Why it matters: Wednesday's surprise decision threw the rules of global commerce into chaos, adding urgency into the appeals process.
The administration filed a notice of appeal just minutes after the ruling.
Driving the news: Leavitt called Wednesday's decision "judicial overreach" during a press briefing Thursday, saying, "The courts should have no role here."
"There is a troubling and dangerous trend of unelected judges inserting themselves into the presidential decision making process," she said. "America cannot function if President Trump, or any other president for that matter, has their sensitive diplomatic or trade negotiations railroaded by activist judges."
She added, "But ultimately, the Supreme Court must put an end to this for the sake of our Constitution."
Context: The three-judge panel — made of Reagan, Obama and Trump appointees — blocked almost all of Trump's levies to date with their summary judgment that threw out the tariffs he imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA.
The 1977 law — which can be invoked only when the U.S. faces an "unusual and extraordinary threat" to national security, foreign policy, or the economy — had never been used to impose tariffs.
Those tariffs were a cornerstone of the Trump administration's fiscal plan, which has now been cast into even more uncertainty.
The ruling does not affect tariffs imposed under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 or Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974.
The big picture: DOGE-driven cuts wreaked havoc on federal workers, prompting a litany of lawsuits seeking to rein in Musk's chainsaw. As the billionaire departs, judges across the country could still unravel key parts of the effort for which he became the face.
Musk, who arrived in D.C. as a political outsider with unprecedented power, will depart the capital with his boasts of government savings contested, his favorability ratings deflated and his brands battered, Axios' Zachary Basu writes.
How history remembers his turbulent tenure could in part be determined by the courts.
The White House did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment.
Driving the news: Ongoing legal battles over record transparency, firings at the U.S. Institute of Peace and various federal agencies, budget cuts to the National Endowment for the Humanities, and access to sensitive personal information — among others — could hobble DOGE's reach long after Musk's departure.
The latest: On Tuesday, a federal judge allowed a lawsuit filed by more than a dozen Democratic state attorneys general accusing Musk and DOGE of illegally exerting power over government operations to move forward.
The states alleged Musk holds "virtually unchecked power" over the executive branch.
As he closes the door on his time at DOGE, the remnants of that power remain — though not everything went to plan during Musk's roughly four-month tenure.
By the numbers: Musk started with an audacious goal to find $2 trillion in savings through DOGE, which was originally set to sunset July 4, 2026.
According to the most recent update to DOGE's website, the cost-cutting initiative claims only $175 billion in savings — though it's backtracked on its claims in the past.
That estimate includes workforce reductions, which have seen more than 120,000 federal employees laid off or targeted for layoffs, per CNN's count. Those cuts have rocked D.C.'s economy and massively stressed the bureaucracy.
Catch up quick: Musk on Wednesday thanked President Trump for "the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending" as his time as a special government employee comes to its end.
The mission of DOGE, he wrote, "will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government."
What we're watching: The White House plans to send a $9.4 billion rescissions package to Congress next week, an administration official told Axios' Hans Nichols, to give lawmakers the chance to codify some of the cuts identified by DOGE.
Republicans in Congress could then help fortify DOGE's legacy of spending cuts.
But Musk's malleable legacy, at least in part, is in the court's hands.
Steve Madden has gone viral for his recent, no-holds-barred interview on "The Cutting Room Floor" podcast — and in the days following, the footwear company's stock price has also gotten a bump.
Why it matters: Long-form interviews can be a risky public relations move, but when done right, they can attract new customers and generate business.
Catch up quick: Madden sat down with fashion podcaster Recho Omondi to discuss the shoe empire he founded, his time in prison for securities fraud, his penchant for "dupes," the impact President Trump's trade policies could have on the fashion industry and more.
Between the lines: For most executives, many of the topics Madden covered would be off-limits. However, Madden's unfiltered approach paid off by spotlighting his personal brand and offering insight into how the business runs.
The interview is "a case study in how brands should just be themselves," Omondi said in a TikTok video. "They should just own everything, flaws and all, all their blemishes. So often, brands are so scared. You can't have a single real conversation with anybody from their brand."
She called the Madden interview "refreshing" and an example of how important it is for brands to have personalities.
Yes, but: The interview, which is behind a paywalled Patreon account, had a chance to go viral because Omondi offers video clips she posts across social.
The interview clips have garnered about 24.6 million views on TikTok and thousands of views on YouTube as of Tuesday, with Gen Z podcast listeners flocking to watch them.
A recent Edison Research report found 76% of Gen Z listeners say they discover podcasts through clips on social media.
More than 600 media stories have been written about Steve Madden since the interview first dropped on May 21, per Muck Rack data, which likely caught the attention of an even broader consumer base.
The big picture: Podcasts havebecome a preferred channel for executives and politicians to reach and appeal to specific audiences.
What they're saying: "Steve Madden's interview shows how podcasts have become the proving ground for public figures," says Andrew Vontz, founder ofOne Real Voice, a podcast coaching consultancy.
"Talking-point robots are headed for the scrapyard. Madden clearly thought deeply about these topics and didn't duck and cover — he owned his story, and that's exactly what broke through."
Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) on Thursday formally launched his bid to become ranking member of the House Oversight Committee.
Why it matters: The 47-year-old Democratic leadership member is likely to be pitted against a pair of septuagenarian colleagues with more seniority, making this a proxy battle in Democrats' ongoing generational war.
The role came vacant last week with the passing of Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) at 75. Connolly beat out 35-year-old Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) last year for the position.
Reps. Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.), 70, and Kweisi Mfume (D-Md.), 77, have both expressed interest in succeeding Connolly, as has Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas), 44.
What they're saying: In a three-page "dear colleague" letter announcing his candidacy, Garcia wrote that Democrats need to "organize" and "fight back" against the Trump administration.
"I'm ready to help lead that fight ... [and] to ensure we hold those in power accountable and protect democracy for the next generation," he said.
Garcia cited his tenure as mayor of Long Beach, in which he "used audits and data to drive reform, launched new technology to make city services more accessible, and modernized how City Hall operates."
The intrigue: Democrats have struggled to hold down a House Oversight Committee leader, having churned through four in the last six years.
Two, Connolly and Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), died in office.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) lost her primary in 2022, while Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) jumped over to lead the Judiciary Committee last year.
Lynch currently serves as the acting ranking member. He is second in seniority on the panel after Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), 87.
What's next: House Democratic caucus chair Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.) plans to schedule a vote for the position June 24, according to guidance he sent to colleagues earlier this week.
That will require the caucus to vote to waive a rule that requires committee leadership vacancies to be filled within 30 days.
Aguilar said he wants to "ensure that the Caucus has sufficient time to hear from all candidates."
China is now setting the pace in life sciences R&D, conducting more clinical trials than the U.S. and licensing new discoveries to American companies.
The big picture: China has become a linchpin in global drug development, the result of a decade-long national strategy to develop a biopharmaceutical industry.
Where it stands: China has surpassed the U.S. in drug clinical trials, per a report from GlobalData, marking a turning point in the global race to dominate the life sciences.
An independent, bipartisan commission told Congress last month that China is beating the U.S. inadvanced biotech and that policymakers need to pour significant resources into the sector over the next five years to keep up.
Some experts say the Trump administration's cuts to National Institutes of Health and university-based biomedical research risk putting the U.S. further behind when it should be supporting work on drugs targeting cancer and other conditions and outbreaks like the avian flu.
"China is not the [biotech] superpower that has overtaken the U.S., but we certainly have to be very careful that they don't become the superpower," said entrepreneur Cyriac Roeding, who's been tracking Chinese influence in the industry for nearly a decade.
By the numbers: In 2024, China listed more than 7,100 clinical trials in the World Health Organization's International Clinical Trials Registry Platform. The U.S. listed about 6,000 trials.
Beijing and Shanghai had more laboratory and R&D space under construction at the end of 2024 than any other global markets, with Boston in a distant third place, according to an April report from CBRE.
Pharmaceutical and medical technology patents also increased 379% in China over the past decade, the CBRE report said.
Between the lines: Cheaper labor and less regulation have shifted drug discovery from the U.S. to China. The investment bank Stifel projects 37% of big pharmaceutical companies' licensed molecules will come from China this year.
Chinese biotechs have gone from mostly replicating U.S. discoveries with copycat products to creating new treatments that could potentially dominate categories like cancer therapies and autoimmune diseases.
That's led to more licensing agreements for experimental Chinese drugs and significant new investments from companies like Pfizer, GSK, Sanofi and Novartis.
What they're saying: "When U.S. drugmakers license compounds from China, they divert funds that might otherwise bolster innovation hubs such as Boston's Kendall Square or North Carolina's Research Triangle," Scott Gottlieb, President Trump's first-term Food and Drug Administration commissioner, wrote in an op-ed in Stat this month.
"The U.S. biotechnology industry was the world's envy, but if we're not careful, every drug could be made in China."
A defining moment came last fall, when Summit Therapeutics announced that a cancer immunotherapy it licensed from a Chinese biotech firm outperformed Merck's blockbuster Keytruda in patients with advanced lung cancer.
Some likened the development to the breakthroughs from Chinese AI startup DeepSeek that rocked Silicon Valley.
Scholars at the Center for Strategic and International Studies wrote in a March commentary that it wasn't a one-off event, noting there are increasing numbers of new drugs in development, accompanied by a surge in clinical trials.
Reality check: Gottlieb said the trend will accelerate unless the U.S. takes steps to make U.S.-based drug development easier.
Roeding, the biotech entrepreneur, said improving the speed of clinical trials and ensuring stable funding for startups are necessary to keep the U.S. at the forefront of innovation.
What we're watching: Whether the tariffs and trade wars lead China to double down on biotech and other industries heavy in IP, to lessen the U.S. threat to their economy.
"The trends that are already underway — higher innovation from Chinese biotech, a booming market in Hong Kong and the like would very likely accelerate," Stifel analyst Tim Opler wrote in a recent note.
The leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates all argued against a strike on Iran's nuclear facilities during President Trump's recent visit and encouraged him to continue pushing for a new nuclear deal, three sources with knowledge of the talks tell Axios.
Why it matters: Saudi Arabia, the UAE and other Gulf states opposed a nuclear deal in 2015. Now they're among the most enthusiastic supporters of diplomacy.
Flashback: At the time, the Saudis and Emiratis quietly backed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's public fight against then-President Obama on the Iran deal and his threats to attack Iran.
Now, they're worried Netanyahu will pull the trigger, or that Trump will give up on talks and opt for a military option himself.
Behind the scenes: Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, UAE President Mohammed bin Zayed and Qatari Emir Tamim al-Thani all told Trump they worry that if Iran's nuclear sites are attacked, their countries will be targeted for Iranian retaliation. All three host U.S. military bases.
A source with direct knowledge said al-Thani told Trump the Gulf states will be affected more than anybody else in such a scenario.
The Saudis and Qataris expressed concerns specifically about an Israeli military strike on Iran. The UAE also said it would prefer a diplomatic solution.
All three leaders expressed support for Trump's negotiations, U.S. officials say. Saudi, Qatari and Emirati officials declined to comment.
State of play:Trump confirmed Wednesday that he cautioned Netanyahu during a call last Thursday against ordering a strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, as Axios first reported.
Trump said he believes the Iranian nuclear crisis can be solved with "a very strong document," which could be signed within the next two weeks.
The intrigue: Trump considered announcing during his trip that the U.S. would start referring to the Persian Gulf as the Arabian Gulf, but said before taking off that he didn't want "to hurt anybody's feelings."
Ultimately, Trump took a pass. Two Arab officials say the reason was a lack of consensus among the Gulf countries, with some feeling it would create unnecessary tensions with Iran.
The big picture: The Saudis and Emiratis are less concerned about Iran's regional activity than they were during Obama's 2015 talks, which they opposed in part because they were not consulted in advance. Their priority now is to maintain regional stability and focus on economic growth.
Saudi Arabia has been gradually normalizing relations with Iran over the last two years. The UAE has also been reengaging Iran to reduce tensions.
An unusual visit to Tehran last month by Saudi Defense Minister Khalid bin Salman to Tehran, during which he met Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, was meant to signal that the kingdom opposes a military strike against Iran's nuclear program, a former U.S. official said.
An obscure federal court blew up the cornerstone of President Trump's economic agenda last night, unleashing more chaos on the global economy and all but wiping out his negotiating leverage with trading partners.
Why it matters: At least for now, it turns out the legal system — not the bond market, nor weak economic indicators — is the biggest restraint on Trump's trade agenda.
Zoom in: A three-judge panel of the Court of International Trade — Reagan, Obama and Trump appointees — ruled that Trump does not have the authority to impose sweeping tariffs under 1970s-era emergency legislation.
In fact, the judges said an injunction wasn't enough — they issued a summary judgment invalidating and blocking almost all of Trump's trade levies to date.
Those levies were vast, from a 10% global baseline tariff, to fentanyl-related tariffs on China, Canada and Mexico, to (paused) reciprocal tariffs on dozens of other countries.
They effectively raised U.S. tariff rates to their highest levels since the 1930s, and threatened to cost American households thousands of dollars in higher goods costs.
The big picture: Tens of thousands of containers full of goods enter the United States every day.
Whether or even what levies to assess on their contents today, versus yesterday, is a mess that could snarl commerce across the country for days to come.
Follow the money: The levies, while causing huge economic strain, were also generating significant revenue for the government — almost $23 billion so far this month.
They were meant to be a cornerstone of the administration's fiscal plans — trade adviser Peter Navarro wrote in an op-ed Wednesday that tariffs would generate up to $3.3 trillion in revenue over the next decade.
Not all the income will disappear, though; tariffs imposed under a different legal authority called Section 232 — including on imports of autos, steel and aluminum — are unaffected by the ruling.
What they're saying: "This really *is* Liberation Day: The court's decision striking down Trump's mass tariffs as unlawful is a tremendous triumph for the rule of law, human freedom, and prosperity, and a deserved rebuke for arbitrary one-man rule over our livelihoods," Walter Olsen, senior fellow at the Cato Institute's Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies, said of the ruling.
For the record: "It is not for unelected judges to decide how to properly address a national emergency," White House spokesperson Kush Desai said in a statement.
"President Trump pledged to put America First, and the Administration is committed to using every lever of executive power to address this crisis and restore American Greatness."
The administration filed a notice of appeal just minutes after the ruling.
"The judicial coup is out of control," White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller posted to X.
The bottom line: Trump previously declared the U.S. was like a department store, and he set the prices.
Three little-known judges just put him out of business, and upended global commerce in the process.
The Trump administration's embrace of AI acceleration is testing MAGA's populist roots, as fears mount of a jobs apocalypse that could destabilize the movement's economic foundation.
Why it matters: MAGA leaders are engaged in a high-stakes juggling act — championing American dominance in AI while sounding the alarm over its potential to wipe out millions of jobs for young and working-class Americans.
The debate is more nuanced than the Trump administration's public posture, which has prioritized deregulation and aggressive investment as necessary to outpace China in the global AI race.
Driving the news: Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's dire warning to Axios — that AI could wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs — rippled through the MAGA media ecosystem on Wednesday.
"We have to get ahead of this," Steve Bannon warned on his "War Room" podcast. "Or we're going to have mass unemployment, particularly among entry-level people under 30."
"What you are going to see is one of the most dramatic job displacements, and it's going to be a top issue in the 2028 campaign," MAGA activist Charlie Kirk said on his show.
The intrigue: Kirk later expanded on his reaction to Amodei's warning on X, where he argued that college-educated Democrats are the voters most likely to face a "gigantic economic earthquake."
"For decades, elites were smug about their economic security compared to blue collar people. ... But now, because of AI, the jobs of elites — and their children — are in grave danger," Kirk wrote.
"The people who work with their hands will likely be spared, while white-collar jobs, those who have voted for Dems in increasing margins, will be the first victims of AI job losses."
The big picture: Despite the threat of job losses, the Republican Party — especially its new allies in Silicon Valley — broadly views AI advancement as an inevitable boon to the economy.
Grok, the AI tool embedded on Elon Musk's X platform, is a favorite among the Trump-loving masses who spend time engaging with the MAGA media ecosystem.
The Daily Wire in March announced a partnership with AI search engine Perplexity, which is frequently cited on The Ben Shapiro Show. A Daily Wire spokeswoman told Axios Wednesday that Perplexity "has allowed us to tap into the power of AI in a way that enhances the experience for our audience."
In the "One, Big, Beautiful Bill" passed by the House last week, Republicans included language prohibiting enforcement of state AI laws for 10 years, hoping to avoid a patchwork of different regulations coast to coast.
What to watch: Still, wary of alienating their blue-collar base, MAGA leaders in Washington say they're eyeing ways to protect working-class Americans even as they promote AI's upsides.
"We will always center American workers in our AI policy," Vice President Vance, a key bridge in the MAGA-tech alliance, said in a major AI speech in February.
"We believe, and we will fight for policies that ensure, that AI is going to make our workers more productive, and we expect that they will reap the rewards with higher wages, better benefits and safer and more prosperous communities."
The bottom line: "This technology ... may have tremendous upside for man," Bannon said on his show Wednesday.
"But it's got such unlimited dark side and downside that it has to be reviewed, thought through, until this thing spins out of control."
Data: Department of Justice; Map: Kavya Beheraj/Axios
The Trump administration is signaling it wants to ditch federal desegregation efforts in public school systems, a move that would end much-debated, decades-old programs mainly aimed at improving education opportunities for nonwhite students.
Why it matters: Lifting desegregation policies set by federal rules and court orders — some of them a half-century old — could lead to a wide range of changes in more than 80 school systems Axios has identified as still being under such requirements.
Those systems, primarily in the South, would no longer have to follow policies that set flexible transfer rules, school boundary guidelines, diversity hiring goals, and requirements for equal resources among schools, for example.
It also would mean that Black and Latino parents in school systems that have been historically resistant to desegregation efforts likely would have less help tackling allegations of discrimination.
State of play: This month, the Trump administration moved to dismiss a school desegregation case in Louisiana that began in 1966 in mostly white Plaquemines Parish.
Plaquemines schools — like many systems targeted by the government's efforts — were run by white segregationists when Lyndon Johnson's administration sued the district for resisting the 1954 Supreme Court Brown v. Board of Education decision, which outlawed racial segregation in schools.
Now, President Trump's Justice Department says it has "righted a historical wrong" by "freeing" the Plaquemines school board from federal oversight.
The DOJ and Plaquemines school officials — who say their district addressed its equity issues long ago — have asked a judge to dismiss the case.
After that announcement, Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill (R) said she wants to end more desegregation orders in the state.
To close desegregation cases, the U.S. government and a school system must agree to end monitoring agreements or get approval from a federal judge in most cases.
The big picture: Trump's administration has been focused on removing programs that have benefited people in historically disadvantaged communities — and on fighting what it has called anti-white discrimination.
The administration, for example, has said the U.S. government no longer will unequivocally prohibit contractors from having segregated restaurants, waiting rooms and drinking fountains.
Zoom in: Like those in Plaquemines, some school officials in districts still under desegregation orders say they've met their integration and equity goals — and that the orders still in effect amount to government overreach at a time when enrollments are more diverse than ever.
However, civil rights advocates argue that desegregation programs are still necessary, citing ongoing disparities in educational opportunities and test scores.
The advocates also point to the "resegregation" happening in many systems, as white students disproportionately leave neighborhood schools for charter and private schools.
By the numbers: At least 84 school districts remain under court orders or federal monitoring agreements, an Axios review found.
More than half of those districts — 63% — are in Alabama, Georgia or Mississippi in the South's "Black Belt," a rural and historically impoverished area with large Black populations dating back to enslavement.
Another 26% of the districts are in Louisiana, Florida, Tennessee and Texas.
Zoom in: The Huntsville City (Ala.) system is among the districts that still have active desegregation orders.
The district has struggled since 1970 to adjust school zoning policies that often have reinforced racial divides and limited extracurricular activities for Black students, according to court documents.
What they're saying: Raymond Pierce, president and CEO of the Southern Education Foundation, tells Axios the Trump administration appears to see school desegregation with the disdain it's shown for DEI programs.
"They want to blend diversity, equity and inclusion with civil rights," Pierce said. "DEI is good policy, but desegregation is the law."
Pierce added that many districts that still have desegregation orders have never adopted effective plans, and have been waiting for an administration that would de-emphasize them.
"These are places that never desegregated seriously, so the chances that minority students will get any response from the courts in the future to violations of rights will vanish," said Gary Orfield, co-director of the UCLA Civil Rights Project.
Noliwe Rooks, author of "Integrated: How American Schools Failed Black Children," told Axios that desegregation failed to address many Black students' needs — whether that meant upgrading their schools, moving them to better ones or providing equal resources.
"How robust was it?" Rooks said of desegregation efforts.
"How available was it to all, and where has it led us?"
More employees are using generative AI at work and many are keeping it a secret.
Why it matters: Absent clear policies, workers are taking an "ask forgiveness, not permission" approach to chatbots, risking workplace friction and costly mistakes.
The big picture: Secret genAI use proliferates when companies lack clear guidelines, because favorite tools are banned or because employees want a competitive edge over coworkers.
Fear plays a big part too — fear of being judged and fear that using the tool will make it look like they can be replaced by it.
By the numbers: 42% of office workers use genAI tools like ChatGPT at work and 1 in 3 of those workers say they keep the use secret, according to research out this month from security software company Ivanti.
A McKinsey report from January showed that employees are using genAI for significantly more of their work than their leaders think they are.
20% of employees report secretly using AI during job interviews, according to a Blind survey of 3,617 U.S. professionals.
Catch up quick: When ChatGPT first wowed workers over two years ago, companies were unprepared and worried about confidential business information leaking into the tool, so they preached genAI abstinence.
Now the big AI firms offer enterprise products that can protect IP, and leaders are paying for those bespoke tools and pushing hard for their employees to use them.
The blanket bans are gone, but the stigma remains.
Zoom in: New research backs up workers' fear of the optics around using AI for work.
A recent study from Duke University found that those who use genAI "face negative judgments about their competence and motivation from others."
Yes, but: The Duke study also found that workers who use AI more frequently are less likely to perceive potential job candidates as lazy if they use AI.
Zoom out: The stigma around genAI can lead to a raft of problems, including the use of unauthorized tools, known as "shadow AI" or BYOAI (bring your own AI).
Research from cyber firm Prompt Security found that 65% of employees using ChatGPT rely on its free tier, where data can be used to train models.
Shadow AI can also hinder collaboration. Wharton professor and AI expert Ethan Mollick calls workers using genAI for individual productivity "secret cyborgs" who keep all their tricks to themselves.
"The real risk isn't that people are using AI — it's pretending they're not," Amit Bendov, co-founder and CEO of Gong, an AI platform that analyzes customer interactions, told Axios in an email.
Between the lines: Employees will use AIregardless of whether there's a policy, says Coursera's chief learning officer, Trena Minudri.
Leaders should focus on training, she argues. (Coursera sells training courses to businesses.)
Workers also need a "space to experiment safely," Minudri told Axios in an email.
The tech is changing so fast that leaders need to acknowledge that workplace guidelines are fluid.
Vague platitudes like "always keep a human in the loop" aren't useful if workers don't understand what the loop is or where they fit into it.
GenAI continues to struggle with accuracy, and companies risk embarrassing gaffes, or worse, when unchecked AI-generated content goes public.
Clearly communicating these issues can go a long way in helping employees feel more comfortable opening up about their AI use, Atlassian CTO Rajeev Rajan told Axios.
"Our research tells us that leadership plays a big role in setting the tone for creating a culture that fosters AI experimentation," Rajan said in an email. "Be honest about the gaps that still exist."
The bottom line: Encouraging workers to use AI collaboratively could go a long way to ending the secrecy.
Generative AI works best when it's combined with human intelligence, says Elliot Katz, co-founder of mixus.ai, a collaborative AI business platform.
"One person's dirty little secret," Katz told Axios in an email, "can be a tool that teams are excited to use together daily."
A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration on Wednesday from suspending Biden-era temporary migrant protections and ordered officials to resume applications.
Why it matters: The ruling that comes as the Trump administration is moving to escalate its hardline immigration crackdown affects thousands of people who came to the country legally via temporary programs from Afghanistan, Latin America and Ukraine.
Driving the news: President Trump in January ordered the Homeland Security Department to terminate Biden-era "parole" programs that allowed people from certain countries to temporarily live and work in the U.S. due to humanitarian or public interest grounds.
A lawsuit is challenging the suspension of processing applications for people from Afghanistan, Ukraine, Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
State of play: U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani in her order accepted that the Trump administration has broad discretion on immigration policy, but said it was not wholly shielded from judicial review.
The judge in Boston, Massachusetts, made a similar order in April regarding people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela given temporary legal status under the CHNV Program, which the Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to overrule.
"This court emphasizes, as it did in its prior order, that it is not in the public interest to manufacture a circumstance in which hundreds of thousands of individuals will, over the course of several months, become unlawfully present in the country," Talwani said Wednesday.
"[S]uch that these individuals cannot legally work in their communities or provide for themselves and their families."
What they're saying: "This ruling reaffirms what we have always known to be true: our government has a legal obligation to respect the rights of all humanitarian parole beneficiaries and the Americans who have welcomed them into their communities," said Anwen Hughes, a lawyer for Human Rights First, which is representing plaintiffs in the case, in a statement Wednesday.
The other side: Attorneys for the Justice Department in its appeal to the Supreme Court on Talwani's April ruling said that order "blocks the Executive Branch from exercising its discretionary authority over a key aspect of the Nation's immigration and foreign policy and thwarts Congress's express vesting of that decision in the Secretary, not courts."
Representatives for the Trump administration did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment in the evening.
Reality check: While certain people "just like low-key events," most go smaller to spend less, Shane McMurray, CEO of The Wedding Report, tells Axios.
The big picture: Cutting the guest list is the best way to save, with prices for meals, venues, invitations and more usually based on headcount, McMurray says.
Pros estimate micro weddings can cost over 50% less than traditional ones.
Between the lines: Many brides and grooms-to-be are bracing for pricier nuptials as tariffs stand to hike the $33,000 cost of an average U.S. wedding, according to The Knot, a planning and registry site.
Those worrying about their jobs or finances may delay celebrations altogether.
What we're watching: Intimate doesn't mean boring.City hall ceremonies have become a "full-blown aesthetic."
Pinterest searches for terms like "city hall elopement" and "courthouse wedding dress ideas" recently surged among Gen Zers.
The bottom line: No need to invite the roommate you haven't talked to since graduation.
The big picture: The move marks a major escalation in the Trump administration's immigration crackdown, and comes a day after Rubio directed a halt to student visa interviews.
One senior Trump administration official confirmed to Axios that the order applies to all students from China, noting that Rubio's announcement coincides with trade negotiations between the two countries.
"Everything is connected," the official said.
Driving the news: Rubio made the announcement on X Wednesday,saying the revocation of visas of Chinese students includes for those "with connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields."
He said in an emailed statement soon after that under President Trump's leadership, the State Department will work with the Department of Homeland Security to "aggressively revoke" the visas.
The Trump administration will also "revise visa criteria to enhance scrutiny of all future visa applications" from China and Hong Kong, Rubio said.
Neither statement specified whether the directive would impact all students from China.
What they're saying: A State Department official told Axios the Trump administration was taking action to "protect Americans and rebalance" the U.S. relationship with China.
"China exploited our visa system for decades to advance the priorities of the Communist Party," the official said.
"They sent students to our best colleges and research universities. Many of these so called guests in our country arrived with one purpose — to steal our intellectual property on Beijing's behalf," the official added.
"The President's goal is clear: we will put America first, and that means our priorities on everything from trade to immigration should benefit Americans, not other nations at the expense of our people."
Representatives for the Chinese Embassy and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment Wednesday evening.
Zoom out: The Trump administration has targeted universities and students, policing foreign nationals' conduct and speech.
Rubio also sought to launch an AI-fueled "Catch and Revoke" effort to cancel the visas of foreign nationals who appear to support Hamas or other designated terror groups.
Flashback: Rubio has been a China hawk for years. In 2018 as a U.S. senator, he launched the successful effort to ban the China-funded Confucius Institutes from college campuses in his home state of Florida.
Rubio was also a lead proponent of banning TikTok because of Chinese influence. But he has kept those concerns to himself now that he's an appointee of President Trump, who has praised the platform and delayed the banning it in the U.S.
At a press conference Wednesday, President Trump had a very unhappy reaction to being asked about the "TACO trade" — a shorthand for Trump Always Chickens Out.
Why it matters: Traders have been using TACO to describe the belief that the president will back off on a big tariff threat if the markets sink in response.
It happened after "Liberation Day," and more recently last weekend when the president threatened 50% tariffs on the European Union. The market dropped — only to recover after the president said he'd give the EU more time to negotiate.
TACO is a catchier version of what Wall Street had been calling the Trump put, which investors relied on in the president's first term.
State of play: Trump was asked about a spate of TACO-related headlines while taking questions in the Oval Office Wednesday.
"I've never heard that, you mean because I reduced China from 145%," he said, then detailing how he stepped down that threat, as well as the higher rate on the EU.
"But don't ever say what you said. That's a nasty question."
Zoom out: Financial Times columnist Robert Armstrong felt some dread about the whole thing, he told Axios later in the day.
Armstrong, who writes the FTs Unhedged newsletter, came up with the term TACO a few months ago.
"I needed a shorthand way in my newsletter to describe this pattern, because it was an important pattern in markets. And perhaps I was hungry, too, and so I came up with the acronym TACO."
It didn't take off at first.
"It was definitely not becoming a thing, but I kept using it because it had utility for me, and then it sort of started to appear in brokers notes. And, you know, people started mentioning it to me, and then it shows up in a New York Times headline, and today, somebody is putting a question to the president."
Friction point: Apparently, sometimes the markets don't need TACO. The courts intervene instead.
Wednesday night, a panel of judges at the U.S. Court of International Trade blocked most of the tariffs the Trump administration has put in place — ruling he didn't have the authority to implement them.
The bottom line: "I want to be famous for my dumb joke, definitely, but I also don't want the president to ruin the U.S. economy," Armstrong says. "And so I'd like to have both of those things, if at all possible."
The Trump administration canceled a nearly $600 million award to Moderna to develop an mRNA vaccine for bird flu in humans, the company announced Wednesday.
Why it matters: It ends one of the remaining Biden-era efforts aimed at creating vaccines for pandemic preparedness. But the company said it would explore alternatives for further developing and manufacturing the shot.
Driving the news: Moderna reported positive early stage data on the mRNA vaccine, saying clinical testing in roughly 300 adults was found to be generally well-tolerated.
Participants achieved 98% immunity within three weeks of the second dose of the vaccine, the company said.
"While the termination of funding from HHS adds uncertainty, we are pleased by the robust immune response and safety profile observed in this interim analysis of the Phase 1/2 study of our H5 avian flu vaccine and we will explore alternative paths forward for the program," Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said in a statement.
"These clinical data in pandemic influenza underscore the critical role mRNA technology has played as a countermeasure to emerging health threats."
Details: The funds awarded in January from the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority were aimed at creating a line of defense against H5N1in peoplethat matches the strains circulating in cows and birds.
It followed another award to Moderna for bird flu vaccine development worth $176 million that the Biden administration granted in July 2024.
Trump administration officials previously told the company it was reviewing all contacts from the prior administration.
The Department of Defense has officially ended Elon Musk's "what did you do last week" emails, a Pentagon spokesperson said in a statement on Wednesday.
Why it matters: In the wake of Musk's short but consequential time leading DOGE, the move suggests elements of the government are starting to move on from some of his more controversial policies.
State of play: Defense Department official Jules Hurst told employees on Friday that the weekly "What You Did Last Week" initiative would end the following Wednesday, per the statement.
Hurst asked employees to share "one concrete idea to enhance efficiency or root out waste" in final submission emails.
"This initiative provided leaders and supervisors with additional insights into their employees' contributions, fostered accountability, and helped to identify opportunities for greater efficiency and effectiveness throughout the Department," the statement said.
Catch up quick: Musk said in February that all federal employees would be required to send an email reporting what they had accomplished in the previous week — saying that failure to do so would be considered a resignation.
It was a page straight out of the playbook he used when he took over Twitter, making workers justify themselves to stay employed.
Elon Musk pivoted to damage control in his final days as a "special government employee," publicly recommitting to Mars, cars and robots after a bruising year in the political limelight.
Why it matters: The billionaire CEO confirmed Wednesday he is departing the Trump administration, though he will remain one of President Trump's most influential outside advisers.
By scaling back the time and money he spends on politics, Musk is seeking to claw back the credibility he torched during his toxic tenure in Washington.
That won't be easy: SpaceX and Tesla both saw their brand reputations crater over the past year, with the latter enduring violent protests and a steep drop in sales as a result of Musk's activism.
Still, Musk is clear-eyed about the task ahead — and has already taken steps to distance himself from Trump in a rare series of interviews over the last several days.
Driving the news: Musk told CBS News that he's "disappointed" by the "massive spending bill" passed by the House last week, arguing that it "undermines" the work of his DOGE team.
Musk created DOGE to fight what he calls the "existential" threat of a national debt spiral. His team claims to have saved $175 billion in taxpayer money — though even that figure is widely seen as inflated.
By comparison, the so-called "One Big, Beautiful Bill" — the linchpin of Trump's legislative agenda — is projected to add between $3 trillion and $5 trillion to budget deficits over the next 10 years.
Zoom out: In an interview with the Washington Post, Musk conceded that DOGE's efforts to slash the federal bureaucracy — including an original goal of $2 trillion in savings — proved far more challenging than he expected.
He complained that DOGE had become "the whipping boy for everything," defending its mission while lamenting the impact it had on his companies.
"[S]omething bad would happen anywhere, and we would get blamed for it even if we had nothing to do with it," Musk said. "People were burning Teslas. Why would you do that? That's really uncool."
Between the lines: Musk's media blitz has functioned as part exit interview, part image rehab — an attempt to reassert his identity as an engineering visionary after a year mired in political scrutiny.
He spoke to reporters from SpaceX headquarters in Texas ahead of Tuesday night's high-stakes Starship test flight — a moment he said demanded his full attention and a "maniacal sense of urgency."
"[P]eople want to have the chill vibes, and SpaceX is sort of ultra hardcore. But if we're not ultra hardcore, how are we going to get to Mars? You're not going to get to Mars in 40 hours a week," Musk told the Post.
In an interview with Ars Technica, he went deep on detail — waxing poetic about SpaceX's long-term goals before admitting he "probably did spend a bit too much time on politics."
"It's not like I left the companies," he cautioned, arguing that the media "is going to overrepresent any political stuff."
"It was just relative time allocation that probably was a little too high on the government side, and I've reduced that significantly in recent weeks."
Why it matters: Depending on who you ask, it's either another symptom of America's loneliness epidemic or it's healthy YOLO move for people who just need a break from the craziness of daily life.
🏕️ The big picture: About 31% of campers went solo at least one night in 2024, according to a survey of more than 4,000 campers by The Dyrt, an app that helps people snag camping spots.
That's up from 30% in 2023, 24% in 2022 and 19% in 2021.
"We just keep seeing this go up, up, up," The Dyrt CEO Kevin Long tells Axios.
Between the lines: The pandemic may have sparked the solo camping boom.
"During the pandemic, we all got good at doing things by ourselves and got good at getting creative at how to go have experiences," Long says. "I think that has just moved forward since then and has become a permanent thing in the ecosystem."
🌳 For campers like Colorado resident Kris Angelo, the freedom to go wherever you want, whenever you want, do what you want and spend what you want is a huge draw.
It's "the freedom of making all the decisions yourself and being able to choose your location," he says. "You can make it as cheap or expensive as you'd like."
"I certainly wouldn't have been able to afford four vacations last year if I was staying at hotels," he adds.
The intrigue: The solo camping trend looks like the latest evolution in what political scientist Robert Putnam famously chronicled in his book "Bowling Alone" — America's steady decline of togetherness and collective experiences.
Then-Surgeon General Vivek Murthy flagged loneliness as a public health issue in 2023.
But Angelo argues that solo camping leads to more social interaction than you would expect: "You end up talking to the locals a lot more when you're out there by yourself than when you're traveling with people."
Chappelle, an Australian Shepherd mix, often accompanies his owner, Colorado resident Kris Angelo, on camping trips. Photo courtesy of Kris Angelo
🐶 Reality check: Many solo campers are traveling with a four-legged friend: About half brought their dog with them in 2024, according to The Dyrt's research.
That includes Angelo, who brings his Australian Shepherd mix Chappelle with him on his camping excursions, such as his trip last year to the Black Hills of South Dakota.
"Are you really camping solo — you're out there with your best friend," The Dyrt's Long says.
The bottom line: "Solo camping is just a massive reset button," Long adds.
The White House is optimistic a new proposal from Trump envoy Steve Witkoff could help bridge the remaining gaps between Israel and Hamas and produce a ceasefire and hostage deal in Gaza soon, three sources involved in the negotiations tell Axios.
"If each side moves just a bit, we could have a deal within days," one U.S. source said.
The big picture: President Trump has made clear he wants to end a war that has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians and more than 1,600 Israelis, according to the relevant authorities. But talks had been stalled for weeks, and Israel is undertaking a massive operation to flatten and occupy Gaza.
The White House now believes it's within striking distance of a deal that could ultimately lead to an end to the war, though it would initially be temporary.
Driving the news: Over the past two weeks, Witkoff has been negotiating with Prime Minister Netanyahu and his top adviser Ron Dermer, and with Hamas leaders in Doha through Palestinian-American businessman Bishara Bahbah.
On Monday, following another round of talks with Bahbah, Hamas announced it had agreed to a U.S. proposal for a deal that includes a 60-day ceasefire and the release of five live hostages on the first day and five on the last day.
Israel quickly rejected the proposal. Witkoff also pushed back, telling telling Axios Hamas misrepresented the U.S. offer and the group's position was "disappointing and unacceptable."
Behind the scenes: The source familiar with the talks explained that Monday's dispute stemmed from a miscommunication that led Hamas, Israel, and the U.S. to interpret the proposal under discussion differently.
Despite that setback, talks resumed Tuesday in an effort to reach a compromise. Bahbah held further meetings with senior Hamas officials in Doha and Witkoff met with Netanyahu's confidant Ron Dermer in Washington, the sources said.
On Wednesday, Hamas issued a statement emphasizing that it was trying to reach an agreement with Witkoff on "a general framework" involving a permanent ceasefire, a full Israeli military withdrawal from Gaza, renewed humanitarian aid, and the establishment of a technocratic committee to govern Gaza.
Hamas claimed that framework included the release of ten live hostages and the remains of several deceased hostages, in exchange for an agreed number of Palestinian prisoners — along with guarantees from the U.S., Egypt, and Qatar.
Two hours later, Witkoff appeared alongside President Trump in the Oval Office and announced he had drafted "a new term sheet" for President Trump's approval.
"I have some very good feeling about getting to a temporary ceasefire and a long-term resolution, a peaceful resolution of that conflict," Witkoff said.
Between the lines: A senior Israeli official said their understanding is the new White House draft does not differ dramatically from previous versions, but includes some "wordsmithing" in an attempt to gain both Israel's and Hamas' agreement.
The key changes focus on the clause regarding the guarantees Hamas wants in order to ensure that a serious negotiation on a permanent ceasefire will take place during the 60-day temporary ceasefire, and that as long as such talks are ongoing Israel won't unilaterally break the ceasefire, as it did in March.
The Israeli official said the U.S. tried to find language that would give Hamas enough confidence that the temporary ceasefire would lead to a permanent one — while also allowing Israel to feel confident it was not committing in advance to ending the war.
Another unresolved dispute concerns the sequence and timeline for hostage releases.
Israel wants all ten live hostages released on the first day of the ceasefire, fearing Hamas might not uphold its commitments later on.
Hamas, for its part, wants to release the hostages in stages to ensure Israel does not break the agreement and resume fighting before the 60-day period ends.
"There's not much wiggle room left with the wording. The hope is that Hamas, under pressure, will be willing to compromise on the guarantees it's asking for, and that Prime Minister Netanyahu will agree to compromise on the timeline for releasing the hostages. The test still lies ahead," the Israeli official said.
Senior Israeli officials believe one factor that could make Hamas more inclined to sign a deal is the new humanitarian aid mechanism Israel attempted to launch this week.
"Hamas is very concerned that it no longer controls a large part of the humanitarian aid. If a deal is reached, aid distribution will return to the old model in which Hamas had much more control," said a senior Israeli official.
What to watch: While an agreement on the principles of the deal would be a dramatic breakthrough after two months of failure, the parties would still need to negotiate further to agree on details like the names of the Israeli hostages and the Palestinian prisoners who will be released, and the staged withdrawal of Israeli forces from most the Gaza Strip.
President Trump's budget bill is about to meet the realities of the Senate, where the rules of reconciliation could help Democrats force changes to the bill.
Why it matters: Senate Republicans have been quietly working to ensure Trump's budget bill gets a clean bill of health from the Senate parliamentarian.
But GOP leader John Thune is at the mercy of Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, who is the final decision-maker if a given provision can pass the "Byrd bath," named for the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.).
The process Senate Republicans are using only allows for budget-related items in the bill, in exchange for being able to pass with just 51 votes. Any policies deemed unrelated to the budget will be excised.
Top Senate Dems are planning an aggressive push to strip out a wide array of policies from the reconciliation package, sources told Axios.
Zoom in: Sources from both parties pointed to these issues as some of the likely major fights to come in the Senate over the reconciliation package.
The REINS Act would significantly boost congressional authority to review and stop federal regulations. Republicans are expecting a fight to convince the parliamentarian that it is budget-related, sources told Axios.
Gender-affirming care: The House bill would prevent the use of Medicaid to cover gender-affirming care. Democrats plan to argue this is more about a political agenda than making changes to the federal budget.
AI moratorium: The House bill includes a 10-year ban on state laws regulating artificial intelligence.
Energy permitting: The House-passed bill includes an expedited permitting process for certain natural gas energy pipeline projects, capping all federal and state review periods to a maximum of one year.
Immigration fees: Democrats may also try to push back on the bill's major fees for asylum seekers, arguing it is more about deterrence than a genuine revenue raiser.
