Supreme Court to hear Louisiana race and redistricting case

(WASHINGTON) — In a case that sits squarely at the intersection of his business and political interests, President Donald Trump is trying to stop a civil lawsuit against his multibillion-dollar social media company by arguing that he should be immune from civil litigation filed in state court while he serves as president.

Trump and his co-defendants — including FBI director nominee Kash Patel and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino — asked a Delaware judge to either issue a four-year delay of the case or dismiss a lawsuit filed by Trump Media & Technology Group co-founders Andy Litinsky and Wes Moss, who alleged that Trump and company executives orchestrated a scheme to prevent them from getting their full stake in the company after it went public.

Facing an “unprecedented” number of civil lawsuits, Trump argued that having to fend off the litigation would be a “distraction” from his presidential duties and “interfere substantially” with the function of the executive branch.

“Without the protections of temporary Presidential immunity, the President will be forced to defend against these cases — and the many more that are sure to arise during his second term — all to the detriment of his office and the American people he serves,” attorneys John Reed and Theodore Kittila wrote in a filing on Friday in Delaware Chancery Court.

In December, Delaware Chancery Court Judge Morgan Zurn agreed to temporarily pause the claim so Trump could make his immunity argument, though she noted that Trump “is not presently deemed to be immune” from the civil case. Lawyers for Trump Media and the president asked the court to establish a “brightline deferral rule” to delay any civil litigation Trump faces in state court by four years.

“State courts across the country are being called upon to sit in judgment of the sitting President, to tax his time, and to second-guess his priorities. That state of affairs — President Jefferson’s nightmare — dishonors the Presidency and debases the state courts that purport to control his actions,” the filing said.

During his first term in office, Trump was sued at least 10 times, and he returned to the presidency with at least 14 lawsuits pending, including multiple suits related to his social media company. Trump placed his stake in the company — 14,750,000 shares worth more than $3 billion — into a trust controlled by his sons before entering office this month.

If successful, Trump’s claim of “temporary presidential immunity” could provide the president an additional layer of legal protection, having already entered office with newly broadened presidential power and protection from criminal liability following the Supreme Court’s ruling last year on presidential immunity.

Defense lawyers, in Friday’s filing, claimed without evidence that Trump’s “billionaire adversaries” are funding a wave of litigation “to destroy the president.”

“The President has already been sued more than all his predecessors combined, yet his rivals promise that there is still more to come,” the lawsuit said. “That swell of litigation will pose an even greater threat to the operations of the Executive Branch and the standing of state courts that purport to sit in judgment of his conduct.”

While the Supreme Court established in Clinton v. Jones that a president does not have immunity from civil lawsuits related to personal conduct, lawyers for Trump Media argued that the decision only applies to cases in federal court. Though the Trump Media lawsuit does not center on official acts, Trump argued that the burden of defending himself would intrude on his official duties, citing an example of how President Bill Clinton consulted his personal attorney three times on the same day he was deliberating whether to go to war with Iraq.

“With the benefits of hindsight and lived experience, it now is clear that state civil litigation against the President causes real ‘diversion’ and ‘harassment’ of the Presidency, sufficient to interfere substantially with the operations of the Executive Branch,” the filing said.

The defense lawyers claimed that the lawsuit would occupy Trump’s limited “energies and attention,” which is already strained by the demands of the presidency.

“During his first term, President Trump … slept just four to five hours per night — because the burdens of the Presidency dwarfed even his responsibilities as a global business leader,” the filing said.

In a separate filing on Friday, Trump’s personal lawyers told the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that the president should be immune from any civil claims related to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack because he was acting in his official capacity as president when he sought to challenge the results of the 2020 election.

When reached for comment, regarding the Trump Media lawsuit, Richie Jones, an attorney for Moss and Litinsky, provided a quote by former President Theodore Roosevelt, saying it was “the best we can do in terms of comment.”

“No man is above the law, and no man is below it. Nor do we ask any man’s permission when we require him to obey it,” Jones wrote.

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(WASHINGTON) — Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy comes to the White House on Friday to ink a deal that would give the U.S. access to his country’s mineral resources — an agreement that President Donald Trump has cast a way to ensure American taxpayers get paid back for supporting Ukraine in its war with Russia.

“We’ll be digging. We’ll be dig, dig, digging. Dig, we must,” Trump said on Thursday, saying the U.S. would be “doing a substantial amount of work” in Ukraine “taking the rare earth, which we need in our country very badly.”

“It’ll be great for Ukraine,” he continued. “It’s like a huge economic development project. So, it’ll be good for both countries.”

Zelenskyy, meanwhile, has spoken about the deal in different terms — describing it as a means to an end: keeping U.S. backing.

If not the full-fledged military security guarantee he wants, Trump administration officials have said a U.S. economic investment on the ground in Ukraine could serve as a kind of barrier to a further Russian invasion.

“I will meet with President Trump,” the Ukrainian leader said on Wednesday. “For me, and for all of us in the world, it is crucial that America’s assistance is not stopped. Strength is essential on the path to peace.”

ABC News spoke to officials and analysts to break down what’s in the deal, and what the agreement could mean for Ukraine’s future and efforts to end the war after three grueling years.

What is — and isn’t — in the deal

Officials familiar with the negotiations say that under the terms of the deal, the U.S. and the Ukraine will work together to unearth deposits of valuable minerals and other natural Ukrainian resources.

Unlike the original proposal, this framework does not call for Kyiv to use the proceeds from the sale of those resources to pay the U.S. $500 billion — which the Trump administration previously characterized as “payback” for the roughly $183 billion spent in response to Russia’s invasion, according to the U.S. special inspector general in charge of overseeing Ukrainian aid.

Instead, the deal aims to create an investment fund for Ukraine’s post-war reconstruction that will be jointly owned by both countries, they say, and that additional negotiations on the control of that fund and its operation will take place will take place after the initial deal is cemented.

Other factors will depend on the free market.

“The profitability of the fund is entirely dependent on the success of new investments in Ukraine’s resources,” said Gracelin Baskaran, the director of the Critical Minerals Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and Meredith Schwartz, a research associate at the same program.

“Therefore, the response of private industry is key to the success of the fund and will determine how much value the United States ultimately derives,” they added.

But officials say the Ukrainians also made concessions. Officials say Kyiv initially wanted the terms of the deal to include concrete security guarantees for Ukraine — something the current framework lacks.

“However, the idea is that with joint U.S.-Ukraine investment in the nation’s resources, the United States will continue to have a stake in Ukraine’s security, stability, and lasting peace and therefore be incentivized to uphold and defend Ukrainian security,” Baskaran and Schwartz said.

If it proves successful, Baskaran and Schwartz say the U.S. may boost its mineral security — but that the results could take decades to come to fruition.

“Mining is a long-term effort — so the United States may not yield benefits for another 20 years,” they said.

Trump himself has acknowledged the uncertainty.

“You know, you dig and maybe things aren’t there like you think they’re there,” he said on Thursday.

A different tune from Trump

After repeatedly bashing Zelenskyy in recent days, Trump softened his tone on Thursday.

Asked if he still believed Zelenskyy was a dictator — an assertion he made just over a week ago — Trump answered, “Did I say that? I can’t believe I said that,” before brusquely moving on to the next questioner.

Later in the day, Trump also offered praise for Zelenskyy and Ukrainian fighters’ valor on the battlefield.

“We’ve given him a lot of equipment and a lot of money, but they have fought very bravely. No matter how you figure it, they have really fought,” he said. “Somebody has to use that equipment. And they have been very brave in that sense.”

Ukrainian officials who have been urging Zelenskyy to accept the mineral pact are likely to see this turnaround as proof positive for their main argument — that signing off on Trump’s deal will boost ties between the Trump administration and Kyiv, while drawing out negotiations would further sour the president’s view of Zelenskyy.

But whether any bonhomie will last is unclear.

“Critical mineral resource access is the latest arena for Trump to focus his transactional methods of diplomacy,” Baskaran and Schwartz argue. “But the viability of the deal remains to be seen as tensions continue to rise between the two world leaders.”

Trump is not known for his patience, and some U.S. officials anticipate slow-moving results from the agreement could leave Trump frustrated.

Or, if the two clash during their high-stakes White House meeting, the president could become embittered toward Zelenskyy again even sooner where Trump is likely to spotlight potential benefits the mineral agreement holds for the U.S. and the Ukrainian leader is likely to push for additional American security guarantees.

But the president shared only positive predictions on the eve of the meeting.

“I think we’re going to have a very good meeting,” he said. “We’re going to get along really well. Okay. We have a lot of respect. I have a lot of respect for him.”

John E. Herbst, senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center and a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, argues the very fact that the meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump is taking place is a good sign for Ukraine.

“Zelenskyy’s visit highlights how far he has come from two weeks back, when Trump spoke of seeing Putin as many as three times in the near future, or even last week, when senior Russian and US officials were meeting in Riyadh,” he said. “Yet now it is Zelenskyy, not Putin, in the Oval Office.”

The other negotiations

While much of the public focus has shifted toward negotiations over the mineral deal in recent weeks, talks ultimately aimed at ultimately ending the war in Ukraine have quietly continued on a separate track.

On Thursday, American and Russian officials met in Istanbul for more than 6 hours to discuss increasing staff at their respective embassies in Moscow and Washington — a move Secretary of State Marco Rubio previously said was essential for furthering potential areas cooperation between the countries, including resolving the war in Ukraine.

Officials from sides reported a favorable outcome from the meeting, and predict that an larger diplomatic footprint could create momentum for peace talks and a potential summit between Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

As a chorus of European leaders have tried to encourage Trump to include American security guarantees for Ukraine to enforce a truce with Russia, the president has continued to say he trusts Putin to hold up his end of a deal.

“I’ve known him for a long time now,” Trump said. “I don’t believe he’s going to violate his word. I don’t think he’ll be back. When we make a deal, I think the deal is going to hold.

But ahead of his meeting with the U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, he added a potentially important caveat.

“You know, look, it’s, trust and verify, let’s call it that,” he said.

Clifford D. May, founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, argues it’s imperative that the president is clear-eyed in his dealings with Putin.

“As President Trump attempts to negotiate a halt to Russia’s war against Ukraine, it’s not unreasonable for him to show respect for Mr. Putin (as he has been) if he believes that will make Mr. Putin more likely to agree to concessions,” he said.

“But it’s imperative that President Trump harbor no illusions about Mr. Putin – about his character, ambitions, ideology, and his abiding hatred for American greatness,” May added.

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(WASHINGTON) — Pete Marocco, the Trump administration official tasked with the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), at a private “listening session” held at the State Department earlier this month with dozens of aid groups — some on the brink of financial collapse — opened the proceedings by making one request: that everyone stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Inside the Loy Henderson Conference Room, representatives from aid organizations, industry groups, and foreign embassies — reeling from the administration’s sweeping freeze on foreign aid and the unraveling of USAID — dutifully rose to their feet.

The aid groups were there in the hope that Marocco would provide answers on the future of foreign assistance. After the Pledge, Marocco outlined the Trump administration’s foreign aid plans, defending what he called a “total zero-based review,” and arguing that some areas of foreign aid required “radical change” before taking questions from those in attendance, according to an audio recording of the private meeting obtained by ABC News.

‘Nefarious actors in the agencies’

Multiple sources who attended the Feb. 13 meeting described the mood in the room as “deeply uncomfortable,” saying that some of the attendees who were representing groups teetering on bankruptcy were left “traumatized” by the tone and the lack of specific details.

During the discussion, a representative for World Vision, a global Christian humanitarian organization, asked Marocco about the impact of the freeze, noting that aid groups like his had been forced to bankroll U.S. government-funded programs with private money while awaiting overdue payments to be unpaused.

“Will the spigot open? We’ve gotten waivers, but the PMS system isn’t operating, so we’re bankrolling U.S. government-funded programs out of private money,” said Edward Brown, the vice president of World Vision, which provides poverty alleviation, disaster relief, and child welfare in nearly 100 countries.

Marocco responded that following President Donald Trump’s executive order halting foreign aid, some transactions were still being processed, prompting his team to “seize control” of the payment system to stop them — leaving some groups without payments that, weeks later, had still had not arrived.

“As far as payment, one of the reasons that there have been problems with some of the payments is because, despite the president’s executive order, despite the secretary’s guidance, we still had nefarious actors in the agencies that were trying to push out hundreds of illegal payments,” Marocco said. “And so we were able to seize control of that, stop them, take control of some of those people, and make sure that that money was not getting out the door.”

Marocco suggested that payments for organizations with existing contracts would resume the following Tuesday.

“I feel confident we’re going to have that pretty good by Tuesday of next week,” he said. “That does not mean everybody’s going to be caught up on everything that they want. But I think that our payment system will probably be fluid at that point.”

But Tuesday came and went, and many groups say they were still on the edge of bankruptcy — prompting some to escalate their legal battle against the administration.

On Monday, several USAID officials told ABC News that the payment system Marocco said would be fully restored was now technically operational, but that funding was still moving at an extremely slow pace and that many of the programs that were granted waivers to continue operations had still not received any money.

USAID officials said the lack of funding has rendered many of the exempted programs inoperative. Some have resorted to using stockpiled resources, but because these programs have been cut off from federal support for weeks, most report that they have few funds left and don’t anticipate they will be able to function for much longer, according to the officials.

On Friday, after a federal judge cleared the way for the administration to proceed with its plan to pull thousands of USAID staffers off the job in the U.S. and around the world, the Trump administration moved forward with its effort to dismantle USAID, telling all but a fraction of staffers worldwide that they were on leave as of Monday.

In a court-ordered affidavit filed last Tuesday, Marocco wrote that the agency “has authorized at least 21 payments” for grants, loans, and other foreign aid executed before Trump’s inauguration “that are in total worth more than $250 million and are expected to be paid this week.”

As of Monday, it was not clear whether those payments had been made.

When reached for comment, World Vision would not confirm to ABC News if payments had resumed, but told ABC News they were “complying with the executive order that pauses U.S. foreign assistance funding — with potential waivers for emergency food and lifesaving humanitarian assistance — for the next 90 days, while programs are reviewed for alignment with the current administration’s foreign policy.”

‘What we consider to be legitimate’

In one tense moment during the listening session, a senior Democratic Senate staffer pressed Marocco on whether, once the payments resumed, they would include reimbursements for work incurred before the Jan. 24 freeze.

“When payments resume, will they include work incurred before Jan. 24 in the payments forthcoming on Tuesday?” asked the staffer, who, when reached for comment by ABC News, asked not to be named our of fear of retribution.

Marocco would not guarantee that government-contracted work that occurred before the freeze would be reimbursed, stating that the Trump administration would only cover “legitimate expenses” — and noting that the administration’s definition of a legitimate expense may differ from the groups in the room.

“We will be looking at those,” Marocco said. “What we consider to be legitimate may not be the same thing that other people consider to be legitimate, but we’re going to.”

The staffer attempted to follow up, arguing that if the work had been incurred before the freeze, “it was legitimate at the time, right?”

“We’ve moved on to the next person,” Marocco responded.

In his affidavit filed on Tuesday, Marocco conveyed the scope and status of the government’s aid freeze. He wrote that, since Trump signed the executive order for a 90-day freeze, USAID had terminated nearly 500 grants and contracts. He said the agency “has not quantified” the total cost of those programs.

As of Tuesday, the State Department had terminated more than 750 foreign assistance-funded grants and contracts of its own and had suspended nearly 7,000 more, Marocco wrote.

A ‘cycle of dependency’

Marocco used the meeting with the organizations to paint a dire picture of U.S. foreign aid, claiming it had “devolved into a fiscal cycle of dependency, of presumption, arrogance, and frankly, folly, that is just astonishing.” He dismissed past reform efforts as ineffective, arguing that officials had merely “nibbled around the edges” rather than addressing what he saw as systemic failures.

He insisted the review was necessary to force difficult conversations about “what these programs are actually doing” and whether they should continue at all. And he framed the overhaul as part of President Trump’s broader effort to reshape Washington’s approach to foreign assistance.

“The American people deserve better. They require better. And President Trump has promised better,” he said, criticizing aid decisions made “behind closed doors in Congress, in small groups in Washington, D.C.”

Marocco told those gathered that the administration’s review extended beyond USAID and would encompass a range of federal agencies, including NASA, the Patent and Trademark Office, the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), and the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM).

“If there is a tax dollar that is going out to a foreigner, we need to gain control of that and understand what it is we’re trying to achieve with our partners,” he said. “We want to identify all of that. We want to fix it. That’s the goal.”

Marocco made clear that the new foreign aid structure would be tied to Trump’s political priorities.

“With the Secretary of State, you will be in line,” Marocco said. “The foreign assistance review, you will follow the president’s foreign policy objectives. Or you will not be spending money abroad.”

He told the aid groups in the room they needed to justify their programs.

“You need to think about convincing someone — perhaps one of the women who is in my mother’s Bible study,” he said. “You need to think about somebody who’s working at a McDonald’s in Mississippi. You need to think about a grad student in Harlem.”

The Trump administration has received widespread condemnation from Democrats in Congress over its effort to slash foreign aid programs. “What Trump and Musk have done is not only wrong, it’s illegal,” Rep. Don Beyer of Virginia said earlier this month during a news conference outside USAID headquarters. “USAID was established by an act of Congress, and it can only be disbanded by an act of Congress. Stopping this will require action by the courts and for Republicans to show up and show courage and stand up for our country.”

‘Catastrophic’ harm

The Feb. 13 meeting came as the legal battle over the aid freeze was escalating. Last week, a coalition of aid groups asked a federal judge to intervene, arguing that the freeze violated existing funding agreements and had caused “catastrophic” harm to their humanitarian missions. U.S. District Judge Amir Ali issued a temporary restraining order halting the freeze, but aid organizations said their funding remained locked, leaving them scrambling to keep operations afloat.

Late Tuesday, Trump administration attorneys filed court papers arguing that their interpretation of the judge’s order allows the freeze to largely remain in place. The aid groups fired back Wednesday, urging the court to enforce the ruling.

“The court should not brook such brazen defiance of the express terms of its order,” they wrote in the filing.

Judge Ali, a Biden-era appointee, wrote Thursday that while Trump administration officials had “not complied” with his order, he would not hold them in contempt of court.

But he warned those officials not to buck what he characterized as his “clear” directive to lift their “blanket freeze” on aid disbursements.

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