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    US equality chief fired by Trump condemns ‘demonization of the term DEI’

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    View image in fullscreenSeven days after Donald Trump was inaugurated, Jocelyn Samuels received a message from the White House saying that the president – who had first appointed her as a commissioner to the US government agency tasked with fighting workplace discrimination – now wanted her gone.Like so many other officials Trump has axed since retaking office, Samuels was informed she was being terminated from the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) because of her “support for radical Biden administration guidance, DEI initiatives and a refusal to defend women against extreme gender ideology”.The order appeared to fly in the face of the legal precedent governing her appointment to the commission, but Samuels also sees her firing as part of a greater strategy to create a Republican majority on the five-member commission that will roll back protections for transgender employees in particular, and retaliate more generally against businesses that attempt to address inequity in their workforce.“What I observed from the outside is that there is a real desire to decimate the federal government’s ability to provide the level of services that it has to the American people,” Samuels told the Guardian as she sat in a cafe earlier this week across the street from the White House, where her firing was orchestrated.“With regard to the EEOC, I think that these terminations were in service of the administration’s agenda to eliminate whatever they mean by DEI programs, and to erase the existence of trans people, because those are issues that fall directly under the EEOC jurisdiction, to the extent that they result in discrimination in the workplace.”A longtime civil rights lawyer who has been a senior official in the departments of justice and health and human services, Samuels was appointed to the commission during Trump’s first term, and then reappointed by Joe Biden.On 27 January, she, along with fellow commissioner Charlotte Burrows and the EEOC’s general counsel, both Democratic appointees, received an email from the White House presidential personnel office, saying they “unsuitable to be members of this administration”, Samuels recalled.View image in fullscreenThe termination “makes a mockery of the whole structure of these independent agencies,” she said. “I do think that this was an unlawful action on his part, and it is a real disservice to workers across the country for me not to have been able to serve out my term.”A Trump administration official described Samuels and Burrows as “far-left appointees with radical records of upending longstanding labor law, and they have no place as senior appointees in the Trump administration, which was given a mandate by the American people to undo the radical policies they created”.Samuels is one of many targeted in the firing spree Trump embarked on after returning to power last month, which the president has justified as necessary to root out supporters of policies he opposes, such as diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives supported by Biden.The president has ordered the axing of the leaders of the US Coast Guard, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and 18 independent federal agency watchdogs, allowed Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” to attempt to entice millions of federal employees into quitting their jobs and tried to pause all government loans and grants. Democrats say the campaign is an attempt to remove dissenters and ensure a compliant federal bureaucracy, while his spending freeze and mass buyouts have faced setbacks in court.The president has also gone after Democrats appointed to independent agency positions that are meant to be insulated from political interference. In addition to his dismissals from the EEOC, Trump fired three Democratic members of the Private Civil Liberties Oversight Board, a presidential advisory body, as well as a Democrat on the National Labor Relations Board, who this week filed a lawsuit alleging an “unprecedented and illegal” dismissal by the president. He is also attempting to fire the chair of the Federal Election Commission, who has thus far refused to leave her post.Created by the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 and tasked with enforcing protections against the discrimination of job applicants and employees, the five-member EEOC is intended to be bipartisan, with no more than three commissioners belonging to a sitting president’s party.Among its tools is litigation against companies that it claims allow discrimination, including against transgender workers. Under Biden, the commission brought suits against a New York bar and restaurant where a transgender employee was told he “wasn’t a real man”, and a Michigan restaurant chain that allowed a transgender employee to be misgendered by a co-worker, then fired him and his colleagues when they complained.Samuels’s term was not to expire until July of next year, and she expected to have “another 18 months on the commission, along with my fellow Democratic commissioners, to continue to advance our interpretations of the law”.Instead, she was sent an email full of conservative buzzwords as justification for her dismissal. But Samuels says Trump and his acolytes have never spelled out what they mean by DEI, and instead believe they are using their dislike of it as cover for a regulatory offensive intended to stop all efforts to address inequity.“I think that this demonization of the term DEI is really misrepresenting the nature of the important work that needs to be done to really create a level playing field,” Samuels said. “And my concern is that once there is a Republican majority on the EEOC, the commission will work to undermine employers’ ability to do this important work.”View image in fullscreenWith its commission in Republican hands, Samuels said the EEOC could roll back guidance that protects transgender workers from harassment, and rescind its interpretation of a federal law that female employees who seek abortions must be given accommodation by their employer. It may also actively take part in the Trump administration’s fight against DEI, by pursuing claims of discrimination against employers who embrace policies that favor workforce diversity, flipping the traditional mission of pursuing claims against employers who eschew diversity and discriminate against employees from underrepresented demographics.The firing of Samuels and Burrows has left just a single Republican and Democratic commissioner each on the EEOC, robbing it of a quorum and limiting its functionality. Trump appointed the remaining Republican, Andrea Lucas, as acting chair, who, portending what Samuels fears, named as among her priorities “rooting out unlawful DEI-motivated race and sex discrimination” and “defending the biological and binary reality of sex”.“There are plenty of race-neutral ways that employers can advance their commitment to diversity, but I think that a commission that thinks that even committing to that proactive work means that you are taking race into account in a way that will hurt white people, can do a lot of damage,” Samuels said.And contrary to the White House’s accusation that she supports “extreme gender ideology” and failed to “defend women”, Samuels argues there is no conflict between women’s rights and transgender rights.“Cisgender women are not harmed by combating failures to hire trans people or egregious misgendering or harassment of trans people,” Samuels said. “An assault on the rights of one is an assault on the rights of all.”Samuels has considered suing over her dismissal, but is mindful of the greater legal peril that could bring. Such a case could wind up before the supreme court, where its conservative supermajority has recently shown a willingness to expand executive powers, including with last year’s ruling granting presidents immunity for their official acts. If the justices uphold Samuels’s dismissal, they could do so in a way that grants Trump and future presidents the explicit authority to fire members of independent bodies.Such a decision “would be regrettable and a disservice to the functions served by these bipartisan agencies”, Samuels said More

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    Trump isn’t a narcissist – he’s a solipsist. And it means a few simple things | John R MacArthur

    Two weeks into the Trump administration, I’m still being asked by foreigners about the new president’s “political vision”.Some of them, especially the French and the British, might be excused for excessive politeness toward a country that in many respects they still envy and admire. But on most of the news programs and podcasts to which I’ve been invited, I’m still encountering earnest interviewers struggling to understand Trump from a conventional political perspective, no matter how contradictory, irrational, or stupid his statements and actions may be. How can this be and what does it augur?The investigative psychiatrist Robert J Lifton once explained to me that Trump is a solipsist, as distinct from the narcissist that he’s often accused of being.A narcissist, while deeply self-infatuated, nevertheless seeks the approval of others and will occasionally attempt seduction to get what he wants (I think of the French president, Emmanuel Macron). For Trump the solipsist, the only point of reference is himself, so he makes no attempt even at faking interest in other people, since he can’t really see them from his self-centered position.Trump’s absence of external connection is self-evident: his treatment of the “other” – from his own family to his tenants, his political rivals, the victims of the Los Angeles fires or the displaced people of Gaza – displays not only a lack of empathy, but also an emotional blindness. How else could he tease out loud about dating his own daughter, Ivanka? How else could he so cruelly insult former president Biden in his inauguration address, with Biden seated just a short distance away?Trump’s solipsistic character was on full display on 20 January in the Capitol Rotunda. After stating, absurdly, that houses had burned “tragically” in Los Angeles “without even a token of defense”, the president seemed to turn philosophical and then appeared to ad-lib: “Some of the wealthiest and most powerful individuals in our country … they don’t have a home any longer. That’s interesting.”I suppose it’s better than his reaction to a 2018 fire in Trump Tower that killed a resident, Todd Brassner. Trump’s tweeted response: “Fire at Trump Tower is out. Very confined (well built building). Firemen (and women) did a great job. THANK YOU!” No condolences for the dead man or his family. That’s also interesting.None of this is to say that Trump’s policy directives don’t suggest disturbing political predilections that need to be discussed and challenged. He is the president, after all, not just a coldhearted landlord. His firing of 17 inspectors general, attempt to end birthright citizenship and temporary halt of “all federal financial assistance” are certainly causes for concern, and possibly alarm. So, also, are his threats to slap high tariffs on Canada and Mexico, friendly nations that normally are happy to kowtow to their vastly more powerful neighbor no matter who occupies the White House.But this misses the point of Trump, malevolent though he may be. He delights in being attacked because it keeps him at center stage. What could be better for a solipsist than to be criticized across the full spectrum of America’s limited ideological bandwidth?In an editorial, the New York Times denounced Trump’s “first assertions of executive power” that “blatantly exceed what is legally granted”. Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal ridiculed an unprovoked “trade war” that “will qualify as one of the dumbest in history”. Already, Trump has changed the script by “pausing” the tariff increases, but he got the Journal worked up enough to pay him a lot of attention. Federal judges blocked Trump’s two most obviously unconstitutional orders, but the Times still got into a dither about his threats to the constitution.View image in fullscreenOne can’t just ignore Trump’s blathering, but like parents dealing with an ornery child, editors, reporters and columnists need to temper reprimands and raised voices with self-restraint, calmness and even studied indifference. Humor, sarcasm and ridicule can be useful tools, though as we learned from Barack Obama’s famous roast of Trump in 2011, they can also motivate the target to run for president.Covering Trump, like bringing up children, is an art, not a science.Of course, none of Trump’s tariff actions or anti-immigrant edicts will bring factories back from Mexico (the cheap labor and investment protections under our current trade agreement with Mexico and Canada are too good for a rational businessman to pass up). Neither will they quickly raise wages for working-class citizens, since creating a labor shortage through deportations will take much longer to affect pay scales than if Congress simply raised the federal minimum wage, or legalized the “illegals”. Also, ironically, Trump’s tariff threats and military border bluster may backfire and encourage fentanyl production to move to the United States from south of the border.However, it’s a fair bet that Trump the solipsist doesn’t care if his policies fail to help the ordinary people who voted for him, and we anti-Trumpers should fear his supporters’ rage if they conclude that they’ve been duped by their hero. The backlash is more likely to be felt by liberals than by Trump, who will retreat safely to Mar-a-Lago and resume cheating at golf.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionWhile I do tend to mock, rather than fear, Trump’s sound and light show, I don’t mean to make light of his most reckless impulses. There’s always collateral damage when somebody starts a war.On the eve of the inauguration, in the Watergate Hotel, I attended the “Coronation Ball”, where “populist” and royalist rightwingers packed the Moretti Grand Ballroom to drink and dine on French champagne and red wine, as well as Gallic cuisine that included amuse-bouches. I was there at the invitation of an open-minded business consultant, an unfanatical Trump partisan who may not have understood that I wanted to cover the event, though he knows the world of journalism.It was indeed amusing to meet a guy wearing a Gen Douglas MacArthur button. So was hearing Steve Bannon’s rip-roaring speech, which flattered the black-tie and evening dress crowd as the “vanguard of a revolutionary movement” that was “just in the top of the first inning”. Bannon warned his rightwing Jacobins not to “flinch” or “question” Trump’s mission of ending “any of these forever wars” and accomplishing “the deportation of all 15 million illegal aliens”.And when Bannon called for “no mercy, no quarter, no prisoners”, he apparently was including Rupert Murdoch and Fox News: “Murdoch sent a memo: ‘We’re going to make [Trump] a non-person’ … and [Trump] knew it. And he still came back like Cincinnatus from the plough, who saved his country.” (Bannon might have mentioned that the Roman patrician, according to legend, was twice dictator of the Republic, but I quibble.)It wasn’t all amuse-bouches, however. Later in the evening, when the jazz band took a break, the far-right personality Jack Posobiec launched a diatribe against the cliques surrounding the former presidents Clinton, Obama and Biden, who, he said, would never return to power “because they’ll have to come through us”. Meanwhile, a lot of political prisoners would be freed, and not just the martyrs of January 6. “Derek Chauvin will be freed!” he declaimed.Two guests in military dress uniforms standing nearby looked at me, laughing with incredulous astonishment. “You’re going to tell us who he is ?” one said. Once I found out from other journalists in the crowd that it was Posobiec – he of “stop the steal” fame and other conspiracy theories dear to Trump and Maga – I could better appreciate the foreign journalists’ difficulty understanding the president. With no political vision, no long-range goals, it’s quite possible that it never occurred to Trump to pardon George Floyd’s murderer. But now that an influential courtier has serviced the monarch with a concrete idea – an idea guaranteed to slake a solipsist’s thirst for attention – we should all be worried about the short-term whims of the king.

    John R MacArthur is president and publisher of Harper’s Magazine More

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    Judge temporarily blocks Musk’s ‘Doge’ team from accessing treasury records

    A federal judge early on Saturday blocked Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge) from accessing treasury department records that contain sensitive personal data such as social security and bank account numbers for millions of Americans.US district judge Paul A Engelmayer issued the preliminary injunction after 19 Democratic attorneys general sued Donald Trump. The case, filed in federal court in New York city, alleges the Trump administration allowed Musk’s team access to the treasury department’s central payment system in violation of federal law.The payment system handles tax refunds, social security benefits, veterans’ benefits and much more, sending out trillions of dollars every year while containing an expansive network of Americans’ personal and financial data.Engelmayer, who was appointed by Barack Obama, also said anyone prohibited from having access to the sensitive information since 20 January must immediately destroy all copies of material downloaded from treasury department systems.He set a hearing for 14 February.The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit being filed.The New York attorney general, Letitia James, whose office filed the lawsuit, said Doge’s access to the treasury department’s data raised security problems and the possibility of an illegal freeze in federal funds.“This unelected group, led by the world’s richest man, is not authorized to have this information, and they explicitly sought this unauthorized access to illegally block payments that millions of Americans rely on, payments for health care, childcare and other essential programs,” James said in a video message released by her office on Friday.James, a Democrat who has been one of Trump’s chief antagonists, said the president does not have the power to give away Americans’ private information to anyone he chooses, and he cannot cut federal payments approved by Congress.Musk’s Doge was created to discover and eliminate what the Trump administration has deemed to be wasteful government spending. Doge’s access to treasury records, as well as its inspection of various government agencies, has ignited widespread concern among critics over the increasing power of Musk, while supporters have cheered at the idea of reining in bloated government finances.Musk has made fun of criticism of Doge on his X social media platform while claiming it is saving taxpayers millions of dollars.States also included in the lawsuit are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.The suit alleges that Doge’s access to the treasury records could interfere with funding already appropriated by Congress, which would exceed the treasury department’s statutory authority. The case also argues that the Doge access violates federal administrative law and the US constitution’s separation of powers doctrine.It also accuses the treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, of changing the department’s longstanding policy for protecting sensitive personally identifiable information and financial information to allow Musk’s Doge team access to its payment systems.“This decision failed to account for legal obligations to protect such data and ignored the privacy expectations of federal fund recipients,” including states, veterans, retirees and taxpayers, the lawsuit says.Connecticut’s attorney general, William Tong, said it was not clear what Doge was doing with the information in the treasury systems.“This is the largest data breach in American history,” Tong said in a statement on Friday. “Doge is an unlawfully constituted band of renegade tech bros combing through confidential records, sensitive data and critical payment systems. What could go wrong?”The treasury department has said the review was about assessing the integrity of the system and that no changes were being made. According to two people familiar with the process, Musk’s team began its inquiry looking for ways to suspend payments made by USAid, the US Agency for International Development, which Trump and Musk are attempting to dismantle. The two people spoke with the Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.Separately, Democratic lawmakers are seeking a treasury department investigation of Doge’s access to the government’s payment system.Also, labor unions and advocacy groups have sued to block the payments system review over concerns about its legality. A judge in Washington on Thursday temporarily restricted access to two employees with “read only” privileges. More

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    Trump says he will appoint himself chair of Kennedy Center

    Donald Trump announced on Friday that he is appointing himself as chairman of the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, adding that he is immediately terminating multiple people from the board of trustees and the current chairman.“At my direction, we are going to make the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., GREAT AGAIN,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.The Kennedy Center is the country’s national cultural center and is run through a public-private partnership. The idea for such a center began with Eleanor Roosevelt in the 1930s and was authorized by Congress in 1958 . It’s doors officially opened in 1971. The center is known for hosting music, theater, dance, artwork and performance art, and has hosted acts ranging from Tina Turner to Led Zeppelin.A spokesperson for the Kennedy Center said in a statement it was aware of Trump’s Truth Social post, but that it had “received no official communications from the White House regarding changes to our board of trustees”.Some members of the board have received termination notices from the administration, the spokesperson said.The Kennedy Center’s current chairman is David Rubenstein, a billionaire philanthropist and the co-founder of the private equity firm the Carlyle Group. Rubenstein has held the position since 2010 and was set to retire this year. After Trump was elected, the Kennedy Center said it had failed to find a new chair to replace Rubenstein and that he would stay on until September 2026.Rubenstein served as a policy adviser to Jimmy Carter and is reportedly close to Joe Biden. He was first appointed by George W Bush.Members of the board of trustees are typically appointed by the president. Currently, the attorney general Pam Bondi, lobbyist Brian Ballard and singer Lee Greenwood – all Trump supporters – are on the board, according to the Hill. Several Biden appointees are still on the board too, including press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. First ladies are honorary members and Congress can also designate ex-officio members.“We have had a collaborative relationship with every presidential administration,” the Kennedy Center spokesperson said, adding that it has long had “a bipartisan board of trustees that has supported the arts in a non-partisan fashion”.Rubenstein’s position, which Trump says he is now seizing, has always been appointed by the center’s board members, according to the act authorized by Congress in 1958.“There is nothing in the center’s statute that would prevent a new administration from replacing board members,” the center’s spokesperson said. “However, this would be the first time such action has been taken with the Kennedy Center’s board.”Trump said the reason for terminating Rubenstein and some members of the board of trustees is that they don’t “share our Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture”. In his Truth Social post, he also brought up the topic of queer people, something he has raised repeatedly since being sworn into office, saying that the Kennedy Center “featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth – THIS WILL STOP”.The Atlantic first reported Trump’s decision to appoint himself as chairman of the Kennedy Center. During his first term, he didn’t attend a single annual gala event at center – a tradition US presidents have long partaken in. Trump had a prickly relationship with the center after artists protested against his administration and threatened to boycott events at the White House.Now, it seems, Trump wants back in. Capping off his Truth Social post, he wrote: “THE BEST IS YET TO COME!” More

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    Judge temporarily blocks Trump from placing 2,200 USAid workers on leave

    A federal judge on Friday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from placing 2,200 employees of the US Agency for International Development on paid leave.Carl Nichols, a US district judge and Donald Trump appointee, sided with two federal employee associations in agreeing to a pause in plans to put the employees on paid leave as of midnight Friday.Forced leave had already begun for some on Friday when the court ruling came through as workers tried to halt the administration’s swift dismantling of the six-decade-old aid agency and its programs worldwide.Lawyers for the plaintiffs told the judge on Friday afternoon that the administration lacked the authority to shut down an agency enshrined in congressional legislation.The administration had been sued by the largest US government workers’ union and an association of foreign service workers attempting to stop efforts to close the agency.Nichols said the written ruling would be issued later on Friday. He did not seem inclined to grant other requests from the unions to reopen USAid buildings and restore funding.“The major reduction in force, as well as the closure of offices, the forced relocation of these individuals were all done in excess of the executive’s authority in violation of the separation of powers,” Karla Gilbride, a lawyer for the unions, said at the hearing.The White House claims there is fraud at USAid.“CLOSE IT DOWN,” Trump had said earlier on social media of USAid.Crews in the morning used duct tape to block out the agency’s name on a sign outside its Washington DC headquarters and a flag was taken down. Someone placed a bouquet of flowers outside the door.A group of a half-dozen USAid officials speaking to reporters on Friday strongly disputed assertions from Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, that the most essential life-saving programs abroad were getting waivers to continue. With all but several hundred staffers forced out and funding stopped, the agency had “ceased to exist”, one official on the call said.The Trump administration and billionaire ally Elon Musk, who is running a budget-cutting “department of government efficiency”, have targeted USAid hardest so far in an unprecedented challenge of the federal government and many of its programs.The administration told remaining USAid officials on Thursday afternoon that it planned to exempt 297 employees from global leave and furloughs ordered for at least 8,000 staffers and contractors, according to USAid staffers and officials.Late that night, a new list was finalized of 611 employees allowed to remain on the job, many of them to manage the return home of thousands of staffers, contractors and their families abroad, the officials said. Justice department lawyer Brett Shumate confirmed the 611 figure in court.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe USAid officials and staffers spoke on condition of anonymity due to a Trump administration order barring them from talking publicly.Some of the remaining staffers and contractors, along with an unknown number of 5,000 locally hired employees abroad, would run the few life-saving programs that the administration says it intends to keep going for now.It was not immediately clear whether the reductions would be permanent or temporary.Trump and Musk have spoken of moving surviving programs under the state department. Within the state department itself, employees fear substantial staff reductions following the deadline for the Trump administration’s offer of financial incentives for federal workers to resign, according to unnamed officials. A judge temporarily blocked that offer and set a hearing for Monday.At USAid, among the programs officials said had not received waivers: $450m in food grown by US farmers sufficient to feed 36 million people, which was not being paid for or delivered; and water supplies for 1.6 million people displaced by war in Sudan’s Darfur region, which were being cut off without money for fuel to run water pumps in the desert.The Associated Press and Reuters provided reporting More

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    Trump hints Musk ‘Doge’ team has free rein with Pentagon next in line for cuts

    Donald Trump has indicated that Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge) is operating without guardrails after it gained access to Americans’ private information “very easily” and as it prepares to assail the Pentagon.The US president was speaking at a White House press conference alongside Shigeru Ishiba, the prime minister of Japan, but most of the questions focused on Musk’s sweeping mission to root out waste in the federal government, which has caused disarray in Washington.Trump suggested that he has given the tech billionaire free rein and appeared blase about the details. Asked why Doge needs access to treasury payment systems including Americans’ social security numbers, home addresses and bank accounts, he replied: “Well, it doesn’t, but they get it very easily. We don’t have very good security in our country.”The president claimed that he was “very proud” of Musk’s team of young and “very smart” software engineers. He said: “They’re doing it at my insistence. It would be a lot easier not to do it, but we have to take some of these things apart to find the corruption and we’ve found tremendous corruption.”Doge has so far produced no evidence of corruption at USAid, which it shuttered without seeking the required authority from Congress, or other agencies. Its fast and furious assault on the government has resulted in a flurry of lawsuits and street protests.Pressed on whether there was anything he has told Musk he cannot touch, Trump offered only a vague reply. “Well, we haven’t discussed that much,” he confessed. “I’ll tell them to go here, go there. He does it. He’s got a very capable group of people. Very, very, very, very capable.“They know what they’re doing. They’ll ask questions, and they’ll see immediately as somebody gets tongue-tied that they’re either crooked or don’t know what they’re doing. We have very smart people going.”Trump confirmed that he had asked Musk – the world’s richest man – to review spending in the sprawling defence department, which has a proposed budget for 2025 of $850bn. “I’ve instructed him to go check out education, to check out the Pentagon, which is the military. And you know, sadly, you’ll find some things that are pretty bad.”But he added pointedly: “Social security will not be touched. It will only be strengthened … we have illegal immigrants on social security and we’re going to find out who they are and take them off.”Democrats in Congress are seeking a treasury department investigation of the access that Musk’s team was given to the government’s payment system, citing “threats to the economy and national security, and the potential violation of laws protecting Americans’ privacy and tax data”.Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ron Wyden wrote in a letter to inspectors general: “Given the threats to the economy and national security, and the potential violation of laws protecting Americans’ privacy and tax data posed by Mr Musk and his team’s reported access to critical federal payment systems … we request that you use your authorities to investigate this matter further.”On Friday, Trump also said Doge should rehire a staff member who resigned after being linked by a newspaper report to an openly racist social media account.First JD Vance, the vice-president, said Marko Elez, 25, should be brought back and blamed “journalists who try to destroy people”. Asked whether he endorsed Vance’s view, Trump told reporters he was not aware of the specific case but “I’m with the vice-president”.Soon after Musk, who had polled his X followers on the question, posted: “He will be brought back. To err is human, to forgive divine.”Send us a tipIf you have information you’d like to share securely with the Guardian about the impact of cuts to federal programs or the federal workforce, please use a non-work device to contact us via the Signal messaging app at (646) 886-8761. More

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    Trump says he will fire ‘some’ FBI agents who worked on January 6 cases and defends Doge’s treasury access – live

    Donald Trump has made clear he will fire “some” of the FBI agents who investigated the January 6 US Capitol attack, after the bureau turned over their names to a justice department official who was previously one of the president’s attorneys. Speaking at a joint press conference with Japan’s prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, the president also again backed dismantling the Department of Education and said he was “very proud” of the work of the “department of government efficiency”, despite objections from Democrats and advocacy groups. Earlier in the day, he renewed his offensive against USAid, and said he’d announce a new barrage of tariffs on unspecified countries next week.Here’s what else has happened today:

    Trump said he is in “no rush” to make his plan to put the United States in charge of the Gaza Strip a reality.

    USAid’s dismantling may be a boon for China’s global influence, analysts say.

    The health and human services department and agencies under its umbrella – such as the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control – may be the next targets of Trump’s mass layoffs, the Wall Street Journal reports.
    A US judge on Friday said he will enter a “very limited” temporary order blocking Donald Trump’s administration from taking certain steps to dismantle the US Agency for International Development (USaid), according to Reuters.US District Judge Carl Nichols in Washington said he would issue the order following a lawsuit by the largest US government workers’ union and an association of foreign service workers, who sued on Thursday to stop the administration’s efforts to dismantle the agency.In a notice sent to the foreign aid agency’s workers on Thursday, the administration said it will keep 611 essential workers on board at USaid out of a worldwide workforce that totals more than 10,000. This move has largely been directed by Elon Musk, who’s spearheading the president’s effort to shrink the federal bureaucracy.A Justice Department official, Brett Shumate, told Nichols that about 2,200 USaid employees would be put on paid leave under the administration’s plans, saying, “The president has decided there is corruption and fraud at USAID.”A US official said the agency will deploy about 1,500 more active-duty troops, bringing the total number to about 3,600, according to the Associated Press.Moving troops south is part of Donald Trump’s plans to crack down on immigration and beef up security at the border. Trump signed several executive orders during his first week in office addressing immigration, including one declaring a national emergency at the southern border.Roughly 1,600 active-duty troops have already been deployed, according to the Associated Press, and about 500 more are anticipated to head south within the next few days.Donald Trump has signed an executive order to address “serious human rights violations occurring in South Africa”, Reuters reports, in the latest sign of worsening relations between the United States and Africa’s largest economy.It was not yet clear how the order would affect South Africa, but it comes after secretary of state Marco Rubio accused the country of “anti-Americanism”, while Trump announced he would cut funding to the country over its efforts to reform land ownership.Here’s more on the spat:The shuttering of USAid continues apace, with its name taped over on a building directory outside its Washington DC headquarters:Only a few hundred staffers are set to remain at the organization that facilitates the US foreign aid strategy:Donald Trump has made clear he will fire “some” of the FBI agents who investigated the January 6 US Capitol attack, after the bureau turned over their names to a justice department official who was previously one of the president’s attorneys. Speaking at a joint press conference with Japan’s prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, the president also again backed dismantling the Department of Education and said he was “very proud” of the work of the “department of government efficiency”, despite objections from Democrats and advocacy groups. Earlier in the day, he renewed his offensive against USAid, and said he’d announce a new barrage of tariffs on unspecified countries next week.Here’s what else has happened today:

    Trump said he is in “no rush” to make his plan to put the United States in charge of the Gaza Strip a reality.

    USAid’s dismantling may be a boon for China’s global influence, analysts say.

    The health and human services department and agencies under its umbrella – such as the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control – may be the next targets of Trump’s mass layoffs, the Wall Street Journal reports.
    Just before he wrapped up his press conference with the Japanese prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, Donald Trump was asked if he had given Elon Musk and his “department of government efficiency” any particular orders of where to find areas to cut spending.“We haven’t discussed that much. I’ll tell him to go here, go there. He does it. He’s got a very capable group of people, very, very, very, very capable. They know what they’re doing. They’ll ask questions, and they’ll see immediately, as somebody gets tongue-tied, that they’re either crooked or don’t know what they’re doing,” Trump said.“I’ve instructed him go into education, go into military, go into other things as we go along, and they’re finding massive amounts of fraud, abuse, waste, all of these things,” the president added, without offering details.The reporter speaking to Trump noted that social security and Medicare make up the bulk of federal spending. “Social security will not be touched, it’ll only be strengthened,” Trump replied, again without providing details of how he would do that and then pivoting to accusations that undocumented immigrants are accessing those benefits.Donald Trump said he will fire an unspecified number of the FBI agents who worked on January 6 cases, after the justice department sought the names of bureau employees involved in investigations related to the Capitol attack.“I’ll fire some of them because some of them were corrupt,” Trump replied, when asked at his press conference if he would fire all the agents who investigated January 6.“I have no doubt about that. I got to know a lot about that business, that world. I got to know a lot about that world, and we had some corrupt agents, and those people are gone, or they will be gone, and it’ll be done quickly and very surgically.”Donald Trump then signaled he remained serious about closing the Department of Education, saying regulations around schooling would be better left to the states.“We’re ranked dead last,” Trump said. “I want to see it go back to the states where great states that do so well have no debt, they’re operated brilliantly. They’ll be as good as Norway or Denmark or Sweden or any of the other highly ranked countries … 35 to 38 states will be right at the top, and the rest will come along. They’ll have to come along competitively. And by the way, we’ll be spending a lot less money, and we’ll have great education.”Donald Trump has defended Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge), saying their work is necessary to root out unspecified “corruption”.“I’m very proud of the job that this group of young people, generally young people, but very smart people, they’re doing,” Trump said, referring to the reportedly young engineers Musk has staffed Doge with. “They’re doing it at my insistence. It would be a lot easier not to do it, but we have to take some of these things apart to find the corruption.”Democrats have condemned the effort, saying Musk and his employees are unqualified and have put America’s privacy at risk by accessing sensitive government systems, among other concerns.The last time Donald Trump was in office, Shinzo Abe was Japan’s prime minister, and the rapport the two leaders developed looms over Shigeru Ishiba’s visit to Washington DC, the Guardian’s Justin McCurry reports:Donald Trump had yet to get his feet under the Oval Office desk when he held his first meeting with a foreign leader in late 2016. Shinzo Abe, then Japan’s prime minister, arrived at Trump Tower in November that year bearing a gift of a gold-plated golf club and harbouring a determination to get the Japan-US relationship under Trump off to the best possible start.The success, or otherwise, of Abe’s charm offensive had potentially serious repercussions. During the election campaign, Trump had suggested he would withdraw US troops from Japan, contingent on Tokyo’s willingness to make a bigger financial contribution to their countries’ postwar alliance.The gambit worked. During Trump’s five-nation visit to Asia in late 2017, he and Abe, who was assassinated in 2022, bonded over a round of golf – a sport for which the Japanese leader had apparently developed a sudden passion – and gourmet hamburgers.For the remainder of Trump’s term, Abe supported the US administration with a fervour that eluded many of his contemporaries. US troops remained in Japan, and the bilateral security treaty – the cornerstone of Japan’s postwar foreign policy – survived unscathed.As he prepares to fly to Washington on a three-day visit, all eyes are on whether Japan’s current leader, Shigeru Ishiba, will be able to re-create Abe’s personal rapport with Trump, although golf diplomacy is unlikely to play a part for the cigarette-smoking plastic-modelling enthusiast.The press conference is now underway and Donald Trump is currently giving compliments to his counterpart.Just before the two leaders came out, US vice-president JD Vance turned up in the room.Trump said the US worked well together with Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba’s predecessor, Shinzo Abe.The scene is set at the White House for the forthcoming press conference between Donald Trump and Shigeru Ishiba.The press has gathered in the East Room and podium sound checks are complete as the US president and the Japanese prime minister prepare to make remarks and take questions from media representatives.The countries’ respective flags alternate behind the area where the leaders will station themselves and senior aides are chatting nearby.The press conference was due to get under way an hour ago. The two are having a working lunch. Ishiba is the second foreign leader to visit Trump here since he became the 47th president. Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu was the first, earlier this week, and the visit made huge waves with Trump’s comments that the US should take over Gaza.Around a dozen Democratic members of Congress attempted to enter the Department of Education today in response to reports that Donald Trump would soon order it dismantled, but were denied access.“Today we went to the Department of Education and demanded answers in defense of our students, in defense of our teachers, in defense of families and communities that are built around public education. We’re not going to let them destroy our public school system and destroy the futures of millions of kids across this country,” said congressman Maxwell Frost, who was part of the group.The group tried for about 10 minutes to get in, but were informed they would not be allowed access. Police were called, and were positioned inside the building’s lobby.You can see video of the attempt here.Only a few hundred employees will remain at USAid once Donald Trump’s dismantling of the aid agency is complete, the Guardian’s Anna Betts reports:Donald Trump’s administration is reportedly planning to keep just more than 600 essential workers at USAid, according to a notice sent to employees of the US foreign aid agency on Thursday night.The notice, shared with Reuters by an administration official on Friday, reportedly stated that 611 essential workers would be retained at USAid, which had more than 10,000 employees globally.Earlier, it was reported that the administration intended to retain fewer than 300 staff members at USAid.The USAid staff reductions are set to take effect at midnight on Friday, as indicated on the agency’s website. But a lawsuit filed on Thursday by the American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) and the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) seeks to prevent the administration from dismantling USAid, which was established as an independent agency by a law passed by Congress in 1998.Donald Trump said he plans to announce reciprocal tariffs on many countries next week.Trump was asked about his plans for further restrictions on trading partners during a bilateral meeting with the Japanese prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba. Trump replied:
    I’ll be announcing that next week, reciprocal trade, so that we’re treated evenly with other countries, we don’t want any more, any less.
    Trump warned repeatedly during his campaign that he would impose a universal tariff on imports into the US.Trump also threatened tariffs on Japanese goods if the US trade deficit with Japan is not equalized.“Should be pretty easy to do,” he said, according to Reuters. “I don’t think we’ll have any problem whatsoever. They want fairness too.”The Trump administration has agreed not to publicly release the names of FBI agents and employees who investigated the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.The justice department agreed to a temporary deal not to immediately make public the names of agents who worked on investigations related to the 6 January 2021 insurrection until at least late March.The deal was struck after acting head of the FBI, Brian Driscoll, turned over to the justice department a list of FBI employees involved in the January 6 investigations.The data, submitted to at least partially comply with an order from the acting deputy attorney general, Emil Bove, last month demanding information, included employee numbers, job titles and job roles.The demand prompted days of internal resistance from Driscoll and the bureau and prompted two lawsuits from groups of anonymous FBI agents who said the move endangered their safety. More

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    Trump delays key piece of China tariff plan amid threats to other countries

    Donald Trump halted a key part of his tariff attack on China on Friday, as he threatened to impose new US duties on goods from many more countries next week.Plans to ensure shipments from China to the US worth less than $800 still face tariffs – removing the longstanding duty-free status of low-cast packages – have been delayed to give more time to federal agencies to prepare for the change.At the White House on Friday, however, the president said he would announce new reciprocal tariffs on more countries next week. He did not give any details specifying what the tariffs will be and which countries would be affected.“I’ll be announcing that next week reciprocal trade, so that we’re treated evenly with other countries. We don’t want any more, any less,” Trump told reporters during a bilateral meeting with Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba.On Tuesday, the US Postal Service briefly halted all incoming packages from China and Hong Kong after Trump ended a de minimis provision that allowed low-value packages from China to enter the US duty-free.The provision allowed Chinese e-commerce companies such as Shein and Temu to ship items into the US without having to pay tariffs Trump had enacted on China in 2018. After a 12-hour period, the US Postal Service resumed taking all packages on Wednesday.An executive order, signed by Trump, said he would keep the provision until “adequate systems are in place to fully and expediently process and collect tariff revenue”.The president had removed the duty-free provision as his overall tariff strategy against China, what he says is in response to illegal drugs that are coming in from the country. Trump placed a 10% tariff on all Chinese imports, which went into effect this week.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAny new tariffs will add to the confusion and chaos over global trade Trump has created since he entered office. Trump had originally planned to place 25% tariffs against Mexico and Canada on 1 February but ultimately halted both tariffs after negotiations with the country leaders. Those tariffs are now expected to go into effect 1 March.Reuters contributed reporting More