Trump hopes China will quadruple U.S. soybean orders to reduce trade deficit
On Sunday, U.S. President Donald Trump urged China to greatly boost soybean imports from the U.S. to help reduce its trade deficit. However, experts s...
Elon Musk, appointed by President Donald Trump to lead the newly named Department of Government Efficiency and tasked with rooting out waste in federal agencies, renewed his threat to fire federal workers who fail to justify their jobs.
His threat comes after a weekend email directive - urging employees to summarize their work - sparked widespread confusion and raised serious questions about his actual authority within the administration.
In a post on X, Musk dismissed the email’s requirement as “utterly trivial” since passing the test simply meant typing a few words and pressing send. “Yet so many failed even that inane test, urged on in some cases by their managers,” he wrote. Musk warned that, subject to the president’s discretion, workers who do not respond a second time would face termination.
The directive, sent out over the weekend, prompted mixed responses across the federal government. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) later issued guidance stating that responding to Musk’s email was voluntary and that employees should refrain from disclosing any confidential or sensitive information. Despite the memo, some agencies, such as the General Services Administration and OPM itself, continued to encourage staff to respond.
A senior manager at the GSA noted that the agency was still nudging employees to reply, while the Department of Health and Human Services advised workers to keep their responses general due to concerns that their answers might be scrutinized by foreign actors.
The Trump administration, which has been aggressively downsizing parts of the federal workforce - having already laid off more than 20,000 workers and offering buyouts to 75,000 others - has triggered additional turmoil across government agencies. Some departments, including the Transportation and Treasury Departments, as well as independent agencies like the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission, instructed employees to respond to Musk’s email, while others warned against bypassing established chains of command.
Trump, speaking earlier on Monday, backed Musk’s approach, calling the email “great” and emphasizing that the goal was to determine whether workers were actually performing their duties. Meanwhile, a federal judge blocked Trump’s downsizing team, led by Musk, from accessing sensitive data maintained by the U.S. Education Department and OPM.
Musk’s initiative, part of the administration’s broader effort to “root out government waste,” has not only unsettled federal employees but has also forced companies doing business with the government to lay off workers and defer vendor payments. The directive was even sent to federal judges and other court employees, despite them being part of a separate branch of government.
As the deadline for response looms, labor unions have taken legal action, seeking a federal judge’s intervention to declare Musk’s email illegal. The episode underscores the growing tension and uncertainty within the federal workforce amid Trump’s sweeping, and controversial, efforts to downsize government operations.
Musk’s latest remarks and the ensuing confusion highlight the challenges inherent in attempting to rapidly reshape government staffing, particularly when directives conflict with established policies and the guidance of federal agencies. The White House has yet to offer further comment on the matter.
The world’s biggest dance music festival faces an unexpected setback as a fire destroys its main stage, prompting a last-minute response from organisers determined to keep the party alive in Boom, Belgium.
According to the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ), a magnitude 5.7 earthquake struck the Oaxaca region of Mexico on Saturday.
A powerful eruption at Japan’s Shinmoedake volcano sent an ash plume more than 3,000 metres high on Sunday morning, prompting safety warnings from authorities.
China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations will send an upgraded ‘version 3.0’ free-trade agreement to their heads of government for approval in October, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Saturday after regional talks in Kuala Lumpur.
A resumption of Iraq’s Kurdish oil exports is not expected in the near term, sources familiar with the matter said on Friday, despite an announcement by Iraq’s federal government a day earlier stating that shipments would resume immediately.
Jordan is to host a meeting with U.S. and Syrian officials on Tuesday to discuss supporting the rebuilding of Syria after more than a decade of conflict and the ouster of former leader Bashar al-Assad by an Islamist-led rebellion in December.
Russia said it continued developing intermediate and shorter-range nuclear-capable missiles during a moratorium on their deployment and now holds a “substantial” arsenal, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov has said.
Three people were killed in Ukrainian drone attacks overnight in Russia’s Tula and Nizhny Novgorod regions, with several others injured, as Moscow's air defences intercepted dozens of drones, officials said on Monday.
South Korea and Vietnam are set to deepen their economic and strategic partnership as their leaders meet to strengthen ties during growing global trade challenges and shifting tariffs.
New Zealand is weighing the formal recognition of a Palestinian state, Foreign Minister Winston Peters said on Monday, confirming that Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s cabinet will make a decision in September and present it during the U.N. Leaders' Week.
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