Happy Monday! The second round of voting in our inaugural Dispawtch bracket is live, and not a single cat advanced to the Sweet Sixteen. Get your votes in by 8 p.m. ET on Wednesday to have a say in which canines make it to the Elite Eight.
Editor’s Note: Penny seems totally unfazed by her early exit from the tournament and sends her congratulations to Adelaide on a well-earned victory, but Penny’s humans are a little distraught.
Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories
- Israeli warplanes struck Hamas targets across the Gaza Strip overnight Saturday, killing Salah al-Bardawil, a senior member of the terrorist group’s political bureau. The ongoing aerial attacks came as Israeli troops expanded ground operations aimed at destroying Hamas infrastructure and creating a buffer zone along the Israel-Gaza border. Meanwhile, six rockets were fired at northern Israel from Lebanon on Saturday morning—the first such attack since December. Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed terrorist organization, denied responsibility for the rocket fire, which threatened to upend a November ceasefire agreement between Israel and Lebanon. Hours later, Israel carried out airstrikes on dozens of Hezbollah command centers and rocket launchers.
- Sudan’s army seized the country’s presidential palace on Friday, delivering the Sudanese Armed Forces an important political and military victory as it seeks to reclaim the entirety of Khartoum from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The capital city has been at the center of fighting since the start of the war—which has left more than 28,000 people dead nationwide and displaced 11 million others—in April 2023. In January, the State Department determined that both sides of the conflict had committed war crimes.
- The Trump administration plans to revoke temporary legal status for more than 530,000 immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, according to a Federal Register notice published Friday. The move, which follows President Donald Trump’s January executive order directing the Department of Homeland Security to “terminate all categorical parole programs that are contrary to the policies of the United States,” will end the Biden administration’s two-year parole program for immigrants who arrived by air and had American sponsors. The administration urged the immigrants to leave the country before the change takes effect on April 24.
- Columbia University on Friday agreed to the many demands made by the Trump administration after the White House withheld $400 million in federal grants and contracts, alleging that the university created a climate of antisemitism on campus. In a memo, the university’s interim president, Dr. Katrina Armstrong, said that Columbia would hire a team of campus police officers with the power to arrest students, establish a committee dedicated to promoting free speech and academic freedom on campus, revise antidiscrimination policies and disciplinary processes, and require demonstrators to present Columbia ID when asked, among a slew of other policies.
- The Trump administration on Friday selected Boeing to lead the development of the F-47 fighter, the Air Force’s next-generation air superiority and drone coordination jet, a major coup for the embattled aerospace company. Named after Trump, the 47th president, the fighter is expected to fight alongside autonomous aircraft made by Anduril Industries and General Atomics. The new projects are part of the Next Generation Air Dominance effort, meant to succeed Lockheed Martin’s F-22 Raptor, which had been paused earlier this year due to cost concerns.
- More than 100 staffers in the Department of Homeland Security’s Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties were put on leave Friday, as the DHS announced plans to cut the office, along with the Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman. Both offices are responsible for ensuring that the DHS complies with equal protection and civil rights laws. “These reductions ensure taxpayer dollars support the Department's core mission: border security and immigration enforcement,” a DHS spokesperson said.
- Pope Francis was discharged from the Gemelli hospital in Rome on Sunday, the end of a stay that began on February 14 when he entered the hospital with double pneumonia. One of his physicians, Dr. Sergio Alfieri, told reporters that the pontiff experienced multiple life-threatening episodes while in the hospital, but has recovered from his pneumonia and will require at least two months of rest. He is expected to return to his duties as soon as possible, and gave a public blessing while leaving the hospital.
Turkey’s ‘Navalny Moment’?
Hundreds of thousands of protesters gathered in cities across Turkey on Sunday night, with many calling for an end to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s rule after more than two decades in power. The mass demonstrations, now approaching their sixth day, followed the arrest last week of the longtime Turkish leader’s chief political rival: Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu.
Earlier in the day, some 15 million people supported İmamoğlu—the only candidate on the ballot—in the presidential primary of Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP). The party opened voting to non-CHP members, garnering a large turnout in a show of national solidarity with the embattled politician. Meanwhile on Sunday, Turkish authorities jailed İmamoğlu pending a trial and stripped him of his mayorship. The move—widely viewed as an attempt to preemptively bar the popular opposition leader from running in the country’s presidential election, which must be held by May 2028—marked Turkey’s latest and most dire departure from its democratic ...
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Today’s Must-Read
Only about 10 percent of American Jews are Orthodox, generally defined by adherence to traditional Jewish law, such as Sabbath and kosher observance. Fewer still are Orthodox and interested in receiving a secular higher education. These Modern Orthodox—distinguished by traditional observance combined with full participation in American life—have long maintained a disproportionate presence at elite universities relative to their population size. … Yet these students feel the weight of recent campus controversies most acutely, as they are both “visibly” Jewish—often identifiable by their dress—and near-unanimously ardent Zionists.
Toeing the Company Line
Bad Faith
How much judicial deference is owed to an untrustworthy president?
The Energy That Fuels the American Dream
People need mobility—and freedom—to pursue happiness.
A Confessing Church for America’s Weimar Moment
Plus: A century of Flannery O’Connor.
The Hurt We Carry
The hit show ‘Severance’ shows the limits of dissociation.
A Century of Flannery O’Connor
The Southern writer has a depth that's hard to find today.
Mike Johnson’s House Math Problem Gets Easier to Solve
The speaker will soon have a (slightly) larger GOP majority for the next legislative battle.
No Rulers
Intellectual earworms, stand-up comedy, and chinchilla farms.
Rethinking the Democratic Playbook
Autopsies and resolutions.
Worth Your Time
- Hamas’ October 7, 2023, attack and the ensuing war laid bare major intra-Democratic Party divisions over U.S. support for Israel. But those fissures are increasingly evident on the American right, too, as antisemitic conspiracy theories take hold in populist circles, argued New York Times columnist Ross Douthat. “More so than in the Democratic Party, most Republican elites remain staunchly pro-Israel. But on what you might call the alienated right—younger, conspiracy-curious, anti-institutional and very online—there is a vogue for arguments about malign Jewish influences on Western politics, ranging from World War II revisionism to narratives casting Jeffrey Epstein as a cat’s paw for the Mossad,” he wrote. “There’s just no way for mainstream Zionist Republicanism and the anti-Jewish faction on the alienated right to get along. … Those parts of the alienated right that are most comfortable deploying antisemitic tropes also believe earnestly not just in some general theory of Jewish power but in a specific theory of Israel’s power, Israel’s malign influence, Israeli leaders and institutions and spies as conspiratorial and destructive forces in American life.”
- It’s been 18 months since devastating fires in Maui destroyed more than 2,000 homes. But only 6 have been rebuilt. In City Journal, Alex Hu examined the web of regulations, laws, and local government failures that have made the island’s efforts to rebuild so lethargic. “The political divide has only grown wider since the fires. Aside from activists seeking Internet fame by provoking viral confrontations at public meetings, radical councilmembers have called their pro-building colleagues names like ‘colonizer,’ openly questioned what would happen if they defied Hawaii state law promoting homebuilding, and advocated for secession from the United States. A general spirit of conspiracy and bad faith pervades the island’s politics,” he wrote. “These local dynamics discouraged Governor [Josh] Green from taking aggressive action. Suspicious residents interpreted his initial promises to rebuild Lahaina quickly as a plot to redevelop the historic town to profit ‘outside’ developers. He backed off in response. Even Mayor [Richard] Bissen has avoided taking strong actions or asking for strong state assistance for fear of looking like an outsider dictating terms to West Maui.”
Presented Without Comment
NBC News: Putin Said He Prayed for ‘His Friend’ Donald Trump After 2024 Assassination Attempt, U.S. Envoy [Steve Witkoff] Says
Witkoff said some people might question if he should have met with the Russian president because they see Putin as “a bad guy.” But he said: “I don’t regard Putin as a bad guy.”
A real estate tycoon and friend of the president who has become a top diplomatic envoy for Trump, Wiktoff said he appreciated Putin being open to meeting with him and communicating in a “straightforward” way.
“I liked him. I thought he was straight up with me,” he said, adding that “it was gracious of him to accept me, to see me.”
Also Presented Without Comment
Bloomberg: Secret Biden Deal Allowed Chevron to Pay Venezuela Millions
The Biden administration secretly permitted Chevron Corp. to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to the Venezuelan government despite a license that explicitly prohibited such disbursements, according to people familiar with the matter.
The supplement to a November 2022 sanctions waiver allowed Chevron to remain in compliance with US law while paying the regime of President Nicolás Maduro taxes and oil royalties, said the people, who asked not to be identified discussing non-public information.
Also Also Presented Without Comment
Axios: Seniors Won’t Complain if They Miss a Social Security Check, Lutnick Says
“Let’s say Social Security didn’t send out their checks this month. My mother-in-law, who’s 94, she wouldn’t call and complain,” Lutnick—a billionaire former Wall Street CEO—told the billionaire “All In” podcast host Chamath Palihapitiya. “She just wouldn’t. She’d think something got messed up, and she’ll get it next month. A fraudster always makes the loudest noise, screaming, yelling and complaining.”
In the Zeitgeist
The second season of Severance, the popular dystopian thriller starring Adam Scott of Parks and Recreation fame, came to a close last week on yet another cliffhanger. But don’t despair: Apple TV+ announced Friday that a third season is on the way. And thankfully, executive producer Ben Stiller said it won’t take another three years to make it.
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