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Updated on: January 22, 2025 / 10:48 PM EST / CBS News
A memo sent to government department and agency heads from the Office of Personnel Management provides further details on how to comply with Mr. Trump’s memo to return federal employees to in-person work.
Agencies have until 5 p.m. ET Friday to “revise their agency’s telework policy … to state that eligible employees must work full time at their respective duty stations unless excused due to a disability, qualifying medical condition, or other compelling reason certified by the agency head and the employee’s supervisor.”
The memo, however, does not give a deadline for when the in-office policy must take effect, although it does suggest a “target date of approximately 30 days for full compliance.”
Mr. Trump announced he is nominating Andrew Puzder to serve as U.S. ambassador to the European Union. Pudzer is the former CEO of CKE Restaurants, which owns the Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s fast food chains.
“Andy will do an excellent job representing our Nation’s interests in this important region,” Mr. Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
Mr. Trump named Sean Curran to lead the U.S. Secret Service. 
In a post to his Truth Social platform, Mr. Trump said Curran is “a Great Patriot, who has protected my family over the past few years, and that is why I trust him to lead the Brave Men and Women of the United States Secret Service.” 
Curran previously served as the special agent in charge of Trump’s security detail for four years and sprung to cover him on stage during the first assassination attempt against him on July 13 in Butler, Pennsylvania. 
Curran would replace Ron Rowe, who has filled the role of acting director since July, when Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle stepped down following harsh backlash for the agency’s failure to prevent a would-be assassin from targeting Trump during a campaign rally. 
Read more here. 
Mr. Trump issued pardons for Terence Sutton and Andrew Zabavsky, two former Metropolitan Police officers who were found guilty in the death of Karon Hylton-Brown. 
Hylton-Brown, a 20-year-old Black man, was killed when he crashed his moped during a police chase in 2020 in Washington, D.C. His incident sparked unrest after his family called the circumstances around his death suspicious. 
Sutton was convicted of second-degree murder, conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice. Zabavsky was convicted of conspiracy to obstruct justice and obstruction of justice. 
The Trump administration has removed requirements that people applying for green cards be vaccinated against COVID-19.
“Effective Jan. 22, 2025, USCIS is waiving any and all requirements that applicants for adjustment of status to that of a lawful permanent resident present documentation on their Form I-693, Report of Immigration Medical Examination and Vaccination Record, that they received the COVID-19 vaccination,” the U.S. Citizenships and Immigration Service said. “USCIS will not issue any Request for Evidence or Notice of Intent to Deny related to proving a COVID-19 vaccination. USCIS will not deny any adjustment of status application based on the applicant’s failure to present documentation that they received the COVID-19 vaccination”
In a briefing with reporters on Wednesday, a senior U.S. military official said the 1,500-troop deployment would involve dispatching 1,000 Army personnel and 500 Marines, as well as helicopters, to the California and Texas border. The official said the troops would not engage in law enforcement, as federal law generally prohibits the use of the military for civilian law enforcement. Instead, the official said they would be tasked with helping Customs and Border Protection and erecting border barriers to curtail illegal crossings.
The move stems from an executive action Mr. Trump signed upon taking office on Monday, in which he declared a national emergency along the southern border and ordered the Defense Department to provide troops and resources “to support the activities of the Secretary of Homeland Security in obtaining complete operational control” of the border. He also instructed the military to help build border barriers to repel migrants.
Trump administration officials are considering deploying as many as 10,000 soldiers to the U.S.-Mexico border and using Department of Defense bases to hold migrants awaiting deportation as they plan their dramatic crackdown on illegal immigration, according to an internal government memo obtained by CBS News.
Read more here. 
The Department of Homeland Security has terminated its advisory committees, wiping out decades of institutional experience and abruptly ending a sweeping investigation into the Chinese-linked hack of U.S. telecom companies, sources familiar with the move confirmed to CBS News. 
According to a memo signed by acting DHS Secretary Benjamine C. Huffman, and obtained by CBS News, the decision to disband multiple advisory committees is being made “in alignment with the Department of Homeland Security’s commitment to eliminating the misuse of resources and ensuring that DHS activities prioritize our national security.”
DHS has several advisory committees, including panels that offer advice to department personnel on issues including natural disaster and emergency preparedness, critical infrastructure, artificial intelligence and cybersecurity. 
Among them is the Cyber Safety Review Board — a body designed to emulate the National Transportation Safety Board. The group was conducting a comprehensive investigation into the hack of American telecom companies by Beijing actors dubbed “Salt Typhoon.”
Read more here.
Mr. Trump on Wednesday designated the Iranian-backed Houthis a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
The Houthis, operating out of Yemen, fired rockets and drones at Israel, U.S. warships and civilian cargo ships transiting the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden throughout the Israel-Hamas war.
Former President Biden had removed the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2021, but then re-designated them as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist in early 2024.
Department of Homeland Security employees received a mass email Wednesday urging them to report any efforts within the department to conceal diversity and inclusion personnel, following Mr. Trump’s move to push out DEI employees within the federal government, according to four DHS officials familiar with the email. 
Acting DHS Secretary Benjamine Huffman urged the roughly 260,000 DHS employees to report efforts to “disguise” DEI personnel to a dedicated Office of Personnel Management tipline within 10 days — or face “adverse consequences.” 
“Failure to report this information within 10 days will result in adverse consequences,” the email warns.
The email went out shortly before 3 p.m. Wednesday. 
“DHS colleagues,” the email reads, in part. “We are taking steps to close all agency Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility (DEIA) offices and end all DEIA-related contracts in accordance with President Trump’s Executive Orders titled ‘Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing’ and ‘Initial Rescissions Of Harmful Executive Orders And Actions.’ These programs divide Americans by race, waste taxpayer dollars, and result in shameful discrimination.”
As CBS News first reported, a memo from OPM Tuesday called for all federal DEI employees to be placed on leave by Wednesday evening. 
The confirmation hearing for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been scheduled for Jan. 29, Senate Finance Committee chair Sen. Mike Crapo said Wednesday. Kennedy, one of Mr. Trump’s more controversial Cabinet picks, has been nominated to head Health and Human Services. 
Stewart Rhodes, the Oath Keeper founder who had his sentence for Jan. 6 seditious conspiracy commuted by Mr. Trump, was on Capitol Hill Wednesday afternoon.
Rhodes was spotted at the Dunkin Donuts in the Longworth House office building. 
Speaking in a House office building Wednesday, Rhodes told reporters he was there to meet with House Republicans and advocate for a pardon for James Brown, a fellow Oath Keeper who was convicted of weapons charges in a separate federal case. Rhodes said he was not invited by any member of Congress and had not stepped foot in the Capitol. 
Read more here. 
— Caitlin Yilek, Ellis Kim 
 Mr. Trump is threatening to use his powers to adjourn Congress so he can make recess appointments for at least some of his top Cabinet nominees and their deputies, enabling them to begin running the largest federal departments. 
Mr. Trump most recently raised the prospect of plunging the executive and legislative branches into uncharted constitutional territory during his White House meeting Tuesday with Senate Majority Leader John Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson, mulling the option if Democrats opt to slow-walk or delay his top national security and public health nominees, according to two people familiar with the meetings. 
“This remains a significant possibility in the eyes of the White House,” one of the people familiar with the meetings said, emphasizing this is not expected to happen this week, but remains under active consideration.
Mr. Trump has signaled he wants the Senate to move quickly to confirm his top Cabinet picks, and Republican senators have said for weeks they want to move swiftly, particularly on his top national security appointments. On Monday night, the Senate unanimously confirmed Marco Rubio as secretary of state, but votes on John Ratcliffe to serve as CIA director, Pete Hegseth to serve as defense secretary, and Kristi Noem to serve as homeland security secretary, are still in the queue for consideration. 
Read more here. 
— Ed O’Keefe, Major Garrett 
The White House said in a statement on Wednesday afternoon that Mr. Trump and his are monitoring the shooting at a high school in Nashville, where at least one student had died and two others were wounded before the teen gunman shot and killed himself, authorities said. 
“As details unfold, the White House offers its heartfelt thoughts and prayers to those impacted by this senseless tragedy and thank the brave first responders responding to the incident,” the White House said. 
Moderate Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who could be one of the swing votes on several parts of Mr. Trump’s agenda, said that on Pete Hegseth’s nomination for Defense Secretary, she is “factoring that affidavit in with everything else that I’m considering.”
In a sworn affidavit obtained by CBS News on Tuesday, Hegseth’s former sister-in-law told senators that he caused his second wife to fear for her personal safety and abused alcohol over the course of many years.
Hegseth’s nomination was advanced out of committee in a party-line vote. Murkowski’s vote could be critical, since Hegseth can only afford to lose three votes in the GOP-controlled Senate. 
Lawmakers are voicing their concerns over potential retaliation as some involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attacks begin to leave prison after President Trump’s pardons. CBS News’ Scott MacFarlane breaks down the latest news on Capitol Hill.
Maryland is home to 160,000 federal employees, the second highest concentration in the country behind the District of Columbia, according to the state.
Mr. Trump’s new executive order will require all federal employees to work at their office and end remote opportunities.
Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen said the return-to-the-office policy for federal workers requires a scalpel and not a meat axe. He also pointed out the government had a telework policy before the pandemic.
Read more here from CBS Baltimore. 
Lawsuits over President Trump’s immigration orders are already being filed by organizations advocating for the rights of immigrants affected. CBS News legal contrib
The Justice Department’s new leadership directed prosecutors and law enforcement across the country to focus on enacting President Trump’s immigration policies and said they should potentially charge state or local officials who impede their efforts, according to a memo sent to employees on Tuesday and obtained by CBS News.
“The Supremacy Clause and other authorities require state and local actors to comply with the Executive Branch’s immigration enforcement initiatives. Federal law prohibits state and local actors from resisting, obstructing, and otherwise failing to comply with lawful immigration-related commands and requests,” Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove wrote, citing the president’s constitutional authority and several federal laws. 
“The U.S. Attorney’s Offices and litigating components of the Department of Justice shall investigate incidents involving any such misconduct for potential prosecution,” he added.
Bove, who served on President Trump’s criminal defense team before joining the department, also directed the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces to “assist in the execution of President Trump’s immigration-related initiatives.” The task forces are groups of law enforcement and intelligence officers based in cities across the country who typically investigate terrorism threats. An executive order signed by Mr. Trump on Monday initiated a process by which certain cartels could be recognized as foreign terrorist organizations by the U.S.
Read more here. 
Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO and head of the newly-created Department of Government Efficiency, openly disputed on Tuesday the size of the Trump administration’s new OpenAI initiative.
Mr. Trump on Tuesday announced an investment of up to $500 billion to build private sector investment to build artificial intelligence infrastructure through a joint venture called Stargate, comprised of OpenAI, Softbank and Oracle. 
Musk replied to the OpenAI initiative announcement post on social media, “they don’t actually have the money.” He added, “SoftBank has well under $10B secured. I have that on good authority.”
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman replied to Musk on X, writing, “wrong, as you surely know.”
With a dig at Musk, who is developing a chatbot called Grok, Altman invited him to “come visit the first site already under way” and wrote, “i realize what is great for the country isn’t always what’s optimal for your companies, but in your new role i hope you’ll mostly put [America] first.”
Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska criticized the pardons that Mr. Trump granted to defendants who were convicted of violent crimes related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
“The Capitol Police officers are the backbone of Congress — every day they protect and serve the halls of democracy. I strongly denounce the blanket pardons given to the violent offenders who assaulted these brave men and women in uniform,” she wrote on social media.
Murkowski is one of the few Republican senators who have defied Mr. Trump, and she was one of seven Republicans in 2021 who voted to impeach him over his role in the attack. Earlier this week, she also came out against the president’s plan to change the name of Alaska’s Denali, the highest mountain peak in North America, to Mount McKinley.
Citing Mr. Trump’s extraordinary move to close the American asylum system, U.S. border agents have been instructed to summarily deport migrants crossing into the country illegally without allowing them to request legal protection, according to internal government documents and agency officials.
Just hours after being sworn in, Mr. Trump invoked sweeping presidential authorities to bar the entry of migrants deemed to be participating in an “invasion” of the U.S., as well as those who may pose a public health or national security risk. He cited a provision of immigration law known as 212(f) that allows presidents to suspend the entry of foreigners whose entry is deemed to be “detrimental” to the U.S.
In that same proclamation, Mr. Trump cited his constitutional powers over foreign affairs to empower U.S. immigration officials to “repel, repatriate, or remove any alien engaged in the invasion across the southern border of the United States.”
Internal government documents indicate that, as of Tuesday night, the president’s “full” 212(f) authority was being implemented across Texas’ border with Mexico, making nearly all migrants who arrive at the border subject to quick expulsion. The documents cite the public health-related 212(f) authority that applies to “aliens that traveled through a country with a communicable disease.”
Read more of CBS News’ exclusive reporting here. 
House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters at the Capitol that Mr. Trump had “made his decision” on Jan. 6 pardons, and Johnson doesn’t “second guess those.” 
“The president has the pardon and commutation authority,” Johnson said.”It’s his decision. And I think what was made clear all along was that peaceful protests and the people who engage in that should never be punished. There was a weaponization of the Justice Department. There was a weaponization of the events, the following, you know, the prosecutions that happened after Jan. 6. It was a terrible time and a terrible chapter in America’s history.”
Johnson continued that “if you would argue that those people didn’t pay a heavy penalty having been incarcerated and all of that, that’s up to you, but the President’s made a decision.” 
Mr. Trump pardoned and commuted the sentences of roughly 1,500 individuals who were convicted of crimes relating to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, including Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, both of whom were serving long sentences for seditious conspiracy. 
Mr. Trump threatened in a social media post to enact “high levels of taxes, tariffs and sanctions on anything being sold by Russia” to the U.S. unless Russian President Vladimir Putin reaches an agreement to end his country’s war with Ukraine.
“I’m not looking to hurt Russia. I love the Russian people, and always had a very good relationship with President Putin – and this despite the Radical Left’s Russia, Russia, Russia HOAX,” Mr. Trump wrote on Truth Social, the platform he owns.
The president added that he is “going to do Russia, whose Economy is failing, and President Putin, a very big FAVOR. Settle now, and STOP this ridiculous War! IT’S ONLY GOING TO GET WORSE.”
Mr. Trump said if there is not a deal to end the war with Ukraine made “soon,” he would take action against Moscow.
“Let’s get this war, which never would have started if I were President, over with! We can do it the easy way, or the hard way – and the easy way is always better. It’s time to “MAKE A DEAL.” NO MORE LIVES SHOULD BE LOST!!!” he wrote.
Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
 Senate Republicans are trudging through the process to confirm Mr. Trump’s picks for his Cabinet and top administration posts, facing delays by Democrats who are pushing back on their speedy approval. 
Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed cloture on John Ratcliffe’s nomination for CIA director, Kristi Noem’s nomination for Homeland Security Secretary and Pete Hegseth’s nomination for defense secretary on Tuesday. But Democrats forced procedural maneuvers to stall the nominations’ consideration, prompting a tense scene on the Senate floor late Tuesday.
“Now we’re not going to have a vote today, and apparently we’re not going to have a vote tomorrow,” Republican Sen. Tom Cotton said after Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy objected to a time agreement that would have allowed the Senate to vote on Ratcliffe’s nomination Tuesday night. “Which means I hope nobody’s making any plans for the weekend.”
Read more here. 
Mr. Trump is expected to meet with lawmakers at the White House on Wednesday. Reps. Mike Lawler, Don Bacon and Brian Fitzpatrick — three Republicans who won in districts that otherwise went for Vice President Kamala Harris — are expected to be at the meeting. 
Bacon noted that these representatives are the “ones who provided the majority.” 
A judge in Seattle will hear lawsuits filed by four states tomorrow challenging the constitutionality of Mr. Trump’s executive order seeking to eliminate birthright citizenship. Lenni B. Benson, a distinguished professor of immigration and human rights law at the New York Law School, joined CBS News to discuss the suits in the video below: 
The State Department has canceled all refugee travel to the U.S. and halted refugee processing to comply with Mr. Trump’s suspension of the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program, according to internal guidance shared with resettlement agencies and obtained by CBS News. 
Officials were instructed to stop the refugee referral process overseas and to pause a Biden administration program that allowed private American citizens to sponsor refugees. Identified as people displaced by war and persecution, refugees typically go through rounds of interviews and security and medical screenings before being allowed into the U.S. The process typically takes years to complete.
For now, this does not affect Special Immigrant Visa holders, who assisted U.S. military forces.
The president has ordered all federal offices to put their diversity, equity and inclusion employees on paid leave by 5 p.m. Wednesday. Mr. Trump signed an executive order Monday claiming that efforts to diversify the federal government were discriminatory. Read the full story here.
Willie James Inman reports on the latest from the White House in the video below:
Mr. Trump’s expansive executive order aimed at boosting oil and gas drilling, mining and logging in Alaska is being cheered by state political leaders who see new fossil fuel development as critical to Alaska’s economic future and criticized by environmental groups that see the proposals as worrisome in the face of a warming climate.
The order, signed by Mr. Trump on his first day in office Monday, is consistent with a wish list submitted by Alaska Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy shortly after Mr. Trump’s election. It seeks, among other things, to open to oil and gas drilling an area of the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge considered sacred to the Indigenous Gwich’in, undo limits imposed by the Biden administration on drilling activity in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska on the North Slope and reverse restrictions on logging and road-building in a temperate rainforest that provides habitat for wolves, bears and salmon.
In many ways, the order seeks to revert to policies that were in place during Mr. Trump’s first term.
But he “just can’t wave a magic wand and make these things happen,” said Cooper Freeman, Alaska director at the Center for Biological Diversity. Environmental laws and rules must be followed in attempts to unravel existing policies, and legal challenges to the president’s plans are virtually certain, he said.
Within hours of President Trump’s inauguration, the new administration took down the Spanish-language version of the official White House website.
The site — currently https://www.whitehouse.gov/es/ — now gives users an “Error 404” message. It also included a “Go Home” button that directed viewers to a page featuring a video montage of Mr. Trump in his first term and on the campaign trail. The button was later updated to read “Go To Home Page”.
Hispanic advocacy groups and others expressed confusion at the abrupt change and frustration at what some called the administration’s lack of efforts to maintain communication with the Latino community, which helped propel him to the presidency.
LaCasaBlanca, the Spanish profile of the White House’s X page, and the government page on reproductive health information also were offline.
Meanwhile, the Spanish versions of other government agencies such as the Department of Labor, Justice and Agriculture remained available for users on Tuesday.
Asked about the changes, White House principal deputy press secretary Harrison Fields responded Tuesday that the administration is “committed to bringing back online the Spanish translation section of the website.”
“It’s day two. We are in the process of developing, editing and tweaking the White House website. As part of this ongoing work, some of the archived content on the website went dormant. We are committed to reloading that content in a short timeline,” he said without elaborating.
Mr. Trump removed the Spanish version of the page in 2017. At the time, White House officials said they would reinstate it. President Joe Biden reinstated the page in 2021. 
Mr. Trump early Wednesday called a Washington bishop “nasty” and demanded an apology after she told him from the pulpit that he was sowing fear among the country’s immigrants and LGBTQ people.
“The so-called Bishop who spoke at the National Prayer Service on Tuesday morning was a Radical Left hard line Trump hater,” Mr. Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
“She brought her church into the World of politics in a very ungracious way. She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart,” he wrote about the service at the Washington National Cathedral given by Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington.
The president issued measures Monday suspending the arrival of asylum seekers and expelling migrants in the country illegally. He also signed an executive order declaring that only two sexes — male and female, will be recognized by the federal government.
Budde told an unsmiling president, who was seated in the church’s front pew for the customary inaugural service next to his wife, Melania, “I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President.”
Asked what he thought about her remarks, Mr. Trump earlier said he “didn’t think it was a good service.”
But in his Truth Social post, the president slammed Budde, without naming her, and railed against “illegal migrants,” writing, “Apart from her inappropriate statements, the service was a very boring and uninspiring one. She is not very good at her job! She and her church owe the public an apology!”
A federal judge in Seattle has set a Thursday hearing on the lawsuit filed by Washington state, Arizona, Illinois and Oregon challenging the constitutionality of Mr. Trump’s attempt to deny birthright citizenship to the children of undocumented immigrants and temporary visas holders.
U.S. District Judge John Coughenour will be tasked with deciding a request from these states to issue a temporary restraining order blocking Mr. Trump’s edict. 
A coalition of 18 other states also filed a separate federal lawsuit challenging Mr. Trump’s order Tuesday. 
A memo from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management sent Tuesday is directing the heads of all U.S. agencies to place all federal employees in diversity, equity and inclusion roles on leave by 5 p.m. ET Wednesday. 
In addition to placing the employees on paid administrative leave, the memo directs the agencies to “take down all outward facing media (websites, social media accounts, etc.) of DEIA offices,” cancel upcoming DEI trainings and terminate contracts with DEI-related contractors by the same time Wednesday.
By noon on Thursday, the agencies are directed to provide the OPM with a list of all DEI offices and employees and DEI-related contracts. 
The agencies must also submit “a written plan for executing a reduction-in-force action regarding the employees who work in a DEIA office,” by 5 p.m. ET on Friday, Jan. 31.
Mr. Trump signed executive orders on Monday and Tuesday that aim to end DEI programs within the federal government. 
Tuesday’s order also directs the attorney general to create a plan to deter the private sector from adopting or continuing DEI programs.
“As a part of this plan, each agency shall identify up to nine potential civil compliance investigations of publicly traded corporations, large non-profit corporations or associations, foundations with assets of 500 million dollars or more, State and local bar and medical associations, and institutions of higher education with endowments over 1 billion dollars,” Tuesday’s order read.
Read more here.
— Jordan Freiman and Kristin Brown
Mr. Trump announced Tuesday billions of dollars in private sector investment to build artificial intelligence infrastructure in the United States. 
OpenAI, Softbank and Oracle are planning a joint venture called Stargate, Mr. Trump said in a White House briefing. SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son joined Mr. Trump for the announcement, along with Sam Altman of OpenAI and Larry Ellison of Oracle.
In the briefing, Ellison said 10 data centers for the project were already under construction in Texas, and that more were planned. Sources previously told CBS News that Stargate would start with a data center project in Texas, and eventually expand to other states. 
“AI holds incredible promise for all of us, for every American,” Ellison told reporters. 
Read more here.
Mr. Trump announced Tuesday that he has pardoned Ross Ulbricht, creator of the Silk Road, a website on the dark web that was used to sell drugs, weapons and illicit services.
Mr. Trump said in a social media post that he spoke to Ulbricht’s mother by phone after he “signed a full and unconditional pardon for her son.”
Ulbricht operated the Silk Road from 2011 until his arrest in 2013, when the site was seized by the FBI. Users were required to use cryptocurrency to pay for transactions. 
Ulbricht was sentenced to life in prison in 2015. During his trial, prosecutors said at least six deaths were traced to overdoses from drugs bought on the Silk Road.
Read more here.
The Trump administration on Tuesday dramatically broadened the scope of expedited deportations, enacting a nationwide expansion of an immigration policy known as “expedited removal” that was previously limited to areas close to U.S. borders.
Expedited removal allows U.S. immigration officials to deport migrants who lack proper documents through a streamlined process that bypasses the lengthy and massively backlogged immigration court system. If those identified for expedited removal do not request asylum or fail to establish they may have a legitimate asylum case, they can be expeditiously deported, without an opportunity to see an immigration judge.
Before Tuesday’s change, federal immigration officials were only allowed to use expedited removal on unauthorized immigrants detained within 100 miles of an international border and who had been in the U.S. for less than two weeks.
Now, these expedited deportations will apply to unauthorized immigrants anywhere in the U.S. who can’t prove they have been in the country for more than two years.
Read more here. 
U.S. Capitol Police Chief Thomas Manger said he’s concerned by the sweeping pardons Mr. Trump issued Monday night to those convicted or facing charges of assaulting police officers after the Capitol riot four years ago.
“I think it sends the message that politics is more important than policing,” Manger told “CBS Evening News” anchor and managing editor Norah O’Donnell on Tuesday. 
The president also ordered the Justice Department to end all pending cases connected to the riot, abruptly ending the department’s massive effort under former President Joe Biden to hold those who participated in the attack accountable. 
“I’m concerned for my officers. I’m concerned about what message they get from these actions,” Manger said, adding that it could prompt officers to question why they put themselves in harm’s way. 
Read more here. 
Answering questions from reporters at the White House, the president told reporters he plans to issue an executive order to bring water from Northern California to Southern California, which has been ravaged by wildfires.
“Los Angeles has massive amounts of water available to it,” Mr. Trump argued. “All they have to do is turn the valve.” 
He accused California of withholding water to the southern part of the state and letting it drain into the Pacific Ocean in order to protect smelt that live in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.
He has posted on social media in the past several days, demanding of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, “RELEASE THE WATER FROM UP NORTH. MILLIONS OF GALLONS A DAY. WHAT’S TAKING YOU SO LONG.”
Days ago, an official who helps oversee Southern California’s water supply disputed Trump’s claim that his proposed changes could have mitigated the wildfires.
Mark Gold, water scarcity director for the Natural Resources Defense Council and member of the Metropolitan Water District Board that provides water to 19 million people in Southern California, told CBS News, “The issues have nothing to do with what amount of water we have stored within the region. The Metropolitan Water District has a record amount of water stored at this time.”
Mr. Trump plans to travel to California at the end of the week.
— Paulina Smolinski, Laura Doan
Mr. Trump said he read the letter left for him by former President Joe Biden in the Oval Office, addressed to “47.”
“He wrote me a nice letter — I mean, I did open it last night,” the president told reporters during an impromptu news conference after an event on AI private investment.
“It’s sort of a tradition. You put it in the drawer, especially of the beautiful Resolute desk, and I opened the drawer. There it was,” he said.
Mr. Trump called it an “inspirational-type letter. ‘Enjoy it. Do a good job — important — very important, how important the job is,'” he said, describing what Biden had written.
He said maybe he’d make the letter public, calling it a “very nice letter.”
An executive order Mr. Trump signed Monday declared it’s now federal government policy to recognize only “two sexes, male and female,” reversing the ability of Americans to mark “other” or “X” on federal forms and causing sweeping implications in the way the federal government acknowledges gender. 
Mr. Trump has long pledged to alter the way the federal government handles the issue of gender identification, and on the campaign trail, his lines about preventing transgender athletes from participating in women’s sports prompted some of the loudest reactions from his rally-goers.
LGBTQ rights groups are pledging to challenge Mr. Trump’s order where they can. 
“Across the country, ideologues who deny the biological reality of sex have increasingly used legal and other socially coercive means to permit men to self-identify as women and gain access to intimate single-sex spaces and activities designed for women, from women’s domestic abuse shelters to women’s workplace showers,” Mr. Trump’s executive order reads. “This is wrong.”
— Kathryn Watson, Caroline Linton
Just hours after Mr. Trump’s inauguration, his administration revoked a Biden-era policy that prohibited arrests by U.S. immigration agents at or near schools, places of worship and other places deemed to be “sensitive locations.”
Benjamine Huffman, whom the Trump administration installed as acting homeland security secretary pending the confirmation of South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, issued a memo on Monday reversing the Biden administration’s immigration arrest guidelines on “sensitive locations.”
That policy, signed by former Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, instructed Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection to refrain from apprehending unauthorized immigrants at or near locations “that would restrain people’s access to essential services or engagement in essential activities.” Those locations included schools; places of worship; hospitals and other healthcare facilities; shelters; relief centers; and public demonstrations, like rallies and protests.
Read more here.
Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, the ranking member on the Senate Judiciary Committee, told reporters this evening at a pen and pad that Kash Patel, Mr. Trump’s nominee to be FBI director, is tentatively set to appear before the committee on Jan. 29. 
Durbin said he would not vote to confirm Patel, arguing that he doesn’t have “the experience, the temperament or the judgment” for the role. 
Making good on Mr. Trump’s promise to reshape the Justice Department, the administration on Tuesday reassigned roughly 20 career officials from their posts within the Justice Department’s Criminal and National Security divisions, multiple people familiar with the moves confirmed to CBS News. 
The officials affected included senior criminal and national security leaders within two of the department’s most critical sections, the sources said. The career officials have handled numerous high-profile investigations across administrations.   
The changes are likely indicators of Trump’s intended shifts in career leadership within the Justice Department.
CBS News has reached out to the Justice Department for official comment. 
The news comes after four officials within the Justice Department’s Executive Office for Immigration Review, which handles immigration cases, were removed from their posts Monday night, according to two sources. 
— Nicole Sganga, Robert Legare and Andres Triay
The former sister-in-law of Pete Hegseth, Mr. Trump’s nominee to become secretary of defense, told senators in a sworn affidavit that he caused his second wife to fear for her personal safety and abused alcohol over the course of many years.
In the affidavit to members of the Senate Armed Services Committee and obtained by CBS News, Danielle Hegseth said she was married to Pete Hegseth’s brother from 2011 to 2019. She recounted what she had told FBI agents who conducted a background check into Hegseth as part of the nomination process. She wrote that her statement came in response to a letter from Sen. Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the committee.
NBC News first reported on the document. Tim Parlatore, an attorney for Hegseth, denied the allegations, calling Danielle Hegseth an “anti-Trump far left Democrat.”
In the affidavit, she wrote that Samantha Hegseth, Pete Hegseth’s second and now ex-wife, had told her that she once hid in the closet from Hegseth for fear of her safety, an incident she said occurred between the years of 2014 and 2016. She noted the anecdote was consistent with what she observed of Hegseth’s behavior over a number of years. 
Read more here. 
 Mr. Trump’s meeting with House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune in the Oval Office began around 3:20 p.m. Mr. Trump is expected to give remarks later this afternoon, with multiple sources familiar with the matter saying he will announce billions of dollars in private sector investment to build artificial intelligence infrastructure.
First lady Melania Trump’s hat caught the attention of many across the country and on social media on Inauguration Day.
The man behind the design, Eric Javits, has been creating headwear for decades. His hats are a familiar sight on the national stage. They have been showcased by celebrities including Madonna, Jennifer Lopez, Ariana Grande and other first ladies like Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush.
“I thought she looked amazing, very polished, very pulled together,” Javits told “CBS Mornings.” “I think it reflected the formality of the occasion.”
He admits due to last-minute changes in the venue for President Trump’s inauguration due to freezing temperatures, he didn’t know if the first lady would wear the hat until he saw her on TV.
He credits the first lady for helping to make the now viral hat a focal point.
“I sort of feel like it wasn’t really a ‘wow’ hat. It was very understated, very elegant and appropriate, but when she put it on, and I had never seen her wearing it before because I never had direct contact with her in person or anything, so I really felt that her presence and her grace and beauty really brought the whole thing alive,” he said.
Read more here. 
In its first 24 hours in office, the Trump administration removed U.S. Secret Service protection from former Trump national security adviser John Bolton, who became a critic of the president after Bolton’s ouster from the first Trump administration in 2019. Multiple sources told CBS News the decision was made in the past 24 hours.
Bolton, an outspoken critic of President Trump, was granted Secret Service protection by the Biden administration in December 2021 for the first time since he served in the Trump White House. That decision followed a series of threats from Iran linked to retaliation for a drone strike ordered by Mr. Trump during Bolton’s tenure, resulting in the assassination Iranian General Qasem Soleimani. 
In a statement, Bolton told CBS News that he is “disappointed but not surprised that President Trump has made this decision.” 
Read more here. 
— Scott MacFarlane, Nicole Sganga and Margaret Brennan 
The Senate Judiciary Committee expects to hold a vote on the nomination of Pam Bondi for attorney general on Jan. 29, it said.
The committee was set to hold a business meeting Wednesday to consider Bondi’s nomination, but its Democratic members requested to hold the nomination over for seven days, as allowed under the panel’s rules.
Bondi appeared before the Judiciary Committee for her confirmation hearing last week. She is expected to easily win approval from the GOP-led Senate.
Bondi served two terms as attorney general of Florida and was part of the legal team that represented Mr. Trump during his Senate impeachment trial in early 2020. She worked as a lobbyist at the firm Ballard Partners after leaving public office in 2019.
Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are responding to Mr. Trump’s executive orders signed on Day 1 of his second term in the White House. The actions include measures on immigration and birthright citizenship. CBS News’ Nancy Cordes reports as Mr. Trump’s full first day of his second term continues. 
Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican from Maine, criticized Mr. Trump’s decision to pardon even many Jan. 6 rioters who assaulted police officers and broke and entered Capitol property. 
“While I believe some Americans were caught up in the crowd on January 6 and may well deserve the clemency President Trump has given, there is a great difference between violent crimes and non-violent crimes,” she said in a statement. “I do not support pardons given to people who engaged in violence on January 6, including assaulting police officers, or breaking windows to get into the Capitol, for example.”
Collins also criticized former President Joe Biden for his 11th-hour pardons.
“I also do not agree with President Biden’s recent clemency decisions, including commuting the sentences of convicted murderers, one of whom killed two FBI agents, and preemptively pardoning his son as well as five other members of his own family in the final hours of his presidency,” she said. “This has been a terrible week for our justice system. Violence must never be tolerated in America.”
Collins, who is the only Republican from New England in either chamber, is up for reelection in 2026. She was one of seven Republicans who voted to impeach Mr. Trump in Feb. 2021 over his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. 
Jacob Chansley, known as the “QAnon Shaman” and arguably one of the most recognizable Jan. 6 defendants, posted on social media on Tuesday that he had been pardoned by Mr. Trump.
“I just got the news from lawyer … I got a pardon baby!” Chansley wrote in capital letters. He said he was going to buy guns now. 
Chansley was released from prison in 2023 after serving a little over two years in prison for pleading guilty to a federal charge of obstruction of an official proceeding.
“J6ers are getting released & JUSTICE HAS COME…” Chansley wrote. “EVERYTHING done in the dark WILL come to light!.” 
Mr. Trump attended the national prayer service at the National Cathedral on Tuesday morning. When asked about the service afterward, he said “they could have done better.”
“What did you think?” Mr. Trump asked reporters. “Did you like it? You find it exciting? Not too exciting, was it? I didn’t think it was a good service.”
The Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde directed some of her sermon at Mr. Trump, specifically noting the fear felt by many undocumented immigrants and transgender Americans.
“Let me make one final plea, Mr. President, millions have put their trust in you, and as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God,” Budde said. “In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country. We’re scared now. There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican and independent families, some who fear for their lives and the people, the people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings, who labor in poultry farms and meat packing plants, who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants, and work the night shifts in hospitals. I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away, and that you help those who are fleeing war zones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here.”
After the sermon, Mr. Trump headed back to the White House. 
A coalition of Democratic state attorneys general filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday to stop Mr. Trump’s executive order that seeks to eliminate birthright citizenship.
Mr. Trump invoked presidential powers to begin his long-promised immigration crackdown shortly after taking office on Monday. His executive actions included an order directing the federal government to stop issuing passports, citizenship certificates and other documents to many children born in the U.S. whose mothers are in the country illegally, or for whom neither parent is a legal permanent resident.
The lawsuit by the 18 states, filed in federal court in Massachusetts, claims Mr. Trump’s initiative violates the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which the federal government has long interpreted to mean that those born on American soil are citizens at birth. The cities of San Francisco and Washington, D.C., also joined the suit.
Read more here. 
Mr. Trump on Monday issued an order to federal agencies to deny birthright citizenship to children of parents who are unauthorized immigrants or temporary visa holders, seemingly defying the longstanding interpretation of the 14th Amendment. CBS News legal contributor Jessica Levinson joins CBS News 24/7 on the legality of that order and some of Mr. Trump’s other executive actions.
Mr. Trump is set to announce billions of dollars in private sector investment to build artificial intelligence infrastructure in the United States, CBS News has learned. 
OpenAI, Softbank and Oracle are planning a joint venture called Stargate, according to multiple people familiar with the deal. 
SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son is expected at the White House Tuesday afternoon, along with Sam Altman of OpenAI and Larry Ellison of Oracle.
Executives from the companies are expected to say they plan to commit $100 billion initially and pour up to $500 billion into Stargate over the next four years. Other details of the new partnership were not immediately available. 
Read more here. 
Mr. Trump took executive action Monday to start revoking the security clearances of his former national security adviser, John Bolton, and dozens of intelligence officials who signed a letter in 2020 claiming emails found on a laptop owned by Hunter Biden bore the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation campaign.
The executive action was part of a slew of measures signed by Mr. Trump in the hours after he was sworn into a second term in office and is one of his first steps he has taken to target those he considers political opponents now that he has returned to the White House.
Mr. Trump said in his order that the signers of the letter “willfully weaponized the gravitas of the Intelligence Community to manipulate the political process and undermine our democratic institutions.”
“This fabrication of the imprimatur of the Intelligence Community to suppress information essential to the American people during a presidential election is an egregious breach of trust reminiscent of a third world country,” the order states. “And now the faith of Americans in all other patriotic intelligence professionals who are sworn to protect the nation has been imperiled.”
Read more here. 
Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Linda Fagan was ousted by the Trump administration Tuesday, on Mr. Trump’s first full day in office. In 2022, Fagan became the first woman to lead a branch of the U.S. military. 
Fagan was relieved of her duties Monday night in a workforce-wide message by Acting Homeland Security Secretary Benjamin Huffman. 
“Under my statutory authority as the Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security I have relieved Admiral Linda L. Fagan of her duties as Commandant of the United States Coast Guard,” the brief message read, in part. “She served a long and illustrious career, and I thank her for her service to our nation.”
The Coast Guard commandant is appointed for a four-year term, and Fagan had served two years.
Read more here. 
The Trump administration has issued guidance to U.S. border officials instructing them to call migrants “illegal aliens,” reversing a Biden-era move to stop the use of that term, two U.S. Customs and Border Protection sources tell CBS News.
The term is found in U.S. immigration law, but advocates argue it is dehumanizing. The Biden administration had instructed agents and officers to use “migrants” or “undocumented” individuals instead. 
Border officials have also been directed to stop most releases of migrants, requiring agents to get approval from headquarters before releasing migrants into the U.S. with court notices, the CBP sources said.
Attorney General Rob Bonta said he would defend birthright citizenship following an executive order by Mr. Trump, as California officials gear up for what is expected to be many legal challenges involving the new administration.
The order, signed hours after Mr. Trump was inaugurated, seeks to deny birthright citizenship to the children of immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally or on temporary visas.
“Birthright citizenship is a right expressly guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution. It is disappointing, but unfortunately unsurprising, that the President chose to disregard the constitution and attempt to invalidate this right as one of his first acts in office,” Bonta said in a statement Monday.
The U.S. government has long interpreted the Constitution to mean that those born on American soil are citizens at birth, regardless of their parents’ immigration status.
Read more from CBS Bay Area here. 
Attorneys for both Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes have both been released from prison following Mr. Trump’s pardon. 
Tarrio, who was not at the Jan. 6 riot, was serving a 22-year sentence for seditious conspiracy and other crimes. Rhodes was serving an 18-year sentence for seditious conspiracy and other crimes. 
Tarrio was expected to return to Miami on Tuesday night, a family spokesperson told CBS Miami. 
Ed Martin, a champion of the Jan. 6 defendants and a speaker at a Jan. 5, 2021, “Stop the Steal” election rally has been named acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia. Martin was subpoenaed by the House Jan. 6 select committee, and he will now be overseeing the Justice Department requests to dismiss Capitol riot cases. 
Mr. Trump headed to the National Cathedral on Tuesday morning, where he will attend the national prayer service. 
Senate Majority Leader John Thune told CBS News on Tuesday about the Jan. 6 pardons that Republicans are “not looking backwards, we’re looking forwards.” 
Thune pointed to former President Joe Biden’s pardons at the end of his term, saying “Biden laid forth the most massive use of the pardon power that we’ve seen in history … and I think you guys should probably be asking the same questions.”
Thune on J6 pardons: “We’re not looking backwards we’re looking forwards…Look I’ve said this before Biden laid forth the most massive use of the pardon power that we’ve seen in history…and I think you guys should probably be asking the same q’s.” pic.twitter.com/Nvcv6WFKk3
Mr. Trump’s inauguration speech promised a “golden age” and outlined his priorities for a second term. CBS News political contributors Joel Payne and Terry Sullivan join “CBS Mornings” to break down what his speech means for the country’s future.
Mr. Trump and first lady Melania Trump attended three inaugural presidential balls to celebrate his 2025 inauguration Monday evening: the Commander-in-Chief Ball, the Liberty Ball and the Starlight Ball. 
After delivering several speeches earlier in the day and signing a series of executive orders — including one on granting clemency to Jan. 6 defendants, several on immigration policy, and another on his plans to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement — Mr. Trump headed out to celebrate with supporters and deliver brief remarks at each of the three balls.
Read more here. 
Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik is facing senators’ questions on Tuesday as she defends her record and qualifications to become the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. 
Stefanik, one of Mr. Trump’s most reliable allies in Congress, goes before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations for her confirmation hearing less than 24 hours after Mr. Trump was sworn into office. Mr. Trump hopes his key Cabinet picks will sail through confirmation and take their posts once he’s president on Jan. 20. Stefanik is likely to be confirmed when the full Senate takes up a vote. 
Stefanik, 40, would be the youngest-ever U.S. ambassador to the U.N. The New York Republican has served in a leadership position as Republican conference chair, and she was on the House Armed Services Committee and House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. And that skillset honed in Congress will serve her well, said John Alterman, senior vice president and director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 
Watch her confirmation hearing here. 
Marco Rubio, confirmed unanimously by the Senate Monday as secretary of state, said his “singular focus” will be to ensure American interests are at the center of State Department priorities.
“Our foreign policy, once again, needs to focus on the national interest of the United States,” Rubio said on “CBS Mornings.”
Rubio represented Florida in the Senate since 2011 and resigned Monday. He was officially sworn in as secretary of state Tuesday morning.
Rubio sidestepped questions about Mr. Trump’s far-reaching pardons of Jan. 6 rioters, saying his focus is on his new role and the nation’s foreign policy approach. 
“I work for Donald J. Trump, the new president of the United States, the 47th president who has a clear mandate to reorient our foreign policy to one that, once again, puts America and our interests at the center,” Rubio said. 
Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, said his entire life and career has been influenced by his parents’ decision to come to the U.S. in 1956, with nothing but “dreams of a better life.”
 “I think it reminds us that this remains the one place on earth where anyone from anywhere can achieve anything,” Rubio said. 
Vice President JD Vance swore Rubio in as secretary of state on Tuesday morning, after the Senate confirmed him Monday night in a 99-0 vote. 
Rubio said Mr. Trump has “given us a very clear mandate,” saying “everything we do must be justified” by whether it makes the nation stronger, safer or more prosperous. Rubio said that is the promise his government will help him keep. 
The secretary of state said “it’s a transformational moment,” adding that the U.S. is “heading into a new era that I think will make the world a safer place.”
“Yesterday, President Trump made clear in his inaugural speech that one of the primary goals of American foreign policy is the promotion of peace,” Rubio said, adding that includes “peace through strength” and the promotion of peace without “abandoning our values.”
Mr. Trump on Monday granted clemency to roughly 1,500 defendants who had been convicted of crimes on Jan. 6, 2021, following through on his longtime promise to absolve those who participated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol of wrongdoing. 
The president’s action comes on his first day back in the White House and just hours after he was sworn in for a second term. Mr. Trump has repeatedly sought to downplay the events of Jan. 6, when a mob of his supporters breached the Capitol in an effort to stop Congress from reaffirming Joe Biden’s victory over him in the 2020 presidential election. 
Mr. Trump extended clemency to those convicted of violent and serious crimes, including assaulting police officers and seditious conspiracy. He also ordered the attorney general to dismiss all pending indictments related to the Capitol riot, essentially eradicating the Biden Justice Department’s massive effort to hold accountable those who participated in the assault.
“These are the hostages, approximately 1,500 for a pardon, full pardon,” Mr. Trump said during remarks from the Oval Office. “This is a big one.”
Read more about the Jan. 6 pardons here. 
— Melissa Quinn, Rob Legare 
Mr. Trump delivered his second inaugural address Monday, vowing a “revolution of common sense” and announcing “we are at the start of a thrilling new era of national success.”
In the 30-minute speech in the Capitol Rotunda, he promised a “tide of change” and salvation from what he said was the “decline” brought on by the policies of his predecessor, former President Joe Biden. 
To that end, he’s expected to sign about 200 executive orders, actions and proclamations following his address. 
“The golden age of America begins right now,” Mr. Trump said. “From this day forward, our country will flourish and be respected again all over the world.”  
Read the full transcript here of Mr. Trump’s second inaugural address, provided by the Associated Press, and watch the full speech in the player below.
Mr. Trump signed roughly 200 executive actions, memoranda and proclamations on his first day in office, undoing Biden administration mandates and implementing his “America first” policies. 
Mr. Trump signed executive actions related to immigration, including invoking presidential powers to launch a sweeping crackdown on immigration, tasking the military with border enforcement, designating cartels and gangs as terrorist groups and shutting down asylum and refugee admissions,  declaring a national emergency at the southern border, ordering the Defense Department to more heavily involve military resources there, tasking officials to deploy additional troops to the border. 
Mr. Trump also moved to dismantle birthright citizenship, which the U.S. government has long interpreted the Constitution to mean that those born on American soil are citizens at birth, regardless of their parents’ immigration status, meaning the executive action is likely to be challenged legally.
Mr. Trump also signed executive action ordering federal workers back to the office, ending diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives within the federal government and telling the Justice Department not to enforce the TikTok ban for 90 days. 
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By Faris Tanyos, Emily Mae Czachor, Jordan Freiman
Updated on: February 8, 2025 / 6:35 PM EST / CBS News
A passenger jet and a Black Hawk helicopter that collided in midair on the night of Jan. 29 and crashed into the Potomac River near Reagan National Airport near Washington, D.C., left no survivors. All of the 67 victims have been identified as more details about what led up to the incident are emerging.
The plane, American Eagle Flight No. 5342, a regional jetliner, was carrying 60 passengers and four crew members on a flight from Wichita, Kansas. There were three soldiers aboard the U.S. Army’s Sikorsky H-60, a Defense Department official told CBS News.
At least 55 bodies had been recovered as of Sunday, D.C. Fire and Emergency Medical Services Chief John Donnelly said. As authorities continue to work to remove the wreckage, Donnelly said crews will stay and search until all the remains are found.
Here’s what we know so far about the crash:
American Eagle Flight No. 5342, which was operated by PSA Airlines, collided midair with a Sikorsky H-60 helicopter at around 9 p.m. Eastern Time on Jan. 29 while approaching a runway at Reagan National Airport, the FAA said. The plane, a Bombardier CRJ700, had taken off from Wichita, Kansas.
American Eagle and PSA Airlines are subsidiaries of American Airlines. 
The helicopter involved in the collision was on a training flight and had belonged to B Company, 12th Aviation Battalion out of Fort Belvoir in Virginia, Joint Task Force-National Capitol Region media chief Heather Chairez told CBS News. It appears the chopper was flying nearly 200 feet higher than it should have been at the time of the crash, officials said.
One air traffic control worker was managing the helicopters and some planes from the Reagan National Airport tower at the time of the collision, a job normally done by two people, two sources tell CBS News.
The NTSB will look at whether staffing played a role in the deadly midair collision, a former chairman of the agency, Robert Sumwalt, said on “CBS Mornings” on Jan. 31.
“It’s not uncommon for air traffic controllers to combine positions based on the workload at the existing time. I think what’s important here is to let the NTSB sort through the details and figure out if this had any effect at all on the operations,” Sumwalt said.
A livestream camera at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., captured the moment of the collision. The video, which has been verified by CBS News, shows an explosion in the area of the Potomac River at 8:47 p.m. Eastern.
Remains of all 67 victims of the midair collision were recovered, officials announced on Feb. 4. 
The National Transportation Safety Board reported on Feb. 8 that all “major pieces” of both the Bombardier and the Black Hawk helicopter had been recovered and taken to a “secure airport facility for further examination and documentation.”
Teams also recovered the plane’s Traffic Collision Avoidance System, known as a TCAS, as well as “additional avionics” from the chopper, the NTSB said.
A lidar survey, a remote sensing technology that uses lasers, conducted by a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration aircraft on Feb. 8, found multiple areas underwaters which could still have additional aircraft debris, the NTSB said. Divers would be investigating those areas. 
D.C. Fire and EMS Chief John Donnelly previously called the recovery effort “a highly complex operation, the conditions out there are extremely rough for the responders. It’s cold. They’re dealing with relatively windy conditions.” 
CBS News senior transportation and national correspondent Kris Van Cleave reported that human remains and debris had washed up on the Virginia side of the Potomac River. 
He said the plane broke into multiple pieces that were sitting in 5-8 feet of water. 
The flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder, commonly known as black boxes, have been recovered from the crashed plane, the NTSB confirmed. They will be analyzed at the NTSB lab, which is located about a mile from the crash site. 
The black box recovered from the commercial flight had some “water intrusion,” but investigators said they’re confident that the data can be salvaged, so they can piece together what led up to the deadly collision.
Divers have had some access to the aircraft’s cabin. Luggage is among the items divers have recovered. 
The helicopter is upside down but appears to be mostly intact, Van Cleave added.
Top figure skaters from Russia and the United States — including 6 people with ties to the Skating Club of Boston — were among the victims. Athletes Jinna Han and Spencer Lane, their mothers Jin Han and Christine Lane, and skating coaches Vadim Naumov and Evgenia Shishkova were all on board the flight, said Doug Zeghibe, the skating club’s CEO and executive director. They were returning home from the National Development Camp, which was held in connection with the recent U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Wichita.
Spencer Lane’s father, Rhode Island resident Douglas Lane, told CBS affiliate WPRI that his 16-year-old son was a “force of nature” who picked up figure skating just three years ago and progressed rapidly. Douglas Lane described his wife, Christine, as a caring and creative person who excelled in graphic design, photography and quilting. 
Naumov and Shishkova, a couple, are Russian-born figure skaters who won the 1994 World Figure Skating Championship and had been coaching at the club. They shared a son, Maxim Naumov, who is a competitive skater on Team USA. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed earlier that Naumov and Shishkova were on the flight along with other Russian nationals. 
Another victim in the crash, Asra Hussain Raza, had recently relocated to Washington, D.C., for a consulting position and was traveling home from a work trip when the collision occurred, her father-in-law, Hashim Raza, told CBS News. The 26-year-old was a graduate of the University of Indiana and Columbia University, her father-in-law said.
Four members of a Maryland-based labor union, the Steamfitters United Association Local 602, were also on the flight, union leaders said in a social media post on Jan. 30. The union represents heating, air conditioning, refrigeration and process piping industries in the D.C. Metro area. 
The crew chief of the helicopter was identified as 29-year-old Ryan O’Hara, CBS News learned Jan. 30. O’Hara was a husband and father to a 1-year-old son, his local Reserve Officers’ Training Corps program said in a social media post about his death. 
President Trump addressed the crash during a briefing at the White House on the morning of Jan. 30, where he confirmed that there were no survivors.
“I speak to you this morning in an hour of anguish for our nation,” Mr. Trump said. He also criticized the Biden administration and attacked diversity initiatives but offered no evidence linking the former president’s policies to the crash. 
Nick Daniels, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, told “CBS Mornings” on Jan. 31 that controllers go through very rigorous training and multiple “job jeopardy points” before they speak directly to aircraft.
“Any air traffic controller out there – it doesn’t matter their race, color, religion – you can know you are in the best hands that take that responsibility very seriously every day,” he said.
Mr. Trump, who claimed that he had increased standards for those who work within the aviation industry, announced he’d appointed Christopher Rocheleau as acting commissioner of the FAA. Mr. Trump said the investigation into the collision is ongoing and “we have some pretty good ideas” about what caused it.
In an earlier statement, the president said, “Thank you for the incredible work being done by our first responders. I am monitoring the situation and will provide more details as they arise.”
And in a Truth Social post, he questioned what led up to the crash, writing, “This is a bad situation that looks like it should have been prevented. NOT GOOD!!!”
Newly confirmed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wrote on social media that the Pentagon was actively monitoring the situation and “poised to assist if needed.”
With the support of Mr. Trump, Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy on Jan. 31 ordered the FAA to indefinitely restrict helicopter traffic around Reagan National Airport. Meanwhile, two of the airport’s three runways were closed, causing more than 100 flight cancellations.
Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall said in a statement, “Tonight, we received devastating news of what can only be described as nothing short of a nightmare … My prayer is that God wraps his arms around each and every victim, and that he continues to be with their families.”
Alexandria, Virginia, Mayor Alyia Gaskins said on social media, “Earlier this evening, we were devastated to learn of a tragic aviation incident near DCA. Our prayers are with everyone affected. Our fire, police, and emergency personnel are assisting in the regional response.” Alexandria is just south of Reagan Washington National Airport.
Sen. Tim Kaine, of Virginia, acknowledged “there’s a lot of questions” about the deadly collision in its aftermath. 
“You can’t tell a lot from video footage taken at night, but the footage raises a lot of questions about how this happened,” Kaine told “CBS Mornings” on Jan. 30.
Just one day before the deadly collision, another regional jet about to land at Reagan had a close call with a helicopter. 
The pilots received an alert from the onboard collision avoidance system about a military helicopter and aborted the landing attempt, Van Cleave reported. 
CBS News has identified four other close calls between helicopters and planes around the airport, including a 2018 incident where a pilot took last-second evasive maneuvers to avoid an FAA landing on the same runway the jet from Wichita was cleared to land on. In the previously unreported case, an air traffic controller failed to warn the two aircraft in advance.
The last major U.S. commercial air crash occurred in February 2009 when a Continental Airlines flight out of Newark, New Jersey, operated by Colgan Air crashed into a house as it was approaching the airport in Buffalo, New York. That plane was a Bombardier Q400. Forty-nine people died in the tragedy. Continental merged with United Airlines in 2010. 
The last major American Airlines crash occurred in November 2001 near John F. Kennedy International Airport. American Airlines Flight No. 587, an Airbus A300, crashed shortly after takeoff, killing 265 people. It was bound for Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. The plane crashed in the Belle Harbor area of the Rockaways in the New York City borough of Queens.
Kathryn Krupnik, Rhona Tarrant, Kris Van Cleave, James LaPorta and Eleanor Watson contributed to this report.
Faris Tanyos is a news editor for CBSNews.com, where he writes and edits stories and tracks breaking news. He previously worked as a digital news producer at several local news stations up and down the West Coast.
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