WSJ What’s News - Google’s Future Awaits Ruling in Landmark Antitrust Case

Episode Date: May 30, 2025

A.M. Edition for May 30. Lawyers for the Justice Department and Google prepare to make closing arguments today as a judge weighs how to improve competition in online search. Plus, top U.S. officials say trade negotiations with foreign capitals remain on course, despite a court ruling that President Trump’s sweeping global tariffs were illegal. And WSJ reporter Feliz Solomon explains the situation in Gaza as a new aid distribution system backed by Israel goes into effect. Luke Vargas hosts.  Sign up for the WSJ’s free What’s News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Trump administration says nothing's changed in its trade talks after a court setback for the president's tariffs. Plus Google and the Justice Department ready closing arguments in a landmark antitrust case and will get the latest on aid distribution efforts in Gaza as a new ceasefire push falters. Israel and the United States came up with this new system as a way to reintroduce aid after months with no food, no fuel, no medicine. We're going to be looking firstly to see whether they can scale this up rapidly because right now they're only providing a small amount of aid for a large population that is very,

very desperate. It's Friday, May 30th. I'm Luke Vargas for The Wall Street Journal. And here is the AM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. Top U.S. officials say that trade negotiations with foreign capitals remain on course, despite a ruling by a federal court that found that President Trump's sweeping global tariffs were illegal. That ruling is on hold after the administration argued in a filing that it "...jeopardizes ongoing negotiations with dozens of countries by severely constraining the president's leverage."

That appeared to contradict National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, who insisted that negotiations will continue unabated and that three deals were close to being completed, as well as comments by senior counselor for trade and manufacturing Peter Navarro that, quote, nothing has really changed. However, talks with China may be another story. Appearing on Fox News Channel's special report, Treasury Secretary Scott Besant told host Brett Baer that negotiations with Beijing that he previously hailed as productive had lost steam and might require the country's leaders to get involved. I would say that they are a bit stalled. I believe that we will be having more talks with them

in the next few weeks. And I believe we may at some point have a call between the president and party chair Xi. Chinese tech stocks fell today amid renewed pessimism about the prospects of a US-China trade deal with major players like Alibaba, BYD, and Baidu leading the decline. Hamas is poised to reject a U.S.-drafted proposal for a temporary Gaza ceasefire a day after

the White House said that Israel had accepted the plan. The proposal calls for a 60-day pause in fighting and long-term truce negotiations, for Israeli troops to pull back to positions they'd held at the end of a March ceasefire, and for Hamas to release 10 living hostages. Food and humanitarian aid would also have been allowed into Gaza. While joining us now with more on the situation in Gaza is journal reporter Feliz Solomon. Feliz, it's been a pretty active and at times chaotic week, has it not, with the new aid distribution system backed by Israel coming into effect in Gaza several days ago.

This all coming after a more than two-month Israeli blockade had been attracting growing international pressure over warnings of mass starvation within the territory. Recap for us if you could what's been occurring. Thanks Luke. That's right. Earlier this week we saw what's been a pretty rocky rollout of a new aid distribution system in Gaza. Israel and the United States came up with this new system as a way to reintroduce aid after what's been a total blockade that started in early March. After months with no supplies, meaning no food, no fuel, no medicine, the humanitarian situation there has become quite dire with a lot of people struggling to find food. Before the blockade, the UN and NGOs already had a system in place.

But Israeli officials have claimed that Hamas was stealing aid and using it to keep control of the Gaza Strip. Hamas has denied that, and the UN also says that there's no evidence of widespread aid diversion. To avoid that, this new foundation was formed. The UN has criticized the new plan because it requires people to travel long distances to get aid, often through active war zones. And given that it's essentially an Israeli plan, that raises questions about neutrality.

Feli's gathering in some centralized locations for this aid distribution. I imagine that might explain some of the scenes we saw earlier this week. KATE That's exactly right. For a population of about two million people, they started with only one distribution site on Tuesday. That meant that there was a large number of people that came all at the same time. People were worried that they weren't going to get the aid. They knocked down a fence at one point. So it led to a lot of chaos. Later on in the week, they

opened up a couple more sites, but there are still only a few of them. So it's really not a lot of distribution points for this rather large and desperate population. The United Nations, for example, had hundreds of distribution points throughout the Gaza Strip, whereas this new system so far has only four, three of them in operation, and most of them are in the southern part of Gaza. And finally, Feliz, given that this temporary US ceasefire proposal has been rejected by Hamas now, I imagine this distribution system we had been talking about is going to be remaining in place, at least for the time being. Assuming that's the case, what should we be watching for then?

Yes. Moving forward, we're going to be looking firstly to see whether they can scale this up rapidly, because right now the needs are very, very great. And they're only providing a small amount of aid for a large population that is very, very desperate. There are also concerns from the UN and others about whether this plan could ultimately facilitate displacement of Gazans who are in the north of the Strip because much of the aid is being distributed in the south. So there's some concern over whether that's going to lead to people leaving the north coming to the south where they can have access to food and whether that will ultimately

Bar them from returning that was journal reporter Felice Solomon Felice. Thank you so much. Thanks a lot And meanwhile we report that Israeli officials are concerned the Trump administration could agree to a nuclear deal with Iran That doesn't block Tehran's ability to produce a bomb while curtailing the option of Israeli military action. That comes after President Trump admitted on Wednesday that he had warned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu against taking actions like a military strike that could disrupt negotiations. Yeah, I told him this would be inappropriate to do right now because we're very close to a solution. Now, that could change at any moment. It could change with a phone call. But right now I think they want to make a deal, and if we can make a deal, save a lot

of lives. Netanyahu has publicly expressed Israel's concerns, warning that a bad deal with Iran is worse than no deal. Coming up, Google and the Justice Department are set for closing arguments in a landmark antitrust case that could have a huge impact on generative AI. And forget inflation reports and labor market updates, we'll look at the offbeat indicators that Gen Z are turning to to gauge a potential recession. We've got those stories and more after the break.

The Trump administration has named counties and cities in more than 30 states as sanctuary jurisdictions that it could go after for not complying with federal immigration laws, including New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Seattle. Several of President Trump's executive orders have called for withholding funds from sanctuary cities, leading to litigation from cities and states. According to the Department of Homeland Security, each jurisdiction will receive formal notification of its noncompliance, and the list will be updated regularly. In response to the list, more than 50 government leaders from sanctuary jurisdictions and the Public Rights Project said they would continue to oppose Trump's immigration crackdown. Closing arguments are expected today in a landmark antitrust case centered around how

to improve competition in online searches after U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled last year that Google's massive search engine business was an illegal monopoly. The Justice Department has proposed forcing Google to sell its Chrome browser and share data with competitors, and barring it from being able to pay Apple to be the default search engine on Safari, a measure that could wipe out billions in profit from Apple's bottom line. Google's attorneys, meanwhile, plan to argue the government's proposals are overreaching and could cause it disproportionate harm.

And should they do so, journal columnist Dan Gallagher said recent threats to its core business posed by artificial intelligence could come in handy. It might actually prove helpful to Google in this penalty phase of this antitrust trial, because the basic part of the government's case is that the search market will never open up unless we essentially step in and force Google to break up and do all these other things. In this case, Google might be able to argue and show that, hey, we're facing a lot of competition. We don't, you don't need to break us up because ChadGBT,

perplexity, generative AI in general is an actual threat to us." A ruling in the case is expected in August. The Securities and Exchange Commission has dismissed its lawsuit against Binance and its billionaire founder, Chang Peng Zhao. It is the agency's latest move to wind down Biden-era enforcement actions against the crypto industry, which has been boosted by the favorable regulatory environment under President Trump. Back in March, the journal reported that Zhao, who pleaded guilty to violating anti-money-laundering

laws in 2023, had been seeking a pardon while representatives of the Trump family held talks to invest in the US arm of Binance. Zhao and Binance denied the talks, though Zhao has confirmed seeking a pardon. And finally, while experts have long said that the data points they use to measure the economy are robust, they also admit they don't always offer a complete picture. So enter low rise jeans, press on nails and the return of Lady Gaga. Trends associated with previous downturns in which Journal Markets reporter

Hannah Erin Lang says Gen Z are now watching to predict where the economy may be headed. This is not necessarily an unusual impulse for people to have to try and understand the economy. And when you're an everyday person, it's much easier to maybe filter that through the lens of pop culture, the music you listen to, the celebrities you're talking about, as opposed to the things that an economist might look at every day to understand. Things like the yield curve, you know, treasury yields, the SOM rule. These can all be quite complex. And Hannah says there is logic in looking at discretionary income for financial clues.

One so-called recession indicator in this category was the recent partnership between DoorDash and Klarna, the buy now pay later service. So this idea of customers financing a meal was one. And the popularity of press on nails, another that could be considered a sign of folks cutting back on manicures or inessential expenses like that. If we put all those together, maybe we could have a sense of the financial health of American households, right? But then other times I think this is really just like a joke, a way of expressing economic anxiety or having a laugh.

And that's it for What's News for this Friday morning. Today's show was produced by Kate Bulevent. Our supervising producer was Daniel Bach. And I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with a new show. Otherwise, have a great weekend and thanks for listening.