News

Acting AG says ‘Nobody has any idea why’ Pam Bondi was fired except for Trump | CNN Politics

Published

3 weeks ago

April 7, 2026

Acting AG says ‘Nobody has any idea why’ Pam Bondi was fired except for Trump | CNN Politics

Washington, DC —

During his first news conference Tuesday, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche showcased his loyalty to President Donald Trump while declining to answer specific questions about the war with Iran, why Attorney General Pam Bondi was fired or other investigations into the president’s enemies.

“I love working for President Trump. It’s the greatest honor of a lifetime,” Blanche said when asked whether he wanted to be nominated as the full-time attorney general. “If he chooses to nominate somebody else and asks me to go do something else, I will say: ‘Thank you very much, I love you, sir.’”

When asked why Bondi was fired and how the DOJ will change, Blanche was dismissive.

“I’m going to lead the way that I’ve been leading as the deputy attorney general,” said Blanche, a former Trump defense attorney.

“Nobody has any idea why the attorney general is no longer the attorney general and I’m the acting attorney general except for President Trump,” Blanche added.

Beyond her failure to successfully bring cases against Trump’s personal and political enemies, Bondi’s standing was harmed her drastic and self-inflicted stumbles in handling the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.

When asked about Bondi’s outstanding House Oversight Committee subpoena over the botched handling of the Epstein investigation, Blanche said he would said he would leave the matter “to Chairman (James) Comer and others to figure out.”

Blanche said he didn’t know whether the Justice Department would assert privilege in the matter in an effort to stop the subpoena.

“I’m not committing to anything,” he said. “I’m just saying I don’t know.”

Backs the White House and Pentagon on Iran

Blanche, in a news conference meant to focus on efforts to investigate and prosecute fraud in the US, decline to answer a question on the Justice Department’s position on preemptivearguments that Trump might be committing war crimes if he follows through with, as he said Tuesday, killing “a whole civilization” Tuesday night in Iran, barring a deal.

The interim DOJ head said the Justice Department supports the White House and Department of Defense and provides “counsel to them, and we have been doing that, as you would expect.”

CNN also pressed Blanche on what, if any, investigative steps have been taken after Trump threatened to jail an unspecified reporter as part of a hunt for the “leaker” behind initial reports Friday of the missing Air Force officers in Iran.

Two officers went missing after their US fighter jet was downed in Iran. Both have since been rescued.

While first saying he wouldn’t comment on ongoing investigations, Blanche noted that “we will always investigate” leaks involving classified information, especially those that put US soldiers at risk.

“And we will investigate if it means sending a subpoena to the reporter,” Blanche said. “That’s exactly what we should do, and that’s exactly what we will be doing.”

CNN’s Devan Cole contributed to this report.

News

Feds conducting raids connected to welfare fraud investigation in Minnesota

Published

1 hour ago

April 28, 2026

Press Room

Feds conducting raids connected to welfare fraud investigation in Minnesota

Federal law enforcement agencies are conducting a series of raids connected to the Somali fraud investigation in Minnesota on Tuesday morning, federal authorities have said.

The raids are not part of an immigration enforcement operation.

“Today the FBI with federal, state and local law enforcement is involved in court-authorized law enforcement activity as part of an ongoing fraud investigation,” a spokesperson for the Department of Justice said.

At least 22 federal search warrants were executed in Minnesota on Tuesday morning, a senior Justice Department official told NBC News. It was not immediately clear how many total raids occurred.

At least one of the raids appears to be at the Somali Senior Center and Adult Day Services facility, as federal law enforcement can be seen going in and out of the building.

News

King Charles Will Speak of ‘Reconciliation and Renewal’ During Address to Congress

Published

11 hours ago

April 28, 2026

Press Room

King Charles Will Speak of ‘Reconciliation and Renewal’ During Address to Congress

King Charles III of Britain will acknowledge on Tuesday that his country has had its differences with the United States, but he plans to tell a joint session of Congress that the “two countries have always found ways to come together,” according to a preview of his remarks by Buckingham Palace.

The king’s speech is a centerpiece of his first visit to the former colonies as Britain’s monarch. It comes at a fraught time for the relationship between the two governments, with President Trump mocking Prime Minister Keir Starmer for refusing to join the war in Iran.

But in his speech, the king plans to say that the story of the two countries over the past 250 years has been marked by “reconciliation and renewal,” and has produced what he will call “one of the greatest alliances in human history.”

The king and Queen Camilla began planning for their American trip months before the tensions emerged between Mr. Trump and Mr. Starmer. And British officials and representatives of Buckingham Palace have repeatedly said the king does not get involved in day-to-day politics or foreign policy.

But privately, officials have said they are hopeful that the core message in the king’s speech might help to soothe tensions between the president and the prime minister. The palace said he will argue that shared democratic values are woven deeply into the fabric of both countries.

Palace officials said the king will briefly reference the shooting at the White House correspondents’ dinner on Saturday, offering sympathy to Mr. Trump and those who attended.

But he will focus on the things the United States and Britain have done together. In particular, palace officials said, he will speak about cooperation in the Middle East and Ukraine and will take note of the NATO defense pact and the submarine partnership with Australia and the United States.

Mr. Trump has been particularly brutal in his assessment of the British Navy, calling the country’s battleships “toys.” The palace said the king will speak with particular pride about the Royal Navy and its successes.

Mr. Trump has said he is a fan of the royals, often citing the fact that when he was 6, he watched the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, the king’s mother.

The royal couple’s arrival at Joint Base Andrews kicked off two days of pomp and circumstance in Washington. The king, dressed in a blue suit, and the queen, wearing a pink coat dress, listened as the U.S. military band played the national anthems of Britain and the United States.

The king and queen were greeted by the State Department’s top official in charge of protocol. They walked through an honor cordon of U.S. military personnel before heading to the White House for their first formal stop.

There, the royal couple met briefly with Mr. Trump and Melania Trump, the first lady, and viewed a new White House beehive.

The hive, on the South Lawn, is shaped like a miniature White House and is the home for two new bee colonies. Mrs. Trump last week unveiled the latest work of presidential apiculture, the science of maintaining honey bee colonies for pollination, honey production and wax.

The first official White House bee colonies were installed in 2009 by Michelle Obama, the first lady at the time. The bees supported pollination of the White House vegetable garden that Mrs. Obama created as part of her push for healthy eating.

Hives installed by Mrs. Obama support as many as 70,000 bees during peak summer months, according to the White House, and can produce up to 225 pounds of honey a year. The Trump administration said Mrs. Trump’s new hive could increase production to over 255 pounds of honey annually.

The visit to the White House beehive is a nod to the king’s longstanding interest in environmental issues and conservation.

There are four beehives in the gardens around Buckingham Palace and two more outside Clarence House, the official residence of the royal couple. The official royal website notes that the queen produces honey that is sold at the store Fortnum & Mason to raise money for charity.

Monday’s events concluded with a garden party for the king and queen at the British Embassy. The guest list included White House officials like Stephen Miller, the deputy chief of staff, and his wife, Katie Miller; the House speaker, Mike Johnson; and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

The president and the king will have a private meeting on Tuesday before the king addresses Congress in the afternoon. Mr. Trump will host a state banquet for the royal couple on Tuesday evening.

The king and queen will head to New York City on Wednesday morning, where they will lay a wreath at the Sept. 11 memorial and participate in a gala that evening. The king will also visit a youth organization in Harlem, and the queen will participate in an event at the New York Public Library.

On Thursday, the royal couple will lay a wreath at Arlington National Cemetery and travel to rural parts of Virginia.

News

Supreme Court heard case on how to label risks of popular weed killer

Published

13 hours ago

April 27, 2026

Press Room

Supreme Court heard case on how to label risks of popular weed killer

A French farmer sprays Roundup 720 glyphosate herbicide produced by U.S. agrochemical giant Monsanto in 2018 on a field of no-till corn in northwestern France. The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday heard a dispute over labels on the popular Roundup pesticide, which thousands of plaintiffs blame for their cancers.

Jean-Francois Monier/AFP via Getty Images

hide caption

toggle caption

Jean-Francois Monier/AFP via Getty Images

A divided U.S. Supreme Court on Monday heard a dispute over labels on the popular Roundup weed killer, which thousands of people blame for their cancers.

How the Supreme Court rules could have implications for tens of thousands of lawsuits against Roundup maker Monsanto, which is now owned by Bayer. The case centers on who decides about warning labels on chemicals: the federal government — or states or juries.

The main plaintiff in Monday’s case is John Durnell. Durnell in 2019 sued Monsanto in a state court in Missouri, alleging he contracted non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma because of his 20-year exposure to glyphosate, a chemical included in the weed killer. Durnell regularly sprayed the weed killer throughout his neighborhood.

A jury sided with Durnell on his claim that Monsanto had failed to properly warn users about risks, awarding him more than $1 million in damages.

Missouri law bans the sale of dangerous pesticides that lack an “adequate warning,” Durnell’s lawyer Ashley Keller wrote. Keller says the key questions are for juries to decide.

Durnell is one of tens of thousands of people to sue because they say they faced harm because of Roundup. Those plaintiffs have experienced mixed success in the lower courts.

Monsanto argues those claims should have been preempted by the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, which requires manufacturers to register pesticides with the EPA before selling them, which Monsanto did. The EPA also signs off on labels for those pesticides.

Paul Clement, a former solicitor general and a lawyer for Monsanto, argued that it’s important to have a uniform standard nationwide.

“It’s probably the most like studied herbicide in the history of man and they’ve all reached the conclusion, based on more data and the kind of expert analysis they can do, that there isn’t a risk here,” he told the justices. “You shouldn’t let a single Missouri jury second guess that judgment.”

The justices will not be evaluating whether glyphosate causes cancer. Rather, they’ll consider who should decide what appears on warning labels and whether states have a role to play after the EPA weighs in.

The current U.S. solicitor general backed Monsanto. Sarah Harris, his principal deputy, said the Environmental Protection Agency is in the driver’s seat, not anyone in Missouri.

“Missouri thus requires adding cancer warnings but federal law requires EPA to approve new warnings and tasks EPA with deciding what label changes would mitigate any health risks,” Harris argued. “State law must give way.”

Several justices, including Brett Kavanaugh, appeared to agree with Monsanto’s argument about the need for a single, uniform standard across the country.

But others, like Chief Justice John Roberts, wondered what would happen if the federal government moved more slowly than states did, who wanted to act quickly on information about new dangers.

“Well, it does undermine the uniformity,” Roberts said. “On the other hand, if it turns out they were right, it might have been good if they had an opportunity to do something, to call this danger to the attention of people while the federal government was going through its process,” he said about states.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson asked about the emergence of new science, and the EPA’s reviews.

“There’s a 15-year window between when that product has to be re-registered again and lots of things can happen in science, in terms of development about the product,” she said.

Bayer, which now owns Monsanto, only sells Roundup that contains glyphosate to farmers and businesses these days. Bayer has been pushing to resolve scores of the residential cases through a sweeping settlement, trying to put the costly claims behind it.