Five former defense secretaries issued a scathing letter on Thursday assailing President Donald Trump for firing the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and other senior officers.
In an open letter published Thursday, former Defense Secretaries James Mattis, Leon Panetta, Lloyd Austin, Chuck Hagel, and William Perry urged Congress to hold immediate hearings on Trump's recent firings of Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. CQ Brown and several other senior military leaders.
They said senators should "refuse to confirm" any new DOD nominations in response to the firings.
In the letter, they alleged that Trump’s actions undermined "our all-volunteer force and weaken our national security" and they accused the president of trying to turn the apolitical U.S. military into an instrument of partisan politics and using firings, which extend to the top Army, Navy and Air Force lawyers, to do so.
All defense secretaries but one, James Mattis, served under Democratic administrations.
Trump announced the firings late on Friday, but his administration has yet to clarify in any detail what caused the unprecedented shakeup, which also included the dismissal of the head of the Navy, Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first female officer to lead a military service.
Air Force General C.Q. Brown was only the second Black officer to become Joint Chiefs chairman and he was less than halfway through his four-year term when he was let go.
"Mr. Trump's dismissals raise troubling questions about the administration's desire to politicize the military," they wrote. "We, like many Americans - including many troops - are therefore left to conclude that these leaders are being fired for purely partisan reasons."
Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House for comment on the letter.
The former defense secretaries called on Congress to hold hearings to "assess the national security implications" of Trump's dismissals. Republicans hold a majority in both chambers.
The letter cautioned that the actions at the Pentagon could deter Americans from choosing a life in the military, should their careers be judged through the lens of partisan politics. It could also have a chilling effect on speaking "truth to power," they cautioned.
"We write to urge the U.S. Congress to hold Mr. Trump to account for these reckless actions and to exercise fully its Constitutional oversight responsibilities," they wrote.
Fox News’ Liz Friden and Reuters contributed to this report.
"The great people of Iraq of all religions and ethnicities are the inheritors of an amazing civilization," he said in another post. "They deserve more than to be ruled by the terrorist regime in Iran. Biden abandoned the nonsectarian protest movement in Iraq. We must empower the Iraqi people to Make Iraq Great Again and Free Iraq from Iran."
"Defund Iraq," he declared in another post.
In another post Wilson advocated several policies, one of which is to "Cut all aid to Iraq as long as Iran runs Iraq."
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy isn’t backing down from seeking NATO membership for Ukraine despite the fact that President Donald Trump has said the Ukrainian leader "could forget about" joining the military alliance.
Still, Zelenskyy is all in on securing NATO membership for his country, and he said Sunday he would step down as president if it meant NATO adopted Ukraine. Zelenskyy reiterated his position Wednesday and told the BBC, "I want to find a NATO path or something similar."
"If we don’t get security guarantees, we won’t have a ceasefire, nothing will work, nothing," Zelenskyy said.
Zelenskyy is slated to visit the White House on Friday, and Trump told reporters on Thursday that a peace negotiation to end the war between Ukraine and Russia is in the final stages. Even so, no deal is secured, and Trump hesitated to discuss plans regarding a peacekeeping force in the region until one was signed.
Although Trump said on Thursday he believes that Russian President Vladimir Putin will uphold his end of a peace deal, several experts claim Zelenskyy remains adamant about pushing for Ukraine to become a NATO member because it reduces the likelihood that Putin could resume hostilities, and it means that other security guarantees are more likely.
Article 5 of the NATO treaty stipulates that if a member country is attacked, it will be considered an attack against all NATO members and requires other NATO countries to take action, including the use of armed forces.
Peter Rough, a senior fellow and director of the Center on Europe and Eurasia at the Hudson Institute think tank, said that with backing from the West, Ukraine becomes bigger than Russia.
"Putin would have to think twice about restarting a war if he thinks the major Western powers are obligated to defend Ukraine," Rough said in a Thursday email to Fox News Digital. "Of course, bringing Ukraine into NATO would put American (and European) skin and credibility in the game. That explains Trump’s hesitation, even resistance to such a concept."
Rough said Zelenskyy’s "fallback position" if NATO membership isn’t possible is to secure support from Western troops to promote a ceasefire. For example, U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced on Feb. 16 that the U.K. was ready to send troops to Ukraine if necessary to ensure peace between Ukraine and Russia.
"If all else fails, then, Zelenskyy may have to settle for continued financing and military assistance," Rough said. "But he isn’t going to negotiate with himself, which is why he remains adamant about security guarantees in public."
John Hardie, the deputy director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Russia program, said another conflict between Russia and Ukraine is likely and that the "hard truth" is the negotiations from the Trump administration won’t "resolve the fundamental question at stake in this war."
"Putin’s goal isn’t just to grab some more territory in eastern Ukraine," Hardie said in an email to Fox News Digital. "He remains determined to make Ukraine itself into a vassal state and to rewrite the broader security order in Europe."
As a result, Hardie said NATO membership for Ukraine provides the best option for preserving Ukraine’s safety against Russian aggression. Although that’s a no from Trump, Hardie said the U.S. does need to articulate just how much support it can offer for European troops who will provide a post-war security presence in the region.
For example, Starmer told reporters on Feb. 17 that any reassurance force would require a "U.S. backstop because a U.S. security guarantee is the only way to effectively deter Russia from attacking Ukraine again."
"The Trump administration needs to provide Europe with clarity on what U.S. contribution it can expect," Hardie said. "Ukraine will also need a continued supply of military aid from the West, including the United States, though there are ways to reduce the burden on American taxpayers, such as the use of frozen Russian assets."
Zelenskyy told reporters Wednesday he is prepared to broach "very important questions" with Trump during their Friday visit, including whether the U.S. will continue to provide aid to Ukraine. Congress has appropriated $175 billion since 2022 for aid to Ukraine, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
To recoup some of these costs, Trump said Zelenskyy is expected to sign a rare-earth minerals deal that will allow the U.S. and Ukraine to partner on developing resources like oil and gas.
The agreement will permit the U.S. access to Ukraine’s minerals and will also help Ukraine rebuild from the war, Trump said.
"We're going to be signing really a very important agreement for both sides, because it's really going to get us into that country," Trump told reporters Thursday. "We'll have a lot of people working there and so, in that sense, it's very good."
President Donald Trump filled two more roles within his administration late Thursday by announcing who will be serving as deputy secretary of commerce and under secretary of the Navy.
Trump selected former Virginia congressional candidate, Hung Cao, to serve as the next under secretary of the Navy and former under secretary of energy for science, Paul Dabbar, to serve as deputy secretary of commerce.
The president congratulated both men, who are Navy veterans and graduates of the United States Naval Academy, in separate Truth Social posts Thursday night.
Cao, who came to the U.S. in 1975 after his family escaped Vietnam shortly before the fall of Saigon, most recently ran for U.S. Senate in Virginia against Democrat Sen. Tim Kaine during the 2024 election, losing to the incumbent senator. He was endorsed by Trump during the race.
He retired from the Navy as a captain after 25 years in Special Operations. While Cao served in combat roles, he also worked at the Pentagon and was assigned to balancing the Navy's $140 billion budget.
"Hung is the embodiment of the American Dream. As a refugee to our Great Nation, Hung worked tirelessly to make proud the Country that gave his family a home. He went to our amazing United States Naval Academy, and later earned his Master’s Degree in Physics. Hung served in combat as a Special Operations Officer for twenty five years. With Hung’s experience both in combat, and in the Pentagon, he will get the job done. Congratulations to Hung, and his wonderful family!" Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Cao thanked the president for selecting him in a post on X and said "let's get to work."
Dabbar, who worked in Trump's Department of Energy during his first term, served in the Navy as a submarine officer and spent years after his military career working in the energy sector as a managing director at J.P. Morgan.
Trump said Dabbar will work with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to "bring back American Leadership in Global Commerce, Trade, and Technology."
"Paul served as my Under Secretary of Energy for Science, where he lead the National Labs that started as the Manhattan Project, helping to drive semiconductors, AI, quantum, Energy Dominance, and our War-fighting capabilities," Trump wrote on Truth Social, in part.
The president still has to announce his picks for hundreds of smaller positions, but has nearly rounded out his Cabinet. Of the 22 nominations made that require Senate confirmation, 19 have been confirmed as of Thursday.
Illinois taxpayers paid out $1.6 billion for healthcare programs for illegal immigrants since 2020, well above the spending projections estimated by Democrat Gov. JB Pritzker’s administration, per a new state audit released this week at the request of GOP legislators.
The audit also found that, in many cases, state money was spent on people who were actually U.S. citizens or otherwise eligible for federal programs.
"This audit shows that the governor, that the program was rampant in overspending. It spent well in excess of 200% more than what was estimated in budgets and in appropriations," state Senate Republican leader John Curran told Fox News Digital in an interview.
"And it also showed that the governor was unable to manage this program," he said. "Thousands of people were allowed to sign up for free healthcare for years on the state taxpayer dime that should not have been eligible under the parameters laid out for this program, and the governor failed to even seek federal reimbursement when eligible on certain services for years, leaving federal dollars on the table."
Illinois Auditor General Frank J. Mautino flagged more than 6,000 people listed as "undocumented" in the programs but who had Social Security numbers, and some of those individuals may actually be legal permanent residents who are eligible for Medicaid, meaning the state could get federal funding for them. The state reviewed 94 cases and found that 19 should have been classified as legal residents instead of noncitizens.
There were also nearly 700 people in the senior health program who were under 65. A review confirmed that many of the errors were due to incorrect birth dates, which were corrected later.
Nearly 400 enrollees appeared to have been in the country for more than five years and should have qualified for Medicaid, the audit also found. The state acknowledged that some of those people were enrolled incorrectly, which cost the state federal matching funds. The report recommended that the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services seek federal reimbursement for the lost funds.
The auditor's report, which Curran dubbed "gross mismanagement" in a press conference, was released just one week after Pritzker suggested cutting funding for a program that offers Medicaid-like coverage to illegal immigrants under 65 or legal immigrants without a green card. The proposed reduction, expected to save $330 million, was a key part of Pritzker's strategy to address a more than $3 billion budget shortfall.
"The governor was papering over this large spending with tax increases over the last several years, as well as COVID relief funds being spent on this rather than actually trying to rein in spending in the state of Illinois," Curran said. "Now that federal dollars have tapered off, we have a large budget deficit in Illinois this year and the governor is now being forced to try to end the program for all working adults."
"We cannot afford this," Curran continued. "The state of Illinois, state taxpayers, should not be burdened with providing free healthcare, especially for [the] working-age population. People that should be out and working in paying taxes and getting healthcare in the marketplace, just like every other Illinois state taxpayer is doing, so we want to bring the program to an end."
As of December, 41,505 individuals were enrolled in the two programs, part of the Health Benefits for Immigrant Adults program, which Pritzker has proposed cutting starting July 1.
Despite Pritzker's plan to cut funding for healthcare programs, he said during a Wednesday press conference that he supports some kind of universal health coverage: "The broader context is people need to get health care."
He added, "It’s some evidence, anyway, that there are an awful lot of people out there that need coverage who aren’t getting it or who will do anything to get it, and I think that’s a sad state of affairs in our society."
Curran said "Pritzker, from day 1, is taking an adversarial approach to President Donald Trump and his administration, and that has really put Illinois and really the city of Chicago in focus."
"What we would like to see is a more cooperative tone," he said.
Hundreds of illegal immigrants in Chicago, which is deemed a sanctuary city, have been detained by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement since Trump took office.
Both Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson bucked Trump's mass deportation move, vowing in January to protect residents regardless of their immigration status.
Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Cali., is demanding that Elon Musk and Acting Director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Charles Ezell stop sending mass emails to staffers.
In an open letter published Thursday, Padilla said several legislative branch offices and agencies have received mass emails from [email protected] despite not being subject to personnel actions by the executive branch.
"Neither the White House nor [the Department of Government Efficiency] nor OPM have any authority or legitimate purpose to mass email legislative branch offices and agencies demanding information from employees or to threaten adverse personnel actions," Padilla said.
Over the weekend, the OPM sent out mass emails to federal government workers, asking them to summarize what they did over the prior week using five bullet points. They had until 11:59 p.m. on Monday to provide their responses to the inquiry.
Padilla said these emails, received by legislative staffers, wasted "time and resources and potentially [mislead] employees into responding and sharing legislative branch information in an unauthorized manner."
Padilla added that the emails were "especially concerning" since several executive branch agencies have "even warned their own employees not to respond to these messages because doing so would risk sensitive information falling into the hands of malign foreign actors."
"The fact that these mass emails are also going beyond the scope of the executive branch is yet another sign of how DOGE is operating in an uninformed, poorly executed, and chaotic manner," Padilla said.
The Democratic lawmaker ended his letter requesting that DOGE and OPM confirm they have taken steps "to ensure that they will cease directly any further mass email communications at legislative branch offices and agencies and their employees."
Things got awkward when Vice President JD Vance remarked on his previous comments on Britain's free speech environment, just feet away from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer during an Oval Office meeting.
Vance doubled down on his comments at the Munich Security Conference earlier this month when he said he feared that free speech was "in retreat" in Europe.
"To many of us on the other side of the Atlantic, it looks more and more like old entrenched interests hiding behind ugly Soviet-era words like misinformation and disinformation, who simply don’t like the idea that somebody with an alternative viewpoint might express a different opinion or, God forbid, vote a different way, or even worse, win an election," Vance said.
On Thursday, as Starmer met with President Donald Trump and administration officials at the White House, Vance stood by his comments.
"I said what I said, which is that we do have, of course, a special relationship with our friends in the U.K. and also with some of our European allies," he said.
"But we also know that there have been infringements on free speech that actually affect not just the British. Of course, what the British do in their own country is up to them," Vance added. "But (it also affects) American technology companies and, by extension, American citizens. So, that is something that we’ll talk about today at lunch."
Starmer, seated just a few feet away next to Trump, quickly chimed in.
"We’ve had free speech for a very, very long time in the United Kingdom, and it will last for a very, very long time," the Labour Party politician said.
"Certainly, we wouldn’t want to reach across, and [regulate] U.S. citizens, and we don’t, and that’s absolutely right," he told Vance. "But in relation to free speech in the U.K., I’m really proud of that — our history there."
In Munich, Vance cited the case of a British army veteran who was convicted of breaching a safe zone around an abortion clinic where he silently prayed outside.
He decried the enforcement of buffer zones, alleging that the Scottish government had warned people against private prayer within their own homes.
A judge in California blocked the Trump administration on Thursday from ordering departments and agencies to begin dismissing recently hired probationary federal workers, saying the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) lacks the power to fire employees.
The move came during a court hearing over a lawsuit from labor unions and other groups challenging OPM’s mass terminations.
In their lawsuit, the plaintiffs claim the mass terminations violate the Administrative Procedure Act requirements and congressional laws that deal with agency hiring and firing practices.
The judge ruled that OPM lacks the power to fire workers, including probationary employees who may have less than a year of civil service on the job.
Last week, a federal judge declined to stop the Trump administration from firing federal workers and conducting mass layoffs, which allowed the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to remain on track with its mission of finding and slashing wasteful government spending.
In one of the cases, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper shot down a request from several labor unions, including the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), to issue a pause on the mass firings of federal workers.
NTEU and four other labor unions representing the federal employees filed a complaint on Feb. 12, challenging the firing of probationary employees and the deferred resignation program.
Under the resignation program, federal employees were presented with a fork in the road, meaning they could either return to office or they could resign from their positions and continue to get paid through September.
The deadline to decide was originally Feb. 6, though the date was ultimately deferred to Feb. 12, then subsequently closed that day.
The unions moved for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to prevent the firing of probationary employees across all federal agencies and furtherance of the resignation program on Feb. 14, and the next day it was sent to Cooper’s court.
Cooper denied the request, though, saying the court lacks jurisdiction over the unions’ claims.
Instead, Cooper ruled the unions must pursue their challenges through the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute, which provides for administrative review by the Federal Labor Relations Authority.
President Donald Trump was asked several times on Thursday about comments he made last week, when he called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a "dictator," though he oftentimes either ignored the question or could not remember making the statement.
Trump met with U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the White House on Thursday, when the two leaders addressed peace talks between Ukraine and Russia.
The president told reporters he has had back-to-back "very successful" calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as with Zelenskyy, with hopes of bringing the war between Ukraine and Russia to an end.
"I think we’ve made a lot of progress, and I think it’s moving along pretty rapidly," Trump said. "[Friday], the progress toward peace will continue when President Zelenskyy visits the White House. He’ll be here tomorrow in the early part of the day, and we’ll be signing a historic agreement that will make the United States a major partner in developing Ukraine's minerals and rare earths, oils and gases."
The president and Zelenskyy will meet at the White House around 11 a.m. Friday, and Trump said the rare earth minerals agreement will provide the basis for a sustainable future between the two countries.
With Zelenskyy’s visit quickly approaching, reporters asked Trump on Thursday if he had plans to apologize to the Ukrainian president for calling him a dictator.
Earlier this month, Trump blasted Zelenskyy as a "dictator without elections" after the U.S. left Ukraine out of its initial peace talks with Russia.
"A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left," Trump wrote on Truth Social at the time. "In the meantime, we are successfully negotiating an end to the War with Russia, something all admit only ‘TRUMP,’ and the Trump Administration, can do. Biden never tried, Europe has failed to bring Peace, and Zelenskyy probably wants to keep the ‘gravy train’ going."
When Trump greeted Starmer at the White House on Thursday, one reporter asked the two leaders about having common ground, with Trump describing Zelenskyy as a dictator and Starmer describing Putin as a dictator.
After dodging the question, another reporter asked Trump if he still believed Zelenskyy was a dictator.
"Did I say that?" Trump asked. "I can’t believe I said that. Next question."
After the two leaders met in the Oval Office, they faced reporters once again, and a reporter asked Trump if he would take the opportunity to apologize to Zelenskyy for calling him a dictator while praising Putin, who is a dictator.
Rather than address calling Zelenskyy a dictator, Trump spoke about the upcoming meeting with the Ukrainian president, saying, "I think we’re going to have a very good meeting tomorrow. … We’re going to get along really well."
While Ukraine and Russia were a big topic during Trump and Starmer’s meeting, so were tariffs. One reporter asked Trump if Starmer had persuaded him not to impose tariffs on the U.K.
Trump said Starmer tried hard to convince him not to impose the tariffs.
"I think there’s a very good chance that, in the case of these two great friendly countries, I think we could very well end up with a real trade deal where the tariffs wouldn’t be necessary," Trump said. "We’ll see."
While the U.S. and U.K. started with a rocky relationship in colonial days, it has flourished into one that both leaders agree is special and will remain strong.
In fact, Trump was handed a letter from King Charles through Starmer, inviting the president and first lady for a state visit.
"It was my privilege and honor to bring a letter with me today from His Majesty the King, not only sending his best wishes but also inviting the president and the first lady to make a state visit to the United Kingdom, an unprecedented second state visit," Starmer said, noting this has never happened before. "It’s so incredible. It will be historic, and I’m delighted that I can go back to His Majesty the King and tell him that President Trump has accepted the invitation."
Immediately following Starmer’s announcement, Trump thanked the prime minister and offered a compliment.
"What a beautiful accent," the president said. "I would have been president 20 years ago if I had that accent."
Fox News Digital's Danielle Wallace contributed to this report.
Department of Transportation (DOT) Secretary Sean Duffy announced Thursday his plan to "supercharge" the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)'s air traffic controllers after numerous fatal plane crashes over the last two months.
The FAA will be "streamlining" its eight-step hiring process into a five-step process, with hopes it will accelerate the time to hire for "critical positions," according to Duffy, who shared the announcement in a post on X.
The protocol change will shave more than four months off the old process, he said.
In addition, the agency will be "raising starting salaries by nearly 30%" for those in training as an incentive to apply.
"We want the best and brightest to get expedited entry into the academy," Duffy wrote in the post. "This administration is committed to solving the air traffic control shortage that has existed for too long."
The FAA imposes a mandatory retirement age of 55 for air traffic controllers, contributing to a high turnover rate, Fox News Digital previously reported.
Duffy noted the FAA's training academy also slowed during COVID-19, with small class sizes delaying the process.
While more than 50,000 people work at the FAA, President Donald Trump announced recent cuts that will trim 300 non-critical workers from the force.
Duffy's new policy comes after numerous aviation disasters in the U.S. over the past few months, including the midair collision of an Army Black Hawk helicopter with a commercial passenger plane in Washington, D.C., which claimed the lives of all 67 people aboard the two aircraft.
Just days after the D.C. crash, which was the country's deadliest aviation mishap in more than 20 years, a medevac plane plummeted into a Philadelphia street, killing all six on board and one person on the ground.
More disasters followed, with an Alaska crash killing 10 and an Arizona crash killing one.
In neighboring Canada, 21 people were injured when a Delta plane erupted in flames after overturning during a crash landing at Toronto’s Pearson Airport on Feb. 17.
Andrea Lucas, the Trump administration’s acting chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), blasted The Washington Post and reporter Jeff Stein for spreading "fake news" about DOGE cutting 90% of the EEOC's workforce.
Lucas explained that Stein, the chief economics reporter at The Washington Post, mixed up federal agencies that have nothing to do with each other.
The Post reported that "an office within the Labor Department that enforces equal employment opportunity laws" is planning on reducing its workforce by 90%. The article went on to state that the Department of Labor plans to cut its Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) from more than 50 offices and nearly 500 employees to four offices and 50 employees.
Stein also posted on X that, among the "major changes" planned by Elon Musk’s DOGE, the Labor Department was eying "gutting EEOC office by *90%*."
After Lucas called out the error on X, Stein posted another message in which he said, "To clarify, the office I refer to above is an office within the Labor Department that enforces workers' civil rights laws."
Speaking with Fox News Digital, Lucas said the Post’s reporting "undermines" the EEOC’s ability to enforce the law by misleading the public.
"We pushed back with corrections … and WaPo [Washington Post] retweeted being like, ‘Oh, I was talking about the OFCCP,’ which is in fact what he should have been doing if he bothered to get us back straight," she said. "But the main message is that reporting is misleading.
"The Department of Labor may be contemplating significant cuts to OFCCP. I don't know. We're totally separate from OFCCP."
Lucas said any potential cuts by DOGE to the Labor Department and the OFCCP are "entirely distinct from the work that the EEOC does," which she explained is to "enforce Title VII, which explicitly creates the EEOC and gives us a specific mission to combat discrimination."
Lucas said the EEOC is "fully operational and continues to be laser-focused on combating discrimination," which she said includes discrimination on behalf of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) interests.
Lucas said the EEOC is "fully comply[ing] with the president's executive orders calling for evenhanded civil rights enforcement."
After four years of the Biden administration using federal agencies to advance DEI, Lucas directed the EEOC to issue a warning to U.S. employers that the commission would be prioritizing the enforcement of legal and financial consequences for "anti-American bias" against workers during hiring.
"Discriminatory employers should be aware the EEOC is not asleep," she said. "This kind of fake news really can muddy the water and make it unclear to workers that this government watchdog remains active and ready to defend them against unlawful discrimination, including DEI-related discrimination."
On DOGE, Lucas said, "I fully support the president's mission and DOGE’s mission to ensure government efficiency."
But she remains confident the EEOC is here to stay.
"We're working really hard to make sure that we have the most productive workforce possible, and we're looking to make the agency a really evenhanded and efficient workforce," Lucas said. "But I'm confident that we have an important role to play because our jurisdiction and mission are directly related to the civil rights executive orders.
"So, we're a law enforcement agency, and we're here to execute on those and enforce the law."
The Washington Post did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment by time of publication.
A federal judge on Thursday ordered Trump administration officials involved with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to testify in a legal dispute that seeks to block DOGE's access to sensitive government databases.
U.S. District Judge John Bates said officials from the departments of Labor and Health and Human Services, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other agencies linked to the Elon Musk-led DOGE will sit for questioning under oath by lawyers for labor unions and other groups suing to block DOGE's efforts to trim the federal bureaucracy.
The groups claim some DOGE officials and allies have already been granted access to sensitive databases and that privacy concerns of federal workers are being ignored.
"It would be strange to permit defendants to submit evidence that addresses critical factual issues and proceed to rule on a preliminary injunction motion without permitting plaintiffs to explore those factual issues through very limited discovery," the judge wrote.
Bates’ order also permits a limited set of written questions to be submitted to the agencies targeted by the lawsuit.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the White House.
