The Russian Embassy in Tehran has issued an angry denunciation of Wednesday US-Israeli airstrikes which damaged a Russian Orthodox Church and an adjacent nursing home. 

“Two missile strikes on the morning of April 1st in the immediate vicinity of St. Nicholas Orthodox Cathedral in Tehran caused damage to the main building and outbuildings (windows and doors were blown out),” the Russian Embassy said in a statement which featured some photos of the damage.

On April 1, two strikes were conducted near the Saint-Nicholas Orthodox Church in Tehran.

Main building, almshouse and several technical facilities were damaged. No victims 🙏🏻

Statement by the Embassy: https://t.co/zg8QABxkOp pic.twitter.com/eMztNvy7Cu

— Russian Embassy in Iran (@rusembiran) April 1, 2026

Not only the main church complex, but an “almshouse” also suffered damage, according to the official statement. As US-based pro-Iranian opposition NGO also confirmed the strike.

The embassy statement further underscored that the tragedy happened during a sacred week of the Christian calendar.

“We note that St. Nicholas Cathedral was damaged during Great Lent and ahead of one of the main religious holidays, Easter. Due to the military recklessness of the United States and Israel, the Orthodox community in Iran is unable to visit the church,” the diplomatic mission wrote on Telegram.

“The adjacent Russian Nursing Home, where elderly residents still live, also sustained significant damage (including a collapsed roof). Thankfully, there were no casualties,” it added.

There has been a significant Russian emigre community in Tehran – with a church there – going back to the period immediately following 1917 Soviet Revolution, after which Russian Orthodox Christians were heavily persecuted in their home country by Soviet authorities. Many so-called White Russians fled to central and eastern Asia and beyond – and to the West.

The Armenian Orthodox Church has also had a long, very ancient presence in Iran, with the total Christian population of Iran numbering in the low hundreds of thousands – though some modern estimates have put it around possibly one million.

St. Nicholas Church in Tehran

AntiWar.com, citing the AP, has reported that “the missile strike appeared to have targeted the nearby former US embassy compound in Tehran, from where the CIA coordinated the 1953 coup in Iran and where the hostage crisis started in 1979 following the Islamic Revolution that ousted the US-backed Shah.”

“Part of the former embassy has been turned into a museum highlighting the US role in the coup, called the Den of Espionage Museum,” the report continues.

Most Americans are likely unaware of the strong Christian, as well as Jewish presence, throughout Iran. Akin to Bush’s Iraq war, US mainstream media has done little to educate the American public on the sizable Christian minorities – part of ancient communities which predate the advent of Islam the Middle East. Middle East Christians are often the first bystanders in NeoCon regime change wars.

Authored by Tsvetana Paraskova via OilPrice.com,

Australia’s government intends to consider using emergency powers to protect domestic natural gas supply in case of a shortfall on its east coast in the third quarter of 2026.

The potential consideration of using such powers would be part of the steps the Albanese Government is taking to secure domestic gas supplies for Australian households and industry as the Middle East conflict disrupts global energy markets.

Australian Minister for Resources, Madeleine King, has given notice of her intention to consider using powers under the Australian Domestic Gas Security Mechanism (ADGSM) to protect Australian energy supplies in the event of a possible east coast domestic gas shortfall in the third quarter of 2026, the winter months Down Under.

The minister will consult with major gas producers over the next 30 days regarding supplies to the domestic market and will make a decision on whether to use the ADGSM by the middle of May, the government said.

“My decision to issue a notice of intent is a precautionary measure that gives me the flexibility to intervene if Australia is at risk of facing an energy shortfall,” King said in a statement.

“The notice does not place any limits on gas exports. Currently, Australia’s domestic market is well supplied with Australian gas.”

Australia remains a reliable gas supplier to international partners, but if there is a risk of domestic supply shortfall, Australians will be priority for energy supplies during the disruption on the global markets caused by the war in the Middle East, the minister said.

On Wednesday, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) said that wholesale gas supply on Australia’s east coast is expected to be tight and large volumes of gas will likely be required from storage to meet demand in the third quarter of 2026.

Apart from gas supply, Australia has moved to protect consumers from soaring fuel prices.

Early this week, the government halved the fuel excise on gasoline and diesel for three months in a bid to alleviate financial stress from spiking fuel prices.

According to Reuters national security reporter Phil Stewart on X, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has targeted a data center facility operated by Oracle in Dubai. 

IRAN’S REVOLUTIONARY GUARDS SAY THEY HAVE TARGETED ORACLE’S DATA CENTER IN DUBAI – STATE MEDIA

— Phil Stewart (@phildstewart) April 2, 2026

Not much is known about the IRGC strike on Oracle’s data center or what type of air-delivered munitions were involved. There is no word on what damage the facility sustained.

Context on Oracle’s data center operations in the Middle East: 

Oracle’s Dubai facility is its Oracle Cloud UAE East region, with the region identifier me-dubai-1 and region key DXB. Oracle says the Dubai cloud region is located in Dubai, UAE, and the company also operates a second UAE region in Abu Dhabi. 

Oracle’s data center map:

Oracle’s status page currently shows no operational issues in Dubai or worldwide. 

On Wednesday, the IRGC targeted Amazon’s cloud computing operation in Bahrain. Also, last month, numerous data centers operated by U.S. companies were hit by IRGC drones (read report).

Earlier this week, Sepah News, the IRGC’s official news outlet, named 18 U.S. companies with operations in the Middle East that are now considered “legitimate targets.”

“From now on, for every assassination, an American company will be destroyed,” the RGC-affiliated news outlet said.

The list of companies also included Cisco, HP, Intel, Oracle, IBM, Dell, Palantir, JPMorgan, Tesla, GE, Spire Solutions, Boeing, and UAE-based artificial intelligence company G42.

Related:

U.S. Alerts Goldman Sachs Paris After Iranian Group Threatens Terror Bombing

One thing the U.S.-Iran conflict has taught the world is that civilian infrastructure is not off limits, as well as the massive security gaps in protecting data centers from cheap drones. 

Authored by Alexander William Salter via AmericanMind.org,

It’s illegal in theory and ineffective in practice.

The independence of the Federal Reserve System has become a major source of public controversy. As political leaders signal dissatisfaction with monetary policy, officials and commentators rush to defend the central bank’s insulation from democratic pressure.

We are told, as if it were self-evident, that central bank independence is a pillar of sound economic governance.

But this confidence is misplaced. The economic case for central bank independence is far weaker than its defenders suggest. And the constitutional case is weaker still.

Start with economics. The standard argument is that independent central banks deliver low and stable inflation because they are insulated from short-term political incentives.

Elected officials, facing electoral pressures, might be tempted to juice the economy with artificially loose monetary policy. By contrast, independent technocrats can take the long view.

Early empirical studies did show that countries with independent central banks experienced lower inflation. Yet more recent research has cast doubt on this relationship.

The correlation is sensitive to different samples and methods. In many cases, the supposed benefits of independence disappear entirely.

A more plausible explanation has emerged. Countries that enjoy low and stable inflation share deeper institutional characteristics: respect for the rule of law, stable political systems, and credible commitments to property rights. These are the real foundations of sound money. Central bank independence accompanies these basic governance norms, but its standalone effect is debatable.

This matters for a free-enterprise economy. Monetary policy is not a neutral technocratic exercise. Interest rates are prices: the price of time, risk, and capital. When insulated officials tinker with those prices at their discretion, the result is distorted market signals. Cheap credit can mislead investors, encourage unsustainable projects, and redistribute wealth in opaque ways. Independence does not eliminate politics. It simply hides politics behind a veil of expertise.

If the economic case for independence is overstated, the constitutional case is entirely bunk. The Constitution is clear: Congress holds the power “to coin Money” and “regulate the Value thereof.” Monetary authority, like all legislative power, originates with the people’s representatives. Congress may delegate certain functions to administrative bodies, including by creating a central bank. But delegation is not abdication. Those who exercise delegated authority remain accountable to the laws Congress passes and, ultimately, to the chief executive charged with enforcing them.

Yet the modern Fed operates as if our constitutional framework were irrelevant. Its leaders enjoy significant protection from removal. Its decisions (targeting interest rates, allocating credit, regulating banks, etc.) have sweeping consequences for the entire economy. If this does not constitute the exercise of executive power, it is hard to say what does.

The Supreme Court has recently emphasized that administrative agencies cannot be insulated from presidential oversight simply because they possess technical expertise.

The separation of powers does not yield to convenience, nor to the promise of better policy outcomes.

Yet when it comes to the Federal Reserve, the Court has signaled a willingness to tolerate precisely such insulation—a “special case” for the most powerful economic institution in the country.

This exception is indefensible. Appeals to history or prudence, however well-grounded, are not constitutional arguments. An agency that wields executive power must answer to the chief executive. Concerns about how that works in practice does not justify ignoring the Constitution.

The truth is that central bank independence persists not because it is firmly grounded in law or economics, but because the alternative unsettles us. We worry, not without reason, that elected officials might misuse monetary policy for short-term gain. But the Constitution does not permit us to resolve that fear by concentrating vast economic power in the hands of unaccountable experts. A free and self-governing people must confront the difficult task of designing institutions that combine competence with accountability.

That begins with Congress. There are several legislative reforms that can restore the rule of law to monetary policy. First, lawmakers should narrow the Federal Reserve’s mandate to a single, clear objective—price stability—rather than the vague and conflicting goals it currently pursues. A simpler mandate would make it easier to evaluate performance and hold policymakers responsible when they fail.

Second, Congress should revisit the legal protections that shield senior Fed officials from removal. Freedom of judgment is one thing; freedom from oversight is another. Officials entrusted with such consequential authority must ultimately answer to elected leadership. Legislators ought to make it easier to fire central bankers.

Finally, the president should take a more active role in ensuring that the Fed operates within its statutory and constitutional bounds. This does not mean dictating day-to-day interest rate decisions. Instead, it means recognizing that monetary policy, like all exercises of government power, must remain subject to democratic control. President Trump’s nomination of Kevin Warsh as the next Fed chairman is a good start. The two must work together to restore normalcy to the Fed’s everyday operations, something missing since the 2007-08 financial crisis.

Economic stability is obviously desirable. But we cannot purchase it at the cost of self-government.

Republican principles require officials to be answerable to the people.

If we are serious about preserving the constitutional order and free enterprise, we must abandon the comforting myths of central bank independence and restore accountability to the Federal Reserve.

The Gulf energy shock is now hitting Asian economies with full force.

In Seoul, President Lee Jae Myung on Thursday urged citizens to “save every drop of fuel,” a new sign policymakers are moving quickly into crisis mode as the U.S.-Iran conflict raises the risk of nasty fuel shortages across some of Asia’s most energy- and Hormuz-dependent economies.

Lee told lawmakers in a parliamentary address about the urgent need to conserve fuel. He warned that the Middle East crisis has triggered one of the worst energy shocks ever.

“I earnestly appeal to all citizens to actively participate in energy-saving movements in daily lives, such as taking public transportation and conserving electricity,” Lee said.

He added, “The current crisis is not a passing shower that quickly subsides, but rather a massive storm whose duration is uncertain, making it all the more severe.”

South Korea is trying to offset a collapse in energy imports from the Gulf region, with the Hormuz chokepoint still disrupted as the U.S.-Iran conflict enters its second month.

Lee’s government proposed a $17 billion emergency program to cushion households and businesses against fuel price shock.

Seoul has already imposed a fuel price cap, expanded fuel tax cuts, and moved to secure alternative supplies of key petrochemicals such as naphtha, as well as urea for fertilizer.

Seoul also announced it will delay the shutdown of coal-fired power plants and has lifted caps on coal-fired electricity, as coal switching across Asia goes into high gear to offset losses in Gulf energy flows.

In South Asia, India has told coal-fired power plants to crank up power generation. 

Australian officials asked citizens to trade their cars for public transport to conserve fuel. Fuel shortages in the country have become visible in recent weeks because it is highly exposed to Gulf energy flows.

Last month, China halted refined fuel exports to the region to preempt a potential fuel shortage.

JPMorgan analysts recently explained that the energy shockwave from the Iran war is already hitting Asia, with Africa next, then Europe, and shortly thereafter the U.S., especially West Coast states.

Source

The disruption of petrochemical production in the Gulf region has also sparked a global plastics supply crisis. To note, China is the world’s largest plastic consumer and producer.

Which country will be next to declare a fuel crisis and urge citizens to take public transportation? 

Authored by Aidan Johnston via Gun Owners of America,

President Trump campaigned on restoring robust protections for the Second Amendment. Yet more than a year into his second term, gun owners feel disillusioned, and many are planning to sit out the midterm elections.

Having viewed President Trump’s election as a generational opportunity to course-correct, the stark reality is that not all that much has changed with respect to the nation’s gun laws. Gun owners’ frustration centers not on the Administration’s broader record, but on the large number of times the Department of Justice under Attorney General Pam Bondi has fallen short on gun rights.

Ms. Bondi entered office with a mixed record on the Second Amendment. During her time as Florida’s attorney general, she supported a number of anti-gun restrictions after the Parkland shooting, including red flag laws, raising the age for gun ownership, Florida’s open carry ban, and a ban on bump stocks.

Understandably, then, gun rights groups voiced concerns during her nomination. In retrospect, they were completely justified.

For starters, President Trump ordered Bondi to prepare and submit a report examining Second Amendment infringements. But DOJ then sought an extension, and the deadline for DOJ’s report came and went with no public evidence that it was ever delivered. This has left a visible gap where decisive action was promised.

But gun owners aren’t just disappointed in a lack of a public roadmap. DOJ and ATF thus far have failed to curtail three major Biden-era rules that candidate Trump pledged to eliminate in his first week.

First, Biden’s so-called “ghost-gun” regulation survived Supreme Court review in a case that the Trump Department of Justice should have immediately rendered moot.

Second, a regulatory ban on pistol stabilizing braces continues to be enforced against some firearms despite pro-gun injunctions.

Third, Biden’s universal background check rule remains on the books, with DOJ attempting various legal maneuvers to avoid it being struck down.

These unfinished tasks – and many more like them – fuel a narrative of inaction at the department level.

Contrast DOJ’s lack of forward progress on gun rights with progress elsewhere in the administration.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon is using the Civil Rights Division to challenge unconstitutional state-level gun controls, earning regular praise from Second Amendment advocates.

The Department of Veterans Affairs restored gun rights to more than 250,000 veterans previously flagged solely for needing fiduciary assistance with benefits.

The Treasury Department rolled back reputational-risk guidance that had pressured banks against serving the firearms industry.

The Department of the Interior expanded hunting access on federal lands.

And , Congress eliminated a century-old $200 tax on suppressors and short-barreled firearms.

But that Congressional enactment merely circles back to another area where Ms. Bondi’s leadership has lagged. After federal lawmakers reduced the National Firearms Act tax from $200 to zero, DOJ inexplicably continued defending related federal registration requirements against litigation by Gun Owners of America and fifteen Republican state attorneys general.

For its part, GOA repeatedly has offered to help DOJ deliver on President Trump’s campaign promises. But those proffers have almost always been rejected or ignored. Rather, we’ve received a number of requests to temper our criticism of Ms. Bondi, so as not to offend her notoriously sensitive feelings.

As a result, public statements proclaiming that Ms. Bondi’s DOJ is the “most pro-Second Amendment administration in history” became a punchline among Trump’s pro-gun base, rather than a rallying point. Among gun owners, the feeling about DOJ has been, ‘with friends like these, who needs enemies?’

Rather than advancing the president’s agenda on the Second Amendment, Bondi protected the institutional interests of the Department of Justice. Under her leadership, DOJ continued defending unconstitutional gun laws, fought to moot promising pro-Second Amendment lawsuits without resolution, slow-walked deregulatory efforts, and repeatedly assured gun owners that the status quo represented the best achievable outcome.

At one point, Bondi even “bragged” to Congress about ATF—an agency that tyrannized gun owners for four years under Joe Biden.

Gun owners did not vote for President Trump merely to preserve business as usual at the DOJ. Rather, they elected him to radically de-weaponize federal power and fundamentally reorient federal priorities toward safeguarding constitutional rights.

The net result is a paradox. Across most of the executive branch and in Congress, the second Trump term has delivered tangible gains for gun owners. Yet polling and grassroots sentiment still show a negative impression of the administration on firearms issues. Nearly all of that discontent traces back to DOJ’s utter failure to deliver on the President’s campaign promises.

The good news is that this problem is easily fixed by whomever becomes the next Attorney General. A clear roadmap exists:

First, announce immediately that the three Biden ATF rules are no longer being enforced. Direct the ATF to cease new prosecutions or administrative actions based on them.

Second, in ongoing litigation, pursue swift settlements that include binding commitments to non-enforcement and regulatory rescission of Biden-era gun control.

Third, instruct the department to stop defending plainly unconstitutional gun laws and regulations in court, consistent with recent Supreme Court precedent.

These steps require no new legislation and can be executed quickly. Implementing them would demonstrate fidelity to the president’s agenda, neutralize a huge source of voter dissatisfaction, and energize the gun-rights community ahead of the midterms.

Time is short. The midterms loom, and sustained enthusiasm from Second Amendment voters remains essential to building the durable majority President Trump envisions. The next Attorney General will have the tools to repair DOJ’s relationship with gun owners. What DOJ needs now is the will to use them decisively.

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

The recent convention of the Canadian New Democratic Party (NDP) became a microcosm of the inanity of identity politics found in forums ranging from politics to higher education.

Participants were given familiar “equity cards” as literal card-carrying members of groups demanding preferred treatment. The problem is when one identity group demands preference over another. The result, as seen in Winnipeg, was calamity and quickly became comedy.

Many in education have long pushed equity cards and “identity markers” to get students to define themselves by their race, disability, gender, or other criteria. Even computer science teachers are told to tailor their lessons to identity markers.

Such markers are treated as essential to creating “Identity safe classrooms.”

There are even DEI games where children are encouraged to “match” their identity groups.

At the NDP convention, people were given equity cards to give preference to certain identities over groups such as males or whites. The problem is that the cards create an entitlement that can clash with others’ claims to speak first.

The cards were based on identity categories, including gender, race and ethnicity, LGBTQ+ status, and Indigenous status. You were supposed to be able to jump ahead of others because of your priority identity.

One video shows a person holding up their green gender equity card to claim the right to speak first as another woman waves her pink race equity card to speak.

What followed were objections to people not yielding to those with greater priority or right to speak with one noting that cards for people who identify as Black women “have no value outside of this space.”

Then there was the speaker who called out another delegate for the sin of misgendering the speaking who identified as “non-binary.”

The collapse of the equity house of cards is due to the inherent myth that identity politics produces equity. It is, in fact, a separate system of privilege and entitlement. It is used to marginalize other voices in the name of amplifying other voices.

The greatest impact is to balkanize a population or party rather than emphasize common identities.

The alternative is to enforce uniform treatment of any speakers based on such novel devices as a line to speak.

Under this cutting edge approach, people are guaranteed to speak in the order in which they line up to speak. It may be a radical experiment for the NDP, but it has been shown to have some success in other areas.

Amid several waves of missile strikes out of Yemen onto Israel from Tuesday into Wednesday, the Iran-aligned Houthis have made it clear they are coordinating with both Tehran and Hezbollah.

Yemeni Brigadier General Yahya Saree said the Houthis have carried out several missile launch operations on “sensitive targets” in “southern occupied Palestine”. The statement underscored this was conducted “in continuation of supporting and backing the fronts of Resistance” and as part of a “religious, moral, and humanitarian duty” toward allied forces in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine – specifically saying there was coordination with Iran.

Getty Images

The Houthis first announced last week they would be joining the war, but it has been the last 24 to 48 hours that Israel has really been subject of some of the biggest inbound rocket attacks in weeks.

This is because not only have Houthi forces stepped up attacks alongside Iran, but Hezbollah is increasing them too:

Four people were lightly injured as Hezbollah fired around 130 rockets at northern Israel on Wednesday and Thursday, the start of the Passover holiday, as the military struck dozens of sites in Lebanon belonging to the Iran-backed terror group.

The bombardment as Israelis celebrated the first two days of the Passover festival sent hundreds of thousands of people into shelters, as Iran continued to also launch missiles at the country, including the north.

The Houthis have very powerful, and longer-range rockets (compared to Hezbollah, apparently) – which were supplied (or assisted in terms of development) by Iran.

The Houthis are warning of more missile waves to come so long as Iran is attacked, saying the US-Israeli strikes “will only push free Yemen toward further escalation.“

One conflict monitor has compiled some recent examples of the tight Iran-Hezbollah-Houthi coordination this week:

The coordination seems to have been primarily the timing of the launch, as Iranian missiles were launched at Tel Aviv and Bnai Brak at the same time, wounding 14, and Lebanon’s Hezbollah fired rockets at the northern city of Kiryat Shmona, announcing it as the start of the “Khaybar 2″ operation in defense of Lebanon.

The Houthis had previously targeted the resort city of Eilat with missile strikes, and there were missiles that hit that city, though Israeli media has continued to maintain that all the missiles and drones fired by the Houthis were successfully intercepted, so it’s not clear where the Eilat missile actually came from.

Footage shows an Iranian ballistic missile hitting central Israel.

No injuries. pic.twitter.com/u7BAH5CVLw

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) April 2, 2026

A big lingering uncertainty regarding Yemen’s role in the conflict is whether the Houthis will start attacking Red Sea shipping once again. It has already threatened to, and such an escalation would add to deep uncertainty and rising prices in oil and energy markets.

* * *

Buy here. Read more about it here. 

Authored by Chris Summers via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Luigi Mangione, who is accused of murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, had both his state and federal trials postponed on April 1 until the fall.

Luigi Mangione is escorted into Manhattan state court in New York City on Sept. 16, 2025. Seth Wenig/AP Photo

Mangione allegedly shot Thompson, 50, on Dec. 4, 2024, as he walked toward a hotel in Manhattan where UnitedHealth Group was holding its annual investor conference. Mangione, 27, has pleaded not guilty, but faces life in prison if he is convicted in either trial.

Judge Gregory Carro on Wednesday rescheduled the state trial from June 8 to Sept. 8, acting hours after the judge in the federal case, Margaret Garnett, moved jury selection in that matter from Sept. 8 to Oct. 5.

Garnett said her decision was based on Mangione’s state murder trial taking place in June.

Mangione’s attorneys asked to postpone the federal case until January or February 2027. Garnett declined, but accepted there may be a further delay.

“Whether we like it or not, we’re at the mercy of the state case,” Garnett said.

Carro did not explain why he was pushing back the state trial, which is expected to take up to six weeks.

NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch said at the time of the shooting that it was a “brazen, targeted attack.”

Mangione, who is from Maryland, was arrested at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, five days after the shooting.

His lawyers have argued that authorities prejudiced him by turning his arrest into a “Marvel movie” spectacle with armed officers parading him up a pier after he was flown to New York City and by publicly declaring their desire to seek the death penalty before he was indicted.

Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, arrives at a helicopter pad after being extradited from Pennsylvania, in New York, on Dec. 19, 2024. Eduardo Munoz/Reuters

In April 2025, Attorney General Pamela Bondi ordered federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty in Mangione’s case.

In January, Garnett ruled that prosecutors could not seek the death penalty in Mangione’s federal trial. Garnett, a former prosecutor, also threw out a firearms charge.

Along with the new date for the federal trial, Garnett compressed preparations for jury selection to give Mangione and his legal team more time to review questionnaires filled out by hundreds of potential jurors. The original schedule, which was set when the death penalty was still on the table, would’ve overlapped with a state trial held in June.

Prosecutors Urge ‘Speedy Trial’

Federal prosecutors opposed a delay in the trial, arguing that witnesses are harder to locate and that memories fade over time. At least one witness will be traveling from abroad, Assistant U.S. Attorney Dominic Gentile said.

“The public has a right to a speedy trial as well, especially in a case as significant as this,” Gentile said.

He said Mangione’s lawyers had had more than a year to prepare for two trials, which include the same allegations and witnesses.

A truck with a video screen outside Manhattan Federal Court on April 25, 2025. Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images

At a hearing on Feb. 6, Mangione spoke out against the prospect of two trials, telling Carro: “It’s the same trial twice. One plus one is two. Double jeopardy by any commonsense definition.”

During that hearing, defense lawyer Karen Friedman Agnifilo said, “Mr. Mangione is being put in an untenable situation. This is a tug-of-war between two different prosecution offices.”

The Epoch Times reached out to Mangione’s lawyers for comment, but did not receive a response by publication time.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

The Trump administration on Thursday announced a pair of tariff actions under national-security authority, maintaining core 50% duties on many imported steel, aluminum and copper products while overhauling the rules to exempt goods containing negligible amounts of those metals and imposing 100% tariffs on imported patented pharmaceuticals that do not meet new domestic production or pricing conditions.

President Donald Trump pauses as he finishes speaking about the Iran war from the Cross Hall of the White House in Washington on April 1, 2026. Alex Brandon-Pool/Getty Images

The pharmaceutical measure targets branded drugs and active ingredients brought in by companies that have neither struck “most-favored-nation” pricing deals with the U.S. government nor committed to manufacturing in the United States. Exemptions will be honored for firms that reach such agreements or are already building or expanding U.S. plants. The policy gives large drugmakers 120 days and smaller ones 180 days to comply. Generics and certain trade-agreement partners are largely unaffected.

Exceptions were also granted, lowering tariffs to 15 percent – for the European Union, Switzerland, Japan, and South Korea, and a 10 percent levy for the United Kingdom.

Reduced rates reflect prior commitments with trading partners, according to a senior administration official.

The UK was awarded a lower tariff “because they were the first ones who did this deal, and they committed to raise their prices for pharmaceuticals, and they have actually done so,” the official told reporters during a background call on April 2.

Trump negotiated deals with 13 pharmaceutical companies over the past year, securing $400 billion in domestic manufacturing investments, the Epoch Times reports.

In tandem, the White House released updated fact sheets detailing changes to Section 232 tariffs on steel, aluminum and copper and their derivative products. The administration will keep 50% tariffs in place on many imported steel, aluminum and copper products. However, goods in which the total steel, aluminum or copper content is below 15% will be effectively exempted. Some other derivative goods will face a lower 25% rate if they are deemed “substantially made” of one of the metals. Even so, 50% tariffs will remain on a large number of derivative products—including imported steel pipe—and will be assessed against the full value of the product, not merely its metal content.

Aluminum cans are shown during a production run before being filled with craft beer at Black Plague Brewery in Oceanside, California, U.S., March 14, 2025. REUTERS/Mike Blake/File Photo

A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity to describe the changes before formal announcement, said the revisions were designed “to simplify a complicated policy and provide more fairness to businesses grappling with President Donald Trump’s tariff regime.”

The adjustments follow months of lobbying by companies that complained that earlier duties on derivative products unfairly hit items containing only trace amounts of metal, Bloomberg reports. Officials cited consumer products such as dental floss, which contains a small metal cutter but otherwise has negligible steel or aluminum content, and washing machines as examples that will now receive relief.

Summary of metals tariffs (via the White House):

The Trump administration will maintain 50% tariffs on many imported steel, aluminum, and copper products under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962.
The policy simplifies duties for goods made with negligible amounts of these metals to provide fairness to businesses and ease compliance.
Goods with total steel, aluminum, or copper content below 15% will be effectively exempted from the metals tariffs.
Some derivative goods will be subject to a lower 25% rate if they are deemed “substantially made” of steel, aluminum, or copper.
50% tariffs will remain in place on a large number of derivative products – including, for example, imported steel pipe – and will be assessed against the full value of the product, not merely its metal content.
The revisions address months of lobbying from companies that said earlier duties unfairly hit items containing only trace amounts of metal.
Examples of products receiving relief include consumer goods such as dental floss (small metal cutter with negligible steel/aluminum content) and washing machines.
The changes build on the administration’s second-term trade agenda and follow the Supreme Court’s earlier decision striking down certain emergency authorities, allowing the White House to continue using Section 232 national-security tools.
Administration officials emphasized that the revisions will not have a significant impact on consumer prices and will help ensure the tariffs function as originally intended.

The revised metal tariffs were established under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. They come roughly one year after the launch of the administration’s second-term trade agenda, which initially imposed broad levies using emergency authorities. The Supreme Court earlier this year struck down certain country-by-country tariffs imposed under that emergency law, prompting the administration to rebuild protections through alternative pathways.

Administration officials said the changes are intended to support domestic production and American workers while easing compliance burdens. Jon Toomey, president of the Coalition for a Prosperous America, a group representing U.S. manufacturers, welcomed the move. “This action will help ensure these tariffs function as intended to support domestic production and American workers,” he said.

The White House downplayed the revised tariff scheme’s likely impact on consumer prices. Officials noted that while some imported steel and aluminum goods could face higher duties under the new full-value assessment, the simplified structure should reduce administrative headaches for importers.

Full official proclamations, fact sheets and implementation guidance from the Commerce Department and U.S. Customs and Border Protection are now available on whitehouse.gov. Affected industries have a window to adjust supply chains before the changes take full effect. Trading partners are expected to review the measures in the coming days.