Elon Musk faces 1st questions on DOGE’s transparency as he joins Trump in Oval Office
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(WASHINGTON) — Elon Musk joined President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on Tuesday, where he addressed reporters for the first time amid his controversial cost-cutting efforts across the federal government.
Musk defended DOGE as Trump asked him to speak about the team’s work. The Tesla billionaire brought his young son “X” and was wearing a black “Make America Great Again” hat.
“If there’s not a good feedback loop from the people to the government and if you have rule of the bureaucrat, or if the bureaucracy is in charge, then what meaning does democracy actually have?” said Musk, who is an unelected official himself.
Musk had not faced questions since taking the lead on Trump’s mandate to dismantle federal agencies. The White House has said he is classified as a “special government employee” and it’s unclear to whom he is accountable to, other than Trump.
ABC News Senior Political Correspondent Rachel Scott pressed Musk on what checks he faces and whether he is policing himself. Musk in response claimed his actions are “fully transparent.”
DOGE has faced early setbacks from the courts, with a federal judge temporarily blocking Musk and his team from accessing Treasury Department material, including sensitive information such as the Social Security numbers and bank account information of millions of Americans.
The administration and some key Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, have criticized the court action against DOGE. Johnson earlier Tuesday said the courts should “step back” and let DOGE work.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON ) — Three of President Donald Trump’s most controversial Cabinet picks will face the scrutiny of Senate committees this week — Tulsi Gabbard, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Kash Patel.
Director of national intelligence nominee Gabbard’s hearing will take place Thursday morning before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
The former Democratic congresswoman and onetime Democratic presidential candidate has stirred up waves of controversy from across the political spectrum and is expected to face a bruising confirmation battle. Not only are critics wary of her lack of intelligence experience, they have also accused her of promoting an anti-American agenda, including blaming the U.S. for the war in Ukraine and being sympathetic to U.S. adversaries.
Michigan Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin told ABC News’ Martha Raddatz on “This Week” on Sunday that she “do[es] not believe she’s qualified for this role.”
“From what I understand from people who have been meeting directly with her, and she hasn’t asked to meet with me, is that she doesn’t show the competence, the understanding, the depth. She wasn’t prepared for her meetings,” Slotkin said, pointing to Gabbard’s “deeply questionable decisions” over her relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.
Republican Sen. Lindsay Graham remained tight-lipped about his stance on Gabbard, telling CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union” that “we will see how she does” when asked if he planned to support her.
Fellow Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, chairman of the Intelligence Committee, acknowledged concerns with Gabbard, telling Shannon Bream on “Fox News Sunday” that he “understand[s] that people have their differences of opinion” regarding her nomination.
However, he emphasized his faith in her record: “She’s passed five different background checks. I reviewed the latest one. It’s clean as a whistle,” he said. “It’s fine for people to have policy differences and ask questions about those differences. I hope no one would impugn Ms. Gabbard’s patriotism or her integrity.”
He also pointed to Pete Hegseth’s successful confirmation to become secretary of defense after a tie-breaking vote Friday despite the controversy that surrounded his nomination.
Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine — who was one of three Republicans who voted against Hegseth last week — expressed caution towards Gabbard.
“There are several questions I want to follow up on in the hearing,” Collins told The Hill on Monday, adding that there are “a lot of obvious issues” with the DNI nominee.
However, Vice President JD Vance remained adamant in supporting Trump’s nomination of Gabbard, telling CBS News’ Margaret Brennan on “Face the Nation” on Sunday, “I feel confident that Tulsi Gabbard will ultimately get through.”
“She is a career military servant who’s had a classification at the highest levels for nearly two decades. She has impeccable character, impeccable record of service, and she also is a person who I think is going to bring some trust back to the intelligence services,” Vance said during his first interview since becoming vice president.
Also on Thursday, FBI director nominee Kash Patel, who served in several roles in Trump’s first administration, will appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee for his confirmation hearing.
Patel’s nomination has similarly faced backlash, particularly regarding his promoting of conspiracy theories, his defense of Jan. 6 rioters and his threats to target journalists, former senior FBI and Department of Justice officials.
Sen. Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, told reporters last week that he will not vote to advance Patel’s nomination.
“After meeting with him and doing this study, I’ve come to the conclusion that Kash Patel has neither the experience, the judgment or the temperament to serve as head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to take on this awesome responsibility to keep America safe,” Durbin said.
Democratic Sen. Chris Coons, another member of the Judiciary Committee, called Patel’s nomination “alarming” after meeting with him last week.
Coons said he questioned Patel on efforts by Trump to use the FBI for political retribution, as well as his calling for the weaponization of the federal government against Trump’s political enemies.
“I left this meeting still concerned about Mr. Patel’s ability to put past grievances aside and focus the FBI on its core mission of keeping Americans safe,” he said in a statement.
Health and Human Services nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will face the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday morning. Kennedy has faced criticism over his history of remarks against vaccines and his recent vaccine skepticism. In addition to asking the federal government to revoke authorization of COVID-19 vaccines in 2021, and medical experts have expressed concerns over his views potentially spreading medical misinformation.
Kennedy continues to echo Trump’s views. On Sunday, he sent out a fundraising email called Trump’s executive order withdrawing the U.S. from the World Health Organization “a massive win” for Kennedy’s health agenda and for Americans’ “fundamental medical freedom rights.”
Trump’s withdrawal, which has been criticized by medical and health experts, “marks a turning point for our nation. No more subservience to a globalist organization prioritizing profits over American lives and health,” Kennedy said in his fundraiser.
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Thursday to declassify files related to the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King.
“That’s a big one,” Trump said as put his signature to the order in the Oval Office. He asked an aide standing nearby to give the marker to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who he’s nominated to be secretary of Health and Human Services.
Trump has long vowed to make the information public. He released a trove of documents in 2017 related to the 1963 killing of John F. Kennedy but left some of it redacted based on recommendations from the CIA and FBI.
A 1992 law passed by Congress required the release of the JFK files by 2017 unless the president authorized that they be withheld longer.
According to the White House text of the order, Trump has “now determined that the continued redaction and withholding of information” on JFK “is not consistent with the public interest and the release of these records is long overdue.”
“And although no Act of Congress directs the release of information pertaining to the assassinations of Senator Robert F. Kennedy and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I have determined that the release of all records in the Federal Government’s possession pertaining to each of those assassinations is also in the public interest,” the order states.
The records, however, will not immediately be made available.
The order gives the director of national intelligence and attorney general 15 days to present a plan to Trump for the “full and complete” release of records for JFK and 45 days for a plan for the RFK and MLK documents.
The Biden administration also released documents related to JFK’s assassination — more than 13,000 of them.
At the time, the National Archives said more than 97% of records in the collection, which contain more than 5 million pages, were publicly available. The CIA also said that 95% of its collection had been released, and that no documents remained entirely redacted.
In 2023, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called on then-President Joe Biden to release all the files related to his uncle’s assassination.
Last year, as he ran for president first as a Democrat then as an independent before endorsing Trump, RFK Jr. pushed a conspiracy theory that the CIA was directly involved in the assassination of JFK.
When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. stood on stage with Trump in August after making his endorsement, Trump announced he would establish a “a new independent presidential commission on assassination attempts” tasked with releasing “all remaining documents pertaining to President John F. Kennedy’s assassination and other events in question.”
JFK was shot and killed in November 1963 during a visit to Dallas at the hands of Lee Harvey Oswald.
RFK and MLK were killed in 1968. RFK was shot on the night he won the 1968 California Democratic presidential primary by Sirhan Sirhan. King was killed in Memphis, where he was supporting a sanitation workers strike, by James Earl Ray.
“Lot of people are waiting for this for a long — for years and decades,” Trump said as he signed the order on Thursday.
(WASHINGTON) — Special counsel Jack Smith’s team has withdrawn from their appeal of the classified documents case against President-elect Donald Trump’s co-defendants and referred the case to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, according to a court filing Monday afternoon.
Smith last month dropped his appeal against Trump due to a longstanding Department of Justice policy prohibiting the prosecution of a sitting president, but his team continued to pursue their appeal against Trump’s two co-defendants in the case, longtime Trump aide Walt Nauta and Mar-a-Lago employee Carlos De Oliveira.
Trump pleaded not guilty last June to 37 criminal counts related to his handling of classified materials, after prosecutors said he repeatedly refused to return hundreds of documents containing classified information ranging from U.S. nuclear secrets to the nation’s defense capabilities, and took steps to thwart the government’s efforts to get the documents back.
The former president, along with Nauta and De Oliveira, also pleaded not guilty to allegedly attempting to delete surveillance footage at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.
Smith’s appeal, to the Atlanta-based Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, came after U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed Smith’s case in July, citing the constitutionality of his appointment as special counsel.
With the appeal ongoing, Smith’s team on Monday withdrew from the case and passed the case to federal prosecutors in Florida. In a separate filing, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, Markenzy Lapointe, entered his appearance in the case.
A representative for the office of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
Smith has also been winding down his federal election interference case against Trump following Trump’s reelection, and is expected to issue a report on his investigations to Attorney General Merrick Garland in the coming weeks.
