Elon Musk has told the White House he plans to give $100 million to President Trump's political operation, according to a person familiar with his plans.
Why it matters: The contribution is unheard of in both amount and type: Musk, who is technically a special government employee, is the world's richest person.
Musk donated more than $250 million to a pro-Trump super PAC during the 2024 election campaign. That made Musk Trump's biggest financial booster.
Now, he is the face of the DOGE team that's driving the Trump administration's huge cuts to the federal workforce and agencies.
The New York Times first reported the latest planned contribution.
Zoom in: Trump's political team has set up a pair of organizations: MAGA Inc. and Securing America's Greatness. It is not clear if Musk will give to either of those two groups, or if he plans on giving to another one that will be controlled by Trump's team.
MAGA Inc. and Securing America's Greatness are run by Chris LaCivita and Tony Fabrizio, who were top advisers on Trump's 2024 campaign and have close ties to the Trump White House.
The two groups have raised around $500 million -- a massive sum that will be used to help expand the Republican majorities in the midterm elections and to pressure Republicans to support Trump's agenda.
Representatives for Musk and the White House did not respond to Axios' requests for comment in the evening.
Southwest Airlines will soon end its free checked bags policy, the company announced on Tuesday.
Why it matters: The airline has long touted that "bags fly flee," which has been a calling card for the company throughout its 54-year history.
Jettisoning the policy will likely make distinguishing itself from budget competitors like Spirit and Frontier harder.
State of play: The new policy changes go into effect starting May 28.
Starting then, only Southwest's Rapid Rewards A-List Preferred members and passengers who book Business Select will receive two included checked bags.
Select customers including frequent flyer A-List members and Southwest credit card holders will be allotted one included checked bag.
The Dallas, Texas-based airline announced increased points for customers who book higher-priced seats (e.g. Business Select) while reducing the points earned for less expensive seats (Wanna Get Away and Wanna Get Away Plus).
Southwest will also add a basic economy fare class, the last major airline to offer that tier.
Our thought bubble: With the end of free checked bags, there's little left separating Southwest from airlines with higher prices but more perks, or low-cost barebones carriers — leaving it stuck in the muddy middle, Axios' Alex Fitzpatrick writes.
What they're saying: In a video statement Tuesday morning, Southwest CEO Bob Jordan said the changes "will help us return to the levels of profitability we all expect, and to support our collective long term success. It's also about adapting to what our customers want."
United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said at a JP Morgan Chase online event Tuesday that Southwest's policy change is like "the slaying of a sacred cow."
Delta President Glen Hauenstein, who also spoke at the conference, said he thinks some Southwest customers could now be "up for grabs."
Catch up quick: Waning consumer demand has hit Southwest, Delta and American Airlines hard, the three companies announced this week in warnings that first-quarter results will disappoint.
Southwest cut its unit revenue growth forecast on Tuesday, citing lower government travel and "softness in bookings and demand trends as the macro environment has weakened."
Delta and American cut their own forecasts as well.
Delta CEO Ed Bastiantold CNBC companies have started "to pull back in terms of corporate spending."
"Consumer spending started to stall," he added, "Largely domestic, largely in the close-in, but it was also exacerbated, as you know, [by] the uncertainty that's out there, and consumers in a discretionary business do not like uncertainty."
The National Transportation Safety Board "urgently recommended" Tuesday that the Federal Aviation Administration permanently prohibit helicopter traffic near Reagan National Airport when two runways are in use following the deadliest aviation disaster in the U.S. in decades.
The big picture: Reagan National Airport has the nation's busiest runway, while commercial planes and choppers, often carrying top officials, share the nearby airspace. The midair collision that left 67 dead amplified long-held concerns about congestion in the busy skies around DCA.
Helicopters were temporarily restricted from operating over the Potomac River near DCA after the crash, with some exceptions for medical or law enforcement flights.
Driving the news: The NTSB, in an urgent safety recommendation report, urged the FAA to prohibit helicopters from flying in part of a route near DCA when runways 15 and 33 are in use.
But the NTSB also noted that it is "critical" for public safety helicopter operations to have a designated alternative route when the runways are being used.
The latest: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Tuesday that he will comply with the NTSB's recommendations, with exemptions for VIP and lifesaving missions.
Context: The crash around DCA occurred during the commercial aircraft's final approach to runway 33.
The NTSB cautioned in its report that helicopters traveling through the Route 4 corridor at the maximum authorized altitude could have just about 75 feet of vertical separation from a plane landing at the runway.
"[T]he NTSB concludes that existing separation distances between helicopter traffic operating on Route 4 and aircraft landing on runway 33 are insufficient and pose an intolerable risk to aviation safety by increasing the chances of a midair collision," the report read.
NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy cited "an intolerable risk" during a Tuesday briefing urging the FAA to adopt her board's recommendations.
While reviewing over 944,100 commercial operations at DCA between October 2021 and December 2024, the NTSB identified over 15,200 occurrences where there was a lateral separation of less than one nautical mile and vertical separation of less than 400 feet between helicopters and commercial planes.
In half of the near midair collisions, the helicopter may have been above the route's altitude restriction. Two-thirds of the occurrences were at night.
What they're saying: Mary Schiavo, the former inspector general of the Department of Transportation, characterized the NTSB action as "highly unusual" in a statement provided to Axios.
"The release of an emergency recommendation requesting the FAA take immediate action, before the completion of the NTSB investigation is rare," she said.
Out thought bubble: An incident of this magnitude demands some form of permanent change, but officials often wait for more information from investigators before making any long-term changes in response, Axios aviation expert Alex Fitzpatrick says.
Case in point: In 2006, after a plane carrying New York Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle struck a skyscraper, the FAA tightened restrictions on small planes flying above New York's East River. Lidle and his flight instructor died in the crash.
What they're saying: Secretary Duffy in the days after the crash suggested military chopper missions could be done at "a different time of night." Duffy questioned why officials were being ferried by helicopters for "convenience" in the area — calling it unacceptable.
"Get in a damn Suburban and drive," he said at a Feb. 5 press conference.
Duffy added, "We need a whole upgrade of the airspace."
State of play: "Reduction in Force" notices started to go out to impacted employees at 6pm ET Tuesday, according to a source familiar with the matter.
Those staff members will be placed on administrative leave beginning March 21, the department said.
Every part of the department is expected to be impacted.
However, the agency said it will continue to deliver on all statutory programs that fall under its purview — including formula funding, student loans, Pell Grants, funding for special needs students and competitive grant-making.
What they're saying: Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement that Tuesday's reduction reflects the department's "commitment to efficiency, accountability, and ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most: to students, parents, and teachers."
Editor's note: This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
Disney's $1.5 billion investment in Epic Games last year is part of a broader push to amplify its franchise flywheel with new tech, Disney Experiences chair Josh D'Amaro and Disney Entertainment co-chair Alan Bergman told Axios in an interview from SXSW.
Why it matters: "From an investor point of view, the combination of strong IP and ambitious investment leads to returns," D'Amaro said.
"If you look at the return on invested capital over the period of time when we started leaning in [to tech innovation], it goes up by 3 times," D'Amaro said.
A 2024 regulatory filing shows that return on investment is even higher when looking at certain franchises, such as "Frozen" and "Toy Story."
State of play: D'Amaro and Bergman appeared on stage at the annual SXSW conference in Texas on Saturday to unveil a slew of tech-enabled additions to their franchises.
They were joined by director Jon Favreau who showed off new BDX droid robots built by Disney's Imagineering team for his upcoming film "The Mandalorian & Grogu."
The free-roaming animatronic robots, which resemble the famous Star Wars character R2-D2, will also be brought to Disney's parks and experiences, per D'Amaro.
Favreau is leveraging Epic Games' 3D creation tool Unreal Engine for many of the new tech experiences related to his upcoming movie.
Zoom out: Disney has long invested in technology, but as the media landscape shifts away from traditional television and movie theaters, it's had to rely more on innovation and collaboration among its studios and parks to push its IP forward.
Over the past few years, Disney has brought more of its franchises into its parks as part of that effort.
A new Monsters, Inc.-themed land is coming to Hollywood Studios. New Encanto and Indiana Jones attractions are in the works at Disney's Animal Kingdom. An Avatar-themed destination is coming to Disney California Adventure.
Great park experiences are often what inspire new film sequels, Bergman said, pointing to examples such as Zootopia land, which opened in Shanghai in 2023, ahead of a planned sequel.
The big picture: Disney's streaming business was the focal point of its epic stock rally during the pandemic. But in the years since, it's faced increased pressure on Wall Street to make its streaming products more profitable and find new ways to monetize its IP.
Collecting data from across all of Disney's consumer touch points has been a major focus for the company over the past few years, Bergman said.
"We're getting more and more sophisticated about how we use that data in the right way to create a guest experience and ultimately to create that synergistic effect," D'Amaro said.
What to watch: The integration of Epic Games' tech across Disney's franchises will hopefully result in more consumer experiences that resonate with younger generations, per D'Amaro.
"Technology is going to allow us to serve consumers where they are and bring the Disney brand to consumers that may not be familiar with us, and create that generational effect," he said.
President Trump's new FTC chair Andrew Ferguson told a group of big business CEOs on Tuesday that he wouldn't let proposed deals "die on the vine," but warned them not expect automatic approval for big mergers.
Why it matters: Ferguson is explaining the Trump administration's approach to M&A, giving fresh guidance to the group it will need to help bolster the economy and usher in a new age of prosperity.
"If we think conduct or merger is going to hurt Americans economically, I'm taking you to court," Ferguson told a gathering of Yale's CEO Caucus in Washington on Tuesday morning, according to a recording of his remarks obtained by Axios.
"But if we don't, we'll get the hell out of the way," he said in the closed-door meeting, which included JPMorgan Chase's Jamie Dimon, Goldman Sachs' David Solomon and Dell's Michael Dell.
"But I want to be really clear about something. This isn't the Bush administration."
A spokesperson for the FTC declined to comment.
Zoom out: Bankers, dealmakers and CEOs are looking for clarity from Ferguson on how he will deviate, if at all, from the strict scrutiny that former FTC chair Lina Khan pursued under President Biden.
Last month, the FTC announced that it would keep the Biden administration's merger guidelines in place, raising concerns in the business and banking community that Trump's White House might be more hostile to big mergers than they would have preferred.
Driving the news: Before a range of CEOs, including those from Edison International, Gap, Motorola Solutions and Pfizer, Ferguson explained the approach he will take towards reviewing mergers.
"We are in this catastrophic, dangerous debt crisis, and the only way out is not just cutting government spending, it is creating an innovative and vibrant economy for all," he said.
"The last thing we want are monopolies (that) slow innovation, slow growth and injure American consumers."
"But we also don't want regulators who slow down the process."
Zoom in: Ferguson took a detour from traditional M&A talk to explain to his audience the anger many conservatives feel towards big business.
He recalled his time working for former Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in 2020, when he would receive calls from the business community on social issues.
"Hey, cops are racist. Congress should do something about police reform. I sat there and said, 'Why are you all calling me about policing?'" he recounted.
"And then I watched in 2020 businesses started to censor Americans because they wanted to talk about how masks weren't working, or ask questions about whether vaccines were effective," he said.
"And for the first time, I really started to understand the real connection between large economic power and the transfer and leveraging of that power for social and political impact," he said.
Go deeper: The FTC under Trump made its first move on Monday to challenge private equity in health care, Axios Pro reported, suing to block the $627 million acquisition of a maker of specialized coatings for catheters and other medical devices.
Ukraine "expressed readiness to accept" a U.S. proposal for an immediate 30-day ceasefire with Russia, the two countries said in a joint statement after a key meeting between U.S. and Ukrainian officials in Saudi Arabia.
Why it matters: A ceasefire, if implemented, would be a major diplomatic breakthrough in the three-year war between Russia and Ukraine. But the Kremlin has yet to weigh in on the U.S. proposal.
"The ball is now in their court. We hope the Russians will reciprocate," Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a press conference after the meeting.
The latest: A source close to the Ukrainian government told Axios the intelligence sharing with the U.S. was fully restored on Tuesday.
Driving the news: During the meeting — which lasted more than five hours — the U.S. agreed to lift its suspension on intelligence sharing with Ukraine and resume weapons shipments to the country, which were paused eight days ago.
President Trump told reporters at the White House that he hopes Russia will agree to the ceasefire, and said he would invite Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky back to the White House.
National security adviser Mike Waltz said Ukraine not only accepted the U.S. proposal but also presented its principles for a comprehensive peace deal including the security guarantees that it requires.
Key points: Waltz also said Trump made it clear to his team — and through them to the Ukrainians — that all fighting needs to stop, not just air and missile strikes. Zelensky confirmed in a statement after the meeting that the ceasefire would be comprehensive, including the front lines.
The U.S.-Ukraine statement says the ceasefire is subject to agreement from Russia and could be extended beyond 30 days "by mutual agreement" between Kyiv and Moscow.
Per the joint statement, the U.S. committed to raising proposals discussed with Ukraine with the Russians, while the Ukrainian side "reiterated that European partners shall be involved in the peace process."
"Before you negotiate, you need to stop shooting at each other. That's what the president wanted to see," Rubio said.
Zoom in: The U.S. delegation in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, was led by Rubio and Waltz, while the Ukrainian delegation was led by Zelensky's chief of staff, Andriy Yermak. Ukraine's foreign and defense ministers also participated.
What to watch: According to the joint statement, the U.S. and Ukraine also agreed to conclude as soon as possible "a comprehensive agreement for developing Ukraine's critical mineral resources."
An initial agreement was already negotiated, but President Trump canceled the signing ceremony last month after his Oval Office argument with Zelensky.
Rubio said both presidents would instruct their teams to bring the deal to conclusion.
What's next: The State Department said both delegations agreed to name their negotiating teams and start talks immediately on a peace agreement with Russia.
Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to visit Moscow on Thursday to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin and discuss the 30-day ceasefire proposal.
Waltz said he will speak to his Russian counterpart in the next few days while Rubio will meet his G7 counterparts soon and discuss the path forward.
Editor's note: This story has been updated to include details of the U.S. resuming military aid to Ukraine, along with intelligence sharing. It has been corrected to reflect that Trump froze arms and intelligence sharing with Ukraine eight (not 10) days ago.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has launched a new app that officials say will allow immigrants suspected of being in the country illegally to report when they "self deport."
Why it matters: The move comes after the Trump administration shut down the CBP One app that facilitated the legal entry of migrants at the border, and as immigrant removals in President Trump's first days in office fall behind the daily average in the final weeks of former President Biden's term.
The big picture: President Trump's vow to deport "millions and millions" of unauthorized immigrants has hit a harsh reality of a lack of funds, detention space, officers and infrastructure.
The administration is seeking more resources from Congress, but in the meantime is focusing more on threats and new orders for a registry to scare some immigrants out of the country.
Zoom in: The new CBP Home app will have a "self-deportation reporting feature" letting immigrants "submit their intent to depart" the U.S., the DHS announced Monday.
The department said the self-deportation functionality is a part of a $200 million domestic and international ad campaign encouraging undocumented immigrants to "Stay Out and Leave Now."
The new app is free across mobile application stores, DHS said.
What they're saying: "The CBP Home app gives aliens the option to leave now and self-deport, so they may still have the opportunity to return legally in the future and live the American dream," DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said in a statement.
"If they don't, we will find them, we will deport them, and they will never return."
Noem said the Biden administration exploited the CBP One app to allow more than 1 million immigrants to enter the U.S. illegally.
Reality check: The Biden administrationlaunched an app for people to schedule legal border crossings but also likely contributed to drawing more Mexican families, experts told Axios.
The vast majority of migrants who enter the country via the app were released into the U.S. on parole, which allowed them to get a work permit in roughly six weeks and legally stay in the country for up to two years.
Nearly 1 million migrants used the app under the Biden administration to schedule appointments since that feature launched in January 2023.
What we're hearing: Immigrant immigration lawyers are cautioning immigrants not to use the new "self deport" feature on the CBP Home app.
They are telling immigrants it will likely only gather their personal data with no hope of giving a legal pathway for residency or citizenship.
The intrigue: Immigrant advocates also denounced the app as mean and confusing.
"The Trump administration's approach of "self-deportation" will only add chaos and cruelty to an already broken system," said Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of the immigrant advocacy group America's Voice.
Cárdenas says the app is stoking fears and encouraging self-deportation among immigrants who came to the country lawfully.
What we're watching: The Biden administration came up with data from the CBP One app, so comparing data from the new CBP Home app could be illuminating.
The Trump administration has fired staff from the nation's immigration court system, and other staff and judges have announced their retirement or resignation.
The staff reduction will likely add to the historic backlog of cases and slow Trump's mass deportation plan, even as he asks Congress for more resources.
Steady demand kept the economy humming for the last few years even amid recession predictions. Now there are early, tentative signs that demand from consumers and businesses may be cracking.
Why it matters: Sentiment indicators show that economic uncertainty, tariff threats and federal government cutbacks are weighing on consumer and business spending plans.
Some companies most exposed to discretionary spending say it isn't just talk: Weak sentiment is carrying over into weaker buying.
It is unclear whether a similar cooling of demand is underway across the economy. But the anecdotes can't be ignored, especially as the factors that previously supported spending among consumers — robust hiring and wage growth — begin to fade.
Driving the news: Three of the nation's biggest airlines — Delta, American Airlines and Southwest — warned about sluggish demand for flights. American Airlines said weaker dynamics started to appear "primarily in March."
The falloutfromfederal spending cuts isn't limited to the government sector. They also spill over into less demand for private-sector goods and services, as shown by airline executives' latest comments.
What they're saying: Less government travel is weighing on business this quarter, airline executives said.
"The government contractors, the aerospace and defense business — certainly the employees that feel threatened as to whether they're going to have a job are not out there spending money traveling," Delta CEO Ed Bastian told CNBC.
Bastian added corporations were nervous about trade uncertainty and pulling back some on business travel.
"We saw in February a pretty significant shift in GDP sentiment and the output and the confidence signals that we monitor," Bastian said. "We saw companies start to pull back in terms of corporate spending."
Zoom out: Smaller firms — responsible for the bulk of U.S. jobs growth — are also signaling concerns about how business will fare in the months ahead.
"Many small firms are supported by assisting firms with government contracts. How these developments are resolved will shape the economy's future," the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), a lobbying group for small businesses, said in a statement.
Trump officials have emphasized the administration's focus on small businesses. In the face of a stock market sell-off, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that Wall Street would be OK and the administration was concentrated on Main Street.
What to watch: NFIB's latest small business optimism index fell again last month, though the index is still above pre-election levels.
The underlying details of the survey had a stagflationary tone. The net share of small business owners raising prices surged 10 percentage points — the largest monthly jump since 2021.
The share of owners who said it was a "good time" to expand their business fell by the most since the onset of the pandemic.
The bottom line: For now, the evidence of waning demand is contained to anecdotes. But an uncomfortably high share of those anecdotes point to an economy losing momentum.
President Trump on Tuesday imposed new retaliatory tariffs on Canada and insisted the only solution was for the country to join the U.S. — but then reversed his decision after Ontario agreed not to levy electricity exports.
Why it matters: The pullback was the latest example of the on-again, off-again volatility that has disrupted financial markets.
However, the initial threat was an escalation — both of the trade war with one of the top U.S. trading partners, and of Trump's increasingly serious rhetoric about trying to make Canada part of the U.S.
The big picture: Close allies less than two months ago, relations between the U.S. and Canada have now frayed to the point that diplomacy is being conducted by furious TV appearances and social media name-calling.
It's spurred a sense of Canadian nationalism strong enough to change the course of the country's politics.
Catch up quick: Trump, in a Truth Social post Tuesday morning, said steel and aluminum tariffs on Canada, already scheduled for Wednesday, would now be 50% instead of 25%.
He also threatened further tariffs to "permanently shut down the automobile manufacturing business in Canada."
"The only thing that makes sense is for Canada to become our cherished Fifty First State. This would make all Tariffs, and everything else, totally disappear," he wrote.
Canada has repeatedly rejected any notion of sacrificing its sovereignty to join the U.S.
Between the lines: Ontario Premier Doug Ford posted to X that he would meet with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Thursday to discuss trade issues, and in the meantime would suspend a tariff on electricity coming into the U.S.
Following Ford's reversal, the White House issued a statement confirming the extra tariffs would not go into effect tomorrow — just the 25% steel and aluminum tariff that was originally planned.
"President Trump has once again used the leverage of the American economy, which is the best and biggest in the world, to deliver a win for the American people," a White House spokesman said in a statement.
Canada is by far the largest source of U.S. electricity imports, per EIA data, though those imports account for less than 1% of U.S. consumption.
What they're saying: Canada's incoming prime minister, former central bank head Mark Carney, promised a response that maximized the impact on the U.S.
"My government will keep our tariffs on until the Americans show us respect and make credible, reliable commitments to free and fair trade," he posted to X.
The White House, at a press briefing, said Trump and Carney have not yet spoken.
Editor's note: This story has been updated with U.S. and Canadian officials revising their plans on tariffs.
Data: Moody's Analytics/National Association of Realtors/Federal Housing Administration. Chart: Axios Visuals
Not only have home prices soared over the past decade, but it's the so-called "affordable homes" that have seen the biggest price increases.
Why it matters: Rising prices, exacerbated by a shortage of affordable homes, put homeownership out of reach for many, driving them to a rental market that's also seen remarkable cost increases.
Zoom out: It's a doom loop. A shortage of affordable homes means that buyers compete fiercely for the cheapest ones, pushing up prices.
Prices for the bottom third of homes are up 124% since 2015, while the top third increased 77%, per an analysis from Moody's Analytics.
The big picture: The most desirable cities are becoming affordable only to the wealthy, while many of those of more modest means are forced into longer commutes — creating more traffic, more environmental strain, and greater social division, writes Mark Zandi, Moody's Analytics chief economist, in a new paper.
The latest: The paper endorses legislation set to be re-introduced Tuesday morning by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the ranking Democrat on the Senate banking committee, along with Senator Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) and Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) in the House.
The American Housing and Economic Mobility Act of 2025 is an ambitious piece of legislation that Warren's been backing since 2018.
It would provide more than $500 billion over the next decade to build more homes, funded by an increase in the estate tax.
The money would be used to incent localities to cut regulations that impede building, as well as go to first-time homebuyers, among other things.
"My comprehensive bill would build 3 million new homes across America, bring down rents by 10%, and create incentives for local governments to cut unnecessary red tape that drives up costs," Warren said in a statement to Axios.
Between the lines: Cutting red tape sounds great — and may appeal to conservatives — but the zoning restrictions that impede building are typically fiercely defended by Republicans, including the president.
But there is a surprising amount of bipartisan agreement that something needs to be done about housing affordability.
That includes a bill introduced in 2023 that would reform rural housing programs cosponsored by four Democratic senators and four Republicans; and another that would increase home buyer protection in credit reports that passed the Senate last year.
Democratic banking committee staffers tell Axios they're looking to find some areas for compromise. They pointed to a part of Warren's bill that would restrict private equity firms' ability to buy homes.
Reality check: Congress has little appetite for spending on folks in need these days — as lawmakers ponder slashing Medicaid in order to extend the 2017 tax cuts. Affordable housing funding has reportedly been stalled by the Trump administration.
What to watch: There will be a Senate hearing on the topic Wednesday.
They did it delicately, privately and belatedly. But some Cabinet members and top confidants warned President Trump that two pillars of his flood-the-zone strategy could backfire: tariffs and Elon Musk's budget-gutting.
Why it matters: Both moves hacked off allies — some Hill Republicans and Cabinet officials with cuts, Canada and Mexico with tariffs — and created the impression and reality of uncertainty or outright chaos.
Now, the public is weighing in:
Markets hate uncertainty and chaos. The S&P 500 is down 6.4% since Inauguration Day, and 3% since Election Day — one of the worst-performing major indices in the world. Most market signals are negative — partly because of a tech meltdown that's not entirely Trump-driven. But the uncertainty is the critical element. The uncertainty is the point.
Consumers are already losing confidence and pulling back on spending, weakening a key engine of the economy.
Several polls show a slump in Trump's popularity since he took office and launched his shock-and-awe plan to remake the U.S. government and the world order.
Today is Day 51 of Trump's term — halfway through the opening 100 days.
"Ever since the election, Trump has been the master of the narrative," a Trump adviser told Axios' Marc Caputo. "We won every day. But this stock market fall is just different, no control. But it's just a detox — it'll get better."
A senior White House official tells us: "The market isn't great, not gonna lie. But the vibes are still good otherwise."
Another White House official said Trump and his team "are adept at playing the long game, and we will not be dictated by a snapshot in time when there are so many indicators that show we're building a strong economy with staying power."
What we're hearing: House and Senate Republicans are hyper-focused on avoiding a government shutdown at midnight Friday. And they're hopeful the stock market will trend back upward.
"If the stock market looks like this in three weeks, we've got a problem," said a top consultant to Republican Senate and House candidates. "There's time. It's early."
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) posted on X with a bear-red graphic of Monday's indexes: "The stock market is comprised of millions of people who are simultaneously trading. The market indexes are a distillation of sentiment. When the markets tumble like this in response to tariffs, it pays to listen."
Behind the scenes: Trump's team remains confident and aggressive, and contends not a minute has been wasted. The number of migrants trying to reach the U.S. by trekking through the Darién Gap jungle into Central America plunged 99% last month from February 2024, Bloomberg reported Monday.
Trump and his aides are taking risks with eyes wide open — and we're told they're determined to persevere. They think the first 50 days couldn't possibly have gone better. An emboldened Trump is leaning into his instincts on every front.
Trump's team cares most about the MAGA base, which is beyond delighted with the pace and scope of his move-fast-and-break-things approach.
Trump and his advisers recognize "that changing the globalized economic system, which has deindustrialized the United States, will create friction in the real economy," a top Republican insider told us.
"To rebuild the U.S. civilian and defense industrial base that the globalists gave away to China will cause economic and market dislocation in the short term," the insider added. "It's a play for long-term results — like Reagan on deficits to win the Cold War."
Reality check: Some Cabinet members and congressional Republicans fear this painful "transition," Trump delicately labeled it Sunday in an interview with Fox News' Maria Bartiromo, could stall his agenda.
It was that quote — Trump refusing to rule out a recession — that helped fuel Monday's market swoon as fears rose about a U.S. economic slowdown and the possible pocketbook effects of tariffs.
"This big sell-off feels ugly, it feels nasty," Drew Pettit, an equity strategist at Citigroup, told the Financial Times. "We were coming off very high sentiment and very high growth expectations. All of this is just recalibrating to the new risks that are in front of us."
Between the lines: There's a messaging gap that's confusing the market, too. The same morning Trump was hedging on a possible recession, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick was on NBC's "Meet the Press" guaranteeing: "There's going to be no recession in America."
Investors like one message from government — not a menu.
Axios' Ben Berkowitz and Marc Caputo contributed reporting.
Go deeper: The real "stagflation" risk, by Axios' Neil Irwin and Courtenay Brown.
Five years after the COVID pandemic began, its legacy is as much political as epidemiological, according to a comprehensive new Axios-Ipsos poll, with Americans' views of what happened cleaved by partisanship and media preferences.
The big picture: 39% say they know someone who died. Everybody wants to leave the era behind. Yet two-thirds of Americans don't believe the nation is adequately prepared to deal with another pandemic or widespread health crisis, according to the Axios-Ipsos American Health Index.
Trust in public health institutions and leaders divided, declined and never fully recovered.
Today, just 31% of Americans (67% of Republicans, 7% of Democrats, 22% of independents) say they trust President Trump for information about health topics. Trust in Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is equally low.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the prominent former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who became a political target during the pandemic, today is trusted by nearly three-fourths of Democrats and half of independents but only about 1 in 10 Republicans.
Since the election, Republicans have driven some uptick of support for federal health agencies and public health measures.
Why it matters: "We definitely see how the politicization of the COVID epidemic is still echoing through society," said Ipsos pollster and senior vice president Chris Jackson.
The difference primarily is in the attitudes of Republicans, Jackson said of societal shifts reflected in the data. These patterns, he said, may seep over into emerging public health challenges, including a resurgence of measles.
"You can see the seeds of the same phenomenon we saw in 2020 and 2021," Jackson said. "If these institutions get caught in the political crosshairs, their reputations suffer."
By the numbers: Nearly two-thirds believe shutdowns in early 2020 were necessary to save lives. But 56% say they caused unnecessary damage to the economy. Now consider this:
Just 24% of those who identified their primary source of media as a conservative outlet, including Fox News, said the shutdowns were necessary, compared with 81% whose primary source of media was broadcast TV news, and 88% whose primary source was national newspapers, CNN or MSNBC.
90% of those who gravitated to conservative media said the shutdowns caused unnecessary economic damage, while only 52% of broadcast watchers and 23% of those who turned to national newspapers, CNN or MSNBC agreed.
Data: Axios-Ipsos poll; Chart: Axios Visuals
Majorities of Americans still trust the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (62% overall, 42% Republicans, 86% Democrats) and the National Institutes of Health (57% overall, 40% Republicans, 77% Democrats) — and say the government should keep funding COVID monitoring and prevention measures.
But more than half (53%) believe public health officials lied to the public about how effective vaccines and masks were at preventing the virus' spread, with Republicans far outnumbering Democrats and independents.
Between the lines: 84% say they believe COVID has changed Americans' lives forever.
Yet when it comes to their own experience, 7 in 10 said the virus had no lasting impact on their physical or mental health, work/life balance, professional success, ability to pay bills or their family's ability to thrive.
About one-third said the pandemic experience made them rethink their politics and caused them to get more politically engaged.
Women, people under 30 and self-described Democrats tended to fare worse in terms of mental health and their finances.
State of play: A minority of Americans who tend to be older and Democratic-leaning stay current on boosters and track the spread not only of COVID but other infectious diseases.
But for most people, the perception began to shift in the second half of 2022, about a year after the deadly Delta wave, as people began venturing out and returning to their pre-COVID routines.
Concern about COVID fell about 20 percentage points over 2022 and vaccine uptake began to plummet early in 2023. By the spring of 2023, diners were again packing bars and restaurants, gym memberships were hot again and tours by Taylor Swift and Beyoncé were filling stadiums.
Now, just 17% of adults report receiving a COVID booster in the last three months, and fewer members of the public see COVID as a threat than the risk of unsafe chemicals or additives in food.
More than 4 in 10 believe the only people dying from the virus are already sick or unhealthy.
But the COVID experience, and the politicization of science that characterized the past five years, still is influencing opinion.
Trust in the government is down, and most Americans say it doesn't make the health and well-being of the public a priority.
About a third of the population thinks getting a COVID booster poses a large or moderate risk to their well-being — about the same on the threat scale as air and water pollution.
And we're divided on whether health care workers should be required to be vaccinated against COVID, with 47% supporting the idea and 42% opposed.
Roughly the same number think the government should be focused on healthy foods, lifestyles and disease prevention (41%) as on research to develop drugs and treatments for disease (38%).
But more than 7 in 10 oppose ending vaccine requirements for children to attend public schools. And 55% are against preventing the CDC from showing ads encouraging people to get certain vaccines.
Methodology: This Axios/Ipsos Poll was conducted Feb. 28-March 3, 2025, by Ipsos' KnowledgePanel®. This poll is based on a nationally representative probability sample of 1,066 general population adults age 18 or older.
The margin of sampling error is ±3.2 percentage points at the 95% confidence level, for results based on the entire sample of adults.
President Trump calls nuclear weapons the "greatest existential threat" humanity faces, but he may be ushering in a world of more nuclear powers and fewer nuclear guardrails.
Why it matters: Trump on Sunday reiterated his urgent hope to halt the nuclear spiral in which China, Russia and the U.S. are developing ever-more sophisticated tools to end life on earth.
He also revealed that he'd written to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei expressing his desire for a new nuclear deal — while warning that without one, he'll have to take "the other option" to ensure Tehran never gets a nuke.
Trump's first weeks back in office have been peppered with nuclear warnings, including his desire to avoid "World War III" over Ukraine.
The flipside: Trump's withdrawal of U.S. support for Kyiv has U.S. allies debating whether to develop their own nukes, rather than depend on Washington.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Friday that his country would have to explore "opportunities related to nuclear weapons" due to the "profound change of American geopolitics."
French President Emmanuel Macron also said last week that he would consult with European allies like Germany about including them under the French nuclear umbrella.
Trump's ally-bashing has also turbocharged the debate in South Korea over whether a domestic nuclear program is needed to counter nuclear-armed North Korea.
Some experts fear a new era of nuclearization.
"The belief that the United States has no interest in defending allies, which is the conclusion that allies are rapidly and rightly drawing, is very likely to cause proliferation," says James Acton, co-director of the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
"I think it's virtually inevitable they will explore their options, and there is a realistic prospect that some of those explorations turn into weapons programs," Acton says, emphasizing that likelihood for South Korea in particular.
Meanwhile, the last major U.S.-Russia arms control agreement, New START, is less than a year from expiration.
That treaty can't be extended, and any new agreement that constrains the U.S. but not China is unlikely to pass muster in Washington.
China, meanwhile, rejects arms control talks outright — at least until its rapidly advancing nuclear program reaches parity with the other major powers.
A former senior U.S. official conceded to Axios that it's "difficult to conceive of" a scenario where Beijing comes to the table for the sort of trilateral talks Trump envisions.
"There's not a lot of carrots. You mostly offer them the stick," the official said.
"The problem is that a lot of the available sticks they're already brandishing at the Chinese right now — tariffs and other things."
Key quote: "I think we're going into a period of time where we won't have any operative nuclear arms control agreements," the former official says.
A National Security Council spokesperson did not provide a comment for this story.
Flashback: Trump made two dramatic moves in the nuclear arena in his first term — pulling out of the 2015 Iran deal, and holding two summits to try to convince North Korea's Kim Jong-un to denuclearize.
Both Tehran and Pyongyang have made significant nuclear advances since then.
What to watch: Trump's letter to Khamenei and early comments on Kim suggest leader-to-leader nuclear diplomacy is back on the menu.
But force of personality alone won't be enough to keep the world's "greatest threat" in check.
Federal agents' arrest of Columbia University protest leader Mahmoud Khalil — a lawful permanent U.S. resident with a green card — is being criticized by free-speech advocates who see it as a chilling escalation of President Trump's immigration crackdown.
Why it matters: The White House doesn't see Khalil's arrest as a First Amendment issue. It says his actions — helping to lead campus protests against Israel's treatment of Palestinians last year — run afoul of President Trump's recent executive order banning antisemitism.
And in a move that critics say is aimed at silencing campus protesters, Trump's administration is indicating that Khalil's actions against U.S. foreign policy positions justify revoking his green card — a move that could lead to deporting him.
State of play: Green card holders — there are about 13 million in the U.S. — typically must break the law to be deported.There's currently no allegation that Khalil, a Syrian national, committed a crime.
But the Department of Homeland Security has been investigating him and gathered evidence that he was actively supporting Hamas, but not materially supporting the terror group, a White House official said.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio was presented with evidence from the DHS review and determined that Khalil acted against U.S. foreign policy positions, the official said.
U.S. law allows the secretary of state to deport a green card holder if that person is deemed to have "potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States."
The latest: U.S. District Judge Jesse M. Furman on Monday blocked any attempt by the Trump administration to deport Khalil until the court says otherwise.
A conference between the judge and all parties involved is scheduled for Wednesday in a Manhattan federal court.
The White House official said the decision to arrest Khalil was based on his public and private activities, but wouldn't say what those activities revealed about Khalil.
DHS and the State Department didn't respond to requests for comment.
Khalil is being detained at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Louisiana.
His attorneys have filed an emergency petition asking that he be returned to New York, where his the legal challenge to his detention is unfolding.
Khalil's arrest "for his constitutionally protected activity that the administration disagrees with is not only patently unlawful, it is a further dangerous step into modern-day McCarthyist repression," Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights, said in a statement.
Azmy's organization is one of the legal groups challenging Khalil's detention.
Zoom in: Free speech, even hate speech, is protected by the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has backed this principle.
"There's a question on what kind of 'support' [Khalil] was providing [Hamas], if any," said Will Creeley, legal director at FIRE, a free speech-focused legal advocacy group.
"You can walk around and talk about how Hamas is the greatest thing since sliced bread, but unless you're providing material support to Hamas ... then you have the right to your view — no matter how offensive some, many or most Americans would find it," Creeley said.
He added that if Khalil is accused of breaking a law, he'd still be entitled to due process. Creeley's group sent a letter to government agencies requesting more information about the grounds for Khalil's detention.
The intrigue: Khalil's arrest came days after Rubio posted on X that the U.S. had "zero tolerance for foreign visitors who support terrorists."
He added that "violators of U.S. law — including international students — face visa denial or revocation, and deportation."
What they're saying: Khalil's arrest is "a blatant attack on the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech," the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, said in a statement.
CAIR said Khalil is being detained for "his peaceful, anti-genocide activism."
"This arrest is unprecedented, illegal, and un-American," Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU's Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, said in a statement.
The other side: "We appreciate the Trump administration's broad, bold set of efforts to counter campus antisemitism — and this action further illustrates that resolve by holding alleged perpetrators responsible for their actions," the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) posted on X.
"Those who sympathize with terrorism are unwelcome on our shores," Trump Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller said on X. "They will be denied entry or sent home."
What to watch: Trump said in a social media post that Khalil's arrest is the first of many to come.
The White House official did not share which campuses or activists would be targeted next. The official said the crackdown would extend only to visa or green card holders, not to U.S. citizens.
Driving the news: Axios spoke to six current and retired air traffic controllers and instructors, all of whom requested anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the press.
Controllers have so far been spared from President Trump's mass firings, though other FAA employees have gotten the axe, raising safety concerns.
What they're saying: "I have friends and family [asking], 'Should I get on an airplane?' one retired controller tells Axios.
"And I'm like, well, it's not there yet. But it seems to be trending that way."
"I don't believe that if these people really cared about safety, that they would be doing the things that they're doing."
A separate, currently working controller brought up their concerns over staffing shortages, a longstanding issue.
"My biggest fear is an over-exhausted controller who has to work a combined position because of staffing misses something," they say, referring to one controller working multiple posts simultaneously at their location.
That's common at some facilities during quieter periods, but can divide controllers' attention.
Another controller believes it's still safe to fly "in general," thanks to those behind the radar screens.
"It is safe not because of the FAA's policies, it is not safe because of who the president is, or because of who the president was," the controller says.
"It's safe because there's people that go in every single day and they work their ass off to make sure that it's safe."
The other side: "We continue to hire and onboard air traffic controllers and safety professionals, including mechanics and others who support them," the FAA said in a statement.
"Air traffic controllers deal with and have to manage stress, day in and day out," Nick Daniels, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA), said during a Mar. 4 House hearing. "Anything that adds to that, any uncertainty, is what brings an added risk that has to be evaluated into the system."
NATCA declined to make Daniels available or otherwise comment for this story.
Their ideas: One controller proposed a second ATC school to complement an existing Oklahoma facility, but an instructor at that facility says low pay has led to a teacher shortage and smaller classes.
Another says young new controllers are often thrown into high-paced, understaffed facilities — New York approach, for example — like "cannon fodder into the slaughter," leading to higher training times and failure rates.
Yet another suggests hiring more controllers to train and work at understaffed facilities near home, rather than being assigned elsewhere in the country after initial training, as often happens.
Follow the money: Higher pay and better scheduling are pretty much universal wants.
TransportationSecretary Sean Duffy recently claimed that controllers make $160,000 on average three years out of the academy.
But several controllers told Axios that's a rosy view, with some making far less — sometimes while stationed in high-cost areas — and without clear growth opportunities.
Controllers made a median of $137,400 in 2023, per Labor Department data.
Friction point: Air traffic controllers can't legally strike, limiting their bargaining power.
And when controllers struck in 1981, President Reagan fired thousands — a memory that runs deep in controllers' collective psyche.
The latest: Duffy has floated raising the mandatory ATC retirement age from 56, while Elon Musk called for retired controllers to return to work.
The FAA also recently increased pay for initial trainees from about $18/hour to about $23/hour and opened a new ATC hiring window.
Reality check: Retirees would still need to be re-trained before plugging in and working traffic, controllers tell Axios.
And some controllers become eligible for retirement before 56, leaving for other jobs or pursuits while collecting their pensions.
"If your base salary is 130k and your pension is 60k, now you're working for 70k a year," one controller says. "Is it worth it for 70k a year? Could you find something else? So guys are walking away, and they're not making it to 56."
The intrigue: Duffy recently blocked efforts by Musk's DOGE to fire controllers, per New York Times coverage of a meeting of Trump's Cabinet earlier this month.
Musk reportedly denied that DOGE made any such attempt.
Also during that meeting, Trump reportedly told Duffy to hire "geniuses" from MIT to be controllers.
When asked about that comment, one controller replied: "I seriously doubt people with degrees from MIT want six-day workweeks on our rotating schedules for our salaries."
What's next: If the government shuts down Friday, controllers will still be made to work, but with suspended pay — no doubt further eroding morale.
Yet controller sickouts played an under-appreciated role in ending the last major government shutdown, and it doesn't take many absences for delays and cancellations to start mounting.
By the numbers: Tesla shares fell more than 15% Monday. They're now down more than 53% since their high on December 23, a loss of $700 billion in market value.
The company is now more than 11% below where it closed the day Trump was elected.
Context: While stocks overall have taken a beating in recent weeks amid tariff threats, renewed inflation fears and concerns of slowing growth, Tesla's fall has been especially steep. It's suffered the biggest decline of any stock in the S&P 500 year-to-date, per FactSet.
What he's saying: Trump said on Truth Social early Monday that he is "going to buy a brand new Tesla tomorrow morning as a show of confidence and support for Elon Musk, a truly great American," though the president didn't say what kind of Tesla he planned to buy.
"Why should he be punished for putting his tremendous skills to work in order to help MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN???" added Trump, in an apparent reference to his work with DOGE to overhaul the federal government and slash its workforce.
Driving the news: Two negative analyst comments spooked investors Monday: UBS analyst Joseph Spak wrote in a report that there were signs of Tesla's sales softening, and that sales declines were likely to impact both the company's first-quarter delivery targets and full-year-profit forecasts.
Separately, Baird analyst Ben Kallo said on CNBC that demand for Tesla vehicles could be hurt by recent reports of vandalism reportedly linked to political backlash.
This is all coming in context of a tech wipeout Monday amid widespread — and growing — recession fears, which drove the Nasdaq down 4% on the day.
Meanwhile, Musk on Monday was also dealing with what he called a "massive" and "coordinated" cyberattack on X, with tens of thousands of users reporting outages throughout the day.
What we're watching: While details of the attack, including a motivation, were not immediately known, many of social media were noting it in the same context as the Tesla demonstrations, implying a political motivation.
Musk, responding to one such post, seemed to elevate the theory, writing on X: "We get attacked every day, but this was done with a lot of resources. Either a large, coordinated group and/or a country is involved."
Later, in a Fox Business interview, he said the attacks appeared to come from the area of Ukraine.
Former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was taken into custody at Manila's international airport on an Interpol arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court on Tuesday morning local time, local officials said.
A United Nations report found tens of thousands of people may have been killed in police drug operations in the Philippines during the crackdown.
Driving the news: "Early in the morning, Interpol Manila received the official copy of the warrant of the arrest from the ICC" in connection with the investigation into the 79-year-old Duterte, the presidential palace said in a statement, according to a translation.
"As of now, he is under the custody of authorities."
A spokesperson for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. told local reporters Monday the presidential office would "follow what law dictates, if the warrant of arrest needs to be served."
Duterte told cheering crows in Hong Kong Monday if an arrest warrant is "truly my fate in life, it's OK, I will accept it — they can arrest me, imprison me," according to multiple reports.
President Trump said Monday he will "lead the charge" to oust Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) for his refusal to support Republicans' government funding bill.
Why it matters: A doctrinaire libertarian, Massie has been a persistent thorn in the side for both Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) by defecting on key votes and imperiling major GOP legislation.
"Congressman Thomas Massie, of beautiful Kentucky, is an automatic 'NO' vote on just about everything," Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Trump said Massie "SHOULD BE PRIMARIED, and I will lead the charge against him." He compared the Kentucky Republican to "Liz Chaney [sic]," the Republican former Jan. 6 committee member whom he helped oust.
Yes, but: Trump has previously tried unsuccessfully to oust Massie, who signaled on Monday he is not afraid of another Trump-backed primary challenger.
"Three times I've had a challenger who tried to be more MAGA than me. None busted 25% because my constituents prefer transparency and principles over blind allegiance," Massie said in a post on X.
Massie has said he will oppose the short-term government spending measure because it keeps federal funding at 2024 levels without enshrining the cuts DOGE has made.
Zoom out: With a roughly two-seat majority, Johnson has faced a nailbiter on virtually every major vote of the last three months due to Massie's refusal to be a reliable GOP vote.
White House Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff is planning to travel to Moscow later this week for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, a source with direct knowledge confirmed.
Why it matters: The meeting with Putin is planned to take place several days after a key meeting between U.S. and Ukrainian officials in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday that will focus on a possible ceasefire in the war with Russia.
Witkoff was supposed to participate in the meeting with Ukrainian officials, but at the moment it looks like he is going to be the main channel of communication with Russia as part of the division of labor inside of President Trump's foreign policy and national security team.
Flashback: This will be Witkoff's second meeting with Putin.
Trump's envoy traveled to Moscow in mid-February as part of a deal to release U.S. citizen Marc Fogel, who was then detained in Russian prison. Witkoff met Putin for three hours on that trip.
Driving the news: Witkoff left Miami on Monday en route Abu Dhabi. He is expected to meet with UAE president Mohammed Bin Zayed on Tuesday, according to three sources with knowledge.
On Tuesday evening, Witkoff will travel to Doha to join Qatari and Egyptian mediators in negotiations over the Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, two sources said. On Wednesday, Witkoff will meet with the prime minister of Qatar.
On Thursday, Witkoff plans to travel to Moscow but, according to a source familiar with the knowledge, the plan could change based on the situation with negotiations in Qatar and Putin's schedule.
Bloomberg first reported Witkoff's planned trip to Moscow.
State of play: Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House National Security Adviser Mike Waltz arrived in Jedda, Saudi Arabia's largest city, on Monday ahead of their meeting with senior Ukrainian officials.
Rubio and Waltz met on Monday with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS) and discussed efforts to reach a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, the State Department said.
MBS met later on Monday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who visited the kingdom.
"The Ukrainian delegation remains in Jeddah to work with the U.S. team on Tuesday and we hope for practical outcomes. Ukraine's position in these talks will be fully constructive," Zelensky said after the meeting.
