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Judge orders immediate release of Rumeysa Ozturk, Tufts student abducted by ICE

Judge orders immediate release of Rumeysa Ozturk, Tufts student abducted by ICE

Politico reports: A federal judge Friday ordered the immediate release of Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish Tufts University Ph.D. student whose video-recorded detention by masked federal agents drew national scrutiny amid a crackdown by the Trump administration. U.S. District Judge William Sessions III ruled that Ozturk had been unlawfully detained in March for little more than authoring an op-ed critical of Israel in her school newspaper. “That literally is the case. There is no evidence here … absent consideration of the…

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Jewish feud over Trump escalates

Jewish feud over Trump escalates

The Forward reports: More than three dozen former leaders of major Jewish organizations published an open letter in The New York Times rebuking current leadership for being “far too silent about the stunning assault on democratic norms.” Although they did not name President Donald Trump in the letter published Thursday, the signatories — which included directors and former chairs of the Anti-Defamation League, American Jewish Committee, Hillel International, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and major federations — decried his…

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China’s exports surge as shipments to Southeast Asian countries offset plunge in U.S. trade

China’s exports surge as shipments to Southeast Asian countries offset plunge in U.S. trade

CNBC reports: China’s exports surged in April on the back of a jump in shipments to Southeast Asian countries, offsetting a sharp drop in outbound goods to the U.S. as prohibitive tariffs kicked in. Exports jumped 8.1% last month in U.S. dollar terms from a year earlier, according to data released by customs authority on Friday, sharply beating Reuters’ poll estimates of a 1.9% rise. Imports slumped by just 0.2% in April from a year earlier, compared with economists’ expectations…

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Americans no longer live in a full democracy

Americans no longer live in a full democracy

Steven Levitsky, Lucan Way and Daniel Ziblatt write: Authoritarianism is harder to recognize than it used to be. Most 21st-century autocrats are elected. Rather than violently suppress opposition like Castro or Pinochet, today’s autocrats convert public institutions into political weapons, using law enforcement, tax and regulatory agencies to punish opponents and bully the media and civil society onto the sidelines. We call this competitive authoritarianism — a system in which parties compete in elections but the systematic abuse of an…

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Conservative critics of Francis will be disappointed with the first American pope

Conservative critics of Francis will be disappointed with the first American pope

Michael Sean Winters writes: As the cardinals discussed the future of the church last week, the happy shadow of Francis loomed large. They wanted someone who shared his commitment to synodality and focus on the world’s poor. With Prevost, a mild-mannered man, they also voted for fewer surprises and a steadier hand at the wheel of governance, someone with experience of the Vatican Curia but not a creature of that Curia. The wealthy and well-organized conservative critics of Francis will…

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New pope criticized J.D. Vance and Trump on X just weeks ago

New pope criticized J.D. Vance and Trump on X just weeks ago

The Daily Beast reports: Pope Leo XIV called out Vice President J.D. Vance in a social media post just weeks ago bluntly calling him “wrong”—and bashed Donald Trump in a retweet less than a month ago. Posting on his X profile as Cardinal Robert Prevost, he criticized Vance for an interview he gave about Christianity on Fox News. “JD Vance is wrong,” he said. “Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others.” The new pope, 69, posted the…

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Trump’s deal with Paul Weiss has exposed the contrived nature of his attacks on law firms

Trump’s deal with Paul Weiss has exposed the contrived nature of his attacks on law firms

Business Insider reports: President Donald Trump’s deal with Paul Weiss was his first big win in his war against Big Law. In court, it’s coming back to haunt him. For the law firms choosing to fight Trump’s executive orders targeting them, rather than striking deals with the president, the Paul Weiss deal has turned into a potent weapon. They have cited Trump’s quick revocation of the order — just six days after it was initially issued — to argue that…

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Family of Shireen Abu Akleh responds after Zeteo documentary names Israeli soldier who killed her

Family of Shireen Abu Akleh responds after Zeteo documentary names Israeli soldier who killed her

  As the Israeli military kills two more Palestinian journalists in Gaza, a new documentary by Zeteo has uncovered critical details about Israel’s killing three years ago of the acclaimed Palestinian-American Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. The film identifies for the first time the Israeli soldier who allegedly shot Abu Akleh. We get response when we speak with two members of Abu Akleh’s family — her brother Anton and her niece Lina — as well as the documentary’s executive…

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Bill Gates accuses Elon Musk of ‘killing the world’s poorest children’

Bill Gates accuses Elon Musk of ‘killing the world’s poorest children’

The Guardian reports: Bill Gates announced plans on Thursday to shutter the Gates Foundation in 2045 and also strongly criticized Elon Musk for slashing funding to the US Agency for International Development (USAID), accusing the Tesla CEO of “killing the world’s poorest children” in new interviews. In an interview with the Financial Times published on Thursday, Gates condemned the sudden funding cuts to USAID by Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), saying the cuts had led to life-saving food…

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A molecular basis for memory

A molecular basis for memory

Ajdina Halilovic writes: When Todd Sacktor was about to turn 3, his 4-year-old sister died of leukemia. “An empty bedroom next to mine. A swing set with two seats instead of one,” he said, recalling the lingering traces of her presence in the house. “There was this missing person — never spoken of — for which I had only one memory.” That memory, faint but enduring, was set in the downstairs den of their home. A young Sacktor asked his…

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Trump administration plans to send migrants to Libya where they could face forced labor and slavery

Trump administration plans to send migrants to Libya where they could face forced labor and slavery

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration is planning to transport a group of immigrants to Libya on a U.S. military plane, according to U.S. officials, another sharp escalation in a deportation program that has sparked widespread legal challenges and intense political debate. The nationalities of the migrants were not immediately clear, but a flight to Libya carrying the deportees could leave as soon as Wednesday, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they…

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We can’t just be against Trump. It’s time to fight for a bold, progressive populism

We can’t just be against Trump. It’s time to fight for a bold, progressive populism

Robert Reich writes: Demonstrations against Donald Trump Trump are getting larger and louder. Good. This is absolutely essential. But at some point we’ll need to demonstrate not just against the president but also for the United States we want. Trump’s regressive populism – cruel, bigoted, tyrannical – must be met by a bold progressive populism that strengthens democracy and shares the wealth. We can’t simply return to the path we were on before Trump. Even then, big money was taking…

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Intelligence community rejects Trump’s claim that Venezuela controls Tren de Aragua

Intelligence community rejects Trump’s claim that Venezuela controls Tren de Aragua

The New York Times reports: A newly declassified memo released on Monday confirms that U.S. intelligence agencies rejected a key claim President Trump put forth to justify invoking a wartime statute to summarily deport Venezuelans to a prison in El Salvador. The memo, dovetailing with intelligence findings first reported by The New York Times in March, states that spy agencies do not believe that the administration of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, controls a criminal gang, Tren de Aragua. That determination…

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Judge demands Trump officials promptly detail legal grounds for deporting Mahmoud Khalil

Judge demands Trump officials promptly detail legal grounds for deporting Mahmoud Khalil

The New Arab reports: A federal judge instructed the Trump administration on Wednesday to detail the legal precedent for its plan to deport Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian activist whose presence in the country the government alleges could harm U.S. foreign policy interests. District Court Judge Michael Farbiarz in Newark, New Jersey, ordered the administration to supply a catalogue of every case in which U.S. officials have employed the law being used against Khalil, a Columbia University graduate student. The judge…

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