US politics live: Musk ‘disappointed' by Trump move
Welcome to our live coverage of US politics.
In a rare split with Donald Trump, Elon Musk has publicly criticised the President's 'big, beautiful' spending bill.
'I was disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decreases it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing,' Mr Musk said.
Mr Trump has responded to the billionaire's comments, saying he is negotiating the bill.
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News.com.au
11 minutes ago
- News.com.au
A bad wrap: An angry Trump blasts the 'TACO Theory'
President Donald Trump made no pretense at hiding his irritation this week when he was asked by a reporter about "TACO" -- an acronym that has been gaining traction among Wall Street traders who believe that "Trump Always Chickens Out." The so-called "TACO Theory" was coined by Robert Armstrong, a Financial Times writer seeking to underline the US president's tendency to backtrack on policies when they start to roil the markets. Investors have come to realize that the US administration "does not have a very high tolerance for market and economic pressure and will be quick to back off when tariffs cause pain," the journalist concluded. "This is the TACO Theory: Trump Always Chickens Out." Armstrong was writing earlier this month, after stocks had just rebounded sharply on Trump's announcement of a pause in massive tariffs imposed on the rest of the world by the Republican leader. Worsening the whiplash, Trump announced last week that tariffs of 50 percent on imports from the European Union would come into force on June 1 -- but two days later declared a pause until July 9. - 'It's called negotiation' - At the heart of Trump's flip-flops is an acute sensitivity for the ups and downs of market trading that he honed as a brash New York property developer and business magnate in the 1980s. During his first term in office, a sharp reaction on Wall Street could sometimes be the only way to change the billionaire's mind. Beyond the columns of the Financial Times, the "TACO Theory" is having a viral moment, and has entered the lexicon of investors who see it as more than just a snarky in-joke, according to analysts. "TACO trading strategy gets attention again," blared the headline on a podcast released Monday by John Hardy, head of macroeconomic strategy at Danish investment bank Saxo. The phrase eventually found its way back to the 78-year-old president, who furiously denied on Wednesday that he was backing down in the face of stock market turmoil. "I chicken out? I've never heard that... don't ever say what you said, that's a nasty question," the mercurial tycoon thundered, rounding in the journalist who had asked for his take on the expression. Far from caving, Trump said he was merely engaging in the high-stakes cut and thrust of international dealmaking, he snarled -- adding, with a sardonic edge: "It's called negotiation." For Steve Sosnick of Interactive Brokers, the TACO Theory is a "nonpolitical way of the markets calling the administration's bluff." - Reaction - Sam Burns, an analyst at Mill Street Research, told AFP he has noticed a new equanimity in Wall Street's reaction to each new tariff announcement, with traders' responses initially "much larger and more direct." Where they once convulsed markets, Trump's tariff talk now tends to be viewed as "easily reversible or not reliable," said Burns, and investors are accordingly more willing to ignore the instinct to act rashly. This new calm was evident among traders at the New York Stock Exchange who held steady in the face of Trump's EU tariff threats, and again when they did not overreact to successive court rulings blocking and then temporarily reinstating most of the tariffs. But Hardy, the Saxo analyst, warns that the vagaries of Trump's day-to-day announcements should not distract from the protectionist bent of his broader political outlook. "Trump might 'chicken out' at times," Hardy wrote in a recent commentary on Saxo's website. "But the underlying policy moves are for real, and a deadly serious shift in US economic statecraft and industrial policy that is a response to massive instabilities that have been growing for years."
News.com.au
11 minutes ago
- News.com.au
New York's Met museum sheds new light on African art collection
From a delicate 13th-century clay figure to self-portraits by photographer Samuel Fosso, New York's Metropolitan Museum reopens its African art collection on Saturday, exploring the "complexity" of the past and looking to the present. After a four-year renovation with a $70 million price tag, the reopening of the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing comes amid heated debate over the representation of cultural diversity in Western museums and the return of works to their countries of origin. The reopening should be "an opportunity to recognize that the achievements of artists in this part of the world (sub-Saharan Africa) are equal to those of other major world traditions," Alisa LaGamma, the Met's curator for African art, told AFP. In a spacious gallery bathed in light, visitors are greeted by a monumental Dogon sculpture -- "a heroic figure, likely a priest," LaGamma explained. Next to it sits a clay sculpture of a curled body from the ancient city of Djenne-Djenno, in present-day Mali, which is believed to be one of the oldest pieces in the collection, dating back to the 13th century. - 'Complex history' - The exhibit does not present the works of sub-Saharan Africa as a single unit, but in chapters to better distinguish between the various cultures. "We don't want people to oversimplify their understanding of an incredibly complex history," LaGamma said. "There are over 170 different cultures represented among the 500 works of African art on display," she pointed out. "That gives you a sense of how many different stories there are to tell in this presentation." The museum wing, which also displays arts of Oceania and the "ancient Americas" -- prior to European colonization -- opened in 1982 after former Republican vice president and philanthropist Nelson Rockefeller donated his monumental collection. It is named for his son. "This is a collection that was formed essentially following independence in a lot of what were new nations across sub-Saharan Africa," LaGamma said. "It doesn't have necessarily the heavy weight of a collection that was formed under colonialism," she said, hinting at the pressure faced by many museums to respond to questions about the origins of works on display. - 'African Spirits' - A third of the works shown here were newly acquired. The museum was thus able to benefit from a donation of thousands of photographs from the renowned Arthur Walther collection. Among the vast trove of pieces donated is a 2008 series of self-portraits entitled "African Spirits" by Fosso, a Cameroonian-Nigerian photographer. Among Africa's leading photographers, Fosso poses as major figures in African independence and civil rights struggles, from Congolese independence leader and first prime minister Patrice Lumumba, to Nelson Mandela and Malcolm X. Through around a dozen films directed by Ethiopian-American artist Sosena Solomon, visitors can also explore iconic cultural sites across the continent, like Tsodilo rock paintings in Botswana, the rock-hewn churches of Lalibela and Tigray in Ethiopia, and the tombs of Buganda kings at Kasubi in Uganda. "In an art museum like this, it is important that rock paintings should be reflected," said Phillip Segadika, chief curator for archeology and monuments at Botswana's national museum, in residence at the Met to participate in the project. "It tells us that what we are seeing today, whether it's in European art, medieval art, whatever -- it has a history, it also has an antiquity."
Sky News AU
11 minutes ago
- Sky News AU
Trump ‘attacks' journalist following tariff ‘TACO' question
Sky News US analyst Michael Ware discusses United States President Donald Trump's recent lashing out at a journalist in relation to the 'TACO' acronym which is circulating within Wall Street. 'Trump always chickens out, when it comes to the negotiations with tariffs or anything else,' Mr Ware said. 'The president hadn't heard it yet, he was most upset and attacked a journalist for such a nasty question. 'A lack of certainty leads to paralysis in the markets.'
