April 1, 2025 - PBS News Hour full episode

As the U.S. sees new tariffs, we look at how they can make or break an economy. In Haiti, U.S. policies forced the government to bring down tariffs on foreign goods, allowing American farmers to export crops cheaply. That made it expensive for Haitians to eat food grown domestically, leading to dependence on foreign aid. Special correspondent Marcia Biggs and videographer Eric O'Connor report.

Princeton University said several dozen of its federal grants have been halted. It's just the latest Trump administration move targeting colleges. Partly in response, Yale philosophy professor Jason Stanley announced he’s leaving not only his school, but the country, to teach at the University of Toronto. Stanley joined Amna Nawaz to discuss his decision.

Steward Health Care was once the largest private hospital system in the country. When the private equity-backed network filed for bankruptcy last year, it devastated providers and patients. In Massachusetts, five of the eight Steward-owned hospitals were salvaged by the state and two were shuttered. Economics correspondent Paul Solman went there to see what happened and how.

It’s a small federal agency few have heard of, but it has a large impact around the country. The Institute of Museum and Library Services is the largest source of federal funding for museums and libraries and the Trump administration has placed roughly 80 percent of IMLS staff on administrative leave. Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown reports for our arts and culture series, CANVAS.

President Trump’s pick to be the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told senators during his confirmation hearing that he would give the president candid guidance and stay out of politics. But he also said he was willing to push back if asked to do something unconstitutional and suggested concern about recent messages sent by senior national security leaders over Signal. Nick Schifrin reports.

Recovery efforts from the earthquake in Myanmar are slow-moving. The country is grappling with the natural disaster plus an ongoing humanitarian crisis amid the civil war since 2021. The death toll has now risen past 2,700, with more than 4,500 people injured and at least 440 still missing. Stephanie Sy reports.

In our news wrap Tuesday, Attorney General Bondi directed federal prosecutors to pursue the death penalty for Luigi Mangione, the body of a fourth Army soldier who died in Lithuania has been found and Israel struck the Lebanese capital of Beirut for the second time since a ceasefire with Hezbollah took effect last November.

The American public and U.S. trading partners are waiting for President Trump’s new set of tariffs, a plan he says is finalized and will be revealed on Wednesday. Trump's first two months back in office have seen him implement tariffs on countries like Canada and Mexico, only to reverse course days later. It’s not yet clear which countries will be taxed hardest. Geoff Bennett reports.

The Trump Administration began terminating thousands of staff and purging some of the top leaders at the Department of Health and Human Services. It included several key agencies, including the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Geoff Bennett discussed more with Matthew Herper of STAT News.