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      Kash Patel tells FBI staff to ignore Elon Musk request to list their achievements

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      The new FBI director, Kash Patel, has told his agency employees to hold off on responding to an email from the Donald Trump administration asking them to list their accomplishments in the last week as tech billionaire Elon Musk expands his crusade to slash the federal government’s size.Hundreds of thousands of federal workers had been given little more than 48 hours to explain what they achieved to the office of personnel management (OPM), sparking confusion across key agencies that included the US’s top law enforcement agency.But the FBI director – confirmed by the Senate on Thursday – undercut the request. According to ABC News, the agency was seeking additional guidance from the US justice department on next steps.“FBI personnel may have received an email from OPM requesting information,” Patel’s message read. “The FBI, through the Office of the Director, is in charge of all of our review processes, and will conduct reviews in accordance with FBI procedures. When and if further information is required, we will coordinate the responses. For now, please pause any responses.”Patel’s missive came amid reports on Sunday indicated that he was expected to be named acting head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), a domestic law enforcement agency that – like the FBI – sits within the Department of Justice.Separately, the US attorney John Durham, the top federal prosecutor in the eastern district of New York, also sent a message to his staff to hold off, according to the outlet.“Of course, a majority of our work is law enforcement sensitive (in addition to much classified work), so even assuming this is legitimate, we will need to be careful in how we respond to this inquiry. As noted, the deadline isn’t until 11.59pm on Monday, so we have plenty of time,” Durham wrote in his letter.And the Department of Defense reportedly told employees to pause responding to the OPM message.“The Department of Defense is responsible for reviewing the performance of its personnel and will conduct any review in accordance with its own procedures,” the force’s undersecretary for personnel and readiness said in a message, CNN’s Natasha Bertrand reported on Sunday. “When and if required, the department will coordinate responses to the email you have received from OPM.”Trump’s national health secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, however, evidently did not follow the leads of Patel, Durham and the defense department. He required that his staff comply with the OPM directive, according to a copy of an email reported on by Sam Stein of the Bulwark.“This is a legitimate email,” Kennedy’s agency said in an email to staffers. “Please read and respond per the instructions.”Musk, who has been tasked to ostensibly cut government costs during Donald Trump’s second presidency, telegraphed the extraordinary request on his social media network on Saturday.“Consistent with [Trump’s] instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week,” Musk posted on X, which he owns. “Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.”Shortly afterwards, federal employees – including some judges, court staff and federal prison officials – received a three-line email with this instruction: “Please reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager.”The deadline to reply was listed as Monday at 11.59pm, although the email did not include Musk’s social media threat about those who fail to respond.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe latest unusual directive from Musk’s team has injected a fresh sense of chaos across beleaguered agencies, including the National Weather Service, the state department and the federal court system, as senior officials worked to verify the message’s authenticity on Saturday night and in some cases, instructed their employees not to respond.The president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), which represents 800,000 workers in the federal government, issued a statement saying: “Elon Musk and the Trump Administration have shown their utter disdain for federal employees and the critical services they provide to the American people.”“It is cruel and disrespectful to hundreds of thousands of veterans who are wearing their second uniform in the civil service to be forced to justify their job duties to this out-of-touch, privileged, unelected billionaire who has never performed one single hour of honest public service in his life,” said Everett Kelley, the AFGE president.Thousands of government employees have already been forced out of the federal workforce – either by being fired or offered a buyout – during the first month of Trump’s administration. In fire both new and career workers, the White House and Musk’s so-called department of government efficiency (Doge) have been telling agency leaders to plan for “large-scale reductions in force” and freeze trillions of dollars in federal grant funds.There is no official figure available for the total number of firings or layoffs so far, but the Associated Press has tallied hundreds of thousands of workers who are being affected. Many work outside Washington. The cuts include thousands at the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Defense, Health and Human Services, the Internal Revenue Service and the National Parks Service, among others.Musk on Friday celebrated his new role at a gathering of conservatives by waving a giant chainsaw in the air. He called it “the chainsaw for bureaucracy” and said “waste is pretty much everywhere” in the federal government. More

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      Trump ‘surrendering to the Russians’ on Ukraine, top Democrat says

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      A senior Democratic lawmaker accused Donald Trump of “surrendering to the Russians” on Sunday, as Trump special envoy Steve Witkoff said talks between the US and Russia over Ukraine was “the only way to end the carnage”.In an interview on ABC News’ This Week, Democratic senator Jack Reed, a senior member of the Armed Services Committee, hit out at Trump’s recent verbal attacks on Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy and increased alignment with Russia.“Essentially, this is President Trump surrendering to the Russians,” Reed said. “This is not a statesman or a diplomat. This is just someone who admires Putin, does not believe in the struggle of the Ukrainians and is committed to cozying up to an autocrat.”But senior administration officials sought to side-step accusations that Trump’s re-positioning of US policies on Ukraine, including a possible deal for Ukraine to repay US military and financial support with rare-earth materials, amounted to a capitulation to the Russian position on the war.Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy to the mideast who revealed this week that he had “spent a lot of time with President Putin”, during a recent trip to Moscow, “talking, developing a friendship, a relationship with him”, declined to blame Russia for starting war in Ukraine, calling Ukraine’s ambitions to join Nato “a threat to the Russians”.“The war didn’t need to happen – it was provoked. It doesn’t necessarily mean it was provoked by the Russians,” Witkoff said on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday.“There were all kinds of conversations back then about Ukraine joining Nato”, he said. “That didn’t need to happen. It basically became a threat to the Russians and so we have to deal with that fact.”Witkoff’s remarks come days after he, along with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security adviser Mike Waltz, held talks in Saudi Arabia with Russian officials over re-establishing diplomatic relations and a Russia-Ukraine peace deal.Ukrainian officials said they were not invited to the meeting, and later said they would not accept a peace deal imposed on them. But Ukraine’s position later appeared to shift after Trump called Zelenskyy a “dictator without elections” who “better move fast or he is not going to have a country left”.On Sunday, Zelenskyy said he wanted Trump to be a close partner to Ukraine, not just a mediator between two superpowers, the US and Russia, and would be willing to step down, if it would secure lasting peace for his country.“If, to achieve peace, you really need me to give up my post, I’m ready. I can exchange it for Nato [membership]”, he said. “I don’t plan to stay in power for decades” he added. “But we won’t let Putin stay in power over Ukrainian territories either.”That came as President Putin appointed the chief of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, Kirill Dmitriev, as a special envoy on international economic and investment cooperation with western nations “including the United States of America”. Dmitriev, considered the most US-savvy member of Russia’s elite, was part of the Russian delegation that met with US counterparts in Riyadh.Nato membership for Ukraine has all-but been ruled out by the US negotiators. The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, confirmed to Fox News Sunday that no US troops would be part of any future peace-keeping force in Ukraine and dodged the question over responsibility for starting the bloody three-year conflict.“Does all the finger-pointing and pearl clutching make peace more likely? That’s the enduring question the president is asking. He wants peace, and if that’s the case, you’ve got to stare down the Russians, and Vladimir Putin, and who they’ve chosen to negotiate and have earnest conversations about difficult things,” Hegseth told his former colleague Shannon Bream.“Standing here and saying, ‘You’re good, you’re bad; you’re a dictator, you’re not a dictator; you invaded, you didn’t’, it’s not useful, it’s not productive. So President Trump isn’t getting drawn into that in unnecessary ways and as a result, we’re closer to peace than ever before,” Hegseth added.The White House continued its pushback against claims that it has pivoted to Russia’s position on the war. “President Trump’s peace through strength America First diplomacy effectively deterred Russia in his first term, and this war would have never started if he had never left office,” said the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt in an email to the Wall Street Journal.Leavitt said Trump was “actively pressing both sides to end this brutal conflict once and for all”. More

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      Climate researchers should play the Trump card | Brief letters

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      The obvious solution to American researchers having grants withdrawn for projects containing the word “climate” (Outcry as Trump withdraws support for research that mentions ‘climate’, 21 February) is to rename climate heating “Trump”. We could be amazed that “Trump makes seas rise”, “Trump makes Greenland a green land again” and “Trump makes summer warmer and longer”. Who would oppose that?Mark DavisFrome, Somerset My friend always said that you should never leave a small child and a dog of any size together as it is equivalent to leaving two toddlers together and giving one of them a pair of sharp scissors (The rise of the cane corso: should this popular status dog be banned in the UK?, 19 February).Vanessa RickettGreat Missenden, Buckinghamshire Aged 14, I received an otherwise good school report (Letters, 20 February) that included an observation made by Mrs Tinlin, my art teacher: “Steven is too easily satisfied by a mediocre standard of work.” Her acid comment provided me with the lifelong motivation to pursue a scientific career.Prof Steve ArmesUniversity of Sheffield When I worked in mainstream schools, pupils’ feedback on their teachers was all the rage. One favourite comment: “I hate RE with Mr Grieve as he occasionally manages to teach me something.” Ian GrieveGordon Bennett, Llangollen canal Re the Duchess of Sussex’s latest rebranding effort “As Ever” (Emma Brockes, 19 February), I couldn’t help feeling it was a little too close to “Whatever”.Sarah HallLeamington Spa, Warwickshire More

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      Business leaders must stand up against attacks on diversity and democracy | Letters

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      Stefan Stern’s article on CEOs and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives was very timely, and resonated strongly with me (To the CEOs who’ve joined Trump’s fight against diversity, I say this: you’re making a big mistake, 18 February). We live in times where individualism is preferred over community, and connectedness means being connected with our own group, not with the wider world. Those of us in leadership positions have to show some bravery and stand up for what we believe, in the face of the most challenging attacks western democracy has faced since the second world war.While the application of DEI policies should always be critiqued for effectiveness and improvement, it is clear that the current anti-DEI campaign is mainly designed to protect the historic status quo for those in power and to marginalise others. It is based on ideology, not on any serious analysis or research.My support goes to leaders who demonstrate that they are serious about bringing the world together for the benefit of everyone, not just for their own narrow interests. The institutions of democracy and regulated capitalism, while far from perfect, have achieved a huge amount over the last 80 years. They are now being seriously tested, and it is incumbent on all of us, particularly those of us in leadership positions, to show our mettle.Simon BazalgetteKew, London More

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      ‘Heinous actions’: opposition to Trump, slow to energize, shakes off its slumber

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      On a bright winter’s day this week, a group of protesters fanned out along a palm tree-lined thoroughfare in the picturesque city of Palm Desert to demand that their Republican congressman stand up to Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s slash-and-burn effort to reshape the American government. “You work for us, not Musk!” read one sign. “Remember your oath,” another warned, as a mobile billboard circled nearby, featuring the president and the billionaire tech mogul, with the message: “When he’s snooping through your bank accounts, you dump him.”The group, dozens strong, cheered wildly when the driver of a white Tesla turned the corner and laid on his horn. A smaller contingent of constituents had attempted to secure a meeting with the congressman, Ken Calvert, but found the door of his regional office locked and the blinds drawn.“He needs to hear from us, we the people,” said Colleen Duffy-Smith, 71, who helped organize the lunchtime demonstration as a volunteer with the progressive political advocacy group MoveOn. The semi-retired trial lawyer and college lecturer waved her “Nobody elected Elon” sign as a string of cars honked. She insisted she was not a “professional activist” but had been “called to action” by a real fear that Trump, with Musk by his side, had put the country’s democracy in grave peril.“I have to believe, given the heinous actions that are being signed with a Sharpie on the daily, abridging people’s personal freedoms, their civil rights, our social service programs, our aid abroad, that somebody would have a conscience,” Duffy-Smith said. “And once you start tipping the iceberg, other right-minded people will follow.”Progressive activists and concerned constituents spent the first week-long recess of the new Trump administration pressuring congressional Republicans to stand up to the president, Musk and their potentially unlawful power grabs.At congressional offices, Tesla dealerships and town halls across the country, including in solidly conservative corners of Georgia, Wisconsin and Oregon, voters registered their alarm over Republicans’ proposed cuts to Medicaid, the widening influence of Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” and the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle or entirely eliminate federal agencies that Americans rely on for essential services.“They scoff at the constitution,” said Kathleen Hirschi, 74, who wore a knitted pink pussy hat that became a symbol of an anti-Trump resistance movement during his first term to the Palm Desert protest. She carried the same sign she made for the Women’s March eight years ago, when the wave of discontent helped fuel Democratic victories in the 2018 midterms. Calvert’s office did not respond to a request for comment.One month into the new Trump administration, the opposition looks different than it did during his first term.But activists say the week of protests signals a growing movement. “We’re seeing a lot of the energy that happened in 2016 and 2020 really coming back as people are feeling pretty incensed by the actions of Musk and Trump,” said Ravi Mangla, the national press secretary for the Working Families Party (WFP). “If the threat did not feel real and urgent at election time or earlier this year, it seems to be feeling very urgent to people now.”The group helped organize several protests this week, including a Wednesday action with parents, educators and students at a congressional office in Republican Mike Lawler’s suburban New York district.Among those who braved the frigid temperatures to protest a Trump administration proposal to abolish the Department of Education was Melita Corselli, 38, a mother of four whose children rely on special education services.“The people who rely the heaviest on these services are your workforce – the people that are pumping your gas at the gas station in your town but who are barely able to afford to live in your town,” she said, describing her message to the congressman. “Our kids deserve the same education as your kids.”With few exceptions, Republicans have remained silent as the president moved quickly to purge critics from the government, fire federal prosecutors, upend democratic alliances and assert authority over Congress’s spending power. And despite a growing backlash, they have mostly voiced support for Musk’s Doge and its purported goal of rooting out waste in the federal government.View image in fullscreenLawsuits brought by Democratic attorneys general as well as unions and legal groups that formed during Trump’s first administration have stalled some of the actions taken by the administration and Doge. While congressional Democrats, out of power and still reeling from their losses in November, face mounting pressure to use all available leverage – including the possibility of a government shutdown – to derail the president’s agenda.Musk has become something of a supervillain to liberals, many of whom spent the better part of the last decade powering the opposition – or the “resistance” – to Trump. Doge’s aggressive government cuts – and its access to sensitive taxpayer data – have triggered a flood of lawsuits and nationwide protests, with activists and Democrats accusing Musk of orchestrating a “hostile” and “illegal” takeover of the federal government.“The idea of somebody who was not elected, who does not have a mandate to lead, who also happens to be the richest man on earth, taking unilateral actions outside of normal processes, feels so deeply disconnected with our values, with just basic democratic principles, that it, I think, is setting off an alarm in a lot of people’s minds,” Mangla said.In a joint interview with Fox News’s Sean Hannity, Trump praised Doge’s efforts while Musk brushed aside his critics: “They wouldn’t be complaining so much if we weren’t doing something useful.” Onstage at the Conservative Political Action Conference this week, Musk celebrated with a “chainsaw for bureaucracy”.But new polling suggests many Americans aren’t as pleased. A Washington Post-Ipsos poll found that twice as many respondents disapproved as approved of Musk shutting down federal agencies that he deems unnecessary. Meanwhile, a CNN survey found that 62% of respondents – including 47% of Republicans – believe Trump has not done enough to address many Americans’ top concern: the high cost of everyday goods.In Georgia this week, Trump supporters said they understand it may take the president time to lower prices, but they’re still struggling to pay for basic necessities like eggs and milk.Democrats sense an opening to channel that frustration.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn California, Democrat Christina Gagnier, a former school board member, recently joined the race to take on Republican congresswoman Young Kim in a closely watched Orange county district. On the campaign trail, Gagnier said she has heard many stories from business owners and parents who “feel bullied” by the administration’s threats to impose tariffs and enact sweeping cuts.“They feel like they’re not being respected,” she said. “These are real things that are happening to real people. They are happening to our neighbors. This isn’t just something happening in DC.”In a statement, Sam Oh, Kim’s political consultant, said the congresswoman has “deep roots in the community and has always been focused on meeting and listening to her constituents, fighting for her district, and delivering results”.Fury over Trump and Musk’s actions boiled over not only in liberal enclaves and House battlegrounds that will probably decide control of Congress, but also in conservative places that backed the president in 2024.In Georgia, congressman Rich McCormick may have expected a friendly reception at a town hall in his heavily Republican district. But the congressman was repeatedly booed and jeered by attendees furious over Musk’s merciless approach to the federal government but also over Trump’s baseless assertion that Ukraine started the war with Russia and the president’s social media post likening himself to a “king”.“We are all freaking pissed off about this,” a constituent told McCormick. Another attendee concerned by the administration’s dismissal of hundreds of workers at the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention asked: “Why is a supposedly conservative party taking such a radical and extremist and sloppy approach to this?”“I came here to have a discussion,” McCormick said as the tense session came to a close. “I think a lot of you didn’t come here in good faith to have a discussion. You came here to yell at me and to boo me.”Many House Democrats held in-person events to address the impacts of the administration’s cuts and the Republican’s government funding proposal. On Tuesday night, a town hall hosted by Democratic congressman Eugene Vindman of Virginia drew a large crowd that included federal workers who said they were living in fear that their job might be eliminated next.Congressman Mark DeSaulnier, a Democrat of California, scheduled a second town hall in light of the “overwhelming response” to his first one. And congressman Jim McGovern, a Democrat of Massachusetts, said 500 people attended his “Coffee with your Congressman” last week, “maybe the most I’ve ever had”. In Omaha and Iowa City, Vermont senator Bernie Sanders rallied thousands as part of his “fight oligarchy” tour.Sanders hit the road after joining Senate Democrats in an all-night “vote-a-rama” to protest against the Republicans’ budget bill. The plan, a blueprint for enacting key pieces of the president’s immigration and energy agenda, passed on a near-total party-line vote early on Friday morning. But it remains a backup option if the House is unable to advance Trump’s preference for “one big, beautiful bill” that “implements my FULL America First Agenda”.To pay for the House version, Republican negotiators are considering steep cuts to social services, and particularly Medicaid, the government health insurance program for poor and disabled Americans that Trump recently said would not be “touched”. With only a razor-thin majority in the House, GOP leaders can hardly afford any defections.Aware of the math, Keeley Level, 64, and her dog Prudence joined the Palm Desert protest on Thursday in hopes that she might persuade Calvert, the Republican congressman, to oppose any cuts to Medicaid, or California’s version, Medi-Cal.For more than two decades, Level has cared for her husband, who suffered a brain injury that left him partially paralyzed. Without federal assistance, she worries: “I don’t know how I’m going to be able to afford his prescriptions.”She also fears for the country. The midterm elections won’t take place until 2026. By then she wonders what will be spared of the federal government from Trump and Musk’s wrecking ball?“I’m hoping that, before it’s too late, people wake up,” she said. More

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      Chain, chain, chain: political theatre confirms Elon Musk’s Maga hero status at jubilant CPAC

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      What do you give the man who has everything? A ballroom full of cheering conservative activists found out this week when Elon Musk was presented with a chainsaw by Argentina’s president, Javier Milei, who has used the power tool as a symbol of his push to impose fiscal discipline.Wearing sunglasses, a black Maga baseball cap and a gold necklace, Musk giddily wielded the chainsaw up and down the stage. “This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy!” he declared. Members of the audience shouted: “We love you!” Musk replied: “I love you guys, too!” And he quipped: “I am become meme.”It was a wild political theatre that confirmed Musk’s status as a new hero of the Maga movement. The head of Tesla and SpaceX had been fully embraced by the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), long a window on the soul of the Republican party and, in recent years, a purity test among Donald Trump’s support base.This year’s conference at National Harbor in Maryland was a four-day celebration not only of Trump’s return to the White House but the rise of global rightwing populism. Emboldened, exultant and convinced that their momentum is unstoppable, speakers put less emphasis than usual on baiting liberals and more on spreading the Maga gospel around the world.Attendees were united in praise for the shock-and-awe approach of Trump’s first month in office, which JD Vance described as “a hell of a lot of fun”. Brett Hawkes, 69, from Rockville, Maryland, hailed the “blitzkrieg”; Christopher Cultraro, 19, from Easton, Pennsylvania, called it “phenomenal”; Adelbert Walker, 72, from Petersburg, Virginia, said: “He’s keeping his promises. He’s going about his agenda at warp speed.”View image in fullscreenThe enthusiasm extended to Musk and his so-called “department of government efficiency”, or Doge, which has slashed the federal government and fired thousands of workers in ways that have been challenged in the courts.Musk, the world’s richest man, who has blocked food and medicine for the world’s poorest people by gutting the agency responsible for delivering US aid, told CPAC: “We’re trying to get good things done, but also, like, you know, have a good time doing it and, you know, and have, like, a sense of humour.”Republicans including Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary; Pam Bondi, the attorney general; Mike Johnson, the House of Representatives speaker; Rick Scott, the Florida senator; and Eric Schmitt, the Missouri senator all took the stage to heap praise on Musk and Doge.Rightwing figures from overseas got in on the act. Britain’s Nigel Farage called Musk a “hero of free speech” and lauded the “amazing Doge project” a month after the tech billionaire suggested that Farage should stand down as leader of the Reform UK party.Liz Truss, the former British prime minister, indicated that Musk is now part of the Maga brand when she declared: “We want a Trump revolution in Britain. We want to flood the zone. We want Elon and his nerd-army of Musk rats examining the British deep state.”View image in fullscreenBut across America, there are already stirrings of a backlash against Musk’s “nerd army” of mostly young male engineers with no government experience. Members of Congress were this week confronted by raucous town halls in which citizens complained about Doge’s chaotic, indiscriminate and illegal tactics.Some 71% of people agree that the very wealthy have too much influence on the White House, according to a Reuters/ Ipsos survey, while 58% are concerned that programmes such as social security retirement payments and student aid could be delayed by Musk’s campaign.CPAC attendee Ashlie Hightower, who lives in northern Virginia, acknowledged that workers there are suffering the consequences of Musk’s cuts. She said: “Many people have been affected because it’s a huge area that mostly works for government or has some connection to government. I understand that and it might be painful at first.”Even so, Hightower approves of Doge’s actions, saying: “What they have discovered is that we can actually get out of debt if we rein in some of this nonsense spending. Right now they’ve found it’s equal to about 20 or 30% of our GDP. It incredible. I feel rejuvenated.”Others joined in the plaudits for Musk. Matthew Kochman, 76, a property broker from New York, said: “He’s a genius. What’s wrong with that? He could put people on Mars and the federal government is so effed up it’s not funny. He can do nothing but help. If you find $1 of waste, you’re doing a good thing. If you find $500bn, how can anybody possibly find fault with that unless you’re a moron?”Kochman, who drives a vehicle that he calls a “Trumpmobile”, is equally impressed by the president, saying: “He’s going Trump speed, as they say, and he’s not going to waste any time. He’s doing everything that he promised to do and he’s following the agenda to try and bring the country back from chaos and failure.”One big beast of CPAC is more ambivalent about South African-born Musk, however. Steve Bannon, a rightwing populist and former Trump adviser, regards Musk’s oligarch status and pro-immigration views with deep suspicion. He told the conservative website UnHerd: “Musk is a parasitic illegal immigrant. He wants to impose his freak experiment and play-act as God without any respect for the country’s history, tradition or values.”But in his CPAC speech, Bannon welcomed Doge’s assault on the administrative state and even dubbed Musk “Superman”. And on Friday, a long queue of people waiting to take selfies with Bannon included plenty of Musk admirers content to square that circle.Michael Stearns, 30, who works at a golf course near Nashville, Tennessee, was wearing a Nasa sweater and said: “I’m a big Steve Bannon fan. I love that guy. One of my heroes. I support Elon Musk and I Iove Doge. He’s doing the right thing cutting out all the waste and abuse. I support both guys.”Bannon, meanwhile, became embroiled in controversy of his own. As he called on the audience to “fight, fight, fight”, he briefly held out a stiff arm in what appeared to be a fascist salute reminiscent of one made by Musk on inauguration day. In response, France’s far-right leader, Jordan Bardella, cancelled his CPAC appearance because “one of the speakers out of provocation allowed himself a gesture alluding to Nazi ideology”.View image in fullscreenBannon also used his typically fiery speech to float the idea of a constitutional change that would allow Trump to run for a third term as president, saying: “We want Trump in 28.”The case was also put at CPAC by Third Term Project, a thinktank exploring the case for reconsidering presidential term limits. Wearing a “Trump 2028” sticker, Amber Harris of Third Term Project said: “You need more than four years to enact some of the things he wants to do.”However, most CPAC attendees interviewed by the Guardian opposed the idea. Nina Golden, 47, from Raleigh, North Carolina, believes Trump is exceeding her expectations and is “100%” supportive of Musk but said: “I believe in the constitution as it is and it should stay that way.”Bannon, who served four months in prison last year for defying a subpoena in the congressional investigation into the January 6 insurrection, hosted his influential War Room podcast from CPAC. He interviewed a group who had been imprisoned for attacking the US Capitol only to be pardoned by Trump on his first day in office.The “J6ers” received a heroes’ welcome at CPAC. Richard Barnett, who had put his feet on the House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s desk and was sentenced to more than four years in prison, revelled in his newfound celebrity by showing off his “certificate of pardon” from Trump.The 64-year-old retired firefighter, wearing a sweater emblazoned with “J6” and “political prisoner”, said of the president’s first month in office: “Awesome, baby. Keep it coming.”Stewart Rhodes, the founder and leader of the far-right Oath Keepers, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy but had his 18-year sentence commuted, denied that his group had acted violently on behalf of Trump.Sporting a Trump tattoo on his arm, Rhodes, 59, from Granbury, Texas, said he was “very happy” with Trump, adding: “I got no complaints. His cabinet is fantastic from what I’ve seen so far. I love Doge. Let the sunlight come in and show all the corruption.”View image in fullscreenIn past years, CPAC has thrived on opposition to the status quo and targeted Democrats such as Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden with crude insults. But with Trump installed in the White House, and Democrats weak and leaderless, targets were less obvious or conspicuous.Kari Lake, Trump’s nominee to be director of the Voice of America media outlet, observed: “For the past four years, we have been in a fight-fight-fight mode and now we are in a win-win-win mode.” Sebastian Gorka, a White House adviser, said he had expected anti-Trump protests and “pink pussy hat insanity” but “where are they? We crushed them.”Instead, energy was channeled into Trump worship. People sported Maga caps and other regalia; some even wore giant Trump face masks. Sparkly jackets were on sale with slogans such as “Make fries great again” and “Gulf of America”.The swagger also fuelled CPAC’s expansionist ambitions. The conference was addressed by far-right figures from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Hungary, Japan, North Macedonia, Poland, Slovakia and South Korea. Many saw Trump as a blueprint for nationalist populism in their own countries; some adopted the slogan “Make Europe great again”.Vance criticised Germany’s free-speech laws, accused European leaders of failing to control immigration and defended Trump’s negotiations with Vladimir Putin over the war in Ukraine.As for Musk, he waved around the chainsaw – which had the words “Long live freedom, damn it” written along its blade – after an interview in which he pushed falsehoods about Europe jailing people for memes, astronauts being left in space for political reasons and Democrats having an electoral incentive “to maximise the number of illegals in the country”.Finally, he was asked to paint a picture of the inside of the mind a genius. “My mind is a storm,” Musk replied. “It’s a storm.” More

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      ‘Starmer’s big moment’: can PM persuade Trump not to give in to Putin?

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      When Keir Starmer is advised on how to handle his crucial meeting with Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday, he will be told by advisers from Downing Street and the Foreign Office to be very clear on his main points and, above all, to be brief.“Trump gets bored very easily,” said one well-placed Whitehall source with knowledge of the president’s attention span. “When he loses interest and thinks someone is being boring, he just tunes out. He doesn’t like [the French president, Emmanuel] Macron partly because Macron talks too much and tries to lecture him.”Starmer will also be advised to flatter Trump when he can, to say that everyone is so grateful that he has focused the world’s attention on the need for peace between Russia and Ukraine. But to flatter subtly. And not to lay it on too thick.View image in fullscreenOne – unconfirmed – story from Theresa May’s first visit to see Trump at the White House in 2017 is doing the rounds in Whitehall again before the Starmer trip, and is being used as a cautionary tale for the current prime minister.“When May first went to see Trump, she was told she had to congratulate him on lots of things,” said one source.“So she rushed over to him and congratulated him on his new cabinet appointments, saying: ‘You’ve appointed a great team, Donald.’“At which point he said: ‘Oh thank you so much, Theresa – who do you particularly like among them?’ Which left her a bit stumped, so she just said: ‘Oh, well, all of them, Donald.’”The lesson being that too much flattery can get you into trouble if you do not do your homework.Dealing with, and responding to, Trump in his self-appointed role as ultra-provocative would-be global peacemaker is requiring other leaders the world over to perform near-impossible balancing acts when framing their responses.View image in fullscreenMany of the US president’s statements on the Ukraine conflict, such as those suggesting that Ukraine was responsible for the Russian invasion and that its president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is a dictator, are regarded by European governments, including the British one, as patently ludicrous.Yet at the same time, no one can say so for fear of what the man who said those things will do next and what revenge he might wreak in return.Peter Ricketts, former UK ambassador to Paris, said that Starmer should himself tune out from Trump’s rhetoric. “He should focus not on what Trump says but what he does. He needs to get into Trump’s mind that a rushed deal with [Vladimir] Putin over the heads of Ukraine/Europe is bound to be a deal that serves Putin’s interests, and that Putin would be seen as strong and Trump weak.”Another senior UK source agreed, saying that Starmer needed to convey to Trump that the only thing that would stop him earning his place in history would be by getting a great peace that was not seen as a “fair deal”. “He needs to make Trump think that his success rests on not giving in to Putin, because if he does he will himself seem weak,” said the source.While cross-continental mud-slinging has intensified, UK political leaders have had a painfully difficult few days trying to adapt to Trump’s barrage of remarks, the latest of which was to say neither Starmer nor Macron – who will meet Trump at the White House on Monday – have done anything of note to sort out the war in Ukraine.Even Nigel Farage, who prides himself on his closeness to Trump and the Republicans, has had to equivocate and throw up a cloud of deliberate confusion around his own responses, so he can claim to be both distancing himself from the US president and validating his interventions at the same time.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionSpeaking to Sky News on Thursday about Trump’s statement that Zelenskyy was a dictator, Farage said: “Take everything Trump says truthfully, but not literally.”The Reform UK leader then tried to argue that Trump “doesn’t literally say Ukraine started the war”, and was instead focused on bringing peace. When, however, it was put to Farage that Trump had told Zelenskyy: “You should have never started it [the conflict],” Farage then replied: “OK, he did. If you’re happy.”With UK public opinion overwhelmingly critical of Trump’s comments on Zelenskyy and Ukraine – today’s Opinium poll for the Observer shows the Trump administration has a -40% approval rating on Ukraine compared with -2% for the previous Biden administration – the Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch, also felt the need to part company with Trump, tweeting on X that “President Zelenskyy is not a dictator”, though she backed him over the need for European nations to increase defence spending.About 61% of Tory voters disagree with the Trump administration on Ukraine, so for Badenoch not to express some reservations over the US president could have left her in big trouble in her own party.The Liberal Democrats, meanwhile, looking for more seats and votes behind the “blue wall” have spotted an opportunity as the anti-Trump party. Calum Miller, their foreign affairs spokesman, said the Lib Dems had a duty to stand up for people in his constituency and others who flew Ukrainian flags in their villages and had taken in Ukrainian refugees.“It is our role to be their voice in parliament,” he said “to say that Trump is a narcissist who is not to be trusted.”Government sources suggested on Saturday nightthat Starmer would probably try to speak to Macron on Sunday before the French president flies to Washington, so as to agree the broad outlines of a European position.But another senior source said the last thing Starmer should do when he meets Trump is try to speak for the Europeans or represent a European position.“Trump has made clear what he thinks of European leaders [last]week. Starmer needs to be his own man, to say the UK was the first country to offer to send troops to Ukraine and do its bit.“If he does that, and succeeds in persuading Trump that it will look terrible to the world if he allows Putin just to get everything he wants, it could be a big moment for him.” More

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      Party of one: Donald Trump’s 75 minutes at CPAC talking about himself

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      God save the king. Drunk on power, Donald Trump spent Saturday afternoon before adoring fans, boasting of his victories, taunting his enemies and casting himself as America’s absolute monarch, supreme leader and divine emperor rolled into one.Trump’s appearance at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the National Harbor in Maryland began with country singer Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA and raucous cheers in a crowded ballroom that included January 6 insurrectionists.Seventy-five minutes later, it concluded with the US president standing between two stars-and-stripes flags, pumping his fists and swaying to the Village People’s anthem YMCA.What emerged in between was a man who has never felt so sure of himself, so contemptuous of his foes and so convinced of his righteous mission to make America great again, even if it means breaking china, cracking skulls and leaving global destruction in his wake.As the title of Michael Wolff’s new book puts it, last November’s election was All or Nothing. Defeat meant ruin, disgrace and prison. Victory meant what Trump’s cheerleaders like to call the greatest comeback in political history. It also meant vengeance against his perceived tormentors in the justice department, Democratic party and media. As the martyr of Mar-a-Lago put it at CPAC two years ago: “I am your retribution.”The message he took from that win over Kamala Harris was that he had broken his opponents, broken the checks and balances and broken reality itself. He was invincible.“Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world/Like a Colossus,” Cassius tells Brutus in William Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, “and we petty men/Walk under his huge legs and peep about/To find ourselves dishonorable graves.”This was the 15th time Trump has addressed CPAC, the biggest annual gathering of conservative activists. When he was out of power, his freewheeling speeches could be dismissed as the ravings – or “weavings” – of a madman. Even during his first term, his extremist rhetoric came with some expectation that the democratic guardrails would hold.But as America and the world have discovered during his first month back in the White House, Trump is unbound, unhinged and looking for blood. He took the stage at CPAC brimming with confidence and basking in chants of: “USA! USA!”The 78-year-old Florida resident describes his presidency as a game of golf in which he can match Arnold Palmer all the way: “If you golf, when you sink that first four-footer at the first hole, it gives you confidence, and then the next hole you sink another and now you go on to that third hole and by the time you get to the fifth hole you feel you can’t miss.”To be here was to live in a world turned upside down. Trump said: “For years, Washington was controlled by a sinister group of radical-left Marxists, war-mongers and corrupt special interests,” which would have been news to Karl Marx.But then, on 5 November, “we stood up to all the corrupt forces that were destroying America. We took away their power. We took away their confidence … and we took back our country.”Trump should in fact have won by a bigger margin, he claimed without evidence, but Democrats “cheated like hell” only to find his victory was “too big to rig”. Later, he revisited his 2020 loss, too, assuring conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell that “now it’s OK” to say the election was “rigged”.The president bragged about pardoning hundreds convicted of crimes in the January 6 attack on the US Capitol, describing them as “political prisoners” and “J6 hostages”. Some of them were in the room, chanting “J6! J6!” and shouting “Thank you!”. They have gone from prison cells to being CPAC’s newest celebrities.Trump also boasted about killing diversity, equity and inclusion programmes, denying the identity of transgender people, yanking the US out of the Paris climate agreement and sending undocumented immigrants (“monsters”) to Guantánamo Bay. He hailed Elon Musk’s evisceration of the federal government, including the international aid agency USAid.Each time, the crowd cheered.Up until then, CPAC had felt toned down this year, with few if any chants of “Lock her up!” or T-shirts portraying Joe Biden as Satan. After all, Republicans won and there is no obvious Democratic leader to target. Still, that did not prevent Trump unleashing the usual insults and lies at his opponents.View image in fullscreenView image in fullscreen“Kamala,” he said, eliciting boos. “I haven’t heard that name in a while. Nobody ever knows her last name … But think of it, I was beating Joe badly and they changed him. Think of it, I’m the only one who had to beat two people.”The Biden presidency already feels like a millennium ago but Trump did not want his audience to forget, asking whether they preferred the nickname “Crooked Joe” or “Sleepy Joe”. For the record, “Crooked Joe” won.Trump mocked Biden’s golf handicap and bathing suit and offered a baseless opinion: “He was a sleepy, crooked guy. Terrible, terrible president. He was the worst president in the history of our country … Every single thing he touched turned to shit.”Such magnanimity!He took aim at the Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren over her past claims of Native American ancestry, recycling the “Pocahontas” nickname he once gave her and jibing: “She does not like me. She’s a very angry person. You notice the way she is? She’s always screaming. She’s crazy.”And don’t get Trump started on liberal TV host Rachel Maddow: “I watch this MSNBC – which is a threat to democracy,actually – they’re stone-cold mean. But they’re stuttering. They’re all screwed up. They’re all mentally screwed up. They don’t know what – their ratings have gone down the tubes. I don’t even talk about CNN, CNN’s sort of like, I don’t know, they’re pathetic, actually.“This Rachel Maddow, what does she have? She’s got nothing. Nothing. She took a sabbatical where she worked one day a week. They paid her a lot of money. She gets no ratings. I should go against her in the ratings because, I’ll tell you, she gets no ratings. All she does is talk about Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump. All different subjects: Trump this, Trump, that. But these people are really, I mean, they lie. They shouldn’t be allowed to lie every night. They are really a vehicle of the Democrat party.”Trump loves the rightwing media that populates CPAC, however. He smugly quoted conservative host Bill O’Reilly as saying that after four weeks Trump had become “the greatest president ever in the history of our country”, beating George Washington.O’Reilly was hardly alone this week in building an image of Trump as a superman who thinks sleep is for wimps. How do they love him? Let us count the ways.Dan Scavino, a Trump golf caddie turned White House deputy chief of staff, described his boss as “the greatest host in America”. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a former White House press secretary, said Trump is “maybe the most popular human on the face of the planet right now”, adding: “He doesn’t sleep. He doesn’t expect anyone to sleep either. He’s twice my age and has twice my energy.”Mike Waltz, the national security adviser, confirmed that Trump works 21 or 22 hours a day and, along with the interior secretary, Doug Burgum, confidently forecast that Trump would receive the Nobel peace prize for his capitulation to Vladimir Putin masterful negotiations with Russia and Ukraine.Border tsar Tom Homan called Trump “the greatest president of my lifetime”. Elise Stefanik, the US ambassador-designate to the United Nations, went one better by calling him “the greatest president in the history of our country”.And the homeland security secretary, Kristi Noem, whose home state of South Dakota includes the ripe-for-addition Mount Rushmore, topped them all by just coming out with it: “Our president wakes up every day knowing he’s the greatest president of all time.”When someone wakes up knowing that, when their self-aggrandisement is so monumental, they are like a golfer who believes they will never miss. But as Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine put it, Trump is living inside a disinformation bubble. The iron law of politics is that all bubbles burst. More