April 26, 2026

Pentagon

AFGE, the largest union representing 300,000 employees at the Department of Defense (DOD), expressed outrage after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appears to have issued a memo directing agencies and components to terminate all collective bargaining agreements between the DOD and AFGE. Read more »

Congress

Bowers News Media -   Early on Thursday morning, the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate approved a budget resolution to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) for the remainder of Donald Trump's term in office without any reforms to the agencies. The vote was 50-48, with all Democrats and two Republicans voting against it.

Polls

NATIONAL POLL By CNBC Interactive Polls Pres. Trump Approve: 40% (-5) Disapprove: 58% (+6) Lowest approval in either term by CNBC —— Trump's net approval on key issues 🟢 Southern Border: +5 🟤 Economy: -21 (record low) 🟤 Tariffs: -23 🟤 Dealing with Iran: -25 🔴 Inflation: -39 (new low) —— Generic Ballot 🟦 DEM: 49% (-1) 🟥 GOP: 45% (-1)


Common Dreams  - With the national average price for a gallon of gasoline sitting at $4.059 on Friday, a Reuters/Ipsos poll showed that fuel costs “are a very big concern” for 78% of Americans, and 77% blame President Donald Trump for the recent price spikes.

Cities powered by renewable energy

[MSN] - Six US cities powered entirely by renewable energy sources like wind, solar, and hydro  The shift toward the use of sustainable energy sources is a profound transition in the energy system in the US. Here are six towns and cities in the US that are successfully using renewable energy for their electricity supplies, doing away with fossil fuels. 

The press and Trump

Heather Cox Richardson -   Since he entered the political arena, Trump has denigrated the press and even urged supporters to attack journalists, but in his second term his administration has gone further, trying to silence the press with lawsuits or threats of them against media outlets and individuals, blocking access to the White House and the Pentagon for journalists Trump dislikes, personally attacking female journalists, arresting independent journalists Don Lemon and Georgia Fort, and raiding the home of Washington Post political correspondent Hannah Natanson. Inviting him to address the press at a fancy dinner seemed to normalize his attacks on the First Amendment...

The Framers of our government enshrined the right to freedom of the press in our Constitution along with the right to gather together, to practice any religion we want (including none at all), the right to say what we want, and the right to ask our government to do (or not to do) things. After writing a new constitution that created a far stronger national government than existed under the Articles of Confederation, which had underpinned the government since 1777 (although the Articles were not ratified until 1781), the Framers designed the ten amendments that make up the Bill of Rights to hold back government power.

The power to control what citizens can publish about the government would give leaders the power to destroy democracy. A free press is imperative to keep people informed about what leaders are doing. Lose it, and those in power can do whatever they wish without accountability.

Federal judges receiving hundreds of threats

Alternet -  Federal judges have received more than 800 threats since Trump's rhetoric intensified — and retired members of the judiciary are now speaking out.  “According to the U.S. Marshals Service, there were 564 threats against federal judges in 2025 and there have been 275 already this year,” wrote USA Today’s Rex Huppke on Sunday. “The Marshals Service asked Congress for an additional $34 million in April, noting that ‘the threat environment’ is ‘unlikely to decrease in the foreseeable future.’”

Immigration

Washington Post -   One year ago, the Trump administration gutted the Education Department’s Office of English Language Acquisition, which is supposed to help about 5 million students in public schools “attain English proficiency and achieve academic success.” By “gutted,” I mean cut 14 of the 15 staff positions in that office. Now the department has given Congress official notice that it plans to dissolve the office entirely.

The conversations animating the Editorial Board, delivered to your inbox every Tuesday
As of 2021, students identified as English learners made up 10.6 percent of the total K-12 population, and they are considered “the fastest growing population of students in K-12 schools.” As you might expect, a lot of these kids are children of immigrants, both legal and illegal, and speak a language other than English at home.

Health

NBC News -   The Alzheimer’s Association released its annual report Tuesday, which included a survey of more than 3,800 adults 40 and older, 99% of whom indicated brain health is at least as important as physical health....

Christopher Weber, a clinical psychologist and the Alzheimer’s Association’s senior director of global scientific initiatives, said people generally understand how lifestyle habits — like getting enough sleep, being physically active, eating a balanced diet, and staying socially and mentally engaged — can protect the brain. “But the data also show how challenging these habits can be to maintain,” he said.

The Alzheimer’s Association partnered with the University of Michigan National Poll on Healthy Aging to conduct the survey. Among the findings:

50% got at least seven hours of sleep most nights
39% consistently followed a healthy diet
34% were physically active most days
42% reported adequate mental stimulation

Pentagon eyed explusion od Spain from NATO

Deep State Tribunal -    A leaked Pentagon memo is floating the idea of “suspending” Spain from NATO—an attention-grabbing threat that exposes how fragile allied cooperation can become when America goes to war.

.Spain hosts major U.S. military facilities but reportedly denied certain access, basing, and overflight rights connected to the Iran campaign.  NATO’s founding treaty has no expulsion or “suspension” mechanism, making the proposal largely symbolic and legally difficult to execute.

The flare-up revives a long-running Trump-era argument: allies must meet higher defense spending and provide baseline operational support, not just political solidarity.

...Reporting in late April said an internal Pentagon email described possible steps to penalize NATO allies that refused access, basing, and overflight rights during U.S. military operations against Iran. Spain drew special attention because it hosts key U.S. bases, including at Rota and Morón, yet still resisted supporting offensive operations tied to the Iran conflict. That combination—strategic geography without full operational cooperation—appears to be what elevated Spain from a general frustration to a named example.

The Trump speech shooting

Washington Post -   Trump was rushed offstage after a man armed with a shotgun, a handgun and knives charged a security checkpoint. Gunfire rang out just after the dinner began, and Trump, the first lady and hundreds of journalists looked up from their conversations. “Shots fired,” a member of the Secret Service shouted. Then agents, their guns drawn, sprinted to reach the president. Guests dressed in gowns and tuxedos hid under their seats. See the dramatic video.

The man was tackled by law enforcement officers and was taken into custody. A Secret Service officer was shot but was “saved” by his bulletproof vest, Trump said.

Trump posted two images of a man he said was the attacker being detained. He also posted surveillance footage on social media of a man making a mad dash through the cavernous halls of the hotel.

Trump held a news conference in the White House briefing room later last night, still dressed in his tuxedo and bow tie, to talk about the events of the evening.

“Well, thank you very much,” he said. “That was very unexpected!”

.... Two law enforcement officials have identified Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, Calif., as the suspect in the shooting. Federal authorities surrounded his home late Saturday.

Attendees dropped to the floor, crouching beside chairs and ducking under tables as a sense of danger spread through the room. Trump said that he had hoped to continue the dinner, because he didn’t want “sick people” to “change the fabric of our life,” but that he ultimately decided to reschedule it. Some afterparties, however, continued as scheduled.

After two previous assassination attempts against Trump, this latest incident is reigniting the conversation about political violence in the U.S.

The People -  Law enforcement officials familiar with the investigation have identified Cole Tomas Allen, 31, of Torrance, Calif., as the armed man who was taken into custody after injuring a Secret Service agent, according to Reuters, The New York Times, and CNN.

A LinkedIn profile with Allen's name and photo refers to him as a "mechanical engineer and computer scientist by degree, independent game developer by experience, teacher by birth," the outlets reported.

He obtained a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering in 2017 from the California Institute of Technology, followed by a master's degree in computer science in 2025 from California State University at Dominguez Hills, according to the LinkedIn profile.

It’s 2026. Why are we still speaking ‘English’?

Washington Post -  The idea of Americanized English dates at least to the Founders’ generation. In a lengthy 1789 linguistic dissertation, Noah Webster, the godfather of the American dictionary, wrote that “as an independent nation, our honor requires us to have a system of our own, in language as well as government.” He added that “Great Britain, whose children we are, and whose language we speak, should no longer be our standard. … It must be considered further, that the English is the common root or stock from which our national language will be derived.”

In 1919, the essayist H.L. Mencken published an erudite tome titled “The American Language,” arguing that our version of English had matured into a distinctive one that “shows its character in a constant experimentation.” 

April 25, 2026

Donald Trump

Ralph Nader -  To wreck, weaken, and endanger our country, Trump disrupts the lives of millions of civil servants, contractors, small businesses and their families. He fired or forced out hundreds of thousands of federal civil servants staffing programs that protect the health, safety, and economic well-being of tens of millions of Americans, relying on food supplements, Medicaid, government-backed loans, and innumerable other social safety nets.

Trump has especially targeted law enforcement programs directed at enforcing worker and consumer safety, financial protections, and environmental health against toxic corporations. He is taking federal cops off the corporate crime beat.

Hartmann Report - Has Trump’s mental health deteriorated so badly he’s a danger to the world? Even his longtime friends are saying yes, now on national television. On Morning Joe Friday, Rev. Al Sharpton — who has known Trump for decades as contemporaries in New York City society — told co-host Jonathan Lemire that Americans should be worried about the president’s state of mind. The trigger: a 79-year-old president posting on Truth Social well after 2 a.m., only to resume again five hours later, ranting about prosecuting the Clintons and whatever else crossed his mind.

Sharpton called the behavior unstable, which is an understatement. Chief of Staff Susie Wiles is doing a better job managing the White House than anyone did in term one, but as Sharpton put it, “they’re not containing him.” In the middle of the night, alone with his phone, the president can flip everything from policy to prosecutions to war. America now has a sleep-deprived, paranoid 79-year-old with the nuclear codes who’s awake at 2 a.m. posting rage into a phone and nobody can stop him. What could possibly go wrong? It’s long past time for Congress and his Cabinet to act.

Alternet -   In a “highly unusual” move, the contractor behind the construction of President Donald Trump’s ballroom got a monetary boost from the National Park Service. 
The New York Times reports that Maryland-based Clark Construction not only nabbed a secret no-bid contract for a nearby job, but the National Park Service under Trump inflated the value of the contract several times over before awarding it to them. The additional work involves construction at the site of two ornamental fountains in Lafayette Park near the White House in Washington, DC.

“The National Park Service wanted to repair two ornamental fountains in Lafayette Park, across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House,” reports the Times. “The Biden administration in 2022 had estimated the work would cost $3.3 million. But Mr. Trump’s government agreed to pay Clark $11.9 million to do it, and later added tasks that increased the contract to $17.4 million, the documents show.”

Alternet -   Former White House Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Matthews says nobody can escape Father Time, and right now Father Time is trampling boot marks all over President Donald Trump’s mind. Her opinion came after a painful series of photos of Trump appearing to nod off and go straight into REM sleep at an important Oval Office Thursday conference, augmented with citations of Trump’s more unnerving late-night posts.

“I just think it's gotten even worse in the sense that it's a little bit more extreme. In the first administration, we didn't have him posting about wanting to annihilate an entire civilization. And so … it seems like he's lost his fastball and that he's not beating Father Time,” said Matthews, who worked in Trump's first administration. “Look, you can't beat father time. And I think old age is catching up with him. And so he's not as on it and as sharp as he once was. And I think that is also just enhancing the craziness that was already kind of there and bringing it to a whole new level. And, and we're seeing that play out.”

MS NOW anchor Nicole Wallace pointed out that Trump “drift[ed] off to la la land” likely because he was furiously posting on social media between the hours of midnight and 2:45 A.M. a total of 18 times.

Polls

MSN -    Anxiety about the U.S.-Iran conflict and rising gas prices pushed Americans' view of the economy to the worst level ever recorded, according to the University of Michigan's consumer sentiment survey that has been running for 48 years....The consumer sentiment reading for April slid to 49.8 from 53.3 in March, landing just below the previous record low of 50 set in June 2022 during the post-pandemic inflation crisis.

The final 49.8 reading came in slightly above the preliminary April figure of 47.6 published two weeks ago, as responses collected later in the survey period—after the U.S. and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire on April 7—turned more positive, per Michigan survey director Joanne Hsu.

NBC News - Nearly half (47%) of adults ages 18-29 said that if they had the option, they’d choose to live in the past, according to a new NBC News Decision Desk Poll powered by SurveyMonkey. One-third said they’d pick a time period less than 50 years in the past, while another 14% said they’d choose more than 50 years in the past. Meanwhile, 38% of Gen Zers said they’d prefer to live in the present, 10% said they’d go less than 50 years in the future, and 5% chose more than 50 years in the future.

NY Times -  Disapproval of President Trump has climbed to the highest level of his second term, according to The New York Times polling average, which found that 58 percent of Americans disapprove of the president’s job performance while only 39 percent approve. 
That is the highest disapproval rating Mr. Trump has faced since the end of his first term, in the aftermath of his re-election campaign loss and the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Meanwhile. . .

Independent, UK - Trader Joe’s customers have sued the popular grocery chain claiming there is not enough caffeine in their coffee.  The lawsuit filed in California Thursday alleges that Trader Joe’s deceived customers into believing its French Roast Low Acid whole bean coffee had significantly more caffeine than it did. "It is so common that it is now cliché that coffee drinkers depend on the caffeine contained therein to provide them with the energy they need to get through the day,” the lawsuit said, according to several media outlets. But when the coffee was tested, it was found to contain half the caffeine of a regular blend, according to the lawsuit.

Artificial intelligence and schools

Jessica Winter, New Yorker - Artificial intelligence has, with sudden and crushing speed, seeped into the fabric of our everyday existence. It’s in our love lives, our reading material, our health care. It is also, increasingly, in our schools. As the staff writer Jessica Winter reports, in an alarming new column, many school districts around the country have adopted A.I. tools for elementary-school classrooms, and the practice is quickly spreading. With it comes a growing number of parents, educators, and cognitive scientists who are expressing anxiety about the ubiquity and seeming inevitability of this technology’s usage in K-12 education. Does the “efficiency” these tools offer undermine the premise and the promise of learning? What happens when we impose cognitive offloading on kids who have yet to do much cognitive onloading? Did anyone stop to ask whether we should have A.I. in schools at all? I recently caught up with Winter, who covers family and education, to discuss what she learned.  More

Gays

Advocate At Baylor University, a private Baptist institution in Waco, Texas, where questions of faith and identity have long been tightly policed, students gathered Wednesday for something that, until recently, would have been difficult to imagine. They called it “All Are Neighbors.”

The event, organized by a coalition of student groups, brought LGBTQ+-affirming Christian voices to campus in a deliberate counterpoint to a same-day stop by Turning Point USA, the far-right political group that targets young people.

For the first time, Baylor students were permitted to host prominent LGBTQ+ Christian advocates... It marked a rare moment in which out gay Christian voices were given a sanctioned platform at the university.


Related: Texas Baptists might end 140-year relationship with Baylor over one LGBTQ+ event

hrc president kelley robinson Human Rights Campaign President Kelley Robinson speaks about LGBTQ+ people and faith out of personal experience.Human Rights Campaign

Robinson made clear the moment didn’t come easily.  “We are here. On this campus, in this moment, together. Because this didn’t just happen,” she said. “This moment exists because people spoke up. Because students organized. Because a community decided that if harmful ideas were going to have a platform, then truth would have one too.”

Trump being sued for memo saying that text messages between officials can be deleted despite law to the contrary

New Republic -  President Trump is being sued by two watchdog groups for an internal White House memo asserting that text messages between officials could be deleted, regardless of a law stating the opposite. The lawsuit was filed Friday by the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and the Freedom of the Press Foundation.

“These text messages capture the day-to-day business of the most powerful office in the country—and arguably the world,” the Freedom of Press Foundation’s Lauren Harper told The New York Times, arguing that the memo “sanctifies” the notion that Trump and his Cabinet “get to decide what becomes part of the American story.”

This all comes after the Justice Department claimed that the post-Watergate Presidential Records Act was unconstitutional earlier this month. And just a day after that, the White House sent that memo around, asserting that text messages between officials didn’t need to be kept unless they were “the sole record of official decision-making.” The memo is cited in the watchdog groups’ lawsuit.

Beyond text messages, the memo relaxes restrictions on emails from personal accounts and general record-keeping.

DOJ reviving federal firing squads

New Republic -   The Department of Justice announced Friday that it will resurrect federal firing squads as part of an effort to implement Donald Trump’s day-one executive order to revamp capital punishment.

Trump’s order, signed in January 2025, demanded the attorney general pursue the death penalty on “all crimes of a severity demanding its use,” including murder of a law enforcement officer or any capital crime committed by an undocumented immigrant.

Under former President Joe Biden, Attorney General Merrick Garland had paused federal executions. Trump became furious when, before leaving the White House, Biden pardoned 37 prisoners on death row. The Republican kicked off his second term in office with a bloodthirsty decree for more death.

The January order made no mention of firing squads. Still, the DOJ said in its Friday announcement it had directed the Bureau of Prisons to “expand the execution protocol to include additional manners of execution such as the firing squad.”

Some view firing squads as more humane than lethal injection, which do not have a 100 percent success rate and sometimes require multiple doses. However, execution by firing squad can also result in prisoners slowly bleeding to death if they are not immediately killed by the bullet.

Middle East

President Trump on Saturday canceled plans for two of his top advisers to go to Pakistan. Earlier, Abbas Araghchi, the Iranian foreign minister, left Pakistan after holding discussions with the country’s leaders. Read more 

Both the United States and Iran are blocking the transit of ships through the waterway, which remains a critical issue in peace talks. Read more ›

Headline USA - The cost of the US war with Iran was not included in President Donald Trump’s request for a massive $1.5 trillion military budget for 2027, according to a Pentagon budget official. “This budget was formulated, honestly, before we went into conflict with Iran,” Jules Hurst III, the Pentagon’s acting chief financial officer, told reporters on April 21, according to USA Today. The record-shattering budget is a nearly 50% increase over this year’s $1 trillion budget, but the Trump administration is going to ask Congress for even more military spending to make up for depleted weapons and other military operations related to the Iran war.

The Hill -  Iran said it will not meet directly with the U.S. in upcoming talks mediated by Pakistan, despite a contrary statement from the White House earlier Friday. “No meeting is planned to take place between Iran and the U.S. Iran’s observations would be conveyed to Pakistan,” Esmaeil Baqaei, a spokesperson for Iran’s foreign ministry, said in a social media post Friday afternoon. Diplomats from Iran and the U.S. are expected to engage in negotiations facilitated by Pakistani officials in Islamabad this weekend. 

NBC News -   American military bases and other equipment in the Persian Gulf region suffered extensive damage from Iranian strikes that is far worse than publicly acknowledged and is expected to cost billions of dollars to repair, according to three U.S. officials, two congressional aides and another person familiar with the damage.

The Iranian regime swiftly retaliated after the U.S. military attacked on Feb. 28, hitting dozens of targets across American bases in seven Middle East countries. Those attacks struck warehouses, command headquarters, aircraft hangars, satellite communications infrastructure, runways, high-end radar systems and dozens of aircraft, according to the U.S. officials and an assessment by the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank in Washington, D.C.

....The Pentagon has not detailed the extent of the damage publicly or, according to the U.S. officials, to members of Congress. Some Republican lawmakers privately expressed frustration about the Pentagon’s refusal to provide information about the damage or cost of repairs, according to two GOP congressional aides. 

Jerome Powell

The Hill - White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Friday sought to signal that the legal pressure was not off Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, despite the Justice Department dropping its investigation into his handling of renovations at the central bank.

Leavitt said “the case is not necessarily dropped,” pointing to a statement released by Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, earlier in the day.

“It’s just being moved over to the Inspector General who has critical tools at their disposal to continue to look into the financial mismanagement at the Fed,” Leavitt said. “It’s just under a different authority, and that’s what you’ll continue to see.”

Leavitt’s comments came hours after Pirro announced the Justice Department closed its investigation, which had been holding up the confirmation of President Trump’s nominee to replace Powell.

Wall Street Journal - The Justice Department said it would end its criminal investigation of Fed Chair Jerome Powell, an attempt to clear the obstacle that has stalled Kevin Warsh’s confirmation as his successor. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said, if warranted, she would reopen the probe, which concerns Powell’s congressional testimony about the renovation of central-bank buildings. The Fed declined immediate comment.


Health

Independent UK  - A new study from researchers in Ireland indicates that drinking coffee, whether caffeinated or decaffeinated, can improve gut health and mood. The research found that regular coffee drinkers exhibited increased levels of beneficial gut bacteria, such as Firmicutes, Eggerthella, and Cryptobacterium curtum, which support metabolism and digestion. Participants in the two-year study, led by Professor Cryan of the University of Cork, reported reduced stress, depression, and impulsivity after reintroducing coffee, irrespective of its caffeine content. Significantly, only decaffeinated coffee drinkers showed improvements in learning and memory, suggesting that non-caffeine components of the beverage are responsible for this particular benefit. These findings add to existing research that highlights coffee's health advantages, including a reduced risk of dementia, slower biological ageing, and lower mortality rates.

1440 - Mental health crisis hotline linked to an estimated 4,400 fewer deaths in American teens and young adults who might otherwise die by suicide within its first 2.5 years. (More)


America becoming more multi-ethnic

Axios - America is becoming more multiracial, but its data systems are still thinking in black and white, Axios' Russell Contreras writes. ...The multiracial ("Two or More Races") population grew from 9 million in 2010 to 33.8 million in 2020, per the U.S. CensusIt's expected to keep growing faster than most groups, and exactly how fast largely depends on how America measures race. 

Climate change

Democratic Conservation Alliance -  Glacier National Park once had 150 majestic glaciers. Now they have 26.

Joshua Tree National Park is experiencing such bad tree loss that scientists predict their namesake tree will be completely disappear by the end of the century.

The beautiful Everglades has lost over half of its original wetland habitat.

Inside Climate News -   The Pacific Ocean is a giant climate cauldron, with a powerful heat engine that affects storms, fisheries and rainfall patterns half a world away, and scientists are watching closely to see if it’s about to boil over. 

Their projections suggest the tropical Pacific is simmering toward a strong El Niño, the warm phase of an ocean-atmosphere cycle that can intensify and shift those impacts.

In a world already superheated by greenhouse gases, a strong El Niño during the next 12 to 18 months could permanently push the planet’s average annual temperature past the 1.5 degrees Celsius warming threshold enshrined in scientific documents and political agreements as a turning point for potentially irreversible climate impacts.

Climate scientists also recently published a study showing that strong El Niño events can trigger what they called “climate regime shifts,” meaning abrupt, lasting changes in heat, rainfall and drought patterns.

Old people

NY Times - It is not ageist to ask whether older people should be required to give more to younger Americans… Older Americans favor restrictions on immigration… there is a correlation between age and resistance to policies to halt the overheating of the planet… impose age ceilings on political offices… Older Americans own much of the most desirable real estate… It is not ageist, finally, to impose policies to transfer jobs, houses and wealth down the generational chain.

Word


From our overstocked archives: Dealing with old times

Tens of millions just three months away from financial ruin

The Hill -   Tens of millions of Americans are three months away from financial ruin. A single quarter stands between the average household and bankruptcy, and the average household knows it. According to a recent national survey, a little over $6,000 in additional debt is all it takes to push a family over the edge. Six thousand dollars. The cost of a half-decent secondhand car. A modest kitchen renovation. In the country that put a man on the moon, mapped the human genome, won two world wars, and produces more billionaires per capita than anywhere on earth, that’s the cliff edge.

The old vocabulary no longer fits. The conservative catechism of thrift, discipline, and delayed gratification has aged poorly in light of the evidence. Tariffs, as the survey notes, rippled through supply chains and left a sizeable dent in consumers’ pockets. Health care waits in the background, capable of dismantling a decade of careful saving with a single bad diagnosis. American households have always lived under financial pressure. The difference now is the direction — or rather, the directions. It is coming from everywhere at once, which is what makes it almost impossible to outrun.

The changing Republican drug policy

The Hill -   The Trump administration’s moves on marijuana and psychedelics signal the start of a new era in Republican drug policy. The orders to fast-track reviews of psychedelic drugs and reschedule medical marijuana are a far cry from the party of “just say no” and former Republican President Richard Nixon’s war on drugs. 

“Regardless of what one may think of the president … he seems to be someone who is open to innovation and is not imprisoned by dogmatic viewpoints,” said Bryan Hubbard, CEO of the advocacy group Americans for Ibogaine, a psychoactive compound that shows promise for addiction treatment. 

Last week, President Trump signed an executive order to loosen research restrictions on psychedelic drugs as medicine to treat mental conditions like depression and substance abuse disorder....

The order came with $50 million to boost states’ efforts and a directive for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to fast-track reviews that could ultimately lead to the approval of psychedelic medicines. 

Days later, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche ordered the reclassification of state-licensed medical marijuana as less dangerous. Blanche said the Justice Department “is delivering on President Trump’s promise to expand Americans’ access to medical treatment options.”  

...Psychedelics are still illegal, and Trump did not endorse their use recreationally. Similarly, recreational marijuana was not legalized. It remains a Schedule I drug under federal law, akin to heroin or LSD. 

But together, the moves reflect changing public perception on “softer” drugs like cannabis and LSD. It also reflects the influence of the “Make America Healthy Again” movement, which together with Trump’s populist tendencies has helped jump-start a desire for drug experimentation and health freedom.  

How Americans get their news

Pew Research -   A growing share of Americans say they mostly get news because they happen to come across it, not because they’re actively seeking it out. About half of U.S. adults (49%) say this is the case today, up from 39% when we first asked this question in 2019.

Most U.S. adults say they happen across opinions and humor about news but seek out deep dives and up-to-date information

However, Americans are especially likely to find certain types of news by chance and actively look for others, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey from the Pew-Knight Initiative.

The types of content that most Americans say they get by chance tend to be reactions to news: humor and opinions. About two-thirds of adults say they see funny posts (66%) and opinions (64%) about the news mostly because they happen to come across them. Meanwhile, 21% say they get opinions mostly by looking for them, and 14% say the same for funny posts.

By contrast, only 31% say they get in-depth information or deep dives into issues or news events because they happen to come across them. And 38% say this is how they tend to get the most up-to-date information about issues or events.

Key facts about Asians in the U.S.