National Politics

By Adam Cancryn, CNN (CNN) — The White House is looking to exercise tighter control over key areas of the US Health and Human Services Department, planning a shakeup of top personnel as the administration looks ahead to the midterm elections, an administration official told CNN. The moves are aimed at restructuring HHS Secretary Robert

By Sarah Ferris, Morgan Rimmer, CNN (CNN) — A bitterly divided Washington is headed for its third government funding lapse of President Donald Trump’s second term — this time, a shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security over the issue of federal immigration enforcement. With lawmakers leaving town Thursday, funding for the department is set

By Holmes Lybrand, Annie Grayer, Manu Raju, CNN (CNN) — Attorney General Pam Bondi obtained Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal’s search history of the unredacted Jeffrey Epstein files and even President Donald Trump’s most powerful ally in Congress has a problem with it. House Speaker Mike Johnson on Thursday said the Justice Department’s tracking of lawmakers’

By Devan Cole, CNN (CNN) — A federal judge on Thursday shut down Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s attempts to punish Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly over his urging of US service members to refuse illegal orders, ruling that the Pentagon chief’s actions were unconstitutionally retaliatory. The decision landed two days after a grand jury in Washington,

By Natasha Bertrand, Zachary Cohen, CNN (CNN) — US military forces have departed a strategic military garrison in Syria after more than a decade “as part of a deliberate and conditions-based transition” to a smaller US footprint in the country, US Central Command said on Thursday. The US troops at al-Tanf garrison had primarily been

By Kaitlan Collins, CNN (CNN) — Gail Slater, who ran the antitrust division for the Justice Department for nearly a year, was forced out by the Trump administration this week, two people familiar with the matter told CNN. Slater, who suggested in a post on X Thursday she was leaving on her own, had been

By Tami Luhby, CNN (CNN) — The Department of Homeland Security has been ensnared by a partial government shutdown as Congress did not act to fund the agency by the end of February 13. But nearly all DHS workers will remain on the job — even if many won’t get paid until the lapse ends

By Jennifer Agiesta, CNN (CNN) — Gallup, one of the country’s most well-known polling firms, announced Wednesday that it will no longer track presidential approval or favorability of political figures. The move ends the longest-running continuous effort to track US opinion of the nation’s president, dating back to the tenure of Franklin D. Roosevelt in

By Annie Grayer, Adam Cancryn, CNN (CNN) — The budget-slashing Department of Government Efficiency that upended the federal government at the start of President Donald Trump’s second term has stalled out on Capitol Hill, a reality that’s left conservative lawmakers fuming. Inside the White House, the cost-cutting crusade marked by mass firings and blanket funding

By Donald Judd, CNN (CNN) — The chairman of President Donald Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission said Wednesday that he ousted a member of the commission after she sparred with fellow members during a contentious public hearing on antisemitism. Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who chairs the commission, said on X that it was his call

By Donald Judd, CNN (CNN) — The National Governors Association said Wednesday that a traditionally bipartisan meeting at the White House next week is back on after invitations were extended to all of its members, even as President Donald Trump continued to rage against two of the nation’s Democratic governors and the organization’s co-chair, GOP

By Holmes Lybrand, CNN (CNN) — The Justice Department’s ongoing struggle with redactions in the released records related to Jeffrey Epstein continued Wednesday when it was discovered that the face of an undercover FBI employee was left uncovered in a video. The department requested CNN make the face of an undercover person unidentifiable in a

By Lauren Fox, Sarah Ferris, CNN (CNN) — Republicans’ warning for President Donald Trump is growing louder with the Department of Homeland Security set to shut down in just days: Don’t feel public pressure to relent on an issue central to his campaign. Even as the White House has engaged with Democrats over reforms to

By Sarah Ferris, Veronica Stracqualursi, CNN (CNN) — In a vote that GOP leaders fought hard to avoid, a half dozen Republicans sent a blunt message to President Donald Trump that they do not support the tariff regime that he has made the centerpiece of his second term. Six Republicans joined with Democrats in the

By Aaron Blake, CNN (CNN) — Attorney General Pam Bondi’s testimony in front of the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday was some of the tensest and most combative testimony we’ve seen to date from a Trump Cabinet official. Bondi came into the hearing with the administration and DOJ facing a series of problems, including their

By David Wright, CNN (CNN) — “He’s running from his past, while ICE is in our communities,” the ad’s narrator says. The target of the ad is Alex Bores, a congressional candidate in New York City who used to work for Palantir, the tech company with long ties to defense and intelligence agencies. An image

By Veronica Stracqualursi, Alison Main, CNN (CNN) — Speaker Mike Johnson failed to reinstate a ban on lawmakers’ ability to challenge President Donald Trump’s tariffs when three Republicans crossed party lines to vote with Democrats. The House sank a procedural vote on Tuesday that contained language blocking votes in the chamber that object to Trump’s

By Hannah Rabinowitz, Evan Perez, Holmes Lybrand, CNN (CNN) — A federal grand jury on Tuesday declined to indict Democratic lawmakers who posted a video urging service members and intelligence officials to disobey any illegal orders from the Trump administration, according to two people familiar with the matter. The Justice Department’s case focused on a

By Piper Hudspeth Blackburn, CNN (CNN) — The Trump administration has removed an LGBTQ Pride flag from the Stonewall National Monument in New York City, the United States’ first national monument to LGBTQ rights, following a directive restricting what kinds of flags can be flown on National Park sites. The removal is the latest change