Trump hopes Hegseth will be ‘great’ defense secretary despite Signal flap
ABC News
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump expressed confidence in Pete Hegseth on Tuesday in an exclusive interview with ABC News, saying he hopes the former Fox News host will be a “great” defense secretary amid a bevy of press reports calling his leadership into question.
The interview airs on ABC at 8 p.m. ET, 7 p.m. CT. It can also be streamed later Tuesday on ABC News Live, Disney+ and Hulu.
“I had a talk with him, and whatever I said I probably wouldn’t be inclined to tell you,” Trump told ABC News anchor and Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran. “But — we had a good talk. He’s a talented guy. He’s young. He’s smart, highly educated. And I think he’s gonna be a very good defense — hopefully a great defense secretary.”
Trump’s vote of confidence in Hegseth comes amid scrutiny over Hegseth’s use of the Signal app to communicate sensitive military plans to members of the administration and, in at least one case, his wife, who does not hold a security clearance.
Asked by Moran whether Trump has “a hundred percent confidence” in Hegseth, Trump fired back.
“I don’t have — a hundred percent confidence in anything, OK? Anything,” Trump said. “Do I have a hundred percent? It’s a stupid question.”
“It’s a pretty important position,” Moran said.
“No, no, no,” Trump said. “You don’t have a hundred percent. Only a liar would say, ‘I have a hundred percent confidence.'”
(WASHINGTON) — The nonprofit corporation that oversees National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service is firing back at President Donald Trump’s executive order to pull funding for the two popular media outlets.
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting pointed out that Congress controls its funding, not the president.
“CPB is not a federal executive agency subject to the President’s authority,” Patricia Harrison, president and CEO of the CPB, said in a statement Friday. “Congress directly authorized and funded CPB to be a private nonprofit corporation wholly independent of the federal government.”
She continued, “In creating CPB, Congress expressly forbade ‘any department, agency, officer, or employee of the United States to exercise any direction, supervision, or control over educational television or radio broadcasting, or over [CPB] or any of its grantees or contractors.'”
On his way to Florida aboard Air Force One on Thursday, Trump signed an executive order instructing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to “cease direct funding to NPR and PBS.”
The order blocks federal funding to NPR and PBS to the maximum extent allowed by law, according to a fact sheet from the White House. It also prevents indirect funding to PBS and NPR by prohibiting local public radio and television stations, and any other recipients of CPB funds, from using taxpayer dollars to support the organizations.
The order mandates that the CPB revise its 2025 General Provisions to explicitly prohibit direct or indirect funding to NPR and PBS. It directs all federal agencies to terminate any direct or indirect funding to NPR and PBS and to review existing grants and contracts for compliance. Additionally, it instructs the Federal Communications Commission and relevant agencies to investigate whether NPR and PBS have engaged in unlawful discrimination.
In the fact sheet, the White House claims the two news organizations “have fueled partisanship and left-wing propaganda with taxpayer dollars.”
“I hear, respect and understand your concerns regarding bias and whether public media is relevant in a commercial landscape,” NPR President and CEO Katherine Maher said at the hearing. “It is critical for NPR’s newsroom to operate with the highest journalistic standards. That means they do their jobs independently, and as CEO I have no editorial role at NPR.”
Minutes later, PBS President and CEO Paula Kerger added: “PBS stations are focused on the needs and interests of the viewers they serve. Especially in rural areas, PBS stations are the only outlets providing coverage for local events, for example high school sports, local history and culture content, candidate debates at every level of the election ballot and specialized agricultural news.”
NPR and PBS are primarily funded through a combination of public and private sources. The CPB, a federal agency, provides a portion of the funding, along with private donations from individuals, foundations and corporations. The CPB oversees dozens of media organizations in addition to NPR and PBS, including everything from American Public Media to Native Public Media and Public Media in Mid-America.
Those in the Senate and House quickly responded along party lines.
“The fact that taxpayers are forced to subsidize far-left propaganda outlets like NPR is an outrage,” Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., wrote on X. “I commend President Trump for his common-sense order ending taxpayer funding for liberal media outlets.
“President Trump is once again walking us towards authoritarianism, by eliminating funds for PBS and NPR, claiming it will stop ‘biased and partisan news coverage,'” Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., wrote on X. “NPR and PBS is how 160 million Americans find their fact-based, impartial news each month.”
“These organizations were created under an act of Congress, and therefore cannot be eliminated in an executive order,” he continued. “We need these programs and must challenge this ruling in the courts.”
ABC News’ Max Zahn and Lalee Ibssa contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — The State Department has moved to squeeze lifesaving foreign aid dramatically for countries around the world, according to several U.S. officials familiar with the matter.
The latest cuts include the termination of all remaining U.S. Agency for International Development contracts supporting the delivery of food, water and medicine to populations in Afghanistan and Yemen, the cancellation of the largest World Food Programme (WFP) contract for Somalia, and the termination of several awards that funded the delivery of critical assistance in Syria and Lebanon, three officials told ABC News.
Jordan, Haiti, Gaza, Niger, Palau and Papua New Guinea, as well as several other countries and major aid groups, also saw significant lifesaving aid contracts terminated in recent days, they added.
The latest round of cuts to aid totals over $1.3 billion, according to OneAID, a grassroots advocacy group made up of former and current USAID experts and partners.
It also marks an apparent reversal for the State Department, which previously granted exemptions for the funding to continue after the Trump administration’s sweeping reduction in U.S. foreign aid prompted widespread backlash.
The WFP confirmed on Monday that the U.S. government had informed the organization that funding for emergency food assistance in 14 countries had been terminated.
“If implemented, this could amount to a death sentence for millions of people facing extreme hunger and starvation,” the WFP said in a statement. “We are in contact with the US administration to seek clarification and to urge for continued support for these life-saving programmes.”
ABC News reached out to the State Department for comment on the cuts but did not receive a response.
It’s unclear what motivated the latest round of funding cancellations, but one official said they were ordered by Jeremy Lewin, the USAID deputy administrator for policy who previously worked with Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency to dismantle the agency.
The official also said many of the programs hit by the latest cuts were recently granted hiring privileges or had spending modifications to their contracts approved by Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
These special permissions were viewed as an indication that State Department leadership viewed the work as essential for fulfilling its mission of delivering “core life-saving medicine, medical services, food, shelter, and subsistence assistance” amid the Trump administration’s review of all foreign aid spending.
Shortly after returning to the White House in January, President Donald Trump ordered all a freeze on all foreign assistance for 90 days, leading to a flurry of stop-work orders and hiring freezes affecting a broad range of humanitarian aid work.
Since then, the Trump administration has moved to cancel some $60 billion worth of foreign aid grants and contracts, but senior officials like Rubio have promised that the most essential assistance would continue.
“This is not about getting rid of aid. This is about restructuring how we’re going to do aid,” Rubio said last month.
(WASHINGTON) — Democrats on Wednesday vowed to fight President Donald Trump’s tariffs “tooth and nail” and criticized his policies as having started an “absurd, crazy, chaotic trade war.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer held a news conference just hours before Trump’s big tariff reveal, where he urged Republicans to join Senate Democrats on a measure to block tariffs on Canadian goods.
“They know they’re a tax hike on the American people,” he said. “They know that the stock market is in turmoil, risking people’s retirements. They know that consumer confidence is down and the odds of a recession — something people hate, it’s harder to find a job, keep a job, maintain your weekly budget if a recession occurs — and now our greatest financial prognosticators are saying the chances of recession because of these tariffs, this tariff tax, goes way up.
“So, we’re going to fight these tariffs tooth and nail. Trump’s done a lot of bad things. This is way up there,” Schumer said.
Sen. Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat who introduced the resolution to block Trump’s tariffs on Canada, said he expected a vote to occur between 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. ET.
Unlike most legislation in the Senate, the resolution will only need a simple majority to pass. Just a handful of Republicans would need to side with Democrats to hit that vote threshold.
President Trump, in an early morning post on his social media platform, pressured Republicans to oppose the measure — going so far as to call out some specific members of his party by name.
“Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, and Rand Paul, also of Kentucky, will hopefully get on the Republican bandwagon, for a change,” he wrote on his social media platform.
The president added the bill “is just a ploy of the Dems to show and expose the weakness of certain Republicans, namely these four, in that it is not going anywhere because the House will never approve it and I, as your President, will never sign it.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries also preemptively slammed Trump’s tariffs, saying they will make goods more costly.
“This is not Liberation Day. It’s Recession Day in the United States of America,” Jeffries said. “That’s what the Trump tariffs are going to do.”
Top House Republicans, meanwhile, expressed confidence in President Trump ahead of this Rose Garden unveiling. Though they admitted their may be some “short-term pain” as a result.
“I trust the president’s instincts,” Speaker Mike Johnson said when asked by ABC News if he’s concerned. “We are fully supportive of his initiatives, and we’ll see how it all shakes out.”
“The president talked in the State of the Union that that may be some short-term pain, ultimately, long term we’re going to get more things made in America, and we’re going to get fair treatment of America by other countries,” said Majority Leader Steve Scalise.
ABC News’ Lauren Peller contributed to this report.
