Weekend Report: What's going on?

HIV vaccine research killed. Scientists look elsewhere as U.S. labs stripped. Trump doubles steel tariffs as Wall Street warns GOP bill could crash bond markets. Senator Joni Ernst implodes.

What Donald Trump has done to decades of research in treatment and prevention of HIV has been staggering, cutting both international and domestic programs that have made sure, through Republican and Democrati administrations—including Trump’s first one—that people receive life-saving drugs. And now he is dismantling several critical studies to create a groundbreaking vaccine against HIV.

The White House unveiled a new budget proposal, slashing even more funding for cancer research—on top of the massive cuts they pushed through with Elon Musk’s reckless actions already—and a host of other medical research programs. Now the world’s greatest scientists, all based in the United States for decades, are looking to other countries as labs are depleted. This will also cause a massive economic hit to the U.S.

And Trump late Friday, faced with courts that have thrown out his tariffs and Wall Street stock traders who’ve mocked him, doubled steel and aluminum tariffs to 50%. Meanwhile, bond traders are reeling over the GOP’s big, bad bill, warning the White House that the bill could upend the bond market and do major harm to the economy. GOP senators are now grappling with the bill, and Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa caused a massive self-inflicted wound in her response to criticism of the bill’s Medicaid cuts at a town hall.