Trump pardons Jan. 6 rioters, ends Biden executive actions and withdraws from climate pact on Day 1
CBC
Donald Trump on Monday issued pardons for about 1,500 people charged over the Jan. 6 attack, hours after he was inaugurated as U.S. president for a second time. He also commuted six others' sentences.
The pardons fulfil a campaign promise Trump made to release supporters who tried to violently overturn his election defeat four years ago.
"These are the hostages," he said while signing the paperwork in the Oval Office.
Asked when he would impose his proposed trade tariffs on Canada on Mexico, Trump said, "I think we'll do it" on Feb 1.
Trump also signed a number of executive orders including withdrawing the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accord and the World Health Organization; a hiring freeze and a requirement that federal workers return to full-time, in-person work; rescinding orders that promoted and protected 2SLGBTQ+ people and racial minorities; adding Cuba back to the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism; and an order seeking a 75-day delay on the enforcement of a TikTok ban.
Trump completed his stunning political comeback Monday when he was sworn in as the 47th U.S. president, during which he promised tariffs, deportations and a new approach to race and gender.
In his inaugural address inside the Capitol Rotunda in Washington, Trump began laying out the details of his first-day executive orders.
First up was declaring a national emergency at the southern border. He said he will send troops to the border and begin deporting "illegal" immigrants. Trump promised to designate drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations and invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to expel gangs as quickly as possible.
Trump referred in passing to his plan to impose trade penalties but remained vague. "We will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens," he said.
He promised to undo Biden's green energy policies, including an electric vehicle mandate, and to "Drill, baby, drill" more oil.
Trump said his government's view will be that there are only "two genders: male and female." He also vowed to end the effort to "socially engineer race" into every aspect of public and private life and "forge a society that is colour-blind and merit-based."
Trump overcame impeachments, criminal indictments and two assassination attempts to win his second term in the White House, during which his Republican party will take control of Washington.
Trump is only the second president in American history to serve non-consecutive terms and the first felon to hold the most powerful political office in the world. He took the oath during an unusually small ceremony in the rotunda away from the general public, after it was moved indoors due to cold weather.
The 78-year-old's speech was more optimistic than the one he gave during his 2017 inauguration. He started by saying, "The golden age of America begins right now," and later added, "From this moment on, America's decline is over."
Israel's cabinet approved a deal early Saturday for a ceasefire in Gaza that would release dozens of hostages held there and pause the 15-month war with Hamas, bringing the sides a step closer to ending their deadliest and most destructive fighting ever.
A complex and fragile deal to pause fighting in the Gaza Strip has been reached, with hostilities expected to cease on Sunday — more than 15 months after the Israel-Hamas war began.
The contrasting reactions between Palestinians and Israelis to the long-awaited news of an impending hostage exchange and ceasefire have been telling.
Amid the relief at the prospect of hostages returning home and an end to the slaughter and destruction in Gaza, there are also plenty of questions about why the potential ceasefire between Israel and Hamas — being brokered with the help of Qatar — couldn't have been signed eight months ago.
Foreboding weather forecasts keep tensions high in Los Angeles as one of North America's largest cities battles wildfires that have already claimed at least two dozen lives and thousands of homes.
Qatari mediators have sent Israel and Hamas a draft proposal for an agreement to halt the fighting in the Gaza Strip and exchange hostages for Palestinian prisoners as a first step toward an end to the 15-month-old war.
Over the last nine months of the war in Gaza, Nora al-Batran was pregnant with twins. The 38-year-old was displaced multiple times with her husband and children as they skirted bombs and gunfire and sought refuge in a tent in the town of Deir al Balah.
U.S. special counsel Jack Smith has resigned from the Justice Department after submitting his investigative report on president-elect Donald Trump, an expected move that comes amid legal wrangling over how much of that document can be made public in the days ahead.
When people think of wildfires, burning trees are likely the first image that comes to mind.
U.S. president-elect Donald Trump has escaped any legal punishment other than a criminal record for his felony crimes, after a judge on Friday handed him an alternative sentence called an unconditional discharge.
Thursday was marked by massive marches and a confused high-profile abduction in Venezuela, on the same day that Canada recognized opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia as the legitimate president of the country.
Firefighters battled early Thursday to control a series of major fires in the Los Angeles area that have killed five people, ravaged communities and sent thousands of people frantically fleeing their homes.
Finland says it has found more than two dozen serious deficiencies aboard the impounded Eagle S, a ship that was carrying Russian oil and is accused of deliberately dragging its anchor in the Baltic Sea on Dec. 25, damaging an underwater power line and four telecommunication cables.
As if having the ear of incoming U.S. president Donald Trump weren't enough, tech billionaire Elon Musk has been on a tear this week, trashing European politicians on both the left and right, and using posts on his social media platform, X, to disrupt politics across the continent.
A wildfire whipped up by extreme winds swept through a Los Angeles hillside dotted with celebrity residences Tuesday, burning homes and prompting evacuation orders for tens of thousands. In the frantic haste to get to safety, roadways were clogged and scores of people abandoned their vehicles and fled on foot, some toting suitcases.
A strong earthquake killed at least 95 people in Tibet on Tuesday and left many others trapped as dozens of aftershocks shook the high-altitude region of western China and across the border in Nepal.
For two centuries, the certification of U.S. presidential election results was little more than a ceremonial rubber stamp by Congress.
Gunmen opened fire on a bus carrying Israelis in the occupied West Bank on Monday, killing at least three people and wounding seven others.