Trump administration faces new lawsuit from LGBTQ, health nonprofits
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(WASHINGTON) — Several LGBTQ rights organizations sued the Trump administration on Thursday, alleging that the president’s executive orders aimed at dismantling diversity and equity programs are unconstitutional and will cripple critical programs used by Americans.
The lawsuit, filed by civil rights groups the Legal Defense Fund and Lambda Legal on behalf of several nonprofits, is one of dozens filed against the new administration one month into office. All of the plaintiffs receive federal funding to support their work.
They challenge three executive orders signed by President Donald Trump that call for an end to government funding tied to diversity, equity and inclusion programs and what the administration calls “gender ideology.”
“The government is attempting to erase a very specific group of people. Transgender and non-binary folks in our country are being singled out as individuals who are being told that they don’t exist,” Tyler TerMeer, one of the plaintiffs and CEO of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, told ABC News in an interview Thursday. “So this moment is us going to the courts and saying, ‘We won’t be silenced.'”
In the complaint, the nonprofits claim that the executive orders are a violation of their Fifth Amendment rights under the U.S. Constitution that “[n]o person shall … be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
Among the plaintiffs is the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, which helps communities affected by HIV. The group expected to receive more than $641,000 in federal funds this budget year, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit lists as defendants the Departments of Justice, Labor, Housing and Health, along with several administration officials.
“The executive orders, in essence, require our organizations or non-governmental entities to certify that they don’t engage in DEI work or engage in what they call radical gender ideology in any of their work,” Jose Abrigo, senior attorney at Lambda Legal, told ABC News in an interview Thursday.
“So, this case particularly is really important … it prevents the government from forcing their viewpoint on essentially private nonprofits who are serving the community for good.”
The GLBT Historical Society, another plaintiff in the suit, operates a museum of LGBTQ+ history and culture in San Francisco — the first of its kind in the U.S. The organization receives at least $130,000 in federal funding and would not be able to advance public knowledge without it, it alleged in the suit.
The Legal Defense Fund and Lambda Legal also filed a lawsuit on Wednesday on behalf of the National Urban League, the National Fair Housing Alliance and the AIDS Foundation of Chicago, alleging that the administration is violating the organizations’ rights to free speech and due process and is engaging in intentional discrimination by issuing and enforcing the orders, according to Lambda Legal.
The White House did not immediately return ABC News’ request for a statement and the DOJ declined to comment on either suit.
ABC News Contributors Sabina Ghebremedhin, Anne Flaherty, Molly Nagle and Alex Mallin contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The Senate Intelligence Committee is expected to vote on former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard’s nomination for Director of National Intelligence in a closed-door session Tuesday afternoon. The vote follows Gabbard’s at-times contentious confirmation hearings on Capitol Hill on Thursday, where she was grilled over her views on government secrets leaker Edward Snowden and her refusal to label him a traitor.
Gabbard, a former Democratic Hawaii Congresswoman turned Republican, picked up three key Republican votes on Monday from Sens. Susan Collins, James Lankford and Todd Young. They had previously been critical of her past statements on Snowden and her opposition to government surveillance programs. Gabbard can only afford to lose one Republican vote on the committee.
During Thursday’s hearing, lawmakers from both parties repeatedly pressed Gabbard to disavow her past support of Snowden, a former intelligence contractor who fled the country with more than 1 million classified records. Gabbard previously described Snowden as a “brave” whistleblower who exposed civil liberties violations by the intelligence community. While in Congress, she introduced legislation stating that “Snowden’s disclosure of this program to journalists was in the public interest, and the Federal Government should drop all charges.”
While Gabbard repeatedly stated that Snowden “broke the law,” she did not back away from her previous statements and refused to call him a “traitor” despite being asked several times by senators from both parties.
In an op-ed in Newsweek over the weekend, Gabbard wrote that she explained in the closed session in her confirmation hearing why she refused to call him that.
“Treason is a capital offense, punishable by death, yet politicians like former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former US Senator Mitt Romney have slandered me, Donald Trump Jr. and others with baseless accusations of treason. It is essential to focus on the facts, not the label. Snowden should have raised his concerns about illegal surveillance through authorized channels, such as the Inspector General or the Intelligence Committee, instead of leaking to the media.”
Gabbard also presented a four-point plan to prevent future Snowden-like leaks, which includes oversight to ensure there are no illegal intelligence collection programs, minimizing access to sensitive intelligence, informing government workers about legal options for whistleblowers, and creating a hotline for whistleblowers to contact Gabbard directly.
Several senators questioned Gabbard’s past opposition to government surveillance programs under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows the U.S. government to collect electronic communications of non-Americans outside the country without a warrant. Gabbard, who voted against the provision as a member of Congress, said changes made to the program since she left office were enough to earn her support.
Gabbard faces perhaps the most difficult route to confirmation of all of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks. She cannot afford to lose any Republican votes in the committee. Her nomination is expected to be voted on during a closed-door confirmation session on Tuesday.
A source with knowledge of the proceedings told ABC News that newly confirmed CIA Director John Ratcliffe, former NSA adviser Robert O’Brien and former Sen. Richard Burr, a former Senate Intelligence Committee chairman, have been making calls to senators on Gabbard’s behalf. Gabbard has also talked to senators since her hearing, a source said.
Over the weekend, Young faced pressure from Gabbard and Trump allies, but on Tuesday, Young, who was believed to be the final key vote needed for Gabbard’s nomination to move from the committee to the Senate floor, announced he would support her.
“I have done what the Framers envisioned for senators to do: use the consultative process to seek firm commitments, in this case commitments that will advance our national security, which is my top priority as a former Marine Corps intelligence officer,” Young posted. “Having now secured these commitments, I will support Tulsi’s nomination and look forward to working with her to protect our national security.”
In a now-deleted post on X ahead over the weekend, Elon Musk said Young was a “deep state puppet.” However, hours later, Musk deleted the post and said, “Just had an excellent conversation with @SenToddYoung. I stand corrected. Senator Young will be a great ally in restoring power to the people from the vast, unelected bureaucracy.”
Meghan McCain, a close ally of Gabbard, also voiced her support over the weekend, posting, “Any Senator who votes against @TulsiGabbard for DNI isn’t just going to have a problem with MAGA and Trump – I will make it my personal mission to help campaign and fundraise against you in your next election. And my people are probably a lot like their people,” she added.
Young, who did not endorse Trump in his presidential campaign, had a heated exchange with Gabbard during her hearing.
“Did [Snowden] betray the trust of the American people?” Young asked.
“Edward Snowden broke the law,” Gabbard responded, “and he released this information in a way that he should not have.”
ABC News’ Lucien Bruggeman and Allison Pecorin contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — As President-elect Donald Trump’s comments tanking House Speaker Mike Johnson’s short-term government funding bill sent House Republicans into a tailspin Wednesday night, Senate Republicans were left to try to make sense of the remaining pieces.
Congress must act to fund the government by midnight on Friday or risk a shutdown. With the House back at the drawing board, the clock is ticking.
The nature of government funding bills means that the Senate is usually in a wait-and-see posture until the House acts. That’s particularly true this time around, where Johnson has to wrangle his slim House majority into passing legislation that Trump will find palatable before the Senate decides whether they can accept it.
The looming funding deadline means that the Senate will in all likelihood be forced to stomach whatever Johnson manages to pass through the House unless it is so unacceptable that Senators are willing to shut the government down over it. Democrats still run the Senate for a few more days, and the 60-vote threshold in the Senate makes compromise essential.
During late votes Wednesday night, Senate Republicans weighed in on the current government funding situation with a little more than 48 hours until a shutdown.
Many say they weren’t happy with Johnson’s original proposal
Despite the challenges now facing Congress to finish up work on government funding, there are a number of Senate Republicans who concede they weren’t happy with the House proposal that Johnson put forward on Tuesday. Some are pleased that Trump got involved to encourage changes.
“This is supposed to be a CR that extends the status quo. And it’s supposed to be lean and mean,” Sen. John Kennedy, R-LA said. “Well, I mean, it may have been mean, but it wasn’t lean. And what I think we’re going to have to do to get it passed is go back to a real CR, which is just an extension of the status quo.”
Sen. Mike Rounds, R-SD, said all of the “crap” that was attached to the House CR was “very very disappointing to me.”
He signaled a willingness to support a clean CR with disaster relief.
There appears to be some eagerness to re-open discussion about a path forward, but the time is running out, and there are now a number of very thorny issues that will require a lot of negotiation with very little time.
Southern State Republicans draw the line at disaster relief
As House Republicans go back to the drawing board to try to satiate Trump’s demands, it’s clear they’ll have to balance them against all-out insistence from many Senate Republicans that billions in disaster relief remain tacked to this bill.
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, whose home state of South Carolina was deeply impacted by Hurricane Helene, said he will vote against a funding bill that doesn’t include relief for his and other affected states.
He called it a “moral imperative to get money into the system.”
“We’ve got to have the disaster relief. I can’t go home and play like it didn’t happen,” Graham said. “To anybody who thinks that disaster relief is pork, come to where I live and see what happened in my state in North Carolina and Georgia.”
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-NC, whose home state was affected by both Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton, said he’d do everything in his power to slow down the passage of any government funding bill that doesn’t include funding for relief.
“I feel very strongly. [If] we don’t get disaster in the bill I’ll do everything to keep us there until we do,” Tillis said.
Tillis said he spoke with VP-Elect Vance Wednesday and said Vance “gets” the importance of disaster aid.
“JD gets it. I spoke with him this afternoon. He understands the need to get disaster follow-up in there,” Tillis said. “Most people, at least JD and others, believe that we have to do the disaster supplement.”
Republicans open to debt limit hike, but skeptical about accomplishing it on this timeline
Trump complicated government funding matters significantly with an eleventh-hour push to include a hike to the federal debt limit in this package. It has left some Republicans unclear on a path forward.
“I don’t think he’s wrong,” Sen. John Kennedy, R-LA, said when asked if Trump’s debt limit proposal was helpful. “But it complicates the matter.”
That’s an understatement.
Debt limit negotiations have in prior years taken months upon months to carefully weave together. A number of Senate Republicans conceded tonight that while they’d support raising the debt limit in this bill, getting to yes on it in the tiny window of time left will be a real challenge.
“I don’t know how we do that,” Sen. Mike Rounds, R-SD, said. “I mean, I’m open to ideas on it but I don’t know how we do that.”
Graham said he’d leave decisions about the debt limit to Trump but conceded that Democratic buy-in would be necessary to do it.
“I don’t know how this plays into things. I do know this, we don’t want to default. There are a lot of Republicans who will never vote to raise the debt ceiling for ideological reasons,” Graham said.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-TX, acknowledged that getting all Republicans on board a debt limit hike would be a challenge.
“I don’t know if Republicans are going to vote for that, particularly the Freedom Caucus, so I guess we’ll take it one step at a time,” Cornyn said.
Tillis also acknowledged that Democrats would have to buy into a plan to hike the debt limit. And with the deadline to do so still months off, he said he was unsure what would inspire Democrats to participate in eleventh-hour negotiations on the issue.
“I just think there’s got to be something more to it than a demand that it get in, because again there’s no burning platform,” Tillis said.
Calls with Trump
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-MO, said he spoke to Trump just before he issued his original statement today that discouraged Republicans from supporting the short-term government bill put forward by Johnson.
Hawley said that Trump thought Speaker Johnson’s CR was a “total disaster.”
Hawley criticized Johnson for what he said was “clearly” not reading Trump into the negotiation process of the bill.
“I made this point to him, to the president that is, about the House Leadership. I mean, is this going to be the norm? Is this how we’re going to operate? They’re going — is this going to be the standard that we are setting?”
ABC News asked Hawley if Trump expressed frustration with Johnson specifically, and Hawley said “yes.”
But that was refuted by Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-OK.
“I have spoken to the president several times today. I would not classify, I would not classify it as being frustrated with the Speaker,” Mullin said.
Mullin said that it was articulated to Johnson for “awhile” that Trump wanted a debt limit hike.
“He does want the debt limit included in whatever package they put forth, but he’s as far as being upset, I absolutely do not agree with that.
The Musk factor
Senators seemed to downplay the significance of Elon Musk’s influence on the current situation. Musk took to his social media platform X to repeatedly slam the Johnson-backed bill on Wednesday.
“I think there are people putting too much weight on Musk or anybody else opining. I think there were structural challenges to begin with,” Tillis said. “These outside influences have an impact, but I think that that came from within not from without. I’ve seen some of the reports about how Elon basically vetoed it. I’m sure his voice weighed in, but it had, it clearly had a structural problem before anybody opined on it.”
Hawley, when asked about Musk’s weighing in, seemed to push concerns aside.
“As somebody who doesn’t like the CR, I welcome the criticism,” Hawley said.
(WASHINGTON) — Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine on Friday announced his lieutenant governor, Jon Husted, will replace Vice President-elect JD Vance in the U.S. Senate.
Husted, 57, will serve until a special election in November 2026, the winner of which will complete the remainder of Vance’s term.
Vance and President-elect Donald Trump will be sworn into office on Monday.
DeWine said at a news conference that when he mulled over his appointment, he wanted “someone who knew Ohio” and a proven “workhorse.”
“Serious times demand serious people,” he said.
DeWine praised Husted’s track record on economic development, which includes a commitment from Intel to invest more than $20 billion in manufacturing plants in the state.
“In my mind, my mission has always been clear: to ensure Ohioans have access to good jobs, quality job training and the opportunity to achieve their vision,” Husted said as he accepted the appointment on Friday.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
