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Week of April 4-10, 2025
Welcome to TRACKING THE CRISIS, a weekly round-up from The Democracy Collaborative tracking the administrative, legislative, and other actions of the new Trump Administration as well as the many forms of legal and movement response from across a broad range of social, political, and economic actors. TDC is providing this service for collective informational purposes, as a tool for understanding the times during a period of disorientingly rapid flux and change in the U.S. political economy. TDC should not be understood as endorsing or otherwise any of the specific content of the information round-up.
TRUMP TRACKER: Administration actions
Trump pulls back on most tariffs after bond markets follow crashing stocks to the brink of global financial meltdown. World markets continued to roil in extreme volatility after Trump’s tariff announcement triggered a stock rout last week, making Monday, April 7th the worst market start to a presidential term in modern history. The United States and China also raised retaliatory tariffs against each other, bringing levies of Chinese goods up to 104% on Monday. Stocks tanked as JPMorgan hiked its forecast probability of a recession up to 60%. Despite a brief lift Tuesday on Treasury Secretary Bessent’s claim that more than 70 countries were approaching the Trump Administration for deals, markets closed on the edge of Bear territory as the Federal Reserve indicated it would not intervene despite pressure from Trump and volatile market forces. As the tariffs officially took effect at 12:01am on Wednesday, April 9, markets went into full panic mode as the U.S. bond market cratered upon opening, blowing up the conventional ‘safe haven’ for troubled investors as a ‘dash for cash’ began to destabilize U.S. Treasuries and threaten a full blown financial crisis. Hours after Trump chastised investors to “BE COOL!” on social media, Trump abruptly reversed course, announcing a 90-day pause on most reciprocal tariffs on Wednesday morning (except for China, whose tariffs were raised to 125%), and maintaining a universal 10% levy on imported goods. The announcement, which was so abrupt it caught Treasury Representative Jamieson Greer off-guard as he testified to a Congressional committee, sent stocks soaring on Wednesday afternoon, as major indexes spiked on some of the biggest one-day gains since the Second World War. However, the market rally proved to be short-lived as stocks fell dramatically again on Thursday, driven by fear over the trade war escalation between the United States and China and on warnings about the continued fragility of U.S. dollar securities. The Economist asserted this week that despite the pause, Trump’s tariffs “represent the most disruptive policy in the history of global trade.”
Geopolitics of Trump’s trade war: Countries pivot away from dollar, U.S. trade as head-on confrontation with China escalates. Trump’s stated aim with the trade war is to force countries to come to the Administration seeking favorable deals. While some countries, such as Taiwan, have indicated their willingness to negotiate with the Trump Administration, others have begun to pivot away from dependence on U.S. markets and trade, possibly signaling the re-ordering of a world economic order heretofore characterized by U.S. dominance. China in particular has emerged as Trump’s primary antagonist in the trade war, exchanging retaliatory tariffs that as of this writing now stand at 145% against China. Meanwhile, China has been reaching out to U.S. trading partners affected by tariffs and cuts to foreign aid who now see the Chinese economy as a safer harbor for investment. Other countries and trade blocs have also emerged favorably from the U.S. market volatility this week – notably the Euro, which surged against the dollar along with the yen and Swiss franc after the tariff announcement, and nations such as Brazil, Egypt, Singapore, and Turkey who are net importers of U.S. goods and can offer stability with more impacted countries looking to diversify their trade partnerships. As the EU approved retaliatory tariffs, which were then pulled back on Thursday after Trump’s announced pause, European Commission president Ursula Von der Leyen discussed meeting with Chinese officials to manage trade diversions and “support a strong and reformed trade system” to offset the damage from U.S. tariffs. Vietnam, one of the countries most heavily impacted by Trump tariffs, pledged closer ties with Spain this week, as Chinese president Xi Jinping plans meetings with Southeast Asian leaders to develop new trade agreements. Spain is also seeking closer trade ties with China and has urged the EU to ‘rethink’ its approach to China as the ‘special relationship’ between the United States and Europe continues to deteriorate. Japan and Canada also committed to cooperating to maintain financial stability this week, as Canada vowed to use the revenue from its retaliatory tariffs to aid businesses and workers domestically. As the U.S. and China escalate their ‘monumental’ economic confrontation, with China refusing to bow under Trump’s tariff pressure, the Chinese government continues to restrict U.S. companies while deploying macroeconomic policy tools to ensure internal stability, including an ‘orderly’ devaluation of the yuan to increase export competitiveness and maintain stability in financial markets, and issuing guidance to state banks to reduce U.S. dollar purchases and curb speculative trading. Treasury Secretary Bessent continues to assert that the U.S. has the upper hand against China, and weighed various strategies including delisting Chinese stocks and forming a bloc of willing allies that can approach China for negotiations. California governor Gavin Newsom also entered into the fray this week, indicating his intention to negotiate independent trade deals with other countries in a bid to bypass Trump’s tariffs.
Leading capitalists and fellow Republicans urged Trump to reverse course on tariffs. Trump’s tariffs sparked a frantic backlash among Republican lawmakers this week as several leaders scrambled to convince Trump to enact his pause on most retaliatory tariffs. Congressional efforts intensified as GOP lawmakers came under pressure from Wall Street donors and a right-wing organization backed by Leonard Leo and the Koch network filed suit against the Trump Administration. Some of Trump’s backers among U.S. billionaires, who reportedly lost half a trillion dollars in the stock market turmoil after the tariffs were announced, publicly blasted Trump’s move. Elon Musk, who had lost $11 billion off his personal net worth, escalated his simmering feud with Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro, calling him a “moron.” The tariff turmoil also exposed rifts within the White House between Trump officials and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, rumored to be the ‘most loathed’ individual within Trump’s inner circle. Senate Republicans Ron Johnson and Rand Paul were some of the earliest lawmakers to speak out publicly against the tariffs last week; seven GOP senators signed on to a bipartisan bill that would require Congressional approval for new tariffs, which Trump immediately threatened to veto. A similar bill was introduced in the House to contest Trump’s dubious use of emergency powers to enact tariffs, which gained bipartisan support. Semafor reports on the behind-the-scenes lobbying effort from GOP Senators urging Trump to change course; while other Senators used their media airtime on Fox News to make public appeals. According to reports, it was a televised interview with JPMorgan head Jamie Dimon, the collapse in bond markets and the threat of a ‘buyers’ strike’ on U.S. Treasuries that ultimately convinced Trump to pause the tariffs on Wednesday; Trump commented later that “people were getting a little queasy” about the impending economic meltdown.
Insider trading questions raised after Trump tweets, boasts of friends making millions from tariff U-turn. The timing of Trump’s abrupt decision to pause tariffs on Wednesday, April 9, leading to a historic stock rally, is facing scrutiny from critics and market observers. On April 4, Rolling Stone reported on Trump’s sharing of a video claiming that Trump was “crashing the stock market on purpose” and how it could “make supporters rich.” On Wednesday morning, Trump posted “NOW IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!” on social media just hours before he announced the tariff pause. Market watchers noted that the large spike in NASDAQ calls during the stock rally actually started minutes before Trump’s announcement of the pause, and option calls spiked over ten times just ten minutes before the announcement, leading to speculation that investors were being tipped off. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, who found out about the pause while testifying before a House hearing, was grilled by Rep. Steven Horsford, who then speculated on the record about Trump’s ‘market manipulation.’ On Wednesday evening, Trump hosted investors Charles Schwab and Roger Penske in the Oval Office, bragging that the two men made “$2.5 million and…$900 million today” as a result of the market rally. Bloomberg reports that the brief rally on Wednesday was the ‘best day ever’ for billionaires as they recouped a total of $309 billion that afternoon, including a boost in Tesla stock that benefited Elon Musk. Democratic lawmakers amplified the suspicions on Thursday as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Adam Schiff called for a formal investigation into whether Trump willfully engaged in market manipulation and insider trading.
Main Street heavily impacted by tariff wars, throwing doubt on Trump’s ambitions to return to U.S.-based manufacturing power. On Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent reiterated Trump’s claim that a major aim of the tariff plan is to empower ‘Main Street’ to ‘restore the American dream’ after four decades of losing to Wall Street by bringing ‘jobs and manufacturing’ back to the United States. However, economic experts doubt that such a transformation can occur as a result of tariffs, due to the high cost and long lag time of building new plant and equipment capacity domestically. And while Bessent suggested that civil service workers impacted by federal layoffs could fill purported manufacturing jobs such as assembling iPhones or making Nike shoes, sociologist Jessica Calarco remarked on MSNBC that Trump boosters miss the historical point that American postwar prosperity was also driven by high unionization and relative wage growth. The American Prospect details how the economic consequences of Trump’s tariff plan are playing out in an already shaky economy, not only in the form of higher prices for consumer goods, but also in the loss of export markets for agricultural producers, higher mortgage rates driven by market uncertainty and higher costs for small businesses who rely on foreign suppliers. Tariffs combined with the federal spending cuts enacted by DOGE over the last two months have caused extra hardship and chaos for Main Street small businesses; and most of the manufacturing jobs created under the Biden Administration are now under threat as the Trump Administration freezes funding for clean energy and other federally subsidized economic development and infrastructure projects. The Wall Street Journal outlines how Michigan’s economy, devastated in the last few decades of globalization and deindustrialization, has already become one of the first casualties of Trump’s new tariff war. Fortune reports on a case study of an Idaho business that sells on Amazon to demonstrate how the new tariff regime hurts small businesses while sparing large tech companies.
Universities in over half of U.S. states in Trump Administration crosshairs as hundreds of students lose visas, campuses face funding freezes. On Monday, April 7, Inside Higher Ed reported that over 640 international student visas have been terminated at nearly 120 colleges covering over half of all U.S. states. Some campuses reported that students were made to abruptly leave the United States after receiving a text message that their visa was revoked. Visas were reported as revoked for several students including at UMass Amherst and Worcester Polytechnic Institute, University of Chicago and UIC, Carnegie Mellon and University of Pittsburgh, Central Michigan University, Texas A&M, Yale, Columbia, and over 100 students at California universities. The hundreds of revocations were announced as part of the Trump Administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestine activism, as well as students who were ‘identified in a criminal records check,’ although Zeteo reports there is no evidence of any criminal record in many cases. Some campuses report being given no explanation for why visas were revoked. The Council of UC Faculty Associations also released a statement reporting that the University of California disclosed the names and personal information to federal investigators of over 850 UC faculty who had signed letters in opposition to Israel’s military assault on Gaza. In a Thursday hearing called in the case of Columbia pro-Palestine activist Mahmoud Khalil, a memo submitted by Secretary of State Marco Rubio argued that although Khalil committed no crime, the Trump Administration had the authority to deport foreign nationals for their political beliefs. Pro-Palestinian students that have been detained by ICE have been transferred to detention facilities in the South ‘in jurisdictions more favorable’ to the Administration and ‘far away from families and attorneys,’ making them ‘unable to promptly challenge their detention. New details also emerged in the case of Badar Khan Suri, a Georgetown postdoctoral research fellow who was detained, transferred at least three times and kept in inhumane conditions. ICE also detained a U.S. citizen working as a lawyer representing student protestors. This week, the Trump Administration also froze billions of dollars in funding for Cornell and Northwestern Universities, in an attempt to extract demands from those institutions similar to those demanded from Harvard and Columbia University in the last few weeks. In the case of Columbia, which capitulated to Trump demands without resistance, the Trump Administration has not yet restored funding, but has actually frozen more research funding and is now expanding its demands including putting the university under consent decree, implementing direct federal oversight over its practices and curricula. These moves, according to critics, represent a wider crackdown on free speech in higher education that affects immigrants and citizens alike, weaponizing the discourse of ‘antisemitism’ with dangerous implications for civil liberties in a political environment critics say is reminiscent of the McCarthy era and the Red Scare.
SCOTUS decision allows Trump Administration to resume deportations under Alien Enemies Act, while White House floats idea of sending U.S. citizens to foreign detention centers. On Monday, April 7, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to allow the Trump Administration to resume deportations of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador, with the caveat that migrants be allowed due process and the opportunity to file habeas petitions in the proper court before being deported out of the country. The ruling addressed narrow procedural issues and avoided giving an opinion on the Trump Administration’s use of the 1798 Alien Enemies Act in ordering arrests and deportations. Judge Sonia Sotomayor, in her dissenting opinion, issued a dire warning that “the implication of the Government’s position is that not only noncitizens but also United States citizens could be taken off the streets, forced onto planes, and confined to foreign prisons with no opportunity for redress if judicial review is denied unlawfully before removal.” Sotomayor and the two other liberal judges on the court were joined by Trump appointee Amy Coney Barrett in dissent. The Washington Post reports that at least seven U.S. citizens have been caught up in deportation raids, as White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed on Tuesday that the Trump Administration was ‘seriously’ considering options to deport U.S. citizens to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT prison. New Republic contributor Greg Sargent discusses the implications of the SCOTUS decision with immigration law expert Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, while Huffpost warns that the decision leaves scant legal protection for anyone who could be ‘disappeared’ under the Trump regime. Truthout recalls the use of the Alien Enemies Act to incarcerate Japanese Americans during WWII, and legal experts decried Trump’s plans as ‘like sending [dissenters] to the gulag.’ The Supreme Court also weighed the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland legal resident who was deported to El Salvador in error; first temporarily blocking a district judge’s order to return Garcia, then reversing course on Thursday and ordering the Trump Administration to ‘facilitate’ his return to the United States. Constitutional law professors Edwin Chemerinsky and Laurence H. Tribe discussed the chilling implications of the Trump Administration’s arguments in the Garcia case in a New York Times op-ed, calling it an “unwarranted claim of unlimited power to deprive people of liberty without due process.”
ICE director reveals vision for mass deportation program as Amazon-like “Prime, but with human beings” as Trump Administration steps up tactics to hasten the pace and scale of deportations. At this week’s Border Security Expo in Phoenix, Arizona, acting ICE director Todd Lyons said that immigration officials “need to get better at treating this like a business” as he laid out a vision for mass deportations that was “like [Amazon] Prime, but for human beings.” Border czar Tom Homan also delivered the keynote speech at the Expo, telling private contractors in the audience that the Trump Administration “is depending on the private sector” to implement its deportation agenda. ProPublica reports this week that the Trump Administration has cut the DHS oversight office responsible for protecting the civil rights of immigrants and U.S. citizens, freezing over 600 civil rights abuse investigations. A Massachusetts immigration lawyer reported on social media that the case of a detained client he was representing was wiped from the docket and that his client has now ‘disappeared’. On Tuesday, April 8, several IRS officials, including the acting commissioner, quit the agency after the Trump Administration pushed them to share migrants’ tax data with ICE. The DHS this week also revoked parole for migrants who entered the country via the Biden-era CBP app, which allowed migrants seeking asylum to enter a legal process and issued work authorizations for up to two years. Nearly 985,000 migrants are affected by the change and were encouraged by the DHS to ‘leave immediately’ or face deportation. Also on Tuesday, the Trump Administration announced plans to fine migrants under deportation orders $998 per day if they do not leave the U.S., and to seize their property if they do not pay; the fines would be applied retroactively over the last 5 years, resulting in possible fines of up to $1 million. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services also announced this week that the agency plans to monitor immigrants’ social media for ‘evidence of antisemitic activity’ as grounds for denying citizenship applications or immigration benefit requests. On Thursday, April 10, the Social Security Administration re-classified over 6,000 mostly Latino immigrants as ‘dead’, cutting off their ability to receive benefits or work legally in the United States, in a move White House officials described as a tactic to pressure migrants to ‘self-deport.’ As reports mount that nearly 90% of the Venezuelan migrants deported to El Salvador have no criminal record, border czar Tom Homan asserted that ICE’s ‘word’ is enough to ‘prove’ a migrant’s gang affiliation and justify their detention; as the Trump Administration deported a gay Venezuelan makeup artist to El Salvador this week on a report filed by a disgraced Milwaukee cop. Venezuelan Army veteran and Purple Heart recipient Jose Barco was also arrested by ICE this week and is now in detention ‘limbo,’ despite not having been to Venezuela since he was a toddler. Homeland Security officers were denied entry to two Los Angeles elementary schools this week as the Trump Administration threatened to cut all federal funding to sanctuary cities. In Baltimore, ICE agents broke through a car window to arrest a 52-year-old mother and seamstress whom ICE claimed was an MS-13 gang member. ABC News reports on the ‘Trump slump’ of U.S. tourism as foreign visitors avoid the United States due to fears of being detained, as several tourists and visa holders have been arrested and deported by ICE.
House passes the SAVE Act to enact voting restrictions that could disenfranchise millions of American voters. On Thursday, April 10, the House of Representatives voted 220-208 to pass the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, a bill that requires Americans to provide proof of citizenship, such as a passport or birth certificate, to register to vote. Voting rights groups say the Act is a massive voter suppression measure that could disenfranchise millions of legitimate voters, including poor, rural, and minority voters who could experience difficulties obtaining the required documents, as well as over 69 million married women who changed their last names from that which is on their birth certificate. An amendment that would have adjusted the provisions for married women was rejected by Republicans. The act was mostly passed along party lines, with four Democrats crossing over to vote in favor of the bill.
Congress passes budget resolution extending Trump tax cuts and slashing spending after Mike Johnson wrangles GOP holdouts in the House. After an all-night voting session, the Republican-led Senate pushed through its budget resolution bill on Saturday, April 5. The bill makes permanent Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, raises the debt ceiling by $5 trillion, and calls for committees to find a minimum of $4 billion in spending cuts that could include drastic cuts to Medicaid and other social programs. The bill then faced an uphill battle in the House, as a number of Republican fiscal hawks protested the high increase in the debt ceiling and insufficient spending cuts, as well as doubts over an unconventional accounting maneuver used as a baseline for Trump’s tax cuts. House Speaker Mike Johnson, under pressure amid market volatility, canceled the House vote scheduled for Wednesday, April 9 without the votes to pass the bill. Trump reportedly yelled at the holdouts to “close your eyes and get” the bill through the House. The House narrowly passed the budget blueprint on Thursday, April 10, which now enables the GOP to craft Trump’s legislative budget agenda without the threat of a Democratic filibuster. The New York Times outlines the details of the budget plan here, which lays the groundwork for significant cuts to SNAP and Medicaid programs and other social services in order to accommodate Trump’s tax cuts for the wealthy.
SCOTUS rules that Trump Administration, DOGE can resume mass firings of federal workers as cuts to IRS, Treasury, Social Security and other agencies impact public services. On Tuesday, April 8, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7-2 to block a lower court’s decision to order the Trump Administration to reinstate fired probationary employees at six agencies, paving the way for more mass firings of federal workers. On Friday, April 4, the IRS began issuing Reduction In Force (RIF) notices to employees, starting with a layoff of over 75% of staff at the Office of Civil Rights and Compliance. DOGE also moved this week to close the Department of Justice’s tax division, reducing the agency’s capacity to pursue white-collar crimes. The Administration also shuttered several divisions at the U.S. Treasury’s Bureau of Fiscal Services with the intention of privatizing most of its functions. DOGE is also set to make cuts of up to 20% of staff at the FDIC later this week, impacting the resilience of commercial banks at a time of extreme financial instability. Widespread layoffs are expected at the Department of Interior as the agency moves to ‘consolidate functions’ across the country. The Peace Corps reported this week that DOGE has arrived at the agency, presumably to evaluate and recommend job cuts there. Although the Social Security Administration walked back its plans to scrap its phone services this week, technical problems continue as the website crashed multiple times amid cuts to IT staff, leaving many seniors across the country worried about interruptions to their benefits as thousands more job cuts are planned at the SSA over the coming weeks.
Trump Administration actively reversing climate action efforts through executive orders aimed at reviving coal industry, attacking state/local conservation. On Tuesday, April 8, Trump signed an executive order directing the Department of Justice to identify and block enforcement of state and local climate change statutes. The order specifically targets New York and Vermont’s ‘climate superfund’ laws requiring fossil fuel companies to help pay for recovery from climate-related disasters, as well as California’s billion-dollar cap and trade program that raises money for conservation and climate adaptation programs through the carbon market. Trump’s order characterized the state policies as ‘fundamentally irreconcilable with my Administration’s objective to unleash American energy’ and calls on Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate state policies regarding climate change, environmental justice, or greenhouse gas emissions. Legal experts say that the order is ‘toothless’ as Trump lacks the authority to change state laws; and California Governor Gavin Newsom was dismissive of Trump’s order in his response, saying that “California’s efforts to cut harmful pollution won’t be derailed by a glorified press release masquerading as an executive order.” ProPublica also reports this week that the EPA plans to stop collecting data on greenhouse gas emissions from industrial polluters, hampering scientific efforts to track climate change trends. Trump also mobilized his trade war tactics to block the International Maritime Organization’s efforts to regulate carbon emissions from international shipping. On Tuesday, April 8, Trump signed a set of executive orders aimed at revitalizing the coal industry, including granting immediate relief to dozens of coal plants exempting them from regulatory pollution standards tied to carbon, mercury, lead, and arsenic emissions. The coal orders come at a time when the Department of Energy is looking to develop up to 16 new AI data centers in the U.S., which come with massive water and energy demands. The AP has published an article fact-checking Trump’s justifications for the executive orders boosting the coal industry.
Tracking the Money: Conflicts of interest and privatization in the Trump Administration. A new report from Americans for Tax Fairness found that the top 100 billionaires spent a total of $2.6 billion on federal elections in 2024 (more than double the total contributions from billionaires in 2020), with approximately 70% going to Republicans. Mother Jones reports on how Trump’s tariffs give him the power to dole out favors, waivers, and exemptions to corporations who pledge loyalty. Ken Klippenstein reports that the FBI have become agents for corporate executives through surveillance of critics on social media. As top Democrats call for an investigation into Elon Musk’s conflicts of interest within the Trump Administration, the U.S. Space Force announced $13.7 billion in new national security contracts, the majority of which were awarded to SpaceX; and Musk stands to make even more as Trump calls for $1 trillion in defense spending as the GOP moves forward with its budget agenda. The Revolving Door project is tracking more instances of corruption under the Trump Administration through their regular Corruption Calendar feature.
MOVEMENT TRACKER
Millions turn out in all 50 states for ‘Hands Off’ protests. Organizers estimate up to 3 million people in total turned out at over 1,200 protests in all 50 states on Saturday, April 5 for the ‘Hands Off’ national day of action against the Trump Administration. Local protests attracted many who were ‘newly alarmed’ about the Trump Administration’s cuts to services and presidential overreach. Large crowds filled city streets not only in cities such as New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., but also showed up by the thousands in red states such as Boise, Idaho, Salt Lake City, Utah, Raleigh, North Carolina, Omaha, Nebraska, and Saint Augustine, Florida. Left-leaning rock band Dropkick Murphys debuted a new protest anthem in front of a crowd of over 100,000 on Boston Common. Although the New Republic lamented the lack of coverage in mainstream print media, a New York Times op-ed celebrated the protests for ‘dragging the Democratic Party and liberal elites back into the fight’ after months of lackluster resistance. The 50501 Movement has called for another round of protests on April 19th.
Amid Trump’s tariff war, national and international corporate boycotts gain steam. In the wake of Trump’s sweeping tariff chaos, consumers around the world are mounting boycotts of U.S. products to push back against Trump’s trade war. In Canada, a ‘wave of economic defiance’ has united and ignited Canadians to support homegrown businesses in a show of solidarity as Trump continues to target the United States’s neighbor to the north. Shoppers in Denmark have initiated a boycott of U.S. goods in protest of Trump’s Greenland ambitions and tariff threats; and a survey released this week showed that 71% of Austrians were willing to boycott U.S. goods to protest Trump’s trade policies against the EU. Deutsche Welle reports this week on the growing global movement against U.S. goods as a grassroots front in Trump’s trade war. In the United States, thousands of people have signed petitions and joined a boycott of Avelo Airlines over the company’s contracting with ICE for migrant deportation flights. U.S. shoppers are boycotting Walmart this week from April 7 to 14 as part of a campaign of targeted boycotts organized by People’s Union USA; Newsweek has published a list of companies targeted for boycott actions throughout 2025. The group has called for another National Economic Blackout action for April 18th. Forbes reported this week on the effectiveness of thousands of Black Americans using their economic power against Target to protest its scrapping of DEI policies; and provides a measure of effectiveness of politically motivated consumer shifts against a host of other companies associated with the Trump Administration.
Community defense of immigrants gain wins against ICE. In border czar Tom Homan’s hometown of Sackets Harbor, New York, a mother and three children were released on Monday, April 7 after nearly the entire town of 1,350 people rallied to protest their detention; a crowd of over a thousand marched over two miles from the town square to Homan’s residence on Saturday, April 5 demanding their release. In Portland, the Asylum Seeker Solidarity Collective is building capacity for direct protection and shelter for immigrants targeted by ICE in what observers call a ‘model for migrant solidarity under Trump.’ In Los Angeles, the Community Self Defense Coalition has organized street patrols and an information network where activists can identify impending ICE raids and mobilize people with bullhorns to alert the community and drive ICE out of the neighborhood. On Monday, April 7, ICE agents attempted to detain students at a Los Angeles elementary school and were denied entry. The Conversation outlines what rights and resources K-12 educators have in defending immigrant students. In Austin, Texas, activists with the Students for a Democratic Society organized a walkout as part of their campaign to kick ICE off campus. In Delano, California, unions and community groups united in a show of solidarity for migrant workers on Cesar Chavez Day and spoke to the Real News about organizing efforts to protect undocumented workers. A new report from the Center for Immigration Studies lists California, Illinois, Virginia, Connecticut, and Massachusetts as the top five states refusing ICE detentions of jailed migrants.
Obama urges universities to stand up to Trump Administration pressure as non-Ivy presidents begin to organize resistance. In a speech at Hamilton College on Saturday, April 5, former president Barack Obama urged universities to resist capitulating to Trump Administration pressure to crack down on campus protest, calling for universities to ‘be prepared’ to lose federal funding to defend academic freedom and civil rights. An op-ed in the Washington Post blasted Ivy League schools for bowing to the Trump Administration when their large endowments provide them with resources to push back against threats to their students’ First Amendment rights. As advocates at Northwestern University called for ‘solidarity and resistance’ from the campus community in the face of funding threats, Princeton University president Christopher L. Eisgruber spoke to the New York Times about his willingness to fight the Trump Administration against the $1 billion freeze threatened against his campus; and several Princeton departments have issued warnings and guidance to students and faculty about potential ICE visits to the campus. The Boston Globe reports on the handful of university presidents who have vowed to fight back in defense of international students whose visas were revoked by the State Department, amid Rutgers and University of Wisconsin’s efforts to organize colleges to band together against Trump Administration threats. The editorial board of the New York Times published an op-ed this week outlining a potential ‘playbook’ for institutions willing to stand up to the Trump Administration.
Labor updates: Unions, professional associations coming together to defend federal workers, immigrants, and science against Trump Administration attacks. As federal workers mobilize against DOGE cuts and the Trump Administration’s attempted ban on federal unions, ten national unions representing more than 3 million workers issued a joint statement this week demanding the release of immigrant workers, students and union organizers detained by ICE. SEIU members also visited Congressional offices this week urging lawmakers to defend Medicaid programs against cuts in the upcoming budget process. The California Federation of Labor Unions stood in solidarity with UAW academic workers at UC Berkeley on Tuesday, April 8 as part of Higher Education Labor United’s ‘Kill the Cuts’ national day of action. This week, librarians commemorating National Library Week called for Americans to fight against federal funding cuts to the Institute of Museum and Library Services, establishing a website hosting a petition and letter-writing campaign for people who want to get involved. AFGE is collecting information from fired federal workers in response to a judge’s request in their ongoing lawsuit seeking to block and reverse mass firings of probationary workers. The AFL-CIO has joined in solidarity with researchers and healthcare professionals who are pushing back against RFK Jr’s cuts to public health agencies; the Journal of the American Medical Association has published a special issue featuring researchers’ stories and analyses about the impact of the cuts, and the National Public Health Association has publicly called for RFK Jr. to resign, citing his ‘complete disregard for science’ in the wake of the cuts.
Upcoming Protests.
The 50501 Movement has called for another National Day of Action in all 50 states on Saturday, April 19th. Information on local events can be found on the group’s website.
Stand Up for Science is mobilizing students to organize protests at college campuses on the last day of classes or near the end of April. Resources and a map of announced protests can be found on the ‘Stand Up with Us’ website.
MayDay Movement USA is mobilizing activists to organize mass protests nationwide and an occupation of the National Mall on International Workers Day, May 1. Links to resources and social media organizing can be found at this link.
Democracy Action Network is mobilizing a ‘March for Democratic Action’ in Los Angeles on May 10th.
Lawsuit Updates.
On Tuesday, April 8, a federal judge ordered the White House to restore the Associated Press’s full access to the Trump press pool, citing that the Administration’s ban on the AP over the ‘Gulf of Mexico’ name change violated the First Amendment.
On Tuesday, April 8, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington sued the Office of Management and Budget and its director, Russell Vought, over the OMB’s removal of online information on agency guidance for taxpayer spending – information the agency is required to post by law.
On Tuesday, April 8, the American Library Association sued the Trump Administration over cuts to the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences, asking for the organization to be reinstated.
On Wednesday, April 9, the ACLU filed an emergency lawsuit in a Texas district court to again block removals of migrants under the Alien Enemies Act after the Supreme Court declined to specifically address the Act in its ruling over the Trump Administration’s deportation of Venezuelan migrants.
An unnamed California student has sued the Trump administration for revoking their F1 student visa in a bid to fight the revocation of hundreds of student visas throughout the country.
On Thursday, April 10, New York Attorney General Letitia James and a coalition of state Attorneys General filed suit against the Trump Administration for cutting off $1 billion in funding to address the long-term effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on K-12 students.
