Trump administration briefing: top immigration official removed and judge clears way for USAid firings

Trump removes Ice chief amid apparent frustration

The Trump administration has reassigned its top official at US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) after the agency’s arrests and deportations were slower than expected, Reuters reported, citing a senior administration official and two other sources familiar with the matter.

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US judge clears Trump to put more than 2,000 USAid workers on leave

A federal judge on Friday cleared the way for the Trump administration to put more than 2,000 US Agency for International Development (USAid) workers on leave, a setback for government employee unions that are suing over what they have called an effort to dismantle the foreign aid agency.

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Kellogg hails Zelenskyy in stark contrast with Trump

The US envoy to Ukraine, Gen Keith Kellogg, has praised Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “the embattled and courageous leader of a nation at war”, striking a dramatically different tone from Donald Trump, who has called Ukraine’s president a “dictator”.

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AP sues Trump officials over barred access

The Associated Press sued three officials in Donald Trump’s administration over access to presidential events, citing freedom of speech in asking a federal judge to stop the 10-day-long blocking of its journalists.

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US Senate passes budget to fund Trump’s deportations

The US Senate has passed a budget resolution that paves the way for funding Donald Trump’s mass deportation plan after his “border tsar” said there were insufficient funds for the operation. Voting concluded in the early hours of Friday morning with a 52-48 vote, almost entirely on party lines, in favor of a spending structure that includes $175bn reserved for border security and a $150bn boost to the Pentagon budget.

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Zelenskyy will sign minerals deal, Trump aide predicts

Mike Waltz, the White House national security adviser, said on Friday that the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, was expected to sign a minerals agreement with the United States imminently, as part of broader negotiations to end the war with Russia. Waltz told the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC): “Here’s the bottom line: President Zelenskyy is going to sign that deal.”

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Mass firings could cause ‘monumental’ bill

Donald Trump’s administration could rack up a “monumental” bill and is breaking the law by firing government workers on spurious grounds, according to a top labor lawyer. Officials have cited “poor performance” when terminating thousands of federal workers. In many cases, it’s not true, according to employees embroiled in the blitz, many of whom are now seeking legal advice.

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French far-right leader cancels US speech over Bannon ‘Nazi’ salute

Jordan Bardella, the French far-right leader, cancelled a speech at CPAC after Donald Trump’s former aide Steve Bannon flashed an apparent fascist-style salute there hours earlier. Bannon, who helped Trump win office in 2016, finished his speech on Thursday with an outstretched arm, fingers pointed up and palm down – a sign that echoed both the Nazi salute and a similar gesture made by the tech billionaire Elon Musk at the US president’s second inauguration in January.

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What else happened today:

• A judge said he would not immediately dismiss Eric Adams’s corruption case, but ordered the New York mayor’s trial delayed indefinitely after the justice department asked for the charges to be dismissed.

• Trump faced pushback from the Maine governor after threatening to withhold federal funds over trans athletes’ participation in female sporting events. Janet Mills told the president: “We will see you in court” as she refused to be cowed during an exchange at a White House event.

• Two polls show Americans are becoming worried that Trump is overreaching, though he still remains more popular than he was in his first term.

• The United States might actually be serious about airstrikes on Mexican drug cartels, but experts don’t think they’d make much of a difference, the Los Angeles Times reports.