The Gov Hub Newsletter: April 28, 2026

After a MAGA influencer floated the idea of changing ICE’s name to “NICE,” to force anyone reporting on the rogue agency’s actions to say “nice” instead of “ICE,” Trump took to Truth Social to “endorse” the idea. 

A U.S. Customs and Border Protection Officer has been charged with third-degree assault and criminal mischief in Colorado, following an investigation into how the officer engaged with a protester. The investigation has hinged on a number of videos that show the protester being put into a chokehold by the officer, a practice that is banned in the state.

ICE has set its eyes on building a detention facility for children and their families on one of the most PFAS-contaminated sites in the country. Per reporting from The Guardian, the site, which was once called, “The England air force base, now called England Airpark, is a sprawling former military facility in Louisiana where Pfas levels in the groundwater have been found at at least 41m parts per trillion (ppt).”

Congressman Andrew Clyde [R-GA] has made legislative moves on his anti-immigrant beliefs by introducing his Territorial Protection and Sovereignty Act. The bill would eliminate TPS [Temporary Protected Status] and get rid of any existing TPS designations if it were to become law.

Ahead of the World Cup this summer, which will be hosted in the U.S., Amnesty International has issued a travel advisory to the U.S. for soccer fans, warning them of a deteriorating human rights environment.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for DC has ruled that Trump’s asylum ban at the border is illegal. The ruling blocks Trump’s executive order that had halted asylum access at the southern border.

55% of respondents to a new Gallup poll said that they view their personal financial situation as getting worse. 

AAA is keeping tabs on gas prices, and as of today, has noted that the national average per gallon of regular is $4.175, and $5.461 for diesel. 

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York has a new report out sharing the college majors with the highest unemployment rates, as well as those with the high underemployment rates. On the highest unemployment rates list, the second highest may come to a shock to anyone that lived through the STEM-education push, and it’s computer engineering.

Following Trump’s DOJ dropping its investigation into Fed Chair Jerome Powell [for now], Senator Thom Tillis [R-NC], who’d been blockading Trump nominees in protest of the investigation, has shared that he will now vote to confirm Trump nominee Kevin Warsh to chair the Fed. 

New data from LendingTree shares an alarming new statistic – of the respondents making above $100K/year, 57% said that they’re worried about paying for groceries in the last month. Also noted in the data, only 22% of total respondents reported that they had/have no difficulty in paying for groceries.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration announced it will no longer allow federal funds to be used to purchase or distribute fentanyl test strips for people who use drugs, reversing a harm reduction policy put in place during the Biden Admin in 2021. The announcement, which went out to federal grantees, noted that federal funds will continue to be available for test strips that are used by public health and law enforcement officials.

RFK Jr. has used his exemplary decision making skills to appoint a former tobacco exec and big oil lobbyist for Chevron, Stephen Sayle, to be the CDC’s Deputy Director  for Legislative Affairs.

New research published in JAMA Pediatrics shared that the CDC’s decision to no longer recommend giving infants a dose of the hepatitis B vaccine within 24hrs after birth is likely to lead to hundreds of more infections. Those infections, per the analysis, will increase healthcare costs associated with the long-term and chronic impacts of hepatitis b.

According to reporting from MotherJones, the FDA is finally considering finalizing a rule proposed during the Biden Admin to ban the use of electric shocks on disabled children as a form of punishment. The double ‘finally’s’ mentioned in the sentence before are because the Trump Admin put the decision on hold while it played hire and fire at the FDA.

Circa January of this year, the Wyoming state Supreme Court struck down an abortion ban and abortion pill ban, ruling that they violated the state’s constitution. Fast forward to now, and a District Judge has struck down another attempt from state Republicans to ban abortion, granting a temporary restraining order on the latest law.

For those lucky ducks that need to renew their passports in Washington, the new default passport given out there will feature Trump’s face and signature under the guise of celebrating America’s 250th. The irony of this being announced while King Charles and fam are in town hanging with Trump… which has thus far resulted in this strange tennis ordeal and a rage-bait post of the two from the White House captioned “two kings.”

Former Deputy FBI Director turned once again, talking head, who cultivated a reputation for complaining about working “long” hours, Dan Bongino is back in the conversation following a yap sesh on Sean Hannity’s podcast. In their convo, Bongino shared that he used to spread lies around the FBI to “catch snakes,” a game he thought was necessary to oust who he viewed as the “bad FBI” versus the “Good FBI.”

Congressman Tom Kean Jr. [R-NJ] has been MIA for weeks, missing votes and becoming the center point of conspiracies that he's the political version of Avril Lavigne. Alas, he’s seemingly reappeared in the form of a written statement where he vaguely addresses dealing with an unspecified medical condition and plans to return “soon.” 

As Countess Luann once said, “money doesn’t buy you class,” and that’s all the more evident in a decision made by the Trump Admin to resurface the bottom of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool with a surface material in “American Flag Blue.” The project is estimated to cost taxpayers $1.5M.

ICYMI [again], Sleepy Trump appeared to doze off during this press conference on where he was surrounded by members of his cabinet. And it’s those snoozes that may account for new polling from Navigator Research, which have found that 1 out of 5 voters that voted for Trump in 2024, regret their vote.

Texas Tech, which is known for its deeply conservative central campus, has begun rolling out a new policy across all five of the universities under its umbrella that bans students from writing on LGBTQ+s topics in theses and dissertations. 

Amidst this weekend’s White House Correspondents Dinner, adoringly referred to as “nerd prom,” by the DC scene, became a chaotic and intense scene when a man allegedly tried to storm the ballroom the event was being held in with an array of weaponry. The man was apprehended by law enforcement, while Trump was escorted away by Secret Service, and various cabinet secretaries either ditched their wives for safety [RFK Jr.] or used their pregnant wives as body armor [Stephen Miller]. Following the series of events, which were recapped by Washington Post reporter Dylan Wells, questions over seemingly lax security protocols, conspiracy theories on it being a staged assassination attempt, and calls for taxpayer money to be used to build Trump’s White House ballroom have taken over the conversation [Iran, who? Epstein Files? What are those?].

A Trump-appointed immigration Judge Melissa Isaak has come to national attention not for her devout allegiance to “fighting for men’s rights” during her time as a divorce lawyer, but for this  now viral video where she says: "There's two types of women. There are good, solid, valuable women who are major assets to men—if you're a good woman—and then there's a warm, wet hole."

Following a weirdo-style Apache helicopter flyby of Kid Rock’s Tennessee house using taxpayer dollars a few weeks ago, Kid Rock joined none other than SecDef Hegseth for a flight in an Apaches in D.C. on Monday. According to Rolling Stone, the 10-minute joyride was filmed with the intention of the footage being used in Kid Rock’s “Freedom 250 Concert Tour.”

Gannon Ken Van Dyke, a U.S. Special Forces soldier that was a part of kidnapping Venezuelan dictator Nicholas Maduro and his wife, was hit with fraud charges in connection with allegations that he used insider information about the operation to place $33,000 in bet on prediction market, Polymarket. Van Dyke is facing five criminal counts to which he pleaded not guilty. Interestingly enough, Polymarket claimed that it flagged Van Dyke’s trading to officials, and rival Kalshi had banned Van Dyke from its platform.

The Trump Admin has fired all 22 sitting members of the independent board that oversees the National Science Foundation. The board, which is typically made up of scientific experts across the academic space, was established decades ago to advise presidents on policy in the science realm and approve related funding awards. *Editor’s Note: typically the board has 25 members

Wind is going, well into the wind… with an announcement from the Trump Admin’s Interior Department that it will reimburse more energy companies for offshore wind leases if they abandon projects and invest in fossil fuels instead. Amongst those cutting a deal is Global Infrastructure Partners, which follows an agreement made with TotalEnergies last month.

USA Today: Winter is shorter. See why it matters

Essence: Femicide Against Black Women Is A Public Health Crisis

Gothamist: He went to report crime to an upstate NY sheriff. Instead, ICE arrested him.

The Hill: GLP-1s and endometriosis: Could there be a new treatment?