Writers and Editors

Updated 6-20-25:
• Musk Adviser May Make as Much as $1 Million a Year While Helping to Dismantle Agency that Regulates Tesla and X

  (Jake Pearson, ProPublica, 5-14-25)

Records show that Chris Young is simultaneously working as a political adviser to Musk while serving in the Department of Government Efficiency, helping to gut the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Ethics experts said Christopher Young’s dual role — working for a Musk company as well as the Department of Government Efficiency — likely violates federal conflict-of-interest regulations. Musk has publicly called for the elimination of the agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, arguing that it is “duplicative.’’ Government ethics rules bar employees from doing anything that “would cause a reasonable person to question their impartiality” and are designed to prevent even the appearance of using public office for private gain.

 

• Techno-Fascism Comes to America (Kyle Chayka, New Yorker, 2-26-25) When a phalanx of the top Silicon Valley executives—Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and Google’s Sundar Pichai—aligned behind President Trump during the Inauguration in January, many observers saw an allegiance based on corporate interests.

    The ultra-wealthy C.E.O.s were turning out to support a fellow-magnate, hoping perhaps for an era of deregulation, tax breaks, and anti-“woke” cultural shifts. The historian Janis Mimura saw something more ominous: a new, proactive union of industry and governmental power, wherein the state would drive aggressive industrial policy at the expense of liberal norms.

     In the second Trump Administration, a class of Silicon Valley leaders was insinuating itself into politics in a way that recalled one of Mimura’s primary subjects of study: the élite bureaucrats who seized political power and drove Japan into the Second World War. The historic parallels that help explain Elon Musk’s rampage on the federal government.

•  Elon Musk’s Most Alarming Power Grab: Can anyone stop his space-based internet? (Ross Andersen, The Atlantic, 5-25) If Elon Musk continues to dominate the space-based internet, he could end up with more power over information than anyone in history. "Musk first announced his intention to build a space-based internet, which he would eventually call Starlink, in January 2015. He had plans to settle Mars, then the moons of Jupiter, and maybe asteroids too. All those space colonies would have to be connected via satellite-based communication; Starlink itself might one day be adapted for this use. Indeed, Starlink’s terms of service ask customers to affirm that they “recognize Mars as a free planet and that no Earth-based government has authority or sovereignty over Martian activities.”

• Elon Musk has direct business interests in 70% of the government agencies that DOGE targeted (Robert Reich chart on Facebook, 5-9-25) "Elon Musk has financial conflicts of interest at more than 70% of the departments and agencies targeted by DOGE — including the CFPB, NLRB, and DOJ. DOGE was never about "efficiency." It was about making Musk more wealthy and less accountable."

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Trump's tariffs: a roundup, updated June 2025

 

• 'The Economist' editor unpacks the 'biggest trade policy shock' of Trump's tariffs (Terry Gross, Fresh Air, 4-9-25) President Trump's sweeping "Liberation Day" tariffs have upended the global economy, sending stock markets into turmoil. "This is, without a doubt, the biggest trade policy shock, I think, in history," Zanny Minton Beddoes, the editor-in-chief of The Economist, says.

    "Trump last week ordered a minimum 10% tax on nearly everything the U.S. buys from other countries. He's also ordered much higher levies on things the country buys from China, Japan and the European Union. However, a lot of those tariffs are in flux, because almost each day the president has either increased some tariffs or paused others." And then he increased them to preposterous proportions.

• Robert De Niro Slams Trump In Cannes Honorary Palme d’Or Speech: “We Are Fighting Like Hell For The Democracy We Once Took For Granted” (Melanie Goodfellow, Nancy Tartaglione, Deadline, 5-23-25)

    An impassioned De Niro used his acceptance speech to address issues he said are facing the artistic community and threatening democracy under the presidency of Donald Trump. “In my country, we are fighting like hell for the democracy we once took for granted. That affects all of us here because the arts are democratic. Art is inclusive, it brings people together. Art embraces diversity and that’s why art is a threat, that’s why we are a threat to autocrats and fascists,” he said.
    “America’s philistine president has had himself appointed head of one of our premier cultural institutions,” he continued. “He has cut funding and support to the arts, humanities and education. And now he has announced a 100% tariff on films produced outside of the U.S. Let that sink in. … You can’t put a price on creativity, but apparently you can put a tariff on it.”

    “This is not just an American problem, it’s a global one,” he said. “We can’t all just sit back and watch. We have to act and we have to act now, not with violence but with great passion and determination. It’s time for everyone who cares about liberty to organize, to protest — and when there are elections, of course, to vote. Tonight and for the next 11 days we show our strength and commitment by celebrating art in this glorious festival. Libérté, égalité, fraternité.”

• Trump 2.0 tariff tracker (ReedSmith, Trade Compliance Resource Hub, 5-5-25) Reed Smith’s International Trade and National Security team tracks the latest threatened and implemented U.S. tariffs, as well as counter-tariffs  Read More 

Trump Watch: A checklist.

A steadily growing batch of links to revealing pieces, continually updated (most recently 5-21-25)

    If the shape of the column goes wonky (too narrow, in particular), scroll down and click on one of the headings/links. That should bring the columns back to a readable width.

 

TRUMP FIRED THE WATCHDOGS. PROJECT 2025 IS HAPPENING NOW.

                          (Sign seen in 2025)
Trump and Musk are tearing down democracy to expedite Project 2025—threatening everything from fair elections to Social Security.  

  See more about Project 2025 here and check out David A. Graham's The Project 2025 Presidency (The Atlantic, 4-24-25) "The blueprint for Trump 2.0 predicted much of what we’ve seen so far—and much of what’s to come."

• You Asked, We Answered: How The Times Is Reporting on the Trump Administration (New York Times). Hundreds of readers asked about our coverage of the president. Times editors and reporters responded to some of the most common questions. Listen (30 minutes) or read -- a compendium. Scroll down for list of topics.

• Were the No Kings protests the largest single-day demonstration in American history? (Alaina Demopoulos, The Guardian, 6-19-25) -Depending on who you ask, between 4 and 6 million people showed up – possibly among the biggest ever single-day protests in US history (contrasting with the small attendance Trump got on his birthday for a military parade).

• All That Trump Has Changed (Jess Bidgood, On Politics Newsletter, New York Times, 5-19-25) Four months in, the president and his advisers have overwhelmed political opponents who are still grasping for a message and a means with which to fight back.

• ‘He’s moving at a truly alarming speed’: Trump propels US into authoritarianism (Robert Tait, The Guardian, 6-19-25) A senator handcuffed, people snatched in public, military deployed – Trump’s slide towards autocracy has come quicker than critics feared. Five months after Trump’s inauguration, seasoned analysts with years of studying one-time stable democracies degenerating into autocracies are voicing alarm at the speed of the Trump administration’s authoritarian assault on institutions and constitutionally guaranteed freedoms of expression.

• Trump is turning the U.S. into a private club, and we are not members (Lucian Truscott Newsletter, 6-6-25)

    "Federal agencies have been ordered by Donald Trump’s White House to find grants that the administration can withhold from the state of California. It’s not the first time Trump has targeted the most populous state in the Union. Trump’s Office of Management and Budget recently announced that $126 million in California flood control funding will be zeroed out in the 2025 public works budget. According to CNN, a total of $436 million was cut from the budget for water projects in states with Democratic senators, while states led by Republicans are to receive $257 million more than was allocated in last year’s budget. Texas alone is to receive $206 million in new funds. In all, the Trump budget allocates 64 percent of new funds to red states, with only 33 percent of funds going to blue states.
     A Spokesman for the White House told CNN, “No taxpayer should be forced to fund the demise of our country,” specifically referencing cuts targeting California.

• 'He was always a bully, now he's dangerous' Mary Trump tells all on uncle Donald Trump (The Daily T, The Telegraph, Part 2, 5-23-25).

• Trump energy adviser slams renewables, says focus is on fossil fuels ( Ian M. Stevenson, Politico, 6-10-25) Energy “dominance” has been a main theme of Trump’s second term, and he has wielded an emphasis on oil and gas to jettison clean energy programs and abandon climate goals. The National Energy Dominance Council’s executive director said the administration doesn’t have faith in solar and wind energy.

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