Fauci’s Wife, An NIH Bioethicist Who Never Probed Ethics Of Wuhan Research, Fired
Christine Grady, a top bioethicist at the National Institutes of Health and the wife of former top NIH official Anthony Fauci, was among the health bureaucrats who received a layoff notice on Tuesday, according to news reports.
Grady was given the boot as part of the post-pandemic restructuring of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), according to the New York Times and STAT News. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his top aides have said the layoffs are aimed at consolidating administrative functions and overhauling a failed status quo in Americans’ health.
Some NIH leaders were given the option of transferring to one of the field offices of the Indian Health Service in Alaska, Montana, Minnesota, and other locations far removed from Washington, DC. But it’s not clear whether Grady was among the officials given the option of taking up a remote post hundreds of miles from the couple’s tony Beltway neighborhood. The couple had a net worth of $11.5 million by the time of Fauci’s 2022 retirement, according to federal disclosures, a $7.6 million jump from before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Open The Books.
Even an NIH official who described Grady as well respected acknowledged that her marriage to Fauci impacted the ability of the institutes to tackle ethical questions that risked reflecting poorly on the former White House medical advisor.
An NIH official speaking on the condition of anonymity told the Daily Caller News Foundation that Grady was “a good person with a major conflict of interest.”
“One of the problems when the coverup was going on of the Wuhan lab leak, that whole fiasco, was that they were not listening to anyone giving ethics advice,” the official said. “If they had had someone at the table with knowledge of this, they would have said: ‘Hey do you want to play it this way, or be more transparent?’ Someone could have raised the question.”
“That’s something Christine Grady could have, or should have, done,” the official continued. “She wasn’t able to do it because she was Fauci’s wife.”
“Maybe they had discussions in private about what was going on,” the official said. “She was placed in a conflicted role because of that.”
Other NIH officials in Fauci’s inner circle were also let go.
Clifford Lane, who had worked at Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1991 — most recently as deputy director of clinical research and special projects — was also let go, according to the New York Times.
NIAID Division of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases Director Emily Erbelding has also been let go, according to Government Executive. Erbelding was involved in communications with Fauci and with EcoHealth Alliance President Peter Daszak about the connection between the NIAID and high-risk virology in Wuhan, China, in 2020 according to emails obtained by U.S. Right to Know through the Freedom of Information Act and a congressional investigation.
Emailed requests for comment to Grady, Lane and Erbelding received no immediate response. A phone call to the NIH Department of Ethics was answered but abruptly ended when the receptionist learned this reporter was calling.
https://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2025/04/02/faucis-wife-an-nih-bioethicist-who-never-probed-ethics-of-wuhan-research-fired/
Mike Johnson issues statement on proxy voting
Speaker Mike Johnson
@SpeakerJohnson
As the father of a large family, I know firsthand the difficulty and countless sacrifices that come with balancing family life and service in Congress. New mothers and all young parents face real challenges in this regard. We truly empathize with them.
That said, all of us have a responsibility to defend and uphold the Constitution and the integrity of this institution, which has stood the test of time for more than two centuries. While I understand the pure motivations of the few Republican proxy vote advocates, I simply cannot support the change they seek.
The procedural vote yesterday was our effort to advance President Trump’s important legislative agenda while disabling a discharge petition that would force proxy voting and open a dangerous Pandora’s box for the institution. To allow proxy voting for one category of Members would open the door for many others, and ultimately result in remote voting that would harm the operation of our deliberative body and diminish the critical role of the legislative branch.
While 96 percent of Republicans voted in our favor, when the procedural vote failed, it was Democrats who stood up and cheered. President Trump’s agenda is now stalled for the week because, beyond the SAVE Act, nothing else can proceed for a vote without passing a new rule first, and many Republicans refuse to do so until we stop the proxy initiative.
Nancy Pelosi experimented with proxy voting during the 117th Congress, and it was quickly abused. Republicans put an end to it then, and we cannot allow it again.
Proxy voting aside, I am actively working on every possible accommodation to make Congressional service simpler for young mothers. As the pro-family party, our aim as Republicans is to support those principles while also defending our constitutional traditions.
https://x.com/SpeakerJohnson/status/1907520482112569719
Radhika Jones to Step Down as Vanity Fair Editor-in-Chief
Jones, who joined the Condé Nast publication in 2017, will leave in the spring.
There will be a changing of the guard atop Vanity Fair, one of the flagship publications in the Condé Nast portfolio.
Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Radhika Jones told staff Thursday that she plans to leave the publication in the spring.
“Those of you who know me well know that I can be a little restless, once a mission is accomplished. And I have always had a horror of staying too long at the party,” Jones wrote employees in an email, obtained by The Hollywood Reporter. “So I’ve made the decision to leave Vanity Fair this spring. It was a difficult decision, because it was a tremendous privilege to lead this team.”
Jones joined Vanity Fair from The New York Times in December 2017, succeeding its longtime editor Graydon Carter.
In a meeting with Vanity Fair staff Thursday, Condé Nast chief content officer Anna Wintour said that “Radhika has shown herself to be as much at home on the red carpet as sitting front row, and has graciously hosted the most legendary party in Hollywood. She has done it all with poise and wit and wisdom.
“In the coming weeks, Radhika will be helping us with the transition as we start the search for a new editor,” Wintour continued. “We look forward to Vanity Fair’s exciting next chapter. Radhika, we are so grateful for your high standards of journalism, your fearlessness and your empathetic leadership. You will be much missed.”
You can read Jones’ memo to staff below.
Hello all,
At the end of every year, I look over the memo I wrote back in 2017 when I was interviewing to be the editor of Vanity Fair, as a way to remember the goals I had and check my progress. Last year, somewhat to my surprise, I realized that—with your help—I had accomplished virtually all of those goals. Vanity Fair is a thriving modern publication with incisive, lively reporting; a vast and highly engaging social media audience; a studio business with terrific projects under our belt and in the works on FX, Amazon, Netflix, and more; a video powerhouse; and an epic party machine, to which this year’s Oscar party (my seventh!) was testament. We are fully at home in our worlds.
It was gratifying, but also a little jarring, to feel like I could check off those boxes. And simultaneously I began to feel, more powerfully, the pull of new goals in my life, around family and friends and writing and other ways to make an impact. Those of you who know me well know that I can be a little restless, once a mission is accomplished. And I have always had a horror of staying too long at the party. So I’ve made the decision to leave Vanity Fair this spring. It was a difficult decision, because it has been a tremendous privilege to lead this team. Our work has been a beacon. We have published incredible writing, by everyone from Jesmyn Ward to James Pogue. Just last night I went to the Whitney Museum and saw Amy Sherald’s painting of Breonna Taylor, hanging prominently in her new show, “American Sublime.” That piece of art would not exist in the world had we not commissioned it for the cover of our September 2020 issue, and publishing it remains one of the proudest moments of my whole career—and one of many proud moments here at Vanity Fair.
I have loved working with you all, for all the reasons you know. We’ve come through a lot of challenges, from Covid on, for which we had no playbook; we wrote our own. I will always be grateful to David Remnick for bringing me in the door, to Anna Wintour and Roger Lynch for their support over the years, and to the Newhouse family for their stewardship of these magazines. I will want to say goodbye and thank each of you individually over the days to come. For now, know that I admire you all, I believe in you, and I will be rooting for you and for Vanity Fair.
-Radhika
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/vanity-fair-editor-radhika-jones-exits-1236180736/
216,000 federal jobs eliminated in March
-Furloughs in the federal government totaled 216,215 for March, part of a total 275,240 reductions overall in the labor force, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
-The monthly total was surpassed only by April and May of 2020 in the early days of the pandemic when employers announced combined reductions of more than 1 million.
A surge in federal government job cuts contributed to a near record-setting pace for announced layoffs in March, exceeded only by when the country shut down in 2020 for the Covid pandemic, according to a report Thursday from job placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Furloughs in the federal government totaled 216,215 for the month, part of a total 275,240 reductions overall in the labor force. Some 280,253 layoffs across 27 agencies in the past two months have been linked to the Elon Musk-led so-called Department of Government Efficiency and its efforts to pare down the federal workforce.
The monthly total was surpassed only by April and May of 2020 in the early days of the pandemic when employers announced combined reductions of more than 1 million, according to Challenger records going back to 1989. It also was the highest March on record.
“Job cut announcements were dominated last month by Department of Government Efficiency [DOGE] plans to eliminate positions in the federal government,” said Andrew Challenger, senior vice president and workplace expert at the firm. “It would have otherwise been a fairly quiet month for layoffs.”
However, DOGE has continued to cut aggressively across the government.
Various reports have indicated that the Veterans Affairs Department could lose 80,000 jobs, the IRS is in line for some 18,000 reductions and The Treasury is expected to drop a “substantial” level of workers as well, according to a court filing.
The year-to-date tally for federal government announced layoffs represents a 672% increase from the same period in 2024, according to Challenger.
To be sure, the outsized layoff plans haven’t made their way into other jobs data.
Weekly unemployment claims have held in a fairly tight range since President Donald Trump took office. Payroll growth has slowed a bit from its pace in 2024 but is still positive, while job openings have receded but only to around their pre-pandemic levels.
However, the Washington, D.C., area has been hit particularly hard by the announced layoffs, which have totaled 278,711 year to date for the city, according to the report.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/03/layoff-announcements-surge-to-the-most-since-the-pandemic-as-musks-doge-slices-federal-labor-force.html
US to host Military World Games for the first time ever
The 2027 Military World Games will be played in Charlotte, North Carolina, marking the first time the event has ever been hosted in the United States.
The last Military World Games took place in Wuhan, China, in October 2019, just months before the COVID-19 pandemic erupted from that very city, putting the event on ice for what will be an eight-year hiatus.
When the games return in 2027, it will come right in the middle of two major international sporting events that are also set to play in the U.S. – the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.
President Donald Trump will preside over each of the events, and while he played a role in bringing the World Cup and Olympics to America in his first term, he has his Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to thank for giving the approval of the Military World Games for North Carolina, according to the event's co-chair Eli Bremer.
Bremer told Fox News Digital that Hegseth gave the final approval for the U.S. to host the games.
"His vision for the U.S. military, creating warriors, aligns so precisely with the U.S. military engaging in elite sporting," Bremer said. "I think this aligns extremely well with the new leadership in the military. I think it's a tremendous opportunity for the U.S. military to attract amazing talent into it that aligns with the leadership of Secretary Hegseth and all the way down the Trump administration."
Bremer, a former major in the Air Force Reserves and former modern pentathlete who competed in the 2008 Olympics, recalled his experience competing with athletes from some of America's notable military adversaries in past Military World Games, and believes the 2027 event can help opposing sides humanize each other amid geopolitical tensions.
"As a young officer in the Air Force, I had contact with Iranians and North Koreans who were at those sporting events, so it gave Americans a chance to kind of make contacts with other countries and to show them we're real people," Bremer said.
The games are organized by the International Military Sports Council (CISM) the world's second-largest multidiscipline sports organization, after the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
CISM President Nilton Rolim of Brazil told Fox News Digital that there were barriers to bringing the games to the U.S., but the committee powered through a "competitive" process to get it done in America, citing the symbolic importance of global peacekeeping.
"Barriers included the complexity of hosting such a large-scale international event for the first time on U.S. soil. Navigating security, diplomatic protocols, and ensuring infrastructure met CISM standards was key. However, shared commitment and vision made success possible," Rolim said.
"The significance is historic. Western allies have long been active members of CISM, and the U.S. has supported the mission from the beginning. Now, hosting the Games on American soil extends a clear message: the West is committed to global peace and unity, not just through strategic alliances, but through shared human values.
"By hosting the Games, the USA is demonstrating leadership in promoting peaceful international military engagement beyond defense cooperation—through athletics, cultural exchange, and global solidarity."
Three of the last four MWGs were hosted in BRICS nations, with China hosting in 2019, Brazil hosting in 2011 and India hosting in 2007. By coming to the U.S., the event will be hosted in a G7 nation for the first time since it was hosted in Italy in 2003.
For many Americans who are both veterans and former athletes, the 2027 games will mark a proud milestone.
Former U.S. Olympian Chad Senior, who competed in the 2004 and 2000 Summer Olympics in modern pentathlon, and served in the Iraq War and Afghanistan War as an Air Force special operations veteran, told Fox News Digital that the games will come at an important time, as he sees the military in the U.S. becoming more "partisan."
"Policies in this administration are changing, and I don't think people are in the middle of it, they're either solidly against it or solidly embrace it," Senior said.
"Will it change people's minds? I don't know. I think that's why they have these World Military Games. Any time that different miliaries can get together in a friendly environment of sports versus on the battlefield I think is a positive thing for all of us."
Former U.S. Senator from Colorado Ben Nighthorse Campbell, who competed in the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and served in the Air Force, celebrated the selection of Charlotte for the next MWG.
"I was thrilled to hear that the World Military Games are coming to the United States. As one who served our country in the Air Force during the Korean War and represented our country on the judo mats at the 1964 Olympic Games, I believe there is a direct correlation between the discipline and dedication required to be an elite athlete or member of an elite fighting force and competition always pushes both to higher levels of performance," Campbell told Fox News Digital.
https://www.foxnews.com/sports/us-host-world-military-games-first-time-ever-after-pete-hegseths-historic-approval
Kid Rock predicts Bill Maher will say this about his meeting with Trump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKMXrATu9Qc
DC_Draino
@DC_Draino
I regret to inform you that a 21 year old student at University of South Carolina was just killed in a hit & run by an illegal alien
Nate Baker died Wednesday after being hit by Rosali Fernandez Cruz who left the scene after the crash
The worst part? This illegal alien was already wanted by ICE
Biden’s open border just killed another innocent American
Say his name - Nate Baker
https://x.com/DC_Draino/status/1907903837077119015
Turning Point USA
@TPUSA
Our "Prove Me Wrong" tabling event with @TheOfficerTatum at UC Davis was completely destroyed by violent protesters.
They stole the canopy, ripped down banners, smashed foam boards, and even tried to steal the iPad and laptop of a @tpusastudents field rep.
TPUSA students were shoved and had objects thrown at them—while police did nothing.
Only after the damage was done did law enforcement finally form a perimeter. This is the reality of free speech on campus.
https://x.com/TPUSA/status/1907884759256281356
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab Laid Off 900 Workers Due to Budget Cuts—But Hasn’t Fired Its Top DEI Officer
Over the course of 2024, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory laid off nearly 900 workers due to budget cuts at the agency. The cuts, which came amid delays on the Mars Sample Return program, a mission to collect dust and rocks from the red planet, reduced the lab’s headcount by 13 percent and impacted both technical and support staff.
But the jet propulsion laboratory’s chief inclusion officer, Neela Rajendra, survived the cuts. Rajendra, who helped organize a project to recruit women and minorities to the space industry, has argued that "extreme deadline[s]" are an obstacle to "inclusion," stating on a 2022 podcast that "some people might be left behind" by the "super fast pace."
The comment came two years before a pair of NASA astronauts were stranded on the International Space Station for nine months due to a faulty propulsion system, raising questions about why the agency had spent millions on DEI when it couldn’t even bring back space rocks from Mars or its own employees from orbit.
The cuts to the laboratory, which creates land rovers and re-entry systems, had not impacted Rajendra’s role. But by early March, it seemed like her number was finally up.
NASA had closed its central diversity office and fired 23 employees in response to President Donald Trump’s executive order banning DEI in the federal government. The jet propulsion lab, meanwhile, had begun to "alter, remove, or reroute" web pages related to DEI, lab director Laurie Leshin told staff in an email. Though the laboratory is administered by the California Institute of Technology, meaning its staff are not civil servants, it is still owned by NASA and funded by the federal government.
But rather than fire Rajendra, the lab created a new role for her—one with many of the same duties as the old one. Instead of chief inclusion officer, the lab explained in a March 10 email, Rajendra would henceforth serve as the "Chief of the Office of Team Excellence and Employee Success." Ostensibly set up to "maximize our potential," the office would oversee the lab’s "affinity groups"— including "B.E.S.T," the Black Excellence Strategic Team—as well as "wellness" and "accessibility."
"I believe this change is essential for JPL’s future success and aligns well with Neela’s strengths and focus over the past year," Leshin, the lab director, wrote in an email obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. She added that a "small number" of human resources officers would be reassigned to the new office.
The title change provides one of the most clear cut examples yet of how institutions are seeking to circumvent Trump’s ban on DEI by renaming diversity offices and shuffling staff. At the University of Michigan School of Nursing, for example, the school’s diversity office was renamed "the office of community culture," while at PBS, the network attempted to move two diversity officials to other departments so that they wouldn’t be fired.
Rajendra’s new role comes as NASA is under scrutiny for the sort of the diversity programs she helped organize, such as an industry pledge, "Space Workforce 2030," to hire more women and minorities. She also ensured that the leaders of affinity groups were paid for their DEI work, according to a 2023 article in Physics World, and spoke of the "world reckoning" that followed the death of George Floyd.
It led to "awareness and willingness and commitment to change from the perspective of diversity, equity and inclusion," she told the magazine.
A spokeswoman for the laboratory, Veronica McGregor, said that Rajendra’s new role would focus solely on "retaining our highly skilled workforce" in the wake of the budget cuts. But for more than two weeks after the title change, Rajendra’s bio on a NASA website continued to reference "diversity, equity, and inclusion." The language was only scrubbed on March 27, the day after the Free Beacon asked the laboratory for comment.
The lab "launched the Office of Team Excellence and Employee Success to strengthen its potential, better leverage its extraordinary talent and cultivate an industry-leading workplace," McGregor wrote in an email. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, she said, "continues to be committed to following all rules, laws, and regulations."
The lab’s emphasis on diversity appears to have come from the top. Leshin, the laboratory’s director, wrote in a 2023 LinkedIn post that the lab had "made a commitment to increase the number of women in senior technical leadership roles, and to hire and retain more Black engineers."
Those commitments were justified on the grounds that DEI improves employee retention. In a 2022 presentation on "DEIA in the NASA Family," Rajendra suggested that the "failure to promote DEI" at SpaceX—"a fast paced, high innovation company"—was one reason why it had a higher attrition rate than Boeing, a "traditional corporate entity."
In June 2024, two astronauts were stranded when the thrusters malfunctioned on a Boeing spaceship. They were only rescued nine months later, when a SpaceX capsule brought them back.
https://freebeacon.com/campus/nasas-jet-propulsion-lab-laid-off-900-workers-due-to-budget-cuts-but-hasnt-fired-its-top-dei-officer/
HealthSec JFK Jr begins layoffs (10,000 total) at HHS
Employees across the massive U.S. Health and Human Services Department received notices Tuesday that their jobs were being eliminated, part of a sweeping overhaul designed to vastly shrink the agencies responsible for protecting and promoting Americans’ health.
The cuts include researchers, scientists, doctors, support staff and senior leaders, leaving the federal government without many of the key experts who have long guided U.S. decisions on medical research, drug approvals and other issues.
“The revolution begins today!” Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote on social media as he celebrated the swearing-in of his latest hires: Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, the new director of the National Institutes of Health and Martin Makary, the new Food and Drug Administration commissioner. Kennedy's post came just hours after employees began receiving emailed layoff notices. He later wrote, “Our hearts go out to those who have lost their jobs,” but said that the department needs to be “recalibrated" to emphasize disease prevention.
Kennedy announced a plan last week to remake the department, which, through its agencies, is responsible for tracking health trends and disease outbreaks, conducting and funding medical research, and monitoring the safety of food and medicine, as well as for administering health insurance programs for nearly half the country.
The plan would consolidate agencies that oversee billions of dollars for addiction services and community health centers under a new office called the Administration for a Healthy America.
HHS said layoffs are expected to save $1.8 billion annually — about 0.1% — from the department’s $1.7 trillion budget, most of which is spent on Medicare and Medicaid health insurance coverage for millions of Americans.
The layoffs are expected to shrink HHS to 62,000 positions, lopping off nearly a quarter of its staff — 10,000 jobs through layoffs and another 10,000 workers who took early retirement and voluntary separation offers. Many of the jobs are based in the Washington area, but also in Atlanta, where the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is based, and in smaller offices throughout the country.
Some staffers began getting termination notices in their work inboxes at 5 a.m., while others found out their jobs had been eliminated after standing in long lines outside offices in Washington, Maryland and Atlanta to see if their badges still worked.
Some gathered at local coffee shops and lunch spots after being turned away, finding out they had been eliminated after decades of service.
One wondered aloud if it was a cruel April Fools' Day joke. Adding to the confusion, some layoff notices included instructions to file equal employment complaints to a person who had died in November.
At the NIH, cuts included at least four directors of the NIH’s 27 institutes and centers who were put on administrative leave, and nearly entire communications staffs were terminated, according to an agency senior leader, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid retribution.
An email viewed by The Associated Press shows that some senior-level employees of the Bethesda, Maryland, campus who were placed on leave were offered a possible transfer to the Indian Health Service in locations including Alaska and given until the end of Wednesday to respond.
At least nine high-level CDC directors were placed on leave and were also offered reassignments to the Indian Health Service. Some public health experts outside the agency saw it as a bid to get veteran agency leaders to resign.
At CDC, union officials said programs were eliminated because of the layoffs focused on smoking, lead poisoning, gun violence, asthma and air quality, and occupational safety and health. The entire office that handles Freedom of Information Act requests was shuttered. Infectious disease programs took a hit, too, including programs that fight outbreaks in other countries and labs focused on HIV and hepatitis in the U.S. and staff trying to eliminate tuberculosis.
At the FDA, dozens of staffers who regulate drugs, food, medical devices and tobacco products received notices, including the entire office responsible for drafting new regulations for electronic cigarettes and other tobacco products. The notices came as the FDA’s tobacco chief was removed from his position. Elsewhere at the agency, more than a dozen press officers and communications supervisors were notified that their jobs would be eliminated.
“The FDA as we’ve known it is finished, with most of the leaders with institutional knowledge and a deep understanding of product development and safety no longer employed," said former FDA Commissioner Robert Califf in an online post. Califf stepped down at the end of the Biden administration.
The layoff notices came just days after President Donald Trump moved to strip workers of their collective bargaining rights at HHS and other agencies throughout the government.
“Congress and citizens must join us in pushing back,” said Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees. “Our health, safety, and security depend on a strong, fully staffed public health system.”
Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington predicted the cuts will have ramifications when natural disasters strike or infectious diseases, like the ongoing measles outbreak, spread.
“They may as well be renaming it the Department of Disease because their plan is putting lives in serious jeopardy,” Murray said Friday.
The intent of cuts to the CDC seems to be to create “a much smaller, infectious disease agency,” but it is destroying a wide array of work and collaborations that have enabled local and national governments to be able to prevent deaths and respond to emergencies, said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.
Cuts were less drastic at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, where Trump's Republican administration wants to avoid the appearance of debilitating the health insurance programs that cover roughly half of Americans, many of them poor, disabled and elderly.
However, the impact will still be felt, with the department slashing much of the workforce at the Office of Minority Health.
Jeffrey Grant, a former CMS deputy director, said the office is not part of a diversity, equity and inclusion program, the kind Trump's Republican administration has sought to end.
“This is not a DEI initiative. This is meeting people where they are and meeting their specific health needs,” said Grant, who resigned last month and now helps place laid-off CMS employees into new jobs.
Beyond layoffs at federal health agencies, cuts are beginning at state and local health departments as a result of an HHS move last week to pull back more than $11 billion in COVID-19-related money. Some health departments have identified hundreds of jobs that stand to be eliminated, “some of them overnight, some of them are already gone,” said Lori Tremmel Freeman, chief executive of the National Association of County and City Health Officials.
A coalition of state attorneys general sued the Trump administration on Tuesday, arguing the cuts are illegal, would reverse progress on the opioid crisis and would throw mental health systems into chaos.
HHS has not provided additional details or comments about Tuesday’s mass firings, but on Thursday, it provided a breakdown of some of the cuts:
__3,500 jobs at the FDA, which inspects and sets safety standards for medications, medical devices and foods.
__2,400 jobs at the CDC, which monitors for infectious disease outbreaks and works with public health agencies nationwide.
__1,200 jobs at the NIH, the world’s leading medical research agency.
__300 jobs at the CMS, which oversees the Affordable Care Act marketplace, Medicare and Medicaid.
https://ca.style.yahoo.com/layoffs-begin-nations-health-agencies-111501955.html
EXC: Democrat Members of Congress partnered with a Harvard Institute funded by Chinese state-owned enterprises that trains Chinese Communist Party officials.
This partnership is being used to train American activists how to protest Trump with "regime change" tactics.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1907040841941541105.html
EXC: A USAID-funded Harvard institute partnered with Democrat members of Congress to train far-left activists.
These "Resistance Labs" researching the most effective tactics for full-blown “regime change."
They’re analyzing whether terrorism or violence are useful tactics.
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1907036094345998376.html
How The Lawfare Against Marine Le Pen Led to Her Prison Sentence and Politics Ban
A French court convicted Marine Le Pen, leader of the populist National Rally (RN) party, on March 31, 2025, of “embezzling” European Parliament funds—but make no mistake, the move was nothing short of politically orchestrated lawfare.
Prosecutors alleged that from 2004 to 2017, during her time as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP), Le Pen and 24 co-defendants funneled over €3 million (~$3.2 million) earmarked for assistants to support their Brussels-based parliamentary work into party operations in France. For this, she received a four-year prison term—two years suspended, two under house arrest—a $108,000 fine, and a five-year ban from public office, slamming the door on a projected 2027 presidential election triumph.
Her lawyer, Rodolphe Bosselut, rightly calls the ban a “declaration of civil death.” RN president Jordan Bardella notes she is not the only victim: “It is French democracy that is being executed.”
‘POLITICAL BY DEFINITION.’
To be clear, RN doesn’t deny Le Pen’s assistants performed RN work. They argue that, as the leader of a national movement, advancing the RN platform she was elected on was a perfectly legitimate part of their work—particularly when it comes to fighting European Union overreach into national affairs.
“Parliamentary assistants do not work for the Parliament. They are political assistants to elected officials, political by definition,” she argued at trial. “Their role is to assist us in our political work, which is inseparable from our mandate as elected representatives.
”Such work is commonplace, even standard, among MEPs’ assistants, and the fact that Le Pen is being singled out is a dead giveaway of bias from a judiciary in lockstep with France’s liberal elite and the EU she’s vowed to defy.
DOUBLE STANDARDS.
Even if you accept that Le Pen violated some technical, selectively enforced interpretation of the European Parliament’s rules around assistants, the 56-year-old’s sentence is clearly disproportionate.
Contrast the iron fist used against her with Christine Lagarde’s velvet-glove treatment. In 2016, Lagarde, then France’s finance minister—later head of the International Monetary Fund, and now the head of the European Central Bank—was convicted of negligence over a €404 million (~$428 million) payout to businessman Bernard Tapie.
The court ruled her guilty but handed down no punishment at all—no fine, no jail, no ban. She sailed into one of Europe’s top jobs without consequence. Lagarde’s negligence dwarfed Le Pen’s €3 million case—but Europe’s elite cradle their own, like Lagarde, while smashing outsiders like Le Pen, whose anti-EU, populist politics threaten their power.
THE ROMANIAN PRECEDENT.
Polls show RN well ahead of the Renaissance party founded by Emmanuel Macron, and Le Pen was favored to win the next presidential election in 2027. Now, however, she will have no opportunity to defeat the establishment—because the French people will not be able to vote for her.
It mirrors the tactics used against Călin Georgescu, the Romanian populist barred from his country’s May 2025 presidential race. Georgescu, a skeptic of the EU and NATO, took a surprise win in the first round of the race last year—only for the courts to step in and cancel the election, ostensibly because voters had been tricked into supporting him by Russia-funded TikToks.
His supporters slammed this as a stitch-up by a rattled establishment, and polls suggested he would win a planned rerun—so the Constitutional Court made his exclusion permanent in a March ruling.
The EU playbook is clear: when populists like Le Pen and Georgescu surge, the EU doesn’t seek to defeat them at the ballot box; it shuts them out. Americans should be thankful similar partisan efforts to stop Donald Trump from standing last November failed, but they should be wary of the way Europe is normalizing such behavior.
https://thenationalpulse.com/2025/03/31/explained-how-the-lawfare-against-marine-le-pen-led-to-her-prison-sentence-and-politics-ban/
Trump Administration To Review Billions in Federal Funding to Harvard
Three federal agencies announced a review of more than $8 billion in “multi-year grant commitments” to Harvard as part of an ongoing investigation into the University by the Federal Task Force to Combat Antisemitism on Monday.
The review — which was launched by the Department of Education, Department of Health and Human Services, and the United States General Services Administration — marks a drastic escalation in the Trump administration’s threats against Harvard over its response to pro-Palestine protests and alleged campus antisemitism.
The review also includes more than $255 million in contracts.
It comes weeks after the Trump administration pulled more than $400 million in federal funding to Columbia University, demanding in exchange that Columbia change disciplinary policies and place its Middle Eastern, African, and South Asian studies programs under administrative control.
Columbia ultimately caved to many of the demands — but the exchange resulted in massive national backlash and the abrupt ouster of the university’s interim president. Harvard, confronted with an unprecedented threat to its operations, may be forced to decide how much it is willing to concede in order to preserve its federal funding.
The public announcement of the review into Harvard’s funds did not outline specific demands but linked to a document outlining the conditions issued to Columbia.
“Harvard’s failure to protect students on campus from anti-Semitic discrimination — all while promoting divisive ideologies over free inquiry — has put its reputation in serious jeopardy,” Secretary of Education Linda McMahon wrote in the press release.
Just four days before the Trump administration pulled $400 million in federal funding, Columbia received a letter — similar to Harvard’s — saying that its federal grants and contracts were being reviewed. It is unclear whether funding cuts will follow in Harvard’s case.
Under the review, the Trump administration will examine individual contracts to determine whether stop-work orders should be issued. The University will also be expected to provide the White House with a list of federal contracts not included in the initial review.
A University spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“We could not carry out our mission the way we do now without substantial federal research support, nor could we provide the benefits to the nation that we do now without that support,” Garber said in a December interview with The Crimson.
Harvard has spent months bracing for an unstable political future and potentially massive losses to its funding — especially after the Trump administration repeatedly threatened research funding. Harvard President Alan M. Garber ’76 announced a University-wide hiring freeze in early March, and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences issued budget guidance in February urging FAS leadership to keep spending flat in fiscal year 2026.
But Monday’s review puts Harvard squarely in the crosshairs of more targeted threats.
At Columbia, then-interim President Katrina Armstrong capitulated to the Trump administration’s demands within two weeks. But after Armstrong seemed to downplay the extent of Columbia’s concessions at a faculty meeting — possibly to pacify an outraged professoriate — she abruptly departed from her seat, which was filled by one of the school’s trustees.
The crisis at Columbia illustrates that, elsewhere, top university brass have opted to trade policy concessions for a chance at leniency.
But similar moves at Harvard could ignite backlash among faculty who see them as compromising its academic independence. In an extraordinary show of unity, more than 600 Harvard faculty signed a letter urging the University’s governing boards to “refuse to comply with unlawful demands that threaten academic freedom and university self-governance.”
The federal antisemitism task force — which is investigating nine other schools, including Columbia — plans to visit Harvard’s campus but has not yet announced a date.
https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/4/1/trump-review-harvard-funds/
French Populist Leader Marine Le Pen Sentenced to Jail, Banned from Politics in Heinous Lawfare Case
PULSE POINTS:
❓What Happened: French nationalist leader Marine Le Pen has been found “guilty” of misusing European Union (EU) funds and has been sentenced to a five-year ban from politics and a four-year prison sentence, half of which is suspended.
👥 Who’s Involved: Marine Le Pen, presiding judge Bénédicte de Perthuis, co-defendants including Thierry Légier and Catherine Griset, and political figures like Éric Coquerel and Jordan Bardella.
📍 Where & When: The verdict was delivered at a Paris court, with proceedings concluding in March 2025 following a trial held in late 2024.💬 Key Quote: “Marine Le Pen has been at the heart of this illegal system since 2009,” said presiding Judge de Perthuis, labeling the actions as a threat to democracy.
⚠️ Impact: Le Pen’s ban prevents her from running in the 2027 presidential election. She has been the leading candidate in opinion polls for months.
IN FULL:
Marine Le Pen, the long-standing leader of France’s National Rally party who is leading opinion polls for the presidency, has been prohibited from participating in any elections for the next five years following a court ruling. Le Pen, aged 56, was convicted of misusing European Union funds. She received a near $100,000 fine along with her political ban.
More concerningly, she has been given a four-year prison sentence, of which two years are suspended, with the potential option of serving the remaining time under electronic monitoring.
The Paris court’s decision came after Le Pen and several associated party personnel were found guilty of diverting funds meant for EU parliamentary assistants to pay party staff from 2004 to 2016, a violation of arcane and oft-mocked EU regulations.Judge Bénédicte de Perthuis, who headed the proceedings, deemed the actions a “serious and lasting attack on the rules of democratic life” within both Europe and France. This ruling impacts Le Pen’s anticipated candidacy for the 2027 French presidential election. Despite the conviction, Le Pen and her co-defendants deny any wrongdoing, asserting their actions were within legal bounds.
Global figures like Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban have shown support for Le Pen, cautioning that democratic norms are being sidelined.
The conviction affects others as well, including Catherine Griset, who received a suspended sentence and electoral ban, and Louis Aliot, sentenced to a partially suspended 18-month prison term. As Le Pen’s political future hangs in balance, attention turns to younger political figures like Jordan Bardella, who Le Pen has encouraged towards leadership within the party. Bardella recently reneged on a speech in United States after left wing media reports alleging Trump advisor Stephen K. Bannon performed a ‘Nazi salute’ at the same CPAC conference at which Bardella was due to speak.
Le Pen remains a pivotal figure in French politics, her party having already made substantial inroads into the mainstream political landscape over recent years. The verdict represents the latest case of lawfare against populist parties, with French voters likely to dissent against the idea that rogue judges can rule candidates ineligible for office.
https://thenationalpulse.com/2025/03/31/french-populist-leader-marine-le-pen-sentenced-to-jail-banned-from-politics-in-heinous-lawfare-case/
Gov. Reeves Signs Historic Legislation Eliminating Mississippi’s Individual Income Tax
JACKSON, Miss. – Governor Tate Reeves today signed historic legislation that eliminates the individual income tax in Mississippi. House Bill 1, or the “Build Up Mississippi Act,” empowers the state workforce by not taxing their hard-earned wages and gives Mississippi another competitive advantage when competing for new economic development projects and private capital investment.
“I am proud to sign into law a complete elimination of the individual income tax in the state of Mississippi,” said Governor Tate Reeves. “Let me say that again: Mississippi will no longer tax the work, the earnings, or the ambition of its people. The legislation I’m signing today puts us in a rare class of elite, competitive states. There are only a handful of states in the country that do not tax income. Today, Mississippi joins their ranks – and in doing so, we plant our flag.”
House Bill 1 builds upon House Bill 531, which was the biggest tax cut in Mississippi history at that time. House Bill 531 was signed into law by Governor Reeves in 2022 and returned half a billion dollars to taxpayers. The new legislation, House Bill 1, cuts the individual income tax rate to 3% by calendar year 2030, with future annual decreases until it ultimately falls to 0%. Additionally, the legislation signed by Governor Reeves decreases the tax on grocery sales from 7% to 5%.
By signing this legislation, Governor Reeves delivers on his promise to eliminate Mississippi’s individual income tax once and for all.
“This is more than a policy victory,” said Governor Reeves. “This is a transformation. And it’s a transformation that I have believed in, fought for, and worked toward for many years. From my days as lieutenant governor to my first campaign for this office – and every legislative session since – I have made this my mission. Because I believe in a simple idea: that government should take less so that you can keep more. That our people should be rewarded for hard work, not punished. And that Mississippi has the potential to be a magnet for opportunity, for investment, for talent – and for families looking to build a better life.”
Governor Reeves spoke directly to Mississippians during the press conference. Governor Reeves said: “The work of your hands belongs to you. It is yours – to feed your family and invest in your home and your community. Because that’s what this is ultimately about. Not just numbers on a balance sheet, but lives. Generations from now, when our kids are raising families of their own in a stronger, more prosperous Mississippi, they will look back on this moment and say: this is when we took our shot. To the people of Mississippi: you are the real winners today.”
Governor Reeves thanked legislators, including Speaker Jason White and Lieutenant Governor Delbert Hosemann, for their efforts on this legislation and for being good partners in the process.
House Bill 1 is yet another major victory for the state of Mississippi during the Reeves administration. This includes record levels of new private sector investment, the largest economic development projects in Mississippi history, and nation-leading education gains.
Governor Reeves signed House Bill 1 during a signing ceremony at the Mississippi Governor’s Mansion.
https://governorreeves.ms.gov/gov-reeves-signs-historic-legislation-eliminating-mississippis-individual-income-tax/
Indiana University Cybersecurity Professor, XiaoFeng Wang, fired on day FBI searched his homes
-Indiana University fired computer science professor XiaoFeng Wang on the same day FBI agents executed search warrants at two homes owned by Wang and his wife, his union revealed.
-The university removed the online profiles of both Wang, who has researched cryptography, privacy and cybersecurity, and Nianli Ma, an IU library systems analyst.
-Wang’s work at the university’s Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering has been funded by multiple federal government agencies.
-A criminal defense lawyer who worked on the federal criminal investigation of then-President Bill Clinton was at the couple’s Carmel home when FBI agents searched it.
Indiana University fired computer science professor XiaoFeng Wang on the same day that FBI agents executed search warrants at two homes owned by Wang and his wife, his union revealed Monday as it asked the school to revoke his termination.
The Bloomington chapter of the American Association of University Professors in a letter to Indiana U. on Monday protested Wang’s firing, which it said occurred without the “highest level of scrutiny and process” required by university policy.
The letter came as both the FBI and the university declined to reveal what led to the search of Wang’s home and the termination of the tenured professor after two decades at the university.
Indiana U. spokesman Mark Bode, in an email to CNBC, said, “Indiana University was recently made aware of a federal investigation of an Indiana University faculty member.”
“At the direction of the FBI, Indiana University will not make any public comments regarding this investigation,” Bode said. In accordance with Indiana University practices, Indiana University will also not make any public comments regarding the status of this individual.”
The university has removed the online profiles of both Wang, who researched cryptography, privacy and cybersecurity at the university’s Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering, and his wife Nianli Ma, a systems analyst and programmer in the university’s library division.
Indiana U. Law Professor Alex Tanford, the union chapter’s president, told CNBC in an interview Monday that Wang contacted him earlier this month as the university conducted what had first appeared to be a “routine” investigation over a grant application and how he reported a publication of his curriculum vitae.
Wang, who had been barred from his office and from access to his computer during the university’s probe, emailed Tanford on Friday to say, “I’ve been terminated,” the law professor recalled.
The email arrived shortly after Tanford heard from his daughter, who lives out of state, asking him what he knew about news reports of the FBI searching a house that same day in Bloomington, where Indiana U. is located.
That house is owned by Wang and Ma.
In addition to the Bloomington house, FBI agents at the same time Friday were searching and seizing materials from a second home owned by the couple, in Carmel, Indiana, located about 70 miles northeast of the university.
Tanford said a termination letter to Wang on Friday did not say why he was being fired after more than two decades at the school.
Tanford accused the university of “hypocrisy” for not following its own policy in terminating Wang, which Tanford said was “totally unnecessary,” since the school could have continued its effective suspension of the computer science professor.
“It is our understanding that Professor Wang was not provided the due process specified” by university policy, the union chapter’s executive committee said in its letter to Indiana U. Provost Rahul Shrivastav.
“His appointment was terminated without the required notice and a hearing before the Faculty Board of Review.”
“We are aware of news reports indicating that Professor Wang is under investigation by law
enforcement,” the letter said.
“While the outcome of those investigations may ultimately bear on Professor Wang’s continued appointment at IU, the mere fact of an investigation or of unadjudicated allegations cannot justify failure to comply with university policies on the part of the administration.”
“It is fundamental that individuals are presumed innocent until proven guilty,” the letter said. “Silence fuels suspicion and distrust and makes shared governance harder.”
Matthew Gutwein, a lawyer who had been representing Wang in connection with the university’s investigation, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.
An FBI spokeswoman said, “I can confirm the FBI executed federal search warrants at homes in Carmel and Bloomington Friday.”
“We have no further comment at this time,” the spokeswoman said.
There is no record of any federal criminal case against either Wang or Ma.
Wang had been the associate dean for research at the Luddy School, according to an archived profile page.
That page notes that his work has been funded by multiple federal agencies and that he has been the principal investigator for research projects totaling nearly $23 million.
“Dr. Wang’s research focuses on system security and data privacy with a specialization on security and privacy issues in mobile and cloud computing, and privacy issues in dissemination and computation of human genomic data,” notes a Luddy School page that was still online as of Monday.
The couple did not immediately reply to a message from CNBC requesting comment.
CNBC has also requested comment from Jackie Bennett Jr., an Indianapolis criminal defense lawyer. Bennett was seen arriving at the Carmel, Indiana, home Friday with a woman believed to be Ma.
FBI agents, assisted by Department of Homeland Security agents, searched the Carmel residence for more than four hours and removed boxes containing unknown items.
Video obtained by WTHR-TV of the FBI search at the Carmel residence also shows an agent snatching a phone from the woman believed to be Ma, as she stood in front of the home.
Bennett, the attorney, is a former federal prosecutor who served in the office of independent counsel Kenneth Starr from 1995 to 1999, when Starr was conducting a criminal investigation of then-President Bill Clinton.
Bennett questioned Clinton during the president’s testimony before a grand jury regarding his sexual relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/31/fbi-searches-xiaofeng-wang-homes-indiana-university-cyrptography-computer.html
FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado
Indiana University quietly removes profile of tenured professor and refuses to say why.
A prominent computer scientist who has spent 20 years publishing academic papers on cryptography, privacy, and cybersecurity has gone incommunicado, had his professor profile, email account, and phone number removed by his employer, Indiana University, and had his homes raided by the FBI. No one knows why.
Xiaofeng Wang has a long list of prestigious titles. He was the associate dean for research at Indiana University's Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering, a fellow at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and a tenured professor at Indiana University at Bloomington. According to his employer, he has served as principal investigator on research projects totaling nearly $23 million over his 21 years there.
He has also co-authored scores of academic papers on a diverse range of research fields, including cryptography, systems security, and data privacy, including the protection of human genomic data. I have personally spoken to him on three occasions for articles here, here, and here.
“None of this is in any way normal”
In recent weeks, Wang's email account, phone number, and profile page at the Luddy School were quietly erased by his employer. Over the same time, Indiana University also removed a profile for his wife, Nianli Ma, who was listed as a Lead Systems Analyst and Programmer at the university's Library Technologies division.
As reported by the Bloomingtonian and later the Herald-Times in Bloomington, a small fleet of unmarked cars driven by government agents descended on the Bloomington home of Wang and Ma on Friday. They spent most of the day going in and out of the house and occasionally transferred boxes from their vehicles. TV station WTHR, meanwhile, reported that a second home owned by Wang and Ma and located in Carmel, Indiana, was also searched. The station said that both a resident and an attorney for the resident were on scene during at least part of the search.
Attempts to locate Wang and Ma have so far been unsuccessful. An Indiana University spokesman didn't answer emailed questions asking if the couple was still employed by the university and why their profile pages, email addresses, and phone numbers had been removed. The spokesman provided the contact information for a spokeswoman at the FBI's field office in Indianapolis. In an email, the spokeswoman wrote: "The FBI conducted court authorized law enforcement activity at homes in Bloomington and Carmel Friday. We have no further comment at this time."
Searches of federal court dockets turned up no documents related to Wang, Ma, or any searches of their residences. The FBI spokeswoman didn't answer questions seeking which US district court issued the warrant and when, and whether either Wang or Ma is being detained by authorities. Justice Department representatives didn't return an email seeking the same information. An email sent to a personal email address belonging to Wang went unanswered at the time this post went live. Their resident status (e.g. US citizens or green card holders) is currently unknown.
Fellow researchers took to social media over the weekend to register their concern over the series of events.
"None of this is in any way normal," Matthew Green, a professor specializing in cryptography at Johns Hopkins University, wrote on Mastodon. He continued: "Has anyone been in contact? I hear he’s been missing for two weeks and his students can’t reach him. How does this not get noticed for two weeks???"
In the same thread, Matt Blaze, a McDevitt professor of computer science and law at Georgetown University, said: "It's hard to imagine what reason there could be for the university to scrub its website as if he never worked there. And while there's a process for removing tenured faculty, it takes more than an afternoon to do it."
Local news outlets reported the agents spent several hours moving boxes in an out of the residences. WTHR provided the following details about the raid on the Carmel home:
Neighbors say the agents announced "FBI, come out!" over a megaphone.
A woman came out of the house holding a phone. A video from a neighbor shows an agent taking that phone from her. She was then questioned in the driveway before agents began searching the home, collecting evidence and taking photos.
A car was pulled out of the garage slightly to allow investigators to access the attic.
The woman left the house before 13News arrived. She returned just after noon accompanied by a lawyer. The group of ten or so investigators left a few minutes later.
The FBI would not say what they were looking for or who is under investigation. A bureau spokesperson issued a statement: “I can confirm we conducted court-authorized activity at the address in Carmel today. We have no further comment at this time.”
Investigators were at the house for about four hours before leaving with several boxes of evidence. 13News rang the doorbell when the agents were gone. A lawyer representing the family who answered the door told us they're not sure yet what the investigation is about.
https://arstechnica.com/security/2025/03/computer-scientist-goes-silent-after-fbi-raid-and-purging-from-university-website/