Trump’s inauguration moving indoors due to weather
(WASHINGTON) — President-elect Donald Trump said his inauguration will move indoors Monday and he’ll be sworn in inside the Capitol Rotunda due to the freezing weather expected in Washington, D.C.
“The various Dignitaries and Guests will be brought into the Capitol,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “This will be a very beautiful experience for all, and especially for the large TV audience!”
“We will open Capital One Arena on Monday for LIVE viewing of this Historic event, and to host the Presidential Parade,” Trump said. “I will join the crowd at Capital One, after my Swearing In.”
This inauguration is forecast to be the coldest in 40 years.
A quick-moving storm could bring some snow to D.C. on Sunday afternoon.
When Trump is sworn in at noon on Monday, the temperature will be about 18 or 19 degrees. Due to the wind, the wind chill — what temperature it feels like — will be between 5 and 10 degrees.
President Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration in 1985 was also moved inside due to the weather.
The temperature that morning fell to a low of 4 degrees below zero. The temperature was just 7 degrees at noon, marking the coldest January Inauguration Day on record. Reagan’s parade was also canceled.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — A federal judge temporarily paused the Trump administration’s “illegal” reductions in force and reinstated approximately 20,000 probationary government employees across 18 agencies who had been terminated.
U.S. District Judge James Bredar — an Obama appointee — concluded that the Trump administration failed to provide the legally required advanced notice before it tried to conduct “massive layoffs.” The judge also prohibited the Trump administration from conducting future mass firings without giving notice.
“When the federal government terminates large numbers of its employees, including those still on probation because they were recently hired or promoted, it must follow certain rules,” Bredar wrote.
The ruling applies to 18 of the federal agencies named as defendants in the case except for the Defense Department, the National Archives and the Office of Personnel Management.
The decision came in a case brought by 20 Democratic attorneys general who sued last week to block the firings and is separate from a California judge’s decision also dealing with probationary employees that was issued earlier Thursday.
Similar to the reasoning of the judge in the California case, Bredar wrote that he believes the government lied when it listed “performance” or other individualized reasons as justification for the layoffs.
“On the record before the Court, this isn’t true. There were no individualized assessments of employees. They were all just fired. Collectively,” he wrote. “It is simply not conceivable that the Government could have conducted individualized assessments of the relevant employees in the relevant timeframe.”
Bredar concluded that the states that sued are suffering irreparable harm by having to assist thousands of unemployed workers who were fired illegally.
“Lacking the notice to which they were entitled, the States weren’t ready for the impact of so many unemployed people,” he wrote. “They are still scrambling to catch up,” he wrote.
Bredar’s order will remain in place for two weeks, and he scheduled a hearing for March 26 to consider issuing a preliminary injunction, which is a longer-term measure.
Like the California case, Bredar did not rule that the Trump administration is not able to conduct mass firings; rather, the administration just needs to provide advanced notice when it conducts a reduction in force. While the order provides a reprieve for more than 20,000 government workers, the lifeline is temporary, even if the order is extended later this month.
The judge’s order came after a hearing Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Maryland.
The Democratic attorneys general argued that the Trump administration violated federal law with the firings by failing to give a required 60-day notice for a reduction in force, opting to pursue the terminations “suddenly and without any advance notice.”
Lawyers with the Department of Justice have argued that the states lack standing because they “cannot interject themselves into the employment relationship between the United States and government workers,” and that to grant the temporary restraining order would “circumvent” the administrative process for challenging the firings.
In separate earlier lawsuits, two other federal judges had declined to immediately block firings of federal employees or to reinstate them to their positions.
(WASHINGTON) — Florida state Sen. Randy Fine, the Republican candidate in Tuesday’s special U.S. House election for the seat vacated by former Rep. Mike Waltz, said on ABC News Live on Monday that doesn’t think be breaks with President Donald Trump on policies.
“I don’t think so,” Fine told ABC News Live anchor Diane Macedo when asked if he disagrees with Trump on anything.
“I mean, look, I was the second Florida legislator to endorse [Trump] over Gov. [Ron] DeSantis [in the 2024 presidential primaries] … And so no, I mean, I believe in the America First agenda and the Donald Trump agenda. And more importantly, I think that when you have a team captain, you have to support the team,” Fine said.
Fine’s race is one of a pair of special elections for the U.S. House in Florida on Tuesday that might have an impact on the balance of power in the U.S. House of Representatives.
While the Republicans are favored to win in each district — given that both districts were ruby-red in 2024 — some have speculated that the margin between the Republicans and Democrats in each district could be tighter than anticipated, and voices within the Republican Party have raised concerns over Fine’s campaign. Fine and his allies, including President Donald Trump, have maintained he has momentum.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — The Senate on Thursday confirmed Kash Patel, President Donald Trump’s choice to be FBI director.
The final vote was 51-49.
Two Republicans, Sens. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, voted against Patel. Democrats were unanimous in their opposition.
Despite his controversial nomination, Republicans rallied around Patel, arguing he is the right person to bring reform to the nation’s top law enforcement agency they allege has been corrupted.
“Mr. Patel should be our next FBI director because the FBI has been infected by political bias and weaponized against the American people. Mr. Patel knows it, Mr. Patel exposed it, and Mr. Patel has been targeted for it,” Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said last week as the committee met to consider and advance his nomination.
Though not all GOP members backed him. Collins, explaining her decision to vote against his confirmation, said there is a need for an FBI director who is “decidedly apolitical” and Patel’s “time over the past four years has been characterized by high profile and aggressive political activity.”
Murkowski voiced similar concerns.
“My reservations with Mr. Patel stem from his own prior political activities and how they may influence his leadership,” the senator said in a post on X. “The FBI must be trusted as the federal agency that roots out crime and corruption, not focused on settling political scores. I have been disappointed that when he had the opportunity to push back on the administration’s decision to force the FBI to provide a list of agents involved in the January 6 investigations and prosecutions, he failed to do so.”
Democrats, meanwhile, objected to Patel up until the last minute. Sen. Dick Durbin, the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, held a press conference outside FBI headquarters on Thursday morning railing against Patel’s “bizarre political statements” on Jan. 6 to retribution.
He accused Republicans of “willfully ignoring red flags on Mr. Patel,” who he argued has “neither the experience, the judgment or the temperament” to be FBI chief for the next 10 years.
“Mr. Patel will be a political and national security disaster,” Durbin said.
Patel, 44, is a loyalist to the president and worked in a number of roles during Trump’s first administration, including acting deputy director of national intelligence.
Shortly after the November election, Trump indicated he would fire then-FBI Director Christopher Wray and tap Patel to take his place. Wray, first appointed by Trump in 2017, stepped down at the end of the Biden administration.
Patel has been a vocal critic of the FBI for years, and previously said he wanted to clean out the bureau’s headquarters in Washington as part of a mission to dismantle the so-called “deep state.”
He faced pointed questions from Democrats on those comments and more — including support for Jan. 6 rioters and quotes that appeared favorable to the “QAnon” conspiracy movement — during his confirmation hearings last month.
Patel sought to distance from some of his past rhetoric, and told lawmakers he would take “no retributive actions” despite his history of comments about targeting journalists and government employees.
Patel will take over an agency facing uncertainty and turmoil amid firings and other key changes.
The Justice Department’s sought a list of potentially thousands of FBI employees who worked on Jan. 6 cases, ABC News previously reported, prompting agents to file a lawsuit to block the effort.
