Up First from NPR
Hearing For Wrongly Deported Man, Prescription Drug Prices, Harvard Battle Continues
Wed, 16 Apr 2025
A federal judge in Maryland questioned the Trump administration about its continued refusal to retrieve a mistakenly deported man from an El Salvador prison, President Trump signed an executive action that aims to lower drug prices for Americans, and the President threatened to remove Harvard's tax exempt status.Want more comprehensive analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.Today's episode of Up First was edited by Anna Yukananov, Scott Hensley, Steven Drummond, Janaya Williams and Mohamad ElBardicy. It was produced by Ziad Buchh, Nia Dumas and Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Arthur Laurent. And our technical director is David Greenburg.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Chapter 1: What is the issue with the wrongly deported Maryland man?
The Trump administration says it can't force El Salvador to return a man they admit was deported there by mistake.
But when attorneys for the Justice Department appeared in court, a judge said they hadn't shown they tried to facilitate the man's return at all.
I'm E. Martinez, that's Michelle Martin, and this is Up First from NPR News. The president signed an executive action that aims to lower drug prices.
I think it comes as no surprise that Trump is taking another swing. have policies to lower prescription drug costs because it does really resonate with people.
But executive orders can only do so much. Will it work?
And President Trump escalated threats against Harvard University after cutting billions in federal funds to the school yesterday. He floated the idea of revoking its nonprofit status. Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day.
Check it out at plus.npr.org.
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Chapter 2: What actions has Judge Paula Zinnes ordered regarding the deportation case?
Gilmar Abrego-Garcia was detained and deported last month. His family sued the government to bring him back. The case has become one of the highest profile lawsuits against President Trump's efforts to increase deportations.
And Piers, Ximena Bustillo has been following this, and she's here with me in our studios in Washington. Good morning, Ximena. Good morning, Michelle. Could you just remind us of where we are in this case and what exactly the Judge Zinni's order the government to do?
The judge originally ordered for two items. First, for the government to facilitate Abrego Garcia's release and return from Secod. This is the mega prison in El Salvador. The White House has said that his deportation was an administrative error. Second, to ensure that if he is brought back to the U.S., his immigration case receives due process within immigration courts.
During Tuesday's hearing, Judge Ziniz said that she had received, quote, "...information of little value on what had been done to fulfill any of this." So she granted a request from Abrego Garcia's lawyers for the government team to undergo a process called expedited discovery.
This means that government officials from Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and state will be deposed under oath. She gave both sides two weeks to complete the discovery process.
Did the judge say why she's granting this expedited discovery process?
She said that this would be done specifically to determine whether the government is abiding by her original court order, whether they intend to abide by it, and if not, whether that's in good or bad faith.
How did the government respond?
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Chapter 3: How has the Trump administration responded to the deportation lawsuit?
The administration has so far continued to argue that it cannot force another government to extradite someone that they're holding back to the U.S. On Tuesday, Drew Ensign, the lawyer for the Justice Department, also brought up two documents. One was a status report on where the DOJ stands on bringing a Grego Garcia back to the U.S.,
In this, a DHS official said that Abrego Garcia could be let in through a legal port of entry, but that if he did arrive, DHS would either move to deport him to a third country or back to El Salvador anyways. Now, Zini said that this was already getting too far ahead since the government hasn't shown that it has facilitated his return at all.
Ensign then pointed to the Oval Office press conference transcript from Monday during which Trump met with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele. Both leaders said that they didn't have the power to return him. But to that, Zini said that those answers that Ensign is pointing to during this press conference would not be considered responsive in a court of law.
So let's talk a bit about the stakes of this case. I mean, for example, what have we learned about the relationship between the president and the courts?
The takeaway from Tuesday's hearing is that this is another judge growing frustrated with the administration's answers on what it's doing in response to court orders. But the administration has, in a way, set up for many of these policy debates to take place in the courts and even make their way up to the Supreme Court, as we've seen in this case.
But not every decision is going to go the administration's way. So we have continued to see that there's also a growing tension between the courts and the administration. And, you know, on Monday, in front of El Salvador's leader, Trump criticized the, quote, liberal judges that are blocking his agenda.
This is, of course, not new, as he's previously criticized those who have issued orders against his immigration directives, especially those related to the flights to El Salvador.
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Chapter 4: What are the broader implications of the deportation case for the Trump administration and the courts?
That is NPR's Jimena Bustillo. Jimena, thank you.
Thank you.
President Trump signed executive action yesterday that aims to lower drug prices for Americans.
It would build on Medicare's new ability to negotiate drug prices, but there's a lot more to it.
NPR's pharmaceuticals correspondent Sidney Lupkin is here to tell us all about it. So Sidney, how would this proposal help consumers?
Yeah, the administration says it can do a better job at negotiating the prices Medicare pays for drugs. It's not clear from the action exactly how that would be the case. And I have to say that a lot of the savings on drug prices are
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Chapter 5: What executive action did President Trump sign to lower prescription drug prices?
baked into the biden administration law that gave medicare negotiating power in the first place it allowed 10 drugs to be negotiated last year and 15 more this year next year another 15 should be up for negotiation so over time the savings should add up but the executive action asks the health secretary and congress to fix what the administration sees as a flaw in the law
It treats prescription pills like some cancer drugs differently from more complex biotech drugs like the blockbuster rheumatoid arthritis drug, Humira. The pills are eligible for Medicare negotiation sooner, seven years after FDA approval, compared with 11 years for drugs like Humira. The proposal would level the playing field, but it would require a change in the law.
Does the executive order go beyond Medicare?
Chapter 6: How might the executive order impact Medicare's drug price negotiations?
Yeah, it does. There's a lot in the executive action. It has 14 different sections. It takes aim at middlemen called pharmacy benefit managers, which handle drug coverage for health insurance. The order tells officials to look for ways to increase transparency into how they're compensated. The companies have been criticized for not passing on savings to consumers.
It also instructs the FDA to streamline its generic drug approvals process and to better facilitate state programs to import lower-cost drugs from Canada. The drug importation push actually started under the first Trump administration, and it just hasn't gotten much traction.
So how much of this executive order is building off of that first try?
bit in this executive order is familiar. The first Trump administration made several attempts to lower drug prices, and that included importing drugs from Canada and speeding generic approvals. It also proposed pegging drug prices in the U.S. to lower prices paid in other countries, but that didn't happen. So when it came to drug prices as a campaign issue last year, Trump didn't say much.
This is really the first time in a while we're hearing about drug prices. Here's Juliet Kubanski, a Medicare drug pricing expert at the nonpartisan research group KFF.
I think it comes as no surprise that Trump is taking another swing at policies to lower prescription drug costs because it does really resonate with people.
High drug prices are a big deal to voters, whether they're Democrats or Republicans.
Sure, I can understand that. So will this executive action then lower the price of prescription drugs?
You know, that's unclear. Executive orders can only do so much. In this case, the action is telling the FDA to take certain steps, instructing his HHS secretary to work with Congress, instructing officials to come up with regulatory solutions. So a lot will depend on all these different players working together.
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Chapter 7: Does the executive order extend beyond Medicare drug pricing?
Chapter 8: What is the controversy involving Harvard University and President Trump?
And President Trump escalated threats against Harvard University after cutting billions in federal funds to the school yesterday. He floated the idea of revoking its nonprofit status. Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day.
Check it out at plus.npr.org.
Does the idea of listening to political news freak you out? Well, don't sweat it. The NPR Politics Podcast makes politics a breeze. Every episode will break down the day's headlines into totally normal language and make sure that you walk away understanding what the day's news might mean for you.
Take a deep breath and give politics another chance with the NPR Politics Podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts.
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Judge Paula Zinnes ordered the Trump administration to provide more information on whether it has done anything to facilitate the return of a Maryland man deported to El Salvador by mistake.
Gilmar Abrego-Garcia was detained and deported last month. His family sued the government to bring him back. The case has become one of the highest profile lawsuits against President Trump's efforts to increase deportations.
And Piers, Ximena Bustillo has been following this, and she's here with me in our studios in Washington. Good morning, Ximena. Good morning, Michelle. Could you just remind us of where we are in this case and what exactly the Judge Zinni's order the government to do?
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