Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy (L) and Pope Leo XIV (R) wave to reporters at the end of their meeting at the Papal residence in Castel Gandolfo, on the outskirts of Rome, Italy, on December 09, 2025. (Riccardo De Luca/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(LONDON) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with Pope Leo XIV near Rome on Tuesday, amid a flurry of meetings with fellow European leaders to discuss the latest permutations of a U.S.-proposed peace plan to end Russia’s full-scale invasion of his country.
The Vatican Press office said the two men met at the papal residence at Castel Gandolfo outside the Italian capital.
“During the cordial talks, which focused on the war in Ukraine, the Holy Father reiterated the need for the continuation of dialogue and expressed his urgent desire that the current diplomatic initiatives bring about a just and lasting peace,” the Vatican statement said.
“In addition, the questions of prisoners of war and the need to assure the return of Ukrainian children to their families were also discussed,” the statement said.
Zelenskyy and the pope greeted journalists and photographers from the balcony of the papal residence.
The Ukrainian president is due to meet with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Tuesday afternoon.
That meeting follows discussions with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in London on Monday.
Zelenskyy is meeting with European leaders to discuss their approach to the latest version of the U.S.-proposed peace deal to end Russia’s invasion.
Following talks in Geneva, Moscow and Miami over the past couple of weeks, the initial 28-point peace plan presented to Kyiv by American negotiators has been revised down to 20 points, Zelenskyy said on Monday.
Key issues such as territorial control and future Western security guarantees for Ukraine remain unsettled.
“The Americans think we must look for compromises. There are difficult questions about territories. In this regard, there is no compromise for now,” Zelenskyy told reporters on a plane after the meetings in London.
Zelenskyy said the “strongest security guarantee” that Ukraine can get would be from the U.S. “They are so far reacting positively to such a move,” he said.
The “Coalition of the Willing,” as the group of mostly European leaders refer to themselves, will also provide security guarantees, but Zelenskyy said he has not received an answer on what they would be ready to do in the event of a “repeated aggression from Russia.”
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Ukraine’s president, at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, on Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. Nathan Laine/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(LONDON) — No compromise has been reached on the question of territorial control to reach a peace settlement, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said following his meeting with European leaders on Monday.
“The Americans think we must look for compromises. There are difficult questions about territories. In this regard, there is no compromise for now,” Zelenskyy told reporters on a plane after the meeting in London, translated from Ukrainian.
Following talks in Geneva, Moscow and Miami over the past couple of weeks, the initial 28-point peace plan is now 20 points, Zelenskyy said. Key issues such as territorial control and future Western security guarantees for Ukraine remain unsettled.
Zelenskyy said the “strongest security guarantee” that Ukraine can get would be from the United States, adding, “They are so far reacting positively to such a move.”
The Coalition of the Willing, made up of mostly European leaders, will also provide security guarantees, but Zelenskyy said he has not received an answer on what they would be ready to do in the event of a “repeated aggression from Russia.”
Ahead of traveling to the U.K.,Zelenskyy on Sunday urged “collective pressure on Russia” amid the latest American peace push in Ukraine, and as Moscow and Kyiv both continued their long-range barrages despite renewed diplomatic maneuvers.
“We are starting a new diplomatic week,” Zelenskyy said in posts to social media, saying Ukrainian representatives would be meeting with European counterparts in the coming days.
Zelenskyy said the most pressing questions included “security issues, support for our resilience and support packages for our defense.” For the latter, “air defense and long-term funding for Ukraine” are Kyiv’s prime concerns, he said.
Zelenskyy said the Ukrainian negotiating team held “substantive discussions” with U.S. envoys in recent days, with Kyiv’s delegation — led by National Security and Defense Council Secretary Rustem Umerov and Chief of the General Staff Andrii Hnatov — now returning to Europe.
“I expect detailed information from them on everything that was said to the American envoys in Moscow, and on the nuances the Americans are prepared to modify in negotiations with us and with the Russians,” Zelenskyy said.
“Ukraine deserves a dignified peace, and whether there will be peace depends entirely on Russia — on our collective pressure on Russia and on the sound negotiating positions of the United States, Europe, and all our other partners,” Zelenskyy wrote.
“Russia must be held accountable for what it is doing — for the daily strikes, for the constant terror against our people, and for the war itself,” Zelenskyy said.
Trump on Sunday appeared to express frustration with the Ukrainian position on the latest U.S.-proposed peace deal, which neither Kyiv nor Moscow have publicly committed to supporting in full.
“We’ve been speaking to President Putin and we’ve been speaking to Ukrainian leaders, including President Zelenskyy,” Trump told reporters. “I have to say that I’m a little bit disappointed that President Zelenskyy hasn’t yet read the proposal — that was as of a few hours ago.”
“His people love it, but he has — Russia’s fine with it,” Trump continued. “Russia’s, you know, Russia, Russia, I guess would rather have the whole country, when you think of it. But Russia is, I believe, fine with it. But I’m not sure that Zelenskyy is fine with it. His people love it, but he hasn’t read it.”
The U.S. initially presented Kyiv with a 28-point peace plan that critics dismissed as equivalent to Ukrainian capitulation. The blueprint was widely perceived as pro-Russian for its demand that Ukraine surrender territories in the east of the country and cap the size of its military. Nonetheless, Moscow refrained from offering its full backing, though Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested the document could “form the basis for future agreements.”
Presidential envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner have since traveled to Moscow to meet with Putin and held meetings with Ukrainian representatives as they sought to firm up a potential framework for a future peace deal.
Long-range Russian drone and missile strikes continued all across Ukraine through the weekend, with Ukrainian officials reporting that the attacks focused on critical energy infrastructure.
On Monday morning, Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 149 drones into the country overnight, of which 131 were shot down or suppressed.
Ukraine’s Energy Ministry said in a post to Telegram that the continued Russian strikes had caused significant power outages for customers in Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Sumy and Chernihiv regions.
Ukraine also continued its own cross-border strike campaign. Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Monday that its forces downed at least 74 Ukrainian drones overnight, including two over the Moscow region.
ABC News’ Hannah Demissie and Meghan Mistry contributed to this report.
Rebecca Slaughter, commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), during a House Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, DC, July 13, 2023. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
(WASHINTON) — The Supreme Court on Monday appeared likely to allow President Donald Trump to remove a Democratic member of the Federal Trade Commission purely for policy reasons, likely rolling back 90 years of legal precedent that had prevented at-will removal of independent agency officials in a decision that would expand presidential power.
The case could transform the federal government and effectively end the independence of some two dozen bipartisan agencies that Congress had designed to be insulated from political interference and direct White House supervision.
All six of the Supreme Court’s conservative justices indicated during oral arguments in the case, Trump v. Slaughter, that a president should have absolute control over the leadership of any government body carrying out executive functions, such as rulemaking and law enforcement.
They pointed to Article II of the Constitution which says, “the executive power shall be vested in a President” and that he alone “shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
Such a ruling would overrule or substantially limit a unanimous 1935 Supreme Court decision involving the FTC — Humphrey’s Executor v. U.S. — which had affirmed limits on a president’s ability to fire members of the commission only for cause.
“Humphrey’s Executor is just a dried husk of whatever people used to think it was,” Chief Justice John Roberts said bluntly.
Justice Samuel Alito suggested that the earlier Supreme Court had egregiously erred, opening the door for Congress to circumvent the president altogether if it wanted to.
Could every Cabinet office “be headed by a multi-member commission whose members are not subject to at-will removal by the president?” he asked Amit Agarwal, the attorney representing the terminated FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter.
The Supreme Court’s three liberal members vigorously defended the agencies as they were designed by Congress — and signed into law by prior presidents — as legitimate sentinels of the public interest and regulatory continuity across administrations.
“You’re asking us to destroy the structure of government,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor told Trump administration Solicitor General John Sauer.
Justice Elena Kagan said she worried about a slippery slope.
“The result of what you want is that the president is going to have massive unchecked, uncontrolled power not only to do traditional execution [of the laws] but to make law,” Kagan said, referring to the agencies’ regulatory authority.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson warned of the “danger” in allowing a president to replace members of independent commissions with “loyalists and people who don’t know anything” about the agency’s expertise.
Independent agencies have regulated American monetary policy and stock trades, transportation systems and election campaigns, consumer product safety and broadcast licenses historically overseen by subject-matter experts from both parties.
“If the petitioners get their way,” said Agarwal, “everyone is on the chopping block.”
Few of the conservatives seemed concerned about the consequences.
“It’s been suggested if we rule for you, the entire government will fall,” Alito told Sauer.
“The sky will not fall. In fact, the entire government will live with accountability,” Sauer replied.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, one of the justices most often in the majority camp on the Supreme Court’s decisions, made a point of downplaying the impact of potential fallout.
“Overruling or narrowing Humphrey’s won’t affect the existence of these agencies,” he pointed out. Sauer agreed.
Kavanaugh also suggested the Supreme Court is likely to carve out two exceptions to a ruling that would give a president greater control: the Federal Reserve Bank, which is also an independent agency, and administrative courts, such as the tax court, which are operated out of the executive branch.
Next month, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case involving Trump’s unprecedented attempt to fire a Democratically-appointed member of the Federal Reserve, Lisa Cook. She currently remains on the job after the justices declined Trump’s request to stay a lower court decision.
The outcome in the Slaughter case will determine whether or not there will be any Democrats left on the FTC or other regulatory bodies, and whether any of the other independent agencies will be truly “independent” any longer.
A decision in the case is expected by the end of June 2026.
(PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla.) — A 6-year-old girl died after she was injured in a go-kart accident at a trampoline adventure park in Florida, police said.
First responders were dispatched to an Urban Air Trampoline and Adventure Park in Port St. Lucie on Saturday shortly before 9 p.m. for a “medical run” after staff at the facility reported a go-kart accident involving a child, according to local police.
The girl was airlifted to a hospital in Fort Pierce and died from her injuries on Sunday, according to the Port St. Lucie Police Department.
“Detectives are actively investigating the circumstances surrounding the incident,” the Port St. Lucie Police Department said in a statement on Monday.
The medical examiner’s findings are pending, a police department spokesperson said in a statement earlier Monday.
Police did not release any additional details on the incident, including the nature of the injuries, citing the ongoing investigation.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has also been notified, “as required,” police said.
ABC News has reached out to the franchise location for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
The Port St. Lucie location includes a number of attractions in addition to trampolines, including go-karts, bumper cars, a zip line and laser tag.
Karoline Leavitt, White House press secretary, during a news conference in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House in Washington, DC, US, on Monday, Dec. 1, 2025. Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — The mother of White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s nephew was ordered released from immigration detention on Monday, according to her attorney.
Bruna Caroline Ferreira, who is in the process of obtaining a green card and previously held DACA status, was ordered released by an immigration judge on a minimum bond of $1,500.
Ferreira’s attorney, Todd Pomerleau, told ABC News that he argued at a hearing that his client is not a “criminal illegal alien,” as described by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), nor that she is a flight risk.
Ferreira is expected to be released Monday or Tuesday, according to Pomerleau.
The White House did not immediately respond to an ABC News request for comment.
DHS confirmed two weeks ago that Ferreira had been detained. A reporter with ABC New Hampshire station WMUR spoke with Leavitt’s brother, Michael Leavitt, who also confirmed the arrest and said Ferreira had been detained a few weeks previously.
A DHS spokesperson then described Ferreira, a Brazilian national, as a “criminal illegal alien” who had a previous arrest for battery and had overstayed a visa that expired in 1999.
“ICE arrested Bruna Caroline Ferreria, a criminal illegal alien from Brazil. She has a previous arrest for battery. She entered the U.S. on a B2 tourist visa that required her to depart the U.S. by June 6, 1999,” the DHS spokesperson said. “She is currently at the South Louisiana ICE Processing Center and is in removal proceedings. Under President Trump and Secretary Noem, all individuals unlawfully present in the United States are subject to deportation,” the spokesperson said.
“Bruna has no criminal record whatsoever, I don’t know where that is coming from. Show us the proof,” Pomerleau told Boston ABC station WCVB after Ferreria’s arrest was announced.
Pomerleau also said then that Ferreira entered the country lawfully, previously held DACA status and was in the process of obtaining a green card. He further said that his client was arrested in her car in Massachusetts after being stopped with no warrant, adding that he now has to litigate her case in Louisiana, thousands of miles away from her home.
Pomerleau also told WCVB that he did not believe that his client’s connection to Karoline Leavitt could affect the case, adding that he believes it’s just “happenstance.”
ABC News’ Armando Garcia, Jason Volack and Hannah Demissie contributed to this story.
Masked ICE agents were seen stalking the corridors on the 12th floor of Lower Manhattan’s immigration court at 26 Federal Plaza, New York City, USA on September 8, 2025. (Photo by Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — An asylum seeker who fled Afghanistan last year after being persecuted by the Taliban is at risk of being deported back to his home country, according to his attorney.
Attorney Elora Mukherjee told ABC News that despite having no criminal record and having future asylum hearings scheduled, her client was apprehended by immigration authorities last Wednesday during a routine “check in” at 26 Federal Plaza in New York City.
Mukherjee and her client’s family requested his name not be used due to fear of threats.
The asylum seeker’s arrest comes after President Donald Trump directed his administration to suspend all Afghan immigration cases in response to a shooting earlier this month that killed one National Guard member and left another in critical condition in Washington, D.C. The administration has accused the Biden administration of not properly vetting asylum seekers.
The suspected shooter is an Afghan refugee named Rahmanullah Lakanwal, who previously worked with the U.S. government, including the CIA, in Afghanistan. He has pleaded not guilty.
Since the shooting, immigrant advocates and attorneys say Afghan asylum seekers and refugees have been targeted for detention and deportation.
Mukherjee told ABC News that her client applied to enter the United States through the Customs and Border Protection’s One app and received an appointment to enter the country in May 2024.
According to a habeas petition filed by Mukherjee, her client fled Afghanistan “after being subject to forced eviction and threats of potential death by the Taliban.”
The man was held in Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody for six months and then released on parole, according to court documents. Shortly after being released, he appeared before immigration court and applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and Convention Against Torture relief.
Mukherjee said her client has attended all of his immigration hearings and has one scheduled for February 2026.
But last Wednesday, Mukherjee told ABC News, her client received a notification from ICE to appear at 26 Federal Plaza, the government building that has become an epicenter for clashes between immigrants and immigration authorities, for a “check in.”
After the man entered the ICE waiting room, Mukherjee said, he was apprehended by immigration authorities and taken to a detention center in New Jersey.
“I tried to stay by his side, but officers insisted on separating us … in fact, they took [him] and detained him,” said Mukherjee.
Mukherjee told ABC News she filed a habeas petition challenging his detention.
“He’s not done anything wrong,” she said. “He has complied with all of his immigration check-in requirements. Filed a timely asylum application. He was persecuted by the Taliban and he will be very seriously harmed, tortured and killed by the Taliban if he’s forced to return to Afghanistan.”
ABC News reviewed federal and state court records and did not find a criminal record for the man.
During a hearing on Friday, a federal judge ordered the government to answer to the habeas petition by Wednesday and Mukherjee to respond by Thursday.
A representative of the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
“He was not safe in his home country,” said the man’s brother, who also asked that his name not be used due to fear of threats to him and his family. “So he came to the United States and he feels safe over here, and he wants to establish a secure life for his future.”
He told ABC News that his brother was working and taking English classes before he was detained.
“Being returned to Afghanistan is on everyone’s mind,” his brother said. “I’m very worried.”
Alex Murdaugh sits during an evidentiary hearing at the Richland County Courthouse in Columbia, South Carolina, on Jan.16, 2024. Tracy Glantz/The State/Tribune News Service via Getty Images
(NEW YORK) — A former South Carolina court clerk who served during the double murder trial of Alex Murdaugh pleaded guilty on Monday to criminal charges stemming from the case — including for releasing sealed court exhibits to the press and then lying about it, and over the promotion of her book about the high-profile trial.
Former Colleton County Clerk of Court Mary Rebecca “Becky” Hill pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice, perjury and misconduct in office.
“I take full responsibility for my actions, and I know I have let down this Court, my community, and the people who placed their trust in me,” Hill said in court. “There is no excuse for my mistakes. I am ashamed of them, and I will carry that shame with me for the rest of my life.”
Judge Heath Taylor said he doesn’t believe Hill deserved incarceration and sentenced her to three years’ probation and 100 hours of community service.
Taylor said Hill has been “humiliated throughout this whole ordeal.”
“A lot of folks got swept up in the hoopla that was that trial,” Taylor said while handing down the sentence. “A lot of folks probably made a lot of money, but you didn’t.”
Hill was arrested in May, more than two years after Murdaugh was found guilty of brutally murdering his wife, Margaret “Maggie” Murdaugh, 52, and younger son, Paul Murdaugh, 22, who were found dead from multiple gunshot wounds near the dog kennels at the family’s hunting estate in 2021.
A judge imposed two sentences of life in prison, to be served consecutively for the murders.
According to the arrest warrants filed against Hill, investigators found she obstructed justice during the 2023 trial and then committed perjury during a hearing amid Murdaugh’s bid for a new trial last year.
Investigators found she obstructed justice in February 2023 during the trial by releasing or making available “‘scaled evidence’ photographs to a third party or parties, such act occurring in violation of a written court order issued to protect the ‘sealed evidence’ photographs, in violation of the law of the State of South Carolina,” the arrest warrant stated.
She then gave “false and misleading testimony” during a hearing on Jan. 29, 2024, in Richland County, as part of Murdaugh’s appeal, when she denied that she allowed anyone from the press to view the sealed exhibits in February 2023, according to the arrest warrant.
She was also charged with misconduct for using her office to promote a book she co-authored about the trial on social media, “such act being for her own financial gain and in violation of her duties, in violation of the laws of the State of South Carolina,” the arrest warrant stated. The book, “Behind the Doors of Justice: The Murdaugh Murders,” was ultimately pulled from publication over accusations of plagiarism.
The probe also found she received financial bonuses totaling nearly $12,000 between September 2021 and March 2024 for her own financial gain, “in violation of her duties, and further in violation of the laws of the State of South Carolina,” according to the arrest warrant.
Hill said in court Monday that she has “already begun the hard work of rebuilding the relationships I damaged by accepting responsibility, seeking forgiveness from those I love, and repaying any improper bonus I received.”
“I am committed to making amends, to being honest, and to living in a way that reflects the values I failed to uphold,” she said.
Her attorney, William Lewis, said they respect the judge’s decision and found the probationary sentence to be “appropriate.”
The Colleton County Clerk’s Office said it does not have any comment on Hill’s case.
Hill resigned as the Colleton County clerk of court in March 2024, amid the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division’s investigation into allegations she may have abused her government position for financial gain.
In the wake of the double murder trial, the South Carolina State Ethics Commission filed 76 counts of ethics violations against Hill over allegations she improperly sought financial gain through her position.
(WASHINGTON) — Members of Congress are tracking to pass new legislation that would compel Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to provide lawmakers the unedited military video of 11 people being killed in the Caribbean Sea on Sept. 2 after an initial strike on a suspected drug boat left two passengers alive in the water.
A provision tucked into the annual, must-pass Pentagon spending and policy bill says the Defense Department should hand over unedited copies of video to the House and Senate Armed Services committees. If the department does not comply, Hegseth’s travel budget would be slashed by 25% until the relevant videos are turned over, according to the legislation.
The provision could be amended before the bill is voted on in either chamber.
The House is expected to hold a floor vote on the bill this week. The Senate must take it up for a floor vote by the end of the month.
At issue is whether the Sept. 2 military strike on the alleged drug boat amounted to a war crime. Officials have confirmed there were four military strikes against the boat — the first strike killing nine of the 11 people aboard. Some 40 minutes later, a second strike was ordered to kill the remaining two survivors. Two more strikes were ordered to sink the boat, officials say.
Lawmakers who have seen portions of the video of the strikes in a classified briefing last week have described the state of the survivors before being killed by the U.S. military in starkly different terms. Democrats insisted the survivors were helpless and should have been rescued to comply with international laws that call for either sides in a conflict to help combatants who fall overboard or are shipwrecked. Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, however, said the survivors were trying to “flip” the boat “so they could stay in the fight.”
President Donald Trump last week said he is open to releasing the video.
“I don’t know what they have, but whatever they have, we’d certainly release, no problem,” he told reporters in the Oval Office last Wednesday.
Hegseth, however, has not committed to doing so. Speaking at the Reagan National Defense Forum on Saturday, Hegseth said he was concerned that releasing the video could expose sources and methods tied to an ongoing operation. He said the military uses “bespoke capabilities, techniques, procedures” that would have to be protected.
“I’m way more interested in protecting that than anything else. So, we’re viewing the process, and we’ll see,” he said.
Hegseth also has suggested that the people killed in the strike were an imminent threat.
“I was told, ‘Hey, there had to be a reattack, because there were a couple folks who could still be in the fight [with] access to radios.’ There was a link-up point of another potential boat, drugs were still there … I said, ‘Roger, sounds good,'” Hegseth said.
Rep. Adam Smith, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee who was briefed on the video, said there were no radios and called Hegseth’s description “ridiculous.”
“They ought to release the video. If they release the video, then everything that the Republicans are saying will clearly be portrayed to be completely false and people will get a look at it and they will see,” Smith said.
ABC News’ Lauren Peller and Allison Pecorin contributed to this report.
(NEW YORK) — After a three-month battle over the legality of her appointment, Alina Habba has resigned from her position as the Acting U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey.
She announced her resignation as U.S. attorney in a social media post on Monday. She will remain serving as “Senior Adviser to the Attorney General for U.S. Attorneys.”
The resignation comes after a protracted legal fight about whether she could serve in the U.S. attorney role without Senate confirmation.
In August, a federal judge ruled that she was serving in the position “without lawful authority” and disqualified her as New Jersey’s top federal law enforcement officer. A federal appeals court unanimously upheld that decision last week, and the Department of Justice has not appealed that decision.
“As a result of the Third Circuit’s ruling, and to protect the stability and integrity of the office which I love, I have decided to step down in my role as the U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey,” Habba said in her statement. “But do not mistake compliance for surrender. This decision will not weaken the Justice Department and it will not weaken me.”“Following the flawed Third Circuit decision disqualifying Alina Habba from performing her duties in the U.S. Attorney’s office for the District of New Jersey, I am saddened to accept Alina’s resignation.
“Following the flawed Third Circuit decision disqualifying Alina Habba from performing her duties in the U.S. Attorney’s office for the District of New Jersey, I am saddened to accept Alina’s resignation,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement. “The Department of Justice will seek further review of this decision, and we are confident it will be reversed. Alina intends to return to lead the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Jersey if this occurs.”
Despite the rulings, Habba remained in the position after Attorney General Pam Bondi named her a “Special Attorney to the Attorney General,” though several judges delayed proceedings to consider the legality of her position.
Before she was appointed as U.S. attorney, Habba served as a personal defense attorney for President Donald Trump in his New York civil fraud case and defamation trials. Last month, a federal appeals court upheld a $1 million penalty against Habba and Trump for bringing a frivolous lawsuit against former FBI Director James Comey and Hillary Clinton.
The Trump administration has faced growing headwinds over its efforts to install Trump loyalists as top prosecutors in U.S. attorneys’ offices across the country, suffering a string of court defeats as judges raise concerns they’re actively disregarding the law.
Last month, a judge threw out both criminal cases against Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James after determining that Lindsey Halligan, a former insurance lawyer and White House aide with no prosecutorial experience, was unlawfully appointed to lead the Eastern District of Virginia U.S. Attorney’s Office.
While Bondi previously said the administration would appeal that ruling, as of Monday, no appeal has been filed, and last week, a grand jury rejected an effort by the administration to revive its case against James.
A growing chorus of judges for the Eastern District of Virginia has raised concerns that the administration appears to be defying the order that disqualified Halligan by continuing to include her signature and title on legal filings.
On Monday morning, Attorney General Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a joint statement attacking judges for questioning Halligan’s legitimacy in the role, and accused them of “engaging in an unconscionable campaign of bias and hostility.”
“Lindsey and our attorneys are simply doing their jobs: advocating for the Department of Justice’s positions while following guidance from the Office of Legal Counsel,” the statement said. “They do not deserve to have their reputations questioned in court for ethically advocating on behalf of their client. This Department of Justice has no tolerance for undemocratic judicial activism.”
A farmer climbs onto a cotton stripper during a harvest at a farm near Corn, Okla., Nov. 19, 2025. Nick Oxford/Bloomberg via Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump is set to announce a $12 billion aid package for American farmers on Monday, a White House official confirmed to ABC News.
The package is set to include $11 billion in one-time payments to crop farmers through a new Department of Agriculture bridge payment program. The remaining funds will then go to other crops not covered by that program.
The long-promised aid package is intended to provide relief to farmers who have been hurt directly by Trump’s trade policies, including his global tariffs.
The news of the aid package announcement was first reported by Bloomberg.
A White House official confirmed that Trump will announce the package at an event with farmers at the White House on Monday afternoon.
Impact of tariffs on farmers
The aid package comes as the U.S.-China trade war has hit soybean farmers especially hard. Through most of this fall, during a bumper harvest season, China had blocked all purchases of soybeans from the U.S.
China was the biggest buyer of U.S. soybeans in 2024, accounting for $12.64 billion in sales, according to the USDA.
During Trump’s high-stakes meeting with Chinese President Xi in late October, the U.S. and China announced a framework trade agreement that included a deal on soybeans. China agreed to purchase 12 million metric tons of soybeans in the final two months of this year and 25 million metric tons in 2026, 2027 and 2028 — on par with levels before the trade war.
So far, China has purchased about 2.2 million metric tons of soybeans from the U.S. since the end of October, USDA data shows.
New package comes after Argentina bailout controversy
The administration’s new actions also come on the heels of the administration’s $20 billion bailout of Argentina, a move many American farmers and lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle criticized.
This fall, as China stopped buying all soybeans from U.S. farmers, it purchased soybeans from Argentina instead. So as the U.S. was giving a financial lifeline to Argentina, a country that directly benefited from the trade war, American farmers said they felt left behind.
“Farmers VERY upset [about] Argentina selling soybeans to China right after USA bail out Still ZERO USA soybeans sold to China,” Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa wrote in a September social media post about the bailout.
Trump, in his first term, also took action to bail out American farmers. His administration approved two packages in 2018 and 2019 totaling $28 billion for farmers impacted by his economic policies.
