GNI POLITICS

Iranian human rights attorney and activist Nasrin Satoudeh holds a photo of her husband outside Tehran's Evin Prison, where he is an inmate. Reza Khandan was taken into custody in December on charges of making buttons reading "I Oppose the Mandatory Hijab" and otherwise supporting women's rights. His wife has spent six years behind bars on similar charges. "Today was the day I'm supposed to be able to meet Reza," she said, "but as usual they prevented me from seeing him because I wasn't wearing a hijab." Credit - Photo by Barbad Behravan این متن را به فارسی بخوانید Reza Khandanwas arrested in December 2024 for supporting women's rights in Iran, and creating thousands of homemade buttons that said, "I Oppose the Mandatory Hijab." He had previously been imprisoned for 111 days in 2018 for this so-called crime before being released on bail. Reza's wife, Nasrin Sotoudeh, spent over six years in Iranian prisons for her work as a human rights attorney and activist. Reza raised their daughter and son while maintaining his graphic design business, and defying government threats as he campaigned for Nasrin's freedom. Now, Nasrin is home on a medical furlough for a heart condition that was exacerbated by COVID-19 and mistreatment in prison, and Reza is facing at least three more years in Tehran's notorious Evin Prison. I got to know these good people when I directed and producedNasrin, a 2020 documentary about her life and work. She was in prison most of the time we were filming, and I saw Reza's character— and love—repeatedly tested by a regime that punishes families as a way of inflicting additional pain on its detainees. This interview started in April when I sent a series of questions to Reza. Slowly and with some complicated back and forth, he passed his answers to me. Why have you put yourself at risk (in and out of prison) by criticizing your government—and is it dangerous for you to do this interview?I have a duty and the privilege to defend my rights and the rights of others. Without that, there is a dark future for us and our children. In a country like Iran, with this government, every protest and criticism carries a risk, but that's a chance I'm willing to take.You are a man, with all the privileges that brings in virtually every country. Why do you so strongly support women's rights?No country can achieve democracy, and development with justice and human dignity, without guaranteeing equal rights for women and men. A society that ignores the rights of half of its population will never achieve real greatness. Describe your December 2024 arrest.That morning, I'd gone to the store so I could do some work at the house. On my way back, I noticed several people standing by the entrance talking to the building manager. As soon as I got out of the car, they came towards me, pointed at my license plate, and said they were investigating a crime that had been committed with my car. It quickly became clear that all of their words were lies, and their real intent was to arrest me for my judicial case. After a minute or so, Nasrin joined us. She asked if she could get our son Nima from upstairs so he and I could have a moment together before they took me away. They said yes, but when she left to get him, they forced me into their car and drove off. I never got a chance to say goodbye to my son. I slept in the detention center that night. It was extremely cold. They intentionally turned off the radiator, and there was no other heating device. The detainees were not given food or water. The cells had no beds and there were only a few dirty blankets to somehow be shared by about a dozen people. The Guardian Officer responded to my protests with dirt and ridicule. The filthy bathroom had no soap. They weren't even willing to even let me buy soap with my own money. The next morning, I was transferred to the prosecutor in Evin Prison's court. After hours of being interviewed and processed, I was transferred to a prison quarantine, where I stayed for nine days without any outside contact.Read more:Why Iran's Leading Women's Rights Defender Thinks the Protesters Could Topple the Regime What is your typical day like in prison? Part of my day is spent cleaning and doing personal chores like buying supplies that are available in the prison store. Food in Iranian prisons is rarely edible, so we have to purchase whatever ingredients we can and prepare our own meals. Ward 8, where I am held, has 33 gas burners for around 600 people. I am part of a group of about ten inmates who cook and eat together, and we are allowed to use a burner three times a week. When possible, I read in the library, and I make sure to exercise. I also walk with friends, which gives us the opportunity to exchange opinions about the news we get through contact with our families. The big problem for an inmate is usually the very slow passage of time, but for me it is just the opposite. I don't want my time here to pass faster because that means I am losing all the moments I should be sharing with my wife, my children, and others I love. Describe Evin Prison and the ward you are in.Evin Prison houses about 15,000 inmates divided into different wards, and there is extreme overcrowding. The reason Evin is infamous is because of its terribly cruel high security detention centers that are poorly supervised by the Prison Chief. Each of these security areas is controlled by of one of the government's security bodies, such as the Ministry of Information, the Revolutionary Guards, and the Judiciary. These detention centers do not comply with any law. Their interrogators employ all kinds of inhumane behavior with the inmates, who are systematically deprived of their rights. Prisoners face beatings, denial of medical care, months in solitary confinement with a total news-blackout, crushing interrogations, forced confessions that taped and broadcast on national television after heavy editing, plus psychological, physical, and sexual torture. Even seemingly small acts deliver needless cruelty. For instance, prisoners have to wear a blindfold and be escorted by an officer if they need to use the bathroom or go to the nurse's office.Read more:'It's Like We're Hanging in the Air.' Iranian Activist Nasrin Sotoudeh's Husband on Her Temporary Release From Prison After the interrogation phase and the issuance of a sentence, prisoners are transferred to a public ward. This is where we will remain until our sentence expires. I am in Ward 8, which has about 600 prisoners. Almost 80% of these men are held for public offences, and the rest are political. Political prisoners do not enjoy equality with ordinary prisoners. We are constantly monitored and followed, our phone access is strictly controlled, the limited calls we do get are constantly cut off for false reasons during conversations, and we rarely get parole. Bedbugs continue to plague all the prisoners. Drugs are rampant. The prison yard has become unusable due to drug use in front of guards and cameras. The slightest complaint about the prison administrators' performance is severely suppressed. This is why I have gone on several hunger strikes since my arrest.How and why have the authorities harassed and hurt your family? How does this make you feel?The Iranian government actively suppresses the voices of civil society, especially women, and it reacts with great brutality to the smallest protest or disobedience. My wife Nasrin was imprisoned for over six years for her work as a human rights attorney. Our daughter Mehraveh has been threatened and harassed in numerous ways (including a forced daylong interrogation). Our son Nima was savagely beaten by prison guards when he tried to visit me (this was no accident, but a planned assault). In addition, our bank accounts were frozen, and now I am held in one of the worst wards of Evin Prison because I support women' rights and I made buttons that said, "I oppose the mandatory hijab." Many others have faced similar cruelties, and much worse. Despite all the difficulties and hardship that Nasrin has endured on this path, she doesn't doubt her choices. Neither do I. We can't be apathetic towards injustice and oppression. I think this is why regardless of the challenges and struggles we've faced; we have kept the family close and as strong as ever. This is the treasure that has made all our activism possible. What has your wife Nasrin taught you and how does she inspire you?I've loved Nasrin since we first met, and a shared commitment to women's rights and opposition to the compulsory hijab has always been part of our relationship. Nasrin was unjustly and cruellyimprisonedfor her legal work representing Iranian human rights and women's rights activists from 2010 through 2013 (when our children were very young), and again from 2018 through 2021 (she was eventually released on a medical furlough due to a serious heart problem). In October 2023, she was beaten, arrested, anddetainedfor several weeks for attending the funeral ofArmita Geravand, a 17-year-old who was killed for supposedly not properly wearing her hijab. All this time, Nasrin has never stopped showing a deep concern for her family, and she has never given in to enormous pressure from the government. I am inspired by those qualities, and more. I am also inspired by my fellow inmates who have been arrested for their support of human rights, in Iran and around the world.Read more:Nasrin Sotoudeh Is on the 2021 TIME100 List You have spoken openly about some of your cellmates who are also imprisoned for being human right activists. If it will help and not put them at risk, please share what you can about them.We have no statistics of the number of political prisoners in the security detention centers inside Evin Prison, but I estimate that there are about 300, and about 70 of them are women. There are nearly 80 political prisoners in our ward alone, including men with dual citizenship, women's rights and democracy activists, and those held for a variety of ideological beliefs. Reza Valizadeh is currently the only dual-national political prisoner with American citizenship. Last year he visited Iran to see his aging parents. After a few months of harassment and interrogation, he was finallyarrested and sentencedto ten years in prison. Valizadeh was a radio reporter until a few years ago, so they tried to force him to confess to "collaborating with a foreign government." The also tried to get him to speak against his former colleagues at Radio Farda, which he strongly rejected. Valizadeh has consistently stood up against their inhumane demands. Mohammad Najafi,Mohammad Reza FaghiheeandTaher Naghaviare lawyers who are in prison for their human rights activities.Mohammad Najafiholds the record in having the most cases created against him. He has been in prison for nearly 7 years. Vahid Khadirzadeh is a young man who was convicted and incarcerated for protesting the forced veiling of women, and he is somewhat similar to me and my friend Farhad Meysami (Farhad was imprisoned for 5 years). Another man is in prison for the fourth time for a total of 8 and a half years. He says he spent 120 days in solitary confinement during one of his detentions. Because of this experience, he was so intellectually and psychologically disturbed that at the end of confinement when they gave him a piece of fruit, he could not remember the word "orange." What personal message can you say to your daughter Mehraveh and your son Nima?Nasrin and I at all times think about our son and daughter. When we are working for individual freedoms and human rights, andwhen we are away in prisonfor those activities, Mehraveh and Nima are in our hearts. We consider their circumstances, their dreams, their future, and the future of all the children in this country. They deserve a better life. All our strength and energy come from our children, who have suffered more than us. Nasrin and I are very proud of them, and we have learned from them greatly. Being separated from Mehraveh and Nima, and from Nasrin, is agony. I love them very much. You are in prison in part because you believe in a democratic ideal, yet democracy is being seriously challenged in many countries, including America. Do you still believe in democracy and where do you see the world headed in the next decade or two?The process of democratization starts and stops, but the world is moving forward. Progress is inevitable. Perhaps it is hard for people in other countries, like yours, to imagine having leaders who have so little concern for human rights that they will lock up individuals for trying to make their society better. This can happen if you are not careful. In Iran, I feel the arrest of people like me, activists in the women's movement, protesters of the compulsory hijab, and advocates of a just civil society, is a last desperate and senseless attempt to continue this incompetent and corrupt government. I do draw hope and strength from those here who support the process of democratization, and from people half-way across the world whose daily lives are dedicated to the fight against injustice. I am proud of our work and am sure that we have taken the right path. How can you keep hope alive in prison?The most important point of hope is that it strengthens our belief in change and in the impact our activities have outside of prison. When political prisoners hear of support from people like you, it has a direct benefit. Knowing we are not alone and not forgotten is very closely tied to keeping our sense of purpose. Of course, all prisoners must have a plan for themselves. Reading, exercise, exchange of information and ideas with fellow inmates, and helping each other, all helps us to serve our sentence with the least damage. What message do you have for the leaders of Iran? Leaders of authoritarian governments do not want to hear anything except praise. They always deem themselves to be an exception to the lessons of history. But they should know, history doesn't have any exceptions. I also want to say, "I demand freedom for all political prisoners," and "I object to the compulsory hijab!" What would you like to say to all the people who signed the petition calling for your freedom?When Nasrin told me that this petition was signed by so many people from dozens of countries around the world, it made me very proud and hopeful. I am deeply grateful to every one of these dear friends. Were it not for this level of concern, awareness, and public pressure for the release of me and other political prisoners, our condition would be much worse and more dangerous. This a great blessing. Farsitranslationby Parisa Saranj Contact usatletters@time.com.

WASHINGTON − TheSupreme Courton May 30 said theTrump administrationcanrevoke the temporary legal statusof hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans living in the United States. Two of the court's liberal justices – Ketanji Brown Jackson and Sonia Sotomayor – dissented. Jackson wrote that the court "plainly botched" its assessment of whether the government or the migrants would suffer the greater harm if their legal status ends while the administration's mass termination of that status is being litigated. Jackson said the majority undervalued "the devastating consequences of allowing the Government to precipitously upend the lives and livelihoods of nearly half a million noncitizens while their legal claims are pending." The administration wants to cut short a program that provided a two-year haven for migrants because of economic, security, political and health crises in their home countries. Lawyers for the migrants said half a million people lawfully in the country will become subject to deportation, in what it called the "largest mass illegalization event in modern American history." Labor unions and communities that have welcomed the migrants said they've filled gaps in key industries, including healthcare, construction and manufacturing. Nearly 20% of the workers at one automotive parts manufacturer are in the temporary program, according to labor unions. The Trump administration said it's determined the migrants' presence in the United States is "against the national interests" and the courts don't get to decide otherwise. The move is part of the PresidentDonald Trump'scrackdown on immigrationandpush to ramp up deportations, including of noncitizens previously granted a legal right to live and work in the United States. TheBiden administration hoped the programwould deter migrants from those countries from trying to enter the country illegally. But theTrumpadministration cancelled people's work permits and deportation protections, arguing the program failed as a deterrent and makes it harder to enforce immigration laws for those already in the country. Immigrant rights groups challenged the change on behalf of the immigrants and their sponsors. A federal judge in Massachusettssaidthe abrupt curtailing of the program was based on a legal error, as the administration wrongly concluded that letting the temporary status naturally expire would foreclose the Homeland Security Department's ability to legally expedite their deportations. District Judge Indira Talwani, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, also said early cancellation of protections requires a case-by-case review for each participant. A three-judge panel of the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of AppealsbackedTalwani's decision to temporarily block mass cancellation. All three judges were appointed by Democratic presidents. The Justice Department argued the lower courts are "undoing democratically approved policies that featured heavily in the November election." Lawyers for a group of cities and counties said the abrupt cancellation of the program "would case severe economic and societal harms." This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Supreme Court lets Trump revoke migrants' temporary status

By Francesco Canepa FRANKFURT (Reuters) -For all the drama surrounding U.S. President Donald Trump's trade tariffs, the world economy is holding up better than many had expected. The latest data from the United States, China and, to a lesser extent, Europe are showing resilience and the global economy as a whole is still expected to grow modestly this year. This is in part due to U.S. buyers and foreign sellers bringing forward business while many of the import duties unveiled by U.S. President Donald Trump remain suspended. While that effect may prove short-lived, Trump's decision to pause tariffs and some glimpses of progress in trade talks, particularly between the United States and the European Union, have fuelled cautious optimism. "We are seeing a bit of a sugar rush in industry, with manufacturers bringing forward production and trade," said Holger Schmieding, an economist at investment bank Berenberg. "The other thing is that we have evidence that Trump pedalled back on tariffs. The bet in markets and to some extent in the economy is that he barks but doesn't bite." Investment banks and institutions generally expect the United States to avoid a recession this year and the global economy to keep growing. The International Monetary Fund downgraded its global GDP growth forecast by just 0.5 percentage points last month to 2.8%. This is roughly in line with the trend over the past decade and a far cry from the downturns experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2008 financial crisis or even the turmoil that followed the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001. No one is venturing a prediction on where the trade negotiations will eventually settle, particularly with a U.S. president who sees himself as unstoppable. This week alone, separate U.S. courts first blocked and then reinstated Trump's tariffs - creating a degree of legal uncertainty that will do little to facilitate trade deals between the United States and those threatened with the levies. While the EU celebrated "new impetus" in its trade talks with the United States, negotiations with China were "a bit stalled" according to U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Companies are counting the cost of the ongoing impasse. A Reuters analysis of corporate disclosures shows Trump's trade war had cost companies more than $34 billion in lost sales and higher costs, a toll that is expected to rise as ongoing uncertainty over tariffs paralyses decision making at some of the world's largest companies. Car-makers from Japan's Toyota to Germany's Porsche and Mercedes-Benz are bracing for lower, or lower-than-previously expected profits if they have not given up making predictions altogether, like Volvo Cars and Dutch-based Stellantis. This is likely to result in a hit especially for Japan. The United States is Japan's biggest export destination, accounting for 21 trillion yen ($146.16 billion) worth of goods, with automobiles representing roughly 28% of the total. "While the worst shocks may be over, there's still a lot up in the air," Xingchen Yu, a strategist at UBS's Chief Investment Office, said. "We don't really know what a new normal for tariffs would look like, unfortunately." PAYBACK But so far the global economy has held up pretty well. China's output and exports are resilient as its companies re-route trade to the United States via third countries. Even in Europe, manufacturing activity was at a 33-month high in May, rebounding from a slump induced by more expensive fuel following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Confidence was also buttressed by the prospect of greater fiscal spending in Germany, a missing ingredient for European growth for the past couple of decades. The robustness of the world economy has surprised even professional forecasters. A measure produced by U.S. bank Citi that tracks the degree to which global economic data has surprised to the upside is now at its highest in more than a year.    Some of that strength circles back to the tariffs themselves and the attempts by U.S. households and businesses to front-load purchases to beat anticipated price increases later this year. U.S. imports were up around 30% in March from where they were in October. The risk to the upbeat outlook comes from the expected "payback" of those advance purchases, which are unlikely to be repeated and will mean slower activity - in the U.S. and elsewhere - later. Economists still fear a triple whammy in which the front-loaded boost to the goods sector is unwound while U.S. household purchasing power is squeezed by higher prices and companies put off investment and hiring. At the margin, however, this scenario is starting to appear a little less likely after Trump's pause on tariffs. "The balance has slightly shifted towards more optimism, albeit with uncertainty and volatility," ING's global head of macro Carsten Brzeski said. ($1 = 143.6800 yen) (Additional reporting by Dan Burns in Washington, Claire Fu in Singapore, Ellen Zhang in Beijing and Leika Kihara in Tokyo; Editing by Mark John and Jane Merriman)

President Donald Trumpaccused China of violating a tariff agreement with the United States in a social media post on May 30, after his Treasury Secretary said negotiations had "stalled." "Everybody was happy! That is the good news!!! The bad news is that China, perhaps not surprisingly to some, HAS TOTALLY VIOLATED ITS AGREEMENT WITH US. So much for being Mr. NICE GUY!"he said in the poston his social media platform Truth Social. Two weeks ago, the United States and China agreed to dial back triple-digittariffsfor 90 days while they negotiated an agreement. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News on Thursday that talks "are a bit stalled" but they continue. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer declined to respond to reporters' questions at the White House about the progress of trade negotiations with China or whether tariffs would return to 145%. The temporary truce was reached after Trumpslapped sky-high tariffs on importsfrom China into the U.S., and China retaliated in kind. In the post, Trump inaccurately claimed that he saved China from "grave economic danger" caused by his tariffs by agreeing to trade discussions. "We went, in effect, COLD TURKEY with China, and it was devastating for them. Many factories closed and there was, to put it mildly, "civil unrest," Trump claimedin the Truth Social post. Reporter Bart Jansen contributed This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Trump lashes out at China, says country 'totally violated' tariff deal

DAMASCUS (AP) — The lifting of economic sanctions onSyriawill allow the government to begin work on daunting tasks that include fighting corruption and bringing millions of refugees home, Hind Kabawat, the minister of social affairs and labor, told The Associated Press on Friday. Kabawat is the only woman and the only Christian in the 23-membercabinet formedin March to steer the country during a transitional period after the ouster of former PresidentBashar Assadin a rebel offensive in December. Her portfolio will be one of the most important as the country begins rebuilding after nearly 14 years of civil war. She saidmoves by the U.S. and the European Unionin the past week to at least temporarily lift most of the sanctions that had been imposed on Syria over decades will allow that work to get started. Before, she said, "we would talk, we would make plans, but nothing could happen on the ground because sanctions were holding everything up and restricting our work." With the lifting of sanctions they can now move to "implementation." One of the first programs the new government is planning to launch is "temporary schools" for the children of refugees and internally displaced people returning to their home areas. Kabawat said that it will take time for the easing of sanctions to show effects on the ground, particularly since unwinding some of the financial restrictions will involve complicated bureaucracy. "We are going step by step," she said. "We are not saying that anything is easy -- we have many challenges — but we can't be pessimistic. We need to be optimistic." The new government's vision is "that we don't want either food baskets or tents after five years," Kabawat said, referring to the country's dependence on humanitarian aid and many displacement camps. That may be an ambitious target, given that 90% of the country's population currently lives below the poverty line, according to theUnited Nations. Thecivil warthat began in 2011 also displaced half the country's pre-war population of 23 million people. The U.N.'s refugee agency, UNHCR, estimates that about half a million havereturned to Syriasince Assad was ousted. But the dire economic situation and battered infrastructure have also dissuaded many refugees from coming back. The widespread poverty also fed into a culture of public corruption that developed in the Assad era, including solicitation of bribes by public employees and shakedowns by security forces at checkpoints. Syria's new rulers have pledged to end the corruption, but they face an uphill battle. Public employees make salaries far below the cost of living, and the new government has so far been unable to make good on a promise to hike public sector wages by 400%. "How can I fight corruption if the monthly salary is $40 and that is not enough to buy food for 10 days?" Kabawat asked. Women and minorities The country's new rulers, led by PresidentAhmad al-Sharaa— the former head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, a Sunni Islamist insurgent group that spearheaded the offensive against Assad — have been under scrutiny by western countries over the treatment of Syrian women and religious minorities. In March, clashes between government security forces and pro-Assad armed groups spiraled into sectarian revenge attacks onmembers of the Alawite sectto which Assad belongs. Hundreds ofcivilians were killed. The government formed a committee to investigate the attacks, which has not yet reported its findings. Many also criticized the transitional government as giving only token representation to women and minorities. Apart from Kabawat, the cabinet includes only one member each from the Druze and Alawite sects and one Kurd. "Everywhere I travel… the first and last question is, 'What is the situation of the minorities?'" Kabawat said. "I can understand the worries of the West about the minorities, but they should also be worried about Syrian men and women as a whole." She said the international community's priority should be to help Syria to build its economy and avoid the country falling into "chaos." 'Rebuilding our institutions' Despite being the only woman in the cabinet, Kabawat said "now there is a greater opportunity for women" than under Assad and that "today there is no committee being formed that does not have women in it." "Syrian women have suffered a lot in these 14 years and worked in all areas," she said. "All Syrian men and women need to have a role in rebuilding our institutions." She called for those wary of al-Sharaa to give him a chance. While the West has warmed to the new president -- particularly after his recenthigh-profile meetingwith U.S.President Donald Trump— others have not forgotten that he fought against U.S. forces in Iraq after the invasion of 2003 or that his HTS group was formed as an offshoot of al-Qaida, although it later cut ties. "People used to call (Nelson) Mandela a terrorist, and then he became the first leader among those who freed South Africa, and after that suddenly he was no longer a terrorist," Kabawat said. She urged skeptics to "give us the same chance that you gave to South Africa."

By Brad Heath, Jason Lange, Andy Sullivan, Grant Smith WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Elon Musk once famously wielded a chainsaw on stage in a theatrical demonstration of his effort to drastically cut U.S. federal spending under President Donald Trump. As he leaves government, official data shows he achieved something closer to a trim with scissors. In the four months since Musk's Department of Government Efficiency began slashing federal spending and staffing, a handful of the agencies he has targeted trimmed their combined spending by about $19 billion compared with the same period last year, according to U.S. Treasury Department summaries reviewed by Reuters. That is far below Musk's initial goal of $2 trillion in savings and amounts to about a half of 1% of total spending by the federal government. Musk said on Wednesday he is leaving the administration but that its cost-cutting work will "only strengthen over time." It remains to be seen, however, how enthusiastically Trump's cabinet secretaries will continue to downsize their departments. DOGE says it pulled the plug on more than 26,000 federal grants and contracts that are worth about $73 billion, while more than 260,000 government workers have been bought out, taken early retirement or been fired. But the DOGE tallies have been riddled with errors, according to reviews by numerous budget experts and media outlets, including Reuters. That has made them difficult to verify, and some of the announced cuts are not saving the government any money because judges have reversed or stalled them. That leaves the Treasury Department's daily reports on how much the government is spending as the clearest window into the scope of the administration's cost-cutting. The view they offer so far is modest: The government has spent about $250 billion more during the first months of Trump's administration than it did during the same period of time last year, a 10% increase. And even some parts of the government Trump has cut the most deeply are, for now at least, spending more money than they did last year. One big factor driving costs is largely outside Trump's immediate control: interest payments on the United States' growing pile of debt, which amount to about $1 in every $7 the federal government spends. Debt interest payments are up about 22% from a year ago. Spending on Social Security, the safety-net program for the elderly and disabled, totaled about $500 billion since Trump's inauguration, up 10% from a year earlier. To be sure, the view offered by the Treasury Department's daily reports is incomplete. Many of the cuts DOGE has made to the federal workforce, grants and contracting will reduce what the government will spend in the future but do not show up in its checkbook today. For example, while thousands of workers have taken buyouts, the government will continue to pay their wages until October. So far, the Labor Department has estimated there were only about 26,000 fewer people on federal payrolls in April than were on the books in January, after adjusting the figures for typical seasonal swings. Tallying savings from future cuts, however, is seldom straightforward. "It could be that in the future we never replace these workers and we save billions of dollars, or it could be that they come back and it's even more expensive than before," said Martha Gimbel, executive director of the Budget Lab at Yale, a nonpartisan budget analysis organization at Yale University. The White House declined to offer an explanation for DOGE's figures. Spokesman Harrison Fields said in a statement that "DOGE is working at record speed to cut waste, fraud, and abuse, producing historic savings for the American people." Reuters estimated the administration's impact by tallying outlays at agencies that had been targeted for cuts and whose spending had dropped from the same time last year. Among the agencies hardest hit are the Department of Education, State Department, U.S. Agency for International Development, National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other independent agencies. Rachel Snyderman, an expert on fiscal policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, said the spending declines at agencies could be reversed if the Trump administration doesn't get congressional approval to cancel outlays from this year's federal budget, as required by law. AN $11 BILLION EDUCATION CUT The most obvious sign that the Trump administration is making a dent in federal spending is in the Education Department, which Trump has ordered shut down. The administration cut the department's staff by about half in March. DOGE's website lists 311 Education Department grants and contracts it says it has eliminated for a savings of about $1.6 billion, though it is not clear how it arrived at those figures. Some cuts have not stuck. A federal judge in March ordered the administration to restore some of the grants it had cut, and another judge this month ordered it to rehire 1,400 workers. Still, the Education Department under Trump has spent close to $11 billion less than it did over the same period last year, the Treasury reports show, far more than what DOGE says it has cut. One reason could be that layoffs have made it harder for the government to process payments for special education and low-income schools. School districts that have sued over the cuts alleged that states were already experiencing slowdowns in receiving money. Another factor for the reduced outlays: The department has stopped handing out the $4.4 billion that remains to be distributed from the hundreds of billions of dollars approved in previous years to help schools weather the COVID-19 crisis. The Education Department did not respond to a request for comment. OTHER AREAS DOGE HAS CUT Other agencies targeted in Trump's overhaul are also starting to show declines in their spending compared with the same time last year. Spending is down about $350 million at the CDC and about $1 billion at the National Institutes of Health. The Trump administration has moved to slash spending across those agencies, cancelling grants and ending leases for office space. The Department of Health and Human Services has reported terminating close to 2,000 grants that planned to disperse more than $20 billion. Many of the grants were to boost labs that fight new infectious diseases, or to fund state mental health programs. Some $14 billion of the grant money had already been spent prior to the termination, with roughly $7 billion effectively frozen, according to a Reuters analysis of the government's tallies. The administration has effectively dismantled USAID, which handled most U.S. foreign assistance, firing nearly all of the agency's employees and cancelling most of its humanitarian aid and health programs, though federal courts have forced the government to continue making some payments. USAID spending is down about 40%, to about $4.6 billion, from last year. Spending at the State Department – where DOGE says it has cut nearly $1 billion in grants and contracts – is also down about 20% from 2024. WHY WE CAN'T KNOW MORE Measuring the impact of the administration's actions is difficult because many cuts will not yield savings for months or years even as spending elsewhere increases. Spending on federal employee salaries, for example, is up by more than $3 billion under Trump. Some of the grants and contracts DOGE cut were due to be paid out over several years, and many remain the subject of lawsuits that will determine whether they can be cut at all. DOGE says it has saved taxpayers $175 billion, but the details it has posted on its website, where it gives the only public accounting of those changes, add up to less than half of that figure. It says the figure includes workforce cuts, interest savings and other measures it has not itemized. It is also hard to know exactly how much the government would have spent if the administration had not started cutting. (Reporting by Brad Heath, Jason Lange and Andy Sullivan in Washington and Grant Smith in New York, Editing by Ross Colvin and Matthew Lewis)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday said China had violated an agreement on tariffs with the United States. "China, perhaps not surprisingly to some, HAS TOTALLY VIOLATED ITS AGREEMENT WITH US. So much for being Mr. NICE GUY!," Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform. U.S. trade talks with China were "a bit stalled" and getting a deal over the finish line will likely need the direct involvement of President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News on Thursday. Two weeks after breakthrough negotiations that resulted in a temporary truce in the trade war between the world's two biggest economies, Bessent said progress since then has been slow, but said he expects more talks in the next few weeks. The U.S.-China agreement to dial back triple-digit tariffs for 90 days prompted a massive relief rally in global stocks. But it did nothing to address the underlying reasons for Trump's tariffs on Chinese goods, mainly longstanding U.S. complaints about China's state-dominated, export-driven economic model, leaving those issues for future talks. (Reporting by Susan Heavey, Katharine Jackson; Editing by Sharon Singleton)