Author: potus

Barely a week ago, Israelis rallied in Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square, waving placards thanking President Trump and his Middle East envoy for their role in helping secure an initial cease-fire deal in Gaza and getting some hostages freed.Many of them were hoping that Mr. Trump would strong-arm Israel’s long-hesitant prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, into agreeing to negotiate an end to the war with Hamas and get the rest of the hostages released when the two leaders met in Washington on Tuesday. Instead, they woke up to news of Mr. Trump’s fantastical idea of removing the population of roughly two million…

The Trump administration sued the state of Illinois and the city of Chicago on Thursday, alleging that their sanctuary city policies are blocking federal authorities from enforcing immigration laws.The federal lawsuit is the first by President Donald Trump’s Justice Department against states or municipalities that have sanctuary city policies in effect.The 22-page lawsuit, filed one day after a sanctuary jurisdiction directive was issued by U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi on her first day on the job, alleged that the sanctuary policies put in place by Illinois, Chicago and Cook County “obstruct” the federal government from enforcing immigration laws.“The challenged provisions…

Welcome back to Foreign Policy’s Situation Report, where our heads are still spinning from the dizzying pace of the news lately. Alright, here’s what’s on tap for the day: Trump’s incendiary Gaza proposal, migrants sent to Guantánamo, and a possible DeepSeek ban. Negotiations for the second phase of the fragile Gaza cease-fire began this week. There are myriad obstacles to the six-week truce moving forward to the next stage and widespread uncertainty about who will govern postwar Gaza. Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump has made a bold, controversial proposal for the United States to take control of the coastal territory.…

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, speaks with CNBC on May 16, 2023.David A. Grogan | CNBCA staff member on the Department of Government Efficiency advisory group led by tech billionaire Elon Musk resigned Thursday after The Wall Street Journal asked the White House about his connection to a social media account that advocated for racism and eugenics.The DOGE staffer, Marko Elez, earlier in the day had been approved by a federal judge along with another DOGE staff member to have access to the payment system at the U.S. Treasury, but the judge restricted his ability to share data from the…

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted along party lines Thursday to confirm Russell Vought as the next head of the Office of Management and Budget despite fierce pushback from Democrats.Although Democrats have been divided over various Trump nominees, they unified in opposition to Vought.Democrats see Vought as the embodiment of a Trump agenda that they want to build their opposition message around — from his long-standing ties to Project 2025 to his support for slashing spending programs that benefit the middle class to his election denial.But with just 47 Democratic votes in the Senate compared with Republicans’ 53-seat majority, there was little Democrats…

How did Thomas Jefferson, America’s third president, get along with his fellow Founding Fathers? Not all that well, actually. The nation’s Founders may have agreed heartily on the need for liberty, but they rarely agreed on how to run their new country. Seldom just spats or squabbles, their clashes involved big, and enduring, issues about the structure and funding of the federal government, and how big a role it should have in the affairs of individual states.To boot, the Founders didn’t always like each other. Jefferson, in particular, was prone to prickly relationships. While generally mild-mannered and reserved, he had…

Jamieson Greer, President Trump’s nominee to be the next U.S. trade representative, defended the president’s plan to impose tariffs on all imported products and told senators he would work to restructure international trading relationships during his confirmation hearing on Thursday.Mr. Greer, a trade lawyer and former Trump administration official, told the Senate Finance Committee that he believed the United States “should be a country of producers” as well as consumers, and that he would work to open international markets for U.S. farmers and try to “reverse” the deindustrialization of the nation.Mr. Greer said Mr. Trump’s idea of imposing a universal…

U.S. President Donald Trump during the annual National Prayer Breakfast at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Feb. 6, 2025.Kevin Lamarque | ReutersThe Trump administration on Thursday ordered all federal departments and agencies by March 7 to submit lists of employees who received less than “fully successful” job performance ratings over the past three years.The order from the acting director of the Office of Personnel Management said “OPM is developing new performance metrics for evaluating the federal workforce,” and requires agencies to identify any barriers to making “meaningful distinctions” between employees’ job performance relative to one another.The memo also orders…

Minnesota lawmakers settled on a bipartisan power-sharing agreement in the state House, ending a weekslong political stalemate in one of the most closely divided legislative bodies in the country.Under the drafted agreement, Republicans will control the speakership in the House, where the party currently holds a one-seat advantage. The Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party secured assurances that Republicans wouldn’t block one of their members from being seated and would share power if the chamber returns, as expected, to a tie after a special election next month.For the last three weeks, the Minnesota House has been unable to conduct any business, after Democrats denied…

In West Virginia, a nonprofit mental health program for teenage girls is turning to a private donor to help cover its expenses. Three Virginia health clinics have shut their doors. And a network of health centers in rural Mississippi is facing a deficit of $500,000 and may have to scale back services. Across the country, health clinics and nonprofit organizations largely serving rural and low-income patients have found themselves unable to access previously allocated federal funds, as a short-lived government funding freeze has continued to disrupt daily operations for a range of programs. The disruption appears to stem from a vaguely worded, two-page…