Trump scores major legal victory as election interference and classified docs cases are abandoned: Live updates

In an appearance on CNN’s State of the Union, Senator James Lankford of Oklahoma downplayed Donald Trump’s threats of payback at the Department of Justice over the criminal indictments he faced over election interference and classified documents.

However, he then told Dana Bash: “If someone is in the Department of Justice right now that is actively trying to undercut the president, they should be gone.”

This was a sentiment echoed by Senator Eric Schmitt of Missouri, who told NBC’s Meet the Press that one of the president-elect’s first priorities should be to fire any staff at the Justice Department who worked on cases that involved charges against Trump.

“First and foremost, the people involved with this should be fired immediately,” he told Kristen Welker. “And anybody part of this, this effort to keep President Trump off the ballot and to throw him in jail for the rest of his life because they didn’t like his politics, and who continue to cast him as a quote, unquote threat to democracy, was wrong, and so we’ll see where that goes.”

Schmitt framed his stance as a form of “accountability,” telling Kristen Welker, “[The cases] all fell apart under the weight of the law. And so I do think there needs to be accountability. I think that getting it back to crime-fighting is important, but there has to be accountability for these kinds of abuses.”

“Kamala is for they/them. Trump is for you,” was the message of a widely aired ad for Donald Trump’ 2024 campaign.

But a resurfaced 2016 clip shows how much the president-elect’s view on transgender rights has shifted in eight years.

Kelly Rissman has the story.

President-elect Donald Trump is planning an executive order that would remove all transgender troops from the US military, according to a report by The Times.

Such an order could be signed as soon as Inauguration Day on January 20, 2025, when the newly sworn-in president returns to the White House.

It is estimated there are approximately 15,000 active service transgender personnel across the branches of the US military.

According to The Times, they would be medically discharged, deeming them unfit to serve. There would also be a ban on trans people joining the armed services — as was the case in the first Trump administration, when already serving trans personnel were permitted to keep their jobs.

“These people will be forced out at a time when the military can’t recruit enough people,” a source familiar with Trump’s plans told the paper. “Only the Marine Corps is hitting its numbers for recruitment and some people who will be affected are in very senior positions.”

Those who fought the trans ban in the first Trump administration have been preparing for a similar move when he takes office again.

“Should a trans ban be implemented from day one of the Trump administration it would undermine the readiness of the military and create an even greater recruitment and retention crisis, not to mention signaling vulnerability to America’s adversaries,” Rachel Branaman, executive director of Modern Military Association of America, an organization that campaigns on behalf of LGBT+ military personnel and veterans, told The Times.

“Abruptly discharging 15,000-plus service members, especially given that the military’s recruiting targets fell short by 41,000 recruits last year, adds administrative burdens to warfighting units, harms unit cohesion, and aggravates critical skill gaps,” she said. “There would be a significant financial cost, as well as a loss of experience and leadership that will take possibly 20 years and billions of dollars to replace.”