Trump: ‘I'm not even thinking about Elon'
President Trump insisted Friday morning that he's not ruminating over his explosive fallout with tech billionaire Elon Musk a day earlier.
'I'm not even thinking about Elon,' Trump told CNN's Dana Bash in a phone call. 'He's got a problem. The poor guy's got a problem.'
The president also signaled that he doesn't expect to make up with the tech mogul in the near future, despite ongoing attempts by their mutual allies to broker a truce and Musk's subtle acknowledgment that he may be inclined to put their issues aside.
'I won't be speaking to him for a while, I guess, but I wish him well,' Trump told Bash.
Trump and Musk took aim at each other as their previously close relationship came to an explosive end on Thursday. Cracks in their alliance had begun to show in recent days as Musk took aim the House GOP's 'One Big Beautiful Bill Act.'
The tax and spending measure — a key component of the president's domestic policy agenda for his second term — narrowly passed the House last month and is currently up for review in the Senate.
Musk, who left his role in Trump's administration under the White House's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) last week, has argued that the Trump-backed bill doesn't cut spending enough and will increase the federal debt.
Trump, meanwhile, suggested that Musk was upset that the proposal doesn't include subsidies for electric vehicles that would benefit Tesla, the automaker Musk owns.
A senior White House official told NewsNation's Tanya Noury on Friday that the president plans to sell or give away the Tesla that he purchased earlier this year after the company faced backlash over Musk's White House work.
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Politico
7 minutes ago
- Politico
Negotiate or fight? Trump has colleges right where he wants them.
President Donald Trump's campaign against two of the planet's best-known universities is laying bare just how unprepared academia was to confront a hostile White House. Schools never imagined facing an administration so willing to exercise government power so quickly — targeting the research funding, tax-exempt status, foreign student enrollment and financial aid eligibility schools need to function. That's left them right where the president wants them. Even as Ivy League schools, research institutions, and college trade associations try to resist Trump's attacks in court, campus leaders are starting to accept they face only difficult choices: negotiate with the government, mount a painful legal and political fight — or simply try to stay out of sight. Groundbreaking scientific research, financial aid for lower-income students and soft power as an economic engine once shielded schools' access to federal funds. Trump has now transformed those financial lifelines into leverage. And the diversity and independence of U.S. colleges and universities — something they've seen as a source of strength and competition — is straining efforts to form a singular response to the president. 'Perhaps it's a failure of imagination on the part of universities,' said Lee Bollinger, the former president of Columbia University. 'It feels now like there has been a naïveté on the part of universities. There's been no planning for this kind of thing.' Schools are accustomed to tension with their faculty, governing boards, legislatures and governors. But punishments for resisting the Trump administration plumbed untested levels of severity this week when the president issued an executive order to bar foreign students from entering the country to study at Harvard University as his administration threatened Columbia's academic accreditation. Even though Project 2025 — The Heritage Foundation's roadmap for a second Trump administration — previewed some of the tactics the administration would use, many school leaders may have underestimated the president's determination. 'It just seemed inconceivable that we would be in this position of having massive amounts of federal funding withheld, threats to have legislation that attacks your tax status, and now these new issues with international students,' Bollinger said. A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order Thursday night that blocked Trump's directive to restrict Harvard's access to international students. But the administration is brandishing its response to Harvard's resistance as a warning to other schools who might resist, as federal officials pressure schools to negotiate the terms of a truce over the administration's complaints about campus antisemitism, foreign government influence and its opposition to diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives. 'We've held back funding from Columbia, we've also done the same thing with Harvard,' Education Secretary Linda McMahon told House lawmakers this past week. 'We are asking, as Columbia has done, to come to the table for negotiations,' she said, just hours before telling the school's accreditor it was violating federal anti-discrimination laws. 'We've also asked Harvard. Their answer was a lawsuit.' A Harvard spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. 'What we've seen so far when it comes to Harvard is the playbook for holding these radical schools accountable is way deeper than anyone anticipated or expected,' a senior White House official told POLITICO. 'You're starting to get to the bone, so to speak, of holding these people accountable,' said the official, who was granted anonymity to freely discuss White House strategy. 'Harvard knows they cannot endure this for long, they just can't. They're going to have to come to the table, and we'll always be there to meet them. But this was a test case of what to do.' The university described Trump's latest foreign student order this week as 'yet another illegal retaliatory step.' A federal judge in May blocked a separate administration attempt to prevent Harvard from enrolling international students. Harvard is still locked in a legal fight over more than $2 billion in federal grants the White House blocked after the school refused to comply with demands to overhaul its admissions and disciplinary policies. Trump announced plans to cancel Harvard's tax-exempt status in early May, then later floated redistributing billions of dollars in university grants to trade schools. 'It is not our desire to bring these schools to their knees. The president reveres our higher educational facilities. He's a product of one,' the White House official said. 'But in order to hold these people accountable, we will be unrelenting in our enforcement of the law and hitting them where it hurts, which is their pocketbook.' Many institutions have chosen a more muted response following months of conflict, including major public institutions in states that have also grown reliant on the full-freight tuition paid by international students. 'Universities don't have as many degrees of freedom, at least in the public sector, as you might think they do,' said Teresa Sullivan, the former president of the University of Virginia. 'One reason they seem to be relatively slow to act is there's a certain disbelief — can this really be happening?' 'We seem to be in uncharted territory, at least in my experience,' Sullivan said. 'All of a sudden, the rules don't seem to apply. I think that's disconcerting. It shakes the ground beneath you, and you don't necessarily know what to do next.' Still, some higher education leaders are trying to confront the government. More than 650 campus officials have so far signed onto a joint statement that opposes 'the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education.' Sullivan and a group of other former presidents used an op-ed in The Washington Post to argue the Trump administration's offensive 'won't be confined to Harvard University.' Trade associations including the American Council on Education, Association of American Universities, and Association of Public and Land-grant Universities have joined schools in a lawsuit to block some of Trump's research funding cuts. The Presidents' Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a collective of school leaders, has also sued to challenge the Trump administration's attempts to target the legal status of thousands of foreign students. 'Your first obligation as president is you don't want to hurt the institution you represent,' Sullivan said of the relative silence coming from non-Ivy League institutions. 'These days it's hard to tell what hurts and what doesn't. I think that's the motive. The motive is not cowardice.' Schools still face a choice between negotiating with the government — and risk compromising on their principles — or inviting Trump's rage by putting up a fight. 'Every school has had an option to correct course and work with the administration, or stand firm in their violations of the law,' the administration official said. 'They have an option, they know very well what to do.' The real question, according to Bollinger, the former Columbia president, is how far the White House will go and how much resistance the schools are willing to put up. 'The power of government is so immense that if they want to destroy institutions, they can,' he said. 'What you do in that kind of environment is you stand on principle.'
New York Post
8 minutes ago
- New York Post
Ex-NY Young Republicans leader Gavin Wax gets nod for FCC spot
WASHINGTON — The former leader of New York's Young Republicans was endorsed Saturday by an outgoing member of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to fill his vacancy. FCC commissioner Nathan Simington told The Post in a phone interview Saturday that Gavin Wax, 31, 'would be a great' replacement and had been hearing 'buzz' about a potential nomination from President Trump. 'I don't want to get ahead of the president,' said Simington, who has served at the FCC since the Senate confirmed him as Trump's pick in December 2020, before adding: 'Trump has been very smart and creative with his picks in general. And he seems willing to look outside of, I guess, the establishment … or Beltway insiders.' 4 FCC commissioner Nathan Simington told The Post in a phone interview Saturday that Gavin Wax, 31, 'would be a great' replacement and had been hearing 'buzz' about a potential nomination from President Trump. AP Simington, who previously served as an associate at law firms like Mayer Brown as well as in a senior advisory role at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, is departing the FCC after his term expired last year and he stayed on in the intervening months as a holdover. Wax is currently serving under the Republican appointee as chief of staff and senior adviser at the FCC. If confirmed, he would be the youngest-ever FCC commissioner since 1945, when Democrat Charles Denny was confirmed at age 32. 'I came in as someone whose experience was primarily on the international trading side of wireless finance, and so I've been reading a lot of telecom reg[ulations],' he explained. 'Gavin and I have collaborated on a lot of writing, and I think the common thread of tying it together is a desire to take a fresh look at telecom.' 4 Simington is departing the FCC after his term expired last year and he stayed on in the intervening months as a holdover. AP 'Gavin has spent a lot of effort with me thinking through questions of 5G industrialization. … I would expect [him] to focus on what it means to get smart manufacturing up and running at high scale in the United States,' he added. The two co-authored an op-ed in the conservative Daily Caller last month calling for 'DOGE-style' reforms at the FCC to do away with 'outdated practices that burden consumers, broadcasters, and taxpayers alike.' Established as part of the Communications Act of 1934, the five-member FCC regulates TV, radio, internet, satellite and cable industries, approves licensing and auctions off the use of spectrum for services like 5G. 4 'I don't want to get ahead of the president,' said Simington. 'And he seems willing to look outside of, I guess, the establishment … or Beltway insiders.' AFP via Getty Images As for his work chairing the Young Republicans, Simington noted: 'The commission is an organization of 1,600 people. … I have to say when I got Gavin's resume, the line items about the sizes of the events that he had organized and put on … my response was, this guy can clearly do things that I would find very challenging.' Wax hosted the group's annual holiday gala in previous years. Trump was the keynote speaker for the event in 2023. The FCC currently has two Republican commissioners including Simington and two Democratic commissioners. 4 Wax hosted the group's annual holiday gala in previous years. Trump was the keynote speaker for the event in 2023. Kevin C. Downs Democratic Commissioner Geoffrey Starks announced that he was stepping down Friday, leaving another vacancy. Olivia Trusty was previously nominated as the third Republican to serve on the panel of commissioners and is in the process of being confirmed by the Senate. Chairman Brendan Carr, a Republican, has led a series of reforms at the agency since Trump returned to the White House, including targeting diversity practices at Verizon and hinting at broader changes to so-called 'Section 230' protections for big tech companies. The latter has been the subject of furious debate by Republicans due to the liability shield it provides the platforms, even as some Facebook admitted to taking advantage of the tool to censor Americans' views online during the COVID-19 pandemic. Neither the White House nor Wax immediately responded to requests for comment.
Chicago Tribune
13 minutes ago
- Chicago Tribune
What to know about the monumental $2.8 billion settlement that will change college sports forever
A federal judge has approved terms of a sprawling $2.8 billion antitrust settlement that will upend the way college sports have been run for more than a century. In short, schools can now directly pay players through licensing deals — a concept that goes against the foundation of amateurism that college sports was built upon. Some questions and answers about this monumental change for college athletics. A: Grant House is a former Arizona State swimmer who sued the defendants (the NCAA and the five biggest athletic conferences). His lawsuit and two others were combined and over several years the dispute wound up with the settlement that ends a decades-old prohibition on schools cutting checks directly to athletes. Now, each school will be able to make payments to athletes for use of their name, image and likeness (NIL). For reference, there are nearly 200,000 athletes and 350 schools in Division I alone and 500,000 athletes and 1,100 schools across the entire NCAA. A: In Year 1, each school can share up to about $20.5 million with their athletes, a number that represents 22% of their revenue from things such as media rights, ticket sales and sponsorships. Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne famously told Congress 'those are resources and revenues that don't exist.' Some of the money will come via ever-growing TV rights packages, especially for the College Football Playoff. But some schools are increasing costs to fans through 'talent fees,' concession price hikes and 'athletic fees' added to tuition costs. A: Scholarships and 'cost of attendance' always have been part of the deal for many Division I athletes, and there is certainly value to that, especially if athletes earn their degree. The NCAA says its member schools hand out nearly $4 billion in athletic scholarships every year. How college sports are preparing for 'seismic change,' including revenue sharing and new roster limitsBut athletes have long argued that it was hardly enough to compensate them for the millions in revenue they helped produce for the schools, which went to a lot of places, including multimillion-dollar coaches salaries. They took those arguments to court and won. A: Yes, since 2021. Facing losses in court and a growing number of state laws targeting its amateurism policies, the NCAA cleared the way for athletes to receive NIL money from third parties, including so-called donor-backed collectives that support various schools. Under House, the school can pay that money directly to athletes and the collectives are still in the game. A: Probably not. But under terms of the settlement, third parties are still allowed to cut deals with the players. Some call it a workaround, but most simply view this as the new reality in college sports as schools fight to land top talent and then keep them on campus. In a big-money era, University of Illinois shrugs off rules on athletes' NIL dealsTop quarterbacks are reportedly getting paid around $2 million a year, which would eat up about 10% of a typical school's NIL budget for all its athletes. A: The defendant conferences (ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC and Pac-12) are creating an enforcement arm that is essentially taking over for the NCAA, which used to police recruiting violations and the like. Among this new entity's biggest functions is to analyze third-party deals worth $600 or more to make sure they are paying players an appropriate 'market value' for the services being provided. The College Sports Commission promises to be quicker and more efficient than the NCAA. Schools are being asked to sign a contract saying they will abide by the rules of this new structure, even if it means going against laws passed in their individual states. A: A key component of the settlement is the $2.7 billion in back pay going to athletes who competed between 2016-24 and were either fully or partially shut out from those payments under previous NCAA rules. That money will come from the NCAA and its conferences (but really from the schools, who will receive lower-than-normal payouts from things such as March Madness). A: Because football and men's basketball are the primary revenue drivers at most schools, and that money helps fund all the other sports, it stands to reason that the football and basketball players will get most of the money. But that is one of the most difficult calculations for the schools to make. There could be Title IX equity concerns as well. A: The settlement calls for roster limits that will reduce the number of players on all teams while making all of those players — not just a portion — eligible for full scholarships. This figures to have an outsize impact on Olympic-sport athletes, whose scholarships cost as much as that of a football player but whose sports don't produce revenue. There are concerns that the pipeline of college talent for Team USA will take a hit. A: The new enforcement arm seems ripe for litigation. There are also the issues of collective bargaining and whether athletes should flat-out be considered employees, a notion the NCAA and schools are generally not interested in, despite Tennessee athletic director Danny White's suggestion that collective bargaining is a potential solution to a lot of headaches. NCAA President Charlie Baker has been pushing Congress for a limited antitrust exemption that would protect college sports from another series of lawsuits, but so far nothing has emerged from Capitol Hill.
