Donald Trump

NY Times - The Trump administration released new rules that could revoke tax-exempt status from any school offering targeted support to Black or other minority students, a sweeping change that opens another front in the president’s campaign to reshape American education.

The proposed regulations, which the Treasury Department published on Thursday, would add another element to the guidelines schools and other organizations must follow to qualify for tax-exempt status with the Internal Revenue Service. The rules would deny tax-exempt status to any school, including secondary schools and universities, if it has any policy or program, including admissions and scholarships, that the I.R.S. finds to be racially discriminatory.

Such a change would thrust the I.R.S. into the center of the Trump administration’s push to pressure schools to abandon initiatives aimed at supporting Black and other minority students, efforts meant to address the nation’s long history of racial discrimination and segregation. Trump officials, however, view such programs as a form of discrimination against white and Asian Americans, and federal civil rights lawyers have opened investigations on those grounds into admissions policies at Harvard, Yale and other schools.

The threat of losing tax-exempt status would tighten the financial squeeze the administration has applied to higher education by withholding federal research funding. Last year, President Trump called for the I.R.S. to strip Harvard of its tax-exempt status, which experts said would be contrary to a federal law prohibiting the I.R.S. from carrying out politically directed audits.

 NBC News - In a bid to bolster voter turnout, the administration is looking for ways to make the midterms about Trump.

One approach is telling any and all disaffected voters that the president has answers to the economic anxieties that people face, which could be tough considering the ongoing Iran war and the high prices — especially for diesel fuel — that have resulted.

A second approach is rousing Trump’s core supporters to get them to show up as if he’s on the ballot. Next week, Trump will appear at a first-of-its-kind GOP midterm campaign event in Dallas. And he is planning to hit the campaign trail in the weeks leading up to the election for Republican candidates in 35 races.

But a Trump-centric strategy is a gamble. With his approval rating at 33%, according to the latest Reuters/Ipsos survey, the effort could instead energize those who oppose the president.