Trump 2nd term updates: Trump says USAID is run by 'radical lunatics'

The comments came amid turmoil as DOGE took over USAID offices last week.

ByAlexandra Hutzler, Ivan Pereira, Emily Chang, Andrea Pineda-Salgado, Meredith Deliso, and Julia Reinstein
Last Updated: February 3, 2025, 4:11 AM GMT

President Donald Trump made good on his threats to impose tariffs on some of the U.S.'s trading partners, announcing Saturday that he will levy 25% tariffs on some goods from Canada and Mexico and 10% on Chinese goods.

Experts have warned that tariffs of this magnitude will likely increase prices paid by U.S. and Trump appeared to acknowledge that “some pain” might be possible in the U.S.

Meanwhile, the Senate Finance Committee announced it will meet Tuesday, when it is expected to vote on the controversial nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for secretary of Health and Human Services.

Key Headlines

Here's how the news is developing:
Jan 31, 2025, 5:15 PM GMT

Rubio to travel to Central America, Caribbean

Secretary of State Marco Rubio will be visiting several Central American and Caribbean countries for the next six days.

Rubio will meet with leaders in Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica Guatemala and the Dominican Republic, Special Envoy for Latin America Mauricio Claver-Carone said.

The State Department claimed it is the first time in more than 100 years a secretary of state has elected to make their first diplomatic visit to a country in Latin America.

-ABC News' Shannon Kingston

Jan 31, 2025, 4:52 PM GMT

Federal employees told to remove pronouns from email signatures

Employees at multiple federal agencies were ordered to remove pronouns from their email signatures by Friday afternoon, according to internal memos obtained by ABC News that cited two presidential executive orders.

The memos included instructions for how to edit email signatures.

-ABC News' Selina Wang, Dr. Mark Abdelmalek, Anne Flaherty and Will Steakin

Jan 31, 2025, 4:09 PM GMT

Trump to meet with Nvidia CEO Friday, sources say

President Donald Trump is set to meet with the CEO of chipmaker Nvidia Friday afternoon at the White House, multiple sources told ABC News.

This will be the first meeting between Trump and Jensen Huang, the leader of the $3 trillion company that manufactures computer chips that help power the artificial intelligence boom.

President Donald Trump speaks as he signs executive orders in the Oval Office at the White House, Jan. 30, 2025, in Washington.
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

A person familiar with the plans tells ABC News the meeting has been planned for weeks and is not a direct response the stock market sell-off Monday, which was prompted by the threat of Chinese artificial intelligence app DeepSeek.

-ABC News' Fritz Farrow and Elizabeth Schulze

Jan 31, 2025, 4:00 PM GMT

Trump envoy expected to meet with Maduro in Venezuela: Official

Richard Grenell, the envoy for Special Missions, is expected to meet with Venezuela's authoritarian leader Nicolas Maduro in the country on Friday, a senior Trump administration official told ABC News.

As the Biden administration did, the Trump administration has recognized Edmundo González Urrutia as the "rightful president" of Venezuela. The U.S. cut formal diplomatic ties with Venezuela during President Donald Trump's first term.

Grenell's agenda for his meeting with Maduro is expected to include repatriation of deportees in the country and gang activity, the senior official said.

-ABC News' Shannon Kingston

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