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Donald Trump vows new ‘golden age’ for US as he moves to unwind Joe Biden era

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Donald Trump vows new ‘golden age’ for US as he moves to unwind Joe Biden era

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Donald Trump promised a “golden age of America”, as he used his inaugural address to unveil sweeping moves to undo Joe Biden’s policies and reverse a “crisis of trust” he said had engulfed the government.

The new president announced aggressive new steps to boost energy production and curb immigration as he vowed to quickly deliver on the populist and nationalist platform that swept him to victory in last year’s White House race.

Trump also spoke of his own return to the White House as both personal vindication, following two assassination attempts, and a mission for dramatic overhauls of domestic and foreign policy.

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“I was saved by God to make America great again,” he said, in a speech that included echoes of his dystopian description of “American carnage” in his first inaugural address in 2017.

“For many years, a radical and corrupt establishment has extracted power and wealth from our citizens while the pillars of our society lay broken and seemingly in complete disrepair,” he said.

“We now have a government that cannot manage even a simple crisis at home, while at the same time stumbling into a continuing catalogue of catastrophic events abroad,” he said.

Trump said his return to office meant “America’s decline is over”, as he vowed to “again build the strongest military the world has ever seen”. But he also hinted at a new era of American expansion, when he said the country would take back control of the Panama Canal.

He echoed his campaign promises to end wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, saying he would be a “peacemaker”.

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“We will measure our success not only by the battles we win but also by the wars that we end and, perhaps more importantly, the wars we never get into,” Trump said. “My proudest legacy will be that of a peacemaker and unifier.”

In an apparent reference to previous efforts to prosecute him, Trump vowed “never again will the immense power of the state be weaponised to persecute political opponents”. He has previously threatened to prosecute his own political foes.

Former presidents including George W Bush and Barack Obama attended the ceremony, while technology billionaires such as Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos who have recently flocked to Trump’s side had prime spots in the audience.

Trump re-enters the White House with broader support from the public and business community than when he left office in 2021, just weeks after his supporters stormed the US Capitol to try to reverse Biden’s election.

Trump now faces the daunting task of delivering on his promise to lower the cost of living for middle-class households, a pledge that was his most potent political weapon in his victorious campaign against Kamala Harris.

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The new president said he would declare national emergencies on issues including immigration and energy, giving the president power to rush through new measures. As he was speaking, the White House said it was withdrawing from the Paris climate accord.

But Trump stopped short of announcing new tariffs immediately, instead planning to release a memorandum instructing government agencies to re-evaluate America’s trade relations with trading partners including China, Mexico and Canada.

The hesitance suggests his top aides are grappling with how aggressively to impose levies on America’s top trading partners. But Trump said tariffs would still be forthcoming.

“Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens,” he said.

Before he spoke, the dollar dropped about 1 per cent against a basket of other currencies in US morning trading, putting it on course for its biggest daily decline in more than five months.

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Trump’s return to the White House has unnerved some of America’s closest allies who fear a further lurch towards protectionism and new turn towards isolationism in Washington.

But staunch conservative world leaders have cheered his election victory. Javier Milei, the president of Argentina, and Giorgia Meloni, Italy’s prime minister, were among leaders attending his inauguration.

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What to Know About the Deportation of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to El Salvador

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What to Know About the Deportation of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to El Salvador

Some of President Trump’s top aides on Monday misstated several key facts involving the deportation of a Maryland man to El Salvador last month, blatantly contradicting other members of the administration who have maintained for weeks that his expulsion was an “administrative error.”

In remarks from the Oval Office and on television, Mr. Trump’s advisers suddenly declared that the man, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, had been lawfully sent to a prison in El Salvador.

The White House also sought to portray a recent Supreme Court ruling in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case as a victory when in fact the decision was a nuanced one. It partly found in favor of Mr. Abrego Garcia while also leaving open a loophole for the administration to avoid bringing him back from El Salvador.

The efforts by the Trump administration to misrepresent the case came as President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador announced after a meeting with Mr. Trump that his government would not return Mr. Abrego Garcia to U.S. soil.

Here are some of the ways in which the White House has twisted the facts.

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When Mr. Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran immigrant, was arrested while looking for work at a Home Depot in Maryland in 2019, a judge determined that he should not be deported to his homeland because he might face danger there. The ruling, known as a “withholding from removal” order, meant that he could stay in the United States with a measure of legal protection.

In March, however, he was suddenly pulled over by federal agents who accused him of being a member of the Salvadoran gang MS-13 and inaccurately told him that his protected status in the country had changed. Within three days, he was on a plane with other migrants to a prison in El Salvador called CECOT, which is known for its human rights violations.

After Mr. Abrego Garcia’s family sued the government seeking his return, several Trump administration officials — including the United States solicitor general — made a rare admission: The White House had made a mistake when it deported Mr. Abrego Garcia.

But on Monday, Stephen Miller, Mr. Trump’s top domestic policy adviser, abruptly changed course. He declared on Fox News that Mr. Abrego Garcia had not in fact been wrongfully deported.

“He was not mistakenly sent to El Salvador,” Mr. Miller said, adding, “This was the right person sent to the right place.”

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The sudden turnabout was remarkable not only because Mr. Miller, who is not a lawyer, contradicted previous assertions by some within the administration, but also because he appeared to go against the findings of the Supreme Court. In their recent ruling in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case, the justices immediately stated that the government itself had taken the position that “the removal to El Salvador was the result of an ‘administrative error.’”

That view had already been advanced in court papers by a top official at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and by D. John Sauer, Mr. Trump’s newly appointed solicitor general. It was also offered during a court hearing this month by Erez Reuveni, a Justice Department lawyer who was handling the case — that is, until he was fired this weekend, according to a person familiar with the matter.

In one of the more remarkable moments in his appearance on Fox News, Mr. Miller blamed Mr. Reuveni — and only Mr. Reuveni — for having planted the idea that Mr. Abrego Garcia’s deportation had been in error.

“A D.O.J. lawyer who has since been relieved of duty, a saboteur, a Democrat, put into a filing, incorrectly, that this was a mistaken removal,” Mr. Miller said.

That assertion, however, flew in the face of the fact that other Trump officials had said the exact same thing.

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One of them was Mr. Sauer, a top-ranking Justice Department official. Another was Robert Cerna, the acting field office director for enforcement and removal operations at ICE.

Early in the case, Mr. Cerna submitted a sworn declaration about Mr. Abrego Garcia’s deportation, and made clear that it was a mistake.

“This removal was an error,” he said.

Moreover, just a few weeks before he was fired, Mr. Reuveni was praised as a “top-notched” prosecutor by his superiors in an email announcing a recent promotion.

Mr. Trump and his top aides have repeatedly accused Mr. Abrego Garcia of being a member of MS-13. They have also said at times that he is a terrorist — but only because the administration recently designated MS-13 as a terrorist organization.

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In the Oval Office on Monday, Attorney General Pam Bondi said that two courts — an immigration court and an appellate court — had “ruled” that Mr. Abrego Garcia was a member of MS-13. But Ms. Bondi’s statement was a bit misleading.

To be clear, Mr. Abrego Garcia has never been charged with — let alone convicted of — being a member of the gang. But during his deportation proceedings, some evidence was introduced that he belonged to MS-13, and judges decided it was enough to keep him in custody while the matter was resolved.

But other judges have found the same evidence to be lacking.

When Judge Paula Xinis, who has been overseeing the efforts to bring Mr. Abrego Garcia back to the United States, considered the accusations that he was a gang member, she decided they were less than persuasive.

“The ‘evidence’ against Abrego Garcia consisted of nothing more than his Chicago Bulls hat and hoodie, and a vague, uncorroborated allegation from a confidential informant claiming he belonged to MS-13’s ‘Western’ clique in New York — a place he has never lived,” Judge Xinis wrote in an order last week.

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In its daily update to Judge Xinis outlining what steps it has taken to return Mr. Abrego Garcia to the United States, the Justice Department, submitting its filing more than an hour late, echoed many of the recalcitrant remarks that administration officials made in the Oval Office. It included the assertion that in 2019, a judge had determined that Mr. Abrego Garcia was a member of MS-13.

When the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in Mr. Abrego Garcia’s case last week, its findings were complicated and rather ambiguous.

The justices endorsed Judge Xinis’s previous order that required the administration to “facilitate” the return of Mr. Abrego Garcia. But they stopped short of actually ordering his return, indicating that even federal courts may not have the authority to require the executive branch to do so.

And yet Mr. Miller, in his appearance on Fox News and in the Oval Office, portrayed the ruling as an unmitigated victory for the Trump administration.

He said, for instance, that the Supreme Court’s instructions that the White House had to “facilitate” getting Mr. Abrego Garcia out of custody meant that Trump officials could assume an entirely passive stance toward his release.

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“If El Salvador voluntarily sends him back,” Mr. Miller said on Fox News, “we wouldn’t block him at the airport.”

But whether that position flies with Judge Xinis remains to be seen. She has scheduled a hearing to discuss what the government should do for Tuesday in Federal District Court in Maryland.

Mr. Miller also seized upon a small portion of the justices’ ruling that directed Judge Xinis to take the first crack at telling the White House what to do. The justices cautioned Judge Xinis that as she considered that issue, her ultimate decision needed to be made “with due regard for the deference owed to the executive branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.”

The Justice Department used that line in a court filing on Sunday to suggest that the courts were powerless to dictate how the White House should act because the president alone has broad powers to handle foreign policy.

“The federal courts have no authority to direct the executive branch to conduct foreign relations in a particular way, or engage with a foreign sovereign in a given manner,” lawyers for the department wrote. “That is the ‘exclusive power of the president as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations.’”

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Glenn Thrush contributed reporting.

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Live news: US stocks close higher as tech shares gain on tariff relief

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Live news: US stocks close higher as tech shares gain on tariff relief

Treasury yields were on track for their first daily decline in a week, as investors increased their bets on a US recession despite news of tariff exemptions.

The 10-year Treasury yield, which sets government borrowing rates and underpins pricing on financial assets worldwide, fell 0.13 percentage points on Monday to 4.36 per cent. That puts the 10-year on track to record its first day of declines in yield, which move inversely to price, since April 4. Across maturities, yields were lower. 

The 10-year Treasury yield is sensitive to growth expectations — it tends to fall when investors are betting on increased chances of a recession. 

Mohit Mittal, chief investment officer of core strategies at bond fund group Pimco, said: “Even with the 90-day pause, even with the weekend pause on tech products, this has created an environment of extreme uncertainty. Until we get more certainty, businesses and consumers will continue to act with caution. That brings us closer to a recession in 2025. That’s the fundamental story for the bond market.” 

Treasuries typically move inversely to shares — when stocks rise, bond prices fall and yields rise. But that relationship has been subverted in the past week, as investors sold both stocks and bonds. On Monday, investors were buying both, which could be seen as a “buy the dip” move — in stocks and in bonds. 

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Mittal said: “Government bonds look very attractive here. This is starting to create attractive opportunities for long-term investors. If you expect US growth to decline further, then yields could be much lower going forward.”

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Swarthmore College mourns graduates killed in upstate NY place crash

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Swarthmore College mourns graduates killed in upstate NY place crash

School officials at Swarthmore College are morning the loss of members of the schools “extended family,” they said in a letter to students after six people died in a plane crash in upstate New York over the weekend.

According to the Associated Press, a twin-engine aircraft, a Mitsubishi MU-2B, went down shortly after noon Saturday in a muddy field in Copake, New York, near the Massachusetts line, on Saturday.

The crash, officials said, killed all six people aboard.

In a letter addressed to students, faculty and staff members, officials with Swarthmore College said that three of those who were killed were graduates of Swarthmore College — Alexia Couyutas Duarte, class of 2023, Jared Groff of the class of 2022, and Jared’s father, Michael Groff, class of 1988.

Jared’s mother Joy Saini, along with his sister and former MIT soccer player recently named the NCAA Woman of the Year, Karenna Groff, along with her partner, James Santoro, were killed in the crash.

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Swarthmore College officials noted, in the letter, that Alexia is survived by her sister, Ariana Couyutas Duarte, of Swarthmore College’s class of 2026, who was studying abroad when this tragedy occurred.

“In the face of such devastating news, we recognize and celebrate all that these extraordinary individuals meant to us, as well as support those who knew, mentored, and loved them,” Swarthmore College officials wrote in a letter.

School officials called the former students “extraordinary.”

  • Alexia, a first-generation American, graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in economics and political science. After graduation, she began her career as a legal intake specialist at the Rian Immigrant Center in Boston. Most recently, Alexia worked as a paralegal in the pro bono initiative unit at MetroWest Legal Services in Miami. She had planned to attend Harvard Law School this fall.
  • Jared, originally from Weston, Mass., graduated with a B.A. in economics and political science. He was a four-year member of the men’s basketball team and contributed to squads that won a Centennial Conference championship and reached the NCAA Division III National Championship game for the first time in program history. Jared most recently worked as a paralegal at DW Partners in New York and planned to attend law school this fall.
  • Michael was a neurosurgeon and the executive medical director of neuroscience at Rochester Regional Health. He and Joy, a pelvic surgeon and founder of Boston Pelvic Health and Wellness, met while training at University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Their survivors include their daughter, Anika, who was recently admitted to Swarthmore’s Class of 2029.

School officials said they plan to celebrate the victims’ lives, but noted it was too soon to share details.

“On behalf of everyone at Swarthmore, our hearts go out to the families and friends of those we lost on Saturday, and to everyone affected by their tragic passing,” school officials said. “Please join us in sending them peace and light.”

The National Transportation Safety Board has begun an investigation into the crash, officials have said.

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