April 1 2025

US Stocks Down in Q1 as Tariff Fears Loom Before Tomorrow’s ‘Liberation Day’

Trump Admin Targets Harvard, Probes $9B in Grants Over Antisemitism Claims

Special Elections Today in FL, WI, Test Political Waters as Both Parties Watch Closely

YouTuber Kat Abughazaleh Launches Bid to Shake Up Democrats in Congress

French Court Bans Le Pen, Sparking Clash Over Courts vs. Democracy

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1. US Stocks Down in Q1 as Tariff Fears Loom Before Tomorrow’s ‘Liberation Day’

Wall Street stocks posted their worst quarter in almost three years on fears that Donald Trump’s tariffs will usher in a period of stagflation in the world’s biggest economy. The S&P 500 dropped 4.6 per cent in the first three months of 2025, the worst performance since the third quarter of 2022, according to FactSet data. The sharp pullback in the first quarter comes as Wall Street banks and investors fret that Trump’s levies on trading partners will slow economic growth while also increasing prices. Sentiment among consumers and businesses has also cooled sharply, several recent surveys have shown. Investors are bracing themselves for Trump’s “liberation day” event on Wednesday, when the US president is expected to announce fresh tariffs, on top of existing levies on imports of goods such as steel and aluminium.

Editors note: the level of the new 2025 tariffs is speculative, nobody knows the number except Trump.

Source: FT

My take on tariffs

2. Trump Admin Targets Harvard, Probes $9B in Grants Over Antisemitism Claims

The Trump administration said on Monday that it was reviewing roughly $9 billion in federal grants and contracts awarded to Harvard, claiming that the university had allowed antisemitism to run unchecked on its campus. In a statement on Monday, the administration said that it was examining about $256 million in contracts, as well as an additional $8.7 billion in what it described as “multiyear grant commitments.” The announcement of the investigation suggested that Harvard had not done enough to curb antisemitism on campus but was vague about what the university could do to satisfy the Trump administration.
Source: NYT

3. Special Elections Today in FL, WI, Test Political Waters as Both Parties Watch Closely

Today's special congressional elections in Florida and the Wisconsin Supreme Court race have drawn national attention, with some political analysts framing them as an early referendum on the Trump administration. Despite narrow Republican control of Congress, Democrats are hoping to gain momentum in these contests. In Wisconsin, a swing state crucial for presidential elections due to its electoral significance, the supposedly nonpartisan Supreme Court race has attracted high-profile attention, including campaign appearances by Elon Musk supporting the conservative candidate. Republicans are expected to maintain their hold on both Florida seats, Wisconsin is more unpredictable.

While media coverage has amplified the importance of these races, I caution against overinterpreting results from low-turnout special elections. The Democratic coalition, increasingly composed of highly educated, consistent voters, often holds a structural advantage in such contests compared to the numerically larger but less consistently voting working-class Republican base. Regardless of today's outcomes, longer-term economic factors—particularly the impact of tomorrow’s tariff policies—will play a more decisive role in shaping both the 2026 midterms and the 2028 presidential election.
Source: Citizen Journal

4. YouTuber Kat Abughazaleh Launches Bid to Shake Up Democrats in Congress

On Monday, Kat Abughazaleh announced her candidacy for Congress with a YouTube video. “What if we didn’t suck?” she asked. The “we” she was referring to was the Democratic Party. “Unfortunately, this party has become one where you have to look to the exceptions for real leadership as the majority work from an outdated playbook,” she said to the camera. Abughazaleh is a 26-year-old content creator who lives on the North Side of Chicago. She cut her teeth at the liberal watchdog group Media Matters, where she monitored right-wing media and has continued to make left-leaning videos and social media posts after she was laid off last year. She’s challenging an incumbent Democrat in the solidly blue state of Illinois, in the solidly blue 9th Congressional District, which covers part of Chicago’s North Side as well as a smattering of nearby suburbs including Democratic strongholds Evanston and Skokie. Rep. Jan Schakowsky has been the congresswoman there since 1999 (the year Abughazaleh was born) and has not lost an election since. But some voters are taking her seriously. Within three days after she uploaded her “Why I’m Running for Congress” video to YouTube, her campaign had raised more than $275,000 from over 7,000 individual donors.
Source: Washington Post

5. French Court Bans Le Pen, Sparking Clash Over Courts vs. Democracy

Leaders of the U.S. and Europe are increasingly at odds over a key aspect of democracy: How far should the courts go in constraining the power of elected politicians and should those decisions be allowed to undermine the will of voters? That conflict is sure to deepen after Monday’s decision by a French court found nationalist Marine Le Pen guilty of embezzlement and barred her from politics for five years, making it unlikely she can take part in 2027 presidential elections, when she was expected to be the front-runner, unless she can win a swift appeal. The decision will strengthen a growing narrative among members of the Trump administration, as well as their right-wing nationalist allies in Europe, that liberal elites around the world are undermining democracy by weaponizing the judiciary against political rivals they don’t want to take power—in much the same way President Trump has claimed he faced legal prosecution before winning his second term.
Source: WSJ

April 1, 1985: Nike releases its first Air Jordan shoes, named for basketball superstar Michael Jordan. It sells 450,000 pairs in the first month.

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Sources

1. https://www.ft.com/content/52a198c0-235b-4662-87cc-527c7cd79b4a; https://www.adastraperaspera.us/news/lets-talk-tariffs/ (FT, Ad Astra Per Aspera)
2. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/31/us/trump-administration-harvard-funding.html (NYT)
3. Citizen Journal
4. https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/power/2025/03/31/kat-abughazaleh-democrat-congress/ (Washington Post)
5. https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/le-pen-verdict-fuels-claims-that-europes-elites-are-colluding-against-populists-c08493e2?mod=hp_lead_pos4 (WSJ)