Your guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the world
Donald Trump’s tariffs will send US inflation soaring to as high as 4 per cent this year, push unemployment higher and hit economic growth amid “pervasive” uncertainty, a top Federal Reserve official has warned.
New York Fed chief John Williams said in prepared remarks on Friday that a “pervasive sense of uncertainty is becoming increasingly evident, especially in so-called soft data such as surveys and information from business contacts”.
He added that there had been “a sharp decline in consumer sentiment, and business sentiment measures have weakened, too”.
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Williams said that he expected inflation to reach 3.5 to 4 per cent this year as a result of Trump’s tariffs, much higher than the Fed’s 2 per cent mandate and far above the 2.5 per cent February reading for the central bank’s preferred PCE inflation measure.
He also said that he expected growth to “slow considerably from last year’s pace, likely to somewhat below 1 per cent”, while unemployment could rise from 4.2 per cent currently to 4.5 to 5 per cent.
The gloomy assessment from one of the Fed’s most prominent officials comes as US financial markets have been rocked over the past week by Trump’s announcement of ultra-protectionist trade policies that he only partially rolled back.
Last week, Jay Powell, the Fed chair, had warned that the tariffs proposed by the administration had been larger than expected and the result was likely to be higher inflation and slower growth. But Williams’ comments are more dire and more specific, and are far gloomier than the projections posted by Fed officials during their March meeting, which had inflation rising by 2.7 per cent and GDP expanding at a rate of 1.7 per cent.
Despite the gloomy outlook, Williams said “the current modestly restrictive stance of monetary policy is entirely appropriate given the solid labour market and inflation still above our 2 per cent goal”.
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The comments from Williams came as data showed US consumers’ inflation expectations surging to their highest reading since 1981 in April, as sentiment fell sharply for a fourth consecutive month.
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The University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index fell to a preliminary reading of 50.8 in April, its fourth successive drop and the lowest reading since June 2022, according to LSEG. Economists polled by Reuters had estimated a fall to 54.5 from 57 in March.
new video loaded: Nick Reiner Talked Openly About His Addiction Struggles
transcript
transcript
Nick Reiner Talked Openly About His Addiction Struggles
Nick Reiner was arrested and booked on suspicion of murder after his mother and father, the movie director Rob Reiner, were found dead in their home. The younger Reiner had been open about his struggles with drug abuse and homelessness.
“I was scared to get in trouble…” “We’re talking with Nick Reiner and his father, Rob Reiner.” “I think I’m lucky in the sense that I have parents that care about me. And because of that, when I would go out and do, you know, things like drugs and stuff like that, I’d feel a tremendous amount of guilt because I’d think, oh, you know, they’re thinking about me right now. They want me to do good.” “How was it working with your son?” “Oh, good, good.” “Deep down, he trusted that we loved him and that we were there for him. And that put a little bit of a break on certain things. I mean, it’s a desire to survive.”
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Nick Reiner was arrested and booked on suspicion of murder after his mother and father, the movie director Rob Reiner, were found dead in their home. The younger Reiner had been open about his struggles with drug abuse and homelessness.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy says proposals negotiated with US officials on a peace deal to end Russia’s war in Ukraine could be finalised within days, after which American envoys will present them to the Kremlin.
After two days of talks in Berlin, US officials said on Monday they had resolved “90%” of the problematic issues between Russia and Ukraine, but despite the positive spin it is not clear that an end to the war is any closer, particularly as the Russian side is absent from the current talks.
In the early hours of Tuesday morning the Ukrainian president said the US Congress was expected to vote on security guarantees and that he expected a finalised set of documents to be prepared “today or tomorrow”. After that, he said, the US would hold consultations with the Russians, followed by high-level meetings that could take place as soon as this weekend.
“We are counting on five documents. Some of them concern security guarantees: legally binding, that is, voted on and approved by the US Congress,” he said in comments to journalists via WhatsApp. He said the guarantees would “mirror article 5” of Nato.
On Monday, US officials declined to give specific details of what the security package was likely to include, and what would happen if Russia attempted to seize more land after a peace deal was reached. They did, however, confirm that the US did not plan to put boots on the ground in Ukraine.
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Leaders of the UK, France, Germany and eight other European countries said in a joint statement that troops from a “coalition of the willing” could “assist in the regeneration of Ukraine’s forces, in securing Ukraine’s skies, and in supporting safer seas, including through operating inside Ukraine”.
They stopped short, however, of suggesting these would be guarantees that would match Nato’s article 5, and in any case there is little sign that Russia is anywhere close to agreeing to the kind of package under discussion between Washington and Kyiv.
On Tuesday, the Kremlin said it had not seen the details of proposals on security guarantees. “We have seen newspaper reports so far, but we will not respond to them. We have not seen any texts yet,” its spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters.
Peskov added that Moscow, which has in the past demanded Kyiv cede territories Russia claims as its own and ruled out the presence of any foreign troops in Ukraine, had not changed its stance on the conflict and the achievement of its military goals.
“Our position is well known. It is consistent, it is transparent and it is clear to the Americans. And, in general, it is clear to the Ukrainians as well,” Peskov said.
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Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said Russia would not agree to troops from Nato countries operating in Ukraine “under any circumstances”. It was unclear whether that formulation also included troops drawn from Nato countries operating under a separate non-Nato command.
The German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, said on Monday that peace was closer than at any time since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion. But privately, European officials say that at this stage the talks are more about keeping the Trump White House onboard with supporting Ukraine than about reaching a lasting deal between Moscow and Kyiv.
The main sticking point between the Ukrainian team and US negotiators remains the issue of land. Trump wants Ukraine to give up the parts of the Donbas region it still holds, while Ukraine wants to freeze the lines at the current point of contact. “We are discussing the territorial issue. You know it is one of the key issues. At this point, there is no consensus on it yet,” Zelenskyy said after the Berlin talks.
The US negotiation team, led by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, has proposed a compromise solution whereby Ukraine would withdraw, but Russia would not advance and the demilitarised area would become “a free economic zone”. Russia has suggested that they could use police and national guard formations rather than the military, implying they would still expect to control the territory.
“I want to stress once again: a ‘free economic zone’ does not mean under the control of Russia. Neither de jure nor de facto will we recognise Donbas – its temporarily occupied part – as Russian. Absolutely,” said Zelenskyy.
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It is not clear how the two sides will proceed on the territorial issue, with Zelenskyy previously suggesting that a compromise solution such as a free economic zone could be theoretically possible if the Ukrainian people voted for it in a referendum. The critical stumbling block is likely to be when the plans are put to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, who has given no sign he is willing to compromise on his war aims.
“If Putin rejects everything, we will end up with exactly what we are experiencing on our plane right now – turbulence,” said Zelenskyy, recording the comments after his plane took off from Berlin for the Netherlands for a series of meetings on Tuesday.
“I believe the United States will apply sanctions pressure and provide us with more weapons if he rejects everything. I think that would be a fair request from us to the Americans,” he said.
new video loaded: Brown Student Has Survived Two School Shootings
transcript
transcript
Brown Student Has Survived Two School Shootings
Mia Tretta, a Brown student, survived a deadly shooting at her high school in 2019 and another attack on Saturday. As the authorities search for the gunman in the latest attack, she is coping with trauma again.
“The F.B.I. is now offering a reward of $50,000 for information that can lead to the identification, the arrest and the conviction of the individual responsible, who we believe to be armed and dangerous.” “It was terrifying and confusing, and there was so much misinformation, generally speaking, that I think everyone on Brown’s campus didn’t know what to do. This shooting does still impact my daily life, but here at Brown I felt safer than I did other places. And it felt like of course it won’t happen again. You know, it already did. But here we are. And it’s because of years, if not decades, of inaction that this has happened. Unfortunately, gun violence doesn’t — it doesn’t care whether you’ve been shot before.” “It is going to be hard for my city to feel safe going forward. This has shaken us.”
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Mia Tretta, a Brown student, survived a deadly shooting at her high school in 2019 and another attack on Saturday. As the authorities search for the gunman in the latest attack, she is coping with trauma again.
