The Justice Department charged Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-N.J.) over a scuffle with law enforcement outside an ICE facility in New Jersey last week.

Why it matters: McIver is the first federal officeholder targeted by the the Trump administration as they aggressively prosecute politicians who open themselves up to legal liability while opposing the president's mass deportations.

• McIver has strongly denied assaulting law enforcement during the clash, saying she was the one who was assaulted. In a Monday statement, she called the charges against her "purely political" and said they are "meant to criminalize and deter legislative oversight."
• The Department of Homeland Security has pointed to body camera footage of what they say is McIver elbowing an ICE agent during the arrest of Newark Mayor Ras Baraka.

What's happening: Alina Habba, U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey announced on X charges against McIver of assaulting, impeding, and interfering with law enforcement, but dismissed a trespassing charge against Baraka.

Catch up quick: McIver, Baraka and Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) and Rob Menendez (D-N.J.) were at the Delany Hall detention center in Newark earlier this month to protest its use as a migrant holding facility.

• The lawmakers argued that they were there to conduct legitimate oversight based on accusations that GEO Group, the private prison company operating the facility, lacked the proper permitting.
• In addition to Baraka and McIver, the FBI also arrested a Wisconsin judge last month for allegedly helping an undocumented defendant avoid arrest by ICE agents. She was indicted and pleaded not guilty this week.

What to watch: House Republicans have floated additional repercussions for the three lawmakers, with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) accusing them of "wildly inappropriate behavior."

• "I think it's pretty clear that the law was violated," the speaker said at a press conference earlier this month, floating censure, removal from committees and expulsion as possible punishments.
• He acknowledged the two-thirds threshold for an expulsion vote would be a difficult hurdle to clear given Democrats' unity around defending their colleagues.
• Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) has introduced a resolution to remove the trio from their committees.

Editor's note: This is a breaking news story. Check back for updates.

The Trump administration's first charter flight for dozens of "self-deporting" immigrants took off from Houston early Monday, part of a new program offering them a free trip back home and $1,000 — or else.

Why it matters: The self-deportation flights are one of the few incentives for unauthorized immigrants to present themselves to authorities under President Trump's immigration crackdown, which is long on sticks and short on carrots.

• The self-deportation program was announced in March. Since then, the administration has paid for tickets for some people to return to their home countries on commercial airliners.
• For those who are unauthorized and either don't turn themselves in or don't agree to self-deport, the alternative is being detained by immigration officials and held — possibly for months — in overcrowded facilities.

Zoom in: Monday's flight left Houston about 9:30 a.m. and took 65 people from Honduras and Colombia to their respective home countries, according to a Department of Homeland Security official.

• To participate in the program, the immigrants logged into the CBP Home App and requested to be voluntarily flown home in return for the free trip and $1,000 after they land, the Homeland Security official said.

Zoom out: The program is a small part of fulfilling Trump's campaign-trail promise for mass deportations after a historic number of migrants were allowed into the U.S. under his predecessor, Joe Biden.

• The administration is aggressively using the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 and the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1958, with mixed results.
• The State Department is using AI to monitor social media accounts of foreign students for alleged "pro-Hamas" sympathies, as Axios first reported.
• And officials are weighing plans to ban some colleges from accepting foreign students if the officials decide the schools have been too soft on immigrant students viewed as supporters of Hamas and other terror groups, as Axios also first reported.
• The number of deportations of people living in the U.S. is increasing under Trump, but his administration is still lagging behind the Biden administration's for total removal numbers compared to this time last year, according to an analysis of government data.

What they're saying: "In principle, [self-deporting] could be a very good option for people," said Michelle Brané, former executive director of the Biden administration's Family Reunification Task Force.

• But there's a big caveat, she said. The Trump administration's "shock and awe" campaign of immigration enforcement has been effective at scaring people — to the point it may prevent people from using the government-run CBP Home app.
• "If people are not being coerced, are fully informed and if it actually is a safe option that preserves people's rights," Brané said, "it could be a successful program."

But the administration hasn't detailed how and when self-deporters could be able to return to the U.S., and critics are skeptical.

• "It's a scam because most people won't be allowed back into the U.S.," said Kerri Talbot, executive director of Immigration Hub, an advocacy group.
• "They don't have the power to change those laws, and those are statutes that will block people from being able to come back."

Monday's self-deportation flight was far less controversial than the administration's first effort to use the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelans alleged to be Tren de Aragua gang members. They were sent to a notorious lockup in El Salvador two months ago.

• A judge ordered the jets to turn around mid-fight but the administration refused, saying the judge's jurisdiction didn't extend to international waters.
• The Supreme Court on Friday temporarily blocked the administration from using the law to deport more Venezuelans to the El Salvador prison.
• The administration also is resisting a court order to facilitate the release of Salvadoran national Kilmar Abrego Garcia from that same prison, after his accidental deportation.
• Other court fights involve the deportations of pro-Palestinian demonstrators Mahmoud Khalil, Moshen Madawi, and Rumeysa Ozturk. Only the former remains incarcerated.

The intrigue: Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have stressed that leaving the country voluntarily could eventually lead to a pathway to return to the U.S. legally.

• Trump has said he wanted to create a system for "great" people to leave and legally return to the U.S.
• That message also has been part of a multimillion-dollar ad campaign by Noem.
• "If you are here illegally, use the CBP Home App to take control of your departure and receive financial support to return home," Noem said in a statement to Axios. "If you don't, you will be subjected to fines, arrest, deportation and will never allowed to return. ... Self-deport NOW and preserve your opportunity to potentially return the legal, right way."

• Ray Dalio said on X that Moody's credit downgrade doesn't cover the risks of government money printing.
• Moody's downgraded US credit to Aa1, citing growing deficits and ballooning interest payments.
• A GOP tax bill could worsen US debts, with proposed tax breaks and increased defense spending.

Billionaire investor Ray Dalio thinks Moody's recent downgrade of the US sovereign credit rating doesn't capture the danger of the federal government simply printing cash to cover its bills.

"You should know that credit ratings understate credit risks because they only rate the risk of the government not paying its debt," Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, warned said on X. "They don't include the greater risk that the countries in debt will print money to pay their debts thus causing holders of the bonds to suffer losses from the decreased value of the money they're getting."

"For those who care about the value of their money, the risks for US government debt are greater than the rating agencies are conveying," Dalio added.

Dalio's comments came after Moody's, the international financial services company, downgraded the US credit from Aaa to Aa1 on Friday, citing growing deficits and surging interest payments. That makes Moody's the last of the three major credit agencies to bump America's credit off the highest rating. S&P Global Ratings downgraded the US back in 2011, and Fitch Ratings followed suit in 2023.

In response to the downgrade, stocks slipped on Monday while Treasury yields spiked. The 30-year bond yield jumped 4.995%, and the 10-year bond yield rose to 4.521%.

Adding to investor concerns, economists are sounding the alarm on a tax cut bill proposed by Republicans that could come to pass given the slim GOP majorities in both the House and the Senate.

The bill proposes tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans through a higher estate tax exemption, interest tax breaks for private equity, and a $150 billion boost in defense spending. It also plans to increase the child tax credit by $500 and eliminate taxes on tips and overtime pay.

Despite the bill also proposing spending cuts to Medicaid and SNAP and to hike taxes for immigrants, the Budget Lab at Yale, a nonpartisan policy research center, says that the GOP bill would worsen America's debt.

"The bill as currently proposed would substantially add to the deficit, even if accounting for possible tariff revenue," authors of the report wrote, "If we account for the likelihood that these provisions would become permanent, at the end of 30 years the debt-to-GDP ratio would be over 180%, even assuming substantial revenue from tariffs."

According to the report, Sudan and Japan are the only two countries with a debt-to-GDP ratio over 180%.

"Assuming temporary provisions expire, the bill's baseline cost of $3.4 trillion would make it the largest spending package in US history," the report added.

In a rare Sunday night vote on May 18, the GOP tax cut bill narrowly passed the House Budget Committee, which days before rejected the bill. The bill now heads to the House for a vote this week.

A spokesperson for Dalio did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

• OpenAI says it has struggled to raise funds due to its nonprofit structure.
• The company just revealed its fundraising challenges in a letter to California's attorney general.
• OpenAI plans to restructure as a Public Benefit Corporation to attract investors.

OpenAI is one of the most well-funded startups in history, raising a massive $40 billion round led by SoftBank earlier this year.

But many investors have passed on the startup because it's controlled by a nonprofit and is unable to offer "easy-to-understand" equity, the AI giant revealed in a recent letter to California's attorney general.

"Many potential investors in OpenAI's recent funding rounds declined to invest," the May 15 letter reads.

"OpenAI's recent attempts at securing funding have demonstrated the challenges posed by the organization's existing structure," it adds.

OpenAI didn't respond to a request for comment. The letter was first reported on by the AI publication Obsolete. OpenAI submitted the May 15 letter in response to an April 9 petition from a coalition of nonprofits and other organizations that urged the California attorney general to block OpenAI's for-profit conversion plans. Business Insider obtained the letter from LatinoProsperity, one of the nonprofits leading the coalition.

Startups are typically highly reluctant to acknowledge fundraising challenges, so it's an unusual disclosure.

But OpenAI, which was last valued at $300 billion, isn't a typical startup: it was founded as a nonprofit and remains controlled by its board, creating a big fundraising hurdle.

In the letter, OpenAI says it was only "able to secure" investments by promising to change its structure. Indeed, a big chunk of its massive SoftBank round was conditioned on just that.

OpenAI is now trying to restructure its for-profit arm as a Public Benefit Corporation, similar to competitors like Anthropic. It has given up on plans to free itself from its nonprofit's control.

The May 15 letter also shows that OpenAI is worried about competitors who are "far better funded, conventional for-profit businesses."

Google, Meta, and other tech giants have pledged capital expenditures of over $300 billion in AI investments in 2025 alone. OpenAI mentioned such investments as "threats" to its mission, which risks that artificial general intelligence, or AGI, will be consolidated in the hands of a few powerful entities.

If OpenAI can't raise more money to compete with them, then its ability to ensure safe AGI will be "compromised," the letter states.

Orson Aguilar, the founding president of LatinoProsperity, remains skeptical of OpenAI's plans.

"OpenAI's response comes only after they reversed course on their for-profit plans, but they haven't offered anything new," he told Business Insider.

"The core questions remain: What is the true value of their charitable assets? Who are they accountable to? And how can a nonprofit claim independence when it's clearly entangled with corporate interests?"

Investors reacted swiftly Monday morning to the U.S. losing its last triple-A credit rating, briefing sending the yield on 30-year Treasuries above 5%.

Why it matters: Credit rating downgrades — like Moody's decision Friday to slash the U.S. government to Aa1 — mean the borrower is now viewed as a riskier bet.

• U.S. Treasuries are still widely regarded as a dependable place to park cash, but long-term bond yields Monday nonetheless touched their highest level since November 2023, and last seen before that in 2007.

Zoom out: U.S. debt is now deemed by Moody's to be a risker proposition for investors than debt issued by a dozen countries.

• Those better bets are Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, Sweden and Switzerland.

What they're saying: "Globally, the downgrade may dent confidence in U.S. Treasuries, traditionally perceived as a safe-haven asset due to the U.S. dollar's status as the global reserve currency," Wells Fargo Investment Institute analysts wrote today in a special report.

• "While demand for Treasuries is likely to remain strong, in our view, reduced foreign appetite — already evident following President Donald Trump's tariff announcements — could exacerbate fiscal pressures," they wrote.

Yes, but: Most buyers of Treasury bonds aren't doing so based on credit rating firms' assessment, however, Axios' Neil Irwin notes.

Reality check: The U.S. had already lost its perfect rating from S&P in 2011 and from Fitch in 2023.

• Some, like Morningstar chief U.S. market strategist Dave Sekera, characterized Friday's Moody's downgrade as largely symbolic, with the issues that led to the downgrade "long in coming, well known, and priced into" the U.S. Treasury market.

The impact: The morning's bond selloff tapered off by the afternoon, with yields on 30-year Treasures settling at 4.91%.

• Stocks finished the day largely in the green, with the S&P 500, Nasdaq and Dow Jones indexes all closing Monday with small gains.

The big picture: For investors today the downgrade "reinforces that [U.S.] fiscal strain is no longer a distant concern," writes Tom Kozlik, head of public policy and municipal strategy at Hilltop Securities.

• "It is unfolding in real time, with significant implications for investor sentiment and policy discussions."