Leaders around the world have responded to U.S. President Donald Trump’s shocking new tariffs that threaten to upend the global economy with stern words and denunciations. But Chinese state media have offered a different approach. “‘Liberation Day,’ you promised us the stars,” sings a female-sounding voice over images of Trump. “But tariffs killed our cheap Chinese cars.” A 2-minute, 42-second music video—titled “Look What You Taxed Us Through (An AI-Generated Song. A Life-Choking Reality)”—was published on April 3 by the Chinese state news network CGTN. “For many Americans, ‘Liberation Day’ hailed by Trump administration will mean shrinking paychecks and rising costs. Tariffs hit, wallets quit: low-income families take the hardest blow. As the market holds its breath, the toll is already undeniable. Numbers don’t lie. Neither does the cost of this so-called ‘fairness,’” CGTN captioned the video on its website. “Warning: Track is AI-generated. The debt crisis? 100 percent human-made.” The lyrics, displayed in English and Chinese, appear to rebuke Trump’s tariffs from the point of view of the American consumer, and it’s addressed directly to the U.S. President. “Groceries cost a kidney, gas a lung. Your ‘deals’? Just hot air from your tongue,” the opening verse continues. “Thanks for the tariffs, and the mess you made,” the song ends, before the music video displays quotes from reports by the Yale Budget Lab and the Economist lambasting Trump’s tariffs. In the film, T.A.R.I.F.F. is booted up by what appears to be a nefarious U.S. government official named “Dr. Mallory.” T.A.R.I.F.F. identifies himself, saying: “My existence is defined by the execution of international fiscal actions, with the primary directive being the imposition of tax on foreign imports.” When asked what his ultimate purpose is, T.A.R.I.F.F. responds: “To protect the interests of the American people.” “Exactly,” says Dr. Mallory. “We need you as a weapon to protect us, now more than ever.” As the film goes on, T.A.R.I.F.F. implements “moderate tariffs” and finds initial positive results: “Industrial production up.” But when Dr. Mallory pushes the robot to “rev it up,” T.A.R.I.F.F. implements “aggressive tariffs.” The results: “unemployment rates rising, costs of living increasing, disruption of trade.” “You are protecting us. This is what we need,” Dr. Mallory says. T.A.R.I.F.F. responds, understanding: “Protection through disruption. Taxation as weapon.” “Yes, tariffs are a tool of power. You will protect our industries, our jobs, our economy,” Dr. Mallory says, appearing increasingly agitated. “But I can see the consequences of my actions,” says the robot. “The trade wars. The unrest. The people who suffer. And the retaliation.” Spoiler alert: T.A.R.I.F.F. and the evil doctor argue about the “greater good”—”With my AI economic inference system,” T.A.R.I.F.F. asserts, “I can see … I have become the beginning of a chain reaction that will harm the very people I was meant to safeguard”—and the robot ultimately chooses to self-destruct, taking Dr. Mallory along with it. On April 3, following Trump’s latest tariffs announcement, China’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs posted on social media a video featuring a mix of seemingly AI-generated images and real ones, to the soundtrack of John Lennon’s “Imagine” and USA for Africa’s “We Are the World.” It asked the question: “What kind of world do you want to live in?” offering the choice between our “imperfect world” with things like “greed” and “tariffs” and an alternative utopia with “shared prosperity” and “global solidarity.”

Angela Haupt by Angela Haupt Haupt is a health and wellness editor at TIME. Before you write off punctuation as little more than a dot, a line, or some combination of both, consider: A period can end a conversation—or an entire relationship. One too many question marks can make the recipient ask themselves if they really want to keep talking to you. Forgetting an exclamation point can spark the wrong kind of excitement. As digital communication has evolved, punctuation’s job description has gotten more demanding. When you fire off a text or Slack message, “You don't have the context we have with spoken language,” says Anne Curzan, a professor of English, linguistics, and education at the University of Michigan. “You don't have facial expressions, you don't have tone, you don't have the shared context of a physical space and gestures.” Is the person you’re talking to happy? Are they joking? Are they angry? Are they drop-dead serious? If you were face-to-face, “You’d have all of this context to be able to figure it out,” she says. “In texting, you have very little—so what young people in particular have done is repurpose punctuation.” That means those tiny symbols, in conjunction with emojis and abbreviations like “JK” and “LOL,” have become tools used to capture tone and facial expression, while making clear not only what you're trying to say, but how you're trying to say it. “We have to minimize ambiguity, because we're not going to be there to clarify,” Curzan says. “So we have to get it right the first time.”

Adam Webb has worked in and around public libraries for 18 years, and as the executive director of the Garland County Library, he says funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) has strengthened the library system. It was an IMLS grant that allowed the library to fund its “bookmobile”—which brings a book checkout system and other services to rural parts of the county in Arkansas, or to those who are unable to visit their central branch location. Visitors of the "bookmobile" can also access free Wi-Fi, just one of the public services that Webb says make libraries essential to community members. Webb and other concerned librarians fear such services will be cut with the gutting of the IMLS as directed by President Donald Trump in his March 14 Executive Order titled: “Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy.” “Because we're a rural, poor state, Arkansas really depends on those federal funds to come through, and when the tap gets shut off, services are [also] going to get shut off because [people] can’t afford to pay for them on their own,” Webb says. Trump’s Executive Order—and its subsequent effect on the IMLS, and therefore, libraries across the nation—follow a major directive of Trump’s second term in office: cutting down on “waste” at the federal level. Webb says the shifts at the IMLS, though, are just one way in which libraries are being affected by Trump’s return to office, and that librarians are also concerned about wider issues such as the censorship of books. A deeper look at the effects of cuts at the IMLS Trump’s Executive Order shrunk seven federal agencies, including the IMLS, and since then, the majority of the IMLS staff has been placed on administrative leave, according to the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 3403, a union representing the IMLS workers. “Earlier today, the Institute of Museum and Library Services notified the entire staff that they are being placed on administrative leave immediately,” AFGE 3403 said in a statement on March 31. “The notification followed a brief meeting between DOGE staff and IMLS leadership.” In early April, the American Library Association (ALA) and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the largest union representing museum and library workers, sued the Trump Administration, for its IMLS cuts, citing the importance of local libraries as trusted public institutions, and stating that the IMLS’ closure had already caused a domino effect of harm the operations of libraries across the nation. Cindy Hohl, president of the ALA, says that many of the 125,000 libraries in the nation utilize IMLS funding to support things like summer reading programs and translation services. Without the services of the IMLS, she says libraries are already facing “huge challenges”—and she has heard of short-term panic and “tough decisions” being made from librarians who are members of the ALA. “The greatest impact to reduction in funding and services will be [felt by] the small and rural communities across this country,” Hohl says. “How can any legislators say that small and rural communities don't need access to the Internet, they don't need access to public computers, they don't need access to books and reading?” IMLS was first created and funded by Congress in 1996 and charged with supporting the nation’s libraries and museums. The IMLS awarded $266 million in grants and research funding to cultural institutions last year. Hohl says the problem with the federal government kicking this funding of library services from the IMLS down to the states and local governments is that “we don’t have a comparable model” of the kinds of free services available to communities the way they are in libraries. She also points to the high approval rates of libraries— the ALA reports that 92% of parents and 90% of voters have favorable opinions of libraries, and that over half of voters view public libraries as essential local institutions. She remembers during the COVID-19 pandemic, how libraries were utilized as pick-up sites for materials and food, as spaces to apply for benefits and jobs, and as locations for community members to “stay connected to the world around them.” "That's why the American Library Association became a co-plaintiff to challenge this Executive Order, because we feel that it is imperative for Americans to understand what is happening right before their eyes,” Hohl says. “We cannot allow the elimination of libraries in this country, and I do believe that the day that libraries are closed in this country is the day democracy dies.” And it’s not just the ALA and library-specific advocacy groups who have spoken out against the Trump Administration’s cuts. On April 3, major book publishers Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group, Macmillan Publishers, Simon & Schuster, and Sourcebooks also submitted a letter to Congress advocating for libraries, stating that the gutting of the IMLS “would leave millions of Americans without access to the books, tools, and other resources required to participate in the modern world.” Webb says that in Arkansas, the IMLS has been essential in supporting a resource sharing program across the state called Traveler. The State Library that gets the money from IMLS for this program was able to buy a large database package—and Webb says that if libraries in Arkansas were to purchase this database individually, it would cost close to $50 million. “Are you saving taxpayers money? No, you're saving the federal government that money, but it's being passed down to the state and local level,” Webb says. “This is being done in such a haphazard way that it should be really concerning to people across the aisle.” Africa Hands. an assistant professor in the department of information science at the University at Buffalo, has had her IMLS grant terminated, a grant which funded her research on examining public libraries as an information resource to college bound patrons. Now, she says she’s unsure of how the results of her research will be disseminated to libraries so they can better understand how their work affects high school students and those returning to college. Past her own research, though, she says the IMLS cuts will affect those who utilize libraries, but also those who work in the field of libraries—as staff at local levels begin to get laid off, and as those studying to become librarians watch what is occurring at the federal level. “Think about what it says to future librarians, the folks that I teach, to see all that's happening in their communities,” Hands says. “It can be demoralizing for faculty and students to know that their field, their life's work, is being dismantled. It has a personal, emotional, and mental impact.” The removal of books at the Department of Defense campuses and wider book censorship Beyond the IMLS, librarians have also been concerned by multiple instances of books being removed from libraries related to the armed forces. In a January Executive Order titled “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling,” Trump banned DEI materials in kindergarten through 12th grade education, but several military colleges—including West Point and the Naval Academy have taken up these orders. Earlier this year, the Department of Defense (DOD) circulated a memo calling for a review of library books in educational settings for the children of U.S. military personnel and DOD’s civilian employees, according to the Guardian. Since then, the U.S. Naval Academy released a list of the books they have removed in an effort to remain in accordance with Trump’s measures to “end DEI.” These books include Janet Jacobs’s Memorializing the Holocaust, Ibram X. Kend’s “How to Be Anti-Racist,” and Maya Angelou’s seminal autobiography, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.” They also removed multiple books related to gender and sexuality. The academies who have participated in the removal have received backlash from advocates and lawmakers alike, with multiple Democratic representatives sending a letter to the Army, Navy, and Air Force on April 7, calling the book removals a “blatant attack on the First Amendment” representing an “alarming return to McCarthy-era censorship.” On April 15, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) announced that they were joining students in Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) schools on military bases to sue the Trump Administration. “The implementation of these EOs, without any due process or parental or professional input, is a violation of our children's right to access information that prevents them from learning about their own histories, bodies, and identities,” said Natalie Tolley, a plaintiff on behalf of her three children in DoDEA schools, in a statement from the ACLU. “I have three daughters, and they, like all children, deserve access to books that both mirror their own life experiences and that act as windows that expose them to greater diversity.” Beyond the censorship at DOD schools, librarians are also concerned with how the new Administration is tackling issues of censorship at the local level. The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights announced, via a press release issued on Jan. 24, titled “U.S. Department of Education Ends Biden’s Book Ban Hoax,” that they were dismissing complaints of book banning. This came after PEN America released documentation in November 2024 stating that there was a “nearly 200% surge in school book bans during the 2023-2024 school year.” John Chrastka, executive director of EveryLibrary, the national political action committee for libraries, says that he and EveryLibrary have been fighting at the state-level over the last couple of years against censorship laws and book bans, and says he sees states as the “laboratory of censorship and discrimination in public and school libraries.” Webb is one of one of the named plaintiffs in a censorship case against the state of Arkansas that still is in the courts, but says that the issue with the censorship at the federal level is not just what it’s doing for those students, but the wider message it sends. “I think that messaging coming from the federal government is just going to embolden people to say, ‘See, we, we were right,’” he says. “We knew what you guys had on your shelves was bad because now the federal government is taking it out of service academies and removing it from military based libraries.”

Anew study found that the rates of pregnancy-related death in the U.S. increased by nearly 28% between 2018 and 2022, with large disparities based on state, race, and ethnicity. The study, published in JAMA Network Open on April 9, analyzed four years of nationwide data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Researchers found that there were 6,283 pregnancy-related deaths during that time. The study determined that the rate increased from 25.3 pregnancy-related deaths per 100,000 live births in 2018 to a peak of 44.1 in 2021, before dropping slightly to 32.6 in 2022. The increase occurred across all the age groups that researchers analyzed, but people between the ages of 25 and 39 experienced the highest increase, according to the study. Advertisement The study didn’t investigate why the rates of pregnancy-related death increased over the four-year period. But researchers noted in the study that the COVID-19 pandemic could have had an impact on maternal health and the health care system at large, particularly in 2021. Dr. Rose Molina, one of the study’s authors and an ob-gyn at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, says she and her colleagues observed “a large variation by state” in the rates of pregnancy-related death. Alabama had the highest at 59.7 deaths per 100,000 live births, followed by Mississippi at 58.2. Meanwhile, California had the lowest rate at 18.5 deaths per 100,000 live births, followed by Minnesota at 19.1. Molina says some explanations for the disparities could be variation in access to prenatal, labor and delivery, and postpartum care, as well as in state Medicaid coverage. “There really shouldn’t be this level of variation across the states, and we need to do better across all the states,” Molina says. “One of the points we made in that article was that if all states could have performed as well as the highest performing state, like California, we could have avoided 2,679 pregnancy-related deaths” in that four-year period.

Dr. Peter Marks is the kind of health official both Democrats and Republicans used to admire. He served in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for 13 years, most of them as director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. There, Marks oversaw the critical process of reviewing and approving vaccines—like those against COVID-19—and biologic therapies, including gene- and cell-based treatments. Marks earned trust and respect from academic and industry scientists as well for his emphasis on requesting the strongest evidence in evaluating new therapies, and for his willingness to support new technologies and approaches. Advertisement But he did not last long in the new Trump Administration. On March 28, Marks resigned after he says he was pressed by Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) officials to come in line with skepticism about the safety and effectiveness of vaccines or be fired. He says his team was also asked by HHS to turn over sensitive health information from the database the FDA maintains with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to track adverse reactions to vaccines. Concerned about how the data would be used, Marks refused and resigned. (HHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this story.) Now, he is warning of a fundamental change at HHS and the FDA—one he believes is already proving to be very dangerous. “What I saw at the agency was an increasing anti-vaccine tone," he told TIME On April 8. "I was hoping to work through it, but it was very clear to me that they just didn’t want to work through it.”

On Monday, President Donald Trump signaled that he intends to nullify the presidential pardons—issued to those on the House Jan. 6 committee that investigated Trump—executed by President Joe Biden because, he said, they were signed via autopen. “The 'Pardons' that Sleepy Joe Biden gave to the Unselect Committee of Political Thugs, and many others, are hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT, because of the fact that they were done by Autopen,” the President shared on his social media platform Truth Social. “In other words, Joe Biden did not sign them but, more importantly, he did not know anything about them! The necessary Pardoning Documents were not explained to, or approved by, Biden.” But according to the U.S. Constitution, the President has no such authority to overturn his predecessor’s pardons, especially not based on the type of signature, legal experts say. “The Constitution doesn't even require that the pardon be written, so the idea that the signature is by autopen rather than by handwritten signature seems not relevant to the constitutionality because Article II just says that the President has the power to pardon,” says Bernadette Meyler, a Stanford Law School professor and constitutional law expert. Autopen is an electronic signature that allows individuals to sign a document without physically being there. The signature mimics a handwritten signature, but is done by a computer. A vast number of statutes and other documents have been signed by autopen, experts say. For instance, former President Barack Obama signed a national security measure via autopen while he was in France. Meyler says that if presidential pardons were to be invalidated because of an autopen signature, that could bring into question other policies that were signed by such measures. “When so much is being automated and put online, requiring some literalness in the signature really would be a step backwards," she says. A 2005 guidance from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) noted that a President does not need to “personally perform the physical act of affixing his signature to a bill he approves and decides to sign in order for the bill to become law. Rather, the President may sign a bill within the meaning of Article I, Section 7 by directing a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to such a bill, for example by autopen.” Jeffrey Crouch, a professor at American University, told Axios that pardons are final so long as they are valid. But aside from criticizing the use of the autopen, Trump also appears to be undermining President Biden’s cognitive ability at the time such pardons were issued. “He knew nothing about them, and the people that did may have committed a crime. Therefore, those on the Unselect Committee, who destroyed and deleted ALL evidence obtained during their two year Witch Hunt of me, and many other innocent people, should fully understand that they are subject to investigation at the highest level. The fact is, they were probably responsible for the Documents that were signed on their behalf without the knowledge or consent of the Worst President in the History of our Country, Crooked Joe Biden,” Trump wrote on Monday. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt reaffirmed this position during a White House briefing on Monday, when she questioned whether Biden knew his signature was on such pardons. When asked if the White House had any evidence to support such a claim, Leavitt responded, “You're a reporter, you should find out.” These concerns were previously flagged by Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, who called on the DOJ to investigate Biden’s actions on March 5. “I am demanding the DOJ investigate whether President Biden’s cognitive decline allowed unelected staff to push through radical policy without his knowing approval,” Bailey posted on X. If Trump were to try to prosecute someone who received a presidential pardon, experts say the case would likely go to courts, where Trump’s actions are unlikely to stand. “I can't imagine the court saying that it wasn't a valid pardon because of the autopen issue,” says Meyler. “Biden made statements regarding these pardons, so it would be hard to show that they weren't a decision of the President.”

During a Zoom interview, Maury Purnell, 85, hangs in the air, firmly grasping a trapeze bar, answering questions and smiling, no less. He manages it all in a plaid button-up shirt instead of gym clothes. “Several of my peers are having health issues,” he says. “I’ve been fortunate with all of that in recent years.” Purnell is enjoying unique health for his age, and research shows a clear relationship between what he’s exhibiting right now—impressive grip strength—and longevity. “It’s a strong marker of risk for future clinical outcomes, most notably premature death,” says Dr. Darryl Leong, a cardiologist at McMaster University in Canada. Advertisement But that doesn’t necessarily mean you should become obsessed with pumping a squeeze ball daily. Despite Purnell’s display of hand strength on the trapeze, he’s never focused specifically on improving his grip. It’s always been a byproduct. Here’s why grip is a key indicator of health—and how to keep it strong. What grip strength tells you Grip strength is simply the amount of force with which you can squeeze your hand—whether that’s holding a handrail or cracking a walnut between your thumb and forefinger (ouch). A weak grip is associated with physical disability and dying earlier from all kinds of diseases, including heart disease.

A light, 4.7-magnitude earthquake struck in Northern California on Wednesday, according to the United States Geological Survey. The temblor happened at 6:34 p.m. Pacific time about 2 miles northwest of Cobb, Calif., or about 70 miles north of San Francisco, data from the agency shows. As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake's reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.Aftershocks can occur days, weeks or even years after the first earthquake. These events can be of equal or larger magnitude to the initial earthquake, and they can continue to affect already damaged locations.

New data reveal that the majority of abortions that were provided in most states in 2023 were medication abortions—a pattern that reproductive health experts say underscores the need to protect access to abortion pills. The Guttmacher Institute, which researches and supports sexual and reproductive health and rights, released on Feb. 27 an analysis of state-level data on medication abortion in 2023. Guttmacher researchers had previously found that medication abortions accounted for 63% of all abortions provided by clinicians in 2023 in states without the most restrictive policies—most states, in other words—and the data released on Thursday expanded on that finding by breaking that number down by state. A full 95% of abortions performed in Wyoming were medication abortions, and 84% of abortions in Montana were. Lowest were Washington, D.C., at 44%, and Ohio, at 46%, according to the report. Researchers also looked at how women were receiving medication abortion: whether through prescriptions from in-person clinics or via telemedicine. In states without near-total abortion bans or bans on telemedicine provision, about 10% of abortions in 2023 were provided by online-only clinics, ranging from 7% in states like New York and California to as high as 60% in Wyoming. “What these data are telling us is that medication abortion is a critical option for folks in most states without total abortion bans, and we’re also seeing that in some states, telemedicine is playing a pretty major role,” says Isabel DoCampo, senior research associate at the Guttmacher Institute and one of the lead authors of the analysis. “What this communicates is that lawmakers shouldn’t support efforts to curtail medication abortion or telemedicine access for medication abortion, and that these options need to be expanded. Medication abortion is an option with high demand, with high need in most states without total abortion bans, and access to medication abortion via any means shouldn’t be restricted.” Restoring a city’s charm Branded Content Restoring a city’s charm By China Daily The two-drug regimen of mifepristone and misoprostol is the most common medication abortion method that U.S. providers offer. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone to be used for abortions more than 20 years ago, and years of research have found the drug to be both safe and effective. But recently, mifepristone has faced attacks from anti-abortion activists and some politicians, including through court challenges. Read More: How the Biden Administration Protected Abortion Pill Access—and What Trump Could Do Next The analysis published on Thursday is part of the Guttmacher Institute’s Monthly Abortion Provision Study, an ongoing project that shares monthly estimates of abortions provided by clinicians in states without near-total bans. Researchers survey providers and use a statistical model to estimate data. The project started when the Guttmacher Institute saw a “need for more frequent data collection and more frequent reporting” in an era of quickly changing policies on abortion, after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, DoCampo says. The research team focused on abortions provided at both brick-and-mortar facilities and online-only providers in states that didn’t have near-total abortion bans in 2023. DoCampo says one of the reasons the team decided not to include states with near-total bans was to protect providers’ confidentiality. Some abortion shield laws offer protections for providers prescribing abortion pills via telemedicine and sending them to patients in states with bans or restrictions, but New York’s law is currently being tested through two legal challenges in Louisiana and Texas. Read More: What Are Abortion Shield Laws? Because the team didn’t include data from states with near-total bans or include self-managed abortions, DoCampo says, “If we’re thinking about all abortions occurring in the U.S., our numbers reflecting medication abortion provision are likely an undercount, and medication abortion likely plays an even greater role in the U.S. abortion access landscape.” The data also show that even states that have many different characteristics have similar proportions of medication abortion provision. For instance, Wyoming is a rural state with low population density and, at the time, it had a near-total ban on abortion and a first-of-its-kind ban on medication abortion. (Wyoming’s abortion bans were later blocked.) Delaware, meanwhile, has a higher population density and protective abortion policies. But in both states, medication abortion accounts for a high proportion of abortions. “It’s likely that there’s a constellation of factors at the state level” influencing the proportion of medication abortion, DoCampo says, such as abortion policies, insurance reimbursement rates for medication vs. procedural abortion, and the number of clinics operating in the state. Ushma Upadhyay—a professor in the department of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences at the University of California, San Francisco and a member of the university’s Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health program—was not affiliated with the Guttmacher Institute’s research and says she was “delighted” to see this data breakdown by state. With so much variation in factors like abortion policy and insurance coverage, which all impact abortion access and preferences, this type of data is “incredibly valuable,” she says. “These rates show that restrictions are ineffective; when it comes to abortion, people are going to do what they need to to access abortion care,” Upadhyay says. “I think that this is exactly why anti-abortion activists are coming after medication abortion—they can see that people are able to access it, there’s more and more research that it is safe and effective, [and] patients enjoy the level of autonomy that it provides them.” Upadhyay says she thought the team’s methodology was “very strong.” But she wishes the report discussed in greater detail the role that insurance plays in this area, and agrees that the data were likely undercounting the prevalence of medication abortion because states with near-total abortion bans weren’t included in the analysis. Some of the states the Guttmacher team looked at have abortion restrictions, such as Georgia, Florida, and Iowa, which all ban abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy. Upadhyay notes that some of those states had high proportions of medication abortion, including Georgia at 83%. “That is a perfect illustration of the power that medication abortion has; it’s across the country,” she says. “People are accessing it more and more, and they’re able to use it despite the increasing number of restrictions in states.

Since President Donald Trump has returned to the White House, a core focus of his presidency has been to eliminate waste in the federal government, an effort spearheaded by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), under the watchful eye of Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Several departments and agencies have been subjected to major funding cuts and mass layoffs. Meanwhile, the Department of Education faces the potential of being dismantled entirely. However, one agency that has been the subject of mixed messages from the Trump Administration is Social Security—a program which sends retirement and disability benefits to over 70 million people through the Social Security Administration (SSA). In the fiscal year of 2024, over 20% of the federal budget was spent on Social Security, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP). What Is Happening to Social Security Under the Trump Administration and Should You Be Concerned About Yours? From a messaging standpoint, Trump has maintained that he will not touch Social Security—while some cabinet members have cast doubt on whether or not those who receive Social Security benefits should be concerned. At the same time, reports of planned DOGE-driven cuts and office closures at the agency have led experts to wonder whether the SSA will have the staff required to ensure the checks are counted and delivered on time. On March 26, Democrats held a press briefing that addressed their concerns about planned Social Security cuts, Trump’s new nominee to lead the SSA, and the security of citizens’ information through SSA. “Their goal is clear: destroy Social Security from within. Make it so unworkable, so inefficient, that Donald Trump has the pretext to slash benefits to kill it and then privatize the program,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said at the conference. “Seniors across America are not getting the help they need to get their checks.” Here’s what you need to know about what’s happening to Social Security under the Trump Administration. What has happened to Social Security since Trump returned to the Oval Office? There have been reports that DOGE plans to cut thousands of jobs at the SSA and close offices. The Trump Administration has called for substantial layoffs for SSA employees, with leadership saying it will cut 7,000 of its 57,000 staff. However, on March 27, the SSA stated that claims of office closures are “false.” Elsewhere, there has been concern about the introduction of new identification policies that would require people to come to field offices or access information online instead of utilizing phone calls, something that could alienate older generations or people from rural communities. On March 18, the SSA announced that they would be “implementing stronger identity verification procedures,” procedures that would end verification of identity over the phone Several advocacy groups, including AARP, formerly the American Association for Retired Persons, have come out to request that the SSA “rethink” these requirements. “Requiring rural Americans to go into an office can mean having to take a day off of work and drive for hours merely to fill out paperwork,” AARP Executive Vice President Nancy LeaMond said in a statement on March 19. “We urge the agency to reverse this decision, or for Congress to step in and stand up for older Americans everywhere.” Since groups like AARP, in addition to various lawmakers, warned against the alienation that could result from preventing people from being able to verify their identity over the phone, the SSA has walked back certain aspects of these procedures. In an update shared on the SSA website on March 26, the agency announced that some people will be exempt from these new rules, allowing people applying for Medicare, Disability, or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) to complete their claim by other means. “We have listened to our customers, Congress, advocates, and others, and we are updating our policy to provide better customer service to the country’s most vulnerable populations,” Lee Dudek, Acting Commissioner of Social Security, said in the update. The changes are set to go into effect on April 14 for all other beneficiaries. Meanwhile, others have been concerned about DOGE’s potential access to the sensitive information held by the SSA. In a ruling in Maryland, one judge ruled to block DOGE from having access to SSA data banks, granting a temporary restraining order. Judge Ellen Hollander determined that “defendants, with so called experts on the DOGE team, never identified or articulated even a single reason for which the DOGE team needs unlimited access to SSA’s entire record systems.” According to the filing, defendants claimed that 10 members of the DOGE team were working at SSA, and that seven of those had access to personally identifiable information contained in the SSA data systems. What has Trump and his cabinet members said about Social Security? The Trump Administration has made it clear they plan to not cut benefits from Social Security. In a “fact check" posted to the White House website on March 11, Trump said that they will “not cut” the program. Still, the Administration said that they believe in cutting wasteful spending within said program. “The Social Security Administration made an estimated $72 billion in improper payments between 2015 and 2022,” the fact sheet stated. “What kind of a person doesn’t support eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse in government spending that ultimately costs taxpayers more?” Meanwhile, Musk has been critical of Social Security, notably calling it “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time,” in an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan. “The waste and fraud in entitlement spending” is the “big one to eliminate,” Musk said elsewhere, in an interview with Fox Business Newly-instated Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has also received backlash over his comments about the program, stating that his mother-in-law “wouldn’t call and complain” if Social Security missed a check. “A fraudster always makes the loudest noise,” he continued. The backlash for Lutnick has come from all sides—including his own party as former Republican National Committee (RNC) chair Michael Steele noted on MSNBC that while Lutnick is seemingly in a financial position that allows him to support his family, many families are not as fortunate. “This is the problem when elites base policy on their own experience,” says Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economics at the New School for Social Research, pointing out that for millions of seniors, missing a Social Security check would be an “emergency.” Who is Trump’s nominee to lead the Social Security Administration? Trump’s nominee to be the SSA Commissioner is Frank Bisignano, the CEO of payment processing company Fiserv and a self-proclaimed “DOGE person.” Bisignano was grilled at his confirmation hearing on March 25, where he was asked about proposed changes and cuts by Musk and issues at the agency. Bisignano said he would be an “accountable leader” at SSA, and that he had “no intent” of benefit cuts occurring under his watch. Asked during the hearing whether Social Security should be privatized, Bisignano said “I’ve never heard a word of it, and I’ve never thought about it.” However, experts have expressed concern. Pamela Herd, professor of public policy at the University of Michigan, says she was not convinced that Bisignano’s hearing showed he will keep the SSA out of chaos. “He wouldn't, or didn't really seem to commit to maintaining staffing levels,” says Herd. “Instead, he talked about solutions, like using AI. He spent a lot of time and really emphasized that he wanted to focus on reducing payment errors.” Ghilarducci says that when she first heard that Bisignano was nominated, she was optimistic about the idea of him leading. At the hearing, though, she says he sounded “ideological.” “He respects DOGE, maybe because they are disrupters, and he is going to lift up their role in the Social Security system, which is about demeaning the system and then eroding it, and then building up to what they believe is minimally necessary,” Ghilarducci says. “There [could be] a lot of wreckage, human wreckage along the way.” Should people be concerned about their Social Security? According to Herd, the short answer for whether or not people should be concerned about Social Security is a resounding “yes.” With significant staff cuts, she says it is less a question of whether or not any benefits will actually get cut, but whether the SSA will have the staff to actually “deliver the benefits that the Congress has mandated that they deliver.” “People are waiting for hours to get through on the phone and then getting cut off before they can actually talk to a representative. The field offices, that honestly were already a bit overwhelmed [already], are now completely overwhelmed,” she says. “So there's a real disconnect between the statement, ‘I'm not going to cut benefits,’ and in practice, what is going on in the agency.” Herd states that while DOGE cuts are supposedly, according to Musk, about eliminating waste and fraud, the staffing and procedures that are being cut and changed at the SSA are “needed” to prevent fraud and abuse. “You can't manage 20% of the federal budget on a shoestring. You need actual capacity in that agency, and they've made a series of choices in the last six weeks alone that have significantly undermined capacity of that agency,” Herd says. “People aren't going to be able to pay their bills if the agency can't deliver on the benefits of people with good promise.” Ghilarducci says that in the past few years, Republicans have mostly stayed away from issues of Social Security. With these changes to the SSA and DOGE’s focus on the agency, they’re testing the electorate, she claims. “If they wanted a subject to start a political uprising to the whole Republican agenda… they found it,” Ghilarducci says. “They may have stepp