Whether it's his plan or not, Trump's policies so far closely align with Project 2025

In his Project 2025 chapter on trade, economist Peter Navarro called on the next U.S. president to bring about a domestic manufacturing "renaissance" by adopting reciprocal tariffs against trading partners and taking a particularly hard line on China.

Promptly after being elected, President Donald Trump appointed Navarro as his senior counselor for trade and manufacturing. Within months, he announced sweeping new tariffs largely in line with Navarro's suggestions.

When the stock market plunged and economists warned of increasing inflation and a potential recession, several of Trump's other advisors rushed to step in, drive space between him and Navarro and prod the president into hitting pause on much of the plan.

The episode, which sent shock waves through the global economy, illustrated a broader pattern in which the president has rushed to implement unconventional or extreme policies also outlined in Project 2025. He has done so despite having insisted throughout his 2024 presidential campaign that he wanted nothing to do with the unpopular, ultraconservative playbook, and despite warnings from experts and other liberal critics that such policies were unwise, if not illegal.

—Los Angeles Times

Trump flip-flops on millionaire tax hike amid GOP budget feud

President Donald Trump flip-flopped again Friday on a controversial tax hike on millionaires as congressional Republicans struggle to reach agreement on a sprawling budget bill.

Just two days after saying he backs higher tax rates for the wealthiest Americans, Trump softened his stance.

Trump conceded in a social media post that the higher tax rate would be politically controversial, citing President George H.W. Bush’s toxic decision to break his “no new taxes” vow in 1992.

“The problem with even a ‘tiny’ tax increase for the rich ... is that (Democrats) would go around screaming, “Read my lips,” the fabled quote by George Bush the elder that is said to have cost him the election (to former President Bill Clinton),” Trump wrote.

—New York Daily News

Brace for the seaweed invasion, Florida. It could be biggest ever

MIAMI — Bad news, beachgoers: The seaweed monster is back and it’s expected to be bigger than ever.

Scientists at the University of South Florida Optical Oceanography Lab, the point people for tracking the floating mats of seaweed called sargassum, are predicting what could be the state’s worst seaweed season. In the latest report issued April 30, they project 40% more seaweed than the previous record mess of 2022, when stinky, scratchy piles sent many tourists packing and cost cities millions to clean up.

The mass of seaweed, which piles up on beaches and collects around marinas and docks, is also forming earlier than usual out in far-off ocean waters. The bloom began in March and reached unprecedented levels by the end of April, said Chuanmin Hu, the professor who runs USF’s Optical Oceanography Lab.

What’s to blame? Wind, nutrients, and higher temperatures due to climate change could all be impacting how the sargassum belt forms and moves, he said.

—Miami Herald

Putin targets ‘victory’ in Ukraine as Trump pushes for truce

Russian leader Vladimir Putin said Russia would achieve its strategic objectives in Ukraine as he insisted the country was united behind his war.

“That strength of spirit has always brought us only victory,” Putin said Friday at the May 9 military parade on Moscow’s Red Square marking the 80th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. Russia “will always rely on our unity in military and peaceful affairs, in achieving strategic goals.”

Putin spoke after U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday called for a 30-day ceasefire in Russia’s war on Ukraine to allow for talks on a lasting peace deal. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he’s willing to abide by a 30-day truce. Putin has so far resisted a halt to fighting while insisting on Russia’s maximalist demands in return for a settlement to the war he started that’s now in its fourth year.

“Hopefully, an acceptable ceasefire will be observed,” Trump said in a social media post. “If the ceasefire is not respected, the U.S. and its partners will impose further sanctions.”

—Bloomberg News