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A FEDERAL appeals court temporarily reinstated the most sweeping of President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Thursday, a day after a US trade court ruled that Trump had exceeded his authority in imposing the duties and ordered an immediate block on them.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington said it was pausing the lower court’s ruling to consider the government’s appeal, and ordered the plaintiffs in the cases to respond by June 5 and the administration by June 9.

Wednesday’s surprise ruling by the US Court of International Trade had threatened to kill or at least delay the imposition of Trump’s so-called Liberation Day tariffs on imports from most US trading partners and additional tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico and China. The latter was related to his accusation that the three countries were facilitating the flow of fentanyl into the US.

The trade court’s three-judge panel ruled that the Constitution gave Congress, not the president, the power to levy taxes and tariffs, and that the president had exceeded his authority by invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a law intended to address threats during national emergencies.

Senior Trump administration officials had said they were undeterred by the trade court’s ruling, saying they expected either to prevail on appeal or employ other presidential powers to ensure the tariffs go into effect.

Trump has used the threat of charging US importers costly tariffs for goods from almost every other country in the world as leverage in international trade talks, a strategy the trade court’s ruling would upend. The trade court ruling had not interfered with any negotiations with top trading partners that are scheduled in the days ahead, Trump’s administration said.

Trump himself wrote in a statement shared on social media that he hoped the US Supreme Court would “reverse this horrible, Country threatening decision” of the trade court, while lambasting the judicial branch of government as anti-American.

“The horrific decision stated that I would have to get the approval of Congress for these Tariffs,” Trump wrote on Thursday evening. “If allowed to stand, this would completely destroy Presidential Power — The Presidency would never be the same! This decision is being hailed all over the World by every Country, other than the United States of America.”

Many US trading partners offered careful responses. The British government said the trade court’s ruling was a domestic matter for the US administration and noted it was “only the first stage of legal proceedings.” Both Germany and the European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, said they could not comment on the decision.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said the trade court’s finding was “consistent with Canada’s longstanding position” that Trump’s tariffs were unlawful.

Financial markets, which have whipsawed in response to the twists and turns in Trump’s chaotic trade war, reacted with cautious optimism to the trade court ruling, though gains in stocks on Thursday were largely limited by expectations that the court’s ruling faced a potentially lengthy appeals process.

Indeed, analysts said broad uncertainty remained regarding the future of Trump’s tariffs, which have cost companies more than $34 billion in lost sales and higher costs, according to a Reuters analysis.

Some sector-specific tariffs, such as on imports of steel, aluminum and automobiles, were imposed by Trump under separate authorities on national security grounds and were unaffected by the ruling.

The Liberty Justice Center, the nonprofit group representing five small businesses that sued over the tariffs, said the appeals court’s temporary stay was a procedural step.

Jeffrey Schwab, senior counsel for the center, said the appeals court would ultimately agree with the small businesses that faced irreparable harm of “the loss of critical suppliers and customers, forced and costly changes to established supply chains, and, most seriously, a direct threat to the very survival of these businesses.”

A separate federal court earlier on Thursday also found that Trump overstepped his authority in using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act for what he called reciprocal tariffs of at least 10% on goods from most US trading partners and for the separate 25% levies on goods from Canada, Mexico and China related to fentanyl.

That ruling was much narrower, however, and the relief order stopping the tariffs applied only to the toy company that brought the case. The administration has appealed that ruling as well.

UNCERTAINTY PERSISTS
Following a market revolt after his major tariff announcement on April 2, Trump paused most import duties for 90 days and said he would hammer out bilateral deals with trade partners.

But apart from a pact with Britain this month, agreements remain elusive, and the trade court’s ruling on the tariffs and the uncertainty of the appeals process may dissuade countries like Japan from rushing into deals, analysts said.

“Assuming that an appeal does not succeed in the next few days, the main win is time to prepare, and also a cap on the breadth of tariffs — which can’t exceed 15% for the time being,” said George Lagarias, chief economist at Forvis Mazars international advisers.

The trade court ruling would have lowered the overall effective US tariff rate to about 6%, but the appellate court’s emergency stay means it will remain at about 15%, according to estimates from Oxford Research. That is the level it has been since Trump earlier this month struck a temporary truce that reduced punishing levies on Chinese goods until late summer. By contrast, the effective tariff rate had been between 2% and 3% before Trump returned to office in January.

Trump’s trade war has shaken makers of everything from luxury handbags and sneakers to household appliances and cars as the price of raw materials has risen.

Drinks company Diageo and automakers General Motors and Ford are among those that have abandoned forecasts for the year ahead.

Non-US companies including Honda, Campari, Roche and Novartis have said they are considering moving operations or expanding their US presence to mitigate the impact of tariffs. — Reuters

MORRISTOWN, New Jersey — US President Donald J. Trump backed away on Sunday from his threat to slap 50% tariffs on imports from the European Union (EU) next month, agreeing to extend the deadline until July 9 for talks between Washington and the 27-nation bloc to produce a deal.

Mr. Trump on Friday said he was recommending a 50% tariff go into place on June 1 because of frustration that talks with the EU were not moving quickly enough. The threat roiled global financial markets and intensified a trade war that has been punctuated by frequent changes in tariff policies toward US trading partners and allies.

Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly expressed disdain for the EU and its treatment of the United States on trade, relented after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told him on Sunday that the EU needed more time to come to an agreement.

She asked him during a call to delay the tariffs until July, the deadline he had originally set when he announced new tariffs in April. Mr. Trump told reporters he had granted the request.

“We had a very nice call, and I agreed to move it,” Mr. Trump said before returning to Washington after a weekend in New Jersey. “She said we will rapidly get together and see if we can work something out.”

Ms. Von der Leyen said in a post on X that she had a “good call” with Trump and that the EU was ready to move quickly.

“Europe is ready to advance talks swiftly and decisively,” she said. “To reach a good deal, we would need the time until July 9.”

The euro and US dollar rose against the safe-haven yen and Swiss franc after the deadline extension.

In early April, Mr. Trump set a 90-day window for trade talks between the EU and the United States, which was to end on July 9. But on Friday he upended that timeframe and said he wasn’t interested in a deal at all.

“I’m not looking for a deal,” Mr. Trump said then. “We’ve set the deal — it’s at 50%.” Major US stock indexes and European shares dropped and the dollar weakened as a result.

Mr. Trump has sought to upend the world economy with his trade policies, but after his announcement in April of tariffs on multiple countries sparked financial market upheaval, he dialed down his threats in favor of talks. Since then Washington has inked a pact with Britain and has held discussions with China.

But progress with the EU has been more limited, sparking Mr. Trump’s ire and adding to broader tensions between the two allies over Mr. Trump’s “America first” agenda and Europe’s longtime reliance on Washington for security and defense needs. — Reuters

ISTANBUL — Who is Russian President Vladimir Putin sending to the peace talks with Ukraine that the Kremlin chief himself proposed

Just over an hour before Moscow’s midnight on May 14, the Kremlin published the names of those who would attend.

• Vladimir Medinsky, Kremlin aide. To head the delegation.

Born in Soviet Ukraine, Medinsky helped lead the 2022 peace talks which ultimately failed.

Educated at Moscow State Institute of International Relations, Mr. Medinsky was behind a new history textbook for schools which reflect Mr. Putin’s historical view: pride at the achievements of the superpower Soviet Union, indignation at the humiliations of the Soviet collapse, and acclaim for the “rebirth” of Russia under the former KGB spy’s rule which began on the last day of 1999.

He is chairman of the ultra-patriotic Russian Military Historical Society.

• Mikhail Galuzin, deputy foreign minister

Oversees relations with the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), a grouping of former Soviet republics.

Educated at Moscow State University’s Institute of Asian and African Studies. Speaks fluent Japanese and English.

• Igor Kostyukov, director of Russian military intelligence, known as GRU, or more recently as simply GU. The GRU is one of the most powerful intelligence agencies in the world.

Kostyukov was the first naval officer to head GRU.

• Alexander Fomin, deputy Defense minister. Took part in the 2022 talks on Ukraine.

Additionally, Mr. Putin approved a list of experts for the negotiations.

• Alexander Zorin, first deputy chief of information of the directorate of the General Staff. Born in Soviet Ukraine. Helped lead Russian intervention in the Syrian civil war. Known for seeking to reconcile sides.

• Yelena Podobreyevskaya, deputy head of the Kremlin directorate for humanitarian policy.

• Alexei Polishchuk, director of the foreign ministry’s CIS department dealing with Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova.

• V. Shevtsov, deputy head of the main directorate for international military cooperation at the Defense Ministry.

Lawyers, teachers and politicians marched among thousands of demonstrators across the U.S. on Thursday to protest President Donald Trump’s policies on immigration, the targeting of lawyers and judges, and the power of wealthy decision-makers.

Jennifer Vasquez Sura, whose husband Kilmar Abrego Garcia is a U.S. resident the administration sent by mistake to a prison in El Salvador, spoke at a Washington rally that was among the protests organized by lawyers’ groups and by a coalition of more than 200 labor unions and immigrant rights advocates.

“He was illegally detained, abducted and disappeared by the Trump administration, though they admitted it was an error,” Ms. Vasquez Sura said, adding her husband has endured “50 days of suffering.”

“For everyone watching, keep fighting,” she said. The crowd responded with chants of: “Bring Kilmar home.”

Organizers have accused the Trump administration of prioritizing profits for billionaires and called on it to invest in working families by fully funding healthcare, housing and public schools.

“It’s a clear split screen between the priorities of the Trump administration and what regular people want and need,” said Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, a consumer rights advocacy group and a co-organizer of the Washington rally.

Organizers expected hundreds of thousands of protesters across the country, hoping for the biggest May Day Protests in U.S. history. Previous protests have garnered thousands of attendees since Trump returned to office.

Federal workers have been fired as Mr. Trump and billionaire Elon Musk, a top adviser heading a new Department of Government Efficiency, have moved to slash government departments and fire workers.

U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar told a crowd in Washington the administration’s actions were “eliminating oversight so corporations can exploit workers without consequences.”

Days after Mr. Trump celebrated his first 100 days in office with a campaign-style event in Michigan, the rallies came as Democrats sought a unified response and a galvanizing leader.

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont addressed thousands at a rally in Philadelphia.

In New York, U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez warned protesters that Mr. Trump and the Republican majority in the U.S. Congress “are going after Medicaid next.”

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, who has been touring the country holding rallies with Sanders, said she had just learned that Republicans “have stopped and suspended next week’s Medicaid cuts because they are getting too scared … But our fight is not over because they have only suspended” the cuts to Medicaid, the federal health insurance program for low-income Americans.

She said there were 6,000 protesters in New York City and tens of thousands more demonstrating in Philadelphia, Idaho, Los Angeles, Denver, and Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona.

Also in New York, hundreds of lawyers attended a separate “National Law Day of Action” event, chanting “Respect our judges, give support. Stand behind them, and the court.”

Some prominent law firms have pledged millions in free legal work and made other concessions to Mr. Trump in efforts to get him to rescind punitive measures against them. Others have filed lawsuits challenging his orders and have been supported by law professors, advocacy groups, state attorneys general, former top legal executives at large companies and others.

Federal judges have claimed the Trump administration has failed to comply with court orders regarding foreign aid, federal spending and the firing of government workers. The administration disputes it has defied judges.

Among the speakers in Manhattan was Stuart Gerson, who served President George H.W. Bush, a Republican, as an assistant attorney general and also served President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, as acting attorney general.

“This is about country, not about party,” Gerson told the crowd, recalling what Bush told him when Clinton asked him to serve in his cabinet. “You don’t pledge fealty to an individual, you pledge fealty to the Constitution.”

In Los Angeles, demonstrators turned their ire on Musk, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Mr. Trump’s hard line against immigration, hoisting banners declaring, “L.A. labor stands with immigrants” and “Resist Fascism.”

“The constitution is being trampled on,” said Mark Diamond, 62, from the L.A. neighborhood of San Pedro. “If it takes four years, we’ll be out here 100 times.” — Reuters

WASHINGTON – Worldwide economic output will slow in the months ahead as USUS President Donald Trump’s steep tariffs on virtually all trading partners begin to bite, the International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday, as global finance chiefs swarmed Washington seeking deals with Trump’s team to lower the levies.

Indeed, the pace of negotiations was brisk, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, with 18 different countries offering proposals so far and Trump’s trade negotiating team set to meet with 34 countries this week to discuss tariffs. Trump himself expressed optimism that a trade deal with China could “substantially” cut tariffs, lifting markets.

After setting a baseline import tax of 10% and much higher on dozens of countries earlier this month, Trump abruptly put the steeper levies on hold for 90 days for countries to try to negotiate less stringent rates.

The talks blitz is occurring after hundreds of finance and trade delegates arrived for the spring meetings of the IMF and World Bank Group, almost all with the singular mission of inking a deal to ease the hefty tariffs burden Trump has imposed on US goods imports since beginning his second stint in the White House in January.

With tariffs on goods coming into the world’s No. 1 economy now at their highest in a century, the IMF projects global growth in 2025 will slow to 2.8% – its poorest showing since the COVID-19 pandemic – from 3.3% in 2024.

And it is not just a pain being visited upon others: US gross domestic product growth will drop by a full percentage point to just 1.8% in 2025 from 2.8% last year, the IMF forecast, with “notable” upward revisions to inflation as the cost of imports climbs.

Another big victim of the fallout is China, with the IMF slashing its growth outlook to 4.0% for this year and next under the weight of crushing import taxes of 145% now levied against imports to the US from the world’s largest goods producer.

China has retaliated with 125% tariffs of its own on goods from the US, effectively resulting in a trade embargo between the largest two economies, a standstill that US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said neither sees as sustainable.

According to a person who heard Bessent’s closed-door presentation on Tuesday to investors at a JP Morgan conference in Washington, Bessent believes there will be a de-escalation in US-China trade tensions but described future negotiations with Beijing as a “slog” that has not started yet.

TRUMP ON CHINA
Later on Tuesday, Trump expressed optimism that he would make progress with China that would substantially lower tariffs on their imports but also warned that “if they don’t make a deal, we’ll set the deal.”

Trump said a deal would result in “substantially” lower tariffs on Chinese goods.
“It won’t be that high,” Trump said when asked about the current rates. “It won’t be anywhere near that.”

He added that “it won’t be zero.”

US stocks jumped in extended trade following Trump’s comments, with Amazon and Nvidia gaining 3% each and Apple rising 2%.

While talks have been slow to start with China, Bessent and other members of Trump’s trade team have been pressing on with other key trading partners, though details are scant and no firm deals have been reached so far.

The US and Japan, for one, are moving closer to an interim arrangement on trade, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters, but many of the biggest issues are being put off. Such an interim framework will not tackle the thorniest issues facing the two countries in their trade relationship, and it was still possible that no final deal could be reached, the person said on condition of anonymity.

That movement comes after the US and India said during a visit there by Vice President JD Vance that they had agreed to the broad scope of negotiations. While the two sides touted it as significant progress, agreeing to the so-called “Terms of Reference” mostly provides a roadmap for more extensive talks ahead.

Meanwhile, a number of US companies reporting first-quarter results said tariffs are having an effect on business.

Consumer giant Kimberly-Clark said tariffs would cost it about $300 million this year, with CEO Michael Hsu noting “the breadth and degree of tariffs and also the countries involved have changed significantly since maybe where we were at the end of the last quarter.”

GE Aerospace CEO Larry Culp told Reuters he recently met with Trump and urged him to restore a tariff-free regime for the aerospace industry that existed under a 1979 agreement. Culp said the company’s position was “understood” by the administration, but added “it’s not the only item they’re solving for.”

GE Aerospace hung onto its outlook for the year, despite the cost of tariffs. “We’ll continue to press this point respectfully in the hopes that we can re-establish in effect what we had prior to the recent tariff moves,” he said in the interview.

The affirmation of its outlook helped lift GE Aerospace shares by more than 5%. Indeed, investors rattled over the past two months by Trump’s harsh tariffs and erratic approach to imposing them seemed to find some solace among the earnings being reported. The S&P 500, on the heels of another steep down day on Monday, rose about 2.5% on Tuesday.

(Reporting by Andrea Shalal, David Lawder, Nupur Anand, Trevor Hunnicutt, Brendan O’Brien, Nandita Bose, Steve Holland, Noel Randewich, Rajesh Kumar Singh, Savyata Mishra, and Neil J Kanatt; Writing by Dan Burns; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Andrea Ricci)

BRASILIA – Brazil Prosecutor General Paulo Gonet decided not to charge former President Jair Bolsonaro with fraud in his vaccination records, asking the Supreme Court to throw out the case, a document showed on Thursday.

Mr. Gonet said he could not press charges against Bolsonaro based only on allegations from a plea-bargain deal with a former presidential aide, arguing he needed more evidence to support any charges.

A legal representative from Mr. Bolsonaro did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The former president had previously denied any wrongdoing.

The move comes a day after a Supreme Court panel voted to put Bolsonaro on trial as part of another case, in which he is accused of allegedly conspiring to overthrow the government after he lost the 2022 election.

Brazil Federal Police had formally accused Bolsonaro last year of fraud on his vaccination records. Police said his former aide Mauro Cid fraudulently obtained COVID-19 vaccination records for Bolsonaro and his daughter Laura at the request of the then-president.

The police said they found the fraudulent certificates were issued “to obtain undue advantages related to the evasion of sanitary rules established during the pandemic period.“

Mr. Gonet argued in Thursday’s decision that accusations of fraud in vaccine records against Bolsonaro were based only on Cid’s plea-bargain deal.

This plea-bargain deal is also part of the coup attempt charges against Bolsonaro, but Mr. Gonet said that he decided to press charges in that case in February because other evidence backed the allegations.

Mr. Gonet still has to decide on another police probe targeting Mr. Bolsonaro, in which he is accused of embezzling jewelry gifted by the Saudi government.

Mr. Bolsonaro is barred by Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court from running for public office until 2030 over his efforts to discredit the country’s voting system. – Reuters

SEOUL – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un supervised the test of suicide drones with artificial intelligence (AI) technology and said unmanned control and AI capability must be the top priorities in modern arms development, state media reported on Thursday.

Kim inspected new upgraded reconnaissance drones that are capable of detecting various tactical targets and enemy activities on land and at sea, KCNA state news agency said.

“The field of unmanned equipment and artificial intelligence should be top-prioritized and developed in modernizing the armed forces,” KCNA quoted Kim as saying.

The nuclear-armed North also officially unveiled an airborne early-warning aircraft for the first time, a capability that could improve its aging air defense systems.

Photographs published by state media showed Kim climbing steps toward the door of a large aircraft with four engines and a radar dome mounted on the fuselage, and viewing the aircraft on a low fly-by.

Using commercial satellite imagery, analysts have previously reported that North Korea was converting the Russian-made Il-76 cargo aircraft for an early-warning role.

Such an aircraft would help augment the North’s existing land-based radar systems, which are sometimes limited by the peninsula’s mountainous terrain, London’s International Institute for Strategic Studies said in a report in September.

“The ability of an AEW aircraft to look down mitigates some of the challenges of the terrain and ground-clutter returns to track low-flying aircraft and cruise missiles,” the report said.

One AEW aircraft would not be enough, however, and North Korea would risk cannibalizing the rest of its cargo fleet to build more, the report said.

South Korea’s military said the aircraft’s operational capability is not yet clear but its appearance indicated it is “large and heavy and probably susceptible to interception.”

While the aircraft was refurbished from the existing fleet, “Russia may have had something to do the internal system and parts,” Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesperson Lee Sung-jun told a briefing, when asked about possible Russian assistance.

Russia has provided North Korea with anti-air missiles and unspecified air defense equipment, in return for Pyongyang’s deployment of troops to help with the Ukraine war, South Korea’s national security adviser Shin Won-sik said in November.

Kim separately inspected newly developed equipment for reconnaissance, intelligence gathering, electronic jamming and attack systems, KCNA said.

Photos showed fixed-wing UAV zeroing in on a tank-shaped target then exploding in flames. Kim was seen walking with aides with what appeared to be an unmanned surveillance aircraft that resembles the U.S. RQ-4 Global Hawk high-altitude surveillance aircraft parked on the tarmac in the background.

North Korean troops deployed in Russia’s war against Ukraine are believed to have been engaged in drone warfare, gaining valuable battleground experience. – Reuters

WASHINGTON – Top Trump administration officials mistakenly disclosed war plans in a messaging group that included a journalist shortly before the US attacked Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis, the White House said on Monday, following a first-hand account by The Atlantic.

Democratic lawmakers swiftly blasted the misstep, saying it was a breach of US national security and a violation of law that must be investigated by Congress.

The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg said in a report on Monday that he was unexpectedly invited on March 13 to an encrypted chat group on the Signal messaging app called the “Houthi PC small group.” In the group, national security adviser Mike Waltz tasked his deputy Alex Wong with setting up a “tiger team” to coordinate US action against the Houthis.

National Security Council spokesperson Brian Hughes said the chat group appeared to be authentic.

US President Donald Trump launched an ongoing campaign of large-scale military strikes against Yemen’s Houthis on March 15 over the group’s attacks against Red Sea shipping, and he warned Iran, the Houthis’ main backer, that it needed to immediately halt support for the group.

Hours before those attacks started, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted operational details about the plan in the messaging group, “including information about targets, weapons the US would be deploying, and attack sequencing,” Goldberg said. His report omitted the details but Goldberg termed it a “shockingly reckless” use of a Signal chat.

Accounts that appeared to represent Vice President JD Vance, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, and senior National Security Council officials were assembled in the chat group, Goldberg wrote.

Joe Kent, Trump’s nominee for National Counterterrorism Center director, was apparently on the Signal chain despite not yet being Senate-confirmed.

Trump told reporters at the White House that he was unaware of the incident. “I don’t know anything about it. I’m not a big fan of The Atlantic,” Trump said. A White House official said later that an investigation was under way and Trump had been briefed on it.

The NSC’s Hughes said in a statement: “At this time, the message thread that was reported appears to be authentic, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain.”

“The thread is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials. The ongoing success of the Houthi operation demonstrates that there were no threats to our servicemembers or our national security.”

Hegseth denied sharing war plans in the group chat.

“Nobody was texting war plans, and that’s all I have to say about that,” he told reporters while on an official trip to Hawaii on Monday.

Goldberg responded to Hegseth’s denial in an interview on CNN late on Monday by saying, “No, that’s a lie. He was texting war plans.”

‘EUROPEAN FREE-LOADING’

According to screenshots of the chat reported by The Atlantic, officials in the group debated whether the US should carry out the strikes, and at one point Vance appeared to question whether US allies in Europe, more exposed to shipping disruption in the region, deserved US help.

“@PeteHegseth if you think we should do it let’s go,” a person identified as Vance wrote. “I just hate bailing Europe out again,” the person wrote, adding: “Let’s just make sure our messaging is tight here.”

A person identified as Hegseth replied: “VP: I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC.”

The Atlantic reported that the person identified as Vance also raised concerns about the timing of the strikes, and said there was a strong argument in favor of delaying them by a month.

“I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now. There’s a further risk that we see a moderate to severe spike in oil prices,” the account wrote, before saying he was willing to support the group’s consensus.

Yemen, Houthi-ally Iran and the European Union’s diplomatic service did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Reuters.

Under US law, it can be a crime to mishandle, misuse or abuse classified information, though it is unclear whether those provisions might have been breached in this case. Messages that The Atlantic report said were set by Waltz to disappear from the Signal app after a period of time also raise questions about possible violations of federal record-keeping laws.

As part of a Trump administration effort to chase down leaks by officials to journalists unrelated to the Signal group, Gabbard posted on X on March 14 that any “unauthorized release of classified information is a violation of the law and will be treated as such.”

On Tuesday, Gabbard is due to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee on worldwide threats to the United States.

Created by the entrepreneur Moxie Marlinspike, Signal has gone from an exotic messaging app used by privacy-conscious dissidents to the unofficial whisper network of Washington officialdom. Signal does not use US government encryption and is not hosted on government servers.

Democratic lawmakers called the use of the Signal group illegal and demanded an investigation.

“This is one of the most stunning breaches of military intelligence that I have read about in a very, very long time,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said, adding that he would ask Majority Leader John Thune to investigate.

“We’re just finding out about it. But obviously, we’ve got to run it to ground and figure out what went on there. We’ll have a plan,” said Thune, a Republican from South Dakota.

There was no immediate suggestion from the White House that the breach would lead to any staffing changes.

“President Trump continues to have the utmost confidence in his national security team, including national security adviser Mike Waltz,” White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told Reuters.

Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren said on X the use of Signal to discuss highly sensitive national security issues was “blatantly illegal and dangerous beyond belief.”

“Every single one of the government officials on this text chain have now committed a crime – even if accidentally – that would normally involve a jail sentence,” Democratic Senator Chris Coons said on X. — Reuters

BANGKOK – Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra faces a no-confidence motion in parliament starting on Monday, with the opposition set to grill her over an underperforming economy and her powerful father’s perceived influence over her administration.

Despite lukewarm ratings in opinion polls, Paetongtarn comes into the debate in a firm position, with no signs of turmoil in a ruling coalition that commands a parliamentary majority, making it unlikely the motion will prosper when it goes to a vote on Wednesday.

The opposition People’s Party has accused Paetongtarn of taking direction from her father, divisive political heavyweight Thaksin Shinawatra, a billionaire former premier who is banned from holding office over a conviction for conflicts of interest and abuse of power that kept him in self-exile for 15 years.

Thaksin, Thailand’s most influential and polarizing politician, has loomed large over Thai politics for the past 24 years. He returned home in 2023 and spent six months in detention in hospital under a government led by the Pheu Thai Party he founded, before being released on parole.

He has spoken openly and frequently about policies that include legalizing gambling and adopting cryptocurrency and championed a $14 billion handout scheme to stimulate the economy, all of which the Pheu Thai-led government has pursued.

Paetongtarn has insisted her government is not under anyone’s influence, while Thaksin, 75, has said he is retired and only offers advice.

The government’s economic measures so far have yet to spur significant growth in Southeast Asia’s second-largest economy, with last year’s 2.5% expansion far adrift of regional peers.

The anchors to growth including structural issues and household debt of 16.34 trillion baht ($486 billion), or 89.0% of gross domestic product, among the highest ratios in Asia, which the opposition says the government is not addressing.

Lawmakers will be unable to name Thaksin during the motion due to parliamentary rules that say outsiders should not be mentioned. After weeks of debate on the issue, the house speaker has allowed “family member” to be used.

“The opposition’s tactic to delegitimize Paetongtarn’s leadership is not new because she already faces criticism from society,” said Yuttaporn Issarachai, a political scientist at Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University.

“The focus on Thaksin’s role and interference makes it too political and not beneficial to public, instead of raising issues on the economy and security,” Yuttaporn said.

Paetongtarn, 38, took over as premier in August after political ally Srettha Thavisin was ousted by a court over an ethics violation. She is the fourth member of the Shinawatra family to hold the top post. — Reuters

WASHINGTON – Federal workers faced fresh uncertainty about their futures on Tuesday after Elon Musk gave them “another chance” to respond to his ultimatum that they justify their jobs or risk termination, contradicting guidance from some Trump administration officials that the request was voluntary.

The confusing back-and-forth has rippled through the federal bureaucracy, with some agencies instructing workers to comply and others not. It has become a test of how much power Mr. Musk wields over the government’s operations as he pursues an unprecedented cost-cutting campaign with President Donald Trump‘s backing.

Twenty-one workers resigned from his so-called Department of Government Efficiency in protest on Tuesday, saying they refused to aid the downsizing effort.

“We will not use our skills as technologists to compromise core government systems, jeopardize Americans’ sensitive data, or dismantle critical public services,” the employees wrote in a resignation posted online.

DOGE did not respond to a request for comment on the resignations.

The workers, who include data scientists, product managers and the division head of IT, were employed in an office known as the United States Digital Service before Mr. Musk took it over and renamed it DOGE after a favorite cryptocurrency.

The resignations added to the drama surrounding Mr. Musk’s email demand, which was sent to employees across the government asking them to summarize their accomplishments of the past week by Monday. In a post on X, the social media site Mr. Musk owns, he asserted that failure to respond would constitute resignation.

With the deadline approaching on Monday, the Office of Personnel Management, the government’s human resources arm, told workers they could ignore the email.

Mr. Musk, the billionaire CEO of electric vehicle maker Tesla and rocket company SpaceX, was undeterred.

“Subject to the discretion of the president, they will be given another chance. Failure to respond a second time will result in termination,” he wrote on X late on Monday without setting a new deadline.

Prior to the new OPM guidance, Mr. Trump said workers who did not respond would be “sort of semi-fired,” adding to the uncertainty.

Asked on Tuesday whether the renewed threat would be carried out against non-compliant employees, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump would defer to cabinet secretaries’ guidance for their individual workforces.

‘WORKING AS ONE TEAM’

The head-spinning developments exposed new fissures within Trump’s administration over Mr. Musk’s blunt-force approach. Even some Trump loyalists, such as Kash Patel, the newly installed FBI chief, told employees to hold off on replying.

Leavitt rejected any suggestion of rifts within the administration, saying everyone was “working as one team.”

Mr. Musk will attend Mr. Trump’s cabinet meeting on Wednesday, she said.

Employees at several agencies said they received conflicting guidance from leadership, leaving them unsure how to proceed.

The Department of Health and Human Services advised employees that if they chose to reply, they should refrain from mentioning specific drugs or contracts, according to an email reviewed by Reuters.

“Assume that what you write will be read by malign foreign actors and tailor your response accordingly,” the email said.

The acting director of OPM itself sent an email to the agency’s staff that said responding was voluntary “but strongly encouraged.”

The Trump administration plans this week to gut a unit within OPM charged with keeping track of all federal government human resource transactions including hiring, promotions, retirements and separations, two people familiar with the matter said. The unit will be slashed from 64 people to just under a dozen, the people said.

OPM did not respond to a request for comment.

Mr. Musk’s downsizing initiative has laid off more than 20,000 workers, with another 75,000 accepting buyouts, and the effort continued to accelerate on Tuesday.

There are about 2.3 million civilian federal employees.

The vast majority of fired workers were in their jobs for less than a year, making them easier to lay off under civil service rules. But OPM has begun firing career workers within its own agency in what sources told Reuters is intended to serve as a template for a second round of mass layoffs across the government.

To that end, IRS executives have been told to brace for another round of job cuts beyond the nearly 12,000 IRS employees already slated to be terminated, two people familiar with the matter said, referring to the roughly 7,000 probationary employees set to be fired and 5,000 employees taking a buyout. The cuts so far amount to more than 10% of the IRS workforce.

Gavin Kliger, the 25-year-old software engineer dispatched by Mr. Musk to scrutinize IRS operations, has told executives he believes the agency can meet its mission with far fewer employees, the sources said.

The Interior Department on Tuesday received a directive from OPM saying that bureaus such as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Bureau of Indian Affairs should prepare plans for reductions in their workforce ranging from 10% to 40%, an Interior source told Reuters. – Reuters