Welcome to The Logoff: The Trump administration is reversing decades of federal policy to exclude undocumented children from the federal preschool program Head Start, in its latest attack on immigrants in the US.

Who will be affected? Children without legal immigration status will be directly excluded from the program under Thursday’s announcement, but the impact will be broader. As the National Head Start Association wrote in response to the news, “Attempts to impose such a requirement threaten to create fear and confusion among all families who are focused on raising healthy children, ready to succeed in school and life.”

What does Head Start do? Head Start is an early childhood education program for low-income and homeless children between the ages of three and five, run at the national level by the Department of Health and Human Services but largely administered at the local level. Among other benefits, it also provides nutrition assistance for enrolled children and, crucially, reliable child care for their parents.

Why is the policy changing? As the education publication Chalkbeat pointed out, this change fits with a deliberate strategy by the Trump administration to make life harder for undocumented immigrants and force them to self-deport. In February, President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing the government to exclude undocumented immigrants from more programs.

What else did HHS change? Thursday’s announcement doesn’t just impact Head Start, but at least 12 other programs, including mental health and substance abuse assistance, that the administration is now reclassifying as “federal public benefits” in order to exclude undocumented immigrants.

What’s the big picture? Data on the benefits of early childhood education is complicated, as my colleague Kelsey Piper has reported — but research suggests that it can have a positive lifelong impact on outcomes for children. The Trump administration’s decision excludes a group of children young enough that they may know no other home than the United States from those benefits.

And with that, it’s time to log off…

The pygmy hippo Moo Deng, who became a global sensation last year for her puckish antics, turned 1 on Thursday and celebrated with a “cake” made of fruits and vegetables. Last year, my colleague Li Zhou examined what makes Moo Deng and her peers in the world of viral baby animals so popular — it’s a great piece that also features a very fluffy penguin chick and a baby beaver. I hope you give it a read, and if there are any other baby animals who have stolen your heart recently, I’d love to see photos. Have a great weekend!

In the latest round of the Trump tariff saga that has economists around the world on the edge of their seats, the U.S. released updated guidelines on Friday exempting specific technology devices, such as laptops, smartphones, and machines needed to make semiconductors, from reciprocal tariffs imposed by the U.S.

The new tariff guidelines exclude a range of electronics, including laptops, semiconductors, solar cells, flat-panel displays, flash drives, memory cards, and solid-state drives. However, while these products are currently exempt, future duties remain possible.

China’s Ministry of Commerce called the exemptions “a small step by the U.S. towards rectifying the misguided approach of unilateral ‘reciprocal tariffs’” and added that Beijing was still reviewing its impact.

The Ministry took the opportunity to repeat its heavy criticism of the U.S. tariffs, insisting that Washington was “severely disrupting the international economic and trade order” and “harming others without benefiting itself.” It also called on the U.S. to:

“Take a significant step towards rectification, completely abandon the erroneous ‘reciprocal tariffs’, and return to the right path of mutual respect and resolving differences through equal dialogue.”

145% tariffs hit tech companies like Apple particularly hard

The exemption provides temporary relief to companies like Apple, which manufactures over 90% of its products in China, including iPads and Mac computers. Without the exemptions, Apple may have had to increase the price of its U.S.-sold iPhones by up to 85% to maintain profit margins.

The company had already taken emergency measures by chartering flights to ship millions of iPhones from India to the U.S., aiming to mitigate the impact of potential tariffs. The Economic Times of India wrote:

“Apple’s relationship with China, where it makes up to nine out of ten of its iPhones, turned Donald Trump’s so-called “Liberation Day” into six days of hell for the tech company.”

Despite the rally, Apple faces an uphill climb

Despite efforts to diversify manufacturing to countries like India and Vietnam, Apple’s dependency on China’s well-established ecosystem remains. Rebuilding its intricate supply chains elsewhere could take decades, and manufacturing iPhones entirely in the U.S. is impractical due to labor shortages and costs.

The memes circulating on social media are entertaining but speak volumes about the reality that American reindustrialization can’t happen overnight.

Trump critics remain unreserved in their commentary, including Ed Krassenstein, a political commentator and creator of KrassenCast, who said:

“It’s almost getting comical at this point. Trump literally said there would be “no exemptions” to his reciprocal tariffs and MAGA cheered… Now, suddenly he’s backtracking again and adding a bunch of exemptions to his reciprocal tariffs. And MAGA is cheering yet again.”

Political commentator Keith Olbermann posted:

“Trump: Tariffs are perfect and beautiful and mandatory, and I won’t back down. Also, Trump: here are 37,498 tariff exemptions for companies who’ve greased me.”

Meanwhile, crypto markets reacted favorably to the news, with Bitcoin reaching $86,000 for the first time since ‘Liberation Day’ on April 2. It may be worth getting the popcorn ready as we gear up for a new week. The next round of tariff actions is about to take off.

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