Trump news at a glance: president eyes ‘long-term' DC police takeover; warns Putin of consequences if no ceasefire reached
Trump earlier this week invoked a never-before-used clause of the law that sets out the federal district's governance structure to take temporary control of the police department, but will need Congress's permission to extend it beyond the 30 days allowed under the statute.
'We're going to need a crime bill that we're going to be putting in, and it's going to pertain initially to DC,' Trump said. He alluded to other options for extending control of the police department, saying 'if it's a national emergency, we can do it without Congress'.
Here are the key stories at a glance:
Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would ask Congress for 'long-term' control of Washington DC's police department and signaled he expected other Democratic-led cities to change their laws in response to his deployment of national guard troops and federal agents into the capital.
The president's comments came as the White House took credit for dozens of arrests overnight in Washington as part of Trump's campaign to fight a 'crime crisis', which its leaders say does not exist.
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Vladimir Putin will face 'very severe consequences' if he does not agree a ceasefire in the war in Ukraine at his summit with Donald Trump in Alaska, the US president said on Wednesday.
Speaking after a call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other European leaders, including Britain's Keir Starmer, Trump also suggested he would push for a second summit if his meeting with Putin goes well – this time including his Ukrainian counterpart.
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Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that he will host the Kennedy Center honors this year and said he had been heavily involved in choosing who to nominate, rejecting people he thought were too liberal.
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A senior official appointed to the defense department led a thinktank that promoted fake news about the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua (TdA) gang, according to InSight Crime, a non-profit analyzing organized crime.
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A grassroots organization of health professionals has released a report outlining major health challenges in the US and calling for the removal of Robert F Kennedy Jr from the US Department of Health and Human Services.
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Donald Trump on Wednesday revoked a 2021 executive order on promoting competition in the US economy issued by Joe Biden, the White House said.
Biden signed a sweeping executive order in July 2021 to promote more competition in the US economy as part of a broad push to rein in what his administration described as a pattern of corporate abuses, ranging from excessive airline fees to large mergers that raised costs for consumers.
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A US judge ordered the Trump administration to restore a part of the federal grant funding that it recently suspended for the University of California, Los Angeles.
Veteran climate scientists are organizing a coordinated public comment to a US Department of Energy report which cast doubt on the scientific consensus on the climate crisis.
Catching up? Here's what happened on 12 August 2025.
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The Independent
15 minutes ago
- The Independent
Judge denies Trump administration request to end a policy protecting immigrant children in custody
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The Independent
15 minutes ago
- The Independent
Trump tells Fox News that Zelensky has ‘got to make a deal' with Putin after Alaska summit
President Donald Trump insists Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has 'gotta make a deal' with Russian President Vladimir Putin following his Alaska summit with the Russian leader. After the nearly three-hour meeting between the two leaders, with no agreement having been reached on the future of the war in Ukraine, Trump appeared for an interview on Fox News ' 'Hannity'. Host Sean Hannity asked what advice he would give to Zelensky and Trump replied: 'Make the deal. Gotta make a deal.' 'Russia's a very big power. And they're not,' Trump said, adding that the U.S. has supplied Ukraine with weaponry. Hours earlier, during a joint statement with Putin, where neither took questions, the U.S. president admitted that while 'great progress' had been made, he emphasized: 'There's no deal until there's a deal.' Trump noted that he planned to call Zelensky and NATO members following the meeting. On Fox News, Hannity asked Trump about next steps, alluding to the U.S. president's previous comments about a possible meeting between Putin and Zelensky. 'I don't know if I trust the two of them in a room alone together. I think it would be better if you are there,' the Fox News host suggested. Trump agreed: 'They both want me there, and I'll be there. You got to see it out.' What exactly was discussed in the high stakes meeting and what was agreed remains a mystery. Both Putin and Trump used vague terms to describe the meeting and refused to take questions from reporters. Still, both men flattered one another in front of the world's cameras. The Russian president called the United States a 'dear neighbor.' He also repeated one of Trump's claims: the war in Ukraine would not have started if Trump had remained in office after the 2020 election. Trump touted his 'fantastic relationship' with his Russian counterpart and branded the meeting 'extremely productive.' The U.S. president continued laying on the praise for Putin during his interview with Hannity. 'I think we've agreed on a lot, and I can tell you, the meeting was a very warm meeting,' he said. Referring to Putin, he continued: 'He's a strong guy, he's tough as hell and all of that, but the meeting was a very warm meeting between two very important countries, and it's very good when they get along.' Earlier in the day, Trump rolled out the red carpet for Putin, greeting him warmly before they jumped into his U.S. limousine, dubbed 'The Beast.' At the end of their joint speech to press Putin suggested the pair next meet on his home turf: Moscow. 'That's an interesting one, I'll get a little heat on that one,' Trump replied. 'But I could see it possibly happening.' Following the summit, some pundits slammed Trump's performance. A Fox News host said he was 'steamrolled' by Putin while former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Trump's warm welcome of the Russian leader dealt a 'big victory' for Putin. Despite the flack, Trump told Hannity he believed on a scale of one to 10, the meeting was a 10. 'It's good when two big powers get along, especially when they're nuclear powers. We're number one, they're number two in the world. And it's a big deal. That's a big deal,' the U.S. president said.
The Independent
15 minutes ago
- The Independent
‘No deal': Putin met a tougher Trump in Alaska than the one he steamrolled in Helsinki seven years ago
Nearly eight years after Donald Trump turned in such an embarrassing performance at his first summit with Vladimir Putin that members of his own party were left struggling to defend him, critics feared he was set for a repeat performance in Alaska Friday. Putin — on what was once sovereign Russian land — after three years of isolation brought on by his unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, hoping he could charm, cajole and flatter Trump into taking his side over that of Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump arrived first, and the two leaders met on a red-carpeted tarmac for a handshake. It was there that Putin got his first surprise. As the leaders walked towards waiting reporters and photographers, a noise above drew the Russian leader's attention. He looked up to see something that on any other day, in any other place, would have meant very bad things for him: The belly of an American B-2 bomber, a machine built to kill him by dropping nuclear weapons on Moscow without detection by Soviet (later Russian) air defense systems. Trump then pulled Putin into his waiting limousine for a shared ride to their talks, bypassing the armored car that had been brought from Moscow for the Russian president's use. Next, the one-on-one meeting Putin had expected became a three-on-three session with him and two of his aides across from Trump, his special envoy Steve Witkoff, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Only after that could Putin expect to have Trump sit down with a group of Russian business leaders who he'd brought with him, expecting the American leader to be swayed with the promise of investment and business opportunities in the same way other foreign leaders have curried favor with Trump. It never happened. After nearly three hours of talks, Trump and Putin walked out to face hundreds of reporters who'd gathered in expectation of a joint press conference. Speaking first, Putin appeared optimistic about the talks as he said he and Trump had come to 'agreements' and described Ukraine — the sovereign nation he invaded and has been pillaging since March 2022 — as Russia's 'brotherly nation' and claimed Russia wants to end the conflict. Through a translator, the Russian strongman repeated oft-used lines about addressing what he calls the 'primary roots, the primary causes of that conflict' — meaning his desire for Ukraine to end any ambitions to integrate with the West by joining the European Union or NATO — and said any settlement in the conflict must 'consider all legitimate concerns of Russia and to reinstate a just balance of security in Europe and in world on the whole.' But moments later, Trump torpedoed Putin's claim to have reached an agreement, telling reporters instead that there were 'many points that we agreed on' during the talks but there were still 'a couple of big ones that we haven't quite gotten there.' 'So there's no deal until there's a deal,' Trump summed it up. The president stressed that any future deal would have to receive assent from the Ukrainian government as well as America's NATO allies, and said he'd be 'calling up ... the various people that I think are appropriate,' as well as Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to read them in on what transpired behind closed doors today. Trump added that the meeting, in his estimation, had been 'very productive' and included 'many points' that had been agreed to, and said there was a "good chance" of reaching some sort of accord going forward. A second meeting has been floated in recent days by Trump but has not been confirmed. Putin suggested to Trump in English: 'Next time in Moscow,' which the president said he could 'get a little heat' for but added he could see it 'possibly happening.' Trump thanked the reporters for attending and he and Putin quickly left the stage. Within the hour, both leaders' aircraft were wheels up and bound for home. There were no fireworks, there was no grand bargain rolled out, and it wasn't clear what — if anything — the two leaders had actually agreed on at all. And while some commentators were casting the lackluster result as a win for Putin because Trump hadn't rolled out the sanctions he has spent weeks threatening, the Russian leader most likely wasn't smiling as his plane climbed away from Alaska. That's because he failed to do what he'd done in Helsinki, where he'd charmed and flattered Trump into taking his side over America's own intelligence services. He'd even failed to bring Trump back to his previous anti-Ukraine worldview, that which was on display in February when he and Vice President JD Vance got into an Oval Office shouting match with Zelensky before throwing him out of the White House. Instead, he had to watch as Trump reaffirmed that the final settlement in the war he'd started would have to pass muster with Zelensky, the man who he'd hoped to kill in the opening days of the war. The years between Helsinki and Anchorage — and the months between February and now — have seen Trump go through trials (literally) and tests. For better or worse, he's no longer the neophyte, easily flattered naif who Putin made a fool of in Finland all those years ago. And though he's long had an uneasy relationship with both Zelensky and NATO, the months since that disastrous bilateral meeting have seen him grow more and more frustrated with Putin and better understand the European desire to avoid rewarding attempts at military conquest on their soil. It wasn't a perfect result, but Trump is learning. And now, Putin knows that.
