TV News LIES

Donald Trump is receiving widespread backlash after he likened himself to a “king” on social media following his administration’s decision to rescind New York City’s congestion pricing program.

On Wednesday, following a letter issued by his transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, to the New York governor, Kathy Hochul, that ended the transportation department’s agreement with New York over a new congestion pricing program for Manhattan, Trump wrote on Truth Social:

“CONGESTION PRICING IS DEAD. Manhattan, and all of New York, is SAVED. LONG LIVE THE KING!”

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A federal appeals court Wednesday evening declined the Trump administration’s request to partially revive the president’s executive order restricting birthright citizenship.

The Justice Department asked the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to immediately limit a district judge’s ruling, one of multiple indefinitely blocking Trump’s order nationwide, to only the individual plaintiffs who sued in an underlying case.

The three-judge appeals panel wrote in its ruling that the administration had “not made a ‘strong showing that [they are] likely to succeed on the merits’ of this appeal.”

Trump’s order would restrict birthright citizenship from being extended to children born on U.S. soil to parents without permanent legal status, part of a flurry of immigration actions he signed on his first day in office. Multiple judges have found the order is inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s longstanding interpretation of the 14^th Amendment.

A federal judge on Tuesday ordered that a Democrat who served as the chair of a U.S. agency that hears appeals by federal government employees when they are fired or disciplined be temporarily reinstated after Republican President Donald Trump fired her.

U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras in Washington, D.C. issued a temporary restraining order preventing the Trump administration from removing Cathy Harris from her position on the Merit Systems Protection Board while he considers her lawsuit alleging that her termination was unlawful.

The case is one of several brought by chairs or members of independent boards who have been fired by Trump since he took office last month that will likely test the scope of the president's powers over those agencies.

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A top federal prosecutor has quit after refusing to launch what she called a politically driven investigation into Biden-era climate spending, exposing deepening rifts in the US’s premier law enforcement agency.

Denise Cheung, head of criminal prosecutions in Washington, resigned on Tuesday after Trump appointees demanded she open a grand jury investigation into Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) grants based largely on an undercover video, multiple people familiar with the matter told CNN.

The directive came from the acting deputy attorney general Emil Bove through Ed Martin, Trump’s nominee for Washington DC US attorney. Officials wanted Cheung to investigate EPA contracts awarded during Biden’s tenure and freeze related funding, CNN reported.

In her resignation letter, Cheung wrote to Martin that she and other prosecutors had determined there was insufficient evidence to warrant grand jury subpoenas, even if senior officials cited the Project Veritas video as justification.

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The US postmaster general, Louis DeJoy, said on Tuesday he had asked the US Postal Service (USPS) governing board to identify his successor.

In November, DeJoy warned that the post office, which has lost more than $100bn since 2007, must continue to cut costs or will remain on the path to either a “government bailout or the end of this great organization as we know it”.

USPS did not say when DeJoy – who has headed the agency since 2020 – plans to step down. His announcement comes weeks after Donald Trump took office.

USPS is implementing a 10-year restructuring plan announced in 2021 that aims to eliminate $160bn in predicted losses over the next decade. USPS now projects $80bn in losses over the period and plans further cuts to address the shortfall.

He has faced criticism in Congress about processing network consolidation plans.

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A federal judge on Monday denied a request from college students to prevent Elon Musk’s government efficiency team from accessing U.S. Department of Education databases, a move they said placed the confidential records of millions in jeopardy.

U.S. District Judge Randolph Moss permitted the agency’s six-person detail from the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, to access systems with millions of students' personal and financial information while the privacy lawsuit unfolds. The Education Department had agreed to bar DOGE from the agency's databases for a week while awaiting the judge's decision.

In a 13-page order, Moss called fears that DOGE’s entry into the Education Department’s internal systems could lead to identity theft and targeted immigration enforcement “entirely conjectural.”

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