President Trump's first month in office has exceeded the wildest dreams of his most loyal supporters, and the darkest nightmares of his fiercest detractors.

Why it matters: Both groups can agree: The America that Joe Biden left behind on Jan. 20 is no longer recognizable, erased in four frenetic weeks by an empowered, implacable and historically popular MAGA presidency.

• Like Trump 1.0, the firehose of news and norm-busting behavior is — and will continue to be — the defining feature of this administration.
• Unlike Trump 1.0, the chaos is calculated — and explicitly designed to institutionalize MAGA, paralyze the president's enemies and permanently break the Washington establishment.

Zoom in: Above all else, Trump's first month has been dominated by his war on the federal bureaucracy — and his various efforts to prod, probe and blow through the limits of presidential power.

• The White House's early attempt to freeze federal funding has set the stage for a massive legal fight over Congress's "power of the purse," which is laid out in Article 1 of the Constitution.
• Elon Musk and his DOGE allies are slashing and burning their way through government agencies — cheered on by the MAGA faithful as they fire thousands of federal workers, sometimes with reckless abandon.
• The rapid dismantling of USAID and the government-wide assault on DEI have sent clear signals that any programs misaligned with Trump's MAGA will be on the chopping block. The Department of Education could be next.
• At the Justice Department — which haunted both Trump's first term and his next four years as a private citizen — the purging of career prosecutors and FBI agents has punctured any veneer of independence from the White House.

Between the lines: Trump and Musk's shock treatment of the U.S. government has overshadowed the two main issues that dominated the 2024 campaign: immigration and inflation.

1. On immigration, Trump has moved with lightning speed to enforce his promise of a sealed border.

• Arrests from border crossings plummeted to 21,593 in January — down from 47,316 in December, and an all-time high of 250,000 in December 2023 — after a blizzard of Day One immigration-related executive orders.
• Trump's goal of deporting millions of undocumented immigrants has proven more difficult, with the pace of operations stalling because of a lack of funds, detention space, officers and infrastructure.

2. "Inflation is back," Trump acknowledged in an interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity this week. "I had nothing to do with it," he then argued, pinning the blame on Biden's spending policies.

• Despite promising to "end inflation" starting on Day One, Trump is right that the effects of his new policies won't immediately show up in consumer prices.
• The danger: Trump's sweeping use of tariffs is injecting deep uncertainty into global markets, and could turn inflation into a long-term feature of the U.S. economy.

What to watch: With the dust still settling on America's new normal, Congress soon will move to codify vast swaths of Trump's agenda.

• Trump on Wednesday endorsed House Republicans' budget resolution, which includes $4.5 trillion in tax cuts and at least $1.5 trillion in spending cuts — including to Medicaid.
• With a razor-thin majority in the House, Trump's vision for "ONE BIG BEAUTIFUL BILL" is a huge gamble — but one that would clear the way for a historic, and enduring, reordering of the American economy.

Zoom out: In the meantime, Trump's return to a deeply transactional foreign policy has exhilarated his "America First" base while alarming U.S. allies worldwide.

• This week alone, Trump called Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky a "dictator without elections" and repeatedly endorsed the Kremlin's false narrative that it was Ukraine — not Russia — that started the war.
• Even more shocking was Trump's proposal to take over and redevelop Gaza into "the Riviera of the Middle East." Critics say the plan — which Trump says would involve relocating Palestinians to Egypt, Jordan or elsewhere — is unworkable and would amount to the ethnic cleansing of 2 million Palestinians.
• The president's aides and allies say his provocations should be viewed through the lens of dealmaking. For now, most foreign leaders are opting to take him at his word.

The bottom line: For all the scar tissue already accumulating in Washington, Trump is only 2% through his four-year term.

• If his bets pay off, he'll have rewritten the rules of American governance for generations.
• If they backfire, the consequences could be just as historic.

President Trump stunned, strangled and humiliated Europe — leaving America's closest continental ally dazed and dumbfounded.

• That was over the course of three short days this week.

The big picture: No amount of "Trump-proofing" could have prepared Europe for the MAGA-shaped hurricane that swept across the continent this week, wreaking torrential havoc on America's closest allies.

Driving the news: Trump left NATO and Ukraine still reeling with his initiation of direct peace talks with Russia, without Ukraine fully in the loop or other European leaders even in the conversation.

• Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth perplexed and perturbed allies on his first visit to NATO by seemingly taking some of Ukraine's bargaining chips off the table before those talks began. He also demanded that Europe take ownership of its own defense so the U.S. could focus on the more urgent threat from China.
• Back at home, Trump announced "reciprocal" tariffs on every country that imposes import duties on the U.S., likely affecting $600 billion worth of goods from the EU.
• And at a global AI summit in Paris on Tuesday, Vice President Vance torched the EU's "excessive regulation of the AI sector" and "hand-wringing about safety," and left the conference without signing its joint declaration.

But it was in Vance's remarks to the Munich Security Conference on Friday that things got particularly personal.

• "[T]he threat that I worry the most about vis-a-vis Europe is not Russia, it's not China, it's not any other external actor," Vance began in one of his first major speeches on the world stage.
• "What I worry about is the threat from within. The retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values: values shared with the United States of America."

What came next left conference attendees silent, stunned and steaming.

• Vance called European Union officials "commissars" — a reference to the Soviet Union — and accused them of censoring their citizens in the name of fighting disinformation and hate speech online.
• He excoriated Romania for annulling the results of its Nov. 24 election, in which an obscure ultranationalist candidate rocketed to first place after a TikTok campaign that intelligence services linked to Russia.
• He condemned the convictions of a British man who prayed outside an abortion clinic, and of a Swedish man who participated in Quran burnings that led to his friend's murder.
• And he said that of all the challenges Europe faces, there's "nothing more urgent than mass migration" — tying Thursday's terrorist attack in Munich to a "series of conscious decisions" by European politicians.

Between the lines: Ahead of Germany's snap election on Feb. 23, Vance called for an end to political "firewalls" — the principle of refusing to form governments with far-right parties such as the AfD.

• Vance later met with the leader of the AfD — becoming the highest-ranking U.S. official ever to do so — while snubbing Germany's center-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
• Together, Vance's actions amounted to an astonishing intervention in European politics that was swiftly condemned by top officials, including Germany's conservative leader and likely next chancellor.

Zoom out: No one could ever mistake Trump for a great supporter of Europe, which he once said "treats us worse than China."

• But whether it's threatening to annex Greenland from Denmark, or picking Saudi Arabia as the mediator for Russia-Ukraine talks, the second Trump term could mean twilight for the transatlantic relationship.

The bottom line: Europe's leaders have been bracing for Trump's return for well over a year. And yet much like the Democrats paralyzed by the chaos at home, the last three days have exceeded their worst nightmares.

WARSAW -- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth doubled down on remarks he made at NATO this week about the terms of a potential Ukraine-Russia peace deal, saying his job was simply to "introduce realism to the conversation."

Why it matters: Hegseth's comments, followed Wednesday by President Trump's initiation of direct negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, drew fierce criticism from NATO allies and even some Republicans.

• "I don't know who wrote the speech — it is the kind of thing Tucker Carlson could have written, and Carlson is a fool," Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), chair of the Armed Services Committee, told Politico.
• Wicker, speaking on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, suggested that Hegseth had made a "rookie mistake" and "walked back some of what he said" on Thursday.

But Hegseth, whose position on Ukraine and NATO was echoed by Trump in the Oval Office on Thursday, rejected the notion that he walked back anything at a press conference with Poland's defense minister.

What they're saying: "I stand by the comments that I made on that first day in the Ukraine Contact Group — and that's for all the press out there, who it's difficult for them to understand that," Hegseth told reporters Friday.

• "My job today and in Brussels was to introduce realism to the conversation. The reality that returning to 2014 borders as part of a negotiated settlement is unlikely. The reality of U.S. troops in Ukraine is unlikely. The reality of Ukraine membership in NATO as a part of negotiated settlement, unlikely," he said.
• "That said, I would never put constraints around what the president of the United States would be willing to negotiate with the sovereign leaders of both Russia and Ukraine," Hegseth added.

Between the lines: Hegseth, like Vice President Vance and other Trump emissaries in Europe this week, is walking a difficult tightrope as negotiations get underway.

• Trump's position is clear, even if it's unpopular with Russia hawks: He believes Ukraine's potential membership in NATO instigated Putin's invasion, and that ending the war is the top priority.
• But Trump is also a self-styled "deal-maker," as Hegseth has repeatedly stressed this week, and refuses to definitively rule out trading chips as a matter of principle.

The big picture: What has proven most controversial in Washington, Brussels and Kyiv this week is the notion that Trump and Putin would directly negotiate a deal without Ukraine's approval.

• "I think Ukraine ought to be the one to negotiate its own peace deal," Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) told Axios. "I don't think it should be imposed upon it by any other country, including ours."
• "It's obvious that Europeans can't be involved in securing peace that they haven't been involved in negotiating," German defense minister Boris Pistorius told reporters in Munich, calling Hegseth's comments "clumsy."

Go deeper: Trump and Hegseth send NATO scrambling over future of Ukraine

BRUSSELS -- NATO allies are in a state of anger, denial and despair after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth effectively declared an end to America's role as the primary guarantor of European security, particularly over Ukraine.

• President Trump's surprise phone call with Vladimir Putin, just hours later, only added salt to the wound.

Why it matters: Europe has been bracing for this moment since the early days of Trump's 2024 campaign. That hasn't made it any less painful — or the future any less uncertain.

State of play: Hegseth, who visited NATO headquarters for the first time this week, made clear Wednesday that the following chips will now be "off the table" in peace talks, as a senior U.S. defense official stressed to Axios.

1. NATO membership for Ukraine — a central source of tension with Russia promised by the alliance in 2008 — is not a "realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement," Hegseth said.
2. U.S. troops will not be deployed to Ukraine to enforce postwar security guarantees.
3. Any European peacekeepers sent to Ukraine should be deployed as part of a "non-NATO mission," meaning Article 5 — the alliance's bedrock principle of collective defense — should not protect them.

Zoom out: Less clear is what chips remain on the table, given Ukraine's deteriorating position on the battlefield, the potential curtailment of U.S. military aid, and Russia's gleeful response to the concessions.

• Trump spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday after his call with Putin, and said he and Putin had "agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately."
• Zelensky told Trump in their phone call that Putin is only pretending to want to negotiate a peace deal because he is "afraid of you," as Axios' Barak Ravid scooped.

The latest: Amid backlash from Ukrainian officials and NATO defense ministers, Hegseth defended the new U.S. position and rejected claims that Trump had handed Russia preemptive concessions.

• "Any suggestion that President Trump is doing anything other than negotiating a position from strength is, on its face, ahistorical and false," Hegseth said at a press conference after his NATO meetings Thursday.
• Asked by Axios what leverage Ukraine has left, Hegseth responded sharply: "It's just a cheap political point to say, 'Oh we've left all the negotiating cards off the table by recognizing some realities that exist on the ground.'"

"[Trump's] got all the cards he would like," Hegseth stressed.

• "And the interesting part is, while the conventional status quo mindset, or the legacy media, wants to play checkers ... President Trump, time and time again, finds a way to play chess," he said.
• "We have the perfect deal-maker at the table from a position of strength to deal with both Vladimir Putin and Zelensky. No one's going to get everything they want."

The intrigue: Despite his previous remarks about Ukraine's "unrealistic" future membership in NATO, Hegseth clarified that "everything is on the table" and that Trump is ultimately the one leading the negotiations.

• "I'm not going to stand at this podium and declare what President Trump will do or won't do, what will be in or what will be out," Hegseth said.
• "Simply pointing out realism, like the borders won't be rolled back to what everyone would like them to be in 2014, is not a concession to Vladimir Putin. It's a recognition of hard power realities on the ground," he argued.

Friction point: NATO allies and supporters of Ukraine have criticized Trump for seemingly taking Russia's side at various points during the war, including this week.

• In the Oval Office Wednesday, Trump demurred when asked whether Ukraine was "an equal member" of the peace process: "I think they have to make peace," he said after a pause. "That was not a good war to go into."
• On Thursday, he went a step further: "I don't see any way that a country in Russia's position could allow [Ukraine] to join NATO ... I believe that's the reason the war started."

What to watch: The European Union's top diplomat Kaja Kallas, who attended Thursday's meetings along with Ukrainian defense minister Rustem Umerov, said the EU would continue supporting Ukraine if Kyiv refused to accept Trump's conditions.

• "It's not good negotiation tactics if you just give away everything before the negotiations have even started," Kallas told reporters, echoing similar comments by NATO defense ministers.
• "Appeasement will always fail."

The big picture: Here in Brussels, NATO officials have largely responded to Hegseth's bombshell by pointing out that the alliance has steadily been taking a greater share of responsibility for supporting Ukraine.

• "This administration deeply believes in alliances," Hegseth said Thursday as he reiterated his call for NATO members to dramatically increase their defense spending and take ownership of European security.
• "But make no mistake, President Trump will not allow anyone to turn Uncle Sam into Uncle Sucker."

BRUSSELS -- Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth delivered a blunt message to NATO allies Wednesday: U.S. troops will not be part of any future peace-keeping mission in Ukraine.

• Nor should NATO's Article 5 protections — under which the U.S. vows to respond if an ally is attacked — apply to any European forces sent to Ukraine to secure a postwar peace settlement, he said.
• Ukraine, meanwhile, should make a deal now — and give up on regaining all of its occupied territory, or becoming a member of NATO.

Why it matters: Hegseth is the first senior Trump administration official to visit NATO headquarters, where he met with Ukraine's defense minister and other key officials ahead of the third anniversary of Russia's invasion.

• A few hundred miles away, Vice President Vance is slated to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the Munich Security Conference later this week to discuss President Trump's vision for peace.
• Since Trump's election, NATO and Ukrainian officials have been bracing for the U.S. to wind down military aid to Ukraine — and potentially force Kyiv to make territorial concessions to Russia.

What they're saying: Ahead of his first meeting with the Ukraine Defense Contact Group at NATO HQ, Hegseth relayed a simple message from Trump: "The bloodshed must stop, and this war must end."

• "We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective," Hegseth said, referring to Russia's years-long occupation of Crimea and the eastern Donbas region.
• "Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering."

The big picture: Turning to the prospect of peace talks, Hegseth suggested that Trump's efforts to drive down energy prices will weaken the Russian "war machine" and help bring Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table.

• A future peace deal must include "robust security guarantees" for Ukraine, Hegseth said — backed by "capable European and non-European troops," but not through NATO membership or U.S. troops on the ground.
• "If these [NATO-country] troops are deployed as peacekeepers to Ukraine at any point, they should be deployed as part of a non-NATO mission, and they should not be covered under Article 5," Hegseth stressed.

Between the lines: Hegseth is both pushing Ukraine to seek a deal, and ruling out provisions Kyiv would want as part of any agreement to reduce the risk Russia would attack again when the time was ripe.

• In an interview with The Guardian this week, Zelensky dismissed the notion that Europe could provide legitimate security guarantees without American muscle.
• "Security guarantees without America are not real security guarantees," Zelensky said, suggesting he could win Trump over by offering American companies lucrative contracts to rebuild Ukraine.
• Trump recently demanded that Ukraine grant access to $500 billion in rare earth minerals in return for years of U.S. military support, and is dispatching Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to Kyiv this week.

What to watch: "Europe must provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and nonlethal aid to Ukraine," Hegseth said, warning that the strategic threat from China will no longer allow the U.S. to be "primarily focused on the security of Europe."

• "The United States remains committed to the NATO alliance and to the defense partnership with Europe," he concluded.
• "But the United States will no longer tolerate an imbalanced relationship which encourages dependency."

STUTTGART, GERMANY — The Pentagon plans to welcome Elon Musk and "the keen eye of DOGE" to scrutinize its spending "very soon," Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told Axios on his first overseas trip since taking office.

Why it matters: At more than $890 billion, the Pentagon's budget is a behemoth — accounting for roughly half of the U.S. government's discretionary spending this fiscal year.

• It's also a black box: The sprawling Defense Department has failed its annual audit seven years in a row, including this past December.
• Contrary to DOGE's downsizing goals, President Trump actually wants to increase defense spending — but believes Musk and his team can help salvage and redirect "billions of dollars" of inefficiencies in the military.

What they're saying: "There is waste, redundancies, and headcounts at headquarters that need to be addressed. There's just no doubt," Hegseth told Axios outside U.S. Africa Command here on Tuesday.

• A fierce proponent of "getting back to basics," Hegseth pointed to spending on dealing with climate change — prioritized as a national security threat by the Biden administration — as a clear target for cost-cutting.
• "The Defense Department is not in the business of ... solving the global thermostat. We're in the business of deterring and winning wars," the former Fox News host and Army combat veteran told Axios.

Between the lines: Neither Trump nor Hegseth have acknowledged public concerns about letting Musk — whose companies have billions of dollars in Pentagon contracts — into the heart of the military-industrial complex.

• But Hegseth did downplay the notion that Musk would exercise unilateral authority at the Pentagon, as critics allege the billionaire has done at other agencies targeted by DOGE.
• "We'll do it in coordination. We're not going to do things that are to the detriment of American operational or tactical capabilities," Hegseth said.
• "The Defense Department is not USAID," he added, referring to the foreign aid agency crippled by DOGE. "USAID's got a lot of problems ... pursuing globalist agendas that don't have a connection to America First."

Zoom in: Hegseth, who served as an infantry officer in the Army National Guard, began his first full day in Europe by joining an early-morning physical training session with Special Forces soldiers.

• He later encountered a small crowd of protesters — mostly military families and teachers who booed and chanted "DEI" — before his meetings at U.S. European Command. Hegseth, following Trump's lead, has targeted diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives at the Pentagon.
• At an AFRICOM town hall, Hegseth was grilled by service members on Trump's executive order banning trans people from the military and pausing gender reassignment procedures. This week he directed the military to stop recruiting trans people.

Hegseth, 44, was upbeat and defiant as he ended his day celebrating the restoration of Fort Bragg — now renamed after World War II hero Roland L. Bragg, rather than the Confederate general. During the Biden administration in 2023, the fort's name had been changed to Liberty.

• "We're honoring a private first class. And I'm proud that we have a Marine corporal as the vice president of the United States," Hegseth told reporters with a smile, referring to JD Vance.
• "Junior enlisted have never seen better days."

What to watch: On Wednesday, Hegseth will become the first senior Trump official to visit NATO headquarters, where defense ministers are anxiously waiting to hear the administration's plans for ending the war in Ukraine.

President Trump is taking a sledgehammer to a bedrock of U.S. foreign policy, ripping up decades of "soft power" in favor of a highly personalized, transactional, coercive style of dealmaking.

Why it matters: For Trump, results speak loudest. Less than three weeks into office, his administration already has struck deals of varying substance with Canada, Mexico, Colombia, Panama, El Salvador, Guatemala and even Venezuela.

• Most were secured through threats of tariffs and other leverage, with Trump's top diplomat, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, occasionally serving as the good cop.
• But the headlines obscure a longer-term risk: Trump is gutting key aspects of America's global influence and the workforce that promotes it — leaving a vacuum that U.S. adversaries are eager to fill.

Zoom in: Trump and Elon Musk's rapid dismemberment of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) — by far the world's largest provider of foreign aid — has stunned diplomats and NGOs around the globe.

• In an instant, the most impoverished and unstable regions of the world have seen funding dry up for basic food supplies, water, medicine, education, disaster relief — affecting the lives of millions of people.
• The New York Times reports that Trump is slashing the number of USAID jobs worldwide from over 10,000 to 290, while canceling about 800 grants and contracts.
• Trump and his "America First" allies argue the money should be spent at home, and that USAID is a Trojan horse for spreading destructive leftist ideologies. The governments of China, Russia and Iran seem to agree.

Between the lines: Republicans haven't always held such negative or conspiratorial views of foreign aid.

• "Our national interests are inextricably tied to the security and development of our friends and allies," said President Ronald Reagan, who made soft power central to U.S. foreign policy during the Cold War.
• As a senator, Rubio was a fierce defender of foreign aid — and even sent President Biden a letter in 2022 calling for more USAID funding to "counter the Chinese Communist Party's expanding global influence," according to CNN.
• "I promise you, it's going to be a lot harder to recruit someone to anti-Americanism, anti-American terrorism, if the United States of America was the reason why they're even alive today," Rubio said in 2017.

Zoom out: Meanwhile, Trump has made clear his disdain for America's network of alliances, which previous presidents have seen as a crucial competitive advantage over adversaries.

• Trump threatened Canada with 25% tariffs and has repeatedly suggested turning America's northern neighbor into the 51st state.
• He has said the European Union is "worse than China" when it comes to trade.
• He wouldn't rule out sending in troops if NATO ally Denmark doesn't hand over Greenland.
• And he threatened tariffs on Colombia, historically one of the closest U.S. partners in Latin America, for turning back a flight of deported migrants.

What they're saying: "There's really no better gift to Putin and Xi than for the world to see that the United States is a completely unreliable friend and partner," says Daniel Shapiro, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel who also held senior roles at the Pentagon and National Security Council.

• "People will obviously treat us as just one more transactional great power."

What to watch: Rubio announced Thursday that he would boycott a G20 gathering in South Africa after Trump and Elon Musk condemned a post-apartheid land reform law as "racist" toward white people.

• "South Africa is doing very bad things. Expropriating private property. Using G20 to promote 'solidarity, equality, & sustainability.' In other words: DEI and climate change," Rubio tweeted.
• It's very rare for any member of the club of global powers to skip such a gathering, let alone the U.S.
• China, which has invested heavily in soft power through its sprawling Belt and Road Initiative, pointedly expressed support for South Africa's G20 presidency after Rubio's snub.

The bottom line: Biden was fond of saying that what mattered was "not the example of our power, but the power of our example."

• Trump believes exactly the opposite.

The White House has directed the General Services Administration to terminate "every single media contract" expensed by the agency, according to an email obtained by Axios.

What they're saying: "GSA team, please do two things," a Trump administration official wrote:

Pull all contracts for Politico, BBC, E&E (Politico sub) and Bloomberg

Pull all media contracts for just GSA - cancel every single media contract today for GSA only.

Why it matters: President Trump is targeting the federal government's media contracts after Elon Musk and his allies discovered millions of dollars in agency subscriptions to Politico Pro, a policy tracking service widely used in Washington.

• The discovery, made through a U.S. government spending database that has long been publicly available, triggered erroneous theories on X about the Biden administration "funding" anti-Trump media.
• White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Wednesday that the executive branch would stop spending money on Politico subscriptions amid the right-wing outrage.
• GSA manages real estate, procurement and technology services for the federal government. An X account for DOGE has also announced cuts to other individual deals, such as a Treasury contract with the New York Times.

Reality check: Politico's executives addressed the false conspiracy theories about the company receiving "funding" from the government in a note to readers Thursday.

• "POLITICO is a privately owned company. We have never received any government funding — no subsidies, no grants, no handouts. Not one dime, ever, in 18 years," wrote Politico Media Group CEO Goli Sheikholeslami and Politico Global Editor-In-Chief John Harris.
• "POLITICO Pro is different. It is a professional subscription service used by companies, organizations, and, yes, some government agencies."
• "Government agencies that subscribe do so through standard public procurement processes—just like any other tool they buy to work smarter and be more efficient."

Between the lines: A White House official said there should be no surprise the government is targeting media subscription, given DOGE's mandate to cut spending and Trump's opposition to financially helping the mainstream media.

• "The eye of Sauron is on more than just Politico," the adviser said. "It's all the media."

Disclosure: Our Axios Pro product provides in-depth policy and industry news to paying subscribers, including government employees. Last year, $5,550 in payments were made to Axios as part of a Federal Communications Commission subscription, according to the government's database that tracks federal spending.

President Trump and Elon Musk promised to break Washington. No one thought it would look this easy.

Why it matters: Trump 2.0 has already laid waste to democratic norms, precedents and even some laws. Paralyzed by the breadth of disruption, many of the president's demoralized critics have been left sputtering: "He can't do that."

• And yet he is.

The big picture: With a popular mandate, unified control of Congress, a pliant Republican Party, a struggling opposition and the resources of the world's richest man, there are few guardrails to curb Trump's maximalist agenda.

• Short of a court order, Trump's opponents have so far failed to stop him from bending and breaking the limits of presidential authority.

Zoom in: The extraordinary empowerment of Musk, who spent at least $288 million to help elect Trump, has triggered new fears over the administration's lack of accountability to Congress.

• This weekend, Musk's allies orchestrated a physical takeover of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), ousting security officials who tried to stop them from accessing classified spaces.
• With USAID employees locked out of their accounts and Musk vowing to shutter the "evil" agency, Secretary of State Marco Rubio took over as acting administrator and notified Congress of a "potential reorganization."

Democrats reacted furiously, holding a press conference outside USAID headquarters to sound the alarm over what they called an "illegal" takeover of an independent agency authorized by Congress.

• "We don't have a fourth branch of government called Elon Musk," said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.).
• "You cannot wave away an agency that you don't like ... by literally storming into a building and taking over the servers," said Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), who vowed to stall Trump's State Department nominations in protest.
• Trump, meanwhile, disputed that shutting down USAID would require an act of Congress — arguing it would be justified because the agency is rife with "fraud."

Between the lines: Beyond rhetoric, Democrats have limited recourse to slow Trump's agenda — especially with the party still grappling with an identity crisis in the wake of the disastrous 2024 election.

• House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) unveiled a plan Monday to try to stop Trump from freezing or diverting congressionally appropriated funds, namely by using leverage in government funding negotiations.
• But Democrats are fundamentally limited by life in the minority. Even if they reclaim a majority in the 2026 midterms, history suggests Trump officials will have no qualms about blowing off subpoenas.
• "We'll speak out. We will open investigations, and we will demand accountability," Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said Monday. "The one tool we do not have is the majority in this Congress. So that means our Republican colleagues have to say enough."

Reality check: So far, there's no sign Republicans will put up any resistance. In Trump's first two weeks in office, his administration has:

• Temporarily frozen all federal grants, loans and financial assistance, signaling a desire to challenge Congress' power of the purse.
• Offered "deferred resignations" to roughly 2 million federal workers, promising to pay them through September even though the government hasn't been funded past March 14.
• Fired at least 17 independent agency watchdogs, openly defying a statute requiring an explanation to Congress 30 days in advance.
• Fired federal prosecutors involved in Trump-related investigations and hinted at an additional purge for thousands of FBI agents.
• Signed an executive order directing the attorney general not to enforce the law Congress passed requiring TikTok to be sold by its Chinese parent company or face a U.S. ban.

What to watch: The courts acted swiftly to block Trump's most audacious Day One executive order: terminating birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants.

• Still, the judicial branch is inherently a slow-moving, last line of defense — one that Democrats can't always count on to curb Trump's executive encroachment.

Challenges to the U.S. government's checks and balances are likely to continue in the coming weeks, months and years.

• Trump officials are now discussing an executive order to dismantle the Department of Education, fulfilling a longtime conservative goal, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Elon Musk and his cost-slashing allies are taking a hammer to the massive bureaucracy that staffs the U.S. government — and a scalpel to any senior officials who dare put up a fight.

Why it matters: Musk isn't the only force driving the Trump administration's escalating purge of civil servants. But his fingerprints are everywhere, and his methods are unlike anything the federal government has ever seen.

Zoom in: Musk and his lieutenants — many of them Silicon Valley transplants, some as young as 19 — have been tied to a series of high-profile departures and ousters at the top of key federal agencies.

• The Treasury Department's highest-ranking career official announced his retirement Friday after a dispute with Musk allies who sought access to a sensitive system for government payments, The Washington Post scooped.
• David Lebryk, who worked at Treasury for more than three decades, was one of a few career officials who control the Bureau of Fiscal Service's technical checkbook, which disburses trillions of dollars in spending.
• "Truly a shocking move — Dave is a total apolitical professional who's been trusted by Treasury secretaries from both parties to maintain the critical financial plumbing of the U.S. govt," Biden Treasury official Mike Gwin tweeted in response to the news.

By late Friday, Musk's allies at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) had been granted full access to the payment system by newly confirmed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, according to the New York Times.

• "Career Treasury officials are breaking the law every hour of every day by approving payments that are fraudulent or do not match the funding laws passed by Congress," Musk claimed Saturday. "This needs to stop NOW!"
• "I can think of no good reason why political operators who have demonstrated a blatant disregard for the law would need access to these sensitive, mission-critical systems," Senate Finance ranking member Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) wrote in a letter demanding answers from Bessent.

The pattern repeated itself at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which Trump could be preparing to fold into the State Department — openly defying a congressional statute.

• A top HR official at USAID, which has become the epicenter of a vicious debate over foreign aid, was placed on administrative leave Thursday for trying to rescind a DOGE order purging career officials, the Post reports.
• On Saturday, two top security officials also were put on leave after trying to stop Musk allies from physically accessing USAID headquarters and personnel files, including classified information.
• "USAID is a criminal organization. Time for it to die," Musk tweeted in response to reports of the confrontation.

Behind the scenes: So far, the White House appears pleased with Musk's foray into the inner workings of the government, seeing his efforts as aligned with Trump's broader goals of disrupting D.C.'s status quo.

• "Elon's top interest outside of DOGE is making sure the president's orders are acted upon," a senior White House official told Axios. "Elon is the ultimate command-and-control guy. He's making sure there's a sense of urgency in the agencies."
• "What Elon's doing is great because he's an innovative businessman bringing business innovation to bear in government. That's why he's here," the official added.

But political risks are inherent in Musk's whirlwind takeover of federal agencies, especially when they intersect with his business interests.

• Democrats have accused Musk of pressuring former Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) head Mike Whitaker to resign Jan. 20 over $600,000 in fines the agency levied against Musk's SpaceX.
• Whitaker's departure left the FAA without a leader during Wednesday night's in-air collision near Reagan National Airport — the deadliest U.S. air disaster since 2001. Trump named Chris Rocheleau as FAA acting administrator the next day.

The big picture: Musk hasn't slowed down since helping orchestrate last week's stunning offer of "deferred resignations" for 2 million federal workers, which came days after he visited the Office of Personnel Management.

• Musk allies installed at the OPM have locked career officials out of computer systems that contain the personal data of millions of federal workers, Reuters reported Friday.

What we're watching: Musk paid a visit last week to what's likely to be his next target: the General Services Administration, which oversees thousands of government leases as part of its massive budget.

• "Deleted," Musk responded bluntly to an X post highlighting the billions of dollars and thousands of federal workers under GSA's control.

In his first national tragedy, President Trump posted like a pundit, speculated needlessly, and blamed Democrats and DEI without any evidence to suggest either were involved.

Why it matters: The traditional presidential playbook is boring by design — pray for the lost and their families, reassure the public, promise a swift investigation. That has never been Trump's style.

The big picture: Trump has responded to the deadliest U.S. air disaster in a generation with a similar approach that he took to COVID — which produced arguably the lowest moments of his first term.

• It's vintage Trump: His instincts for bare-knuckle brawling were a huge asset during his four years in the wilderness, helping to fuel a historic political comeback.
• But Trump is president now, not a powerless pundit. His words carry the weight of the U.S. government.

Zoom in: As bodies were still being recovered from the Wednesday night collision outside Reagan National Airport, Trump began a press conference at the White House with a moment of silence and request for national unity.

• Moments later, he pivoted sharply to attacking his Democratic predecessors, Presidents Biden and Obama, and accusing the Federal Aviation Administration of prioritizing diversity over air safety.
• He acknowledged an investigation was needed to determine the exact causes of the crashes, but cited "common sense" when asked how he knew diversity hiring could have played a role.
• "They actually came out with a directive — 'too white,'" Trump claimed of the FAA under Obama. "Their policy was horrible and their politics was even worse."

Trump later signed a memo ordering a review of all federal aviation hiring and safety decisions — and explicitly blaming his predecessors for the collision.

• "This shocking event follows problematic and likely illegal decisions during the Obama and Biden Administrations that minimized merit and competence" in the FAA, the memo alleged.

Reality check: There's no evidence that Obama or Biden's hiring policies at the FAA led to any kind of decline in aviation safety.

• The "disabilities" language that Trump now opposes was in FAA regulations during his entire first term and first appeared around 2013, according to the fact-checking website Snopes.
• The FAA administrator under Biden resigned when Trump took office, and the agency had been leaderless until Trump tapped Chris Rochealeau on Thursday, after the crash.

What they're saying: Democrats reacted with outrage at Trump's finger-pointing, with some lawmakers diverting blame to the president's gutting of a key aviation safety advisory committee and federal hiring freeze.

• "Despicable. As families grieve, Trump should be leading, not lying," tweeted former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, whom Trump accused of leading the diversity charge at the FAA.
• "We put safety first, drove down close calls, grew Air Traffic Control, and had zero commercial airline crash fatalities out of millions of flights on our watch," Buttigieg wrote.

Zoom out: Trump's knee-jerk politicization of the Potomac River crash fits a familiar pattern — one that was on display not only during his first term, but in the weeks before he took office this time.

• After Hurricane Helene ravaged North Carolina, Trump spread baseless conspiracy theories about the Biden administration purposely refusing to help mostly Republican areas and wasting emergency resources on migrants.
• When an American-born Army veteran drove through a crowd in New Orleans on New Year's Day, Trump falsely linked the terror attack to undocumented migrants crossing the border.
• And when the worst wildfires in California history unleashed mass devastation in Los Angeles, Trump blamed Gov. Gavin Newsom's water policies and floated the idea of placing conditions on federal disaster aid.

Flashback: In a post-2020 election autopsy, Trump's own pollster cited the president's handling of COVID as the leading cause of his defeat.

• Trump's daily pandemic press briefings and public attacks on his own health officials wore down the American public, which ultimately saw Biden as the steadier hand.
• Four years in opposition have helped Trump rehabilitate his image. But by reflexively blaming Democrats and DEI for the country's problems, Trump risks a repeat of the dynamics that weakened his first presidency.

The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) rescinded a memo Wednesday that had ordered a "temporary pause" on federal funding and unleashed major confusion across the country.

Why it matters: It's an astonishing reversal by the Trump administration, a day after top officials defended the funding freeze — which a judge temporarily halted on Tuesday — as necessary to ensure all government spending was aligned with the president's vision.

The latest: "This is NOT a rescission of the federal funding freeze. It is simply a rescission of the OMB memo," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a post on X.

• "Why? To end any confusion created by the court's injunction. The President's EO's on federal funding remain in full force and effect, and will be rigorously implemented," she added.
• It's unclear what exactly Leavitt meant, as it was the now-rescinded memo — not the executive orders Trump signed previously — that outlined the "temporary pause."

Catch up quick: The memo ordering the freeze, issued Monday night, had called for a pause on federal grant, loan and other financial assistance programs — potentially affecting billions or even trillions of dollars in spending.

• White House officials said it would not affect Medicare, Social Security, or other direct assistance that Americans "rely on," but the lack of detail left state governments, nonprofits, schools and other programs scrambling to determine whether they'd be impacted.
• Outages affecting Medicaid reimbursement portals across the country only added to the confusion, and Democrats seized on the chaos to mount their first significant and sustained attacks on the Trump administration.

What they're saying: "This is an important victory for the American people whose voices were heard after massive pressure from every corner of this country — real people made a difference by speaking out," Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said in a statement.

• "Still, the Trump administration — through a combination of sheer incompetence, cruel intentions, and a willful disregard of the law — caused real harm and chaos for millions over the span of the 48 hours which is still ongoing," she added.
• "Round one goes to Team America. We remain in the ring until far right extremism has been completely and totally knocked out," House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) tweeted.

The intrigue: Other Democrats argued the memo rescission was simply a sleight of hand, and that the Trump administration is seeking to circumvent lawsuits while keeping certain funding frozen.

• "Crisis is deepening, not abating. They are trying to ignore the court order," Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) warned.
• "This is just more confusion and chaos," tweeted New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is leading a group of states suing the administration. "We will be in court this afternoon."

This story is developing. Please check back for updates.

A potential constitutional crisis erupted Tuesday over the Trump administration's surprise federal funding freeze, jolting Democrats into action after months of strategic paralysis.

Why it matters: For the first time since President Trump won the election, the so-called Resistance is showing signs of life.

Senate Democrats moved with rare dexterity to block a GOP-led bill in one of the few places where they have real leverage, and blanketed social media with panicked reports from their constituents.

• House Democrats called an emergency meeting for Wednesday to plot a "comprehensive three-pronged counteroffensive" — targeting appropriations, litigation and communications.

Nonprofits — later joined by Democrat-led states — stormed the federal court system with lawsuits, leading a judge to temporarily halt the funding freeze at 5pm ET Tuesday.

What they're saying: "This is cruelty, this is lawlessness, this is a heist done on a national scale," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) told reporters in one of several press conferences by top Democrats, vowing to "fight this every way we can."

• "We need Democrats to use every procedural maneuver to grind things to [a] stop and use every media tool to raise alarm and allow public pressure to build," Ezra Levin, co-founder of progressive group Indivisible, said in a statement.
• "Shut down the Senate, refuse to allow them to steamroll, and take this fight to every town hall, courtroom, and news outlet."

State of play: The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) sent shockwaves through Washington on Monday night with a memo directing agencies to "temporarily pause" grants, loans and federal financial assistance programs to ensure they align with Trump's priorities.

• "This is not a blanket pause," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt stressed as she was bombarded with questions about the freeze in her first press briefing Tuesday.
• "Social Security benefits, Medicare benefits, food stamps, welfare benefits, assistance that is going directly to individuals will not be impacted by this pause," she said.

Leavitt then told reporters she would check into whether Medicaid — the nation's largest health insurance program, covering 72 million mostly low-income Americans — would be affected.

• In the meantime, reports flooded in from all 50 states about Medicaid reimbursement systems being inaccessible — prompting the White House to issue a statement acknowledging an online "outage."
• "We have confirmed no payments have been affected — they are still being processed and sent. We expect the portal will be back online shortly," Leavitt said.

The big picture: For more than a week, Trump has overwhelmed his critics with an unrelenting flood of executive orders, government purges and bureaucratic maneuvering.

• On Tuesday alone, Trump offered to buy out any federal employees who resign by Feb. 6, and signed an executive order aiming to restrict youth gender-affirming care — diverting headlines from the funding freeze.
• Some of Trump's moves have pushed the lines of legality, including his mass firing of government watchdogs and purging of pro-worker influence at the National Labor Relations Board.
• But nothing has broken through like the funding memo, which sent state governments, nonprofits, schools, emergency workers and even some GOP officials scrambling to determine whether they'd be affected.

Between the lines: Besides billions of dollars in federal funding, something far more fundamental could be at stake in the coming legal battle — Congress' power of the purse.

• Trump and his nominee for OMB director, Russ Vought, have argued that the Impoundment Control Act — a Nixon-era law that restricts presidents from withholding funding passed by Congress — is unconstitutional.
• An FAQ sheet distributed by the OMB Tuesday claims Trump's "temporary pause" doesn't constitute an "impoundment." But that hasn't satisfied Democrats, given Vought's defense of the impoundment power in his confirmation hearing.
• "What happened last night is the most direct assault on the authority of Congress, I believe, in the history of the United States," Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) warned Tuesday.

The federal government is going MAGA — fast.

Why it matters: President Trump has only been in office a week, but the departments under his command are moving with blazing speed to transform the federal bureaucracy into an army of loyalists.

• The new administration immediately moved to freeze nearly all foreign aid, root out DEI programs, remove officials and whole offices deemed ideologically suspect, and muzzle public health agencies.
• "We're getting rid of all of the cancer ... caused by the Biden administration," Trump told reporters while signing a Day One executive order that stripped employment protections from civil servants.

Driving the news: Late Friday night, the White House fired 17 inspectors general — independent agency watchdogs responsible for identifying fraud, waste and corruption.

• The mass firings, relayed via email, appear to violate a federal law that requires the administration to notify Congress 30 days before removing inspectors general.
• Amid outrage from Democrats and ethics experts, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) — a Trump ally and longtime advocate for whistleblowers — called on the president to explain his decision to Congress.

Zoom in: DEI offices and programs have been shuttered across the government, including at the CIA, Department of Veterans Affairs, Army and Air Force, and the Federal Aviation Administration.

• Federal workers have been ordered to report colleagues who may seek to "disguise" DEI efforts by using "coded language."
• And Trump directed federal agencies to each identify "up to nine" major companies, universities or non-profits to investigate over their DEI practices.

There have been hundreds of staff removals or reassignments, including at the State Department, where far more career officers were asked to resign than in past administrations.

• The Department of Justice reassigned at least 15 senior career officials, including a top counterintelligence attorney involved in the FBI's investigation of classified documents Trump stashed at Mar-a-Lago.
• The DOJ also rescinded job offers to recent law school graduates who were placed through the Attorney General's Honors program.
• Trump's National Security Council sent home around 160 staffers while Trump officials conducted loyalty screenings to ensure they're aligned with his agenda.
• One of the administration's highest-profile firings so far was Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Linda Fagan, the first woman to lead a branch of the U.S. military. She was accused of leadership failures and an "excessive focus" on DEI at the Coast Guard Academy.

Between the lines: Trump loyalists have also moved to centralize control around public messaging, particularly when it comes to public health.

• The Department of Health and Human Services ordered an unprecedented "immediate pause" on all health reports and social media posts through at least the end of the month, leading scientists to cancel CDC meetings on the escalating bird flu outbreak.
• The Pentagon also ordered a global pause on all official social media posts until the confirmation of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who has promised a radical culture shakeup across the U.S. military.

The new administration is also moving quickly on issues including LGBTQ and civil rights.

• The State Department froze all passport applications with "X" designated as the gender.
• DOJ ordered a freeze on civil rights litigation and is weighing a potential reversal of police reform agreements negotiated by the Biden administration.
• It also ordered federal prosecutors to investigate local and state officials in so-called "sanctuary cities."
• Meanwhile, the Pentagon moved to abolish an office set up during the Biden administration focused on curbing civilian deaths in combat operations.

Zoom out: Trump made no secret of his intentions to build a MAGA-aligned federal workforce during the campaign, and he quickly imposed a hiring freeze after taking office.

• The vast majority of federal workers are career employees, not political appointments, but the president has made clear he wants them all to board the Trump train.
• His administration is currently testing the ability to email the entire federal government workforce from a single email address.

What to watch: Trump's nominee to lead the Office of Management and Budget, Russ Vought, will be a key architect of the White House's efforts to re-engineer the administrative state.

• Vought has assailed "the woke and weaponized bureaucracy," and said in a 2023 speech to his conservative think tank that he wants to put federal bureaucrats "in trauma," ProPublica reported.
• "When they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains," Vought said — comments he defended during his confirmation hearing.

President Trump left Washington four years ago touting a revolutionary new consensus on the threat posed by China.

• He returned this week seeming to downplay that threat — signaling a potential thaw in relations between the world's two leading superpowers.

Why it matters: The stakes are enormous. How Trump deals with Chinese President Xi Jinping over the next four years will have sweeping implications for the global economy, AI, climate change, national security and more.

The big picture: After mentioning China just once in his inauguration address, Trump revealed he's considering 10% tariffs on Chinese products — far lower than the 60% duties he had threatened during the campaign.

• Trump held a phone call with Xi just days before the inauguration to discuss trade, fentanyl and TikTok — the Chinese-owned app that the president is now seeking to protect from a U.S. ban.
• Beijing's readout of the call was exceedingly warm, with state media declaring the two superpowers "can become partners and friends ... prosper together, and benefit both countries and the world."

Trump has struck a similar tone with his own rhetoric, even while insisting on the need for trade "fairness" and criticizing China for its operations near the Panama Canal.

• "I like President Xi very much. I've always liked him. We always had a very good relationship," he said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, acknowledging tensions ran high during the COVID pandemic.
• Trump went on to say he hopes China "can help us stop the war" in Ukraine, citing Beijing's close ties with Russia — and even suggested the three countries could work together on "denuclearization."

What they're saying: Trump's early actions undoubtedly signal a "more restrained" approach to Beijing, Jacques deLisle, a China scholar at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, tells Axios.

• In a remarkable moment on Fox News, Trump was pressed by interviewer Sean Hannity on why he has defended TikTok given its reputation as a "spying app for the Communist Chinese."
• "You can say that about everything made in China," Trump shot back, citing cell phones and other imports. "Is it that important for China to be spying on young people, on young kids watching crazy videos?"

Flashback: It was Trump who first signed an executive order in 2020 warning China could use TikTok to conduct disinformation campaigns, build data dossiers for blackmail, and conduct corporate espionage on U.S. soil.

Between the lines: Investors like the sound of what Lu Zhou, CEO of investment firm Vanquor, called "a more pragmatic economic approach towards China."

• Zhou predicted Trump would "artfully implement certain tariffs on China" to satisfy the American people and his voters, but potentially hold back on blanket tariffs to satisfy certain Chinese officials.
• Mark Malek, chief investment officer of Siebert.NXT, agreed that Trump appears to be moderating his stance toward China — a dynamic that Wall Street and the bond markets "would love to see" continue.

The intrigue: Some experts believe Elon Musk could be a moderating influence on Trump's approach to China.

• Tesla has a factory in Shanghai and gets about 37% of its sales from China, according to Evercore ISI estimates, and Musk rarely criticizes Beijing —while constantly railing against "censorship" in Western countries.
• So if China were to retaliate against the U.S. over tariffs, TikTok or other Trump policies, Tesla would make a convenient target — especially now that Musk is so close to the new president.
• Chinese officials have also privately discussed the possibility of selling TikTok to Musk to allow the app to keep operating in the U.S., Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal reported last week.

Reality check: Trump's Cabinet is stocked with China hawks like Secretary of State Marco Rubio and national security adviser Michael Waltz.

• Few experts view Trump's first week as a full retreat from his previous policy views, especially his plans for tariffs.
• "If the question is, 'Are we going to be back to sunshine and puppies?', the answer is definitely not," deLisle says.

What to watch: Trump's policies toward Taiwan, which Beijing has vowed to bring under its control, could be the ultimate indicator of where U.S.-China relations are heading.

• "Taiwan doesn't give us anything. Taiwan is 9,500 miles away. It's 68 miles away from China," Trump told Bloomberg Businessweek when asked whether the U.S. would come to the island's defense.
• "They did take about 100% of our chip business," he added. "I think, Taiwan should pay us for defense."

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) condemned Elon Musk for making a series of Nazi-related jokes on X, calling it "inappropriate and offensive to make light" of the "singularly evil" Holocaust.

Why it matters: Just days earlier, the ADL had defended Musk over an awkward hand gesture he made during an inauguration event that drew comparisons to a Nazi salute — saying "all sides should give one another a bit of grace."

• "This is a delicate moment. It's a new day and yet so many are on edge. Our politics are inflamed, and social media only adds to the anxiety," the ADL, an organization dedicated to fighting antisemitism, wrote on X.
• "It seems that Elon Musk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute, but again, we appreciate that people are on edge."

In the days since, Musk has mocked media outlets and liberals who fanned the controversy, accusing them of a "dirty tricks" campaign to smear him over his support for Trump.

• On Thursday morning, Musk rattled off a series of puns referencing prominent Nazis like chief propagandist Joseph Goebbels and Heinrich Himmler.
• "Bet you did nazi that coming," Musk wrote on X along with a laughing emoji.

What they're saying: "Making inappropriate and highly offensive jokes that trivialize the Holocaust only serve to minimize the evil and inhumanity of Nazi crimes, denigrate the suffering of both victims and survivors and insult the memory of the six million Jews murdered in the Shoah," the ADL said in a statement.

Flashback: Almost exactly one year ago to the day, Musk visited the former Nazi concentration camp in Auschwitz, Poland, as part of an apology tour for endorsing an antisemitic post on X.

• Musk later said "it might be literally the worst and dumbest post I've ever done."

President Trump's threats of retribution are rapidly materializing in policies across the U.S. government, an early warning to Trump critics that bygones will not be bygones.

Why it matters: Trump is flexing his vast new powers to target what he's described as "the enemies from within" — enforcing loyalty tests, purging career officials and attempting to rewrite the history of the last eight years.

• Trump has at times downplayed his thirst for revenge — but his first moves back in office suggest resentment against Democrats, former allies, prosecutors and the media will be a driving force in his second term.
• "For those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution," the president promised supporters on the campaign trail.

Zoom in: Some of Trump's acts of vengeance this week have been petty and personal.

• On Day 1 as president, he revoked the security clearances of 51 former intelligence officials who signed a letter in 2020 saying the Hunter Biden laptop scandal carried "classic earmarks" of a Russian disinformation campaign.
• On Day 2, he publicly fired thousands of Biden presidential council appointees, including former Joints Chief of Staff chairman Gen. Mark Milley and Biden-supporting celebrity chef José Andrés.
• The Pentagon also removed a portrait of Milley — who Trump once suggested should be executed for treason — just hours after inauguration.

Other Trump moves have been far more serious.

• Within hours of taking office, Trump revoked Secret Service protection for his former national security adviser John Bolton, who has been targeted for assassination by Iran.
• He pardoned about 1,500 supporters convicted or charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, including hundreds who violently attacked the police officers protecting the building.
• Trump's new FCC chair plans to reinstate complaints against ABC, CBS and NBC for allegedly biased coverage, which the former Democratic chair had dismissed as a partisan attempt to "curtail freedom of the press."

The big picture: In his 2023 book, Trump's ultra loyalist nominee for FBI director, Kash Patel, compiled a list of "government gangsters" he said should be targeted for sabotaging Trump's first presidency.

• Even with Patel's confirmation in flux, there are clear indications that the second Trump administration will channel his aggressive approach to rooting out the so-called "Deep State."
• On Day 1, Trump moved to strip thousands of civil servants of their employment protections. Roughly 160 National Security Council career officials already have been sidelined amid loyalty screenings.
• At least 15 senior Justice Department officials have been removed or reassigned, including one who played a key role in the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago in August 2022 as prosecutors sought evidence that Trump had mishandled classified documents.

Between the lines: In his final days in office, Biden pardoned Milley, Anthony Fauci, former Rep. Liz Cheney and members of his own family as a precautionary measure against the retribution Trump had telegraphed.

• Trump and his allies have harshly criticized Biden, and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) suggested Wednesday that House Republicans may investigate the circumstances of the pardons.
• Johnson also announced a new subcommittee that would continue investigating "the false narratives peddled by" the Jan. 6 committee — a sign Trump will have allies on Capitol Hill as he pursues his revenge tour.
• "I went through four years of hell by this scum we had to deal with," Trump told Fox News' Sean Hannity when asked if the attorney general should investigate his enemies. "It's really hard to say they shouldn't have to go through it also."

President Trump moved to obliterate the outer bounds of executive power Monday, igniting a series of constitutional showdowns that could curtail — or enable — his vision for a maximalist second term.

Why it matters: Within hours of taking office, Trump dared the courts, Congress and his fragmented opposition to stand in the way of what could be his most enduring legacy: a radical expansion of presidential power.

• He did so publicly and with a flourish — signing an initial batch of executive orders in front of a roaring crowd at Capitol One Arena, before returning to the White House.
• There, Trump signed a barrage of executive orders, announced that Canada and Mexico are likely to face 25% tariffs beginning Feb. 1, and pardoned roughly 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants.

Trump also commuted the sentences of 14 Oath Keepers and Proud Boys convicted of seditious conspiracy— an extraordinary act of clemency for far-right extremists who sought to overthrow the government on Jan. 6.

• Many of the Jan. 6 defendants — targeted in the largest Justice Department investigation in U.S. history — were sentenced by Trump-appointed judges.
• "They've already been in jail for a long time," Trump said when asked if there should be any punishment for supporters who attacked police officers. "These people have been destroyed."

Zoom in: One of Trump's Oval Office executive orders stands out for its ambition and audacity: a declaration ending birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants.

• Birthright citizenship is enshrined in the Constitution, but Trump's order seeks to "clarify" the language in the 14 Amendment to exclude undocumented immigrants.
• The ACLU and other immigrant rights groups already are planning to sue to block the executive order, and legal experts widely expect it to be struck down by the courts.

Still, new evidence has emerged to suggest that Trump — emboldened by his historic political comeback and a record-high approval rating — may be willing to circumvent or openly defy U.S. law in his second term.

• Trump has refused, for example, to enforce the U.S. ban on TikTok — despite the law passing with the support of over 80% of Congress, and being unanimously upheld by the Supreme Court.
• Instead, he signed an executive order — without citing any legal authority — giving himself "the right" to find a buyer or ultimately ban the Chinese-owned app in 75 days.

The big picture: Trump's other Day 1 actions vividly illustrate his desire to concentrate power in the executive branch, even while Republicans control both chambers of Congress.

• The new president issued 10 executive orders on immigration, including a national emergency declaration allowing the Pentagon to redirect funds and deploy additional troops at the southern border.
• Trump also designated drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, potentially paving the way for the U.S. to deploy special forces in Mexico without permission from Congress.
• He issued an executive order that could strip thousands of civil servants of their employment protections, making it easier to fire federal employees deemed to be "disloyal."
• And even with U.S. fossil fuel production at record highs, Trump declared a "national energy emergency," unlocking new authorities to increase drilling and bypass environmental and climate regulations.

The other side: Trump allies argue President Biden's own actions in his final days in office amount to a greater abuse of executive authority than anything Trump has done.

• That includes Biden's unilateral declaration that the Equal Rights Amendment, which was passed by Congress in 1972 but not ratified by enough states in time, is "the law of the land."
• Biden also issued preemptive pardons for five members of his family in his final minutes in power, citing "unrelenting attacks and threats" of prosecution by Trump allies.

What they're saying: Trump's blizzard of executive orders has exhilarated his base, who see it as proof that he's willing to steamroll the "Deep State" to fulfill his campaign promises.

• But his rapid consolidation of power has unnerved liberals, institutionalists and even some Republicans who are skeptical of big government.
• "In America, we abide by the rule of law. Even when the law comes for a popular app — TikTok — that the MAGA king likes," Joe Lonsdale, a Silicon Valley magnate who supports Trump, wrote in the Free Press.

Years of debate, months of procrastination and weeks of panic have brought the U.S. to the brink of banning TikTok — a bipartisan achievement that top politicians suddenly want nothing to do with.

Why it matters: On the eve of his inauguration, President-elect Trump is facing an enormous challenge to his popularity, his executive power and his word. He has vowed to save TikTok — but failed to explain how he can do so without violating U.S. law.

The latest: The Supreme Court on Friday upheld the law passed by Congress last year that forces Chinese parent company ByteDance to divest from TikTok by Jan. 19, or else face a ban in the U.S.

• The decision was unanimous, with all nine justices shrugging off a brief from Trump asking the court to delay the ban so that his administration could "pursue a negotiated resolution."
• President Biden, who signed the TikTok bill into law, will not enforce the ban — saying in a statement Friday that "actions to implement the law simply must fall" to the Trump administration, given the timing.
• TikTok, meanwhile, said the app "will be forced to go dark" on Sunday unless the Biden administration "immediately provides a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers assuring non-enforcement."

State of play: Trump is now in a serious bind.

• It was his administration that spearheaded the initial push to ban TikTok via executive order in 2020, citing the national security threat posed by Beijing's potential influence over the app and its user data.
• Trump became a defender of TikTok once he realized how powerful it could be as a campaign messaging tool, especially among young people.
• Now, for many of the platform's 170 million American users, Trump's first day in office threatens to be overshadowed by — or worse, forever tied to — the disappearance of TikTok from app stores.

What to watch: Trump is considering an executive order delaying enforcement of the TikTok ban to give the administration time to find a U.S. buyer, despite ByteDance's refusal to sell for the past eight months.

• It's unclear how the executive order could bypass the letter of the law, and app stores run by Google and Apple could face fines and liability risk if they ignore the Supreme Court's ruling.
• Still, Trump is trying: He discussed TikTok with Chinese President Xi Jinping in a phone call Friday, and has invited TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew to be a VIP at Monday's inauguration.

The intrigue: One of the biggest obstacles to Trump's salvation mission is his own party.

• Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), the chair of the Intelligence Committee, blocked Democrats' attempt to extend the deadline for the ban on Thursday.
• "Let me be crystal clear: there will be no extensions, no concessions, and no compromises for TikTok," Cotton said, echoing the hawkish language typical of most Republicans before Trump's change of heart.
• Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Trump's nominee for secretary of state, was among the very first lawmakers to raise the alarm about TikTok in October 2019 — though he has indicated he will now defer to Trump.

Between the lines: In many ways, the dynamics around banning TikTok are a microcosm of the broader debate over the U.S.-China competition.

• "Decoupling" the two economies may sound like the shrewd national security approach, but the practical consequences — and potential for public backlash — are staggering.
• In the days leading up to the ban, hundreds of thousands of self-described "TikTok refugees" have downloaded the Chinese app RedNote — its name believed to be a reference to Mao Ze Dong's "Little Red Book."
• The cross-pollination has led to an unprecedented cultural exchange between young Americans and Chinese users — and an anti-U.S. propaganda coup that Beijing could only have dreamed of.

LOS ANGELES — Elon Musk and his allies are waging a ruthless information war in California, sensing opportunity in the ashes of the most destructive wildfires in state history.

Why it matters: For decades, Republicans have tried and failed to end Democrats' near-monopoly on power in the nation's most populous state. This time, they insist, the conditions are ripe for a reckoning.

Driving the news: More than a week after the Palisades Fire erupted — and with three major infernos still burning — Republicans are still flooding the zone with allegations of gross mismanagement by California Democrats.

• For conservatives emboldened by Donald Trump's victory, the targets are familiar: DEI programs at the Los Angeles Fire Department, undocumented immigrants, red tape — even aid to Ukraine.
• Trump, Musk and other MAGA influencers have spread misinformation about water policies in California, while downplaying the role of climate change in fostering historically dry conditions.

As his allies gleefully mused about flipping California in the next election, Musk predicted the state's burdensome regulations would accelerate the electorate's rightward trend.

• "The real red pill will come when people try to get permits to rebuild their homes and face multiyear waits," Musk wrote on X, racking up nearly 50 million views on his post.
• California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed an executive order this week waiving permitting requirements for fire victims seeking to rebuild their homes, and has pushed to slash red tape as the GOP attacks have escalated.

Zoom in: The political danger is most acute for LA Mayor Karen Bass, a former U.S. House Democrat who was on President Biden's short list to be his running mate in 2020.

• Bass, who was elected in 2022 and is up for reelection next year, has been pilloried for traveling to Ghana a day after the National Weather Service warned of dangerous fire conditions in LA.
• Her 2022 opponent Rick Caruso, a billionaire real estate developer and former Republican, has seized on the crisis as he weighs another run for mayor — or for governor.

Newsom — one of the most prominent Democrats in the country amid the party's post-election leadership vacuum — is widely expected to run for president in 2028.

• He's been front-and-center in countering MAGA's messaging offensive but expressed a desire to work with Trump on the recovery effort, despite their verbal sparring.
• "I get the California Derangement Syndrome. I've been living with that for years and years," Newsom told MSNBC, excoriating Trump and Musk for spreading "lies" about the wildfire response.

The big picture: Musk's bluster aside, Democrats acknowledge they face serious challenges in California that predate the fires — and that their supermajority in the legislature makes it difficult to blame Republicans.

• Crime, homelessness, illegal immigration, high prices and an intractable housing crisis helped Trump increase his vote share in 45 of California's 58 counties in 2024.
• In Los Angeles County — which shifted an astonishing 11 points to the right — a progressive district attorney was defeated by a former Republican who vowed to crack down on crime.
• California voters overwhelmingly passed a ballot measure, Prop 36, to increase penalties for drug and theft crimes, and recalled Oakland's mayor and local district attorney over public safety issues.

Reality check: The main beneficiaries of California's backlash have been independents and moderate Democrats — not Republicans, and certainly not the strain of MAGA Republicans publicly agitating for a revolution.

• Most Californians believe climate change is contributing to the fires, even if they're unhappy with state leadership's handling of the crisis.
• House Republicans' threat to condition federal aid to California, meanwhile, risks public blowback at a moment of vulnerability for Democrats.

What to watch: Republicans today are flush with billionaire cash and influence, much of it concentrated in Silicon Valley, Hollywood and other parts of California where supporting Trump is no longer taboo.

• Flipping the state is still a "long-term project," as pro-Trump activist Charlie Kirk put it last month — but one that could be accelerated by this type of systemic shock.
• "We don't see these shifts overnight," California Assembly Republican leader James Gallagher said in a local news interview. "Texas was once a blue state, and slowly but surely it became a red state."