People demonstrate outside the main campus of the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention on April 1, 2025 in Atlanta, Georgia. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. laid off thousands of employees across multiple agencies on April 1, as part of an overhaul announced in March. (Photo by Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images)

A coalition of Democratic state officials sued the Trump administration Tuesday over plans to cut more than $11 billion in grants by the Department of Health and Human Services, on the same day thousands of HHS workers reportedly found they’d been swept up in a mass layoff.

In Washington, the Republican chairman and top Democrat on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee wrote HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. asking him to appear before the panel and discuss his plans for the massive agency.

The federal suit, signed by 22 attorneys general and two Democratic governors, alleges Kennedy revoked, without warning, billions in grant funding appropriated by Congress during the COVID-19 pandemic, starting last week. That led to states scrambling to adjust plans for vaccination efforts, infectious disease prevention, mental health programs and more.

The sudden and chaotic rollout of the grant cuts foreshadowed a scene at HHS offices, including at big campuses in Maryland, on Tuesday morning. Termination notices to laid-off workers were reportedly emailed early Tuesday, but many workers did not see them before arriving at the office and finding out they’d lost their jobs when their key cards did not work.

Few specifics

Both the mass layoffs and the grant funding cuts challenged in the lawsuit stem from Kennedy’s March 27 announcement that the department would be “realigning,” by shuttering several offices and cutting 10,000 workers.

It was unclear Tuesday exactly what offices or employees were affected.

An HHS spokesperson responded to a request for comment by referring States Newsroom to Kennedy’s announcement, a press release and an accompanying fact sheet from March 27.

None provided a detailed breakdown but laid out plans to eliminate 3,500 full-time positions at the Food and Drug Administration, 2,400 employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1,200 staff at the National Institutes of Health and 300 workers at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The spokesperson did not respond to a follow-up inquiry requesting more details of the positions eliminated and other clarifications.

Efficiency doubted

In a written statement, Andrés Arguello, a policy fellow at Groundwork Collective, a think tank focused on economic equity, said the cuts would have “the exact opposite” effect of the administration’s stated goal of government efficiency.

“Gutting 10,000 public servants means higher costs, longer wait times, and fewer services for families already struggling with the rising cost of living,” Arguello, an HHS deputy secretary under former President Joe Biden, wrote. “Entire offices that support child care, energy assistance, and mental health treatment are being dismantled, leaving working families with fewer options and bigger bills. This isn’t streamlining—it’s abandonment, and the price will be paid by the sick, the vulnerable, and the poor.”

The lack of communication led to confusion among advocates and state and local health workers about the impacts of the staff cuts and cast doubt about the administration’s goals, speakers on a Tuesday press call said.

“There are so many more questions than answers right now,” Sharon Gilmartin, the executive director of Safe States Alliance, an anti-violence advocacy group, said. “They clearly are eliminating whole divisions and branches, which doesn’t speak to bureaucratic streamlining. It speaks to moving forward an agenda, which has not been elucidated for the public health community, it’s not been elucidated for the public.”

While specific consequences of the cuts were not yet known, Gilmartin and others said they would be felt at the state and local level.

“I think what we do know is that … when we’re cutting these positions at the federal level, we are cutting work in states and communities,” Gilmartin said.

Pain in the states

The lawsuit from Democratic officials is full of details about the impacts of the loss of federal funding on state programs.

The suit was brought in Rhode Island federal court by the attorneys general of Colorado, Rhode Island, California, Minnesota, Washington, Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Wisconsin and Govs. Andy Beshear of Kentucky and Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania.

HHS revoked “more than half a billion dollars” of grants from Pennsylvania, the Democratic officials said, affecting more than 150 state employees and contracted staff. The grants funded work “to respond to and mitigate the spread of infectious disease across the Commonwealth” and mental health and substance abuse programs.

In Nevada, “HHS abruptly terminated at least six grants” that had funded epidemiology and lab capacity, immunization access and mental health services, according to the suit.

“These terminations led Nevada to immediately terminate 48 state employees and to order contractors working under these awards to immediately cease all activity,” the complaint reads. “The loss of funding will have substantial impacts on public health in Nevada.”

The cutoff of $13 million in unobligated grants for local communities in Minnesota will mean the shuttering of clinics to provide vaccines for COVID-19, measles, mumps, rubella, influenza and other diseases, the suit said.

“One local public health agency reported that it held 21 childhood vaccination clinics and provided approximately 1,400 vaccinations to children in 2024,” a paragraph in the complaint about Minnesota local vaccine clinics said. “It also held 87 general vaccination clinics in 2024. As a result of the termination of the … funds, it has immediately ceased all vaccination clinics for 2025.”

The grant terminations also affected state plans already in the works.

Rhode Island had received an extension from HHS for a grant with $13 million unspent, but that money was revoked last week.

“Accordingly, the state public health department developed a workplan for its immunization program that included an April 2025 vaccination clinic for seniors, provided salaries for highly trained technicians to ensure that vaccine doses are stored and refrigerated correctly to prevent waste of vaccines purchased with other tax-payer dollars, planned computer system upgrades, and covered printing costs for communications about vaccine campaigns,” the suit said.

Senators want RFK Jr. on the Hill

Democrats on Capitol Hill issued a slew of statements opposing the cuts and warning of their effects.

Republicans were more deferential to the administration, asking for patience as details of the cuts are revealed.

But the letter from the top members of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee also brought both sides together to write Kennedy asking him to testify before the committee to make those explanations plain.

“The hearing will discuss your proposed reorganization of the Department of Health and Human Services,” the letter from Louisiana Republican Bill Cassidy and Vermont independent Bernie Sanders said.

In a written statement, Cassidy said the hearing would be an opportunity for Kennedy to inform the public about the reorganization.

“The news coverage on the HHS reorg is being set by anonymous sources and opponents are setting the perceptions,” Cassidy said in a written statement. “In the confirmation process, RFK committed to coming before the committee on a quarterly basis. This will be a good opportunity for him to set the record straight and speak to the goals, structure and benefits of the proposed reorganization.”

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on Feb. 3, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — Top Democrats in Congress are asking the Government Accountability Office to open an investigation into whether the Trump administration violated federal law by freezing funding for several programs.

Pennsylvania Rep. Brendan Boyle and Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley, ranking members on the House and Senate Budget committees, wrote in a two-page letter sent Monday to the government watchdog organization that certain actions appear to have violated the Impoundment Control Act.

“Unilaterally impounding funds is illegal, and Donald Trump and Russ Vought are trying to gut the federal government piece by piece,” Merkley wrote in a statement accompanying the letter. “GAO must get to the bottom of this and reiterate to the administration that Congress has the power of the purse, not Trump and Vought.”

The Senate voted along party lines earlier this year to confirm Vought as director of the Office of Management and Budget, which has wide-reaching authority over decisions within the executive branch

A Government Accountability Office spokesperson told States Newsroom the agency is working through its process to determine whether it will launch an investigation based on the letter.

GAO, the spokesperson said, also has ongoing work related to the ICA.

OMB authority

Boyle wrote in a statement that the Constitution gives Congress the authority to determine when and where the federal government spends money.

“The administration’s withholding of critical investments harms American communities that rely on these funds for jobs, economic stability, and essential infrastructure,” Boyle wrote. “Robust congressional oversight, alongside litigation, is vital to protecting the interests of the American people.”

The Impoundment Control Act, enacted in the 1970s, bars presidents from not spending the money that Congress has appropriated. Vought has said repeatedly he believes the law is unconstitutional and that presidents have this authority.

Several lawsuits have been filed over the Trump administration opting not to spend federal money, some of which have blocked the actions from taking effect while the cases proceed through the federal courts. 

The Boyle-Merkley letter alleges the Trump administration has run afoul of the law on several occasions, including on his first day in office when he ordered a pause on foreign development assistance as well as funding in the Inflation Reduction Act and the bipartisan infrastructure law.

The two ask GAO to also look into the Trump administration’s decision to halt military aid to Ukraine for about a week in March, writing they are “concerned this pause may have been an illegal impoundment with negative foreign policy and national security implications.”

“The Constitution grants the President no unilateral authority to withhold funds from obligation,” Boyle and Merkley wrote in the letter. “Instead, Congress has vested the President with strictly circumscribed authority to impound or withhold budget authority only in limited circumstances as expressly provided in the Impoundment Control Act.

“The executive branch may withhold amounts from obligation only if the President transmits a special message to Congress that includes the amount of budget authority proposed for withholding and the reason for the proposal (2 U.S.C. §§ 683–684).”

What can GAO do?

During the first Trump administration, the GAO found the Office of Management and Budget violated the Impoundment Control Act  when it halted assistance to Ukraine.

“Faithful execution of the law does not permit the President to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law,” GAO wrote in the report. “OMB withheld funds for a policy reason, which is not permitted under the Impoundment Control Act (ICA). The withholding was not a programmatic delay. Therefore, we conclude that OMB violated the ICA.”

The GAO writes on its website that the ICA “authorizes the head of GAO, known as the Comptroller General, to file a lawsuit if the President illegally impounds funds.”

Comptroller General Gene Dodaro testified before Congress earlier this year that he plans to do just that if the independent agency finds violations of the ICA.

“We’re going to make these decisions as fast as possible,” Dodaro said, according to a news report. “I fully intend to carry out our responsibilities under the Impoundment Control Act expeditiously and thoroughly . . . I’ll do it as quickly as I can, but we need to be careful and thorough, because the next step for us is to go to court ourselves. If we say there’s been impoundment and money isn’t released in a certain period of time, we have to go to court.”

White House Senior Advisor to the President, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk arrives for a meeting with Senate Republicans at the U.S. Capitol on March 05, 2025 in Washington, DC. Musk is scheduled to meet with Republican lawmakers to coordinate his ongoing federal government cost cutting plan. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

While the role and actions of the Elon Musk-headed Department of Government Efficiency remain somewhat murky, data privacy experts have been tracking the group’s moves and documenting potential violations of federal privacy protections.

Before President Donald Trump took office in January, he characterized DOGE as an advisory body, saying it would “provide advice and guidance from outside of government” in partnership with the White House and Office of Management and Budget in order to eliminate fraud and waste from government spending.

But on Inauguration day, Trump’s executive order establishing the group said Musk would have “full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, software systems and IT systems.”

In the nine weeks since its formation, DOGE has been able to access sensitive information from the Treasury Department payment system, information about the headcount and budget of an intelligence agency and Americans’ Social Security numbers, health information and other demographic data. Musk and department staffers are also using artificial intelligence in their analysis of department cuts.

Though the Trump administration has not provided transparency around what the collected data is being used for, several federal agencies have laid off tens of thousands of workers, under the direction of DOGE, in the past two months. Thousands have been cut from the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Education, Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Treasury this month.

Frank Torres, senior AI and privacy adviser for The Leadership Conference’s Center for Civil Rights and Technology, which researches the intersection of civil rights and technology, said his organization partnered with the Center for Democracy and Technology, which researches and works with legislators on tech topics, to sort out what DOGE was doing. The organizations published a resource sheet documenting DOGE’s actions, the data privacy violations they are concerned about and the lawsuits that several federal agencies have filed over DOGE’s actions. 

“It doesn’t have to be this way,” Torres said. “I mean, there are processes and procedures and protections in place that are put in place for a reason, and it doesn’t appear that DOGE is following any of that, which is alarming.”

The organizations outlined potential violations of federal privacy protections, like the Privacy Act of 1974, which prohibits the disclosure of information without written consent, and substantive due process under the Fifth Amendment, which protects privacy from government interference.

White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Harrison Fields would not say if DOGE planned to provide more insight into its plans for the data it is accessing.

“Waste, fraud and abuse have been deeply entrenched in our broken system for far too long,” Fields told States Newsroom in an emailed statement. “It takes direct access to the system to identify and fix it. DOGE will continue to shine a light on the fraud they uncover as the American people deserve to know what their government has been spending their hard earned tax dollars on.”

The lack of transparency concerns U.S. Reps. Gerald E. Connolly, (D-Virginia) and  Jamie Raskin, (D-Maryland), who filed a Freedom of Information Act request this month requesting DOGE provide clear answers about its operations.

The request asks for details on who is in charge at DOGE, the scope of its authority to close federal agencies and lay off federal employees, the extent of its access to sensitive government sensitive databases and for Musk to outline how collected data may benefit his own companies and his foreign customers. They also questioned the feeding of sensitive information into AI systems, which DOGE touted last month.

“DOGE employees, including teenage and twenty-something computer programmers from Mr. Musk’s own companies, have been unleashed on the government’s most sensitive databases — from those containing national security and classified information to those containing the personal financial information of all Americans to those containing the trade secrets and sensitive commercial data of Mr. Musk’s competitors,” the representatives wrote in the request.

Most Americans have indeed submitted data to the federal government which can now be accessed by DOGE, said Elizabeth Laird, the director of equity in civic technology for the Center for Democracy and Technology — whether it be via a tax filing, student loan or Social Security. Laird said the two organizations see huge security concerns with how DOGE is collecting data and what it may be doing with the information. In the first few weeks of its existence, a coder discovered that anyone could access the database that posted updates to the DOGE.gov website.

“We’re talking about Social Security numbers, we’re talking about income, we’re talking about, you know, major life events, like whether you had a baby or got married,” Laird said. “We’re talking about if you’ve ever filed bankruptcy — like very sensitive stuff, and we’re talking about it for tens of millions of people.”

With that level of sensitive information, the business need should justify the level of risk, Laird said.

DOGE’s use of AI to comb through and categorize Americans’ data is concerning to Laird and Torres, as AI algorithms can produce inaccurate responses, pose security risks themselves and can have biases that lead to discrimination against marginalized groups.

While Torres, Laird and their teams plan to continue tracking DOGE’s actions and their potential privacy violations, they published the first resource sheet to start bringing awareness to the information that is already at risk. The data collection they’ve seen so far in an effort to cut federal spending is concerning, but both said they fear Americans’ data could end up being used in ways we don’t yet know about.

“The government has a wealth of data on all of us, and I would say data that’s probably very valuable on the open market,” Torres said. “It’s almost like a dossier on us from birth to death.”

Musk fired back at critics in an interview with Fox News published Thursday.

“They’ll say what we’re doing is somehow unconstitutional or illegal or whatever,” he said. “We’re like, ‘Well, which line of the cost savings do you disagree with?’ And they can’t point to any.”

The U.S. Supreme Court building. (Photo by Ariana Figueroa/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration submitted an emergency appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday in an effort to resume the rapid deportations of Venezuelans accused of gang ties under a wartime law that a lower court blocked.

Acting U.S. Solicitor General Sarah Harris argued in a brief to the Supreme Court that a federal judge’s temporary restraining order this month, and an appeals court ruling Wednesday upholding it, wrongly denied President Donald Trump the authority to make decisions about national security operations, including the removal of Venezuelan nationals the administration says are subject to the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.

“The district court’s orders have rebuffed the President’s judgments as to how to protect the Nation against foreign terrorist organizations and risk debilitating effects for delicate foreign negotiations,” Harris wrote in her request to the court.

The Alien Enemies Act had only been invoked three times, during the War of 1812, World War I and World War II.

The Trump administration has tried to use it in a novel way, when the nation is not officially at war. The administration designated the Tren de Aragua – a gang that originated in Venezuela – as a foreign terrorist group, and argued that any Venezuelan nationals aged 14 and older with suspected ties to the gang are subject to the proclamation.

U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg placed a temporary restraining order on the Trump administration’s use of the law this month, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the order this week. The administration asked the Supreme Court to lift the order.

“As long as the orders remain in force, the United States is unable to rely on the Proclamation to remove dangerous affiliates with a foreign terrorist organization—even if the United States receives indications that particular (Tren de Aragua) members are about to take destabilizing or infiltrating actions,” Harris said Friday.

Extending restraining order

Boasberg’s temporary restraining order placed on the use of the Alien Enemies Act is set to expire Saturday. The American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the suit, requested that order be extended for an additional two weeks.

The ACLU also plans to request Boasberg issue a preliminary injunction, which would block the administration from deportations under the act until the lawsuit is complete. A hearing is set for April 8.

Boasberg has rejected the Trump administration’s move to lift his restraining order, on the grounds that those subject to the Alien Enemies Act should have due process to challenge those accusations.

At the D.C. Circuit this week, Department of Justice attorneys for the Trump administration argued that those subject to the proclamation do not need to be notified they are being removed under the Alien Enemies Act. The Trump administration also argued that those who fall under the Alien Enemies Act can bring a challenge of their detention under a habeas corpus claim.

Defied verbal order

The White House quietly implemented the act on March 15 and a verbal restraining order given by Boasberg that day to block it went into effect hours later.

In that order, Boasberg barred the Trump administration from applying the act but three deportation planes landed in El Salvador after the order was issued. The Trump administration has argued that his verbal order was not enforceable.

Boasberg also ordered that anyone subject to the Alien Enemies Act be returned to the U.S., but federal immigration agents took more than 250 men aboard the three flights to a notorious prison in El Salvador.

Boasberg has vowed to determine if the Trump administration violated his restraining order in sending the deportation planes to El Salvador, but Attorney General Pam Bondi invoked the “state secrets privilege” to refuse to answer detailed questions about the flights.

Friday’s emergency request is one of several immigration-related appeals the Trump administration has made to the high court, such as the request to lift several nationwide injunctions placed on the president’s executive order that ends the constitutional right of birthright citizenship.

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. 

U.S. Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., points to text messages by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth during an annual worldwide threats assessment hearing at the Longworth House Office Building on March 26, 2025, in Washington, D.C. The hearing held by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence addressed top aides inadvertently including Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, on a high level Trump administration Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen. (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — The now-famous group chat made up of high-ranking Trump administration national security officials and a journalist included a precise timeline of U.S. bombing of Houthi targets in Yemen, and revealed one of the targets of the attack was under surveillance, according to a release of the entire text chain The Atlantic published Wednesday.

Despite the newly revealed details of the leaked chat, administration officials, including President Donald Trump himself, continued to downplay the seriousness of the breach, and Republicans in Congress refused to join Democrats in calls for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to step down.

Administration officials argued the texts lacked key information and that the “attack plans” revealed in the chat were less damaging than “war plans,” the term Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg used to refer to information he’d decided to withhold for national security reasons. Trump aides also implied the magazine – which has endorsed Trump’s opponent in each of his elections – was spinning the entire episode to discredit the administration.

What’s been dubbed “Signalgate” began when The Atlantic on Monday published a stunning account by  Goldberg of his apparently accidental inclusion in a group chat on the messaging app Signal, titled “The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans.”

The others in the chat were senior administration officials discussing the upcoming war operation.

Administration leaders on Tuesday denied, including in testimony before Congress, that the chat contained classified information. The magazine then published a report Wednesday by Goldberg and staff writer Shane Harris that purported to include virtually the entire transcript of the chat until Goldberg’s voluntary exit.

The administration position was inconsistent with the screenshots published in The Atlantic of detailed and explicit messages in the chat. At the Capitol, concerns were raised even among the administration’s usually obsequious GOP allies in Congress, with U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker saying the information in the chat should have been classified.

“The information as published recently appears to me to be of such a sensitive nature that, based on my knowledge, I would have wanted to classify it,” Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, told reporters on the Hill Wednesday.

Attack details revealed

In the initial story, Goldberg reported National Security Advisor Michael Waltz on March 11 added the journalist to a group chat on Signal that included Vice President J.D. Vance, Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Waltz and others.

Goldberg in the first story withheld details of the chat that he said could have compromised intelligence-gathering and military operations.

But after a day of administration figures claiming the Signal chat did not reveal classified material, while smearing Goldberg, the magazine published the entire thread with one redaction: the name of Ratcliffe’s chief of staff, at the request of a CIA spokesperson.

The unredacted messages show Hegseth shared plans of the bombing campaign about 30 minutes before the first planes took off on March 15 and two hours before the start of the window of opportunity for hitting a target.

“TEAM UPDATE,” Hegseth wrote in the chat on the day of the strike, according to the Atlantic’s Wednesday story. “TIME NOW (1144et): Weather is FAVORABLE. Just CONFIRMED w/CENTCOM we are a GO for mission launch.”

In the same message, Hegseth laid out a timeline of the attack, including confirmation that a target was at his expected location.

“Target Terrorist is @ his Known Location so SHOULD BE ON TIME,” Hegseth wrote.

He also noted that the mission’s operational security was “clean.”

Two hours and 15 minutes later, Waltz told the group that bombs had destroyed a building where the Houthi “top missile guy” was thought to be present.

“The first target – their top missile guy – we had positive ID of him walking into his girlfriend’s building and it’s now collapsed,” Waltz wrote.

Tuesday denials led to publishing

At a previously scheduled U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee hearing Tuesday, Gabbard said that no classified information was discussed in the chat.

Trump echoed that message and Hegseth said, “Nobody was texting war plans and that’s all I have to say about that.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote on social media:

“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.”

Gabbard and Ratcliffe told the Senate Intelligence Committee they did not recall specific weapons systems or the timing of the operation being discussed in the chat.

But the transcript published by The Atlantic showed Hegseth’s down-to-the-minute timeline of the launch of F-18 aircraft.

The denials led to the magazine’s decision to publish the full transcript Wednesday, Goldberg and Harris wrote.

“The statements by Hegseth, Gabbard, Ratcliffe, and Trump — combined with the assertions made by numerous administration officials that we are lying about the content of the Signal texts — have led us to believe that people should see the texts in order to reach their own conclusions,” they wrote.

“There is a clear public interest in disclosing the sort of information that Trump advisers included in nonsecure communications channels, especially because senior administration figures are attempting to downplay the significance of the messages that were shared.”

‘No names. No targets.’

But Hegseth and other administration officials continued to deny the growing controversy was serious Wednesday.

“So, let’s (sic) me get this straight,” Hegseth wrote on X Wednesday. “The Atlantic released the so-called ‘war plans’ and those ‘plans’ include: No names. No targets. No locations. No units. No routes. No sources. No methods. And no classified information.

“Those are some really shitty war plans.”

Waltz posted a similar message.

“No locations,” he wrote. “No sources & methods. NO WAR PLANS. Foreign partners had already been notified that strikes were imminent. BOTTOM LINE:  President Trump is protecting America and our interests.”

White House Counselor Alina Habba told reporters shortly after the second Atlantic story posted on Wednesday morning the issue had been overblown.

“We stand by Mike Waltz; he’s doing a tremendous job,” she said, according to a White House pool report. “I think this is a distraction.”

Bipartisan call for investigation

Leading members of Congress, though, were treating the matter with more seriousness.

Wicker said he and Armed Services ranking Democrat Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island had agreed on next steps, which included a letter to the administration asking for an expedited inspector general report on the matter.

He also said they were requesting “a senior person” come to a secure facility on Capitol Hill to provide a classified briefing to the committee to confirm the reporting was accurate.

Asked what the consequence should be for Hegseth if the transcript of the chat was accurate, Wicker took a forgiving tone.

“I make a lot of mistakes in my life,” he said. “And I’ve found that it’s best when I just own up to it and say ‘I’m human, I made a mistake.’ And I’m glad in this case no real damage was done. I think that’s probably the approach of the administration right up to the president.”

He also said that no targets or specific timing were mentioned.

Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a moderate who has voiced criticism of Trump more often than most GOP colleagues, wrote in an X post Wednesday that the incident should be a “wake-up call” to prioritize operational security.

“I am appalled by the egregious security breach from top administration officials,” she wrote. “Their disregard for stringent safeguards and secure channels could have compromised a high-stakes operation and put our servicemembers at risk. I hope this serves as a wake-up call that operational security must be a top priority for everyone—especially our leaders.”

Dems urge Hegseth’s resignation

Many Democrats went further, calling for Hegseth to resign over the use of an unclassified messaging platform to discuss impending military action.

Gabbard and others noted the Defense secretary can decide what information is classified to argue that the chat did not include classified information.

But critics said whether or not the information was technically classified, its disclosure would put service members at greater risk.

“Advance strike times are sensitive and classified because they put American military directly at risk,” Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, wrote on social media Wednesday. “The Secretary of Defense was blasting them out to unknown numbers over unclassified channels. It’s sloppy, careless, and dangerous. He should resign.”

Warner spokeswoman Rachel Cohen added that, despite the administration’s denials, the information revealed in The Atlantic would compromise intelligence sources and methods.

“They can keep repeating this but it’s not true,” she wrote, responding to Hegseth’s post. “Those messages, as released by the Atlantic, are source revealing, and include targeting and weapons information that would have, at the very least, been considered at the ‘secret’ classification level.”

The top Democrats in the U.S. House and U.S. Senate, Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, both of New York, also called for Hegseth to lose his job.

“The secretary of Defense should be fired immediately if he’s not man enough to own up to his mistakes and resign in disgrace,” Jeffries said on MSNBC Wednesday.

“I agree he should be fired,” Schumer told reporters at the Capitol.

A demonstrator holds a sign outside the U.S. Capitol on March 25, 2025, protesting the detainment by immigration authorities of Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil. (Photo by Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — A group of progressive U.S. House Democrats on Tuesday rebuked the detainment by immigration authorities of Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil and demanded that he be released from a Louisiana detention center.

At a press conference steps outside the U.S. Capitol, Reps. Delia Ramirez of Illinois, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, Pramila Jayapal of Washington state and Greg Casar of Texas argued that Khalil’s First Amendment rights were violated, as the Syria-born lawful permanent resident appeared to be targeted for his activism and not any immigration violations.

“The detention and threatened deportation of Mahmoud is illegal, and it is a direct assault on our constitutional rights to due process, freedom of speech and right to protest and on dissent itself,” Tlaib said.

Vince Warren, executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and Mike Zamore, national director of policy and government affairs at the American Civil Liberties Union, joined the members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus in speaking out against Khalil’s arrest Tuesday.

Both advocacy groups are among those providing legal representation for Khalil.

“We should also be clear that this is not a regular deportation proceeding,” Warren said.

“What this is is an attempt at disappearance, again, something that happens routinely in authoritarian countries, and it is happening right here.”

In a filing on Sunday, the administration alleged that Khalil did run afoul of immigration law, saying he lied on his permanent residency application when he “withheld membership in certain organizations and failed to disclose continuing employment by the Syria Office in the British Embassy in Beirut.”

Court challenge

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested Khalil — a former Columbia University student who helped organize protests against the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza — in New York City this month. He was later moved to a detention facility in Louisiana.

Khalil challenged the lawfulness of his detention in a New York federal court, and a federal judge last week transferred his case to a court in New Jersey.

The administration claimed that Khalil “led activities aligned to Hamas, a designated terrorist organization” and is calling for his deportation.

President Donald Trump has vowed to crack down on students protesting against the war in Gaza.

He and his administration conflated Khalil’s protests of the war in Gaza with support for Hamas to rationalize the arrest.

Backlash

The lawmakers’ event Tuesday was part of the backlash against the arrest that civil rights groups view as targeting political speech.

Tlaib referenced a letter Khalil wrote inside the detention center, where he described his arrest as a “direct consequence” of exercising his right to free speech.

“The Trump administration is targeting me as part of a broader strategy to suppress dissent,” Khalil wrote. “Visa-holders, green-card carriers, and citizens alike will all be targeted for their political beliefs.”

Jayapal dubbed the administration’s actions regarding Khalil “unconstitutional.”

The Washington state Democrat, who led the Congressional Progressive Caucus  until this year, said Khalil’s detainment marked the start of a “chilling war” on free speech rights in the United States.

Casar added “the administration targeting people for detention based on their political views should send a chill down the spine of every single American.”

“This administration’s plans will not end with Mr. Khalil — they will target activists who speak out about the plundering of taxpayer dollars by billionaires,” said the Texas Democrat, who chairs the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

“They will target those whistleblowers who speak out about the incompetence that we see within this administration,” he said.

Meanwhile, the American Association of University Professors, its chapters at Harvard University, Rutgers University and New York University, along with the Middle East Studies Association, filed suit against the Trump administration on Tuesday to block them “from carrying out large-scale arrests, detentions, and deportations of noncitizen students and faculty members who participate in pro-Palestinian protests and other protected First Amendment activities.”

American Civil Liberties Union lead attorney Lee Gelernt holds a press conference outside the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia after a March 21, 2025, hearing on deportation flights that occurred despite a court’s restraining order in place. (Photo by Ariana Figueroa/States Newsroom) 

WASHINGTON — A federal judge Friday probed the U.S. Department of Justice about whether the Trump administration knowingly defied his court order to return deportation flights to the United States and questioned the president’s authority to invoke a wartime law during peacetime.

The case, which is likely to head to the U.S. Supreme Court, will test President Donald Trump’s authority to invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 and apply it to any Venezuelan nationals ages 14 and up who are suspected members of the Tren de Aragua gang amid his mass deportation plans.

Three deportation flights containing some Venezuelans subject to the proclamation that Trump signed last Friday were in transit when U.S. District Court Judge James Emanuel Boasberg issued a temporary restraining order to block the removals. But the administration continued sending the men to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador.

The Trump administration published a highly produced video detailing the operation, but has not been forthright with answers to questions Boasberg posed about it.

“The government’s not being terribly cooperative at this point, but I will get to the bottom of whether they violated my order, who ordered this and what the consequences will be,” Boasberg said Friday.

Wartime law

Boasberg also pressed the Department of Justice attorney Drew Ensign on whether the Trump administration can deport people under the Alien Enemies Act without allowing the deportees to prove they are not members or associated with the Tren de Aragua gang.

“How do they challenge that removal?” Boasberg asked.

The Alien Enemies Act allows nationals of a country deemed an enemy of the U.S. to be detained and deported without due process of law regardless of immigration status.

Boasberg also raised concerns of using the proclamation when the U.S. is not at war.

“The policy ramifications for this are incredibly troublesome,” Boasberg said of the Alien Enemies Act. “This is a long way from the heartland of the act.”

A panel of judges in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit will hear oral arguments Monday afternoon on the Trump administration seeking an emergency stay on the restraining order. 

Restraining order

Boasberg asked DOJ attorney Ensign to clarify how he interpreted the oral temporary restraining order issued on March 15.

He asked Ensign if he relayed to the Trump administration that his order included returning any Venezuelans back to the U.S. who were deported under the wartime authority.

“I understood your intent, that you meant that to be effective at that time,”  Ensign said of the oral temporary restraining order.

In filings, the Department of Justice has argued that Boasberg’s oral argument was not binding because it was not written.

For nearly a week, the Department of Justice has evaded pointed questions from Boasberg about the timing of the deportation flights on March 15.

Boasberg said Thursday he would give the Trump administration until Tuesday to submit a declaration on whether the government was invoking the state-secrets privilege and a brief “showing cause why they did not violate the Court’s Temporary Restraining Orders by failing to return class members removed from the United States on the two earliest planes that departed on March 15, 2025.”

In Friday filings, Trump officials said they are currently having Cabinet-level conversations about using that privilege to block Boasberg from obtaining details about the timing of the deportation flights.

Flight location an issue

The Department of Justice has also argued that because the flights were no longer in U.S. airspace or territory when Boasberg issued the restraining order, they were not under U.S. courts’ jurisdiction.

Lead attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union Lee Gelernt pushed back on that claim. He told Boasberg that some immigrants on those deportation flights to El Salvador were returned to the U.S. because of mistakes and that the El Salvadoran “government would not take them.”

He said that included someone who was not a Venezuelan national, and a woman because the mega-prison is for men only.

He said the ACLU will submit an affidavit late Friday with more details.

Gelernt said the ACLU is also questioning the type of removal for people on the third flight, even though the Trump administration said those on that flight had final orders of removal and were not subject to the Alien Enemies Act.

Gelernt argued that in immigration law, those with final orders are required to be notified what country they are being deported to. He said that was not the case with the immigrants on the third flight, which originally went to Honduras before heading to El Salvador.

“We asked the judge to clarify that with the government, because it seems very doubtful that Venezuelans had a final order that said you could be removed to El Salvador,” Gelernt said to reporters after Friday’s hearing.

The White House earlier this week said of the men on the deportation flights, 137 were alleged Tren de Aragua members and deported under the Alien Enemies Act.

Attorneys for several of the 238 Venezuelan men deported argue their clients are not members of the gang and were only targeted by immigration officials because they had tattoos and were Venezuelan nationals.  

El Salvador prison

Gelernt said that because the Trump administration is paying the government of El Salvador $6 million to imprison the men, he believes those men who were deported under the wartime law can be returned, although it would be a lengthy process.

“I think we very much think the federal court can order the U.S. to get them out, since they’re constructively in U.S. custody,” he said outside the courtroom. “The U.S. is apparently paying for it all. (El Salvador is) doing it at the behest of the United States.”

Human Rights Watch, a nonprofit that monitors human rights conditions around the world, has raised major concerns with the conditions of the prison and has noted that the group “is not aware of any detainees who have been released from that prison.”

Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s authoritarian president, called this week for the men taken to the mega prison to be returned to Venezuela, calling on El Salvador president to “not be an accomplice to this kidnapping, because our boys did not commit any crime in the United States, none,” according to CNN.

“They were not brought to trial, they were not given the right to a defense, the right to due process, they were deceived, handcuffed, put on a plane, kidnapped, and sent to a concentration camp in El Salvador,” Maduro said.

Several of the men who were transferred to El Salvador’s prison initially fled Venezuela because they experienced violence from officials after they partook in political protests against the Maduro regime, according to court filings. 

U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin and a group of six other Democratic senators representing Great Lakes states sent a letter this week to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) pressing for more information about how staff cuts at the agency will affect programs on the lakes. 

The letter, addressed to NOAA Vice Admiral Nancy Hann, asked her to detail the number of people fired at NOAA since she became the agency’s acting administrator, the number of people fired at each Great Lakes-focused NOAA program, the services that will be terminated and her plan to preserve those services.

Baldwin was joined in sending the letter by Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Elissa Slotkin (D-MI), Tina Smith (D-MN), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), and Gary Peters (D-MI).

“We write to express our deep concern over the firing of probationary staff at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the potential impact these firings will have on the Great Lakes,” the senators wrote. “The Great Lakes are among the United States’ greatest natural treasures, strengthening our economy and attracting millions of visitors each year. The Lakes provide drinking water to over 30 million people, generate clean hydropower, and generate $3.1 trillion in gross domestic product. National and regional NOAA programs help protect these lakes and support our constituents who call the Great Lakes home.” 

Among the NOAA programs that the group is seeking information about are the National Weather Service, National Estuarine Research Reserve System, Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory, Cooperative Institute for Great Lakes Research and Midwestern Regional Climate Center. 

In Wisconsin, Lakes Michigan and Superior support 50,000 jobs and provide nearly $3 billion to the state’s gross domestic product, according to a 2024 NOAA report. Last month, Baldwin told the Wisconsin Examiner she’d fight to protect the Great Lakes. 

“Wisconsin communities, farmers, and businesses rely on our Great Lakes, and I’ll stand up to any efforts that will hurt them and their way of life,” she said.

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The Blatnik Bridge under construction in 1958. (Minnesota Department of Transportation)

Gov. Tony Evers is leaning on U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to release stalled federal highway money along with $78 million in promised funding to build out a network of electric vehicle charging stations in Wisconsin.

The governor’s office on Thursday released a letter Evers sent Duffy last week, urging the former Wisconsin congressman “to take immediate action to end the unlawful and harmful obstructions to federal approvals and federal funding for crucial transportation projects across the nation and here in your home state of Wisconsin.”

Federal delays will slow down projects across the state, Evers wrote, including a railroad bypass in Muskego, outside Milwaukee, that is planned for improved freight movement; a grant for highway improvement in Menominee County that will help forestry shippers; and numerous rural road and bridge projects in Wisconsin.

A pause in the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program — part of the bipartisan infrastructure law enacted during the Biden administration — is “threatening at least 15 already-approved electric vehicle infrastructure projects for private entities, utilizing approximately $7 million in NEVI funding, including multiple projects located in the congressional district you used to represent in the U.S. Congress,” Evers wrote.

Duffy represented Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District, covering the northwestern part of the state, until he stepped down in late 2019.

“More than $56 million that Wisconsin has been allocated in future rounds of the NEVI program is also at risk due to the uncertainty caused by unnecessary delays at USDOT,” Evers wrote.

“These delays and obstructions hurt Wisconsinites and Wisconsin communities,” he added. “As a fellow Wisconsinite, I urge you to end these obstructions and support states in implementing lawful federal funding and needed approvals.”

Evers’ letter follows one written March 4 from the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials also calling for an end to the delays.

Federal dollars awarded to states according to established federal formulas are “legally binding obligations,” wrote the association’s president, Garrett T. Eucalitto.

The funds go to repay states for expenses they’ve already incurred under the terms set by the federal highway program. That letter demands reimbursement requests “be paid immediately for construction and related costs already incurred.”

After President Donald Trump took office Jan. 20, he issued executive orders halting the distribution of funds as well as other federal administrative actions across a wide range of federal programs. The orders have led to a raft of lawsuits challenging them.

Highway programs are among those caught up in the Trump administration’s freezes. In addition to financial payouts owed the states, the administration has also put a hold on issuing approvals, such as environmental reviews required by law, related to pending projects.

“These interruptions—whether directly or indirectly related to funding—have the effect of freezing essential construction and planning activities including those involving roadway and bridge projects,” wrote Eucalitto, who is also the Connecticut transportation commissioner. “Delays like these leave state DOTs at serious risk of losing the upcoming construction season for many projects. This will not only add to overall costs to the American people but also deprive communities from receiving those economic, safety, and quality of life benefits.”

President Donald Trump delivers remarks during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron in the East Room at the White House on Feb. 24, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump announced Monday that tariffs would be placed on Canada and Mexico, and additional ones on China, beginning Tuesday, a move that could affect the cost of goods anywhere from tequila to cars to iPhones.

While at the White House, and alongside Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, the president said he would levy 25% tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico and additional 10% tariffs on China.

“The tariffs, they’re all set. They take effect tomorrow,” Trump said.

Trump said that there was “no room left for Mexico or Canada” to make a deal with the United States to avoid the tariffs, which are meant to punish those countries for fentanyl trafficking.

“Just so you understand, vast amounts of fentanyl have poured into our country from Mexico, and as you know, also from China, where it goes to Mexico and goes to Canada,” Trump said.

The comments came during an event at the White House to tout building new semiconductor manufacturing plants in Arizona.

Trump also argued that the tariffs would encourage Canada and Mexico to build car manufacturing plants in the U.S. to avoid being hit by the tariffs.

“What they have to do is build their car plants, frankly, and other things in the United States, in which case they have no tariffs,” Trump said.

Stocks quickly slipped after the announcement. Tariffs are essentially taxes on foreign goods that are paid by those importing the goods.

Trump initially walked back his threat of placing tariffs on Feb. 1 on Mexico and Canada, but still placed a 10% tariff on China. He gave Mexico and Canada a month to address drug trafficking and unauthorized immigration.

Last week, Trump said that he would instead place tariffs on April 2, and then over the weekend said March 4 would be the date for tariffs.

Democrats have raised issues with tariffs, especially those from states that border Canada.

Washington state Democratic Sen. Patty Murray said during a Monday press conference that Trump’s threats of tariffs have already impacted the U.S. – Canada economic relationship.

“We depend on our trading partnerships with Canada on a broad range of products and things,” Murray said. “We are already seeing our Northern communities that rely on tourism from Canada drop significantly because of the way they’re being treated.”

Minnesota Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar said during the press conference that the tariffs would harm farmers as well.

“This has been one of the, really, crown jewels of (the) American economy, the fact that we are able to export agriculture and have free trade back and forth,” Klobuchar said.

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report. 

Children at The Playing Field, a Madison child care center that participates in the federal Head Start program. (Courtesy of The Playing Field)

On Jan. 27, the Trump administration called for federal agencies to implement a sweeping freeze on large amounts of grants, loans and other assistance, creating widespread panic across the country — particularly for families dependent on Head Start for child care. More than a week into  the freeze, many of Wisconsin’s Head Start programs still can’t access the funds they need to stay open.

Head Start provides funding to local organizations to run free, comprehensive preschool and early learning programs for families living in poverty. Many of the local organizations, or grantees, running these programs also provide child care services to families who receive child care subsidies and parents who pay for child care without assistance. 

Wisconsin has 39 Head Start providers serving 16,000 children and employing 4,500 staff across the state. Reach Dane’s Head Start program in Madison is one of many Wisconsinites rely on. 

The day after the announcement, Jen Bailey, executive director of the program, said her program and others  were unable to access funds because  their payment management system was shut down. She described the overwhelming chaos and fear that morning as she wondered how to keep this vital service afloat. 

The Trump administration initially said this freeze was necessary to ensure funding aligns with the president’s priorities. Normally, Jen and her staff would have a direct line of communication to the federal Office of Head Start, but when the freeze was announced she described a lack of communication with the federal government — leaving her and her staff to rely on news articles and press conferences to glean any insight into the meaning of the mayhem.

Across Wisconsin, on the first morning of the freeze, parents received emails  from their child care providers warning of potential closures to programs. On Tuesday afternoon,  the Trump administration walked back its initial inclusion of Head Start in the government-wide freeze. But  some programs had already made the decision to close their doors Wednesday — leaving parents scrambling to find potential backups for child care and wondering if they would be able to go to work. Program staff at those centers were also unsure if their next paychecks would be delayed or if they even still had jobs. 

As of Tuesday, Feb. 4, seven providers serving roughly 3,000 children had still not  received funding from the federal government since the freeze went into effect. The National Head Start Association reported that the funding issues are widespread across the country. At least 45 Head Start grantees serving nearly 20,000 young children are still having problems  accessing their funds. 

Unfortunately, this is unlikely to be the last time Wisconsin families dependent on these programs experience uncertainty and even panic under the current administration. The radical far-right playbook Project 2025 proposed eliminating Head Start entirely, which would increase the number of Americans living in a child care desert and particularly harm child care supply in rural communities. If the leaders in the Trump Administration  who helped author Project 2025  had it their way, no Head Start programs would be opening their doors to the vulnerable families in need of services. 

Fifty-four percent of young children under the age of 5 in Wisconsin live in a child care desert, and the high cost of child care pushes 134,000 families across the U.S. into poverty every year. What Wisconsin parents and families need now is to know that their current child care arrangements are secure while policymakers work on solutions to build supply and bring costs down. 

Over a week since the publication of the freeze memo, it’s obvious the stress and harm inflicted on families and providers was created not only thoughtlessly, but needlessly. It’s been hard to keep track of all the walk-backs and attempts at “clarification” from the Trump administration that only sowed more confusion. Most recently, the administration announced it was  rescinding the freeze memo after a judge had blocked the spending freeze. That about-face came  less than 48 hours after the same administration  sent federal programs and the people dependent on them into a tailspin. So what was all the chaos and confusion for? 

The frantically mixed messages from the Trump administration tell us the president and the people working for him  spend very little time thinking through how their actions will affect everyday Americans, especially parents. When you play unnecessary games with trillions of dollars in federal funding that millions of people depend on, real people suffer. We’re barely two weeks into this new administration. How many more threats to their livelihood can Wisconsin families and providers like Jen expect over the next four years? 

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Sen. Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin) says that legislation requiring sheriffs to cooperate with ICE is meant to “keep communities safe” and that the message to sheriffs is “do not put your personal politics above the safety of the citizens who elected you.” (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

Republican state lawmakers said Tuesday they would introduce a bill to force local law enforcement to verify the citizenship status of people in custody for a felony offense and to notify Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) if citizenship cannot be verified. Counties that do not comply would be at risk of losing state money. 

Lawmakers said that Wisconsin needs to assist President Donald Trump and the federal government with its work deporting “illegal immigrants” from the United States. Since inauguration day, federal agents have arrested more than 8,000 people, including some people who had no criminal history. 

State Sen. Julian Bradley (R-New Berlin) said at a press conference that the legislation is meant to “keep communities safe” and that the message to sheriffs is “do not put your personal politics above the safety of the citizens who elected you.”

Under the bill, noncompliance by a sheriff would result in a 15% reduction in the county’s shared revenue payments from the state in the next year. Counties across Wisconsin rely on those payments to fund public safety, emergency medical services, transportation and other services. Sheriffs would have to certify compliance each year with the Wisconsin Department of Revenue.

The bill would also require sheriffs to comply with detainers and administrative warrants received from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for individuals held in the county jail for a criminal offense. Sheriffs would also need to seek reimbursement from the federal government for any costs incurred while holding people. 

“We don’t want Wisconsin on the hook for this,” Bradley said. 

The bill would also require sheriffs to keep a record of people who were verified as unlawfully residing in the U.S. and submit the information to the Legislature in a biannual report.

Lawmakers said that sheriffs would continue to have discretion over whether to report people who aren’t detained for a felony offense.

Bradley said that only “far left extremists in this country believe that someone here illegally that commits a felony should be allowed to stay.” He noted that the Laken Riley Act, which expands the mandatory detention requirements of immigrants charged and arrested on petty and other crimes, passed Congress with the help of 46 House and 12 Senate Democrats. He said the issue should be one with bipartisan support and called on his Democratic colleagues to sign on.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel first reported the legislation after obtaining a copy of the draft bill.

Similar legislation was enacted in North Carolina last year.

Democratic opposition

Gov. Tony Evers has already committed to vetoing the legislation should it make it to his desk.

In a statement released to the Journal Sentinel, Evers’ spokesperson Britt Cudaback called the bill an “unserious proposal” that is “trying to micromanage local law enforcement decisions by threatening to gut state aid by 15% for our local communities — that’s a non-starter.”  

“We shouldn’t be threatening law enforcement with deep budget cuts, we should be working together with local law enforcement to improve public safety, reduce crime, and keep dangerous drugs and violent criminals off of our streets,” Cudaback said. 

Assembly Majority Leaders Tyler August (R-Walworth) said it’s “unbelievable” Evers would threaten a veto of the legislation. 

“It’s unbelievably unfortunate, but not unexpected that the governor would threaten to veto a bill that he hasn’t even seen yet,” August said. “[It] seems to be his M.O. that he governs by veto.”

Currently, seven Wisconsin counties have agreements with ICE to hold in jail immigrants without legal status to reside in the U.S. At one point, that number was eight, but Lafayette County ended its participation in ICE’s 287(g) program.

August said lawmakers talked with county officials, including those in Waukesha, while drafting the bill.

“A lot of the sheriffs already do this by practice because they know that it’s what’s right for their communities,” August said. 

Dane, Milwaukee counties considered noncooperative

In a cosponsorship memo, lawmakers point to a June 2024 ICE report that lists Dane and Milwaukee counties as “noncooperative institutions.”

Dane County until recently participated in the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP), in which it provided the names of immigrants lacking legal status to the federal government and in return were reimbursed for the costs of their incarceration.

Dane County Sheriff Kalvin Barrett recently ended the county’s participation in the program. He told Channel 3000 that it’s a “different time” and that the “the previous administration is completely different than our current administration, and we have to be able to continue to represent the values of our community.” 

Milwaukee County Supervisors Caroline Gómez-Tom, Juan Miguel Martínez, Anne O’Connor, Steven Shea, Sky Z. Capriolo and Justin Bielinski denounced the legislation in a statement, calling it a “dangerous” proposal that would make sheriffs “a tool of the Trump administration’s bigoted obsession with scapegoating immigrants.”

The supervisors said that mandating that sheriffs honor ‘administrative warrants’ not approved by a judge would “bog down law enforcement with false alarms — preventing them from focusing on real public safety concerns like reckless driving, drug overdoses, and rising crime.” 

They also warned that the bill could force Wisconsin residents to carry documents at all times to prove they have “the right to live in their homes, go to work and pick their children up from school,” and that “anyone detained by a Wisconsin sheriff who cannot immediately prove their legal status would be at risk of being handed over to federal authorities.”

A 2024 survey conducted by the Center for Democracy and Civic Engagement at the University of Maryland in conjunction with the Brennan Center for Justice found that more than 9% of American citizens of voting age don’t have documents — including a passport, birth certificate, or naturalization papers — to serve as proof of citizenship readily available. The survey found that the lack of documentation could be for various reasons including documents being in the home of another family member or in a safety deposit box or that the documents have been lost, destroyed or stolen. 

“The only thing this proposal accomplishes is to bankrupt Wisconsin law enforcement both morally and fiscally,” the supervisors said, adding that they encourage the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s office to “remain focused on actual public safety instead of enabling the worst policies of Trump extremists.”

ACLU of Wisconsin condemned the legislation, saying it “sends the wrong message.” The group noted that it could mean that any one who invokes their Fifth Amendment right to remain silent would have to be reported to ICE along with anyone who cooperates but fails to have access to the specific documents listed in the bill.

“It sends the message that local law enforcement should take on the additional tasks and risks of immigration status investigations,” Executive Director Melinda Brennan said in a statement. “It will encourage xenophobic sheriffs to investigate the status of not just persons accused of serious crimes but of anyone who enters their custody.”

Republican lawmakers accused Democrats of being extremist. Democratic lawmakers announced a proposal last week that would block state and local government officials from cooperating with federal deportation efforts without a judicial warrant. It would apply to detentions in a public building or facility, school, place of worship, place where child care services are provided, or place where medical or other health care services are provided.

August said Democrats’ proposal “basically would turn the entire state into a sanctuary state.”

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