--:-- Tracy Mumford: From the New York Times, it's the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's Monday, April 7th. Here's what we're covering.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Did you purchase your car faster because you knew that tariffs are coming? Absolutely. I could have just imagined how much more expensive it would be. It's going to hit food prices. It's going to hit gas prices. As President Trump's new tariffs set off alarm bells across the global economy, the Times talked with shoppers this weekend at grocery stores, car dealerships and malls, some of whom were scrambling to stock up.
--:-- Guest: What kinds of purchases are you prioritizing? Electronics, anything like that. Definitely trying to buy that up while I can, while it's still affordable.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The new 10 percent baseline tariff applies to all imported goods. And goods from some countries will get hit with up to a 40% surcharge or more. That could mean higher prices for consumers as soon as this month. And it spurred a lot of confusion and concern about whether to buy that new refrigerator or iPhone or even printer paper. The panic is enough to make me want to buy.
--:-- Guest: Yeah. Did you start today? I did. I did actually start today.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The uncertainty continues to shake the stock market, too. This morning, the financial markets in Asia and Europe fell sharply again after plunging last week following Trump's announcement. The U.S. markets had lost more than $5 trillion in value by the end of Friday.
--:-- President Trump: I don't want anything to go down, but sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something. Speaking on Air Force One last night, he said the tariffs will stay in place until the trade deficits that the U.S. has with China, the European Union, and other countries disappear.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Essentially, until the rest of the world buys as much from the U.S. as the U.S. buys from them. And eventually it's going to straighten out and our country will be solid and strong again.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Despite Trump's insistence that the tariffs will stay in place, many countries are hoping they can negotiate. The White House said more than 50 countries have been in touch to try and strike a deal.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: A federal judge has given the Trump administration a deadline of midnight tonight to bring back a man it mistakenly deported to a prison in El Salvador. The man had permission to be in the U.S., and in an order yesterday, the judge said that the government had no right to arrest him or send him to the prison, where he's been held since mid-March.
--:-- Judge: She wrote that the case, quote, shocks the conscience.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The Justice Department, however, has said it can't bring him back. It's claimed there's nothing it can do since he's no longer in U.S. custody. The department also took aim at one of its own lawyers, who said he would try to convince the administration to return the man.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The lawyer, who had admitted last week that the deportation was a mistake, was placed on indefinite leave. In a statement, Attorney General Pam Bondy told The Times that the lawyer had failed to, quote, zealously advocate on behalf of the United States.
--:-- Attorney General Pam Bondy: Meanwhile, around the country this weekend, tens of thousands of people took to the streets to protest President Trump, his administration, and a range of its policies, from tariffs to immigration crackdowns to cuts at government agencies.
--:-- Protester 1: Hands up! Hands up! Our research! Our research!
--:-- Protester 2: The protests were organized by a coalition of progressive groups who planned them in all 50 states. In Manhattan, the protests stretched for 20 city blocks. And in Atlanta, police estimated some 20,000 people showed up to march.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: There were also protests in smaller places including Leesburg Tennessee, St Augustine Florida, and Ketchum Idaho.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: In Syria, one of the most horrifying aspects of the country's civil war was the use of chemical weapons. The symbol for chlorine painted on the barrel bomb used in the air attack. The country's former president, Bashar al-Assad, used them against rebel fighters and civilians over more than a decade of conflict.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: First responders doused the victims with water, stripped off their clothes to wash off what they said was a chemical weapon. But since Assad was suddenly thrown out of power at the end of last year, the fate of those dangerous weapons has been unclear.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: There remain a lot of major questions about this chemical weapons program. Like how many weapons are left, where are they located, and what's going to happen to them under the new government.
--:-- Megha Rajagopalan: My colleague Megha Rajagopalan has been reporting from Syria. She says a watchdog group, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, estimates there may be far more chemical weapons sites than the Assad regime ever disclosed, potentially more than 100.
--:-- Megha Rajagopalan: These sites could contain weapons like mustard, sarin, or chlorine gas, Some of the most toxic substances on Earth and many experts, including people who were actually involved in hunting for chemical weapons in Syria in the past, say that many of these weapons stockpiles could be in locations that are extremely hard to access and impossible to see on satellite images. Places like caves and other hidden locations.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And so while Syria's government has pledged to get rid of these caches of weapons, it presents a major challenge for them because they first have to determine where the locations are.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And finally...
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Ovechkin has it. He scores. Alex Ovechkin scores 895. Alexander Ovechkin made hockey history on Sunday scoring his 895th career goal becoming the NHL's all-time leading scorer.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: There is but one! Alexander the Great! The greatest to ever do it! Ovechkin broke the record set by Wayne Gretzky more than 31 years ago. The goal came in the middle of the second period, and Ovechkin dove to the ice in celebration, with his teammates from the Washington Capitals rushing off the bench to mob him.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Referees paused everything so there could be a mid-game ceremony. We did it, boys. We did it. At center ice, Ovechkin was joined by his family and the league's commissioner, as he thanked his teammates, fans, coaches, and even the goalie he'd just scored on.
--:-- Wayne Gretzky: I can tell you firsthand, I know how hard it is to get to 894. 895 is pretty special.
--:-- Wayne Gretzky: Gretzky said records are made to be broken, but, quote, I'm not sure who's going to get more goals than that.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Those are the headlines today on The Daily. This is a threat to our constitutional fabric, to our democracy, to our civil liberties. And to see Skadden be complicit to aid this attack, I was so ashamed to work there.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: A conversation with a lawyer who quit his job at one of the country's most powerful law firms after it cut a deal with the Trump administration. That's next in the New York Times audio app, or you can listen wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow.
