
Supreme Court rejects toy company's push for a quick decision on Trump's tariffs
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Friday rejected an appeal from an Illinois toy company pushing for a quick decision on the legality of President Donald Trump's tariffs.
Learning Resources Inc. had asked the justices to take up the case soon, rather than let it continue to play out in lower courts. The company argues the tariffs and uncertainty are having a 'massive impact' on businesses around the country and the issue needs swift attention from the nation's highest court.
The justices didn't explain their reasoning in the brief order rebuffing the appeal, but the Supreme Court is typically reluctant to take up cases before lower courts have decided.
The company argues that the Republican president illegally imposed tariffs under an emergency powers law, bypassing Congress. It won an early victory in a lower court, but the order is on hold as an appeals court considers a similar ruling putting a broader block on Trump's tariffs. The appeals court has allowed Trump to continue collecting tariffs under the emergency powers law ahead of arguments set for late July.
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Columnist Jen Zoratti looks at what's next in arts, life and pop culture.
The Trump administration has defended the tariffs by arguing that the emergency powers law gives the president the authority to regulate imports during national emergencies and that the country's longtime trade deficit qualifies as a national emergency.
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Globe and Mail
36 minutes ago
- Globe and Mail
U.S. judge blocks National Science Foundation from slashing universities' federal funding
A federal judge on Friday prevented the National Science Foundation from sharply cutting research funding provided to universities in the latest legal setback to efforts by U.S. President Donald Trump's administration to slash government support of research at major academic institutions. U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston invalidated a policy NSF adopted in May that limited the ability of universities to be reimbursed for administrative and facility costs that indirectly support grant-funded research, ruling that it was 'arbitrary and capricious.' Spokespeople for NSF and the White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the ruling. NSF, a US$9 billion agency that funds scientific research, adopted the policy after having already canceled hundreds of grants out of step with the Republican president's priorities. His administration has also been freezing billions of dollars in government funding for numerous universities, including Harvard. NSF's policy, which was announced on May 2, set a cap on how much grant funding could go to cover indirect costs. NSF said funding for such costs could equal no more than 15% of the funding for direct research costs, regardless of what the costs actually were at universities. Historically, universities had negotiated with NSF and other agencies over the rate at which indirect costs could be reimbursed. The cap meant that for every $100 in funding going directly to a research grant award, universities would receive just $15 to cover overhead, such as the costs of maintaining lab space and paying for electricity and staff. The Trump administration said it sought through the policy to rein in spending on administrative overhead, which had grown to consume US$1.07 billion of NSF's annual US$4.22 billion grant-making budget for higher education institutions. That rate, though, is significantly lower than the indirect cost that many of the 69 research universities belonging to Association of American Universities had negotiated, which was often in the 50 per cent to 65 per cent range, the group's lawyers said. Talwani, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, said in her Friday decision that the administration's 15 per cent rate was unlawful. The association along with two other academic trade groups and 13 schools sued in May to block the policy, after earlier convincing judges in Boston to block similar funding cuts at the National Institutes of Health and U.S. Department of Energy. The association did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Friday decision. Among the schools that challenged NSF's funding cuts were the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton University, Brown University, the University of California, Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University, the University of Michigan and the University of Pennsylvania. They argued that NSF's action, if allowed to stand, 'will badly undermine scientific research at America's universities and erode our nation's enviable status as a global leader in scientific research and innovation.' The U.S. Department of Defense has since also adopted a 15 per cent cap, which a judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked pending a hearing on July 2. He did so a day after a different judge in Boston ordered NIH to reinstate hundreds of grants for research on diversity-related topics nixed as part of the administration's purge of initiatives viewed as supporting 'diversity, equity and inclusion.'


Winnipeg Free Press
42 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Vance blames California Dems for violent immigration protests and calls Sen. Alex Padilla ‘Jose'
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Vice President JD Vance on Friday accused California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass of encouraging violent immigration protests as he used his appearance in Los Angeles to rebut criticism from state and local officials that the Trump administration fueled the unrest by sending in federal officers. Vance also referred to U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, the state's first Latino senator, as 'Jose Padilla,' a week after the Democrat was forcibly taken to the ground by officers and handcuffed after speaking out during a Los Angeles news conference by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on immigration raids. 'I was hoping Jose Padilla would be here to ask a question,' Vance said, in an apparent reference to the altercation at Noem's event. 'I guess he decided not to show up because there wasn't a theater. And that's all it is.' 'They want to be able to go back to their far-left groups and to say, 'Look, me, I stood up against border enforcement. I stood up against Donald Trump,'' Vance added. A spokesperson for Padilla, Tess Oswald, noted in a social media post that Padilla and Vance were formerly colleagues in the Senate and said that Vance should know better. 'He should be more focused on demilitarizing our city than taking cheap shots,' Oswald said. Vance's visit to Los Angeles to tour a multiagency Federal Joint Operations Center and a mobile command center came as demonstrations calmed down in the city and a curfew was lifted this week. That followed over a week of sometimes-violent clashes between protesters and police and outbreaks of vandalism and looting that followed immigration raids across Southern California. Trump's dispatching of his top emissary to Los Angeles at a time of turmoil surrounding the Israel-Iran war and the U.S.'s future role in it signals the political importance Trump places on his hard-line immigration policies. Vance echoed the president's harsh rhetoric toward California Democrats as he sought to blame them for the protests in the city. 'Gavin Newsom and Karen Bass, by treating the city as a sanctuary city, have basically said that this is open season on federal law enforcement,' Vance said after he toured federal immigration enforcement offices. 'What happened here was a tragedy,' Vance added. 'You had people who were doing the simple job of enforcing the law and they had rioters egged on by the governor and the mayor, making it harder for them to do their job. That is disgraceful. And it is why the president has responded so forcefully.' Newsom's spokesperson Izzy Gardon said in a statement, 'The Vice President's claim is categorically false. The governor has consistently condemned violence and has made his stance clear.' In a statement on X, Newsom responded to Vance's reference to 'Jose Padilla,' saying the comment was no accident. Jose Padilla also is the name of a convicted al-Qaida terrorism plotter during President George W. Bush's administration, who was sentenced to two decades in prison. Padilla was arrested in 2002 at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport during the tense months after the 9/11 attacks and accused of the 'dirty bomb' mission. It later emerged through U.S. interrogation of other al-Qaida suspects that the 'mission' was only a sketchy idea, and those claims never surfaced in the South Florida terrorism case. Responding to the outrage, Taylor Van Kirk, a spokesperson for Vance, said of the vice president: 'He must have mixed up two people who have broken the law.' Federal immigration authorities have been ramping up arrests across the country to fulfill Trump's promise of mass deportations. Todd Lyons, the head of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, has defended his tactics against criticism that authorities are being too heavy-handed. The friction in Los Angeles began June 6, when federal agents conducted a series of immigration sweeps in the region that have continued since. Amid the protests and over the objections of state and local officials, Trump ordered the deployment of roughly 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines to the second-largest U.S. city, home to 3.8 million people. Trump has said that without the military's involvement, Los Angeles 'would be a crime scene like we haven't seen in years.' Newsom has depicted the military intervention as the onset of a much broader effort by Trump to overturn political and cultural norms at the heart of the nation's democracy. Earlier Friday, Newsom urged Vance to visit victims of the deadly January wildfires while in Southern California and talk with Trump, who earlier this week suggested his feud with the governor might influence his consideration of $40 billion in federal wildfire aid for California. 'I hope we get that back on track,' Newsom wrote on X. 'We are counting on you, Mr. Vice President.' Vance did not mention either request during his appearance on Friday. ___ Associated Press writers Julie Watson and Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles and Tran Nguyen in Sacramento contributed to this report.


Winnipeg Free Press
an hour ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
How Trump has targeted Harvard's international students – and what the latest court ruling means
President Donald Trump and his administration have tried several tactics to block Harvard University's enrollment of international students, part of the White House's effort to secure policy changes at the private, Ivy League college. Targeting foreign students has become the administration's cornerstone effort to crack down on the nation's oldest and wealthiest college. The block on international enrollment, which accounts for a quarter of Harvard's students and much of its global allure, strikes at the core of Harvard's identity. Courts have stopped some of the government's actions, at least for now — but not all. In the latest court order, a federal judge on Friday put one of those efforts on hold until a lawsuit is resolved. But the fate of Harvard's international students — and its broader standoff with the Trump administration — remain in limbo. Here are all the ways the Trump administration has moved to block Harvard's foreign enrollment — and where each effort stands. Homeland Security tries to revoke Harvard's certification to host foreign students In May, the Trump administration tried to ban foreign students at Harvard, citing the Department of Homeland Security's authority to oversee which colleges are part of the Student Exchange and Visitor Program. The program allows colleges to issue documents that foreign students need to study in the United States. Harvard filed a lawsuit, arguing the administration violated the government's own regulations for withdrawing a school's certification. Within hours, U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs in Boston put the administration's ban on hold temporarily — an order that had an expiration date. On Friday, she issued a preliminary injunction, blocking Homeland Security's move until the case is decided. That could take months or longer. The government can and does remove colleges from the Student Exchange and Visitor Program, making them ineligible to host foreign students on their campus. However, it's usually for administrative reasons outlined in law, such as failing to maintain accreditation, lacking proper facilities for classes, failing to employ qualified professional personnel — even failing to 'operate as a bona fide institution of learning.' Other colleges are removed when they close. Notably, Burroughs' order Friday said the federal government still has authority to review Harvard's ability to host international students through normal processes outlined in law. After Burroughs' emergency block in May, DHS issued a more typical 'Notice of Intent to Withdraw' Harvard's participation in the international student visa program. 'Today's order does not affect the DHS's ongoing administrative review,' Harvard said Friday in a message to its international students. 'Harvard is fully committed to compliance with the applicable F-1 (student visa) regulations and strongly opposes any effort to withdraw the University's certification.' Trump has sought to ban U.S. entry for incoming Harvard students Earlier this month, Trump himself moved to block entry to the United States for incoming Harvard students, issuing a proclamation that invoked a different legal authority. Harvard filed a court challenge attacking Trump's legal justification for the action — a federal law allowing him to block a 'class of aliens' deemed detrimental to the nation's interests. Targeting only those who are coming to the U.S. to study at Harvard doesn't qualify as a 'class of aliens,' Harvard said in its filing. Harvard's lawyers asked the court to block the action. Burroughs agreed to pause the entry ban temporarily, without giving an expiration date. She has not yet ruled on Harvard's request for another preliminary injunction, which would pause the ban until the court case is decided. 'We expect the judge to issue a more enduring decision in the coming days,' Harvard told international students Friday. At the center of Trump's pressure campaign against Harvard are his assertions that the school has tolerated anti-Jewish harassment, especially during pro-Palestinian protests. In seeking to keep Harvard students from coming to the U.S., he said Harvard is not a suitable destination. Harvard President Alan Garber has said the university has made changes to combat antisemitism and will not submit to the administration's demands for further changes. The administration has stepped up scrutiny of Harvard scholars' and students' visas In late May, Secretary of State Marco Rubio directed U.S. embassies and consulates to start reviewing social media accounts of visa applicants who plan to attend, work at or visit Harvard University for any signs of antisemitism. On Wednesday, the State Department said it was launching new vetting of social media accounts for foreigners applying for student visas, and not just those seeking to attend Harvard. Consular officers will be on the lookout for posts and messages that could be deemed hostile to the United States, its government, culture, institutions or founding principles, the department said, telling visa applicants to set their social media accounts to 'public.' In reopening the visa process, the State Department also told consulates to prioritize students hoping to enroll at colleges where foreigners make up less than 15% of the student body, a U.S. official familiar with the matter said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to detail information that has not been made public. Foreign students make up more than 15% of the total student body at almost 200 U.S. universities — including Harvard and the other Ivy League schools, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal education data from 2023. Most are private universities, including all eight Ivy League schools. Some Harvard students are also caught up in the government's recent ban against travel to the U.S. by citizens of 12 nations, mostly in Africa and the Middle East. The Trump administration last weekend called for 36 additional countries to commit to improving vetting of travelers or face a ban on their citizens visiting the United States. International students make up half the students at some Harvard programs Harvard sponsors more than 7,000 people on a combination of F-1 and J-1 visas, which are issued to students and to foreigners visiting the U.S. on exchange programs such as fellowships. Across all the schools that make up the university, about 26% of the student body is from outside the U.S. But some schools and programs, by nature of their subject matter, have significantly more international students. At the Harvard Kennedy School, which covers public policy and public administration, 49% of students are on F-1 visas. In the business school, one-third of students come from abroad. And within the law school, 94% of the students in the master's program in comparative law are international students. The administration has imposed a range of sanctions on Harvard since it rejected the government's demands for policy reforms related to campus protests, admissions, hiring and more. Conservatives say the demands are merited, decrying Harvard as a hotbed of liberalism and antisemitism. Harvard says the administration is illegally retaliating against the university. ____ The Associated Press' education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find the AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at