Trump Pulls ICE Barbie Into His Dangerous War on Harvard

Donald Trump is threatening to take away Harvard University’s ability to enroll international students after the institution refused to agree to his demands.

The White House is demanding that the university change its hiring, admissions, and education practices, ostensibly to oppose antisemitism, and has already pulled $2.2 billion in federal funding. Now Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has asked for records on the “illegal and violent” activities of its foreign student visa holders, saying that Harvard will lose the “privilege of enrolling foreign students” if it doesn’t comply.

Harvard President Alan Garber said Monday in response to administration demands that the “university will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights.” Trump denigrated the university in a Truth Social post on Wednesday, saying that “Harvard can no longer be considered even a decent place of learning, and should not be considered on any list of the World’s Great Universities or Colleges.”

“Harvard is a JOKE, teaches Hate and Stupidity, and should no longer receive Federal Funds,” Trump posted.

The loss of international students would be a big blow to America’s oldest university. This year, 27 percent of its enrollment came from foreign students. Trump has already threatened to pull Harvard’s tax-exempt status, an unprecedented move that could cost the university millions. But Harvard’s decision not to give in to Trump comes after other institutions, such as Columbia University, gave in to administration demands and were still penalized.

The president, backed by much of the conservative movement, is trying to destroy academic freedom and take control of America’s institutions of higher education. If Harvard continues its opposition, this battle could become a war in the courts, with other universities also taking legal action. The question is who will stand up to Trump, and who will capitulate.

Donald Trump isn’t too happy after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the president’s tariff policy would cause more inflation and slow growth.

In a post on Truth Social Thursday morning, Trump furiously blamed Powell for not lowering interest rates. The European Central Bank had announced just a few hours earlier that it would make yet another round of cuts to offset Trump’s tariffs, which have roiled the markets and deteriorated the outlook for growth.

“The ECB is expected to cut interest rates for the 7th time, and yet, ‘Too Late’ Jerome Powell of the Fed, who is always TOO LATE AND WRONG, yesterday issued a report which was another, and typical, complete ‘mess!’” Trump wrote.  

“Oil prices are down, groceries (even eggs!) are down, and the USA is getting RICH ON TARIFFS. Too Late should have lowered Interest Rates, like the ECB, long ago, but he should certainly lower them now,” Trump added. “Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!”

In fact, egg prices have once again risen, ahead of Easter weekend, after falling in mid-March. Trump’s claim that the U.S. is getting “rich on tariffs” also deserves some scrutiny. While the president has claimed that the U.S. is raking in up to $2 billion a day, U.S. Customs and Border Protection revealed this week that the number was more like $250 million.

At an event hosted by the Economic Club of Chicago Wednesday, Powell had warned that “the level of tariff increases announced so far is significantly larger than anticipated, and the same is likely to be true of the economic effects, which will include higher inflation and slower growth.”

Trump had already been pushing for the Fed to cut interest rates ahead of announcing his sweeping “reciprocal tariff” policy earlier this month. 

Despite Trump’s latest call for his “termination,” Powell has already been clear that the president does not have the power to remove him. His term as Federal Reserve chair ends in May 2026. 

Donald Trump’s nominee to run the IRS, Representative Billy Long, just had a six-figure debt paid off by campaign donors, all of whom happen to have tax issues with the IRS.

Long reported in campaign finance disclosures that he loaned $130,000 to his unsuccessful 2022 campaign for the U.S. Senate, with the dormant campaign committee raising $36,000 in the past two years. This meant that Long would have been personally on the hook for more than $100,000.

Shortly after Trump announced Long as his pick to head the IRS, the committee was suddenly flush, taking in $137,000 in under three weeks in January, and Long used that to reimburse himself. Two-thirds of those donations were for $2,900, the maximum amount allowed by law, and one-third of them came from donors in the tax consultant industry or people with tax-related legal issues.

“Making political contributions to aid Billy Long seems like a surefire way to ingratiate yourself with the man poised to lead the IRS, especially when we’re talking about contributions to help repay campaign debt that is just loans to the candidate himself and contributions to his leadership PAC,” Michael Beckel, senior research director of the campaign finance reform organization Issue One, told Lever News.

“People often criticize campaign contributions for being legalized bribery, but in this case, we’re truly talking about money being given to Long to repay himself,” Beckel added.

Some of the contributors to Long’s campaign worked at firms accused of a fraudulent tax scheme in which they hawked fake tax credits, according to Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee. After leaving Congress in 2023, Long worked at one of the companies, Lifetime Advisors, and had dealings with some of the others, such as White River Energy.

“Given IRS Commissioner nominee Billy Long’s direct financial ties to White River and other entities implicated in this scheme, we are concerned that if confirmed, Long could undermine enforcement actions related to this fraudulent scheme,” Democratic Senators Ron Wyden and Catherine Cortez Masto wrote in an April 14 letter to acting IRS Commissioner Melanie Krause.

Long’s confirmation is still awaiting a Senate vote, but unless Republicans in the chamber grow spines, he’ll probably sail through. Trump choosing him in the first place shows how corruption is now openly tolerated in the Republican Party, inspired by the activities of the top man himself.

Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency is involved in Trump’s plan to have people buy their way to American citizenship.

As the Trump administration continues to blatantly ignore court orders and deport thousands of immigrants without justification, Musk’s crew of twentysomething goons is building out a special type of $5 million visa designed to give “high-level people” a “route to citizenship.”

Dubbed “gold cards” by Trump, the visas were first announced in February. Each card sells for $5 million and would replace the E.B.-5 visa program. DOGE is now working with the Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, and United States Citizenship and Immigration Services to build out the project’s website and application process, The New York Times reported Wednesday. His team consists of Marko Elez (the 25-year-old with a history of racist X posts), 19-year-old Edward Coristine, who publicly goes by “Big Balls,” and the billionaire co-founder of Airbnb.

Elez and Coristine have been meeting with staff at different agencies in charge of the immigration vetting process to determine how to build out their system.

While much of MAGA has pushed to eradicate immigration of any kind, Musk has at times defended immigration—if those coming to the U.S. are college-educated, wealthy, and will comply with his mission to run the country like a private start-up.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has touted the “gold card” program and claimed the government has already made $5 billion off the scheme, even though it doesn’t exist yet.

“Yesterday I sold a thousand,” Lutnick said in a podcast interview last month.

“The idea is, if I was not American, and I lived in any other country, I would buy six—one for me, one for my wife, one for my four kids—because God forbid something happens, I want to be able to go to America, and I want to have the right to go to the airport to go to America,” Lutnick added, foreshadowing a not-so-distant reality where only the ultrawealthy can relocate to Trump’s America.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection has revealed how much money has been generated from Donald Trump’s tariffs—and it’s not nearly as much as the president has claimed, NBC News reported Wednesday.

“Since April 5, CBP has collected over $500 million under the new reciprocal tariffs, contributing to more than $21 billion in total tariff revenue from 15 presidential trade actions implemented since Jan 20, 2025,” CBP said in a statement to CNBC Monday.

But that directly contradicts Trump’s claim that his tariffs are raking in a whopping $2 billion every day.

The real number is closer to $250 million per day, according to the CBP. The Treasury Department reported Monday that the day’s deposits listed under “Customs and Certain Excise Taxes” totaled $305 million.

Earlier this month, Trump announced sweeping a “reciprocal tariff” policy, imposing a blanket 10 percent tariff on products from nearly every country in the world. After the stock market tanked, Trump announced a three-month pause on imposing the tariffs, with an exception for China, on which he has levied a 145 percent tariff on everything but certain tech products.

In return, China has imposed its own 125 percent tariff on all U.S. goods, which is already hurting American farmers, who exported $1.6 billion worth of beef to China last year.

Trump has also imposed a 25 percent tariff on goods from Canada and Mexico, as well as a 25 percent tariff on imported cars and autoparts.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell warned Wednesday that Trump’s sweeping tariff policy would likely raise inflation, despite the president’s many promises to lower prices upon entering office.