Pete Hegseth ‘doing a tremendous job’, says White House, despite latest security lapse
Asked about the fact that the three top Pentagon officials – including two of Hegseth’s closest aides – who were fired after an investigation into alleged leaks were “Hegseth’s own guys”, Leavitt doubles down that they “leaked against their boss to news agencies in this room”. She says the administration “will not tolerate leaks to the mainstream media when it comes to sensitive information”.
She says that Pete Hegseth is “doing a tremendous job” and bringing “monumental change” to the Pentagon. “That’s why we’ve seen a smear campaign against the secretary of defense from the moment that President Trump announced his nomination,” she says.
Let me reiterate the president stands strongly behind secretary Hegseth and the change that he is bringing to the Pentagon and the results that he’s achieved thus far speak for themselves.
Key events
In his ruling ordering the Trump administration to re-hire Voice of America journalists and resume broadcasts to provide a “reliable and authoritative source of news” to listeners in countries without press freedom, Royce Lamberth, a district court judge appointed to the federal bench by Ronald Reagan, called the executive branch’s “unwillingness to expend funds in accordance with the congressional appropriations laws is a direct affront to the power of the legislative branch.”
“Congress possesses the ‘power of the purse’”, Lamberth wrote. “Here”, he added, citing a previous court ruling, “the defendants’ termination of grants to the Networks and shutting down VOA ‘potentially run roughshod over a “bulwark of the Constitution’” by interfering with Congress’s appropriation of federal funds’”.
US judge blocks Trump’s shutdown of government-funded radio broadcasts
A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Donald Trump’s administration to halt its efforts to shut down government-funded radio broadcasts of Voice of America, Voice of America, Radio Free Asia, and Middle East Broadcasting Networks.
US district judge Royce Lamberth, who is overseeing six lawsuits from employees and contractors affected by the shutdown of US Agency for Global Media, ordered the Trump administration to “take all necessary steps” to restore employees and contractors to their positions and resume broadcasts. USAGM placed over 1,000 employees on leave after abruptly shutting down the broadcasts in March.
Congress has funded and authorized the broadcasts to provide an “accurate, objective, and comprehensive” source of news in other nations, according to Lamberth’s opinion.
The day so far
Pete Hegseth took to the airwaves to hit back against the latest set of bombshell allegations that he shared sensitive military operations – including launch times of fighter jets, bomb drop timings and missile launches – in a Signal group chat with over a dozen people, including his wife and brother. It has since emerged that at least some of that information shared by the defense secretary came from a top general’s secure messages. Speaking on Fox News this morning, the embattled defense secretary deflected, blaming fired Pentagon officials for orchestrating leaks against the Trump administration. He added that evidence from an internal investigation would eventually be handed over to the justice department and “those people will be prosecuted if necessary”. The White House ignored the fact that a lot of criticism of Hegseth is coming from conservatives, and instead doubled down on the suggestion that the leaks were politically motivated and part of a wider “smear campaign” against Hegseth. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt maintained the defense secretary was “doing a tremendous job” and has Trump’s full support. Meanwhile, Democrats – and one House Republican – have called for Hegseth’s resignation for “gross negligence” and calling him “a threat to national security”.
Elsewhere:
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Secretary of state Marco Rubio announced a proposed sweeping reorganisation of the US state department as part of what he called an effort to reform it amid criticism from the Trump White House over the execution of US diplomacy. The reorganisation will close a number of overseas missions, reduce staff and minimize offices dedicated to promoting liberal values in a stated goal to subsume them to regional bureaus.
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The US supreme court appeared inclined to rule in favor of religious parents in Maryland seeking to keep their elementary school children out of certain classes when storybooks with LGBTQ+ characters are read. Many of the justices in the supreme court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, seemed receptive to the claims by the parents that the lack of opt-outs burdens their religious beliefs. But the court’s three liberal justices raised concerns about how far opt-outs for students could go beyond storybooks in public schools, offering examples of subjects such as evolution, interfaith marriage or women working outside the home that might come up in classes. A ruling is expected in June.
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Four House Democrats who traveled to El Salvador this week were denied visits with Kilmar Ábrego García, a man who the Trump administration wrongly deported from the United States, congressman Maxwell Frost told reporters. The Florida lawmaker added that he saw no sign that the US embassy was taking steps to repatriate him, despite judges saying the government should do so.
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Donald Trump’s administration has been ordered by a federal judge in Colorado to give Venezuelan migrants detained in that state notice 21 days in advance before any deportations under the Alien Enemies Act, and to inform them of their right to challenge their removal. In a written ruling maintaining a temporary block within Colorado on deportations under the rarely invoked wartime law, US district judge Charlotte Sweeney said the administration must tell the migrants in a language they understand that they have the right to consult a lawyer. She also expressed skepticism that the 24 hours notice that the administration had pledged to provide would satisfy the US supreme court’s 7 April order requiring migrants be given the opportunity to challenge their removals in court.
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JD Vance described the US-India partnership as the cornerstone of global progress, warning that the 21st century could be “a very dark time for all of humanity” if the two countries fail to cooperate. In the keynote policy speech of his four-day visit to India, the US vice-president also contrasted the country’s “incredible” potential with a “self-loathing” west. Vance said US and Indian negotiators had finalized “terms of reference” for a bilateral trade agreement that Delhi is urgently seeking, in hopes that it will allow the country to dodge steep tariff increases announced by Trump.
US supreme court leans toward religious parents who object to elementary school LGBT storybooks
The US supreme court appeared inclined to rule in favor of parents in Maryland seeking to keep their elementary school children out of certain classes when storybooks with LGBT characters are read, Reuters reports.
The nine justices heard arguments on Tuesday in an appeal by parents with children in public schools in Montgomery County after lower courts declined to order the local school district to let children opt out when these books are read.
The parents contend that the school board’s policy of prohibiting opt-outs violates the US constitution’s first amendment protections for free exercise of religion. Donald Trump’s administration backed them in the case.
The supreme court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, has steadily expanded the rights of religious people in recent years, including in cases involving LGBT people. And many of the justices seemed receptive to the claims by the parents that the lack of opt-outs burdens their religious beliefs.
Citing one of the disputed storybooks that portrays a same-sex wedding, conservative justice Samuel Alito – who dissented in the supreme court’s landmark 2015 decision to legalize same-sex marriage nationwide – emphasized that the material promotes a moral message.
The book has a clear message. And a lot of people think it’s a good message, and maybe it is a good message, but it’s a message that a lot of people who hold on to traditional religious beliefs don’t agree with.
Conservative justice Amy Coney Barrett pushed back on the idea that the books were merely exposing children to diverse communities and ideas.
It’s presentation of the idea as fact – that’s different, right? It’s saying, ‘This is the right view of the world. This is how we think about things. This is how you should think about things’.
But the court’s three liberal justices raised concerns about how far opt-outs for students could go beyond storybooks in public schools, offering examples of subjects such as evolution, interfaith marriage or women working outside the home that might come up in classes.
A lawyer for the school board, Alan Schoenfeld, told the justices that the school district is attempting to teach respect for others in a pluralistic society, and that exposure to religiously objectionable content happens every day in elementary school classrooms – whether about women who work outside the home, veterans who fought in violent wars or LGBT characters in storybooks.
The book about a same-sex wedding, Schoenfeld told Alito, “is a story that is being used to teach students that, just as in the 99 of the 100 books that we read about couples (in which) it’s a man and a woman, there also may be a man and a man”.
It was unclear whether the court would issue a narrow ruling requiring lower courts to reexamine the case, or broadly require the opt-outs.
The supreme court is expected to rule by the end of June.
El Salvador government rejects lawmakers’ request to visit Kilmar Ábrego García
Chris Stein
Four House Democrats who traveled to El Salvador this week were denied visits with a man the Trump administration wrongly deported from the United States, congressman Maxwell Frost told reporters on Tuesday.
The Florida lawmaker added that he saw no sign that the US embassy was taking steps to repatriate Kilmar Ábrego García, despite judges saying the government should do so.
“It seems like the embassy is pretty much in the dark on this entire operation,” Frost said. US government officials in the country informed them that the Salvadoran government had turned down their request to visit Ábrego García, because their trip had not been deemed an official congressional delegation by the House’s Republican leaders.
“We heard directly from the people on the ground in El Salvador, working on behalf of the administration, that they have not been told to do anything in terms of facilitating his return, and that’s complete defiance of the supreme court,” Frost said. Earlier this month, the justices had ordered Donald Trump to “facilitate” Ábrego García’s return to the US, but the president has refused to do so.
Frost was joined on the trip by fellow Democratic lawmakers Robert Garcia, Yassamin Ansari and Maxine Dexter. After their request to visit Ábrego García was denied, Frost said they requested that the Salvadoran government regularly report on his condition, and not long after, the US government told a court that they would provide updates on his health and whereabouts.
“We didn’t get everything we wanted, but we’re happy we were able to get, at least, knowing where he’s at and that he’s okay, because it’s really important for the family, his wife, who’s a US citizen, and his two children,” Frost said.
Last week, Chris Van Hollen, a Democratic senator representing Maryland, where Ábrego García lived before his deportation, visited him in El Salvador. At least two House Republicans have traveled to the country in recent days to praise president Nayib Bukele’s efforts to take in deportees from the United States, though none met with Ábrego García.
Frost said he expects more Democratic lawmakers to visit the country soon.
Trump administration must give some Venezuelan migrants 21 days’ notice before deportations, judge rules
A federal judge in Colorado directed Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday to give Venezuelan migrants detained in that state notice 21 days in advance before any deportations under a law historically used only in wartime, and to inform them of their right to challenge their removal.
Reuters reports that in a written ruling maintaining a temporary block within Colorado on deportations under the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, US district judge Charlotte Sweeney said the administration must tell the migrants in a language they understand that they have the right to consult a lawyer.
During a hearing on Monday, Sweeney expressed skepticism that the 24 hours notice that the administration had pledged to provide would satisfy the US supreme court’s 7 April order requiring migrants be given the opportunity to challenge their removals in court.
The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Trump in a social media post on Monday claimed the government “cannot give everyone a trial” before deporting them. He wrote:
We would need hundreds of thousands of trials for the hundreds of thousands of Illegals we are sending out of the Country. Such a thing is not possible to do.
The supreme court previously ordered the administration to give any migrants it planned to deport under the Alien Enemies Act notice and the chance to challenge their removals in court. The court did not specify how much notice migrants were to be given.
The American Civil Liberties Union, representing the migrants held in Colorado, had asked Sweeney to require the administration to provide notice 30 days in advance. That timetable was in line with the procedure that the US government used the last time the Alien Enemies Act was invoked, during World War Two, to intern and deport people of Japanese, German and Italian descent.
The law authorizes the president to deport, detain or place restrictions on individuals whose primary allegiance is to a foreign power and who might pose a national security risk in wartime.
On Saturday, the supreme court weighed in again, blocking what advocates said was the imminent removal of dozens of Venezuelans held in Texas without due process.
US special envoy Steve Witkoff will travel to Russia for further talks later this week with Russian president Vladimir Putin about the war in Ukraine, Leavitt says.
She adds “we’re hopefully moving in the right direction” on Ukraine while noting that Trump has expressed “frustrations with both sides” in his drive to seal a halt to the fighting.
Donald Trump plans to speak with Indian prime minister Narendra Modi to express his “heartfelt condolences” after suspected militants opened fire on tourists in Kashmir, killing at least 28 people, Leavitt says.
Leavitt claims the administration is “doing very well with respect to a potential trade deal with China”.
The administration is “setting the stage for a deal with China”, she says, but fails to offer further detail on what that means exactly.
Leavitt says there are 18 trade proposals “on paper” on the table.
The White House trade team is holding meetings with 34 countries this week, she adds.
Asked if the FBI is going to be investigating the leaks that Hegseth earlier said could be prosecuted, Leavitt says you would have to ask the Department of Justice and says the leaks were “unacceptable behavior”.
Pete Hegseth ‘doing a tremendous job’, says White House, despite latest security lapse
Asked about the fact that the three top Pentagon officials – including two of Hegseth’s closest aides – who were fired after an investigation into alleged leaks were “Hegseth’s own guys”, Leavitt doubles down that they “leaked against their boss to news agencies in this room”. She says the administration “will not tolerate leaks to the mainstream media when it comes to sensitive information”.
She says that Pete Hegseth is “doing a tremendous job” and bringing “monumental change” to the Pentagon. “That’s why we’ve seen a smear campaign against the secretary of defense from the moment that President Trump announced his nomination,” she says.
Let me reiterate the president stands strongly behind secretary Hegseth and the change that he is bringing to the Pentagon and the results that he’s achieved thus far speak for themselves.
On Thursday this week, Trump will host the Norwegian prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre at the White House to discuss “trade and regional security”.
Leavitt notes this will be the 13th state visit of Trump’s second term so far.
