Closing summary
Two days after TikTok was officially banned in the US as a supposedly grave threat to national security, Donald Trump told reporters that he might download it to his phone, after suspending the ban to allow time to arrange the sale of a controlling interest in the app’s US version to an American buyer. The president said his affection for the app was prompted by his belief that it had helped him to win a majority of young voters in the recent election, which he did not.
The Department of Homeland Security is not waiting for a new secretary to be confirmed before taking drastic action to put Trump’s promised crackdown on undocumented people into effect. The DHS acting secretary, Benjamine Huffman, fired the head of the coast guard, Commandant Linda Lee Fagan, citing her supposed mismanagement of border security and embrace of diversity and inclusion initiatives. Huffman also rescinded a rule that protected migrants sheltering in “sensitive areas”, such as churches, hospitals and schools, from being arrested by immigration officers and reinstated so-called “expedited removal” to allow US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to deport any undocumented person arrested inside the country who can’t prove they have been here continuously for more than two years.
After the Episcopal bishop of Washington, Mariann Edgar Budde, urged Trump to rethink some of his hardline policies, particularly towards immigrants and transgender people, during a morning prayer service, Trump told reporters, “I didn’t think it was a good service,” and Georgia Representative Mike Collins suggested: “The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list”.
When infrastructure week, which was seemingly promised every week of Trump’s first administration but never arrived, finally came on the first full day of his second term, it was in the form of private sector investment in an AI joint venture, revealed by Trump at the White House on Tuesday. Trump made brief remarks on the subject, before inviting the three partners in the venture, the heads of Oracle, OpenAI and Softbank, to make bold claims for its possible benefits. Trump then took questions for more than 40 minutes, during which he defended his decision to pardon violent rioters who attacked police officers on 6 January 2021 by claiming, falsely, that many people were killed during Black Lives Matter protests in 2020 and the long sentences handed out to Proud Boys and Oathkeepers for storming the Capitol were “ridiculous”.
Here’s what else happened today:
Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol on 6 January 2021, in a failed attempt to keep him in office by force, began pouring out of federal prisons, following his sweeping pardons.
At her confirmation hearing before the Senate foreign relations committee, Donald Trump’s pick for United Nations ambassador Elise Stefanik denied that Elon Musk made a fascist salute yesterday. Germans disagree.
Senators reportedly received an affidavit from the former sister-in-law of Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s controversial pick for secretary of defense, alleging that the nominee’s aggressive behavior prompted his second wife to fear for her safety.
Mexicans rolled their eyes at Trump’s decision to take a metaphorical Sharpie to the world map by renaming the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.
Updated
Trump pardons Silk Road drug marketplace creator, Ross Ulbricht
Trump announced on his social media platform that he has pardoned Ross Ulbricht, who created and ran the Silk Road drug marketplace and is considered a hero by many libertarians for his early adoption of Bitcoin as a means for facilitating black market transactions.
Ulbricht, a/k/a “Dread Pirate Roberts”, was sentenced to life in prison in Manhattan federal court in 2015, following his prosecution by Preet Bharara, then the United States Attorney for the southern district of New York.
The pardon was praised by prominent libertarians, including Representative Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, who wrote: “Thank you for keeping your word to me and others who have been advocating for Ross’ freedom, Mr. President!”
Read the full story here:
Updated
