Author: News Room

Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency has deleted hundreds more claims from its mistake-plagued “wall of receipts,” erasing $4 billion in additional savings that the group said it had made for U.S. taxpayers.Late Sunday night, the group erased or altered more than 1,000 contracts it had claimed to cancel, representing more than 40 percent of all the contracts listed on its site last week. The deleted items included five of the seven largest savings that it had claimed credit for just last week. At the same time, the group added about 1,000 additional canceled contracts, worth smaller total savings.It was…

At the biggest toy industry trade show in the Western Hemisphere this weekend, toy makers, as usual, displayed seemingly endless rows of stuffed animals, action figures and puzzles, hoping to entice retailers to pick their products.But this year, the chatter at Toy Fair New York was dominated not by the next Barbie, but a larger game, one of global tactics, that could make most toys more expensive for U.S. consumers.Almost 80 percent of toys sold in the United States are made in China. Last week, just as toy vendors from across the United States and dozens of other countries started…

There is the theory that President Trump is still bitter about his Canadian hotel ventures that went bust.Some, on social media, have speculated that a 2019 photograph in which Justin Trudeau appeared poised to kiss Melania Trump, the first lady, at a Group of 7 gathering in France, left Mr. Trump with a grudge against the dashing Canadian prime minister.And then there is the transactional view, that Mr. Trump sees the acquisition of Canada as the 51st state as the ultimate real estate deal that would seal his presidential legacy.As Mr. Trump prepares to push ahead with a new round…

The grocery chain Kroger said on Monday that its chief executive, Rodney McMullen, resigned after a board investigation of his personal conduct.Mr. McMullen’s conduct was not related to the company’s financial performance or its operations, Kroger said in a news release, but it was “inconsistent” with the company’s business ethics policy. His actions did not involve any Kroger workers, the company said.The management change comes as Kroger, which has headquarters in Cincinnati, has been dealing with the fallout from its collapsed merger with the grocery chain Albertsons.Kroger said its board learned about “certain personal conduct” of Mr. McMullen’s on Feb.…

Eugene Daniels didn’t plan on being the face of the White House press corps in the dawn of a new administration hostile to the news media.But because of a clause in the bylaws of the White House Correspondents’ Association, an 800-strong group of journalists who report on the president, he was next in line after Kaitlan Collins, the CNN star who was elected 2024-25 president of the association, had to step aside because of a move to New York.Mr. Daniels, 36, a co-author of Politico’s Playbook newsletter, has now emerged as a key figure in an escalating fight between the…

The consequences of a crypto reserveCryptocurrencies are again riding high, after President Trump announced that he would create a national crypto reserve with five tokens, including three lesser-known and highly volatile ones.It’s the latest boost that Trump has given the crypto industry, which spent some $130 million backing him and other Republicans. But the news drew criticism from many, including conservatives and even ardent crypto backers, over many concerns: giveaways to an already wealthy community, delegitimizing the digital currency industry and more.“I will make sure the U.S. is the Crypto Capital of the World,” Trump declared on his Truth Social…

When President Trump threatened tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China in January, saying those countries needed to do more to stop the flow of drugs and migrants into the United States, Canadian and Mexican officials raced to Washington, bearing charts and videos detailing their efforts to toughen their borders.Canada created a “fentanyl czar” and committed fresh resources to combating organized crime, while Mexico dispatched troops to the border and delivered cartel operatives into U.S. custody. As a result, Mr. Trump paused tariffs on America’s North American neighbors for 30 days.China never made these kinds of overtures and, in Mr. Trump’s…

Tony Doris said he never shied away from controversy during his lengthy career at The Palm Beach Post, a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper in the backyard of President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort.Mr. Doris, 67, investigated local government, digging into city affairs in West Palm Beach, Fla., over two decades at the paper, most recently as editorial page editor. He didn’t expect his career there to end over a cartoon.Gannett, the largest newspaper company in the United States and the owner of The Palm Beach Post, fired Mr. Doris last month after he decided to publish a cartoon about the war in Gaza,…

Here’s a pop quiz for married couples.Do you know your spouse’s salary? What about the balance of your partner’s 401(k) — and credit card? Bonus points if you can cite how much your husband or wife thinks you need to live comfortably in retirement, or even what age he or she hopes that will happen.If you’re like most married people, you’re sure you’ll ace this test. Nearly nine in 10 couples say they communicate well with their partner about money, and 94 percent say they are open and transparent with their better half about finances, according to studies released last…

In 2010, a woman in Sakura, Japan, posted photos of her well-manicured Shiba Inu to her digital journal. The dog, Kabosu, shot her owner a wide-eyed glance, a comic image that quickly jumped from Tumblr to Twitter to Facebook and to the rest of the internet.A meme legend was born. Someone on Reddit called the dog “DOGE,” a nonsensical nickname that stuck. Another minted a cryptocurrency in DOGE’s name.Now, 15 years later, in the fast churn of internet culture, DOGE is considered very old. But try telling that to Elon Musk, who has co-opted “DOGE” for the name of his…