Ivanka Trump: Empowered Women Pave the Way to Economic Progress “I recently traveled to Africa to advance the White House's Women's Global Development and Prosperity Initiative, or W-GDP, which seeks to reach 50 million women in the developing world by 2025,” Advisor to the President Ivanka Trump writes. “We will work to achieve this goal by supporting women in the workplace, helping them succeed as entrepreneurs, and by advancing legal reforms that will create greater gender equality . . . Despite the incredible difficulties they face, women in Africa are already transcending poverty, creating jobs, and pioneering a brighter future. Now, we want to empower them.” Click here to read more.

In the Washington Examiner, Anna Giaritelli reports that human smugglers are running radio ads in Central America offering to transport people into the United States. “The word is definitely out,” a U.S. Border Patrol agent told Maria Bartiromo on Fox News. The Department of Homeland Security “estimates unauthorized immigrants are spending nearly $10,000 to hire a human smuggler to travel from Central America in an attempt to enter the U.S. illegally,” bankrolling criminal enterprises.

“Consumer spending in March rose at the highest rate in close to a decade, according to data released Monday by the Commerce Department,” Sylvan Lane reports in The Hill. “Spending on consumer goods rose $123.5 billion in March, a 0.9 percent increase, reflecting strength in one of the most crucial forces behind U.S. economic growth.”

“As Ronald Reagan foretold a generation ago, it is morning again in America. Today’s booming economy, under President Donald J. Trump, stands in stark contrast to the stagnation and volatility Americans endured over the past decade,” Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson writes in RealClearPolicy. “Few programs in modern American history have the potential to touch the lives of so many people as powerfully as Opportunity Zones, which are now home to approximately 31.3 million Americans in all 50 states and the District of Columbia — or roughly 10% of the country.”