President Donald Trump on Monday threatened countries around the world to abide by any tariff deals they agreed to despite the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down many of his far-reaching taxes on imports. And he said he wants a global tariff of 15%, up from 10% he had announced immediately after the ruling.
The court’s Friday decision struck down tariffs Trump had imposed on nearly every country using an emergency powers law. But the Republican president won’t let go of his favorite tool for rewriting the rules of global commerce and applying international pressure.
“Any Country that wants to “play games” with the ridiculous supreme court decision, especially those that have “Ripped Off” the U.S.A. for years, and even decades, will be met with a much higher Tariff, and worse, than that which they just recently agreed to,” Trump posted Monday on Truth Social.
One of Trump's executive orders says he can bypass Congress and impose a 10% tax on imports from around the world starting Tuesday, the same day as his State of the Union speech.
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Johnson will host Hong Kong media tycoon’s daughter at State of the Union
House Speaker Mike Johnson is bringing Clare Lai, the daughter of Jimmy Lai, to the State of the Union address tomorrow evening.
Her presence at the U.S. Capitol comes as she presses for the release of her father, who was sentenced earlier this month to 20 years in prison under a China-imposed national security law that has virtually silenced the city’s dissent.
Lai, 78, had been convicted of charges connected to the publication of articles that allegedly harmed China, as well as “conspiracy to collude with foreign forces” for meeting with U.S. political officials. The New York Times first reported that Clare Lai will be Johnson’s guest.
Trump is visiting China starting at the end of March and has said he felt “so badly” about Lai’s conviction and noted he spoke to Chinese leader Xi Jinping about considering Lai’s release.
Johnson discounts Congress addressing tariffs after Supreme Court decision
House Speaker Mike Johnson is discounting the House playing a role in cementing Trump’s tariff policy through legislation now that the Supreme Court has struck down the president’s far-reaching global tariffs.
Johnson said he believed it’s important to give the White House the time and space to respond to the court’s decisions, “and that’s not something that really involves the House at this point.”
Some have suggested that Congress could enact Trump’s tariffs through a Republican-only reconciliation bill. Republicans used such a process to get Trump’s big tax cut bill approved last year.
“It’s going to be, I think, a challenge to find consensus on any path forward on the tariffs on the legislative side,” Johnson told reporters. “And so that is why I think we see so much of the attention on the executive side.”
Oregon congresswoman to send Epstein survivor to State of the Union in her place
“I’m inviting Lisa Phillips, one of the many brave women who survived Epstein’s abuse, to attend the State of the Union on my behalf,” U.S. Rep. Maxine Dexter said in a statement. “Her presence will send a clear message: Epstein survivors will not be silenced.”
Dexter is among the Democratic lawmakers who won’t be attending President Donald Trump’s State of the Union address before Congress on Tuesday. She will be holding a telephone town hall instead.
“I am deeply grateful to Representative Dexter for this honor. I sit in this seat not for myself, but for the girls who were never given a voice — and for the accountability they deserve,” Philips said in the statement.
Funding cuts and uncertainty have taken a toll on local communities, nonprofits say
Nonprofit leaders said communities are coping with rising demand while also seeing disruptions or reductions in federal funding.
“In the last year, nonprofits have faced record demand for food, housing, mental health services, and at the same time, funding freezes, payment delays, and administrative uncertainty, making their ability to respond even more difficult,” said Diane Yentel, president of the National Council of Nonprofits, speaking in advance of Trump’s State of the Union.
Danielle Clore, the CEO of the Kentucky Nonprofit Network, said federal funding cuts have reduced the availability of substance abuse counseling and food assistance in her state.
“Cuts don’t eliminate need. They simply shift costs elsewhere, often to emergency rooms or law enforcement,” Clore said.
Since the 1960s, the federal government has funded a vast network of nonprofits to address social problems or deliver services. The Trump administration’s policies have significantly strained that partnership, with nonprofits warning that neither local government funding nor charitable donations can replace federal support.
Court denies GOP effort to block Utah’s congressional remap favoring Democrats
New Utah voting districts that give Democrats an improved shot at winning a U.S. House seat can be used in this year’s election, a federal court ruled Monday while turning aside a Republican request to block the new map.
The ruling marked the second setback in recent days for Republicans, who also lost an appeal at the state Supreme Court.
A Utah judge imposed the new districts last November after striking down the congressional districts that the Republican-led Legislature had adopted after the 2020 census. The judge ruled that the Legislature had circumvented anti-gerrymandering standards passed by voters.
Democrats are not just targeting toss-up suburbs in November midterms
Democrats’ initial list of top House challengers in 2026 includes several candidates running in districts that cover swaths of rural voters, and the party is touting those contenders’ biographies as perfect fits to reclaim area’s that Trump and Republicans have dominated.
Announcing its first slate of “Red to Blue” candidates Monday, Democrats said former Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez in Arizona’s sprawling 2nd District is “determined to give rural Arizonans a real seat at the table.”
Iowa Democrat Christina Bohannan, the announcement noted, was raised “in a trailer in a rural small town” and wants to “grow the rural economy.” Western North Carolina’s Jamie Ager “grew up on his family farm” and built it “into a successful, sustainable small business.”
Democrat Rebecca Cooke is running in southwest Wisconsin’s 3rd District as a nonprofit leader and waitress who is “a 6th generation Wisconsinite” and “grew up on a dairy farm.”
Democrats’ ‘Red to Blue’ list includes several return candidates
House Democrats aren’t shy about backing candidates who’ve lost before and now want potential rematches against incumbent Republicans.
In 2024, Christina Bohanan lost the general election in southeast Iowa’s 1st District by just 799 votes (less than 0.25%) to Republican Rep. Marianette Miller-Meeks. Broadcast journalist Janelle Stelson lost to Republican Rep. Scott Perry in Pennsylvania’s 10th District by 1.2 percentage points (about 5,000 votes).
Former Rep. Elaine Luria won Virginia’s 2nd District in 2018. She lost to Republican Jen Kiggans in 2022 by about 10,000 votes (3.4 points) and is seeking a rematch.
Arizona’s Jonathan Nez would need the biggest turnaround. He lost in 2024 to Republican Rep. Eli Crane by 9 points (more than 36,000 votes).
All four Democrats are on the party’s initial “Red to Blue” list of top House challengers released Monday. Democrats believe voter discontent with Trump will yield considerable swings from previous election cycles.
Democrats name their first 12 ‘Red to Blue’ challengers in bid to flip House
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s initial list of “Red to Blue” midterm candidates includes two military veterans, two mayors, two state senators (one of them a Lutheran minister), a fourth-generation farmer, a waitress, a local prosecutor, small business owners and a former Navajo Nation president.
The 12 challengers in Republican-held districts are intended to highlight Democrats’ focus on selling their candidates as advocates for middle- and working-class voters, while contrasting that with Trump’s tumultuous second presidency and compliant GOP incumbents.
The Republican targets span from suburban districts that have been toss-ups in recent election cycles to more small-town and rural districts that Trump won comfortably. There are two seats in Arizona, Iowa, Pennsylvania and Virginia and one each in Michigan, North Carolina, Tennessee and Wisconsin.
The program, launched Monday, is not an official endorsement but offers designated candidates staff resources, training and fundraising support.
Army veteran who was detained by ICE invited to State of the Union
Democratic Rep. Mark Takano of California is inviting George Retes to be his guest at Trump’s State of the Union address. The U.S. citizen was arrested during an immigration raid at a Southern California marijuana farm last year and held for days before being released.
Some Democrats are seeking to draw attention to the excesses of Trump’s immigration crackdown by inviting guests who have suffered at the hands of federal immigration agents. Other Democrats are inviting survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse who have become outspoken critics of how the Trump administration has handled the release of case files on the late financier.
Trump is under pressure to deliver on the economy to an increasingly skeptical public
Trump swept back into the White House on promises to bring down prices and restore order to immigration in America. But on both issues, public sentiment has turned against him.
Only 39% of U.S. adults approve of his economic leadership and just 38% support him on immigration, according to the latest Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey. Those low numbers show the country is still fretting about the costs of groceries, housing and utilities, a problem compounded by Trump’s whipsawing use of tariffs. They also show how the public was disturbed by videos of violent clashes with protesters, including two U.S. citizens killed by federal agents.
Since his party passed a massive tax cut bill last year, Trump has yet to unveil major new economic policy ideas, instead offering reruns about his tax cuts, ideas about reducing mortgage rates and a new government website for buying prescription drugs.
Trump says his State of the Union address will be a ‘long’ one
How long is an important question.
As he was wrapping up the White House event recognizing “angel families,” Trump talked about how well the country is performing, in his view, and his administration’s work to cut off illegal immigration from Mexico to the U.S.
“I’m making a speech tomorrow night, and you’ll be hearing me say that,” he said. “I mean, it’s going to be a long speech because we have so much to talk about.”
Last year, the Republican president spoke for a record-setting 100 minutes to a joint session of Congress. Such a speech in a president’s first year in office technically is not considered a State of the Union address.
Angel families event wraps up
Trump concluded the event by signing a proclamation designating Feb. 22 as “National Angel Family Day.” A candle was lit in memory of victims killed by people in the U.S. illegally, whose names were read aloud. Members of the military then sang “Amazing Grace.”
The event featured remarks by family members of the victims who thanked Trump for his work honoring their loved ones and securing the border. Trump acknowledged their suffering and derided the press for its coverage of the issue.
Tariff taxes should be refunded to benefit consumers, Democrats say
The bill being introduced by Sens. Ron Wyden of Oregon, Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire would require the Trump administration to refund the taxes, plus interest. It would prioritize small businesses and encourage importers, wholesalers and large companies to pass the refunds on to their customers.
Shaheen said that repairing any of the damage starts with “President Trump refunding the illegally collected tariff taxes that Americans were forced to pay.”
The bill is unlikely to become law, but it reveals how Democrats are starting to apply public pressure going into November’s midterm elections for control of Congress. Democrats have begun telling the public that Trump illegally raised taxes and now refuses to repay the money back to the American people.
Democrats call for the government to refund billions in Trump tariff money
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A trio of Senate Democrats is calling for the government to start refunding roughly $175 billion in tariff revenues.
The justices left the refund question unanswered. So what’s going to happen to the money the government has already collected in import taxes now declared unlawful? When the smoke clears, trade lawyers say, importers are likely to get money back — eventually. Still, the path to refunds could prove chaotic.
The Democrats' proposed bill would require U.S. Customs and Border Protection to issue refunds over the course of 180 days and pay interest on the refunded amount, prioritizing refunds to small businesses.
Pennsylvania governor tells AP that the US has ‘a very real problem’ with antisemitism
Gov. Josh Shapiro said in an interview with The Associated Press that antisemitism is “a very real problem” among both Democrats and Republicans.
Shapiro may be the nation’s most prominent Jewish politician as antisemitism surges across America, and he’s made his religion central to his political identity — what he calls living his faith “out loud.”
At this pivotal moment, as he marches toward a dominant reelection this fall that is expected to propel him into the next presidential campaign, the 52-year-old governor is attempting to straddle an almost impossible chasm as both a Jewish progressive and a Zionist.
Trump claims people killed by individuals in the US illegally would still be alive if he’d won the 2020 election
There is no way Trump or anyone can know that. But the Republican president has received high marks in his second term for practically cutting off the flow of illegal immigration into the U.S. from Mexico, and says he would have done the same thing back then had he not lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden.
Trump is using the event to repeat false claims that he only lost because the election was rigged. But there is no evidence to support his allegations.
Trump lost dozens of court challenges, his own attorney general found no evidence of widespread fraud, and reviews, audits and recounts in the battleground states where he contested his loss all affirmed Biden’s victory.
Laken Riley’s mother thanks Trump
Allyson Phillips, the mother of Laken Riley, thanked Trump for the work he’s done to honor her daughter and others who have been killed by people in the U.S. illegally. She said public perception of the president is different than the man she has come to know.
“You have fought a fight that most people wouldn’t want to have to fight,” she said. “There are just not enough words to say, because if you’ve lived the nightmare that we have lived you understand the importance of the job he is doing.”
Phillips remembered her daughter as “the most responsible, hardworking, kind, selfless, beautiful Christian.” She added: “She didn’t make bad choices. She was just a good girl. She just wanted to go for a run that morning.”
Trump is speaking at a White House event to designate ‘Angel Family Day’
“Angel families” is a term the Trump administration is using to refer to relatives of people killed by someone who was illegally in the U.S.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a social media post on Sunday night that Trump was signing a proclamation designating “Angel Family Day.”
The event is meant to recognize Laken Riley and families like hers. The 22-year-old Georgia nursing student was killed in February 2024 while out jogging. Jose Antonio Ibarra, a Venezuelan man, is now serving a life term for her murder. Ibarra had been arrested for illegally entering the U.S. and released to pursue his case in immigration court.
Riley’s case became a flashpoint in the debate over immigration, and the first bill Trump signed into law in his second term was named for Riley. Trump says today is a “truly solemn occasion.”
Media organizations could keep pushing for release of Trump classified documents report
Judge Cannon’s ruling blocking the release of a special counsel report on Trump’s hoarding of classified documents might not be the end of the fight.
Though both the Justice Department and Trump had pushed for the report to be permanently shelved, media organizations had been pushing for the document’s release and had argued that it was in the public interest for it to come out.
They could presumably move to appeal Cannon’s ruling to a higher court.
Smith and his team produced a two-volume report on investigations into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and his retention of classified documents at his Florida estate following his first term. Both indictments were abandoned by Smith’s team after Trump’s November 2024 election win, in light of longstanding Justice Department legal opinions that sitting presidents cannot face federal prosecution.
Supreme Court agrees to hear from oil and gas companies trying to block climate change lawsuits
The Supreme Court will hear from oil and gas companies trying to block lawsuits seeking to hold the industry liable for billions of dollars in damage linked to climate change.
The case out of Boulder, Colorado, is one of series of lawsuits alleging the companies deceived the public about how fossil fuels contribute to climate change.
It’s part of a wave of legal actions around the country and world trying to leverage action on climate change through the courts.
Backed by the Trump administration, the companies say the lawsuits wrongly threaten the industry.
The case is expected to be heard in the fall.
Stocks waver on Wall Street after Trump imposes more tariffs
Stocks are treading water on Wall Street after Trump ramped up his newest tariffs, pegging them at 15% on Saturday after saying they would be 10% just the day before. Trump is reacting to the Supreme Court ruling striking down his sweeping taxes on imports from around the world. Trump’s quick shift toward even more aggressive tariffs shows how much uncertainty still hangs over the global economy.
Despite Friday’s ruling, tariffs aren’t going away, and Trump said Monday he expects other countries to abide by trade agreements based on the tariffs that have been overturned.
“Any Country that wants to “play games” with the ridiculous supreme court decision, especially those that have “Ripped Off” the U.S.A. for years, and even decades, will be met with a much higher Tariff, and worse, than that which they just recently agreed to,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
The order to draw down US personnel in Lebanon comes as US pressures Iran
The Islamic Republic of Iran faces both the threat of a U.S. military strike and new protests at home as the United States and Iran prepare to hold their next round of nuclear talks Thursday in Geneva.
Oman’s foreign minister, Badr al-Busaidi, confirmed the talks after Iran’s top diplomat, Abbas Araghchi, told CBS in an interview that he expected to meet U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff in Geneva on Thursday. Araghchi said a “good chance” remained for a diplomatic solution on the nuclear issue.
The Trump administration has built up the largest U.S. military presence in the Middle East in decades as it pushes its longtime adversary for concessions on its nuclear program and more.
Trump warned on Friday that limited strikes against Iran are possible, and both Iran and the U.S. have signaled they are prepared for war if the talks on Tehran’s nuclear program fail.
Judge blocks release of special counsel Smith’s report on Trump classified documents case
A federal judge on Monday permanently barred the release of special counsel Jack Smith’s report on his investigation into Trump’s hoarding of classified documents.
U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon, who was nominated to the bench by Trump, granted a request from the Republican president to keep under wraps the report detailing Smith’s findings in the probe that resulted in criminal charges in 2023.
Cannon, who in 2024 dismissed the case after concluding that Smith was unlawfully appointed, said releasing it would present a “manifest injustice” to Trump and his two co-defendants.
“Special Counsel Smith, acting without lawful authority, obtained an indictment in this action and initiated proceedings that resulted in a final order of dismissal of all charges,” she wrote.
State Department orders nonessential US diplomats to leave Lebanon as tensions with Iran soar
A State Department official says the U.S. has ordered nonessential diplomats and family members to leave Lebanon as tensions over Iran rise with the threat of a potentially imminent military strike.
The official said a continuous assessment of the regional security environment determined it was “prudent” to draw down the U.S. Embassy’s footprint so that only essential personnel remained at their posts.
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the move had not yet been formally announced, said that it is a temporary measure and that the embassy remained operational Monday.
A second department official, also speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss plans that had not been formally announced, said Secretary of State Marco Rubio may delay his intended visits to Israel this weekend.
— By Matthew Lee
Trump’s big speech will be delivered to a changed nation and a Congress he's sidelined
President Trump will stand before Congress on Tuesday to deliver the annual State of the Union address to a transformed nation.
One year back in office, Trump has emerged as a president defying conventional expectations. He’s executed a head-spinning agenda, upending priorities at home, shattering alliances abroad and challenging the nation’s foundational system of checks and balances. Two Americans were killed by federal agents while protesting the Trump administration’s immigration raids and mass deportations.
As the lawmakers sit in the House chamber listening to Trump’s agenda for the year ahead, the moment is an existential one for the Congress, which has essentially become sidelined by his expansive reach, the Republican president bypassing his slim GOP majority to amass enormous power for himself.
Rubio heads to Caribbean to reassert US interests after Venezuela strikes
Secretary of State Marco Rubio travels to the Caribbean island of St. Kitts and Nevis this week to reassert the Trump administration’s interests in the Western Hemisphere just a month after the U.S. military operation that removed former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
With the eyes of much of the world on the U.S military buildup in the Middle East and President Donald Trump’s threats to attack Iran, Rubio will make a one-day visit to St. Kitts on Wednesday to participate in a summit of leaders from the Caribbean Community, the State Department said.
Trump’s action against Maduro coupled with an increasingly aggressive posture aimed at eliminating drug trafficking and illegal migration have proven a concern for many in the region although they’ve also won support from many smaller states.
In numerous group and bilateral meetings, Rubio intends to discuss ways to promote regional security and stability, trade and economic growth.
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