Week 24 — The Return

This is the week it all started to fall apart for Trump. He ended what was a disastrous week for his regime, having to capitulate with a public statement that he did not intend to fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and softening his tone on China. His statements came after Wall Street dubbed a broad sell-off of U.S. stocks, U.S. government debt, and the U.S. dollar the Trump ‘Sell America’ trade. The Dow Jones and S&P 500 were also on track for their worst April since the Great Depression. Not exactly the stuff of making America great again.

This is also the week when the second Trump regime, which from appearances had been functional up until now and simply following the script of Project 2025, became more akin to a reboot of the dysfunction of the first regime. This week’s list is full of examples of the infighting chaos, incompetence, and failures that plagued the first regime. Trump’s incompetent loyalist Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth found himself in the middle of a storm. The regime played Keystone Cops with an “unauthorized” letter to Harvard University. Trump’s IRS saw a continuing revolving door of leadership in the midst of tax season. And Trump’s co-conspirator Elon Musk was basically run out of town as angry Americans (and Europeans and Asians) protested him and stopped buying his cars, resulting in Tesla’s bottom line plummeting by 71% — sending him packing from DOGE, which by all accounts was failing anyway, in an effort to resuscitate his reputation and brand.

This week Trump faced a series of setbacks. I cover them more extensively in my Substack note, Trump’s Really Bad Week, but this was truly a disastrous week for him, including in the courts, the economy, and a growing resistance to his actions and measures. At the same time, he has set up a showdown with the courts, including the Supreme Court, over his regime’s defying of court orders.

Pushback this week intensified and spread, and I want to recognize the effectiveness of protests at Musk’s Tesla showrooms, and the velocity of the real world impact. That should comfort many, that in this vein, our democracy still works! Other pushback came from Harvard University, the Metropolitan Transit Authority, law firms, federal courts and the Supreme Court, citizens showing up at town halls, and more nationwide protests. The rebellion or resistance or whatever this go-round will be dubbed is gathering strength amid the brewing storm.

1. Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski told a crowd of nonprofit leaders, “We are all afraid…we are in a time and a place where I certainly have not been here before. And I’ll tell ya, I’m oftentimes very anxious myself about using my voice, because retaliation is real. And that’s not right.”
2. Bill Owens, the executive producer of CBS’s “60 Minutes,” resigned, citing a series of encroachments by parent company Paramount on journalistic independence. Owens was only the third person to run the show in its 57 years. Trump sued CBS for $10 billion.
3. Owens had overseen editing of the Kamala Harris interview that was the subject of the lawsuit. He told employees “having defended this show — and what we stand for…I am stepping aside.” Legal experts say Trump’s lawsuit is baseless and far-fetched. Paramount hopes to settle.
4. Republicans from red states were met with broad pushback at town halls: Sen. Charles Grassley was booed, jeered at, and asked why they are not standing up to Trump; Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, who made constituents preregister, was heckled and had people forcibly removed.
5. The Judicial Conference said in a letter to Congress that since Trump took office, 67 judges are receiving enhanced online security, and that roughly 50 people have been criminally charged for threats. The group asked for more federal funding to protect judges.
6. Three former presidents — Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Joseph Biden — denounced Trump and sounded the alarm in the span of two weeks. It is highly unusual for a former president, let alone three, to speak out against a sitting president.
7. WAPO reported the National Intelligence Council determined, in a secret assessment, that the Venezuelan government is not directing an invasion of the U.S. by the gang Tren de Aragua, contradicting Trump’s rationale for invoking the Alien Enemies Act.
8. On Wednesday, Judge James Boasberg ruled that there was “probable cause” to find the Trump regime in criminal contempt for violating his order to pause deportations, saying the regime showed “willful disregard” for his order, and had done so “gleefully.”
9. Boasberg cited Secretary of State Marco Rubio retweeting an X post by El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele about Boasberg’s order saying, “Oopsie…Too late.” Boasberg gave the regime until April 23 to “purge their contempt,” else officials would be referred for prosecution.
10. If the Trump regime fails to rectify the violation by giving detainees due process, Boasberg said he would request the DOJ prosecute the responsible individuals. If the DOJ “declines,” Boasberg said “the Court will “appoint another attorney to prosecute the contempt.”
11. On Friday, an appeals court put an administrative stay on Boasberg’s order to give it time to evaluate the validity of his contempt proposal. The DOJ accused Boasberg of overstepping his authority.
12. On Wednesday, in the DOJ’s first daily update for Judge Paula Xinis, the Department of Homeland Security refused to offer any substantive update, instead referring to a previous filing claiming the regime was powerless to remove Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador.
13. On Thursday, an appeals court refused the Trump regime’s request to stop Xinis from probing their efforts to return Abrego Garcia, saying the executive branch and the courts were “grinding irrevocably against one another in a conflict that promises to diminish both.”
14. An appeals judge appointed by Ronald Reagan wrote, “The respect that courts must accord the executive must be reciprocated by the executive’s respect for the courts,” adding, “The executive will lose much from a public perception of its lawlessness.”
15. In the midst of answering questions about Abrego Garcia at a daily briefing, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt brought Patty Morin, the mother of Rachel Morin, who was murdered in 2023, to the podium to describe the incident in gruesome detail. The case is unrelated to Abrego Garcia.
16. On Wednesday, Maryland Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen traveled to El Salvador to check on the condition of Abrego Garcia. He was stopped by Salvadoran military officials, and was unable to visit. Van Hollen said, “This was a very sort of simple humanitarian request.”
17. Van Hollen told reporters on Thursday, the purpose of his trip “was simply to be able to go see if Abrego Garcia is doing OK.” Later, he posted an image of his eventual meeting with Abrego Garcia at a hotel. After, Abrego Garcia was then returned to custody.
18. Van Hollen told reporters that counter to what the Trump regime had claimed about Abrego Garcia, El Salvador’s vice president had told him that there was no evidence he had committed a crime there, and that he was being held because the regime paid them to do it.
19. Trump’s DOJ said in a court filing Abrego Garcia was moved from the notorious CECOT prison to the detention facility Centro Industrial in Santa Ana. This was the regime’s first notification to the court, despite the move happening eight days before he met with Van Hollen.
20. NYT reported that Trump welcomed the fight on Abrego Garcia, believing the issue polls well, but at the same time with his claiming unprecedented power, the case “has come to crystallize the debate about whether Mr. Trump himself is a law-abiding American.”
21. On Tuesday, Trump’s DOJ continued to stonewall Judge Xinis, providing little detail on the regime’s plans to return Abrego Garcia, despite three courts now weighing in on his return. This marked another case in which Trump’s White House resisted court orders.
22. Xinis said in a written order on Tuesday, “Defendants have failed to respond in good faith, and their refusal to do so can only be viewed as willful and intentional noncompliance.” She gave them until Wednesday at 6 p.m. to provide a full response.
23. On Tuesday, a federal judge in Colorado said Venezuelan migrants should be given at least 21 days notice before being deported, and have a lawyer to assist them in the process. She also said the regime’s invoking the Alien Enemies Act was flawed.
24. On Tuesday, a federal judge in New York said he was skeptical whether the regime could remove Venezuelan migrants over their alleged membership in the gang Tren de Aragua. He also castigated Trump’s DOJ for their method of notifying detainees.
25. On Tuesday, Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that undocumented immigrants should not be entitled to trials, insisting that the regime should be able to deport migrants, who he called “very bad people,” without appearing before a judge.
26. On Saturday, in a 1 a.m. ET emergency order, the Supreme Court temporarily blocked the Trump regime from deporting more than 50 Venezuelan migrants accused of being gang members from an Anson, Texas detention center to El Salvador using the Aliens Enemies Act.
27. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented from the unsigned order. The ACLU mounted three separate legal challenges on Friday within five hours to stop the deportations, citing the migrants were not given the opportunity for due process.
28. Venezuelan migrants were informed on Friday that they faced imminent deportation. Some were told to sign a removal waiver in English, even though they only spoke Spanish. Another was accused of being in a gang because of a Facebook photo showing him holding a water pistol.
29. NYT reported the quick speed at which the Supreme Court ruled was highly unusual, indicating their skepticism over whether the regime would abide by their April 7 ruling that detainees were entitled to be notified of deportation with enough time to challenge it.
30. Also unusual was each federal circuit is supervised by a Supreme Court justice, in this case it would have been Alito who could have alone issued an administrative stay. Instead, Chief Justice Roberts issued a ruling by the full court, with Alito’s dissent to follow.
31. Alito issued a sharp dissent late Saturday, castigating the seven member majority, saying the “unprecedented” relief was “hastily and prematurely granted,” and that there was “dubious factual support” for granting the request in an emergency appeal.
32. DHS refused to allow Mahmoud Khalil a furlough from a detention center in Louisiana to attend the birth of his first child, even as his lawyer cited he was not a danger to community or a flight risk. The move was seen as “punitive” by his attorney.
33. WAPO reported that dozens of immigrants who were marked as being in the death database at the Social Security Administration by DHS, in a DOGE effort to get them to leave the country, are showing up at SSA offices to say they are alive, and are being reinstated.
34. NYT reported the Trump’s Justice Department issued guidance for immigration judges to swiftly deny asylum to “legally deficient” cases without holding a hearing, circumventing the normal hearing process.
35. On Wednesday, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem demanded Harvard University submit records of all international students who have engaged in “illegal and violent activities” by April 30, or face losing its certification to admit foreign students.
36. Noem said that hosting international students was a privilege not a guarantee. Harvard enrolls about 10,000 international students, and counts on their full-freight tuition payments.
37. Noem also said DHS was terminating two grant programs awarded to Harvard worth more than $2.7 million, claiming one of the grants as funding “Harvard’s public health propaganda.”
38. On Wednesday, the Trump regime asked the IRS to start the process of revoking Harvard’s tax-exempt status. Experts say the tax code prohibits the president and other senior officials from directly or indirectly requesting certain investigations of particular taxpayers.
39. Late Friday, NYT reported that Trump officials claimed the letter sent to Harvard the previous Friday with a long list of demands that resulted in the university saying they would not cooperate was “unauthorized” and should not have been sent.
40. The regime sought to blame Harvard for not calling to check with regime lawyers after receiving the letter. Harvard responded, saying the letter “was signed by three federal officials, placed on official letterhead, was sent from the email inbox of a senior federal official.”
41. Josh Gruenbaum, a top official at the General Services Administration, called a Harvard lawyer late Friday, and said the letter sent by acting general counsel of DHS Sean Keveney was not authorized by him and Thomas Wheeler, acting general counsel for the Education Department.
42. A lawyer for Columbia University received a similar call from Gruenbaum around the same time, to let the lawyer know that the letter to Harvard was “unauthorized.”
43. On Monday, WSJ reported the Trump regime was irate about the escalating dispute with Harvard, and planned to pull an additional $1 billion in funding for health research.
44. The regime viewed the long list of demands in the Friday letter as a confidential starting point for negotiations, and had planned to treat Harvard more leniently than Columbia. Members of the Trump regime task force had thought Harvard would concede.
45. On Monday, Harvard sued the Trump regime, marking a major escalation. Harvard’s president accused the regime of trying to wield “unprecedented and improper control,” adding the consequences of their actions would be “severe and long lasting.”
46. The lawsuit said the Trump regime’s demands violates the First Amendment, and accused the regime of plowing through timelines and procedures for disputes about civil rights issues. Students and faculty cheered the decision to move forward with the lawsuit.
47. On Tuesday, more than 220 higher education leaders from colleges and universities, including state universities, released a joint statement condemning the Trump regime’s “political interference,” adding its “overreach” is “now endangering higher education in America.”
48. On Wednesday, the law firms Perkins Coie and WilmerHale, in two separate cases, sought to permanently block Trump’s executive orders targeting them.
49. On Thursday, NYT reported that David Eisner, a Treasury official in the Trump regime, asked the IRS in a letter last month to look into whether Mike Lindell, a Trump loyalist and 2020 election denier, was inappropriately targeted for an audit.
50. IRS officials claim they did not act on the letter, but referred it to the agency’s inspector general. The message alarmed agency staffers that Trump would use the agency to protect his friends and allies from normal scrutiny, and punish enemies.
51. On Wednesday, CBS News reported William Pulte, director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, accused New York Attorney General Letitia James of possible mortgage fraud for listing a home in Virginia as her “principal residence” to secure better mortgage terms.
52. Pulte referred the accusation to Attorney General Pam Bondi. James, who previously prosecuted Trump in her state, told local news that the allegations are “baseless,” and called them “nothing more than a revenge tour.”
53. On Thursday, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the Trump regime would take over control of the $7 billion renovation of Pennsylvania Station in New York City, saying the leadership of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority had mismanaged it.
54. On Sunday, congestion pricing for Manhattan drivers remained in effect, despite the Trump regime giving the MTA a March 21 deadline to end it, which was extended by a month to Easter Sunday due to a federal court hearing. An MTA official said congestion pricing is here to stay.
55. On Monday, Sec. Duffy renewed the threat of loss of federal funding and approval for other projects over congestion pricing, giving Gov. Kathy Hochul until May 21 to explain why the department should not take these actions, which would begin May 28.
56. NYT reported that current and former Equal Employment Opportunity Commission members are concerned that Trump is weaponizing the agency to target and retaliate against law firms’ DEI efforts, rather than its traditional role of enforcing civil rights laws.
57. On Wednesday, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said it has been almost a century since the Smoot-Hawley era, and Trump’s tariffs are even higher, but warned Trump’s tariffs could trigger higher inflation and slower growth, the notion of a stagflation shock.
58. On Thursday, Trump posted on Truth Social that Powell is “always TOO LATE AND WRONG,” adding, “Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!” A White House official sought to calm the markets, saying Trump’s post was not a threat but his expressing frustration.
59. Trump later told reporters in the Oval Office, “If I want him out, he’ll be out of there real fast, believe me,” adding, “I’m not happy with him.” Trump falsely claimed interest rates were rising “because we have a Federal Reserve chairman that is playing politics.”
60. WSJ reported Trump has privately discussed firing Powell for months while at Mar-a-Lago. He has spoken with Kevin Warsh, a former Fed governor, who he is considering to replace him, and Warsh is against it. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned the markets would plunge.
61. Bloomberg reported Trump’s National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett told reporters Trump is studying whether removal of Powell is an option, adding his personal preference was to focus on “the policy, rather than the personalities.”
62. On Friday, Volvo announced that it plans to lay off up to 800 workers at three plants in Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania because of concern that Trump’s tariffs will cut into sales. Mack Trucks announced layoffs of 250 to 350 employees at its Lehigh Valley plant, citing Trump’s tariffs.
63. On Monday, Trump attacked Powell again on Truth Social, seeking to place blame on him, posting, “there is virtually No Inflation,” and adding, “But there can be a SLOWING of the economy unless Mr. Too Late, a major loser, lowers interest rates, NOW.”
64. Trump also baselessly claimed that Powell was politically motivated, posting, “when it came to the Election period when he lowered in order to help Sleepy Joe Biden, later Kamala, get elected.”
65. WSJ reported Trump seemed to be laying the groundwork to blame Powell for the unfolding economic downturn, and in doing so, Trump’s effort could also delegitimize the independent institution, undermining its effectiveness.
66. On Monday, Bloomberg reported after Trump’s Fed attacks and Trump’s trade war, the world is pushing to sell off U.S. assets, in what was dubbed the Trump ‘sell America’ trade. The stock market broadly sold off on Monday, as did U.S. treasuries and the U.S. dollar.
67. On Tuesday, WSJ reported the S&P 500’s performance since Inauguration Day is now the worst for any president up to this point in data going back to 1928, as investors sent a ‘no confidence’ signal about Trump’s policies and actions.
68. On Tuesday, after the market close, Trump said he had “no intention” of firing Powell, adding, “none whatsoever,” and claiming he “never did.” The comments marked a major shift, and stock futures rallied.
69. On Wednesday, Rubio shut down the Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference Hub, an office that tracks and counters global disinformation from foreign actors, including the governments of China, Russia and Iran, and put the office’s 40 employees on leave.
70. On Wednesday, former cybersecurity agency chief Chris Krebs said he would leave SentinelOne, his employer which Trump had also targeted with his executive order in Week 23, to fight the order. Krebs said the departure was his choice.
71. Krebs told SentinelOne staffers, “For those who know me, you know I don’t shy away from tough fights,” adding, “It’s a fight for democracy, for freedom of speech, and for the rule of law. I’m prepared to give it everything I’ve got.”
72. On Wednesday, three senior aides to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth — Dan Caldwell, Darin Selnick, and Colin Carroll — all political appointees, were suspended amid a Pentagon investigations into possible leaks of sensitive information. On Friday, they were terminated.
73. On Friday, Politico reported Joe Kasper, Hegseth’s chief of staff, will leave his role in the coming days for a new position in the agency. Kasper requested an investigation into leaks in March, but some at the Pentagon noted a rivalry between Kasper and the three who were fired.
74. On Saturday, the three aides broke their silence in a joint statement posted on X, citing what they called “baseless attacks,” and adding they were “incredibly disappointed by the manner in which our service at the Department of Defense ended.”
75. They added, “we still have not been told what exactly we were investigated for, if there is still an active investigation, or if there was even a real investigation of ‘leaks’ to begin with.” All three served in the U.S. military and understood “the importance of information security.”
76. On Sunday, NYT reported Hegseth set up a Signal group chat called “Defense | Team Huddle,” which included his wife, brother, personal attorney, and about a dozen people in his personal inner circle in January, and shared details of the Yemen attack in that group.
77. The information shared by Hegseth was similar to the group chat reported on by The Atlantic. The second chat included Kasper, and the three senior aides who were terminated. Many in the group were not Pentagon officials or in need of access to detailed military plans.
78. Shortly after, former Defense Department official John Ullyot, who left the department last week, said in an opinion piece that the Pentagon was in “total chaos” and “the building is in disarray under Hegseth’s leadership,” and that Trump should fire him.
79. On Monday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News that Trump “stands strongly behind Pete Hegseth,” but added, “the entire Pentagon” is working against him, and “the monumental change” Hegseth is trying to implement.
80. Hours later, NPR reported the White House has begun the process of looking for a new defense secretary. Leavitt denied the story, posting on X that it was “total FAKE NEWS based on one anonymous source,” and added that Trump “stands strongly behind” Hegseth.
81. Hegseth told reporters at the White House Easter Egg Roll that the Times reporting on the second Signal channel was one of many “hit pieces,” that cited accusations from “disgruntled former employees,” adding he and Trump are “on the same page all the way.”
82. Trump echoed Hegseth, saying concern about the second Signal group was a “waste of time,” saying Hegseth was “doing a great job,” and called the reporting “fake news” from “disgruntled employees.”
83. On Tuesday, Hegseth appeared on his former network, Fox News, and blamed “leakers,” adding, “I don’t have time for the hoax press that peddles old stories from disgruntled employees.” Co-host Brian Kilmeade said, “You know these guys. These are the guys you picked.”
84. NYT reported there is chaos at the Pentagon, including screaming matches in Hegseth’s inner office, a growing mistrust of military and civilian personnel, bureaucratic logjams which have slowed progress on some of Trump’s key priorities, and Hegseth’s inner circle being in disarray.
85. Later Tuesday, NYT reported that the information Hegseth shared in the two Signal chats came from Central Command via a secure government system, designed for sending classified information.
86. On Monday, NPR told its member stations in a memo, “We strongly urge you to communicate and meet with your members of Congress this week,” relating to the Trump regime’s threat to rescind more than $1 billion in federal funding for public broadcasters.
87. A proposed rule by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration would narrow the definition of harm in the Endangered Species Act to exclude habitat destruction, opening the door for more mining, construction, and other activities.
88. The National Endowment for the Humanities terminated a $1.5 million grant meant to be used for digitizing archival records and first-hand accounts of the 150 year period when Native Americans were forced to attend U.S. government run boarding schools.
89. NYT reported at the direction of Musk’s DOGE, 75% of employees at AmeriCorps, an agency created by Congress in 1993 that organizes community service programs which attracted young Americans from diverse backgrounds, received letters putting them on leave.
90. The A.F.L.-C.I.O. along with several other unions and civil rights groups, formed a pro bono legal network of more than 1,000 lawyers in 42 states to help federal employees whose jobs have been lost or threatened under the Trump regime.
91. On Thursday, the Trump regime sent layoff notices to as many as 1,500 of the 1,700 employees at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. A federal judge scheduled a hearing for Friday, where she halted the firings and said the regime may have violated her injunction.
92. On Friday, the White House announced a new category for federal workers, classifying 50,000 civil servants as “at will” in a category known as Schedule F, saying those who “refuse to advance the policy interests of the president” should be removed from their posts.
93. On Monday, WAPO reported watchdog agency the Office of Special Counsel told thousands of probationary federal workers who had filed complaints about their firings that it would not pursue their complaints about firings, saying they have no legal basis.
94. Hampton Dellinger, who had led the agency before Trump fired him, said some probationary firings were probably illegal, noting the Trump regime was “firing probationary employees without individualized cause.”
95. On Tuesday, WAPO reported the Environmental Protection Agency informed more than 450 employees working on environmental justice and DEI that they will be fired or reassigned.
96. On Tuesday, a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction, saying Voice of America staffers can go back to work, saying the regime did not act in a careful or considered way in attempting to shut down the agency.
97. On Thursday, CNBC reported that Target CEO Brian Cornell will meet with civil rights activist Al Sharpton, after the big box retailer’s DEI rollback resulted in calls for a boycott and a slump in foot traffic.
98. On Friday, three days after being appointed acting head of the IRS, Gary Shapley was replaced, after Treasury Secretary Bessent said the choice was made by Elon Musk without his knowledge, and was given approval by Trump to replace Shapley.
99. The move comes in the midst of tax season, and a long list of acting heads for the agency, while Trump’s nominee for the permanent role awaits Senate confirmation. Shapley was pushed through White House channels by Musk.
100. Musk elevated an attack on Bessent from the far-right activist Laura Loomer on his social media platform X late Thursday, in which Loomer accused Bessent of colluding with a “Trump hater.” Musk added, “troubling.”
101. On Friday, a federal appeals court reaffirmed temporary legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants that the Trump regime wanted to immediately deport, rejecting a White House request for emergency relief.
102. On Friday, a federal judge ruled that Tufts student Rumeysa Ozturk be brought to Vermont, where ICE took her after detaining her, by May 1 to face a hearing, denying Trump’s DOJ’s request to keep her in Louisiana, which has the most conservative appeals court in the country.
103. Later Friday, a lawsuit representing foreign students whose visas were canceled sought class action status with a federal court in New Hampshire, seeking to stop detentions and deportation in New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Puerto Rico
104. On Wednesday, the American Association of University Professors asked a federal judge to stop the Trump regime from revoking visas and detaining students and professors, as over 1,000 international students and academics have seen their visas cancelled in recent weeks.
105. NBC News reported Lisa Anderson, a physician from Cromwell, Connecticut, received a letter from DHS saying, “It is time for you to leave the United States.” Anderson was born in Pennsylvania, and is a U.S. citizen.
106. AP reported U.S. citizen Juan Carlos Lopez Gomez, 20, was stopped just past the Georgia state line by the Florida Highway Patrol, citing the state’s new law making it a crime for undocumented migrants to enter the state, and remained in ICE custody for 24 hours.
107. The case drew national attention, as a federal judge had ruled that the Florida law be put on hold. Additionally, ICE is not allowed to take custody of U.S. born citizens. Gomez’s mother produced a state ID card, birth certificate and Social Security card, and charges were dropped.
108. On Monday, WAPO reported DOGE was allowed access to the Executive Office for Immigration Review’s Courts and Appeals System immigration data, which includes addresses and case histories of millions of legal and undocumented immigrants.
109. On Friday, Rubio said the U.S. was ready to “move on” from peace talks between Ukraine and Russia if there was no progress in the coming days. It was unclear what move on meant. Trump, while campaigning, had promised to end the war within 24 hours.
110. On Sunday, NYT reported a 16 page draft executive order relating to the State Department would eliminate nearly all of its African operations, and would cut State headquarter offices that deal with climate change and refugee issues, as well as democracy and human rights concerns.
111. The Trump regime denied the Times reporting, with Rubio posting on X, “This is fake news. The @nytimes falls victim to another hoax.”
112. On Tuesday, Rubio announced an overhaul of the State Department, which would shutter an office whose goal is to build “more democratic, secure, stable, and just societies,” citing it was run by “rogue liberal bureaucrats.” Critics called the overhaul a blow to U.S. values.
113. On Saturday, tens of thousands rallied at more than 700 protests nationwide to condemn Trump’s policies, a sign of sustained resistance following similar protests two weeks prior. In front of the White House, protestors yelled “Shame!” and “Bring Kilmar home!
114. The protestors spoke out on multiple issues, including deportation, DOGE, federal job cuts, their 401(k)s, veterans’ rights, Social Security, the war in Ukraine, transgender and gay rights, and misinformation on autism and vaccines.
115. Thousands of protestors also showed up at an event in Massachusetts commemorating the start of the American Revolutionary War 250 years ago, with many holding signs comparing “tyranny” then and now. Protestors also continued to show up at Tesla showrooms.
116. On Easter Sunday, Vice President JD Vance met briefly with Pope Francis in Rome. In a message read to the crowd, Pope Francis said, “How much contempt is stirred up at times towards the vulnerable, the marginalized, and migrants!” The Pope passed away on Monday.
117. Trump wished a Happy Easter on Truth Social to “the Radical Left Lunatics who are fighting and scheming so hard to bring Murderers, Drug Lords, Dangerous Prisoners, the Mentally Insane, and well known MS-13 Gang Members and Wife Beaters, back into our Country.”
118. Trump also offered a Happy Easter to “the WEAK and INEFFECTIVE Judges and Law Enforcement Officials,” attacked “Sleepy Joe Biden” who “purposefully allowed Millions of CRIMINALS to enter our Country,” and called out “people who CHEATED” to get Biden elected.
119. CNBC reported that Trump inauguration committee raised $239 million, more than double his $107 million in the first regime. Donors included corporations and their chief executives, special interest groups, members of his cabinet, and people who were given ambassador roles.
120. Trump Media, in which Trump still owns 53% of the stock, entered a deal with a crypto trading platform to market investment products, including crypto, to retail investors. The deal comes at a time when Trump’s regime is involved with regulating crypto.
121. On Sunday, Tesla bull analyst Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities called the situation at Tesla a “code red,” saying, “Musk needs to leave the government,” citing “the brand damage Musk has inflicted” with car buyers in the U.S., Europe, and Asia markets.
122. On Tuesday, Musk’s Tesla reported a 20% fall in automotive sales for the quarter over the prior year, and a 71% fall in profits. Amid the backlash to Musk and his role in DOGE, and his tarnished brand, Musk said his time in Washington DC will drop ‘significantly” in the next month.
123. On Wednesday, a Reuter/Ipsos poll found Americans souring on Trump’s handling of the economy, with just 37% approving. Americans were concerned about a recession, that stock market falling due to tariffs, and Trump’s threats to fire the Fed chair.
124. Reuters also reported a large increase in the number of Canadian ‘snowbirds,’ who are seeking to sell their homes and apartments in Florida and Arizona, citing their country’s strained relations with Trump. Canadian travel to the U.S. has also sharply dropped.