Judge orders Trump administration to preserve Yemen attack plan messages

US Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, joined by Rep. Joaquin Castro, left, points to a chart displaying a text message by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in a group chat that revealed US military plans in Yemen to a journalist, as the House Intelligence Committee holds a hearing on worldwide threats, at the Capitol, in Washington, on March 26, 2025. (AP Photo)
Short Url
Updated 28 March 2025
Follow

Judge orders Trump administration to preserve Yemen attack plan messages

  • A government accountability group sued federal agencies involved in the chat on Tuesday, alleging that the use of Signal, which allows for messages to be automatically deleted after a certain time span, violated a federal record-keeping

WASHINGTON: A US judge on Thursday ordered President Donald Trump’s administration to preserve messages sent on the Signal messaging app discussing attack plans against the Houthis in Yemen that became public after they were inadvertently shared with a journalist.
The order from US District Judge James Boasberg requires federal agencies whose leaders participated in the chat, which included Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, to maintain all messages sent through Signal from March 11 until March 15, the period during which an editor for The Atlantic magazine documented activity in the chat.
A lawyer for the Trump administration earlier said federal agencies were already working to determine what records still existed so they could be preserved.
American Oversight, a government accountability group, sued federal agencies involved in the chat on Tuesday, alleging that the use of Signal, which allows for messages to be automatically deleted after a certain time span, violated a federal record-keeping law.
“We are grateful for the judge’s bench ruling to halt any further destruction of these critical records. The public has a right to know how decisions about war and national security are made — and accountability doesn’t disappear just because a message was set to auto-delete,” Chioma Chukwu, American Oversight’s interim executive director, said in a statement.




Text messages by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on a high level Trump administration Signal group chat discussing plans to bomb Houthi targets in Yemen are shown during a US House of Representatives hearing on March 26, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Getty Images via AFP)


The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Atlantic magazine published on Wednesday messages it said were exchanged in the group after Trump administration officials said they were not classified in an attempt to play down the impact of the breach.
The messages revealed discussions among senior national security officials about planned military strikes targeting the Houthi militant group. Hegseth shared information about the timing of attacks on March 15, including one aimed at someone identified in the chat as a terrorist, hours before the attack began, according to the report.
The existence of the group chat, and the inadvertent disclosure of messages to a journalist, has sparked a brewing controversy over the Trump administration’s treatment of sensitive military and intelligence information.
The lawsuit was unrelated to the national security implications of the disclosure and instead focused on American Oversight’s claim that the messages should count as government records that agencies are legally required to preserve.


Russian attacks kill two in Ukraine

Updated 4 sec ago
Follow

Russian attacks kill two in Ukraine

  • Diplomatic efforts to end the war have accelerated in recent weeks, with both sides meeting earlier this month for their first round of direct talks in more than three years
KYIV: Russian shelling and air strikes on southern Ukraine overnight killed a man and a nine-year-old girl in separate attacks, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday.
In the Zaporizhzhia region, “Russians hit a residential area with guided aerial bombs,” killing the girl and wounding a 16-year-old boy, Ivan Fedorov, head of the regional military administration, said on the Telegram platform.
One house was destroyed and several others damaged by the blast, he added.
In a separate assault on the city of Kherson, a “66-year-old man sustained fatal injuries” from Russian shelling, Oleksandr Prokudin, Kherson region’s governor, wrote on Telegram.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, tens of thousands of people have been killed, swaths of eastern and southern Ukraine destroyed, and millions forced to flee their homes.
One person was wounded in a Russian drone strike in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, its mayor said.
In Russia, Ukrainian drone attacks wounded 10 people in the Kursk region overnight, acting governor Alexander Khinshtein said.
Diplomatic efforts to end the war have accelerated in recent weeks, with both sides meeting earlier this month for their first round of direct talks in more than three years.
But the negotiations in Istanbul yielded only a prisoner exchange and promises to stay in touch.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday that his government did not expect results from further talks with Russia unless Moscow provided its peace terms in advance, accusing the Kremlin of doing “everything” it could to sabotage a potential meeting.
“There must be a ceasefire to continue moving toward peace. We need to stop the killing of people,” Zelensky added in a statement on Telegram.
The Ukrainian leader also said he had discussed with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “a possible next meeting in Istanbul and under what conditions Ukraine is ready to participate,” with both agreeing that the next round of talks with Moscow “cannot and should not be a waste of time.”
Russia has said it will send a team of negotiators to Istanbul for a second round of talks on Monday, but Kyiv has yet to confirm if it will attend.

Australia’s defense minister urges greater military openness from China

Updated 3 min 21 sec ago
Follow

Australia’s defense minister urges greater military openness from China

SINGAPORE: Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles on Saturday urged greater transparency from China over its military modernization and deployments as Pacific nations brace for a more assertive Chinese presence.
Speaking to Reuters on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue defense meeting in Singapore, Marles said that while China remains an important strategic partner to Australia, more open communication between the two nations is key for a “productive” relationship.
“When you look at the growth in the Chinese military that has happened without a strategic reassurance, or a strategic transparency....we would like to have a greater transparency in what China is seeking to do in not only its build up, but in the exercises that it undertakes,” said Marles.
“We want to have the most productive relationship with China that we can have ... we hope that in the context of that productive relationship, we can see greater transparency and greater communication between our two countries in respect of our defense.”
Both Australia and New Zealand raised concerns in February after three Chinese warships conducted unprecedented live-fire drills in the Tasman Sea.
Both nations complained of late notice over the drills by China, which led to the diversion of 49 commercial flights.
Marles said that while the drills were in accordance with international law, China should have been less disruptive.
He also said Australia was able to closely scrutinize the Chinese task-force.
“It’s fair to say that this was done in a bigger way than they have done before, but equally, that was meant from our point of view, by a much greater degree of surveillance than we’ve ever done,” he said.
“From the moment that Chinese warships came within the vicinity of Australia, they were being tailed and tracked by Australian assets ... we were very clear about what exercises China was undertaking and what capability they were seeking to exercise and to build.”
Chinese officials have signalled that more such exercises could be expected as it was routine naval activity in international waters. Defense analysts say the exercises underscore Beijing’s ambition to develop a global navy that will be able to project power into the region more frequently.
Australia has in recent times pledged to boost its missile defense capability amid China’s nuclear weapons buildup and its blue-water naval expansion, as the country targets to increase its defense spending from roughly 2 percent of GDP currently to 2.4 percent by the early 2030s.
The nation is scheduled to pay the United States $2 billion by the end of 2025 to assist its submarine shipyards, in order to buy three Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines starting in 2032 — its biggest ever defense project.

Germany hopes for EU deal on sending failed asylum seekers to third countries, minister says

Updated 10 min 43 sec ago
Follow

Germany hopes for EU deal on sending failed asylum seekers to third countries, minister says

  • The EU’s executive Commission proposed a scheme that would let member states reject asylum applications from migrants who passed through a “safe” third country on their way to the bloc

BERLIN: Germany’s interior minister is hoping the European Union can reach a bloc-wide agreement on sending failed asylum seekers who cannot go home to safe countries near their original homelands.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservatives won February’s national election on a promise to bring down immigration levels, which opinion polls showed many voters regarded as being out of control, although numbers have been falling for over a year.
In an interview with the Welt am Sonntag newspaper published on Saturday, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said the approach of using third countries could work only if there was a Europe-wide consensus.
“We need third countries that are prepared to take migrants who are objectively unable to return to their home countries,” he told the newspaper.
Earlier this month, the EU’s executive Commission proposed a scheme that would let member states reject asylum applications from migrants who passed through a “safe” third country on their way to the bloc. The proposals, criticized by rights groups, have yet to be adopted by national governments or the European Parliament.
“No individual EU member state can create this model on its own: it will have to happen on an EU level,” Dobrindt said. “We are preparing the foundations for that right now.”
Dobrindt’s initial promises to tighten border controls on taking office angered neighbors who protested at plans to return to their territory those migrants found not to have a right to enter Germany.
An Italian plan to process asylum seekers picked up at sea in Albania has stalled amid Italian court challenges.
A scheme by Britain, which is not an EU member, under its previous Conservative government to send asylum seekers who arrived in Britain without permission to Rwanda was scrapped by Prime Minister Keir Starmer when he took office last year.


US FDA approves Moderna’s next-generation COVID-19 vaccine for adults 65 or older

Updated 38 min 29 sec ago
Follow

US FDA approves Moderna’s next-generation COVID-19 vaccine for adults 65 or older

  • The vaccine has also been approved for people aged 12 to 64 with at least one or more underlying risk factors
  • The Moderna vaccine, branded mNEXSPIKE, can be stored in refrigerators rather than freezers

The US Food and Drug Administration has approved Moderna’s next-generation COVID-19 vaccine for everyone aged 65 and above, the company said on Saturday, the first endorsement since the regulator tightened requirements.

The vaccine has also been approved for people aged 12 to 64 with at least one or more underlying risk factors, Moderna said in a statement.

The Department of Health and Human Services, under the leadership of long-time vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is increasing regulatory scrutiny on vaccines.

The FDA said on May 20 it planned to require drugmakers to test their COVID booster shots against an inert placebo in healthy adults under 65 for approval, effectively limiting them to older adults and those at risk of developing severe illness.

The Moderna vaccine, branded mNEXSPIKE, can be stored in refrigerators rather than freezers, to offer longer shelf life and make distribution easier, especially in developing countries where supply-chain issues could hamper vaccination drives.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which Kennedy also oversees, said on Thursday that COVID vaccines remain an option for healthy children when parents and doctors agree that it is needed, stopping short of Kennedy’s announcement days earlier that the agency would remove the shots from its immunization schedule.


Musk vows to stay Trump’s ‘friend’ in bizarre black-eyed farewell

Updated 31 May 2025
Follow

Musk vows to stay Trump’s ‘friend’ in bizarre black-eyed farewell

  • “I look forward to continuing to be a friend and adviser to the president,” Musk said in a press conference
  • Many people were more interested in the black bruise around Musk’s right eye, which he blamed on his son

WASHINGTON: Billionaire Elon Musk bade farewell to Donald Trump in an extraordinary Oval Office appearance Friday, sporting a black eye, brushing aside drug abuse claims and vowing to stay a “friend and adviser” to the US president.

As the world’s richest person bowed out of his role as Trump’s cost-cutter-in-chief, the Republican hailed Musk’s “incredible service” and handed him a golden key to the White House.

But Trump insisted that Musk was “really not leaving” after a turbulent four months in which his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cut tens of thousands of jobs, shuttered whole agencies and slashed foreign aid.

“He’s going to be back and forth,” said Trump, showering praise on the tech tycoon for what he called the “most sweeping and consequential government reform program in generations.”

 

South-African born Musk, wearing a black T-shirt with the word “Dogefather” in white lettering and a black DOGE baseball cap, said many of the $1 trillion savings he promised would take time to bear fruit.

“I look forward to continuing to be a friend and adviser to the president,” he said.

But many people were more interested in the livid black bruise around Musk’s right eye.

Speculation about the cause was further fueled by accusations in the New York Times Friday that Musk used so much of the drug ketamine on the 2024 campaign trail that he developed bladder problems.

‘Go ahead punch me in the face’

The SpaceX and Tesla magnate said that his son was to blame for the injury.

“I was just horsing around with lil’ X, and I said, ‘go ahead punch me in the face,’” 53-year-old Musk said. “And he did. Turns out even a five-year-old punching you in the face actually is...” he added, before tailing off.

Musk, however, dodged a question about the drug allegations.

The New York Times said Musk, the biggest donor to Trump’s 2024 election campaign, also took ecstasy and psychoactive mushrooms and traveled with a pill box last year.

Elon Musk looks on during a news conference with US President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on May 30, 2025. (AFP)

Musk, who has long railed against the news media and championed his X social media platform as an alternative, took aim at the paper instead.

“Is that the same publication that got a Pulitzer Prize for false reporting on the Russiagate?” said Musk, referring to claims that Trump’s 2016 election campaign colluded with Moscow.

“Let’s move on. Okay. Next question.”

Later in the day, when a reporter asked Trump if he was “aware of Elon Musk’s regular drug use,” Trump simply responded: “I wasn’t.”

“I think Elon is a fantastic guy,” he added.

The White House had earlier played down the report.

“The drugs that we’re concerned about are the drugs running across the southern border” from Mexico, said Trump’s Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, whose wife works for Musk.

Musk has previously admitted to taking ketamine, saying he was prescribed it to treat a “negative frame of mind” and suggesting his use of drugs benefited his work.

Leaving under a cloud

The latest in a series of made-for-TV Oval Office events was aimed at putting a positive spin on Musk’s departure.

Musk is leaving Trump’s administration under a cloud, after admitting disillusionment with his role and criticizing the Republican president’s spending plans.

It was a far cry from his first few weeks as Trump’s chainsaw-brandishing sidekick.

Elon Musk receives the key to the White House from President Donald Trump during a press conference in the Oval Office at the White House on May 30, 2025. (Reuters)

At one time Musk was almost inseparable from Trump, glued to his side on Air Force One, Marine One, in the White House and at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.

The right-wing magnate’s DOGE led an ideologically-driven rampage through the federal government, with its young “tech bros” slashing tens of thousands of jobs.

But DOGE’s achievements fell far short of Musk’s original goal of saving $2 trillion dollars.

The White House says DOGE has made $170 billion in savings so far. The independent “Doge Tracker” site has counted just $12 billion while the Atlantic magazine put it far lower, at $2 billion.

Musk’s “move fast and break things” mantra was also at odds with some of his cabinet colleagues, and he said earlier this week that he was “disappointed” in Trump’s planned mega tax and spending bill as it undermined DOGE’s cuts.

Musk’s companies, meanwhile, have suffered.

Tesla shareholders called for him to return to work as sales slumped and protests targeted the electric vehicle maker, while SpaceX had a series of fiery rocket failures.