Why corporate America is mostly staying quiet as federal immigration agents show up at its doors by Alessandro Piazza

 

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When U.S. Border Patrol agents entered a Target store in Richfield, Minnesota, in early January, detaining two employees, it marked a new chapter in the relationship between corporate America and the federal government.

Across the Twin Cities, federal immigration enforcement operations have turned businesses into sites of confrontation — with agents in store parking lots rounding up day laborers, armed raids on restaurants and work authorization inspections conducted in tactical gear.

Some retailers report revenue drops of 50% to 80% as customers stay home out of fear. Along Lake Street and in East St. Paul, areas within the Twin Cities, an estimated 80% of businesses have closed their doors at some point since the operations began.

Then came the killing of U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti, the latter of which came a day after widespread protests and a one-day business blackout involving over 700 establishments.

The response of corporate America to those killings was instructive — both for what was said and left unsaid. After the Pretti killing, more than 60 CEOs from Minnesota’s largest companies — Target, 3M, UnitedHealth Group, U.S. Bancorp, General Mills, Best Buy and others — signed a public letter organized by the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce. The letter called for “peace,” “focused cooperation” among local, state and federal officials, and a “swift and durable solution” so that families, workers and businesses could return to normal.

What it didn’t do was name Pretti, mention federal immigration enforcement or criticize any specific policy or official. It read less like moral leadership and more like corporate risk management. 

 

As a researcher who studies corporate political engagement, I think the Minnesota CEO letter is a window into a broader shift. For years, companies could take progressive stances with limited risk — activists would punish them if they remained silent on an issue, but conservatives rarely retaliated when they spoke up. That asymmetry has collapsed. Minneapolis shows what corporate activism looks like when the risks cut both ways: hedged language, no names named and calls for calm.

A shifting pattern

In 2022, after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, corporate America was remarkably quiet compared with its vocal stances on LGBTQ+ rights or the war in Ukraine.

The explanation: Companies tend to hedge on issues that are contested and polarizing. In my research with colleagues on companies taking stances on LGBTQ+ rights in the United States, I’ve found that businesses frame their stances narrowly when issues are unsettled — focusing on workplace concerns and internal constituencies like employees rather than broader advocacy. Only after issues are legally or socially settled do some companies shift to clearer activism, adopting the language of social movements: injustice, moral obligation, calls to action. 

 

By that logic, the Minnesota CEOs’ caution makes sense. The Trump administration’s federal immigration enforcement policy is deeply contested. There’s no clear legal or social settlement in sight.

But something else has changed since 2022 — something that goes beyond any particular issue.

For years, corporate activism operated under a favorable asymmetry that allowed them to stake out public positions on controversial topics without much negative consequence.

That is, activists and employees pressured companies to speak out on progressive causes, and silence carried real costs. Meanwhile, conservatives largely subscribed to free-market economist Milton Friedman’s view that the only social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. They generally didn’t demand corporate stances on their issues, and they didn’t organize sustained punishment for progressive corporate speech.

That asymmetry has collapsed

During the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, corporations rushed to declare their commitments to racial justice, diversity and social responsibility. Many of those same companies have since quietly dismantled diversity, equity and inclusion programs, walked back public commitments and gone silent on issues they once called moral imperatives. It appears that their allegedly deeply held values were contingent on a favorable political environment. When the risks shifted, the values evaporated.

The turning point may have been Disney’s opposition to Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law in 2022. The company faced criticism from employees and activists for not doing enough – and then fierce retaliation from Florida’s government, which stripped Disney of self-governing privileges it had held for 55 years.

In other high-profile examples, Delta lost tax breaks in Georgia after ending discounts for National Rifle Association members following the Parkland shooting. And Bud Light lost billions in market value after a single social media promotion that featured Dylan Mulvaney, a transgender influencer.

Conservatives learned to play the game that progressive activists invented. And unlike consumer boycotts, government retaliation carries a different kind of weight.

 

Minneapolis reveals the new calculus

What makes Minneapolis distinctive is that the federal government isn’t a distant policy actor debating legislation in Washington. It’s a physical presence in companies’ daily operations. When federal agents can show up at your store, detain your employees, raid your parking lot and audit your hiring records, the calculation about whether to criticize federal policy looks very different than when the worst-case scenario is an angry tweet from a politician.

Research finds that politicians are less willing to engage with CEOs who take controversial stances – even in private meetings – regardless of local economic conditions or the politicians’ own views on business. The chilling effect is real. As one observer noted, Minnesota companies communicated through industry associations specifically “to avoid direct exposure to possible retaliation.”

“De-escalation,” then, has become the corporate buzzword of choice because, as one news report in The Wall Street Journal noted, it “sounds humane while remaining politically noncommittal.” It points to a process goal – reduce conflict, restore order – rather than a contested diagnosis of responsibility.

This is the triple bind facing businesses in Minneapolis: pressure from the federal government on one side, pressure from activists and employees on the other, and the economic devastation from enforcement itself — comparable in some areas to the COVID-19 pandemic — crushing them in the middle. It’s a situation that rewards silence and punishes principle, and most companies are making the predictable choice.

And yet the situation within companies is also full of internal tensions, whether they’re companies headquartered in Minnesota or not. At tech company Palantir, which holds contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, employees took to internal Slack channels after Pretti’s death to express that they felt “not proud” to work for a company tied to what they described as “the bad guys.” Similar sentiments could be seen at elsewhere, where rank-and-file employees expressed far more vocal outrage than their bosses.

What comes next

The Minnesota CEO letter is what corporate political engagement looks like when the risks run in every direction: no injustice framing, no attribution of blame, no names named — just calls for stability and cooperation.

As a local Minneapolis writer put it in an op-ed: “Stand up, or sit down … because the Minnesotans who are standing up? We don’t recognize you.”

It’s not cowardice, exactly. It’s what the research predicts when an issue is contested and the costs of speaking cut both ways.

But it does mean Americans shouldn’t expect corporations to lead when government power is directly at stake. The conditions that enabled corporate activism on LGBTQ+ rights — an asymmetry where speaking out was relatively low-risk — don’t exist here.

Until the political landscape shifts, the hedged statement and the cautious coalition letter are the new normal. Corporate activism, it turns out, might always have been more about positioning than principle.

Even with Trump’s support, coal power remains expensive – and dangerous by Hannah Wiseman/Seth Blumsack

 

As projections of U.S. electricity demand rise sharply, President Donald Trump is looking to coal – historically a dominant force in the U.S. energy economy – as a key part of the solution.

In an April 2025 executive order, for instance, Trump used emergency powers to direct the Department of Energy to order the owners of coal-fired power plants that were slated to be shut down to keep the plants running.

He also directed federal agencies to “identify coal resources on Federal lands” and ease the process for leasing and mining coal on those lands. In addition, he issued orders to exclude coal-related projects from environmental reviews, promote coal exports and potentially subsidize the production of coal as a national security resource.

And in February 2026, Trump ordered the U.S. military to increase its purchases of electricity from coal-fired power plants.

But there remain limits to the president’s power to slow the declining use of coal in the U.S. And while efforts continue to overcome these limits and prop up coal, mining coal remains an ongoing danger to workers: In 2025, there were five coal-mining deaths in West Virginia and at least two others elsewhere in the U.S.

 A long legacy

Until 2015, coal-fired power plants generated more electricity than any other type of fuel in the U.S. But with the rapid expansion of a new type of hydraulic fracturing, natural gas became a cheap and stable source for power generation. The prices of solar and wind power also dropped steadily. These alternatives ultimately overcame coal in the U.S. power supply.

 

Before this change, coal mining defined the economy and culture of many U.S. towns – and some states and regions, such as Wyoming and Appalachia – for decades. And in many small towns, coal-related businesses, including power plants, were key employers.

Coal has both benefits and drawbacks. It provides a reliable fuel source for electricity that can be piled up on-site at power plants without needing a tank or underground facility for storage.

But it’s dirty: Thousands of coal miners developed a disease called black lung. The federal government pays for medical care for some sick miners and makes monthly payments to family members of miners who die prematurely. Burning coal also emits multiple air pollutants, prematurely killing half a million people in the United States from 1999 through 2020.

Coal is dangerous for workers, too. Some coal-mining companies have had abysmal safety records, leading to miner deaths, such as the recent drowning of a miner in a sudden flood in a West Virginia mine. Safety reforms have been implemented since the Big Branch Mine explosion in 2010, and coal miner deaths in the U.S. have since declined. But coal mining remains a hazardous job.

 A champion of coal

In both of his terms, Trump has championed the revival of coal. In 2017, for example, Trump’s Department of Energy asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to pay coal and nuclear plants higher rates than the competitive market would pay, saying they were key to keeping the U.S. electricity grid running. The commission declined.

In his second term, Trump is more broadly using powers granted to the president in emergencies, and he is seeking to subsidize coal across the board – in mining, power plants and exports.

At least some of the urgency is coming from the rapid construction of data centers for artificial intelligence, which the Trump administration champions. Many individual data centers use as much power as a small or medium city. There’s enough generation capacity to power them, though only by activating power plants that are idle most of the time and that operate only during peak demand periods. Using those plants would require data centers to reduce their electricity use during those peaks – which it’s not clear they would agree to do.

So many data centers, desperate for 24/7 electricity, are relying on old coal-fired power plants – buying electricity from plants that otherwise would be shutting down.

 

Limits remain

Despite the Trump adminstration’s efforts to rapidly expand data centers and coal to power them, coal is more expensive than most other fuels for power generation, with costs still rising.

Half of U.S. coal mines have closed within the past two decades, and productivity at the remaining mines is declining due to a variety of factors, such as rising mining costs, environmental regulation and competition from cheaper sources. Coal exports have also seen declines in the midst of the tariff wars.

The U.S. Department of the Interior’s recent effort to follow Trump’s orders and lease more coal on federal lands received only one bid – at a historically low price of less than a penny per ton. But in fact, even if the government gave its coal away for free, it would still make more economic sense for utilities to build power plants that use other fuels. This is due to the high cost of running old coal plants as compared to new natural gas and renewable infrastructure.

Natural gas is cheaper – and, in some places, so are renewable energy and battery storage. Government efforts to prevent the retirement of coal-fired power plants and boost the demand for coal may slow coal’s decline in the short term. In the long term, however, coal faces a very uncertain future as a part of the U.S. electricity mix.

Concerns over autocracy in the U.S. continue to grow by Frank Langfitt

 As the United States heads toward the midterm elections, there are growing concerns among some political scientists that the country has moved even further along the path to some form of autocracy. 

 Staffan I. Lindberg, the founding director of Sweden's V-Dem Institute, which monitors democracy across the globe, says the U.S. has already crossed the threshold and become an "electoral autocracy."

Steven Levitsky, a professor of government at Harvard University and co-author of How Democracies Die, agrees.

"I would argue that the United States in 2025-26 has slid into a mild form of competitive authoritarianism," Levitsky said. "I think it's reversible, but this is authoritarianism."

Under competitive authoritarianism, countries still hold elections, but the ruling party uses various tactics — attacking the press, disenfranchising voters, weaponizing the justice system and threatening critics — to tilt the electoral playing field in its favor.

 

Levitsky cited what he considers two strikingly autocratic moments that occurred in September. First, the Trump administration threatened ABC's parent company, Disney, following Jimmy Kimmel's comments on the killing of Charlie Kirk.

"We can do this the easy way or the hard way," Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, warned.

A week later, President Trump proposed that U.S. generals use American cities as training grounds for their troops.

"We're under invasion from within," Trump said to a gathering of military brass in Quantico, Virginia. "No different than a foreign enemy, but more difficult in many ways because they don't wear uniforms."

 

Levitsky said this is the kind of language dictators in South America used in the 1970s — leaders like Augusto Pinochet in Chile.

A smaller number of scholars reject the portrayal of Trump as a would-be autocrat. They say he is expanding executive power to address the excesses of his predecessor, former President Joe Biden.

Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School, says Trump is pressuring news organizations and universities to address problems with liberal bias.

"There are legitimate objections that have been raised by the Trump administration," said Turley, the author of Rage and the Republic. "That does not justify some of the means, but there is a long-standing need for a debate within these institutions."

 

Other political scientists say the U.S. system of government is battered but still democratic. Kurt Weyland, who researches democracy and authoritarianism at the University of Texas at Austin, says he's increasingly confident that the U.S. can withstand Trump's sweeping attempt to expand executive power.

Weyland said that for the first months of his second term, Trump was like a "steamroller" and faced little containment or opposition. But Weyland, who wrote Democracy's Resilience to Populism's Threat: Countering Global Alarmism, says that has changed.

For instance, Kimmel was yanked off the air but soon returned and continues to routinely mock Trump. Weyland also said the president's attempt to tilt the electoral playing field through mass redistricting hasn't worked out as he might have hoped.

"If the guy had succeeded in seriously skewing [future] elections in the House, that would've gone to the core of democracy," said Weyland, "but he didn't. He got barely anything."

Weyland also said federal agents shooting two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis last month was disastrous for the president. Border czar Tom Homan said last week that the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota is ending. Weyland thinks the public blowback to the killings limits Trump's ability to deploy such aggressive tactics going forward.

 The next big test for American democracy could come in November's midterms. The Trump administration is suing states to hand over voter data, which worries Kim Scheppele, a Princeton University sociologist who has studied the authoritarian tactics of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.

In 2014, Orbán's government messaged Hungarian voters living in the United Kingdom to go to one polling place and then switched to a different location on Election Day.

"They disenfranchised almost all the Hungarians in the U.K., most of whom were oppositional to Orbán," says Scheppele.

This month, Steve Bannon, a close Trump ally, proposed that the administration deploy Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to polling places to root out undocumented migrants trying to vote — which is statistically rare.

 White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said she'd never heard the president discuss such a plan — and federal law prohibits it.

But Brendan Nyhan, a professor of government at Dartmouth College, worries that such a move would drive down participation by people of color and naturalized citizens who fear harassment by ICE. If ICE were deployed, Nyhan hopes it would spark even more people to vote.

"But even contemplating that kind of interference is, I think, a really substantial threat," said Nyhan. "The way Election Day works in this country, there are no do-overs."

Bezos orders deep job cuts at 'Washington Post' by David Folkenflik

 

The Washington Post moved Wednesday at the behest of owner Jeff Bezos to cut a third of its entire workforce. The layoffs affect every corner of the newsroom.

In a newsroom Zoom call, Executive Editor Matt Murray called the move "a strategic reset" it needs to compete in the era of artificial intelligence. The paper had not evolved with the times, he said, and the changes were overdue in light of "difficult and even disappointing realities."

With the job cuts, the storied newspaper narrows the scope of its ambitions for the foreseeable future. It is a remarkable reversal for a vital pillar of American journalism that had looked to Bezos — one of the wealthiest people on Earth — as a champion and a financial savior.

 

Murray said the Post will shutter its sports desk, while keeping some sports reporters who will write feature stories. It will likewise close its Books section and suspend the signature podcast Post Reports.

The international desk will shrink dramatically. Among those laid off: the paper's Ukraine bureau chief and correspondent, the latter of whom was in a war zone. (The local staffers are still employed as of now.)

The paper's entire Middle East desk was let go, according to their social media posts. So too was Caroline O'Donovan, the reporter who covers Amazon — the primary source of Bezos' wealth.

On the newsroom call, Murray said the decisions did not reflect the quality of the work.

The Metro section will be restructured, ensuring a "healthy presence for local subscribers," he said. According to a Metro staffer who was just laid off, there will be about a dozen people left on the desk. That's down from more than 40. (The staffer did not want to be named because negotiations over severance are ongoing.)

 The Post, which is privately held by Bezos, declined through a spokesperson to confirm basic data about its newsroom, subscriptions and other financial data for this article. Bezos has so far remained silent throughout the process.

 

"Ill-conceived decisions"

For the past 20 years, the paper has defined itself as "For and About Washington." Former controlling owner Don Graham and former Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. reveled in news stories and investigative pieces about local crime, politics, school boards, traffic, weather, sports. It has had a robust report about the arts and restaurant scene.

But the paper also had an understanding that a sophisticated audience — including politicians, foreign diplomats and businesses with international interests — also relied on the paper's coverage of matters abroad.

"This ranks among the darkest days in the history of one of the world's greatest news organizations," former Executive Editor Marty Baron said in a statement Wednesday. "The Washington Post's ambitions will be sharply diminished, its talented and brave staff will be further depleted, and the public will be denied the ground-level, fact-based reporting in our communities and around the world that is needed more than ever."

While acknowledging that the media industry as a whole is struggling, Baron blamed Bezos for exacerbating the newspaper's woes through "ill-conceived decisions," including killing an endorsement in fall 2024 of Kamala Harris for president. That choice, which Bezos took responsibility for, led hundreds of thousands of subscribers to cancel their subscriptions. 

 

Under Baron, whom Bezos inherited as executive editor, the paper flourished, flexing journalistic muscle in accountability reporting on President Trump's first term in office.

It reaped rewards from readers too, exceeding 3 million paying subscribers. It is now far below that level, according to a person at the paper with knowledge. (The person spoke on condition of anonymity, citing fears of being fired for speaking to the press.)

Now the Post appears poised to appeal primarily to readers interested in issues about the U.S. government, with an emphasis on national security and American politics. In a note to staff, Murray also said the paper would focus on other areas too, including culture, science, health, business and "journalism that empowers people to take action, from advice to wellness."

 

Several former editors said it appeared the paper was seeking to compete more with such specialized publications as Politico and Punchbowl rather than The New York Times. And numerous Post reporters and editors blamed their chief executives under Bezos — first Fred Ryan, a former Politico CEO — and then publisher and CEO Will Lewis, the former chief executive of the Wall Street Journal and a top executive at the British Telegraph and at Rupert Murdoch's London newspaper division.

"There's no question you can produce a world-class news report with fewer people. But the how and why matter. What's the strategy?" says former Post Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli, who also served as managing editor at The Wall Street Journal, although not at the same time as Lewis. "The Post occupies a singular place in American journalism. It needs visionary and independent stewardship that is equal to its journalism, worthy of its promise and necessary to meet this important moment in history."

Quiet from the top

Lewis charmed the newsroom upon his arrival in the winter of 2024, but that curdled as news reports focused on episodes of allegations of wrongdoing during his British newspaper days.

 

Senior editors at the paper told colleagues that they had been cut out of the process of helping to design the strategy for the restructured Post. Executive Editor Murray, who previously held the same job at The Journal under Lewis, pushed back against even more extreme cuts, they said. NPR spoke to a dozen current and former Post staffers for this article. Most spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing concerns of job security.)

In June 2024, Lewis told his colleagues at an all-staff meeting that not enough of the public wanted to read their reporting. He said the paper had lost $177 million over two years.

Lewis has not held a town hall with his staff since. Nor, despite a flurry of futuristic sounding initiatives, ranging from the use of artificial intelligence to craft individual news roundups and a "third newsroom" to come up with experimental coverage, have those losses in the tens of millions of dollars abated. And Lewis has not, until now, articulated his strategy for the paper's future. Cuts had been anticipated in December but put off, creating a frenzy within the newsroom. 

 Lewis did not participate in the discussion with staff on Wednesday.

In recent weeks, scores of journalists wrote letters to Bezos to preserve the Post. He has a personal wealth estimated at $261 billion by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

 

But his thinking about the paper has evolved since he bought it in 2013 from the Graham family for $250 million. He spoke then about the paper as a civic investment, although one for which he wanted innovation to drive financial sustainability.

He poured money into it: The newsroom grew by about 85% at its peak. Some former Post executives say a stripped-down newsroom from those heights could easily still dominate audiences in greater Washington, D.C.

The Post Guild, which represents staffers, is planning a rally for Thursday outside the paper's headquarters.

"These layoffs are not inevitable. A newsroom cannot be hollowed out without consequences for its credibility, its reach and its future," the union said in a statement. "If Jeff Bezos is no longer willing to invest in the mission that has defined this paper for generations and serve the millions who depend on Post journalism, the The Post deserves a steward that will."

Trump sought Schumer’s support to rename Dulles, Penn Station after him for tunnel funds: Reports by Alexander Bolton

 The Amazon founder bought the paper to save it. Instead, with a mass layoff, he’s forced it into severe decline.

 

President Trump told Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) last month that he would drop his hold on more than $16 billion in funding for the Gateway tunnel project connecting New York and New Jersey if Schumer agreed to rename Penn Station and Washington Dulles International Airport, according to reports.

Schumer immediately rejected the proposal, explaining to the president that it was beyond his authority to advance the Trump’s unusual request, according to sources cited by Punchbowl News and CNN.

 

New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D) called the president’s proposal “ridiculous.”

“These naming rights aren’t tradable as part of any negotiations, and neither is the dignity of New Yorkers,” Gillibrand said in a statement. “At a time when New Yorkers are already being crushed by high costs under the Trump tariffs, the president continues to put his own narcissism over the good-paying union jobs this project provides and the extraordinary economic impact the Gateway tunnel will bring.”

Trump met with Schumer in mid-January at the president‘s request to discuss the administration‘s hold on the Gateway tunnel project funding.

 

The New York Democrat at the meeting urged Trump to press Senate Republicans to approve a three-year extension of the enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits that expired at the end of 2025.

He also told the president that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids to deport immigrants from Minnesota and other cities are “terrorizing communities,” according to his office. Schumer urged Trump to pull back ICE officers from Minneapolis.

Democrats have reacted angrily to Trump’s decision to add his name to Washington’s famous John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The move has led to several performers pulling out of scheduled events at the venue.

 

Schumer, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.) and other Democrats, such as Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.) and Mark Warner (Va.), condemned the president’s attempt to name the center after himself.

Whitehouse, the ranking member of the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee, released a statement this week protesting the announcement that the Kennedy Center would close for two weeks for renovations.

He accused Trump of “bucking rules and convention” to “commandeer the Kennedy Center as a clubhouse for his friends and political allies.”

The president has also faced backlash over adding his name to the U.S. Institute of Peace and after demolition began on the White House’s East Wing for Trump’s massive ballroom project.

 

 

Powerful people, random redactions: 4 things to know about the latest Epstein files BY Stephen Fowler , Jaclyn Diaz

 

The release of millions of pages of Epstein files Friday has raised more questions than it has answered.

Convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein's private communications continue to reveal the web of powerful figures who sought his friendship and counsel. Internal notes from the Justice Department show the extent of allegations made against Epstein — but also against others who have not faced criminal charges for sex trafficking.

Speaking on CNN's State of the Union on Sunday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said new charges for anyone are unlikely.

"I can't talk about any investigations, but I will say the following, which is that in July, the Department of Justice said that we had reviewed the 'Epstein files,' and there was nothing in there that allowed us to prosecute anybody," he said. "We then released over 3 1/2 million pieces of paper, which the entire world can look at now and see if we got it wrong."

 

Here are four takeaways from the latest release of the Epstein files.

The files aren't organized and have issues with redactions

NPR's review of the documents has found numerous examples of the Justice Department failing to redact names of publicly identified victims of sexual abuse as well as names of individuals who have not previously been publicized.

The Epstein Files Transparency Act, signed by President Trump last year, called for the Justice Department to minimize its redactions while turning over information about the life and death of Epstein and the criminal charges he and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell faced. Maxwell is serving a 20-year sentence in federal prison for sexual exploitation and trafficking of children, crimes she committed with Epstein.

Those redactions, too, are inconsistent with what the law directs.

"In addition to the documentary redactions, which includes personal identifying information, victim information and other privileges, there is extensive redaction to images and videos to protect victims," Blanche said Friday, announcing the final batch of files. "We redacted every woman depicted in any image or video, with the exception of Ms. Maxwell. We did not redact images of any men unless it was impossible to redact the woman without also redacting the man."

 But multiple examples can be found in the Epstein files repository that show the faces of women and hide the faces of men, including one text message conversation between former Trump adviser Steve Bannon and Epstein where Trump's face in a news article was obscured with a black box.

 

The files aren't shared in chronological order or grouped in any identifiable way. Countless duplicate copies of email threads, investigative files and correspondence are spread throughout the database, sometimes with different levels of redactions applied.

The same PowerPoint presentation prepared last fall by the Justice Department detailing the timeline and cases against Epstein and Maxwell, alleged victims and powerful figures in his orbit who faced allegations of misconduct appears six times with different information blocked out in each version.

 

Annie Farmer, one of the women who testified in court against Epstein and Maxwell, told NPR's All Things Considered on Monday that the redaction issues felt intentional.

"There's just no explanation for how it could've been done so poorly," she said. "They've had victims' names for a very long time. I don't think this is just about rushing to get this information out."

A Department of Justice spokesperson said in a statement to NPR that the department "takes victim protection very seriously and has redacted thousands of victim names in the millions of published pages to protect the innocent."

"The Department had 500 reviewers looking at millions of pages for this very reason, to meet the requirements of the act while protecting victims," the statement reads. "When a victim's name is alleged to be unredacted, our team is working around the clock to fix the issue and republish appropriately redacted pages as soon as possible. To date, 0.1% of released pages have been found to have victim identifying information unredacted."

That number, if taken at face value, would suggest more than 3,000 pages revealed sensitive information about Epstein victims.

A federal judge in New York will hold a hearing Wednesday morning on a request from victims' lawyers to shut down the dedicated website for the trove of documents until all victim information is removed. Several files NPR previously identified that contained personally identifying information have since been removed.

 

Epstein's connections are vast and personal

Epstein surrounded himself with wealthy and influential people throughout his life from a variety of disciplines and ideologies. A revealing prison psychiatric evaluation, published following his death by suicide while awaiting a federal trial in 2019, said the enigmatic financier had few close friends, despite having a huge social circle.

"He had been a successful, wealthy businessman with a number of high-profile acquaintances that he accumulated through a combination of charisma, charm, and intelligence. Despite his many associates, he had limited significant or deep interpersonal ties," the evaluation said. "Although Mr. Epstein appeared to cultivate a large social and professional network, he was estranged from his only brother. Indeed, his identity appeared to be based on his wealth, power, and association with other high profile individuals."

The more than 3 million pages released by the Justice Department last Friday show how many of his relationships with prominent figures in Hollywood, finance and politics continued well after Epstein was convicted in Florida in 2008 of sex crimes. Appearing in the files and in communications with Epstein is not an indication of wrongdoing or knowledge of Epstein's crimes.

Epstein and billionaire Elon Musk were in contact several times over many years, according to these documents, including several unsuccessful attempts for the two to meet.

"What day/night will be the wildest party on your island?," Musk asked in 2012.

"sorry we didn't connect," Epstein wrote a few weeks later.

The newest batch of files includes numerous messages with the spiritualist Deepak Chopra about his finances, notes from a meeting with the founder of popular image board 4chan, Christopher Poole, and more conversations with figures like former Obama White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler and former Clinton Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, who have already faced scrutiny for their Epstein ties.

A look into Epstein's finances

Epstein's notoriety stems in part from his work as a financial adviser and his sizable wealth.

 

The new files fill in some pictures about his money and how he used it. As a child, Epstein attended the Interlochen Center of the Arts, a nonprofit that runs an arts-focused school and summer camp, in the summer of 1967. Records show Epstein participated in programs for the bassoon, radio and orchestra.

These records from Interlochen released by the DOJ also show that Epstein donated close to $400,000 to the center, which has a campus in Michigan, from 1990 to 2003.

Epstein's history at the camp and years of donations were confirmed by the center last December. The organization said it distanced itself from Epstein after his conviction in 2008.

 

The organization said, "Interlochen conducted an internal review and found no record of complaint or concern about Epstein. All donor recognition in his name was removed from campus at that time. Subsequent to Epstein's second arrest in July 2019, we again reviewed our records and found no report or complaint involving Epstein within our records."

Epstein and his ex-girlfriend and accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell are alleged to have used the Interlochen campus as a hunting ground, however. During Maxwell's criminal trial, a woman testified that she met the couple when she was a girl while in between classes at the camp in the early '90s. The couple gained her mother's trust and when she returned home to Florida, the girl and her mother visited Epstein and Maxwell. Afterward the girl said she was groomed and sexually abused.

Interlochen said in a statement following this testimony, "No abuse is alleged to have taken place on the Interlochen campus. Our policies, then and now, do not permit unsupervised contact between students and donors."

Epstein updated his trust two days before death

 Just two days before his death by suicide in a Manhattan jail cell Aug. 10, 2019, Epstein updated his will for the last time. He planned to dole out his considerable wealth to a host of friends, employees, business associates and his brother's children upon his death.

 

The deceased sex offender and disgraced financier's trust, which was not previously made public, details how Epstein wanted his millions of dollars, and his properties including the infamous Little Saint James Island in the U.S. Virgin Islands, distributed to at least 44 people.

Epstein signed his trust on Aug. 8, 2019. The document was signed by his longtime lawyer Darren Indyke on Aug. 18, 2019, eight days after Epstein's death. His accountant, Richard Kahn, signed it two days later.

Under this trust, Indyke was set to get $50 million and Kahn $25 million.

Epstein's last known girlfriend, Karyna Shuliak, was set to get the bulk of Epstein's fortune, including $50 million outright a year after his death, his New Mexico Zorro Ranch property, his two properties in the U.S. Virgin Islands, his Paris apartment, his Palm Beach home and his Upper East Side townhouse in Manhattan.

Epstein also bequeathed Shuliak multiple pieces of jewelry, including an almost 33 carat diamond ring and 48 separate loose diamonds previously given to her "in contemplation of marriage," the trust says in a handwritten note in blue ink.

Maxwell and Epstein's brother were set to get $10 million each, with Mark Epstein's share intended to go to a trust to benefit his children.

It's unclear how much money each of these beneficiaries actually received following Epstein's death. At the time of his death, his estate was valued at close to $600 million, according to court documents from the U.S. Virgin Islands. But after he died, victims of Epstein received more than $120 million from a fund dedicated to compensating more than 100 victims.

According to the records released by the DOJ, the former billionaire updated and amended his will and trust more than two dozen times over many years. The regular changes offer some insight on the prominent people who circled in and out of Epstein's inner circle over the years.

In a version of Epstein's trust from 2012, Jean Luc Brunel, a modeling scout and close associate of Epstein's for decades, is listed as getting as much as $5 million.

Brunel was arrested in 2020 by French authorities and held on charges of rape of minors and trafficking of minors for sexual exploitation. Before he could face trial, he died by suicide in a French jail cell.

Brunel denied any wrongdoing.

 

 

America is falling behind in the global EV race – that’s going to cost the US auto industry by Hengrui Liu /Kelly Sims Gallagher

At the 2026 Detroit Auto Show, the spotlight quietly shifted. Electric vehicles, once framed as the inevitable future of the industry, were no longer the centerpiece. Instead, automakers emphasized hybrids, updated gasoline models and incremental efficiency improvements.

The show, held in January, reflected an industry recalibration happening in real time: Ford and General Motors had recently announced US$19.5 billion and $6 billion in EV-related write-downs, respectively, reflecting the losses they expect as they unwind or delay parts of their electric vehicle plans.

The message from Detroit was unmistakable: The United States is pulling back from a transition that much of the world is accelerating.

 

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At the 2026 Detroit Auto Show, the spotlight quietly shifted. Electric vehicles, once framed as the inevitable future of the industry, were no longer the centerpiece. Instead, automakers emphasized hybrids, updated gasoline models and incremental efficiency improvements.

The show, held in January, reflected an industry recalibration happening in real time: Ford and General Motors had recently announced US$19.5 billion and $6 billion in EV-related write-downs, respectively, reflecting the losses they expect as they unwind or delay parts of their electric vehicle plans.

The message from Detroit was unmistakable: The United States is pulling back from a transition that much of the world is accelerating.

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Highlights from the Detroit Auto Show, starting with V-8 trucks, by the Detroit Free Press’ auto writer.

That retreat carries consequences far beyond showroom floors.

In China, Europe and a growing number of emerging markets, including Vietnam and Indonesia, electric vehicles now make up a higher share of new passenger vehicle sales than in the United States.

That means the U.S. pullback on EV production is not simply a climate problem – gasoline-powered vehicles are a major contributor to climate change – it is also an industrial competitiveness problem, with direct implications for the future of U.S. automakers, suppliers and autoworkers. Slower EV production and slower adoption in the U.S. can keep prices higher, delay improvements in batteries and software, and increase the risk that the next generation of automotive value creation will happen elsewhere.

Where EVs are taking over

In 2025, global EV registrations rose 20% to 20.7 million. Analysts with Benchmark Mineral Intelligence reported that China reached 12.9 million EV registrations, up 17% from the previous year; Europe recorded 4.3 million, up 33%; and the rest of the world added 1.7 million, up 48%.

By contrast, U.S. EV sales growth was essentially flat in 2025, at about 1%. U.S. automaker Tesla experienced declines in both scale and profitability – its vehicle deliveries fell 9% compared to 2024, the company’s net profit was down 46%, and CEO Elon Musk said it would put more of its focus on artificial intelligence and robotics.

 

Market share tells a similar story and also challenges the assumption that vehicle electrification would take time to expand from wealthy countries to emerging markets.

In 39 countries, EVs now exceed 10% of new car sales, including in Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia, which reached 38%, 21% and 15%, respectively, in 2025, energy analysts at Ember report.

In the U.S., EVs accounted for less than 10% of new vehicle sales, by Ember’s estimates. 

 U.S. President Donald Trump came back into office in 2025 promising to end policies that supported EV production and sales and boost fossil fuels. But while the U.S. was curtailing federal consumer incentives, governments elsewhere largely continued a transition to electric vehicles.

Europe softened its goal for all vehicles to have zero emissions by 2035 at the urging of automakers, but its new target is still a 90% cut in automobiles’ carbon dioxide emissions by 2035.

Germany launched a program offering subsidies worth 1,500 to 6,000 euros per electric vehicle, aimed at small- and medium-income households.

In developing economies, EV policy has largely been sustained through industrial policies. In Brazil, the MOVER program offers tax credits explicitly linked to domestic EV production, research and development, and efficiency targets. South Africa is introducing a 150% investment allowance for EV and battery manufacturing, giving them a tax break starting in March 2026. Thailand has implemented subsidies and reduced excise tax tied to mandatory local production and export commitments.

 

Share article

Print article

At the 2026 Detroit Auto Show, the spotlight quietly shifted. Electric vehicles, once framed as the inevitable future of the industry, were no longer the centerpiece. Instead, automakers emphasized hybrids, updated gasoline models and incremental efficiency improvements.

The show, held in January, reflected an industry recalibration happening in real time: Ford and General Motors had recently announced US$19.5 billion and $6 billion in EV-related write-downs, respectively, reflecting the losses they expect as they unwind or delay parts of their electric vehicle plans.

The message from Detroit was unmistakable: The United States is pulling back from a transition that much of the world is accelerating.

One great story in your inbox every afternoon

Highlights from the Detroit Auto Show, starting with V-8 trucks, by the Detroit Free Press’ auto writer.

That retreat carries consequences far beyond showroom floors.

In China, Europe and a growing number of emerging markets, including Vietnam and Indonesia, electric vehicles now make up a higher share of new passenger vehicle sales than in the United States.

That means the U.S. pullback on EV production is not simply a climate problem – gasoline-powered vehicles are a major contributor to climate change – it is also an industrial competitiveness problem, with direct implications for the future of U.S. automakers, suppliers and autoworkers. Slower EV production and slower adoption in the U.S. can keep prices higher, delay improvements in batteries and software, and increase the risk that the next generation of automotive value creation will happen elsewhere.

Where EVs are taking over

In 2025, global EV registrations rose 20% to 20.7 million. Analysts with Benchmark Mineral Intelligence reported that China reached 12.9 million EV registrations, up 17% from the previous year; Europe recorded 4.3 million, up 33%; and the rest of the world added 1.7 million, up 48%.

By contrast, U.S. EV sales growth was essentially flat in 2025, at about 1%. U.S. automaker Tesla experienced declines in both scale and profitability – its vehicle deliveries fell 9% compared to 2024, the company’s net profit was down 46%, and CEO Elon Musk said it would put more of its focus on artificial intelligence and robotics.

Market share tells a similar story and also challenges the assumption that vehicle electrification would take time to expand from wealthy countries to emerging markets.

In 39 countries, EVs now exceed 10% of new car sales, including in Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia, which reached 38%, 21% and 15%, respectively, in 2025, energy analysts at Ember report.

In the U.S., EVs accounted for less than 10% of new vehicle sales, by Ember’s estimates.

U.S. President Donald Trump came back into office in 2025 promising to end policies that supported EV production and sales and boost fossil fuels. But while the U.S. was curtailing federal consumer incentives, governments elsewhere largely continued a transition to electric vehicles.

Europe softened its goal for all vehicles to have zero emissions by 2035 at the urging of automakers, but its new target is still a 90% cut in automobiles’ carbon dioxide emissions by 2035.

Germany launched a program offering subsidies worth 1,500 to 6,000 euros per electric vehicle, aimed at small- and medium-income households.

In developing economies, EV policy has largely been sustained through industrial policies. In Brazil, the MOVER program offers tax credits explicitly linked to domestic EV production, research and development, and efficiency targets. South Africa is introducing a 150% investment allowance for EV and battery manufacturing, giving them a tax break starting in March 2026. Thailand has implemented subsidies and reduced excise tax tied to mandatory local production and export commitments.

Low prices from Chinese automakers such as BYD helped the EV industry take off, not just in China but globally. A car priced at 99,800 yuan is just over US$14,000. These were at an auto show in Yantai, in eastern China, in April 2025. Stringer/AFP via Getty Images

In China, the EV industry has entered a phase of regulatory maturity. After a decade of subsidies and state-led investment that helped domestic firms undercut global competitors, the government’s focus is no longer on explosive growth at home.

With their domestic market saturated and competition fierce, Chinese automakers are pushing aggressively into global markets. Beijing has reinforced this shift by ending its full tax exemption for EV purchases and replacing it with a tapered 5% tax on EV buyers.

Consequences for US automakers

EV manufacturing is governed by steep learning curves and scale economies, meaning the more vehicles a company builds, the better it gets at making them faster and cheaper. Low domestic production and sales can mean higher costs for parts and weaker bargaining power for automakers in global supply chains.

The competitive landscape is already changing. In 2025, China exported 2.65 million EVs, doubling its 2024 exports, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. And BYD surpassed Tesla as the world’s largest EV maker in 2025. 

 

The U.S. risks becoming a follower in the industry it once defined.

Some people argue that American consumers simply prefer trucks and hybrids. Others point to Chinese subsidies and overcapacity as distortions that justify U.S. industry caution. These concerns deserve consideration, but they do not outweigh the fundamental fact that, globally, the EV share of auto sales continues to rise.

What can the US do?

For U.S. automakers and workers to compete in this market, the government, in our view, will have to stop treating EVs as an ideological matter and start governing it like an industrial transition.

That starts with restoring regulatory credibility, something that seems unlikely right now as the Trump administration moves to roll back vehicle emissions standards. Performance standards are the quiet engine of industrial investment. When standards are predictable and enforced, manufacturers can plan, suppliers can invest in new businesses, and workers can train for reliable demand.

Governments at state and local levels and industry can also take important steps.

Focus on affordability and equity: The federal clean-vehicle tax credit that effectively gave EV buyers a discount expired in September 2025. An alternative is targeted, point-of-sale support for lower- and middle-income buyers. By moving away from blanket credits in favor of targeted incentives – a model already used in California and Pennsylvania – governments can ensure public funds are directed toward people who are currently priced out of the EV market. Additionally, interest-rate buydowns that allow buyers to reduce their loan payments and “green loan” programs can help, typically funded through state and local governments, utility companies or federal grants.

Keep building out the charging network: A federal judge ruled on Jan. 23, 2026, that the Trump administration violated the law when it suspended a $5 billion program for expanding the nation’s EV charger network. That expansion effort can be improved by shifting the focus from the number of ports installed to the number of working chargers, as California did in 2025. Enforcing reliability and clearing bottlenecks, such as electricity connections and payment systems, could help boost the number of functioning sites.

Use fleet procurement as a stabilizer for U.S. sales: When states, cities and companies provide a predictable volume of vehicle purchases, that helps manufacturers plan future investments. For example, Amazon’s 2019 order of 100,000 Rivian electric delivery vehicles to be delivered over the following decade gave the startup automaker the boost it needed.

Treat workforce transition as core infrastructure: This means giving workers skills they can carry from job to job, helping suppliers retool instead of shutting down, and coordinating training with employers’ needs. Done right, these investments turn economic change into a source of stable jobs and broad public support. Done poorly, they risk a political backlash.

The scene at the Detroit Auto Show should be a warning, not a verdict. The global auto industry is accelerating its EV transition. The question for the United States is whether it will shape that future – and ensure the technologies and jobs of the next automotive era are in the U.S. – or import it.