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      US judge blocks Trump’s suspension of refugee resettlement program

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      A federal judge has blocked Donald Trump’s attempt to suspend the US’s refugee admission system after ruling that the move exceeded his powers.The ruling, from US district judge Jamal Whitehead, stated that Trump’s executive order affecting refugee admissions, issued on the day of his inauguration, amounted to an illegal usurpation of the powers of Congress.“The president has substantial discretion … to suspend refugee admissions. But that authority is not limitless,” Whitehead told a court in Seattle in delivering his verdict.The ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by major refugee assistance groups, who argued that Trump’s order breached the system created by acts of Congress to absorb refugees into the US, while impeding their ability to help refugees already in the US.Whitehead agreed that it represented an “effective nullification of congressional will”.The ruling is a significant setback for Trump’s agenda on immigration – on which he has moved to end protected status for around half-a-million Haitians in the US legally, as well as deport undocumented migrants.August Flentje, a lawyer for the justice department, told the judge that the administration was likely to consider filing an emergency appeal.Trump’s executive order said the refugee program – a form of legal migration to the US – would be suspended because cities and communities had been taxed by “record levels of migration” and didn’t have the ability to “absorb large numbers of migrants, and in particular, refugees”.The federal refugee system has been in place for decades and helps people who have escaped war, natural disaster or persecution. Despite long-standing support from both parties for accepting thoroughly vetted refugees, the program has become politicized in recent years.Trump temporarily halted it during his first presidency, and then dramatically lowered the number of refugees who could enter the US each year.The groups challenging his latest order included the International Refugee Assistance Project on behalf of Church World Service, the Jewish refugee resettlement agency HIAS, Lutheran Community Services Northwest, and individual refugees and family members. They said it had several restricted their ability to provide critical services to refugees, including those already in the US.Some refugees whose entry had previously been approved had their travel cancelled on short notice, and families who have waited years to reunite have had to remain apart, the lawsuit said.Last week a federal judge in Washington DC refused to immediately block the Trump administration’s actions in a similar lawsuit brought by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. That case faces another hearing on Friday. More

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      More than 20 Musk staffers resign over Doge’s ‘dismantling of public services’

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      More than 20 civil service employees resigned on Tuesday from Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), saying they were refusing to use their technical expertise to “dismantle critical public services”.“We swore to serve the American people and uphold our oath to the constitution across presidential administrations,” the 21 staffers wrote in a joint resignation letter, a copy of which was obtained by the Associated Press. “However, it has become clear that we can no longer honor those commitments.”The employees also warned that many of those enlisted by Musk to help him slash the size of the federal government under Donald Trump’s administration were political ideologues who did not have the necessary skills or experience for the task ahead of them.The former government employees said that they had been visited in the office by individuals wearing White House visitor’s passes, who interrogated employees about their political loyalty, work experience as well as their colleagues in the federal workforce. The letter also denounced the widespread worker layoffs that Doge has put into effect.The mass resignation of engineers, data scientists and product managers is a temporary setback for Musk and the Republican president’s tech-driven purge of the federal workforce. It comes amid a flurry of court challenges that have sought to stall, stop or unwind their efforts to fire or coerce thousands of government workers out of jobs.When news of the letter was first reported, Musk called the article “more fake news” in a post on X, though his tweets appeared to also confirm the resignations.“These were Dem political holdovers who refused to return to the office,” Musk wrote on his X platform. “They would have been fired had they not resigned.”Doge employee Katie Miller seemed to ridicule the staffers who resigned, saying: “These were full remote workers who hung Trans flags from their workplaces,” in a separate post on X.On Tuesday, it was reported that Amy Gleason was identified as the acting administrator of Doge.The staffers who resigned worked for what was once known as the United States Digital Service, an office established during Barack Obama’s administration after the botched rollout of healthcare.gov, the web portal that millions of Americans use to sign up for insurance plans through the Democrat’s signature healthcare law.Meanwhile, New York’s Democratic governor wants to hire federal workers fired by Doge. Kathy Hochul on Tuesday welcomed recently laid-off federal workers to apply for state jobs using an online portal.“The federal government might say: ‘You’re fired,’ but here in New York, we say: ‘You’re hired.’ In fact, we love federal workers,” Hochul said in a videotaped statement. More

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      Trump’s Iron Dome for America system is now reportedly called Golden Dome

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      Donald Trump’s Iron Dome for America initiative for a missile defense system protecting US skies from attack has been reportedly renamed the Golden Dome for America.In a video published on Thursday, secretary of defense Pete Hegseth referred to the project as “the Golden Dome or Iron Dome”. A defense official confirmed shortly after that the name of the initiative has been officially changed to “Golden Dome”, according to military news website Defense One.A spokesperson for Space Force did not respond to a Guardian query on the possible name change.The idea of a new name comes as a team of technical experts has been assembled by the US Space Force to determine which programs can help build out the initiative.The Iron – or perhaps now Golden – Dome for America executive order, signed by Trump on 27 January, is a directive for Hegseth to submit a comprehensive plan that details an implementation strategy, including the required architecture, for a missile defense system.Trump is known for his grand renaming of things, including the Gulf of Mexico, which is now known officially in the US as the Gulf of America, as well as having a gaudy taste for golden and luxurious decorations, such as that which often adorn his apartments and buildings like Trump Tower in New York.The defense system focuses heavily on the concept of space-based sensors and interceptors. The company that currently dominates the market for such equipment is the Elon Musk-owned SpaceX, leading to concerns that this project is another way for Musk to make money from federal programs.The team will finish planning in “a matter of weeks”, a senior Space Force official told reporters Monday.Last month, it was announced that the space development agency, a branch under the Space Force, was in the process of acquiring new satellites in order to create a network of missile-tracking sensors within Earth’s orbit. This network would be part of the Dome system.While Trump’s executive order argues that the US is in need of a space-centric defense against missile threats, many critics question the technical and financial feasibility of such a project.The name and concept of the Dome for America alludes to Israel’s Iron Dome, a defense system designed to counter against short-range rockets and missiles. More

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      Apple shareholders vote against ending DEI program amid Trump crackdown

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      Apple shareholders voted down an attempt to pressure the technology company into yielding to Donald Trump’s push to scrub corporate programs designed to diversify its workforce.A proposal drafted by the National Center for Public Policy Research – a self-described conservative thinktank – urged Apple to follow a litany of high-profile companies that have retreated from diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives currently in the Trump administration’s crosshairs.After a brief presentation about the anti-DEI proposal, Apple announced shareholders had rejected it without disclosing the vote tally. The preliminary results will be outlined in a regulatory filing later on Tuesday.The outcome vindicated Apple management’s decision to stand behind its diversity commitment even though Trump asked the US Department of Justice to look into whether these types of programs have discriminated against employees whose race or gender are not aligned with the initiatives’ goals.But Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, has maintained a cordial relationship with Trump since his first term in office, an alliance that so far has helped the company skirt tariffs on its iPhones made in China. After Cook and Trump met last week, Apple on Monday announced it would invest $500bn in the US and create 20,000 more jobs during the next five years – a commitment applauded by the president.Tuesday’s shareholder vote came a month after the same group presented a similar proposal during Costco’s annual meeting, only to have it overwhelmingly rejected.That snub did not discourage the National Center for Public Policy Research from confronting Apple about its DEI program in a pre-recorded presentation by Stefan Padfield, executive director of the thinktank’s Free Enterprise Project, who asserted “forced diversity is bad for business”.In the presentation, Padfield attacked Apple’s diversity commitments for being out of line with recent court rulings and said the programs expose the Cupertino, California, company to an onslaught of potential lawsuits for alleged discrimination. He cited the Trump administration as one of Apple’s potential legal adversaries.“The vibe shift is clear: DEI is out and merit is in,” Padfield said in the presentation.The specter of potential legal trouble was magnified last week when the Florida attorney general, James Uthmeier, filed a federal lawsuit against Target for allegedly failing to properly disclose the financial risks of its DEI programs to stakeholders.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut Cook conceded Apple may have to make some adjustments to its diversity program “as the legal landscape changes” while still striving to maintain a culture that has helped elevate the company to its current market value of $3.7tn – greater than any other business in the world.“We will continue to create a culture of belonging,” Cook told shareholders during the meeting.In its last diversity and inclusion report issued in 2022, Apple disclosed that nearly three-fourths of its global workforce consisted of white and Asian employees. Nearly two-thirds of its employees were men.Other major technology companies for years have reported employing mostly white and Asian men, especially in high-paid engineering jobs – a tendency that spurred the industry to pursue largely unsuccessful efforts to diversify. More

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      House Republicans to vote on spending deal that could slash Medicaid funding

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      House Republicans are planning to vote on Tuesday on a spending blueprint central to Donald Trump’s agenda, but the package faces potential derailment over nearly $1tn in Medicaid cuts that could fracture their slim majority.The fiscal year 2025 proposal includes approximately $4.5tn in tax cuts alongside increased spending for defense and border security. To offset these costs, the plan tasks congressional committees with finding about $2tn in spending reductions over the next decade.But some lawmakers are warning that the budget could include an estimated $800bn in potential cuts from Medicaid, a federal program providing healthcare coverage to more than 72 million Americans. Though the resolution doesn’t explicitly target Medicaid, skeptical lawmakers warn there are few alternatives to achieve the $880bn in cuts assigned to the energy and commerce committee.If the budget measure doesn’t pass by the 14 March deadline, the government faces a shutdown – and Democrats are committed to not voting it through.“Let me be clear, House Democrats will not provide a single vote to this reckless Republican budget,” said the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, from the steps of the US Capitol on Tuesday surrounded by Democratic lawmakers and advocates protesting the vote. “Not one, not one, not one.”With Democrats united in opposition, House speaker Mike Johnson’s slim Republican majority cannot afford more than one defection. Several moderate Republicans from vulnerable districts have expressed concerns, particularly those with constituents heavily reliant on Medicaid.Eight House Republicans, including the California representative David Valadao and the New York representative Nicole Malliotakis, warned in a letter to Johnson last week that “slashing Medicaid would have serious consequences, particularly in rural and predominantly Hispanic communities”.The Nebraska Republican Don Bacon, representing a district that backed Kamala Harris as the Democratic presidential candidate in November, has demanded leadership to prove the proposal “won’t overly cut Medicaid”.Opposition to the House budget resolution has been steadily building over the last few weeks. During last week’s recess, constituent anger over Republicans’ proposed cuts to Medicaid and other social safety net programs as well as Elon Musk’s efforts to dismantle the federal government boiled over at town halls and congressional offices across the country.At an earlier Capitol Hill rally on Tuesday, Senator Chris Murphy assailed the Republican budget bill as the “most massive transfer of wealth and resources from poor people and the middle class to the billionaires and corporations in the history of this country”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHe continued: “You’re talking about $880bn of cuts to Medicaid … That means that sick kids die in this country. That means that hospitals in depressed communities and rural communities close their doors, right? That means that drug and addiction treatment centers disappear all across this country.”The vote comes after the Senate passed its own budget bill last week – a less contentious one that Trump does not support as much as the House’s. House leadership must now navigate competing demands within their caucus: some members want deeper tax cuts while others seek steeper spending reductions or protection for social programs.“There may be more than one [defector], but we’ll get there,” Johnson said on Monday. “We’re going to get everybody there. This is a prayer request. Just pray this through for us because it is very high stakes, and everybody knows that.” More

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      ‘We’re being treated as grifters or terrorists’: US federal workers on the fear and chaos of their firings

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      The Trump administration has fired at least 20,000 government employees in its first month, as Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) dramatically overhauls work at federal agencies. Some economists have speculated that these terminations, which could affect nearly 300,000 workers, will be the biggest job cuts in US history.Most of the workers cut were in probationary periods and lacked job protections that come with longer terms of employment. In social media spaces, especially the r/fednews subreddit, these workers described scenes of confusion and feelings of anger directed at Musk, an unelected billionaire dubbed a “special government employee” by the White House. Last week, unions for federal workers sued the Trump administration for unlawfully using probationary periods to cut staff.The mass firings appear far from over: this weekend, Musk demanded that all remaining workers detail their day-to-day duties in bullet points or face dismissal. (Several federal agencies told their employees not to respond to Musk’s email, and unions and advocacy groups moved to prevent retaliation against employees who did not comply.)Three recently terminated probationary workers told the Guardian about the effects on their lives and job prospects, and how the consequences will “trickle down” to all Americans. They requested anonymity due to fears of retaliation and the fact that they are currently looking for new jobs.‘Do I need to think about becoming a political refugee?’Scientist who works on food sustainability issues in the north-east USI was the third person hired in our unit, almost three years ago, to look at issues of access and fairness when it comes to food. Our probationary period for government scientists is three years. I was 10 weeks away from the end of this period; one of my colleagues who was also fired was only six weeks out.I went on maternity leave in August. When Trump was elected, I knew it would mess with my job. Specifically, I thought it would mess with telework, which I did half the time after I returned from maternity leave. I was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to have the time to breastfeed my baby at home or to manage the postpartum separation anxiety I’ve experienced. I decided to take a deferred resignation, because then I’d get severance.Six days after my resignation, when I was into the off-boarding process, my boss told me I was going to get a termination letter. It was a huge, emotional process to resign – I feel like I was basically bullied by Trump into doing so – but at least it was my decision to make. Now, I was getting fired. It’s been an insane rollercoaster of emotions.Government workers are real people with families who dedicated their lives and expertise to service. It feels like we’re being treated as grifters or terrorists, when we’re not. A lot of us have given up options for much higher incomes in order to do the work that we thought was going to help the world. This is a huge, huge loss for science, because now government researchers are going to shift into the private sector. There’s a lot of good work that the world won’t even know to miss, because we won’t get to do it.Now I’m wondering, do I need to think about becoming a political refugee? I have a big network in Europe and Canada, though I’d like to stay in the US. It’s hard these days to know what’s catastrophizing and what’s good planning. I think people are really hesitant to go to the worst-case scenario, but we know from history that things can get really bad. Some people see it coming, and some people don’t.It’s also been really, really disappointing and enraging for me to see the lack of effective resistance to Trump and Musk from Congress. There’s a lot of talk on the left about how this is all bad, but nothing’s really getting done. I understand the numbers, the majorities and minorities, but I just think this is not the time to be playing nice with the fascists.‘I’m exploring legal options’Cultural resource specialist for the National Resources Conservation Services (NRCS), an agency of the US Department of Agriculture, in North DakotaI’m an archaeologist. Anytime the NRCS wants to provide support to private landowners such as ranchers or famers, they are legally required to have someone like me to do on-the-ground surveys and excavations of the site.I started on 30 December. I was let go on 13 February. I’d moved from California to North Dakota, and believe it or not I was given relocation expenses to help pay for my move. I came here with my wife and two dogs, and we spent a good amount of money to do so. I sold my Camry and bought a Subaru because I thought I needed a car that could handle the snow up here; now I have a new SUV and a car payment.They told me that if I didn’t work for the federal government for more than a year, I’d have to pay back those expenses. I don’t know if they’re going to come after me for that now.View image in fullscreenIt would be one thing if they’d sent me a personalized letter saying something like: “Your position is being cut.” Instead, I got this generic form letter that still said “template” in the document title. It told me I was being fired for performance-based reasons, but my boss and I were like, I haven’t even worked here long enough to get a performance review. How can they say that?I guess there’s camaraderie among the people who got cut, but more than that everyone just talks about how stupid it is. Are they really making the government more efficient if they’re getting rid of all these people who do things that are required by law? I get the impression that Musk’s treating this like he would a private company such as Twitter, where he fired a lot of people. He’s acting like a CEO, but it’s not his company. It’s the federal government.I’m exploring legal options with employment lawyers, who indicated I’ll have to go through a bigger class-action type thing. There are a couple of class-action lawsuits going around that I’ve submitted my information to. I’m also applying to jobs, and I have a couple of interviews set up. One is for a job that’s in this area, another is out of state. If something good comes up, I would take it and move. That wouldn’t be too hard – I’ve been here for such a short time that I haven’t even unpacked everything yet.‘I didn’t go into this because I wanted to make six figures’Educator at a national forest in OregonI’ve worked for the forest in one way or another since 2019, first as an intern and then in a seasonal position. I got my permanent position in July of last year. During Trump’s first week, they asked for a list of names of everyone who had been hired in the last year. That put me on edge.One day, I saw a bunch of people at the USDA posting on the subreddit for federal employees about getting fired. I was going to text my supervisor to ask: “Am I getting fired?” and then she called me to say that she didn’t have any details but it was probably going to happen. The next day, Valentine’s Day, she called with her definitive list. That was a Friday. It was not a good weekend.It’s overwhelming to know that all the work I put in during the past five years is completely wasted. I have a two-year-old, and my husband and I wanted to have another, but now we don’t know about that. Working in the natural resources field, I don’t know what positions are going to be available, and I’m not sure where my career will go. Do I just give up and go into accounting or something? It’s so uncertain.I feel like we’re being attacked. There have always been people who are anti-government, but now I feel like people see all government employees as villains. I really cared about the work I did, and I didn’t go into this because I wanted to make six figures. The forest or park services have always been very bipartisan, and it’s not something you can easily throw away.We do a lot of school field trips – those won’t happen any more without us. Kids, especially those who come from poorer communities, won’t have the opportunity to come out here and see the natural world. The forest is going to be in disarray, the bathrooms won’t be cleaned, anyone who comes here will have a terrible experience. Without people maintaining the forest, the wildlife will have a worse habitat. All of these things trickle down. The people who fired us are higher-ups who don’t work in the field; everyone who knows the day-to-day of how to take care of this place is gone. More

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      Trump administration briefing: chaos caused by Musk’s Doge; fears over far-right podcaster tapped for FBI

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      Confusion continued on Monday over the demands made by Elon Musk of federal workers. Just hours after the US Office of Personnel Management (OPM) had directed agencies that responses to its email were optional, Musk again threatened federal workers.He wrote on X, the platform he owns: “Subject to the discretion of the president, they will be given another chance. Failure to respond a second time will result in termination.”President Donald Trump backed Musk earlier Monday, two days after OPM initially sent an email asking federal workers to list five things they accomplished last week. Several government agencies, including the FBI and state department, have told their employees not to respond.Here are the biggest stories in US politics on Monday, 24 February.Chaos over Musk’s latest demand for federal workersLabor unions and advocacy groups have asked a federal court to prevent retaliation against government employees, after Elon Musk issued an ultimatum demanding they detail in bullet points what they do at their jobs or face dismissal. The weekend email sent to millions of employees was the latest salvo in Musk’s campaign, authorized by Donald Trump, to dramatically downsize the federal government. Several federal departments have reportedly told their employees not to respond to the email.Read the full storyFears intensify as Trump taps podcaster as FBI deputy directorFears over the future direction of the FBI have intensified after Donald Trump announced that a far-right podcaster, Dan Bongino, who has never served in the bureau, would become its next deputy director. Bongino is best known as a conservative commentator who has vocally supported Trump’s false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.Read the full storyTrump says Putin will accept European peacekeepers in UkraineDonald Trump has said the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, would accept European peacekeepers in Ukraine as part of a potential deal to end the three-year war. Trump was speaking alongside French president Emmanuel Macron at the White House as the leaders sought to smooth over a transatlantic rift to achieve peace. But the meeting came as the US voted against a United Nations resolution condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, siding with countries such as North Korea, Belarus and Sudan over European allies.Read the full storyJudge blocks Doge access to Americans’ personal dataA federal judge has temporarily blocked Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) from accessing the sensitive personal information of millions of Americans, dealing a quick blow to the second Trump administration’s controversial government downsizing goals.Read the full storyExclusive: Neo-Nazi group plots rebuild as Patel takes lead at FBI An international neo-Nazi terrorist group with origins in the US appears to be quickly rebuilding its global and stateside ranks, according to information obtained by the Guardian from its digital accounts. The Base’s regrouping comes at a time when the Trump administration has made it a policy goal to move away from policing far-right extremism and during the appointment of Kash Patel – a Maga acolyte who lauds January 6 attackers and has peddled Qanon conspiracy theories – to helm the FBI.Read the full story‘Doge’ claim about USAid funds for India creates political firestormElon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” has been accused of setting off a political firestorm in India after it claimed that the US government had been sending millions of dollars to support the Indian elections.Read the full storyApple announces $500bn in US investments over next four yearsApple announced it would spend $500bn in US investments in the next four years that would include a giant factory in Texas for artificial intelligence servers and add about 20,000 research and development jobs across the country. The move comes on the heels of reports that the Apple CEO, Tim Cook, met Donald Trump last week.Read the full storyUS judge allows Trump’s AP Oval Office ban to stand over Gulf of Mexico name disputeA federal judge on Monday denied a request by the Associated Press to immediately restore full access to presidential events for the news agency’s journalists.The US district judge Trevor McFadden declined to grant the AP’s request for a temporary injunction restoring its access to the Oval Office, Air Force One and events held at the White House. The Trump administration barred the outlet earlier this month for continuing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico in its coverage after the president renamed it the “Gulf of America”.McFadden, a Trump appointee, said the restriction on “more private areas” used by Trump was different from prior instances in which courts have blocked government officials from revoking access to journalists.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      A federal judge blocked immigration agents from conducting enforcement operations in houses of worship for some religious groups, the Associated Press reported.

      Trump said the US and Ukraine are “very close” to coming to terms on a rare earth minerals agreement, in comments made during a visit from French president Emmanuel Macron amid European concerns over the US position on Ukraine.

      The Trump administration said it was placing all but a handful of USAid personnel around the world on paid administrative leave and eliminating about 2,000 of those positions in the US, as the rapid dismantling of the organization appears to move into its final phases.

      A federal judge has blocked the government downsizing team Doge from accessing sensitive data maintained by the US education department and the US office of personnel management.

      A federal judge has extended protections for trans women in prison. The judge had blocked the Federal Bureau of Prisons from carrying out Donald Trump’s executive order that would have transferred three incarcerated trans women into men’s facilities earlier this month. Those protections have now been extended to include nine additional women. More

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      Can the ‘special relationship’ survive Donald Trump? – podcast

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      It’s the most important international relationship the UK has, and for decades has been referred to as “special”. Since the second world war, the UK and the US have considered themselves the closest allies, working together for shared values, with any resentments, differences of opinion or cross words kept to private channels.But now Donald Trump is back and he seems keen to throw the usual world order of alliances and enmities into chaos. Keir Starmer’s first meeting with the US president comes at a crucial juncture for Europe, with the future of Ukraine in the balance. “The stakes at the moment could not be higher,” says the Guardian’s diplomatic editor, Patrick Wintour.He tells Michael Safi what advice Starmer should be receiving from his advisers, including to keep things simple and not to be boring. And what Starmer will be trying to achieve, especially in terms of clarifying Trump’s recent outpourings around Ukraine. “I think the key thing to find out is where does this man lie ideologically,” Patrick says. But if Trump has no allies, only transactional relationships, how much can Starmer hope to achieve during this meeting? More