March 2, 2025: Donald Trump presidency news

Our live coverage of Donald Trump’s presidency has ended for the day. Follow the latest updates or read through the posts below.

The CEO and co-founder of a Georgia plant that makes a special peanut butter paste for severely malnourished children told CNN his company’s contracts with the US Agency for International Development that were canceled last week have all been reinstated as of Sunday evening.

Mark Moore, CEO of Fitzgerald, Georgia-based MANA Nutrition, shared screenshots of the rescinded contract termination notifications with CNN. “Thrilled,” he said.

The news comes after Elon Musk said earlier Sunday that he would “investigate” and “fix it.”

“We will investigate whether this is real or not and fix it if it is,” Musk wrote on X in response to CNN’s reporting last week about the plant’s canceled contracts.

Moore had immediately stopped using USAID labeling on his peanut butter pouches when he learned the contracts with the agency were canceled, CNN previously reported. He is now quickly trying to reverse that.

“It’s a yo-yo,” he said. “I just texted the factory and told them to switch back to USAID packaging as of midnight.”

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. listens as President Donald Trump holds a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, on February 26.

As a measles outbreak in Texas has grown to nearly 150 cases, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote in an opinion piece on Fox News on Sunday that parents should consult with health care providers “to understand their options to get the MMR vaccine” for their children.

Kennedy did not explicitly recommend the vaccine, but said the outbreak was a “call to action for all of us to reaffirm our commitment to public health.”

The outbreak in West Texas has led to 146 measles cases since late January, the majority of them among people who are unvaccinated or whose vaccination status is unknown. Twenty patients have been hospitalized and an unvaccinated school-age child has died, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services.

Some background: When asked about the outbreak during President Donald Trump’s first Cabinet meeting last week, Kennedy said that “measles outbreaks are not unusual.” However, measles was eliminated in the US in 2000. “The United States had really gotten to a point where we just didn’t see these kinds of outbreaks happening,” Dr. Lara Johnson, the chief medical officer of Covenant Health Lubbock Service Area, said at a news conference after the first death in the West Texas outbreak, the first measles death in the US in a decade.

Kennedy has a history of antivaccine comments, including saying that “no vaccine is safe and effective” and tying vaccines to the rise in autism. Studies have found the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine is safe and effective: Two doses of the MMR vaccine are 97% effective, and studies have shown there’s no link between autism and the MMR vaccine.

The US has suspended operations and planning for offensive cyber operations against Russia, a senior US official told CNN.

The suspension is “a major blow,” the official said, especially since planning for such operations takes time and research to carry out. The concern, the official said, is that the pause on offensive cyber operations against Russia will make the US more vulnerable to potential cyberattacks from Moscow, which has a formidable cadre of hackers capable of disrupting US critical infrastructure and collecting sensitive intelligence.

The pause in operations and planning from US Cyber Command, the military’s offensive and defensive cyber unit, comes as the Trump administration has sought a broader détente with Russia.

“Due to operational security concerns, we do not comment nor discuss cyber intelligence, plans, or operations. There is no greater priority to Secretary Hegseth than the safety of the warfighter in all operations, to include the cyber domain,” a senior defense official told CNN, referring to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The Record first reported on Cyber Command’s suspension of planning related to Russia.

Some background: The Kremlin sees cyberspace as a source of tactical advantage with the US, as it can burrow into US critical infrastructure and try to influence elections. For their part, American military and intelligence hackers have in recent years increasingly gone after Russian cybercriminals and intelligence operatives.

Read more here.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky listens to questions during a meeting with members of the media on the outskirts of London on Sunday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Saturday that his country is ready to sign a rare minerals deal with the United States.

“We were ready to sign it, and honestly, I believe that the United States would be ready as well,” he told reporters in London.

Zelensky, who is in the UK for a pivotal summit with European leaders, added that “the agreement that is on the table, it will be signed if the parties are ready … because the agreement has two parties.”

Zelensky was expected to sign the deal, which would provide US access to Ukraine’s rare-earth minerals, while in Washington last week. But the Ukrainians were instructed to leave the White House following President Donald Trump’s Oval Office argument with Zelensky.

At the meeting in the White House, Trump and Vice President JD Vance accused Zelensky of being ungrateful for American military support, for “gambling with the lives of millions of people,” and for risking “World War III” by fighting Russia’s invasion.

Meanwhile, Trump has pitched the minerals deal as a way “to get the money back,” referring to the aid provided to Ukraine under the Biden administration.

The owner of a plant in Georgia that makes a special peanut butter paste for severely malnourished children told CNN on Sunday he has yet to hear from the federal government about his company’s canceled contracts with the US Agency for International Development, hours after Elon Musk said on social media he would “investigate” and “fix it.”

“We will investigate whether this is real or not and fix it if it is,” Musk wrote on X on Sunday, in response to CNN’s reporting last week about the plant’s canceled contracts with USAID.

Mark Moore, the owner of Fitzgerald, Georgia-based MANA Nutrition, told CNN last week that his contracts with USAID were abruptly canceled.

Moore said as of Sunday afternoon, he had heard only unofficial rumblings that the contracts with MANA may be restored.

Some background: MANA Nutrition makes a special kind of peanut butter paste that is fortified with milk and essential vitamins, packed with calories and sent to severely malnourished children around the world, including some countries in Africa.

Moore said he immediately stopped using “USAID” labels on the peanut butter paste pouches since he would not be able to distribute anything labeled as such without contracts with the agency. He also said he had some 400,000 boxes of RUTF, or “Ready-for-Use Therapeutic Foods,” in his warehouse already made for USAID.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the relationship between the United States and his country “will continue” when asked by reporters in London how he would salvage it following an explosive meeting Friday with President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance.

Zelensky called the US a “strategic partner,” saying it would not benefit anyone other than Russia if US assistance to Ukraine were to stop.

London summit: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer gathered European leaders for a pivotal summit in London on Sunday, as the continent sought to wrestle control of negotiations over the Russia-Ukraine war away from the US and present a united front.

Zelensky and an ensemble of European leaders were in attendance, at a moment of intense anxiety in the conflict. Starmer told reporters he was working with France and a small number of other nations to craft a ceasefire plan, which would then be presented to the US.

First Lady Melania Trump attends the Commander-in-Chief Ball in Washington, DC, on January 20.

First lady Melania Trump is expected to speak publicly Monday for the first time since her husband returned to office, highlighting her support for a bill aimed at protecting Americans from deepfake and revenge pornography.

Trump will hold a roundtable discussion Monday on Capitol Hill, according to the first lady’s office, to shine a light on the “TAKE IT DOWN” Act, which boosts protections for victims of nonconsensual sharing of sexual images, including content generated by artificial intelligence, also known as deepfake porn.

In the past year, targets of AI-generated, nonconsensual pornographic images have ranged from prominent women such as Taylor Swift and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to high school girls.

The bill, introduced by Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, “would criminalize the publication of non-consensual intimate imagery (NCII), including AI-generated NCII (or ‘deepfake pornography’), and require social media and similar websites to have in place procedures to remove such content upon notification from a victim,” according to Cruz’s office.

It passed the Senate with bipartisan support during the last session of Congress and again in February, but it has yet to pass the House. Cruz and a bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, have supported the effort, and the first lady is now lending her support.

Some background: During President Donald Trump’s first term, Melania Trump unveiled her “Be Best” platform, which included a focus on online safety. She indicated in an interview last year that she was interested in reinvigorating those efforts and suggested she could take on “new issues.”

Read more here.

This post has been updated with additional information.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Sunday directed civilian employees at the Pentagon to respond to the Trump administration’s request to detail their job accomplishments.

In a video posted on X, Hegseth called the request a “pulse check” and said employees would receive more instructions after responding to an email from the Office of Personnel Management about how to remain compliant with guidance to the federal workforce.

In a memo distributed to the Pentagon workforce on Friday and obtained by CNN, Hegseth ordered all civilian employees to respond to an email they were expected to receive on Monday asking for five bullet points “on their previous week’s achievements.”

Defense Department leaders had previously ordered all employees to hold off on responding to the initial OPM request.

Hegseth also said employees shouldn’t include classified information in their replies.

“The directive to civilian employees will be clear:, reply to the email, cc your supervisor, provide without any classified or sensitive information, basic topics of what you did last week,” Hegseth said in Sunday’s video.

Hegseth acknowledged the department’s “civilian patriots who dedicate themselves to defending this nation,” adding that “most” civilian Pentagon employees are “critical to our national security.”

Elon Musk, a significant force behind the Trump administration’s efforts to drastically cut the federal government, posted on X that Hegseth’s video was “much appreciated.”

Musk, who is the CEO of X, warned federal workers at the time that failure to respond to initial OPM email would be “taken as a resignation,” though several agency leaders have since directed employees not to reply to the message as its implications are under consideration.

Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaks during a press conference after hosting a summit of European leaders at Lancaster House in London on Sunday.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the US is an important and “reliable” ally, speaking in London after a summit of European leaders discussed support for Ukraine on Sunday.

“Nobody wanted to see what happened last Friday but I do not accept that the US is an unreliable ally; the US has been a reliable ally to the UK for many, many decades and continues to be,” Starmer said, referring to the heated exchange between the US and Ukrainian presidents at the White House this week.

The prime minister also said the United Kingdom, France and others will work with Ukraine on a plan to end to the fighting with Russia.

Here’s what else Starmer said on Sunday:

• He unveiled a new deal for Ukraine’s defense, allowing it to use £1.6 billion ($2 billion) of UK export finance to buy more than 5,000 advanced air defense missiles, which would be made in Belfast, Ireland, Starmer said.

• Leaders also agreed on sustained economic pressure on Russia and to keep military aid to Ukraine flowing, Starmer said, adding that “any lasting peace must ensure Ukraine’s sovereignty and security” and that “Ukraine should be at the table.”

• The prime minister also said countries would develop a “coalition of the willing” to defend a deal in Ukraine and guarantee peace, and that his country would back this with “boots on the ground and planes in the air.”

• And, he said any potential peace plan would have to involve Russia. But Starmer insisted that Moscow would not dictate the terms of “any security guarantee.”

The White House is making clear it views Donald Trump’s Friday Oval Office showdown with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as an overwhelming win that underscores the US president’s “America first” leadership, dispatching top officials and allies to amplify Trump’s handling of the situation even as European leaders are expressing unified support for Ukraine.

Trump often took aim at US aid for Ukraine on the campaign trail, reflecting waning support among Americans for Ukraine and Zelensky over the past three years of the war. Trump views the conflict through an economic lens, seeking to rebuild a partnership with Russia and recoup some of the financial support the US has provided to Ukraine.

The president’s top lieutenants, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, national security adviser Mike Waltz, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick — all of whom were in the Oval Office during the explosive meeting — appeared on news shows Sunday to offer praise to their boss and criticism of his Ukrainian counterpart.

The efforts come as dozens of European leaders are gathering in London for what British Prime Minister Keir Starmer described as a “once-in-a-generation moment for the security of Europe,” a major show of support for Zelensky.

Trump’s team, meanwhile, is doubling down, framing the contentious Friday meeting from a position of US strength, even as it has been met with glee by the Kremlin.

Read more about about the Trump administration’s strategy here.

President Donald Trump walks to speak to members of the media on the South Lawn of the White House before boarding Marine One in Washington, DC, on February 28.

When he steps onto the dais in the House chamber on Tuesday night, President Donald Trump will have another major platform to relay his second term priorities. For Democrats, the moment will present a fresh test of whether they can effectively counter Trump’s primetime programming.

Democratic leadership chose a first-term senator elected in a battleground state Trump won in November to deliver the party’s official response. A Democratic senator whose name is often talked about for 2028 is among those skipping the address, predicting it will be a “MAGA pep rally.” And a protest movement organizing online has identified March 4th – the day of Trump’s speech – as its next day of action.

The varying tactics of Democrats in Washington and across the country will be on display as Trump delivers his address to a joint session of Congress six weeks into a second term where he’s swiftly moved to remake the federal government and implement his foreign policy vision, at times unnerving US allies.

While Democrats have rallied against Elon Musk and DOGE cuts, lawmakers in Washington have struggled to stop the president’s early actions or settle on a cohesive approach to push back on them. It comes amid an ongoing debate within the Democratic party about the best way to handle Trump’s second term and position Democrats for success in the 2026 midterms and 2028 presidential election – with some saying Democratic leaders aren’t doing enough.

Heading into Tuesday’s speech, Democratic leaders – from Capitol Hill to the Democratic National Committee – are hoping to present a united front.

Read how they plan to do that here.

Former House Intelligence Committee Chair Rep. Mike Turner, historically an avid supporter of Ukraine and hardliner on Russia, called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s actions during his tense Oval Office meeting with President Donald Trump “inappropriate.”

“Zelensky came to sign a minerals deal with the United States and it was inappropriate for him to publicly ask for security guarantees during the meeting, while defending Trump’s handling of Ukraine,” Turner said.

Turner said Zelensky was putting “the cart before the horse” and he was very confident in Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s ability to get a peace negotiation done.

“I believe that Zelensky needs to trust him, and he needs to not have this precondition of American security guarantees, which are not coming,” he said.

A proposed investment deal to secure access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals is not currently on the table, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday, following Friday’s tense Oval Office meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and President Donald Trump last week.

“I don’t know what President Zelensky was thinking — we had President of France Emmanuel Macron in on Monday, great meeting; we had Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Thursday, fantastic meeting. They were all on board the arc of the peace agreement,” Bessent, who was in the Oval Office for Friday’s meeting, said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

“All President Zelensky had to do was come in and sign this economic agreement and again, show no daylight, no daylight between Ukrainian people and the American people, and he chose to blow that up.”

Pressed in a follow-up exchange on whether the deal was still on the table, he added, “Not at present.”

After Friday’s explosive meeting, Trump said in a Truth Social post that Zelensky could come back to the White House “when he is ready for peace.”

“I think we have to see if President Zelensky wants to proceed — what’s the use in having an economic agreement that’s going to be rendered moot if he wants the fighting to continue? President Trump wants a peace deal,” Bessent said.

On Friday, Zelensky said Ukraine would like to see an end to the war, but expressed concern that Russian President Vladimir Putin was likely to break a ceasefire if any economic agreement between the Ukraine and the US didn’t come with security assurances.

“We need more than just that. A ceasefire without security guarantees is dangerous for Ukraine. We’ve been fighting for three years, and Ukrainian people need to know that America is on our side,” Zelensky said.

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard claimed a “divergence” exists between the values that President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance are fighting for and those of many European countries coming to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s defense, arguing those who criticize Trump’s efforts “are not committed to peace.”

“I think those who are criticizing his efforts in this way are showing that they are not committed to peace, and in the case of many of those European countries, that they’re not committed to the cause and values of freedom, even though they speak of this,” Gabbard continued.

Gabbard named Germany, the UK and the “tossing out of the elections in Romania” as examples, suggesting that European countries are more interested in helping Zelensky continue the war, rather than end it.

Gabbard also pointed to “the canceling of elections in Ukraine.” Since Russia invaded in 2022, Ukraine has been under martial law, which prohibits elections.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks as President Donald Trump meets with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House in Washington, DC, on February 28.

Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he regrets voting to confirm Secretary of State Marco Rubio earlier this year amid the escalating tension between the United States and Ukraine.

Van Hollen said President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance showed a “despicable display of bullying” toward Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during the fiery meeting.

Trump’s mineral deal — which was scheduled to be signed after the meeting with Zelensky — was “extortion, pure and simple,” Van Hollen said.

“It was Zelensky’s idea originally to include some kind of deal on minerals to provide for reconstruction, but what happened was that idea got transformed originally into an idea where it was really extortion, it was like, ‘Give us half of this stuff for what we’ve already done,’” Van Hollen said.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Sunday he expects Canada and Mexico will be hit with tariffs on Tuesday, but the level will be fluid, though he praised both countries for their respective efforts on border security.

He also indicated that additional 10% tariffs on China remain on the table for Tuesday.

“Both Mexico and Canada have done a reasonable job on the border. They’re both working hard on the border. … But the fentanyl continues to come into this country and continues to murder our people, and the ingredients are made in China. They’re sent to Mexico and Canada, and then they come and attack our country, and that’s got to end,” he said.

Pressed on whether there might be tariffs on Mexico and Canada at a lower rate, Lutnick suggested that was a distinct possibility.

CNN has reported Mexico, China and Canada are America’s top three trading partners. Simultaneous tariffs on all three nations could lead to soaring prices for American consumers, especially at a time when inflation is already heating up.

Republican Sen. James Lankford called Russia President Vladimir Putin a thug and defended President Donald Trump’s commitment to Ukraine after Friday’s contentious Oval Office meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

“No, we’re not turning our back on Ukraine, nor should we. Putin is a murderous KGB thug that murders his political enemies and is a dictator there. … We’ve seen his aggression. Countries around him have seen that,” Lankford said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Lankford did not comment directly on the tension in the meeting between Zelensky and Trump, which resulted in Trump berating Zelensky — a scene lauded by the Kremlin.

But Lankford argued Trump only wants a resolution to the fighting — though he said he understands why Zelensky does not trust Putin to abide by any agreement.

“What I hear President Trump saying over and over again is we need to get to a stop in fighting, find some resolution. I understand Zelensky is rightfully concerned that Putin has violated every single agreement he’s ever signed, and that he can’t be trusted,” he said.

Lankford said he did not agree with senators who’ve suggested Zelensky should resign and said he is simply seeking security guarantees.

“I think they understand each other and that obviously there are differences, where Zelensky wants more in the way of some kind of security guarantees. The United States is not willing to be able to put troops on the ground,” he said.

President Donald Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz indicated US support for new leadership in Ukraine following Friday’s Oval Office showdown with President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Waltz said that the Ukrainian leader needs to make it clear “publicly and privately” that he is “ready to go to peace.”

Waltz also offered new insight into potential concessions during negotiations for a deal between Russia and Ukraine.

Pressed by Bash for specifics on those concessions for Russia, he said, “This will clearly be some type of territorial concession for security guarantees going forward,” pointing to “European-led security guarantees,” including the UK and France’s boots on the ground.

US security guarantees, he added, are “to be negotiated.”

Ukrainian servicemen fire a M777 howitzer towards Russian positions at the frontline near Donetsk, Ukraine, on Sunday.

A little more than half of Americans say they personally support Ukraine in its conflict with Russia, but few believe President Donald Trump is on the same side, according to a CBS/YouGov poll released Sunday and conducted prior to the Oval Office meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday.

We’ve broken down the key findings from the poll for you here:

The survey puts Trump’s overall approval rating at 51%, with 49% disapproving. That’s a slight downtick from his standing in CBS’ early February polling, but it remains higher than other recent polls – including the CNN survey released Sunday, as well as February polls from Reuters/Ipsos, Washington Post/Ipsos, Quinnipiac University and Gallup – that show Trump’s approval rating underwater.