Why annexing Canada would destroy the United States
By Aisha Ahmad, University of Toronto
Trump and Musk have caused ‘complete chaos’ at the Federal Aviation Administration
Isaac Stanley-Becker writes: On January 29, American Airlines Flight 5342 collided with a U.S. Army helicopter near Washington’s Ronald Reagan National Airport, killing 67 people, in the deadliest U.S. air disaster in recent history. That alone would have been a crisis for the Federal Aviation Administration, the agency charged with ensuring the safety of air passengers. But the next day, President Donald Trump deepened the FAA’s problems by blaming the disaster on diversity programs, a pronouncement that baffled many in…
Will the Supreme Court further expand Trump’s power at the expense of Congress?
Joyce Vance writes: Who is Humphrey’s Executor and why should you care? Humphrey’s Executor was the plaintiff in a 1930s court case. Mr. Humphrey, a Federal Trade Commissioner, had passed away, and the executor of his will wanted to recover the salary he was due for his work as a commissioner from October 8, 1933, to the time of his death on February 14, 1934. The problem was that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had fired Humphrey, who refused to resign,…
Tesla is losing in the world’s largest EV market
Fortune reports: It’s almost unthinkable, but Tesla Inc., the company that comes to mind when most people think about electric vehicles, may have had its best days in China, the world’s biggest and most advanced EV market. Elon Musk’s automaker has been backsliding in China for the past five consecutive months on a year-on-year basis, according to data from the country’s Passenger Car Association. Tesla’s shipments plunged 49% in February from a year earlier to just 30,688 vehicles, the lowest…
Trump is the first president of the United States who surrendered to the enemy
Claude Malhuret has been a member of the French Senate since 2014. On Tuesday, he delivered following speech (translated and adapted by The Atlantic): Europe is at a crucial juncture of its history. The American shield is slipping away, Ukraine risks being abandoned, and Russia is being strengthened. Washington has become the court of Nero: an incendiary emperor, submissive courtiers, and a buffoon on ketamine tasked with purging the civil service. This is a tragedy for the free world,…
Russia launches devastating attack on Ukraine after Trump defends Putin
The Guardian reports: Russia launched a devastating attack on Ukraine on Saturday, killing at least 14 people and injuring dozens more, hours after Donald Trump defended Vladimir Putin and said the Kremlin leader was “doing what anybody would do”. Two ballistic missiles hit the centre of Dobropillia in the eastern Donetsk region. Fire engulfed a five-storey apartment building. As emergency services arrived, Russia launched another strike on the same area. Eleven civilians were killed, with five children among the 30…
They were the watchdogs. Then they got fired by Trump
President Trump has sworn to root out corruption within the government, yet one of his first acts as president was to fire over a dozen independent watchdogs who did exactly that. We spoke to seven of them about the abuses they uncovered, what they really think about DOGE and what all this means for the future of American democracy.
Trump tries to bypass the Senate in executive power grab
TPM reports: The Trump White House has taken its attempt to seize direct control over the entire executive branch to a new level and laid out a startling legal rationale for the move in a previously unreported email obtained by TPM. If successful, Trump would be making a dramatic end run around the Senate’s advice and consent power for certain appointed positions. Trump’s wide-ranging effort to bring independent agencies firmly under his control provoked a dramatic confrontation this week at…
Justice Amy Coney Barrett under attack by MAGA influencers after Supreme Court ruling on USAID
The Guardian reports: Amy Coney Barrett, the Donald Trump-appointed conservative supreme court justice, has been branded a “DEI judge” by furious rightwing figures, after she voted to reject Trump’s attempt to freeze nearly $2bn in foreign aid. Coney Barrett, part of the court’s rightwing majority, split with her fellow conservative justices this week. She and John Roberts, the chief justice, voted to leave in place a ruling from a US district judge which ordered the Trump administration to unfreeze the…
Fears of a looming ‘Trump recession’
The Associated Press reports: With his flurry of tariffs, government layoffs and spending freezes, there are growing worries President Donald Trump may be doing more to harm the U.S. economy than to fix it. The labor market remains healthy with a 4.1% unemployment rate and 151,000 jobs added in February, and Trump likes to point to investment commitments by Apple and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company to show that he’s delivering results. But Friday’s employment report also found that the number…
Elon Musk’s entire empire mapped by Wired magazine
There’s barely a place left on Earth outside the gravitational pull of Elon Musk’s empire. How far does Elon’s clout really stretch—and what conflicts of interest are emerging as he wields the power of the federal government? WIRED pulled the data and mapped out the key places that shape Elon’s Empire.
‘Hundreds of dead’ resulting from Trump’s Ukraine intelligence pause
Time reports: The U.S. decision to suspend the flow of military intelligence to Ukraine this week has aided the Russian advance along a critical part of the front, weakening the negotiating position of President Volodymyr Zelensky and killing many Ukrainian soldiers in recent days, according to five senior Western and Ukrainian officials and military officers familiar with the situation. “As a result of this pause, there are hundreds of dead Ukrainians,” one of the officers told TIME in an interview…
Trump’s imperialist shakedown of Panama hits a raw nerve in Latin America
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard writes: The president of Panama is a brave man. José Raúl Mulino has continued to defy the White House with open contempt even after watching the punishment beating of Ukraine. “Donald Trump is lying again. In the name of Panama and all its people I reject this fresh assault on the truth and the dignity of our nation,” he said, in response to Trump’s latest outrage, a fresh set of fabrications and threats to retake the Panama Canal….
What happens if Trump defies the courts?
Erwin Chemerinsky writes: It is not hyperbole to say that the future of American constitutional democracy now rests on a single question: Will President Trump and his administration defy court orders? Federal judges have issued more than a dozen temporary restraining orders and preliminary injunctions against Trump administration actions. But it is unclear whether the government will comply, and in at least two cases, judges have said their orders were ignored. The Trump administration is already facing at least 100…
Trump allies launch a bid to take control of Washington D.C. Bar Association
NBC News reports: Two of President Donald Trump’s allies have launched bids for leadership roles with the D.C. Bar Association, an under-the-radar effort that would give them more control over the influential legal group. The push comes amid bar associations’ confrontations with the Trump administration, and some federal attorneys have looked to their state groups for ethical guidance amid Trump’s rapid reshaping of government. Bradley Bondi — a lawyer who is Attorney General Pam Bondi’s brother — and Alicia Long…
White House cuts $400 million in grants for Columbia — ‘this is just the beginning’
Politico reports: Columbia University faces the immediate loss of grants and contracts totaling about $400 million for failing to address antisemitism, a Trump administration task force said Friday. The Justice Department task force to combat antisemitism, led by Leo Terrell, has been probing 10 institutions because of their responses to antisemitic incidents on campuses since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel. But Columbia, which faced intense scrutiny for its students’ high-profile antiwar encampment and building occupations last spring,…