Trump’s first 100 days: all the news affecting the tech industry – The Verge The Verge is about technology and how it makes us feel. Founded in 2011, we offer our audience everything from breaking news to reviews to award-winning features and investigations, on our site, in video, and in podcasts. 2025-05-08T14:45:00+00:00 https://www.theverge.com/rss/stream/24112892 https://platform.theverge.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/01/verge-rss-large_80b47e.png?w=150&h=150&crop=1 Gaby Del Valle <![CDATA[Grifters thrive under Trump’s scam-friendly administration]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=662109 2025-05-08T10:45:00-04:00 2025-05-07T09:00:00-04:00

On April 22nd, Fight Fight Fight LLC, a company with ties to President Donald Trump, announced that the 220 top investors in its meme coin $TRUMP would be invited to meet with Trump himself. The event was billed as an "intimate private" dinner, but with obvious hints that attendees were buying an elected official's time. Around the date of the announcement, federal government officials reportedly registered three websites apparently related to the dinner: thetrilliondollarinner.gov, dinnerforamerica.gov, and thetrillion.gov. At least one, it was reported, temporarily directed to a Department of Commerce login portal, suggesting that the coin …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Justine Calma <![CDATA[Trump’s proposed budget deals another big blow to science, clean energy, and the environment]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=660579 2025-05-02T17:13:17-04:00 2025-05-02T17:13:17-04:00

President Donald Trump proposed drastic budget cuts today that could stymie green energy projects, gut environmental protections, and further hobble health and climate research in the US.

Topline budget proposals released today for the 2026 fiscal year would ax $15 billion in federal funding for renewable energy and new technologies to capture carbon dioxide emissions. It would strip nearly $18 billion from the National Institutes of Health, while the Environmental Protection Agency would see its budget slashed in half.

All in all, it's yet another wrecking ball aimed at federal agencies after Trump and billionaire-crony Elon Musk swiftly …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Mia Sato <![CDATA[Trump’s tariff plan is a potential death blow to your cheap online shopping]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=642601 2025-05-02T13:16:46-04:00 2025-05-02T13:16:43-04:00

With President Donald Trump's new tariff plan, your online shopping packages coming directly from China are about to get much more expensive.

In February, the Trump administration moved to get rid of a little-known rule that allows US consumers to avoid tariffs on low-value packages. The de minimis exemption meant that packages valued under $800 could enter the US duty-free, and shoppers - as well as retailers - relied on the exemption regularly, even if they didn't realize it. Nearly 1.4 billion packages claiming the exemption entered the US in 2024, the majority of which came from China. The removal of this exemption has been paused since …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Justine Calma <![CDATA[Warning systems for floods, hurricanes, and famine are suffering from Donald Trump’s data purge]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=656714 2025-04-30T17:10:52-04:00 2025-04-30T11:04:26-04:00
Emergency signal

Within weeks of President Trump stepping into office, key health and environmental resources that doctors and farmers rely on started disappearing from federal websites. Trump was also quick to dismantle the US Agency for International Development (USAID), cutting off funding - as well as the flow of data that people around the world use to prevent famine and issue warnings ahead of natural disasters.

"As we all watched the websites being pulled down, as we all watched data disappearing, we were all concerned - because that's truth. There's truth in data," says a former contractor who was granted anonymity to speak freely without fear of re …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Adi Robertson <![CDATA[Donald Trump might actually believe these Calibri labels are real MS-13 tattoos]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=658612 2025-04-30T10:57:56-04:00 2025-04-30T10:55:57-04:00

For several weeks, President Donald Trump and his administration have been grasping for evidence that a man his administration deported and imprisoned in error is a dangerous gang member, and the effort has now reached what may be an untoppable peak: the President repeatedly insisting in an in-person interview that an obvious text label that says MS13 in the Calibri typeface is an actual tattoo.

On Tuesday, Trump sat for an interview with ABC News correspondent Terry Moran. Moran asked Trump about Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was sent to El Salvador's CECOT prison without due process and in violation of a protective order, and who remains in E …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Elizabeth Lopatto <![CDATA[The DOGE days have just begun]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=656704 2025-04-30T12:09:56-04:00 2025-04-30T09:00:00-04:00
DOGE flag

I once wondered whether law enforcement might stop Elon Musk's power grab. About a month ago, I got my answer: no.

On March 17th, the Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency broke into the nonprofit, congressionally funded US Institute for Peace, according to court documents filed by the USIP's board of directors. By allegedly threatening to "cancel every federal contract" of a private security firm that had worked with USIP until a day earlier, they convinced it to let them into the building - where, told by institute staff they were trespassing, the fired security firm headed for the USIP gun safe. That's when the USIP called the co …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Justine Calma <![CDATA[A Canadian mining company wants Trump’s permission to mine the deep sea]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=658493 2025-04-29T20:29:47-04:00 2025-04-29T20:29:47-04:00 A man wearing sunglasses stands in front of a ship with the name of The Metals Company painted on its side.
Gerard Barron, chairman and CEO of The Metals Company in San Diego, California on June 8, 2021. | Photo: Getty Images

The Metals Company, which has been trying for years to exploit battery materials strewn across the ocean floor, announced today that it has applied for a permit from the Trump administration to start commercially mining in international waters.

Together, the company and President Trump are circumventing a multilateral process to develop rules for deep sea mining that has so far prevented any commercial exploitation from happening.

Moving forward with mining now, before fully understanding the potential environmental impact or having international rules in place to mitigate the damage, is already angering other governments and conservation …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Justine Calma <![CDATA[The EPA says it still cares about forever chemicals, but health advocates are wary]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=658244 2025-04-29T16:47:18-04:00 2025-04-29T16:47:18-04:00 A gloved hand holds a bottle under a running faucet.
A geologist with the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency collects samples of treated Lake Michigan water in a laboratory at the water treatment plant in Wilmette, Illinois, on July 3, 2021. | Photo: Getty Images

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has a new plan to address "forever chemicals" once widely used in non-stick and water-proof products that have since been linked to cancer, reproductive health issues, and liver damage. The vague details the EPA has shared so far, however, have health and environmental advocates wondering whether the EPA's plan helps or delays action to keep the chemicals out of drinking water.

The agency says it'll launch new efforts to study the chemicals and will develop new guidelines to limit pollution from manufacturers. But the announcement on Monday comes as the EPA under Donald Trump attempts to roll back d …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Nilay Patel <![CDATA[Amazon has no choice but to display tariffs on prices now]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=657959 2025-04-29T12:21:37-04:00 2025-04-29T11:45:11-04:00

Here's some dumb stuff that just happened:

  • Punchbowl News, a new-ish DC publication which has an excellent record of political scoops but hasn't done much tech reporting, published a single-sourced rumor that Amazon would soon begin showing tariffs next to prices.
  • Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was asked about this at a White House briefing.
  • White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt stepped in to say that she had just discussed this story with President Trump. "This is a hostile and political act by Amazon," she said.
  • Amazon caved almost immediately. "The team that runs our ultra low cost Amazon Haul store considered the ide …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]> Tina Nguyen <![CDATA[MAGA’s next wave of influencers saved TikTok]]> https://www.theverge.com/?p=656717 2025-04-30T11:52:11-04:00 2025-04-29T10:01:44-04:00

The death knell for American TikTok should have been on March 13th, 2024, when Congress voted on an overwhelmingly bipartisan basis to force its parent company to sell the app or face an outright ban. Rarely do you ever see Republicans and Democrats in agreement over anything, but both sides saw the app as a national security threat and worried that the Chinese government would use it to sow misinformation and secretly harvest its users' personal data. After the bill was signed into law by President Joe Biden and negotiations with ByteDance dragged on, a ban seemed inevitable, even if his adversary Donald Trump won.

After all, MAGA had alw …

Read the full story at The Verge.

]]>