of Iran to let parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Sayed Abbas Araghchi travel to Pakistan to meet him. However, while the Iranians appeared to have given Pakistani mediators the green light for talks, by Tuesday morning, that signal was gone, replaced by a demand that the U.S. lift its naval blockade.
As we have previously noted, Trump extended the ceasefire deadline yesterday, but gave no specific date for when fighting could resume. In a Truth Social post, he said he did so to give time for the fractured Iranian leadership to come up with a response to U.S. demands and that the ongoing blockade of Iranian ports would remain in effect.
His post came after Iranians refused to commit to peace talks tentatively scheduled to be held in Pakistan.
The official Iranian IRIB news outlet denied Tehran has taken any official position on Trump’s ceasefire extension or future negotiations.
The Iranians say the future of negotiations depends on the status of the ongoing blockade of its ports.
Iran’s UN Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani stated that Tehran is prepared to negotiate immediately after the United States ends its naval blockade, emphasizing that Washington must first halt its “ceasefire violations.”
He added that while Iran is prepared to negotiate, it is also prepared for war.
Citing data from the Vortexa cargo tracking group, Financial Times is reporting that “at least 34 tankers with links to Iran have bypassed the US blockade since it began.”
CENTCOM, which on Tuesday said the US Navy had directed 28 vessels to turn back to Iranian ports since the blockade was enacted, told us the assertion that dozens of ships bypassed the blockade “is not true.”
The Pentagon on Wednesday pushed back on the assertion that the Iranian-linked oil tanker Tifani was seized by the U.S., however, it may be a matter of semantics.
As we reported yesterday, the vessel boarded by U.S. forces in the Indian Ocean and The Washington Post later said it was “seized” as the United States determines “next steps for the Tifani and its crew in the next couple of days.”
“Seized wouldn’t be accurate at this time,” a Pentagon official told us. “So the way it works is after interdiction the U.S. has 96 hours to determine next steps. That’s where the rest of the interagency comes in. It varies by ship and situation what the solution would be. At this point DoW’s finished its role with just the interdiction.”
“During that 96-hour period, State would make the determination it’s stateless and work through diplomatic channels on where to take it,” the official added. “DHS and Coast Guard could be the ones to escort it. DoE gets involved for the oil, treasury for the sanction, DoJ for the legal elements and warrant. It really is a large, complex coordination effort across the interagency.”
The exact current disposition of the vessel is unclear. We have reached out to the White House for more details.
With Iran partially reopening its airspace, the U.S. State Department stated that any U.S. citizens still in the country “should leave Iran now, monitor local media for updates, and consult with commercial carriers for additional information on flights out of Iran.”
Americans seeking to depart Iran “may also depart by land to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Türkiye, and Turkmenistan. U.S. citizens should not travel to Afghanistan, Iraq, or the Pakistan-Iran border area,” the warning added. “Be aware that the Iranian government may prevent U.S. citizens from departing or charge an ‘exit fee’ for departures from Iran. U.S.-Iranian dual nationals must exit Iran on Iranian passports.”
During the course of Epic Fury, the U.S. has run through a large amount of advanced munitions, CNN reported.
The list includes about 50% of Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptors, 50% of its Patriot interceptors, 45% of its Precision Strike Missiles, 30% of its Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise Missiles (TLAMs), 20% of its Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff (JDAM) munitions and 20% of its Standard Missiles (SM-3 and SM-6).
Given the expenditure of costly defensive munitions used to swat down much cheaper Iranian drones, the U.S. military has introduced Ukrainian counter-drone technology in recent weeks at a key U.S. air base in Saudi Arabia, Reuters reported, citing five people with knowledge of the matter.
These attacks have destroyed aircraft and buildings, and killed at least one service member.
“The deployment of a Ukrainian command-and-control platform called Sky Map at Prince Sultan Air Base, which has not previously been reported,” is another sign of Ukrainian battlefield technological advances after more than four years of full-on war with Russia.
Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com
Source link
Bass, Barger meets with Trump to push for L.A. fire recovery funds
WASHINGTON — Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger met privately with President Trump and administration officials Wednesday to press for federal support and yet-unpaid wildfire recovery funding as the region continues to rebuild from the 2025 fires.
“This afternoon we met with President Trump and Administration officials to advocate for families who lost everything,” Bass and Barger said in a statement. “We had a very positive discussion about FEMA and other rebuilding funds as well as the support of the President to continue joining us in pressuring the insurance companies to pay what they owe — and for the big banks to step up to ease the financial pressure on L.A. families.”
Barger said the two leaders had a “high-level discussion” with the president in the Oval Office, sharing stories about what fire survivors are experiencing day to day. She added that “we left details behind with the President,” but did not specify whether Trump made any funding or policy promises during the meeting.
“First and foremost, today’s meeting was to thank the President for his initial support of infusing federal resources to expedite debris removal, as well as his recent tweet about insurance companies, which have already proven fruitful,” she said in a statement provided to The Times.
Bass was similarly reserved about the discussions, telling reporters that “we will follow up with the details,” but signaled progress is being made on federal support.
“I think what’s important is that we certainly got the president’s support in terms of, you know, what is needed, and then the appropriate people were in the room for us to follow up. And that was Russ Vought, who is the head of the Office of Management and budget,” Bass told KNX on Wednesday.
The meeting comes on the heels of a yearlong standoff between California leaders and the Trump administration over wildfire recovery funding, disaster response and whether the federal government should have a say in local rebuilding permitting.
California leaders, led by Gov. Gavin Newsom, have accused the Trump administration of withholding billions in critical wildfire aid, prompting a lawsuit over stalled recovery funds. Officials allege political bias in the delay of billions of dollars from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Newsom visited Washington in December. When he made his rounds on Capitol Hill, he met with five lawmakers, including three who serve on the Senate and House appropriations committees, to renew calls for $33.9 billion in federal aid for Los Angeles County fire recovery.
But the governor said he was denied a meeting with FEMA and would not say whether he had attempted to meet with Trump to discuss the issue.
Bass, meanwhile, appears to have found a path to the president on a subject that has been paramount for her community.
The fruitful meeting comes after Trump lobbed insults at the mayor at a news conference earlier this year, where he called her “incompetent” for how she handled last year’s wildfire recovery efforts. He alleged that under Bass’ leadership, the city’s delay in issuing local building permits will take years when it should have taken “two or three days.”
California officials, including Newsom, have urged the Trump administration to send Congress a formal request for the $33.9 billion in recovery aid needed to rebuild homes, schools, utilities and other critical infrastructure destroyed or damaged when the fires tore through neighborhoods more than 15 months ago.
What Bass and Barger’s meeting with the president ultimately produces remains to be seen.
The billions in recovery aid have not yet materialized, but the meeting could potentially give those discussions new momentum.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment about the meeting.
Earlier this month, Trump criticized insurance provider State Farm on Truth Social for its handling of the devastating Los Angeles County wildfires. He accused the insurance giant of abandoning its policyholders when tragedy struck.
“It was brought to my attention that the Insurance Companies, in particular, State Farm, have been absolutely horrible to people that have been paying them large Premiums for years, only to find that when tragedy struck, these horrendous Companies were not there to help!” Trump wrote.
But the rebuke didn’t come out of the blue. It stemmed from a controversial February visit to Los Angeles by Trump administration officials.
Trump tapped Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin in an effort to strip California state and local governments of their authority to permit the rebuilding of homes destroyed in the Eaton and Palisades fires.
Within the week, Zeldin was in Los Angeles, bashing Newsom and Los Angeles officials at a roundtable with fire victims and reporters, saying that residents were suffering from “bureaucratic, red tape delays and incompetency” and that leadership was “denying them … the ability to rebuild their lives”.
During the trip, officials heard direct complaints from local leaders and fire victims about insurers being slow, restrictive and insufficient with their claim payouts.
After these meetings, Trump directed Zeldin to investigate the insurers’ responses. State Farm, facing roughly $7 billion in fire-related claims, is also under formal investigation by California’s insurance commissioner over its handling of the crisis.
Despite tensions with the administration, Bass and Barger appeared confident that progress was being made on the insurance and funding issues.
“Our job is to fight for our communities,” their joint statement concluded. “When it comes to this recovery, our federal partners are essential, and we are grateful for the support of the President.”
Source link
Trump maintains blockade as Iran’s factions struggle to unite
WASHINGTON — Iranian forces attacked three commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, stoking an already tense standoff in the Persian Gulf as a U.S. naval blockade strains Tehran’s economy and pressures its divided leadership to return to peace talks.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it seized two ships and damaged a third after the vessels “ignored repeated warnings.” British maritime monitors confirmed the incidents, describing one cargo ship left disabled in the water and another that took heavy damage to its bridge.
“Disrupting order and safety in the Strait of Hormuz is considered a red line for Iran,” the Iranian Navy Command said in a statement.
Hours before, President Trump confirmed he would maintain the naval blockade in the gulf, but agreed to give Iranian leaders additional time to agree on a new peace proposal, he wrote in a Truth Social post.
“Based on the fact that the Government of Iran is seriously fractured, not unexpectedly so and, upon the request of Field Marshal Asim Munir, and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, of Pakistan, we have been asked to hold our Attack on the Country of Iran until such time as their leaders and representatives can come up with a unified proposal,” Trump wrote Tuesday.
More than a dozen American warships have prevented exports from leaving Iranian ports since peace talks in Islamabad failed earlier this month. The tactic has greatly constrained Iranian oil exports — about 90% of which flow through the Strait of Hormuz — contributing to rising inflationary pressure.
The restrictions could wipe out roughly $435 million in daily economic activity, according to Miad Maleki, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Oil exports, Tehran’s primary revenue source, have halted. At the same time, Iran has been unable to import food or industrial goods. As a result, the blockade is expected to empty Iran’s war coffers and sharply accelerate inflationary effects on its people.
Trump is betting that the strategy will force Iran’s fractured negotiating team — which appears to be split between parliamentary moderates and hard-liners within the Revolutionary Guard — to agree on a “unified” peace proposal.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said Wednesday the president extended the ceasefire agreement to allow Iran to get their “act together,” and emphasized that Trump has not given Iran a “firm deadline” to respond yet.
“President Trump will ultimately dictate the timeline and he will do so when he feels it is in the best interest of the United States and the American people,” Leavitt told reporters.
Though she declined to specify who the administration is negotiating with in Iran, Leavitt said the president was “generously offering a bit of flexibility” to the regime so that they can come up with a unified response.
“This is a battle between the pragmatists and the hard-liners in Iran right now,” Leavitt told reporters at the White House.
That division was visible earlier this week when plans for a second round of talks in Islamabad collapsed after Iranian officials failed to confirm participation and instead introduced new preconditions under pressure from hard-line factions.
Iranian Parliament Speaker Bagher Ghalibaf initially signaled a willingness to attend talks, but was overshadowed by Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Maj. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi, who insisted that the United States lift its blockade before discussions could begin. A report by the Institute for the Study of War said Vahidi sought to derail negotiations rather than secure meaningful economic relief.
“One challenge with the ongoing negotiations is the divided nature of Iran’s negotiating team,” the report said, adding that “[Trump’s] reference to a ‘unified’ proposal appears to imply that previous proposals were not unified in some way.”
And while hard-liners continue attempts to derail diplomacy with continued demands and attacks in the strait, moderates in Iran continue to push for peace.
This week, prominent Sunni cleric Moulana Abdol Hamid called a “fair agreement” the only viable path forward and warned that those who seek to block negotiations would bear responsibility for the “homeland’s devastation.”
Benjamin Radd, a political scientist at UCLA who studies Iran, said the dispute is a sign of a larger power struggle for control of Tehran’s government.
“There are clear divisions within the leadership,” Radd said in an interview. “Right now, it’s the IRGC faction that has all the power. They have the guns, they have the weapons. What they don’t have is the diplomatic connections and experience dealing with the United States.”
Radd pointed to the economic toll of the U.S. blockade as a key driver of tension inside Iran.
“They’re facing a huge domestic crisis,” he said. “They’re not able to replenish their own needs. Nothing can get in or out of the country. They can’t make any money.”
The consequences of the U.S. strategy could push the more moderate Iranian leaders to strike a deal on nuclear enrichment or a reopening of the strait in exchange for the United States lifting the blockade, Radd said.
“That would start rebuilding some sort of trust,” Radd said. “And then we’re seeing the IRGC is basically steadfast, refusing to do any of this.”
With renewed Israeli attacks in Lebanon killing at least three people Wednesday, despite a 10-day ceasefire agreement, Iranian leaders are preparing for the possibility that talks with the United States will fail altogether.
“Iran has prepared for a new phase of fighting,” the IRGC-affiliated Tasnim News Agency reported this week, citing military redeployments and updated target lists.
Meanwhile, Iranian Judiciary Chief Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejei warned that renewed U.S. or Israeli strikes were likely. Iran Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei made a similar statement in a news briefing Wednesday. He announced the country’s armed forces were “on high alert” and ready to defend against any threat, while being open to Pakistan’s mediation efforts.
He did not confirm if the government was participating in a second round of negotiations.
“Diplomacy is a tool for ensuring national interests and security,” he said, “and we will take the necessary steps whenever we conclude that the necessary and logical grounds exist to use this tool to achieve national interests.”
Until then, it appears both Washington and Tehran will continue brinkmanship in the strait.
On Wednesday morning, the IRGC released a statement confirming it seized the two cargo ships and identified them as the MSC Francesca and the Epaminondas. It claimed the MSC Francesca was linked to Israel and accused both of “jeopardizing maritime security by operating without necessary permits and tampering with navigation systems.”
A third ship, the Euphoria, which sails under the Panamanian flag and is owned by a company based in the United Arab Emirates, was fired upon early Wednesday while heading east out of the Strait of Hormuz, according to Vanguard, a maritime intelligence firm.
The Euphoria later resumed sailing toward the Gulf of Oman, according to Lloyd’s List.
In Lebanon, Amal Khalil became the fourth journalist killed by Israeli fire since hostilities with the Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah intensified on March 2.
Khalil’s body was reported to have been found under the rubble of a house where she and freelance photographer Zeinab Faraj were sheltering, according to their colleagues.
Khalil and Faran were in the southern Lebanese town of Al-Tayri, covering developments there when an Israeli attack targeted the vehicle in front of them, killing its occupants.
The two journalists then sheltered in a house but were hit by Israeli fire once more, according to a statement from the Lebanese Health Ministry.
When Red Cross crews scrambled to the area to rescue the trapped journalists, they were targeted with a sound bomb and machine-gun fire.
The Israeli military said it was not preventing rescue teams from reaching the area and that the incident was under review. It acknowledged targeting a vehicle it said had come out of a structure used by Hezbollah and was heading toward Israeli troops.
The Red Cross reached the house by the early evening local time, and rescued Faraj, who is reported to be in stable condition after undergoing surgery for a head wound, according to her colleagues.
Times staff writers Ana Ceballos in Washington and Nabih Bulos in Beirut contributed to this report.
Source link
Trump calls Iran’s leadership ‘fractured’. Is it, and who’s in charge? | US-Israel war on Iran News
United States President Donald Trump has described the Iranian leadership as “seriously fractured” as he announced an extension to a ceasefire.
Trump said on Tuesday that the ceasefire would be extended to allow more time for negotiations and appeared to be suggesting that Iran’s leadership is in disarray.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
He added that the US naval blockade on the Strait of Hormuz and Iranian ports would remain in place.
Three weeks ago, Trump claimed the US military campaign had succeeded in its goal of forcing a change in Iran’s government and the US was now dealing with “a whole new set of people” in charge of the country.
On April 11, Iran sent a delegation led by parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf to Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, to begin talks with the US.
So is Iran’s government “fractured”? We take a look at the key Iranian stakeholders and power centres in Iran and how their approach to US negotiations may differ.
Who are the key figures in Iran, and are they ‘fractured’ over talks with the US?
Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei
Khamenei is the second son of former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli air strikes on Tehran on the first day of the war on February 28. Mojtaba Khamenei was selected as Iran’s new supreme leader on March 8, according to state media reports.
The 56-year old has never run for office or been elected but has for decades been a highly influential figure in the inner circle of his father, cultivating deep ties with the the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Observers said the younger Khamenei’s ascension is a clear sign that more hardline factions in Iran’s establishment have retained power and could indicate that the government has little desire to agree to a deal or negotiations with the US in the short term.
Since his ascension, however, Mojtaba Khamenei has not been seen in public. On March 13, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth claimed Iran’s new supreme leader had been wounded in US-Israeli strikes.
An April 11, a Reuters news agency report that quoted three people close to the supreme leader’s inner circle said Khamenei was still recovering from severe facial and leg injuries suffered in the air strike that killed his father. The sources were quoted as saying he was taking part in meetings with senior officials through audioconferencing.
Al Jazeera could not independently verify these claims.
According to state media reports, Khamenei has been active in making decisions on the war.
In a message read on Iranian state TV on April 18, Khamenei warned that the Iranian navy was ready to inflict “new bitter defeats” on the US and Israel as tensions escalated in the Strait of Hormuz.
Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf
Ghalibaf, 64, has served as Iran’s parliamentary speaker since 2020.
He was commander of the IRGC air force from 1997 to 2000. After that, he served as the country’s police chief. From 2005 to 2017, he was the mayor of Tehran.
Ghalibaf stood in elections for president in 2005, 2013, 2017 and 2024. He withdrew his bid for president before the election in 2017 when Hassan Rouhani won a second term.
Last month in the early days of the US-Israel war on Iran, it was suggested that Ghalibaf was the Trump administration’s “pick” to lead the country after the war ended. He has also been the main Iranian official leading negotiations with Washington since they began on April 11 in Pakistan.
In an overnight post on X on Tuesday, Ghalibaf wrote that Iran is “prepared to reveal new cards on the battlefield” after Trump threatened Tehran with “problems like they’ve never seen before” if the two-week ceasefire ended this week without a deal.
Ghalibaf expressed anger at Trump for “imposing a siege and violating the ceasefire”.
“We do not accept negotiations under the shadow of threats, and in the past two weeks, we have prepared to reveal new cards on the battlefield,” he said.
The ceasefire was supposed to have ended on Wednesday, but shortly before its expiration, Trump extended it until Iran “can come up with a unified proposal”.
Within Iran, however, Ghalibaf’s willingness to engage in negotiations with the US has been criticised by some people who have accused him of “betrayal”.
According to a report on Monday by the Iran International TV channel, some critics of Ghalibaf have said on social media platforms in Iran that the parliamentary speaker’s suggestion that peace talks with the US were progressing was “worrying”.
“There is no good in negotiation except harm,” one critic said.
But Ghalibaf has defended undertaking negotiations with the US. In a televised interview on Saturday, he said diplomacy does not mean “a withdrawal from Iran’s demands” but is a way to “consolidate military gains and translate them into political outcomes and lasting peace”.
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
Iran’s military power structure is often described as opaque and complex.
The nation operates parallel armies, multiple intelligence services and layered command structures, all of which answer directly to the supreme leader, who serves as the commander in chief of all the armed forces.
The parallel armies comprise the Artesh, Iran’s regular army, which is responsible for territorial defence, defence of Iran’s airspace and conventional warfare, and the IRGC, whose role goes beyond defence and includes protecting Iran’s political structure.
The IRGC also controls Iran’s airspace and drone arsenal, which has become the backbone of Iran’s deterrence strategy against attacks by Israel and the US.
After the US and Israel struck Iran and killed Ali Khamenei, the IRGC promised revenge and launched what it called “the heaviest offensive operations in the history of the armed forces of the Islamic Republic against occupied lands [a reference to Israel] and the bases of American terrorists”. Since then, it has struck US military assets and infrastructure across the Gulf region.
Some experts said Iranian officials negotiating with the US are more closely aligned with the IRGC than other leaders and groups.
In an interview with Al Jazeera on March 25, Babak Vahdad, a political analyst specialising in Iran, noted that Iran’s appointment of Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr as secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council suggested Iranian negotiations would become more tightly aligned with the IRGC’s priorities. Zolghadr is a former IRGC commander and has been secretary of the advisory Expediency Council since 2023.
But Javad Heiran-Nia, who directs the Persian Gulf Studies Group at the Center for Scientific Research and Middle East Strategic Studies in Iran, said a divide between the IRGC and Iran’s negotiating team was plain to see.
Iran has attacked three cargo ships in the Strait of Hormuz since Trump announced the ceasefire on April 6 and said the US naval blockade will remain.
“The attack on tankers during the ceasefire demonstrates the IRGC’s dominance over the diplomatic team and its disregard for their positions,” he told Al Jazeera.
Paydari Front
Heiran-Nia pointed to the role of the Paydari Front (Steadfastness Front), whose members are hardliners within Iran’s political structure who are deeply committed to preserving the original principles of the 1979 Islamic revolution and the absolute power of the supreme leader. This group, he said, has been using the negotiations to cement its position within the power structure and among its support base.
He added that the Paydari Front has also been questioning the negotiations.
“In Iran’s current political climate, various groups are trying to raise their weight, both within the power structure and in public opinion. Of course, the Paydari Front’s efforts are more meaningful in relation to their own support base rather than trying to influence other segments of society because their hardline approach holds no appeal for other social classes,” he said.
The influence this group could have over the progress of talks is debatable, however, he added.
“If a deal is reached, it will likely have a sovereign character. The establishment will impose its own narrative, and the IRGC will accept it. In the meantime, the hardliners will attack the administration of [President] Masoud Pezeshkian and Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf over the deal. However, it is unlikely that this will spread to the decision-making body of the establishment,” he added.
Source link
Hiltzik: A not-so-fond farewell to Lori Chavez-DeRemer
Lori Chavez-DeRemer seemed at first to be a good Trump hire as Labor secretary. Wow, were we wrong
It has long become clear that those of us who saw a glimmer of hope in President Trump’s appointment of Lori Chavez-DeRemer as secretary of Labor got snowed.
It wasn’t just, or even chiefly, the miasma of sleaze and corruption that seemed to surround her wherever she went. Or her slavish sucking up to Trump in public, notably at a Cabinet meeting in which she pleaded with Trump to send his immigration goons into Portland, Ore., to “crack down.” (“Thank you for what you’re doing with your agents on ICE,” she said at the August 2025 session.) Fun fact: She had represented a Portland suburb as a Republican for a single House term.
No. It was the gulf between the expectations, even among Democrats, that she might be a decent pick for the job, and the reality.
— Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich, recalling his departments accomplishments under Bill Clinton
After all, she had been one of only three Republicans in the House to vote in favor of the so-called PRO Act, which would significantly strengthen collective bargaining rights. (The measure passed the House in 2019 and 2021 but hasn’t gotten out of committee in the current Congress.)
As I reported after her nomination, labor activists and pro-labor politicians made encouraging noises about her. Among them was Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.): “It’s a big deal that one of the few Republican lawmakers who have endorsed the PRO Act could lead the Department of Labor,” Warren said. “If Chavez-DeRemer commits as Labor secretary to strengthen labor unions and promote worker power, she’s a strong candidate for the job.”
Get the latest from Michael Hiltzik
Commentary on economics and more from a Pulitzer Prize winner.
By continuing, you agree to our Terms of Service, which include arbitration and a class action waiver. You agree that we and our third-party vendors may collect and use your information, including through cookies, pixels and similar technologies, for the purposes set forth in our Privacy Policy such as personalizing your experience and ads.
She received an explicit endorsement from Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. “Her record suggests real support of workers & their right to unionize,” Weingarten tweeted. “I hope it means the Trump admin will actually respect collective bargaining and workers’ voices from Teamsters to teachers.”
The betting was that Chavez-DeRemer would be, at the very least, an upgrade from Trump’s previous appointee as Labor secretary during his first term. That was Eugene Scalia, son of the late Supreme Court justice, who had been a lawyer for big corporations fighting unions and resisting workplace regulations.
The most commonly expressed doubt about Chavez-DeRemer was whether she would have the fortitude to maintain a pro-labor stance in the face of the open hostility to workers displayed by Trump and the rest of his administration.
Within months, the answer was clear, and it was no. In May, she ceased enforcing a Biden administration rule that had discouraged businesses from designating their workers as independent contractors, depriving those workers of the legal protections and wage and hour benefits they would have received as employees.
The budget she submitted to Congress last year would slash her agency’s discretionary funding by more than 35%, to $8.6 billion from $13.2 billion, and cut its workforce by nearly 4,000 full-time workers, or more than 26%. In July she announced a plan to rescind 63 regulations that had been designed to help workers.
With language that sounded cribbed from the MAGA playbook, she said her goal is to “eliminate unnecessary regulations that stifle growth and limit opportunity.” Most of the regulations facing the guillotine related to worker health and safety protections.
Brief as it was, Chavez-DeRemer’s tenure wasn’t the first time that the Department of Labor was ill-served by its management. Republican presidents have displayed a decades-long tendency to fill the top spot with political cronies or pro-business activists masquerading as worker advocates, or worse.
Frances Perkins, Franklin Roosevelt’s Labor secretary, recalled having to clean up the agency — not just morally and ethically, but with broom and bucket, when she took over from William Nuckles Doak, Herbert Hoover’s appointee.
The Labor Department was located in a converted apartment building, its interior dark and foreboding, its shadowy corners occupied by silent, hulking men whom Perkins mentally labeled “cigar in the corner of the mouth types. Stale ashtrays and spittoons were everywhere, along with wastebaskets surrounded by mounds of misaimed and crumpled papers. (Its current Washington quarters are in the Frances Perkins Building.)
Doak didn’t seem inclined to leave the premises. Perkins got rid of him by sending him to lunch and packing up his personal effects while he was out.
Perkins’ first step as secretary was to disband an anti-immigrant squad that shook down foreign-born laborers for cash and helped employers harass labor organizers. She set a high standard for the agency, pushing forward legislation establishing the 40-hour workweek and the National Labor Relations Board — and also creating Social Security.
Many of Perkins’ Democratic successors have watched sadly as their efforts have been undone with a change in administrations. Robert Reich, who served under Bill Clinton (and is now an emeritus professor of public policy at UC Berkeley and an assiduous blogger), wrote Tuesday of having loved the agency’s mission: “to protect and raise the standard of living of working Americans.”
With Reich at Labor, the Clinton administration raised the federal minimum wage in 1997 from $3.35 an hour, where it had been stuck since 1980, to $5.15 (albeit still a cheeseparing $10.69 in today’s buying power). “We fought against sweatshops,” Reich recalled. “We took on big corporations that were cheating their employees. We kept workers safe.”
That the agency has been “treated like crap is an insult to generations of hardworking DOL employees, to American workers, to America,” Reich wrote.
Under Trump, the Department of Labor has become just another pro-business front pretending to advocate for workers. Genuine labor advocates are infuriated by its decline, which has proceeded under Republican and Democratic administrations alike.
The budget for its all-important wage and hour division, which enforces laws governing the minimum wage, overtime and prohibitions on child labor, has shrunk by 26% over a decade, according to David Weil, who headed the division under Obama and whose appointment by Biden to head the division was derailed by opposition from Big Business.
“There were 1,050 investigators working for the agency when I had the honor to lead it in the Obama administration,” Weil, who is a professor of social policy and management at Brandeis University, wrote last year. “It has barely over one-half that number now. The agency had 63 times more investigators per workplace in 1939 than in 2024.”
Trump poses as a pro-worker force, but his policies are atrocious for the laboring class. His Labor Department “walked away from a rule that expanded overtime protections to millions of workers,” Weil observed.
“While Congress’s ‘big beautiful bill’ boasts its worker-friendly removal of taxes on overtime, that provision benefits only a small slice of workers and revoking the overtime regulation further reduces the number of workers eligible for overtime protections when working long hours,” he wrote. “Or take the administration’s attack on low-paid workers whose employers hold federal contracts, by rescinding a $15 minimum wage for contractors covered by a Biden-era executive order, which benefited construction workers, purportedly a key Trump constituency.”
The Labor Department plays a role not only in regulating current workplace conditions but looking ahead at the “long-term prospects of our labor markets,” Weil told me Tuesday. “For example, the discussion of ‘affordability’ is rooted not only in rapidly rising price levels but also the low level of long-term earnings growth. Equally, our beliefs about the future prospects of employment and opportunity for college-educated workers are being upended by the potential impacts of AI.”
He added, “Questions like these require that the Labor Department be led by serious and knowledgeable individuals who place the interests of workers as their focus. So far, this administration has shown contempt for this mission,” as is shown by the decline and fall of Chavez-DeRemer.
Sometimes, the departure of an underperforming executive or official presages improvements ahead. That hasn’t been the pattern under Trump, and sadly, it’s not likely to happen at Labor.
Source link
Trump vs. Powell: Interest rates, investigation and a replacement
April 22 (UPI) — Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell‘s term is nearing its end and President Donald Trump is pushing for his replacement but an investigation into Powell may hold up the appointment of a new chair.
The Justice Department opened an investigation into Powell over the renovation of the Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington, D.C., which Trump claims has exceeded $3 billion. The renovation was not the beginning of Trump’s feud with Powell but it has added to his effort to oust the chairman before the end of his term.
Powell’s term as chairman of the Federal Reserve will end in May but he will remain on the Board of Governors until January 2028.
Typically when a Fed chair’s term ends, they resign. However, Powell said he plans to stay put until a replacement is appointed.
At least one lawmaker, Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said he would not vote on a new chairman until the investigation into Powell is over.
The Justice Department alleges that Powell made false or misleading statements to Congress about the cost of the renovation project at the Federal Reserve headquarters during his testimony to the House Committee on Financial Services in June.
Powell’s testimony was part of his semiannual report to Congress on monetary policy.
Following the hearing, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., submitted a request to then-Attorney General Pam Bondi for Powell to be investigated for perjury and making false statements. Luna said that Powell denied there would be “luxury features” included in the renovations, including a “VIP dining room, premium marble, water features and a roof terrace garden.”
Luna added that Powell “falsely claimed that the Eccles building ‘never had’ a serious renovation.” She notes that the building underwent renovations in 1999 and 2003.
“These are not minor misstatements,” Luna said. “Chairman Powell knowingly misled both Congress and executive branch officials about the true nature of a taxpayer-funded project. Lying under oath is a serious offense — especially from someone tasked with overseeing our monetary system and public trust.”
No charges have been formally filed against Powell. The challenge the Justice Department faces in convicting Powell of perjury or false statements is in proving that he willfully, knowingly made statements he knew to be false at the time.
Powell, who was Trump’s nominee for chairman in 2017, has said that the investigation into him and the Federal Reserve renovation is “pretext” to punish him for not following Trump’s direction to lower interest rates.
“No one, certainly not the chair of the Federal Reserve, is above the law, but this unprecedented action should be seen in the broader context of the administration’s threats and ongoing pressure,” Powell said in a video message in January. “This is about whether the Feed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions — or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.”
Last month, federal prosecutor George A. Massucco-LaTaif told Chief U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg that the Justice Department does not know of any evidence that a crime has been committed in the Federal Reserve renovation project.
“We do not know at this time,” Massucco-LaTaif said. “However, there are 1.2 billion reasons for us to look into it.”
The fissure between Powell and Trump began and has continued over the Federal Reserve’s decision to maintain elevated interest rates in response to inflation. Trump has repeatedly called on the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates, saying the United States should “have the lowest interest rate in the world.”
All along the Federal Reserve continues to hold an elevated interest rate, currently between 3.5% and 3.75%, in an effort to tame inflation. Its target rate of inflation is 2% on an annual basis.
Economic markers from the U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics show the rate of inflation remains at about 3%.
Trump has nominated Kevin Warsh to succeed Powell. Warsh served on the Fed’s board for five years after being appointed by President George W. Bush in 2006.
“I have known Kevin for a long period of time, and have no doubt that he will go down as one of the great Fed chairmen, maybe the best,” Trump posted on social media in January. “On top of everything else, he is ‘central casting,’ and he will never let you down.”
Warsh faced his first hearing on the path toward confirmation on Tuesday when he testified before the Senate Banking Committee. Questions by senators centered on the Federal Reserve’s independence, something Trump’s influence has called into question.
If appointed, Warsh would be the wealthiest person to lead the Federal Reserve.
Presidents have butted heads with the Federal Reserve throughout its history, as monetary policy can reflect on how the U.S. population views the president’s performance. A president has never tried to fire the chairman of the Federal Reserve.
The Federal Reserve is a non-partisan, independent agency made up of a board of governors posted in Washington, D.C., and 12 regional banks located across the United States.
Independence is key to the Federal Reserve’s function, keeping it from choosing policy based on the political goals of those occupying the White House and other branches of government.
Trump has not attempted to fire Powell yet but he did attempt to fire Fed board Gov. Lisa Cook. The attempt was unsuccessful as the U.S. Supreme Court intervened in October and ruled that she can remain at her post on an interim basis, at least for 2026.
The president does have some authority over choosing or designating a new Federal Reserve chair, Peter Shane, a constitutional law scholar in residence at NYU Law School, told UPI. However, a president must demonstrate a good reason for doing so.
There are two mechanisms in place that are meant to protect the independence of the Federal Reserve and its chair from political influence.
First, there is Supreme Court precedent. In 1935, the high court made a ruling in the landmark case Humphrey’s Executor vs. the United States. In this case, the court ruled that President Franklin D. Roosevelt could not fire the commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission, another independent agency, without cause.
The ruling affirmed that the authority to remove the head of any independent agency falls to Congress.
Second, there is the Federal Reserve Act. President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 to decentralize the control over monetary policy in the United States. This established the Federal Reserve and set its independence as a foundational feature of its existence.
The Federal Reserve Act makes the Federal Reserve independent in setting monetary policy without the influence of the president or Congress.
Congress has the ability to change the Federal Reserve Act. It did so in 1977 with the Federal Reserve Reform Act.
This amendment, signed into law by President Jimmy Carter, codified the objectives of the agency and established a requirement for the board of governors to report to Congress in hearings twice a year. It also added the requirement of Senate confirmation hearings for the chairman and vice chairman of the board of governors.
Last year, Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., introduced the Federal Reserve Board Abolition Act, calling for the board of governors of the Federal Reserve and all Federal Reserve banks to be abolished.
“Americans have suffered under crippling inflation and the Federal Reserve is to blame,” Massie said in a statement.
Since being introduced in March 2025 the bill has not progressed beyond being referred to the House Committee on Financial Services.
Source link
Worst-run state? In Britain, Steve Hilton was inspired by California
Steve Hilton is a former Fox News host who has unexpectedly emerged as a leading candidate in the race for governor with a message that California is a failed state in need of radical reform.
But his sudden rise in California politics comes a decade and a half after he pitched the U.K. Conservative Party with a very different idea: Britain could learn a lot from the Golden State.
Back in 2010, when Hilton was a top strategist during David Cameron’s rise to power as Conservative prime minister, he looked to Silicon Valley’s high-charged ethos of techno-optimism and green innovation for inspiration as he sought to revitalize the ailing Conservative Party and the U.K.
Splitting his time between London and the Bay Area — his wife worked for Google — Hilton was instrumental in getting California companies to invest in the U.K. and persuading Google to open its first wholly owned and designed building outside the U.S. in London. So infatuated was he with California that one British political commentator dubbed the Cameron administration’s philosophy ”Thatcherism on a surfboard.”
But Hilton is now utterly unsparing in his criticism of California.
After moving to the Bay Area full time, teaching at Stanford University and hosting Fox News’ “The Next Revolution,” Hilton is running as a Republican on a platform of “Making California Golden Again.”
To the dismay of many Democrats, the 56-year-old British immigrant, a supporter of President Trump who dubs California “America’s worst-run state,” is ahead in multiple polls in a crowded race with no front-runner.
Even after former Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell dropped out April 12 after multiple women accused him of sexual assault, Democrats are struggling to unite around one candidate. And Trump’s endorsement of Hilton this month almost seems to guarantee Hilton will secure enough Republican votes to make it past the June primary.
Hilton accuses Democratic leaders of turning the state into the “Wuhan lab of modern leftism.” As Democrats amassed power in Sacramento, seizing control of statewide offices and the Legislature, he argues, California government has become “a massive, bloated, bureaucratic nanny state,” so overregulated and poorly run, it is failing its people.
“We have the highest poverty rate in the country in California, tied with Louisiana, which is shameful, really, for a state that prides itself on being the home of innovation and opportunity,” he told The Times. “We’re ranked by U.S. News and World Report 50 out of 50 for opportunity. The performance of California, when measured against the rest of the country, is really dire.”
Most California voters rank affordability and cost of living as important as they weigh whom to elect as governor. But whether Hilton can persuade them that Democrats are responsible for the state’s problems, or make inroads as a Republican aligned with Trump on immigration and abortion, is unlikely in a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly two to one.
Many Californians who do not watch Fox News know little about Hilton. Even some of Britain’s political observers who followed Hilton for years admit it’s been a struggle at times to make sense of his political odyssey.
Dubbed a “barefoot revolutionary” for his habit of striding around Downing Street without shoes, Hilton was credited with pulling the Conservatives into the 21st century and ushering in a more green, socially liberal strain of British conservatism. He helped turn around their image by highlighting climate change and supporting gay marriage.
Fraser Nelson, a columnist for the Times in London, said Hilton had been seen in Britain as a figure closer to Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom than to Trump.
“When he popped up on Fox, it was like somebody reborn,” Nelson said. “Somebody who seemed to be on the left of politics was somehow on the Trumpish right. We thought it was like a joke. I’m not saying he is not sincere, just … the political journey of Steve Hilton … to being Newsom’s nemesis is something to behold.”
Born in London to Hungarian refugees who fled their homeland during the 1956 revolution, Hilton grew up in a household without much money.
After studying at Oxford University, a life-changing experience for a son of immigrants, Hilton worked at Conservative Party headquarters and as an ad executive on the Conservatives’ 1997 election campaign. When Labour’s Tony Blair won in a landslide, Hilton co-founded a consulting firm, Good Business, advising corporations on how to make money by investing in social and environmental causes.
In 2001, Hilton voted Green. But he returned to the Conservative fold in 2005 to try to detoxify the Tory brand. As an author of the party’s 2010 manifesto, he came up with Cameron’s “Big Society” agenda, which sought to scale back the state and hand more power to local communities. Critics, however, argued that the focus on local control was a fig leaf for austerity and dismantling the welfare state.
When Cameron won in 2010, Hilton infuriated colleagues in the coalition government, the British press reported, proposing a stream of wacky ideas: scrapping maternity leave, abolishing job centers, even buying cloud-bursting technology so Britain would have more sunshine.
Hilton ultimately became disillusioned with Westminster, deciding U.K. politics was stymied by excessive bureaucracy. In 2012, he moved full time to the Bay Area.
Hilton says he was drawn to California because of its “rebel spirit.”
But what he liked about California was the specific Silicon Valley ethos of disruption that emphasized meritocracy and risk-taking, not the state’s ascendant liberal identity politics.
Hilton settled in California precisely when Democrats were consolidating their political and cultural power. Just months after his move, Democrats gained full control of the Legislature with a two-thirds supermajority.
Meanwhile, populism was rising across the U.S. and Britain.
On the 2016 Brexit referendum on whether the U.K. should leave the European Union, Hilton was firmly pro Leave.
Hilton also disagreed with many fellow conservatives on Trump. In November 2016, George Osborne, chancellor of the exchequer under Cameron, watched the U.S. election on Hilton’s couch in Atherton, Calif. “Steve was the only person in the room who said, ‘I think Donald Trump’s going to win,’” Osborne said. “I think he identifies with Trump, although they’re obviously very different. … The outsider challenging the system.”
After the election, Hilton joined Fox News as a contributor and in 2017 was given his own Sunday night show, “The Next Revolution.” Produced out of Los Angeles, it explored populism in the U.S. and globally.
Like many conservatives, Hilton became agitated in 2020 by the COVID-19 lockdowns and Black Lives Matter protests that swept U.S. cities.
Early in the pandemic, Hilton invited Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of health policy at Stanford, to discuss COVID-19 after his study in Santa Clara County indicated the virus was more widespread and less deadly than initially thought. Bhattacharya argued the best path forward was not a general lockdown, but focused protection of the vulnerable. California leaders went on to impose some of the nation’s most stringent lockdowns.
After Joe Biden defeated Trump in November 2020, Hilton repeated Trump’s false allegations of voter fraud on air and called for an investigation.
Hilton became a U.S. citizen in 2021. Asked how his worldview changed in 2020, Hilton said: “I don’t think it changed. I think it actually enhanced my skepticism of centralized bureaucracy and it made me even more determined to dismantle it in California, because you saw all the worst features of it in California.”
In 2023, Hilton left Fox to launch a supposedly nonpartisan policy group, Golden Together, to develop “common sense” solutions to California’s problems. Two years later, he published “Califailure: Reversing the Ruin of America’s Worst-Run State,” a screed against Democrats. He accused them of spending “their time — and taxpayers’ money — pushing increasingly fringe race, gender, and ‘climate’ extremism instead of attending to the basics of good governance.”
A month later, Hilton announced he was running for governor “to make this beautiful state, that we love so much, truly golden again.”
On the campaign trail, Hilton has pledged to slash taxes, make housing more affordable and bring the cost of gas down to $3 a gallon. But how he plans to achieve some of these goals is controversial.
Hilton advocates scaling back environmental regulations. State agencies such as the California Coastal Commission and the California Air Resources Board, he argues, are a “massive roadblock” to housing development.
To lower gasoline prices, Hilton would ramp up California domestic production of oil and natural gas and reduce regulations on refineries.
Hilton would likely struggle to persuade a majority of voters to roll back environmental protections. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, about 55% of Californians think stricter state environmental regulations are worth the cost, while 43% believe they hurt the economy and jobs market.
Hilton is also at odds with most Californians on major issues from immigration to abortion.
If elected, he would foster more local cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and rescind state healthcare to undocumented immigrants. He would work with states such as Louisiana to extradite California doctors accused of prescribing and mailing abortion pills to women in states where abortion is illegal. He would also establish a Covid Accountability Commission to examine officials’ decisions during the pandemic.
Asked if Newsom and other Democrats could face prosecution, Hilton said: “They need to be held accountable for these crimes.”
With Trump in the White House, 2026 is a difficult year to mount a right-wing populist campaign for California governor, said Christian Grose, a professor of political science and public policy at USC.
“That message of ‘Newsom and the Democrats have been a disaster for California,’ that’s like, if you’re running in South Carolina,” Grose said. “It’s a caricature of California. While many California voters think there have been problems and the state is not doing as well, a Fox News presentation for East Coast viewers … that’s not going to win 50%.”
To make inroads past the primary, Grose said, Hilton would need to focus on governance and affordability and ditch the anti-Democratic red meat: “He has to massively soft pedal the kind of Fox News conservative stuff.”
Hilton’s Republican rival in the race, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, has questioned Hilton’s MAGA credentials, raising his green advocacy in the U.K. to cast him as an unprincipled opportunist.
Hilton, however, said he considers himself a “very strong environmentalist.” The problem, he argued, is the movement has become too narrowly focused on climate change and CO2 reduction. As crude oil production within California has fallen in recent decades and refineries have closed, he questioned California importing the bulk of its oil from as far away as Iraq and Ecuador.
“We are shipping oil halfway across the world in giant supertankers that run on bunker fuel, the most polluting form of transportation you can think of, rather than producing in Kern County and sending it in a nice, clean pipeline to the refineries in Long Beach,” Hilton said. “It’s total insanity. We are increasing carbon emissions in the name of climate change.”
Some political observers in the U.K. argue that Hilton’s questioning of California’s policy isn’t necessarily intellectually inconsistent.
“Perhaps in 2010 we needed more environmental policies,” Nelson said. “Perhaps in 2026 they’re doing more harm than good.”
Nor is it so odd, he argued, that Hilton now views California with a more critical eye.
“Even from a distance, when you look at California, there’s so much going fundamentally wrong,” Nelson said, citing its energy policy, homelessness and the exodus of residents to other states. “I’m not surprised by that, and I think it’s entirely consistent with Steve Hilton in 2010.”
Times staff writer Stephen Battaglio contributed to this report
Source link
Tucker Carlson’s too-little, too-late mea culpa for supporting Trump
Former Fox News host and ex-Trump advocate Tucker Carlson is feeling remorse for the role he and others played in publicly promoting Donald Trump as a candidate and as the president.
“In very small ways, but in real ways, you and me and millions of people like us are the reason this is happening right now,” Carlson said Monday on his podcast, “The Tucker Carlson Show.” He was chatting with Buckley Carlson, his brother and a former Trump speechwriter, about the erosion of conservative values within the Republican Party under Trump.
“I do think it’s a moment to wrestle with our own consciences,” Carlson said. “You know, we’ll be tormented by it for a long time. I will be, and I want to say I’m sorry for misleading people. It was not intentional, and that’s all I’ll say.”
After nearly 10 years of yammering nightly about the greatness of Trump, Carlson picks now to cut the conversation short?
There’s a lot more to say, but this time, it’s about Carlson’s too-little, too-late mea culpa. His claim that he did not intentionally mislead the public is in itself misleading. While Carlson promoted Trump and the Big Lie ad nauseam on his prime-time Fox News show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” he was privately disparaging the president and discrediting Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was stolen.
His off-camera thoughts were revealed when internal communications between Fox staffers went public in 2023 due to Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox News for knowingly broadcasting false claims that its machines rigged the 2020 election. Texts and emails from Carlson and other high-profile hosts suggested they knew Trump’s election fraud claims were unfounded, yet they still pushed the “rigged” narrative on air.
In one such example, Carlson texted that Trump needed to concede, and agreed that “there wasn’t enough fraud to change the outcome” of the election, according to the filing. Yet three nights later, he was on air claiming that there were “legitimate concerns” about election integrity. There were several more communications from Carlson where he expressed doubt about Trump’s claims. But in the public eye, he continued to assail the election results and the legitimacy of Biden’s win.
The Fox News host also privately scorned the first Trump presidency as a “disaster,” then turned around and stumped for Trump in 2024, praising him as a “national leader” at the Republican National Convention and campaigning with him in Arizona just days before the election.
If that’s not intentionally misleading the public, then what is?
Perhaps Carlson should have heeded his initial instincts about Trump. Before gaining notoriety with his Fox show, he posted on the website Slate about Trump in 1999, referring to him as “the single most repulsive person on the planet.”
Today the podcaster is among a growing number of right-wing influencers who have turned on their former leader. Former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones want to push Trump out of office by invoking the 25th Amendment. Carrie Prejean Boller, who was a Trump-appointed member of the Religious Liberty Commission up until February, simply called him an “evil psychopath”.
Carlson has criticized the Trump administration’s decision to go to war in Iran, calling it “absolutely disgusting and evil” in March, and later said it was the “single biggest mistake” of Trump’s presidency. And when Trump demanded on Truth Social that Iran “open the F—– Strait, you crazy bastards,” Carlson said the post was “vile on every level” and “the most revealing thing the president has ever done. … Who do you think you are? You’re tweeting out the F word on Easter morning?” Carlson said in his podcast.
The president has responded to criticism from Carlson by telling the New York Post that his detractor is a “a low-IQ person” who has “absolutely no idea what’s going on.”
But Carlson is hardly the only American with buyer’s remorse. A recent NBC poll found that Trump is facing the lowest job approval rating of his second term, largely due to strong disapproval of how the president has handled inflation and the cost of living. Carlson, unlike the rest of the country, rode the MAGA wave to prosperity. His show kicked off in 2016, within weeks of the election, and he rose to prominence on the fervor of Trumpism. Supporting Trump was a family business. From his brother, a Republican operative who previously wrote speeches for Trump, to his son, who worked until recently in Vice President JD Vance’s press office.
Now Carlson is making his way back into the conversation by opposing the man he once claimed to revere.
He is asking for forgiveness for backing a faulty product, while also claiming to be a victim of its beguiling charms. “You and I and everyone else who supported him … you wrote speeches for him, I campaigned for him. We’re implicated in this for sure,” Carlson told his brother on the podcast. “It’s not enough to say, ‘Well, I changed my mind,’ or ‘Oh, this is bad. I’m out.’”
True, that’s not enough. Carlson should apologize for misleading the public, intentionally.
Source link
Fed chair nominee Warsh rejects ‘Trump sock puppet’ label at Senate hearing
Kevin Warsh, the man nominated to lead the Federal Reserve, the world’s most important financial institution, told the US Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday that he had made no secret agreements with the White House over interest rate policy, defending his professional integrity.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
He said he would act independently if confirmed to succeed Jerome Powell, despite continued public pressure from US President Donald Trump for lower borrowing costs.
The question of that independence was put sharply to him during the hearing, when Republican Senator John Kennedy asked whether he would be Trump’s “human sock puppet”. Warsh replied: “Absolutely not.”
His comments came amid broader concerns on Capitol Hill about the future direction of the central bank, with lawmakers divided over his past record and approach to monetary policy.
Warsh insisted that the President had never asked him to commit to any specific interest rate path and said he would not have agreed to such a request.
The hearing highlighted the significant pressure facing the Federal Reserve as it maintains its independence while addressing inflation, which remains at 3.3%.
Just hours before the session began, US President Donald Trump stated in a CNBC interview that he would be disappointed if Warsh did not immediately implement rate cuts.
This current friction suggests that the White House may struggle to secure the necessary votes to confirm Warsh before Powell’s term as Fed Chair expires on 15 May.
Democratic opposition and Republican dissent
Democratic senators were particularly vocal in their scepticism, accusing Warsh of shifting his economic stance to suit the political climate.
US Senator Elizabeth Warren labelled the nominee a “sock puppet”, suggesting his installation would facilitate an “illegal takeover” of the institution.
Critics also pointed to his historical record, alleging that he favoured higher rates during Democratic administrations but has become more dovish under Republican leadership.
US Senator Ruben Gallego cited reporting from the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), which claimed the President had previously urged Warsh to reduce borrowing costs. Warsh responded by stating that such reports were based on inaccurate sources and reiterated that the independence of the Fed is “essential” for economic stability.
Despite Trump’s backing, the nomination also faces a critical roadblock within the Republican Party.
US Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from North Carolina, reiterated his refusal to support Warsh as long as a Department of Justice investigation into Jerome Powell continues.
The probe, led by Assistant US Attorney Jeannine Pirro, is examining whether Powell committed perjury during testimony last year regarding the budget of a Federal Reserve building renovation project.
Tillis and other Republican colleagues have expressed their support for Powell, arguing that the investigation is meritless. According to Tillis, he will not vote for a successor until the “investigation is dropped,” a stance that effectively freezes the nomination in a closely divided committee.
Federal prosecutors have reportedly continued their efforts to access Fed records as recently as last week, even after a judge previously found no evidence to support the charges.
Legal and ethical hurdles
The proceedings also delved into Warsh’s personal financial interests and the logistical challenges of a potential leadership transition.
US Senator Elizabeth Warren raised questions about the nominee’s investments in private entities, including SpaceX and Polymarket, noting that the specific size of these holdings had not been fully disclosed to the public.
Warsh defended his position by stating that the Office of Government Ethics has already approved his plan to divest all assets within 90 days of his confirmation.
Compounding the uncertainty is the unique situation involving Jerome Powell.
Unlike most departing Chairs, Powell has indicated he intends to remain on the Federal Reserve’s governing board until his separate term ends in 2028, or until the perjury investigation is concluded.
This could create an awkward power dynamic where the former Chair sits alongside his successor, a scenario not seen in Washington since the late 1940s.
While US President Donald Trump has threatened to remove Powell from the board entirely, legal experts suggest such a move would be difficult, particularly given recent US Supreme Court precedents relating to the protection of Fed governors from political dismissal.
Source link
Utah man sees politics in honking citation at ‘No Kings’ rally
On March 28, a sunny Saturday in southwestern Utah, Jack Hoopes and his wife, Lorna, brought their homemade signs to the local “No Kings” rally.
The couple joined a crowd of 1,500 or so marching through the main picnic area of a park in downtown St. George. Their signs — cut-out words on a black background — chided lawmakers for failing to stand up to President Trump and urged America to “make lying wrong again.”
After about an hour, the two were ready to go home. They got in their silver Volvo SUV, but before pulling away, Jack Hoopes decided to swing past the demonstration, which was still going strong. He tooted his horn, twice, in a show of solidarity.
That’s when things took a curious turn.
A police officer parked in the middle of the street warned Hoopes not to honk; at least that’s what he thinks the officer said as Hoopes drove past the chanting crowd. When he spotted two familiar faces, Hoopes hit the horn a third time — a friendly, howdy sort of honk. “It wasn’t like I was being obnoxious,” he said, “or laying on the horn.”
Hoopes turned a corner and the cop, lights flashing, pulled him over. He asked Hoopes for his license and registration. He returned a few moments later. A passing car sounded its horn. “Are you going to stop him, too?” Hoopes asked.
That did not sit well. The officer said he’d planned to let Hoopes off with a warning. Instead, he charged the 71-year-old retired potato farmer with violating Utah’s law on horns and warning devices. He issued a citation, with a fine punishable up to $50.
Hoopes — a law school graduate and prosecutor in the days before he took up potato farming — is fighting back, even though he estimates the legal skirmishing could cost him considerably more than the maximum fine. The ticket might have resulted from pique on the officer’s part. But Hoopes doesn’t think so. He sees politics at play.
“I’ve beeped my horn for [the pro-law enforcement] Back the Blue. I’ve beeped my horn for Black Lives Matter,” Hoopes said. “I’ve seen a lot of people honk for Trump and for MAGA.”
He’s also seen plenty of times when people honked their horns to celebrate high school championships and the like.
But Hoopes has never heard of anyone being pulled over, much less ticketed, for excessive or unlawful honking. “I think it’s freedom of expression,” he said.
Or should be.
Jack and Lorna Hoopes made their own protest signs to bring to the “No Kings” rally in St. George, Utah.
(Mikayla Whitmore / For The Times)
St. George is a fast-growing community of about 100,000 residents set amid the jagged red-rock peaks of the Mojave Desert. It’s a jumping-off point for Zion National Park, about 40 miles east, and a mecca for golf, hiking and mountain-bike riding.
It’s also Trump Country.
Washington County, where St. George is located, gave Trump 75% of its vote in 2024, with Kamala Harris winning a scant 23%. That emphatic showing compares with Trump’s 59% performance statewide.
St. George is where Hoopes and his wife live most of the time. When summer and its 100-degree temperatures hit, they retreat to southeast Idaho. The couple get along well with their neighbors in both places, Hoopes said, even though they’re Democrats living in ruby-red country. It’s not as though they just tolerate folks, or hold their noses to get by.
“Most of my friends are conservative,” Hoopes said. “Some of the Trump people are very good people. We just have a difference of opinion where our country is going.”
He was speaking from a hotel parking lot in Arizona near Lake Havasu while embarked on an annual motorcycle ride through the Southwest: four days, a dozen riders, 1,200 miles. Most of his companions are Trump supporters, Hoopes said, and, just like back home, everyone gets on fine.
“Right?” he called out.
“No!” a voice hollered back.
Actually, Hoopes joked, his charitable road mates let him ride along because they consider him handicapped — his disability being his political ideology.
Hoopes is not exactly a hellion. In 2014, he and his wife traveled to Africa to participate in humanitarian work and promote sustainable agriculture in Kenya and Uganda. In 2020, they worked as Red Cross volunteers helping wildfire victims in Northern California.
Virtually his entire life has been spent on the right side of the law, though Hoopes allowed as how he has racked up a few speeding tickets over the years. (His career as a prosecutor lasted four years and involved three murder cases in the first 12 months before he left the legal profession behind and took up farming.)
He’s never had any problems with the police in St. George. “They seem to be decent,” Hoopes said.
A department spokesperson, Tiffany Mitchell, said illicit honking is not a widespread problem in the placid, retiree-heavy community, but there are some who have been cited for violations. She denied any political motivation in Hoopes’ case.
“He must’ve felt justified,” Mitchell said of the officer who issued the citation. “I can’t imagine that politics had anything to do with it.”
And yes, she said, honking a horn can be a political statement protected by the 1st Amendment. “But, just like anything else, it can turn criminal,” Mitchell said, and apparently that’s how the officer felt on March 28 “and that’s the direction he took it.”
The matter now rests before a judge, residing in a legal system that has lately been tested and twisted in remarkable ways.
Jack Hoopes’ case is now before a judge in St. George, Utah.
(Mikayla Whitmore / For The Times)
As he left an initial hearing earlier this month, Hoopes said his phone pinged with a fresh headline out of Washington. Trump’s Justice Department, it was reported, was asking a federal appeals court to throw out the convictions of 12 people found guilty of seditious conspiracy for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
“We have a president that pardons people that broke into the Capitol and defecated” in the hallways and congressional offices, Hoopes said. “Police officers died because of it, and yet I get picked up for honking my horn?”
Hoopes’ next court appearance, a pretrial conference, is set for July 15.
Source link
Trump reads Bible verses on repentance after AI image of himself as Jesus | Donald Trump
Amid a standoff with the pope and criticism for an AI image of himself as Jesus, US President Donald Trump has read a Bible passage about punishment and national repentance as part of a Republican-led marathon event.
Published On 22 Apr 202622 Apr 2026
Share
Source link
Iran war: What’s happening on day 54 as Trump extends ceasefire? | US-Israel war on Iran News
EXPLAINER
President Trump said the US would extend the ceasefire until Iran presents a proposal and talks are concluded, but a naval blockade of its ports continues.
Published On 22 Apr 202622 Apr 2026
President Donald Trump said the United States is extending the ceasefire until Tehran submits its latest proposal with conditions for ending the war, and until negotiations conclude, keeping diplomacy open while maintaining pressure on Iran.
However, Trump said the US naval blockade on Iran would remain. Iran has insisted that the blockade represents a violation of the ceasefire, and has said it will not negotiate under the “shadow of threats” or while the blockade remains in place, underscoring the fragile and uncertain path to talks.
Meanwhile, violence continues across the region, with Israeli settlers killing two people, including a child, in the occupied West Bank, and Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon wounding civilians and damaging homes despite a 10-day ceasefire.
In Iran
War diplomacy
In the Gulf
In the US
In Israel
In Lebanon
Oil and global economy
Source link
Trump extends ceasefire and hopes for ‘unified proposal’ | Newsfeed
In a social media post, President Trump announced an extension of the ceasefire in the war on Iran, but with the US blockade still in place. Al Jazeera’s Alan Fisher says there are signs of movement as Trump shifts towards discussing a ‘unified proposal’.
Published On 22 Apr 202622 Apr 2026
Share
Source link
Pro-Palestine legal aid requests stay high in 2025 amid US campus pressure | Donald Trump News
Washington, DC – Requests for legal support related to pro-Palestine advocacy remained high in the United States last year, as President Donald Trump threatened activists and universities with penalties.
In an annual report released on Tuesday, Palestine Legal, an organisation that “supports the movement for Palestinian freedom in the US”, said it received 1,131 queries for legal support in 2025.
Recommended Stories
list of 3 itemsend of list
The figure is below the record 2,184 requests the group received in 2024, when pro-Palestine protests swept US campuses — and were regularly met with crackdowns from both school administrators and law enforcement.
Despite universities enacting new restrictions on protests across the country, the figures from 2025 show that pro-Palestine advocacy has persisted, according to Dima Khalidi, the executive director of Palestine Legal.
“Our 2025 year-end report shows that while universities have largely cowered and caved to coercive pressure from the Trump administration and its pro-Israel supporters, student activists for Palestinian and collective freedom remain a model of moral conviction and courage,” Khalidi said.
“Even when facing punitive consequences for speaking out, they are holding the line of dissent against injustice from the US to Palestine, because they understand the cost of surrender for all of us.”
Palestine Legal said that the “overwhelming majority of requests” for legal support came from university students and faculty in 2025, but a growing number, 122, were categorised as “immigration and border-related”.
The group received 851 requests from people or organisations targeted for their Palestine-related advocacy, as well as 280 more asking for legal guidance on conducting advocacy.
Despite the drop from 2024, the rate of complaints last year remained 300 percent higher than in 2022, the year before Israel began its genocidal war in Gaza on October 7, 2023.
Since then, at least 72,560 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza.
Pressure campaigns
In 2024, Trump campaigned for a second term in the White House in part on a pledge to crack down on the pro-Palestinian protest movement, which sought to shine a light on the human rights abuses unfolding during the war.
He has framed such protests as anti-Semitic, and since his inauguration in 2025, he has led a campaign to penalise schools that played host to pro-Palestinian activism.
To date, five universities have struck deals with Trump after he threatened to withhold billions in federal funding. They include Columbia University, where a pro-Palestine encampment and resulting police crackdown drew international attention.
Columbia eventually reached a $200m settlement with the Trump administration and moved to make several policy changes it said were aimed at combatting anti-Semitism.
Rights groups have condemned such policies as conflating pro-Palestine advocacy with anti-Jewish sentiment. They also warn that Trump’s actions risk dampening free speech, a protected right under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
All told, nearly 80 of the students who took part in Columbia’s protests faced serious academic discipline, including expulsions, suspensions, and degree revocations, as of July 2025.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration used immigration enforcement to target pro-Palestine protesters and advocates, including scholars like Rumeysa Ozturk, Mohsen Mahdawi, Badar Khan Suri and Mahmoud Khalil.
To date, the deportation proceedings against Ozturk, who was in the US on a student visa, and Mahdawi, a US permanent resident detained at his citizenship hearing, have been abandoned.
Ozturk has since voluntarily returned to her native Turkiye after completing her doctoral studies at Tufts University.
The government is still proceeding with deportation efforts against Khan Suri, a Georgetown University researcher, and Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate and permanent US resident.
Separately, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) raided five homes connected to pro-Palestine activists at the University of Michigan in April 2025, sparking outrage. Federal authorities seized properties, but no arrests were made.
Legal victories
Despite the restrictive climate across the country, Palestine Legal hailed a string of legal victories in 2025 that upheld the right to pro-Palestinian protest.
Last August, for instance, a federal court dismissed a complaint that sought to penalise UNRWA USA, a non-profit that supports the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), under the Antiterrorism Act of 1990.
A separate lawsuit launched by Palestine Legal and the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) charged that the University of Maryland had tread on the free speech rights of students by banning Students for Justice in Palestine (UMD SJP). That case resulted in a $100,000 settlement.
Meanwhile, federal judges have sided with Harvard University and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), in their challenges to the Trump administration’s defunding efforts.
“The fights that Palestine Legal and our partners have waged affirm that the Trump administration, universities, and Israel advocacy groups cannot, without consequence, run roughshod over growing demands to respect and protect Palestinian rights,” Palestine Legal said at the conclusion of its report.
“The developments throughout 2025 made crystal clear that if we allow our right to stand for Palestinian freedom to be trampled, all of our fundamental rights will be in jeopardy in the face of an authoritarian slide.”
Source link
Warsh says he got no pressure from Trump to cut rates even as president publicly pushes for them
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s nominee to chair the Federal Reserve said Tuesday that he never promised the White House that he would cut interest rates, even as the president renewed his calls for the central bank to do so.
“The president never once asked me to commit to any particular interest rate decision, period,” Kevin Warsh, a former top Fed official, said under questioning by the Senate Banking Committee. “Nor would I ever agree to do so if he had. … I will be an independent actor if confirmed as chair of the Federal Reserve.”
Warsh’s comments came just hours after Trump, in an interview on CNBC, was asked if he would be disappointed if Warsh didn’t immediately cut rates and responded, “I would.”
The comments underscore the challenge faced by Warsh, 56, a financier and former member of the Fed’s board of governors whom Trump named in January to replace the current Fed chair, Jerome H. Powell. Democrats on the committee accused Warsh of flip-flopping on interest rates over the years, supporting higher interest rates under Democratic presidents and advocating rate cuts during Trump’s time in office. Investors are watching the hearing closely to see how Warsh balances Trump’s demands with worsening inflation, as the war in Iran pushes up the price of gasoline.
Higher inflation typically leads the Fed to raise rates, or at least keep them unchanged, rather than cut them. When the Fed changes its key rate, it can affect mortgages, auto loans and business borrowing.
Yet Warsh’s account was challenged by Sen. Ruben Gallego, an Arizona Democrat, who said that Wall Street Journal reporting last year found that Trump had urged Warsh to reduce borrowing costs.
“Who’s lying here? Is it you or the president?” Gallego asked.
“I think those reporters need better sources,” Warsh responded.
For all the back and forth, the hearing didn’t appear to advance Warsh’s nomination, which has been delayed by a Justice Department investigation into the Fed and Powell, over brief testimony Powell gave last June before the same panel about a building renovation.
Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican on the committee, reiterated Tuesday he wouldn’t vote for Warsh until the investigation is dropped. With the committee closely divided and all Democrats opposed to his nomination, Tillis’ opposition is enough to bottle it up in committee.
“We have got to get rid of this investigation,” Tillis said, “so I can support your nomination.”
Tillis has previously said that all seven Republicans on the committee have signed a letter stating that Powell did not commit a crime when he testified before the panel last June. Federal prosecutors, led by U.S. Atty. Jeanine Pirro, are investigating his testimony for potential perjury, though a judge said last month they offered no evidence to support the charge when he threw out subpoenas Pirro had issued.
Prosecutors from her office as recently as last week sought access to the Fed’s building project but were turned away, revealing that the Trump administration has not reversed course despite opposition from members of his own party that are essential to Warsh’s confirmation.
In his opening remarks, Warsh told the Senate Banking Committee that one of his top goals would be to fight inflation, which remains elevated at 3.3% annually.
“Congress tasked the Fed with the mission to ensure price stability, without excuse or equivocation, argument or anguish,” Warsh said. “Inflation is a choice, and the Fed must take responsibility for it.”
Warsh would be in a tough spot if confirmed. Inflation is worsening, making it much harder for the Fed to implement the interest rate cuts Trump so desperately seeks. The conflict could also slow the economy, as well as hiring. And if Warsh ultimately becomes chair, he may very well find his predecessor, Powell, still sitting on the Fed’s governing board, an uncomfortable arrangement that hasn’t occurred since the late 1940s.
Warsh said the Fed’s political independence is “essential,” and that the central bank wasn’t threatened when “elected officials — presidents, senators, or members of the House — state their views on interest rates.” Trump has repeatedly urged Powell to cut the Fed’s key rate from its current level of about 3.6% to as low as 1%, a view almost no economist shares.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, said that Trump has not just stated his opinions on rates, but has sought to fire a Fed governor and is investigating Powell.
“The Senate should not be aiding and abetting Donald Trump’s illegal takeover of the Fed by installing his chosen sock puppet as chair,” she said Tuesday.
Warren also noted that Warsh has not disclosed all of his financial holdings, which include investments in startups and private companies, or the size of those financial stakes. For example, Warsh has said he has holdings in SpaceX and Polymarket, but has not said how large those investments are.
Warren charged that Warsh is not in compliance with ethics requirements. Warsh argued that the Office of Government Ethics has signed off on his plan to sell all his assets within 90 days of his confirmation.
The turmoil could make a potential transition from Powell to Warsh an unusually turbulent one for the world’s most pivotal central bank, which has historically experienced smooth transfers of power. Should the change in leadership prove particularly bumpy, it could unnerve markets and lift longer-term interest rates.
Powell’s term as chair ends May 15. He said last month that he would remain as chair until a successor is named. Powell also is serving a separate term as a member of the Fed’s governing board that lasts until January 2028. Fed chairs typically leave the board when their terms as chair end, but Powell said last month he would remain on the board, even if a new chair is approved, until the investigation is dropped.
Trump said he would fire Powell if he attempted to remain at the Fed. Yet Trump’s previous attempt to remove a Fed governor, Lisa Cook, has been tied up in court. During oral arguments in January, a majority of justices on the Supreme Court appeared to lean toward leaving Cook at the Fed.
Rugaber writes for the Associated Press.
Source link
Vance’s trip to Pakistan for Iran talks delayed; Trump expects bombing or ‘great deal’
April 21 (UPI) — Uncertainty over Iran peace talks put Vice President JD Vance’s trip to Pakistan on hold Tuesday, as Iranian officials were silent on whether they intend to take part in the talks at all.
The New York Times reported that talks could, however, restart at any time. Officials in Tehran were divided on whether to take part in negotiations while the United States held firm on its embargo on ports in Iran, Axios reported.
President Donald Trump said earlier in the day that he expects to reach a deal with Iran in negotiations to end the war on Tuesday, but if no deal is made, he is prepared to resume bombing.
The two-week cease-fire Trump agreed to is set to expire on Wednesday, with the Strait of Hormuz remaining a centerpiece to the conflict between the United States and Iran.
“What I think is that we’re going to end up with a great deal,” Trump said in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday. “I think they have no choice. We’ve taken out their navy. We’ve taken out their air force. We’ve taken out their leaders, frankly. It is regime change, no matter what you want to call it. Which is not something I said I was going to do but I’ve done, indirectly maybe, but I’ve done it.”
Trump said the United States’ blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has been a “tremendous success,” adding that “we totally control the strait.”
The president added that he does not want to extend the cease-fire, noting that negotiations will take place near the time the two-week cease-fire ends.
If a deal is not agreed to on Tuesday and Wednesday, Trump said, “I expect to be bombing,” and “we are raring to go.”
“We’re totally loaded up. We have so much of everything; much more powerful than it was four or five weeks ago,” Trump said. “We caught a ship yesterday that had some things on it, which wasn’t very nice. A gift from China perhaps, I don’t know.”
Trump claimed that Iran has executed 42,000 protesters in the last two months, a number that has not been verified, though former Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said thousands were killed earlier this year.
On social media, Trump shared a post saying the Islamic Republic is “preparing to hang eight women.” Trump called on Iranian leaders to release the women.
“I would greatly appreciate the release of these women,” Trump wrote. “I am sure that they will respect the fact that you did so. Please do them no harm! Would be a great start to our negotiations!”
Source link
‘If my people’: Here’s why the Bible passage Trump will read aloud is so potent and polarizing
The scriptural passage that President Trump plans to read Tuesday evening in a livestreamed Bible-reading marathon dates back to the depiction of an ancient event — but it’s one that carries a highly charged significance in the current religious and political climate.
It has long been quoted and promoted by those who believe America was founded as a Christian nation and should be one. It’s from the seventh chapter of 2 Chronicles, a book in the Hebrew (Old Testament) portion of the Bible.
The 14th verse — the one most often quoted — says:
“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”
Trump is among hundreds who are taking turns reading the entire Bible aloud over the course of a week. Most of the readings are taking place at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, though Trump’s is coming by video from the Oval Office.
A passage often quoted at National Day of Prayer events
The Chronicles passage has for decades been a major theme at annual National Day of Prayer events. Organizers of the America Reads the Bible marathon invited Trump to read from it. “It’s a powerful statement that he decided to read that passage,” said Bunni Pounds, founder of Christians Engaged, which organized the project.
The passage has been recited over the decades at countless rallies, services and events, often organized around the disputed belief that America was created as a Christian nation and needs to repent of its sins and return to God. The passage has particularly been associated with annual events commemorating the National Day of Prayer, which has taken various forms since the mid-20th century and became fixed by law on the first Thursday in May since the 1980s.
The verse is set in a context far from modern America — during the reign of King Solomon in ancient Israel some 3,000 years ago. Solomon is presiding over the dedication of the first temple in Jerusalem, and in a lengthy prayer he asks for divine mercy if a future generation sins, is punished with military or natural disaster and then repents. In the key passage, God replies with a promise of restoration.
Critics say the passage is used out of context
But the use of the passage in modern settings has its critics.
The Chronicles passage is “a popular verse among Christian nationalists and has been for quite some time,” said Brian Kaylor, a Baptist pastor and president and editor-in-chief of Word&Way, a progressive site covering faith and politics.
He said its use has taken on a partisan and polarizing tone, often used in tandem with a promotion of a belief in a Christian America in an increasingly diverse country.
“This verse is not about the United States,” said Kaylor, author of “The Bible According to Christian Nationalists: Exploiting Scripture for Political Power.” It is “a promise made to one particular person in one particular moment. It doesn’t really work to pull it out of context and apply it to whatever you want to.”
But many have done so recently and in decades past, either saying America has a divinely ordained destiny similar to ancient Israel’s or simply that they believe every nation has a duty to follow God and repent when needed.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower took the oath of office in 1953 with his hand on a Bible opened to the 2 Chronicles passage. President Ronald Reagan quoted the passage in a proclamation declaring 1984’s National Day of Prayer. A speaker at the 2024 Republican National Convention also quoted it.
The National Day of Prayer, while officially nonsectarian, has long been drawn particular promotion and participation from evangelical Christians. Readings of the “If my people” passage has been a staple of such events.
Politicians, others joining in the Bible-reading marathon
Evangelicals — a loyal Republican voting bloc for decades — have formed a crucial part of Trump’s electoral base. His rallies have featured a fusion of Christian and national symbols and rhetoric, featuring songs like “God Bless USA” and T-shirts with slogans like “Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president.”
Many other Republican politicians are taking part in the Bible reading, along with celebrities, pastors and others. And Trump isn’t the only one reading a passage significant to his office or mission.
Mike Huckabee, a Baptist pastor and U.S. ambassador to Israel, is reading from a Genesis passage in which God says he will bless those who bless Abraham — a passage popular with many evangelicals who believe they have a biblical mandate to support Israel.
David Barton, whose Wallbuilders promotes belief in America as a Christian nation, will read from a passage that gave his organization its name, in which Nehemiah rebuilds the broken walls of Jerusalem.
Smith writes for the Associated Press.
Source link
Southern Poverty Law Center says it faces a Justice Department criminal probe over paid informants
WASHINGTON — The Southern Poverty Law Center says it’s the subject of a criminal investigation by the Justice Department and faces possible charges over its past use of paid informants to infiltrate extremist groups.
The civil rights group made the announcement on Tuesday, saying President Trump’s administration appears to be preparing legal action against it or some of its employees.
“Although we don’t know all the details, the focus appears to be on the SPLC’s prior use of paid confidential informants to gather credible intelligence on extremely violent groups,” CEO Bryan Fair said in a statement.
The Justice Department had no immediate comment.
The SPLC previously paid informants to infiltrate extremist groups and gather information on their activities, often sharing it with local and federal law enforcement, Fair said. It was used to monitor threats of violence, he said, adding that the program was kept quiet to protect the safety of informants.
“When we began working with informants, we were living in the shadow of the height of the Civil Rights Movement, which had seen bombings at churches, state-sponsored violence against demonstrators, and the murders of activists that went unanswered by the justice system,” Fair said. “There is no question that what we learned from informants saved lives.”
He said the organization “will vigorously defend ourselves, our staff, and our work.”
The SPLC, which is based in Montgomery, Alabama, was founded in 1971 and used civil litigation to fight white supremacist groups. The nonprofit has become a popular target among Republicans who see it as overly leftist and partisan.
The investigation could add to concerns that Trump’s Republican administration is using the Justice Department to go after conservative opponents and his critics. It follows a number of other investigations into Trump foes that have raised questions about whether the law enforcement agency has been turned into a political weapon.
The Southern Poverty Law Center has faced intense criticism from conservatives, who have accused it of unfairly maligning right-wing organizations as extremist groups because of their viewpoints. The SPLC regularly condemns Trump’s rhetoric and policies around voting rights, immigration and other issues.
The SPLC came under fresh scrutiny after the assassination last year of conservative activist Charlie Kirk brought renewed attention to its characterization of the group that Kirk founded and led. The SPLC included a section on that group, Turning Point USA, in a report titled “The Year in Hate and Extremism 2024” that described the group as “A Case Study of the Hard Right in 2024.”
FBI Director Kash Patel said last year that the agency was severing its relationship with the SPLC, which had long provided law enforcement with research on hate crime and domestic extremism. Patel said the SPLC had been turned into a “partisan smear machine,” and he accused it of defaming “mainstream Americans” with its “hate map” that documents alleged anti-government and hate groups inside the United States.
House Republicans hosted a hearing centered on the SPLC in December, saying it coordinated efforts with President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration “to target Christian and conservative Americans and deprive them of their constitutional rights to free speech and free association.”
Binkley and Richer write for the Associated Press.
Source link
Virginia voters deciding on redistricting plan that could boost Democrats’ seats in Congress
Virginia voters on Tuesday are deciding whether to ratify an unusual mid-decade redrawing of U.S. House districts that could boost Democrats’ chances of flipping control of the closely divided chamber, as the state becomes the latest front in a national redistricting battle.
A proposed constitutional amendment backed by Democratic officials would bypass the state’s bipartisan redistricting commission to allow use of new congressional districts approved by state lawmakers in this year’s midterm elections.
The referendum, which needs a simple majority to pass, tests Democrats’ ability to push back against President Trump, who started the gerrymandering competition between states after successfully urging Texas Republicans to redraw congressional districts in their favor last year. Virginia is the second state, after California last fall, to put the question to voters.
It also tests voters’ willingness to accept districts gerrymandered for political advantage — coming just six years after Virginia voters approved an amendment meant to diminish such partisan gamesmanship by shifting redistricting away from the legislature.
Even if Democrats are successful Tuesday, the public vote may not be the final word. The state Supreme Court is considering whether the redistricting plan is illegal in a case that could make the referendum results meaningless.
Virginia Democrats are following California’s lead
Congressional redistricting typically is done once a decade after each U.S. census. But Trump urged Texas Republicans to redistrict ahead of the November elections in hopes of winning several additional seats and maintaining the GOP’s narrow House majority in the face of political headwinds that typically favor the party that is out of power during midterms.
The Texas gambit led to a burst of redistricting nationwide. So far, Republicans believe they can win up to nine more House seats in newly redrawn districts in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio.
Democrats think they can win up to five more seats in California, where voters approved a mid-decade redistricting effort last November, and one more seat under new court-imposed districts in Utah. Democrats hope to offset the rest of that gap in Virginia, where they decisively flipped 13 seats in the state House and won back the governor’s office last year.
Voters focus on fairness, with different perspectives
The stream of voters was steady Tuesday at a recreation center in the Old Town area of Alexandria, Virginia.
Matt Wallace, 31, said he votes regularly but this election has additional emphasis.
“I think the redistricting issue across the country is unfortunate, that we’ve had to resort to temporary redistricting in order to sort of alter our elections across the country,” Wallace said. He said he voted for the Democratic redistricting amendment “to help balance the scales a bit until things get back to normal.”
Joanna Miller, 29, said she voted against the redistricting measure, “because I want my vote to count in a fair way.” Miller said she was more concerned about representation in Virginia than trying to offset actions in other states.
“I want my vote and my representation to matter this fall,” she said.
Political parties made a big push in Virginia
Leaders of both major parties see Tuesday’s vote as crucial to their chances to win a House majority in the fall. Trump weighed in via social media Tuesday morning, telling Virginians to “vote ‘no’ to save your country!”
Former Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, rallied with opponents of the measure Monday night, calling the redistricting plan “dishonest” and “brazenly deceptive.” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters at the Capitol earlier in the day that a vote to approve the redraw “will serve as a check and balance on this out-of-control Trump administration.”
A committee supporting the Democratic redistricting effort had raised more than $64 million — three times as much as the roughly $20 million raised by opponents, according to finance reports filed less than two weeks before the election.
The back-and-forth battle over congressional districts is expected to continue in Florida, where the Republican-led legislature is scheduled to convene April 28 for a special session that could result in a more favorable map for Republicans.
A lobster-like district could aid Democratic efforts
In Virginia, Democrats currently hold six of the 11 U.S. House seats under districts that were imposed by the state Supreme Court in 2021 after a bipartisan commission failed to agree on a map based on the latest census data.
The new plan could help Democrats win as many as 10 seats. Five are anchored in Democratic-heavy northern Virginia, including one shaped like a lobster that stretches into Republican-leaning rural areas.
Revisions to four other districts across Richmond, southern Virginia and Hampton Roads dilute the voting power of conservative blocs in those areas. And a reshaped district in parts of western Virginia lumps together three Democratic-leaning college towns to offset other Republican voters.
The Virginia redistricting plan is “pushing back against what other states have done in trying to stack the deck for Donald Trump in those congressional elections,” Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger said during an online rally last week.
Ads for the “yes to redistricting” campaign featuring former President Barack Obama have flooded the airwaves.
Opponents have distributed campaign materials citing past statements from Obama and Spanberger criticizing gerrymandering, but those were before Trump pushed Republican states to redraw their congressional maps in advance of this year’s midterms.
Democrats “were all against gerrymandering before they were for it,” Virginia Republican Party Chairman Jeff Ryer said.
Virginia court weighs whether lawmakers acted illegally
Virginia lawmakers endorsed a constitutional amendment allowing their mid-decade redistricting last fall, then passed it again in January as part of a two-step process that requires an intervening election for an amendment to be placed on the ballot. The measure allows lawmakers to redistrict until returning the task to a bipartisan commission after the 2030 census.
In February, they passed a new U.S. House map to take effect pending the outcome of the redistricting referendum. Republicans have filed multiple legal challenges against the effort.
A Tazewell County judge ruled that the redistricting push was illegal for several reasons. Circuit Court Judge Jack Hurley Jr. said lawmakers failed to follow their own rules for adding the redistricting amendment to a special session.
He ruled that their initial vote failed to occur before the public began casting ballots in last year’s general election and thus didn’t count toward the two-step process. He also ruled that the state failed to publish the amendment three months before that election, as required by law.
If the state Supreme Court agrees with the lower court, the results from Tuesday’s vote could be rendered moot.
Lieb writes for the Associated Press. AP writers Gary Fields in Virginia and Lisa Mascaro in Washington contributed to this report.
Source link