(WASHINGTON) — President Trump met on Monday at the White House with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, the White House said.
The visit marked the first time a Syrian president has ever visited the White House and is viewed as a crucial first step in normalizing U.S.-Syria relations.
The White House did not allow reporters and cameras access to the meeting.
Al-Sharaa is the former leader of U.S.-designated terror group al-Qaeda who was once wanted by the U.S. as a terrorist with a $10 million bounty on his head. He has even served time in the infamous Abu Ghraib prison.
A senior Trump administration official said Trump and al-Sharaa were expected to focus on counterterrorism efforts in Syria, and to discuss the signing of an agreement for Syria to join the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State. The coalition includes some 80 countries working to prevent a resurgence of the extremist group, according to the official.
It’s also the third meeting between Trump and al-Sharaa this year, as the Syrian leader confronts the challenges of rebuilding the country, seeking to restore ties with Arab countries and the West after years of civil war under Bashar al-Assad’s regime. The Assad regime’s fall brought to an end nearly 14 years of civil war.
Al-Sharaa arrived in Washington on Saturday and held meetings with members of Congress over the weekend, including with House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast, a Republican who represents a district in Florida.
Mast shared in a statement that he and al-Sharaa “broke bread” and had a “long and serious conversation about how to build a future for the people of Syria free of war, ISIS, and extremism.”
“He and I are two former soldiers and two former enemies. I asked him directly ‘Why we are no longer enemies?’” Mast revealed.
“His response was that he wishes to ‘liberate from the past and have a noble pursuit for his people and his country and to be a great ally to the United States of America,'” Mast shared in the statement.
The U.S. on Friday removed sanctions on al-Sharaa just one day after the United Nations Security Council lifted similar sanctions ahead of his meeting with Trump.
According to a notice on the U.S. Treasury Department website, the United States removed Specially Designated Global Terrorist designations on Sharaa and Syria’s interior minister, Anas Khattab.
Speaker Mike Johnson delivers remarks to reporters on November 10, 2025 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. (Tom Brenner/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The longest government shutdown in U.S. history appears to be nearing its end, after senators suddenly advanced a funding deal over the weekend after 40 days of little progress.
The agreement still needs to pass the Senate and the House before going to President Donald Trump’s desk. In the meantime, pain continues to grow for Americans on everything from food assistance to air travel.
Here’s a timeline of major developments from the weekslong impasse.
Oct. 1: The federal government shut down at 12:01 a.m. after competing Republican and Democratic proposals that would have funded the government failed in the Senate at the eleventh hour. The Democrat bill included extensions for health care subsidies under the Affordable Care Act while the Republicans’ “clean” bill would have funded the government at current levels until Nov. 1.
Oct. 10: The Trump administration begins to lay off thousands of federal workers. Agencies impacted include the Commerce, Education, Energy, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Homeland Security and Treasury departments.
Oct. 14: Two weeks into the shutdown with virtually no progress, House Speaker Mike Johnson predicts they are headed toward “one of the longest shutdowns in American history.” The House has remained out of session the entire shutdown after Republican members passed a clean, seven-week funding bill in mid-September.
Oct. 15: The Pentagon says that troops have been paid and will not miss a paycheck due to the shutdown after shifting existing funds.
Oct. 24: More than 500,000 federal employees miss their first full paycheck. Days later, the president of the country’s largest union representing federal workers called on lawmakers to pass a short-term spending bill to end the shutdown, a statement seized on by Republicans to ramp up pressure on Democrats.
Oct. 30: President Trump, after weeklong overseas trip, inserts himself in the shutdown showdown by calling on Senate Republicans to terminate the filibuster in order to unilaterally reopen the government. But Senate Majority Leader John Thune quickly rejected Trump’s demand.
Nov. 1: Funds run dry for SNAP benefits, leaving 42 million Americans vulnerable — and setting off a complex legal fight between the administration and states. Plus, open enrollment begins for Affordable Care Act recipients with prices for insurance premiums skyrocketing next year.
Nov. 4: The Senate fails for the 14th time to advance a clean, short-term funding bill.
Nov. 5: The shutdown becomes the longest in U.S. history. Trump brings Senate Republicans to the White House to talk shutdown, after Republican losses in key elections across the country. Democrats capitalize on election wins to argue Republicans should negotiate with them on health care.
Nov. 7: Air travel is even more heavily impacted as the Federal Aviation Administration begins to reduce flight capacity at major airports across the country. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer put on the table a Democratic proposal for a short-term extension of government funding that includes a one-year extension of ACA subsidies. Republicans quickly rejected the offer.
Nov. 8: Thune said he plans to keep the Senate in session until the government is funded, and said Republicans will push forward with a plan to advance a short-term funding bill with a “mini-bus” of three, full-year funding bills for SNAP benefits and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, as well as veterans programs. Schumer calls it a “terrible mistake” for Republicans to have rebuffed Democrats’ offer.
Nov. 9: A sudden breakthrough moment on Capitol Hill as senators reach a bipartisan deal to end the shutdown. Eight Democrats vote with Republicans to advance the measure in a 60-40 vote.
The bill does not include any of the Democratic demands on health care, but sources told ABC News that Republican leadership promised to allow a vote on a bill of Democrats’ choosing related to the ACA in December.
It also includes a new government funding extension of Jan. 30, 2026; language to reverse Trump administration firings during the shutdown; and to ensure furlough workers receive backpay.
Nov. 10: Senate reconvenes to move ahead on the deal, with questions remaining on how fast they can get it done. Speaker Johnson tells House members to start returning to Washington immediately, and says the House will vote as quickly as possible on the funding bill once it clears the Senate to send it to President Trump’s desk.
(WASHINGTON) — The Supreme Court on Monday denied a bid from former Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis to appeal her $100,000 damages suit and get the justices to revisit the landmark 2015 decision in Obergefell v Hodges.
The court did not explain its decision.
Davis gained international attention after she refused to issue a marriage license to a gay couple on religious grounds in open defiance of the high court’s ruling and was subsequently jailed for six days. A jury later awarded the couple $100,000 for emotional damages plus $260,000 for attorneys fees.
In a petition for writ of certiorari filed in August, Davis argued First Amendment protection for free exercise of religion immunizes her from personal liability for the denial of marriage licenses.
She also claimed the court’s decision in Obergefell v Hodges — which rooted marriage rights for LGBTQ couples in the 14th Amendment’s due process protections — was “legal fiction.”
Lower courts had dismissed Davis’ claims and most legal experts considered her bid a long shot.
Davis’ appeal to the Supreme Court comes as conservative opponents of marriage rights for same-sex couples pursue a renewed campaign to reverse legal precedent and allow each state to set its own policy.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(WASHINGTON) — The Senate passed a key test vote Sunday night on a plan that would be a major step toward reopening the government.
After 40 days of a standoff, the bill advanced by a vote of 60-40, just barely meeting the 60 votes needed to keep it moving forward.
The vote was gaveled down to applause in the chamber at 10:49 p.m. ET.
Democratic Sens. Tim Kaine, Dick Durbin, Maggie Hassan, Jeanne Shaheen and Jacky Rosen were the Democrats who flipped to vote for this bill.
They join Democrats Catherine Cortez Masto, John Fetterman and Independent Angus King, who have been voting in favor of a government funding bill for weeks. Sen. Rand Paul was the only Republican to vote against it.
The vote was a big test to gauge whether enough Democrats would vote with Republicans to break the impasse, even though they wouldn’t get an extension of Obamacare subsidies that expire at the end of the year, which they have been holding out for through the 40-day shutdown, the longest in U.S. history.
Multiple Senate sources told ABC News’ Jonathan Karl earlier on Sunday that the bill would extend funding to Jan. 31 as well as provide funding for the remainder of the fiscal year to other agencies like the Department of Agriculture to pay for SNAP benefits and the Department of Veterans Affairs.
A senior Democratic senator told Karl there would be more than enough Democratic votes to pass this, although a majority of Democrats, including most of the leadership, voted against it.
Democrats would get nothing on health care beyond a promise that the Senate will vote on extending Affordable Care Act subsidies before the end of the year — essentially what Senate Majority Leader John Thune offered more than a month ago and Democrats objected to.
Although most Senate Democrats may have opposed this bill, they were resigned to the fact that this part of the fight is over, sources said. They will take the battle over health care to the midterms and argue that Republicans refused to do anything for the millions of Americans who will see their health insurance premiums skyrocket.
Passage of the bill does not immediately reopen the government. The House will also have to approve the bill. The House has been out of session since September and Speaker Mike Johnson would need to call his members back to Washington to consider this bill before it could head to President Donald Trump’s desk.
The Senate wants to modify the bill in a number of ways. Now that the bill has passed the test vote, the debate can begin. There are some key modifications that senators want to make to the bill:
They want to change its expiration date from Nov. 21 to the end of January.
They want to attach three full-year funding bills to it. The government is usually funded through 12 full-year appropriations bills. The three that senators hope to include are Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, the Legislative Branch, and the Department of Agriculture. If lawmakers fail to fund the government by the new deadline, programs covered by these bills would be fully funded through the end of the fiscal year.
There could be the inclusion of some sort of language guaranteeing Democrats a vote by a certain date on a bill to address health care. There could also be some sort of language to reverse some of the administration’s reductions in force of government workers that occurred during the shutdown.
Unless there’s total agreement by all senators to quickly adjust the bill, it could take the Senate up to a week to process it.
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump issued a sweeping pardon to key figures allegedly involved in the plan to arrange an alternate slate of electors and “expose voting fraud” during the 2020 election, according to U.S. Pardon Attorney Ed Martin.
Trump pardoned high-profile individuals allegedly involved in his attempt to overturn the election, including Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Boris Epshteyn, John Eastman and Mark Meadows — and 72 other individuals allegedly associated with the effort to challenge the 2020 election results.
The pardon, which Trump appears to have signed on Friday, covers each of the president’s co-defendants who were charged in Georgia for a sweeping scheme to overturn election results.
Four of the pardon recipients pleaded guilty in the Georgia case.
“This proclamation ends a grave national injustice perpetrated upon the American people following the 2020 Presidential Election and continues the process of national reconciliation,” the pardon says.
The pardon language explicitly states that it does not apply to Trump himself. “This pardon does not apply to the president of the United States,” according to the pardon.
(NEW YORK) — For the first time in more than two decades, the Pentagon has begun sending conventional ground forces to Panama to train in the jungle there, returning U.S. soldiers and Marines to a three-week course once called the “Green Hell” because of its similarities to Vietnam.
The training program at Base Aeronaval Cristóbal Colón, formerly known as Fort Sherman, is relatively small in scope but is expected to ramp up over the next year, according to one defense official.
The program began earlier this year and is not intended to prepare troops for a potential mission, including inside Venezuela, the official said.
Still, the military’s interest in jungle warfare in Latin America is noteworthy given Trump’s heightened focus there. Since taking office, Trump has vowed to “take back” the Panama Canal and repeatedly threatened to attack Venezuela because of its alleged role in transiting illegal narcotics.
“If you can train and fight in one of the most difficult and challenging locations in the world, you build a really lethal, effective force,” the defense official said of the rationale behind the new training program.
Alex Plitsas, a former Pentagon official and senior fellow at The Atlantic Council, said the new training course wouldn’t likely play a role in potential operations inside Venezuela. The training effort appears to be more about building Panama’s capacity to handle security threats in the region.
But the move signals a shift in priorities by the Trump administration, he said.
“It’s an expansion of an existing military relationship, but it’s not happening in a vacuum,” Plitsas said. “It’s happening as a broader change in policy. There’s a renewed interest in South America, where the president sees the drug flow to the United States as a national security issue with the intention of potential military action.”
Jungle training hasn’t been a priority for the military since 9/11, when the nation’s focus shifted to counterterrorism operations in the Middle East. The Defense Department in recent years has relied on a smaller Army jungle training center in Hawaii and at a Marine Corps site in Okinawa, Japan.
During the Vietnam War, however, Fort Sherman was considered a prime location where most troops could hone their jungle survival skills before shipping off to war.
Conditions at the Panamanian training site are considered among the harshest in the world, including venomous snakes and several layers of thick, towering vegetation that can make it difficult to operate communications and night-vision equipment or evacuate wounded personnel.
By 1999, the training site shuttered and the last of the U.S. military departed Panama as part of an agreement ceding U.S. control of the Panama Canal.
Shortly after taking office, though, Trump expressed renewed interest in the region, declaring the U.S. would be “reclaiming” the Panama Canal. That effort has since been couched by Pentagon officials as a renewed “partnership” with Panama to prevent Chinese influence over the canal, which the U.S. relies on heavily for shipping.
Trump also has overseen an unprecedented buildup of U.S. troops to the region, deploying 10,000 troops and, more recently, the USS Gerald R. Ford, the world’s largest aircraft carrier. The public display of force appears to be a kind of pressure campaign aimed at forcing out Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
By August, the military had set up the “Combined Jungle Operations Training Course” with Marines and Panamanian forces training as part of a pilot program. A military spokesperson said there have since been 46 graduates of the three-week course: 18 Marines, one Army soldier and 27 personnel from Panama’s National Aeronaval Service, National Border Service and National Police.
According to the Defense official, the Army plans to ramp up training over the next year, eventually sending in platoons of some 40 soldiers at a time to train.
Steve Ganyard, a retired Marine Corps colonel and ABC contributor, said the renewed interest in Panama is likely a practical one, but it also can be used to send a message.
“From a practical perspective, it’s easier to get to Panama than Okinawa. And the jungles of Central and South America have their own unique challenges,” he said. “That said, no doubt a message is being sent to Maduro by conducting combat training in his neighborhood.”
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Sunday claimed that a “dividend of at least $2000 a person” will be paid to all Americans except for “high-income people,” saying the country is now wealthy as a result of his tariff policies.
“People that are against Tariffs are FOOLS! We are now the Richest, Most Respected Country In the World, With Almost No Inflation, and A Record Stock Market Price. 401k’s are Highest EVER,” the president wrote.
“A dividend of at least $2000 a person (not including high income people!) will be paid to everyone,” he added.
In an interview on ABC News’ “This Week” on Sunday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that he had not spoken with Trump about the proposed dividend.
Calling opponents to tariffs “fools,” Trump claimed “A dividend of at least $2000 a person (not including high income people!) will be paid to everyone.”
“The $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms, in lots of ways, George,” Bessent told anchor George Stephanopoulos. “You know, it could be just the tax decreases that we are seeing on the president’s agenda — you know, no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on Social Security, deductibility of auto loans.”
(WASHINGTON) — Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday that there is no formal proposal from the White House to defund the Affordable Care Act and instead send money directly to Americans, despite a social media post from President Donald Trump on Saturday promoting such a plan.
“The president has also come forward with a new proposal overnight, saying it’s time, instead, to do away with Obamacare and said to have the money go directly to the people. Do you have a formal proposal to do that?” ABC News’ “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos.
“We don’t have a formal proposal,” Bessent said.
But pressed by Stephanopoulos about whether such a plan would be proposed to the Senate, Bessent said that the administration was not proposing it “right now.”
Bessent also hedged when asked about Trump’s push to end the Senate’s filibuster.
“Is the best way to end the shutdown right now to end the filibuster?” Stephanopolous asked.
“The best way is for five Democratic senators to come across the aisle,” Bessent said.
(WASHINGTON) President Donald Trump welcomed Hungary’s autocratic leader Viktor Orban to the White House on Friday, praising him repeatedly as a “great leader” as met sat to discuss trade and Russia’s war in Ukraine.
“I like and respect him,” Trump said as he and Orban sat for lunch with their teams in the Cabinet Room, specifically applauding Orban’s views on immigration and crime.
Orban in turn celebrated what he said will be a “golden age between the United States and Hungary” with Trump’s return to office.
Orban is in Washington seeking an exemption to new U.S. sanctions targeting Russia’s largest oil companies and their subsidiaries that will go into effect later this month.
President Trump was asked if he would grant Hungary’s request.
“We’re looking at it because it’s very difficult for him to get the oil and gas from other areas,” Trump replied, expressing sympathy for Hungary’s geographic reliance on Russia for energy resources.
“It’s a big country. But they don’t have sea. They don’t have the ports. And so they have a difficult problem,” Trump said before turning to criticize European countries he said don’t have that issue but continue to buy Russian oil.
Orban called the issue “vital” for Hungarians.
Orban was recently going to play host to a summit between President Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, before Trump called the proposed meeting off amid frustration with the lack of progress in peace talks.
Trump said they had picked Budapest, Hungary, as the location because both he and Putin liked Orban.
On Friday, Trump reiterated that if he and Putin were to meet, he would like to do it in Budapest. Trump said he and Orban would be discussing a potential summit with Putin.
“We were talking about that with Viktor, he understands Putin and knows him very well,” Trump said, adding: “I think that Viktor feels we’re going to get that war ended in the not too distant future.”
As Orban gave his view on the war, Trump turned to him and asked, “So you would say that Ukraine cannot win that war?”
“You know, a miracle can happen,” Orban replied.
Trump previously welcomed Orban to the White House during his first term, in 2019, breaking from his predecessors who had shunned Hungary’s prime minister from Washington.
The two men met several times when Trump was out of office at his Florida estate, including during the summer of the 2024 campaign and after Trump became president-elect.
Orban has been embraced by many prominent American conservatives over his positions on immigration and LGBTQ issues, and has spoken several times at the Conservative Political Action Conference. Orban hosted a CPAC event in Hungary earlier this year.
Trump on Friday said it was an “honor to have a friend of mine here” at the White House.
“He’s done a fantastic job. He’s a very powerful man within his country … He’s run a really great country, and he’s got no crime, he’s got no problems, like some countries do,” Trump said.
(WASHINGTON) — With almost a year as vice president — and one year until the midterm elections, JD Vance’s supporters say he is settling into his role in the Trump administration, being used as the president’s “fixer” and “enforcer,” a source familiar with their relationship told ABC News.
“Vance really has been an enforcer and fixer for the president and his administration, and he’s been able to do it on a wide variety of topics,” the source, someone familiar with the relationship between Vance and Trump, said. “Unlike past vice presidents who demanded a specific policy portfolio, Vance never did that, which allows the president to put JD in the game whenever he sees a need for him to be put in the game.”
This has allowed Trump to dispatch Vance to advance his agenda, the source said.
“I think that dynamic has benefited the president, the vice president and the entire administration,” the source added, saying trust between the two — and others in the administration with whom Vance has forged relationships for years — has led to Vance’s role.
Vance’s role in the Trump White House has sharpened as the 2026 midterm elections approach and his name has been floated as a possible 2028 presidential candidate — even by Trump himself.
Proponents of Vance say his role as the “enforcer” and “fixer” was on display last summer as the White House worked to push Trump’s massive tax and spending bill through Congress.
In the days leading up to the bill’s passage, Vance — who served as a senator from Ohio before becoming vice president — held a series of meetings with conservative and moderate holdouts and with Senate leadership to help move the bill forward.
“He was a big part of getting it across the finish line and then promoting it afterwards,” a former White House official told ABC News about Trump’s megabill.
When asked by ABC News how they view Vance’s role in the administration, White House spokeswoman Liz Huston said in a statement that Vance is Trump’s “trusted partner” who has helped deliver on Trump’s agenda.
“Vice President Vance is a trusted partner to President Trump and has played a critical role in helping the President keep all of the promises he made to the American people including delivering the largest tax cut in history for middle and working class Americans, securing the border, and putting American workers first,” Huston said.
Vance also took the lead in facilitating the TikTok framework that would transfer majority ownership of the app to Americans, but the deal has not been fully solidified. Vance was heavily involved in developing a strategy to reach the TikTok framework leading up to the U.S.-China summit in Madrid, where officials discussed the matter and joined Trump in the Oval Office when he signed the executive order on the framework.
A critical moment for Vance during this past year was his angry exchange with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the Oval Office where he chastised the world leader for not being thankful for the support the U.S. has provided to Ukraine in its war against Russia.
“Mr. President, with respect, I think it’s disrespectful for you to come into the Oval Office and try to litigate this in front of the American media,” Vance said to Zelenskyy in February. “Right now, you guys are going around enforcing conscripts to the front lines because you have manpower problems. You should be thanking the president for trying to bring an end to this conflict.”
The eyebrow-raising exchange underscored Vance’s willingness to publicly defend Trump and the lengths he would go to do so. But Trump appeared to shut down Vance in the meeting: “But you see, I think it’s good for the American people to see what’s going on. I think it’s very important,” Trump said.
Vance and Trump have not always been aligned. In March of this past year, Vance showed a rare instance of appearing to break with Trump in a Signal group chat with other top US officials and questioned whether the president recognized that a unilateral U.S. attack on the Houthis to keep international shipping lanes open was at odds with his tough talk about European nations paying their share of such efforts.
Still, Vance’s skills as a communicator have been useful for the administration — especially during the ongoing government shutdown, the former White House officials said.
“I would say one thing there that sort of ties to where he’s been in general as a help in the administration, is that he’s a very good communicator, and like you saw when he took the podium at the beginning of the shutdown to talk about, you know, the White House’s position on it,” the official said.
Joel Goldstein, a vice-presidential scholar and former professor at Saint Louis University Law School, told ABC News that Vance follows the footprint of vice presidents as an administration spokesperson — but takes it even further.
“Vice presidents are generally spokespersons for the administration they serve, but Vice President Vance seems unusually active in this regard, including on social media, and more confrontational than most recent vice presidents in some of his rhetoric against political opponents and the discourse he uses or doesn’t rebuke,” Goldstein said. “He has also performed in visible diplomatic roles as have his predecessors, but has often been more confrontational towards traditional allies as he was at the Munich Security Summit and in the Oval Office meeting with Zelenskyy.”
Republican political operatives said Vance’s speech at the Munich Security Conference was a breakout moment as vice president.
In February, Vance delivered a stinging message to European allies, saying that the biggest threat to Europe did not come from Russia or China, but from within Europe itself, and that he was concerned Europe was moving toward censorship and away from democracy.
Vance added another title under his portfolio when he became the Republican National Committee finance chair, a key fundraising role in the organization and the first time a sitting vice president has held the position.
In a statement to ABC News, RNC press secretary Kiersten Pels said that Vance will be critical for the national party heading into next year’s midterms — calling Vance a “fundraising powerhouse for the RNC.”
Vance has also been involved in trying to maintain Republicans’ slim majority in the House ahead of next year’s midterm elections. In August, Vance traveled to Indiana, where he made the pitch to Republican lawmakers to redraw the state’s congressional map.
With a year until the midterm election, a source close to the vice president said Vance will be involved.
“I think you can probably expect, as we get closer to midterms, for the vice president to be a regular presence on the campaign trail for Trump-endorsed candidates across the country,” the source said.
Next year’s election will also be critical for Vance as he’s viewed as a possible 2028 candidate and someone who could take on the mantle of leading the MAGA movement once Trump leaves office.
In a recent interview with Pod Force One, Vance shared that during a private lunch at the White House six months ago, Trump floated the idea of him and Secretary of State Marco Rubio as the Republican ticket in 2028.
“It feels so premature, because we’re still so early. And what I always say to people is, if we take care of business, the politics will take care of itself,” Vance said to podcast host Miranda Devine.
Trump himself recently said Vance and Rubio would be “great” options as 2028 presidential candidates.
“I’m not sure if anybody would run against those two,” Trump said on Oct. 27 of Vance and Rubio. “I think if they ever formed a group it would be unstoppable.”
