Author: News Room
Barely two days after Russell Vought, the new acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, ordered the agency to close its office and halt all its work, employees spent Monday in a state of deep confusion about what they should — or should not — be doing.Mr. Vought, the recently confirmed director of the Office of Management and Budget whom President Trump installed late Friday night as the consumer bureau’s temporary leader, sent an all-staff email on Monday reiterating the instructions he issued over the weekend: Stop everything.“Stand down from performing any work task,” Mr. Vought wrote. “Employees should…
President Trump on Sunday said that he would impose a 25 percent tariff on all foreign steel and aluminum imports into the United States as of Monday and would soon announce reciprocal tariffs on America’s trading partners.Speaking from Air Force One en route to the Super Bowl, the president said his metal tariffs would apply to “everybody,” including Canada and Mexico, America’s allies and its largest trading partners.“Any steel coming into the United States is going to have a 25 percent tariff,” Mr. Trump said. “Aluminum, too.”Mr. Trump’s decision to tax foreign metals and impose reciprocal tariffs comes in the…
The Weekend has scored his fifth No. 1 album with “Hurry Up Tomorrow,” posting the biggest overall numbers on the Billboard chart since Taylor Swift nearly a year ago.The release of “Hurry Up Tomorrow,” which the poppy-yet-creepy Canadian star announced at a livestreamed concert in São Paulo in September, was delayed by a week to Jan. 31 because of the Los Angeles wildfires. But then it got a prominent boost when the Weeknd performed a two-song medley on the Grammy Awards broadcast last week, revealing that he had quashed his four-year boycott over the show’s voting process.“Hurry Up Tomorrow,” the…
Two weeks ago, Netflix’s chief content officer, Bela Bajaria, strutted across the stage of the Egyptian Theater in Los Angeles and crowed about the company’s 13 Oscar nominations for its Spanish-language musical, “Emilia Pérez.”“We just received more Oscar nominations than any other studio,” she boasted.Finally the most coveted prize, the Academy Award for best picture, which had eluded the streaming giant, seemed within its grasp.How fleeting that moment would prove to be.Just three days later, Netflix was releasing an apology on behalf of the film’s lead actress, Karla Sofía Gascón — the first openly trans actor to be nominated for…
President Trump is poised to move forward with sweeping tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum on Monday, re-upping a policy from his first term that pleased domestic metal makers, but hurt other American industries and ignited trade wars with allies on multiple fronts.The 25 percent tariffs that the president said he would impose on foreign steel and aluminum will be welcomed by domestic steelmakers, who argue they are struggling to compete against cheap foreign metals. As they did during Mr. Trump’s first term, U.S. metal makers have been lobbying the administration for protection, and Trump officials agree that a strong…
President Trump’s promise to impose 25 percent tariffs on Monday on all U.S. imports of steel and aluminum would primarily target American allies, but at their heart they strike at his longtime nemesis: China.The top five suppliers of steel to the American market in January were Canada, followed by Brazil, Mexico, South Korea and Germany. Canada has also led in aluminum exports to the United States, while the United Arab Emirates, Russia and China are far behind.China does not export a lot of steel or aluminum directly to the United States. A succession of presidents and Commerce Department rulings have…
An artificial intelligence race is heating up between the United States and China — but don’t count Europe out.That is the case President Emmanuel Macron of France made this week as his country hosts an A.I. summit in Paris, where government leaders, top tech executives and academic experts gathered on Monday to discuss the fears and hopes surrounding A.I technology.“There’s a race to scale,” Mr. Macron told France 2 television on Sunday night under the soaring steel and glass roof of the Grand Palais, the exhibition hall where France and India have teamed up to hold the summit.“Are we completely…
A unionization wave sweeping across Off Broadway is poised to reshape the economics of theater-making in New York — for workers as well as producers.Striking stage crews have idled the nonprofit Atlantic Theater Company — the birthplace of the musicals “Spring Awakening,” “The Band’s Visit” and “Kimberly Akimbo,” which all transferred to Broadway and won Tonys. The strike, which began last month, comes amid a drive to unionize stage hands and crews at Off Broadway theaters.Nonprofit companies and producers fear that the unionization push could drive up costs at a moment when many are running deficits and staging fewer, and…
The Fox Corporation said on Monday that it had acquired Red Seat Ventures, a growing digital media company that has become a go-to partner for old-media stars like Megyn Kelly, Tucker Carlson and Piers Morgan as they create their own independent online programming.Red Seat and its founding partners, the brothers Chris and Kevin Balfe, will continue to operate independently within Fox’s Tubi Media Group, an arm of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire focused on digital and streaming ventures. A purchase price was not disclosed.The acquisition moves the Fox Corporation into the heart of the online “creator economy,” where media personalities who…
Hope you enjoyed the Super Bowl on Sunday night, and congrats to the Philadelphia Eagles. The ads were better than the game. We’ve got a rundown below.I got into a substantive debate on Sunday with Joe Lonsdale, the venture capitalist and co-founder of Palantir, and other investors, about how carried interest is taxed. President Trump has vowed to eliminate the tax exemption, which I’ve been writing about since 2007. You can read excerpts from the debate below.The new phase of the tariff fight Get ready for the latest round of President Trump’s trade wars.On Air Force One on Sunday, en…