Trump's USA

The President's Team
Trump Cuts National Security Council Jobs

Donald Trump has cut several officials from the White House National Security Council, sources tell the Financial Times. The people involved have been fired, placed on leave or sent back to their original government jobs.

The people affected were reportedly notified by email on Friday, and according to the information they were given just 30 minutes to gather their belongings and leave. One explanation for Trump's actions is that during his previous term in office he felt that some officials were quietly sabotaging his plans.

- He does not want to make the same mistake again, says a source.
 

The conflict with universities
Analysis: Judges slow down - but it will be difficult to stop Trump
 

Federal judges in the US are tearing up Donald Trump's decisions time and again - allowing Harvard to continue enrolling foreign students is the latest example.

But even if the judges all point in the same direction (that the Trump administration is acting unlawfully), the actual consequences may differ, writes Charlie Savage of the New York Times.

The slowness of the judicial system means that the courts often lag several steps behind and in some cases fail to catch up at all, he writes. In addition, it is inevitable that the White House will appeal to the highest court, he says, pointing to a statement by Vice President JD Vance:

– I know this is provocative, but I think we are witnessing an attempt by the courts to literally overturn the will of the American people.

New York Magazine political columnist Ed Kilgore also criticizes the quote, which he believes suggests that popular decisions should take precedence over legal restrictions.

“Repeatedly repeating the idea that judges should bend the law to suit Trump, because he – unlike his predecessors – allegedly uniquely embodies the will of the people (despite the fact that an actual majority of voters did not vote for him last year), is harmful and, worse, reinforces the president’s already clear authoritarian tendencies.” 

Tariff crisis  Trump's tariff policy

Reports: EU division irritates Trump's team

Donald Trump's economic advisers have expressed growing irritation with what they perceive as a sluggish and divided EU. This is according to sources for the Wall Street Journal after the president threatened 50 percent tariffs on Friday.

Trump's staff feels that the EU has not come up with sufficiently concrete proposals for a trade agreement and that the 27 member states' different priorities are causing the process to drag on. In addition, there is American frustration that the EU has not yet committed to imposing new tariffs on Chinese industrial goods, which Trump sees as a priority issue.

Swedish expert: "Tariffs are a big step towards free trade"

Swedish economics professor Tomas Philipson has been one of Donald Trump's advisers. Now he is defending the president's tariff war, writes Dagens Nyheter.

Unlike many other economists, Philipson believes that the tariffs are a big step towards free trade. He believes that the basis of tariff policy is to bring countries to the negotiating table because American companies abroad are treated worse than foreign companies in the United States.

– This could be probably the biggest step towards free trade that we have seen, he tells DN.

But the calculation is based on the US ultimately lowering its tariffs in agreements with the outside world.