Category: Politics

(WASHINGTON) — Dozens of Department of Education employees received letters as business hours closed Friday placing them on administrative leave, according to a copy of one letter obtained by ABC News.

While no specific reason was given, some employees told ABC News they believe the only common thread among them is that they attended a voluntary training called the “Diversity Change-Agent Training Program.”

The letter states that the administrative leave notice is not for disciplinary purposes. Rather, it’s being issued under President Donald Trump’s executive order on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and “further guidance” from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, according to the letter.

Per the letter, employees will receive full pay and benefits through the end of the administrative leave. They are not required to do work-related tasks during this time, nor are they required to come into the office. Employees who were placed on leave also had their government email access suspended as they received the letters. There’s no set time for the leave period, according to the letter.

The letters have caused a frenzy throughout the department, as some employees had been locked out of their accounts and had to check their private email addresses for the notice, according to Sheria Smith, president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 252.

Smith told ABC News more than 50 employees in “extremely diverse roles” within the department received the email notices to their government email addresses or their private email accounts after regular business hours over the weekend.

ABC News spoke with three Department of Education employees who received the letters and described their leave as “paid administrative hell” since Friday evening.

“It’s very, very, unsettling,” one department employee of over 20 years, who works in Washington, D.C., told ABC News. “I don’t get it. What’s my crime? What have I done?”

Smith said the positions of Department of Education employees placed on leave run the gamut, from senior civil rights attorneys to attorneys for borrower defense to press specialists. She said she feared more letters would be sent in the coming days.

An attorney who works for the department in Washington, D.C., said they were put on leave from their “dream job.” The employee has two children and received the notice after putting them to bed on Friday night, they said. The person said Friday was tough and the news was shocking to receive, but now they’re feeling “different levels” of sadness.

“My mood felt a little bit different just waking up knowing that I wasn’t going to be working,” the employee told ABC News.

“But I just feel like there’s a lot of information that I’m trying to process and, with small kids, it’s like you’re trying to balance a lot,” the employee added.

The letters came as the Trump administration worked to scrub the federal government’s DEI policies and programs. The president issued an executive order during his first week in office calling on agencies to “combat” private-sector DEI programs.

Trump’s rhetoric — including threatening for months to shutter the Department of Education — has created fear throughout the department, according to Smith.

“People took these jobs because they care about the mission,” Smith told ABC News. “And so it absolutely impacts us. You know, the very thing that brought us to these jobs we’re unable to do.”

The department employee with two small children has worked for the department for just over four years and comes from a family of educators. The employee said education is the “great equalizer,” and the Department of Education benefits everyone.

“I believe in the department,” the department attorney said, adding: “I always wanted to work here.”

In a statement to ABC News, Department of Education Deputy Assistant Secretary for Communications Madi Biedermann said the president was elected to enact “unprecedented reform” that is merit-based and efficient at serving the interests of the American people.

“We are evaluating staffing in line with the commitment to prioritizing meaningful learning ahead of divisive ideology in schools and putting student outcomes above special interests,” Biedermann wrote.

ABC News has reached out to the White House for comment.

Meanwhile, the three department employees who spoke to ABC News said they’re completely stumped on why they were issued administrative leave notices. The department employee with decades of experience in Washington also said it’s puzzling, in part, because during Trump’s first term, managers were evaluated on upholding DEI standards via a department performance rating system.

“We were expected to do DEI,” the employee said. “That’s what Trump and [then-Education Secretary] Betsy DeVos wanted us to do. They wanted to do that. They put it in our [performance] plans. We did not put that in our plans. And not only that, it is in every manager’s plan in the department, not just people that are on administrative leave.”

“Every single person in the Department of Education that’s a supervisor or a manager right now has [DEI] in their performance plan — that is programmed in by the department,” the employee added.

The administrative leave notices may have been tied to a two-day “Diversity Change-Agent Training Program,” a facilitator-led training, according to training document slides obtained by ABC News. The training took place over two days dating as far back as March 2019, under DeVos and during Trump’s first term, according to a February 2019 email obtained by ABC News with the subject “Diversity Change Agent Course.”

The training program aimed to create specific action plans to “drive diversity and inclusion” and increase creativity and innovation. The program also challenged employees to achieve greater results by championing the diversity of its workforce while creating and sustaining an inclusive environment, according to the training document slides.

Another department employee, who took the 2019 training and works remotely out of the New York offices, called the notice “bizarre,” especially since the 2019 training occurred during the president’s first term.

“The whole thing is bizarre,” the department employee told ABC News. “Betsy DeVos — and [Trump’s] prior administration — was a decent champion of these programs, and they didn’t come with any warning to me to say, ‘Hey, taking this training might lead to an adverse personnel action one day,’ right? So it’s just strange how they can retroactively apply something.”

The department employees on leave who spoke to ABC News said they have no official DEI responsibilities in their roles. All three department employees who spoke with ABC News also confirmed the only DEI-like program that would potentially be barred under Trump’s executive order would be the change-agent training sessions.

However, to their knowledge, the three employees on leave said there’s no official list or way of matching the employees on administrative leave with the training programs. Even though they’re convinced these trainings link them to the Trump administration’s definition of DEI, the employees haven’t confirmed why they’re on leave, according to the ones who spoke to ABC News.

The employee who works out of New York has more than a dozen years of experience in administering federal programs. Multiple other employees on administrative leave that this employee spoke to over the weekend said they also took the 2019 training, according to the employee.

“That’s the only thing we can think of that any of us did,” the employee said.

After reaching out to other colleagues with the same titles, the employee in New York said, they “pieced it together.” This employee said they took at least three training programs like the diversity change-agent training program since the initial training.

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(MEXICO CITY) — U.S. tariffs imposed on Mexico have been “paused for a month,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said in a post on X Monday shortly after speaking to President Donald Trump. Trump confirmed the news shortly after in a social media post of his own.

Sheinbaum said Mexico has agreed to “reinforce” the Mexico-U.S. border with 10,000 National Guard troops “immediately.” She also said the U.S. had agreed to work to prevent high-powered weapons from being trafficked into Mexico.

Trump did not mention the U.S. working to prevent weapons from being trafficked into Mexico, but confirmed the 10,000 Mexican troops being deployed to the border “to stop the flow of fentanyl, and illegal migrants into our Country.”

The tariffs on Canada remain in place, however, Trump is expected to speak with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at 3 p.m. ET.

Trump said Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Howard Lutnick, Trump’s yet-to-be-confirmed commerce secretary nominee, will negotiate with Mexican leaders in the next month to achieve a permanent deal.

Sheinbaum, who took over as Mexican president in October 2024, said Trump asked her how long she would like the tariffs on Mexico to be paused, and she responded “forever,” before Trump suggested they pause them for a month.

“He insisted on the commercial deficit that the U.S. has with Mexico. I told him it was not a deficit, that we are commercial partners, and it’s the best way to compete with China and other countries,” Sheinbaum said.

“I told him to collaborate,” Sheinbaum said. “He has agreed to the working group.”

Trump had told reporters he would speak on Monday with Sheinbaum and Trudeau prior to imposing import tariffs on their goods. The U.S. president was expected to sign executive orders on Tuesday putting in place 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada and 10% tariffs on those from China, according to the White House.

Sheinbaum in a video posted to social media on Sunday said her government was calling for “reason and law” among “individuals as well as among nations.”

‘This measure of 25% tariffs has effects for both countries but it has very serious effects for the U.S. economy,” she said, “because it will raise the costs of all the products that are exported from Mexico to the U.S., it will have a 25% higher cost.”

Trudeau responded to the planned tariffs on Saturday evening, announcing his country will implement 25% tariffs on 155 billion Canadian dollars, or about $107 billion, of U.S. goods. The prime minister said he has not talked to Trump since his inauguration.

Sheinbaum, who was elected in June, offered little detail on how her government’s “Plan B” would respond to the tariffs.

She instructed her economic secretary to “implement Plan B that we have been working on, which includes tariff and non-tariff measures in defense of Mexico’s interests,” she said in a statement written in Spanish and translated by ABC News.

She also sought to remind the White House that the current free trade agreements between the U.S. and Mexico have been in place for about three decades. 

“The last free trade agreement was signed by President López Obrador and President Trump himself,” she said.

Trump on Sunday told reporters he was unconcerned about the potential impact of imposing tariffs on close trading partners, saying the American people would understand.

“We may have short term, some, a little pain, and people understand that, but, long term, the United States has been ripped off by virtually every country in the world,” he told reporters on Sunday, as he departed Air Force One at Maryland’s Joint Base Andrews.

He added, “We have deficits with almost every country, not every country, but almost. And we’re going to change it. It’s been unfair. That’s why we owe $36 trillion; we have deficits with everybody.”

Canada has been taking advantage of the U.S., Trump said, calling the relationship with the country a “one-way street.”

“They don’t allow our banks. Did you know that Canada does not allow banks to go in, if you think about it, that’s pretty amazing,” he said. “If we have a U.S. bank, they don’t allow them to go in.”

Trump added, “Canada has been very tough on oil, on energy. They don’t allow our farm products in. Essentially, they don’t allow a lot of things in, and we allow everything to come in. It’s been a one-way street.”

ABC News’ Matt Rivers, Max Zahn, Kelsey Walsh, Victoria Beaule and William Gretsky contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump’s administration is filling one of the State Department’s top positions with a controversial conservative journalist who has promoted conspiracy theories related to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and was fired as a speechwriter by the first Trump administration when it was revealed that he had spoken at a conference tied to White nationalists, sources familiar with the move told ABC News.

The sources said that the man, Darren Beattie, will now be the acting Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, a so-called “Top 10” position that, as the State Department’s website describes it, “leads America’s public diplomacy outreach, which includes messaging to counter terrorism and violent extremism.”

“The Under Secretary oversees the bureaus of Educational and Cultural Affairs and Global Public Affairs, and participates in foreign policy development,” the website adds.

Beattie is slated to start in the position on Monday, sources said. He was already serving in another senior role within the State Department, but the new move to such a high-level position has raised concerns among many of its employees, sources said.

More than two years ago, Beattie launched a right-wing media outlet called Revolver News, which has raised funds in part by selling pro-Trump apparel and merchandise.

“It’s OK to deny 2020,” reads two shirts still being sold on the outlet’s website. Another shirt promotes the refuted claim that Jan. 6, 2021, was an “FBI setup to frame Trump supporters as insurrectionists,” as the shirt says.

And Beattie has become a frequent guest on other right-wing media, often promoting conspiracy theories related to Jan. 6.

On Donald Trump Jr.’s podcast last month, Beattie repeated his claims that the FBI knows who’s behind the pipe bombs left at DNC and RNC offices on Jan. 6 but “what they found out was profoundly embarrassing to the government and to the narrative that the Biden regime wanted to promote, and so instead of following that investigation further, they basically just killed it,” Beattie said.

Beattie also claimed that surveillance video released by the FBI to seek help in identifying the perpetrator was “clearly tampered with.”

In mid-August 2018, he made national headlines, with the Washington Post reporting then that he “was terminated last week after revelations that he had spoken at a conference attended by well-known white nationalists” two years earlier.

According to the Washington Post, Beattie – who is Jewish – insisted that he was not racist and said in a statement.

“In 2016 I attended the [H.L. Mencken Club] conference in question and delivered a stand-alone, academic talk titled ‘The Intelligentsia and the Right.’ I said nothing objectionable and stand by my remarks completely,” the statement said. “It was the honor of my life to serve in the Trump Administration. I love President Trump, who is a fearless American hero, and continue to support him one hundred percent.”

At the end of the Trump administration, in November 2020, the Trump White House appointed Beattie to a three-year term with the Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, which helps preserve sites related to the Holocaust.

The Anti-Defamation League strongly objected to the appointment, issuing a statement at the time saying, “It is absolutely outrageous that someone who has consorted with racists would even be considered for a position on a commission devoted to preserving Holocaust memorials in Europe.”

The New York Times then asked Beattie for comment, and he told the paper: “The ADL pretends to be an organization that protects Jews, but it really exists to protect Democrats. As a Jewish Trump supporter, I consider it an honor to be attacked by the far-left ADL and its disgraced leader, Jonathan Greenblatt.”

Asked about Beattie’s new position at the State Department, a White House spokesperson referred ABC News to the State Department. First reached on Friday, the State Department has so far not commented.

On Sunday, Beattie did not immediately respond to a request for comment by ABC News.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Treasury Department has given Elon Musk and representatives of his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team access to the vast federal payment system responsible for handling trillions of dollars in government expenditures, multiple sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.

The payment system — which is essentially a checkbook for the entire federal government — is a closely held operation run by career officials, with a limited number of people authorized to access the information given it contains sensitive information about hundreds of millions of Americans.

The demand for access to the payment system reportedly caused such a rift inside the Treasury Department that the career official who previously oversaw it, David Lebryk, was placed on administrative leave last week after he resisted granting Musk and his government efficiency team access to the database.

On Friday, Lebryk told colleagues at the department he would be retiring, sources told ABC News.

If Musk or his team were to attempt to block these payments, it would likely face legal challenges given the money is approved by Congress.

Sources said that if Musk or his representatives were to request that changes be made to the system, such requests would be subject to an internal review process by Treasury Department officials.

In a letter to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said that any “politically-motivated meddling” in the payment systems “risks severe damage to our country and the economy.”

“To put it bluntly, these payment systems simply cannot fail, and any politically-motivated meddling in them risks severe damage to our country and the economy. I am deeply concerned that following the federal grant and loan freeze earlier this week, these officials associated with Musk may have intended to access these payment systems to illegally withhold payments to any number of programs,” Wyden wrote in a Friday evening letter.

“I can think of no good reason why political operators who have demonstrated a blatant disregard for the law would need access to these sensitive, missioncritical systems,” Wyden wrote.

Spokespeople for DOGE, the White House and Treasury didn’t respond to a request for comment.

 

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(WASHINGTON) — With a committee vote scheduled Tuesday for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Senate Democrats are demanding more details on the nominee’s connections to vaccine lawsuits and are saying Kennedy should promise to recuse himself from any vaccine-related decisions if confirmed health secretary.

The demands came in letter released Monday by Sens. Ron Wyden and Elizabeth Warren, after Kennedy told the lawmakers that he planned to divest his financial stake in one ongoing vaccine lawsuit to his adult son who practices law in California.

The description matches that of his son, Connor Kennedy, who is an attorney at Wisner Baum, a California-based law firm that is representing plaintiffs in a civil lawsuit against Gardasil, a vaccine intended to protect against HPV and deemed safe by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Warren and Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, called the arrangement of allowing his son to collect future referral fees in the lawsuit “troubling” and “plainly inadequate.”

“The arrangement outlined in your Ethics Agreement Amendment is plainly inadequate, as it would appear to allow an immediate family member to benefit financially from your position as Secretary,” wrote Wyden, D-Ore., and Warren, D-Mass.

It’s not clear whether the letter released Monday by the Democrats would impact Kennedy’s confirmation as health secretary, which could still be pushed through by the Republican majority. It is possible, however, that Republican senators with concerns about Kennedy’s nomination — including Sen. Bill Cassidy — could use the Democrats’ request to slow the confirmation process.

“Your past of undermining confidence in vaccines with unfounded or misleading arguments concerns me,” Cassidy, R.-La., a medical doctor, said in his opening remarks during a hearing last week on Kennedy’s nomination.

He added, “Can I trust that that is now in the past? Can data and information change your opinion? Or will you only look for data supporting a predetermined conclusion? This is imperative.”

The Senate Finance Committee, chaired by Cassidy, is scheduled to vote Tuesday on Kennedy’s nomination.

Warren and Wyden said they couldn’t trust Kennedy’s financial disclosures were “accurate and complete” because they don’t lay out how many cases Kennedy referred to Wisner Baum and whether vaccines were involved.

Wisner Baum has said it has not paid the nominee for any vaccine-related cases, as the current Gardasil case is ongoing.

Wyden and Warren said any involvement is a direct conflict of interest if he were to become health secretary because of his oversight of vaccines.

“By using your authority and bully pulpit as Secretary to sway the outcome of the litigation and secure a big judgment or settlement, you would increase the chances of a large payout for yourself,” they wrote.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Army identified Saturday the third soldier on the Black Hawk helicopter involved in the midair crash over the Potomac River Wednesday night as Capt. Rebecca M. Lobach.

Lobach, of Durham, North Carolina, was the last member of the helicopter’s crew to be identified. The six-year Army member was assigned to the 12th Aviation Battalion at Fort Belvoir, Virginia, according to the Army.

Lobach’s family initially withheld her identity when the Army released the names of the other two soldiers killed in the collision, Staff Sgt. Ryan Austin O’Hara and Chief Warrant Officer 2 Andrew Lloyd Eaves.

“Rebecca was many things. She was a daughter, sister, partner, and friend. She was a servant, a caregiver, an advocate. Most of all, she loved and was loved. Her life was short, but she made a difference in the lives of all who knew her. Our hearts break for the other families who have lost loved ones in this national tragedy and we mourn with them,” her family said in a statement.

Lobach was among the 67 people killed in the crash between the helicopter and the American Airlines regional jetliner.

The Army said Lobach had no deployments but was awarded the Army Commendation Medal, Army Achievement Medal, National Defense Service Medal and Army Service Ribbon.

Her family said she volunteered White House military social aide, supporting the president and first lady in hosting countless White House events, including ceremonies awarding the Medal of Honor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Lobach also was a certified Army Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention victim advocate and “hoped to continue her education so she could serve this country as a physician when her time with the Army ended,” her family said.

“She once said, ‘My experiences with SHARP have reinforced my resolve to serve others with compassion, understanding and the resources necessary for healing,'” her family said in a statement.

“Her life was short, but she made a difference in the lives of all who knew her. Our hearts break for the other families who have lost loved ones in this national tragedy and we mourn with them,” the family added.

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(WASHINGTON) — The United States used manned fighter jets to conduct an airstrike against Islamic State targets in Somalia on Saturday, three U.S. officials told ABC News on Saturday.

President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth confirmed the airstrike, claiming no civilians were harmed in the attack. No details were released about the targets aside from the president labeling the target as a “Senior ISIS Attack Planner.”

Hegseth said the airstrikes were carried out “at President Trump’s direction and in coordination with the Federal Government of Somalia.”

Notably, the strikes were not drone strikes but were carried out by fighter aircraft from the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman, which is currently in the Red Sea, as well as Air Force fighter aircraft, U.S. officials told ABC News.

And unlike other airstrikes, these attacks were offensive airstrikes against ISIS, not the defensive drones strikes, such as what U.S. forces have done against al Shabaab when they’re called in to support Somali troops who are being attacked by the militant group.

“This action further degrades ISIS’s ability to plot and conduct terrorist attacks threatening U.S. citizens, our partners, and innocent civilians and sends a clear signal that the United States always stands ready to find and eliminate terrorists who threaten the United States and our allies, even as we conduct robust border-protection and many other operations under President Trump’s leadership,” Hegseth added.

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(WASHINGTON) — Secretary of State Marco Rubio is set to embark on his first diplomatic mission abroad since being confirmed to his post, visiting five countries in Central and South America over the first week of February.

During the trip, Rubio is expected to reinforce the Trump administration’s immigration priorities with leaders in the region, according to a senior official, who said the secretary is also planning to address Beijing’s influence during several of the stops.

The State Department is also billing Rubio’s trip as historic — saying his six-day journey to Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic marks the first time a U.S. secretary of state has opted to make his or her first official visit to Latin America in over 100 years.

“This is where we live”

In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, Rubio said the trip is part of a realignment of American diplomatic priorities.

“For many reasons, U.S. foreign policy has long focused on other regions while overlooking our own. As a result, we’ve let problems fester, missed opportunities and neglected partners,” he said. “That ends now.”

State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said the region’s proximity to the United States was an important factor in selecting it for Rubio’s first trip.

“The fact of the matter is, this is where we live. This is who we are,” she said. “This is about not just wanting to have new partnerships — but that’s always good — but the nature of what it means to have an extended relationship with the people closest to you.”

Those relationships are vital for fulfilling the Trump administration’s border security and deportation plans, Rubio noted.

“Diplomacy’s role in this effort is central. We need to work with countries of origin to halt and deter further migrant flows, and to accept the return of their citizens present in the U.S. illegally,” he said.

Cooperation and coercion

However, the countries on his itinerary have largely been very cooperative with the administration so far, as other countries in the region Rubio will skip over remain hesitant to comply.

Guatemala, for instance, has accepted hundreds of migrants brought to the country on military planes since Trump took office, and the country’s leadership has signaled it is open to accepting deportees of other nationalities.

Meanwhile, Mexico, which is traditionally the U.S.’ most important partner in handling illegal immigration, has been much more tentative.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum originally said the country wouldn’t accept migrants from other countries, but she quietly reversed course in late January when she revealed Mexico had accepted over 4,000 deportees and that while “the large majority” was Mexican, others were not.

Mexico has also so far refused requests from the U.S. to allow military flights carrying deportees to land in the country, according to officials from both countries.

Honduras has posed another challenge to the administration’s agenda. According to data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the end of 2024, Hondurans made up the largest share of the population in the deportation pipeline. But ahead of Trump’s inauguration, the president of Honduras threatened to expel members of the U.S. military stationed in the country in response to mass deportations of Honduran nationals.

However, Honduran authorities have signaled the country’s position may be softening. The country’s foreign minister wrote on X that the government is in the process of launching a program to support returning migrants called “Brother, Come Home.”

The Trump administration has also had some early success in overtly pressuring countries to acquiesce. His threatened trade war against Colombia prompted its government to allow military deportation flights to land on its territory.

“It sends a message that this administration, President Trump, Secretary Rubio — they mean what they say,” said Mauricio Claver-Carone, special envoy for Latin America.

Claver-Carone also suggested the Trump administration would use gentler diplomatic tactics as well, saying that during Rubio’s trip, he will attempt to lay the groundwork for a program to repatriate migrants travelling through Central America with the government of Costa Rica.

He also addressed Richard Grenell’s visit to Venezuela to meet with strongman Nicolas Maduro on Friday.

“President Trump expects Nicolas Maduro to take back all of the Venezuelan criminals and gang members that have been exported to United States and to do so unequivocally and without condition,” he said, adding that Grenell, the envoy for special missions, will also urge Maduro to release American hostages held in the country.

A “direct threat” from China

Beyond immigration, Claver-Carone said Beijing’s growing influence in Central America will also be top of mind for Rubio through much of the trip, but it is expected to take center stage during the secretary’s first stop in Panama.

Trump has lodged a litany of complaints related to Panama’s operation of the canal that cuts through the country — claiming that American vessels are overcharged, lamenting that the U.S. ceded control of the vital waterway in the first place and promising “we’re taking it back” during his inaugural address.

Rubio has taken a more measured approach in discussing the Panama Canal while also underscoring that what he says are Trump’s legitimate concerns about the waterway — especially when it comes to companies controlled by Beijing located on each end of it.

“If the government in China in a conflict tells them to shut down the Panama Canal, they will have to,” Rubio said in an interview on Thursday. “That is a direct threat.”

Rubio continued to say it is a dynamic that cannot be allowed to continue.

“It is not in the national interest of the United States to have a canal we paid for and we built used as a leverage and a weapon against us. That can’t happen,” he said.

But ahead of Rubio’s visit, Panama President Jose Raul Mulino said handing back control of the canal isn’t a thought he can entertain.

“It’s impossible,” Mulino said during a press conference on Thursday. “I cannot negotiate, and much less open, a process of negotiation over the canal. That’s sealed. The canal belongs to Panama.”

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(WASHINGTON) — The Trump administration is set to impose tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico and China on Saturday, placing pressure on three top U.S. trade partners while risking price increases for essential products like gasoline and groceries.

The policy is expected to slap a 25% tariff on all products from Canada and Mexico, as well as a 10% tariff on goods from China.

Hours before the tariffs were set to take effect, leaders in Canada and Mexico vowed to respond, indicating the possibility of a trade war.

Tariffs of this magnitude will likely increase prices paid by U.S. shoppers, since importers typically pass along a share of the cost of those higher taxes to consumers, experts previously told ABC News.

The policy could raise prices for an array of products ranging from avocados to tequila to auto parts.

The price impact remains unclear, however, since businesses within the supply chain could opt to take on some or all of the tax burden, some experts added.

Speaking at the White House on Friday, U.S. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said the tariffs target the three countries for hosting the manufacture and transport of illicit drugs that end up in the U.S.

“Canada, Mexico and China have all enabled illegal drugs to pour into America,” Leavitt said.

The sentiment echoed comments made by President Donald Trump when he proposed such tariffs in a post on Truth Social weeks after winning the November election.

“These are promises made and promises kept by the president,” Leavitt said.

Less than two hours after Leavitt addressed reporters, Canadian President Justin Trudeau said in a post on X that such tariffs would elicit a “forceful and immediate response.”

Speaking earlier in the day, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum cast doubt on the likelihood of tariffs. “We don’t believe that it will happen and if it does, we have our plan,” Sheinbaum said.

Mexico and Canada account for 70% of U.S. crude oil imports, which make up a key input for the nation’s gasoline supply, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, a government agency.

The tariffs could raise gasoline prices by as much as 70 cents a gallon for some drivers, Timothy Fitzgerald, a professor of business economics at the University of Tennessee who studies the petroleum industry, previously told ABC News.

Trump said at the Oval Office earlier this week that the tariffs may feature an exemption for oil. Such a move could mitigate the risk of a price hike for gasoline, but the inclusion of the exemption remained unclear a day before the tariffs were set to take effect.

When asked on Friday about a possible exemption for oil, Leavitt declined to directly respond. “I don’t have an update,” Leavitt said. “Those tariffs will be for public consumption in about 24 hours.”

The proposed tariffs could also raise the price of an array of fresh fruits and vegetables, including tomatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, jalapenos, limes and mangoes, Jason Miller, a professor of supply-chain management at Michigan State University, told ABC News.

It would be difficult for the U.S. to replace those goods with domestic production or an alternative supplier, making it likely that prices would rise significantly if the tariffs take effect, he added.

The auto industry also retains deep ties to Canada and Mexico, making tariffs a threat to prices for cars and auto parts, experts said.

Inflation has slowed dramatically from a peak of more than 9% in June 2022, but price increases have picked up in recent months, keeping inflation nearly a percentage point higher than the Fed’s target rate of 2%.

Speaking on Friday, Leavitt touted Trump’s previous achievements in keeping inflation under control.

“Americans who are concerned about increased prices should look at what President Trump did in his first term. He effectively implemented tariffs and the average inflation rate during the first Trump administration was 1.9%.”

ABC News’ William Gretsky contributed to this report.

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(WASHINGTON) — After a bruising round of confirmation hearings this week that left Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation in doubt, the nominee for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services declared in a written statement to senators on Friday that, if confirmed, he will divest his financial stake in an ongoing civil lawsuit against a vaccine manufacturer.

Kennedy’s commitment to walk away from the potential windfall is a major reversal for the nominee, who in his ethics plan submitted to federal officials earlier this month told lawmakers he was entitled to those proceeds so long as the U.S. government wasn’t involved.

Democrats had seized on Kennedy’s financial stake in the lawsuit, with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., warning that he could use his perch in government to make it easier for lawyers – including himself – to sue vaccine manufacturers and drug makers in court.

The lawsuit alleges marketing fraud against pharmaceutical company Merck for its HPV vaccine, Gardasil, which Merck denies. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) maintains that the vaccine has been proven safe, with more than 160 studies finding no concerns.

“Kennedy can kill off access to vaccines and make millions of dollars while he does it,” Warren said at Kennedy’s confirmation hearing on Wednesday.

“Kids might die, but Robert Kennedy will keep cashing in,” she added.

Kennedy struggled to lock-up conservative support for his nomination after testifying this week. On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal’s right-leaning editorial board praised Warren, writing that her questioning “expose[d]” Kennedy.

The next day, Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy said he was “struggling” with Kennedy’s nomination, noting at one point that Kennedy was “financially vested in finding fault with vaccines.”

Kennedy told senators in his testimony Thursday that he was giving away his rights to the fees in the lawsuit against Merck. However, it was unclear whether he misspoke because his ethics agreement still maintained that he was entitled to the fees.

In written answers provided to the Senate Finance Committee on Friday, Kennedy clarified that an amendment was forthcoming.

“An amendment to my Ethics Agreement is in process, and it provides that I will divest my interest in this litigation,” he said.

Kennedy has earned millions of dollars in referral fees from law firms in the past for lawsuits unrelated to vaccines, including one involving a pesticide. He had not earned money yet from the Merck case, which only recently was taken up in civil courts.

In his testimony, Kennedy said he wanted to retain the right to sue drug companies even if confirmed.

“You’re asking me to not sue drug companies, and I am not going to agree to that,” he said.

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