Anthony Zurcher
BBC North America correspondent
February 5th 2025
Hello from Washington DC. I have
to keep reminding myself that Donald Trump has only been back in the White
House for just over two weeks. The pace of activity – as I detail below – has been
astounding. The threat of a global trade war has not gone away - despite the
rollercoaster ride on tariffs seemingly being overshadowed, perhaps only
temporarily, by pronouncements on the Middle East.
During a visit by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday, Trump proposed taking ownership of the Gaza Strip, redeveloping it and permanently "resettling" all Palestinians - amid the ongoing, fragile ceasefire deal. Meanwhile, in Congress, two of Trump's more controversial appointments – Robert F Kennedy Jr for health secretary and Tulsi Gabbard for intelligence chief – consolidated Republican support and appear headed for confirmation.
THE TAKEAWAY
The breadth – and speed – of the
disruption Trump and his new administration have brought to the federal
government is only now coming into focus.
At the centre of it all, of
course, is Trump himself. Recent focus had been on tariffs, but he is
unpredictable – and willing to inject himself into any major issue, whether
it's airline safety, politics in the Middle East or South African land
ownership reforms.
Trump isn't the most disruptive
person in his own administration at this point, however. He has teams of
loosely coordinated operators undertaking some of the most aggressive changes
to the federal government in the modern era.
Multibillionaire Elon Musk and
his young government-efficiency engineers have focused their efforts on the
federal payment system in the Treasury Department – the purse strings of the
bureaucracy. They've accessed vast troves of information on federal employees
at the Office of Personnel Management and commandeered internal communications
systems, deactivating user accounts and sending out multiple
messages urging government workers to quit their jobs. They've gutted the
US Agency for International Development, placing thousands of employees on
leave, and have the Department of Education in their sights.
Another budget-cutting push has
come from the White House's Office of Management and Budget, which issued last
week's since-suspended memorandum ordering an across-the-board freeze of most
federal grants and loans. Those efforts are sure to increase once the Senate
confirms Russell Vought to head that key White House office. He authored a
chapter in the Project 2025 blueprint for conservative government on
how to effectively use presidential power to slash federal spending.
Long-time Trump aide Stephen
Miller is already in the White House, working along with "border
tsar" Tom Homan to bring US refugee resettlement and asylum processing to
a grinding halt. They are turning immigration enforcement into an expansive,
militarised operation, with the planned creation of a new detention facility in
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and an agreement with El Salvador to hold violent
deportees in their prison system.
The takeaway: These chaos
agents – operating in Trump's name, if not with his direct oversight – are
tearing down federal bureaucracies and uprooting long-established programmes.
The lawsuits challenging their actions are being filed, but the demolition is
already taking place and with each passing day it will be harder to reverse.
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