Trump’s department of war rebrand ‘won’t strengthen national security or help military personnel’ – US politics live

<p>Democrat Tammy Duckworth, an injured veteran, says money should go towards helping military families and preventing conflicts</p><p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/04/trump-defense-war-department">Trump expected to rebrand Pentagon as ‘Department of War’</a></p><p>Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics where <strong>opponents have criticised <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/04/trump-defense-war-department">Donald Trump’s expected move to rebrand the Department of Defense as the Department of War</a></strong>.</p><p>The president is expected to sign an executive order on Friday authorizing the rebrand, the White House said, as part of an attempt to formalize the name change without an act of Congress.</p><p>Why not put this money toward supporting military families or toward employing diplomats that help prevent conflicts from starting in the first place?</p><p>Because Trump would rather use our military to score political points than to strengthen our national security and support our brave servicemembers and their families - that’s why</p><p>The health secretary, <strong>Robert F Kennedy Jr</strong>, fended off calls for his resignation and spread vaccine misinformation during a contentious Senate hearing.</p><p><strong>Susan Monarez</strong>, the ousted CDC director, rejected Kennedy’s claim that she had lied about having been pressured to rubber-stamp vaccine recommendations from a panel of his anti-vaccine allies, and offered to repeat her claim under oath.</p><p>Trump hosted an array of tech industry leaders for dinner in the White House state dinning room on Thursday night, including <strong>Mark Zuckerberg</strong>, <strong>Tim Cook</strong>, <strong>Bill Gates</strong>, <strong>Sam Altman</strong> and <strong>Sergey Brin</strong>, but his former first buddy, <strong>Elon Musk</strong>, was a notable absence.</p><p><strong>Donald Trump</strong> said Thursday that he thinks Democrat <strong>Zohran Mamdani</strong> is likely to become New York City’s next mayor unless two of the three major candidates running against him drop out of the race. But the Republican didn’t say which two candidates he’d like to see quit.</p><p>Demolition to build president Trump’s new ballroom off the East Wing of the <strong>White House</strong> can begin without approval of the commission tasked with vetting construction of federal buildings, the Trump-appointed head of the panel said Thursday.</p><p>As <strong>Trump </strong>accuses Federal Reserve governor <strong>Lisa Cook</strong> of criminal mortgage fraud, for allegedly obtaining more than one mortgage on a home designated as her primary residence, at least three members of his cabinet have multiple primary-residence mortgages, <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-cabinet-mortgage-fraud">ProPublica reports</a>.</p><p>The justice department has launched a criminal mortgage fraud inquiry into Federal Reserve governor <strong>Lisa Cook</strong> and issued grand jury subpoenas out of both Georgia and Michigan.</p><p>New York’s attorney general moved to have the state’s highest court reinstate Trump’s staggering civil fraud penalty, appealing a lower court decision that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/aug/21/trump-civil-fraud-case-appeal-ruling">slashed the potential half-billion dollar penalty to zero</a>.</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2025/sep/05/donald-trump-pentagon-department-of-war-immigration-tariffs-us-politics-live-news-updates">Continue reading...</a>

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