“What Lutnick is talking about is central planning, plain and simple. It’s also just silly. How much of America’s aluminum supply should come from Canada if not 60 percent? Is 50 percent the right amount? Is it 17.54 percent? Lutnick doesn’t know—because no one does—because that’s a question without an answer.
Clearly, however, the Trump administration wants the figure to be lower. New 25 percent tariffs on aluminum imports might accomplish that, but at significant cost to American consumers and businesses, whose only offense is buying aluminum from sources located within a country that is a close American ally and the signatory of a trade deal that the current president negotiated just five years ago.”
“The United States said Russia had agreed to an energy and infrastructure ceasefire. After Moscow and Kyiv agree to stop hitting each other’s power plants and electric grids, negotiators would move on to a potential halt in fighting on the Black Sea − and then to a full ceasefire and peace agreement in the 3-year-old Ukraine war, a White House statement said.
Trump said on social media the talk ended “with an understanding that we will be working quickly to have a Complete Ceasefire and, ultimately, an END to this very horrible War between Russia and Ukraine.”
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“Ukraine backers immediately slammed the scaled-back agreement as one that would primarily benefit Russia.
The agreement would keep Ukraine from striking Russia’s oil refineries”
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“Putin was likely to pull back from attacks on energy infrastructure in warmer weather anyway, said Luke Coffey, a senior fellow at the conservative Hudson Institute.
“Recognizing the need to offer something to stay in President Trump’s good graces, he delivered only the bare minimum,” said Coffey, who was senior adviser Britain’s defense ministry.”
“The lawsuit filed by USAID employees and contractors argued that Musk and DOGE are wielding power the Constitution reserves only for those who win elections or are confirmed by the Senate.”
“Candidate Donald Trump thought that bombing Yemen was “just a failed mentality” when then-President Joe Biden did it. “It’s crazy. You can solve problems over the telephone. Instead, they start dropping bombs. I see, recently, they’re dropping bombs all over Yemen. You don’t have to do that. You can talk in such a way where they respect you and they listen to you,” Trump said in a May 2024″
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“Trump is now dropping bombs all over Yemen. Over the weekend, the U.S. military launched its first air raids on Yemen in months, hitting targets around the country and killing at least 53 people. Sources in the administration have told The New York Times that the attacks will continue for weeks”
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“Instead of calling Biden a warmonger, as he had a year ago, Trump claimed on Sunday that Biden’s “pathetically weak” policy had allowed “unrelenting campaign of piracy, violence, and terrorism” against American shipping.”
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“Trump’s notoriously hawkish national security adviser, Mike Waltz, thinks this campaign will be different. “These were not kind of pinprick, back and forth—what ultimately proved to be feckless attacks. This was an overwhelming response that actually targeted multiple Houthi leaders and took them out. And the difference here is, one, going after the Houthi leadership, and two, holding Iran responsible,” he told ABC on Sunday.”
“Any hope of robust economic growth resulting from unleashing energy abundance, deregulating the private sector economy, or pro-growth tax policy may now be doused by the economic fallout of a pointless trade war.
It started as a murmur—a slight downward revision, nothing alarming. But within five days, the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta’s GDPNow forecast for the first quarter of 2025 went from mild optimism (2.3 percent growth) to outright recessionary territory (-1.5 percent). By March 3, the number had plunged to -2.8 percent, the kind of contraction that doesn’t just signal weakness but outright economic distress. Eight months of stock market gains were wiped out in less than four weeks.”
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“Global supply chains are rattled, businesses are reluctant to invest in capital, and consumers are cutting back on purchases. Tariffs—pitched as a way to bring jobs back—have instead choked growth. The administration’s bet that protectionism would insulate the economy from foreign competition is proving to be precisely the opposite: a self-inflicted wound.”
“the White House’s social media team had no such concerns as it gleefully bragged about sending dozens of people to a Central American prison without any proof of their guilt.”
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“The White House says most of the migrants deported over the weekend were believed to be Tren de Aragua members (while others were part of MS-13, a different gang). However, immigration attorneys have pointed out that the administration has not released detailed information about the individuals or explained why they were chosen for deportation.”
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“The Trump administration’s determination to ignore due process for would-be deportees would be worrying even if it were happening in a vacuum. However, that’s not the case. From the relatively low-stakes willingness of the Department of Government Efficiency to move fast and not wait for permission, to the Trump administration’s attempt to punish law firms for working with the administration’s opponents, and its ongoing attempt to undermine birthright citizenship, the White House is showing little regard for limits on executive authority.
On several different issues, the Trump administration’s “actions reflect an unorthodox conception of American government in which the president pushes his powers to the outer limits, with diminished regard for the checks and balances provided by the legislative and judicial branches,” is how The Wall Street Journal summarized things on Monday.”
“The new proposed ban list was leaked to The New York Times over the weekend. Along with classic adversaries such as Iran and North Korea, and war-torn countries such as Syria and Yemen, the list also includes the tranquil Himalayan mountain kingdom of Bhutan.
The Land of the Thunder Dragon, an isolated country of less than 800,000 people, doesn’t have any internal or external wars at the moment. It suffers from “relatively little crime,” according to the U.S. State Department’s own reports.”
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“The Bhutanese, a local newspaper, reported after The New York Times report came out that Bhutan was moved from the immediate ban list to a probationary “yellow list.” An “official source” told The Bhutanese that Bhutan was listed because of its high U.S. visa overstay rate.
Around 43 percent of Bhutanese visitors overstayed their visas in FY 2022, including 60 percent of tourists and business travelers, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s statistics. But the percentage was high because the number of Bhutanese visitors was so small to begin with. There were 112 overstays out of 255 visitors total from Bhutan in FY 2022. The following fiscal year, there were only 72 overstays out of 371 visitors total from Bhutan. There were only 17 Bhutanese people among the 2.58 million foreigners deported in FY 2022.”
“A Rhode Island doctor who is an assistant professor at Brown University’s medical school has been deported to Lebanon even though a judge had issued an order blocking the U.S. visa holder’s immediate removal from the country, according to court papers.
The expulsion of Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, is set to be the focus of a hearing on Monday before a federal judge in Boston, who on Sunday demanded information on whether U.S. Customs and Border Protection had “willfully” disobeyed his order.”
“Any decision by the administration to defy federal courts would immediately implicate profound constitutional questions about separation of powers that have kept each branch of the government in check for centuries. That’s in large part because it would test the power of courts to enforce rulings that are supposed to be the final word.
The issue reached a fever pitch on over the weekend when the Trump administration deported hundreds of alleged gang members to El Salvador despite a federal judge’s order that the 19th Century Alien Enemies Act could not be used.”
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“Legal experts say there are few options to force compliance with its pronouncements. Judges could hold an agency or official in civil or criminal contempt – but that’s about it.
Fears that the Trump administration might deliberately break into a pattern of not following judicial rulings with which it disagrees were amplified last month when a federal judge in Rhode Island, for the second time, told the Trump administration it can’t cut off grant and loan payments after Democratic-led states complained that the administration wasn’t obeying the judge’s previous court order.”
“The flights suggest the Trump administration may be growing more brazen in its defiance of judicial restraint. The U.S. Constitution established the judiciary as a co-equal and independent branch of government.
Trump has sought to push the boundaries of executive power since taking office in January, cutting spending authorized by Congress, dismantling agencies and firing tens of thousands of federal workers.”
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“On Monday, Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, said the flights were already in international airspace when the judge’s orders came and that more flights would continue.
“Once you’re outside the border, you know, it is what it is. But they’re in international waters, already on the way south, close to landing. You know what? … We did what we had to do,” he told Fox News’ “Fox & Friends” program.
Asked what was next, Homan said: “Another flight, another flight every day.”
“We’re not stopping. I don’t care what the judges think,” he added.”