Category: National News Feed

WASHINGTON (AP) — For decades, proponents of psychedelic drugs have come to Washington with a provocative message: Illegal, mind-altering substances like LSD and ecstasy should be approved for Americans grappling with depression, trauma and other hard-to-treat conditions.

A presidential administration finally seems to agree.

“This line of therapeutics has tremendous advantage if given in a clinical setting and we are working very hard to make sure that happens within 12 months,” Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recently told members of Congress.

His suggested timeline for green-lighting psychedelic therapy surprised even the most bullish supporters of the drugs. And it comes as psychedelics are making inroads in deep red states like Texas, where former Trump cabinet secretary and ex-governor Rick Perry has thrown his full support behind the effort.

The administration’s embrace of psychedelics has sparked both excitement as well as concern from those in the field, who worry the drugs might be discredited if they appear to be rushed onto the market or are too closely linked with Kennedy, who is known for controversial views on vaccines, antidepressants and fluoride.

“I’m quite optimistic,” says Rick Doblin, whose organization has pursued the medical use of MDMA (or ecstasy) since the 1980s. “But I’m also worried that the message the public might get is ‘Well, RFK likes psychedelics and now it’s approved.’”

FDA may reconsider MDMA

Under President Joe Biden, the FDA rejected MDMA as a treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, citing flawed data and questionable research. Regulators called for a new study, likely taking several years. It was a major setback for Doblin and other advocates hoping to see the first U.S. approval of a psychedelic for medical use.

But the agency appears ready to reconsider. FDA chief Marty Makary, who reports to Kennedy, has called the evaluation of MDMA and other psychedelics “a top priority,” announcing a slate of initiatives that could be used to accelerate their approval.

One new program promises to expedite drugs that serve “the health interests of Americans,” by slashing their review time from six months or more to as little as one month. Makary has also suggested greater flexibility on requirements for certain drugs, potentially waiving rigorous controlled studies that compare patients to a placebo group.

That approach, considered essential for high-quality research, has long been a stumbling point for psychedelic studies, in which patients can almost always correctly guess whether they’ve received the drug or a dummy pill.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and FDA also recently hired several new staffers with ties to the psychedelic movement.

“These are all very promising signs that the administration is aware of the potential of psychedelics and is trying to make overtures that they’re ready to approve them,” said Greg Ferenstein, a fellow at the libertarian Reason Foundation, who also consults for psychedelic companies. “We didn’t hear anything about that in the Biden administration”

A spokesperson for HHS did not respond to a request for comment.

As a presidential candidate, Kennedy discussed how his son and several close friends benefited from using psychedelics to deal with grief and other issues.

A number of veterans lobbying for psychedelic access have already met with Trump’s Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Doug Collins.

“What we’re seeing so far is positive,” Collins told House lawmakers in May.

But some experts worry the hope and hype surrounding psychedelics has gotten ahead of the science.

Philip Corlett, a psychiatric researcher at Yale University, says bypassing rigorous clinical trials could set back the field and jeopardize patients.

“If RFK and the new administration are serious about this work, there are things they could do to shepherd it into reality by meeting the benchmarks of medical science,” Corlett said. “I just don’t think that’s going to happen.”

Texas goes all-in on ibogaine research

As officials in Washington weigh the future of psychedelics, some states are moving ahead with their own projects in hopes of nudging the federal government. Oregon and Colorado have legalized psychedelic therapy.

And last month, Texas approved $50 million to study ibogaine, a potent psychedelic made from a shrub that’s native to West Africa, as a treatment for opioid addiction, PTSD and other conditions. The research grant — the largest of its kind by any government — passed with support from the state’s former GOP governor, Perry, and combat veterans, some who have traveled to clinics in Mexico that offer ibogaine.

Ibogaine is on the U.S. government’s ultra-restrictive list of illegal, Schedule 1 drugs, which also includes heroin. So advocates in Texas are hoping to build a national movement to ease restrictions on researching its use.

“Governmental systems move slowly and inefficiently,” said Bryan Hubbard of Americans for Ibogaine, a group formed with Perry. “Sometimes you find yourself constrained in terms of the progress you can make from within.”

Ibogaine is unique among psychedelics in both its purported benefits and risks. Small studies and anecdotal reports suggest the drug may be able to dramatically ease addiction and trauma. It was sold for medical use in France for several decades starting in the 1930s, but the drug can also cause dangerous irregular heart rhythms, which can be fatal if left untreated.

Some veterans who have taken the drug say the risks can be managed and ibogaine’s healing properties go far beyond antidepressants, mood stabilizers, counseling and other standard treatments.

Marcus Capone struggled with anger, insomnia and mood swings after 13 years as a Navy Seal. In 2017, at the urging of his wife Amber, he agreed to try ibogaine as a last resort. He described his first ibogaine session as “a complete purge of everything.”

“But afterward I felt the weight just completely off my shoulders,” he said. “No more anxiety, no more depression, life made sense all of a sudden.”

A nonprofit founded by the Capones, Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions, or VETS, has helped over 1,000 veterans travel abroad to receive ibogaine and other psychedelics.

But federal scientists have looked at the drug before — three decades ago, when the National Institute on Drug Abuse funded preliminary studies on using it as an addiction treatment. The research was discontinued after it identified “cardiovascular toxicity.”

“It would be dead in the water,” in terms of winning FDA approval, longtime NIDA director Nora Volkow said.

But Volkow said her agency remains interested in psychedelics, including ibogaine, and is funding an American drugmaker that’s working to develop a safer, synthetic version of the drug.

“I am very intrigued by their pharmacological properties and how they are influencing the brain,” Volkow said. “But you also have to be very mindful not to fall into the hype and to be objective and rigorous in evaluating them.”

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. wholesale inflation cooled last month, despite worries that President Donald Trump’s tariffs would push prices higher for goods before they reach consumers.

The Labor Department reported Wednesday that its producer price index was unchanged last month from May after rising 0.3% the previous month. June wholesale prices were up 2.3% from a year earlier, smallest year-over-year gain since September. Both measures came in below what economists had expected.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so called core producer prices were also unchanged from May and up 2.6% from June 2024.

The report on wholesale inflation came a day after the Labor Department reported that consumer prices last month rose 2.7% from June 2024, the biggest year-over-year gain since February, as Trump’s sweeping tariffs pushed up the cost of everything from groceries to appliances.

Consumer prices and producers prices do not always move in tandem.

The producer price report showed that wholesale goods prices rose 0.3% from May, biggest month-over-month increase since February. Steel and iron prices rose

Wholesale prices can offer an early look at where consumer inflation might be headed. Economists also watch it because some of its components, notably measures of health care and financial services, flow into the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge — the personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, index.

Inflation began to flare up for the first time in decades in 2021, as the economy roared back with unexpected strength from COVID-19 lockdowns. That prompted the Fed to raise its benchmark interest rate 11 times in 2022 and 2023. The higher borrowing costs helped bring inflation down from the peaks it reached in 2022, and last year the Fed felt comfortable enough with the progress to cut rates three times.

But it has turned cautious this year while it waits to see the inflationary impact of Trump’s trade policies. Trump has aggressively stepped up pressure on the Fed to cut rates, a move that threatens the central bank’s independence.

Early trading on Wall Street was quietly mixed on Wednesday as markets shift their attention toward a deluge of corporate earnings reports while monitoring ever-changing developments on U.S. trade policy.

Futures for the S&P 500 were flat before the bell, while futures for the Dow industrials rose 0.2% Nasdaq futures were down 0.2%.

Johnson & Johnson rose 1.8% after the drug and medical device giant beat analysts’ sales and profit targets and raised its full-year outlook on both. J&J said it expects “game-changing approvals and submissions” in the second half of 2025 on an array of products in its pipeline.

Bank of America ticked up less than 1% after it beat Wall Street’s second-quarter profit targets. The bank’s net interest income grew for the fourth straight quarter, but came in slightly lower than expectations.

Goldman Sachs also beat Wall Street’s sales and profit targets on a strong performance from its trading division, which took advantage of market volatility triggered by President Donald Trump’s on-again-off-again tariff announcements this spring. Its shares rose about 1% before markets opened.

Netherlands-based ASML, the world’s leading supplier of chipmaking gear, said in its latest earnings report Wednesday that the impact of Trump’s tariffs on its business was less negative than anticipated, but its shares tumbled more than 7% after the company said it couldn’t guarantee growth next year.

The company makes equipment used in cutting edge semiconductors and one of its key customers is Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., or TSMC, a major supplier for Nvidia.

“The level of uncertainty is increasing, mostly due to macroeconomic and geopolitical consideration. And that includes, of course, tariffs,” CEO Christophe Fouquet said.

United Airlines posts its most recent quarterly results after the bell Wednesday.

Also coming Wednesday is the government’s report on producer prices, which measures inflation at the wholesale level.

A report on Tuesday showed that consumer inflation in the United States accelerated to 2.7% last month from 2.4% in May. Economists said higher prices for clothes, toys and other imported goods suggest that Trump’s stiffer tariffs are fueling inflation. That sticky inflation could mean that the Federal Reserve will hold its ground on interest rates, which have remained elevated in recent years after red-hot demand and supply chain breakdowns in the wake of the pandemic sent prices for just about everything skyrocketing.

Wall Street loves lower interest rates because they juice prices higher for stocks and other investments, and Trump himself has been clamoring for the Federal Reserve to cut rates more quickly. But the Fed has been keeping interest rates on hold this year since lower rates can give inflation more fuel while they boost the economy. Fed Chair Jerome Powell has insisted he wants to see more data about how tariffs affect the economy and inflation.

Elsewhere, in Europe at midday Germany’s DAX rose 0.4%, while Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 0.3%. The CAC 40 in Paris was unchanged.

In Asian trading, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 edged less than 0.1% lower, to 39,663.40. Investors are focusing on the potential impact of an election for the Upper House of Parliament on Sunday that is expected to lead to tax cuts and higher spending as lawmakers try to restore the waning popularity of the ruling Liberal Democrats.

Worries over a deterioration in Japan’s fiscal health have pushed yields of long-term Japanese government bonds to their highest levels in years.

“What’s at stake isn’t simply which party hands out the biggest bundle of goodies. It’s whether the walls holding up Japan’s house of debt can withstand another round of fiscal fireworks…” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a commentary.

Elsewhere in Asia, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng shed 0.3% to 24,517.76, while the Shanghai Composite index slipped less than 0.1% to 3,503.78.

South Korea’s Kospi lost 0.9% to 3,186.38 and in Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.8% to 8,561.80.

Taiwan’s Taiex jumped 0.9% and India’s Sensex added 0.2%. Thailand’s SET dropped 0.3%.

In Jakarta, shares rose 0.7% after President Donald Trump said on Truth Social that he plans to charge imports from Indonesia a tariff of 19%, while American goods sent to the Southeast Asian country will face no tariffs. Trump also said Indonesia committed to buying U.S. energy, agricultural products and aircraft.

Indonesia’s central bank cut its key interest rate by 0.25 percentage points on Wednesday, to 5.25%.

“We have calculated everything and discussed everything. The most important thing for me is my people, as I must protect the interests of our workers,” Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto told reporters, adding that “this is our offer, and we are not able to give more (to the U.S.).”

In energy trading, U.S. benchmark crude oil shed 79 cents to $65.73 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, slipped 67 cents at $68.04 per barrel.

The dollar fell to 148.75 Japanese yen from 148.87 yen. The euro was steady at $1.1601.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Kingdom, France and Germany have agreed to restore tough U.N. sanctions on Iran by the end of August if there has been no concrete progress on a nuclear deal, two European diplomats said Tuesday.

The three countries’ ambassadors to the United Nations met Tuesday at Germany’s U.N. Mission to discuss a possible Iranian deal and reimposing the sanctions. The matter also came up in a phone call Monday between U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the foreign ministers of the three countries, according to two U.S. officials.

The State Department said after the call that the four had spoken about “ensuring Iran does not develop or obtain a nuclear weapon.”

The officials and diplomats spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

The U.K., France and Germany are part of an agreement reached with Iran in 2015 to rein in its nuclear program, from which President Donald Trump withdrew the U.S. during his first term, insisting it wasn’t tough enough.

Under the accord that lifted economic penalties on Iran in exchange for restrictions and monitoring of its nuclear program, a so-called “snapback” provision allows one of the Western parties to reimpose U.N. sanctions if Tehran does not comply with its requirements.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said Tuesday that the three European countries would be justified in reapplying sanctions.

“With regard to Iran, the minister reiterated the priority of resuming negotiations to establish a long-term framework for Iran’s nuclear program,” the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement after a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels. ‘’Without a verifiable commitment from Iran by the end of August at the latest, France, Germany and the U.K. will be justified in reapplying the UN sanctions (snapbacks) that were lifted 10 years ago.”

The diplomats did not provide details of the deal being sought. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in recent days that Tehran would accept a resumption of nuclear talks with the U.S. if there were assurances of no more attacks, following Israeli and U.S. strikes on its nuclear facilities.

He said there should be “a firm guarantee that such actions will not be repeated, stressing that “the attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities has made it more difficult and complicated to achieve a solution.”

The United States and Iran held several rounds of negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program before the Israeli strikes began in June. Trump and his Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, said last week that talks would happen soon, but nothing has yet been scheduled.

Araghchi, whose country insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, said in a July 2 CBS interview that “the doors of diplomacy will never slam shut.”

Iran’s U.N. Mission had no comment Tuesday on the threat of renewed sanctions if there is no deal.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said last week that the U.S. airstrikes so badly damaged his country’s nuclear facilities that Iranian authorities still have not been able to access them to survey the destruction. Iran has suspended cooperation with the IAEA.

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AP writers Matthew Lee in Washington and Angela Charlton in Paris contributed to this report.

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Dozens of Native American radio stations across the country vital to tribal communities will be at risk of going off the air if Congress cuts more than $1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, according to industry leaders.

The U.S. Senate is set to vote this week on whether to approve the Department of Government Efficiency’s plan to rescind previously approved public broadcasting funding for 2026 and 2027. Fear is growing that most of the 59 tribal radio stations that receive the funding will go dark, depriving isolated populations of news, local events and critical weather alerts. The House already approved the cuts last month.

“For Indian Country in general, 80% of the communities are rural, and their only access to national news, native story sharing, community news, whatever it is, is through PBS stations or public radio,” said Francene Blythe-Lewis, CEO of the Lincoln, Nebraska-based Native American video programming producer Vision Maker Media. “If the claw back happens, I would say a good 90% of those stations will cease to exist.”

Native American communities rely on local radio stations

Local radio plays an outsized role in the lives of many who live in Indigenous communities, where cable television and broadband internet access are spotty, at best, and nonexistent for many. That leaves over-the-air TV stations — usually a PBS station — and more often local radio to provide local news, community event details and music by Indigenous artists. Sometimes the news is delivered in Indigenous languages.

“It means we’re not going to hear our language on the radio,” Blythe-Lewis said.

Flagstaff, Arizona-based Native Public Media, which supports the network of 59 radio stations and three television stations serving tribal nations across the country, said about three dozen of those radio stations that rely heavily on Corporation for Public Broadcasting funding will be the first to go dark if funding is cut for the coming fiscal year that starts Oct. 1.

Loris Taylor, CEO of Native Public Media, said in an op-ed that the tribal stations reach more than 1.5 million people and “may be the only source of locally relevant news, emergency alerts, public safety announcements, language preservation, health information and election coverage.”

Republicans face pressure to pass the cuts

GOP senators are under pressure from President Donald Trump, who promised last week on his Truth Social platform that any Republican who votes against the cuts “will not have my support or Endorsement.”

Many Republicans say the public media system is politically biased and an unnecessary expense. Sen. Eric Schmitt, a Republican from Missouri, recently defended the cuts as necessary to hack away at the nearly $37 trillion national debt, adding, “It is critical in restoring trust in government.”

But some Republicans have pushed back, such as Maine Sen. Susan Collins, who questioned the proposed cuts last month during a Senate committee hearing. She said that while some of the federal money is assigned to National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System, most of it goes to locally owned public radio and television stations.

Tribal stations provide lifesaving alerts

Jaclyn Sallee is president and CEO of Koahnic Broadcast Corporation and KNBA, its radio station in Anchorage, Alaska. Koahnic produces National Native News, a five-minute daily newscast that features headline news from across Indian Country, and Native America Calling, a daily hourlong call-in program, for about 190 stations across the nation. It also produces Indigefi, a music program in Indigenous languages.

KNBA is on Native Public Media’s list of those stations that would be most affected by the federal funding cuts — a concern Sallee confirmed, as 40% of the station’s funding comes from CPB.

“What we’re really worried about are the rural stations in Alaska where they may be the only station in the community,” she said. “The people that live there depend on the station for vital weather alerts, emergency alerts; it’s the local hub of the community where people share information. So that is very troublesome because people’s lives are at risk without this service.”

It’s currently fishing season in Alaska, she said, “which means getting out in the ocean or in rivers and going long distances to subsist, and so they really rely on weather reports.”

Having the news reported in a tribe’s language isn’t just about preserving that language, she said. Sallee spent summers in Nome with her mother’s family. Her grandmother, she said, spoke only Inupiaq.

Loss of small stations could hurt the larger system

New Mexico PBS’s signal reaches all but one of the more than 20 tribes and pueblos in the state. It also has signed an agreement with the Navajo Nation, which has the largest reservation of any tribe in the U.S., that allows the tribe to carry the PBS signal and programming on the Navajo Nation Television network, New Mexico PBS general manger Franz Joachim said.

“It’s no question in my mind that, you know, immediately some stations will pretty much go dark,” Joachim said.

When those first stations fail, it won’t take long for others to follow, Joachim said. And as they do, it will mean fewer and fewer stations left to pay membership dues that also help fund all of the stations.

“So now the whole system starts to fracture,” he said. “So for me, the federal funding is really about the system as a whole that keeps us in place.”

That funding also helps produce national content that groups like Vision Maker Media produce. Those include Native American documentaries shown on PBS like “Mankiller,” the story of Wilma Mankiller who became the first woman elected principal chief of the Cherokee Nation.

Blythe-Lewis compared the potential loss of tribal stations to the country’s past attempts to erase Native American cultures, such as through federal boarding schools where Indigenous children were sent for generations to assimilate them into white society and where systemic abuse of Indigenous children was carried out.

“We’re erased from public media and therefore invisible and therefore become unknown and unheard of,” she said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump says he has finally found a way to achieve his goal of removing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, accusing him of mismanaging the U.S. central bank’s $2.5 billion renovation project.

The push comes after a monthslong campaign by Trump to try to rid himself of the politically independent central banker, who has resisted the president’s calls to slash interest rates out of concerns about the administration’s tariffs sparking higher levels of inflation.

The president indicated Tuesday that Powell’s handling of an extensive renovation project on two Fed buildings in Washington could be grounds to take the unprecedented and possibly legally dubious step of firing him. “I think it sort of is,” Trump said.

“When you spend $2.5 billion on, really, a renovation, I think it’s really disgraceful,” Trump said, adding that he never saw the Fed chair as someone who needed a “palace.”

The project has been underway for years, going back to Trump’s first term. But it only recently caught the White House’s attention. Trump maintains that Fed rate cuts would lower the costs of government borrowing, while Powell has warned that a premature rate cut could worsen inflation and ultimately raise those borrowing costs.

The risk of the Fed losing its political independence could undermine America’s financial markets, possibly leading to a meltdown in stocks and investors charging a premium to lend to the U.S. economy.

Here’s what to know:

Ousting Powell risks setting off market panic

The Fed chair has been an obstacle in Trump’s efforts to gain total control over the executive branch.

Powell and his board have the dual mandate of maximizing employment and keeping prices stable, a task that can require them to make politically unpopular moves such as raising interest rates to hold inflation in check. The general theory is that keeping the Fed free from the influence of the White House — other than for nominations of Fed officials — allows it to fulfill its mission based on what the economy needs, instead of what a politician wants.

An attempt to remove Powell from his job before his term ends in May 2026 would undercut the Fed’s long-standing independence from day-to-day politics and could lead to higher inflation, higher interest rates and a weaker economy.

The Supreme Court recently signaled that the president can’t fire Powell simply because Trump disagrees with him on interest rates. But legally he could do so “for cause,” such as misconduct or dereliction of duty.

Trump’s workaround appears to be that Powell misrepresented the renovation project in congressional testimony and that the cost is excessive, thus meriting his dismissal.

The Fed’s main headquarters is over 90 years old

The Fed says its main headquarters, known as the Marriner S. Eccles building, was in dire need of an upgrade because its electrical, plumbing and HVAC systems, among others, are nearly obsolete and some date back to the building’s construction in the 1930s.

The renovation will also remove asbestos, lead and other hazardous elements and update the building with modern electrical and communications systems. The H-shaped building, named after a former Fed chair in the 1930s and ‘40s, is located near some of Washington’s highest-profile monuments and has references to classical architecture and marble in the facades and stonework. The central bank is also renovating a building next door that it acquired in 2018.

The Fed says there has been periodic maintenance to the structures but adds that this is the first “comprehensive renovation.”

The renovation costs have ballooned over the years

Trump administration officials have criticized the Fed over the project’s expense, which has reached $2.5 billion, about $600 million more than was originally budgeted.

Like a beleaguered homeowner facing spiraling costs for a remodeling project, the Fed cites many reasons for the greater expense. Construction costs, including for materials and labor, rose sharply during the inflation spike in 2021 and 2022. More asbestos needed to be removed than expected. Washington’s local restrictions on building heights forced it to build underground, which is pricier.

In 2024, the Fed’s board canceled its planned renovations of a third building because of rising costs.

The Fed says the renovations will reduce costs “over time” because it will be able to consolidate its roughly 3,000 Washington-based employees into fewer buildings and will no longer need to rent as much extra space as it does now.

White House budget director calls renovations ‘ostentatious’

Russ Vought, the administration’s top budget adviser, wrote Powell a letter last Thursday that said Trump is “extremely troubled” about the Fed’s “ostentatious overhaul” of its facilities.

The Fed’s renovation plans call for “rooftop terrace gardens, VIP private dining rooms and elevators, water features, premium marble, and much more,” Vought said in his letter.

Powell has disputed the claims, which were given wide circulation in a paper issued by the Mercatus Center, a think tank at George Mason University, in March 2025. The paper was written by Andrew Levin, an economist at Dartmouth College and former Fed staffer.

“There’s no VIP dining room,” Powell said last month during a Senate Banking Committee hearing. “There’s no new marble. … There are no special elevators. There are no new water features. … And there’s no roof terrace gardens.”

Some of those elements were removed from initial building plans submitted in 2021, the Fed says.

But the White House also takes issue with the Fed reducing its renovation costs

The Fed’s changes to its building plans have opened it up to another line of attack: White House officials suggest the Fed violated the terms of the approval it received from a local planning commission by changing its plans.

In its September 2021 approval of the project, the National Capital Planning Commission said it “Commends” the Fed for “fully engaging partner federal agencies.” But because the Fed changed its plans, the administration is indicating it needed to go back to the commission for a separate approval.

Essentially, White House officials are saying Powell is being reckless with taxpayer money because of the cost of the renovation, but they are also accusing him of acting unethically by scaling back the project to save money.

James Blair, the White House deputy chief of staff whom Trump named to the commission, said last Thursday in a post on X that Powell’s June congressional testimony “leads me to conclude the project is not in alignment with plans submitted to & approved by the National Capital Planning Commission in 2021.”

Speaking last Thursday at the planning commission meeting, Blair said he intends to tour the construction site, review materials from the Fed on how the approved 2021 renovation plans have changed and circulate a letter among his colleagues on the commission that would go to Fed officials.

The Fed has asked for an independent review of the project

The central bank says, in a series of frequently asked questions on its website, that it is “not subject to the direction” of the commission and has only complied with its directives voluntarily.

Instead, the Fed said it is accountable to the Senate and House of Representatives, and is also overseen by an independent inspector general, not the White House. Powell has asked the inspector general to review the costs of the renovation project.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Pentagon said Tuesday it is ending the deployment of 2,000 National Guard troops in Los Angeles, accounting for nearly half of the soldiers sent to the city to deal with protests over the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

Roughly 4,000 National Guard soldiers and 700 Marines have been in the city since early June. It wasn’t immediately clear what prompted the 60-day deployment to end suddenly, nor was it immediately clear how long the rest of the troops would stay in the region.

In late June, the top military commander in charge of troops deployed to LA had asked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth for 200 of them to be returned to wildfire fighting duty amid warnings from California Gov. Gavin Newsom that the Guard was understaffed as California entered peak wildfire season.

The end of the deployment comes a week after federal authorities and National Guard troops arrived at MacArthur Park with guns and horses in an operation that ended abruptly. Although the U.S. Department of Homeland Security wouldn’t explain the purpose of the operation or whether anyone had been arrested, local officials said it seemed designed to sow fear.

“Thanks to our troops who stepped up to answer the call, the lawlessness in Los Angeles is subsiding,” Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a statement in announcing the decision.

On June 8, thousands of protesters took to the streets in response to Trump’s deployment of the Guard, blocking off a major freeway as law enforcement used tear gas, rubber bullets and flash bangs to control the crowd. Photos captured several Waymo robotaxis set on fire.

A day later, police officers used flash bangs and shot projectiles as they pushed protesters through Little Tokyo, where bystanders and restaurant workers rushed to get out of their way.

Mayor Karen Bass set a curfew in place for about a week that she said had successfully protected businesses and helped restore order. Demonstrations in the city and the region in recent weeks have been largely small impromptu protests around arrests.

Bass applauded the troops’ departure.

“This happened because the people of Los Angeles stood united and stood strong. We organized peaceful protests, we came together at rallies, we took the Trump administration to court — all of this led to today’s retreat,” she said in a statement, adding that “We will not stop making our voices heard until this ends, not just here in LA, but throughout our country.”

Bass said in a press conference that the National Guard’s primary mission has been to guard two buildings that “frankly didn’t need to be guarded.”

“I am hoping that this experiment with the lives of people ends here,” she said.

No visible military presence at federal complex

On Tuesday afternoon, there was no visible military presence outside the federal complex downtown that had been the center of early protests and where National Guard troops first stood guard before the Marines were assigned to protect federal buildings. Hundreds of the soldiers have been accompanying agents on immigration operations.

President Donald Trump ordered the deployment against the wishes of Newsom, who sued to stop it.

Newsom argued that Trump violated the law when he deployed the California National Guard troops despite his opposition. He also argued that the National Guard troops were likely violating the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits troops from conducting civilian law enforcement on U.S. soil.

Newsom won an early victory in the case after a federal judge ruled the Guard deployment was illegal and exceeded Trump’s authority. But an appeals court tossed that order, and control of the troops remained with the federal government. The federal court is set to hear arguments next month on whether the troops are violating the Posse Comitatus Act.

The deployment of National Guard troops was for 60 days, though Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had the discretion to shorten or extend it “to flexibly respond to the evolving situation on the ground,” the Trump administration’s lawyers wrote in a June 23 filing in the legal case.

Following the Pentagon’s decision Tuesday, Newsom said in a statement that the National Guard’s deployment to Los Angeles County has pulled troops away from their families and civilian work “to serve as political pawns for the President.”

He added that the remaining troops “continue without a mission, without direction and without any hopes of returning to help their communities.”

“We call on Trump and the Department of Defense to end this theater and send everyone home now,” he said.

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Klepper reported from Washington and Watson from San Diego. Sophie Austin in Sacramento, Amy Taxin in Santa Ana, California, and Hallie Golden in Seattle contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A trio of cryptocurrency bills that had been expected to pass the House this week stalled Tuesday after a bloc of Republicans unexpectedly joined with Democrats to prevent the legislation from coming up for debate and votes.

The procedural snafu brought the House’s so-called “crypto week” to a standstill — and dealt a blow to President Donald Trump, who had strongly urged Republicans to pass the bills as part of his push to make the U.S. the “ crypto capital of the world.”

Trump intervened during a late evening meeting with Republicans at the White House, and appeared to put the bills back on track. He posted on social media that he expected votes as soon as Wednesday.

A group of 13 Republicans had joined all Democrats in opposition to a procedural vote needed to bring the crypto bills to the floor. Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters it was just part of the “legislative process” and that negotiations were underway between the House, Senate and White House. He suggested they could try again Tuesday evening.

“We expected there might be some ‘no’ votes, but we thought it was important to put it on the floor to advance it because time’s of the essence on this,” Johnson said. “So stay tuned. We’ll have lots of discussions over the next few hours.”

But just hours later, House leadership canceled votes for the remainder of the day, potentially throwing the crypto bills into limbo.

Then, late in the evening, Trump posted that he was having a White House meeting with lawmakers and had won their support to vote for the procedural step.

“I am in the Oval Office with 11 of the 12 Congressmen/women necessary to pass the GENIUS Act and, after a short discussion, they have all agreed to vote tomorrow morning in favor of the Rule,” Trump said on social media, referring to the step.

The president said that Johnson attended via telephone “and looks forward to taking the Vote as early as possible.”

The stalled legislation includes a Senate-passed bill to regulate a form of cryptocurrency known as stablecoins, along with far more sweeping measures aiming to address cryptocurrency market structure. Another bill would prohibit the Federal Reserve from issuing a central bank digital currency.

The disagreement blocking the bills from advancing centers on how the three bills would be passed. Johnson explained that “some of these guys insist that it needs to be all in one package.” Packaging the bills would require them to be sent back to the Senate, since the chamber has only taken up one of the three bills so far.

Rep. Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania, a Republican co-sponsor of one of the cryptocurrency bills, told reporters that some of the Republicans wanted to package the bills together due to them “not having a lot of faith in the Senate moving our legislation.”

Trump and Republican leaders have called on the House to pass the bills individually, so that the stablecoin legislation can get to Trump’s desk for his signature before an August recess. The stablecoin legislation took the Senate nearly a month and half to pass, and the more sweeping market structure legislation is expected to take even longer.

In a post Tuesday morning on social media, Trump had called on Republicans to advance the crypto bills that afternoon, saying that “all Republicans should vote ‘yes.’” Asked Tuesday evening about the stalled legislation, Trump told reporters that Republicans who voted against it wanted it to be “stronger.”

Trump has pushed hard for the passage of the stablecoin legislation, with him and his family standing to profit from a boost to stablecoins. They hold a significant stake in World Liberty Financial, a crypto project that recently launched its own stablecoin, USD1.

The stablecoin legislation passed by the Senate includes a provision that bars members of Congress and their families from profiting off stablecoins. But notably, that prohibition does not apply to the president or his family, even as Trump builds what some are calling a crypto empire from the White House.

The cryptocurrency industry hopes the bills as a whole will aid in their push for legitimacy and increasing consumer trust. And road bumps like those seen Tuesday may not have been expected after spending heavily in the 2024 election to elect a large number of crypto-friendly lawmakers.

Faryar Shirzad, chief policy officer of Coinbase, the nation’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, said in a statement after the failed procedural vote that “every few steps forward there’s inevitably a step back.”

“It’s in these moments we’ll see who is trying to get pro-crypto legislation done and who is not,” Shirzad said on social media.

Passage of the bills could have implications on the 2026 midterm races. Fairshake, a crypto super political action committee, said that it and its affiliated organizations already have more than $140 million in the bank ready to spend on midterm races.

“The voters last year were clear — Congress needs to stop playing politics with crypto and finally pass responsible regulation,” said Josh Vlasto, spokesperson for Fairshake. “We are building an aggressive, targeted strategy for next year to ensure that pro-crypto voices are heard in key races across the country.”

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Associated Press writer Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump told reporters Tuesday that he plans to place tariffs of over 10% on smaller countries, including nations in Africa and the Caribbean.

“We’ll probably set one tariff for all of them,” Trump said, adding that it could be “a little over 10% tariff” on goods from at least 100 nations.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick interjected that the nations with goods being taxed at these rates would be in Africa and the Caribbean, places that generally do relatively modest levels of trade with the U.S. and would be relatively insignificant for addressing Trump’s goals of reducing trade imbalances with the rest of the world.

The president had this month been posting letters to roughly two dozen countries and the European Union that simply levied a tariff rate to be charged starting Aug. 1.

Those countries generally faced tax rates on the goods close to the April 2 rates announced by the U.S. president, whose rollout of historically high import taxes for the U.S. caused financial markets to panic and led to Trump setting a 90-day negotiating period that expired July 9.

Trump also said he would “probably” announce tariffs on pharmaceutical drugs at the “end of the month.”

The president said he would start out at a lower tariff rate and give companies a year to build domestic factories before they faced higher import tax rates. Trump said computer chips would face a similar style of tariffs.