Boeing investors brace for fallout from Trump tariffs

Jets intended for Chinese airline returned to US, raising fears for planemaker as results near

Investors in Boeing are braced to learn the full impact of Donald Trump’s trade war, amid fears the US planemaker could be hit harder than first expected after jets intended for a Chinese airline were returned to the US.

A Boeing 737 Max 8 plane intended for use by a Chinese airline returned to the US on Monday from Boeing’s China finishing centre, according to flight data cited by Reuters. It followed the arrival in the US on Sunday of another 737 Max painted in the livery of China’s Xiamen Airlines at Boeing’s US production hub in Seattle.

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Jim Ratcliffe’s chemicals business under pressure from Trump tariffs, Moody’s warns

Rating agency downgrades Ineos Quattro as it says ‘trade barriers’ could affect it for next two years

Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s loss-making chemicals business could take longer than expected to recover its financial health because of Donald Trump’s trade tariffs, analysts have said.

The billionaire industrialist has faced growing concerns over the state of his chemicals group amid problems with his business interests in Manchester United and All Blacks rugby.

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Senate Democrat meets Ábrego García in El Salvador as legal battles continue – US politics live

Visit by Maryland’s Chris Van Hollen comes as a federal appeals court rules against the Trump’s administration’s efforts to block return to the US

Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. My name is Tom Ambrose and I’ll be bringing you all the latest news over the next few hours.

We start with news that Maryland senator Chris Van Hollen met in El Salvador with Kilmar Ábrego García, a man who was sent there by the Trump administration in March despite an immigration court order preventing his deportation.

James Comer, the chair of the House oversight committee, and Elise Stefanik, chair of the House Republican leadership, have launched an investigation into Harvard University, accusing the university of a “lack of compliance with civil rights laws”.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX and two partners have emerged as frontrunners to win a crucial part of Donald Trump’s “Golden Dome” missile defense shield.

The supreme court said it will hear arguments next month over Donald Trump’s bid to restrict automatic birthright citizenship.

In their unanimous opinion issued today, a US appeals court warned the Trump administration that battles against the judiciary could undermine public confidence.

After weeks of strong rhetoric, the president told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday that he thought trade deals could be finished in the “next three or four weeks”.

Trump on Thursday extended a government-wide federal hiring freeze that was set to expire this weekend.

The Washington DC headquarters for the Department of Housing and Urban Development may soon be up for sale.

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Temu and Shein drop US ad spending as they face tariffs on even small sales

E-tailers also hiking prices after Donald Trump ends ‘de minimis’ exemption for cheap shipments from China and Hong Kong

Temu and Shein are cutting back their spending on US social media advertising as they lose an exemption on tariffs for many of their shipments from China and Hong Kong.

The online e-tailers, both of which ship low-priced China-made goods direct to US shoppers, had been on an ad spree until recently. But under an executive order from Donald Trump, as of 2 May their sales valued at under $800 will no longer be exempt from US tariffs.

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Reeves says inflation fall shows ‘plan for change is working’ – UK politics live

Chancellor says wages are growing faster than prices but acknowledges many are still struggling with the cost of living

A government minister has reiterated the call for the Unite union to accept a deal and end the bin strike in Birmingham.

Speaking on GB News this morning, Lillian Greenwood, parliamentary under-secretary of state for the future of roads, said residents were facing “a completely unacceptable situation”

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US begins inquiry into pharmaceutical and chip imports in bid to impose tariffs

Notices show Trump administration setting stage for levies on both sectors on national security grounds

The Trump administration is kicking off investigations into imports of pharmaceuticals and semiconductors as part of a bid to impose tariffs on both sectors on national security grounds, notices posted to the Federal Register on Monday showed.

The filings scheduled to be published on Wednesday set a 21-day deadline from that date for the submission of public comment on the issue and indicate the administration intends to pursue the levies under authority granted by the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. Such inquiries need to be completed within 270 days after being announced.

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UN calls on Trump to exempt poorest countries from ‘reciprocal’ tariffs

Unctad says many countries targeted with high tariff rates are unlikely to be a threat to US

The UN’s trade and development arm, Unctad, is calling on Donald Trump to exempt the world’s poorest and smallest countries from “reciprocal” tariffs, or risk “serious economic harm”.

In a report published on Monday, Unctad identifies 28 nations the US president singled out for a higher tariff rate than the 10% baseline – despite each accounting for less than 0.1% of the US trade deficit.

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‘No winners’ in a trade war, says China’s Xi as he heads to Vietnam on charm offensive

Xi Jinping expected to present China as reliable partner in contrast to US, which imposed – then suspended – tariffs over 40% on some countries

The Chinese president, Xi Jinping, warned there would be “no winners” in a trade war and that protectionism “leads nowhere”, as he began a three-nation trip to south-east Asia, starting in Vietnam on Monday.

Xi’s tour, which started in Hanoi, also includes rare visits to Malaysia and Cambodia and will seek to strengthen ties with China’s closest neighbours amid a trade war that has sent shock waves through global markets.

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‘The sky won’t fall’: China plays down Trump tariff risks as stock markets rally

Chinese customs official says trade has diversified away from US in recent years and plays up its ‘vast domestic market’

China has played down the risk of damage to its exports from Donald Trump’s tariffs, with an official saying the “the sky won’t fall”, as stock markets rose on Monday amid signs of a retreat on electronics restrictions.

The world’s second-largest economy has diversified its trade away from the US in recent years, according to Lyu Daliang, a customs administration spokesperson, in comments reported by state-owned agency Xinhua.

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US stock markets expected to recover after Trump drops tariffs on mobiles

Exemption, seen as a climbdown, includes laptops and chips, and is likely to help firms such as Apple and Nvidia

US stock markets were expected to stage a recovery on Monday after Donald Trump excluded imports of smartphones and laptops from his tariff regime late on Friday night.

Shares in Apple and chip maker Nvidia were on course to soar after tariffs on their products imported into the US were lifted for 90 days.

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Xi Jinping seeks to strengthen economic ties during tour of south-east Asia

President’s first stop is Vietnam as China urges US to end trade war and return to ‘right path of mutual respect’

The Chinese president, Xi Jinping, will visit Vietnam on Monday as he begins a tour of south-east Asia where he will seek to strengthen ties with neighbouring countries amid an escalating trade war.

Xi will visit Vietnam from Monday before travelling to Malaysia and Cambodia, a high-profile tour that Chinese officials have described as being of “major importance”.

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Trump administration to exempt smartphones and computers from tariffs

Announcement says tariffs – including those imposed on China – will also not apply to other electronic devices

Donald Trump’s presidential administration has exempted smartphones and computers from the 125% levies imposed on imports from China as well as other “reciprocal” tariffs, which experts had cautioned might cause electronic consumer prices to spike dramatically in the US.

The announcement was made late on Friday in a US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) notice that said the devices would be excluded from the 10% global tariff that Trump recently imposed on most countries, along with the much heftier import tax on China.

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Did Trump’s tariffs kill economic populism?

Lasting damage has been done not only to Trump’s political credibility but to globalisation as a system

At the beginning of this helter-skelter week, Downing Street was declaring globalisation not only dead but a failure. Now, only five trading days later, the autopsy is still under way but the victim may instead be economic populism, strangled by Wall Street, the citadel of globalisation. Donald Trump’s so-called liberation day may in fact have been the anti-globalist’s entombment day.

In an effort to deny even a tactical retreat, Trump’s aides insist the White House goal all along was not to weaken globalism, or even to protect the US economy with tariffs, but instead to get into a negotiation to lower tariffs around the world and to punish China. As cover stories go, it is hardly credible, partly because the tariffs were repeatedly lauded by Trump as a macroeconomic revenue-raising measure, or a means to bolster US manufacturing.

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Tesla stops taking orders in China for two models imported from US

Carmaker removes ‘order now’ buttons for Model S saloon and Model X SUV on its Chinese website amid tariffs war

Tesla has stopped taking orders in China for two models it previously imported from the US, as companies scramble to adapt to prohibitive tariffs imposed in Donald Trump’s trade war.

The manufacturer, run by Trump’s close ally Elon Musk, removed “order now” buttons on its Chinese website for its Model S saloon and Model X sports utility vehicle.

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Trump administration ordered to help return man wrongly deported to El Salvador – US politics live

Supreme court upholds earlier order that Kilmar Abrego Garcia should be released after being improperly sent to prison

The Mississippi library commission, which offers services such as specialized research assistance to libraries in the state, has ordered the deletion of two research collections: the race relations database and the gender studies database. The collections were stored in what’s called the Magnolia database, which is used by publicly funded schools, libraries, universities and state agencies in Mississippi.

The commission’s executive director, Hulen Bivins, confirmed the deletion to the Guardian, and said:

We may lose a lot of materials.

All of the states, we are in dire shape. We have had a reconsideration of everything with regard to what Doge [is doing].”

Commanders are expected to adhere to the highest standards of conduct, especially as it relates to remaining nonpartisan in the performance of their duties.”

Our message to Denmark is very simple: you have not done a good job by the people of Greenland. You have under-invested in the people of Greenland and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this incredible, beautiful land mass.”

I do not presume to understand current politics, but what I do know is the concerns of the US administration discussed by vice-president Vance on Friday are not reflective of Pituffik space base.”

Actions to undermine the chain of command or to subvert President Trump’s agenda will not be tolerated at the Department of Defense.”

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UK economy far exceeds forecasts to grow 0.5% in boost to Rachel Reeves

February GDP rise was bigger than forecast – but impact from Donald Trump’s tariff war is yet to come

The UK economy unexpectedly expanded by 0.5% in February, figures show, in a boost for the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, before an expected downturn sparked by Donald Trump’s tariff war.

The increase in gross domestic product in February was five times larger than the 0.1% that a poll of City economists had forecast, while January’s figure of a modest fall of 0.1% was revised up to 0.0% growth.

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China raises US tariffs to 125% as Xi invites EU to team up against Trump ‘bullying’

Chinese leader canvasses Spain and other trading partners on how to tackle economic fallout as market turmoil continues

China has raised its tariffs on US products to 125% in the latest salvo of the trade dispute with Washington, just hours after Xi Jinping said there were “no winners in a tariff war”.

Xi made the comments during a meeting with the Spanish prime minister in which he invited the EU to work with China to resist “bullying”, part of an apparent campaign to shore up other trading partners.

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Trump’s economic adviser dampens Starmer’s hopes of tariffs relief

It would take an ‘extraordinary deal’ for any country to improve on 10% rate, says Kevin Hassett

A senior economic adviser to Donald Trump has said it would take “an extraordinary deal” for any country, including the UK, to improve on the 10% tariff rate the US has imposed almost worldwide, pouring cold water on Downing Street’s hopes for a breakthrough.

Trump succumbed to pressure from plunging financial markets on Wednesday and temporarily reduced “retaliatory” tariffs on all countries’ goods to 10%, except those from China, which face a rate of 145%.

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Australian stock market slumps amid fears of worsening US-China trade war

Benchmark S&P/ASX 200 falls 2.4% after another sell-off on Wall Street overnight triggered by changes to the US tariff regime

The Australian sharemarket closed lower on Friday, ending a volatile week on a sour note as concerns about Donald Trump’s unsettling policy shifts and deteriorating trade relations between the world’s two biggest economies took hold.

The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 dropped 0.8% on Friday to 7,646.5 points after a sell-off on Wall Street overnight.

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Will Trump’s tariff chaos be China’s gain in global trade wars?

As China retaliates against tariffs, it is also making strategic manoeuvres on EU and Asia to maximise opportunities

On the basis of Napoleon’s dictum “never interrupt your enemy while they are making a mistake”, there was a large incentive for China to do precisely nothing as Donald Trump displayed his determination to lose friends and induce market panic. Indeed, the Chinese advocates of passivity cited a social media meme attributed to President Xi Jinping: “Do nothing. Win.”

Initially it was tempting for China to sit back and watch the US’s former allies recoil at Trump’s disruptive war on globalisation and let them realise that, by comparison, China represented an oasis of stability, modernity and predictability.

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