Closing summary
This brings our live coverage of a world-historical day in Washington to an end. We will continue to chronicle the major events in the second Trump administration for you in real time in the days ahead.
Here are a few of the day’s big developments:
Donald Trump cut talks with Volodymyr Zelenskyy short following heated exchanges in the Oval Office during which the US president and his vice-president, JD Vance, falsely accused Zelenskyy of being “disrespectful” and not thanking the US for its support. European leaders promptly rallied behind the Ukrainian president in a show of unity after the joint press conference was canceled and he left the White House early. No mineral deal was signed.
Documents seized in an FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago were returned to Trump, the White House said. Steven Cheung, the White House communications director, told reporters traveling with Trump to Florida on Friday that classified documents seized by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago in 2022 had been returned to Trump and were loaded on to Air Force One for the trip.
Trump “asked Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians to depart the White House”. Speaking to reporters on Friday night in Washington, the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that Trump had “asked Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians to depart the White House” after their contentious exchange in the Oval Office. She also noted, with disapproval, that Zelenskyy had refused Fox anchor Bret Baier’s invitation to apologize to Trump on the air.
Trump said Zelenskyy needs to stop saying “all negative things” about Putin. On his way out of the White House, Trump was asked: “What does Zelenskyy need to do to re-start talks with you?” “He’s gotta say: ‘I want to make peace,’” Trump replied. “He doesn’t have to stand there and say about: ‘Putin this, Putin that’, all negative things.”
Brian Glenn, an ardent Trump supporter who covers the president for the rightwing network Real America’s Voice, played an important role in turning the mood in the Oval Office sour. Glenn, whose questions to Trump are often invitations for the president to attack his political enemies, was called on by Trump early in the meeting with Zelenskyy, before it got contentious, and he chose to confront Zelenskyy for not wearing a suit.
Federal employees could get another email on Saturday requiring them to explain their recent accomplishments, a renewed attempt by Trump and Elon Musk to demand answers from the government workforce. The second email will come from individual agencies that have direct oversight of career officials, rather than being sent by the Office of Personnel Management as with the first email. It’s unclear how national security agencies will handle the second email.
Trump was sued by the Democratic party over a recent executive order it says violates federal election law by giving him too much power over the independent federal election commission. The lawsuit objects to an 18 February order giving the White House more control over the election commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Securities and Exchange Commission and other traditionally independent agencies that normally operate day-to-day at arm’s length from the president.
The Social Security Administration is preparing to lay off at least 7,000 people from its workforce of 60,000, AP reported. The workforce reduction could be as high as 50%. Around 800 employees at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (Noaa), the US’s pre-eminent climate research agency, are reportedly also going to be forced out.
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Bannon riles up Trump's base against Zelenskyy: 'a bad guy, he's not to be trusted'
While recent polling shows that 47% of Americans have a positive opinion of Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and just 28% have a negative one, the belligerent way in which Ukraine’s president was confronted and scolded on Friday by Donald Trump and JD Vance will not surprise one segment of the American public: Steve Bannon’s viewers.
Bannon, whose podcast is the centerpiece of the rightwing Real America’s Voice television network, has been railing against Zelenskyy for years, casting him as a villain.
On Friday, he told viewers that the confrontation in the White House was entirely Zelenskyy’s fault. “Zelenskyy is just a bad guy; he’s not to be trusted,” Bannon said. “Now you understand why Zelenskyy’s at 16% in the polling in Ukraine and the reason he hasn’t had an election,” Bannon added, citing an entirely incorrect number that is nearly 50 points lower than in actual surveys.
“He’s a bad guy. He essentially lied about the perfect phone call President Trump had in August of 2019,” Bannon added, referring imprecisely to the July 2019 phone call between the two leaders that prompted Trump’s first impeachment. In that call, Trump told Zelenskyy that, in return for the Javelin anti-tank missiles Trump boasted on Friday about having provided to Ukraine, Zelenskyy needed to do him “a favor” by opening a baseless investigation into Joe Biden, his son Hunter and the conspiracy theory that Ukraine, not Russia, had meddled in he 2016 election.
The views from inside that media bubble perhaps also explain why the White House, on its official X account, proudly posted a photograph of the moment the US vice-president asked the Ukrainian president during the meeting: “Have you said thank you once?”
Zelenskyy, for the record, has frequently expressed thanks for US support in the war to defend his country against the Russian invasion.
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Writing on his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump has confirmed that “the boxes” at the center of the classified documents case against him have been returned to him and transported back to Florida.
“The Department of Justice has just returned the boxes that Deranged Jack Smith made such a big deal about. They are being brought down to Florida and will someday be part of the Trump Presidential Library. Justice finally won out,” Trump posted. “I did absolutely nothing wrong. This was merely an attack on a political opponent that, obviously, did not work well. Justice in our Country will now be restored.”
A Reuters photographer caught Steven Cheung, the White House communications director, overseeing the loading of the boxes on to Air Force One in Maryland on Friday afternoon.
A reporter for the pro-Trump Daily Wire, who was selected by the White House to cover the president’s trip to Mar-a-Lago, shared video online of what she said were those boxes being unloaded from Air Force One after the flight arrived in Florida Friday night.
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Trump 'asked Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians to depart the White House', press secretary says
Speaking to reporters on Friday night in Washington, the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that Trump had “asked Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians to depart the White House” after their contentious exchange in the Oval ffice.
She also noted, with disapproval, that Zelenskyy had refused Fox anchor Bret Baier’s invitation to apologize to Trump on the air.
“He feels President Zelenskyy is not in the right mindset to negotiate peace. And I think, frankly, that was reinforced with his comments on Bret Baier, refusing to apologize for disrespecting the president and the American people in the Oval office,” she said.
Leavitt also elaborated on Trump’s repeated statements earlier in the day that Zelenskyy was not in a strong negotiating position. “As President Trump said today, he doesn’t have any cards,” Leavitt said. “The cards are not in his favor. They’re in President Trump’s favor.”
It was striking that Leavitt seemed to suggest that the person Zelenskyy had to negotiate with from a position of weakness was Trump, not Putin, as though the American president’s primary concern was a deal to secure Ukraine’s mineral wealth, not a deal to end the war.
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The defense secretary Pete Hegseth ordered US Cyber Command to stand down from all planning against Russia last week, according to a new report from the Record.
“Hegseth gave the instruction to Cyber Command chief Gen Timothy Haugh, who then informed the organization’s outgoing director of operations, Marine Corps Maj Gen Ryan Heritage, of the new guidance, according to these people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity,” the outlet reports.
The publication notes that, even before Friday’s extraordinary events, Trump “has made a series of false statements and demands that align him with Russian President Vladimir Putin, including blaming Ukraine for the war and calling the country’s leader a dictator”.
At one stage during the Oval Office press availability, Trump responded to a question from a reporter who asked what would happen if Russia broke a ceasefire he negotiated. Trump replied by scoffing at the question and defending Putin’s reputation, while sitting next to the leader of a country whose people are being killed by Putin’s forces. “Putin went through a hell of a lot with me. He went through a phony witch-hunt, where they used him and Russia – Russia, Russia, Russia, you ever hear of that deal?” Trump said. “The whole thing was a scam, and he had to put up with that, he was being accused of all that stuff.”
As our colleague Stephanie Kirchgaessner reported earlier on Friday, the Trump administration “has publicly and privately signaled that it does not believe Russia represents a cyber threat against US national security or critical infrastructure, marking a radical departure from longstanding intelligence assessments”.
Read Stephanie’s reporting here on what that could mean:
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Zelenskyy stands his ground in Fox interview, but admits Trump meeting 'was not good'
In an interview with Fox News, Volodymyr Zelenskyy was asked by host Bret Baier whether he regretted what took place in the tense Oval Office exchange with Donald Trump and JD Vance.
“Yes, I think it was not good,” Zelenskyy replied.
“I’m not hearing from you, Mr President, a thought that you owe the president an apology,” Baier said at one stage.
“No, I respect president and I respect American people,” Zelenskyy said, speaking in English, which is his third language, after his native Russian and Ukrainian. “I think that we have to be very open and very honest, and I’m not sure that we did something bad.
“I think maybe sometimes, some things we have to discuss out of media, with all respect to democracy and to free media,” he added.
Throughout the interview, the Ukrainian leader stood his ground as he insisted that his relationship with Trump could be salvaged and brushed aside a call by the Republican senator Lindsey Graham to resign.
Asked about Trump’s claim that Zelenskyy wasn’t interested in peace, the Ukrainian president said that nobody wants an end to the grueling three-year war more than Ukrainians. But, he said, Ukraine needed security guarantees from the US before entering peace talks with Russia.
Zelenskyy insisted that even if he were to give the order for his troops to stop fighting, “nobody will just stop” because everyone is afraid “Putin will come back tomorrow”.
“We want just and lasting peace,” he said.
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Brian Glenn, an ardent Trump supporter who covers the president for the rightwing network Real America’s Voice and was selected by the White House to attend the Oval Office meeting with Zelenskyy, played an important role in turning the mood sour.
Glenn, whose questions to Trump are often invitations for the president to attack his political enemies, was called on by Trump early in the meeting, before it got contentious, and he chose to confront Zelenskyy for not wearing a suit.
As Winston Churchill did during the second world war, Zelenskyy visited the White House in a military outfit, a black sweater with a Ukrainian trident. That has been Zelenskyy’s choice since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of his country.
“Why don’t you wear a suit?” Glenn asked Zelenskyy. “You’re at the highest level in this country’s office, and you refuse to wear a suit. Just wanted to see if, do you own a suit?”
“You have problems?” Zelenskyy asked.
“A lot of Americans have problems with you not respecting the dignity of this office,” Glenn replied.
“Really?” Zelensky replied. “I will wear a costume after this war will finish,” Zelensky added, using the Ukrainian word for suit.
“Maybe something like this?” Glenn said, pointing to his own suit.
“Maybe something like yours, yes,” Zelensky replied. “Maybe something better, I don’t know,” he added, with a touch of the former comedian’s humor coming out.
“We will see. Maybe something cheaper,” he concluded.
Video of the exchange was shared on X by the representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, who wrote that she was “so proud” of Glenn, whom she is dating, “for pointing out that Zelensky has so much disrespect for America that he can’t even wear a suit in the Oval Office when he comes to beg for money from our President!!”
Trump himself had earlier drawn attention to Zelenskyy’s clothing as soon as he arrived at the White House, when he pointed at him and said to reporters, with obvious sarcasm: “He’s all dressed up today.” Video of that comment was immediately posted on X by a senior member of the White House communications team.
While Reuters and the Associated Press, wire services that were previously always allowed to attend such meetings, were blocked from the Oval Office, Dmitry Kirsanov, a correspondent for Russia’s state-owned news agency Tass, was initially allowed into the room with Trump and Zelenskyy.
After the presence of the Russian government media representative in the Oval Office was reported on social media by Reuters correspondents who were barred from the room by the same White House officials, Kirsanov was asked to leave. The White House has offered no explanation for why he was permitted to come so close to the leader of a nation his own country is currently attacking.
“Tass was not on the approved list of media for today’s pool,” a White House official told Reuters. “As soon as it came to the attention of press office staff that he was in the Oval, he was escorted out by the Press Secretary.”
Kirsanov declined to comment to the Guardian.
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Documents seized in FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago returned to Trump, White House says
Steven Cheung, the White House communications director, told reporters traveling with Trump to Florida on Friday that classified documents seized by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago in 2022 had been returned to Trump and were loaded on to Air Force One for the trip.
“The FBl is giving the president his property back that was taken during the unlawful and illegal raids. We are taking possession of the boxes today and loading them on to Air Force One,” Cheung said in a statement to reporters chosen by the White House to report on the journey.
According to a reporter for the conservative Washington Examiner, there were no seats on the plane for journalists from the Associated Press, or anyone chosen by the White House Correspondents Association, but the Daily Wire and Real America’s Voice, two pro-Trump rightwing outlets, were on hand to cover the president they support.
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Trump says Zelenskyy needs to stop saying 'all negative things' about Putin
On his way out of the White House, Donald Trump was just asked by Nancy Cordes of CBS News, “What does Zelenskyy need to do to re-start talks with you”?
“He’s gotta say ‘I want to make peace,’” Trump replied. “He doesn’t have to stand there and say about, ‘Putin this, Putin that’, all negative things.”
“He’s gotta say: ‘I want to make peace. I don’t want to fight a war any longer,’” Trump continued. “His people are dying. He doesn’t have the cards, just so you understand it, OK.”
When another reporter asked, “Did you tell Zelenskyy, ‘Leave the White House,’?” Trump at first refused to say, before adding: “I think you know the answer.”
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Democrats, and European leaders, are voicing support for Zelenskyy after his public dispute with Trump and Vance in the Oval office.
“Trump and Vance didn’t say a single bad word about Putin—a bloodthirsty dictator who invaded Ukraine, poisons his opposition, steals from his people, rigs elections, and murders those who speak out,”a Democratic representative from Massachusetts, Jim McGovern, posted on X. “They spent the entire meeting lying and yelling like maniacs at Zelenskyy—the leader of a democratic country defending itself against Russian imperialism and aggression. I am so disgusted and embarrassed. Trump and Vance are pathetic, lazy, lying, bottom-feeding grifters. Thank God Zelenskyy has the balls to fact check these bullies to their face.”
Other Democratic lawmakers sounded similar themes in their comments on the meeting, and a host of European leaders did the same.
“In Washington, by refusing to bend, Volodymyr Zelensky was the honor of Europe” the French prime minister, François Bayrou wrote. “It remains for us to decide what we Europeans want to be. And if we want to be at all”.
Following years of strong support from both sides of the aisle in Washington, Trump’s apparent decision to side with Putin instead of Zelenskyy could soon make Ukraine a more partisan issue in the US.
While recent polling suggests that Americans support maintaining or increasing military aid to Ukraine to help defend its territory from Russia’s full-scale invasion, important context for what unfolded in the White House today is that the Maga base of the Republican party has been exposed to intense anti-Zelenskyy disinformation for years now, on social media and on rightwing news channels and podcasts.
To take one example, Elon Musk recently shared a fake news report linked to Russia that promoted the false claim that leading Hollywood celebrities who visited Ukraine to meet Zelenskyy were paid millions of dollar to do so.
And, as the BBC reported in 2023, a fake story that Zelenskyy had purchased two luxury yachts with American aid money, created by a former US marine who now lives in Russia, was accepted as fact by Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican.
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The White House communications team just sent reporters a lengthy round up of statements of support for Donald Trump and JD Vance from Republican lawmakers and cabinet members after what Ukrainians see as their ambush of Zelesnkyy.
Perhaps concerned that the press corps is not closely following Republicans on X, the social-media platform that has tilted right since Elon Musk’s takeover, or Fox, the email includes quotes praising Trump and Vance from 45 Republican lawmakers and eight cabinet secretaries.
Among them was this, from Senator Lindsey Graham: “I’ve never been more proud of President Trump for showing the American people — and the world — you don’t trifle with this man ... He wanted to get a ceasefire. He wants to end the war and Zelenskyy felt like he needed to bait Trump in the Oval Office.”
Graham’s comment, made to Fox, is curious because he told reporters earlier that he had spoken with Zelenskyy this morning, before the meeting, and warned him, “don’t take the bait”. That seems to suggest that he had cautioned Zelenskyy against being baited into an argument. Then, after Zelenskyy did respond to insults from Vance and Trump by arguing back, Graham accused him of “baiting” Trump.
Graham then said that he was proud of both Trump and Vance.
“What I saw in the Oval Office was disrespectful, and I don’t know if we can ever do business with Zelenskyy again,” Graham said. “He either needs to resign and send somebody over that we can do business with or he needs to change.”
Here is video of Graham’s earlier comments, to a group of non-partisan reporters outside the White House after the meeting.
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David Smith, the Guardian’s Washington DC bureau chief, in his ‘US politics sketch’, has more on the historic and histrionic Trump-Zelenskyy Oval office showdown.
For American readers unfamiliar with the term, political sketch writing is a British newspaper genre, described as “a form of verbal cartooning” akin to the kind of satirical truth-telling we more commonly get from late-night comedians.
Here is how David’s latest sketch begins, but please do read it all:
This is going to be great television,” Donald Trump remarked at the end. Sure. And the captain of the Titanic probably assured his passengers that this would make a great movie some day.
Trump has just presided over one of the greatest diplomatic disasters in modern history. Tempers flared, voices were raised and protocol was shredded in the once hallowed Oval Office. As Trump got into a shouting match Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a horrified Europe watched the post-second world war order crumble before its eyes.
Never before has a US president bullied and berated an adversary, never mind an ally, in such a public way. Of course reality TV star and wrestling fan turned US president had it all play out on television for the benefit of his populist support base – and a certain bare-chested chum in the Kremlin.
Zelenskyy had come to the White House to sign a deal for US involvement in Ukraine’s mineral industry to pave the way for an end to three-year war in Russia. There was a hint of trouble to come when he arrived at the West Wing, wearing black – not a suit – and Trump greeted him with a handshake and sarcasm: “Wow, look, you’re all dressed up!”
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The day so far
Donald Trump cut talks with Volodymyr Zelenskyy short following heated exchanges in the Oval Office during which the US president and his vice-president JD Vance falsely accused Zelenskyy of being “disrespectful” and not thanking the US for its support. European leaders promptly rallied behind the Ukrainian president in a show of unity after the joint press conference was canceled and he left the White House early. No mineral deal was signed. More on that here.
Federal employees could get another email on Saturday requiring them to explain their recent accomplishments, a renewed attempt by Trump and Elon Musk to demand answers from the government workforce. The second email will come from individual agencies that have direct oversight of career officials, rather than being sent by the office of personnel management as was the first email. It’s unclear how national security agencies will handle the second email.
Trump was sued by the Democratic party over a recent executive order it says violates federal election law by giving him too much power over the independent federal election commission. The lawsuit objects to an 18 February order giving the White House more control over the election commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Securities and Exchange Commission and other traditionally independent agencies that normally operate day-to-day at arm’s length from the president. Critics have called the order an unprecedented power grab. The Democrats said it would effectively substitute Trump’s views on election-related disputes for those of the bipartisan election commission, and let him dictate outcomes.
The US government’s “severe” cuts to USAid will make the world less healthy, less safe and less prosperous, the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, said. Imploring the US to reverse its decision to cut funding for life-saving initiatives across the world, Guterres said America’s retreat from its humanitarian role and influence will run counter to its influence globally and its own interests. He said: “America’s generosity and compassion have not only saved lives, built peace and improved the state of the world; they have contributed to the stability and prosperity that Americans depend on.” In South Africa alone, the US shutdown of HIV/AIDs funding could lead to 500,000 deaths over the next ten years, modelling suggests.
The Social Security Administration is preparing to lay off at least 7,000 people from its workforce of 60,000, AP reported. The workforce reduction could be as high as 50%.
Trump wants to also radically shrink the state department – leaving it with fewer diplomats, a smaller number of embassies and a narrower remit that critics argue could hand China wins across the world, Politico reported.
Meanwhile around 800 employees at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Assocation (Noaa), the US’s preeminent climate research agency, have been tapped for termination, according to ABC7 NewYork.
Five former US defense secretaries have demanded congressional hearings on Trump’s firings of several military commanders, including the chair of the joint chiefs of staff, saying it was done for “purely partisan reasons” and weakens national security.
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Trump sued by Democrats for seeking control over federal election commission
This report is from Reuters.
Donald Trump was sued on Friday by the Democratic Party over a recent executive order it says violates federal election law by giving him too much power over the independent federal election commission.
The lawsuit filed in the Washington DC federal court by three national Democratic committees is the party’s first against Trump during his second term.
It comes as Democrats, outnumbered in Congress, seek an effective means to counteract far-reaching changes from Trump’s first six weeks in office, including many steps to lessen government oversight and eliminate internal dissent.
Several dozen lawsuits have challenged other actions taken by Trump since his inauguration last month.
Friday’s lawsuit objects to a February 18 order giving the White House more control over the election commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Securities and Exchange Commission and other traditionally independent agencies that normally operate day-to-day at arm’s length from the president.
Other defendants include attorney general Pam Bondi, the election commission and three commissioners.
The Department of Justice did not immediately respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for the election commission said that agency does not discuss litigation.
Trump’s order, “Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies,” makes his and Bondi’s opinions on questions of law “controlling” for all federal employees performing their official duties, and bans executive branch employees from advancing contrary views.
Critics have called the order an unprecedented power grab.
The Democrats said it would effectively substitute Trump’s views on election-related disputes for those of the bipartisan election commission, and let him dictate outcomes.
According to the complaint, letting Trump micromanage the commission would undermine that purpose, by allowing a “single partisan political figure” to rig campaign rules and resolve disputes against his opponents.
The plaintiffs include the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
They said Trump’s order is already causing irreparable harm, by making it harder for the Senate committee to defend against a complaint by the 2024 reelection campaign of Republican US Senator Ted Cruz of Texas over his opponent’s advertisements.
The lawsuit seeks a declaration that a federal law shielding the election commission from “presidential coercion and control” is constitutional, and to block Trump’s February 18 order.
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US defence secretary Pete Hegseth has confirmed a report by CBS that the Trump administration has moved to ease restrictions on American commanders carrying out raids and ordering airstrikes outside battlefields.
CBS reported that Hegseth changed the rules of engagement for the US army during a meeting with members of the US Africa Command (Africom) last month. In a post on social media above a hyperlink to the story, Hegseth wrote: “Correct.”
The change gives greater latitude to American commanders to choose their targets and move against them.
Biden initially tightened restrictions around airstrikes outside traditional conflict zone in 2022 after Trump loosened them. Under Biden’s guidance the president would have had to approve the drone strike himself, whereas Trump has moved decision making power further down the chain of command. Trump ordered his first airstrikes against IS-Somalia targets earlier this month.
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State department terminates USAid initiative helping restore Ukraine's energy grid
The state department this week terminated a USAid initiative that has invested hundreds of millions of dollars to help restore Ukraine’s energy grid from attacks by the Russian military, two USAid officials working on the agency’s Ukraine mission have told NBC News.
According to NBC’s report, power outages have been applied overnight in some regions of Ukraine due to the attacks on energy facilities. Ukraine’s systems have been systematically targeted by Russia since its full-scale invasion three years ago.
“It significantly undercuts this administration’s abilities to negotiate on the ceasefire, and it’d signal to Russia that we don’t care about Ukraine or our past investments,” one USAid official involved in the Ukraine mission said.
The official continued:
Russia is fighting a two-pronged war in Ukraine: A military one but also an economic one. They’re trying to crush the economy, but USAid has played a central role in helping it be resilient, [including] shoring up the energy grid … We’ve provided vast amount of support to the Ukrainian government to avoid a macro economic crisis.
In addition to ending the Ukraine Energy Security Project, USAid is also dramatically downsizing its presence in Ukraine.
Before the Trump administration’s latest moves, 64 American government employees and contractors were serving on the ground in Ukraine for the agency. Just eight of those personnel are slated to remain on the ground in the war-torn country after the Trump administration placed its remaining global workforce on administrative leave and ordered those workers not deemed “critical” to return to the US.
The two officials warned that USAid withdrawing from Ukraine would leave its energy grid vulnerable in the heart of the winter as it endures assaults from further Russian missiles.
You can read NBC’s report here.
From Reuters:
House Democrats demanded answers on Friday from health and human services secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr on the exact number of employees fired from the health agencies he oversees and warned the dismissals could undermine public health.
Hundreds of workers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, and the National Institutes of Health have been forced out as the Trump administration overhauls government agencies.
In three letters sent on Wednesday, one each for the CDC, the FDA, and the NIH, energy and commerce committee senior Democrat Frank Pallone Jr, and the top Democrat on the health subcommittee, Diana DeGette, pressed Kennedy to disclose not only how many workers were terminated at each agency, but also how many more layoffs are expected.
They also asked how many of the currently vacant positions would be left unfilled and how many of those fired were responsible for responding to outbreaks of diseases like bird flu, measles, and mpox.
Kennedy had pledged “radical transparency” and accountability including an “unprecedented level of collaboration” with Congress during his confirmation hearings.
HHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether Kennedy intended to provide the information.
Pallone and DeGette also asked whether HHS conducted any assessment of how these firings would impact the country’s ability to respond to public health threats. They wrote:
We are deeply concerned these widespread terminations took place without any review of these employees’ work history or without any analysis of the impacts these job losses would have on the Department’s ability to protect the health and well-being of the American people.
The letters come just a day after a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration’s directives, which led to the mass firings, were illegal and ordered them to be rescinded.
Pallone and DeGette warned that failing to restore these positions could put Americans at greater risk from foodborne illnesses, infectious disease outbreaks, and delays in medical research.
The impending impact of these terminations, including exposing Americans to greater death and illness due to outbreaks of foodborne illness and infectious disease, will fall on your shoulders.
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The S&P 500 dipped slightly in choppy trading on Friday after talks between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy ended in disaster.
Trump and Zelenskyy traded verbal blows at the White House before the world’s media, adding fresh uncertainty for investors already worried about sticky US inflation and a tepid economy.
The S&P 500 was last down 0.07% at 5,857.40 points. The Nasdaq declined 0.22% to 18,504.02 points, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.01% at 43,236.40 points.
Earlier, a Commerce Department report showed inflation rose in line with expectations in the previous month. However, consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy, dropped 0.2% after an upwardly revised 0.8% increase in December.
Not that there was any ambiguity, but the White House has confirmed that Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy did not sign a minerals deal on Friday.
Trump has not ruled out an agreement, but not until Ukraine is ready to have a constructive conversation, a senior US official told Reuters.
It was up to the Ukrainians if the leaders’ canceled joint news conference could be rescheduled while Zelenskyy remained in the US, the official said.
Trump-Zelenskyy press conference canceled with Zelenskyy set to leave early
Following furiously heated talks earlier, during which Donald Trump shouted at the Ukrainian president, the joint press conference has been canceled, the White House said.
A White House source confirmed to Reuters that Volodymyr Zelenskyy is leaving the White House early.
Trump posted on Truth Social that Zelenskyy was “not ready for peace”. He claimed Zelenskyy had “disrespected” the US (as did his vice-president, JD Vance, who also accused Zelenskyy during the meeting of apparently not thanking the US enough for its support thus far).
Trump added:
He can come back when he’s ready for peace.
For all the details head to over Europe live blog:
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Federal workers could get a second 'what did you do last week' email that may require a response
This report is from the Associated Press.
Federal employees could get another email on Saturday requiring them to explain their recent accomplishments, a renewed attempt by Donald Trump and Elon Musk to demand answers from the government workforce.
The plan, first reported by the Washington Post (paywall), was disclosed to AP by a person with knowledge of the situation who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly.
The first email, which was distributed a week ago, asked employees “what did you do last week?” and prompted them to list five tasks that they completed. Musk, who empowered by Trump is aiming to downsize agencies and eliminate thousands of federal jobs, said anyone who didn’t respond would be fired. Many agencies, meanwhile, told their workforces not to respond or issued conflicting guidance.
The second email will be delivered in a different way, according to the person with knowledge of the situation, potentially making it easier to discipline employees for noncompliance.
Instead of being sent by the Office of Personnel Management, which functions as a human resources agency for the federal government but doesn’t have the power to hire or fire, the email will come from individual agencies that have direct oversight of career officials.
It’s unclear how national security agencies will handle the second email. After the first one, they directed employees not to write back because much of the agencies’ work is sensitive or classified. Less than half of federal workers responded, according to the White House.
The Office of Personnel Management ultimately told agency leaders shortly before the Monday deadline for responses that the request was optional, although it left the door open for similar demands going forward.
On Wednesday, at Trump’s first cabinet meeting of his second term, Musk argued that his request was a “pulse check” to ensure that those working for the government have “a pulse and two neurons”.
Both Musk and Trump have claimed that some workers are either dead or fictional, and the president has publicly backed Musk’s approach.
Trump said that people who didn’t respond to the first email “ are on the bubble”, adding that he wasn’t “thrilled” about them not responding.
“Now, maybe they don’t exist,” he claimed without providing evidence. “Maybe we’re paying people that don’t exist.”
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Florida first lady Casey DeSantis doesn’t rule out running for governor alongside her husband.
At an event at the Florida International University Academic Health Center on Friday, after reporters asked if she could confirm if she was considering a run, DeSantis said: “Well, I would say one thing. To quote the late, great Yogi Berra, ‘when you come to a fork in the road, take.’”
Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, said of his wife that people have been approaching him “for years, begging to get her in the fray”.
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Russian state media gets kicked out of the White House during Zelenskyy meeting
Russian state media Tass was removed from the Oval Office during the bilateral meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy.
The White House said they were not on the approved media list for the meeting, so they were removed as soon as it came to the attention of press office staff.
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Trump says he is 'for both Ukraine and Russia'
In the meeting with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, at the White House, Trump plays diplomat. Zelensky responds to Trump, pleading for “no compromises with a killer”, in reference to Russia’s president, Vladmir Putin.
For more on this story, follow along on our Europe liveblog:
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29 Mexican cartel members were extradited to the United States, the White House announced on Friday.
Of those extradited is Rafael Caro Quintero, which the White House calls “one of the most evil cartel bosses in the world.” Quintero is accused of murdering a US DEA agent in 1985.
The cooperation between the US and Mexican government comes despite the fact that Mexico is trying to prevent a 25% tariff on all of its imports into the US, which will begin Tuesday.
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The US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, saw few political consequences in supporting Donald Trump’s ouster of the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff because he never had the support of the senators who wanted Gen Charles Brown to remain in the role, advisers close to the secretary said.
The ramifications of Trump’s decision to fire Brown and seven other senior officials at the Pentagon took on new urgency on Thursday after five former defense secretaries, outraged at Trump’s firings, urged Congress to hold hearings and extract justifications for their dismissals under oath.
But people close to the defense secretary said Hegseth felt that some senators who voted against his nomination, like Susan Collins who pushed for Brown to stay in his role, could be ignored because Hegseth never had their support in first place.
That calculus appears to have come into play when Hegseth met with Trump on 14 February to discuss the personnel moves, broadly agreeing that they should not have a joint chiefs chair or any other senior official who was associated with the Biden administration.
It could also be tested in the coming weeks as Congress weighs whether to entertain the letter and hold a series of hearings.
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Zelenskyy arrives at White House to meet with Trump
The stakes could not be higher for the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who has arrived at the White House to meet with Donald Trump.
Can he persuade the US president to provide a backstop to guarantee any peace deal? Will the minerals deal happen?
My colleague Jakub Krupa will bring you all the latest on that here:
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'USAid cuts make world less safe': Guterres calls for US to reverse cuts to humanitarian aid
Going through with these cuts will make the world less healthy, less safe and less prosperous, Guterres says.
The reduction of America’s humanitarian role and influence will run counter to American influence globally, he says.
I can only hope that these decisions can be reversed based on more careful reviews, and the same applies to other countries that have recently announced reductions in humanitarian and development aid.
In the meantime, Guterres says, every UN agency stands ready to provide information and justification for its projects, adding that the UN will do everything it can to provide life-saving aid to those in need.
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From Gaza to Sudan, Afghanistan and Syria, Ukraine and beyond, US funding supports people living through wars, famines and disasters, providing essential healthcare, shelter, water, food and education, Guterres says.
The message is clear, he says.
America’s generosity and compassion have not only saved lives, built peace and improved the state of the world; they have contributed to the stability and prosperity that Americans depend on.
Guterres starts by expressing deep concern over developments over the last 48 hours regarding “severe cuts in funding” by the US.
These cuts impact a wide range of critical programs, he says, from life-saving humanitarian aid to support to vulnerable communities recovering from war or natural disasters, from development to fights against terrorism and drug-trafficking.
The consequences will be especially devastating for vulnerable people around the world, he says.
In Afghanistan, more than 9 million people will out on health and protection services. In Syria, where 2.5 million people need assistance, where the absence of US funding leaves large populations even more vulnerable. In Ukraine, cash-based programming has been suspended in key regions. In South Sudan, funding has run out for programs supporting people who have fled the conflict, leaving border areas dangerously overcrowded.
Meanwhile, he says, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime will be forced to stop many counter-narcotics programs, including the one fighting the fentanyl crisis [a preoccupation of the Trump administration with regards to justifying its proposed sweeping tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico], and dramatically reduce activities against human trafficking.
And funding for many programs fighting HIV/AIDs, TB, malaria and cholera have stopped, Guterres says.
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The UN secretary-general António Guterres is making a statement on USAid cuts to reporters now. You can watch along here, I’ll bring you the main lines.
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Ex-US defense chiefs urge congressional hearings on Trump’s military firings
Five former US defense secretaries have demanded congressional hearings on Donald Trump’s firings of several military commanders, including the chair of the joint chiefs of staff, saying it was done for “purely partisan reasons” and weakens national security.
The five – including James Mattis, who served as defence secretary during Trump’s first presidency – wrote in a letter that they were “deeply alarmed” by the dismissals, which they said were “reckless” and unjustified by operational reason.
Trump fired Gen CQ Brown, the chair of the joint chiefs, last Friday night. The sacking was followed by an order from Pete Hegseth, the newly installed defence secretary, dismissing the head of the navy, Adm Lisa Franchetti, and Gen James Slife, the air force’s vice-chief of staff.
Calling on Congress to “exercise fully its constitutional oversight responsibilities”, the five defence secretaries argue that “the president offered no justification for his actions”.
These officers’ exemplary operational and combat experience, as well as the coming dismissals of the Judge Advocates General of the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force, make clear that none of this was about warfighting.
Mr Trump’s dismissals raise troubling questions about the administration’s desire to politicise the military and to remove legal constraints on the president’s power.
Read the full report here:
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Social Security Administration could cut up to 50% of its workforce – report
This report is from the Associated Press.
The Social Security Administration is preparing to lay off at least 7,000 people from its workforce of 60,000, according to a person familiar with the agency’s plans who is not authorized to speak publicly. The workforce reduction, according to a second person who also spoke on the condition of anonymity, could be as high as 50%.
It’s unclear how the layoffs will directly impact the benefits of the 72.5 million Social Security beneficiaries, which include retirees and children who receive retirement and disability benefits. However, advocates and Democratic lawmakers warn that layoffs will reduce the agency’s ability to serve recipients in a timely manner.
Some say cuts to the workforce are, in effect, a cut in benefits.
Later on Friday, the agency sent out a news release outlining plans for “significant workforce reductions,” employee reassignments from “non-mission critical positions to mission critical direct service positions,” and an offer of voluntary separation agreements. The agency said in its letter to workers that reassignments “may be involuntary and may require retraining for new workloads.”
A representative from the Social Security Administration did not respond to an Associated Press request for comment.
The people familiar with the agency’s plans say that SSA’s new acting commissioner Leland Dudek held a meeting this week with management and told them they had to produce a plan that eliminated half of the workforce at SSA headquarters in Washington and at least half of the workers in regional offices.
In addition, the termination of office leases for Social Security sites across the country are detailed on the so-called “department for government efficiency” website, which maintains a “Wall of Receipts,” which is a self-described “transparent account of Doge’s findings and actions.” The site states that leases for dozens of Social Security sites across Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Kentucky, North Carolina, and other states have been or will be ended.
“The Social Security Administration is already chronically understaffed. Now, the Trump Administration wants to demolish it,” said Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, an advocacy group for the popular public benefit program.
She said the reductions in force “will deny many Americans access to their hard-earned Social Security benefits. Field offices around the country will close. Wait times for the 1-800 number will soar.”
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Russia names new US ambassador in latest sign of thaw in relations
Russia has named career diplomat Alexander Darchiev as its new ambassador to the United States.
It is a sign of thawing relations between the two countries, as Russia had no ambassador to the US since last October amid growing tensions in the aftermath of its illegal invasion of Ukraine.
The Russian ministry of foreign affairs said that Darchiev would leave for Washington “in the near future.”
The two countries have been working on restoring diplomatic ties on the back of the US-Russia summit in Riyadh, and held a follow-up meeting on this specific issue in Istanbul just yesterday.
This report is from Reuters.
Donald Trump’s effort to curtail automatic birthright citizenship nationwide as part of his hardline immigration crackdown suffered another legal setback on Friday when a second federal appeals court declined to lift one of the court orders blocking the president’s executive order.
The Richmond, Virginia-based fourth US circuit court of appeals rejected the Trump administration’s request for an order putting on hold a nationwide injunction issued by a federal judge in Maryland who concluded the order was unconstitutional. The appeals court said:
For well over a century, the federal government has recognized the birthright citizenship of children born in this country to undocumented or non-permanent immigrants.
The government has not shown that it will be harmed in any meaningful way if it continues to comply, for the pendency of its appeal, with that settled interpretation of the law.
The court also said the public interest was served by leaving the injunction in place, saying it would be “hard to overstate the confusion and upheaval” that would result from implementing Trump’s order.
It was the second time an appellate court had taken up Trump’s executive order on birthright citizenship, whose fate may ultimately be decided by the US Supreme Court.
Another appeals court last week declined to lift a similar injunction issued by a judge in Seattle. Other judges in Massachusetts and New Hampshire have likewise enjoined the order, finding it violates the US constitution.
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Trump planning to sign executive order making English official US language – report
Donald Trump is planning to sign an executive order that would for the first time make English the nation’s official language, the Wall Street Journal (paywall) reports citing White House officials.
In its almost 250-year history, the US has never had an official national language at the federal level. Owing to a long history of immigration from all around the world, more than 350 languages are spoken across the country.
The executive order would rescind a Clinton-era federal mandate that agencies and other recipients of federal funding are required to provide language assistance to non-English speakers, the officials told the WSJ. Agencies will still be able to provide documents and services in languages other than English, according to a White House summary of the order viewed by the paper. The summary of the order said the goal of making English the national language is to promote unity, establish efficiency in the government and provide a pathway to civic engagement.
Though the US doesn’t have an official language, applicants must pass a test demonstrating an ability to read, write and speak English to become naturalized citizens. According to the US Census Bureau, most Americans – more than 78% – speak only English at home. But millions of Americans primarily speak other languages, such as Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog and Arabic. Dozens of Native American languages are also spoken in the US.
JD Vance, the vice-president, introduced the English Language Unity Act when he served as a senator from Ohio. The proposed bill called for the federal government to conduct all official business in English and introduce a language-testing standard for a pathway to citizenship.
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An important measure of inflation in the United States has eased slightly, my colleague Graeme Wearden reports.
The PCE price index, which tracks the costs of a range of goods and services, slowed to a 2.5% rise in the year to January, down from 2.6% in December.
Core PCE, which excludes the price of food and energy, eased to 2.6% per year – down from 2.9% in the 12 months to December.
US JAN REAL CONSUMER SPENDING -0.5% VS DEC +0.5% (PREV +0.4%)
— PiQ (@PiQSuite) February 28, 2025
US JAN YEAR-OVER YEAR PCE PRICE INDEX +2.5% (CONSENSUS +2.5%) VS DEC +2.6% (PREV +2.6%); CORE +2.6% (CONSENSUS +2.6%) VS DEC +2.9% (PREV +2.8%)
US JAN PCE PRICE INDEX EX-FOOD/ENERGY/HOUSING +0.3% VS DEC +0.2%
US…
PCE is the preferred inflation measure of the US central bank, the Federal Reserve, so this may reassure policymakers that inflationary pressures are easing….
For all things business, you can follow Graeme’s reporting over on the business live blog.
With Kash Patel officially appointed as the new FBI director and Dan Bongino as his number two, experts are warning the fate of federal law enforcement investigations into the far right face a grim future.
Patel taking the reins of the FBI also coincides with a resurgence of the Base, an accelerationist neo-Nazi group with terrorism designations around the world, along with other emboldened extremists connected to the January 6 attacks on the Capitol.
But after peddling QAnon conspiracies and writing a children’s book portraying president Donald Trump as a king, Patel has already signalled he is not interested in pursuing insurrectionists or other extremists.
Instead, he has put Black Lives Matter, antifascist activists, the media and his own FBI agents daring to go against his agenda, on watch.
For his part, Bongino, a superstar among conservative podcasters, regularly feeds election denialism, January 6 screeds and bigotries about “illegals” to his millions of listeners. A former NYPD cop and Secret Service agent on both the presidential details of Barack Obama and George W Bush, Bongino often calls Democrats “communists” and his enemy.
“I think it makes it very unlikely that the far right will continue to be seen as the threat it actually is in terms of hate crimes and domestic terrorism,” said Heidi Beirich, co-founder of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, about the new FBI leadership. She added:
Patel’s past QAnon links and Bongino’s bigotry likely make taking this threat seriously, regardless of the fact, impossible for these two men.
Both of them, seen by some as Trump’s “henchmen”, have all but sworn public omerta to the president. Patel is even refusing to count out dispatching the bureau and its agents to target Trump’s political enemies. In one of his first acts as director, Patel relocated up to 1,500 agents from its central headquarters at the J Edgar Hoover building in Washington DC – the heart of what he calls the “deep state” and where several counterterrorism and national security investigators are working.
“All of this marks a huge departure from the first Trump administration, when the FBI for the first time declared white supremacy the country’s greatest domestic terrorist threat,” Beirich said, adding:
Facts about violence and its perpetrators probably won’t matter this time around.
Read more here:
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Trump wants to shrink size, reach and focus of state department - report
Donald Trump wants to radically shrink the state department – leaving it with fewer diplomats, a smaller number of embassies and a narrower remit that critics argue could hand China wins across the world, Politico reports.
The administration appears “determined to focus state on areas such as transactional government agreements, safeguarding US security and promoting foreign investment in America”. That would mean slashing bureaus promoting traditional soft power initiatives – such as those advancing democracy, protecting human rights and supporting scientific research.
It’s not clear yet how many embassies would be closed, but Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, is on board with cutting a significant number, a person familiar with the internal discussions told Politico.
The move is “going to dramatically shrink the ambit of American diplomacy, dramatically shrink the purpose and the practice of our diplomacy and return it, if not to the 19th century, at least” before the second world war, said Tom Shannon, a former senior state department official who served under Republican and Democratic presidents.
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Volodymyr Zelenskyy is expected to arrive at the White House at around 11am ET in the Washington, with a joint press conference with Donald Trump to follow about two hours later, so 1pm ET.
But as my colleague Jakub Krupa helpfully reminds us, these timings can and usually do change as talks take more time than expected.
He adds: “Given the tensions between the two leaders, there will be more temptation than usual to read into any delays, too…”
I will be bringing you the key takeaways from Zelenskyy’s visit throughout the day, but you can follow all the developments on the Europe blog here:
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Noaa braced for more staffing cuts after hundreds fired on Thursday
The Trump administration has set its government-shrinking sights on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Assocation (Noaa), the US’s preeminent climate research agency, where around 800 employees have been tapped for termination, two sources close to the agency have told ABC7 NewYork.
More layoff are possible today, one of the sources said, potentially costing the agency more than a thousand employees by the end of the week.
Employees began receiving termination notices on Thursday, learning via email that their jobs would be cut off by the end of the day. The firings specifically affected probationary employees, a categorization that applies to new hires or those moved or promoted into new positions, and which makes up roughly 10% of the agency’s workforce.
Noaa conducts climate and weather modeling and forecasts for the country, as its National Weather Service and National Hurricane Center provides information that helps communities plan for natural disasters and climate change-driven events. These cuts come days before a potential severe weather outbreak in the south-eastern US and just a few months ahead of the next Atlantic hurricane season.
It is not only laid-off employees who will be harmed by the cuts, one worker said yesterday. Ordinary Americans who rely on Noaa’s extreme weather forecasts, climate data and sustainably monitored fisheries will also suffer. They said:
Words can’t describe the impact this will have, both on us at Noaa and on the country. It’s just wrong all around.
Andrew Rosenberg, former deputy director of Noaa’s National Marine Fisheries Service, said Thursday was a “sad day”.
There is no plan or thought into how to continue to deliver science or service on weather, severe storms and events, conservation and management of our coasts and ocean life and much more.
Let’s not pretend this is about efficiency, quality of work or cost savings because none of those false justifications are remotely true.
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Tucked away in a former garage space in Toronto’s west end, Gram’s Pizza, is usually packed with diners hankering for anything from a classic pepperoni to vodka and hot hawaiian.
Lately, however, owner and chef Graham Palmateer has made some changes to how he makes his pizzas.
After Donald Trump threatened to slap a 25% tariff on Canadian goods – and even to annex the whole country – Palmateer decided to banish US ingredients from his restaurant.
“I just decided I was done with the US. I wanted to move away from American companies,” he said. “Canadians know Americans pretty well, and we don’t always agree with the choices that they make. A lot of us are disappointed, to put it mildly.”
Making the switch has not been the easiest task: the two countries’ economies have been tightly bound through a longstanding free trade agreement since the late 1980s.
But years of cross-border trade and investment has blurred the lines on country of origin: in the car manufacturing industry, for example, a vehicle passes the border an average of seven times during the manufacturing process.
Read the full report here:
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US aid cuts have forced the UN children’s agency Unicef to suspend or scale back many programmes in Lebanon, with more than half of children under the age of two experiencing severe food poverty in the country’s east, a Unicef official said on Friday.
“We have been forced to suspend or cut back or drastically reduce many of our programmes and that includes nutrition programmes,” Unicef’s deputy representative in Lebanon, Ettie Higgins, told reporters in Geneva via video link from Beirut, Reuters reports.
US shutdown of HIV and Aids funding ‘could lead to 500,000 deaths in South Africa’
by Kat Lay, Global health correspondent
Sweeping notices of termination of funding have been received by organisations working with HIV and Aids across Africa, with dire predictions of a huge rise in deaths as a result.
After the US announced a permanent end to funding for HIV projects, services across the board have been affected, say doctors and programme managers, from projects helping orphans and pregnant women to those reaching transgender individuals and sex workers.
The cuts could result in 500,000 deaths over the next 10 years in South Africa, modelling suggests, while thousands of people are already set to lose their jobs in the coming days.
The US government has announced it will be cutting more than 90% of the contracts of its key development agency, USAid, and slashing $60bn (£48bn) of overseas aid spending.
The Guardian has heard that notices of termination have been sent to organisations in other countries in the region, including Malawi, Zambia, Tanzania and Zimbabwe, as well as with the joint United Nations programme UNAids.
Read the full report here:
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America must not surrender its democratic values
For 250 years, the United States has held itself up as a symbol of democracy – an example of freedom and self-governance to which the rest of the world could aspire. People have long looked to our declaration of independence and constitution as blueprints for how to guarantee those human rights and freedoms.
Tragically, all of that is changing. As Donald Trump moves this country towards authoritarianism, he is aligning himself with dictators and despots who share his disdain for democracy and the rule of law.
This week, in a radical departure from longstanding US policy, the Trump administration voted against a United Nations resolution which clearly stated that Russia began the horrific war with Ukraine. That resolution also called on Russia to withdraw its forces from occupied Ukraine, in line with international law. The resolution was brought forward by our closest allies, including the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and dozens more democratic nations. And 93 countries voted “yes”.
Rather than side with our longstanding allies to preserve democracy and uphold international law, the president voted with authoritarian countries such as Russia, North Korea, Iran and Belarus to oppose the resolution. Many of the other opponents of that resolution are undemocratic nations propped up by Russian military aid.
Let’s be clear: this was not just another UN vote. This was the president of the United States turning his back on 250 years of our history and openly aligning himself with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. This was the president of the United States undermining the independence of Ukraine.
Read the full opinion piece here:
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Russia lauds 'substantive' talks with US in Istanbul
The Russian foreign ministry praised the latest round of talks with the United States in a statement on Friday, calling them “substantive and businesslike”.
Russian and US teams held six hours of talks in Turkey on Thursday to try to restore the normal functioning of their embassies, and Vladimir Putin said initial contacts with Donald Trump’s administration had inspired hope.
The foreign ministry said the delegations had discussed issues related to what it said was the illegal confiscation of Russia’s diplomatic property in the US and had asked the Americans to consider restoring direct air links.
It said both sides had agreed on steps to restore the uninterrupted financing and normal operations of their respective embassies, Reuters reports.
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Ex-Washington Post editor Marty Baron rebukes Bezos: ‘betrayal of free expression’
Marty Baron, a highly regarded former editor of the Washington Post, has said that Jeff Bezos’s announcement that the newspaper’s opinion section would narrow its editorial focus was a “betrayal of the very idea of free expression” that had left him “appalled”.
In an interview with the Guardian, Baron also said: “I don’t think that [Bezos] wants an editorial page that’s regularly going after Donald Trump.”
On Wednesday, the billionaire newspaper owner and Amazon founder sent an email to Post staffers announcing that the newspaper’s editorial section would shift its editorial focus and that only opinions that support and defend “personal liberties” and “free markets” would be welcome, and other viewpoints “will be left to be published by others”.
Bezos’s announcement was met with criticism and resulted in the departure of the newspaper’s opinions editor, David Shipley. Baron, who was executive editor of the Washington Post from 2012 until 2021 and is one of the most esteemed figures in American journalism, blasted Bezos’s decision.
You can read the full report here:
Cardinal McElroy calls for compassion in Trump's immigration policy
Cardinal Robert McElroy, the bishop of San Diego who is preparing to take over as archbishop of Washington DC next month, has called for a compassionate approach toward refugees and immigrants who are in the United States illegally.
Associated Press reported that in a press conference in San Diego he said the removal of immunity for houses of worship from immigration enforcement is particularly problematic, and a “deep moral question.”
“When these places become targets of ICE raids, it strikes fear in everyone’s hearts, and it acts as a deterrent to people going to church and freely worshipping or going to schools,” he said. “That’s why it’s so deadly.”
“A nation needs to secure its borders and a strong immigration policy, but what we’re seeing is an effort to classify all of these people as criminals,” he said. “That casts them as the other or not having the same dignity.”
McElroy has previously stated that Trump’s threats of mass deportations of immigrants are “incompatible with Catholic doctrine.”
McElroy, 70, is set to replace retiring Cardinal Wilton Gregory.
The Republican-controlled Congress has voted to repeal a federal fee on oil and gas producers who release high levels of methane, undoing a major piece of Joe Biden’s climate policy, Associated Press reports.
The Senate on Thursday voted along party lines 52-47 to repeal the fee, following a similar House vote Wednesday.
The American Petroleum Institute, the largest lobbying group for the oil and gas industry, applauded the move, calling the fee a “duplicative, punitive tax on American energy production that stifles innovation”.
“Republicans are helping out the absolutely worst offenders of methane leakage,’’ said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the environment panel. “The companies only pay the methane fee if they don’t meet their own industry standard for … avoiding leaks of a dangerous, explosive, poisonous greenhouse gas.”
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China reacts to Trump tariff threat and Rubio comments on fentanyl
China’s foreign ministry has hit out at comments made by secretary of state Marco Rubio. Reuters reports that the ministry said Rubio’s comments that China may be flooding the US with fentanyl demonstrated a “cold war mentality”.
At a regular press conference, ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said China expressed strong dissatisfaction and firm opposition to Rubio’s comments, adding: “The US keeps coercing and threatening China, which will only backfire on itself.”
The ministry also asserted that US criticism of China’s treatment of the Uyghurs were the “lies of the century”.
China’s commerce ministry has also commented on Donald Trump’s latest tariff announcement, vowing to retaliate, and accusing the US of “shifting the blame” on fentanyl flows.
Reuters quotes a statement from the ministry which urged Washington to “return to the right track of properly resolving differences through dialogue on an equal footing as soon as possible.”
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RFK Jr criticised over failure to address measles outbreak in Texas
An official at the Health and Human Services agency (HHS) has criticised Robert F Kennedy’s failure to address a measles outbreak in Texas which has led to the first recorded measles death in the US since 2015.
Speaking to NBC News anonymously, the official told the news network Kennedy has done nothing about the outbreak, observing: “It’s almost like he’s still in campaign-mode rather than realizing he’s head of a large agency and workforce.”
It was reported that Kennedy has yet to issue any all staff emails or visit several HHS agencies.
Kennedy downplayed the measles outbreak yesterday, saying: “There have been four measles outbreaks this year in this country so it’s not unusual. We have measles outbreaks every year.”
The Texas outbreak has affected more than 120 people and has led to the death of a school-age child.
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Labor unions cheer court ruling that blocks Trump's mass firings
Welcome to the Guardian’s rolling coverage of the second Donald Trump administration and US politics.
Labor unions were celebrating after a federal judge in California temporarily blocked the Trump administration from ordering the US defense department and other agencies to carry out the mass firings.
Attorneys for the coalition cheered the order, although it does not mean that fired employees will automatically be rehired or that future firings will not occur.
“What it means in practical effects is the agencies of the federal government should hear the court’s warning that that order was unlawful,” said Danielle Leonard, an attorney for the coalition, after the hearing.
“This ruling by Judge Alsup is an important initial victory for patriotic Americans across this country who were illegally fired from their jobs by an agency that had no authority to do so,” said Everett Kelley, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees.
“These are rank-and-file workers who joined the federal government to make a difference in their communities, only to be suddenly terminated due to this administration’s disdain for federal employees and desire to privatize their work.”
Here are the rest of the headlines:
The Trump administration has fired hundreds of workers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), the US’s pre-eminent climate research agency.
The Trump administration has taken down the online application form for several popular student debt repayment plans, causing confusion among borrowers and likely creating complications for millions of Americans with outstanding loans.
The US justice department has released additional files related to the late disgraced financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
New laws in Florida impose harsher penalties for offenses committed by people illegally in the US than for everyone else, with an automatic death sentence for anyone who is in the US illegally and is convicted of first-degree murder.
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is expected in Washington DC later today, where he and Donald Trump are expected to hold a joint press conference.
