All posts tagged: Donald J. Trump

Mamdani’s NYC pied-à-terre tax can continue during court appeal

Mamdani’s NYC pied-à-terre tax can continue during court appeal

Published by Sam Flores

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during the annual New York State Financial Control Board meeting on August 12, 2026 in New York City. Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images New York City’s pied-à-terre tax can continue its planned rollout while it faces a legal challenge, an appellate judge ruled Thursday. The ruling comes after Staten Island Judge Wayne Ozzi on Monday issued a temporary restraining order briefly halting the levy on second homes above a certain value. The tax has become a hallmark policy of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Mamdani’s government filed a motion to seek an appeal, triggering an automatic stay. Earlier Thursday, NYC asked the appeals court to confirm that auto-pause, arguing Ozzi’s ruling “threatens to derail the City’s time-sensitive implementation of a new surcharge.” The lawsuit was filed by three city residents challenging the legality of the rollout, not the tax policy itself. Their suit highlights the city’s distribution of a list showing information on thousands of homeowners, and mailed notices informing 17,000 people on that list that they …

Kennedy Center board votes to put Trump name on facade

Kennedy Center board votes to put Trump name on facade

Published by Sam Flores

Workers erect scaffolding at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, US, on Friday, June 12, 2026. Andrew Leyden | Bloomberg | Getty Images The Kennedy Center’s board of trustees voted Thursday to inscribe President Donald Trump’s name on its building facade, setting up a renewed legal battle over changes to the Washington, D.C., performing arts facility. Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, called the new vote “a transparent effort to circumvent” a judge’s order in May that Trump’s name be removed from the Kennedy Center. Beatty and her lawyers detailed the vote on that and other items in a press release. “I will continue to fight for this treasured national monument,” said Beatty, whose lawsuit in D.C. federal court led to the order stripping Trump’s name from the center. Trump’s name was removed in June. The Kennedy Center’s board, of which Beatty is an ex-officio member, voted Thursday to redo the facade so that it would read: “The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Restored and Renovated By President Donald J. Trump.” The board, which …

Trade court upholds Trump’s closure of ‘de minimis’ loophole

Trade court upholds Trump’s closure of ‘de minimis’ loophole

Published by Sam Flores

U.S. President Donald Trump departs after a Cabinet meeting at Camp David in Thurmont, Maryland, U.S., July 31, 2026. Nathan Howard | Reuters A federal trade court on Thursday upheld President Donald Trump’s elimination of the “de minimis” exemption, which allowed goods valued under $800 to be imported to the U.S. tax free. Trump, a major proponent of tariffs and other forms of protectionism, celebrated the continued closure of the loophole, which he claims has cost the U.S. billions of dollars in uncollected import-tax revenue. Attorneys for the plaintiff, a Michigan-based auto-parts distributor, did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on the ruling. The company, Detroit Axle, had sued the Trump administration in May 2025, more than three months after Trump signed an executive order rescinding the de minimis exemption. The plaintiff argued that Trump lacked the legal authority to scrap the loophole under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA. Trump had used the same law to try to impose sweeping “liberation day” tariffs on nearly every country in the world …

Democrats demand Trump reveal stock managers, explain certain trades

Democrats demand Trump reveal stock managers, explain certain trades

Published by Sam Flores

US President Donald Trump during an executive order signing in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Monday, Aug. 10, 2026. Bonnie Cash | Bloomberg | Getty Images Two top Democratic lawmakers are pushing President Donald Trump for answers on the mountain of stock trades made in his name since he returned to the White House. In a 17-page letter sent Wednesday and seen by CNBC, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Rep. Robert Garcia of California asked Trump to reveal the money managers he says are in charge of all his investment decisions. They also pressed him to disclose his involvement in or awareness of numerous individual stock trades that have raised concerns due to their potential overlap with government policy, or their proximity to market-moving statements made by Trump himself. “The appearance of numerous conflicts of interest from a President trading in individual stocks – including the potential for insider trading, market manipulation, and policy decisions that benefit the President’s stock portfolio rather than the public interest – …

Iran looks to join BRICS bank as war with U.S. drags on

Iran looks to join BRICS bank as war with U.S. drags on

Published by Sam Flores

A woman and a child walk past Iranian-made Zolfaghar missiles displayed at Azadi Square in Tehran on July 24, 2026. Afp | Getty Images Iran is set to join the BRICS New Development Bank, the country’s central bank chief said Thursday, as Tehran seeks to shore up its economic alliances almost six months into its war with the U.S. and Israel. The BRICS alliance was set up in 2006 by founding members Brazil, Russia, India and China, with South Africa joining in 2010. It has since expanded to include Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Indonesia, with various other nations — including Belarus, Cuba and Nigeria — joining as partner countries. Iranian state media reported Thursday that Abdolnasser Hemmati, governor of the Central Bank of Iran, had announced Iran would soon become a member of the BRICS bank. Hemmati is currently in India ahead of next month’s BRICS summit, according to Iran’s Tasnim News Agency. “We are seeking to establish bilateral and trilateral monetary cooperation with member states,” Hemmati said, according …

Trump sued over Truth Social advance access sale

Trump sued over Truth Social advance access sale

Published by Sam Flores

President Donald Trump was sued on Wednesday by a media outlet and a non-profit group seeking to block a controversial new service that sells advance notifications of his posts on Truth Social. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, notes that Trump’s posts on his own social media site often move financial markets with announcements about government policy, military actions and other decisions. “President Donald Trump is charging $100,000 per month for advance access to his official government announcements on Truth Social, the social media platform he owns,” the civil suit says. “This scheme is extraordinary, corrupt, and unconstitutional, and Plaintiffs bring this case to stop it,” the suit says. “There is no legitimate interest, let alone a significant one, in permitting President Trump to profit from selling government information.” The suit was filed by The Intercept Media, a news organization, and by the Freedom of the Press Foundation, a non-profit group. Read more CNBC politics and policy coverage The complaint alleges that the new service, known as Truth API, violates the First …

Trump says Karoline Leavitt resigning as White House press secretary

Trump says Karoline Leavitt resigning as White House press secretary

Published by Sam Flores

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt will leave that post by the end of August, President Donald Trump said on Wednesday. Leavitt’s departure was announced less than a month after she returned to the White House after having been on maternity leave for the birth of her daughter on May 1. Leavitt, 28, is resigning “so she can spend more time with her beautiful young children and family, a decision I totally understand and respect!” Trump said in a Truth Social post announcing her planned departure. The president said that Leavitt will become “one of my top outside advisors” and work with the Republican Party to win the upcoming midterm elections in November. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks during a press briefing in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House in Washington, July 16, 2026. Saul Loeb | AFP | Getty Images Leavitt, who has served as White House press secretary since Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, has two young children with her husband, real estate developer Nicholas …

Houthi attack kills six in first death in Red Sea since Iran war began

Houthi attack kills six in first death in Red Sea since Iran war began

Published by Sam Flores

The navigation bridge of a sunken vessel is all that is seen at the surface of the water in the Port of Mokha the day after an attack by the Houthis on the city Mokha, held by Yemen’s internationally recognised, Aden-based government on August 10, 2026. Khaled Ziad | Afp | Getty Images Iran-backed Houthi rebels killed six people aboard a cargo ship in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait on Tuesday, the first reported fatalities from attacks targeting Red Sea shipping in more than a year. Within hours, U.S. forces said they had fired missiles at a container ship that allegedly attempted to breach Washington’s blockade of Iranian ports in the Gulf of Oman. The twin incidents illustrate how the Iran war, now in its sixth month, is inflicting a widening toll on two of the world’s most critical shipping lanes. And even as diplomats offer vague signs of progress toward reopening the Strait of Hormuz, hostilities between the U.S. and Iran appear to be on the rise. President Donald Trump, in an aggressively hostile Truth …

Trump claims ‘100% control’ of Hormuz, demands Iran pay reparations

Trump claims ‘100% control’ of Hormuz, demands Iran pay reparations

Published by Sam Flores

US President Donald Trump speaks before signing an executive order calling for more research and flexibility on vaccines, in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on August 10, 2026. Jim Watson | Afp | Getty Images The U.S. and Iran are close to “some sort of arrangement” over the Strait of Hormuz, a senior Pakistani minister said Tuesday, offering another glimmer of hope for a deal even as the warring powers appear to be hardening their negotiating stances. Pakistan’s defense minister, Khawaja Asif, told reporters that “things are shaping up again in favor of a peace arrangement or a deal,” according to Bloomberg News. “The signals in the last two to three days are that we are close to some sort of an arrangement,” he added, without providing further details. The Pakistani official’s comments came after a Qatari Foreign Ministry spokesperson told Al Jazeera that talks between Iran and Oman about opening a shipping channel through the Strait of Hormuz were at a “critical juncture.” Asked to respond to Asif’s remarks, …

Hong’s defeat in Wisconsin deals blow to rising Democratic socialists

Hong’s defeat in Wisconsin deals blow to rising Democratic socialists

Published by Sam Flores

Democratic Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate David Crowley greets supporters at a campaign rally on Aug. 10, 2026 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Scott Olson | Getty Images News | Getty Images Milwaukee County executive David Crowley stunned Democratic socialist Francesca Hong in Wisconsin’s Democratic gubernatorial primary, surging to victory after polls had him down by double digits. The Associated Press called the race early Wednesday morning, with Crowley ahead of Hong by less than a percentage point. The result is likely to take some wind out of a progressive surge that has threatened to upend Democratic politics on the economy. Progressives, however, did score a win in Minnesota on Tuesday with Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan defeating centrist Rep. Angie Craig, D-Minn, in an open Democratic Senate primary. Flanagan — a supporter of universal healthcare known as Medicare for All and halting military support for Israel — was endorsed by leading progressives like Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. and Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. Flanagan was ahead of Craig by roughly 20 percentage points with 99% of ballots counted, according to the …