Welcome to This Week in Politics, the recurring column covering the highlights in politics for this week.

Saturday, April 15  – Sunday, April 16

• France holds election

  • The first round of the French presidential election was held Sunday.

  • Two candidates, Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, advanced to the final round of voting to be held on May 7.

• • Macron is an inexperienced government outsider and has campaigned on centrism. His policy is viewed as moderate.

  • Le Pen is a career politician, leading the National Front party, founded by her father, Jean Marie LePen.

    • Jean Marie Le Pen is a extremely right wing politician. He has been charged with inciting racial violence and has downplayed the significance of the Holocaust multiple times.

    • Marine LePen has taken the National Front closer to the center of the political spectrum, while still retaining its conservative roots.

      • She supports increased immigration protocols, banning religious dress and other measures to “retain french values”.

• National Science March

  • On Saturday, thousands of people protested around the country in advocacy of science.

  • Topics of protest included the EPA, climate change policy and other scientific ideas that are affected by the Trump Administration.

Tuesday, April 25

• President Donald Trump drops demand for wall

  • Trump dropped his demand for funding for a border wall with Mexico in the national budget and delayed his deadline for funding to this fall. If a budget is not passed by Friday night, the United States government will shut down.

• Executive order blocked

  • An executive order that gives the government the ability to withhold funding from sanctuary cities has been blocked by a federal judge in San Francisco.

    • A sanctuary city is a municipality which refuses to turn over illegal immigrants to federal authorities, like Immigration and Customs Control, if the person was detained due to committing another crime not related to their immigration status.

      • There are many sanctuary cities around the country, including San Francisco, Seattle, New York and Cincinnati.

Wednesday, April 26

• Trump releases tax plan

  • Trump’s much-anticipated tax cut plan includes a 20 percent reduction in corporate taxes, as well as a simplification of tax brackets and other tax cutting measures.

    • It is currently unknown what the effects of this plan will be on the economy or how much of the plan will be passed and put into place.

• Fox News faces new lawsuit

  • Eleven current and former employees have filed a class-action lawsuit against Fox News, claiming racial discrimination. This follows Fox firing their most popular host Bill O’Reilly after multiple sexual harassment scandals last week and firing their Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes, for similar scandals.

Thursday, April 27

• American Health Care Act revised

  • A revised version of the American Health Care Act (AHCA), Trump’s ObamaCare repeal bill, has gained support of the Republican House Freedom Caucus (RHFC).

  • The revision includes more conservative points, including allowing states to repeal parts of ObamaCare even more.

    • RHFC is a group of conservative congressmen who originally opposed the AHCA, believing that the bill was not conservative enough, causing it to be pulled the day before it was to be voted on.

• Trump flips on NAFTA promise

  • Originally promising to leave the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Canada and Mexico, Trump announced that he now plans to renegotiate the treaty with better terms.

  • The flip follows a frantic conference call with the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the Mexican President Pena Nieto.

• FCC Announces Laxed Internet Policies

  • The Federal Communications Commission’s policies will go back on policies implemented two years ago to preserve “net neutrality” and allow internet service providers (ISPs) to police themselves.

    • “Net neutrality” is the belief that ISPs should not be able to change the speed of your internet connection based on what sites you visit.

      • For example, an ISP may slow your connection if you use Google, because Microsoft (who owns Bing, a rival search engine) paid the ISP to.

Friday, April 28

• AHCA Revision Dropped

  • The second iteration of the AHCA, Trump’s ObamaCare repeal bill, has been pulled from the floor of the House due to a lack of support.

  • This comes just one day before Trump reaches the 100 day of his presidency, a landmark for nearly every presidential administration.