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Reuters US Domestic News Summary

Following is a summary of present US domestic news briefs.

US to use AI to revoke visas of students it sees as Hamas advocates, Axios reports

The U.S. State Department will use expert system to withdraw visas of foreign trainees who it views as advocates of Palestinian Hamas militants, Axios reported on Thursday, citing senior State Department officials. President Donald Trump signed an executive order in January to fight antisemitism and has pledged to deport non-citizen college trainees and others who participated in pro-Palestinian protests that have been ongoing for months amidst Israel’s military attack on Gaza after Hamas’ October 2023 attack.

CIA fires an unspecified variety of new officers

The Central Intelligence Agency fired a slew of recent hires today, three people acquainted with the matter said, cuts that current and former U.S. intelligence officers cautioned would run the risk of destructive U.S. national security. The under U.S. President Donald Trump’s new CIA director, John Ratcliffe, come as Trump commands huge federal labor force reductions overseen by billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Veterans, farm groups slam Trump cuts at Democrat-run Arizona town hall

Arizona farm groups and veterans combined by Democratic attorney generals of the United States lashed out at U.S. President Donald Trump’s federal cuts, stating the president was disregarding judges who blocked his executive orders and harming previous service members. They spoke at an often raucous city center on Wednesday night organized by the country’s 23 Democratic attorneys general, who have filed lawsuits to ask judges to obstruct a string of Trump executive orders, including his suspension of trillions of dollars in federal grants, loans and financial backing.

‘We’re in a dark area,’ US judge says on rising threats

Threats versus U.S. judges are increasing and lawyers should do more to push back versus heated rhetoric, four federal judges said in a panel conversation on Thursday. Speaking at an American Bar Association meeting on white collar criminal activity in Miami, U.S. District Judge Richard Boulware of Las Vegas federal court stated dangers against the judiciary had gone up “greatly.”

Trump’s FDA candidate tepidly backs role for vaccine advisers in secured Senate look

Martin Makary, President Donald Trump’s candidate to run the U.S. FDA, told lawmakers on Thursday he would convene a committee of vaccine advisors however said he would reassess which scientific problems need their input. It was one of a number of issues on which Makary, a Johns Hopkins physician, kept his cards close to his chest while facing the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee for two hours.

Trump informs cabinet secretaries they, not Musk, supervise of staff cuts

U.S. President Donald Trump informed his cabinet members on Thursday that they, not Elon Musk, have the final say on staffing and policy at their companies, according to a source knowledgeable about the matter. The billionaire Tesla CEO and his Department of Government Efficiency will play an advisory function only, Trump said, according to the source. Musk remained in the room and told the cabinet he was great with Trump’s plan, the source stated.

Push for permanent US daylight conserving time frozen as Trump states Americans are divided

A three-year congressional effort to make daytime saving time permanent in the United States appears to have halted, with President Donald Trump saying on Thursday that Americans are uniformly divided over the problem. Daylight saving time – putting the clocks forward one hour during the summertime half of the year to make the many of the longer nights – has been in location in almost all of the United States considering that the 1960s, however supporters have actually pushed to make it year-round.

Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs deals with new indictment, is accused of ‘forced labor’

U.S. prosecutors on Thursday unveiled a brand-new indictment versus Sean “Diddy” Combs, accusing the hip-hop magnate of requiring staff members to work long hours and threatening to punish those who did not help in his two-decade sex trafficking plan. Combs, 55, still deals with a scheduled May 5 trial in Manhattan on federal charges of racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking and transport to engage in prostitution. He has pleaded innocent.

US federal workers hit back at Trump mass firings with class action grievances

U.S. government staff members who have been fired in the Trump administration’s purge of just recently worked with employees are reacting with class action-style problems declaring that the mass firings are prohibited and tens of countless individuals should get their tasks back. Lawyers at 2 firms stated on Thursday that they had filed 6 appeals with the federal Merit Systems Protection Board given that recently and, together with other law firms, plan to produce 15 more on an agency-by-agency basis on behalf of large groups of employees who were fired in current weeks.

Trump administration need to make some foreign aid payments by Monday, judge rules

The Trump administration should make some payments to foreign help specialists and grant recipients by 6 p.m. (1100 GMT) on Monday, a federal judge ruled on Thursday, a day after the U.S. Supreme Court rebuffed the administration’s demand to prevent a due date for the payments. The ruling by U.S. District Judge Amir Ali came at the end of a hearing in a claim by specialists and non-profit grant recipients challenging President Donald Trump’s comprehensive freeze of U.S. foreign help, a day after the groups got an increase from the Supreme Court. It purchases the federal government to pay billings submitted by the complainants in the event before February 13.