Happy Wednesday! There are just more than 24 hours left to sign up for the TMD March Madness pool and fill out your bracket! To join nearly 800 of your fellow readers (so far), just click here (you will need a free ESPN account) and select “Join Group.” The password is “TMD2K25!” and your bracket must be submitted by 12:15 p.m. ET on Thursday. If you want to be eligible for prizes—including a year of premium Dispatch membership, TMD merch, and more—fill out this form so we can connect you with your ESPN entry.
Paying members can also participate in our first-ever Dispawtch Bracket. Cast your vote for the best Dispatch pet today!
Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories
- Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday agreed to immediately halt attacks on energy facilities, on the condition that Ukraine does the same. The offer, which followed a lengthy phone call between Putin and American President Donald Trump, falls short of the U.S. plan for a sweeping 30-day ceasefire between the two warring parties. A White House readout of the conversation described the Kremlin’s agreement to halt energy strikes as the first step in the “movement to peace,” adding that negotiations toward a more robust truce will “begin immediately” in the Middle East. Both Russia and Ukraine accused one another of launching air attacks on infrastructure sites within hours of the call.
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday that future ceasefire and hostage deal negotiations with Hamas will take place “only under fire.” In the televised address, the premier added that Israel’s large-scale airstrikes on Hamas targets across the Gaza Strip early Tuesday morning were “only the beginning” and accused the terrorist group of upending the U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement—which had been in effect since January—by refusing to release additional abductees. About 60 hostages, 24 of whom are believed to be alive, remain in Gaza. Israeli aerial attacks on the enclave continued overnight.
- Turkish authorities on Wednesday detained Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoğlu, a key political rival of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, in connection to an ostensible corruption and terrorism investigation. Imamoğlu was expected to be named the presidential nominee of Turkey’s Republican People’s Party this weekend, but his arrest—as well as Istanbul University’s decision on Monday to revoke his degree under apparent pressure from Ankara—threatens to upend his bid for the presidency. Under the Turkish constitution, presidential candidates must hold a university degree.
- Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts released a statement on Tuesday appearing to rebuke President Trump’s calls to impeach a federal judge who ordered the administration to halt its deportation of alleged Venezuelan gang members over the weekend. “For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” Roberts said. “The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.” The statement didn’t mention Trump by name, but it followed the president’s public attacks on Judge James E. Boasberg—the chief justice of the federal district court in Washington, D.C., who on Monday accused the White House of ignoring his court order to stop the deportation flights.
- President Trump on Tuesday moved to fire the only two Democratic members of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), an independent agency charged with enforcing antitrust and consumer protection laws. The fired commissioners, Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Slaughter, both indicated plans to sue in response to what they described as unlawful dismissals. “The president just illegally fired me,” Bedoya said in a statement. “This is corruption plain and simple.” Meanwhile, FTC chair Andrew Ferguson—a Republican appointed by former President Joe Biden and elevated to chairman by Trump—said Tuesday that he had “no doubts” about the president’s authority to remove commissioners. FTC commissioners serve seven-year terms, and no more than three can be from the same political party.
- The Trump administration on Tuesday released thousands of pages of unredacted government records related to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The move followed President Trump’s January executive order compelling government agencies to draw up plans to publish documents related to the assassinations of Kennedy, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy. The full tranche is still being digitized and documents will be made available on the JFK Assassination Records website as they become available, the National Archives and Records Administration said Tuesday.
- A federal judge ruled Tuesday that attempts by Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) likely violated the Constitution in “multiple ways.” In an injunction, U.S. District Judge Theodore D. Chuang—who intervened on multiple actions undertaken by President Trump during his first term—ordered DOGE to halt its efforts to slash the agency but did not rule out future cuts, so long as they’re undertaken by USAID itself.
The future we dreamed of is waiting. Let’s go!
Columbia in the Crosshairs
It’s been a tough year for Columbia University. The school has faced protests, congressional hearings, arrests, and now major funding cuts—paired with demands from the Trump administration.
The federal government stripped $400 million in federal funding from the university in early March because of its “continued inaction” in combating antisemitism on campus. But in a letter to university leadership last Thursday, the administration offered Columbia an opportunity for reprieve—kind of. Setting a compliance deadline for this Thursday, the administration said it would consider lifting the grant cancellation if the university institutes a series of sweeping changes to its disciplinary practices.
What comes next is unclear. But the battle playing out between Washington and the Ivy League likely portends future clashes, as the Trump administration seeks to leverage federal funding in its quest to impose top-down changes on American higher education. And although the changes seek to address very real problems emanating from college campuses, plenty of questions remain as to whether …
As a non-paying reader, you are receiving a truncated version of The Morning Dispatch. You can read our 1,471-word item on the Trump administration’s clashes with Columbia University in the members-only version of TMD.
Today’s Must-Read
Elon Musk’s IQ Is Irrelevant
Toeing the Company Line
The Trump Administration’s Free Speech Hypocrisy
Distinctions Are Important, Actually
Trump Memo on Civil Procedure Rules Spawns Confusion and Misinformation
Worth Your Time
- Anthony Dolan, an award-winning journalist and speechwriter for President Ronald Reagan, died last week at the age of 76. He wrote some of the Republican president’s most memorable orations, including his 1983 “evil empire” speech—a scathing indictment of communism and authoritarianism under the Soviet Union. “In your discussions of the nuclear freeze proposals, I urge you to beware the temptation of pride—the temptation of blithely … declaring yourselves above it all and label both sides equally at fault, to ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire, to simply call the arms race a giant misunderstanding and thereby remove yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil,” Reagan said. “While America’s military strength is important, let me add here that I’ve always maintained that the struggle now going on for the world will never be decided by bombs or rockets, by armies or military might. The real crisis we face today is a spiritual one; at root, it is a test of moral will and faith. … I believe that communism is another sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last—last pages even now are being written. I believe this because the source of our strength in the quest for human freedom is not material, but spiritual. And because it knows no limitation, it must terrify and ultimately triumph over those who would enslave their fellow man.”
Presented Without Comment
Mediaite: Tucker Carlson Warns Trump Against Bombing Iran: ‘Will Set off a War’ and ‘Result in Thousands of American Deaths’
In the Zeitgeist
The Major League Baseball season kicked off at 6 a.m. ET yesterday, with the Los Angeles Dodgers defeating the Chicago Cubs 4-1 in front of more than 40,000 fans at the Tokyo Dome in Japan. Here’s hoping the good guys are winning the second game of the series by the time this email hits your inbox.
Please note that we at The Dispatch hold ourselves, our work, and our commenters to a higher standard than other places on the internet. We welcome comments that foster genuine debate or discussion—including comments critical of us or our work—but responses that include ad hominem attacks on fellow Dispatch members or are intended to stoke fear and anger may be moderated.
With your membership, you only have the ability to comment on The Morning Dispatch articles. Consider upgrading to join the conversation everywhere.