Trumps

WASHINGTON — An appeals court has cleared the way for President Trump’s executive order aimed at ending collective bargaining rights for hundreds of thousands of federal employees while a lawsuit plays out.

The Friday ruling came after the Trump administration asked for an emergency pause on a judge’s order blocking enforcement at roughly three dozen agencies and departments.

A split three-judge panel in the nation’s capital sided with government lawyers in a lawsuit filed by unions representing federal employees. The majority ruled on technical grounds, finding that the unions don’t have the legal right to sue because the Trump administration has said it won’t end any collective bargaining agreements while the case is being litigated.

Judge Karen Henderson, appointed by Republican President George H.W. Bush, and Justin Walker, appointed by Trump, sided with the government, while Judge Michelle Childs, appointed by Democratic President Biden, dissented.

The government says Trump needs the executive order so his administration can cut the federal workforce to ensure strong national security. The law requiring collective bargaining creates exemptions for work related to national security, as in agencies like the FBI.

Union leaders argue the order is designed to facilitate mass firings and exact “political vengeance” against federal unions opposed to Trump’s efforts to dramatically downsize the federal government.

His order seeks to expand that exemption to exclude more workers than any other president has before. That’s according to the National Treasury Employees Union, which is suing to block the order.

The administration has filed in a Kentucky court to terminate the collective bargaining agreement for the Internal Revenue Service, where many workers are represented by the National Treasury Employees Union. They say their IRS members aren’t doing national security work.

Other union employees affected by the order include the Health and Human Services Department, the Energy Department, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Federal Communications Commission.

Whitehurst writes for the Associated Press.

In May 1939, a ship called the St. Louis departed from Hamburg, Germany, with 937 passengers, most of them Jews fleeing the Holocaust. They had been promised disembarkation rights in Cuba, but when the ship reached Havana, the government refused to let it dock. The passengers made desperate pleas to the U.S., including directly to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, to allow them entry. Roosevelt never responded. The State Department wired back that they should “wait their turn” and enter legally.

As if that were a realistic option available to them.

After lingering off the coast of Florida hoping for a merciful decision from Washington, the St. Louis and its passengers returned to Europe, where the Nazis were on the march. Ultimately, 254 of the ship’s passengers died in the Holocaust.

In response to this shameful failure to provide protection, the nations of the world came together and drafted an international treaty to protect those fleeing persecution. The treaty, the 1951 Refugee Convention, and its 1967 Protocol, has been ratified by more than 75% of nations, including the United States.

Because the tragedy of the St. Louis was fresh in the minds of the treaty drafters, they included an unequivocal prohibition on returning fleeing refugees to countries where their “life or freedom would be threatened.” This is understood to prohibit sending them to a country where they would face these threats, as well as sending them to a country that would then send them on to a third country where they would be at such risk.

All countries that are parties to the Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees are bound by this prohibition on return (commonly referred to by its French translation, “nonrefoulement”). In the U.S., Congress enacted the 1980 Refugee Act, expressly adopting the treaty language. The U.S. is also a party to the Convention Against Torture, which prohibits the return of individuals to places where they would be in danger of “being subjected to torture.”

In both Trump administrations, there have been multiple ways in which the president has attempted to eviscerate and undermine the protections guaranteed by treaty obligation and U.S. law. The most drastic among these measures have been the near-total closure of the border to asylum seekers and the suspension of entry of already approved and vetted refugees.

However, none of these measures has appeared so clearly designed to make a mockery of the post-World War II refugee protection framework as the administration’s proposals and attempts to send migrants from the U.S. to Libya and Rwanda.

Although there are situations in which the U.S. could lawfully send a migrant to a third country, it would still be bound by the obligation not to return the person to a place where their “life or freedom would be threatened.” The choices of Libya and Rwanda — rather than, for example, Canada or France — can only be read as an intentional and open flouting of that prohibition.

Libya is notorious for its abuse of migrants, with widespread infliction of torture, sexual violence, forced labor, starvation and slavery. Leading advocacy groups such as Amnesty International call it a “hellscape.” The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has stated in no uncertain terms that Libya is not to be considered a safe third country for migrants. The U.S. is clearly aware of conditions there; the State Department issued its highest warning level for Libya, advising against travel to Libya because of crime, terrorism, civil unrest, kidnapping and armed conflict.

Although conditions in Rwanda are not as extreme, the supreme courts of both Israel and the United Kingdom have ruled that agreements to send migrants to Rwanda are unlawful. The two countries had attempted to outsource their refugee obligations by calling Rwanda a “safe third country” to which asylum seekers could be sent to apply for protection.

Israel and the U.K.’s highest courts found that Rwanda — contrary to its stated commitment when entering these agreements — had in fact refused to consider the migrants’ asylum claims, and instead, routinely expelled them, resulting in their return to countries of persecution, in direct violation of the prohibition on refoulement. The U.K. court also cited Rwanda’s poor human rights record, including “extrajudicial killings, deaths in custody, enforced disappearances and torture.”

If the Trump administration had even a minimal commitment to abide by its international and domestic legal obligations, plans to send migrants to Libya or Rwanda would be a nonstarter. But the plans are very much alive, and it is not far-fetched to assume that their intent is to further undermine internationally agreed upon norms of refugee protection dating to World War II. Why else choose the two countries that have repeatedly been singled out for violating the rights of refugees?

As in Israel and the U.K., there will be court challenges should the U.S. move forward with its proposed plan of sending migrants to Libya and Rwanda. It is hard to imagine a court that could rule that the U.S. would not be in breach of its legal obligation of nonrefoulement by delivering migrants to these two countries.

Having said that, and despite the clear language of the treaty and statute, it has become increasingly difficult to predict how the courts will rule when the Supreme Court has issued decisions overturning long-accepted precedent, and lower courts have arrived at diametrically opposed positions on some of the most contentious immigration issues.

In times like these, we should not depend solely on the courts. There are many of us here in the U.S. who believe that the world’s refugee framework — developed in response to the profound moral failure of turning back the St. Louis — is worth fighting for. We need to take a vocal stand. The clear message must be that those fleeing persecution should never be returned to persecution.

If we take such a stand, we will be in the good company of those who survived the Holocaust and continue to speak out for the rights of all refugees.

Karen Musalo is a law professor and the founding director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at UC Law, San Francisco. She is also lead co-author of “Refugee Law and Policy: A Comparative and International Approach.”

Nonpartisan analysts say bill would add $3-5tn to the nation’s $36.2tn debt over the next decade.

United States President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax-cut bill has won approval from a key congressional committee to advance towards possible passage in the House of Representatives later this week.

The rare Sunday night vote marks a big win for Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson, after hardline Republican conservatives on Friday blocked the bill from clearing the House Budget Committee over a dispute involving spending cuts to the Medicaid healthcare programme for lower-income Americans and the repeal of green energy tax credits.

Four hardline members of the committee’s 21 Republicans allowed the legislation to advance by voting “present”. The bill passed in a 17-16 vote, with all Democrats voting against it.

The hardliners had spent much of the day in closed-door negotiations with House Republican leaders and White House officials.

Johnson met with Republican lawmakers shortly before the meeting, telling reporters that the changes agreed to were “just some minor modifications. Not a huge thing.”

Republican House Budget Chairman Jodey Arrington said he expects deliberations to continue on into the week, “right up until the time we put this big, beautiful bill before the House”.

Nonpartisan analysts say the bill, which would extend the 2017 tax cuts that were Trump’s signature first-term legislative win, would add $3 trillion to $5 trillion to the $36.2 trillion national debt over the next decade.

Credit ratings agency Moody’s cited the rising debt, which it said was on track to reach 134 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2035, for its decision on Friday to downgrade the US’s credit rating.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in an interview with CNN on Sunday that the bill would spur economic growth sufficient to offset any growth in the debt, adding that he did not put much credence in Moody’s downgrade.

Economic experts have warned that the downgrade – following previous downgrades by Fitch Ratings and S&P – is a clear sign that the US has too much debt and lawmakers need to either increase revenues or spend less.

Trump’s Republicans hold a 220-213 majority in the House, and are divided over how deeply to slash spending to offset the cost of the tax cuts.

Hardliners want cuts to Medicaid, which some Republican senators have pushed back against, saying it would hurt the very voters who elected Trump in November, and whose support they will need in 2026 when control of Congress is again up for grabs.

The bill’s cuts would kick 8.6 million people off Medicaid.

It also aims to eliminate taxes on tips and some overtime income – both Trump campaign promises – while boosting defence spending and providing more funds for Trump’s border crackdown.

Democratic US Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut said the credit rating cut spelled trouble for Americans.

“That is a big deal. That means that we are likely headed for a recession,” Murphy told NBC’s Meet the Press.

“These guys are running the economy recklessly.”

WASHINGTON — Republicans advanced their massive tax cut and border security package out of a key House committee during a rare Sunday night vote as conservatives who blocked the measure two days earlier reversed course after gaining commitments on the package’s spending cuts.

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) met with Republican lawmakers shortly before the meeting, telling reporters that the changes agreed to were “just some minor modifications. Not a huge thing.”

Democrats on the panel pressed for more details about the changes that Republicans had agreed to in the private negotiations. But Rep. Jodey Arrington (R-Texas), the chairman of the House Budget Committee, said he could not do so.

“Deliberations continue at this very moment,” Arrington said. “They will continue on into the week, and I suspect right up until the time we put this big, beautiful bill on the floor of the House.”

The first time Republicans tried advancing the bill out of the Budget Committee, hard-right Republicans joined with Democrats in voting against sending the measure to the full House. Five Republicans voted no, one on procedural grounds, the other four voicing concerns about the bill’s effect on federal budget deficits.

On Sunday evening, the four voicing concerns about the deficit voted present, and the measure passed by a vote of 17 to 16.

Johnson is looking to put the bill on the House floor before the end of the week.

“This is the vehicle through which we will deliver on the mandate that the American people gave us in the last election,” he said on “Fox News Sunday” in advance of the vote.

The Republicans who criticized the measure noted that the bill’s new spending and tax cuts are front-loaded in the bill, while the measures to offset the cost are back-loaded. For example, they are looking to speed up the new work requirements that Republicans want to enact for Medicaid recipients. Those requirements would not kick in until 2029 under the current bill.

“We are writing checks we cannot cash, and our children are going to pay the price,” said Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas), a member of the committee. “Something needs to change, or you’re not going to get my support.”

Johnson said the start date for the work requirements was designed to give states time to “retool their systems” and to “make sure that all the new laws and all the new safeguards that we’re placing can actually be enforced.”

Roy was joined in voting no by Reps. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma and Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia. Rep. Lloyd Smucker of Pennsylvania switched his vote to no in a procedural step so it could be reconsidered later.

The vote against advancing the bill had come after President Trump urged Republicans in a social media post to unite behind it.

At its core, the sprawling package permanently extends the existing income tax cuts that were approved during Trump’s first term, in 2017, and adds temporary new ones that the president campaigned on in 2024, including no taxes on tips, overtime pay and auto loan interest payments. The measure also proposes big spending increases for border security and defense.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan fiscal watchdog group, estimates that the House bill is shaping up to add roughly $3.3 trillion to the debt over the next decade.

Democrats are overwhelmingly opposed to the measure, which Republicans have labeled “The One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act.” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) called it “one big, beautiful betrayal” in Friday’s hearing.

“This spending bill is terrible, and I think the American people know that,” Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) said on CNN’s “State of the Union’’ on Sunday. “There is nothing wrong with us bringing the government in balance. But there is a problem when that balance comes on the back of working men and women. And that’s what is happening here.”

Johnson is not just having to address the concerns of those in his conference who raised concerns about the deficit. He’s also facing pressure from centrists who will be warily eyeing the proposed changes to Medicaid, food assistance programs and the rolling back of clean energy tax credits. Republican lawmakers from New York and elsewhere are also demanding a much large state and local tax deduction.

As it stands, the bill proposes tripling what’s currently a $10,000 cap on the state and local tax deduction, increasing it to $30,000 for joint filers with incomes up to $400,000 a year.

Rep. Nick LaLota, one of the New York GOP lawmakers leading the effort to lift the cap, said they have proposed a deduction of $62,000 for single filers and $124,000 for joint filers.

If the bill passes the House this week, it would move to the Senate, where Republicans are seeking additional changes that could make final passage in the House more difficult.

Johnson said: “The package that we send over there will be one that was very carefully negotiated and delicately balanced, and we hope that they don’t make many modifications to it because that will ensure its passage quickly.”

Freking and Mascaro write for the Associated Press.

On May 12, the United States and China announced that they are putting reciprocal tariffs on pause for 90 days. Some tariffs will be retained while trade negotiations continue, a joint statement said.

This is yet another reversal of the sweeping tariffs US President Donald Trump imposed in early April that destabilised the global economy and sent stock markets into freefall.

Although he claimed that his measures would make the US economy “boom”, it was clear from the start that they would not work. A trade war cannot improve the lot of American workers, nor bring back manufacturing into the country.

Now spooked by corporations slashing profit targets and reports of the US gross domestic product (GDP) shrinking, the Trump administration appears to be walking back on its strategy. But going back to economic liberalism under the guise of “stability” is not the right course of action.

The current global economic system, distorted by policies favouring the rich sustained over decades, has proven itself to be unsustainable. That is why we need a new world economic order that promotes inclusive and sustainable development across both the Global North and South and addresses global socioeconomic challenges.

The crisis of liberal globalisation

The troubles that economies around the world currently face are the result of policies the elites of the Global North imposed over the past 80 years.

In its original Keynesian vision, the economic order put forward by the Allied Powers after World War II aimed to combine trade, labour, and development best practices to foster inclusive growth. However, over the following few decades, corporate opposition in the US and Britain derailed this order, replacing it with a skewed system centred around the Global North’s chief economic instruments, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, both created in 1944.

In the 1970s, economic elites blamed rising inflation and stagnation not on temporary shocks like the oil crisis but on what they saw as excessive concessions to organised labour: government overspending, strong unions, and heavy regulation. Subsequently, they launched an institutional counter-revolution against the Keynesian model of power sharing and social compromise.

This counter-revolution took shape in the 1980s under US President Ronald Reagan and UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who aggressively pursued policies to restore corporate profitability. They slashed taxes on the wealthy, liberalised international capital flows that made it easier to relocate production to low-cost economies, deregulated the financial sector, weakened labour unions, and privatised public services. As a result, outsourcing of labour, tax evasion, real estate speculation, financialisation, and credit-fuelled bubbles became US corporations’ dominant ways of making profit.

In developing countries, the IMF, the World Bank and regional development banks pushed governments to cut public spending, privatise state-owned enterprises, remove trade barriers, and deregulate markets rapidly and with little regard for social consequences.

As a result, the 1980s and 90s became lost decades for many countries embracing globalisation through radical liberalisation. These policies triggered massive employment shocks, rising inequalities, skyrocketing debt and persistent financial turbulence from Mexico to Russia.

East Asian economies were the exceptions, as they learned to circumvent the straitjacket of liberal globalisation and joined the global economy on their own terms.

The biggest beneficiaries of this system were Western economic elites, as corporations profited from low-cost production abroad and domestic deregulation at home. The same cannot be said for Western workers, who faced stagnating real wages, eroded labour protections, and increasing economic insecurity under the pressure of competitiveness, relocation, and automation.

Illiberal economic policy is doomed to fail

For those of us who studied the post-war economic order, it was apparent that without correcting the pitfalls of liberal globalism, a nationalist, illiberal counter-revolution was coming. We saw its signs early on in Europe, where illiberal populists rose to prominence, gaining a foothold first in the periphery and then gradually scaling up to become Europe’s most disruptive force.

In the countries where they gained power, they pursued policies superficially resembling developmentalism. Yet, instead of achieving genuine structural transformation, they fostered oligarchies dominated by politically connected elites. Instead of development, they delivered rent-seeking and resource extraction without boosting productivity or innovation.

Trump’s economic policies follow a similar path of economic populism and nationalistic rhetoric. Just like illiberal economic policies failed in Europe, his tariffs were never going to magically reindustrialise the US or end working-class suffering.

If anything, tariffs – or now the threat of imposing them – will accelerate China’s competitive edge by pushing it to deepen domestic supply chains, foster regional cooperation, and reduce reliance on Western markets. In the US, the illiberal response will drag labour standards down, eroding real wages through inflation and propping up elites with artificial protections.

Furthermore, Trump has no real industrial policy, which renders his reactive trade measures completely ineffective. A genuine industrial policy would coordinate public investment, support targeted sectors, enforce labour standards, and channel technological change towards good jobs.

His predecessor, President Joe Biden, laid the foundations of such an industrial policy agenda in the Inflation Reduction and CHIPS acts. However, these programmes are now under attack from the Trump administration, and their remaining vestiges will not have a meaningful effect.

Without these pillars, workers are left exposed to economic shocks and excluded from the gains of growth, while the rhetoric of reindustrialisation becomes little more than a political performance.

The way forward

While Trump’s economic policies are unlikely to work, returning to economic liberalism will not resolve socioeconomic grievances either. Let us remember that past efforts to maintain this deeply flawed system at any cost backfired.

Following the 2008 global financial crisis, Western governments rescued big banks and allowed financial markets to return to business as usual. Meaningful reforms of the global economic architecture never materialised. Meanwhile, the living standards of working- and middle-class families from Germany to the US stagnated or declined as wages flatlined, housing prices soared, and economic insecurity deepened.

We cannot return to this dysfunction again. We need a new global economic order focused on multilateral governance, ecological sustainability, and human-centric development. Such progressive global multilateralism would mean governments coordinating not only on taxing multinational corporations and curbing tax havens but also on regulating capital flows, setting minimum labour and environmental standards, sharing green technologies, and jointly financing global public goods.

In this new economic order, the institutions of global economic governance would make space for developing and emerging countries to implement industrial policies and build stronger ties with public finance bodies to mobilise patient, sustainable capital. This cooperative approach would offer a practical alternative to liberal globalism by promoting accountable public investment and development-focused financial collaboration.

Parallel to the eco-social developmentalism in emerging economies, wealthy nations need to embrace a post-growth model gradually. This strategy prioritises wellbeing, ecological stability, and social equity over endless GDP expansion.

This means investing in care work, green infrastructure, and public services rather than chasing short-term profits or extractive growth. For mature economies, the goal should be shifting from growing more to distributing better and living within planetary limits. This would also allow more space for low- and middle-income countries to improve their living standards without overexploiting our limited shared natural resources.

With stronger cooperation between national and multilateral public finance institutions and better tools to tax and regulate corporations, governments could regain the capacity to create stable, well-paying jobs, strengthen organised labour, and tackle inequalities. This is the only way for American workers to regain the quality of life they aspire to.

Such progressive multilateralism would be a powerful long-term antidote against illiberal populism. Achieving this shift, however, requires building robust global and regional political coalitions to challenge entrenched corporate interests and counterbalance the existing liberal, capital-driven global framework.

The challenge is clear: not only to critique Trump’s destructive policies but to present a bold, coherent vision of industrial renewal, ecological sustainability, and global justice. The coming months will show whether anyone is prepared to lead that transformation.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia  — President Trump’s four-day visit to the Middle East was marked by a flurry of activity: Billion-dollar trade deals, a meeting with Syria’s new president and diplomatic efforts to resolve the nuclear standoff with Iran.

But the fate of Palestinian people and the war in Gaza, where the dead are piling up in recent days under an Israeli onslaught, appears to have received short shrift.

Trump finished his visit to the Persian Gulf on Friday, touting his abilities as a deal maker while he forged trade agreements worth hundreds of billions of dollars — his administration says trillions — from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

But despite his repeated insistence that only he could bring a peaceful end to the world’s intractable problems — and saying Friday that “we have to help” Palestinians — there were no breakthroughs on the Israel-Hamas war, and the president repeated his suggestion of U.S. involvement in the Gaza Strip.

Noting the widespread destruction in the territory, Trump said, “I have concepts for Gaza that I think are very good — make it a freedom zone. Let the United States get involved and make it just a freedom zone.”

President Trump walks down the stairs of Air Force One upon his arrival at Joint Base Andrews, Md., on Friday.

(Luis M. Alvarez / Associated Press)

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1. Palestinians struggle to get donated food at a community kitchen in Jabalia, northern Gaza Strip, Thursday, May 15, 2025. (Jehad Alshrafi / Associated Press) 2. Islam Hajjaj holds her 6-year-old daughter Najwa, who suffers from malnutrition, at a shelter in central Gaza City, on May 11, 2025. Amnesty International accuses Israel on April 29 of committing a ‘’live-streamed genocide’’ against Palestinians by forcibly displacing Gazans and creating a humanitarian catastrophe in the besieged territory, claims Israel dismisses as ‘’blatant lies’’. (Majdi Fathi / NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Trump’s comments Friday came as the Israel military began the first stages of a ground offensive it called “Operation Gideon’s Chariots” — an apparent fulfillment of a threat by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu earlier this month that he would launch an attack on Gaza to destroy Hamas and liberate detainees if there wasn’t a ceasefire or a hostage deal by the time Trump finished his time in the Middle East.

Trump’s concerns “are deals that benefit the U.S. economy and enhance the U.S.’ global economic positions,” or preventing costly military entanglements in Iran or Yemen, said Mouin Rabbani, a nonresident fellow at the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies, based in Qatar.

“Unlike Syria or Iran,” Rabbani said, “ending the Gaza war provides no economic benefit to the U.S., and doesn’t risk American troops getting involved in a new war.”

Ahead of Trump’s four-day trip, there were moves that had buoyed hopes of a ceasefire or allowing humanitarian aid into Gaza, which Israel has blocked for more than two months as aid groups warn of impending famine. On May 12, Hamas released Edan Alexander, a soldier with Israeli and U.S. citizenship and the last American detainee in its hands, as a goodwill gesture to Trump, and there were rumors of a meeting between Trump and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.

But that meeting never took place, and instead of a ceasefire, Israel launched strikes that health authorities in the enclave say have killed at least 250 people in the last few days, 45 of them children, according to UNICEF.

A man looks at burned vehicles in the Barkan Industrial area, near Salfit in the occupied West Bank, on Friday, after more than 17 Palestinian workers’ cars were reportedly set on fire by Israeli settlers the night before. Since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, violence has soared in the West Bank where Israeli settlements are illegal under international law.

(John Wessels / AFP via Getty Images)

Netanyahu insists his aim is to destroy Hamas, which attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people and seizing roughly 250 hostages. Israel’s military campaign has so far killed at least 53,000 people in Gaza — including combatants and civilians, but mostly women and children, according to health authorities there — and many believe that toll to be an undercount.

A ceasefire that Trump’s incoming administration brokered in January broke down in mid-March after Israel refused to continue second-stage negotiations.

“We expect the U.S. administration to exert further pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to open the crossings and allow the immediate entry of humanitarian aid, food, medicine and fuel to hospitals in the Gaza Strip,” said Taher El-Nounou, a Hamas media advisor, in an interview with Agence France-Presse on Friday.

He added that such moves were part of the understandings reached with U.S. envoys during the latest meetings, under which Hamas released Alexander.

Yet there has been little sign of that pressure, despite fears in Israeli circles that Trump’s actions before and during his Middle East trip — which skipped Israel, saw Trump broker a deal with Yemen’s Houthis and lift sanctions on Syria without Israeli input — was a snub to Netanyahu.

President Trump speaks on Air Force One at Abu Dhabi International Airport before departing on Friday in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

(Alex Brandon / Associated Press)

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One as he left the Emirati capital, Abu Dhabi, on Friday, Trump sidestepped questions about the renewed Israeli offensive, saying, “I think a lot of good things are going to happen over the next month, and we’re going to see.”

“We have to help also out the Palestinians,” he said. “You know, a lot of people are starving in Gaza, so we have to look at both sides.”

On the first day of Trump’s Mideast trip, in Saudi Arabia, he announced that the U.S. was ending sanctions on Syria, now headed by an Islamist government that overthrew longtime dictator Bashar Assad in December. He met Syrian interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa and praised him as a “tough guy” and a “fighter.”

Israel views Al-Sharaa’s government as a threat and has made incursions into its territory since Assad’s fall, and launched a withering airstrike campaign to defang the fledgling government’s forces.

When asked whether he knew Israel opposed the lifting of sanctions, Trump said, “I don’t know, I didn’t ask them about that.”

Palestinians struggle to get donated food at a community kitchen in Khan Yunis, Gaza Strip, on Friday.

(Abdel Kareem Hana / Associated Press)

Commentators say that although Washington’s leverage over Israel should make a Gaza ceasefire easier for a Trump administration seeking to project itself as an effective peacemaker, the conflict there remains a low priority for Trump.

“Gaza may seem like low hanging fruit on the surface, but it’s also low political yield — how does acting decisively on Gaza benefit Trump? It doesn’t,” said Khaled Elgindy, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies.

He added that going along with Netanyahu would be more in line with Trump’s vision for owning and remaking Gaza, while on Iran, Syria and the Houthi rebels in Yemen, it makes sense to separate U.S. interests from Israel’s.

“Palestinians have nothing to offer Trump. And the Gulf states offered their investments for free, with no conditions on Gaza. Gaza is a moral imperative, not a strategic one, and Trump is not known for acting on moral grounds.”

United States President Donald Trump’s tour of the Middle East this week is his first international trip since he started his second term. Conspicuously absent from his itinerary, however, was Washington’s closest ally in the region: Israel.

In the US and Israeli media, the apparent snub has fuelled talk of a growing rift between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Contributors:
Diana Buttu – Human rights lawyer and analyst
Dana Mills – Writer, +972 magazine and Local Call
Jeremy Scahill – Cofounder, Drop Site News

On our radar:

Tariq Nafi reports on the killing this week of one of Gaza’s best-known journalists – and why it represents a new low in Israel’s unparalleled war on the press.

Are India’s news channels helping or harming?

The tit-for-tat conflict between India and Pakistan lasted only a week before a ceasefire deal was reached, but it was long enough to provide an insight into the role the media might play in a longer war.

We speak with Indian journalist Hartosh Singh Bal about mainstream media under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government – from misinformation to hate speech – and the alternative news outlets trying to provide the antidote.

Featuring:
Hartosh Singh Bal – Executive editor, The Caravan magazine

United States House Republicans’ “big, beautiful bill”, a wide-ranging tax and spending legislation, is at a crucial moment.

The nearly 400-page legislation proposes sweeping changes which include extending the 2017 tax cuts, slashing taxes for businesses and individuals, and enacting deep cuts to social programmes like Medicaid and SNAP.

While Republicans tout the bill as a boon for economic growth and middle-class relief, nonpartisan analysts warn it could add trillions to the national debt and strip millions of Americans of medical and food assistance.

The bill will be voted on by the House Budget Committee today and, if passed, will be voted on the floor next week.

The most substantive part of the bill is an extension of the 2017 tax cuts. The tax bill would add at least an additional $2.5 trillion to the national deficit over the next 10 years and decrease federal tax revenue by roughly $4 trillion by 2034.

Passing the legislation will also raise the debt ceiling, which sets the amount of money the government can borrow to pay for existing expenditures, by $4 trillion, a sticking point for hardline Republicans who want deeper cuts.

Here are some of the key measures in the proposed bill in its current form.

Changes for households

The bill increases standard deductions for all Americans. Individual deductions will increase by $1,000, $1,500 for heads of households, and $2,000 for married couples.

The bill extends the child tax credit of $2,000, which would otherwise have ended with the expiration of the 2017 tax cuts at year’s end.

It bumps up the child tax credit by $500 per child for this tax year and runs through the end of 2028. It also includes a $1,000 savings account for children born between December 31, 2024 and January 1, 2029. The legislation would also allow families to annually contribute $5,000 tax-free.

There is a new tax deduction for Americans 65 and older. The new bill would give a $4,000 annual deduction starting this year for people making a gross income of $75,000 for a single person and $150,000 for a married couple. If passed, the rule would take effect for the current tax year and run until the end of 2028.

“It will just make tax paying more complicated and more uncertain when a lot of these things ultimately expire,” Adam Michel, director of tax policy studies at the right-leaning Cato Institute, told Al Jazeera.

Another provision in the bill modifies state and local tax (SALT) deductions. It allows filers to be able to write off some of what they paid in local and state taxes from their federal filings.

Under the 2017 tax act, that was capped at $10,000, but the new legislation would raise that to $30,000. Some Republicans, particularly those in states with higher taxes like New York and California, have been pushing to raise the cap or abolish it altogether. However, they have faced fiscal hawks and those who see the increases as relief for those already wealthy.

The bill includes an increased benefit for small businesses that allows them to deduct 23 percent of their qualified business income from their taxes, up from the current 20 percent.

There is also a call for no taxes on overtime pay for select individuals. It would not apply to people who are non-citizens, those who are considered “highly compensated employees,” and those who earn a tipped wage.

The bill, however, also eliminates taxes on tips, a critical campaign promise by both Donald Trump and his Democratic rival Kamala Harris. The bill would allow people who work in sectors like food service, as well as hair care, nail care, aesthetics, and body and spa treatments, to specifically deduct the amount of tipped income they receive.

At the federal level, employers will still not be required to pay tipped workers more than the subminimum wage of $2.13 hourly. The intention is that workers will be able to make up the difference in tipping the receipt from customers.

Cuts to the social safety net

The legislation calls to make $880bn in cuts to key government programmes with a focus mostly on Medicaid and food stamps.

The CBO found that more than 10 million people could lose Medicaid access and 7.6 million could lose access to health insurance completely by 2034 under the current plan.

Even far-right Republicans have called out the Medicaid cuts. In an op-ed in The New York Times this week, Republican Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri said the cuts are “morally wrong and politically suicidal”.

According to a new report from One Fair Wage shared with Al Jazeera, tipped workers could be hit especially hard, as 1.2 million restaurant and tipped workers could lose access to Medicaid.

“A no tax on tips proposal, which is like a minuscule percentage of their income and doesn’t affect two-thirds of tips workers because they don’t earn enough to pay federal income tax, is just nowhere near enough to compensate for the fact that we’re going to have millions of these workers lose the ability to take care of themselves, in some cases go into medical debt, in many cases just not take care of themselves,” Saru Jayaraman, president of One Fair Wage, an advocacy group for restaurant workers, told Al Jazeera.

The bill also introduces work requirements to receive benefits, saying that recipients must prove they work, volunteer or are enrolled in school for at least 80 hours each month.

At the same time, the bill also shortens the open enrolment period by a month for the Affordable Care Act (ACA), otherwise known as Obamacare. This means people who have employer-funded healthcare and lose their job might lose eligibility to buy a private plan on the healthcare exchange.

“It’s taking folks like 11 to 12 weeks to find a new job. The worse the labour market gets, that number will tick up. If you’re unemployed for three months, you get kicked off Medicaid,” Liz Pancotti, managing director of policy and advocacy at the Groundwork Collective, told Al Jazeera.

“Then, if you try to go buy a plan on the ACA marketplace, you are no longer eligible for subsidies … which I think is really cruel.”

Other major proposed cuts will hit programmes like Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programme or SNAP, which helps 42 million low-income individuals afford groceries and comes at a time when food costs are still 2 percent higher than a year ago. The CBO found that 3 million people could lose SNAP access under the new plan.

The bill would also force states to take up more responsibility in funding the programmes. States would be required to cover 75 percent of the administrative costs, and all states would have to pay at least 5 percent of the benefits — 28 states would need to pay 25 percent.

“States are now going to be on the hook for billions of dollars in funding for these two vital programmes. They have a tough choice. One is, do they cut funding from others like K-12 education, roads, veteran services, etc, to cover this gap, or do they raise taxes so that they can raise more revenue to cover this gap,” Pancotti added.

Under the current law, the federal government is solely responsible for shouldering the cost of benefits. The proposed cuts would save $300bn for the federal government but hit state budgets hard.

Bill fuels Trump administration priorities

The bill would also cut the $7,500 tax credit for new electric vehicle purchases and $4,000 for a used EV, a move which could hurt several major US automakers that are already reeling from the administration’s tariffs on automobiles.

General Motors pumped billions into domestic EV production in the last year, which has included a $900m investment to retrofit an existing plant to build electric vehicles in Michigan and alongside Samsung, the carmaker invested $3.5bn in EV battery manufacturing in the US.

In February, Ford CEO Jim Farley said that revoking the EV tax credit could put factory jobs on the chopping block. The carmaker invested in three EV battery plants in Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee. The federal government under the administration of former President Joe Biden paid out more than $2bn in EV tax credits in 2024.

The proposed legislation would also give the Trump administration authority to revoke the tax exempt status of nonprofit organisations that it deems as a “terrorist supporting organisation”. It would give the secretary of the treasury the ability to accuse any nonprofit of supporting “terrorism”, revoke their tax exempt status without allowing them due process to prove otherwise, which has raised serious concerns amongst critics.

“This measure’s real intent lurks behind its hyperbolic and unsubstantiated anti-terrorist rhetoric: It would allow the Treasury Department to explicitly target, harass and investigate thousands of U.S. organizations that make up civil society, including nonprofit newsrooms,” Jenna Ruddock, advocacy director of Free Press Action, said in a statement.

“The bill’s language lacks any meaningful safeguards against abuse. Instead it puts the burden of proof on organizations rather than on the government. It’s not hard to imagine how the Trump administration would use it to exact revenge on groups that have raised questions about or simply angered the president and other officials in his orbit.”

The bill would introduce new taxes on colleges, including a varying tax rate based on the size of a university’s endowment per student with the highest at 14 percent for universities with a per student endowment of more than $1.25m but less than $2m and 21 percent for those of $2m or more.

This comes amid the Trump administration’s increased tensions with higher education. In the last week, the Trump administration pulled $450m in grants to Harvard on top of the $2.2bn it pulled in April — a move which will hinder research into cancer and heart disease, among other areas. Harvard has an endowment of $53.2bn, making it one of the richest schools in the country.

The legislation would also increase funding for a border wall between the US and Mexico, which the administration has argued will help curb undocumented immigration. However, there is no evidence that such a wall has deterred border crossings.

A 2018 analysis from Stanford University found that a border wall would only curb migration by 0.6 percent, yet the bill would give more than $50bn to finish the border wall and maritime crossings. The bill would also provide $45bn for building and maintaining detention facilities and another $14bn for transport.

Washington, DC – Three days, three countries, hundreds of billions of dollars in investments and a geopolitical shift in the United States’s approach to the region: Donald Trump’s trip to the Middle East has been eventful.

This week, the United States president visited Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates in the first planned trip of his second presidency, after attending Pope Francis’s funeral last month.

Trump was visibly gleeful throughout the trip as he secured investments, criticised domestic political rivals and heaped praise on Gulf leaders. The word “historic” was used more than a few times by US officials to describe the visits.

With Trump returning to the White House, here are five key takeaways from his trip:

A rebuke of interventionism

Addressing an investment summit in Riyadh, Trump promoted a realist approach to the Middle East — one in which the US does not intervene in the affairs of other countries.

He took a swipe at neoconservatives who oversaw the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as he lauded Gulf leaders for developing the region.

“This great transformation has not come from Western intervention or flying people in beautiful planes, giving you lectures on how to live and how to govern your own affairs,” he said.

“The gleaming marbles of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi were not created by the so-called nation-builders, neo-cons or liberal nonprofits like those who spent trillions and trillions of dollars failing to develop Kabul, Baghdad, so many other cities.”

Trump built his political brand with his “America First” slogan, calling for the US to focus on its own issues instead of helping — or bombing — foreign countries.

But his words at the investment summit marked a stern rebuke of the neo-cons who dominated Trump’s Republican Party a decade ago.

“In the end, the so-called nation-builders wrecked far more nations than they built, and the interventionists were intervening in complex societies that they did not even understand themselves,” Trump said.

Israel sidelined, but no Gaza solution

It is rare for US presidents to travel to the Middle East and not visit Israel, but Trump omitted the US ally from his itinerary as he toured the region.

Skipping Israel was seen as a reflection of the deteriorating ties between the US administration and the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

This week’s trip also came in the context of several moves perceived as evidence of the US marginalising Israel. The US has continued to hold talks with Israel’s rival Iran, announced a ceasefire with the Houthis in Yemen, and conducted unilateral negotiations to release Israeli soldier Edan Alexander, a US citizen, from Hamas captivity.

Moreover, while touring the Gulf, Trump did not use his remarks to prioritise the establishment of formal diplomatic ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel, which had been a top goal during his first term.

It remains unclear how Trump’s decisions will affect the “special relationship” between the two allies, but experts say it is becoming increasingly apparent that the US no longer views the Middle East solely through the lens of Israel.

“Is it a tactical problem for Netanyahu and the entire pro-Israel lobby? I think it is,” Khaled Elgindy, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University, said of Trump’s shift.

“It does throw a wrench in the machinery because it is a president who is showing openly daylight with Israeli decision-making, and not just in rhetoric, but acting on it — leaving Israel out of the process.”

With that chasm emerging, some Palestinian rights advocates had hoped that the US president’s trip to the region would see Washington pursue a deal to end Israel’s war on Gaza.

But as Trump marvelled at the luxurious buildings in the Gulf, Israel intensified its bombardment to destroy what’s left of the Palestinian territory.

No ceasefire was announced, despite reports of continuing talks in Doha. And Israel appears to be pushing forward with its plan to expand its assault on Gaza as it continues to block aid for the nearly two million people in the enclave, leading to fears of famine.

United Nations experts and rights groups have described the situation as a genocide.

But despite preaching “peace and prosperity” for both Israelis and Palestinians, Trump made no strong push to end the war during this week’s trip.

On Thursday, Trump suggested that he has not given up on the idea of depopulating Gaza and turning it over to the US — a proposal that legal experts say amounts to ethnic cleansing.

“I have concepts for Gaza that I think are very good. Make it a freedom zone,” he said. “Let the United States get involved, and make it just a freedom zone.”

Lifting Syria sanctions

In a move that surprised many observers, Trump announced from Riyadh that he will offer sanction relief to Syria, as the country emerges from a decade-plus civil war.

Trump also met with interim Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa and described him as a “young, attractive guy”.

A wholesale lifting of sanctions was not expected, in part because of Israel’s hostility to the new authorities in Syria. Israeli officials often describe al-Sharaa, who led al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria before severing ties with the group, as a “terrorist”.

But Trump said he made the decision to lift the economic penalties against Syria at the request of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness,” the US president said.

The White House said on Wednesday that Trump had a list of requests for al-Sharaa, including establishing diplomatic relations with Israel and deporting “Palestinian terrorists”.

Removing US sanctions, which had been imposed on the government of former President Bashar al-Assad, is likely to be a boost for the new Syrian authorities, who are grappling with an ailing economy after years of conflict.

“Lifting sanctions on Syria represents a fundamental turning point,” Ibrahim Nafi Qushji, an economist, told Al Jazeera.

“The Syrian economy will transition from interacting with developing economies to integrating with more developed ones, potentially significantly reshaping trade and investment relations.”

A carrot and a stick for Iran

In Saudi Arabia, Trump declared that he wants a deal with Iran — and he wants it done quickly.

“We really want them to be a successful country,” the US president said of Iran.

“We want them to be a wonderful, safe, great country, but they cannot have a nuclear weapon. This is an offer that will not last forever. The time is right now for them to choose.”

Trump warned Iran that, if it rejects his “olive branch”, he would impose a “massive maximum pressure” against Tehran and choke off its oil exports.

Notably, Trump did not threaten explicit military action against Iran, a departure from his previous rhetoric. In late March, for instance, he told NBC News, “If they don’t make a deal, there will be bombing.”

Iran says it is not seeking nuclear weapons and would welcome a stringent monitoring programme of its nuclear facilities.

But Israel and some hawks want the Iranian nuclear programme completely dismantled, not just scaled back.

US and Iranian officials have held multiple rounds of talks this year, but Tehran says it has not received an official offer from Washington. And Trump officials have not explicitly indicated what the endgame of the talks is.

US envoy Steve Witkoff said last month that Iran “must stop and eliminate” uranium enrichment, but days earlier, he had suggested that enrichment should be brought down to civilian energy levels.

Several Gulf countries, including the three that Trump visited this week, have welcomed the nuclear negotiations, as relations between Iran and its Arab neighbours have grown more stable in recent years.

Investments, investments and more investments

Before entering politics, Trump was a real estate mogul who played up his celebrity persona as a mega-rich dealmaker. He appears to have brought that business mindset to the White House.

While in the wealthy Gulf region, Trump was in his element. He announced deals that would see Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE buy US arms and invest in American firms. According to the White House, Trump secured a total of $2 trillion in investments from the Middle East during the trip.

And his administration is framing the deals as a major political and economic victory for Trump.

“While it took President Biden nearly four years to secure $1 trillion in investments, President Trump achieved this in his first month, with additional investment commitments continuing to roll in,” the White House said.

“President Trump is accelerating investment in America and securing fair trade deals around the world, paving the way for a new Golden Age of lasting prosperity for generations to come.”

WASHINGTON — In a massive setback, House Republicans failed Friday to push their big package of tax breaks and spending cuts through the Budget Committee, as a handful of conservatives joined all Democrats in a stunning vote against it.

The hard-right lawmakers are insisting on steeper spending cuts to Medicaid and the Biden-era green energy tax breaks, among other changes, before they will give their support to President Trump’s “big beautiful bill.” They warn the tax cuts alone would pile onto the nation’s $36-trillion debt.

The failed vote, 16-21, stalls, for now, House Speaker Mike Johnson’s push to have the package approved next week. But the holdout lawmakers vowed to stay all weekend to negotiate changes as the president is returning to Washington from the Middle East.

“Something needs to change or you’re not going to get my support,” said Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas).

Tallying a whopping 1,116 pages, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, named with a nod to Trump, is teetering at a critical moment. Conservatives are holding out for steeper cuts to Medicaid and other programs to help offset the costs of the tax breaks. But at the same time, lawmakers from high-tax states including New York and California are demanding a deeper tax deduction, known as SALT, for their constituents.

Johnson has insisted Republicans are on track to pass the bill, which he believes will inject a dose of stability into a wavering economy.

Democrats slammed the package, but they will be powerless to stop it if Republicans are united. They emphasized that millions of people would lose their health coverage if the bill passes while the wealthiest Americans would reap enormous tax cuts. They also said it would increase future deficits.

“That is bad economics. It is unconscionable,” said Rep. Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania, the top Democratic lawmaker on the panel.

The Budget panel is one of the final stops before the package is sent to the full House floor for a vote, which is expected as soon as next week. Typically, the job of the Budget Committee is more administrative as it compiles the work of 11 committees that drew up various parts of the big bill.

But Friday’s meeting proved momentous. Republicans hold a slim majority in the House and have just a few votes to spare to advance the measure, including on the Budget Committee.

Four Republican conservatives initially voted against the package — Roy and Reps. Ralph Norman of South Carolina, Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma and Andrew Clyde of Georgia. Then one, Rep. Lloyd Smucker of Pennsylvania, switched his vote to no.

The conservative holdouts from the Freedom Caucus are insisting on deeper cuts — particularly to Medicaid. They want new work requirements for aid recipients to start immediately, rather than on Jan. 1, 2029, as the package proposes.

Roy complained that the legislation front-loads new tax cuts and spending while back-loading the savings.

“We are writing checks we cannot cash, and our children are going to pay the price,” Roy said.

“Sadly,” added Norman, “I’m a hard no until we get this ironed out.”

At the same time, the New Yorkers have been unrelenting in their demand for a much larger SALT deduction than what is proposed in the bill, which could send the overall cost of the package skyrocketing.

As it stands, the bill proposes tripling what’s currently a $10,000 cap on the state and local tax deduction, increasing it to $30,000 for joint filers with incomes up to $400,000 a year.

Rep. Nick LaLota, one of the New York lawmakers leading the SALT effort, said they have proposed a deduction of $62,000 for single filers and $124,000 for joint filers.

The conservatives and the New Yorkers are at odds, each jockeying for their priorities as Johnson labors to keep the package on track to pass the House by Memorial Day and then onto the Senate.

“This is always what happens when you have a big bill like this,” said Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.). “There’s always final details to work out all the way up until the last minute. So we’re going to keep working. There’s a lot of work to be done.”

At its core, the sprawling package extends the existing income tax cuts that were approved during Trump’s first term, in 2017, and adds new ones that the president campaigned on in 2024, including no taxes on tips, overtime pay and some auto loans.

It increases some tax breaks for middle-income earners, including a bolstered standard deduction of $32,000 for joint filers and a temporary $500 boost to the child tax credit, bringing it to $2,500.

It also provides an infusion of $350 billion for Trump’s deportation agenda and to bolster the Pentagon.

To offset more than $5 million in lost revenue, the package proposes rolling back other tax breaks, namely the green energy tax credits approved as part of President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. Some conservatives want those to end immediately.

The package also seeks to cover the costs by slashing more than $1 trillion from healthcare and food assistance programs over the course of a decade, in part by imposing work requirements on able-bodied adults.

Certain Medicaid recipients would need to engage in 80 hours a month of work or other community options to receive healthcare. Older Americans receiving food aid through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, would also see the program’s current work requirement for able-bodied participants without dependents extended to include those ages 55-64. States would also be required to shoulder a greater share of the program’s cost.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates at least 7.6 million fewer people with health insurance and about 3 million a month fewer SNAP recipients with the changes.

Mocking the name of the bill, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) called it “one big, beautiful betrayal.”

“To pay for it,” Democratic Rep. Morgan McGarvey said, “kids in Kentucky will go hungry, nursing homes and hospitals will close, and millions of Americans will be kicked off their health insurance. It’s wrong.”

Mascaro and Freking write for the Associated Press. AP writer Leah Askarinam contributed to this report.

SEOUL — In South Korea, the Trump administration’s 25% tariff on imported cars has sent local automakers Hyundai and Kia scrambling to protect one of the country’s most valuable exports. But General Motors, which last year shipped 418,782 units from its factories here to American consumers — or 88.5% of its total sales — may be facing a much larger predicament.

Unlike Hyundai and Kia, which control over 90% of the domestic market here, the Detroit-based automaker produces budget SUVs like the Chevrolet Trax or Chevrolet Trailblazer almost exclusively for the U.S. market. The Trax has been South Korea’s most-exported car since 2023.

That business model has made GM, which operates three factories and employs some 11,000 workers in the country, uniquely exposed to Trump’s auto tariffs, resurfacing long-running concerns in the local automobile industry that the company may ultimately pack up and leave.

Until last month’s tariffs, cars sold between the U.S. and South Korea were untaxed under a bilateral free trade agreement. That helped South Korea become the third-largest automobile exporter to the U.S. last year to the tune of $34.7 billion — or around half of its total automobile exports. In contrast, South Korea bought just $2.1 billion worth of cars from the U.S.

Earlier this month, GM executives estimated that the tariffs would cost the company up to $5 billion this year, adding that the company would boost production in its U.S. plants to offset the hit. With additional factories in Mexico and Canada, GM currently imports around half of the cars that it sells in the U.S.

“If the U.S. tariffs remain in place, GM will no longer have any reason to stay in South Korea,” said Lee Ho-guen, an automotive engineering professor at Daeduk University.

“The tariffs may add up to $10,000 to the sticker price on cars shipped to the U.S., while GM sells less than 50,000 units a year in South Korea. There is very little room for them to adjust their strategy.”

Kim Woong-heon, an official in GM Korea’s labor union, said that the union is approaching current rumors of the company’s potential exit with a dose of caution, but added that broader concerns about the company’s long-term commitment remain.

“The cars we’re manufacturing here are on the lowest end of GM’s price range so labor costs will make it impossible to immediately shift production to the U.S.,” he said.

“But we have painful memories of GM shutting down one of its factories in 2018, so we get nervous every time these rumors surface.”

GM Chevrolet automobiles bound for export sit parked at the Port of Incheon in South Korea.

(SeongJoon Cho / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

This isn’t the first time that GM’s prospects in the country have come under question. The company first established itself in South Korea in 2002 by acquiring the bankrupt Daewoo Motor Co. in a government-backed deal that some at the time criticized as “GM taking the cream off Daewoo for almost nothing.”

Struggling to compete with the likes of Hyundai, GM briefly positioned itself as a production base for European and Asian markets until its bankruptcy in 2009.

Amid the global restructuring efforts that followed, concerns that it would close its South Korean operations led the government to once again intervene. In the end, GM stayed after receiving $750 million in financing from the country’s development bank on the condition that it would remain open for at least 10 more years.

But in 2018, the company closed its factory in the city of Gunsan, which had employed around 1,800 workers, and spun off its research and development unit from its manufacturing base — a move that many saw as the company strategically placing one foot out the door.

In February, shortly after President Trump announced the 25% tariffs on foreign-made cars, Paul Jacobson, GM’s chief financial officer, hinted that the company may once again be facing similarly tough decisions:

“If they become permanent, then there’s a whole bunch of different things that you have to think about in terms of, where do you allocate plants, and do you move plants.”

In recent weeks, executives from GM Korea have sought to assuage the rumors that the company’s South Korean operations would be affected.

“We do not intend to respond to rumors about the company’s exit from Korea,” said Gustavo Colossi, GM Korea’s vice president of sales, at a news conference last month. “We plan to move forward with our sales strategies in Korea and continue launching new models in the coming weeks and months, introducing fresh GM offerings to the market.”

The union says the company’s two finished car plants have been running at full capacity, with an additional 21,000 units recently allocated to the factory in Incheon, a city off the country’s western coast — a sign that business will go on as usual for now.

But with GM’s 10-year guarantee set to expire in 2027, Kim, the union official, said that their demands for measures that prove the company’s commitment beyond that have gone unanswered.

These include manufacturing GM’s electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles in South Korean factories, as well as making a greater range of its products available for sale in South Korea and other Asian markets.

”If the company intends to continue its operations here, it needs to make its business model more sustainable and not as reliant on imports to the U.S.,” Kim said.

“That will be our core demand at this year’s wage and collective bargaining negotiations.”

GM’s immediate prospects in the country will depend on the ongoing tariff talks between U.S. and South Korean officials that began last month with the goal of producing a deal by July 8.

Although South Korean trade minister Ahn Duk-geun has stressed that cars are “the most important part of the U.S.-South Korea trade relationship,” few expect that Seoul will be able to finesse the sort of deal given to the U.K., which last week secured a 10% rate on the first 100,000 vehicles shipped to the U.S. each year.

Unlike South Korea, which posted a $66-billion trade surplus with the U.S. last year, the U.K. buys more from the U.S. than it sells. And many of the cars that it does sell to the U.S. are luxury vehicles such as the Rolls-Royce, which Trump has differentiated from the “monster car companies” that make “millions of cars.”

“At some point after the next two years, I believe it’s highly likely GM will leave and keep only their research and development unit here, or at least significantly cut back on their production,” Lee, the automotive professor, said.

In the southeastern port city of Changwon, home to the smaller of GM’s two finished car plants, local officials have been reluctant to give air to what they describe as premature fearmongering.

But Woo Choon-ae, a 62-year-old real estate agent whose clients also include GM workers and their families, can’t help but worry.

She says that the company’s exit would be devastating to the city, which, like many rural areas, has already been under strain from population decline.

GM employs 2,800 workers in the region, but accounts for thousands more jobs at its suppliers. The Changwon factory, which manufactures the Trax, represented around 15% of the city’s total exports last year.

“People work for GM because it offers stable employment until retirement age. If they close the factory here, all of these workers will leave to find work in other cities, which will be a critical blow to the housing market,” she said.

“Homes are how people save money in South Korea. But if people’s savings are suddenly halved, who’s going to be spending money on things like dining out?”

Senators accuse US President Donald Trump of engaging in ‘corruption of US foreign policy’ with defence deals.

A group of United States senators is trying to halt $3.5bn in weapons sales to the United Arab Emirates and Qatar over concerns that the deals will personally benefit the family of US President Donald Trump.

Two “resolutions of disapproval” were submitted on Thursday in the US by Democratic Senators Chris Murphy, Chris Van Hollen, Brian Schatz and Tim Kaine, along with Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent who often votes with Democrats.

The legislators also issued statements accusing President Trump, who is concluding a trip to the Middle East, of actively engaging in the “corruption of US foreign policy” over the timing of the sales and recent investment deals.

The Department of State this week approved the $1.6bn sale to the UAE of Chinook helicopters and equipment, F-16 aircraft components, and spare and repair parts to support Apache, Black Hawk and Chinook helicopters. Initial reporting cited the figure as close to $1.3bn, but the $1.6bn figure was used in a statement from the legislators. The lawmakers are also seeking to block $1.9bn in sales to Qatar of MQ-9B Predator drones and associated equipment, which was approved by the State Department in March.

The legislators accuse Trump of accepting favours in exchange for the deals, citing news from April that the Emirati investment firm MGX would use a stablecoin – a cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to another asset – issued by the Trump family-backed World Liberty Financial to finance a $2bn investment in the cryptocurrency exchange Binance.

The Trump family is reported to have made millions off niche cryptocurrencies like the $TRUMP “meme coin” since the president returned to the White House in January.

I know Trump’s crypto scams can seem hard to understand. So I went the Senate floor to break down the most outrageous one.

A foreign government is investing $2 billion in Trump’s coin to get favorable treatment from the Administration. A wild corruption.

Here’s how it works. pic.twitter.com/pxLSlZH2QN

— Chris Murphy 🟧 (@ChrisMurphyCT) May 13, 2025

In addition to business dealings, the senators also expressed fears that US weapons sent to the UAE could end up in the hands of Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which is allegedly backed by the UAE and has played a critical role in Sudan’s civil war.

“The US should not be delivering weapons to the UAE as it aids and abets this humanitarian disaster and gross human rights violations,” Van Hollen said, citing Sudan’s civil war.

The senators also cited Qatar’s offer of a Boeing 747 jumbo for the president’s temporary use as Air Force One. The offer has drawn criticism from both Democrats and some Republicans because it would be the most expensive foreign gift ever exchanged between a foreign government and an elected US official.

“There’s nothing Donald Trump loves more than being treated like a king, and that’s exactly why foreign governments are trying to buy his favour with a luxury jumbo jet and investments in Trump’s crypto scams,” Murphy said in a statement.

When asked about the offer of the aircraft, Trump blamed Boeing’s lack of progress in building a new Air Force One and said he would be “stupid” to refuse a free plane.

“It’s not a gift to me, it’s a gift to the Department of Defense,” he said.

It is unclear when a vote will happen on the joint “resolutions of disapproval”, but the US political news outlet The Hill said that due to the nature of the bills, Democrats will likely force them to the floor of the Senate.

In Syria, optimism abounds. The unexpected decision by United States President Donald Trump to lift sanctions on the country, announced in Riyadh on Tuesday, is a relief for Syrians. They hope that the move will reintegrate Syria into the global economy, and bring much-needed investment into a country trying to recover from more than 50 years of dynastic family rule, as well as a nearly 14-year-long war.

The impact of Trump’s statement, which he said would give Syria “a chance at greatness” after the December overthrow of Bashar al-Assad, had an almost immediate effect, as the Syrian pound strengthened against the US dollar by about 25 percent, in a boost to a country suffering through economic hardship.

“Lifting sanctions on Syria represents a fundamental turning point,” Ibrahim Nafi Qushji, an economist and banking expert, told Al Jazeera. “The Syrian economy will transition from interacting with developing economies to integrating with more developed ones, potentially significantly reshaping trade and investment relations.”

Complex sanctions

While the announcement will likely lead to some imminent progress, there are still some stumbling blocks to the sanctions removal, analysts and experts told Al Jazeera.

US sanctions on Syria date back to 1979, when the country was under the iron grip of President Hafez al-Assad – Bashar’s father – and designated a “state sponsor of terrorism”. In the intervening years, additional sanctions were placed on the state and individuals associated with both the regime and the opposition, including current President Ahmed al-Sharaa – a result of his former association with al-Qaeda.

“There’s an entire building of a complex gamut of sanctions,” Vittorio Maresca di Serracapriola, sanctions lead analyst for Karam Shaar Advisory Limited, a consulting company with a focus on the political economy of the Middle East, told Al Jazeera.

Analysts said that Trump could remove certain sanctions through executive order, while some “foreign terrorist organisation” (FTO) designations could be removed by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. But other sanctions may be more complicated to end.

According to Maresca di Serracapriola, there are also a series of export controls, executive orders that target the banking sector, and acts that were passed by the US Congress.

“It is a huge moment for the country,” Maresca di Serracapriola said. “Of course, sanctions are very technical and complicated tools, so it’s still unclear how the US government will be able to implement what it promised.”

There are also questions about the timeline. The economic situation for many Syrians is dire, with 90 percent of the population living in poverty and approximately 25 percent jobless, according to the United Nations. The new Syrian authority is under extreme economic pressure, while at times struggling to exert its authority and provide security around the country.

Trump’s decision will come as a welcome reprieve, but Syrians may have to wait for sanctions relief to take effect. Analysts said the changes would come gradually and could take up to a year before “tangible results” are seen.

Sanctions relief alone will also not be enough. Analysts noted that Syria still needs banking reforms to comply and get off international monitoring lists. There will also need to be incentives from the US and other international actors to build trust among private investors looking to invest in Syria’s future.

“Achieving long-term growth requires implementing internal economic reforms, including improving the business environment, enhancing financial transparency, and developing productive sectors to ensure the Syrian economy effectively benefits from global opportunities,” Qushji said. “Lifting economic sanctions on Syria is a first step toward restructuring the economy, but it requires reform policies focused on sustainable development and global economic integration to ensure a real and productive recovery.”

Trump meets al-Sharaa

For months, everyone from Syria’s new leadership, analysts, and international actors has said there is a dire need for sanctions relief. But the US has previously taken an inflexible stance against al-Sharaa’s government, due to perceived ties to violence and armed groups.

Regional powers like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkiye, however, have built strong relations with the new government in Damascus. Before Trump’s pronouncement on Tuesday, multiple analysts told Al Jazeera they did not expect Syria’s sanctions relief to be high up on the agenda for the US or the Gulf states Trump visited during his three-country tour.

The US has taken a cautious, and at times conflicting, approach to Syria’s new authority since the fall of the Assad regime on December 8.

On March 9, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned Syria’s new government for their failure to prevent sectarian violence and massacres in the country’s coastal region. But then, three days later, Rubio praised the agreement between the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Syrian central government in Damascus that ostensibly would see the SDF integrate into state institutions.

Previously, the US provided Syria a list of demands that included destroying the remaining chemical weapons, cooperation on “counterterrorism”, and the removal of foreign fighters from senior roles in the new government or military. There have also been suggestions that Syria might throw in a Trump Tower deal in Damascus and that Trump wanted ties between Syria and Israel before any sanctions relief.

But by Tuesday evening, everything had changed. Trump announced he would remove sanctions on Syria without conditions.

“The key emphasis here is it’s a Saudi-US deal rather than something between the US and Syria,” Rob Geist Pinfold, a lecturer in defence studies at King’s College in London.

Then, on Wednesday morning, Trump and al-Sharaa met for a little more than half an hour in the presence of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and with Turkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan phoning in. The meeting appeared to please Trump.

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One on his way to Doha, Trump called al-Sharaa a “young, attractive guy. Tough guy. Strong past. Very strong past. Fighter.”

After the talks, the White House released a list of issues Trump discussed with al-Sharaa. They included some of the US’s prior demands on Syria, such as dealing with foreign fighters and “counterterrorism” cooperation. But Trump also brought up Syria recognising Israel, as well as taking over ISIL detention centres in northern Syria.

“These don’t appear to be preconditions, but they could slowroll the lifting [of sanctions],” Natasha Hall, a senior fellow with the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Al Jazeera.

As President Trump parades through the Middle East this week, he will encounter a very different region than the one he experienced during his first term. True, the Israeli-Palestinian problem remains unresolved, as do the challenges emanating from Iran’s much-advanced nuclear program and the instability and dysfunction in Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Syria and Yemen.

But this old wine is now packaged in new bottles. Beyond the garish headlines of Trump’s plan to accept a Boeing 747 as a gift from Qatar, new trends are emerging that will redefine the region, posing additional challenges for U.S. policy.

Of all the changes in the Middle East since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, perhaps the most striking is Israel’s emergence as a regional powerhouse. Aided by the administrations of Presidents Biden and Trump, and enabled by Arab regimes that do little to support Palestinians, Israel devastated Hamas and Hezbollah as military organizations, killing much of their senior leadership. With the support of the United States, Europe and friendly Arab states, it effectively countered two direct Iranian missile attacks on its territory.

Israel then delivered its own strike, reportedly destroying much of Iran’s ballistic missile production and air defenses. In short, Israel has achieved escalation dominance: the capacity to escalate (or not) as it sees fit, and to deter its adversaries from doing so. Israel has also redefined its concept of border security in Gaza, Lebanon, the West Bank and Syria by acting unilaterally to preempt and prevent threats to its territory.

Converting Israel’s military power into political arrangements, even peace accords, would seem like a reasonable next step. But the right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu seems uninterested in such options and is unlikely to be induced to change its outlook. Moreover, securing new, lasting agreements also depends on whether there are leaders among the Palestinians and key Arab states ready to take up the challenge, with all the political risks it entails.

But the Arab world remains in serious disarray. At least five Arab states are dealing with profound internal challenges, leaving them in various degrees of dysfunction and state failure. Amid this power vacuum, two alternative power centers have emerged. The first are the states of the Persian Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Relatively unscathed by the Arab Spring and blessed with sovereign wealth funds, oil and natural gas, these stable authoritarian powers, particularly Saudi Arabia, have begun to play an outsize role in the region.

The second category comprises non-Arab states. Israel, Turkey and Iran are the only states in the region with the capacity to project significant military power beyond their borders. While each has suffered periods of internal unrest, they currently enjoy domestic stability. Each also boasts tremendous economic potential and significant security, military and intelligence capabilities, including the capability to manufacture weapons domestically.

One (Israel) is America’s closest regional ally, another (Turkey) is a member of NATO and a newfound power broker in Syria, and the third (Iran) retains considerable influence despite Israel’s mauling of its proxies Hamas and Hezbollah. Iran’s nuclear program keeps it relevant, even central, to both Israeli and American policymaking.

All three non-Arab states engender a good deal of suspicion and mistrust among Arab regimes but are nonetheless seen as key players whom no one wants to offend. All three are at odds — with each frustrating the others’ regional objectives — and all three are here to stay. Their influence will most likely only grow in the years to come, given the fractiousness of the Arab world.

In the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, it seemed that the Palestinian issue was once again front and center, not just in the Arab world, but internationally. Those who claimed it had lost its resonance could point to the outpouring of sympathy and support for Gazan civilians as Israel’s war against Hamas led to a humanitarian catastrophe.

Moreover, the United Nations passed resolutions calling for an end to the war, many around the world condemned the war and Israel, the International Court of Justice took up the question of whether Israel is committing genocide, and the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu (as well as for Hamas’ military commander, later found to have been killed).

Nonetheless, it has become stunningly clear that, far from pushing the Palestinian issue to the top of the international agenda, the Oct. 7 attack has actually diminished its salience and left Palestinians isolated and without good options. Continued U.S. support for Israel’s war against Hamas, despite the exponential rise of Palestinian deaths, has protected Israel from negative consequences; key Arab regimes have done next to nothing to impose costs and consequences on Israel and the U.S. as Palestinian civilian deaths mount. The international community appears too fragmented, distracted and self-interested to act in any concerted way in defense of Palestine.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian national movement remains divided and dysfunctional, giving Palestinians an unpalatable choice between Hamas and the aging president of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. The prospects for anything resembling a two-state solution have never looked bleaker.

How the Trump administration will process these developments remains to be seen. Clearly, it has adopted a pro-Israel view, with Trump musing about turning Gaza into a Riviera-style resort. He has deployed his special envoy to the Middle East to secure the return of hostages taken by Hamas but has yet to invest in any postwar plan for the beleaguered enclave. Indeed, he has left the strategy for Gaza to Israel, which in turn has resumed its military campaign there. Trump has also acquiesced to Israel’s pursuit of aggressive border defenses against both Lebanon and Syria, while enabling Israel’s annexationist policies in the West Bank.

Yet Trump is nothing if not unpredictable. In April, he announced new U.S. negotiations with Iran in the presence of Netanyahu, who himself has tried to persuade the president that the only solution to Iran’s nuclear program is military action. But if U.S.-Iranian negotiations do advance, or if Trump’s interest in Israeli-Saudi normalization intensifies, he may find himself drawn into the Middle East negotiating bazaar, dealing with the intricacies of day-after planning in Gaza and a political horizon for Palestinians.

These paths are already fomenting tension between Trump, who will not be visiting Israel on his Middle East trip, and a recalcitrant Netanyahu. But given Trump’s absolute control over his party, Netanyahu will have few options to appeal to Republicans if the White House proposes policies that he opposes. As most U.S. allies have already learned, if Trump wants something, he’s not averse to using pressure to get it.

Aaron David Miller, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, is a former State Department Middle East analyst and negotiator in Republican and Democratic administrations and the author of “The End of Greatness: Why America Can’t Have (and Doesn’t Want) Another Great President.” Lauren Morganbesser is a junior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Donald Trump isn’t visiting Israel during his Middle East tour because he knows Netanyahu is bluffing and has nothing to offer him, says Israeli political analyst Akiva Eldar. He believes Trump’s snub marks the end of an era in US-Israel relations. #AJOPINION

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Office said Tuesday that President Trump’s tariff policies will reduce state revenues in California by $16 billion through next year.

Despite personal income tax and corporate tax receipts in the state coming in $6.8 billion above projections through April, the Newsom administration is predicting that overall revenues will be lower than they could have been from January 2025 through June 2026 because of the economic impact of Trump’s tariffs.

The governor released the new information, which his team dubbed the “Trump Slump,” on the eve of the presentation of his revised 2025-26 state budget plan, seeking to blame the president for California’s expected revenue shortfall. His office has not released any additional figures about the state budget.

Newsom is expected on Wednesday to project a deficit for California in the year ahead with Medi-Cal costs exceeding expectations, including his signature policy to provide free healthcare coverage to low-income undocumented immigrants. The new shortfall comes in addition to $27.3 billion in financial remedies, including $16.1 billion in cuts and a $7.1 billion withdrawal from the state’s rainy day fund, that lawmakers and the governor already agreed to make in 2025-26.

The deficit marks the third year in a row that Newsom and lawmakers have been forced to reduce spending after dedicating more money to programs than the state has available to spend. Poor projections, the ballooning cost of Democratic policy promises and a reluctance to make long-term sweeping cuts have added to the deficit at a time when the governor regularly touts California’s place as the fourth largest economy in the world.

Trump implemented a series of tariffs on all imported goods, higher taxes on products from goods from Mexico, Canada and China, and specific levies on products and materials such as autos and aluminum, in April. The president has backed down from some of his tariffs, but Newsom alleges that the policies and economic uncertainty will lead to higher unemployment, inflation, lower GDP projections and less capital gains revenue for California.

California filed a lawsuit last month arguing that Trump lacks the authority to impose tariffs on his own. On Tuesday, the state said it will seek a preliminary injunction to freeze the tariffs in federal court.

WASHINGTON — The California attorney general’s office said Tuesday it will seek a preliminary injunction in its case challenging President Trump’s tariff policy, a move that could result in a court order freezing sweeping import duties on worldwide products that have rocked the global economy and U.S. markets since last month.

The case, filed last month in the Northern District of California, argues that Trump lacks authority under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose the tariffs he announced April 2 on nearly all U.S. trading partners, as well as those levied against China, Mexico and Canada due to the fentanyl trade, a set of tariffs that used the same national security rationale.

A hearing in the case is scheduled for next week, and a decision on the preliminary injunction could come from the San Francisco federal court as soon as mid-June, an official with the attorney general’s office told The Times.

Trump announced a new baseline for global tariffs on April 2 and a series of country-specific tariff rates that sent banks and financial institutions into a panic. The White House has retreated on several of the harshest elements of the policy, but tariffs remain far higher on most trading partners, inflicting continuing harm on California, the state’s lawyers argue.

“Uncertainty and unpredictability are bad for business, bad for the economy, and bad for California,” Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta said in a statement. “California is set to experience an outsized share of losses due to our larger economy, workforce, and exposure to trade. We are pulling out all the stops and will today ask the court to immediately halt these illegal tariffs while California argues its case.”

In a filing in another case, the attorney general’s office submitted an amicus brief supporting an effort by other states to halt the tariffs in the Court of International Trade, which could issue a ruling on the matter even earlier.

“President Trump has overstepped his authority, and now families, businesses, and our ports are literally paying the price,” said Gov. Gavin Newsom. “As the largest economy in the nation, California has the most to lose from President Trump’s weak and reckless policies.”

WASHINGTON — House Republicans proposed sweeping tax breaks Monday in President Trump’s big priority bill, tallying at least $4.9 trillion in costs so far, partly paid for with cuts to Medicaid, food stamps and green energy programs used by millions of Americans.

The House Ways and Means Committee named its package “THE ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL” in all capital letters, a nod to Trump himself. It seeks to extend the tax breaks approved during Trump’s first term — and boost the standard deduction, child tax credit and estate tax exemption — while adding new tax breaks on tipped wages, overtime pay, Social Security benefits and auto loans that Trump promised during his campaign for the White House.

There’s also a tripling of the state and local tax deduction, called SALT, from $10,000 up to $30,000 for couples, which certain high-tax state GOP lawmakers from New York and California already rejected as too meager. Private universities would be hit with a hefty new tax on their endowments, as much as 21%, as the Trump administration goes after the Ivy League and other campuses. And one unusual provision would terminate the tax-exempt status of groups the State Department says support “terrorists,” which civil society advocates warn is a way to potentially punish those at odds with the Trump administration.

Overall, the package is touching off the biggest political debate over taxes, spending and the nation’s priorities in nearly a decade. Not since 2017 has Congress wrestled with legislation as this, when Republicans approved the Trump tax cuts but also failed to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare. The cost assessments are only preliminary, and expected to soar.

“Republicans need to UNIFY,” Trump posted on social media before departing for a trip to the Middle East.

Trump said when he returns to Washington, “we will work together on any and all outstanding issues, but there shouldn’t be many — The Bill is GREAT. We have no alternative, WE MUST WIN!”

But one key Republican, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, implored his party not to impair Medicaid, arguing that cutting healthcare to pay for tax breaks is both “morally wrong and politically suicidal.”

“If Republicans want to be a working-class party — if we want to be a majority party — we must ignore calls to cut Medicaid and start delivering on America’s promise for America’s working people,” Hawley wrote in the New York Times.

Late Monday, the House Agriculture Committee released its proposals — cutting $290 billion from federal nutrition programs, in part by shifting costs to the states and requiring able-bodied adults without dependents to fulfill work requirements until they are 64 years old, rather than 54, to qualify for food aid.

Round-the-clock work ahead

As Republicans race toward House Speaker Mike Johnson’s Memorial Day deadline to pass Trump’s big bill, they are preparing to flood the zone with round-the-clock public hearings starting Tuesday and stitch the various sections together in what will become a massive package.

The politics ahead are uncertain. The bipartisan Joint Committee on Taxation said Monday that tax breaks would reduce revenue by $4.9 trillion over the decade — and that was before Trump’s new tax breaks were included.

Texas Rep. Chip Roy, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, warned the price tag could climb to $20 trillion, piling onto the deficits and debt.

“I sure hope House & Senate leadership are coming up with a backup plan,” Roy posted on social media, “…. because I’m not here to rack up an additional $20 trillion in debt over 10 years.”

House Republicans have been huddling behind closed doors, working out final provisions in the 389-page tax portion of the package.

The legislation proposes to boost the standard deduction many Americans use by $2,000, to $32,000 per household, and increase the child tax credit from $2,000 to $2,500 for four years. It adds a new requirement focused on preventing undocumented immigrants from benefiting from the credit even if the children are U.S. citizens, which the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal think tank, estimates would affect 4.5 million children who are U.S. citizens or lawful residents.

It would also increase the estate tax exemption, which is now $14 million, to $15 million and index future increases to inflation.

As for the president’s promises, the legislation includes Trump’s “no taxes on tips” pledge, providing a deduction for those workers in service industry and other jobs that have traditionally relied on tips. It directs the Treasury secretary to issue guidance to avoid businesses gaming the system.

The package also provides tax relief for automobile shoppers with a temporary deduction of up to $10,000 on car loan interest, applying the benefit only for those vehicles where the final assembly occurred in the United States. The tax break would expire at the end of Trump’s term.

For seniors, there would be a bolstered $4,000 deduction on Social Security wages for those with adjusted incomes no higher than $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 for couples.

But one hard-fought provision, the deduction for state and local taxes known as SALT, appears to be a work in progress. The legislation proposes lifting the cap to $15,000 for single filers and $30,000 for couples, but with a reduction at higher incomes — about $200,000 for singles and $400,000 for couples.

“Still a hell no,” wrote Rep. Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.) on social media.

Battle over Medicaid, food aid

Meanwhile, dozens of House Republicans have told Johnson and GOP leaders they will not support cuts to Medicaid, which provides some 70 million Americans with healthcare, nor to green energy tax breaks that businesses back home have been relying on to invest in new wind, solar and renewable projects.

All told, 11 committees in the House have been compiling their sections of the package as Republicans seek at least $1.5 trillion in savings to help cover the cost of preserving the 2017 tax breaks, which are expiring at the end of the year.

The final section from the Agriculture Committee proposed cutting the Supplemental Nutrition and Assistance Program, known as SNAP, by expanding work requirements, limiting future expansions of the program and forcing states to shoulder more of the cost.

Along with new work requirements for older Americans, it would also require some parents of children older than 7 to work to qualify, down from 18 years old. Only areas with unemployment rates over 10% would be eligible for waivers.

Some Republicans have already balked at the increased costs to the states, which would be required to contribute at least 5% of the cost of SNAP allotments beginning in 2028.

At the same time, the legislation would invest $60 billion in new money for agriculture programs, sending aid to farmers.

On Sunday, House Republicans on the Energy and Commerce Committee unveiled the cost-saving centerpiece of the package, with at least $880 billion in cuts largely to Medicaid to help cover the cost of the tax breaks.

While Republicans insist they are simply rooting out “waste, fraud and abuse” to generate savings with new work and eligibility requirements, Democrats warn that millions of Americans will lose coverage. In the 15 years since Obamacare became law, Medicaid has only expanded as most states have tapped into federal funds.

A preliminary estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said the proposals would reduce the number of people with healthcare by 8.6 million.

To be eligible for Medicaid, there would be new “community engagement requirements” of at least 80 hours per month of work, education or service for able-bodied adults without dependents. People would also have to verify their eligibility to be in the program twice a year, rather than just once.

There are substantial cuts proposed for green energy programs and tax breaks, rolling back climate-change strategies from the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act.

Mascaro and Freking write for the Associated Press. AP writers Amanda Seitz, Leah Askarinam and Mary Clare Jalonick contributed to this report.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — The first time President Trump visited Riyadh in 2017, he posed with a ceremonial orb, took part in a traditional sword dance and secured an agreement by Saudi Arabia to purchase $350 billion in weaponry, the largest arms deal in U.S. history.

The sequel, coming eight years later — almost to the day — promises much the same in the way of pageantry and purchases, only more so.

Even before the trip, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman vowed he would invest about $600 billion over the four years of Trump’s presidency (Trump asked him to round it up to $1 trillion).

And although the orb will probably not make an appearance this time around, Trump is bringing with him a phalanx of business leaders for a Saudi-U.S. business summit Tuesday — the day he arrives — that will include BlackRock Chief Executive Larry Fink, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Palantir Technologies’ Alex Karp, Tesla’s Elon Musk and Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg.

The heads of other major firms, including IBM, Boeing, Qualcomm and Alphabet, also will attend. White House artificial intelligence and crypto czar David Sacks, meanwhile, is already in Riyadh.

Trump will then attend a summit with gulf leaders on Wednesday, travel to Qatar that same day and end the trip Thursday in the United Arab Emirates. There will be more gifts: The UAE has pledged $1.4 trillion in U.S. investment packages over the next decade.

“Trump is there to solidify a very close relationship,” said Ali Shihabi, a political and economic expert who is close to the Saudi government, adding that although he did not expect a breakthrough on security matters, the deals signed would nevertheless bring “economic ties and coordination to a very high level.”

Not to be outdone by its two regional competitors, Qatar is in discussions about the “possible transfer” of a luxury Boeing 747-8 to replace Air Force One.

Before departing on the current Air Force One, Trump found himself defending plans to accept the gift, which is thought to cost hundreds of millions of dollars. He dismissed those with concerns over the ethics and constitutionality of the gift as “stupid people,” suggesting he planned to proceed with it, a topic sure to fuel questions over his visit to Doha, the Qatari capital.

Trump also visited Saudi Arabia on the first international trip of his first term, breaking a presidential tradition of visiting U.S. allies and major trade partners such as the United Kingdom and European countries. That Trump chose the gulf region as his first destination, commentators say, reflects the Mideast’s growing centrality to the U.S. in terms of political and security partners. (Technically, this is not his first overseas trip since returning to the White House because he attended the recent funeral of Pope Francis.)

“The gulf nations succeeded in positioning themselves in a way that lets them play constructive roles in several issues,” said Hasan Alhasan, senior fellow for Middle East policy at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Bahrain. He pointed out that Saudi Arabia has sponsored talks between Russia and Ukraine and was involved in peacemaking efforts in Sudan.

Qatar is a driving force in negotiations between Israel and Hamas and has helped to stabilize Syria. Oman, which is not on the itinerary but whose leader will take part in the summit, is hosting high-level talks between the U.S. and Iran.

“Trump is not tied to the protocols of other presidents. He sees an overlap in aims, whether political or commercial,” Alhasan said.

Israel is watching the visit with consternation on a host of fronts, expecting Trump to hear an earful from Arab governments on its continuing conflict with Hamas militants in Gaza and the role Israel is playing in the future of Syria. And Israeli officials are increasingly concerned that their voices will be drowned out as the Trump administration progresses in its negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program.

Any hint from Trump that he would tolerate the Iranians continuing with a civilian nuclear program will send reverberations throughout Washington, particularly on Capitol Hill, where Republicans have long opposed allowing Iran to continue any enrichment of uranium on its soil.

Trump also appears unconcerned with limits placed by his predecessors on what countries can receive from the U.S. He has reportedly revoked the AI diffusion rule, the U.S. policy intended to control the export of advanced semiconductor chips and AI, paving the way for gulf nations to ramp up their already considerable advanced chip holdings.

That’s especially true for the UAE, whose $1.4-trillion investment will be heavily weighted toward AI. Meanwhile, MGX, an investment fund based in the Emirati capital, Abu Dhabi, has pledged $100 billion in energy infrastructures and data centers in the U.S. to support AI.

At the same time, G42, another UAE-based AI firm, has divested from Chinese companies and partnered with Microsoft in an attempt to appease U.S. lawmakers.

There have also been reports that Trump will revive potential arms deals that were on the table from his first term but were never completed, including sales of F-35 fighter jets and Reaper drones to the UAE, and the co-production of advanced missiles with Saudi Arabia, said Prem Thakker, a partner with the global advisory firm DGA and a former official with the National Security Council under President Obama.

Another issue on the table could be nuclear power for Saudi Arabia. President Biden made supporting a civilian nuclear program for the kingdom contingent on Riyadh agreeing to a peace deal with Israel similar to the Abraham Accords, the normalization agreements forged with the UAE, Bahrain and others during Trump’s first term.

Under Trump, that condition appears to have been dropped, with negotiations that could potentially allow Saudi Arabia to capitalize on its uranium reserves and a domestic enrichment program.

“And this means that traditional nonproliferation concerns over Saudi Arabia have really subsided over the last few years,” Thakker said. “Twenty years ago no one in the U.S. would have contemplated such an agreement.”

The trip dovetails with a raft of investments involving the Trump Organization. Its real-estate development arm, which is led by Trump’s son Eric, has announced since last year construction projects across the gulf region, including a $2-billion golf course in Qatar, an 80-story hotel and residential tower in Dubai and two Trump towers in Saudi Arabia — one in Riyadh and one in Jeddah.

Though the deals appear gargantuan, experts say financial realities will cut them down to size. Many point out that Saudi Arabia’s investments during Trump’s first term did not reach the $450 billion he mentioned (the figure includes nonmilitary spending). Even the most generous of calculations would put the Saudi investments at less than $300 billion, experts say.

Though its investments in the U.S. are likely to increase during Trump’s second term, Riyadh has focused much of its spending on gigaprojects such as NEOM. And current oil prices sitting below the government’s break-even price of around $100 a barrel means that it will be running a deficit, said David Butter, a Middle East energy expert at Chatham House, a think tank in London.

He added that the Saudi government and its colossal sovereign fund, the Public Investment Fund, both of which own a part of Saudi oil giant Aramco, have not received performance-linked dividends for this year. The result, Butter said, is a looming financial crisis.

“The investment numbers are fantasy,” he said.

Bulos reported from Riyadh and Wilner from Washington.

May 12 (UPI) — The first set of 49 White South African “Afrikaners” granted refugee status by President Donald Trump arrived in the United States on Monday.

The group departed Johannesburg on Sunday night on a private flight paid for by the U.S. government.

They arrived Monday in Washington at Dulles airport before being expatriated to multiple states, including Texas, Minnesota, Nevada and Idaho, where they will be on a pathway to U.S. citizenship and eligible for government benefits.

Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau welcomed the first group of Afrikaners, the State Department said.

“This tremendous accomplishment, at the direction of Secretary Rubio, responds to President Trump’s call to prioritize U.S. refugee resettlement of this vulnerable group facing unjust racial discrimination,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement.

“No one should have to fear having their property seized without compensation or becoming the victim of violent attacks because of their ethnicity.”

Trump threatened in February to cut all U.S. funding to South Africa seemingly over its land expropriation law, which allows local, provincial and national authorities to confiscate land if it is in the public interest and in few specific cases without compensation.

The American president has claimed without evidence that South Africa is taking land from White Afrikaners, who Trump went on to claim were victims of “racial discrimination” and “large-scale killings.”

“Your case manager will pick you up from the airport and take you to housing that they have arranged for you,” read a document in part for the arriving South Africans. “This housing may be temporary (like a hotel) while a local organization helps you identify more long-term housing,” it added.

According to the South African government, it has not expropriated any land.

On Monday, South Africa Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola said “there is no persecution of White Afrikaner South Africans,” adding how police reports debunked Trump’s false assertion.

The law states property cannot be expropriated arbitrarily and can only be seized if an agreement with the owner cannot be reached, subject to “just and equitable compensation” being paid.

Meanwhile, South Africa’s government said the Afrikaners, who are largely descended from Dutch settlers from the Netherlands in western Europe, wouldn’t be stopped from going, “albeit under a false narrative.”

“You are expected to support yourself quickly in finding work,” U.S. immigration documents said. “Adults are expected to accept entry-level employment in fields like warehousing, manufacturing, and customer service. You can work toward higher-level employment over time,” they were informed.

Elon Musk, who was born in South Africa, has accused Ramaphosa’s government of “openly pushing for genocide of white people” despite any evidence.

In March, Secretary of State Marco Rubio expelled South Africa’s ambassador to the U.S. Ebrahim Rasool for “race-baiting” following remarks accusing the United States of engaging in “supremacist” policies domestically and globally as South Africa has joined other nations in accusing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of committing acts of genocide of Palestinians in Gaza.

“There’s no legal or any factual basis for the executive order sanctioning this action,” Vincent Magwenya, a spokesman for South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, told NPR after learning of the granting of refugee status.

“None of the provisions of international law on the definition of refugees are applicable in this case,” he said, adding that South Africa’s sovereignty as a country was being “grossly undermined and violated” by the U.S. in a way that was “disturbing.”

According to the World Bank, inequality is among the world’s highest in South Africa, which had segregationist policies via “apartheid” that only began to fully unravel in the early 1990s.

A 2017 land audit report found that White South Africans own 72% of all farm and agricultural land, while Black South Africans owned 15%.

As of 2022, White South Africans account for less than 8% of its population of more than 63 million.

Scores of South African civilians, meanwhile, took to social media to post comedic memes and videos expressing doubt over the plight of the Afrikaners, joking how they will miss “privileged lives, domestic workers and beach holidays.”

Max du Preez, a white Afrikaner author, told BBC that the claims of persecution of white South Africans were a “total absurdity” and “based on nothing.”

A U.S. government employee, while not authorized to speak to reporters, told NPR what they considered this was “immigration fraud” after the Trump administration effectively suspended America’s refugee admission program.