Today's Liberal News

Donald Trump’s Cruel and Unusual Innovations

As the Trump administration rounds up people it alleges to be illegal aliens and gang members, deports them to El Salvador, and pays to imprison them there without convicting them of any crime, constitutional challenges have focused on the Fifth Amendment; the administration appears to have deprived many deportees of liberty without due process.

The Judiciary Pushback Against Trump’s Agenda

Editor’s Note: Washington Week With The Atlantic is a partnership between NewsHour Productions, WETA, and The Atlantic airing every Friday on PBS stations nationwide. Check your local listings, watch full episodes here, or listen to the weekly podcast here.
Donald Trump is shaking up his Cabinet, while his immigration agenda faces mounting pushback from the courts. Panelists on Washington Week With The Atlantic joined to discuss.

The Link Between Happiness and Social Connection

This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning.
Think back to a good time you recently had with a loved one: an hours-long conversation with a friend or a perfect night of watching TV on the couch with family. I’d venture to guess you still feel a little surge of warmth when you recall it.

The Writer Who Understood Aloneness

In his introduction to Varieties of Exile, a collection of stories by Mavis Gallant, Russell Banks notes that, more than any other literary form, the short story “speaks to and for every human being who thinks of him or herself as alone, cut off from God, and counted as unimportant and unworthy of attention except when considered en masse.

Don’t Look at Stock Markets. Look at the Ports.

Stock markets plunged for days after President Donald Trump announced steep tariffs on imports from around the world. The sell-off ebbed only when he suspended most, but not all, of the new measures for 90 days. The ticker tape is just one indicator of an economy, and other signs are growing more and more ominous—including at the Port of Los Angeles, where high tariffs on China are crushing maritime traffic.

Trump’s Hollow Defense of Tariffs

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Donald Trump’s genius has always been marketing: himself, his properties, his political campaigns. But when it comes to the effects of his tariffs, the master has either lost a step or is facing a challenge that even he hasn’t yet figured out how to spin.

Fox and Frenemy

This week, the White House adviser Stephen Miller used an appearance on the Fox News Channel to criticize Fox News. Asked by the anchor John Roberts about Donald Trump’s plummeting poll numbers, Miller offered a testy reply: “I don’t want to make things awkward for you, John, but it is our opinion that Fox News needs to fire its pollster.”
The comment was classic political spin—when you don’t like the score, go after the refs.