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Judge Throws Out Trump Administration’s Policy Imposing $100,000 Fees for H-1B Visas

The ruling voided “in its entirety” a policy from September requiring companies to pay $100,000 fees for H-1B visa petitions.

© Brian Snyder/Reuters

Judge Leo T. Sorokin wrote that the Trump administration’s policy appeared to step on Congress’s “exclusive power” to levy taxes.
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Ken Paxton’s Former Defense Lawyer Endorses James Talarico

The lawyer, Dan Cogdell, helped save Mr. Paxton from criminal charges and an impeachment, but now he says the Texas attorney general has “lost sight of his mission.”

© Jordan Vonderhaar for The New York Times

Dan Cogdell, a defense attorney for Ken Paxton, at the State Capitol in Austin during Mr. Paxton’s impeachment trial in 2023.
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How Elon Musk’s Friendship With the F.C.C. Smooths the Way for SpaceX’s I.P.O.

Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, has greenlighted regulatory requests for the company’s Starlink satellite internet service and lavished praise on its chief executive.

© Eric Lee for The New York Times

Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.
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U.S. Judge Reverses Decision on Colombian Woman Deported to Congo

The judge had previously ruled that the woman had been improperly deported by the Trump administration and had ordered her returned to the United States.

© Justin Makangara for The New York Times

A hotel in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo, housing deportees from the United States in April.
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Trump Administration Seeks to Revoke U.S. Citizenship of 17 Immigrants

The push to denaturalize more immigrants is the latest sign that the administration is setting its sights on the legal immigration system.

© Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

“We will continue to use every lawful avenue to denaturalize and remove aliens,” Markwayne Mullin, the homeland security secretary, said in a statement.
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China Reasserts Itself, to Contain North Korea’s Tilt Toward Russia

On a rare visit to North Korea, China’s leader, Xi Jinping, projected unity but also sought to remind Kim Jong-un that he is the senior partner in their alliance.

© Pedro Pardo/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

A giant screen in Beijing displayed news footage on Monday of the meeting between China’s president, Xi Jinping, and North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, in North Korea.
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Why Everyone Wants Jon Ossoff to Run for President

The Georgia senator is excoriating Trump and his systemic corruption in a way that transcends the Democratic Party’s progressive-moderate divide.

© José Ibarra Rizo for The New York Times

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How the Drive to Find a Conspiracy Against Trump Rocked the Justice Dept.

The push to investigate what the president’s allies saw as a “deep state” cabal intent on taking him down set off cascading crises, ended careers and undercut the department’s credibility with judges.

© Kenny Holston/The New York Times

The F.B.I. director Kash Patel’s “grand conspiracy case” sought to tie together actions by a group of people that President Trump blamed for various investigations into him.
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They Got Platner’s Endorsement for Maine Governor. What Did They Do With It?

The crowded race for governor has barely qualified as background noise in recent months, drowned out by the high-stakes, turbulent campaign for U.S. Senate.

© Amanda Sabga/Reuters; Cliff Owen & Joel Page, via Associated Press

Democratic candidates Troy Jackson, a former president of the State Senate; Shenna Bellows, the secretary of state, and Hannah Pingree, a former speaker of the State House.
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A ‘Miraculous Transformation’: How Kim Jong-un Fortified North Korea

He used the pandemic to ruthlessly tighten his grip on the country. Then he energized its economy by leveraging Russia’s war in Ukraine.

© Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters

Kim Jong-un arriving at the Dong Dang railway station in Vietnam, near the Chinese border, in 2019.
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Trump Defends Compensation Fund and Iran War in ‘Meet the Press’ Interview

In a lengthy interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press,” the president again vowed that gas prices would go down when the war in Iran ends.

© Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

President Trump speaking to reporters on Air Force One on Friday.
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Why It Takes California So Long to Count Votes

Experts say speeding up the count in California would take more resources, but also scaling back rules that expand voting access.

© Jae C. Hong/Associated Press

Ballots are sorted the day after California’s primary election at the Los Angeles County Ballot Processing Center in City of Industry, Calif., on Wednesday.
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