The Week Magazine July 18, 2025

Whatever happened to “90 deals in 90 days”? When Trump announced a three-month pause on his crushing Liberation Day tariffs back in April, he promised that countries would rush to Washington to strike trade agreements. Well, here we are, 90 days later, and as I put fingers to keyboard there are just three deals—sort of. There’s what officials have described as “an agreement on a framework for a deal” with China, an “agreement in principle” with the U.K., and a handshake deal with Vietnam. Trump is now trying to speed up negotiations with the other 87 holdout countries by sending them letters detailing the potentially crippling tariffs they’ll have to pay if they don’t strike a deal by the new deadline of Aug. 1. (See Best Business Columns, p.34.) But…

What happened State governments, rural health systems, and food banks braced for pain this week after President Trump signed into law his “big, beautiful bill,” which lowers taxes for the wealthy while enacting the biggest cuts to the safety net in decades. After months of wrangling among Republicans, the Senate passed the cornerstone of Trump’s domestic agenda, with nay votes from Republicans Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Rand Paul of Kentucky, and Susan Collins of Maine forcing Vice President JD Vance to break a 50-50 tie. The House then passed it 218-214, with two Republicans and all Democrats opposing the bill. GOP deficit hawks had decried the legislation, which by extending Trump’s 2017 tax cuts and adding other tax breaks will add $3.4 trillion to the federal deficit by 2034,…

Having handed Trump a big legislative win, Republicans are now “fretting it will lead to some ugly electoral losses” in the midterms, said Lisa Kashinsky in Politico. Recent polls indicate “voters broadly dislike the megabill,” with some showing 2 to 1 disapproval margins. Democrats are gearing up “to weaponize the bill,” as they did after Republicans tried and failed to repeal the Obama-era Affordable Care Act in 2017—an effort followed by the loss of 40 GOP House seats in 2018. A voter backlash “is not guaranteed,” said Perry Bacon Jr. in The Washington Post, and in fact “seems unlikely.” Voters undeniably like Medicaid, which was expanded by the ACA and now covers 1 in 5 Americans. But Democrats have seen “little electoral benefit” in states where they expanded Medicaid, and…

What happened Federal, state, and local officials this week traded accusations of responsibility for the loss of life in the devastating floods that ravaged central Texas and killed at least 119 people, including dozens of children. More than 170 people were missing as The Week went to press. Flash floods hit in the night, after Tropical Storm Barry doused Kerr County, Texas, with a foot of rain in a matter of hours. The Guadalupe River surged up to 37 feet, tearing houses from their foundations and razing nearby RV parks and summer camps. At Camp Mystic, an all-girls Christian retreat for kids as young as 7, 27 children and counselors died. Some children had to swim out of cabin windows and clamber into trees to survive. Coast Guard rescuer Scott…

■ In 1995, the city of Keene, N.H., was used as the fictional Brantford in Jumanji, a kids’ classic starring Robin Williams. In one sequence, locals were chased by a CGI stampede of elephants, rhinos, and zebras. In June, for the movie’s 30th anniversary, Keene held a parade, and quarter-mile “Rhino Rumble Road Race,” with runners in inflatable animal costumes. “To be here today and be able to have our own stampede is kind of awesome,” said Juniper Thurston, who watched the filming when she was 13. ■ A dog at a church adoption event in Virginia demonstrated a surprising nose for medical emergencies when she saved a man from a seizure. Sienna, a 3-year-old lab and pit bull mix, bounded straight for Josh Davis at the event, refusing to…

The Supreme Court has granted President Trump “the victory of his dreams,” said Mark Joseph Stern in Slate. On the last day of its term, the justices finally ruled on Trump’s “brazen” executive order decreeing an end to birthright citizenship—the Constitution’s guarantee of citizenship to anyone born “within the jurisdiction of the United States”—for the children of undocumented immigrants and temporary visa holders. Ominously, the court punted on the substantive issue, pausing Trump’s order only until July 27. But in a vote split along ideological lines, the court’s six conservatives gave Trump something more valuable: an end to the so-called universal injunctions that have allowed district court judges to block, nationwide, unconstitutional presidential orders. Writing for the majority, Justice Amy Coney Barrett delivered a dry “history lesson,” claiming nationwide injunctions…