Three European allies provided millions of dollars that the United States was supposed to spend for low-income countries.
Then the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s government-cutters arrived. Government officials from Sweden, Norway and the Netherlands told The Associated Press that a combined $15 million they contributed for joint development work overseas has been parked at the U.S. Agency for International Development for months. After the Republican administration and Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency cut USAID’s funding and the bulk of its programs, European officials asked whether their money would be funneled to projects as expected or refunded. They have gotten no response.
Here are more Trump administration headlines from Sunday.
University funding: U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon says Columbia University is “on the right track” to recover federal funding frozen by the Trump administration. McMahon’s comments on CNN’s “State of the Union” follow Columbia agreeing to a host of policy changes demanded by the administration. Earlier this month, the Trump administration pulled $400 million in federal funding over how the university handled protests against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
Diplomat returns home: The South African ambassador who was expelled from the United States by the Trump administration has been welcomed home at an airport by hundreds of supporters who sang songs praising him. Ebrahim Rasool told supporters that being declared a persona non grata is meant to humiliate you, but he’s carrying it as a badge of dignity. Rasool was expelled for comments he made on a webinar that included him saying that the Make America Great Again movement was partly a response to “a supremacist instinct.”
Greenland visit: Second lady Usha Vance is set to travel to Greenland this week as Trump continues to suggest the U.S. could take control of the mineral-rich Arctic island. The wife of Vice President JD Vance will be part of a U.S. delegation set to “visit historical sites, learn about Greenlandic heritage, and attend the Avannaata Qimussersu, Greenland’s national dogsled race,” according to her office.
News industry challenges: During the first Trump administration, many journalists worried most about being called “fake news.” A blitz of action by the new administration in Trump’s second term has journalists on their heels. They face lawsuits, a newly aggressive Federal Communications Commission, an effort to control the press corps that covers the president, public data stripped from websites, and attacks, amplified anew.
— Associated Press reports
