March 11, 2025: Donald Trump presidency news | CNN Politics (2025)

Liz Oyer, the former head of the Justice Department’s pardon office, told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Tuesday that she was fired after she resisted adding actor Mel Gibson to a list of individuals she recommended have their gun rights restored.

Oyer said that after she wrote a memo last week to Attorney General Pam Bondi in which she recommended nine people have their rights restored, she was asked by one of the associate deputy attorney generals to add Gibson — who had his gun taken away after a misdemeanor domestic battery conviction.

The day after refusing to do so, she was terminated. While Oyer said she “was not given any reason for my termination … within hours of my decision not to do that, I was escorted out of my office by DOJ security officers.”

The New York Times first reported that Oyer was fired after opposing the restoration of Gibson’s gun rights.

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, who signed Oyer’s termination letter, denied Oyer’s allegations.

“Her decision to voice this erroneous accusation about her dismissal is in direct violation of her ethical duties as an attorney,” Blanche said.

In response to Blanche’s statement, Oyer told CNN: “It’s terrifying that the No. 2 official in the Department of Justice believes that my ethical duty is to keep silent about what is going on inside the Department of Justice.”

In additional comments to CNN, Oyer warned that “dissent within the Department of Justice is just being aggressively silenced.”

An American flag waves outside the US Department of Justice building in Washington, DC, on December 15, 2020.

See Also

19 Actors Who Are Republican - Factual Facts - Facts about the world we live inThe Truth About Mel Gibson And Donald Trump - Nicki Swift

As federal prosecutors and agents adapt to the Trump administration’s new key priorities of fighting violent crime and cracking down on unlawful immigration, the US attorney general has instructed Justice Department employees to adhere to another administration priority: banning paper straws in department facilities.

In a message to the Justice Department workforce Tuesday obtained by CNN, Attorney General Pam Bondi said the department must comply with President Donald Trump’s recent executive order banning the purchase of paper straws for federal buildings, which Bondi described as “nonfunctional, more expensive, and potentially hazardous” compared to plastic.

CNN has reached out to the Justice Department for comment.

In signing the executive order last month, Trump said: “We’re going back to plastic straws. (Paper straws) don’t work. They break. They explode if something’s hot. They don’t last very long, like a matter of minutes, sometimes a matter of seconds. It’s a ridiculous situation.”

Mark Kelly during an interview with CNN.

Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly tonight shrugged off billionaire Elon Musk calling him a traitor, telling CNN’s Kaitlan Collins that “it says more about him than it does about me.”

“I think it says a lot about him. It says much more about him than it does about me,” Kelly said. “But what really concerns me is the veterans that he is firing without cause from the government. These are public servants.”

Musk called Kelly, a former naval pilot and astronaut, “a traitor” Monday in response to a post the Democratic lawmaker made on X announcing his return from a third trip to Ukraine, more than three years into its war with Russia.

When asked if he was surprised that more of his GOP colleagues haven’t defended him, Kelly said “there are a number of them that came up to me to talk to me about this. And yeah, of course they’re not happy with it.”

Kelly also described the impact of the Trump administration’s brief pause on intelligence sharing with Kyiv, recalling meeting with Ukrainian F-16 pilots who said they didn’t have the overhead imagery they needed to plan attacks.

“They didn’t have the entire picture of certain things that are very important when you’re planning a strike that was taken away from them,” Kelly said. “So those things have an impact. We don’t know for sure if additional Ukrainians died because of this, but it is possible.”

Federal agencies made an estimated $162 billion in improper payments in fiscal year 2024, a decrease of about $74 billion from the prior fiscal year, according to a Government Accountability Office report released today. The vast majority of errors were overpayments.

The reduction in improper payments stems largely from the winding down of some Covid-19 pandemic relief programs, several of which were vulnerable to fraud.

The payments are being scrutinized by Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Musk has claimed that federal government payments are rife with fraud and waste — including in Social Security.

However, the agencies’ estimates do not cover all the improper payments made by the government, the GAO notes. Certain agencies have determined that some of their programs are susceptible to “significant improper payments” but don’t estimate the amount. This includes the Department of Health and Human Services’ Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, known as TANF. Plus, some agencies’ inspectors general say certain of the estimates are unreliable.

Improper payments in Medicare accounted for an estimated $54.3 billion, or 34% of the total, while payment errors in Medicaid totaled an estimated $31.1 billion, or 19%, GAO said.

There were an estimated $6 billion in improper payments in Social Security’s Supplemental Security Income program, which provides benefits to low-income senior citizens and people with disabilities, according to GAO. Improper payments in Social Security’s program for retirees, survivors and people with disabilities came to an estimated $4 billion.

While most improper payments are overpayments, they can also be underpayments, unknown payments or payments that were correct but didn’t follow all applicable laws or regulations.

Linda McMahon speaks at the Republican National Convention (RNC), in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on July 18, 2024.

Education Secretary Linda McMahon said today that cutting nearly 50% of the agency’s workforce is the first course of action in shutting down the department, which President Donald Trump has vowed to do.

While McMahon recognized that many have lost their jobs, she asserted that the department kept the right people to ensure that no programs “fall through the cracks,” such as the grants and the appropriations from Congress.

McMahon addressed the agency’s offices being closed for security reasons, which CNN has reported is due to the layoffs. The secretary called the move “standard corporate practice.”

“We didn’t want part of the people who were being permanently let go and those who are remaining to all show — some of them to show up work tomorrow morning,” McMahon said. “We just locked the doors and said for those that are coming back will know that they’ll be coming back Thursday morning.”

McMahon added the agency will arrange a time for those affected to get their belongings from the office.

McMahon also defended Trump from criticism who she said has “directed to me clearly is to shut down the Department of Education.”

The Justice Department told a federal judge today that the acting head of the Office of Personnel Management won’t testify at a hearing later this week in a case challenging the government’s efforts to cull the federal workforce.

DOJ attorneys said that in order to avoid having acting OPM director Charles Ezell testify at the hearing on Thursday in San Francisco, they are withdrawing a declaration he submitted last month that had served as their only evidence in the case.

The declaration from Ezell said that OPM did not “direct” other agencies to terminate probationary employees — the central issue in the case brought by labor unions and others. But the judge said repeatedly that in order for the declaration to remain in the record, attorneys for the plaintiffs would need to have the opportunity to cross-examine him.

The department’s decision comes a day after US District Judge William Alsup rebuffed a request from the government to cancel the hearing – which he previously said he would not do – and quash the subpoenas issued to Ezell and a slew of other officials for either depositions or courtroom testimony this week.

A federal judge has declined to order the Trump administration to temporarily reinstate the president of a small federal agency that sends money to help communities in Africa.

US District Judge Richard Leon rejected a request from Ward Brehm that would have allowed him to stay on as president of the US African Development Foundation while the judge considers his legal challenge to his firing by the White House.

But Leon, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, seemed open to eventually agreeing with Brehm’s argument that the White House had unlawfully appointed Peter Marocco as the acting chair of USADF’s board.

Leon explained in a 10-page order that Brehm had not met the standard needed to obtain a temporary restraining order, particularly because he “has not identified any cognizable irreparable harm to himself as opposed to the potential harm to the agency and its partners.”

Leon’s decision came after a hearing today during which the judge expressed some concern about Trump’s efforts to dismantle the development agency. At one point, Leon said he shares concerns raised by Brehm and his attorneys that the Trump administration, with the assistance of Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency, was moving so quickly to slim down the agency that it would not exist after his lawsuit is resolved.

In an effort to assuage those concerns, the judge said in his order that during the next phase of the litigation, the administration “must be prepared to provide testimony” from three members of the DOGE team “as to what steps were taken to maintain USADF to ‘the minimum presence and function required by law.’”

CNN’s Katelyn Polantz contributed to the report.

The Kremlin's towers are seen in Moscow, Russia, on February 13.

With Ukraine signed up to US proposals for a 30-day ceasefire, the pressure is now on the Kremlin to decide whether it too will accept President Donald Trump’s proposals to bring the Ukraine war to a halt, albeit a temporary one.

Russian officials are hinting at contacts with US representatives “in the next few days” but have not said whether the terms of the ceasefire, as set out at the US-Ukrainian talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, would be acceptable.

For Moscow, this is a moment of truth and one that may require awkward compromises if it is serious about peace.

The Kremlin has long claimed to be open to negotiations to end the conflict, while insisting it must achieve it’s ambitious war aims, such as securing control over all annexed areas of Ukraine.

Only last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin vowed to a group of tearful widows and mothers of killed Russian soldiers that Moscow would never “give in.”

Pro-war Russian hardliners, at times encouraged by the Kremlin, may see a ceasefire as a betrayal.

But a climbdown of some sort may be inevitable.

Even if Russian negotiators can impose their own conditions on the ceasefire — a Ukrainian withdrawal from Kursk, for example, the small pocket of Russia captured by Ukraine, where fighting is now raging — it is hard to imagine its greater territorial demands, yet alone the goal of removing NATO from its western flank, would be met.

This may also become a decisive crossroads in Putin’s oddly warm relationship with Trump who, in exchange for recent concessions and praise, may now expect the Kremlin leader to play ball.

Indeed, “the ball is now in their court,” is precisely what the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said of the Russians after his talks with Ukrainian officials concluded in Jeddah.

Just days ago, Trump claimed the Russians had “all the cards.” Now, intentionally or not, he may have called Putin’s bluff.

The US-Ukraine minerals deal will be signed when US “partners deem it convenient,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff said today.

“Everything is ready” on the Ukrainian side for the minerals deal to proceed, Andriy Yermak said after Ukraine said it had agreed to a US proposal for a 30-day ceasefire.

Yermak added that the draft document was for “a framework agreement” and that work “on a more detailed document” would follow.

As for the 30-day ceasefire proposal, Yermak said that Ukraine was “really satisfied” with the outcome of the US-Ukraine talks in Saudi Arabia and now expects a clear statement from Russia.

“Russia needs to say very clearly: they want peace or not, they want to end this war, which they started, or not,” he said.

It’s now up to the Senate to pass a funding bill before the Friday night deadline after the House succeeded in passing a spending measure on Tuesday.

The House plan, which looks to fund the government into the fall, had to overcome far-right opposition in the party. The Senate will have to decide whether to back the measure — or trigger a spending showdown with President Donald Trump and risk a potential shutdown.

Here’s what lawmakers are saying:

Republicans:

Democrats:

The aftermath of a large scale Russian attack on a residential complex in Dobropillia, Ukraine, on Monday.

The arguments are well rehearsed, and now must meet reality.

A 30-day ceasefire is, unhesitatingly, good news, at first. But a truce is the most complex, and damaged idea of this decade-long conflict. And how it endures will define Ukraine’s support, sovereignty and survival.

After likely hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian and Russian dead, it will be hard for any side to refuse the concept of a truce. Moscow will be under pressure to show it is not the obstacle to US President Donald Trump’s goal of peace at almost any cost.

This is a surreal place for the Kremlin to occupy, after three years of savage aggression and little public desire to end the war outside of the US-Russia diplomacy of the past two months. To maintain the illusion he is Trump’s partner in this, Russian President Vladimir Putin will likely accept some form of peace. It may not be an immediate ceasefire, and he may, as Russia has before, choose to delay its start to pursue military goals first, particularly in the Kursk region, where Ukraine is close to being kicked out of the sliver of Russia it’s held since August.

But then reality will greet the theory of telephone diplomacy. The first argument to be tested is the Kremlin cannot be trusted to engage in meaningful diplomacy as its history shows it rarely does. The second argument is Kyiv retains maximalist ambitions to regain its territory, and is refusing the freezing of the front lines, as this would mean the likely permanent loss of a fifth of its land, and because Ukraine will likely not re-equip with the same vigor as Moscow and be at a disadvantage when Russia attacks again. These ideas too will be challenged.

Read more.

The US Education Department announced that it is cutting nearly 50% of its workforce, according to senior agency officials, as President Donald Trump has proposed eliminated the agency altogether.

Hundreds will be laid off starting this evening in addition to those who took voluntary “buyouts.” The department employs around 4,400 workers.

The layoffs will take effect in 90 days. Those fired will begin teleworking starting Wednesday and go on paid administrative leave starting March 21, according to the officials, who added that the employees will receive severance pay.

The cuts are in addition to the 63 probationary employees who were fired as part of a White House directive last month, the officials added. More than 300 employees also took an up to $25,000 voluntary separation incentives.

Some background: Trump has been mulling over an executive order to eliminate the department altogether, which was expected to be signed last week but was never announced.

This post was updated with a statement from the education secretary.

Speaker Mike Johnson today succeeded in a high-stakes House vote to pass President Donald Trump’s plan to fund the government into the fall, overcoming far-right opposition as the GOP scrambles to avert a government shutdown Friday at midnight.

The 217 to 213 vote to approve Republicans’ stopgap bill now amplifies pressure on Senate Democrats to decide whether to back the measure — or trigger a spending showdown with Trump and risk a potential shutdown.

GOP Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky voted against the GOP funding bill and Democratic Rep. Jared Golden of Maine voted in favor.

This post has been updated with more details about the vote.

Below you can see how each lawmaker voted.

Staff at the US Agency for International Development were instructed to clear out the “classified safes and personnel documents” from their now-shuttered headquarters — and destroy them.

That directive is now being challenged as part of a lawsuit against the dismantling of the independent humanitarian agency, with the plaintiffs alleging that the Trump administration is “destroying documents with potential pertinence to this litigation.”

In a court filing this evening, the Trump administration said that “personnel records” had not been destroyed, and the parties proposed a briefing schedule during which the administration would explain by tomorrow afternoon at the latest “which documents were and were not destroyed.”

In an email from USAID’s acting executive secretary, essential staff were instructed to report to the DC headquarters on Tuesday for the destruction of the documents.

In an emergency motion for a temporary restraining order, the plaintiffs in the lawsuits — unions who represent USAID’s workforce — argued that “defendants have legal duties to preserve these documents under the Federal Records Act, USAID’s own Records Management Program, and the duty to preserve evidence for litigation.”

In the court filing, the Trump administration said that, for now, it “will not destroy additional documents stored in the USAID offices in the Ronald Reagan Building” without notifying the plaintiffs first.

Anna Kelly, White House deputy press secretary, responded on X to CBS reporting of the USAID news, saying it was “more fake news hysteria!”

“The USAID building will soon be occupied by CBP,” Kelly wrote, referring to US Customs and Border Protection. “This was sent to roughly three dozen employees. The documents involved were old, mostly courtesy content (content from other agencies), and the originals still exist on classified computer systems.”

The post was updated with the details from the court filing.

US President Donald Trump, accompanied by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, speaks next to a Tesla on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, DC, on Tuesday.

President Donald Trump praised Tesla CEO Elon Musk during a Business Roundtable event Tuesday night, saying that he is doing a “fantastic job” with the Department of Government Efficiency, while also alluding to other business executives – like Goya Foods CEO Robert Unanue – and how their defense of their support of the president has boosted their businesses.

“Elon has been doing really a fantastic job. He suffers a little bit because of it, people go after him. But actually, if you, I think in the end, it’ll maybe reverse itself and be just the opposite that’s happened before,” Trump said.

“They go after conservatives, and when somebody stands up and fights, it ends up their business ends up doubling. You can see that, just a little example Goya Foods. He was just a wonderful man, the owner and the family, and largely Hispanic foods, and they went after him because he supported me, and this was the end of the first term, and he fought back, and it ended up that he ended up tripling his business, and it’s today, a much bigger business than it was before,” the president said.

Earlier Tuesday at the White House, the president told reporters that he will buy a Tesla at full price to signal his support for Musk. Trump was presented with an array of vehicles after posting on Truth Social overnight that he was “going to buy a brand new Tesla tomorrow morning as a show of confidence and support for Elon Musk, a truly great American.”

CNN’s Donald Judd contributed to this report.

The White House confirmed today that 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum are still set to go into effect at midnight.

Signage is seen outside of the law firm Perkins Coie at their legal offices in Washington, DC, in May 2021.

The law firm to face the most significant blowback from the White House for its political work for the Democrats is suing — saying President Donald Trump is bullying his adversaries.

Trump signed an executive order last week suspending Perkins Coie lawyers’ security clearances and restricting their access to federal buildings, also citing the law firm’s diversity, equity and inclusion practices. The firm argues the order puts its entire business in jeopardy and is a “direct and imminent threat” to its ability to represent clients, who should be able to hire lawyers at their choosing.

The firm also says it believes the order violates the Constitution, including by discriminating against some viewpoints, undercutting the First Amendment.

The case, filed in federal court in Washington, DC, today will now be at the forefront of pushing back against Trump’s retaliatory actions toward the legal establishment.

Attorneys from different firms are losing access to classified information under Trump White House orders, though none are facing as severe restrictions as Perkins Coie, which the president has particularly criticized for its role in commissioning the Russia dossier about him during the 2016 campaign. The firm at the time was a central counsel for Hillary Clinton’s campaign and other Democrats.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he would seek to have attacks on Tesla dealerships designated as domestic terrorism, amid protests against the car company for CEO Elon Musk’s involvement in the Trump administration.

CNN previously reported that police departments across the country are investigating attacks on Tesla showrooms, charging stations and vehicles as vitriol escalates against Musk.

CNN’s Chris Isidore contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump and Tesla CEO Elon Musk speak to the press as they stand next to a Tesla Cybertruck on the South Portico of the White House on March 11 in Washington, DC.

President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House Tuesday he’ll buy a Tesla electric vehicle at full price, with a check, to signal his support for Tesla CEO Elon Musk amidst backlash for Musk’s efforts to slash the federal government.

In a remarkable scene on the White House South Lawn, Trump was presented with an array of Tesla vehicles to choose from for purchase after posting on Truth Social overnight that he was “going to buy a brand new Tesla tomorrow morning as a show of confidence and support for Elon Musk, a truly great American.”

The president’s vocal, and visual, support for Musk and Tesla comes as shares in the electric vehicle company plunged 15% on Monday, erasing the last of their post-Election Day gains.

But as Trump posed with Teslas, the company’s stock climbed on Tuesday, with the president saying that he would label any violence against Tesla dealerships as domestic terrorism. Tesla shares closed up 3.8% Tuesday, regaining some ground from Monday’s losses.

Pressed on how he planned to pay for Tuesday’s purchase, Trump said he planned to pay by check.

And he said he’d decline a discounted rate if offered.