Trump announces 25 percent steel tariff increase to 50 percent as he celebrates US Steel deal

Good morning and welcome to our rolling coverage of the Trump administration.

Today, President Donald Trump hosts Elon Musk in the Oval Office at 1:30 p.m. to mark the tech billionaire’s official departure from the administration. He will continue to advise the president in an unofficial capacity.

Later, Trump heads to Pennsylvania for a rally to mark U.S. Steel’s “partnership” with Japan’s Nippon Steel. Details of the agreement have not yet been announced, but the president says it will keep the iconic American steelmaker in U.S. control.

After a flurry of pardons by the president this week, reality TV stars Todd Chrisley and Julie Chrisley will hold a press conference at 11 a.m., having been released from federal prison. The couple had been sentenced to 19 years in total after they were convicted in 2022 of conspiring to defraud banks out of more than $30 million in loans.

We will also keep you up to date with the latest developments in Trump’s trade war, following his plan for tariffs on U.S. trade partners, which was initially halted by a federal court but subsequently reinstated on appeal.

This morning, Trump said China “totally violated” his deal to pause tariffs on imports from that nation. He wrote on Truth Social: “So much for Mr. Nice Guy.”

President Donald Trump on Friday lashed out at China once more by claiming that Beijing was somehow not abiding by an interim deal under which both American and Chinese tariff rates on each other’s exports would be dialed back after Trump’s trade war caused them to spike precipitously.

Andrew Feinberg reports.

Richard Hall writes:

Donald Trump went on a pardoning spree this week, granting clemency to gang leaders, reality TV fraudsters, and various white collar criminals.

Among the colorful characters freed by the president were a conspicuous number of his own supporters and donors, prompting accusations of corruption and favoritism.

There was also a focus in the pardon list on financial crimes and fraud, both of which Trump has had experience defending himself against.

Norm Eisen, the White House ethics czar under Barack Obama and executive chair of the Democracy Defenders Fund, told The Independent that Trump’s choices had a lot to do with recasting his own past legal troubles.

Read on...

The Trump administration can strip temporary legal status granted to more than 500,000 immigrants under the Biden administration.

Emergency humanitarian protections for roughly 532,000 people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela to legally live and work in the country can be revoked.

The brief order noted that Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Sonia Sotomayor dissented.

The decision comes after the court agreed to strip another 350,000 Venezuelans of those same protections:

President Donald Trump is holding a rally in Pennsylvania on Friday to celebrate a details-to-come deal for Japan-based Nippon Steel to invest in U.S. Steel, which he says will keep the iconic American steelmaker under U.S.-control.

Though Trump initially vowed to block the Japanese steelmaker’s bid to buy Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel, he changed course and announced an agreement last week for what he described as “partial ownership” by Nippon. It’s not clear, though, if the deal his administration helped broker has been finalized or how ownership would be structured.

Trump stressed the deal would maintain American control of the storied company, which is seen as both a political symbol and an important matter for the country’s supply chain, industries like auto manufacturing and national security.

Trump, who has been eager to strike deals and announce new investments in the U.S. since retaking the White House, is also trying to satisfy voters, including blue-collar workers, who elected him as he called to protect U.S. manufacturing.

U.S. Steel has not publicly communicated any details of a revamped deal to investors. Nippon Steel issued a statement approving of the proposed “partnership” but also has not disclosed terms of the arrangement.

State and federal lawmakers who have been briefed on the matter describe a deal in which Nippon will buy U.S. Steel and spend billions on U.S. Steel facilities in Pennsylvania, Indiana, Alabama, Arkansas and Minnesota. The company would be overseen by an executive suite and board made up mostly of Americans and protected by the U.S. government’s veto power in the form of a “golden share.”

In the absence of clear details or affirmation from the companies involved, the United Steelworkers union, which has long opposed the deal, this week questioned whether the new arrangement makes “any meaningful change” from the initial proposal.

President Donald Trump is hosting Elon Musk in one last Oval Office press conference, for now, as the Tesla billionaire wraps up his time working at the White House.

The president announced on his TruthSocial platform that the pair would hold a press conference together on Friday afternoon.

Rachel Clun has the details.

The Supreme Court has ruled that Donald Trump’s administration can begin taking steps to deport more than 500,000 immigrants who were granted emergency humanitarian protections to legally live and work in the United States.

A brief order from the nation’s highest court on Friday allows the administration to revoke temporary legal status granted to roughly 532,000 immigrants during Joe Biden’s administration.

Alex Woodward has the details.

The FBI and the Trump administration have launched a joint investigation into how an impersonator hacked White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles’ phone.

An unknown person pretending to be Wiles has called or texted Republican senators and governors, and “prominent” business executives over the last few weeks, sources told The Wall Street Journal. It’s not clear what the impersonator’s goal is.

Mary Papenfuss has the story.