Simon Montlake

Boston

Senior Staff Writer at The Christian Science Monitor

Senior staff writer, The Christian Science Monitor. Learn-by-doing reporter, formerly in Indonesia, Thailand, China. Whiny Brit. Goofy Dad.

Featured in: Favicon

csmonitor.com Favicon

forbes.com Favicon

businessinsider.com Favicon

scribd.com Favicon

wsj.com

yahoo.com (+1) Favicon

smh.com.au Favicon

christiancentury.org Favicon

flipboard.com Favicon

newsbreak.com + 1 more

Articles

Student-led revolution in Bangladesh leaves Hindu minority behind

3 weeks ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

When massive protests erupted last summer against Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, third-year information technology student Sukanto Barman was all-in. The student-led demonstrations toppled Ms. Hasina and ended 15 years of increasingly autocratic rule in Bangladesh. The uprising has set the country on a new path, with an interim government, led by Nobel Peace laureate Muhammad Yunus, preparing to hold elections by early next year.
Students toppled a dictator. Now they must help remake Bangladesh.

3 weeks ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

Where the family house used to stand, shaded by trees on a lakeside street, there are now piles of broken brick, concrete, glass, and tiles. A visitor, Anwar Hossain Swapan, is picking his way through the house’s charred concrete pillars amid the rubble. He stops to read graffiti denouncing the “fascism” of the family who once lived here. For most of Mr. Hossain’s life, this structure was the symbolic heart of independent Bangladesh.
Trump’s Qatari plane controversy puts a spotlight on Boeing

3 weeks ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

At a press conference in Qatar on Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced a $96 billion deal between Boeing, an American plane manufacturer, and Airways for as many as 210 jets. The agreement, which was signed by the two companies’ CEOs as they flanked Mr. Trump and Qatar’s emir, was Boeing’s “largest ever” order for those types of aircraft.
Trump meme coins raise money. They also buy access.

3 weeks ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

Meme coins have become a profitable new business for President Donald Trump’s family company. The Trump-branded digital tokens are part of a broader push by the Trump Organization – which is managed by Mr. Trump’s sons, and in which the president holds a majority ownership stake – into cryptocurrency, a form of digital money that Mr. Trump once derided but now embraces. Ahead of his Jan. 20 inauguration, Mr. Trump began promoting two meme coins, $TRUMP and $MELANIA, to his supporters.
Empty shelves? Tariffs are about to hit US shoppers in a variety of ways.

1 month ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

The fallout from President Donald Trump’s punitive tariffs hit Wall Street first. Now it’s Main Street’s turn, as dramatically higher import costs start to ripple through the broader economy. The full effects, including higher prices, out-of-stock items, and even empty shelves could be weeks or months away, say analysts. Many businesses scrambled to stockpile imported goods in March, and some people also bought items early, in anticipation of Mr. Trump’s tariffs.
Four years on, Trump is still trying to rewrite the narrative on his 2020 loss

1 month ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

Most politicians never forget the races they lost. But perhaps no elected official has ever been as fixated on an electoral defeat as President Donald Trump. Despite successfully recapturing the White House last November, Mr. Trump has continued to circle back with regularity to the 2020 election, which he still insists was stolen from him.
Markets got a tariff pause. But damage to global confidence in US could last.

1 month ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

A belief in tariffs as an essential tool in economic statecraft has been a constant in President Donald Trump’s career. His recent unprecedented moves to impose sweeping import tariffs – starting at 10% and rising to 50% and more – sparked panic in global markets and rattled U.S. trading partners. On Wednesday, President Trump abruptly announced a 90-day pause during which all countries except China would pay only a 10% tariff, to allow for talks.
Is the anti-Trump ‘resistance’ starting to find its voice again?

2 months ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

For months, Democrats have watched aghast as President Donald Trump has unleashed his head-spinning, all-of-government brand of disruption. Boxed out of federal governing, Democratic voters have bewailed the impotence of their party’s leaders as the Republican administration has dismantled government agencies, claimed wartime powers to deport immigrants – and, last week, imposed an unprecedented level of tariffs that sparked a rout in global financial markets.
Some collateral damage with disruption? In Trump 2.0, that’s OK.

2 months ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

The unprecedented tariffs announced Wednesday by President Donald Trump mark a decisive break with decades of bipartisan support for free trade. Even some economists and aides who support the levies – which include a minimum 10% on imported goods, with some countries subject to much higher rates – concede that they will inflict short-term economic pain. Mr. Trump himself has all but endorsed that view, brushing aside concerns about higher car prices.
Debate over transgender rights grows more fraught in new Trump era

2 months ago | csmonitor.com | Simon Montlake

Transgender issues barely registered on voters’ lists of top policy priorities in 2024, according to polls. But as a front in America’s culture wars, the topic has become increasingly contentious.