The Latest: Trump challenges bedrocks of American democracy

When Elon Musk debuted the Department of Government Efficiency recently at the Capitol, House Speaker Mike Johnson enthusiastically predicted the coming Trump administration would bring “a lot of change around here.”

Three weeks in, the change President Donald Trump has brought is a disruption of the federal government on an unprecedented scale, dismantling longstanding programs, sparking widespread public outcry and challenging the very role of Congress to create the nation’s laws and pay its bills.

Government workers are being pushed to resign. Entire agencies are being shuttered. Federal funding to states and nonprofits was temporarily frozen. And the most sensitive Treasury Department information of countless Americans was opened to Musk’s DOGE team in an unprecedented breach of privacy and protocol.

An opposition movement is gathering steam online, with plans to protest across the U.S. on Wednesday.

Here's the latest:

Trump wants USAID workers off the job and out of the field

The Trump administration says it’s pulling almost all U.S. Agency for International Development workers off the job and out of the field, worldwide.

The order takes effect just before midnight Friday and gives agency staff overseas 30 days to return home unless they’re deemed essential.

The notice posted online Tuesday says contractors not determined to be essential also would be fired. The move had been rumored for several days.

Thousands of USAID employees already have been laid off and programs worldwide shut down after the Republican president imposed a sweeping freeze on foreign assistance.

Senators find Trump’s comments ‘crazy,’ if they acknowledge hearing them at all

“He’s completely lost it,” said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. “He wants a U.S. invasion of Gaza, which would cost thousands of American lives and set the Middle East on fire for 20 years? It’s sick.”

“No wonder Elon Musk is in charge of the government. This guy has no connection to reality,” Murphy added.

The Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said he wasn’t ready to comment on Trump’s remarks.

“I’m not doing any hallway interviews today, none at all – especially if it’s about Gaza,” Sen. Jim Risch of Idaho said Tuesday night. “I haven’t heard it, the statement or anything else, the context.”

Sen. Chuck Schumer decries a ‘hostile takeover’. Elon Musk calls him ‘hysterical’

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., accompanied by other members of congress, speaks during a rally against Elon Musk outside the Treasury Department in Washington, Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Congress is proving little match for DOGE. Lacking the votes as Republicans largely remain silent, they’re supporting a rush of lawsuits demanding court interventions to stop the Republican president’s team from unilaterally gutting government. And protests are erupting outside government agencies and clogging the congressional phone lines.

“Whatever DOGE is doing, it is certainly not — not — what democracy looks like or has ever looked like in the grand history of this country,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said.

“An unelected shadow government is conducting a hostile takeover of the federal government,” Schumer posted on Musk’s social media site X.

Musk responded on his platform: “Hysterical reactions like this is how you know that DOGE is doing work that really matters.”

Trump’s administration is pulling almost all USAID workers off the job worldwide

The flag of the United States Agency for International Development, or USAID, flies in front of the USAID office in Washington, Monday, Feb. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

The Trump administration said that it is pulling almost all U.S. Agency for International Development workers off the job and out of the field worldwide, moving to all but end a six-decade mission to shore up American security by fighting starvation, funding education and working to end epidemics.

The administration notified USAID workers in emails and a notice posted online, the latest in a sudden dismantling of the aid agency by returning political appointees from President Donald Trump’s first term and billionaire Elon Musk’s government-efficiency teams who call much of the spending on programs overseas wasteful.

The order takes effect just before midnight Friday and gives direct hires of the agency overseas — many of whom have been frantically packing up households in expectation of the announcement — 30 days to return home unless they are deemed essential. The notice said contractors not determined to be essential also would be fired.

▶ Read more about USAID

Trump and Musk shake foundations of US democracy

When Elon Musk debuted the Department of Government Efficiency, House Speaker Mike Johnson enthusiastically predicted “a lot of change around here.”

Three weeks in, that change is a disruption of the federal government on an unprecedented scale, dismantling longstanding programs, sparking widespread public outcry and challenging the very role of Congress to create the nation’s laws and pay its bills.

Government workers are being pushed to resign. Entire agencies are being shuttered. Federal funding to states and nonprofits was temporarily frozen. And the most sensitive Treasury Department information of countless Americans was opened to Musk’s DOGE team in an unprecedented breach of privacy and protocol.

An opposition movement is gathering steam online, with plans to protest across the U.S. on Wednesday.

▶ Read more about how Trump is dismantling the U.S. government

U.S. allies reject Trump's musings on Gaza

Trump’s suggestion for the U.S. to “take over” the Gaza strip came at a White House news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Netanyahu smiled several times as the president detailed a plan to build new settlements for Palestinians outside the Gaza Strip, and for the U.S. to take “ownership” in redeveloping the war-torn territory into “the Riviera of the Middle East.”

Saudi Arabia, an important American ally, weighed in quickly on Trump’s idea in a sharply worded statement, noting that its long call for an independent Palestinian state was a “firm, steadfast and unwavering position.”

The prime ministers of Australia and Ireland, foreign ministries from China, New Zealand and Germany, and a Kremlin spokesman all reiterated support for a two-state solution.