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GOP Sen. Susan Collins slammed proposed tariffs on Canada, warning that they would be particularly harmful to Maine and dismissing the Trump administration’s argument that the levies would pressure Canada in the fight against fentanyl trafficking.
“Maine’s economy is very integrated with our Canadian neighbors, and everything from potatoes to lobster to blueberries that are produced in Maine are often processed in Canada,” Collins said.“There are so many examples I can give you of how harmful these tariffs would be, and I also think that it makes no sense,” she said.
“Canada, according to the studies I’ve seen — only 1% of the fentanyl that comes into the United States comes in through Canada. Canada is not the problem.”
Collins also said that she intends to vote for a resolution aimed at blocking the tariffs against Canadian goods, though she noted that she wants to review it before she makes a final decision. The vote is expected tomorrow.
GOP Sen. Thom Tillis also said that he is considering backing the resolution, and Republican Sen. Rand Paul has signed on as a cosponsor.
“This may be one of those rare instances when I’m interested in what Rand’s interested in,” Tillis said.
“We need to fight battles with our foes first and then try to figure out any inequalities with our friends second,” he added.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order today establishing an “Investment Accelerator” office under the Commerce Department with the purpose of driving investments above $1 billion in the United States.
Here’s what the new office would do, according to the order:
“The Investment Accelerator shall facilitate and accelerate investments above $1 billion in the United States by assisting investors as they navigate United States Government regulatory processes efficiently, reduce regulatory burdens where consistent with applicable law, increase access to and use of our national resources where appropriate and consistent with applicable law, facilitate research collaborations with our national labs, and work with State governments in all 50 States to reduce regulatory barriers to, and increase, domestic and foreign investment in the United States.”
The order also notes that the new office will be “responsible” for the CHIPs Program Office within the Commerce Department, “which shall focus on delivering the benefit of the bargain for taxpayers by negotiating much better deals than those of the previous administration.”
During his joint address to Congress, Trump called the CHIPs Act — the bipartisan bill aimed at boosting the domestic semiconductor industry and signed by President Joe Biden — a “horrible, horrible thing.”
CNN previously reported that the Trump administration is pulling certain federal CHIPs contracts based on words like “immigrant” and “diversity.”
Elon Musk visited the Central Intelligence Agency today, as planned, according to a source familiar with the meeting.
Officials declined to offer details on the meeting, but CNN had previously reported that CIA Director John Ratcliffe had told staff that Musk was visiting the intelligence agency to discuss “technology” and “advancing the mission.”
CNN has reached out to the CIA for comment.
President Donald Trump said Monday that “at a certain point,” the Department of Government Efficiency will end, given Elon Musk is only available to him as a special government employee for 130 days.
“He’s got a big company to run, and so at some point, he’s going to be going back,” Trump said of the Tesla and SpaceX CEO. “I’d keep him as long as I can keep him. He’s a very talented guy, you know, I love very smart people, and he’s very smart, and he’s done a good job.”
“At some point, Elon’s gonna want to back to his company,” Trump added.
Asked if DOGE will continue in Musk’s absence, Trump said he believes his federal agency heads have “learned a lot” about how to do the work on their own and some will want to keep DOGE employees aboard.
“You know, at a certain point, I think it will end,” Trump said. “There’ll be a point at which the secretaries will be able to do this work and do it very, you know, as we say, with the scalpel, and that’s what we want.”
Republican senators expressed an uneasiness with President Donald Trump’s planned tariff announcement this week, acknowledging the pain that the policies will likely inflict on their states.
Sen. Ron Johnson said Trump has admitted that “tariffs will create pain for some businesses,” adding that his home state, Wisconsin, “will be particularly hard hit with all the manufacturing and agricultural interests.”
“I’ll wait to see what President Trump’s going to do. He’s used tariffs in the past effectively to get nations to do what they should have done anyway. Right now, I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt but I’m concerned,” Johnson said.
Asked if Trump should pull back, Johnson said he’ll “wait to see what he does on April 2.”
Trump has promoted an April 2 “Liberation Day” announcement in the Rose Garden, when a number of massive tariffs will be announced to fulfill the administration’s ambitious economic agenda. The plan has largely remained a mystery, however, as Trump and his administration have floated a number of conflicting proposals.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama said he thinks “everybody’s concerned” about the potential impact, but he hopes Trump will communicate on Wednesday “what he’s doing and why he’s doing it, what direction we’re going to go.”
“I think it will calm the American people down. It’ll calm the economy down a little bit,” he said, adding that he doesn’t see “any other path” for the US to pay down debts than bringing back domestic manufacturing and that Trump isn’t taking a “gamble” with the strategy.
Tuberville acknowledged that there would be “slow pain” inflicted by rising prices due to reciprocal prices, but he thinks “there’s gonna be a lot of gain from it.”
A reporter asked President Donald Trump if he was comfortable with how the arrest of Tufts University Ph.D. student Rumeysa Ozturk was handled last week, to which Trump said he “hasn’t looked at it in any detail.”
“Well, I haven’t really looked at it in any detail but I will. I mean, I’ve seen it quickly but I wouldn’t want to comment on it,” Trump said.
Six plainclothes officers surrounded Ozturk as she walked alone on March 25 and arrested her, neighborhood surveillance video appears to show. She is being held at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Louisiana, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
As many as 50 senior IT professionals at the Internal Revenue Service, including some of the agency’s top cybersecurity experts, were placed on administrative leave Friday as the Trump administration finalizes controversial plans to share taxpayer data with federal immigration authorities, according to three sources familiar with the matter.
The dozens of IRS employees who were placed on leave Friday evening saw their access to the agency’s computer systems immediately cut off, according to the sources. Some of the employees tried to go into the office Monday morning but were rebuffed, one source said.
CNN reported last week that the IRS is close to reaching an unprecedented agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to share location information of suspected undocumented immigrants as the administration works to ramp up deportations. That has sparked a legal battle over the information that’s typically confidential.
The so-called “separation email” sent Friday, which was obtained by CNN, didn’t include an explanation. The email said their leave status was “effective immediately” and that “access to agency IT systems will be suspended, and you should not attempt to use them.”
Two sources with knowledge of the situation told CNN they believe the IT employees may have been targeted for pushing back on some of the sensitive taxpayer data that the Department of Government Efficiency is seeking as part of the deportation efforts. The source said some of DOGE’s requests have not been in line with the privacy and disclosure laws that impose strict rules for when IRS data can be shared.
The IRS did not comment for this story. DOGE did not respond to a request for comment.
President Donald Trump confirmed that the bodies of three of the four US soldiers who were reported missing after their vehicle was submerged in a bog in Lithuania last week have been recovered.
“Three are no longer with us and one is unfortunately probably in the same category, but they haven’t declared that yet,” Trump said today from the Oval Office.
Search and recovery operations continue to find the fourth soldier, the Army said earlier today.
The soldiers and vehicle, an M88 Hercules, have been missing since the early morning of March 25 when they were conducting a maintenance training mission, recovering another US vehicle in a Lithuania training area.
The president said that it “would seem that the bank of a lake collapsed” under the weight of the truck the soldiers were in.
“It’s a massively heavy vehicle and if they slipped a little bit they… that’s probably what happened, and it flipped,” he said.
Trump said last Wednesday that he had not been briefed about the missing soldiers.
CNN’s Haley Britzky and Natasha Bertrand contributed reporting to this post.
President Donald Trump today floated names of people who “have asked about” becoming his new pick for US ambassador to the United Nations after he pulled GOP Rep. Elise Stefanik’s nomination due to the narrow GOP majority in the House.
The president mentioned David Friedman, who was the US ambassador to Israel during the first Trump administration, and Ric Grenell, a longtime confidant already serving in multiple administration positions, including as Trump’s envoy for special missions and the interim executive director of the Kennedy Center.
“And many 30 other people,” Trump added. “We have a lot of people that are interested in going to the United Nations, as you can imagine.”
The president said he didn’t want to “take chances” on Stefanik’s open seat in northern New York. Currently, Republicans hold 218 seats to Democrats’ 213 in the House and there are four vacancies.
Trump said Stefanik will “take a big leadership position” in the House. Speaker Mike Johnson previously said that he will find a leadership role for the congresswoman, but it is not yet clear what that will be after the 10-year House veteran had forfeited her hard-fought leadership spot in order to join the administration.
CNN’s Sarah Ferris, Kevin Liptak and Betsy Klein contributed reporting to this report.
President Donald Trump said that he will likely visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates in the near future.
“It could be next month, maybe a little bit later,” Trump said in the Oval Office on Monday. “We’re going to Qatar also, and also we’re going to possibly a couple of other countries. UAE is very important.”
“Probably stop at UAE and Qatar,” Trump added. “And Saudi Arabia, the three of them, and then we’ll go other places, also, but in the Middle East those seem to be the three.”
As CNN reported earlier, the White House is considering a potential Saudi Arabia trip for Trump, but an official plan is not set in stone.
“Last time I went to Saudi Arabia, I put it first on the list because they agreed to buy $450 billion worth of American goods, military and otherwise,” Trump said. “I agreed to do it again, but — and they’ve agreed to spend close to a trillion dollars of money in our American companies, which to me, means jobs.”
President Donald Trump said Monday that “that’s a big deal” when asked to comment on French far-right leader Marine Le Pen receiving a five-year ban from running for political office after being found guilty of embezzling European Union funds.
“That’s a big deal. That’s a very big deal. I know a lot about it and a lot of people thought she wasn’t going to be convicted of anything and I don’t know if it means conviction but she was banned for running for five years and she was the leading candidate,” Trump said.
The president went on: “That sounds like this country.”
The conviction of Le Pen, who was the frontrunner for the 2027 presidential election, has shattered her hopes of winning. Her lawyer has said she will file an appeal.
President Donald Trump said he met today with the chairman of Stellantis, John Elkann, but the auto executive did not ask for a pause on sweeping auto tariffs, the president said.
Instead, Trump said the two discussed rolling back environmental standards.
“We’re going to be bringing it back to a standard that is a very good environmental standard, but it makes it possible to build,” the president said.
The 25% tariff on all cars shipped to the United States is set to take effect on April 3 at 12:01 am ET, aimed at expanding America’s auto manufacturing industry. The tariff will not just be applied to foreign-made cars but also to car parts. It is expected to raise the price of all cars, including those from America’s Big Three automakers, Ford, General Motors and Stellantis, which produces Jeep, Ram, Chrysler and Dodge.
A federal judge today temporarily blocked the Trump administration from ending deportation protections for 350,000 Venezuelan migrants in the United States.
Earlier this year, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem moved to end a form of humanitarian relief known as Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelan migrants, with more than 300,000 Venezuelans in the US set to lose those protections next week. Another 250,000 immigrants who arrived before 2023 scheduled to lose their status in September.
A central issue was whether the Department of Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem had the authority to wipe away the existing TPS designation before it was scheduled to expire.
The Biden administration first granted TPS for Venezuelans in March 2021, citing the increased instability in the country, and expanded it in 2023. Two weeks before Trump took office, the Biden administration renewed protections for an additional 18 months. Today’s ruling applies to the 2023 designation.
The challengers, Venezuelan migrants covered under TPS, contended that Noem’s abrupt reversal of the protections violated the Administrative Procedure Act, which mandates specific procedures for federal agencies when implementing policy changes. They also argued that Noem’s decision was motivated by racial and political bias.
Similar lawsuits have been filed in Maryland, New York, and Massachusetts by immigrant-rights groups.
President Donald Trump said he wants to see Russian President Vladimir Putin “make a deal” to end the war in Ukraine, again stating that he would impose secondary tariffs on Russian oil, if necessary.
“I want to see him make a deal, so that we stop Russian soldiers and Ukrainian soldiers and other people from being killed,” Trump said in the Oval Office today. “I want to make sure that he follows through, and I think he will. I don’t want to go secondary tariffs on his oil. But I think, you know, it’s something I would do if I thought he wasn’t doing the job. I did it with Venezuela.”
Over the weekend, Trump told NBC: “If Russia and I are unable to make a deal on stopping the bloodshed in Ukraine, and if I think it was Russia’s fault, which it might not be, but if I think it was Russia’s fault, I am going to put secondary tariffs on oil, on all oil coming out of Russia.”
Trump on Monday also reiterated his frustration with Ukraine and the rare earth minerals deal.
“We made a deal for rare earth. It was all done. And I heard through you,” Trump said, referring to the press. “I haven’t spoken to them yet, but through you, I heard that they now say, ‘Well, I’ll only do that deal if we get into NATO or something to that effect. Well, that was never, number one, discussed. Number two, I think it’s going to be very — long before Putin, they said you’re not going into NATO.”
“That’s probably the reason the war started, actually,” Trump said, again echoing Russian talking points about the war, which started when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
President Donald Trump said Monday that he has “not looked into” running for a third term, when asked about pursuing a possible bid despite the 22nd Amendment.
“There’s a whole story about running for a third term. I don’t know. I never looked into it. They do say there’s a way you can do it, but I don’t know about that, but I have not looked into it,” Trump said, answering questions from reporters in the Oval Office.
When asked what he thought about running against former President Barack Obama if both were allowed to run for a third term in the White House, Trump said “I’d love that.”
“That would be a good one. I’d like that,” he said, adding that people have asked him to run for a third term.
Trump previously claimed that “there are methods” to running for a third term in a phone interview with NBC News’ Kristen Welker on Sunday.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order today aimed at ending price gouging for ticket resales in the live entertainment industry, according to White House staff secretary Will Scharf.
Kid Rock, who appeared at the Republican National Convention, was present for the signing.
“Thank you for making this happen so quick,” the singer told Trump. “Anyone whose bought a concert ticket in the last decade, many 20 years, no matter what your politics are, knows this is a conundrum.”
The order directs the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to work with Attorney General Pam Bondi to ensure competition laws are enforced in the concert and entertainment industry and uphold price transparency throughout all stages of the ticket-buying process for consumers, a White House official said earlier.
The issue of price gouging took center stage during Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, when resale prices hit tens of thousands of dollars.
This post was updated with Trump signing the EO and with some of Kid Rock’s remarks.
A Latino civil rights group and other organizations sued today over an executive order targeting election procedures signed last week by President Donald Trump. It appears to be the first legal challenge to Trump’s attempt to unilaterally revamp how elections are run.
“The Order is an attack on the constitutionally mandated checks and balances that keep American elections free and fair,” the complaint said. “Through this unconstitutional action, the President intrudes on the states’ and Congress’s authority to set election rules in an attempt to make it far more difficult for eligible U.S. citizens to exercise their fundamental right to vote.”
The lawsuit, filed in DC’s federal district court, takes aim at Trump’s efforts to push to states to adopt a requirement that voters show documents proving their citizenship while registering. It also challenges his directives that would add requirements for the military members and other Americans abroad who are seeking to cast ballots.
The complaint alleges Trump’s order oversteps in its attempt to force states to end the practice of accepting mail ballots that arrive after Election Days. (Most of the 20 or so states that count such ballots require a postmark showing they were mailed by Election Day or before).
Bringing the case is the League of United Latin American Citizens, a military families groups called the Secure Families Initiative, and the Arizona Students’ Association.
“The Trump administration is standing up for free, fair, and honest elections and asking this basic question is essential to our Constitutional Republic,” White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said in a statement.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said today that Donald Trump can’t serve another term “without a change in the Constitution” and suggested the president spoke about the possibility of a third term as a way of messing with reporters.
“You guys keep asking the question, and I think he’s probably having some fun with it, probably messing with you,” he said.
Trump yesterday, in a phone interview with NBC News’ Kristen Welker, did not dismiss the idea of pursuing a third term, claiming that “there are methods” to achieving this and emphasizing that he was “not joking.”
On the budget: Separately, Thune said he hopes the Senate will pass a budget resolution blueprint this week, but he said lawmakers are still having conversations with the parliamentarian about the parameters of the bill and assessing attendance and other factors before moving forward.
“And also just making sure we get everybody in a comfortable place with it,” he said. “It’s a process.”
A US team is traveling to Myanmar, also known as Burma, in the wake of a catastrophic earthquake that killed more than 2,000 people, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said today.
A “team of humanitarian experts” from the US Agency for International Development (USAID) based in the area will travel to Myanmar “to identify the people’s most pressing needs, including emergency shelter, food, medical needs and access to water,” Bruce said at a State Department briefing.
“Our disaster experts, including those based in Bangkok, Manila and Washington, DC, continue to monitor the situation with coordination with US government counterparts in the region,” she said.
Bruce said the team would hopefully arrive by Monday evening. She also said the US had received a formal request for assistance from the junta government.
Their travel to the country comes days after the deadly earthquake struck and after countries like China have already been on the ground to support recovery efforts. Many have attributed the delay in the US team’s arrival to the Trump administration’s dismantling of USAID.
Bruce rejected the notion that the tardiness was due to the drastic cuts at USAID.
China, Japan and South Korea will respond to President Donald Trump’s looming tariffs in lockstep, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said today.
The three Asian countries held economic talks yesterday for the first time in five years, vowing to bolster fair trade and strengthen economic ties among them — just days before the United States is set to announce sweeping tariffs on all trading partners.
On Wednesday, Trump said he will unveil wide-ranging tariffs that match the ones foreign countries impose on the US, so-called reciprocal tariffs. Long-time US allies, such as South Korea, won’t be spared, Trump has said.
“South Korea’s average tariff is four times higher,” Trump said earlier this month in his joint address to Congress. “Think of that: four times higher. And we give so much help militarily and in so many other ways to South Korea, but that’s what happens.”
Meanwhile, Trump has renewed trade tensions with China, levying 20% duties on the country, on top of the tariffs he already imposed in his first term. China has responded swiftly to Trump’s tariffs, imposing 15% duties on chicken, wheat, corn and cotton imports from the US.
