FILE -The Judges enter the International Court of Justice, or World Court, in The Hague, Netherlands, July 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Phil Nijhuis, File)

House Republicans are working overtime after a lengthy White House meeting to meet President Donald Trump’s demand for a big budget package that includes some $3 trillion in tax breaks, massive program cuts and a possible extension of the nation’s debt limit to allow more borrowing and prevent a federal default.

Meanwhile, the International Criminal Court on Friday called on its member states to stand up against sanctions imposed by Trump, saying the move was an attempt to “harm its independent and impartial judicial work.”

The court got plenty of support from traditional U.S. allies in Europe who are standing up against Trump’s executive order. The court issued an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes over his military response in Gaza following the Hamas attack against Israel in October 2023.

Here's the latest:

Trump, by executive order, wants plastic straws

He announced on his Truth social media network Friday that he plans to sign an executive order next week unwinding his predecessor’s push to move away from plastic straws, declaring that paper straws “don’t work.”

The president has railed against paper straws in the past and in 2019 his reelection campaign sought to use the issue to galvanize supporters, mocking efforts to use paper straws and selling Trump-branded plastic straws for $15.

The Biden administration in 2024 gave the federal government another quarter-century to phase out single-use plastics, including straws, that are polluting the environment and the oceans.

Another deportation flight to Gitmo

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says another planeload of people in the U.S. illegally has gone to Guantanamo Bay.

Noem said Friday on X that the flight took off Thursday, and that they were all “known gang members from Venezuela.”

President Trump says he’s using the U.S. military’s detention center in Cuba to house as many as 30,000 of the “worst criminal aliens.”

Migrant rights groups say Gitmo is not equipped to handle such an influx and there’s no oversight for people held there.

Iran’s supreme leader criticizes US nuke talks proposal

Iran’s supreme leader said Friday that negotiations with America “are not intelligent, wise or honorable” after Trump floated nuclear talks with Tehran. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also said “there should be no negotiations with such a government.”

Khamenei stopped short of issuing a direct order not to engage with Washington, but his remarks upended months of signals from Tehran to the United States that it wanted to negotiate over its rapidly advancing nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of crushing economic sanctions worth billions of dollars.

The Iranian rial then sunk to a record low of 872,000 rials to $1 in aftermarket trading.

What happens next remains unclear. Reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian had promised Thursday to begin a dialogue with the West.

? Read more about potential talks between the U.S. and Iran

It’s the first full day on the job for bureaucracy-busting Russ Vought

Writing in the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, Vought described the White House budget director’s job “as the best, most comprehensive approximation of the President’s mind.”

The Office of Management and Budget, he declared, “is a President’s air-traffic control system” and should be “involved in all aspects of the White House policy process,” becoming “powerful enough to override implementing agencies’ bureaucracies.”

Vought has pushed to enable mass dismissals by reclassifying tens of thousands of federal workers. He supports the president using “impoundment” to override the legislative branch on spending. And he’s unabashedly advanced “ Christian nationalism. ”

? Read more about Russ Vought’s powers

Forced leaves start for thousands as Trump guts USAID

They began in Washington and worldwide Friday for most employees of the U.S. Agency for International Development, even as workers went to courts to try to block Trump from dismantling the agency and U.S.- funded aid programs around the world.

The administration plans to leave USAID with fewer than 300 workers, out of more than 8,000 direct hires and contractors, and thousands more locally hired employees abroad. That’s according to two current USAID employees and one former senior USAID official, who spoke with The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

They said the numbers were presented to the agency’s remaining senior officials on Thursday. A Trump administration order forbids USAID staffers from talking to anyone outside their agency.

— Paul Wiseman

? Read more about the dismantling of USAID

Trump impact: Not a great time to be job-hunting

The first job report of Trump’s second presidency — just 143,000 jobs added last month — suggests he inherited a solid but unspectacular labor market.

Although Trump’s plan to push out federal workers is temporarily blocked, a federal hiring freeze Trump imposed is a “negative for employment growth,’’ according to economist Bradley Saunders. Economists also worry about Trump’s threat to wage a trade war against other countries and the 10% tax he imposed on Chinese imports.

The tariffs are paid by U.S. importers, generally increasing costs for U.S. consumers, which could rekindle inflation. That could lead the Fed to cancel or postpone the two interest-rate cuts it had forecast, which would be bad for economic growth and job creation.

? Read more about Trump’s effect on the U.S. economy

More federal workers agree to resign, White House says

The number of federal workers agreeing to resign has spiked to 65,000, according to a White House official.

The official requested anonymity because they weren’t authorized to disclose the latest figures.

The workers have opted into the deferred resignation program, which is being challenged in court. A federal judge scheduled a hearing for Monday afternoon to consider arguments over whether the plan can proceed.

? Read more on Trump’s worker resignation push

— Chris Megerian

Japan’s PM aims for personal bond with Trump in whirlwind Washington trip

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba didn’t skimp on legwork as he prepared for his first Trump meeting.

He huddled with SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman after Trump hosted them at the White House, and sought advice from his predecessor, Fumio Kishida.

“It will be our first face-to-face talks, so I would like to focus on building a personal relationship of trust between the two of us,” Ishiba told reporters his White House visit Friday.

? Read more about the Ishiba-Trump meeting

Judge in Boston hears from 18 states asking to block birthright citizenship ban

A federal judge in Boston on Friday will consider a request from 18 state attorneys general to block Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship for the children of parents who are in the U.S. illegally.

A federal judge in Seattle blocked the order Thursday, saying Trump is trying to change the Constitution with an executive order. A Maryland judge also issued a nationwide pause.

The Trump administration says such children are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States and therefore not entitled to citizenship.

The state attorneys general and the cities of San Francisco and Washington want Judge Leo Sorokin to issue a preliminary injunction. They call it a “flagrantly unlawful attempt to strip hundreds of thousands of American-born children of their citizenship.”

? Read more about the court battles over birthright citizenship

House GOP rushing to produce Trump’s big budget bill cutting programs and taxes

House Republicans are working overtime after a lengthy White House meeting to meet President Donald Trump’s demand for a big budget package that includes some $3 trillion in tax breaks, massive program cuts and a possible extension of the nation’s debt limit to allow more borrowing and prevent a federal default.

Speaker Mike Johnson had GOP lawmakers working into the night ahead of a self-imposed Friday deadline to produce the package. Trump popped in and out of their nearly five-hour Cabinet room meeting Thursday with a simple message: Get it done.

On their list: making tax cuts that expire at the end of this year permanent, cutting spending on federal programs and ensuring Trump has enough money to launch his deportation operation and finish building the U.S-Mexico border wall.

? Read more about the House budget package

US allies in Europe join ICC against Trump’s sanctions over Israel

The International Criminal Court on Friday called on its member states to stand up against sanctions imposed by President Donald Trump, saying that the move was an attempt to “harm its independent and impartial judicial work.”

And the embattled court got plenty of support from traditional U.S. allies in Europe who stood up against the Trump measure. Trump’s executive order on Thursday imposing sanctions on the court because of its investigations of Israel.

Neither nation recognizes the court, which has issued an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes over his military response in Gaza following the Hamas attack against Israel in October 2023.

? Read more about the response to Trump’s ICC sanctions

House speaker and Israeli leader to meet

Friday's encounter is a make-up date because House Speaker Mike Johnson missed a scheduled meeting with Netanyahu at the Capitol.

That’s because the speaker and other congressional Republicans were at the White House Thursday in a meeting with Trump and other officials that stretched well into the late afternoon.

Trump popped in and out of the nearly five-hour meeting as the Republicans, who have struggled to agree on their agenda, hammered out differences in the Cabinet Room. They ended up staying so long they were served turkey-bacon sandwiches for lunch.

Trump signs order imposing sanctions on International Criminal Court over investigations of Israel

Trump has signed an executive order imposing sanctions on the International Criminal Court over investigations of Israel, a close U.S. ally.

Neither the U.S. nor Israel is a member of or recognizes the court. Israel is a close U.S. ally, and the court recently issued an arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over his actions toward Palestinians in Gaza after the Hamas attack against Israel in October 2023.

Trump’s order says the ICC’s actions set a “dangerous precedent.” Sanctions include blocking ICC officials from entering the United States.

?Read more about the executive order

DOJ ends program seizing Russian oligarchs’ assets over Ukraine invasion

The Trump administration’s Justice Department has disbanded a Biden-era program aimed at seizing the assets of Russian oligarchs as a means to punish Russia for invading Ukraine.

The move to disband Task Force KleptoCapture is one of several moves undertaken by the Justice Department under the new leadership of Attorney General Pam Bondi that presage a different approach toward Russia and national security issues.

The department also ended the Foreign Influence Task Force, which was established in the first Trump administration to police influence campaigns staged by Russia and other nations aimed at sowing discord, undermining democracy and spreading disinformation.

?Read more about the DOJ changes under Trump

News from © The Associated Press, 2025