In its earliest days, the second Trump administration cut off lifesaving food and medical aid to countries worldwide. It halted efforts to stop teens from joining drug cartels in Mexico. And it shut down programs aimed at resettling Afghans who assisted U.S. troops during the fight against the Taliban.
But at least initially, the budget for expensive artwork to hang in U.S. embassies and consulates worldwide remained robust.
If you have tips about the remaking of American climate science, environmental policy, or disaster response, you can contact Zoë Schlanger on Signal at @zoeschlanger.99.
At 4 p.m. ET yesterday, Andrew Hazelton got a form email telling him his work as a hurricane modeler at the federal government would be officially over at 5 p.m. that day. In his five months as a federal employee, his job was to help improve the models that serve as the basis for the National Hurricane Center’s forecasts.
Leave aside, if only for a moment, the utter boorishness with which President Donald Trump and Vice President J. D. Vance treated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House today. Also leave aside the spectacle of American leaders publicly pummeling a friend as if he were an enemy.
House Majority PAC will run TV and digital ads targeting vulnerable GOP congressional incumbents.
Thousands of informational government webpages have been taken down so far in the second Trump administration, including on public health, scientific research and LGBTQ rights. Amid this mass erasure of public information, the Internet Archive is racing to save copies of those deleted resources.
We continue to look at Israeli torture of Palestinian detainees with Naji Abbas from Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, which has just released a new report detailing the mistreatment of medical workers from Gaza. Hundreds of doctors, nurses, paramedics and other essential medical staff were arrested by Israeli forces in Gaza since October 2023 and held under brutal conditions, with many describing physical, psychological and sexual abuse, starvation, medical neglect and more.
Dr. Khaled Alser, a renowned Palestinian surgeon at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, describes how Israeli forces abducted him from Gaza last year before transferring him to Israeli prisons rife with abuse. He was held by Israel for seven months last year, during which time he says he was beaten, humiliated, denied medical treatment and tortured.
We speak with foreign policy analyst Matt Duss about increasingly fraught relations between the United States and Ukraine, which have undergone a seismic shift under the second Trump administration. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is meeting with President Trump at the White House on Friday and is expected to sign an agreement giving the U.S. access to his country’s rare earth minerals, which are key components in mobile phones and other advanced technology.
One man’s quest to fix the way we build.
When the government does it, it’s real censorship.
The Trump administration seems determined to alienate the EU.
Infomercials walked so influencers could run.
What Next: TBD’s Lizzie O’Leary unpacks the recent deletion of government data.
The unanimous ruling overturns a decision by Texas U.S. District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, a Donald Trump appointee.
When asked about the measles outbreak and death, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said “it’s not unusual, we have measles outbreaks every year.
The Waves also discusses the Riverside Church controversy and the case of Sarah Milov.
What we say matters, especially depending on whom we say it to.
The Waves also discusses the case against Jeffrey Epstein and Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s Fleishman Is in Trouble.
Supporters of climate, infrastructure, mortgage, tech, health, veterans’ and other projects expressed alarm as tens of thousands of programs appeared possibly at risk.
Joe Biden’s top economic adviser opens up on harrowing moments from her time in the White House, and what makes her nervous about the Trump agenda.
We speak with Jose Saldaña, director of Release Aging People in Prison, about a wildcat strike by New York prison guards who claim limits on solitary confinement have made their work more dangerous.
GOP lawmakers are considering a plan to limit federal matching funds for the health insurance program to pay for tax cuts.
“It’s not unusual.” That’s how Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the anti-vaccine activist and secretary of Health and Human Services, described an ongoing measles outbreak in and around Texas that has already infected more than 100 people and killed one child. This incident is, in fact, unusual. Until this week, someone hadn’t died of measles in this country since 2015, and endemic spread of the virus was declared eliminated in the United States 25 years ago.
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Nothing could have prepared Americans for what the first 50-ish days of the second Trump administration have been like. Even some Cabinet members and Republican members of Congress seem caught off guard.
In 1956, an aspiring young actor named Gene Hackman joined the Pasadena Playhouse in California, struggling to find a way into a field he’d been fascinated with since childhood. Hackman, who was born in 1930, had already served five years in the Marine Corps, then bounced around New York, Florida, Illinois, and other places without much luck.
The Trump administration has terminated funding for HIV, malaria and maternal health programs it had labeled lifesaving.
In a little over a month, the Trump administration has started to hollow out America’s federal health agencies. Roughly 2,000 probationary workers have been fired en masse, by virtue of the fact that they were relatively new to their jobs. But the long-term impact of those terminations could pale in comparison to a lesser-noticed spate of departures that has recently roiled the health agencies. In the past two months, the FDA, CDC, and NIH second in commands have all resigned or retired.
