Trump threatens Harvard’s tax-exempt status after freezing $2bn funding
Universities, as well as many charities and religious groups, are exempted from paying federal income taxes.
Obama backs Harvard as Yale faculty members support standing up to Trump
Harvard faces funding freeze as Yale faculty asks leadership ‘to resist and legally challenge any unlawful demands’
Barack Obama has come out in support of Harvard after the Trump administration elected to cut $2bn of its federal grants after the Ivy League school in Massachusetts rejected what it said was an attempt at “government regulation” of the university.
Meanwhile, faculty at Yale University – another prominent Ivy League institution – has asked its leadership “to resist and legally challenge any unlawful demands that threaten academic freedom and … self-governance”.
Continue reading...Attorney general dodges question on Trump proposal to jail US citizens in El Salvador
Trump proposed that ‘homegrown criminals’ should be deported, an idea that experts say is clearly illegal
The US attorney general declined on Tuesday to say whether Donald Trump’s suggestion of removing US citizens to El Salvador was legal, in alarming remarks about what experts think is an obviously illegal idea.
Trump proposed the idea on Monday in the Oval Office during a visit with El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, who has been accepting people deported from the US and imprisoning them in a gigantic facility notorious for human rights abuses.
Continue reading...France expels 12 Algerian officials as tensions escalate
Move comes after Algeria expelled French diplomats, following France's arrest of an Algerian official linked to kidnap.
UK conference on Sudan fails to set up contact group for ceasefire talks
Major setback for diplomatic efforts to end two years of civil war as Arab states refuse to sign joint communique
A British-led attempt to establish a contact group to facilitate ceasefire talks in Sudan fell apart on Tuesday when Arab states refused to sign a joint communique after a conference in London.
The daylong argument between Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates over the communique represents a big diplomatic setback for efforts to end two years of civil war in Sudan.
Continue reading...Hamas rejects Israeli ceasefire disarmament proposal, Palestinian official says
The plan also gives no commitment to end the war in return for hostages, a Palestinian official says.
Hamas rejects Israeli ceasefire disarmament proposal, Palestinian official says
The plan also gives no commitment to end the war in return for hostages, a Palestinian official says.
Does Trump want a Gaza ceasefire before his Middle East trip?
Parsing through Donald Trump's Middle East agenda with Steven Cook from the Council on Foreign Relations.
UK trade secretary to visit China with aim of reviving key joint trade commission
Jonathan Reynold’s trip suggests government will continue its rapprochement with Beijing despite security concerns
The trade secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, will travel to Beijing to revive a key trade dialogue with China despite saying it had been naive to allow Chinese investment in sensitive sectors, the Guardian has learned.
Reynolds is scheduled to travel to China later this year for high-level talks in an effort to boost bilateral trade and investment.
Continue reading...Iran ‘must stop and eliminate’ nuclear enrichment, says US envoy Witkoff
Steve Witkoff previously suggested that the US is seeking to curb Iran's uranium enrichment programme, not abolish it.
France expels 12 Algerian officials as row over alleged kidnapping escalates
Move follows Algiers’ expulsion of diplomats, after France’s arrest of man linked to abduction of influencer Amir DZ
France has expelled 12 Algerian consular and diplomatic officials and recalled its ambassador in Algiers, the French presidency said on Tuesday, in a retaliatory measure as a spat escalates between the two countries.
“The Algerian authorities are responsible for the sudden degradation of our bilateral relations,” President Emmanuel Macron’s office said.
Continue reading...Russian hairdresser jailed over neighbour claim of spreading fake news
Anna Alexandrova denied posting anti-war messages, insisting the case was motivated by a land squabble.
Russian hairdresser jailed over neighbour claim of spreading fake news
Anna Alexandrova denied posting anti-war messages, insisting the case was motivated by a land squabble.
Obama calls Trump’s freeze of Harvard funding ‘unlawful’
The former president broke with his practice of not criticising policies or leaders on social media to praise Harvard's stand
Beijing pauses Boeing orders as trade war escalates
Boeing’s setback boosts competitiveness for rivals Airbus and COMAC in China.
How Harvard’s pushback against Trump may embolden more US resistance
It may be a turning point in the White House’s attempt to gut allegedly liberal universities and punish law firms
It might come to be seen as the moment the “woke liberal empire” of Donald Trump’s most fevered imaginings struck back.
Harvard University, the world-renowned institution emblematic of the elitism that Trump and his coterie hold in contempt, received an extortive demand from the administration that it surrender the core of its academic freedoms – and promptly told it to get lost.
Continue reading...US increases forces near Iran
In this episode of Project Force, @AlexGatopoulos looks the military threat that accompanies negotiations
US labor groups sue over ‘ignorant’ cuts of programs fighting child labor abroad
Musk’s Doge team announced in March it had canceled about $577m in grants for programs it labeled ‘America last’
Labor groups have filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s abrupt termination of international labor rights programs aimed at ending child labor and other abuses.
The Solidarity Center, Global March Against Child Labour, and the American Institutes for Research (AIR), filed the lawsuit on Tuesday seeking to stop the cuts, enacted by Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), and arguing the programs were authorized by Congress and that the secretary of labor has no authority to cancel the funds.
Continue reading...Wealthiest English private schools spend below 6% on means-tested bursaries, research finds
Data shows 200 independent schools devote fraction of fee income to support disadvantaged pupils based on family income
England’s wealthiest private schools devote only a fraction of their income towards means-tested bursaries, according to research that undermines claims that adding VAT to school fees would decimate support for poorer pupils.
The Private Education Policy Forum (PEPF), a thinktank campaigning for greater equality and transparency among independent schools, gathered data from more than 200 leading schools and found they spent less than 6% of their total fee income on supporting pupils based on family income.
Continue reading...Trump envoy demands Iran eliminate nuclear programme in apparent U-turn
Steve Witkoff’s switch from saying low-level production could continue seen as example of chaotic US foreign policy
Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, has announced Iran must totally eliminate its nuclear programme, seeming to reverse the policy he had articulated on Fox News only 12 hours earlier that would have allowed Iran to enrich uranium at a low level for civilian use.
The switch to a more hardline policy is likely to make it much harder for the US to reach a negotiated agreement with Tehran, bringing back the threat of an attack on Iran’s nuclear sites.
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