Reporters packed the room Thursday for a Monitor Breakfast event with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. And there were plenty of national issues to discuss – immigration raids, political violence, rising antisemitism.

But when a reporter introduced herself as having “Pittsburgh roots,” Governor Shapiro couldn’t resist going local.

“Great, another Yinzer!” he said, using Pittsburgh slang for a city resident. “Are you still a Steelers fan?”

Yes, she assured him. “Stillers,” Mr. Shapiro threw in, again shifting to Pittsburghese. (He’s from Philadelphia, but is apparently bilingual.)

The governor is on a book tour, promoting his memoir, “Where We Keep the Light.” The book paints a self-portrait of a man who’s all about his family, his Jewish faith, and “getting stuff done.”

But for the media, the interest is all about 2028 and the widely held assumption that Mr. Shapiro, a Democrat, will run for president. At a time of deep national division, he prides himself on his ability to work across the aisle.

Still, ask Mr. Shapiro straight up if he’s running, as the reporter from Pittsburgh did, and he demurs. Because he has to. He’s up for reelection this November, and while he’s strongly favored to win, the midterm elections are on a razor’s edge – both for control of the U.S. Congress and his state legislature. Pennsylvania is the nation’s biggest swing state, and he enjoys high approval ratings.

“I don’t think we should be thinking about anything other than curtailing the chaos, the cruelty, and the corruption of this administration,” Mr. Shapiro says, as quoted in the Monitor’s coverage.

But the governor’s book did make waves earlier this month, pre-release, when a reporter got an advance copy and highlighted the controversy over his vetting by Kamala Harris’s team for the vice-presidency in 2024. Mr. Shapiro expressed upset over this question: “Have you ever been an agent for the Israeli government?”

In the book, Mr. Shapiro cries antisemitism. The issue of vetting came up last week in our Monitor Breakfast event with another prominent Jewish Democrat, former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Mr. Emanuel expressed sympathy with both sides, saying the question was “not artful, but you have to ask.” Yet another top Jewish Democrat, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, also defended the process as “tough” but necessary.

Notably, all three men are widely viewed as eyeing the presidency. And thus the issue of rising antisemitism could be a dominant theme in 2028. Indeed, the night before our roundtable with Mr. Shapiro, a motorist rammed his car multiple times into a major Jewish institution, the Chabad-Lubavitch world headquarters, in Brooklyn, New York. The incident is being investigated as a hate crime.

In fact, I told Mr. Shapiro after our event had ended, I have personally experienced antisemitism. I have received nasty emails from people who assume I’m Jewish, I said. “Lovely, just forward them to me,” Mr. Shapiro responded.

On a lighter note, in our post-roundtable chit-chat, we got back to the subject of football. The night before, while doing a book event in Boston, Mr. Shapiro mentioned visiting with Robert Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots who is also working to fight antisemitism. My ears perked up.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, “but I’m from Boston. Go Pats!”

After several bad years, the Patriots are back in the Super Bowl. Mr. Shapiro was gracious, given that his hometown Philadelphia Eagles, who won the Super Bowl last year, won’t repeat.

“I lived through those lean years with the birds, with the Eagles,” the governor said, “and so it’s kind of neat to see them [the Patriots] as good as they are.”

Reporters packed the room Thursday for a Monitor Breakfast event with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. And there were plenty of national issues to discuss – immigration raids, political violence, rising antisemitism.

But when a reporter introduced herself as having “Pittsburgh roots,” Governor Shapiro couldn’t resist going local.

“Great, another Yinzer!” he said, using Pittsburgh slang for a city resident. “Are you still a Steelers fan?”

Yes, she assured him. “Stillers,” Mr. Shapiro threw in, again shifting to Pittsburghese. (He’s from Philadelphia, but is apparently bilingual.)

The governor is on a book tour, promoting his memoir, “Where We Keep the Light.” The book paints a self-portrait of a man who’s all about his family, his Jewish faith, and “getting stuff done.”

But for the media, the interest is all about 2028 and the widely held assumption that Mr. Shapiro, a Democrat, will run for president. At a time of deep national division, he prides himself on his ability to work across the aisle.

Still, ask Mr. Shapiro straight up if he’s running, as the reporter from Pittsburgh did, and he demurs. Because he has to. He’s up for reelection this November, and while he’s strongly favored to win, the midterm elections are on a razor’s edge – both for control of the U.S. Congress and his state legislature. Pennsylvania is the nation’s biggest swing state, and he enjoys high approval ratings.

“I don’t think we should be thinking about anything other than curtailing the chaos, the cruelty, and the corruption of this administration,” Mr. Shapiro says, as quoted in the Monitor’s coverage.

But the governor’s book did make waves earlier this month, pre-release, when a reporter got an advance copy and highlighted the controversy over his vetting by Kamala Harris’s team for the vice-presidency in 2024. Mr. Shapiro expressed upset over this question: “Have you ever been an agent for the Israeli government?”

In the book, Mr. Shapiro cries antisemitism. The issue of vetting came up last week in our Monitor Breakfast event with another prominent Jewish Democrat, former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Mr. Emanuel expressed sympathy with both sides, saying the question was “not artful, but you have to ask.” Yet another top Jewish Democrat, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, also defended the process as “tough” but necessary.

Notably, all three men are widely viewed as eyeing the presidency. And thus the issue of rising antisemitism could be a dominant theme in 2028. Indeed, the night before our roundtable with Mr. Shapiro, a motorist rammed his car multiple times into a major Jewish institution, the Chabad-Lubavitch world headquarters, in Brooklyn, New York. The incident is being investigated as a hate crime.

In fact, I told Mr. Shapiro after our event had ended, I have personally experienced antisemitism. I have received nasty emails from people who assume I’m Jewish, I said. “Lovely, just forward them to me,” Mr. Shapiro responded.

On a lighter note, in our post-roundtable chit-chat, we got back to the subject of football. The night before, while doing a book event in Boston, Mr. Shapiro mentioned visiting with Robert Kraft, the owner of the New England Patriots who is also working to fight antisemitism. My ears perked up.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, “but I’m from Boston. Go Pats!”

After several bad years, the Patriots are back in the Super Bowl. Mr. Shapiro was gracious, given that his hometown Philadelphia Eagles, who won the Super Bowl last year, won’t repeat.

“I lived through those lean years with the birds, with the Eagles,” the governor said, “and so it’s kind of neat to see them [the Patriots] as good as they are.”

Voters don’t care about ideology, they care about deliverables, says Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. He calls himself the GSD governor – “Since this is the Christian Science Monitor, that’s ‘Get Stuff Done,’” he quips at an event hosted by the Monitor, as part of the Monitor Breakfast series.

Mr. Shapiro thinks the Democratic Party would benefit from following this approach. The governor, who was vetted as a possible running mate for Kamala Harris in 2024 and is seen now as a likely top contender for the Democratic nomination in 2028, has drawn attention recently with some criticism of the Biden administration, saying in a podcast this week that it failed to deliver “tangible things that people could see or feel.”

But Mr. Shapiro’s sharpest critiques are aimed at President Donald Trump, who the governor says is making America less safe – placing American citizens at risk through immigration enforcement operations that have turned violent, and damaging perceptions of America abroad.

Why We Wrote This

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro – who is seen as a likely Democratic presidential candidate in 2028 – was the guest at a Monitor Breakfast event on Thursday. In a wide-ranging conversation, he talked about what he thinks voters want from their government, and how President Donald Trump is making America less safe.

“I am concerned that some foreign countries will boycott the World Cup,” Mr. Shapiro says, addressing a question regarding travelers’ worries about their safety inside the United States. Philadelphia is scheduled to host six World Cup matches this summer.

On immigration, Mr. Shapiro, like other Democratic officials, is unequivocal: The federal deportation campaign directed by Mr. Trump is violating the constitutional rights of Americans. The governor says his state is taking steps to prepare “should this come to our door.”

Those plans involve law enforcement, Mr. Shapiro says, though he declines to share specifics. In Minneapolis, the number of federal immigration agents and officers deployed there vastly outnumbers local officers.

He believes the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti last weekend in Minneapolis warrants a state investigation. And based on publicly available evidence, Mr. Shapiro – who was attorney general of Pennsylvania before he was governor – sees a strong case against the federal officers who fired the shots.

For now, he’s focused on his own reelection and helping his party in November’s midterms, which he says will be a referendum on the Trump administration. “I don’t think we should be thinking about anything other than curtailing the chaos, the cruelty, and the corruption of this administration,” he says. “The best way for voters to do that is by showing up in record numbers in these midterms.”

That includes being vigilant about election integrity. A portrait of William Penn, the founder of the Pennsylvania colony, hangs above his desk, Mr. Shapiro notes, emphasizing the commonwealth’s role in establishing the American rights to free elections and freedom of expression and religion. He anticipates a possible showdown with Mr. Trump over those values.

This past fall, the Trump administration requested access to Pennsylvania’s voter rolls – including voters’ personal information. Mr. Shapiro refused. Pennsylvania, along with five other states, is now being sued by the Justice Department. “I do not trust this administration to use [voter rolls] for anything other than nefarious purposes,” he says.

In a telltale sign of an expected presidential campaign, Mr. Shapiro has penned a memoir. In his book, “Where We Keep the Light,” which was released this week, he writes at length about his faith. An observant Jew who keeps kosher, he is candid about the risks to his family in a time of surging antisemitism. Last April, on the first night of Passover, a man set fire to the governor’s residence while Mr. Shapiro, his wife, and their children were asleep inside.

It isn’t just politicians who are being targeted. In the wake of the 2018 attack on the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh and the Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel, the governor has had people tell him of their fear to live openly as Jews.

“I’ve felt a responsibility to be more open about my faith,” Mr. Shapiro says. “I have this responsibility now to offer comfort to others.”

The governor also says it is critical to emphasize religious pluralism. The dining room in the governor’s mansion, which was destroyed in the attack last year, has been emblematic of his approach. It has been decorated with Christmas trees, hosted an Iftar dinner, and been the setting for his son’s bar mitzvah.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

Mr. Shapiro wishes people Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukkah, depending on their faith, something he says demonstrates respect for others. “When I see a federal government taking their religion, or any religion, and trying to impose that on others, as a person of faith … that violates everything I believe in,” he says.

“People of different faiths or different religions have strengthened my faith because we found that shared humanity,” the governor says. “That, in many ways, is the American way.”

Voters don’t care about ideology, they care about deliverables, says Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. He calls himself the GSD governor – “Since this is the Christian Science Monitor, that’s ‘Get Stuff Done,’” he quips at an event hosted by the Monitor, as part of the Monitor Breakfast series.

Mr. Shapiro thinks the Democratic Party would benefit from following this approach. The governor, who was vetted as a possible running mate for Kamala Harris in 2024 and is seen now as a likely top contender for the Democratic nomination in 2028, has drawn attention recently with some criticism of the Biden administration, saying in a podcast this week that it failed to deliver “tangible things that people could see or feel.”

But Mr. Shapiro’s sharpest critiques are aimed at President Donald Trump, who the governor says is making America less safe – placing American citizens at risk through immigration enforcement operations that have turned violent, and damaging perceptions of America abroad.

Why We Wrote This

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro – who is seen as a likely Democratic presidential candidate in 2028 – was the guest at a Monitor Breakfast event on Thursday. In a wide-ranging conversation, he talked about what he thinks voters want from their government, and how President Donald Trump is making America less safe.

“I am concerned that some foreign countries will boycott the World Cup,” Mr. Shapiro says, addressing a question regarding travelers’ worries about their safety inside the United States. Philadelphia is scheduled to host six World Cup matches this summer.

On immigration, Mr. Shapiro, like other Democratic officials, is unequivocal: The federal deportation campaign directed by Mr. Trump is violating the constitutional rights of Americans. The governor says his state is taking steps to prepare “should this come to our door.”

Those plans involve law enforcement, Mr. Shapiro says, though he declines to share specifics. In Minneapolis, the number of federal immigration agents and officers deployed there vastly outnumbers local officers.

He believes the fatal shooting of Alex Pretti last weekend in Minneapolis warrants a state investigation. And based on publicly available evidence, Mr. Shapiro – who was attorney general of Pennsylvania before he was governor – sees a strong case against the federal officers who fired the shots.

For now, he’s focused on his own reelection and helping his party in November’s midterms, which he says will be a referendum on the Trump administration. “I don’t think we should be thinking about anything other than curtailing the chaos, the cruelty, and the corruption of this administration,” he says. “The best way for voters to do that is by showing up in record numbers in these midterms.”

That includes being vigilant about election integrity. A portrait of William Penn, the founder of the Pennsylvania colony, hangs above his desk, Mr. Shapiro notes, emphasizing the commonwealth’s role in establishing the American rights to free elections and freedom of expression and religion. He anticipates a possible showdown with Mr. Trump over those values.

This past fall, the Trump administration requested access to Pennsylvania’s voter rolls – including voters’ personal information. Mr. Shapiro refused. Pennsylvania, along with five other states, is now being sued by the Justice Department. “I do not trust this administration to use [voter rolls] for anything other than nefarious purposes,” he says.

In a telltale sign of an expected presidential campaign, Mr. Shapiro has penned a memoir. In his book, “Where We Keep the Light,” which was released this week, he writes at length about his faith. An observant Jew who keeps kosher, he is candid about the risks to his family in a time of surging antisemitism. Last April, on the first night of Passover, a man set fire to the governor’s residence while Mr. Shapiro, his wife, and their children were asleep inside.

It isn’t just politicians who are being targeted. In the wake of the 2018 attack on the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh and the Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel, the governor has had people tell him of their fear to live openly as Jews.

“I’ve felt a responsibility to be more open about my faith,” Mr. Shapiro says. “I have this responsibility now to offer comfort to others.”

The governor also says it is critical to emphasize religious pluralism. The dining room in the governor’s mansion, which was destroyed in the attack last year, has been emblematic of his approach. It has been decorated with Christmas trees, hosted an Iftar dinner, and been the setting for his son’s bar mitzvah.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

Mr. Shapiro wishes people Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukkah, depending on their faith, something he says demonstrates respect for others. “When I see a federal government taking their religion, or any religion, and trying to impose that on others, as a person of faith … that violates everything I believe in,” he says.

“People of different faiths or different religions have strengthened my faith because we found that shared humanity,” the governor says. “That, in many ways, is the American way.”

The Trump administration appears to be softening its approach to immigration enforcement in some locales amid outcry from the public and Democratic lawmakers over the recent killings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.

Tom Homan, President Donald Trump’s border czar, announced on Thursday that he was working on a “drawdown” plan that would reduce the number of federal immigration agents in Minnesota. And Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine said on social media that the Department of Homeland Security had notified her it would end Operation Catch of the Day, an immigration enforcement campaign that was launched in her state on Jan. 21.

Mr. Homan conditioned a withdrawal of immigration agents on increased cooperation between federal law enforcement and local officials. “The withdrawal of law enforcement here is dependent on cooperation,” he said. “As we see that cooperation happen, the redeployment will happen.”

Why We Wrote This

President Donald Trump’s border czar outlined a “drawdown” of immigration agents in Minnesota, while Maine’s GOP senator said the enforcement campaign there would also end. It represents a notable shift in response to public outrage over the killing of two U.S. citizens by federal agents.

The announcements show a marked shift in tone as the administration seeks to respond to broad public outrage over the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens – Renee Good and Alex Pretti – in separate incidents by immigration agents during their operations in Minneapolis.

Protests have swept through that city, and others, for weeks. On Monday, it was reported that Gregory Bovino, the Border Patrol commander who had helmed the operation in Minneapolis, would leave the city. Democratic lawmakers and some Republicans have called for the impeachment or firing of Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, who has faced criticism for falsely claiming that Mr. Pretti was “brandishing” a gun as he approached federal officers. Eyewitnesses and videos have disputed that version of events, and a report from the Department of Homeland Security did not mention Mr. Pretti brandishing a gun.

The remarks from Mr. Homan, who arrived in Minnesota on Monday, were more measured. He said that he had met with Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, and Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison. He characterized those meetings with Democratic leaders as yielding “meaningful dialogue,” and said that he intends to continue working with local law enforcement and community leaders.

“We didn’t agree on everything. I didn’t expect to agree on everything,” Mr. Homan said. “Bottom line is you can’t fix problems if you don’t have discussions. I didn’t come to Minnesota for photo ops or headlines. ... I came here to seek solutions.”

Still, Mr. Homan heavily criticized “sanctuary cities,” or jurisdictions that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement. Minnesota’s state prisons, however, have been honoring Immigrations and Customs Enforcement detainers, he said. Detainers are non-binding requests from ICE to local law enforcement to hold arrestees suspected of violating immigration laws so that ICE can take them into custody. Sanctuary jurisdictions often do not honor them.

Mr. Homan also said that Attorney General Ellison “clarified” that Minnesota’s county jails “may notify ICE of the release dates of criminal public safety risks so ICE can take custody of them.” Mr. Ellison’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

ICE and other immigration agencies, Mr. Homan said, will conduct “targeted” enforcement operations, primarily targeting those with serious criminal histories. Yet he emphasized that the agency was not “surrendering the president’s mission on immigration enforcement.”

“I’m not here because the federal government has carried its mission out perfectly,” he said. “The mission is going to improve because of the changes we’re making internally.”

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

The Trump administration has long contended that its immigration agents primarily target unauthorized immigrants with criminal histories. But news reports have found that more than one-third of those arrested by ICE have no criminal histories. Amid the crackdown in Maine, locals told the Monitor that some of the arrests there appeared indiscriminate, and local officials have argued the same.

In her social media post, Senator Collins said that “there are currently no ongoing or planned large-scale ICE operations” in Maine. Ms. Collins had for days been pressuring Secretary Noem to end the immigration operation in that state, which ICE said today had resulted in the arrests of 206 people.

Standing in the lobby of the St. Regis hotel, about to head into a Monitor event with reporters this week, I warned Rahm Emanuel that the C-SPAN lapel mics we were both now wearing could be “hot” – that is, switched on.

I was thinking, in particular, about the prominent Democrat’s penchant for salty language. He knew exactly what I was alluding to.

“Don’t worry,” Mr. Emanuel said. “I never swear on camera.”

Why We Wrote This

Rahm Emanuel, former White House chief of staff and former member of Congress (among other high-profile roles), appears to be gearing up for a presidential run. At a Monitor event, he shared his strategies for rebuilding the Democratic Party’s image.

Indeed, the man with many titles – former White House chief of staff, former member of Congress, former mayor of Chicago, former U.S. ambassador to Japan – has tons of media experience. And these days, he’s hard to miss. With a regular gig on CNN, a column in The Wall Street Journal, and frequent appearances around the country, be it a fish fry in Iowa or a classroom in Mississippi or a forum at a Democratic think tank, he’s in the news nearly nonstop.

It’s no secret that Mr. Emanuel is thinking about running for president in 2028, and he’s honing his message. Education tops the list of issues he’s highlighting, and so, I asked him: What about his old friend James Carville’s mantra, “It’s the economy, stupid”? Or maybe today, “It’s the affordability ...”

“... stupid,” Mr. Emanuel jumped in. “Don’t forget that word.”

The economy and education, he makes clear, are inextricably linked: A nation that isn’t educating its children cannot compete globally.

“Nothing China does today scares me. Everything we are not doing at home scares me,” Mr. Emanuel says, referencing data that shows some 50% of American children today can’t read or do math at grade level.

He highlights Mississippi, with fourth-grade reading scores moving up from No. 49 in the nation in 2013 to No. 9 in 2024. The state got there, he says, through the teaching of phonics – the old-fashioned method of sounding out words.

Democrats have lost their edge on education as an issue, Mr. Emanuel lamented. “We’re known more for opening bathroom doors and closing school doors than anything else,” he said, as reported in the Monitor’s coverage.

At our afternoon gathering on Wednesday – a part of the Monitor Breakfast newsmakers series – Mr. Emanuel displayed his trademark intensity, no matter the topic. He was full of vinegar on his proposal of mandatory retirement at age 75 for the president and the rest of the executive branch, as well as Congress and the judiciary.

“When you hit 75, we’ll make sure you get Global Entry. Get out of here. … You hit 75, up and out,” he said, a quote shared on X by Edward-Isaac Dovere of CNN.

This wasn’t just a slap at President Donald Trump, it was also an implicit back of the hand for his ex-boss, Joe Biden, and the former president’s ultimately thwarted decision to run for reelection well beyond age 75.

But if any topic got Mr. Emanuel as riled up as education and mandatory retirement, it’s antisemitism. Some critics have charged that Democrats have been too soft on reports of antisemitism at universities and too harsh in critiques of Israel that verge into antisemitic territory. As one of several Jewish Democrats showing signs of presidential ambition, he bristled at the idea that his party has an antisemitism problem. “I think the country has a challenge,” he said.

Still, Mr. Emanuel sounded a hopeful note. In 2023, while living in Japan, his vacation home in Michigan was spray-painted with neo-Nazi insignia.

“Some neighbor came the next day, cleaned it all up,” he said. “I don’t know who he or she is. I’ve seen both the ugly side and the good side of America.”

Standing in the lobby of the St. Regis hotel, about to head into a Monitor event with reporters this week, I warned Rahm Emanuel that the C-SPAN lapel mics we were both now wearing could be “hot” – that is, switched on.

I was thinking, in particular, about the prominent Democrat’s penchant for salty language. He knew exactly what I was alluding to.

“Don’t worry,” Mr. Emanuel said. “I never swear on camera.”

Why We Wrote This

Rahm Emanuel, former White House chief of staff and former member of Congress (among other high-profile roles), appears to be gearing up for a presidential run. At a Monitor event, he shared his strategies for rebuilding the Democratic Party’s image.

Indeed, the man with many titles – former White House chief of staff, former member of Congress, former mayor of Chicago, former U.S. ambassador to Japan – has tons of media experience. And these days, he’s hard to miss. With a regular gig on CNN, a column in The Wall Street Journal, and frequent appearances around the country, be it a fish fry in Iowa or a classroom in Mississippi or a forum at a Democratic think tank, he’s in the news nearly nonstop.

It’s no secret that Mr. Emanuel is thinking about running for president in 2028, and he’s honing his message. Education tops the list of issues he’s highlighting, and so, I asked him: What about his old friend James Carville’s mantra, “It’s the economy, stupid”? Or maybe today, “It’s the affordability ...”

“... stupid,” Mr. Emanuel jumped in. “Don’t forget that word.”

The economy and education, he makes clear, are inextricably linked: A nation that isn’t educating its children cannot compete globally.

“Nothing China does today scares me. Everything we are not doing at home scares me,” Mr. Emanuel says, referencing data that shows some 50% of American children today can’t read or do math at grade level.

He highlights Mississippi, with fourth-grade reading scores moving up from No. 49 in the nation in 2013 to No. 9 in 2024. The state got there, he says, through the teaching of phonics – the old-fashioned method of sounding out words.

Democrats have lost their edge on education as an issue, Mr. Emanuel lamented. “We’re known more for opening bathroom doors and closing school doors than anything else,” he said, as reported in the Monitor’s coverage.

At our afternoon gathering on Wednesday – a part of the Monitor Breakfast newsmakers series – Mr. Emanuel displayed his trademark intensity, no matter the topic. He was full of vinegar on his proposal of mandatory retirement at age 75 for the president and the rest of the executive branch, as well as Congress and the judiciary.

“When you hit 75, we’ll make sure you get Global Entry. Get out of here. … You hit 75, up and out,” he said, a quote shared on X by Edward-Isaac Dovere of CNN.

This wasn’t just a slap at President Donald Trump, it was also an implicit back of the hand for his ex-boss, Joe Biden, and the former president’s ultimately thwarted decision to run for reelection well beyond age 75.

But if any topic got Mr. Emanuel as riled up as education and mandatory retirement, it’s antisemitism. Some critics have charged that Democrats have been too soft on reports of antisemitism at universities and too harsh in critiques of Israel that verge into antisemitic territory. As one of several Jewish Democrats showing signs of presidential ambition, he bristled at the idea that his party has an antisemitism problem. “I think the country has a challenge,” he said.

Still, Mr. Emanuel sounded a hopeful note. In 2023, while living in Japan, his vacation home in Michigan was spray-painted with neo-Nazi insignia.

“Some neighbor came the next day, cleaned it all up,” he said. “I don’t know who he or she is. I’ve seen both the ugly side and the good side of America.”

Immigration was a winning campaign issue for Donald Trump in 2024 and undergirded his approval ratings early in his presidency. But what had been a source of political strength may now be turning into a liability for the president – and, potentially, for Republican lawmakers who back his hard-line policies on sending federal agents to cities to hunt for immigrants with statuses under scrutiny.

The ongoing tumult in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer fatally shot a resident in her car in disputed circumstances, has further eroded Mr. Trump’s poll standings. While his approval rating on immigration is still higher than that of Democratic President Joe Biden in the final year of his presidency, some 6 in 10 voters now express disapproval of Mr. Trump’s approach, according to a batch of recent polls.

A Reuters poll taken after the shooting found a 41% approval rating for Mr. Trump on immigration, down from a peak of 50% in February 2025. Likewise, a new New York Times-Siena poll released Thursday found that 58% of voters disapproved of Mr. Trump’s performance on immigration, and 61% said ICE’s tactics have “gone too far.”

Why We Wrote This

Voters still broadly favor securing the southern border, and they give President Donald Trump credit for that. But as Immigration and Customs Enforcement continues to show up in force in cities across America, that appears to be reframing the issue, with 6 in 10 voters now disapproving of the president’s handling of immigration.

Voters are still broadly in favor of securing the southern border, and many give Mr. Trump credit for achieving that in the first months of his presidency. Notably, while the president’s ratings have dropped, Republicans in Congress still hold an 11-point edge over Democrats on handling immigration, according to a Wall Street Journal tracking poll. (The GOP advantage on border security is a whopping 28 points.) And Democrats only hold a 5-point lead in the New York Times-Siena poll’s generic matchup of congressional candidates, which is hardly insurmountable for the GOP as the party looks toward the 2026 midterm elections.

But as federal agents continue to surge in cities far from the southern border, the violence around deportation-related arrests appears to be reframing the issue for many voters.

Even some people who support a tough line on deportations have growing concerns about how federal agents are acting, says Dante Scala, a politics professor at the University of New Hampshire. The widely circulated videos of the shooting of Renee Good, a mother whose car had been partially blocking a street in Minneapolis, may be a turning point in how voters think about immigration policy, particularly as it affects their own lives.

“Looking at what’s happening in Minnesota, [voters are being] confronted with the idea that this force called ICE appears to be deployed against them, or people like them, and that, I think, changes things,” says Professor Scala, who studies presidential voting patterns.

An “unjustified” shooting in most voters’ eyes

Polls show that Americans are divided over the noisy and at times disruptive protests that have erupted in cities where ICE and other federal agencies are deployed. An Economist/YouGov poll of adults taken Jan. 16-19 found 47% approval and 44% disapproval.

A majority of respondents, however, say that the shooting of Ms. Good wasn’t justified, according to a Quinnipiac poll of registered voters. Eight in 10 respondents said they had watched videos of the shooting: Fifty-three percent found it unjustified, 35% said it was justified, and 12% didn’t express an opinion. Views were largely aligned with party affiliation: Seventy-seven percent of Republicans said the shooting was justified.

Podcaster Joe Rogan, a political independent who has in the past expressed support for Mr. Trump, was scathing about ICE’s conduct in Minnesota, comparing it to the Gestapo. “You don’t want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching people up, many of which turn out to actually be U.S. citizens that just don’t have their papers on them,” he said.

Mr. Trump has rejected criticism of ICE and its agents. He says that ICE is removing “murderers and other criminals” from U.S. cities, which is why crime rates are falling. (Data on immigrant arrests in major cities shows, however, that many have no criminal record.) And he argues that voters would “support the Patriots of ICE” if they knew “the facts.”

Homeland Security officials say protesters are making it unsafe for federal agents to operate and are impeding lawful immigration operations. Vice President JD Vance, in Minneapolis on Thursday, pleaded for more cooperation from local officials. “It would make our lives a lot easier, it would make our officers a lot safer, and it would make Minneapolis much less chaotic,” he said.

Civil rights groups say citizens are exercising their constitutional rights and have been harassed and assaulted by the agents they seek to monitor.

Last week, a federal judge in Minnesota blocked federal agents from arresting, pepper-spraying, or retaliating against peaceful protesters and observers. On Wednesday, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals lifted those restrictions, at least for now.

To Michael Brodkorb, a conservative from Eagan, a town south of Minneapolis-St. Paul, the recent fatal shooting of Ms. Good by ICE was deeply concerning. “I’m actually surprised that more people haven’t gotten hurt,” he says.

While ICE should remove the “worst of the worst,” he says federal enforcement operations in the Twin Cities don’t seem to reflect that priority. Instead, Mr. Brodkorb thinks the street-level show of force is “meant to show the power of the presidency, above anything else.”

Mr. Brodkorb, a podcaster and former deputy chair of the state Republican Party, says the optics are becoming politically costly for his party. “I’m trying to figure out how, when all is said and done, there is any path for Republicans in this state to succeed,” he says. “I just don’t see it.”

Other Republicans note that the party recently recruited a top-tier candidate to run for the state’s open Senate seat this fall. And they say the state’s ongoing multibillion-dollar fraud scandal will give them a strong issue to run on.

Still, for Republican lawmakers seeking to defend a razor-thin House majority in November’s midterms, a backlash against Mr. Trump’s immigration policy could be damaging.

GOP leadership has largely backed the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement operations and echoed its assertions that ICE is deporting criminals and that its agents are acting lawfully. Last year, Congress authorized tens of billions of dollars for ICE to expand its detention facilities, hire more agents, and buy more equipment.

“That’s not who we are as Americans”

Matt Wylie, a Republican strategist based in South Carolina, warns that his party could lose the narrative over public safety as voters watch more videos of masked agents dragging people from cars and sowing fear in communities. “That’s not who we are as Americans,” he says.

Before the Minnesota deployment, the administration could claim it was delivering on what most voters say they want: secure borders and the deportation of violent criminals, says Mr. Wylie.

But that might not hold up in November. “This will be a case study in how to screw up a winning issue and make it so toxic that it will be hard for Republicans to win.”

Pushback from voters against what they perceive as an administration’s excesses is a familiar “thermostatic” pattern, says Matt Grossmann, a political scientist at Michigan State University who directs the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research. Under President Biden, voters responded negatively to what they saw as a lack of border security. But now, it is the Trump administration’s approach that’s giving voters second thoughts.

Public opinion “usually reacts against the direction of policy,” says Professor Grossmann. “The public often says, ‘Things have gone too far.’”

During the first Trump presidency, polling showed a backlash against immigration enforcement when migrant children were being held in what critics described as “cages” at the border, he notes. That backlash helped Democrats win back control of Congress in the 2018 midterms.

Last month, Marcus Penny, a progressive who lives in St. Louis Park, a Minneapolis suburb, began volunteering to escort kids from class after he learned of federal agents near his children’s elementary school. He says classroom windows are now covered to shield students from viewing federal agents across the street. (School officials in another suburban district said this week that the government has detained four students.)

There’s a “larger and larger circle of people who feel unsafe around ICE, myself included,” says Mr. Penny, a parent-teacher organization member. He’s not against all immigration enforcement, he says, but the aggressive, widespread enforcement – seemingly beyond targeted arrests – is interrupting students’ access to public school.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

“They deserve to be learning. They deserve to be kids,” he says.

Sarah Matusek reported from Minneapolis, and Simon Montlake from Boston.

Immigration was a winning campaign issue for Donald Trump in 2024 and undergirded his approval ratings early in his presidency. But what had been a source of political strength may now be turning into a liability for the president – and, potentially, for Republican lawmakers who back his hard-line policies on sending federal agents to cities to hunt for immigrants with statuses under scrutiny.

The ongoing tumult in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, where an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer fatally shot a resident in her car in disputed circumstances, has further eroded Mr. Trump’s poll standings. While his approval rating on immigration is still higher than that of Democratic President Joe Biden in the final year of his presidency, some 6 in 10 voters now express disapproval of Mr. Trump’s approach, according to a batch of recent polls.

A Reuters poll taken after the shooting found a 41% approval rating for Mr. Trump on immigration, down from a peak of 50% in February 2025. Likewise, a new New York Times-Siena poll released Thursday found that 58% of voters disapproved of Mr. Trump’s performance on immigration, and 61% said ICE’s tactics have “gone too far.”

Why We Wrote This

Voters still broadly favor securing the southern border, and they give President Donald Trump credit for that. But as Immigration and Customs Enforcement continues to show up in force in cities across America, that appears to be reframing the issue, with 6 in 10 voters now disapproving of the president’s handling of immigration.

Voters are still broadly in favor of securing the southern border, and many give Mr. Trump credit for achieving that in the first months of his presidency. Notably, while the president’s ratings have dropped, Republicans in Congress still hold an 11-point edge over Democrats on handling immigration, according to a Wall Street Journal tracking poll. (The GOP advantage on border security is a whopping 28 points.) And Democrats only hold a 5-point lead in the New York Times-Siena poll’s generic matchup of congressional candidates, which is hardly insurmountable for the GOP as the party looks toward the 2026 midterm elections.

But as federal agents continue to surge in cities far from the southern border, the violence around deportation-related arrests appears to be reframing the issue for many voters.

Even some people who support a tough line on deportations have growing concerns about how federal agents are acting, says Dante Scala, a politics professor at the University of New Hampshire. The widely circulated videos of the shooting of Renee Good, a mother whose car had been partially blocking a street in Minneapolis, may be a turning point in how voters think about immigration policy, particularly as it affects their own lives.

“Looking at what’s happening in Minnesota, [voters are being] confronted with the idea that this force called ICE appears to be deployed against them, or people like them, and that, I think, changes things,” says Professor Scala, who studies presidential voting patterns.

An “unjustified” shooting in most voters’ eyes

Polls show that Americans are divided over the noisy and at times disruptive protests that have erupted in cities where ICE and other federal agencies are deployed. An Economist/YouGov poll of adults taken Jan. 16-19 found 47% approval and 44% disapproval.

A majority of respondents, however, say that the shooting of Ms. Good wasn’t justified, according to a Quinnipiac poll of registered voters. Eight in 10 respondents said they had watched videos of the shooting: Fifty-three percent found it unjustified, 35% said it was justified, and 12% didn’t express an opinion. Views were largely aligned with party affiliation: Seventy-seven percent of Republicans said the shooting was justified.

Podcaster Joe Rogan, a political independent who has in the past expressed support for Mr. Trump, was scathing about ICE’s conduct in Minnesota, comparing it to the Gestapo. “You don’t want militarized people in the streets just roaming around, snatching people up, many of which turn out to actually be U.S. citizens that just don’t have their papers on them,” he said.

Mr. Trump has rejected criticism of ICE and its agents. He says that ICE is removing “murderers and other criminals” from U.S. cities, which is why crime rates are falling. (Data on immigrant arrests in major cities shows, however, that many have no criminal record.) And he argues that voters would “support the Patriots of ICE” if they knew “the facts.”

Homeland Security officials say protesters are making it unsafe for federal agents to operate and are impeding lawful immigration operations. Vice President JD Vance, in Minneapolis on Thursday, pleaded for more cooperation from local officials. “It would make our lives a lot easier, it would make our officers a lot safer, and it would make Minneapolis much less chaotic,” he said.

Civil rights groups say citizens are exercising their constitutional rights and have been harassed and assaulted by the agents they seek to monitor.

Last week, a federal judge in Minnesota blocked federal agents from arresting, pepper-spraying, or retaliating against peaceful protesters and observers. On Wednesday, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals lifted those restrictions, at least for now.

To Michael Brodkorb, a conservative from Eagan, a town south of Minneapolis-St. Paul, the recent fatal shooting of Ms. Good by ICE was deeply concerning. “I’m actually surprised that more people haven’t gotten hurt,” he says.

While ICE should remove the “worst of the worst,” he says federal enforcement operations in the Twin Cities don’t seem to reflect that priority. Instead, Mr. Brodkorb thinks the street-level show of force is “meant to show the power of the presidency, above anything else.”

Mr. Brodkorb, a podcaster and former deputy chair of the state Republican Party, says the optics are becoming politically costly for his party. “I’m trying to figure out how, when all is said and done, there is any path for Republicans in this state to succeed,” he says. “I just don’t see it.”

Other Republicans note that the party recently recruited a top-tier candidate to run for the state’s open Senate seat this fall. And they say the state’s ongoing multibillion-dollar fraud scandal will give them a strong issue to run on.

Still, for Republican lawmakers seeking to defend a razor-thin House majority in November’s midterms, a backlash against Mr. Trump’s immigration policy could be damaging.

GOP leadership has largely backed the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement operations and echoed its assertions that ICE is deporting criminals and that its agents are acting lawfully. Last year, Congress authorized tens of billions of dollars for ICE to expand its detention facilities, hire more agents, and buy more equipment.

“That’s not who we are as Americans”

Matt Wylie, a Republican strategist based in South Carolina, warns that his party could lose the narrative over public safety as voters watch more videos of masked agents dragging people from cars and sowing fear in communities. “That’s not who we are as Americans,” he says.

Before the Minnesota deployment, the administration could claim it was delivering on what most voters say they want: secure borders and the deportation of violent criminals, says Mr. Wylie.

But that might not hold up in November. “This will be a case study in how to screw up a winning issue and make it so toxic that it will be hard for Republicans to win.”

Pushback from voters against what they perceive as an administration’s excesses is a familiar “thermostatic” pattern, says Matt Grossmann, a political scientist at Michigan State University who directs the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research. Under President Biden, voters responded negatively to what they saw as a lack of border security. But now, it is the Trump administration’s approach that’s giving voters second thoughts.

Public opinion “usually reacts against the direction of policy,” says Professor Grossmann. “The public often says, ‘Things have gone too far.’”

During the first Trump presidency, polling showed a backlash against immigration enforcement when migrant children were being held in what critics described as “cages” at the border, he notes. That backlash helped Democrats win back control of Congress in the 2018 midterms.

Last month, Marcus Penny, a progressive who lives in St. Louis Park, a Minneapolis suburb, began volunteering to escort kids from class after he learned of federal agents near his children’s elementary school. He says classroom windows are now covered to shield students from viewing federal agents across the street. (School officials in another suburban district said this week that the government has detained four students.)

There’s a “larger and larger circle of people who feel unsafe around ICE, myself included,” says Mr. Penny, a parent-teacher organization member. He’s not against all immigration enforcement, he says, but the aggressive, widespread enforcement – seemingly beyond targeted arrests – is interrupting students’ access to public school.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

“They deserve to be learning. They deserve to be kids,” he says.

Sarah Matusek reported from Minneapolis, and Simon Montlake from Boston.

In his first public statement about his investigation into Donald Trump’s actions following the 2020 election, former special counsel Jack Smith said the evidence he had gathered was sufficient to prove the president broke the law to try to stay in power despite his loss to Joe Biden.

Mr. Smith withdrew the case more than a year ago, because of Mr. Trump’s 2024 election victory.

But at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, Mr. Smith said he stood by his decision to bring charges, noting that two grand juries concluded that “rather than accept his defeat in the 2020 election, President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results and prevent the lawful transfer of power.” [Related Monitor story on the case, from 2024: Big development in Jan. 6 case against Trump. Why now?]

Why We Wrote This

Former special counsel Jack Smith’s efforts to prosecute Donald Trump for trying to overturn the 2020 election results ended more than a year ago. But political partisanship around the issue remains strong – and was on display as Mr. Smith made his first public comments on the case during a House hearing.

“No one, no one should be above the law in this country, and the law required that he be held to account,” Mr. Smith said.

The hearing reflected the highly polarized political climate of Mr. Trump’s second term. There was at least one disruption by a pro-Trump audience member who was then removed from the room. Republicans decried Mr. Smith’s investigation as “weaponization of the judicial process.” Democrats alleged intimidation of witnesses and the rewriting of history by Mr. Trump.

The president appeared to be following the hearings closely, commenting on social media. “Hopefully the Attorney General is looking at what he’s done, including some of the crooked and corrupt witnesses that he was attempting to use in his case against me,” Mr. Trump wrote. Last year, he directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate several political opponents, and charges were later filed against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

As a result of Mr. Smith’s investigation, a grand jury found probable cause to indict Mr. Trump with four charges related to his effort to overturn the 2020 results, which culminated in an attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters on the day Congress was scheduled to certify those results. The charges were: “conspiring to obstruct the government function of selecting and certifying the President of the United States; obstructing and attempting to obstruct the official proceeding on January 6, 2021; conspiring to obstruct the official proceeding; and conspiring to violate the federal rights of citizens to vote and have their votes counted.”

After the November 2024 election, Mr. Smith dropped the charges on advice from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, citing a prohibition against prosecuting a sitting president.

Republicans on the committee used Thursday’s hearing as a chance to paint Mr. Smith as a pro-Biden partisan and to question the longtime prosecutor’s integrity and judgment.

“It was always about politics,” committee chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio said in his opening remarks. “The good news is the American people saw through it. ... We elected President Trump twice.”

The committee’s ranking Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, welcomed Mr. Smith in his opening remarks, saying, “Special Counsel Smith, you pursued the facts. You followed every applicable law, ethics rule and DOJ regulation, your decisions were reviewed by the Public Integrity section. You acted based solely on the facts, the opposite of Donald Trump.”

Other Republican committee members largely followed the lead of their chairman, asking Mr. Smith whether he had broken Justice Department protocols by subpoenaing the phone records of Mr. Trump and a number of congressional Republicans as part of the investigation, placing a gag order on President Trump about the ongoing investigation ahead of the 2024 presidential election, and other actions that Republicans say reveal Mr. Smith’s partisan bias and overreach of prosecutorial powers.

Republican Rep. Thomas Tiffany of Wisconsin listed a number of Mr. Smith’s previous cases that had been overturned or ended in mistrial, along with actions during the Trump investigation that were subsequently overturned by courts or led to a change in Justice Department policy. “I would just say this, Mr. Chairman, if Mr. Smith ever works for the Department of Justice again, I would recommend a remedial course on the First Amendment of the Constitution.”

Mr. Smith refuted allegations that his investigations were politically motivated. “If asked whether to prosecute a former president based on the same facts today, I would do so regardless of whether that president was a Democrat or a Republican.”

Democrats defended Mr. Smith’s professionalism and adherence to procedure and called the Republican hearings “theater.”

“Republicans are trying to rewrite history, that’s what this is,” said Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado. Noting the four Capitol Police officers in the gallery who risked their lives defending members of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, Mr. Neguse added: “It’s an outrage that [Republican lawmakers] now sit here and have the audacity to try to rewrite history in front of the very officers who sacrificed everything to protect them.”

On Capitol Hill, members of Congress who aren’t on the committee expressed their own views about the hearings and Mr. Smith.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

Republican Rep. Russell Fry of South Carolina told the Monitor, “I think the whole goal is to show to the American people right now, the ways in which he manipulated process, bastardized Department of Justice standards, went beyond the scope of the law, and even violated the Constitution.”

Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, called Mr. Smith “a man of integrity” and said, “I hope he’s setting the record straight for Republicans on that committee who do everything they can to try to twist the truth.”

In his first public statement about his investigation into Donald Trump’s actions following the 2020 election, former special counsel Jack Smith said the evidence he had gathered was sufficient to prove the president broke the law to try to stay in power despite his loss to Joe Biden.

Mr. Smith withdrew the case more than a year ago, because of Mr. Trump’s 2024 election victory.

But at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, Mr. Smith said he stood by his decision to bring charges, noting that two grand juries concluded that “rather than accept his defeat in the 2020 election, President Trump engaged in a criminal scheme to overturn the results and prevent the lawful transfer of power.” [Related Monitor story on the case, from 2024: Big development in Jan. 6 case against Trump. Why now?]

Why We Wrote This

Former special counsel Jack Smith’s efforts to prosecute Donald Trump for trying to overturn the 2020 election results ended more than a year ago. But political partisanship around the issue remains strong – and was on display as Mr. Smith made his first public comments on the case during a House hearing.

“No one, no one should be above the law in this country, and the law required that he be held to account,” Mr. Smith said.

The hearing reflected the highly polarized political climate of Mr. Trump’s second term. There was at least one disruption by a pro-Trump audience member who was then removed from the room. Republicans decried Mr. Smith’s investigation as “weaponization of the judicial process.” Democrats alleged intimidation of witnesses and the rewriting of history by Mr. Trump.

The president appeared to be following the hearings closely, commenting on social media. “Hopefully the Attorney General is looking at what he’s done, including some of the crooked and corrupt witnesses that he was attempting to use in his case against me,” Mr. Trump wrote. Last year, he directed Attorney General Pam Bondi to investigate several political opponents, and charges were later filed against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

As a result of Mr. Smith’s investigation, a grand jury found probable cause to indict Mr. Trump with four charges related to his effort to overturn the 2020 results, which culminated in an attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters on the day Congress was scheduled to certify those results. The charges were: “conspiring to obstruct the government function of selecting and certifying the President of the United States; obstructing and attempting to obstruct the official proceeding on January 6, 2021; conspiring to obstruct the official proceeding; and conspiring to violate the federal rights of citizens to vote and have their votes counted.”

After the November 2024 election, Mr. Smith dropped the charges on advice from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, citing a prohibition against prosecuting a sitting president.

Republicans on the committee used Thursday’s hearing as a chance to paint Mr. Smith as a pro-Biden partisan and to question the longtime prosecutor’s integrity and judgment.

“It was always about politics,” committee chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio said in his opening remarks. “The good news is the American people saw through it. ... We elected President Trump twice.”

The committee’s ranking Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, welcomed Mr. Smith in his opening remarks, saying, “Special Counsel Smith, you pursued the facts. You followed every applicable law, ethics rule and DOJ regulation, your decisions were reviewed by the Public Integrity section. You acted based solely on the facts, the opposite of Donald Trump.”

Other Republican committee members largely followed the lead of their chairman, asking Mr. Smith whether he had broken Justice Department protocols by subpoenaing the phone records of Mr. Trump and a number of congressional Republicans as part of the investigation, placing a gag order on President Trump about the ongoing investigation ahead of the 2024 presidential election, and other actions that Republicans say reveal Mr. Smith’s partisan bias and overreach of prosecutorial powers.

Republican Rep. Thomas Tiffany of Wisconsin listed a number of Mr. Smith’s previous cases that had been overturned or ended in mistrial, along with actions during the Trump investigation that were subsequently overturned by courts or led to a change in Justice Department policy. “I would just say this, Mr. Chairman, if Mr. Smith ever works for the Department of Justice again, I would recommend a remedial course on the First Amendment of the Constitution.”

Mr. Smith refuted allegations that his investigations were politically motivated. “If asked whether to prosecute a former president based on the same facts today, I would do so regardless of whether that president was a Democrat or a Republican.”

Democrats defended Mr. Smith’s professionalism and adherence to procedure and called the Republican hearings “theater.”

“Republicans are trying to rewrite history, that’s what this is,” said Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado. Noting the four Capitol Police officers in the gallery who risked their lives defending members of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, Mr. Neguse added: “It’s an outrage that [Republican lawmakers] now sit here and have the audacity to try to rewrite history in front of the very officers who sacrificed everything to protect them.”

On Capitol Hill, members of Congress who aren’t on the committee expressed their own views about the hearings and Mr. Smith.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

Republican Rep. Russell Fry of South Carolina told the Monitor, “I think the whole goal is to show to the American people right now, the ways in which he manipulated process, bastardized Department of Justice standards, went beyond the scope of the law, and even violated the Constitution.”

Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, called Mr. Smith “a man of integrity” and said, “I hope he’s setting the record straight for Republicans on that committee who do everything they can to try to twist the truth.”

President Trump waged a sustained campaign last year against America’s top universities, ostensibly over how they handled incidents of antisemitism during campus protests over Israel’s war in Gaza. In response, some universities acknowledged shortcomings on antisemitism and promised steps to foster ideological diversity. Others have balked at Mr. Trump’s demands as a violation of their autonomy. Harvard, one of his biggest targets, has fought back in court.

Mr. Trump’s efforts began last January with an executive order on combating antisemitism that singled out colleges and universities. Later, he moved to freeze federal research grants to several universities accused of violating antidiscrimination laws, sending a message to higher education as a whole. Conservatives argue that many colleges have become bastions of left-wing indoctrination and are failing to properly educate the next generation. 

The administration has demanded a dismantling of diversity programs on campuses and stricter enforcement of merit-based admissions. By freezing billions of dollars in grants to Harvard, Columbia, Brown, and other research universities, Mr. Trump found an effective way to pressure private universities into changing how they operate. 

More stories on President Trump’s second term after one year:

Another pressure point is foreign students. The Trump administration threatened to stop issuing student visas for Harvard, which enrolls large numbers of students from abroad. New international student enrollment has fallen by 17% in the current academic year, amid uncertainty over visa issuance, according to the Institute of International Education. 

In July, Columbia paid more than $200 million to settle an antidiscrimination investigation and restart research funding. Brown, Cornell, Northwestern, and the University of Pennsylvania have also signed agreements accepting varying conditions; all have insisted that academic freedom hasn’t been compromised. 

Harvard has pushed back on Mr. Trump’s demands. It successfully argued in federal court that the administration’s cuts to its research funding were unconstitutional. That case is now under appeal, while Harvard faces investigations on other fronts and demands to turn over more admissions data. 

Colleges also face higher taxes on endowments because of Mr. Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill from July. What had been a flat 1.4% excise tax on private colleges and universities over a certain size will become a tiered system with a top tax rate of 8%. That is aimed squarely at elite universities.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

Read our other stories on President Trump’s second term after one year:

Read more on higher education, DEI, and antisemitism:

President Trump waged a sustained campaign last year against America’s top universities, ostensibly over how they handled incidents of antisemitism during campus protests over Israel’s war in Gaza. In response, some universities acknowledged shortcomings on antisemitism and promised steps to foster ideological diversity. Others have balked at Mr. Trump’s demands as a violation of their autonomy. Harvard, one of his biggest targets, has fought back in court.

Mr. Trump’s efforts began last January with an executive order on combating antisemitism that singled out colleges and universities. Later, he moved to freeze federal research grants to several universities accused of violating antidiscrimination laws, sending a message to higher education as a whole. Conservatives argue that many colleges have become bastions of left-wing indoctrination and are failing to properly educate the next generation. 

The administration has demanded a dismantling of diversity programs on campuses and stricter enforcement of merit-based admissions. By freezing billions of dollars in grants to Harvard, Columbia, Brown, and other research universities, Mr. Trump found an effective way to pressure private universities into changing how they operate. 

More stories on President Trump’s second term after one year:

Another pressure point is foreign students. The Trump administration threatened to stop issuing student visas for Harvard, which enrolls large numbers of students from abroad. New international student enrollment has fallen by 17% in the current academic year, amid uncertainty over visa issuance, according to the Institute of International Education. 

In July, Columbia paid more than $200 million to settle an antidiscrimination investigation and restart research funding. Brown, Cornell, Northwestern, and the University of Pennsylvania have also signed agreements accepting varying conditions; all have insisted that academic freedom hasn’t been compromised. 

Harvard has pushed back on Mr. Trump’s demands. It successfully argued in federal court that the administration’s cuts to its research funding were unconstitutional. That case is now under appeal, while Harvard faces investigations on other fronts and demands to turn over more admissions data. 

Colleges also face higher taxes on endowments because of Mr. Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill from July. What had been a flat 1.4% excise tax on private colleges and universities over a certain size will become a tiered system with a top tax rate of 8%. That is aimed squarely at elite universities.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

Read our other stories on President Trump’s second term after one year:

Read more on higher education, DEI, and antisemitism: