Are U.S. citizen children being deported? Early Friday, three U.S. citizen children from two families were removed from the United States with their mothers by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. One of them is a 4-year-old with Stage 4 cancer who was sent without medication or the ability to contact their doctors, a lawyer for the child’s family said. The others are 2 and 7 years old. The children’s situations have intensified concerns that the Trump administration is carrying out deportations in a way that violates the legal rights of both citizens and noncitizens. Charles Kuck, an immigration attorney and law professor at Emory University, said that while Tom Homan, President Donald Trump’s border czar, might argue that the children weren’t, by legal definition, “deported,” the U.S. government effectively facilitated their removal from the country. 
“Who paid for the ticket? It is clear that the U.S. government paid for this ticket — that means these children were deported,” Kuck said. “Whether they had [due] process or not, whether ICE appropriately followed the rules or not, these children were deported. The question you have to ask yourself is: What’s stopping this from happening to me and my kids?” — After weeks of mounting questions about whether Trump was defying court orders, the administration arrested a Wisconsin judge and accused her of helping a Mexican immigrant evade arrest by federal agents. Officers handcuffed Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan in public. Attorney General Pam Bondi bragged on the Fox News show “America Reports” about the administration’s willingness to go after judges who “think they’re above the law.” FBI Director Kash Patel began the day by announcing Dugan’s arrest on social media and ended it by posting a photo of agents leading her away. Caption from articles by Mariana Alfaro, Patrick Marley and Jeremy Roebuck.

What happens if Meta gets broken up?? Ft @NaomiNixWrites Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg argued in federal court Monday that his company competes against a broad array of online competitors, rejecting the Federal Trade Commission’s claim that the social media giant maintains a monopoly among a small group of communication apps that connect people to friends and family. FTC lawyer Daniel Matheson sought to use Zuckerberg’s previous comments and company documents to show that Facebook prioritized helping users connect with people they knew. For instance, Matheson cited the company’s registration documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission, where it states “people use Facebook to stay connected.” But the social media CEO argued that the company’s broader goal is to enable its users to learn about the world and consume content posted from others outside their personal networks. Caption from a story by: Naomi Nix

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth continued Tuesday to blame “leakers” who were ousted from the Pentagon for a report that has revived scrutiny of his use of the commercial messaging application Signal to talk about military attack plans. “Once a leaker, always a leaker, often a leaker,” Hegseth told Fox News on Tuesday in his first major television interview since the story was published in the New York Times. “I don’t have time for leakers. I don’t have time for the hoax press that peddles old stories from disgruntled employees.” The Times reported Sunday that Hegseth used a Signal chat with his wife, brother and personal lawyer to discuss sensitive information about a forthcoming bombing campaign in Yemen. It was the second reported episode of Hegseth using the application to talk about the strikes in Yemen. Caption from article by Patrick Svitek and Abigail Hauslohner.

A federal judge on Tuesday said she will require the Trump administration to produce records and sworn answers about the U.S. government’s attempts, or lack thereof, to return a Maryland resident who was apprehended by immigration authorities and illegally sent to a notorious prison in El Salvador. The decision from U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, where she left open the possibility of a contempt ruling against the Trump administration, marks another escalation in the legal showdown with the White House. The case has widespread implications, with Justice Department lawyers arguing that the judge lacks the authority to force the administration to coordinate with the Salvadoran government to bring Kilmar Abrego García back to the United States. “It’s going to be two weeks of intense discovery,” Xinis told Justice Department attorneys at the hearing. From article by Steve Thompson and Katie Mettler.

The acting head of the IRS plans to resign after being bypassed over a new agreement to share the tax data of undocumented immigrants with Homeland Security personnel, according to two people familiar with the situation. Acting IRS commissioner Melanie Krause — the tax agency’s third leader since President Donald Trump’s inauguration — will participate in the deferred resignation program the Trump administration offered to agency employees in recent days, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal. Disagreements over the agency’s direction also factored into Krause’s decision to leave, the people said. Losing three agency leaders in three months is “unprecedented,” one of the people said. “I don’t think we’ve seen anything like this at IRS.” Treasury Department officials in recent days sought to circumvent IRS executives so immigration authorities could access private taxpayer information, the people said. Those conversations largely excluded Krause’s input. Caption from reporting by Jacob Bogage and Shannon Najmabadi.

President Donald Trump on Monday signaled he was open to cutting deals with countries around the world to ease tariffs, partially stabilizing markets that have been rattled by an intensifying trade war. While Trump and many White House advisers continued to suggest there would be no quick end to new import duties, the president also fueled optimism that deals with individual countries could avert the worst-case economic scenarios. Major stock indexes closed largely flat after sinking for several consecutive days since the White House unveiled major new tariffs last week. After a dizzying session, the S&P 500 ended down just 0.2 percent on Monday, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq was barely positive. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, which contains just 30 stocks, closed down just shy of 1 percent. “We’re going to get fair deals and good deals with every country. And if we don’t, we’re going to have nothing to do with them,” Trump said in a joint Oval Office appearance with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “They’re not going to be allowed to participate in the United States.” Caption from article by Jeff Stein, Aaron Gregg and Taylor Telford.

Trump extended the TikTok ban deadline for 75 days … again. President Donald Trump said Friday that he was signing an executive order to extend the deadline for TikTok’s nationwide ban another 75 days, raising questions about White House negotiators’ ability to lock down what they have said would be a takeover deal. Trump said his administration had made “tremendous progress” toward a deal to protect the popular Chinese-owned video app from a legally mandated ban, scheduled to take effect this weekend, but that the deal proposal needed “more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed.” “We hope to continue working in Good Faith with China, who I understand are not very happy about our Reciprocal Tariffs,” he said in a Truth Social post. “We do not want TikTok to ‘go dark.’ We look forward to working with TikTok and China to close the Deal.” TikTok’s Beijing-based owner, ByteDance, said in a statement that the company has “been in discussion” with the United States regarding a potential solution for TikTok but added: “An agreement has not been executed. There are key matters to be resolved. Any agreement will be subject to approval under Chinese law.” Caption from article by By Drew Harwell and Cat Zakrzewski.

How could Trump's new tariffs affect YOU President Donald Trump on Wednesday announced the largest increase in tariffs in U.S. history, unveiling new import duties that he said would revive domestic manufacturing and amount to a national “Declaration of Economic Independence.” In an address from the Rose Garden, Trump announced two key new tariff programs, both affecting trillions of dollars in commerce — a 10 percent tariff that would apply to imports from every country, and a separate set of what he called “reciprocal” tariffs that impose a country-specific rate. These tariffs follow several other major tariff programs already threatened or enacted during his administration, including on automobile imports and goods from the nation’s two biggest trading partners, Canada and Mexico. Caption from story by @Jstein_wapo

Here’s a brief history of Republicans and tariffs. Republicans who are evidently not too comfortable with President Donald Trump’s decision to announce large new global tariffs have tried plenty of hints to push him in a different direction. And one of Trump’s most vocal tariff critics on the GOP side, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, tried a relatively novel one on Wednesday. He pointed to electoral peril for the GOP. “Tariffs have also led to political decimation,” Paul told reporters. “When [William] McKinley most famously put tariffs on in 1890, they lost 50 percent of their seats in the next election. When [Sens. Reed Smoot and Willis C. Hawley] put on their tariff in the early 1930s, we lost the House and the Senate for 60 years. “So they’re not only bad economically; they’re bad politically.” Caption from article by Aaron Blake.

Special Election BREAKDOWN The first big elections of 2025 were held Tuesday, giving the first major indicator of where the country stands since President Donald Trump’s 2024 election win five months ago. Wisconsin held a much-watched and expensive state supreme court race featuring a very heavy dose of Elon Musk, while Florida hosted a pair of special elections for U.S. House seats — including one that looked potentially competitive, despite Trump carrying the district by 30 points just five months ago. In the end, Democrats scored a decisive victory in the Wisconsin race, while Republicans held both Florida seats by double digits — but by significantly smaller margins than usual. Now that we’ve gotten the fuller results, here are some takeaways. Story by: Aaron Blake

Will Trump save TikTok on April 5th? President Donald Trump on Wednesday is reviewing a strategy to avert a TikTok ban scheduled to take effect Saturday, in a critical political test that will force the president to weigh the interests of China hawks in his own party against the online MAGA supporters who helped deliver him the White House. The White House has considered a menu of options in recent weeks, including a scenario where investors outside of China would increase their ownership of TikTok while Beijing-based ByteDance would retain ownership of the powerful algorithm that recommends what people see on the popular video app, according to two people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the deal. In a sign of the last-minute nature of the negotiations, Amazon made an 11th hour bid to acquire TikTok, but it was not seriously considered by the White House, a person familiar with the matter said. Amazon declined to comment. The bid was first reported by the New York Times. Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post. Caption from article by Drew Harwell, Cat Zakrzewski and Naomi Nix.

Three special election races on Tuesday could provide an early indicator of President Donald Trump’s popularity just weeks into his second term, as well as insight into how Democratic messaging about his administration’s cuts to the federal government is playing with Americans in those states. Voters in Florida’s 1st and 6th Congressional Districts will head to the polls to elect replacements in the House for Trump allies Matt Gaetz and Michael Waltz. Meanwhile, Wisconsin voters will elect a new member of the state Supreme Court, where liberals are defending a one-seat majority. All three races present an opportunity to measure voters’ support for Trump and billionaire Elon Musk’s efforts to overhaul Washington. The president and his billionaire adviser have backed the conservative candidates in all three races — Musk and groups affiliated with him have pumped about $20 million into the Wisconsin race and, as reported by NBC News, a PAC connected to Musk has spent tens of thousands in both Florida races. Caption from article by Mariana Alfaro.

Trump aide says tariffs will raise $6 TRILLION White House aide Peter Navarro claimed Sunday that President Donald Trump’s new tariffs would raise more than $6 trillion in federal revenue over the next decade, a figure that experts said would almost certainly represent the largest peacetime tax hike in modern U.S. history. Appearing on Fox News, Navarro said the president’s tariffs on auto imports, set to take effect Wednesday, would raise $100 billion per year. Meanwhile, a regime of additional tariffs — details of which have yet to be released — would raise another $600 billion per year, or $6 trillion over the next decade, Navarro said. Navarro’s remarks suggest Trump is preparing dramatic new measures for Wednesday, which the president has referred to as “Liberation Day.” Navarro is among the most hawkish voices on trade in the president’s inner circle, and it was not immediately clear whether he was previewing official administration policy or speaking for one side of an internal debate over the tariffs. By Jeff Stein By Jeff Stein

What’s been canceled so far in 2025? Dave examined the following stories: President Donald Trump has suggested that “methods” exist by which he could attempt to serve a third term in the White House, an act that is barred by the 22nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The Snow White remake hits theaters, but the project has been embroiled in controversy since its announcement in 2016, Vice President JD Vance was dispatched to Greenland to admonish Denmark over its stewardship of the strategically important land mass. Los Angeles palm trees helped fuel the historic wildfires that ravaged Southern California earlier this year. Morgan Wallen pointedly walked off stage during the live SNL taping last weekend, posting a picture of his private jet an hour later on Instagram as he fled New York for “God’s country.”

Tidying up the Education Dept. with M̶a̶r̶i̶e̶ ̶K̶o̶n̶d̶o̶ Dave. The Education Department said last Tuesday that it is cutting its staff by about half, a major step toward President Donald Trump’s goal of shrinking the federal role in education and one that critics denounced as damaging to American children. Trump has said he wants to eliminate the department altogether, but that is unlikely because it would require an act of Congress and 60 yes votes in the Senate, where Republicans hold only 53 seats. Absent that, the administration has been working to gut the agency by cutting grants and contracts and reducing staff. The staff reductions announced Tuesday were the largest in department history and of a magnitude rarely contemplated before this administration took office. A senior official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe details of the layoffs, said that every part of the department will be affected but also insisted that the reductions will not impact its ability to deliver services to student borrowers, distribute grant money to school districts or enforce civil rights law. She said all statutorily mandated functions will continue. But critics said it was impossible to reduce staff so dramatically without affecting the services that states, school districts and students have come to rely on. Caption from article by Laura Meckler and Danielle Douglas-Gabriel.

A vaccine skeptic who has long promoted false claims about the connection between immunizations and autism has been tapped by the federal government to conduct a critical study of possible links between the two, according to current and former federal health officials. The Department of Health and Human Services has hired David Geier to conduct the analysis, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. Geier and his father, Mark Geier, have published papers claiming vaccines increase the risk of autism, a theory that has been studied for decades and scientifically debunked.