U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during an executive order signing in the Oval Office at the White House on Feb. 11, 2025, in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Suddenly veering from his declaration a week ago, President Donald Trump on Wednesday paused his sweeping “liberation day” tariffs for 90 days on countries he’s said are willing to negotiate new trade deals.

Stocks surged upon his announcement after days of wrecked markets erased trillions of dollars from investor portfolios. The Nasdaq index saw the biggest single-day hike in five years as of Wednesday afternoon, according to financial media.

The pause will not extend to China, which he announced will see a further hike to 125% on imports to the U.S. “effective immediately,” he said.

“At some point, hopefully in the near future, China will realize that the days of ripping off the U.S.A., and other Countries, is no longer sustainable or acceptable,” Trump posted on Truth Social just after 1 p.m. Eastern.

The president said more than 75 countries have reached out to negotiate, and that because “these Countries have not, at my strong suggestion, retaliated in any way, shape, or form against the United States” he is dropping their tariff rates to a universal 10%.

Several rounds of tariffs the president enacted in March will remain in place, including 25% import taxes on foreign steel, aluminum and cars — charges which sparked the European Union to approve retaliatory tariffs Wednesday.

Canada and Mexico, which both face up to 25% tariffs on a sizable chunk of products, will continue to see the levies but will not face an additional 10% stacked on top.

Trump’s 25% tax on imports from any country that buys oil from Venezuela also remains unchanged.

Americans ‘yippy’

The president told the press outside the White House Wednesday afternoon that he saw people getting “queasy” and “yippy” about the market turmoil.

“You have to have flexibility,” Trump said about his decision to pause the levies.

The tariffs, which the administration maintains are “reciprocal,” though under a formula disputed by economists, went into effect just after midnight Wednesday.

When asked by reporters if he’ll consider exempting any large companies that lost big in the market crash from paying the baseline 10% import tax, Trump said he’ll rely on his “instinct” to make the decision.

The announcement came just hours after the president posted on social media “BE COOL!” and “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT.”

Trump’s sudden pause also came just after U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer defended the steep tariffs to nervous lawmakers for the second day in a row.

Administration officials quickly claimed the sudden pause was part of Trump’s strategy all along — despite several saying over the last few days that the tariffs were here to stay and that Americans needed to have patience as the market crashed. More than half of Americans are invested in the stock market.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller characterized Trump’s about-face on tariffs as “the greatest economic master strategy from an American President in history,” in a post on X Wednesday afternoon.

A rollercoaster few days

Trump’s tariff plan sent shock waves through the economy after he unveiled import taxes on trading partners and allies, including 46% for Vietnam, a major tech exporter to the U.S.

The administration calculated the steep tariff rates based on each country’s trade deficit with the U.S.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters outside the White House Wednesday that the tariffs were “a successful negotiating strategy.”

“As I told everyone a week ago in this very spot: Do not retaliate, and you will be rewarded,” Bessent said.

The administration met with Vietnamese officials Wednesday, according to Bessent, and meetings with Japan, South Korea and India are expected shortly, though he didn’t provide details.

When asked by reporters if Trump’s tariff policy was mainly now focused on China, Bessent said “it’s about bad actors” but added that China “is the biggest source of the U.S. trade problems.”

The trade war — a term Bessent rejected — between the U.S. and China expanded rapidly overnight Wednesday when Chinese officials raised levies on U.S. goods to 84%.

“The US’s practice of escalating tariffs on China is a mistake on top of a mistake, which seriously infringes on China’s legitimate rights and interests and seriously damages the rules-based multilateral trading system,” according to a translation of a statement Wednesday from the country’s State Council Tariff Commission.

Pressure from lawmakers

A Trump campaign account posted on X a screenshot of the president’s morning message urging people to buy stocks and asked “Did the Panicans listen to @POTUS’s advice this morning?”

“Panicans” is a term Trump used recently to mock lawmakers who openly criticized losses to retirement funds and questioned how the tariffs would affect small businesses in their districts.

Republican Sens. Thom Tillis of North Carolina and James Lankford of Oklahoma grilled Greer Tuesday during a hearing before the Senate Committee on Finance.

“Whose throat do I get to choke if this proves wrong?” Tillis asked.

Greer faced questions Wednesday morning from the House Committee on Ways and Means, where Chair Jason Smith of Missouri cheered on Trump’s choice to unleash tariffs on almost every country at once.

Rep. Richard Neal, the panel’s top Democrat, told Greer that his office has been “inundated” with calls from constituents worried about their 401k funds.

“They don’t know what to expect, trillions of dollars of market value being lost even as we meet,” the Massachusetts Democrat said at the morning hearing before Trump called off the tariffs.   

Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff said Wednesday that he’s asking the White House if any insider trading occurred while Trump was “creating giant market fluctuations with his on-again, off-again tariffs.”

“Who in the administration knew about Trump’s latest tariff flip flop ahead of time? Did anyone buy or sell  stocks, and profit at the public’s expense?” Schiff wrote on X.

Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington and Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa introduced a bipartisan bill to claw back Congressional power over trade decisions from the president, who currently has near-unilateral authority.

GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska introduced companion legislation in the House.

While Trump imposed some of his tariffs — including those on foreign steel and aluminum — under a national security provision, he levied the charges on Canadian and Mexican imports as well as his recent worldwide tariffs by declaring a national emergency. 

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks during the daily press briefing in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House on March 26, 2025 in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — A federal judge sided with The Associated Press Tuesday in a case alleging the Trump administration denied the wire service access to restricted spaces in the White House due to its editorial decision to continue using the term “Gulf of Mexico” rather than “Gulf of America.”

District Judge Trevor McFadden for the District of Columbia granted the AP a preliminary injunction on the merits of the case. McFadden wrote that the news outlet is likely to succeed on its First Amendment and retaliation arguments in further court proceedings, and that the White House’s action has caused irreparable harm to the news agency.

The legal battle tests decades of established press access for the AP in the White House, which was curtailed after President Donald Trump declared the term “Gulf of America” should be used rather than “Gulf of Mexico.”

The injunction orders the White House to immediately rescind the denial of AP’s access to the Oval Office, Air Force One and “other limited spaces based on the AP’s viewpoint when such spaces are made open to other members of the White House press pool.”

The order also states the administration’s press team “shall immediately rescind their viewpoint-based denial of the AP’s access to events open to all credentialed White House journalists.”

The mandate will remain in place while the case is carried out at the district court level, though the White House is likely to appeal the case.

In his 41-page order, McFadden, appointed by Trump in his first term in office, stated the analysis of the AP’s arguments is “straightforward” and that ramifications for the organization have “undoubtedly been adverse.”

“The AP made an editorial decision to continue using ‘Gulf of Mexico’ in its Stylebook. The Government responded publicly with displeasure and explicitly announced it was curtailing the AP’s access to the Oval Office, press pool events, and East Room activities. If there is a benign explanation for the Government’s decision, it has not been presented here,” McFadden wrote.

The AP and the Trump administration presented evidence to McFadden during a March 27 hearing.

The judge contends in his order that the AP clearly showed that its print reporters “have been systematically and almost completely excluded from events open to the broader White House press corps since February 13, while its photographers have suffered curtailed access.”

“The Government declined to offer witnesses in rebuttal. The Court credits the detailed timeline that the AP built through testimony and evidence,” he wrote.

The White House did not immediately respond for comment.

Trump and administration officials also did not immediately react on social media.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer testifies before the Senate Finance Committee in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on April 8, 2025, in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer defended the Trump administration’s sweeping tariffs Tuesday as he faced senators from both sides of the aisle who relayed their constituents’ economic anxiety.

Democratic and Republican senators alike questioned how the policy will affect their states’ industries in the coming months.

“Whose throat do I get to choke if this proves wrong?” asked GOP Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina.

Greer told members of the Senate Committee on Finance that President Donald Trump’s national emergency declaration to trigger steep worldwide import taxes is “common sense.”

“Our trade deficit, driven by these non-reciprocal conditions, is a manifestation of the loss of the nation’s ability to make, to grow, and to build,” Greer said.

“The president recognizes the urgency of the moment. On the first day of his second term, President Trump issued a comprehensive memorandum setting out his trade policy direction. No other president has done this,” Greer continued in his opening statement.

Responses from around the world range from all-out retaliation to negotiation to capitulation. Chinese officials, who could see tariffs reach 104% after Trump threatened Monday to pile more on, said Tuesday they will “fight to the end.”

Tariffs launch just after midnight

The previously scheduled hearing on Trump’s trade agenda came less than a week after the president used his emergency powers to unveil new import taxes on products from nearly every country around the world.

Trump’s tariffs will begin just after midnight, hitting major exporters to the United States as well as poor and developing nations. They range from a 46% tax on Vietnam, whose major exports to Americans include tech products, to a 50% tax on Lesotho, a small African nation that exports diamonds to U.S. jewelers.

Claims from the administration that dozens of governments have reached out to negotiate buoyed U.S. and world markets Tuesday after three days of turbulence erased trillions of dollars in wealth.

Trump’s baseline 10% tariffs launched Saturday on trading partners, including allies who import more American goods than the amount of their own products they export to the U.S.

The tax on allies with a trade surplus drew the ire of Sen. Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat. “Why did they get whacked in the first place?” he asked Greer, raising his voice.

Trump has exempted pharmaceuticals, oil and gas, critical minerals, and semiconductors from his new levies. Those imports are worth $665 billion, according to an analysis from the Atlantic Council, a think tank focused on U.S. foreign relations.

The levies come on top of Trump’s previously enacted 25% national security levies on foreign steel and aluminum, and foreign cars, as well as emergency tariffs at 20% on Chinese imports and 10% to 25% on products from Canada and Mexico. 

‘Aimless, chaotic tariff spree’

Sen. Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the committee, announced at the hearing that he plans to fast-track a resolution “to end the latest crop of global tariffs that are clobbering American families and business members on both sides of the aisle.”

“Donald Trump’s aimless, chaotic tariff spree has proven beyond a doubt that Congress has given far too much of its constitutional power over international trade to the executive branch. It is time to take that power back,” the Oregon Democrat said in opening remarks.

Committee Chair Mike Crapo expressed some optimism that Trump’s tariff agenda would eventually boost American industries.

“Members and the public have questions and concerns about the recent tariff actions. That’s ok. We should think about tariff impacts and ask questions,” said Crapo, an Idaho Republican.

Once people “contextualize” Trump’s tariffs, “the real headline then becomes the fundamental shift in trade policy since President Trump’s inauguration — where the United States actually plans to do trade again,” Crapo said.

Oklahomans worried

But other senators wanted more assurance for small business owners who are contacting them for answers about the sudden economic turmoil.

Sen. James Lankford told Greer he’s heard from a constituent in Oklahoma who switched purchasing from China to Vietnam after Trump’s first administration targeted China with tariffs. Now, the company worries about the 46% tax it will have to pay on imports from Vietnam.

“Is there a timeline you’re dealing with?” the Republican asked Greer.

The trade representative said more than 50 countries, including Vietnam, have reached out to strike new trade agreements.

“We don’t have any particular timeline set on that,” Greer said. “What I can say is I’m moving as quickly as possible.”

“The time piece does matter to them,” Lankford said.

Lankford then asked if any industries, including garment manufacturers in Oklahoma, can apply for an exemption from import taxes on products they can only purchase from abroad.

“I know long term the hope is to have a more diversified (market). In the short term, they don’t have another option. How do you plan to handle that?” Lankford said.

Greer replied: “Senator, the president has been clear with me and with others that he doesn’t intend to have exclusions and exemptions, especially given the nature of the action. If you have Swiss cheese in the action, it can undermine the overall point.”

Warner grew heated during questioning with Greer, saying he’s hearing from Wall Street that business people viewed the U.S. market recovery Tuesday “as a good day in hospice.”

“We have 800,000 small businesses in Virginia. These tariffs are going to wallop them,” Warner said.

EU, other nations react

The European Union is scheduled to vote Wednesday on a list of targeted American imports the bloc of 27 nations plans to tax in response. Trump unveiled a 20% levy on EU products as part of his “Liberation Day” plans.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is staring down a 17% tariff from Trump, promised during an Oval Office meeting Monday that his country will “very quickly” even out trade with the U.S.

Trump wrote on social media Tuesday morning that he held a “great call” with South Korea’s acting president Han Duck-soo. Trump imposed a 25% tariff on South Korean exports into the U.S., which largely include cars, auto parts and electric batteries.

“Their top TEAM is on a plane heading to the U.S., and things are looking good,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

The comments came a day Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he would lead negotiations with Japan, which faces a 24% levy. Americans mainly import cars, auto parts and construction vehicles from Japan.

The prospect of negotiation brought Japan’s stocks up overnight after flagging upon tariff uncertainty. 

President Donald Trump is displayed on a television screen as traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on April 7, 2025, in New York City.  (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Global markets plummeted Monday for the third consecutive trading day since President Donald Trump announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs — and the administration gave mixed signals on meeting other nations at the negotiating table.

U.S. stocks reacted positively to a short-lived, incorrect report amplified on social media that Trump may pause the tariffs for 90 days, but the market plunged quickly when the White House dismissed the claim as “FAKE NEWS.”

Any upward progress was erased upon Trump’s announcement that he planned to further punish China starting Wednesday.

At about 11:15 a.m. Eastern Trump threatened to raise tariffs on China a further 50% if the country does not back down on its retaliatory 34% tax on U.S. imports by Tuesday. If left unresolved, the latest U.S.-China trade war will hit American farmers, particularly soybean producers.

Writing on his platform Truth Social, Trump said “Additionally, all talks with China concerning their requested meetings with us will be terminated! Negotiations with other countries, which have also requested meetings, will begin taking place immediately.”

The administration maintains more than 50 countries have reached out to negotiate.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent wrote on X that Trump has tasked him to negotiate with Japan, which could face a 24% levy beginning Thursday.

“Japan remains among America’s closest allies, and I look forward to our upcoming productive engagement regarding tariffs, non-tariff trade barriers, currency issues, and government subsidies. I appreciate the Japanese government’s outreach and measured approach to this process,” Bessent wrote on the social media platform.

“China has chosen to isolate itself by retaliating and doubling down on previous negative behavior,” Bessent added.

European Union’s stance

Meanwhile, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she has offered the U.S. zero-for-zero tariffs on industrial goods.

“But we are also prepared to respond through countermeasures and defend our interests,” von der Leyen said Monday at a press conference.

Trump slapped a 20% tax on goods from the EU, set to take effect Thursday, on top of 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum that began in mid-March. A 25% tariff on all foreign cars imported to the U.S. also launched Thursday.

The EU is poised to impose retaliatory duties on American products in response to the import taxes. The bloc of 27 nations is scheduled to vote Wednesday on a list of U.S. goods to be taxed at its borders.

When asked by reporters in the Oval Office Monday if the EU offer was enough to scale back the tariffs, Trump said “No, it’s not.”

Journalists had gathered in the Oval Office for Trump’s meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who visited to discuss Trump’s new 17% tax on his country’s imports.

Netanyahu promised to “eliminate” his country’s trade deficit with the U.S.

“We intend to do it very quickly. We think it’s the right thing to do and we’re going to also eliminate trade barriers, a variety of trade barriers that have been put up unnecessarily. And I think Israel can serve as a model for many countries who ought to do the same,” Netanyahu said.

When asked by reporters if he intends to lower the tariffs on Israel, Trump said, “Maybe not.”

“We give Israel billions of dollars a year,” he added.

The meeting was streamed on C-SPAN.

‘Let’s take the deal’

Two Republican senators publicly urged Trump on social media to take the EU offer.

Sen. Mike Lee of Utah wrote, “Let’s take that deal! Much to gain.”

“Totally agree,” Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin replied. “At some point you have to take YES for an answer.”

Another Senate Republican, Ted Cruz of Texas, has publicly criticized Trump’s steep levies on almost every nation around the globe.

A bipartisan effort to claw back power from the president’s near-unilateral authority to impose tariffs might not get far, despite the economic uncertainty unleashed since Trump unveiled his “Liberation Day” plan.

Legislation co-sponsored by Democrat Maria Cantwell of Washington and Republican Chuck Grassley of Iowa would require the president to notify lawmakers prior to new tariffs from the White House and limit the levies to a 60-day window unless Congress approves an extension.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota seemed to shut down the idea Monday, according to reporters on Capitol Hill.

“I don’t think that has a future. The president has indicated he will veto it. I don’t see how they get it to the floor on the House,” Thune told Politico.

A companion bill in the House is sponsored by Republican Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska.

Chances of House Speaker Mike Johnson bringing the bill to the floor are likely slim, as the Louisiana Republican supported Trump’s tariff unveiling in person last week.

Harmeet Dhillon,  confirmed on April 3, 2025, as President Donald Trump's nominee for assistant attorney general for civil rights, prepares for her confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Feb. 26, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The Senate cleared two more of President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice nominees Thursday, installing another attorney who defended Trump last year and a new lead on civil rights who has drawn intense criticism from advocacy groups.

The Senate confirmed California lawyer Harmeet Dhillon in a 52-45 vote to the role of assistant attorney general, heading up the agency’s Civil Rights Division, one of the largest at Justice. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski was the only Republican to oppose the nomination.

Dhillon, a Trump legal adviser and the managing partner at Dhillon Law Group in San Francisco, specializes in commercial litigation, employment law, First Amendment rights and election law matters, according to the biography on her firm’s website.

Dhillon is also the CEO and founder of the Center for American Liberty, which states its mission as “defending the civil liberties of Americans left behind by civil rights legacy organizations.”

Dhillon previously sat on the ACLU Northern California board and defended members of the Sikh community, to which her family belongs, from attacks after 9/11, according to reporting from San Francisco-based KQED-FM.

But Dhillon also has a trail of controversies, including repeatedly denying the 2020 presidential election results and fueling conspiracies following the 2022 attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat.

Civil rights advocates also point to her recent legal work challenging voting and transgender rights.

“She’s not out there to protect the rights of all of us, and that’s what her record has demonstrated,” Lena Zwarensteyn, of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, told States Newsroom Thursday.

In an eight-page letter to senators, led by the Leadership Conference and signed by dozens of advocacy groups, the coalition wrote Dhillon has “relentlessly tried to limit access to the ballot box” and “denied, diminished and tried to erase” the existence of transgender youth.

States Newsroom reached out to the White House for comment.

Former Missouri AG elevated

The Senate also confirmed in a party-line vote, 52-45, Dean Sauer, former Missouri solicitor general and Trump’s defense lawyer, to lead government litigation.

After representing Trump’s presidential immunity argument before the U.S. Supreme Court last year, Sauer will now argue before the high bench on the DOJ’s behalf.

Sauer made headlines in January 2024 when he suggested to a three-judge panel for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals that a president might be shielded by presidential immunity for ordering SEAL Team Six to assassinate a rival. 

New Nissan cars are driven onto a rail car to be transported from an automobile processing terminal located at the Port of Los Angeles on April 3, 2025 in Wilmington, California. The Japanese automotive maker is being impacted by President Trump’s new 25 percent imported automobile tariffs. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Markets and business owners in the United States and around the world reeled Thursday following President Donald Trump’s announcement of sweeping and steep tariffs that are not “reciprocal” but rather punish many countries that U.S. importers heavily rely on, experts say.

U.S. stocks plummeted, posting the worst one-day drop since June 2020, financial media reported at the closing bell Thursday. Business groups issued criticisms, experts predicted increases in household spending and even a conservative Republican senator pushed legislation that would increase congressional power over tariffs.

Trump unveiled the tariffs Wednesday during a White House Rose Garden event billed as “Liberation Day,” where he told the crowd that trading partners and allies have “torn apart our once beautiful American dream.”

His answer: Signing a “historic executive order instituting reciprocal tariffs on countries throughout the world. Reciprocal. That means they do it to us, and we do it to them. Very simple.”

But economists say the new U.S. tariffs Trump revealed Wednesday — illustrated on a large display table — do not match one-for-one other countries’ levies, as Trump said during his remarks.

Trump held in his hands a chart that claimed to show a list of other countries’ taxes on American imports.

But it was wrong.

The problem with the chart

Vietnam does not charge a 90% tariff on American imports, as the chart said. Rather its rate for imported U.S. goods was on average 9.4% in 2023, according to the World Trade Organization.

“The actual calculation (circulated by the White House) doesn’t factor in other countries’ tariffs,” said Brad Setser, senior fellow on global trade at the Council on Foreign Relations, a think tank focused on international affairs.

In other words, Setser told States Newsroom Thursday, “It’s a tariff on big bilateral trade deficits.”

And so, what does that mean? And why did the president’s chart say that the U.S. would now be charging a 46% tax on every imported good from Vietnam?

Vietnam is a small country, but a competitive exporter, particularly in broadcasting equipment, microchips and computers. And the U.S. is a big customer.

In 2023, the U.S. imported $118 billion in goods from Vietnam, while Vietnam imported about $9.6 billion in U.S. products that year, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity, a trade data project with roots at MIT.

The White House claimed on the chart that Vietnam applies a 90% tariff on the U.S. — when actually that percentage is roughly the dollar amount of the U.S. trade deficit divided by the dollar amount of how much the U.S. imports from the country. So, $120B – $10B = $110B, then divide that by $120B, and you get roughly 91%.

Trump said he would be “kind” and give trading partners “discounted” tariff rates by about half, and that’s how Vietnam landed at a 46% tax on its imports into the U.S.

“So Vietnam got hit with a huge tariff. It is literally that simple,” Setser said.

Economists and journalists almost immediately took to social media to question the glaring inaccuracy.

‘Bombshell’ tariffs

The new rates are a “bombshell” on U.S. allies and trading partners, said Jack Zhang, a professor of political science who runs the Trade War Lab at the University of Kansas.

Vietnam tried to head off Trump’s announcement in March by cutting levies on U.S. imports and signing “big purchase agreements,” Zhang said, but it didn’t work.

Historically countries have negotiated tariffs product by product in “laborious” talks, Zhang said.

“You know, ‘You reduce tariffs on your stuff, I will reduce tariffs on maybe some other stuff.’ And it nets out to be fair. This sort of lazy, back-of-the-envelope kind of calculation based on the trade deficit, it makes it really hard to negotiate in those terms,” he said.

Products from the European Union will now be taxed at 20%, Japan’s new rate is 24%, and South Korea’s 25% — all significant U.S. allies and trading partners. The EU has already threatened to retaliate if the U.S. does not come to the negotiating table.

Countries carrying a trade surplus with the U.S. — meaning they import more American goods than they sell back to the U.S. — did not escape the policy, as Trump imposed a universal 10% tariff on every nation.

The United Kingdom, which runs a trade surplus with the U.S. and in 2023 charged an average of 3.8% on imported American products, will now see a 10% tax on its items headed to U.S. buyers. Australia, whose Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the tariffs “totally unwarranted,” faces the same situation.

Trump’s informational table falsely stated that the U.K., Australia and a host of other countries — including the Heard and McDonald Islands, inhabited by penguins and seals — have been charging a 10% tax on American goods.

‘Damage to their own people’

Trump did not include Canada and Mexico in his announcement Wednesday.

But those countries are already subject to up to 25% taxes on steel, aluminum and other imports that the administration enacted in March, after declaring emergencies over illicit fentanyl and immigrants crossing the northern and southern borders.

Additionally Trump’s 25% foreign car tax launched Thursday.  The neighboring countries factor big into the automobile supply chain.

“Given the prospective damage to their own people, the American administration should eventually change course, but I don’t want to give false hope. The president believes that what he is doing is best for the American economy,” Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday in remarks that streamed on C-SPAN. Carney said he and Trump have agreed to economic and security negotiations next month.

The proposed tariffs will amount to an average $2,100 tax increase per American household, according to an analysis released Thursday by the center-right Tax Foundation, which advocates for lower taxes.

The average levy on all imports will reach 18.8%, compared to 2.5% in 2024, according to the foundation’s modeling.

Numerous trade and advocacy groups spoke out against the tariffs.

The National Association of Manufacturers urged the Trump administration to “minimize tariff costs for manufacturers that are investing and expanding in the U.S.”

The center-right Taxpayers Protection Alliance issued a scathing statement Thursday. “​​American consumers and taxpayers should be appalled by this executive overreach,” said its president David Williams.

States Newsroom spoke to small business owners from around the country who expressed fear about the cost of day-to-day supplies. One Arizona coffee shop owner told the news outlet that he purchased a year’s supply of disposable coffee cups from China last year in anticipation of Trump igniting a trade war.

Trump announced a 34% tax on Chinese imports Wednesday, and some experts say that will stack on top of the existing 20% tariffs Trump imposed during his first administration that were kept in place by former President Joe Biden.

Senators want more control over tariffs

A bipartisan pair of senators introduced on Thursday what they’ve titled the “American Trade Review Act of 2025,” aiming to claw back congressional power over the president’s near unilateral decision-making on U.S. tariffs.

“Inflation and high costs are a threat to the stability and prosperity of American businesses of all sizes, to our farmers and to our consumers,” Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington state said on the Senate floor. She and Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa are co-sponsoring the legislation.

“We live now in an interconnected world, a global economy, and advances in technology and transportation have brought that world closer and closer together. We have a global economy,” Cantwell continued.

States Newsroom sent a list of questions to the White House regarding their informational table of tariffs presented Wednesday and an opportunity to respond to criticism.

In a statement, White House spokesperson Kush Desai said, “Trillions in historic investment commitments from industry leaders ranging from Apple to Hyundai to TSMC are indicative of how this administration is working with the private sector while implementing President Trump’s pro-growth, pro-worker America First agenda of tariffs, deregulation, tax cuts, and the unleashing of American energy.

“These America First economic policies delivered historic job, wage, and investment growth in his first term, and everyone from Main Street to Wall Street is again going to thrive as President Trump secures our nation’s economic future,” the statement continued.

TSMC, a Taiwanese mega semiconductor producer, received $6.6 billion in direct funding from the U.S., plus $5 billion in cheap loans, under Biden’s administration after he signed the CHIPS and Science Act, according to an analysis by the Council on Foreign Relations. The country announced an additional $100 billion investment in early March.

Trump announced a 32% tariff on the island nation.

U.S. President Donald Trump holds up a chart while speaking during a “Make America Wealthy Again” trade announcement event in the Rose Garden at the White House on April 2, 2025 in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

This story was updated at 6:55 p.m. EDT.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump rolled out sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs Wednesday on trading partners and allies across the globe.

Declaring that foreign trade practices have created a “national emergency,” the president unveiled a baseline 10% levy on all international imports, plus what he described as additional “kind” and “discounted” tariff rates that will increase but not match the rates other countries apply to American imports.

The levies will hit U.S. industries from agriculture to manufacturing to fashion.

The 10% universal tariffs become effective April 5, with higher levies set for April 9, according to Trump’s executive order. Trump’s remarks Wednesday about the start dates varied from the order’s language.

Trump is the first president to enact tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act — something he already did in March when slapping levies on China, Canada and Mexico over the production and smuggling of illicit fentanyl.

According to a table distributed at Trump’s speech, U.S. tariffs will reach 34% on imports from China, 46% on products from Vietnam and 20% on European Union imports, among other increases.

Canada and Mexico will not see additional tariffs on top of the already imposed 25% on goods (10% on energy and potash) not compliant with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA. All compliant goods can continue to enter the U.S. levy-free.

The new 34% duties on China are set to stack on top of older 20% tariffs, according to some media reports, though Trump did not specify in his remarks or order.

Countries that levy a 10% tax on American goods — including Brazil and the United Kingdom — will only see a 10% match.

The increased levies come as 25% tariffs on foreign cars kick in at midnight.

Business owners who purchase goods from outside the U.S. will have to pay the increased duty rates to bring the products over the border, unless Trump carves out exceptions for certain industries.

The president did not mention carve-outs in his remarks, but language in his subsequent executive order details exceptions for steel, aluminum, cars and auto parts already subject to tariffs under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act. Any products designated in the future under Section 232 will also be exempt from the new levies announced Wednesday.

Other goods not subject to the “reciprocal” tariffs include copper, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, lumber, and “energy and other certain minerals that are not available in the United States,” according to the order.

Trump introduced the taxes on imports with fanfare Wednesday in the White House Rose Garden, where he said, “This is Liberation Day.”

“April 2, 2025, will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn,” Trump said.

“For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike,” Trump said.

Republican lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana and Georgia U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, attended the event alongside several of Trump’s Cabinet members and representatives from the United Auto Workers.

Not all Republicans have signaled support for tariffs. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said at an event in his home state of South Dakota in August 2024 that Trump’s trade policy is a “recipe for increased inflation.”

The White House has circulated figures claiming the U.S. will raise up to $600 billion in revenue per year as a result of the tariffs. The figure was met with skepticism by economists because the amount of imports will likely change under higher levies.

The U.S. is the largest importer of goods in the world, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. The country’s top suppliers in 2022 included China, Mexico, Canada, Japan and Germany.

Economists: Americans will pay

Since Trump began campaigning on tariffs, economists have warned that increased costs for businesses will be passed onto consumers.

Rising prices under Trump’s “reciprocal” tariff scenario are likely to cost an extra $2,400 to $3,400 per family, according to the Yale Budget Lab, with most of the financial burden falling on the lowest-income households.

An analysis from the Peterson Institute on International Economics estimated the typical American household would lose over $1,200, just from the 25% tariffs already imposed on China, Canada and Mexico.

Several small business owners told States Newsroom Tuesday they’re worried about increasing production costs and whether higher prices will chase away customer demand.

Erica York, of the center-right Tax Foundation that advocates for lower taxes, said in an interview with States Newsroom Tuesday that the levies will be “the largest peacetime tax increase we’ve seen in history.”

State officials worry over impact

Democratic state officials sounded the alarm Wednesday over losses for key industries that drive their local economies.

New Mexico State Treasurer Laura Montoya said her state’s energy and agriculture sectors would be victims in a trade war.

“New Mexico is a key player in this conversation, because the non-negotiable reality is that New Mexico is, like the United States as a whole, dependent on trade with our international partners particularly Mexico,” Montoya said on a virtual press briefing hosted by the state economic advocacy group Americans for Responsible Growth.

Montoya said oil and gas production accounts for 35% of the state’s budget and that the industry relies on machinery imported from Mexico.

Additionally, New Mexico, a largely rural state, relies heavily on agricultural trade. It processes a third of the cattle coming across the southwest border, and Montoya said farmers and ranchers will “face blows as tariffs on cattle and produce will result in slow food production.”

Washington state, a top U.S. agricultural exporter, sources 90% of its fertilizer from Canada.

Treasurer Mike Pellicciotti said the state would be “completely squeezed” by “reckless economic decisions.”

“He is crushing the free exchange of goods, and making it much more difficult and much more burdensome on working families. So of course, he needs to call it ‘Liberation Day,’ because he knows he’s doing the complete opposite, and he is trying to frame it in a way that is completely the opposite of what is being accomplished today,” Pellicciotti said.

Dems predict consumer stress

Democrats on Capitol Hill seized on Trump’s new trade policy as a way to push their message that the president is abandoning middle and working class households.

Sen. Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland said the White House is “tone-deaf” in dubbing the tariff announcement as “Liberation Day.”

Trump has said in media interviews, “‘You know, there’s going to be a little pain, some minor pain and disruption.’ But the people that I represent don’t regard increasing costs of groceries, increasing costs of owning a home, increasing costs of owning an automobile, as a minor disruption,” Alsobrooks said.

In back-to-back Democratic press conferences Wednesday, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia slammed Trump’s use of emergency powers in March to justify a 10% duty on Canadian energy and 25% on all other imports.

Kaine warned about the effect on his state’s sizable shipbuilding industry. Approximately 35% of steel and aluminum used to build U.S. ships and submarines comes from Canada, he said.

Senators approved, 51-48, a joint resolution Wednesday evening on a bill, sponsored by Kaine, that would undo Trump’s tariffs on Canadian imports triggered by an emergency declaration targeting illicit fentanyl coming over the northern border.

Four Republicans joined the Democrats in passing the largely symbolic legislation, which will now head to the House. The GOP senators included: Susan Collins of Maine, Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

Earlier Wednesday, Kaine pointed to a report in Canadian news outlet The Globe and Mail that found the White House grossly overstated the amount of fentanyl smuggled through the northern border.

“Canada stood with us on 9/11, Canada has stood side-by-side with U.S. troops in every war we have been in. They have fought with our troops. They’ve bled with our troops. They’ve died with our troops in every war since the war of 1812, and yet we’re going to treat them like an enemy,” Kaine said.

Kaine’s bill, co-signed by eight Democratic and independent senators, drew one Republican co-sponsor, Paul of Kentucky.

The bill gained statements of support from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and former Vice President Mike Pence’s advocacy group Advancing American Freedom, among numerous organizations across the political spectrum.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries criticized Trump’s anticipated tariff announcement Wednesday morning at his weekly press conference.

“We were told that grocery costs were going to go down on day one of the Trump presidency. Costs aren’t going down in America. They’re going up, and the Trump tariffs are going to make things more costly,” Jeffries, of New York, said.

Democratic U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland speaks at a rally in support of federal workers outside the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 19, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Maryland late Tuesday ordered federal agencies across 19 states and the District of Columbia to reinstate thousands of probationary workers who were fired as part of White House adviser Elon Musk’s government-slashing agenda.

U.S. Judge James Bredar for the District of Maryland issued the preliminary injunction mandating 20 federal departments and agencies rehire the new or recently promoted employees whose duty stations or residences prior to termination were in the following states:

• Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.

The lawsuit is among dozens brought against President Donald Trump’s second administration over deep cuts to the federal workforce and funding, sweeping arrests and deportations of immigrants, Musk’s access to Americans’ sensitive data, and press access in the White House.

Trump and Musk have repeatedly criticized federal judges who have ruled unfavorably, even calling for their impeachment.

Republicans have assumed the mantle on the issue, criticizing wide-reaching injunctions from U.S. district courts.

“Although our Founders saw an important role for the judiciary, they didn’t design a system that made judges national policymakers,” Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, chair of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, said in his opening statement at a hearing Wednesday.

The Democratic attorneys general who brought the lawsuit against the federal agencies had requested a nationwide injunction, arguing the mass firings were illegal and harmed states financially, but Bredar only applied the order to the plaintiffs’ jurisdictions.

Bredar has previously issued a temporary emergency order mandating agencies reinstate employment for all 24,418 fired probationary workers, according to government figures, but expressed reluctance at a March 26 hearing to extend his order nationwide. The breakdown of fired probationary employees by state is unclear and the total number could be from the states involved in the lawsuit or other states or both.

Departments and agencies named as defendants in the lawsuit must now return the probationary workers’ jobs to status quo by 2 p.m. Eastern on April 8, Bredar ordered. The agencies also “shall not conduct any future reductions in force (“RIFs”) — whether formally labeled as such or not” involving the affected probationary employees unless the process follows the law, Bredar wrote.

The enjoined defendants include:

• The departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense (civilian employees only), Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Treasury and Veterans Affairs, as well as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, General Services Administration, Office of Personnel Management, Small Business Administration and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The order will remain in place while the case is pending.

The states allege the mass firings led by Trump and Musk harmed them because the federal government did not provide the legally required advance notice that gives states time to prepare “rapid response activities” — including unemployment and social services — ahead of an influx of unemployed residents.

Bredar highlighted in a memorandum opinion accompanying his order Tuesday that 31 states did not join the lawsuit, writing that nationwide injunctions are required in “rare” instances, and that “this case is not one of them.”

“The Court’s injunction is not national in scope because it is possible to substantially stop the harms inflicted on the states that did sue without extending judicial authority over those that didn’t,” Bredar wrote. 

French wine on display in a District of Columbia shop on March 13, 2025, the day President Donald Trump threatened tariffs on European wine and French Champagne. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — American business owners and consumers are bracing as President Donald Trump teases, with few details, the announcement of sweeping tariffs expected Wednesday afternoon.

Trump has dubbed April 2 “Liberation Day,” his self-imposed deadline to fulfill his campaign promise of taxing imported products from around the globe.

The White House confirmed Tuesday that Trump had made a decision on tariff levels but would not provide further details.

“He’s with his trade and tariff team right now perfecting it to make sure this is a perfect deal for the American people and the American worker, and you will all find out in about 24 hours from now,” press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Tuesday afternoon at the daily briefing.

The new tariffs come as Trump already imposed 25% duties on imported steel and aluminum, as well as 25% levies on foreign cars and vehicle parts set to begin Thursday.

But the anticipation of more tariffs on numerous imported goods has stopped business owners in their tracks as uncertainty about costs and consumer reaction clouds day-to-day decisions.

Stockpiling coffee cups

Gabe Hagen, owner of Brick Road Coffee in Tempe, Arizona, said small business owners are feeling “whiplash.”

“Are we going to have a tariff? Are we not? It’s not easy for me to change my prices overnight. But at the same time, if all of the sudden I have my cost of goods going up, it’ll put me into a loss territory.”

Most disposable beverage cups are produced in China, so Hagen made the decision last year to purchase and store $26,000 worth of coffee cups in anticipation of tariffs.

He also had to pull back $50,000 in capital for development on a second shop location, he said.

“The main thing we’re asking for is stability,” said Hagen, who also sits on the Small Business for America’s Future advisory council.

Walt Rowen, owner and president of Susquehanna Glass Company in Columbia, Pennsylvania, said “there’s no clarity at this point at all.”

“Everybody is in a holding pattern. We’re stuck wondering what is going to happen,” Rowen said. “We can sort of know that we’re gonna have to increase prices if the tariffs come into effect. But what we don’t know is if we increase prices, how much does that affect demand?”

Rowen’s historic 1925 three-story production facility right in the middle of the southeastern Pennsylvania town employs anywhere from 35 to 65 workers, depending on the season.

Through a variety of decorating techniques, his employees engrave or imprint screened paint logos, names and other messages on wine glasses he sources from a manufacturer in Italy and mugs made in Vietnam.

Rowen’s production rooms buzz, especially in the months leading up to the holidays, when his employees laser engrave and hand paint personalized ornaments sourced from China for the Lenox Corporation.

“My Christmas ornament business is huge for us in the fourth quarter, and I would normally be planning to bring in 20 to 30 people to work in that category of business. But if those prices increase by 30, 40, 50%, I don’t know how many we’re going to sell this year. So I can’t even plan production. It’s frightening,” he said.

States to feel economic pain

Economists are warning the rollercoaster tariff policy coming from the Oval Office is undermining economic growth and trust in the U.S. as a stable trading partner.

Trump told reporters as recently as Sunday that he was planning to slap tariffs on “all countries.”

His administration’s mid-March levies on aluminum and steel imports sparked retaliation from the European Union and Canada, which beginning in mid-April will enforce taxes on hundreds of American products crossing their borders, including iconic Kentucky bourbon, Tennessee whiskey and Harley-Davidson motorcycles.

Unless Trump carves out exceptions on certain products, more states can expect to feel economic pain, said Mary Lovely, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

“For example, a state like Washington state is very export dependent, not just obviously aircraft, but also apples and a wide variety of other manufacturing and agricultural (products). That state will be really hard hit if there are retaliatory tariffs, both from Canada, which is a market, but also from Asia,” Lovely said.

Trump’s tariffs on products from Canada, China and Mexico could cost the typical American family at least an extra $1,200 annually in price increases, according to a report Lovely co-authored. The dollar amount increases when calculating for universal tariffs on all imported goods, and when accounting for retaliation from other countries.

European Union President Ursula von der Leyen already made clear in a speech Monday that the bloc wants to negotiate with Trump but will apply more levies on American products given no other choice.

“Europe has not started this confrontation. We do not necessarily want to retaliate, but we have a strong plan to retaliate if necessary,” she said.

Tariffs on Canada

On Capitol Hill, Democratic Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner of Virginia and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota introduced a resolution to block the president’s tariffs on Canada, which he triggered under his emergency powers.

Trump’s use of the International Emergency Economic Power Act to slap 25% tariffs on products out of Canada and Mexico marked the first time a president had ever done so.  

“We think that the economic chaos that’s being caused and markets being roiled and consumer confidence dropping, and some predicting recession, together with a bipartisan vote might convince the White House — ‘Hey, look, there’s a better way to treat American citizens and customers,’” Kaine told reporters outside the U.S. Capitol Tuesday.

Kaine said his message to Republicans is “stand up for your constituents and say no tax increase on them.”

The Senate is expected to vote on the legislation late Tuesday or Wednesday.

Bill Butcher, founder of Port City Brewing in Alexandria, Virginia, spoke alongside the senators Tuesday, expressing concern about the price of Canadian Pilsner malt that he’s used for 14 years.

“It’s a very specific strain of high quality barley that grows in the cold climate of Canada, and there’s not a suitable U.S. substitute that we can get at the same quality to make our beer,” he said. “If there’s a 25% tariff on this basic ingredient, it’s going to slow our business down.

“By the time it goes from us to our distributor to the retailer to the consumer, this $12.99 six-pack of beer is going to end up at $18.99. How many people are still going to want to buy a six-pack of great-tasting beer but at $18.99? People are going to start looking for a different substitute,” Butcher said.

White House defends tariffs

In an emailed statement Tuesday to States Newsroom, White House spokesperson Kush Desai said Trump used tariffs “to deliver historic job, wage, and economic growth with no inflation in his first term, and he’s set to restore American Greatness in his second term.”

“Fearmongering by the media and Democrats about President Trump’s America First economic agenda isn’t going to change the fact that industry leaders have already made trillions in investment commitments to make in America, and that countries ranging from Vietnam to India to the UK have already begun to offer up trade concessions that would help level the playing field for American industries and workers,” Desai said.

Peter Navarro, Trump’s senior counselor on trade, told “Fox News Sunday with Shannon Bream” Trump’s new tariffs will raise $600 billion a year for the U.S., plus another $100 billion from the 25% duty on foreign cars that will launch this week.

The government would gain that revenue from U.S. businesses who will need to pay the duty rates to get their purchased goods through the U.S. border.

Erica York with the Tax Foundation, a center-right think tank that advocates for lower taxes, said Tuesday that number is “very, very wrong” because Navarro is basing the math on the current level of imports.

“If we put a 20% tax on imports, people are not going to buy as many imports, so that reduces how much revenue you get,” York said. “Also, mechanically, if firms are making all of these tariff payments, that reduces their revenue. They don’t have as much to pay workers (and) to return to shareholders.”

U.S. stocks showed their biggest losses since 2022, according to Monday’s report on the first quarter of 2025.

Both Moody’s Analytics and Goldman Sachs warned on Monday that they’ve raised their forecasts for an economic recession to 35%.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt speaks during the daily briefing at the White House on March 26, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The Associated Press and the Trump administration delivered arguments in federal court Thursday in a case that could alter decades of established press access in the White House.

U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden for the District of Columbia heard details from the AP’s White House reporter and photographer about their exclusion for the last 44 days from joining their competitors and peers in witnessing President Donald Trump’s events in the Oval Office.

The two journalists, and other AP reporters, have also been refused entry to most larger White House events, including in the East Room, and the tarmac for Air Force One departures.

The AP, which has been a member of the White House press pool since the 19th century, maintains that the sudden ban violates its First Amendment and due process rights and has hurt its competitiveness as a wire service that reaches thousands of newsrooms.

The AP continues to have access to the daily White House press briefings and the driveway near the West Wing entrance, along with over 1,000 other journalists who have “hard passes” to the general White House complex — an argument Trump officials have made to prove they are not altogether banning the wire service.

The news organization is seeking a preliminary injunction mandating the administration immediately cease barring the AP from events that are open to a limited number of credentialed press and rescind its policy excluding the outlet from the smaller daily White House press pool. Such an action would likely last until a final judgment is reached.

McFadden, who was appointed to the D.C. Circuit by Trump in 2017 and confirmed by the Senate in a 84-10 vote, asked the parties to halt any other evidence submissions so that he can rule in a timely manner.

At a hearing Feb. 24, McFadden rejected the AP’s request for a temporary restraining order that would have required the White House to immediately restore its access to the Oval Office, Air Force One and other places.

‘The president wasn’t happy’

White House chief correspondent Zeke Miller testified that Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, summoned him on Feb. 11 to say “the president wasn’t happy” that the AP continued to use the name Gulf of Mexico after he had ordered the U.S. coastal waters should be called the Gulf of America.

“He had decided we wouldn’t be permitted into the Oval Office if we didn’t change our policy and that we should ‘act quickly’ to (change it),” Miller recalled of Leavitt’s message.

The AP has not changed its style guidance because the Gulf of Mexico shares borders with Mexico and Cuba, and the AP’s coverage reaches global clients and readers that have recognized the body of water as the Gulf of Mexico for centuries.

When asked by the AP’s legal counsel if the new policy has chilled the AP’s coverage, Miller said “undoubtedly our reporting has suffered.”

Miller, a White House reporter for just over 12 years, said before Feb. 11 he would regularly see his own news alerts pop up on his cell phone “while the event was still going.”

The wire service, which transmits news and photos in near real-time to subscriber members around the world, is now spending time independently verifying reports from other outlets or relying on delayed video feeds that do not show who else is with the president or his environment, Miller said.

“We don’t know what those other outlets are including or not including,” he said, especially when those outlets may fear the “viewpoint discrimination” the AP contends it’s faced from the Trump administration.

Miller testified neither he nor his White House colleagues have been permitted with other reporters in the Oval Office since Feb. 11, and that they have only been intermittently admitted to press conferences with foreign leaders or ceremonies in larger spaces, including the East Room, which can hold over 100 journalists.

The news outlet has had to fly its foreign correspondents to the United States to be part of the foreign press permitted in the Oval Office during visits from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Kier Starmer, according to the news organization.

While the White House has admitted AP photographers to some events in the East Room, they’ve been shut out of others.

Evan Vucci, the AP’s chief Washington photographer, testified “there’s no rhyme or reason.” The “only thing that’s consistent” is that the AP has been targeted, Vucci said.

White House defense

The government called no witnesses but instead filed a last-minute supplemental declaration Wednesday from Taylor Budowich, White House deputy chief of staff and Cabinet secretary, and lead defendant in the case.

The AP moved to strike the declaration Wednesday, arguing the judge had ordered live witnesses, but McFadden denied the motion Thursday.

Budowich contends the wire services, TV and radio correspondents and print reporters that comprised the smaller press pool “under the old system continue to be eligible for pool selection in the new system.”

Leavitt announced Feb. 25 that going forward, the White House would choose which journalists can access the Oval Office and Air Force One — breaking decades of agreement between numerous administrations and the White House Correspondents Association.

The independent group, made of journalists, has self-governed since the Eisenhower administration, operating on the principle that the press corps, not the president, should determine the makeup of the press pool that accompanies the president almost everywhere.

Under the new pool system, White House officials “have been empowered to better perform their jobs by creating a pool that best serves the public by pairing the topics of each event with the reporters and audience who are most curious about them,” Budowich stated in his declaration.

But AP attorney Charles Tobin said that argument “just doesn’t hold up.”

Showing the list of journalists chosen to be in the pool on Feb. 28 — the day of the explosive Oval Office meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy — Tobin pointed out that the White House had chosen The Los Angeles Times to be in the room.

But for the past several months, the LA Times’ coverage of Ukraine only consisted of republications of AP wire service feeds, he said.

By banning the AP, the White House is “shrinking” its reach to the public, argued Tobin, of Ballard Spahr law firm.

Tobin also said he doesn’t buy Budowich’s argument that the AP remains eligible to be chosen for the smaller press pool, pointing to the deputy chief of staff’s public social media postings and statements from other White House officials, all the way up to the president.

“If he’s saying it does not constitute a ban, then we don’t speak the same language because that’s exactly what he’s saying,” Tobin said.

In his closing statement, Brian Hudak, assistant U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia, said “we’re not saying they can’t publish (what they want), we’re just saying ‘You can’t go here.’”

Hudak also added that the president is well within his power to choose “a certain population of journalists” he wants to allow in the Oval Office and other spaces.

“I don’t think that offends the Constitution on the First Amendment side,” Hudak said.

How it started

President Donald Trump signed an executive order hours after his inauguration renaming the U.S. coastal waters along Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas as the Gulf of America. He also reinstated the name of Alaska’s Denali mountain to Mount McKinley.

The AP, which issues editorial guidelines followed by journalists around the world, advised it would continue using the Gulf of Mexico with the notation that Trump had renamed the portion of water along the U.S. coast.

The outlet, however, issued guidance for journalists to use the name Mount McKinley because the president can rename locations fully within the U.S.

In an attempt to avoid litigation, the outlet’s executive editor, Julie Pace, contacted Trump administration officials to discuss the action against the AP. But the AP ultimately filed a lawsuit on Feb. 21 as the White House and Trump “doubled down” on the new policy, according to court documents.

White House Chief of Staff Susan Wiles told Pace in Feb. 18 correspondence that the AP Stylebook, a detailed online and print guide for reporters and editors, “has been misused, and at times weaponized, to push a divisive and partisan agenda,” according to court documents.

That same day, Trump said the White House would “keep (the AP) out until such time that they agree that it’s the Gulf of America.”

As of a March 3 court filing, the AP said it was still banned from the pool and wider events that other reporters — even at least one that didn’t sign up ahead of time — were permitted to attend in person.

The outlet wrote in the brief that it “has repeatedly explained to administration officials that government attempts to control the words that journalists use — and excluding those journalists and retaliating against them when they do not comply — are unconstitutional and contrary to the public interest.”

A March 17 declaration by Miller lists dozens of events covered by the press pool at the White House and during the president’s travel that the AP has been denied access to.

Barring journalists for what they write

The AP maintains the Trump administration violated the outlet’s Fifth Amendment protections when the White House, without written warning and avenue to challenge, barred its journalists for “arbitrary and viewpoint-discriminatory reasons” from locations and events open to other press.

The outlet has a liberty interest in exercising its First Amendment rights, the AP argued, and therefore must receive due process if the government seeks to take away that constitutional right. And, the AP points to precedent set by the D.C.Circuit that the liberty interest in exercising freedom of speech extends to newsgathering.

Quoting the 1977 D.C. Circuit ruling in Sherill v. Knight — a key decision repeatedly mentioned — the AP argued: “‘Not only newsmen and the publications for which they write, but also the public at large have an interest protected by’ the First and Fifth Amendments ‘in assuring that restrictions on newsgathering be no more arduous than necessary, and that individual newsmen not be arbitrarily excluded from sources of information.’”

In that case, the Circuit Court ruled that press credentials to the White House could not be denied without procedural protections and that “the protection afforded newsgathering under the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of the press requires that this access not be denied arbitrarily or for less than compelling reasons.”

But the White House argues that the AP has no liberty interest in “having special media access to the president.”

“The Associated Press’s journalists continue to enjoy the same general media access to the White House press facilities as all other hard pass holders and continue to occasionally have special access to the President. The Associated Press’s special access is simply no longer permanent,” according to the White House opposition brief.

Quoting from the 1996 case JB Pictures, Inc. v. Department of Defense, the White House argued “‘the First Amendment does not provide journalists any greater right of access to government property or information than it provides to members of the public, despite the fact that access to government information ‘might lead to more thorough or better reporting.’”

White House press officials also maintain that the president has discretion over which journalists join him in the “most intimate of his work and personal spaces.”

Press pool history

For decades the White House Correspondents Association has included in the daily pool three wire service reporters, from the AP, Reuters and Bloomberg; four photographers, from AP, Reuters, Agence France-Presse and The New York Times; and rotations of three TV network journalists, a radio correspondent and a print reporter, according to an amicus brief filed by the organization.

The wire services regularly included in the pool have the largest reach of all news outlets covering the White House, and is why the association structures the pool as it is, according to court filings. 

Samriddhi Patankar, a 19-year-old undergrad at George Washington University and the daughter of two researchers, attended a rally in support of federal workers outside the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 19, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

BALTIMORE — A federal judge in Maryland said Wednesday he will briefly extend his temporary order requiring the Trump administration to reinstate federal jobs for 24,000 fired probationary employees while he considers whether to make it last until the case is decided.

U.S. District Judge James Bredar in the District of Maryland told the plaintiffs and government he will need more details by 10 a.m. Eastern Thursday before he can decide whether the case merits a preliminary injunction to stop all firings and require reinstatements. Such an action would likely last until a final judgment in the case is reached.

The temporary restraining order affecting the fired federal workers expires Thursday night, but Bredar told the parties he expects to extend it briefly while he considers new information.

President Donald Trump and White House adviser Elon Musk began directing agencies in early February to fire tens of thousands of federal workers who were in the first year or two of their positions, or had been recently promoted.

Wednesday’s hearing in Baltimore centered on a lawsuit filed March 6 by Democratic attorneys general in 19 states and the District of Columbia, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.

The attorneys general argued the mass firings led by Trump and Musk harmed states because the federal government did not provide the legally required advance notice that gives states time to prepare “rapid response activities” ahead of an influx of unemployed residents. 

The states have asked Bredar to issue a preliminary injunction to prohibit the government from conducting any further reductions in force, also referred to as RIFs.

‘Great reluctance’ to grant preliminary injunction

But Bredar had tough questions Wednesday for lawyers representing the states and U.S. Department of Justice.

Bredar asked Virginia Williamson, counsel for the state of Maryland, why he should issue a nationwide preliminary injunction when the “majority of states have not joined this lawsuit.”

“That’s the issue that has to be faced,” he said.

Bredar expressed a preference for a more narrow injunction and ordered Williamson to submit more information within 24 hours that proves the need for a broader request.

“This court has great reluctance to issue a national injunction. You’re going to have to show me it’s essential to remedy harms (for your clients),” he said.

Eric Hamilton, representing the federal government, testified that the states lack standing, and that their argument is “unusual” in that their grievance is lack of warning about the firings — but they seek a remedy of giving employees their jobs back.

Bredar replied that the problem wouldn’t exist if the workers were returned to their status quo of being employed.

“If there’s no fire, there’s no need for the fire department to respond,” he told Hamilton.

Hamilton also argued that burdens placed on the government for having to rehire thousands of employees “are so much greater” than any financial injuries the firings caused for the states.

Bredar snapped back that the firings were “sudden and dramatic.”

“It’s not appropriate to flip that around. If you were worried about that, you shouldn’t have done it in the first place. I’m not buying that one,” the judge said.

When Bredar asked Hamilton why rehiring employees is precluded as a remedy, Hamilton argued there’s “not much precedent” for federal courts to issue orders to agencies about personnel decisions.

Second judge to order rehiring

Bredar issued a temporary restraining order March 13 immediately reinstating employment for just over 24,000 federal probationary workers across dozens of federal departments and agencies.

Agencies affected by the order included Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Treasury and Veterans Affairs, as well as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, General Services Administration, Small Business Administration and the U.S. Agency for International Development, according to court filings.

Bredar was the second federal judge on that date to order the Trump administration to rehire fired federal workers.

The government has appealed both rulings to their respective circuit courts.

In a status report due to Bredar on March 17, representatives for the federal agencies detailed the “substantial burdens” of rehiring the employees. At the time of the report, the agency heads placed almost 19,000 out of the 24,418 fired on paid administrative leave rather than placing them back on active duty status.

The required court filings marked the first time the government had provided a comprehensive list of the federal workforce downsizing that spanned February into March.

The agency representatives submitted updated status reports to Bredar Tuesday, reaffirming that many of the employees remain on paid administrative leave.

‘No secret of their contempt’ for civil service

In their original complaint, the attorneys general argued that Trump and administration officials “have made no secret of their contempt for the roughly 2 million committed professionals who form the federal civil service. Nor have they disguised their plans to terminate vast numbers of civil servants, starting with tens of thousands of probationary employees.”

The firings have subjected communities across the U.S. “to chaos” and will cost the states money in lost tax revenue and social services for unemployed residents, they wrote. 

“These costs arise in the administration of programs aimed at providing connections to social services, like health care and food assistance,” they argued.

The government responded that the 19 states and District of Columbia have no standing in the case and ultimately can’t prove irreparable harm. They also maintained that the executive branch has the right to fire probationary employees.

“The action has no hope of success, because third parties cannot interject themselves into the employment relationship between the United States and government workers, which is governed by a comprehensive statutory scheme that provides an exclusive remedial avenue to challenge adverse personnel actions,” the government argued.

Bredar was appointed to the U.S. District Court bench by former President Barack Obama in 2010 and confirmed by voice vote in the Senate.

Before beginning his legal career in Colorado, Bredar worked as a National Park Service ranger, according to his biography published by the U.S. courts. Bredar worked as a prosecutor in Moffat County, Colorado, then as an assistant U.S. attorney and assistant federal public defender in Denver.

In 1992, he was appointed federal public defender for the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland. He was appointed a U.S. magistrate judge in 1998.

FBI Director Kash Patel, left, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, center, and Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe appear during a Senate Committee on Intelligence Hearing on March 25, 2025, in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — National security officials grilled by Democratic senators Tuesday denied any wrongdoing by Trump administration Cabinet members who discussed plans to bomb Yemen on a Signal group chat shared with The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe and National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard sidestepped questions about specific details shared in the text chain and insisted no classified information was relayed over the messaging app.

The officials testified for nearly two hours during the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence’s regularly scheduled hearing on worldwide threats.

Ratcliffe’s and Gabbard’s denials that operational details, including timing and strike targets, were disclosed in the chat contradict Goldberg’s stunning report on the breach. His article was published less than 24 hours prior to their appearance before the panel.

Goldberg told of receiving an invitation, presumably inadvertent, from National Security Advisor Michael Waltz to join a group chat of top security officials. Goldberg remained in the chat, apparently unnoticed, for multiple days and witnessed discussion of planning details and subsequent celebrations of U.S. strikes on Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.

‘I don’t want to get into this’

Gabbard initially refused to confirm she was part of the chat, under the initials “TG.” “I don’t want to get into this,” she told Sen. Mark Warner, the panel’s vice chair.

Turning to the CIA director, Warner asked “You were the ‘John Ratcliffe’ on that chat?”

“I was,” Ratcliffe confirmed to the Virginia Democrat.

Ratcliffe defended the use of Signal, an encrypted commercial messaging app, as a regularly used channel by government officials to “communicate and coordinate for work purposes provided, Senator, that any decisions that are made are also recorded through formal channels.”

“My communications, to be clear, in the Signal message group were entirely permissible and lawful and did not include classified information,” Ratcliffe said.

Gabbard also testified to the panel that no classified information was discussed in the group chat.

Sen. Angus King, independent of Maine, told Gabbard he was “puzzled” by her assertion.

“According to open source reporting, at 11:44 on the morning of March 15, (Defense) Secretary Hegseth put into this group text a detailed operation plan, including targets, the weapons we were going to be using, attack sequences and timing,” King said. “Wouldn’t that be classified?”

“Senator, I can attest to the fact that there were no classified or intelligence equities that were included in that chat group at any time,” Gabbard said, telling King to ask the Pentagon for further information on classification.

“If that’s the case, please release that whole text stream so that the public can have a view of what actually transpired on this discussion,” King said.

While Goldberg did publish verbatim portions and screenshots of the chat — including emoji symbols the officials used to celebrate the strikes — the national magazine editor, citing troop safety concerns, did not quote from Hegseth’s messages regarding targets, weapons to be used and sequencing of strikes.

Adversary nations

Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia brought up the scenario that a wider leak of the chat would have been of interest to adversary countries, particularly revealing the “time period during which enemy air defenses could target U.S. air crews flying in enemy airspace.”

“Director Ratcliffe, this was a huge mistake, correct?” Ossoff asked.

“No,” Ratcliffe replied.

A Pentagon-wide advisory warned officials on March 18 against using Signal because of possible spying, according to an NPR investigative report published Tuesday.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended the Signal group chat Tuesday morning in a post on the social media platform X, attacking Goldberg as “well-known for his sensationalist spin.”

“Here are the facts about his latest story: 1. No ‘war plans’ were discussed. 2. No classified material was sent to the thread. 3. The White House Counsel’s Office has provided guidance on a number of different platforms for President Trump’s top officials to communicate as safely and efficiently as possible,” Leavitt wrote.

She added, “the White House is looking into how Goldberg’s number was inadvertently added to the thread.”

Attack on media

Just after noon Eastern Tuesday, the White House press office issued a statement characterizing media reporting on the breach as a “coordinated effort to distract from the successful actions taken by President Trump and his administration to make America’s enemies pay.”

When pressed by a reporter Monday at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickman in Hawaii, Hegseth attacked Goldberg and said, “Nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that.”

Warner and other Democratic lawmakers have called for the resignations of Hegseth and Waltz.

Tuesday’s Senate Intelligence panel hearing was streamed in its entirety on C-SPAN.

Dozens were killed in the March 15 strikes, according to reporting by The Associated Press that cited Houthi-run health officials.

Former President Joe Biden, joined by British forces, also targeted Houthi strongholds in Yemen beginning in January 2024.

The rebel group has been attacking commercial ships in the Red Sea since the beginning of Israel’s war on Hamas following the Oct. 7, 2023 attack.

A Social Security Administration sign on a field office building in San Jose, California, in 2020. (Photo by Michael Vi/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Democrats warned Monday about President Donald Trump and billionaire adviser Elon Musk’s plans to pare down the Social Security Administration, an agency that pays out benefits to tens of millions of Americans.

Lawmakers, a Social Security recipient and a former commissioner cried foul over the U.S. DOGE Service and administration’s agenda to cut jobs, terminate office leases and change how Americans can contact the agency.

Trump and his top reelection campaign donor are “attacking Social Security through the back door by making it harder and harder for people to collect the benefits they are legally entitled to,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren said during a virtual press briefing hosted by the Democratic National Committee.

“The world’s richest man may not understand what it means to worry about not getting a monthly Social Security check, but tens of millions of Americans know that fear deep down in their guts,” said Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Development.

Just over 73 million Americans received retirement and disability benefits last month, according to the Social Security Administration.

The agency will distribute approximately $1.6 trillion in benefits this year, according to its own data. The program accounts for roughly one-fifth of federal spending.

Musk has a recent history of publicly attacking the agency. He told podcast host Joe Rogan in February that Social Security is “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.” Weeks later on Fox Business, Musk said to host Larry Kudlow that Social Security is “the big one to eliminate” when it comes to fraud and spending.

Job cuts, office closures

In early March, Musk’s DOGE announced plans to cut 7,000 jobs from Social Security and close numerous regional offices, according to media reports.

Despite potential office closures, the administration also plans a policy change that will require recipients to show up in person to verify certain changes to their accounts.

A federal judge Thursday temporarily restrained the Social Security Administration from sharing access to any sensitive files with DOGE.

“I can tell you that democracy is waking up to this very, very real threat that they are coming for Social Security,” former Social Security Administration Commissioner Martin O’Malley said during the briefing.

O’Malley, also a former governor of Maryland, accused the Trump administration of allowing wait times for the agency’s 1-800 number to skyrocket after he and former President Joe Biden worked to improve the hotline.

“Make no mistake about it, in order to rob Social Security, the co-presidency of Musk and Trump must sour enough Americans against the agency, undermine trust in the agency, and they do that by breaking and debilitating the agency’s ability to provide a high level of customer service,” O’Malley said.

Darlene Jones, a Social Security recipient from Arizona who had to retire early and still cares for an adult child with disabilities, told reporters on the call, “We worked our entire lives to own what we have. President Trump and shadow president Musk have to be stopped before they harm seniors, especially those in rural America.”

DNC Chair Ken Martin said Trump and Musk “sure as hell don’t know how much it costs to make dinner for a week, buy a bag of pet food or catch the bus every day.”

Social Security data shows that among beneficiaries 65 and older, roughly 12% of men and 15% of women rely on Social Security checks for 90% of their total income.

White House says intent to identify waste, fraud

In an emailed statement provided to States Newsroom, the White House brushed off the attacks.

“Any American receiving Social Security benefits will continue to receive them. The sole mission of DOGE is to identify waste, fraud, and abuse only,” according to press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

Acting Social Security Commissioner Lee Dudek said in a press release Monday that the agency “is taking several important steps to increase transparency and accountability in order to help others understand our agency’s work and the complexities we navigate.”

Nearly 3,000 employees have either been placed on administrative leave or accepted offers to leave the agency in exchange for a one-time payment of up to $25,000, according to data linked in the press release.

Additionally, the agency plans to terminate 64 leases, saving roughly $4 million in annual rent.

Musk took to his social media platform X to defend the new policy change requiring in-person office visits as a way to avoid fraud.

Confirmation hearing

Trump’s pick to lead the agency, Frank Bisignano of New Jersey, president and CEO of Fiserv, will appear before the Senate Committee on Finance Tuesday.

Warren said she and Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, top Democrat on the Finance Committee, co-wrote a letter to Bisignano this weekend to put him “on notice.”

“These new developments leave us deeply concerned that DOGE and the Trump Administration are setting up the SSA for failure — a failure that could cut off Social Security benefits for millions of Americans — and that will then be used to justify a ‘private sector fix,’” Warren and Wyden wrote.

A Texas National Guardsman observes as Border Patrol agents pat down migrants who have surrendered themselves for processing, May 10, 2023. (Photo by Corrie Boudreaux for Source NM)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration is gearing up to militarize a stretch of the southern border, according to a Washington Post report Thursday, raising concerns from experts that the move would put U.S. military members in direct contact with migrants, a possible violation of federal law.

The White House is mulling the creation of a military satellite installation across the 60-foot-deep strip of federal land known as the Roosevelt Reservation, according to the report.

The move would create a military buffer zone stretching across the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona, California and New Mexico, and mean any migrant crossing into the United States would be trespassing on a military base, allowing active-duty troops to hold them until border patrol agents arrive.

Nearly 10,000 military personnel have already been deployed to the southern border, but creating the military buffer zone would be an escalation of the Trump administration’s ramp-up of the use of the U.S. military in its plans for mass deportation of immigrants without permanent legal status, which experts say would be illegal.

“The use of active-duty military for what clearly amounts to law enforcement on the border is absolutely, plainly illegal,” Stephen Dycus, a professor in national security law at the Vermont Law School, said during a Thursday interview. “It’s a violation of the Posse Comitatus Act.”

The 1878 law generally prohibits the military from being used in domestic law enforcement.

Adam Isacson, director of defense oversight at the Washington Office of Latin America, a research and advocacy group that aims to advance human rights in North and South America, said the escalation of military presence at the border is new.

He added that the military being used to operate deportation flights has “involved an uncomfortable amount of contact between soldiers and migrants.”

“Most of the military that have been sent (to the border) over the years have been a couple thousand National Guard members at a time — a pretty low-level mission,” Isacson said. “So that chance of contact between the soldiers and civilians on U.S. soil (was) very, very, very, very slim. That’s all changing now.”

A Pentagon spokesperson told States Newsroom in an email Thursday that the department has “nothing to announce at this time” regarding the establishment of a base along stretches of the border.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The scenario could spark further legal challenges against the Trump administration, which is already in hot water for potentially defying a federal judge’s order to halt deportation flights of Venezuelans under the wartime Alien Enemies Act.

Transformation of military role

While sending activity duty to the southern border has occurred for more than 20 years in intelligence and logistics roles, military members do not engage in immigration enforcement.

During a visit to the border Feb. 3, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters “guys and gals of my generation have spent decades in foreign countries guarding other people’s borders. It’s about time we secure our own border.”

“All options are on the table,” Hegseth said.

Joseph Nunn, liberty and national security counsel for the Brennan Center for Justice, said during a Thursday interview he would expect the Trump administration to face lawsuits for essentially using the military for civilian law enforcement.

“This is a transparent ruse to try to evade the Posse Comitatus Act by taking advantage of something called the military purpose doctrine,” Nunn said.

Under that doctrine, Nunn said, the military can maintain order or take action to further other military purposes, even if the action does have incidental benefits to civilian law enforcement. For example, if a drunken driver attempts to drive onto a base, military police can detain them before handing them over to civilian law enforcement.

But Nunn said specifically installing a base along the border as a way for the military to detain migrants as trespassers has not been tried before.

“It’s an abuse of the doctrine and one that the courts should reject because in that circumstance the military installation will have been created and the soldiers will have been stationed there for the purpose of assisting with a civilian law enforcement operation,” Nunn said. “That is immigration enforcement.”

Migrant encounters down

Transferring federal land to the Department of Defense, which because it’s fewer than 5,000 acres doesn’t need congressional approval, comes at a time when border encounters are relatively low.

Apprehensions at the southern border have plummeted to their lowest level in 25 years, with 8,347 encounters reported in February, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.

The trend started in February of last year due to Mexico increasing immigration enforcement and policies under the Biden administration that limited asylum claims between ports of entry, said Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh of the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan immigration think tank.

“As with any change in administration, and this was true of the first Trump administration, because of the general rhetoric around immigration, we did see kind of an initial decrease, so it’s not altogether surprising to see that decrease,” Putzel-Kavanaugh, who studies migration trends along the border, said.

“There’s kind of a general wait-and-see period of people trying to figure out what makes the most sense in terms of their own needs and in their journey,” she added.

The sections along the southern border that the Trump administration is eyeing – U.S. Border Patrol sectors based in San Diego; Tucson, Arizona; and El Paso, Texas – are “consistently the busiest,” she said.

Putzel-Kavanaugh added that it’s typical for migration patterns between sectors to change.

“I think it’s certainly plausible to assume that, if they have this militarization campaign across sort of the western side of the border, it’s likely that flows will then start going east,” she said.

Reaction from New Mexico lawmakers

Democrats slammed the idea, questioning why defense funding should be used at the border as global conflict increases.

U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján, a New Mexico Democrat, expressed skepticism about relying on defense resources to solve migration issues.

“Securing our border and protecting the safety of New Mexicans is a top priority, which is why I supported the bipartisan border security agreement — an effort that was ultimately killed by then-candidate Donald Trump,” Luján said in a statement.

“Diverting military resources for this purpose would weaken our military readiness. There is broad bipartisan consensus that we need comprehensive immigration reform and stronger border security, but not at the expense of existing defense missions.”

Rep. Gabe Vasquez, also a New Mexico Democrat, said in a statement the reported plan is “yet another reckless and wasteful proposal that does nothing to fix our broken immigration system.”

“In a time of global uncertainty, our military resources are best used to combat serious international threats abroad,” Vasquez said.

The offices for the Republican-led Senate and House committees on the Armed Forces did not respond to requests for comment.

Source New Mexico editor Julia Goldberg contributed to this report.

An aerial view of the Pentagon on Oct. 28, 2018. (Photo by Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Quinn Hurt/Department of Defense)

WASHINGTON — A federal judge late Tuesday blocked President Donald Trump’s ban on transgender troops in the U.S. military, adding to the list of legal setbacks to the administration’s agenda.

U.S. District Judge for the District of Columbia Ana Reyes ordered Trump’s Department of Defense to revert to military policy in place before he issued an executive order prohibiting openly transgender individuals from joining or continuing their service in the armed forces.

Trump’s executive order, signed in the late hours of Jan. 27, alleges the “adoption of a gender identity inconsistent with an individual’s sex conflicts with a soldier’s commitment to an honorable, truthful, and disciplined lifestyle, even in one’s personal life.” Further, the order asserts that being transgender is “not consistent with the humility and selflessness required of a service member.”

The order reversed a 2021 policy that allowed transgender individuals to openly serve in the military.

In a 79-page opinion, Reyes criticized the administration for lack of data proving the claims in Trump’s order.

“Transgender persons have served openly since 2021, but Defendants have not analyzed their service. That is unfortunate. Plaintiffs’ service records alone are Exhibit A for the proposition that transgender persons can have the warrior ethos, physical and mental health, selflessness, honor, integrity, and discipline to ensure military excellence,” Reyes wrote.

Reyes’ order goes into effect Friday at 10 a.m. Eastern.

Reyes’ ruling is among other recent court orders jamming the Trump administration’s legally questionable actions, including mass firings of federal workers and flying immigrants to El Salvador and Honduras under a wartime authority and in defiance of a judge’s court order.

Then-President Joe Biden nominated Reyes in 2023, and the Senate confirmed her in a 51-47 vote.

Trump aid blasts ruling

A representative for the Department of Justice said the ruling “is the latest example of an activist judge attempting to seize power at the expense of the American people” who elected Trump.

The DOJ has “vigorously defended” Trump and “will continue to do so,” according to the statement provided to States Newsroom attributed to an unnamed spokesperson.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller slammed the decision on social media Wednesday, saying federal judges have “assumed the mantle of Secretary of Defense, Secretary of State, Secretary of Homeland Security and Commander-in-Chief.”

“Each day, they change the foreign policy, economic, staffing and national security policies of the Administration,” Miller wrote on the social media platform X. “Each day the nation arises to see what the craziest unelected local federal judge has decided the policies of the government of the United States shall be. It is madness.”

Trump’s social media attack on a federal judge Tuesday prompted a rare rebuke from U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.

Eight transgender active-duty service members and transgender individuals who are actively pursuing enlistment in the armed forces brought the case against the administration.

The plaintiffs have a combined 130 years of military service in wide ranging roles and numerous deployments around the world. One is currently deployed in an active combat zone, according to Reyes’ opinion.

The plaintiffs reside or are stationed in California, Florida, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, the District of Columbia and Wisconsin.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Glenn Ivey of Maryland speaks at a rally in support of federal workers outside the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration has begun the process of reinstating tens of thousands of fired federal workers, though most are just being placed on administrative leave as the government cites the “burdens” of rehiring, court filings reviewed by States Newsroom show.

The documents also show, agency by agency, the wide swath of firings that swept across the federal government in February and early March.

A federal judge in Maryland last week ruled the recent terminations of probationary employees were illegal and ordered the administration to reinstate the workers across 18 federal agencies by 1 p.m. Eastern Monday. Nineteen Democratic attorneys general and the District of Columbia sued the administration over the firings.

The mass firings began in early February as part of President Donald Trump’s U.S. DOGE Service cost-cutting agenda. Elon Musk, a White House adviser and top donor to Trump’s reelection, is the face of the temporary DOGE project, though the administration maintains he has no decision-making power.

According to the court filings late Monday, the agencies have returned almost 19,000 employees to administrative leave out of the 24,418 fired. The filings provided the most comprehensive list to date of the federal workforce downsizing that spanned February into March.

Judge James Bredar of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland ordered the agencies on Tuesday to provide a progress update by early next week. Bredar was appointed by former President Barack Obama in 2010 and confirmed by a Senate voice vote.

The lawsuit was filed March 6 by Democratic attorneys general in Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.

Workers on leave, some ‘until further notice’

Some agencies, like the departments of Commerce and Transportation, indicated that employees would only be on paid administrative leave temporarily until paperwork and other procedures were finished.

Others, including the U.S. Agency for International Development, have given employees paid administrative leave status “until further notice.”

The government argued that reinstating the terminated employees to full duty status “would impose substantial burdens” on the agencies and cause “turmoil for the terminated employees”

“[T]hey would have to be onboarded again, including going through any applicable training, filling out human resources paperwork, obtaining new security badges, reinstituting applicable security clearance actions, receiving government furnished equipment, and other requisite administrative actions,” according to the filings from several department representatives.

But “nonetheless,” the agency representatives said they began complying with Bredar’s order even as the cancellation of terminations was a “very time and labor intensive process,” wrote Mark D. Green, deputy assistant secretary for human capital, learning and safety at the Department of the Interior.

“The tremendous uncertainty associated with this confusion and these administrative burdens impede supervisors from appropriately managing their workforce. Work schedules and assignments are effectively being tied to hearing and briefing schedules set by the courts. It will be extremely difficult to assign new work to reinstated individuals in light of the uncertainty over their future status,” Green continued in his legal declaration required by Judge Bredar.

The agency representatives also wrote “employees could be subjected to multiple changes in their employment status in a matter of weeks” if an appellate ruling reverses the lower court order.

The Trump administration appealed the district court ruling Friday to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals.

California judge issues warning

The March 13 temporary restraining order out of Maryland was the second on that date mandating agencies rehire terminated workers. A federal judge in California separately ordered the government to reinstate thousands of employees at six federal agencies.

District Judge William Alsup in the Northern District of California warned in a court filing late Monday that the agencies must comply by fully returning employees to their jobs.

“The Court has read news reports that, in at least one agency, probationary employees are being rehired but then placed on administrative leave en masse. This is not allowed by the preliminary injunction, for it would not restore the services the preliminary injunction intends to restore,” Alsup wrote, requesting a status report Tuesday. Alsup was appointed by former President Bill Clinton in 1999 and confirmed by a Senate voice vote.

The Trump administration quickly appealed the California ruling last week to the U.S. Appeals Court for the 9th Circuit.

A three-judge panel for the 9th Circuit Monday ruled 2-1 to deny the Trump administration’s emergency request to block the workers’ reinstatement.

Employees new on the job

Probationary employees were targeted by the Office of Personnel Management on the first day of Trump’s second presidency, according to court documents.

The employees, who are within one or two years of being hired or beginning a new position, have “extremely limited protections against termination,” agency representatives wrote.

The Office of Personnel and Management sent emails Jan. 20 to department heads stating that “agencies should identify all employees on probationary periods” and “should promptly determine whether those employees should be retained at the agency,” according to the court filing.

Agency by agency list

Department and agency representatives detailed the following termination numbers in the Monday filings (not all agencies provided total numbers of probationary employees):

• Health and Human Services: 3,248 of its 8,466 probationary workers were placed on administrative leave between Feb. 15 and March 13 (and remain on extended leave); 88 were subsequently fired and placed back on leave as of Monday.

• Environmental Protection Agency: 419 probationary employees were terminated between Feb. 14 and Feb. 21. “Most” were returned to paid administrative leave Monday. Some who were in “unpaid leave status” were returned to that status.

• Energy: 555 were terminated “on or around” Feb. 13 and Feb 14. All 555 were returned Monday to retroactive administrative leave status “that will continue until their badging and IT access are restored, at which time they will be converted to an Active Duty status.”

• Commerce: 791 of the agency’s roughly 9,000 probationary employees were terminated up until March 3. Twenty-seven were reinstated soon after, and 764 were placed back on paid administrative leave Monday. The agency plans to move them to full duty status within a week, according to the filing.

• Homeland Security: 313 employees were terminated through March 14. With a few exceptions of employees who resigned or declined to return, DHS placed 310 back on paid administrative leave.

• Transportation: 788 employees were terminated between Feb. 14 and Feb. 24. DOT informed 775 that they’ve been placed on paid administrative leave until Wednesday. “The Department of Transportation will coordinate the specifics of their return, including the restoration of their government equipment and Personal Identity Verification (PIV) card,” according to the filing.

• Education: Without providing specific dates, the department terminated 65 of its 108 probationary employees before Judge Bredar’s March 13 order. All have now been placed on paid administrative leave.

• Housing and Urban Development: The agency terminated 312 of its 549 probationary employees on Feb. 14. About 299 are being brought back “temporarily” on administrative leave.

• Interior: As of Monday night, Interior had reinstated roughly 1,540 of the 1,710 workers fired on Feb. 14.

• Labor: 170 were terminated but reinstated before March 7.

• Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: 117 employees were terminated between Feb. 11 and Feb. 13. All were notified Sunday that they “will be immediately placed on administrative leave status while the CFPB continues to act to comply with the TRO and/or employees are to be assigned work by management/supervisors,” according to the filing.

• Small Business Administration: 304 of the SBA’s 700 probationary employees were terminated between Feb. 11 and Feb. 25. The agency was unable to notify seven employees about reinstatement. Roughly 164 were returned to non-pay intermittent status, while the rest were returned to paid administrative leave.

• Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation: 156 of its 261 probationary employees were terminated between Feb. 18 and 19; 151 were placed on paid administrative leave as of Monday.

• USAID: 270 of the agency’s 295 probationary employees were fired March 7. All have been reinstated to paid administrative leave.

• General Services Administration: 366 of its 812 probationary employees were terminated between Feb. 13 and March 7. While two declined reinstatement, 364 were placed Monday on paid administrative leave.

• Treasury: 7,605 of Treasury’s 16,663 probationary employees were fired between Feb. 19 and March 7. All have been reinstated to paid administrative leave status.

• Agriculture: 5,714 probationary employees were terminated between Feb. 13 and 17. The department is “working diligently” to restore employees to active duty status, according to the filing. The employees have been returned to paid or unpaid leave as of March 12.

• Veterans Affairs: 1,683 of the VA’s roughly 46,000 probationary employees were terminated between Feb. 13 to 24. All were placed on paid administrative leave.

USAID ruling

In a separate case against Trump and DOGE’s workforce-slashing agenda, a federal judge in Maryland on Tuesday ruled Musk likely violated the Constitution when orchestrating the shutdown of the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID.

Judge Theodore David Chuang for the U.S. District Court in the District of Maryland demanded Musk and any personnel working for DOGE refrain from any further action related to dismantling USAID.

Chuang also ordered Musk and DOGE to reinstate computer and email access for all current USAID employees and contractors within seven days. Additionally, he ordered Musk and DOGE to strike an agreement within 14 days that would reopen the former USAID headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Musk’s DOGE personnel forced their way into the humanitarian agency’s headquarters in early February ahead of the mass firings.

The shuttering of U.S. humanitarian missions around the world sparked protests in the nation’s capital.

Chuang, an Obama appointee, was approved by the Senate in 2014 in a 53-42 vote.

The White House slammed the court order Tuesday, alleging that “rogue judges are subverting the will of the American people in their attempts to stop President Trump from carrying out his agenda.”

“If these Judges want to force their partisan ideologies across the government, they should run for office themselves. The Trump Administration will appeal this miscarriage of justice and fight back against all activist judges intruding on the separation of powers,” said White House spokesperson Anna Kelly in an emailed statement.

Earlier Tuesday, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts issued a rare statement following Trump’s morning social media attack on federal judges, calling for their impeachment.

“For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” Roberts said. “The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.”

President Joe Biden gives a pen to Bette Marafino, president of the Connecticut chapter of the Alliance for Retired Americans, after he signed the Social Security Fairness Act during an event in the East Room of the White House on Jan. 5, 2025 in Washington, D.C.  (Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump claimed in a social media post late Sunday night that former President Joe Biden’s eleventh hour pardons for numerous officials are no longer valid — a power not granted to Trump in the Constitution.

Trump wrote on his platform Truth Social that Biden’s sweeping preemptive pardons are “are hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT, because of the fact that they were done by Autopen.”

Without citing any evidence, Trump also alleged Biden “did not know anything about” the pardons.

Just hours before leaving office, Biden pardoned lawmakers who investigated the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, as well as former high-ranking health official Dr. Anthony Fauci, who steered the United States through the COVID-19 pandemic, and retired Gen. Mark Milley, former chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Biden also pardoned several members of his own family just before his term expired. The White House released Biden’s statements regarding his Jan. 20 pardons.

Autopen used before

The Autopen is a device that replicates signatures and was used by former President Barack Obama in 2011 to sign an extension of the Patriot Act.

Experts say the debate over the use of the Autopen was settled in a 2005 opinion from the White House Office of Legal Counsel that stated a president may direct a subordinate to affix his or her signature to a bill using the mechanism.

David Super, who focuses on constitutional and administrative law at Georgetown University, said Trump’s Autopen argument is “absurd.”

“But even if it wasn’t, the Constitution does not require signatures for pardons. It simply says the president has the power to pardon,” Super said.

“So if President Biden wanted to simply verbally tell someone they’re pardoned, he could do that. It wouldn’t have to be in writing at all. Administratively, of course, we want things in writing. It makes things a lot simpler, but there’s no constitutional requirement,” he said.

The right-wing Heritage Foundation posted a graphic on the social media platform X on March 10 and 11, claiming the foundation’s “Project Oversight” uncovered the exact same signature on a number of Biden’s pardons.

Fox News also claimed on March 9 that Biden’s exact same signature was found by Heritage on numerous documents from 2022 and 2024 that were published in the Federal Register.

The National Archives said in a statement that all signatures on official documents published in the Federal Register come from “one graphic file,” according to Snopes.

Press secretary defends ‘raising the point’

Kermit Roosevelt, constitutional law expert at the University of Pennsylvania, said the Autopen argument is a “red herring.” Trump’s other suggestion, that  Biden didn’t know about the pardons, would essentially make them invalid.

“If the president doesn’t know that something was done, then it’s not a valid official act,” Roosevelt said. “But I highly doubt that that happened. I know of no reason to think that that did happen.”

“I mean, it is sort of characteristic of Trump to make insinuations and raise questions without any evidence, and then the White House says he’s just asking questions,” Roosevelt said. “I don’t think that’s a great way to govern.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Monday that Trump was “raising the point that did the president even know about these pardons? Was his legal signature used without his consent or knowledge?”

“I think it’s a question that everybody in this room should be looking into,” Leavitt said, citing the New York Post as a source.

The White House did not immediately respond to a question about the Trump administration’s use of the Autopen.

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report. 

Democratic U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland speaks at a rally in support of federal workers outside the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2025. (Photo y Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court on Monday denied the Trump administration’s emergency effort to block the reinstatement of federal employees at six government agencies.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit rejected the government’s request to stay a Northern California district court’s March 13 ruling ordering the departments of Agriculture, Defense, Energy, Interior, Treasury and Veterans Affairs to reinstate thousands of probationary positions.

The newly hired or promoted employees were fired as part of an agenda to slash federal jobs carried out by President Donald Trump and billionaire White House adviser Elon Musk.

“Given that the district court found that the employees were wrongfully terminated and ordered an immediate return to the status quo ante, an administrative stay of the district court’s order would not preserve the status quo. It would do just the opposite — it would disrupt the status quo and turn it on its head,” according to the 9th Circuit order.

Judge Barry G. Silverman, a late 1990s President Bill Clinton appointee, and Judge Ana de Alba, appointed by President Joe Biden in 2023, issued the order, while Judge Bridget S. Bade, a 2019 Trump appointee, delivered a partial dissent.

The government’s response to the emergency motion is due by Tuesday. Further briefs are due throughout April and May. An appeals hearing has not yet been scheduled.

District judge ruling on firings

The Trump administration appealed the lower court’s decision just hours after Judge William Alsup’s extension of his emergency order directing the agencies to reinstate the positions.

Alsup also set Thursday as a deadline for a list of all terminated employees and an explanation of what federal agencies have done to comply with his order.

The White House decried the decision, saying ​”a single judge is attempting to unconstitutionally seize the power of hiring and firing from the Executive Branch,” according to a statement Thursday from press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

Unions representing masses of federal employees sued Trump’s Office of Personnel Management and its acting director Charles Ezell in February over the agency’s unilateral directive across the agencies to fire tens of thousands of workers.

The affected agencies within the six departments included the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Aviation Administration, the National Institutes of Health and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, among several others.

On the same day as the decision out of California, a federal judge in Maryland issued a temporary restraining order mandating 20 federal agencies reinstate fired employees by Monday.

Chainsaw at CPAC

Musk, a senior White House adviser and top donor to Trump’s reelection, is the face of Trump’s workforce downsizing and has not shied away from sharing his plans on his social media platform, X.

He even wielded a chainsaw on stage in February at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington, D.C., and yelled to the audience “This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy.” The chainsaw was gifted to him by Argentina’s strongman President Javier Milei.

The White House has claimed in a court filing in a separate case that Musk has no decision-making power.

President Donald Trump speaks at the Justice Department March 14, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — In a rare appearance by a president at the U.S. Justice Department, Donald Trump delivered a meandering speech Friday promising a “proud new chapter in the chronicles of American justice” and drumming on his campaign trail refrains of the department’s “weaponization” against him and his supporters.

Less than a year ago, the president was a defendant in two Justice Department cases and made history after becoming a convicted felon in New York state. Trump told the crowd of department officials, law enforcement officers and lawmakers his administration is “restoring fair, equal and impartial justice under the constitutional rule of law.”

“It’s going to be legendary,” Trump said.

The president also insinuated he may keep the Federal Bureau of Investigation headquarters in Washington, D.C., after a drawn-out battle over whether it would move to Maryland or Virginia.

Calling out law enforcement officers in the room, Trump said “with me in the White House, you once again have a president who will always have your back.”

Republican senators Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana were among the crowd, even though the Senate had not yet voted to extend government funding that was set to expire in less than eight hours.

Trump’s hour-long speech in part addressed crossings at the southwest border and deaths from illicit fentanyl. At one point he invited to the stage a mother who lost her son in 2022 to a pill laced with a deadly amount of fentanyl.

But the president’s remarks often meandered into topics unrelated to the Justice Department’s mission, including several minutes about his reelection endorsement from Indiana basketball legend Bobby Knight.

Classified documents case

At numerous points during the speech, Trump lambasted the DOJ’s investigations into his alleged mishandling of classified documents at his Florida estate and his attempted conspiracy to overturn former President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.

He said department officials “broke the law on a colossal scale, persecuted my family, staff and supporters, raided my home, Mar-a-Lago, and did everything within their power to prevent me from becoming the president of the United States.”

The government, following the election, dropped its appeal of Trump’s classified documents case, citing a longstanding DOJ policy of not prosecuting sitting presidents.

Florida federal District Judge Aileen Cannon had tossed the case on the grounds that the Justice Department had unlawfully appointed and compensated special counsel Jack Smith.

“The case against me was bullshit, and she correctly dismissed it,” Trump said.

Smith also dropped the 2020 election subversion case against Trump, which probed his alleged role in inciting the violent Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Trump granted clemency to the nearly 1,600 Jan. 6 defendants just hours into his second presidency, undoing the largest-ever investigation executed by the Justice Department.

Attorney General Pam Bondi has since overseen the firings and demotions of FBI agents and DOJ prosecutors who undertook Jan. 6 investigations and the two cases against Trump.

During his Friday remarks Trump thanked his former personal lawyers. Todd Blanche, who defended Trump in the Justice Department cases, is now No. 2 at the agency.

‘We have to keep on showing up’

At a press conference afterward outside the department, Democratic Maryland U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, alongside a police officer who was at the Capitol on Jan 6 and former DOJ officials, struggled to talk over a heckling protester. The event was livestreamed on C-SPAN.

Raskin, who sat on the House select committee to investigate the Capitol attack, described Trump’s speech as a “tirade” and praised Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn for “defending democracy.”

“He pardoned everybody and let them know that it’s OK. Now listen, I don’t know what accountability looks like, I don’t know what this fight is going to continue to look like, but we have to keep on showing up,” Dunn said.

One of Biden’s last acts was issuing broad preemptive pardons to members of the Jan. 6 committee as well as Dunn and three other officers who testified before the panel.

Over 140 police officers were injured in the riot.

Brendan Ballou, a former DOJ prosecutor who investigated the Jan. 6 attack, said while the administration is “perfectly happy to talk about the pardons, it is less willing to talk about some of the things that are happening in this building right now.”

He alleged DOJ officials are dismantling or weakening other divisions, including antitrust and anticorruption.

The Department of Justice did not immediately respond for comment.

The last time a president made a public appearance at the department was former President Barack Obama in 2014.

People hold signs as they gather for a "Save the Civil Service" rally hosted by the American Federation of Government Employees outside the U.S. Capitol on Feb. 11, 2025. Efforts by President Donald Trump and White House adviser Elon Musk to downsize the federal workforce have sparked backlash and legal challenges. (Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — A second federal judge ordered late Thursday that President Donald Trump’s administration reinstate probationary federal workers who were fired as part of the president’s and billionaire adviser Elon Musk’s government downsizing agenda.

District Judge James Bredar for the District of Maryland issued a temporary restraining order mandating nearly 20 federal departments and agencies to reinstate new or recent hires by Monday at 1 p.m. Eastern. The order from Bredar came hours after a similar one from a federal judge in California.

The lawsuit was filed March 6 by Democratic attorneys general in 19 states and the District of Columbia, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.

Bredar’s order reinstates just more than 23,500 probationary positions across the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Labor, Transportation, Treasury and Veterans Affairs, as well as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Environmental Protection Agency, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, General Services Administration, Small Business Administration and U.S. Agency for International Development, according to figures in the original complaint.

A hearing is scheduled for March 26 in Baltimore. The temporary mandate expires the evening of March 27.

Bredar’s order did not include the nearly 5,500 employees fired from the Department of Defense and National Archives and Records Administration.

The emergency decision out of Maryland followed an earlier ruling Thursday from a California federal judge who extended a previous temporary order immediately reinstating probationary jobs at the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Science Foundation and Small Business Administration, as well as the departments of Veterans Affairs and Defense.

The Trump administration quickly appealed the decision out of the Northern District of California. That suit was brought by more than a dozen plaintiffs, including unions representing hundreds of thousands of federal workers.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt slammed the California decision, saying in a statement Thursday “a single judge is attempting to unconstitutionally seize the power of hiring and firing from the Executive Branch.”

Musk, a senior White House adviser, is the face of Trump’s rapid-fire workforce downsizing. The top donor to Trump’s reelection bid has posted numerous times on his social media platform, X, about the need to slash federal workers.

In February at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside Washington, D.C., Musk waved around a chainsaw gifted to him from Argentine President Javier Milei and declared, “This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy.”