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Key events
Trump nominates Kevin Warsh as US Federal Reserve chair
Lauren Aratani
Donald Trump has nominated the former Federal Reserve governor Kevin Warsh as its next chair amid an extraordinary attempt by the president to tighten his grip on the US central bank and flout its longstanding independence.
Trump told reporters on Thursday that he planned to announce his choice for chair of the Federal Reserve on Friday morning, hinting that “a lot of people think that this is somebody that could have been there a few years ago”. He then announced early Friday, as teased, and it was indeed Warsh.
If confirmed by the Senate, Warsh will replace Jerome Powell, who Trump first appointed in 2018, but later infuriated the US president by defying his repeated calls for lower interest rates.
In December, Trump said of Warsh: “He thinks you have to lower interest rates.”
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Opening Summary
Activists have called for a nationwide shutdown on Friday, advocating “no work, no school, no shopping” in a protest against the Trump administration’s sweeping immigration crackdowns.
Organisers say Friday’s “blackout” – or general strike, as some are calling it – is part of a growing non-violent movement to combat ICE’s aggressive enforcement tactics, which have come under renewed scrutiny after a series of fatal shootings involving federal agents.
“We are calling for this strike because we believe what we have been doing in Minnesota should go national,” said Kidus Yeshidagna, president of the Ethiopian Students Union at the University of Minnesota and one of the students organising the strike.
“We need more people and lawmakers across the country to wake up.”
In other updates:
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The Democrats and the White House reached a deal to avoid a government shutdown, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer’s office confirmed to the Guardian on Thursday. The deal will advance a package of spending bills, while separating a Department of Homeland Security spending bill from the package. The agreement will include funding for DHS for two weeks at current levels, while Democrats continue negotiating further guardrails on immigration agents in light of the recent fatal shootings in Minneapolis.
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Donald Trump sued the US Treasury and Internal Revenue Service for $10bn (about £7.9bn) over an unauthorized disclosure of his tax returns during his first term, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday evening. Thursday’s lawsuit puts Trump in the unusual position of suing government agencies that are part of the executive branch, which he leads. Trump famously broke precedent by not releasing his tax returns while running for, and then attaining, the presidency.
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Trump’s “border czar” Tom Homan held a news conference in Minneapolis today, where he said ‘no agency is perfect’ but crucially did not mention the fatal shootings of US citizens by immigration agents there this month. During Thursday’s press conference, Tom Homan noted that the administration has “recognised that certain improvements could and should be made” in the ongoing immigration enforcement operation in Minnesota, but didn’t specify what those looked like or when they would be implemented. The border czar also refused to comment on the newly published video footage of Alex Pretti earlier this month, which appears to show officers grabbing Pretti and bringing him to the ground during intense protests that have gripped Minneapolis. “We’ll let the investigation play out and let it go where it goes,” Homan added.
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Trump signed an executive order on Thursday laying the groundwork to slap tariffs on goods from countries that provide oil to Cuba, the White House said. The order, which ratchets up Trump’s pressure to topple the Communist government, declares a national emergency and establishes a process for the US secretaries of state and commerce to assess tariffs against countries that sell or otherwise provide oil to the island nation. The White House has yet to specify tariff rates for violating its new policy of blocking Cuba from buying oil.
