Key events
Trump pledges overhaul of Kennedy Center in first visit as board chair
Donald Trump visited the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Monday for the first time since making himself its new chair, threatening to shutter an expensive new addition and describing the marble Washington landmark as being in “tremendous disrepair.”
Trump presided over the center’s board meeting in a demonstration of his takeover of an institution that has long enjoyed bipartisan support in Washington, Reuters reported.
Trump, a former real estate executive, criticised an expansive addition built on the Kennedy Center complex for lacking windows and suggested closing it.
He said the center would improve physically over time, however, and he encouraged people to attend shows there.
“This represents a very important part of DC, and actually our country,” he said when asked why he was making time to come to the Kennedy Center with so many other things on his plate. “I think it’s important to make sure that our country is in good shape and is represented well.”
Last month Trump became chair of the Kennedy Center after pushing out billionaire philanthropist David Rubenstein. He fired its longtime president, Deborah Rutter, and installed his former ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, as interim president.
Opening summary
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and I will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next couple of hours.
We start with news that a federal judge has given the Trump administration a Tuesday deadline to provide details about plane loads of Venezuelans it deported despite orders not to, in a brewing showdown over presidential power.
President Donald Trump claims the deported Venezuelans are members of the prison gang Tren de Aragua, which he designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
The White House on Saturday published a Trump proclamation that invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to declare the gang was conducting irregular warfare against the US, Reuters reported.
Later on Saturday, US district judge James Boasberg issued an order blocking the deportations but the flights continued anyway and 261 people were flown to El Salvador.
A Trump administration lawyer argued both that the judge’s initial oral ruling to block the flights was superseded by a more sparsely written order issued later, and that the government had the legal right to continue with flights once they had left US airspace.
Since taking office in January, Trump has sought to push the boundaries of executive power, challenging the historic checks and balances between the US branches of government.
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In other news:
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Trump announced on Truth Social that he was ending secret service protections for Joe Biden’s adult children, Ashley Biden and Hunter Biden.
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Trump also said the government would release all of the remaining classified documents related to the assassination of President John F Kennedy on Tuesday, something he had pledged to do during his campaign.
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Trump also said Joe Biden’s pardon of January 6 committee lawmakers was “void”, and his press secretary later said, without evidence, that the former president may not have been of sound mind when he gave it.
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Meanwhile, the CEO of the non-profit US Institute of Peace said Monday that employees of Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” had “broken into our building”, as part of an escalating standoff over the legal status of the Institute and whether Musk has authority over it.
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Chuck Schumer, the Democratic senate minority leader, has reportedly canceled a book tour as he faces protests from members of his own party for providing votes crucial to the passage of a Republican spending bill.
