On Monday’s episode of The Excerpt podcast: The U.S. and China have reached an agreement to reduce tariffs. The Trump administration floats suspending habeas corpus. What does that mean? USA TODAY National Correspondent Trevor Hughes discusses what deporting people facing criminal charges can mean for justice. President Trump says he will sign an order aimed at cutting drug prices to match other countries. USA TODAY Justice Department Correspondent Aysha Bagchi explains how Diddy’s lawyer defended a ‘sex cult’ leader in an eerily similar case. Pope Leo XIV warned of a ‘piecemeal’ third world war in his first Sunday address. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending an email to podcasts@usatoday.com.
Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
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Taylor Wilson:
Good morning. I’m Taylor Wilson, and today is Monday, May 12th, 2025. This is The Excerpt. Today, a new deal on tariffs for the US and China. Plus, what a wave of recent deportations of people facing criminal charges might mean for justice. And the trial of Sean Diddy Combs is set for opening statements.
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The US and China have reached a deal to slash tariffs. Speaking after talks with Chinese officials in Geneva, Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessent, told reporters the two sides had agreed on a 90-day pause on measures, and that tariffs would come down by over 100 percentage points to 10%. The Geneva meetings were the first of their kind between senior US and Chinese economic officials since President Trump returned to power, and launched his slew of global tariffs. Since taking office in January, Trump has pushed the tariffs paid by US importers for goods from China to 145%. In addition to those, he imposed on many Chinese goods during his first term, and duties put in by the Biden administration. China had responded by putting export curbs on some rare earth elements, and raising tariffs on US goods to 125%. All eyes will be on the markets today, and the rest of the week, to see how they respond to the latest news.
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Stephen Miller, a senior advisor to the president, while answering a question about illegal immigration, told reporters on Friday that the Trump administration is actively looking at suspending the constitutional right that allows people to challenge in court their detention. Miller, the White House Deputy Chief of Staff, said the Constitution says the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus can be suspended in a time of invasion. Habeas corpus, Latin for you have the body, is used to determine if the government’s detention of someone imprisoned is legal, according to Cornell Law School’s Legal Information Institute. A writ of habeas corpus is used in federal courts under civil law to challenge a person’s detention, commonly used by people imprisoned who are challenging the conviction that led to their prison sentence. You can read more about the potential stakes behind Miller’s comments with a link in today’s show notes.
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Some legal experts worry that recent deportations of people facing criminal charges are creating a two-tiered system of justice. I spoke with USA TODAY national correspondent, Trevor Hughes, for more.
Trevor, thanks for hopping on, sir.
Trevor Hughes:
Yeah, good to be here.
Taylor Wilson:
So, Trevor, across the country, we’re seeing an uptick in immigration agents deporting criminal suspects, instead of keeping them in custody, as you write. What are you hearing specifically on this?
Trevor Hughes:
Well, let’s be clear. ICE is deporting people who are criminal suspects when it comes to immigration violations. They consider those people criminals on that hand. What we’re talking about here are people who are accused of local crimes, assaults, theft, carjackings, that kind of thing. And so what we’re seeing is that ICE is increasingly, instead of keeping those folks around and letting the local court process play out, letting those folks get sentenced to five, 10, 15 years in prison, ICE is simply collecting those folks, detaining them, and in many cases, deporting them.
Taylor Wilson:
So in terms of the potential problems here, Trevor, what are legal experts really concerned about?
Trevor Hughes:
You have two problems, really. The first is that there are criminal suspects in these cases who are escaping prosecution in the United States. As one expert told me, you could have a guy accused of a serious crime in the United States agree to be deported by ICE, and be on the streets in Mexico or Venezuela within days or weeks, with no punishment whatsoever, except for that removal order from the United States. And we know that people have come back to the United States under the Trump administration already. The second concern is that, in some cases, ICE has deported the witnesses or the victims in these cases. And so what’s happening, according to some of the DAs and some of the public defenders I talk to around the country, is that people are less willing to come to court and testify, if they feel like they’re going to be deported, or perhaps the case against their assailant has to be dropped because the witnesses were deported.
Taylor Wilson:
The Federal Laken Riley Act requires ICE to detain people living illegally in the US once they’ve been accused of, or charged with, certain crimes, Trevor. What role is that playing in all this?
Trevor Hughes:
I think we’re still starting to, or maybe only just beginning to, understand the ramifications of what this really means. For years, ICE has detained people, and then brought them back to court for their appearances. That happens all the time, if someone is accused of crimes, just local crimes in one state versus another. They might be transported from Massachusetts to Colorado to appear before a judge. What we’re seeing in this case is that ICE is not making some of those folks available, and instead is just deporting. And I think the argument is that, it is better to deport these people and get them off the tax rolls, as it were. We don’t have to pay for their incarceration or their detention, if we simply send them back to where they came from.
Taylor Wilson:
And on that point, have we heard from immigration officials at all, in terms of how they view some of these tensions and issues?
Trevor Hughes:
President Trump has basically said, we should get these people out of this country, period. And he signed the Laken Riley Act. It was the first law he signed as the new president. And so the president has been very, very committed to deporting people as the top priority, not necessarily the criminal prosecution. Now, of course, it’s important to be clear, there are still plenty of criminal prosecutions of suspected illegal immigrants that are going on in this country. But what we’re seeing, more and more, is some of those folks are just being deported before they are criminally prosecuted.
Taylor Wilson:
All right, really interesting findings here. Trevor Hughes is a national correspondent with USA TODAY. Thank you, Trevor.
Trevor Hughes:
You bet.
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Taylor Wilson:
President Trump said he will sign an executive order that institutes a new policy for drug pricing, reviving a plan from his first term that he said will reduce prescription drug and pharmaceutical prices almost immediately by 30% to 80%. The order, which Trump plans to sign this morning, is expected to direct the Department of Health and Human Services to adopt the policy which would set prescription drug prices to match those of comparable countries. Full details of the order were unclear, including which insurance programs and drugs would fall under the initiative. During his first term, Trump pushed a so-called most favored nation rule that would have applied to Medicare payments, but was later rescinded by the Biden administration. You can read more with a link in today’s show notes.
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We’ll see opening statements today in the trial of Sean Diddy Combs. He faces allegations that he ran a criminal enterprise that involved kidnapping, forced labor, and sex trafficking. I caught up with USA TODAY Justice Department correspondent Aysha Bagchi for more, and a look at Diddy’s lawyer’s strategy in an eerily similar case involving a sex cult. A warning, some of the following may not be suitable for all listeners.
Aysha, thank you so much for joining me today.
Aysha Bagchi:
Thanks for having me.
Taylor Wilson:
Who is lawyer Marc Agnifilo, and I guess, just what’s his background? Let’s start there.
Aysha Bagchi:
Marc Agnifilo is Sean Combs’s lead attorney in his upcoming sex trafficking trial. The trial has basically already started, with jury selection over the past week, but it’s really getting underway, in terms of the meat of the trial, with opening statements on Monday. Marc Agnifilo is a really prominent attorney. He’s represented a lot of famous clients, and that includes a client in a case that had really similar charges to this one. The case of Keith Raniere, who was the head of what some people have labeled a sex cult, NXIVM. It was a self-help group that Keith Raniere helped run. But Marc Agnifilo is this famous attorney. He represented Dominique Strauss-Kahn years ago, in a case where Strauss-Kahn was able to defeat charges that were brought against him involving sex-related allegations. And he’s a former prosecutor, so he’s a well-known attorney in New York City, and he’s a big name that’s taking on this case.
Taylor Wilson:
We mentioned that self-help guru Keith Raniere, and in a similar sex trafficking case, what happened there? And what was at stake in that trial?
Aysha Bagchi:
That trial involved Keith Raniere, this head of this large group, getting charged with sex trafficking, among other types of crimes. He basically was charged with racketeering, which is this fancy legal word that has to do with the government trying to take down what they think is a criminal enterprise. And, actually, Marc Agnifilo, Sean Combs’s attorney, helped bring about that expansion of this law targeting criminal enterprises. When he was a prosecutor in New Jersey, he brought it to cases involving street gangs. And in more recent years, we’ve seen prosecutors start to use it in cases that they say involve sex trafficking, sometimes, with really famous people. That includes Keith Raniere in 2020. It also includes R. Kelly, a singer who was accused of sex trafficking as well. So Sean Combs’s trial is another example of someone famous who is being charged with running, basically, a criminal enterprise that involved sex trafficking among other crimes.
Taylor Wilson:
Considering some of the similarities across the cases, do we expect he and his legal team to argue using, I guess, similar tactics to what we’ve seen previously?
Aysha Bagchi:
Time will tell, but we have had a preview of how Marc Agnifilo has approached a similar case, when it came to Keith Raniere’s trial. For that trial, he actually allowed a documentary team to follow him. So we got an up-close-and-personal look at how he was thinking about the defense. And you could really see some features of his defense that legal experts have also told me fall into Marc Agnifilo’s broader style. He really likes to try to humanize his clients, and help the jury to see them as full human beings in the way that they want the jury to see him. So, basically, he tries to convey this impression that, I’m a charismatic guy, I’m a likable guy. Here I am putting my arm around my client because he’s a good guy too. And you should think the same thing about him.
He’s also someone who really thought about how to handle some allegations that involve someone living a lifestyle that is really different from how many people live their lives, especially when it comes to their sex lives. Marc Agnifilo talked a lot in that case about the idea that he needed to get the jurors comfortable with the notion that his client could have lived an alternative sexual lifestyle, had lots of sexual partners at the same time, and still not been guilty of any crime. And when it comes to Sean Combs’s case, he said that he wants jurors to know that there’s this alternative sexual lifestyle. He told the judge, in late April, call it swingers. This lifestyle that’s really different from how some people live, but it’s what Sean Combs did, and that’s not a crime. He’s really going to emphasize that Sean Combs had good intentions. He never meant to coerce someone. He said that at that hearing, and that was a big feature of his defense of Keith Raniere as well.
Taylor Wilson:
All right, opening arguments set for today. Aysha Bagchi covers the Justice Department for USA TODAY. Thank you, Aysha.
Aysha Bagchi:
Thanks, Taylor.
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Taylor Wilson:
Pope Leo XIV gave his first Sunday address yesterday.
(Pope Leo XIV speaks)
Taylor Wilson:
He addressed a crowd tens of thousands deep in St. Peter’s Square, warning in Italian of a piecemeal third world war. Leo said he welcomed the recent announcement of a ceasefire between India and Pakistan. And on Russia’s war in Ukraine, he appealed for negotiations to reach an authentic, just, and lasting peace, adding that he carries in his heart the suffering of the beloved people of Ukraine. The Pope also said he was profoundly saddened by the war in Gaza, calling for an immediate ceasefire, humanitarian aid, and release of the remaining hostages held by Hamas. And he pleaded for an end to the fighting in Gaza.
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And coming up later today, giving moms their due, on a new episode of Forum, with host Michael McCarter.
Michael McCarter:
Yesterday was a day to honor mothers, so we, on the Forum team, asked you for stories about the maternal figures in your lives. You can hear what listeners and readers like you had to share about their moms. Tune into Forum, publishing today at 4:00 PM Eastern Time on this feed.
Taylor Wilson:
You can find more opinions on usatoday.com/forum.
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Thanks for listening to The Excerpt. You can get the podcast wherever you get your pods. And if you’re on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. If you have any comments or concerns, you can always email us at podcasts@usatoday.com. I’m Taylor Wilson. I’ll be back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from USA TODAY.
