Federal Reserve chair says ‘we face a highly uncertain outlook’; Maroš Šefčovič, the EU’s trade commissioner, says he held ‘frank’ talks with US trade officials

• People in the US: how have your shopping habits changed due to Trump’s tariffs?
• Trump insists he won’t back down from global trade war as markets slump

The Trump administration is taking aim at Brown University with threats to freeze $510m in grants, widening its promise to withhold federal funding from schools it accuses of allowing antisemitism on campus, according to multiple media outlets including Reuters and the New York Times.

University officials said they had not yet been formally notified, but the school was among dozens warned last month that enforcement actions could be coming as the administration seeks to crack down on academic institutions .

Dangerous weather comes after Trump administration job cuts left nearly half of offices with 20% vacancy rates

Donald Trump on Friday approved an emergency declaration for Kentucky as the central US braces for what experts in the region have warned could be a “generational” flooding event, as severe spring storms that have killed at least seven continue to wreak havoc.

Millions are affected across a swath of the US stretching from Texas to Ohio, and the powerful storm system that has raged for two days is expected to stall over the country’s midsection, the National Weather Service (NWS) said, fueling further deluges and possible tornadoes in areas already drenched from thunderstorms bringing heavy rains.

US index sees biggest fall since June 2020 amid escalating global trade war as Beijing hits back with new tariffs on US goods

• China hits back hard at ‘bullying’ tariffs as global recession fears grow
• IMF warns of ‘significant risk’ to global economy from Trump tariffs as markets slide
• Analysis: Trump’s ‘idiotic’ and flawed tariff calculations stun economists

New Civil Liberties Alliance, a conservative legal group, has filed what it says is the first lawsuit seeking to block Donald Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports, saying the US president overstepped his authority. Reuters reports:

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Florida, alleges that Trump lacked the legal authority to impose the sweeping tariffs unveiled on Wednesday as well as duties authorized on February 1 under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

“By invoking emergency power to impose an across-the-board tariff on imports from China that the statute does not authorize, President Trump has misused that power, usurped Congress’s right to control tariffs, and upset the Constitution’s separation of powers,” NCLA senior litigation counsel Andrew Morris said in a statement.

White House has said US courts can’t order return of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, whose wife has been protesting outside court

A federal judge on Friday afternoon ordered the US to return a Maryland man mistakenly deported to an El Salvador prison.

The wife of the man, who was flown to a notorious Salvadoran prison had earlier joined dozens of supporters at a rally before a court hearing on Friday, where his lawyers had asked the judge to order the Trump administration to return him to the US.

• Duke plays in the Final Four this weekend
• Flagg beat out Auburn’s Johni Broome for the award

Cooper Flagg and his Duke teammates were days away from clinching a spot in the Final Four, and the Blue Devils’ freshman star was planning ahead.

It wasn’t about anything on the court, though. It was to be ready the next time teammates Khaman Maluach and Patrick Ngongba broke out water guns at the cold tubs.

• The sophomore led the Trojans to a historic season
• Watkins’ season ended with a brutal ACL tear

JuJu Watkins, the sensational sophomore who led Southern California to its best season in nearly 40 years, was honored Thursday as The Associated Press women’s basketball Player of the Year. Duke’s Cooper Flagg captured the equivalent award on the men’s side.

Watkins, whose Trojans won the Big Ten regular-season title for their first conference crown in 31 years, received 29 votes from the 31-member national media panel that votes on the AP Top 25 each week. Notre Dame’s Hannah Hidalgo got the other two. Both were first-team AP All-Americans.

Deadline set by US president was supposed to be Saturday, with Trump now considering decreasing tariffs to get deal

Donald Trump said he will sign an executive order to extend the TikTok ban deadline. This is the second time the president will have delayed the ban or sale of the social media app, and will punt the deadline to 75 days from now.

The TikTok deal “requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed”, Trump announced on his Truth Social platform on Friday.

Appeals court sides with Jefferson Griffin, who lost supreme court election and wants thousands of ballots thrown out

More than 65,000 people in North Carolina who believed they were eligible to vote could have their ballots thrown out nearly five months after election day, flipping the results of a supreme court election, a state appeals court ruled on Friday.

The 2-1 ruling from the North Carolina court of appeals came in response to Republicans’ months-long effort to overturn the results of the state supreme court election in November. The Democrat Allison Riggs, who currently sits on the court, defeated appellate judge Jefferson Griffin, a Republican, by 734 votes. After the election, Griffin filed a protest seeking to get around 60,000 votes thrown out.

Deadline set by US president was supposed to be Saturday, with Trump now considering decreasing tariffs to get deal

Donald Trump on Friday afternoon extended by 75 days a deadline for the Chinese technology company ByteDance to sell US assets of the popular short-video app TikTok to a non-Chinese buyer or face a ban that was supposed to take effect in January under a 2024 law.

“The deal requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed,” the US president said, explaining why he was extending the deadline he set in January that was supposed to expire on Saturday. “We hope to continue working in good faith with China, who I understand is not very happy about our reciprocal tariffs.”