Saudi crown prince welcomes Trump to kingdom as US leader begins four-day Middle East tour
Riyadh (AP): President Donald Trump opened his four-day Mideast trip on Tuesday by paying a visit to Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, for talks on US efforts to dismantle Iran's nuclear programme, end the war in Gaza, hold down oil prices and more.
Bin Salman warmly greeted Trump as he stepped off Air Force One and kicked off his Middle East tour. The two leaders then retreated to a grand hall at the Riyadh airport for a coffee ceremony.
The crown prince will fete Trump with a formal dinner and Trump is slated to take part later Tuesday in a US-Saudi investment conference.
The US president on Wednesday will join a gathering of members of the Gulf Cooperation Council, which is made up of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, before leaving Riyadh.
Saudi Arabia and fellow OPEC+ nations have already helped their cause with Trump early in his second term by stepping up oil production.
Trump sees cheap energy as a key component to lowering costs and stemming inflation for Americans. The president has also made the case that lower oil prices will hasten an end to Russia's war on Ukraine.
But Saudi Arabia's economy remains heavily dependent on oil, and the kingdom needs a fiscal break-even oil price of $96 to $98 a barrel to balance its budget. It's questionable how long OPEC+, of which Saudi Arabia is the leading member, is willing to keep production elevated. The price of a barrel of Brent crude closed Monday at $64.77.
“One of the challenges for the Gulf states of lower oil prices is it doesn't necessarily imperil economic diversification programmes, but it certainly makes them harder,” said Jon Alterman, a senior Middle East analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
Trump picked the kingdom for his first stop because it has pledged to make big investments in the US, but Trump ended up travelling to Italy last month for Pope Francis' funeral. Riyadh was the first overseas stop of his first term.
The three countries on the president's itinerary — Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates — are all places where the Trump Organisation, run by Trump's two elder sons, is developing major real estate projects. They include a high-rise tower in Jeddah, a luxury hotel in Dubai and a golf course and villa complex in Qatar.
Trump is trying to demonstrate that his transactional strategy for international politics is paying dividends as he faces criticism from Democrats who say his global tariff war and approach to Russia's war on Ukraine are isolating the United States from allies.
He's expected to announce deals with the three wealthy countries that will touch on artificial intelligence, expanding energy cooperation and perhaps new arms sales to Saudi Arabia. The administration earlier this month announced initial approval to sell $3.5 billion worth of air-to-air missiles for Saudi Arabia's fighter jets.
But Trump arrives in the Mideast at a moment when his top regional allies, Israel and Saudi Arabia, are far from neatly aligned with his approach.
Ahead of the trip, Trump announced that the US was halting a nearly two-month US airstrike campaign against Yemen's Houthis, saying the Iran-backed rebels have pledged to stop attacking ships along a vital global trade rout
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Supreme Court strikes down Trump's sweeping tariffs, upending central plank of economic agenda
Washington (AP): The Supreme Court struck down President Donald Trump's far-reaching global tariffs on Friday, handing him a significant loss on an issue crucial to his economic agenda.
The 6-3 decision centres on tariffs imposed under an emergency powers law, including the sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs he levied on nearly every other country.
It's the first major piece of Trump's broad agenda to come squarely before the nation's highest court, which he helped shape with the appointments of three conservative jurists in his first term.
The majority found that the Constitution “very clearly” gives Congress the power to impose taxes, which include tariffs. “The Framers did not vest any part of the taxing power in the Executive Branch,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote.
Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh dissented.
“The tariffs at issue here may or may not be wise policy. But as a matter of text, history, and precedent, they are clearly lawful,” Kavanaugh wrote in the dissent.
The majority did not address whether companies could get refunded for the billions they have collectively paid in tariffs. Many companies, including the big-box warehouse chain Costco, have already lined up for refunds in court, and Kavanaugh noted the process could be complicated.
“The Court says nothing today about whether, and if so how, the Government should go about returning the billions of dollars that it has collected from importers. But that process is likely to be a mess,' as was acknowledged at oral argument,” he wrote.
The tariffs decision doesn't stop Trump from imposing duties under other laws. While those have more limitations on the speed and severity of Trump's actions, top administration officials have said they expect to keep the tariff framework in place under other authorities.
The Supreme Court ruling comes despite a series of short-term wins on the court's emergency docket that have allowed Trump to push ahead with extraordinary flexes of executive power on issues ranging from high-profile firings to major federal funding cuts.
The Republican president has been vocal about the case, calling it one of the most important in US history and saying a ruling against him would be an economic body blow to the country. But legal opposition crossed the political spectrum, including libertarian and pro-business groups that are typically aligned with the GOP. Polling has found tariffs aren't broadly popular with the public, amid wider voter concern about affordability.
The Constitution gives Congress the power to levy tariffs. But the Trump administration argued that a 1977 law allowing the president to regulate importation during emergencies also allows him to set tariffs. Other presidents have used the law dozens of times, often to impose sanctions, but Trump was the first president to invoke it for import taxes.
Trump set what he called "reciprocal" tariffs on most countries in April 2025 to address trade deficits that he declared a national emergency. Those came after he imposed duties on Canada, China and Mexico, ostensibly to address a drug trafficking emergency.
A series of lawsuits followed, including a case from a dozen largely Democratic-leaning states and others from small businesses selling everything from plumbing supplies to educational toys to women's cycling apparel.
The challengers argued the emergency powers law doesn't even mention tariffs and Trump's use of it fails several legal tests, including one that doomed then-President Joe Biden's USD 500 billion student loan forgiveness program.
The economic impact of Trump's tariffs has been estimated at some USD 3 trillion over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The Treasury has collected more than USD 133 billion from the import taxes the president has imposed under the emergency powers law, federal data from December shows.
