TV News LIES

Senior White House adviser Kari Lake issued mass layoff notices Friday to 639 employees of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, the federal outlet which owns the Voice of America and through which Congress directs money for other government-funded international networks, such as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Radio Free Asia.

The vast majority of the job cuts, intended to be a permanent reduction in the size of the workforce, affects Voice of America, the government-owned international network that has beamed news reports to countries under autocratic regimes since World War II.

In a press release, Lake called her action "part of a long-overdue effort to dismantle a bloated, unaccountable bureaucracy." She said 85% of jobs, or 1,400 positions, had been eliminated in total, in keeping with an executive order in mid-March from President Trump.

More...

A federal judge on Friday blocked the Trump administration’s efforts to keep Harvard University from hosting international students.

An order from U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs preserves the ability of Harvard to host foreign students while the case is decided. It marks another victory for the Ivy League school as it challenges multiple government sanctions amid a battle with the White House.

Harvard sued the Department of Homeland Security in May after the agency withdrew the school’s certification to host foreign students and issue paperwork for their visas. The action would have forced Harvard’s roughly 7,000 foreign students to transfer or risk being in the U.S. illegally. New foreign students would have been barred from coming to Harvard.

The university called it illegal retaliation for rejecting the White House’s demands to overhaul Harvard policies around campus protests, admissions, hiring and other issues. Burroughs temporarily halted the action hours after Harvard sued.

More...

Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough has ruled that several key pieces of the massive bill to implement President Trump’s agenda run afoul of the Byrd Rule and must be taken out of the package to allow it to pass with a simple majority vote on a special procedural fast track.

The parliamentarian ruled against several provisions under the jurisdictions of the Senate committees on Banking, Environment and Public Works, and Armed Services.

These included a provision that would have placed a funding cap on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), which would have cut $6.4 billion from the agency by reducing its maximum funding to zero percent of the Federal Reserve’s operating expenses. The funding cut would have eliminated the agency.

The creation of the CFPB was one of the central reforms of the Dodd-Frank Act that Democrats passed in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.

More...

A federal judge on Thursday rejected Department of Transportation (DOT) Secretary Sean Duffy’s attempt to tie state funding to immigration enforcement operations.

“Congress did not authorize or grant authority to the Secretary of Transportation to impose immigration enforcement conditions on federal dollars specifically appropriated for transportation purposes,” U.S. District Judge John McConnell wrote in the preliminary injunction.

McConnell, a former President Obama appointee, said the 20 states suing the Trump administration are likely to succeed in blocking Duffy’s efforts to restrict federal funding.

In late April, the Transportation secretary said states would lose federal funds for roads, bridges and other infrastructure projects if they block President Trump’s immigration enforcement efforts; support diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives; or defy other directives from the administration.

More...

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is placing new limitations on lawmakers seeking to visit detention facilities, releasing guidelines in the wake of visits from Democrats that have turned confrontational.

Members of Congress have the legal right to make unannounced visits to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facilities.

But new guidance posted by ICE seeks to rein in that power, asking lawmakers to give 72 hours notice before any visits, while requiring their staff to give 24 hours notice.

Though lawmakers retain the ability to make unannounced visits to ICE detention facilities, the new policy blocks them from visiting field offices, where most agency action takes place.