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Biden steps out, China blames NSA and Kenya busts ant traffickers

 
Today's POLITICS story

Biden slams Trump's Social Security cuts

What happened
Former President Joe Biden yesterday criticized the Trump administration's "damage and destruction" to Social Security, telling a conference of disability advocates in Chicago that President Donald Trump and Elon Musk's DOGE crew have "taken a hatchet" to the federal retirement program and Americans' broader well-being.

Who said what
"In fewer than 100 days, this new administration has done so much damage and so much destruction," Biden said in his half-hour speech, his first major public address since leaving office in January. "It's kind of breathtaking.” 

Trump — who Biden did not mention by name — and Musk's DOGE operation are "taking aim at Social Security now" in accordance with "that old line from tech startups" to "move fast and break things," he said. "They're certainly breaking things. They're shooting first and aiming later." And "they want to wreck it so they can rob it," Biden added, "in order to give tax cuts to billionaires and big corporations."

The "drastic" staffing and service cuts by Musk, who recently called Social Security the "biggest Ponzi scheme of all time," and DOGE have led to "website outages, technical glitches, unanswered phone lines, attempts to access private data and other problems" at the agency, The Washington Post said. 

The Social Security Administration said on its official X account that Biden "is lying to Americans." White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump has pledged to protect Social Security benefits "for law-abiding, taxpaying American citizens." She also mocked Biden's age, telling reporters "I'm shocked that he is speaking at nighttime. I thought his bedtime was much earlier than his speech tonight."

What next?
Biden will continue to speak up about topics that are "real to people" and "matter to him," a former Biden administration official told Politico. "No one would be talking about Social Security tomorrow if Joe Biden wasn't giving this speech."

 
 
Today's ESPIONAGE story

China accuses NSA of Asian Winter Games hacks

What happened
China yesterday claimed the U.S. National Security Agency carried out "advanced" cyberattacks on critical infrastructure and athletes during the Asian Winter Games in February. Police in Harbin, which hosted the games, accused three Americans allegedly affiliated with the NSA of carrying out the hacks, as well as cyberattacks on Huawei Technologies.

Who said what
China's "detailed allegations" about NSA theft of sensitive data of athletes and essential industries come as Beijing and Washington "spiral deeper into a trade war," Reuters said. The U.S. "routinely accuses" China of cyberattacks on "critical infrastructure and government bodies."

Chinese officials "acknowledged in a secret December meeting" in Geneva that "Beijing was behind a widespread series of alarming cyberattacks" on "U.S. ports, water utilities, airports and other targets," The Wall Street Journal reported last week. The "first-of-its-kind" tacit admission "startled American officials" used to hearing Chinese officials blame the campaign "on a criminal outfit or accuse the U.S. of having an overactive imagination." 

What next?
U.S.-China relations "have sunk to a new low" since the December meeting, the Journal said, and top Trump administration officials say the Pentagon will "pursue more offensive cyber strikes against China" as Beijing continues to "mine its extraordinary access to U.S. telecommunications networks."

 
 
Today's NATURE Story

Kenya arrests alleged foreign ant smugglers

What happened
A court in Kenya charged two young Belgian men with wildlife piracy yesterday for allegedly attempting to smuggle thousands of ants out of the country to exotic pet buyers in Europe and Asia. The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) said the "landmark case," and a parallel prosecution of two other alleged ant smugglers, highlighted a "disturbing shift in trafficking patterns — from iconic large mammals to lesser-known yet ecologically critical species." 

Who said what
The 19-year-old Belgian suspects were caught with 5,000 live ants, including queens and sought-after Giant African Harvester Ants (messor cephalotes), concealed inside modified test tubes "designed to sustain the ants for up to two months and evade airport security detection," the KWS said. The two other suspects, from Kenya and Vietnam, had about 400 ants. 

Authorities said the 5,000 ants had a street value of about 1 million Kenyan shillings ($7,700) but would have provided invaluable ecological benefits to Kenya's forests and other ecosystems. Many people "see ants as a picnic-ruining nuisance," Reuters said, but "aficionados enjoy keeping them in formicariums, transparent cases where they can watch them building complex colonies." Messor cephalotes, native to Kenya, "are many people's dream species," said the British specialist retailer AntsRUs.

What next?
"We did not come here to break any laws," Belgian defendant Lornoy David (pictured above left, with codefendant Seppe Lodewijckx), told the court, asking for leniency. "By accident and stupidity we did." The court will reconvene next Wednesday

 
 

It's not all bad

Twenty-two sea turtles were released from Georgia's Jekyll Island into the Atlantic Ocean after a 20-hour journey from Mystic Aquarium in Connecticut, where they had undergone rehabilitation. The 14 green sea turtles, six loggerheads and two critically endangered Kemp's ridley sea turtles were released through the aquarium’s Animal Rescue Program. The goal is to "improve their chances of long-term survival and create potential for future hatchlings and growth of the species," said Sarah Callan, the program's manager.

 
 
Under the radar

Rice is the backbone of the Japanese diet, but amid a severe shortage of the staple and soaring prices, the Japanese government has started auctioning off its emergency stockpile for the first time. The debut auction last month saw 142,000 tons of grain up for offer at a cost of 21,217 yen (about $150) for 60 kg, or 132 lbs., said Business Insider. 

Rice farming in Japan follows a "complex system," said First Post, with limits on production designed to keep prices high enough to support farmers and a multi-step distribution chain in which even a "slight hiccup" can cause a serious disruption. In 2023, extreme heat severely affected the rice harvest, leading to shortages in the supermarkets that first hit last summer and show no signs of abating. As of last month, an 11 lb. bag of rice cost an average of 4,077 yen ($28) — double what it was a year before.  

About 180,000 tons more rice was collected in last year's harvest compared to 2023, but in December distributors said they were down by 210,000 tons — fueling conspiracy theories that speculators are hoarding rice to make bigger profits. In February, Agriculture Minister Taku Eto claimed "there's a quantity that's been stacked away and hidden somewhere."  

The uncertainty is "disquieting," said The New York Times. One shopkeeper was told in January that his distributor had already run out of rice for the year. "Rice is an integral part of Japanese people’s lives," he said. "Japanese people are worried right now."

 
 
On this day

April 16, 2003

A Treaty of Accession was signed to add 10 new member states to the European Union: Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia. The EU has continued to expand throughout the 21st century and ratified its most recent member, Croatia, in 2013.

 
 
TODAY'S newspaperS

"Standoff over Maryland deportee escalates," The Washington Post says on Wednesday's front page, as "judge says contempt ruling remains possible" amid Trump administration's refusal to "detail its efforts" to return the wrongly deported migrant. "Trump flirts with defying court order," The New York Times says, and his "trade war threatens talks to fix other China issues." Chinese President Xi Jinping "makes goodwill tour" abroad as U.S. "trade tensions rise," The Wall Street Journal says. "Another shooting" at a Dallas school, The Dallas Morning News says. 

► See the newspaper front pages

 
 
Tall tale

Eyes on the tracks

NJ Transit says it is taking "under advisement" a suggestion to add googly eyes to some of its trains. Two residents of central New Jersey started a petition to affix sticker eyes to trains as a way to "lift passengers' spirits," NJ Advance Media said. The pair, who asked to remain anonymous, suggest putting eyes on a "limited number of trains," both to "keep costs down" and have an "element of surprise." So far, 60 people have signed the petition.

 
 

Morning Report was written and edited by Theara Coleman, Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Scott Hocker, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Justin Klawans, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz and Peter Weber, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.

Image credits, from top: Scott Olson / Getty Images; VCG / VCG via Getty Images; AP Photo / Brian Inganga; Illustration by Julia Wytrazek / Getty Images