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      It is Elon Musk who is now running the United States. Not Donald Trump | Moira Donegan

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      It’s one of the humiliations of our historical moment that the constitutional order has been destroyed by such stupid and unserious people. On the trail with Donald Trump, the billionaire Elon Musk, who financed Trump’s campaign to the tune of about $250m, pledged to cut $2tn from the federal budget, a project that promised to wreck the economy, destroy the nation’s credit, eliminate programs and institutions that structure people’s lives and create an international economic and leadership vacuum into which America’s rivals – namely, China – could step.This would have been ominous enough on its own. But because Musk is a narcissist and a nerd – because he insists on discarding solemnity and being ostentatiously irreverent and carefree as he destroys people’s lives – he named his new project the “department of government efficiency”, or Doge, a juvenile reference to a years-old internet meme featuring a shiba inu.It is under this idiotic banner that Musk has upended the American system of government, seizing an unprecedented, unelected and seemingly wholly unaccountable degree of personal power. Less than three weeks into the Trump restoration, Doge is well under way.The group is not a government department; Musk is not a cabinet member and has not been subjected to a Senate confirmation process. But he now reportedly has an office in the West Wing, along with one in the Eisenhower executive office building across the street. At his direction, a small group of coders and engineers – men reported to be aged between 19 and 25 years old – are fanning out across federal agencies, seizing control of their sensitive data and making proposals for massive cuts.Just days after Trump’s inauguration, Musk reportedly sent an email to all 2 million federal employees – subject line Fork in the Road – encouraging them to resign ahead of anticipated mass firings. Musk reportedly offered workers a buyout of seven months’ pay; it’s doubtful whether any of those who take him up on the offer will ever receive it.Musk and his young followers have moved to shutter specific programs that they deem wasteful – including those whose funds have been allocated by Congress – and to shutter whole departments. He has declared the closure of USAid, America’s foreign aid agency, and is reportedly looking to eliminate much of the Department of Education and the Department of Labor, along with privatizing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He has seized control of the treasury, and specifically the treasury’s payment system, granting himself a personal line-item veto on all government spending. He also has gained access to reams of private and sensitive data and has reportedly downloaded much of it on to private servers. He can access bank accounts, medical histories, income and debt records. If he cared to, he could look up your social security number.No one elected Musk and very little of what he is doing is legal. It is Congress, not some random rich guy, who is granted the power of the purse, because the citizens deserve to have a say, through their elected representatives, in how the government spends their tax dollars. Federal civil servants are protected by law from purges, because the federal bureaucracy is supposed to serve the people of the United States, not to merely function as courtiers and enforcers of whim for some entitled foreign billionaire who nobody has ever voted for.There is a chance that Musk will be told to stop his unconstitutional dismantling of the federal government by a court order, one he might even obey; there is a chance that he will get scared, declare a hasty victory and back off. But that chance looks more and more remote. Musk, now, has seized control of many of the organs of state. There also does not seem to be any way to stop him.Trump critics have long predicted an oncoming rift between Musk and Trump, but it’s not clear, exactly, that it is from Trump that Musk is deriving his power: his gutting of federal agencies and slashing of federal expenditures seems to be coming from his own preferences and impulses, not as any direction from the man who is nominally the president.It may be Trump, that is, who sits in the Oval Office, and it may be Trump who takes to television every few days to sign yet another executive order seeking to punish and humiliate trans people. But it is Musk who controls government operations and federal spending, and so it is Musk who is running the country. The constitutional order, now, is largely window dressing. The reality is that a foreign billionaire is running the state through a shadow government, and that his power has no formal check.Another humiliation of our era: that to merely state what is happening sounds hyperbolic, even unhinged. Musk, after all, is such a morally small man – so transparent in his corrupt self-interest, so childish in his peevish self-regard – that it is hard to countenance him as such a profound agent of history.He represents not so much the banality as the imbecility of evil: how shallow and vacuous it is. Yet Musk’s personal, private seizure of state power has thrown real doubt on whether the US constitution is still in effect. How can it be, if he upends its demands so heedlessly, and with such impunity? How can it be, if the power of the people’s elected representatives can simply be wished away by a man rich enough to buy anyone?For a long time now, it has been clear that America was slipping out of a liberal democratic mode of governance and into something more vulgar and less accountable, something more like a privatized racket for the rich that extracts from and punishes the people, but never responds to their will. We knew this was coming. I just didn’t expect it to be so embarrassing.

      Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist More

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      Doge v USAid: how Elon Musk helped his acolytes infiltrate world’s biggest aid agency

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      USAid security personnel were defending a secure room holding sensitive and classified data in a standoff with “department of government efficiency” employees when a message came directly from Elon Musk: give the Doge kids whatever they want.Since Donald Trump’s inauguration last month, a posse of cocksure young engineers answering to Musk have stormed through Washington DC, gaining access to government computer systems as part of what Senator Chuck Schumer has called “an unelected shadow government … conducting a hostile takeover of the federal government”.The young men, who are all under the age of 26 and have almost no government experience, have tapped into the treasury department’s federal payment system and vacuumed up employment histories at the office of personnel management (OPM). Roughly 20 Doge employees are now working out of the Department of Education, the Washington Post has reported, and have gained access to sensitive internal systems there too. On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reported they had infiltrated the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and accessed key systems as well.The young engineers, whose identities have been confirmed to the Guardian, wanted the same at USAid. One of them, Gavin Kliger, was a 25-year-old techie who has defended the failed attorney general nominee Matt Gaetz as a victim of the “deep state” and claimed he had left behind a seven-figure salary to join Doge and “save America”. Another, Luke Farritor, 23, was a former SpaceX intern who had been given top-level clearances to USAid systems and had requested similar to Medicare and Medicaid. A third, Jeremy Lewin, was reportedly assigned to the General Services Administration. A superior planned to lobby the CIA for a clearance for him after he failed to gain access to a secure area.Some US officials had begun calling the young engineers the “Muskovites” for their aggressive loyalty to the SpaceX owner. But some USAid staff used another word: the “incels”.The Guardian has identified three calls by Musk to USAid’s political leadership and security officers in which he demanded the suspensions of dozens of the agency’s leading officials, and cajoled and threatened senior USAid officials to give his acolytes private data and access to restricted areas. At one point, he threatened to call in the US Marshals Service.
      One USAid employee said that the calls by Musk, two of which have not been previously reported, showed he had effectively usurped power at the agency even from the Trump administration’s political leadership. “Who is in control of our government?” the person said. “[Doge] basically showed up and took over.”In the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, USAid had been presented as a pilot test for a large-scale overhaul of the federal government that would downsize agencies and arbitrarily move federal employees to looser contracts that made them easier to fire.“If the Trump administration is successful here, they’re going to try this everywhere else,” said Senator Andy Kim of New Jersey, a former USAid employee who came to protest alongside fired and furloughed workers outside the agency’s headquarters on Monday. “This is just the beginning.”View image in fullscreenBut it has also been a primer on how Doge operatives have inserted themselves into federal agencies and cajoled and bullied their way to access their most sensitive systems. This account of Doge’s infiltration of USAid is based on interviews with more than a dozen current and former USAid, state department and other officials briefed on the events of the last week.Security staff initially rebuffed the engineers’ efforts to talk their way into the secure rooms, called sensitive compartmented information facilities (Scifs), because they didn’t have the necessary security clearances. But that evening, Musk phoned a senior official at USAid to demand access for his subordinates, the first of numerous calls to officials and employees of Doge at USAid that have continued into this week.Inside the building, chaos reigned. Areas that were once declared restricted, with limitations on electronics such as phones and watches, suddenly loosened their security protocols to allow in uncredentialed outsiders. Doge employees were said to obscure their identities to prevent online harassment, a tactic that was repeated at other agencies. And Peter Marocco, the controversial new director of foreign assistance at the state department, was stalking the halls and meeting in private with the Doge employees.By Friday, things had gone further downhill. After a tense all-hands meeting with senior staff, and outsiders in the sixth-floor conference room, the young engineers rushed around the offices with their laptops, plugging cords into computers and other electronics as they gathered data from the agency.After the meeting, Matt Hopson, a Trump appointee for USAid chief of staff, abruptly resigned. Jason Gray, the acting administrator, was removed from his position. The secretary of state, Marco Rubio, was soon to announce that he was the new administrator of USAid and appoint Marocco as his deputy. Musk was closing in on his goal.The Doge employees had open access to rooms throughout the sixth floor, including the offices of the administrator’s suite. But the Scifs were still off limits.At USAid, a newly installed leadership was formally in charge. But the real power lay with Marocco and Doge, which was plotting how to wind down the agency, a plan that Trump endorsed on Tuesday afternoon as he confirmed that teams were backed by the White House. That evening, USAid announced it would put all its direct-hire personnel around the world on administrative leave, a decision that would affect thousands of employees and their families.Inside of USAid, the operation to shut down the decades-old operation was being run by Marocco, four engineers in their early 20s and the Doge leadership that contacted them by phone.“It’s all being driven through Doge right now,” said a current USAid official, adding that Doge engineers in USAid headquarters continued to field calls from Musk and Marocco on Monday. “The folks in the building are turning the system off for [USAid employees], they’ve kept a small number of people from the different bureaus to help understand what programs will be kept and not kept, what the footprint will look like.”View image in fullscreenThe tension at USAid headquarters came to a head on Saturday evening, when Doge employees demanded access to the Scif on the agency’s sixth floor. They were stopped by the agency’s top security officer, John Voorhees.Among those present was Steve Davis, according to one current and one former USAid official. Davis, a Musk deputy, has worked with the billionaire for more than 20 years at SpaceX and the Boring Company. He reportedly sometimes slept in the Twitter offices to help Musk slash costs there after he acquired it in 2022.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe argument over access to the Scif had grown verbally heated and senior Doge staff threatened to call in US marshals to gain access to it. During that standoff, according to one account made to the Guardian, a call was again made to Musk, who, as Bloomberg first reported, repeated the threat to involve the US Marshals Service.Shortly after, Voorhees was placed on administrative leave and the Doge staffers entered the Scif. They took over the access control system and employee records. Within hours, the USAid website went down. Hundreds of employees were locked out of the system that weekend, and many still don’t know their status. (The Guardian has seen emails in which USAid administrators admit they do not know the employment states of current USAid officials.)“I’ve been furloughed, I guess?” said one contractor with 15 years of experience for the bureau for humanitarian assistance, where she had helped coordinate urgent responses in Ukraine, Gaza, Somalia and Latin America. “I don’t know what my status is but I don’t think I work here right now.”By Monday, Kliger wrote an email to all staff at 12.42am to tell them not to bother coming into the building that day.The incident has illustrated how Doge employees with Musk’s backing were able to override USAid leadership and bypass government procedures for accessing restricted areas with classified materials, fueling criticism that his agency is a national security risk.“Did Secretary Rubio allow this kind of access by Musk’s employees?” asked Kim. “It worries me about USAid but if it’s happening here, I’m guessing it’s probably happening at all these other national security agencies.”Formally, Rubio has delegated responsibility to Marocco, who has been pressed by congressional staffers to give details of the changes affecting USAid and the $40bn in foreign aid it manages each year.“The question at hand is: who’s in charge of the state department?” Senator Brian Schatz told the Guardian. “So far the answer has been Pete Marocco.”Doge did not respond to questions about what security clearances, if any, the engineers held. “No classified material was accessed without proper security clearances,” wrote Katie Miller, a Doge spokesperson, on social media.But Scifs are regulated by a strict protocol and it is unclear who could have verified the Doge employees’ credentials and filed the necessary paperwork to allow them to enter.Inside the building, staffers said that Doge cultivated a culture of fear.“It’s an extreme version of ‘who do you trust, when and how?’” said Kristina Drye, a speechwriter at the agency, who watched dozens of senior colleagues escorted out of the building by security. “It felt like the Soviet stories that one day someone is beside you and the next day they’re not.”People started meeting for coffee blocks away because “they didn’t feel safe in the coffee shops here to even talk about what’s going on”, she added.“I was in the elevator one morning and there was an older lady standing beside me and she had glasses on and I could see tears coming down under her glasses and before she got off her elevator she took her glasses off, wiped her eyes, and walked out,” she said. “Because if they see you crying, they know where you stand.” More

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      US federal workers weigh Trump’s buyout offer: ‘We’re feeling petty as hell’

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      Amy*, a federal US government employee working for homeland security who was hired by the Joe Biden administration’s refugee programme, has not left her phone out of her sight since last Tuesday, when the Elon Musk-led push for mass voluntary redundancies of government workers began.Since the US office of personnel management (OPM) sent nearly all of the federal government’s 3 million employees an email offering them deferred resignations and warning that, if they choose to stay, they may be laid off or reassigned, US career civil servants have been weighing their options.“It’s just been crazy. A billionaire is taking over a government,” Amy said. “The executive orders against the federal workforce feel designed to create chaos and fear. Musk calls us lazy and described workers at the US Agency for International Development (USAid) as a ‘ball of worms’. They’re trying to dehumanise us to make these changes more palatable, and are trying to rattle enough of us so that a majority of federal employees leave.”Amy was among scores of civil servants from across America who shared with the Guardian what they intend to do with the Trump administration’s “fork in the road” buyout offer, designed to dramatically reduce the ranks of left-leaning federal workers.“While many may think federal employees should take the offer and run, I haven’t spoken to a single person jumping at it,” she said. “Everyone is still digging their heels in and is intent on not taking it. We’re also feeling petty as hell.”Although her department does not qualify for voluntary redundancies, Amy is affected by the blanket return to the office order that was issued.“I was hired for a fully remote position,” she said. “I spend six to eight months every year overseas helping refugees who are trying to enter the US. So many of us are trying to continue focusing on our work while being told to immediately return to the office, but also to not return to the office yet because there is not space for all of us nor the resources to relocate everyone.“The refugee program has been suspended, so we don’t know the future of it, but I feel really determined to stick it out so that the budget for me cannot be used for somebody else who doesn’t care about refugees and [will] infiltrate this line of work to do harm or to prevent good from being done.”Amy’s remarks reflected those of scores of other federal government workers who presented themselves as a united front in defiance of Musk and Trump, but there were some who felt it was possibly time to resign from their careers.For Riordan*, a trans, autistic, disabled veteran who has worked for nearly 20 years for the government, the last few weeks have been stressful and “too much” for their mental health. Feeling “tired”, Riordan wants to hold on until they can retire early.“It’s upsetting. The stereotype of the lazy government worker has persisted for a long time but the majority of us have been working our asses off to serve our populations.”Federal workers have been told that those eligible for voluntary early retirement (Vera) can combine it with their deferred resignation, but Riordan is cautious.“I’m not going to take the chance right now. We’re not even sure what is being offered is legal. [If I’ll be eligible for Vera] I will take it in a second because I’m ready to get out of here. I don’t want to work for Trump and I don’t want to work for Musk. I’ll sell the house and move to a blue state where I can be with my family. For now, I’m just going to delete the emails and ignore them.”A long-term government employee at USAid from the east coast who had been working on programs in the developing world shared her disbelief at how her agency has begun being dismantled.“After going dark for several days, the USAid website was relaunched to tell the world that the entire workforce is being put on administrative leave,” she said. “Every message to my agency’s workforce has been hostile and intimidating with threats of disciplinary action and no space for disagreement with orders from the White House. All of the communication we have received expresses lack of trust in us and our judgment.“As a result of the stop-work order that has affected most of the work USAid funds, our workforce is glued to our computers with nothing to do. The American public is not benefiting from this in any way.”Deaths and illness around the world could result from the halt of USAid assistance that contributes to global security, she warned, adding that despite everything she had decided to stay.“For a second, the [buyout offer] sounded kind of appealing, but I quickly heard voices I trust – employee unions, lawyers, Senator Tim Kaine from Virginia – who raised questions and told people to be very cautious. There’s no funding for this [buyout programme], there’s no guarantee, so I’m not going to take it. This is unprecedented.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionMartin Heyworth, a former chief of staff at the US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in Philadelphia between 1999 and 2009 who retired from federal employment in 2017, disagreed and pointed out that Bill Clinton as well as Barack Obama had ordered large buyout programmes of federal workers during their presidencies.“Offering buyouts is not new and has been standard practice in the US federal government for the last several decades, whether under a Republican or a Democratic president. The phenomenon is neither Republican- nor Trump-specific, and it’s being construed as a sort of Trump-related dysfunction, which I think is not accurate.“I did not vote for Trump, I voted for Jill Stein, and although he does things that are problematic, I think he needs to be given a chance.”Elizabeth, a federal immigration enforcement attorney from the west coast, learned a few days ago that her department would be exempt from the buyout, but that she would have to return to the office despite her flexible hybrid union contract.“I’m a single mother, and the flexibility of this job is what is keeping me sane,” she said. “I have so many court appointments, I just don’t know whether I could handle having to come into the office all the time in between for the next four years.“I currently have no plans of quitting, but I’d have to strongly consider other job options, depending on how draconian they want to be on this.”Elizabeth, who is Black, added that the administration’s decision to suspend DEI practices and departments across the federal government was also “extremely upsetting”. “I’ve been having problems concentrating all week. A handful of people in my office support Trump, but others are very liberal. Politically like-minded people and I are concerned. Power is being given to Elon Musk.”Another major worry, Elizabeth said, was the prospect of being subjected to loyalty tests as part of future workplace evaluations, while she insisted that her political dislike of the Trump administration would not undermine her professionalism.“I’m not taking a loyalty test for any president. We all take an oath, our job is to uphold the laws of the United States. It is not to pledge loyalty to anyone. I can have my views about any politician but still be able to do my job.”An older remote worker for the Department of Veterans Affairs said her office had been “swamped with calls from stressed-out employees considering the deferred resignation but without sufficient information to make a decision within the very limited timeframe”.“If they don’t take the deferred resignation,” she said, “will they need to return to the office even though there is no identified office space? Will they have to relocate in order to keep working? Will their jobs be eliminated? Exactly how does this affect their retirement benefits?”She described emails coming from the administration as “callous” and “staggering”.“Even though we try to refrain from any overtly political comments,” she said, “it was clear that most people I spoke to viewed the ‘[fork in the road]’ email as craven and hypocritical. ‘Enhanced standards of conduct’ – from an administration headed by a felon, a sexual predator, a pathological liar with no respect for the rule of law? What a joke.”A probationary Department of Homeland Security employee from the midwest who wanted to stay anonymous said she would be taking the deferred resignation offer.“I do believe [this offer] is likely illegal and the administration will stiff me, but it doesn’t really matter in my case,” she said. “I only signed on to the federal government for the remote and telework benefits, and now that’s gone, I can cut ties and return to my old job, where I made more money, worked fewer days and hours, and had a shorter commute.”A combat veteran federal government worker from the north-west expressed a steely resolve to resist.“We laugh at [Trump] during meetings, trying to make sense of the nonsense spilling out of the White House,” she said. “His disregard for laws, morality and humanity proves how intimidated he is by real Americans making real contributions. I hold the line and dare him to fucking fire me.”*Names have been changed More

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      Trump’s second tone: authoritarian, radical and triumphalist in a divided US

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      US President Donald Trump’s inaugural address on January 20 revealed the key themes of his rhetoric–triumphalism and overt authoritarianism–and provided insight into the programme he wants to implement. However, accomplishing his goals will not be easy amid deep divisions within the country that narrowly elected him.

      The triumphant hero: martyr and messiah

      In his 2017 inaugural address, Trump delivered a populist message decrying “the establishment” for the “carnage” afflicting “forgotten Americans”. Eight years later, in the longest inaugural speech in four decades, he painted a starkly different picture–one of a victorious and ambitious country with himself as both its savior and an embodiment of its triumph.

      Trump used the words “I,” “me” and “my” 50 times in his 2025 address, compared to just four in 2017, deliberately merging his personal identity with that of the nation.

      J. Viala-Gaudefroy, Fourni par l’auteur

      He cast himself as both a hero-martyr –“tested and challenged more than any president in our 250-year history”– and the sole leader capable of solving the country’s problems. He linked his personal journey to divine intervention, declaring that God had saved him on July 13, the day he survived an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania, “I was saved by God to make America great again.”

      A radical crackdown on immigration

      Trump’s stance on immigration is significantly more extreme than his 2017 agenda. While his first term focused on reinforcing borders, he now frames illegal immigration as an “invasion” requiring military intervention. On inauguration day, the president signed several executive orders, including one seeking to eliminate birthright citizenship despite its protection under the 14th Amendment. His hardline approach energizes supporters within his conservative base, some of whom subscribe to the “great replacement” theory and view his policies as necessary to preserve American identity.

      Culture wars: race, gender and education

      In his second inaugural address, Trump expanded his rhetoric to encompass culture war issues, aggressively targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies in US workplaces. He accused the state of “socially engineering race and gender into every aspect of public and private life”, and then began dismantling programmes promoting equality, including recruitment efforts aimed at hiring racial and sexual minorities within the federal government.

      His executive orders rescind measures dating back to the Civil Rights era, including one from president Lyndon B. Johnson mandating equal opportunity policies for federal contractors. Echoing president Ronald Reagan, Trump framed these actions in anti-racist language –“We will forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based”– disregarding the well-documented realities of systemic racism.

      Trump also asserted that “there are only two genders, male and female”, and has signed an order recognizing only biological sex at birth. Framing this move as a defense of women, he argues that their “safe spaces”, including bathrooms and sports competitions, must be protected from individuals who “identify” as female.

      In education, he decried critical perspectives on US history as “unpatriotic”, insisting that schools instill national pride instead of “teaching our children to hate our country”. His plan includes reducing or eliminating federal funding for schools that teach “inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content” or mandate vaccines and mask-wearing–despite education policy largely falling under state jurisdiction.

      Reviving founding myths

      Trump’s historical narrative is steeped in romanticized patriotism. He revived the myth of “the frontier”, a late 19th century ideal portraying westward expansion as the ultimate symbol of American dynamism. This narrative ignores histories of the genocide of indigenous peoples and environmental destruction.

      His vision of “inexhaustible” natural resources –particularly shale oil and gas, described as “liquid gold”– reflects this ideology of relentless economic expansion and 19th century “bonanza economics”. By rejecting US conservationist traditions, Trump is prioritizing industrial growth over environmental sustainability.

      Expansionism reimagined: from the frontier to space

      Trump draws inspiration from president William McKinley (1897–1901), an advocate of expansionism during the Spanish-American War, which brought territories such as the Philippines and Puerto Rico under US control. Reviving the concept of “manifest destiny”, he merged exceptionalism with expansionism, vowing to “plant the American flag on Mars.”

      Trump restated his intention to rename the Gulf of Mexico the “Gulf of America”–a gesture with little practical impact given that much of the gulf lies outside US territory. While he has expressed interest in purchasing Greenland (which he has also claimed to be willing to take over) and even annexing Canada, he mentioned neither in his inaugural speech. However, he did promise to take control of the Panama Canal, justifying the move with a series of lies and exaggerations regarding its history and operation.

      A new golden age or “Gilded Age”?

      Trump’s admiration for McKinley extends to his economic policies. He envisions a protectionist strategy driving national reindustrialization. Yet, McKinley’s era–the “Gilded Age”–was marked by extreme inequality, a lack of income and corporate taxes, minimal regulation and rampant corruption. The wealthiest figures of the time, later dubbed “robber barons”, mirror the oligarchic ambitions of Trump’s current supporters.

      Ironically, as economist Douglas A. Irwin notes, the economic prosperity of the late 19th century was not driven by tariffs but by mass immigration. Between 1870 and 1913, the US population doubled due to an influx of unskilled laborers, a reality at odds with Trump’s strict immigration agenda.

      A nation divided under an assertive authoritarianism

      Trump’s vision, as outlined in his speech, is one of maximal presidential power, where justice is subordinated to political goals. His decision to pardon over 1,500 individuals convicted for their involvement in the January 6, 2021 Capitol riot underscores this authoritarian approach, reinforcing the idea that traditional laws do not apply to his most loyal and even violent supporters.

      He has also launched a sweeping purge of the federal administration, citing “integrity, competence, and loyalty” as guiding values. Additionally, he has openly planned to use the Justice Department and FBI for political purposes.

      Unlike previous presidents, Trump made no effort to unite a deeply divided nation during his address. He ignored the tradition of acknowledging his predecessor, Joe Biden, and instead declared his electoral victory proof that “the entire nation is rallying behind our agenda.”

      However, the US remains fractured politically. Trump secured less than 50% of the popular vote in the November election, his party holds the narrowest House majority since the 1930s, and he entered office with one of the lowest initial approval ratings in 70 years–just 47%. His personal favorability was even lower, hovering around 41% (Reuters, NPR).

      This polarization is evident in the public reaction to his most controversial policies, such as his pardoning of the January 6 rioters just after his inaugural address. While his base celebrates these decisions, the broader American public largely disapproves. The fundamental question remains: can US institutions withstand the growing tensions? Without majority support, realising Trump’s most radical societal and political agenda may prove an uphill battle. More

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      Trump’s administration seems chaotic, but he’s drawing directly from Project 2025 playbook

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      In his first few days back in office, President Donald Trump engaged in a whirlwind of executive actions, from exiting the World Health Organization, to deploying military personnel and National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.

      Many of these actions are unprecedented. Some appear to be illegal and unconstitutional, according to legal experts and judges. But none of them should come as a surprise – nearly all of them were outlined in 2022 in a plan called Project 2025.

      A Heritage Foundation representative attends a Moms for Liberty National Summit in Washington on Aug. 30, 2024.
      Dominic Gwinn/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images

      Project 2025 is top of Trump’s to-do list

      Project 2025 is a multifaceted strategy to advance conservative policies in the federal government. Part of this effort revolves around the “Mandate for Leadership,” a 922-page document published in April 2023 that outlines a slew of proposed governmental policy changes.

      The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank and advocacy group, organized the collaborative effort. A long list of other right-leaning research organizations and interest groups, like Moms for Liberty and Turning Point USA, also participated in Project 2025.

      In the lead-up to the 2024 presidential election, Project 2025 participants wrote on the plan’s website that “to rescue the country from the grip of the radical Left,” they would “need both a governing agenda and the right people in place, ready to carry this agenda out on day one of the next conservative administration.”

      In my research on think tanks, I’ve investigated how these research organizations can influence public policymaking. The most potent strategy is to ally with a political party and support its objectives through research and advocacy. This is exactly what the Heritage Foundation has done via Project 2025.

      Even though Trump said during his 2024 campaign that he was not affiliated with the project, evidence of Project 2025’s agenda can be seen throughout the beginning of his second term – as well as in his first administration.

      For example, on Jan. 20, 2025, Trump echoed the plan’s statement that “men and women are biological realities” when he signed an executive order that, in part, recognizes “two sexes, male and female” that are “not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.” This order led to the removal of transgender references from government websites.

      Other orders are similarly aligned with Project 2025. Take Trump’s executive order that, in part, eliminated the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, or OFCCP, a government office previously charged with ensuring companies working with the government did not discriminate against any employees. Project 2025 recommended, quite simply, to “eliminate OFCCP.”

      Some news reports have found that there are already many other examples of Trump policy decisions and executive orders that appear to mirror Project 2025 recommendations.

      One CNN analysis from Jan. 31 found that more than two-thirds of the 53 executive orders Trump issued during his first week in office “evoked proposals outlined in [the] ‘Mandate for Leadership.‘”

      Heritage Foundation’s decades of activism

      Project 2025’s influence on Trump reflects the Heritage Foundation’s growing importance to the Republican Party.

      In my forthcoming book about the polarization and politicization of policy research organizations, I show the many ways that think tanks like the Heritage Foundation have become embedded within partisan networks and intimately connected to politicians. Increasingly, Heritage and other partisan-aligned think tanks, including progressive groups like the Center for American Progress, use their research to consistently support partisan agendas that align with their policy goals.

      The relationship between the Heritage Foundation and the GOP represents the most extreme version of this dynamic. The think tank has supported Republican presidents as far back as Ronald Reagan, using another policy document – also called the “Mandate for Leadership” – to secure significant policy gains through his administration. But the symbiosis between the Heritage Foundation and the GOP has been particularly notable since Trump gained more influence in the party.

      At the start of Trump’s first term, as one Heritage Foundation researcher told me in 2017, the think tank recognized that the “administration didn’t have much policy depth, so when they won the election they were sort of like, ‘Now what do we do?’ And that’s where Heritage comes in. … We work on these issues year-round, so we’ll stand by your side.”

      The Heritage Foundation also vetted potential staffers for federal government positions. This led to more than 66 Heritage employees or former employees working for the Trump administration by the middle of 2018.

      But Heritage has not entirely dictated Trump’s agenda. While the group did say that Trump “embraced 64 percent of our 321 recommendations” by the end of 2017, the think tank has also revamped its agenda to align with Trump on the issues he cared most about, like trade and culture wars.

      As the think tank’s president, Kevin Roberts, said in 2024, Heritage views its job as “institutionalizing Trumpism.”

      The people connecting Trump to Project 2025

      Many of the contributors to the “Mandate for Leadership” had been Trump administration officials, like Russ Vought, the former director of the Office of Management and Budget and current nominee for the same position.

      This list also includes John Ratcliffe, the former director of National Intelligence and incoming CIA director, and Tom Homan, former acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and current border czar.

      In all, more than half of the plan’s 312 authors, editors and contributors previously worked in the first Trump administration.

      An incredibly important but often underappreciated part of Project 2025 was its staffing effort: The coalition worked to identify, vet and train potential staffers and appointees who are now making their way into the Trump administration and executive agencies.

      Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer gestures toward a visual aid about Project 2025 during a news conference in September 2024 in Washington.
      Kent Nishimura/Getty Images

      What people – and the law – say about Project 2025

      Polling from January 2025 shows that a majority of Americans oppose many of Trump’s actions since retaking office, sometimes by large margins.

      Even during the presidential campaign, both Project 2025 itself and the policy ideas it advocated were broadly unpopular. Democrats consistently warned about the plan in their attacks against Republicans.

      The lack of popular approval for Project 2025 and its proposals is notable because the Heritage Foundation has historically invested time and money into gaining public support for its work. It even operates an initiative that polls citizens on how they “interpret arguments for and against our policy recommendations and how we can best gain their understanding and support.”

      There are also legal considerations.

      Many of Trump’s actions – like saying the government will deny citizenship to children born to some immigrants in the U.S. – rest on potentially unconstitutional interpretations and expansions of presidential power.

      This represents another about-face for the think tank, which has historically opposed efforts to empower the president at the expense of congressional authority. Indeed, the Heritage Foundation was founded to work through Congress to accomplish its goals. But with Project 2025, it seems it is pursuing a new strategy.

      How successful the Heritage Foundation is in helping Trump implement Project 2025 proposals will partially depend on how the public reacts. Whether Congress asserts its control over budgetary matters and exercises general oversight of the executive branch will also matter, as will the decisions made by the American judicial system.

      These checks and balances have helped sustain American democracy for nearly 250 years – whether they will continue to do so remains to be seen. More

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      Welcome to Trumpworld, where the developer-in-chief sees dollar signs in the rubble of Gaza

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      The venerable East Room, where Abraham Lincoln lay in state and Pablo Casals played cello, had turned into a mosh pit. Sweaty reporters, photographers and camera crews were crammed elbow to elbow. The Guardian shoehorned its way into a corner where a panel had fallen off the wall. Never used to happened in Joe Biden’s day.The big event, an hour and a half later than billed, was Donald Trump’s joint press conference with the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the first foreign leader to visit the White House in Trump’s second term. Two lecterns, two US flags and two Israeli flags were set up before a gold curtain between two elaborate crystal lamps.Netanyahu was afforded the honour of wearing the vintage Maga uniform of white shirt and red tie, while Trump went off-brand with a tie of sky blue. Perhaps he sees a kindred scoundrel in the Israeli leader.Netanyahu has bribery, fraud and breach of trust charges dating to 2019; Trump was convicted last year on 34 criminal counts of falsifying business records. Netanyahu has been slapped with an arrest warrant by the international criminal court over alleged war crimes in Gaza. As would become clear, Trump seems determined to rival him on that score too.The US president began by boasting about how he got a “beautiful” US embassy built in Jerusalem, ranting about his predecessor and giving a shout out to his staff. So far, so Trump. But then things turned weird. Very weird.Gaza has been “an unlucky place” for a long time, Trump mused, as if discussing a haunted house. “Being in its presence has just not been good and it should not go through a process of building and occupation by the same people that have really stood there and fought for it and lived there and died there and lived a miserable existence there.”As Netanyahu looked on, perhaps trying to restrain himself from bursting out laughing, Trump spoke of building “various domains” in other countries “with humanitarian hearts” where 1.8 million Palestinians could live instead. “This can be paid for by neighbouring countries of great wealth,” he slipped in.Was this a plan or the concept of a plan? The man who once aced a cognitive test by reciting “Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV,” rambled on: “It could be one, two, three, four, five, seven, eight, 12 – it could be numerous sites or one large site.”It would be “something really spectacular”, he promised, which is one way to describe ethnic cleansing.Then came the stunner. “The US will take over the Gaza Strip,” Trump declared, “and we’ll do a job with it, too. We’ll own it.”What? Did he say own it? And the supposedly isolationist “America first” president did not rule out sending US troops to take control.It was the latest indication that Trump seems to be entering a new and dangerously expansionist phase. At this stage eight years ago Trump 1.0 was mired in petty concerns such as lying about the size of his inauguration crowd or trying to take away Americans’ healthcare. Trump 2.0 is playing on an altogether grander stage.He said Canada should become the 51st state, prompting nervous laughter from Canadians followed by horror as it dawned that he wasn’t joking. He rattled Denmark by saying it should sell Greenland and upset Panama by vowing to retake the canal. He renamed the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” and, in his inaugural address, spoke of “manifest destiny” launching American astronauts to plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars.He is the new Julius Caesar – “I came, I saw, I conquered,” – and has no need to fear the Ides of March having already neutered the Senate.But when the press conference reached the question and answer stage, his true motivations became clear. He said of Gaza: “We’re going to take over the place and we’re going to develop it, create thousands and thousands of jobs, and it’ll be something that the entire Middle East can be very proud of.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionOf course. Ultimately he’s still that grasping property developer with a daddy complex who launched himself into Manhattan in the late 1970s with the renovation of the derelict Commodore Hotel, adjacent to Grand Central Terminal. Once again he spies dollar signs in rubble and despair.Asked by CNN’s Kaitlan Collins who will live in this new Trumpy utopia, he said: “I envision world people living there – the world’s people. I think you’ll make that into an international unbelievable place. I think the potential in the Gaza Strip is unbelievable and I think the entire world – representatives from all over the world will be there.”Forget Westworld, welcome to Trumpworld: a fantasy theme park full of Trump Towers, Trump golf courses and Maga androids. He added: “I don’t want to be cute, I don’t want to be a wise guy, but the Riviera of the Middle East.”Ah, the master of branding. Who is going to tell the Palestinians that Trump’s property and casino businesses filed for bankruptcy several times, his university faced multiple lawsuits for fraud, his foundation was tarnished by scandal and his company was ordered to pay more than $350m in a New York civil fraud trial?One man who clearly doesn’t care is Netanyahu, who hailed Trump as “the greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House” and said his Gaza plan – adamantly opposed by Palestinians and neighbouring countries – is “worth paying attention to” and “could change history”.The normalisation continues. Netanyahu also offered this homage to Trump that will resonate with his ardent fans: “You cut to the chase. You see things others refuse to see. You say things others refuse to say. And after the jaws drop, people scratch their heads and they say, ‘You know, he’s right’.”That group does not include Chris Murphy, a Democratic senator who responded to Trump’s proposal on social media by observing: “He’s totally lost it.”And we are only two weeks in. Trump seems determined to make this The Empire Strikes Back, Godfather Part II or Terminator 2: Judgment Day of presidential terms: a sequel that outdoes the first go. Today Gaza, tomorrow the world. More

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      In freezing foreign aid, the US leaves people to die – and allows China to come to the rescue

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      One of the executive orders US President Donald Trump signed the day he was inaugurated was a 90-day pause in US foreign development assistance.

      The US Agency for International Development, USAID, was ordered to halt funding. Programs worldwide were issued with stop-work orders.

      All of a sudden, more than US$60 billion (around A$95 billion) of programs for the world’s most vulnerable people just stopped.

      So what happened? The world became less fair, and US soft power fizzled.

      What’s happened so far?

      We know this decision will cause deaths.

      Stop-work orders were delivered to programs that provide AIDS medication to patients. If you stop this, people die.

      Charities, many of which work on a shoestring, had no choice but immediately to lay off staff.

      Food and vaccines already in warehouses couldn’t be distributed.

      Programs providing landmine clearing and counterterrorism training ceased.

      Belatedly, the US walked this back to some extent by saying life-saving humanitarian programs would be exempted.

      But it doesn’t appear to have slowed the pace of layoffs, partly because of confusion.

      With USAID staff now either sacked, placed on forced leave or told to stay home – and the agency’s website taken down – USAID is essentially no longer operational.

      Agents from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have raided the offices of USAID and assumed control, with Musk posting on his X social network that “USAID is a criminal organization” and “it’s time for it to die”.

      Some of the people affected have gone public, including Australian organisations on behalf of their partners.

      But most in the sector can’t speak up if they hope for funding in the future. So the true extent of the impacts, including their knock-on effects, is likely much larger than has been publicly reported so far.

      A more unequal and unstable world

      With the halt in aid for the poorest, the world just became more unequal.

      Before this week, the US was the world’s largest aid donor.

      USAID was established by then-US president John F. Kennedy in 1961. Its programs focused on improving global health, alleviating poverty and providing emergency relief in response to natural disasters or conflict, as well as enhancing education and strengthening democratic institutions abroad.

      The countries that were receiving the most USAID assistance in 2023 were Ukraine, Ethiopia, Jordan, Afghanistan and Somalia.

      USAID programs distributed food to impoverished nations, including Uganda.
      Stephen Wandera/AP

      In the Indo-Pacific, the Lowy Institute’s aid maps show that the Pacific received US$249 million (about A$470 million) and SouthEast Asia received US$1 billion (almost A$1.6 billion) in US overseas development assistance annually in the most recent data.

      This funded 2,352 projects, including peacebuilding in Papua New Guinea, malaria control in Myanmar, early childhood development in Laos, and programs to improve the education, food security and health of school-age children across the region.

      All of these programs are now being reviewed to ensure they are “fully aligned with the foreign policy of the President of the United States”.

      Based on the first Trump administration, there seems no chance that programs on climate, gender equality, abortion and equity inclusion will be reinstated after the 90-day assessment period. Losing funds for climate adaptation and mitigation is a huge issue for the Pacific Islands.

      Assistance for survivors of gender-based violence, employment for people with disabilities and support for LGBTQIA+ youth will likely lose funding.

      In communities that received significant USAID funding, the sudden cut in programs and loss of community organisations will damage the fabric of society.

      An unequal world is a less stable one. Australia’s peak body for the non-government aid sector, the Australian Council for International Development, says the suspension of USAID programs “will work against efforts to build peace, safety, and economic stability for the world”.

      A power that’s no longer super

      Thinking of the impact on the US interests, there has been an enormous hit to US soft power from an entire pillar of US foreign policy suddenly disappearing.

      This is underlined by the fact the cuts apply equally to ally, partner and adversary nations alike.

      USAID offices in Washington were closed shortly after the executive order.
      Shawn Thew/EPA

      In the Pacific, the Biden Administration made a real effort to increase US presence, opening embassies and announcing USAID programs.

      All of this has now been squandered by withdrawing from this space. I am aware of a project for which China has come in to provide funding where US funding has gone. It is a spectacular setback for the US.

      What is most extraordinary is that this is self-inflicted damage. There were alternatives, such as continuing business as usual during a 90-day period of review, then giving notice to some programs that they would be discontinued.

      The performative and haphazard way in which the policy has been implemented suggests an administration that doesn’t care much about the world outside its borders and is more concerned about ideological battles within.

      Researcher Cameron Hill describes Trump as linking foreign aid “to the symbols and slogans of his domestic political coalition”. This is likely to continue beyond the demise of USAID to other agencies involved in foreign assistance, such as development finance.

      Australia needs to help fill the gap

      What does this mean for Australia? As a middle power, it has an opportunity to step up – and work with other development partners such as Japan, Korea, India, Indonesia, Canada and European donors in the face of a genuine emergency.

      For the Australian government this might mean an emergency increase in development funding or freeing up existing funding to keep the lights on.

      Australia will undoubtedly now need to step up on climate programs in the Pacific if US funding doesn’t return. Australia could seek to convene an urgent meeting through the Pacific Islands Forum to discuss.

      The first fortnight of the Trump administration has had global impact well beyond US politics. On the most important issue for the majority of the world – development – the US decided to withdraw, destroying in a few days what took decades to build. More