Reuters World News - Harvard, deportations, American gas and basketball in Europe

Episode Date: April 15, 2025

Harvard is hit with a $2.3 billion funding freeze after rejecting demands from the Trump administration. El Salvador President Nayib Bukele says he has no plans to return a man mistakenly deported from the United States. Plus, Europe faces an energy security dilemma and an eager NBA. Find our recommended read on North Korea and Russia here. Find our weekend special episode on higher education in the U.S. here. Sign up for the Reuters Econ World newsletter here. Find the latest podcast episode here. Reuters Econ World has also been nominated for a Webby Award in two categories for our "Swiftonomics" episode. If you like what you hear please vote for us here and here. Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, how U.S. courts might respond to Trump's claim he can't bring back a man deported to El Salvador. Argentina's peso takes a ride as Javier Malay institutes more economic reforms. Plus, U.S. or Russian gas. Europe is stuck between a rock and a hard place. It's Tuesday, April 15th. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes. every weekday. I'm Christopher Waljesper in Chicago. And I'm Tara Oaks in Liverpool. The Trump administration is freezing more than $2 billion in federal funding for Harvard. The move

comes after the university to refuse to comply with the list of government demands, including an audit of the viewpoints of its staff and students. In a public letter, Harvard President Alan Garber said the demands would seed control of America's oldest university, to a conservative government. The Trump administration says it's trying to crack down on anti-Semitism on college campuses, but critics say it's undermining academic freedom and free speech. And if you want to hear more about the fight over higher education in America,

check out a recent weekend episode. We'll put a link in today's pod description. I don't have the power to return him to the United States. President Naib Buckele saying he can't bring back a U.S. man erroneously deported to El Salvador. That's despite the U.S. Supreme Court directing the Trump administration to facilitate Kilmar Abrago-Gargeu Garcia's return. Legal reporter Tom Hauss is looking into how this will go down in the courts.

We're going to find out this afternoon. The U.S. District Court judge will be holding a hearing at 4 o'clock. She's going to want to hear what the U.S. government has done to comply with her order to facilitate and effectuate the return of Mr. Kilmar-Bergo-Gosia. I imagine the lawyers for Abrago Garcia will tell the judge that government does have the power to bring him back from El Salvador. They have a contracted El Salvador to house these people. So that might give them some power over the Salvadoran government to get these people out of prison. The Trump administration will say what they've been saying is that the court can't interfere with foreign policy, which is true. But this is not a foreign policy question.

They violated a court order that prevented him from being sent there. And the attorney general, Pam Bondi, brought this up. in the Oval Office. She said, if they want to return him, that's not up to us. The Supreme Court ruled president that if, as El Salvador wants to return him, this is international matters, foreign affairs. So where does this case go from here? I think it's going to come down to, you know, was the president of El Salvador in some way guided to give the answer he gave, that he would not release him? The judge will want to know if there was communications or if there was collusion, if there was guidance or some kind between the Trump administration.

and the president of El Salvador, because that would show they're not complying with the order to effectuate and facilitate Abrago Garcia's return. Lawmakers from a small opposition party in Hungary blowing horns in protest, as Parliament approved constitutional changes targeting LGBTQ plus people. The government now has the powers to ban the annual Pride parade. The changes also enshrine in the Constitution that Hungary recognizes only two sexes, male and female, in line with Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Christian conservative agenda. Saudi Arabia plans to pay off Syria's debts to the World Bank, paving the way for reconstruction

and rebuilding the country's public sector. It would be the first known instance of Saudi Arabia providing financing for Syria since Islamist-led rebels toppled former leader Bashar al-Assad last year. Up to 400,000 people have been displaced from Sudan Zam Zam Camp in North Darfur after it was taken over by the rapid support forces. That's according to data from the UN. Popstar Katie Perry and five other women launched into space on a Blue Origin rocket and successfully returned to Earth. Oh, the Moon!

You guys! The Blue Origin rocket flight aboard the New Shepard launch vehicle developed for space tourism lasted around 11 minutes. Blue Origin does not disclose the average cost of a seat on one of its rockets. On his website, the company says potential passengers have to pay 150,000 US dollars in the form of a refundable deposit to start the order process. Want to hear about a wild swing on markets that has nothing to do with tariffs? Enter Argentina, but the peso has slid 10% after President Javier Millet lifted most of the country's currency controls. It's all part

of a $20 billion loan deal with the International Monetary Fund. Our Argentina bureau chief, Adam Jordan, has been following it all. You would normally look at a falling currency and start to panic, but this has been very much planned by the government. They don't call it a devaluation. They call it a floating of the currency. And in some ways, it's succeeded in doing what they wanted. We have seen Wall Street investors and local investors cheer this move,

and that has led to international bonds rising. What Millet is trying to do, he's trying to turn over. years of fiscal deficits. He's trying to tamp down inflation that's been up to almost 300%. He's trying to change the whole economic model of a country and push it towards a far more orthodox, far more austerity-driven economic model. More than three years after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Europe's energy security is fragile. U.S. liquefied natural gas, or LNG, has helped to plug the gap in supply of Russia. Russian gas to Europe. But now businesses are wary that reliance on the U.S. has become another

vulnerability as Trump has turned energy into a bargaining chip in trade negotiations. Our energy reporter, America Hernandez, is reporting on how EU countries are considering their options. What the domestic political pressures are is undoubtedly high energy prices and the fact that Europe's industry is still hurting and still hasn't bounced back from. the energy crisis of a few years ago. And for a lot of places, including Germany with its industrial base, you know, there is that temptation to say, should we go back to cheap energy wherever we can get it? The other difficulty is that the European Union, on a broader political level, has decided they want to phase out fossil fuels. So there's been this big shift to move toward wind

and solar with batteries. But that's not moving fast enough to be able to really replace all of the Russian gas that was lost. So how is Trump influencing these decisions? And I guess what will these countries do if U.S. gas is a bargaining chip? I think what we've seen in the past week or so is that U.S. LNG has now been put on the table as part of these trade negotiations. Back during the Biden administration, he talked a lot about guaranteeing U.S. gas for Europe, but the reality was they were always commercial agreements.

So now, ever since Trump has been in office, he's been talking about putting these tariffs and, you know, leveling the playing field with Europe. And he said very clearly, the one thing Europe can do to reduce its trade surplus with the U.S. is buy our oil, buy our gas. And now that can be done to an extent, but there's that hesitation. How will we be positioned in the future if we're getting even more dependent on U.S. gas? if already now we're being asked to do more to avoid the pain of tariffs. One thing the U.S. is hoping to export to Europe? Basketball. The NBA is looking across the Atlantic and seeing a lot of dollar signs.

Basketball is the second most followed sport in Europe. And the league says it's exploring, launching a new operation on the continent. Our sports reporter Amy Tennery has more. So the NBA is looking at where a lot of the talent is coming from these days. Roughly 15% of all NBA players today come from Europe. But there is a lack of basketball infrastructure in Europe. So if they are talking about opening up franchises in some of these big markets, they're going to have to start building things first.

So I think we are still a few years out from actually seeing the launch. But there's a lot of talent there right now, and they can use that momentum to get things going in the right direction. And for today's recommended read, a deep dive into North Korea's role in arming Russia. A Reuters investigation shows the extent of Russia's reliance on North Korean shells in a war of attrition that Ukraine has struggled to match. You can read the investigation by following the link in the pod description. And before we go, a plea. The Swiftinomics episode of our Econ World podcast has been nominated for a Webby Award in two categories.

If you enjoyed the episode, we'd love it if you could go on vote. There's a link in today's pop description. For more on any of the stories from today, check out reuters.com or the Reuters app. Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast player. We'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show.