--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Thursday, May 29th. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today.
--:-- Shamita Basu: On today's show, the running theme among the people Trump is pardoning. As Harvard students graduate, its president speaks out. And Elon Musk hands in his special government employee pass. But first, a federal trade court has struck down President Trump's sweeping tariffs, ruling that he exceeded his legal authority.
--:-- Ryan Goodman: The court's argument basically says this goes back to Congress. It boils down to the idea that there was always a poor fit for the tariffs being invoked by the administration because the administration says they were operating under this emergency National Security Act. And the court says, no, you aren't. The National Security Act was not built for something like this. It's really Congress's authority to give it to you and you don't have it yet.
--:-- Shamita Basu: CNN notes that the 25 percent auto tariffs stay in place as a different law had been used in that case. Yesterday, shortly before this news broke, President Trump took issue with a reporter asking for his reaction to a phrase coined by a Financial Times writer to describe Trump's tariff threats followed by walkbacks, TACO trade, an acronym short for Trump Always Chickens Out.
--:-- President Trump: Six months ago, this country was stone cold dead. We had a dead country. We had a country people didn't think it was going to survive. And you ask a nasty question like that. It's called negotiation. And he defended his tariffs, describing them as crucial to his trade talks.
--:-- Shamita Basu: I can promise you, and I have great respect for the people at the European Union, they wouldn't be over here today negotiating if I didn't put a 50 percent tariff on. The sad thing is now when I make a deal with them, it's something much more reasonable. They'll say, oh, he was chicken. He was chicken. That's so unbelievable.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The ruling last night raises big questions as to what happens to those plans to negotiate new trade agreements and what happens to the few trade deals that were already made. Now to a series of pardons recently announced or issued by President Trump that appear to have some similar themes. There's either money, personal connections or loyalty involved.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Yesterday, we told you about the president's plans to pardon a couple made famous by reality TV, Todd and Julie Chrisley, who were found guilty of tax evasion, fraud, and conspiring to swindle community banks of more than $30 million. They have denied the charges and were sentenced to a combined 19 years in federal prison.
--:-- Savannah Chrisley: President Trump didn't just commute their sentences. He gave them a full, unconditional pardon. So for that, I am forever grateful.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Trump also pardoned Scott Jenkins, a longstanding supporter and former Virginia sheriff who was convicted of fraud and accepting over $75,000 in bribes. In exchange for those bribes, Jenkins appointed businessmen as deputy sheriffs without training them, according to prosecutors.
--:-- Shamita Basu: He is now one of at least four former public officials who have supported Trump, been convicted of financial improprieties, and been pardoned. Jenkins was set to report to prison on Tuesday. He's denied any wrongdoing.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And reporting from The New York Times revealed that Trump also recently pardoned a former nursing home executive who pleaded guilty to tax crimes just a few weeks after his mother went to a fundraising dinner for the president in April that cost $1 million per person to attend.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Paul Walzak admitted that he withheld more than $10 million from the paychecks of nurses, doctors, and others who worked at his facilities under the pretext of using it for their Social Security, Medicare, and federal income taxes. He instead used some of that money to buy himself a yacht.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Trump's pardon spared Walzak from having to serve any of his 18-month prison sentence. Now, it's not unusual for a president to issue pardons. Almost every president has, and some of their choices were controversial, like former President Biden pardoning his son Hunter, who was convicted on federal gun charges and pled guilty to tax evasion.
--:-- Liz Oyer: This administration appears to be using pardons in a completely different and new way, which is to reward people who demonstrate political loyalty to the administration. And that is unprecedented.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Pardons are normally reserved for people who show remorse for a crime they've been convicted of and who have actually served at least some and typically all of their sentence and have shown personal growth and rehabilitation during that time.
--:-- Liz Oyer: And she says this is a departure from how Trump handled pardons in his first term, where the profile and number of people he gave clemency was broadly in line with other presidents, even if some were high profile people he had personal connections to, like Paul Manafort and Roger Stone.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But now the ordinary people seem to have been completely forgotten. There are applications piled up at the office of the pardon attorney from individuals who are incarcerated around the country some of whom have been waiting years for their applications to be considered and those are being ignored in favor of the wealthy and well.
--:-- Shamita Basu: There are two people primarily supporting Trump's pardon efforts in this term. A newly appointed pardon czar named Alice Marie Johnson, she's in charge of recommending individuals for commutations. She herself was pardoned by Trump in his first term after serving 21 years in prison for cocaine trafficking.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And Ed Martin has taken on the role of a pardon attorney at the DOJ. He's a Trump loyalist who The Wall Street Journal reports has been working to turn his office into a pipeline for political allies to get their cases in front of the president.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Yesterday, news of high-profile pardons continued. This time it was Michael Grimm, the former Republican congressman who was convicted of tax fraud in 2014 and served an eight-month sentence.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Let's turn to higher education, and specifically to Harvard, which has its commencement ceremony later today. Harvard's voice is loud and clear! Harvard's voice is loud and clear! Crowds of students and supporters filled Harvard's Science Center Plaza on Tuesday to protest the Trump administration's attempt to ban international students.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The same day, the administration announced its plans to cancel another $100 million in federal funding to the university. Yesterday, CNN anchor Christian Amanpour delivered an address to students at Harvard's Kennedy School of Business and urged the audience to champion public service and defend the free expression of ideas.
--:-- Christian Amanpour: Make no mistake about it, academics, education are on the front lines of the current struggle between the two halves of America. Dissent is not disloyalty. Dissent is actually an invaluable part of our democratic process.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We cannot surrender to any system that deems only power-approved speech or thought is allowed. Before the latest funding cut, Trump had already cut $450 million in grants, frozen $2 billion in federal funding pending a lawsuit, and threatened to scrap the university's tax-exempt status.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A judge has temporarily halted the attempt to block international students from attending the institution, but current and incoming students are left feeling confused and worried about what that means.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The administration wants Harvard to agree to a list of demands, including admission policy overhauls and what they describe as audits of academic programs and staff.
--:-- Shamita Basu: With an endowment of $53 billion, Harvard can afford to absorb some of these blows as the price for continued independence, but it remains a difficult position for Harvard's president, Alan Garber.
--:-- Alan Garber: I don't know fully what the motivations are, but I do know that there are people who are fighting a cultural battle. They don't like what's happened to campuses, and sometimes they don't like what we represent.
--:-- Shamita Basu: What I can tell you is Harvard is a very old institution, much older than the country. And as long as there has been a United States of America, Harvard has thought that its role is to serve the nation.
--:-- Alan Garber: In his interview he acknowledged some of the criticism of Harvard pointing to a recent internal report that conceded that anti has infiltrated parts of academic and social life But he said the university is taking steps to encourage a more respectful exchange of ideas, and that this school year is ending more peacefully than the year before.
--:-- Shamita Basu: He also said these attacks on higher ed institutions go beyond Harvard. It is a warning. They see this as a message, that if you don't comply with what we're demanding, These will be the consequences.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Before we let you go, a few other stories we're following. Elon Musk has announced he's officially leaving the Trump administration, telling ex-followers that the Doge mission will, quote, only strengthen over time.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The move is not a complete surprise. As a so-called special government employee, Musk could only work for the administration for 130 days in a calendar year, and the end of May marks 130 days since inauguration.
--:-- Shamita Basu: That said, the announcement comes only a day after Musk criticized Republicans' upcoming tax and spending bill in an interview with CBS.
--:-- Shamita Basu: I was, like, disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decrease it, and unreminds the work that the Doge team is doing.
--:-- Shamita Basu: I think a boat can be big or it can be beautiful, but I don't know if it can be both, my personal opinion.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Musk will return to his various companies, including Tesla, which he promised he would devote more time to. Yesterday, data revealed sales of the car had tumbled by nearly 50 percent in Europe.
--:-- Shamita Basu: In international news, Israel says it has killed Hamas's leader, Mohamed Sinwar, in a targeted attack on a hospital. Sinwar was the younger brother of deceased leader and mastermind of the October 7, 2023 attack, Yahya Sinwar.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Hamas has yet to confirm his death, which Netanyahu announced in parliament on Tuesday. Israel regarded Sinwar as just as hardline as his brother.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Two weeks ago, the Israel Defense Forces carried out a massive strike on a European-run hospital a day after Hamas released Israeli-American soldier Idan Alexander. The strike killed 28 people, the Gaza Health Ministry said at the time.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And finally, in Turkey, airlines are fighting back against impatient customers. Those flying Turkish airlines will be fined nearly 70 U.S. dollars if they stand up before the seatbelt sign is turned off.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A Turkish aviation official issued a note declaring the behavior poses a risk to passenger and baggage safety and security, along with affecting the satisfaction and exit priority of others.
--:-- Shamita Basu: So if you're someone who has long been bothered by this breach of plane etiquette but held your tongue, rejoice, at least on Turkish Airlines, someone else will be doing the enforcing for you.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You can find all these stories and more in the Apple News app. And if you're already listening in the News app right now, we've got a narrated article coming up next.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Scientific American traveled to the Arctic to follow one startup company's efforts to geoengineer and refreeze the sea ice above the Arctic Circle. If you're listening in the podcast app, follow Apple News Plus Narrated to find that story.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And I'll be back with the news tomorrow. Thank you.
