First on CNN: Republican and Democratic former USAID leaders speak out against Trump’s attempts to dismantle agency
CNN
Five former leaders of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) from across Republican and Democratic administrations spoke out against the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle the humanitarian agency.
Five former leaders of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) from across Republican and Democratic administrations spoke out against the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle the humanitarian agency and called on “Congress to swiftly protect the Agency’s statutory role.” In a Wednesday statement obtained first by CNN, the five former administrators said that to “weaken and even destroy the Agency is to the benefit of neither political party and the detriment of all Americans.” They defended the USAID workforce, which has come under vicious rhetorical attack by President Donald Trump and Elon Musk. “While we don’t agree on all issues, we wholeheartedly agree that USAID and America’s foreign assistance programs are vital to our interests, that the career men and women of USAID have served each of us well, and that it is the duty of the Administration and Congress to swiftly protect the Agency’s statutory role,” wrote Samantha Power, Gayle Smith, Andrew Natsios, J. Brian Atwood and Peter McPherson. They served under the Biden, Obama, George W. Bush, Clinton, and Reagan administrations, respectively. “Failure to maintain the global engagement that foreign aid enables, to honor the men and women of our civilian service as we do those in the military, or weaken and even destroy the Agency is to the benefit of neither political party and the detriment of all Americans,” they wrote. The Trump administration has taken a series of steps to dismantle the agency – a move that the Congressional Research Service says is in violation of the law.
As Melania Trump prepares to walk the red carpet at the newly rebranded Kennedy Center Thursday evening, she is proving that a peek behind the curtain of her life isn’t just a historical record, but a multi-million-dollar commodity.
Even after a press conference Thursday morning from the new leader of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, Tom Homan, it’s still not clear exactly how much the mission will change in the aftermath of Alex Pretti’s killing.
As the Trump administration prepared late last year for the US military operation to capture Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, a handful of officials began studying the US approach to oil resources in Iraq following the 2003 US invasion.
Bipartisan senators blocked a massive spending bill Thursday, as eleventh-hour talks continue to avoid a costly partial government shutdown that looms at the week’s end.
After weeks of nationwide protests, Iran’s Supreme Leader ordered a violent crackdown that left thousands dead. President Trump, who had urged demonstrators to remain in the streets, ultimately did not intervene — a decision that now shapes the narrow set of options before him.
As tensions between the US and Cuba rise to the highest levels since the Cuban Missile Crisis, the mood was grim at a recent staff meeting at the US Embassy in Havana.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar launched a Democratic bid for governor on Thursday, pledging to unify her state and move beyond a deadly battle with the federal government over immigration.
White House Border czar Tom Homan will address the press in Minneapolis after being sent to take the reins on the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota. President Donald Trump dispatched Homan following the fatal shooting of two US citizens in Minneapolis. Follow for live updates
Vague descriptions of presidential signing ceremonies, policy meetings and industry executive sit downs — mostly behind closed doors — began peppering President Donald Trump’s public schedule at the end of last year.
Stephen Miller has sought this week to distance himself from the recent fatal shootings in Minneapolis. But Miller has been the architect of Trump’s aggressive deportation push.
President Donald Trump’s sweeping deployment of National Guard troops to several major cities across the United States cost taxpayers approximately $496 million from June through December last year, according to an estimate from the Congressional Budget Office.
President Donald Trump is weighing a major new strike on Iran after preliminary discussions between Washington and Tehran over limiting the country’s nuclear program and ballistic missile production failed to make progress, according to people familiar with the matter.
The White House and Senate leaders are moving closer to a deal to avert a government shutdown but are seeking to resolve final sticking points in eleventh-hour negotiations ahead of Friday’s deadline, according to several sources familiar with the talks.