Page 42 - Trump Administration

Trump admin prioritising relations with India: Ex-White House official

The Donald Trump administration is prioritising relations with India and recognises that the country has the potential to transform the Indo-Pacific region and is an important partner when it comes to competing effectively with China, a former White House official has said. These remarks were made by Lisa Curtis ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to the White House for a bilateral meeting with President Trump on Thursday. She has served in President Donald Trump's first administration as the senior director for South and Central Asia in the National Security Council between 2017 and 2021. In an online press briefing on Tuesday hosted by Washington DC-based think tank The Centre for a New American Security (CNAS) on the eve of Modi's visit, Curtis said,"Clearly, the Trump administration is prioritising relations with India." "They recognise that India is an important emerging global power and really has the potential to transform the Indo-Pacific region and the world," ..

US foreign aid freeze hampers Cambodia's fight against human trafficking

President Donald Trump's freeze on foreign assistance has dealt a blow to organisations fighting human trafficking and forced labour in Cambodia, where tens of thousands of people are held captive and forced to work in call centres running telephone scams. Hundreds of thousands of people work in remote compounds in countries including Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos where they run online scams targeting people all over the world, including Americans, according to UN estimates. Some are trafficked and lured to the jobs under false pretenses and forced to work against their will. A shelter for people who manage to leave these compounds run by the Catholic charity Caritas recently let some victims go and may stop accepting further victims due to the funding squeeze, two sources with direct knowledge of the situation said. The shelter, in the capital Phnom Penh is the only one not operated by the government which takes in victims of scam compounds, both foreign and Cambodian. The sources ...

4 employees fired over payments reimbursing NY for migrants' hotel costs

Four federal employees were fired Tuesday over payments to reimburse New York City for hotel costs for migrants, Department of Homeland Security officials said. The workers are accused of circumventing leadership to make the transactions, which have been standard for years through a program that helps with costs to care for a surge in migration. However, officials did not give details on how the four had violated any policies. On Monday, President Donald Trump's aide Elon Musk posted on X that his team had discovered payments used to house migrants in luxury hotels with money intended for disaster relief. Musk blasted the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is part of Homeland Security, and called the payments gross insubordination. FEMA's acting administrator, Cameron Hamilton, later said the payments were suspended and the employees who authorized them would be held accountable. The terminated employees were FEMA's chief financial officer, two program analysts and a grant

Elon Musk appears at WH defending DOGE's work but acknowledging mistakes

President Donald Trump's most powerful adviser, Elon Musk, made a rare public appearance at the White House on Tuesday to defend the swift and extensive cuts he's pushing across the federal government while acknowledging there have been mistakes and will be more. Musk stood next to the Resolute Desk with his young son as Trump praised Musk's work with his Department of Government Efficiency to slash spending and as the president signed an executive order to continue downsizing the federal workforce. Despite concerns that he's amassing unaccountable power with little transparency, Musk described himself as an open book. He joked that the scrutiny over his sprawling influence over federal agencies was like a daily proctology exam. Despite Musk's pledge to be maximally transparent, the White House on Tuesday fired the inspector general for the U.S. Agency for International Development, a day after the watchdog's office warned that the DOGE-directed dismantling of USAID had made it all

Airlines urge Trump admin to end Biden's push on paying stranded customers

The proposal being considered would require airlines to pay stranded passengers at least $200, and as much as $775, in cash when a disruption is caused by the carrier

US court won't halt order requiring Trump admin to unfreeze federal cash

A federal appeals court on Tuesday refused to halt a judge's order requiring the Trump administration to release billions of dollars in federal grants and loans. States say the money remains frozen even after a court blocked a sweeping pause on federal funding. The Boston-based 1st US Circuit Court of Appeals turned back the emergency appeal, though it said it expected the lower court judge to act quickly to clarify his order. The Justice Department argued the sweeping lower court order to keep all federal grants and loans flowing was intolerable judicial overreach. That ruling came from U.S. District Court Judge John McConnell in Rhode Island, the first judge to find that the administration had disobeyed a court order. McConnell is presiding over a lawsuit from nearly two dozen states filed after the administration issued a boundary-pushing memo purporting to halt all federals grants and loans, worth trillions of dollars. The plan sparked chaos around the country. The administrat

Trump admin appeals judge's ruling blocking birthright citizenship order

President Donald Trump's administration on Tuesday said it's appealing a Maryland federal judge's ruling blocking the president's executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship for people whose parents are not legally in the country. In a brief filing, the administration's attorneys said they were appealing to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals. It's the second such appeal the administration has sought since Trump's executive order was blocked in court. The government's appeal stems from US District Judge Deborah Boardman's grant of a preliminary injunction last week in a case brought by immigrant rights groups and expectant mothers in Maryland. Boardman said at the time her court would not become the first in the country to endorse the president's order, calling citizenship a precious right granted by the Constitution's 14th Amendment. Tuesday's appeal is the latest volley over the president's birthright citizenship order, which has generated at least nine lawsuits nationwide,

Starlink got $1 mn from USAID over 4 yrs, now Musk is shutting it down

US President Donald Trump has frozen billions in international aid, leaving USAID-funded projects, including Starlink deployments, in limbo

Trump signs order pausing law barring firms from bribing foreign officials

Enacted in 1977, the law bans US-based companies from bribing foreign officials. Over time, the legislation has become a guiding force for how US firms operate in other nations

Trump pushes for plastic straws as he declares paper ones 'don't work'

President Donald Trump is moving to reverse a federal push away from plastic straws, declaring that paper straws don't work. Trump signed an executive order Monday, saying: It's a ridiculous situation. We're going back to plastic straws The move by Trump who has long railed against paper straws, and whose 2019 reelection campaign sold Trump-branded reusable plastic straws for $15 per pack of 10 targets a Biden administration policy to phase out federal purchases of single-use plastics, including straws, from food service operations, events and packaging by 2027, and from all federal operations by 2035. Enjoy your next drink without a straw that disgustingly dissolves in your mouth!!! Trump said on his Truth Social site over the weekend, in a post that declared former President Joe Biden's policy DEAD! Several U.S. states and cities have banned plastic straws because they pollute oceans and waterways and harm marine life. Some restaurants no longer automatically give plastic straw

USAID watchdog warns of lack of oversight of $8.2 bn in unspent aid

The US Agency for International Development has lost almost all ability to track $8.2 billion in unspent humanitarian aid after the Trump administration's foreign funding freeze and idling of staff, a government watchdog warned Monday. The new administration's rapid dismantling of USAID has left oversight of the humanitarian aid largely nonoperational, the inspector general's office for USAID said. That includes the agency's greatly reduced ability to ensure no aid falls into the hands of violent extremist groups or goes astray in conflict zones, the watchdog said. The Trump administration on Monday told The Associated Press that it had taken USAID off the lease of the building, which it had occupied for decades. The eviction comes as a court temporarily blocked a Trump administration order that would have pulled all but a fraction of workers off the job worldwide. USAID's eviction from its headquarters marks the latest in the swift dismantling of the aid agency and its programs by

Could using words like 'female', 'trauma' jeopardise US research grants?

The US National Science Foundation is reviewing thousands of ongoing grants to ensure compliance with executive orders issued by former President Donald Trump

US SC that Trump helped shape could have last word on his executive orders

President Donald Trump will need the Supreme Court, with three justices he appointed, to enable the most aggressive of the many actions he has taken in just the first few weeks of his second White House term. But even a conservative majority with a robust view of presidential power might balk at some of what the president wants to do. The court gave Trump major victories last year that helped clear away potential obstacles to his reelection, postponing his criminal trial in Washington, D.C., then affording immunity from prosecution for official actions. But Trump's first term was marked by significant defeats as well as some wins at the court. "It will be an extraordinary test for the Roberts Court whether it's willing to stand up for constitutional principles it has long embraced, said Michael Waldman, the president of New York University's Brennan Center and the author of a book that is critical of the court. Some of the things we have seen are so blatantly unconstitutional tha

Vance, Musk question authority of courts as Trump's agenda faces pushback

Top Trump administration officials are openly questioning the judiciary's authority to serve as a check on executive power as the new president's sweeping agenda faces growing pushback from the courts. Over the past 24 hours, officials ranging from billionaire Elon Musk to Vice President JD Vance have not only criticized a federal judge's decision early Saturday that blocks Musk's Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department records, but have also attacked the legitimacy of judicial oversight, a fundamental pillar of American democracy, which is based on the separation of powers. If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal. If a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that's also illegal. Judges aren't allowed to control the executive's legitimate power, Vance wrote on X on Sunday morning. That post came hours after Musk said overnight that the judge who rule

Trump admin orders Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to stop work

The Trump administration has ordered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to stop nearly all its work, effectively shutting down an agency that was created to protect consumers after the 2008 financial crisis and subprime mortgage-lending scandal. Russell Vought, the newly installed director of the Office of Management and Budget, directed the CFPB in a Saturday night email confirmed by The Associated Press stop work on proposed rules, to suspend the effective dates on any rules that were finalised but not yet effective, and to stop investigative work and not begin any new investigations. The agency has been a target of conservatives since President Barack Obama pushed to include it in the 2010 financial reform legislation that followed the 2007-2008 financial crisis. The email also ordered the bureau to cease all supervision and examination activity. Since the CFPB is a creation of Congress, it would require a separate act of Congress to formally eliminate it. But the head of

Judge blocks Musk's access to US Treasury systems, orders data destruction

19 Democratic state attorneys general filed a lawsuit with the US Supreme Court against DOGE arguing granting Musk's team access to sensitive govt systems violates constitution and federal laws

Donald Trump meets Japan's PM Shigeru Ishiba as China trade tensions loom

Trump put a 10 per cent tariff on all imports from China in what he called an opening salvo in a clash between the world's two largest economies

Trump admin plans to slash all but fraction of USAID jobs, say officials

The Trump administration presented a plan Thursday to dramatically cut staffing worldwide for US aid projects as part of its dismantling of the US Agency for International Development, leaving fewer than 300 workers out of thousands. Late Thursday, federal workers associations filed suit asking a federal court to stop the shutdown, arguing that President Donald Trump lacks the authority to shut down an agency enshrined in congressional legislation. Two current USAID employees and one former senior USAID official told The Associated Press of the administration's plan, presented to remaining senior officials of the agency Thursday. They spoke on condition of anonymity due to a Trump administration order barring USAID staffers from talking to anyone outside their agency. The plan would leave fewer than 300 staffers on the job out of what are currently 8,000 direct hires and contractors. They, along with an unknown number of 5,000 locally hired international staffers abroad, would run t

Will continue to counteract any scheme aimed at evading US sanctions: Rubio

Rubio emphasised that the seizure of Venezuelan aircraft demonstrates the US's determination to hold Nicolas Maduro's regime accountable for its illegal activities

Protests erupt across cities against Trump's policies, Project 2025, Musk

Demonstrators gathered in cities across the US on Wednesday to protest the Trump administration's early actions, decrying everything from the president's immigration crackdown to his rollback of transgender rights and a proposal to forcibly transfer Palestinians from the Gaza Strip. Protesters in Philadelphia and at state capitols in California, Minnesota, Michigan, Texas, Wisconsin, Indiana and beyond waved signs denouncing President Donald Trump; billionaire Elon Musk, the leader of Trump's new Department of Government Efficiency; and Project 2025, a hard-right playbook for American government and society. I'm appalled by democracy's changes in the last, well, specifically two weeks but it started a long time ago, Margaret Wilmeth said at a protest outside the Statehouse in Columbus, Ohio. So I'm just trying to put a presence into resistance. The protests were a result of a movement that has organized online under the hashtags #buildtheresistance and #50501, which stands for 50 .