US and China reach deal to slash trade tariffs

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What is the latest deal between the US and China on tariffs?

Taylor Wilson 0:05
Good morning, I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Monday, May 12th, 2025. This is The Excerpt. Today, a new deal on tariffs for the U.S. and China. Plus, what a wave of recent deportations of people facing criminal charges might mean for justice. And the trial of Sean Diddy Combs is set for opening statements. The U.S. and China have reached a deal to slash tariffs. Speaking after talks with Chinese officials in Geneva, Treasury Secretary Scott Besson told reporters the two sides had agreed on a 90-day pause on measures and that tariffs would come down by over 100 percentage points to 10 percent. The Geneva meetings were the first of their kind between senior U.S. and Chinese economic officials since President Trump returned to power and launched his slew of global tariffs. Since taking office in January, Trump has pushed the tariffs paid by U.S. importers for goods from China to 145 percent. In addition to those he imposed on many Chinese goods during his first term and duties put in by the Biden administration.
Taylor Wilson 1:06
China had responded by putting export curbs on some rare earth elements and raising tariffs on U.S. goods to 125 percent. All eyes will be on the markets today and the rest of the week to see how they respond to the latest news. Stephen Miller, a senior advisor to the president, while answering a question about illegal immigration, told reporters on Friday that the Trump administration is actively looking at suspending the constitutional right that allows people to challenge in court their detention.

What are the implications of suspending habeas corpus?

Taylor Wilson 1:36
Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, said the Constitution says the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus can be suspended in a time of invasion. Habeas corpus, Latin for you have the body, is used to determine if the government's detention of someone imprisoned is legal, according to Cornell Law School's Legal Information Institute. A writ of habeas corpus is used in federal courts under civil law to challenge a person's detention, commonly used by people imprisoned who are challenging the conviction that led to their prison sentence. You can read more about the potential stakes behind Miller's comments with a link in today's show notes. Some legal experts worry that recent deportations of people facing criminal charges are creating a two-tiered system of justice. I spoke with USA Today national correspondent Trevor Hughes for more. Trevor, thanks for hopping on, sir. Yeah, good to be here.
Taylor Wilson 2:26
So you know, Trevor, across the country, we're seeing an uptick in immigration agents deporting criminal suspects instead of keeping them in custody, as you write. What are you hearing specifically on this?
Trevor Hughes 2:36
Well, let's be clear. ICE is deporting people who are criminal suspects when it comes to immigration violations. They consider those people criminals on that hand. What we're talking about here are people who are accused of local crimes, assaults, theft, carjackings, that kind of thing. And so what we're seeing is that ICE is increasingly, instead of keeping those folks around and letting the local court process play out, letting those folks get sentenced to 5, 10, 15 years in prison, ICE is simply collecting those folks, detaining them, and in many cases, deporting them. So in terms of the potential problems here, Trevor, what are legal experts really concerned about? You have two problems, really. The first is that there are criminal suspects in these cases who are escaping prosecution in the United States.

How are recent deportations affecting the justice system?

Trevor Hughes 3:23
As one expert told me, you could have a guy accused of a serious crime in the United States agree to be deported by ICE and be on the streets in Mexico or Venezuela within days or weeks with no punishment whatsoever, except for that removal order from the United States. And we know that people have come back to the United States under the Trump administration already. The second concern is that in some cases, ICE has deported the witnesses or the victims in these cases. And so what's happening, according to some of the DAs and some of the public defenders I talk to around the country, is that people are less willing to come to court and testify if they feel like they're going to be deported or perhaps the case against their assailant has to be dropped because the witnesses were deported.

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