Politics and views in the United States.

Deadly Texas floods draw a federal response as the administration reduces emergency and weather services. States prepare to deal with cuts to schools, health care and environmental protections, while Elon Musk launches a new political party.

TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to 2025 Talks, where we're following our democracy in historic times.

There was a debris line that had gone over the mailbox.

It was an apocalyptic scene.

I could see a crashed car, a kayak trapped underneath.

Former news anchor Casey Claiborne was vacationing in the Texas Hill Country when the Guadalupe River rose more than 25 feet, killing at least 70.

President Donald Trump says he will probably visit this week and has already approved a disaster declaration.

The flooding wiped out campsites, roads and homes and offers an early test of trump cuts to weather staff and federal disaster aid.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says they'll upgrade outdated warning systems after residents said they had little time to escape.

Five small southwest Virginia mountain towns have lost half a million in federal funding for flood and pollution mitigation.

Emma Kelly of Appalachian Voices says the EPA money would have paid for river walks and demolition of asbestos-laced buildings based on what local people asked for.

So many of these projects were just like, can we please shore up a riverbank, put some native species in and do some planning so that the storm waters don't wipe out our communities and our businesses.

Without that, the storms, they're going to keep coming and the damages will continue to be unaddressed.

Former advisor Elon Musk broke with the president over the mega bill signed Friday and now says he'll start a political party.

Musk calls the current system wasteful and undemocratic.

The unpredictable tech billionaire's large following and massive war chest may help his America Party impact the midterms.

The administration says the law is a win for taxpayers, but critics say it forces families into impossible trade-offs.

Murad Awoudah of the New York Immigration Coalition says they're facing the intentional cruelty of deep cuts to safety net programs that redirect unprecedented billions towards migration enforcement. - 17 million people stand to lose access to healthcare, Critical social safety net programs will face devastating cuts.

More than 125,000 children in New York alone stand to lose the child tax credit simply because their parents are immigrants.

As school budgets tighten, some educators are calling out the federal Department of Education for withholding over $6 billion already allocated by Congress.

Kate Diaz with the Connecticut Education Association says the state's being shorted $50 million.

We are talking about teachers who teach English are ESOL teachers.

We're talking about social workers, school psychologists, before and after school program workers, paraprofessionals.

Connecticut will hold a special legislative session in September to cover the gaps.

Some lawmakers say the state shouldn't have to fix what they call federal negligence.

Treasury Secretary Scott Besset says countries without finalized trade deals will revert to higher tariff levels August 1st.

After months of turbulence tied to shifting trade policies, the stock markets are near record highs.

By contrast, the dollar has fallen more so far in 2025 any similar period in the last four decades.

I'm Farah Siddiqui for Pacifica Network and Public News Service.

Find our trust indicators at publicnewsservice.org.