Nomia Iqbal

The White House is very keen to play it down. You've got President Trump saying that this was a glitch and as far as he's concerned that that's the end of it. He is standing by his team. You've also got his White House Communications Director, who is...

Es ist ziemlich hart, wenn es um das, wie wir Steven Chung fühlen, kritisieren, dass die Kritiker nach Präsident Trump gehen, um seine Präsidentschaft zu bringen. Aber interessanterweise scheint es hier eine Art Splitter zu sein, weil du den SED-Majoritätsleiter John Thune hast, der eröffnet wurde. He said that the messages are inappropriate, by the way.

And he's also said that the Armed Services Committee may want to have some folks testify and have some questions answered as well. So it doesn't seem to be the end of it.

President Trump walked into the chamber, shaking hands with excited Republicans. This was his moment to boast.

He praised all the domestic actions he has taken so far, such as on immigration.

And spending cuts.

He praised his close ally, the unelected tech billionaire Elon Musk, who arrived with the president for the address.

He's appointed the world's richest man to reduce government spending and boost the US's space ambitions.

In a key moment, Donald Trump reached out to Ukraine's President Zelensky after days of criticising him.

President Trump looks and sounds like he did the first time round, but now he's more experienced and emboldened. His speech really underlines the blitz of action he's taken since he returned to the White House. He's testing the boundaries of power... and creating confusion, with Democrats, the opposition, unsure how to react. One congressman stood up and heckled Mr Trump.

Al Green of Texas was eventually kicked out by the Speaker, Mike Johnson.

Other Democrats brought signs reading false, pay your taxes and this isn't normal. Some said nothing as Mr Trump taunted them. President Trump arrived here at the Capitol as polls suggest Americans are split on the start of his second term. He can't run again, giving him four years to deliver on his big, bold promises.

Susan Crawford is a county judge. She's formerly a private lawyer for Planned Parenthood and had made abortion rights a big issue on the campaign trail. Now, the Supreme Court election here in Wisconsin is always significant, always closely watched, always has a lot of money pumped into it.

But of course, that was taken to a whole other level with Elon Musk, the world's richest man, being involved. Hier in Milwaukee, die demokratisch lehnt, haben die Wahlkandidaten gesagt, dass sie aus Ballotpapieren ausgegangen sind. Und sie sagten, dass es wegen des unvorhergesehenen und historischen Voterturnouts war. Dieses Ergebnis ist ein Setback für Präsident Trump.

Er hat das Wettbewerb Wisconsin gewonnen, bei einem kleinen Prozent im letzten Jahr in der Präsidentie. Untertitelung des ZDF für funk, 2017

It is just so staggering, actually. I mean, just to remind Goldberg so that he received a connection request by someone named Michael Waltz, who is the national security advisor to President Trump. He was then added to it. I mean, he also mentioned how Mr. Higgs had posted a detailed war plan. in which he gave a certain time for when the first bombs would be dropped in Yemen.

And then two hours later, explosions were heard in the country. I do think it was pretty notable that VP Vance, who has been in lockstep with President Trump, actually disagreed with some of the president's approach in that chat. But I think one of the really extraordinary things about this is that Jeffrey Goldberg left the group. That's how they knew he was in it.

And so it raises the question, if he hadn't left the group of his own accord, would they have spotted him?

It's not. And the reason why he might have thought that as well is because Donald Trump isn't a big fan of the Atlantic, nor is he a big fan of Jeffrey Goldberg. Over the years, he has really

sort of made it quite clear how he doesn't like him so i can see why mr goldberg might have thought that it was some kind of hoax and especially on on that particular chat app you never quite know but uh the white house did confirm that uh they are now looking to quote them how an inadvertent number was added to the chain but this is potentially illegal isn't it Well, here's the thing.

Disappearing messages on Signal to coordinate military operations, that could have violated the Espionage Act and other federal laws. And so Congress are now demanding an investigation into it.

And were the teenagers, were they Russian?

Rasha Alouia is 34. She's a transplant doctor and assistant professor at Brown University based in Rhode Island. And she'd been in the U.S. since 2018 on an H-1B visa. So these are visas typically issued to foreigners who've got special skills for a job that an employer would say they can't get an American to do.

But court documents show that in February, she went to Lebanon for what she thought would be a short visit, but was delayed in returning while trying to get paperwork from the U.S. consulate in in Beirut and her cousin filed a petition on her behalf.

You had a US district court judge on Friday saying that the federal government must give 48 hours notice to the court before her removal from the country. But she was already put on a flight back to Lebanon by US Customs and Border Protection.

Well, Homeland Security has sent us a statement alleging that she told agents during her detainment that she had traveled to Beirut last month to attend the funeral of the dead Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. Now, tens of thousands of people attended the funeral. It was held at a 48,000 seat stadium in Beirut. But, of course, Hezbollah is considered a terrorist group by the U.S.

They also claim she had pictures of the Iran's Ayatollah on her phone. But she reportedly said that this was not a political reason why she went to the funeral or why she had the pictures, but it was more of a religious one. As a Shia Muslim, she said that they were important religious figures and it wasn't anything political.

Nonetheless, the university has sent an email advising international students and faculty members to avoid international travel due to potential changes in travel restrictions and travel bans. This all comes at a time when the Trump administration is really ramping up its efforts to deport people.

It was pretty normal. And I think it was a reminder of how these sessions are supposed to go. It all in all took about 36 minutes. And if you contrast that to four years ago, very, very different. It's worth mentioning that certifying a US election where basically they just conclude the election results is, dare I say, a pretty straightforward, mundane event. It usually doesn't get any attention.

But because of this mob storming the Capitol four years ago, of course, all of that changed after Donald Trump encouraged them to march away. To the Capitol, he repeated his unproven claims that the 2020 election was riddled with massive voter fraud, that it was stolen from him. But this time round, it was different.

President Biden, Kamala Harris has given something to Donald Trump he never gave to them, the acknowledgement of an election victory and a peaceful transfer of power.

Well, we understand that loads of offer letters of employment are going out this week to political appointees in the new administration. His transition team has got this set goal of bringing on about 2,000 political appointees on January the 20th, day one of the administration. We're not far from that. But he hasn't reached that target as of yet.

And do bear in mind as well, his cabinet picks will need Senate confirmation hearings. And some of those picks are seen as hugely controversial. So it's going slowly, I think is the feeling.

Well, the weather actually stopped some members of Congress from attending the certification process today. I mean, you know, DC is very much in the middle of a

winter storm and it's created so many hazardous conditions for not just people here in dc but in other parts of america which have got it much worse and we're not quite sure exactly when it will end but it is expected to continue you know certainly into the midweek normia iqbal

Over the weekend, key members of his cabinet coalesced around him. The whole Republican Party has pretty much fallen in line with his view on how things went on Friday. His national security advisor Mike Waltz echoing. Actually, there seems to be a line that they're all using at the moment, which is, President Zelensky doesn't want peace.

This is a guy that does not want peace, which is what Mr. Trump has put in his post. I think if there was any way that Zelensky could redeem himself in the eyes of the Trump administration, it would be to say sorry for what happened on Friday, to sign the deal without any objections and to just make peace with Russia. But of course, President Zelensky is not likely to do that.

Well, Mike Waltz, going back to the National Security Advisor, he said that he welcomes it and that it's good that Europe is doing this. I mean, President Trump has also said in the past that Europe needs to pull its weight when it comes to security, when it comes to the financial side of things, such as Vielen Dank. Und ist die Trump-Administration trying to force Zelensky out, personally?

Es scheint es so zu sein, weil es über den Wochenende auch Anrufe von Donald Trump gab, dass Präsident Zelenskyy aufgehört wird. Einer der bemerkenswertesten Kommentare kam von Republikaner Lindsey Graham, der ein pro-Ukraine-Advokat ist. Er ist ein starker Unterstützer.

Und nur ein paar Wochen zuvor hat er gesagt, dass Präsident Zelenskyy, um ihn zu bezeichnen, der Alli, den ich mein ganzes Leben warte. And now he has turned around, he has done a U-turn, he backs Trump and Vance and he has suggested that Mr. Zelensky should resign. Mr. Zelensky has responded to that saying, well, you know, Ukrainians decide the election.

So whether or not they want him to go is like an official sort of policy, I don't know, but they're certainly making those sounds and those suggestions.

Investigators are obviously starting to look into exactly why the Black Hawk and the passenger flight collided. I'm not able to get too close to the scene, but I can make out just across the way on the Potomac River what is happening. You can see the red flashes of the emergency crew that are there. Obviously, this is now a recovery operation, not a rescue one.

The plane is essentially in three parts sitting in waist-high frigid water. You can also see And some of the photos that are emerging, just the sort of the top of the chopper that is in the water as well. As you mentioned here, the main runaway here is the busiest in the country. It's thought to like handle 90 percent of the airport's flights due to the space.

And here it's quite normal, especially in D.C. You know, we're not far, as you mentioned, from D.C., to see civilian aircraft and military aircraft in the sky at the same time. But investigators are saying that there were no sort of unusual travel patterns here, that the American airline flight and the military helicopter were doing, you know, there was nothing unusual about their practices.

They have located the two aircraft. As I mentioned, the fuselage of American Airlines craft was inverted. It's located in three different sections, as I mentioned. But, yes, we're very much at the early stages in terms of finding out exactly what happened.

That's correct. There has been an update. There was Russian-Americans. There has been a statement from the Kremlin. Just to mention also the families of these people are inside the terminal. This flight was just minutes from landing on the runway and people were here waiting for that flight to arrive. I mean, it's just pretty unfathomable, the tragedy of it.

And they are, of course, waiting to find out exactly what's happened to their loved ones.

Donald Trump is already sort of speculating, I would say, about this. For the president, this is, I would say, one of the first big crises of his administration. And it's a new administration finding its feet. His transport secretary, Sean Duffy, was only sworn in yesterday. It's the first week for his new defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, as well.

And so there will be pressure on the administration to get to the bottom of exactly what's happened.

I think there's a lot of scepticism, certainly by Democrat senators, on the way Mr Kennedy seems to have done a U-turn. It's worth remembering that he has a pretty big following in this country because of his anti-vaccine views. And he says that news reports have me down as anti-vaccine.

Well, the senators were saying to him, look, here's the transcript from podcasts, from shows that you've spoken on in which you've been anti-vaccine. So they really did bring evidence when they were questioning him. On the other side, you have Conservatives who aren't quite sure about him because they're suspicious in terms of his abortion stances.

He was pro-abortion before, then he changed his mind on bats. And bear in mind, he did run to be a Democratic presidential candidate, but dropped out last year and fully endorsed Donald Trump. This is just one of two hearings he's facing.

Oh, completely. You know, he could oversee a life and death corner of the federal government. He would be overseeing health care for millions and millions of Americans. And in fact, just to quote Senator Bennett, he said, unlike other jobs that we're confirming here, this one is about life and death. So this is why it's a really, really important. important hearing.

And out of all the picks that Donald Trump has made for his cabinet, this is arguably the most controversial, provocative one due to the fact that Mr. Kennedy is seen as someone who has dabbled in conspiracy theories, someone who has flip-flopped on a lot of issues. And the key thing is, are there enough Republicans to go against him?

If all the Democrats vote against RFK, it would only take four Republican senators to sink the nomination.

Donald Trump said he wanted to end the Ukraine war. It was a big promise. He said he'd end it on day one. He hasn't done that. And he clearly thinks threatening to sanction Russia is a way of making it happen. So he has said the potential sanctions are likely.

He also said to reporters on Tuesday that he had suggested to the Chinese President Xi Jinping that Beijing should help to get the conflict settled, that they've got a lot of power. Support for Ukraine is interesting. He was asked if he intends to cut that off. There are lots of Republicans that don't want to keep providing money and support to Ukraine. Trump didn't give a firm answer.

He sort of said that European nations should be doing more since they're in closer proximity to the conflict. This is what Trump does. He announces a policy. Well, it's not that he's announced a policy on Russia, I should say, but then he says something else on his social media. So it's you kind of have to read between the lines. And you say, look, I'm not looking to hurt Russia.

I love the Russian people. I've always had a good relationship with Putin. But clearly, Donald Trump thinks he has to sort of make these kind of threats, I guess, and his bluster may pay off. Let me just also add the U.S. already has steep tariffs on Russian metals and the Biden administration imposed sweeping sanctions to cripple the Russian economy.

Yes. So this targets refugees and specifically this is going to impact refugees from Afghanistan. So there were about 1,660 who were previously cleared by the government to come to the U.S. And that included family members of active duty U.S. military personnel, unaccompanied minors flying to America to reunite with family.

And then there were those who fought for the Afghan government that was backed by the U.S., taking huge risks to themselves. And, you know, in some ways, he's sort of mirroring actions from his first term where he signed that executive order barring people from Muslim-majority countries. And it is controversial.

There'll be some Republicans who will be uncomfortable with it, especially for those Afghans who, as I mentioned, helped America. And if you compare it to the Biden administration, Joe Biden, you know, he... Approximately 200,000 Afghans were brought to the US following the US troops' withdrawal from the capital. But this is what Trump... He promised to be tough on immigration.

He promised to implement this. And he would argue, I'm living up to that promise.

I imagine pro-natalists would never go around saying we only want white people to be born. We only want white children. I think, however, when you look at the movement more closely, there is a fine line between the concern about birth rates in the developed world and the great replacement theory. This is considered racist.

It posits that white Americans and Europeans are being replaced by non-white immigrants.

Many would say that the Collinses do have a point there, but it does leave them open to this argument that certainly liberals would make, which is if you want to... increase birth rates, if you want to address the declining population, then why not have more immigration? Why not bring people over from other countries? It has proven to be effective.

Net immigration is actually the main reason why the U.S. population is currently growing. But then you do get those who are skeptical about pro-natalist claims that this is just about economic reasons. They would say those certainly who are involved in pretty

far right politics are more concerned about just quite bluntly having white babies and that they want to protect a vision of a more European culture. I mean, the hard policy reality is that raising birth rates enough to address the problems of population ageing and eventual decline is impossible. on the timescale required. Legal immigration, interestingly, in this country is a bipartisan issue.

President Donald Trump has said he wants legal immigration. Of course, illegal immigration is incredibly contentious. But as I say, there are those who would argue that immigration would be the way to solve declining birth rates. It would probably be the most effective way of doing it compared to having more babies.

Well, the way they keep the distance is just by saying, don't they, that we don't agree with them. We agree with the actual movement of pronatalism. We agree with the concept of increasing birth rates, but we don't share that view.

That's why you do get critics of the pronatalist movement who say, well, you know, if you want to advance this movement, if you believe that this is the right way to increase birth rates, then you've got to look at who else is joining you with that message. And, you know, just also worth saying that critics of pronatalism, they say it doesn't just overlap with racism.

They also are concerned about misogyny. They think that the sort of the pronatalist movement, certainly, again, the more extreme parts of it, view women as breeding machines whose job is to repopulate the earth.

Well, Elon Musk is constantly accompanied by his child everywhere he goes, whether it's the Oval Office, whether he's on Air Force One and what have you. And he recently welcomed his 14th child with another woman. But he's someone that's completely on record for saying that human population is on the verge of collapse. I mean, he's really sowed panic over it.

And he is saying that low birth rates present this huge risk to civilisation. much more than global warming, he claims. You've got J.D. Vance, the vice president. He has three children. We know he's had a lot to say about women who don't have babies in the past, calling them childless cat ladies. Before he was elected, he downplayed it.

But when he gave his first speech as vice president, this was at the March for Life in Washington, D.C., regularly held every year by those who are anti-abortion and those who call themselves pro-life. He said that he opposes abortion because, to quote him, he wants more babies in the United States of America. And then also another key member of Donald Trump's administration is Sean Duffy.

He was confirmed as the transportation secretary. And shortly after that, he circulated an order telling his department to give preference to communities with marriage and birth rates higher than the national average when awarding grants.

Definitely. And, you know, Donald Trump is also very closely aligned with the tech world. Fertility generally is becoming this sort of pet project in Silicon Valley. I think in 2023, there was about $174 million invested in it. You've got Sam Altman. He's the head of OpenAI. He once had a big family. He's investing in experimental fertility technology.

Great, let's do it.

It's a startup working to make egg cells out of other cells in the body, which basically means that a woman without viable eggs or even two men could make a baby. You've got some that are experimenting with using artificial wombs. And, you know, in some ways, this technology forward vision of pronatalism has become a religion.

And so I can see why families like the Collins would look at the Trump administration as a real great opportunity for them to push forward their philosophy.

It is. So, a general definition would be it's any attitude or any policy that's pro-birth, that basically encourages reproduction. So, any view that basically considers parenthood as the most amazing thing that you can do, the most powerful, incredible role. And so, basically, pronatalists think that people should have more babies. Others go further. They think it should be state-sponsored.

And then you have this kind of crossover with those who are anti-abortion, and they believe in total abortion bans.

Well, it means that there is a decline in birth rates. And that is true. So, for a country in the developed world, like the U.S., to increase or maintain its population, it needs a birth rate of 2.1 children per woman on average. And that's known as the replacement rate. So, here in the U.S., the fertility rate fell in 2023 to 1.62. That's a record low. And then last year, it was 1.78.

So, it climbed up. But that's still low, especially if you think back to 1960. It was 3.65%. And so, if you're a pronatalist, generally speaking, your argument, well, certainly on the extreme end, I would say, of that movement, your argument would go something like this. Birth rates are falling. If we don't take dramatic action, we're going to witness the extinction of entire societies.

The economy will collapse. Entire races and countries will be wiped out because of lower fertility rates.

I mean, it's not a new concept. If you read the Bible, you've got, you know, be fruitful and multiply. And then there are lots of other religious traditions. And they go all the way back to, I think it's Louis XIV's France. So They had a policy in France of encouraging large families back in 1666. There was basically this edict offering tax privileges to fathers of 10 or more children.

And that was aimed at increasing the population, strengthening the nation. You had Soviet Russia as well. They wanted to respond to population losses during and after World War II. The goal was increase the birth rates, bolster the workforce. And then even here in the U.S. in 1920s America, women had the right to vote. They could go to work.

And so there were lots of concerns about what that meant in regards to having babies. And now we've seen this resurgence, I guess, of pronatalism because you do have this modern tech look to it, don't you? You have many in Silicon Valley who have taken a big interest in pronatalism.

It's interesting, isn't it? The pronatalists, many of them don't want to just increase the birth rate. Some want to sort of optimise the children being born. You get those who are pro-family and pronatalists. I think that's probably how I would try and separate the two. And not everyone who is pro-having kids probably tests their embryos to the extent that

the Collins family do or even can afford to do it. So you do get families who do the common testing to make sure their unborn child is healthy, not at risk of any hereditary diseases. But whilst the numbers doing what the Collins family is doing is much smaller. I think there is actually a huge push by the Silicon Valley tech world.

Prominent figures in the tech industry, they're not just passive observers, but they're almost becoming like active participants in this so-called reproductive revolution. They're investing so much money, like millions and millions in startups focused on fertility and genetic technologies to try and encourage so-called super babies. And of course, that is just ethically hugely controversial.

In 2022, Sir Salman Rushdie was at the Chautauqua Institution in southwestern New York. He was on stage, ironically giving a talk about how to keep writers safe. Now, 27-year-old Hadi Matar was in the audience. He had purchased a ticket to go to the event, but he rushed onto stage and attacked Mr Rushdie multiple times. The author had to be airlifted to hospital.

It took him weeks to recover, and he chronicled the incident in his latest book. Now, in terms of this trial, it took less than two weeks and it took less than two hours for the jury to come back with their verdict. I was in court when Sir Salman himself took to the stand and he went into vivid description of what happened that day and he removed his glasses to show the jury how he'd lost his eye.

This was never a case of whodunit. This incident had been witnessed by many people in the audience. They gave evidence at the trial. It was also live-streamed, the event, and so people saw it online. So the prosecution's case was quite clear-cut.

The defence had argued that the prosecution hadn't proven the intent, that Hadi Mattar had gone to the event, and that this was more of a chaotic incident, not... you know, a premeditated attack. But that was rejected by the jury. As I said, it took less than two hours to come back with their verdict. Mattar will be sentenced at a later date. He's facing up to 32 years in jail.

Walking onto stage at the Capitol Arena, Donald Trump was where he wants to be, ready to reclaim power.

As always, his bombastic style pleased the tens of thousands of people inside. We're outside the arena where Donald Trump was inside holding his rally. Tens of thousands of people came here. Not everyone could get in and so many people were just queuing outside. They were very, very excited just to be here, to see Donald Trump return to power.

Roger Rehorn has come from Georgia.

Samantha Drake from Missouri is wheeling a cart of Trump hats, buttons, scarves and badges.

This overall is a very happy Trump crowd, unlike four years ago. A mob loyal to Mr Trump broke into the Capitol in support of his false claims the 2020 election was stolen. He's promised to pardon those convicted. Other big promises include carrying out mass deportations and ending global wars.

The freezing weather has forced Donald Trump's inauguration to now take place inside the Capitol, the first time that's happened in 25 years. So he won't get the crowds he loves to see, but he does plan to hold another rally. This year marks 10 years since Donald Trump first announced his run for the White House. And his return underlines what once seemed impossible.

Donald Trump has dominated American politics and will continue to for the next four years.

It's almost back to business here at the airport. There have been so many planes flying in the skies. But if you're a passenger on that plane and you look out the window, you will still see the Black Hawk and the airliner half submerged in the icy waters of the River Potomac. The recovery operation is still very much underway behind me.

Now, the National Transportation Safety Board has said that it's investigating multiple factors. It's confirmed that they have not recovered the flight data, also known as the black boxes. They plan to issue a preliminary report in around about 30 days, but they have said it will take some time because there's so much information that they have to verify.

And even though President Trump seems to have prejudged the investigation, saying what he thinks caused it, the Safety Board says it's refusing to speculate.

Namia Iqbal ist unsere Berichterstatterin in Washington. But it appears that he still seems to not have shifted much on his position in terms of being not convinced about Ukraine's desire for peace. It was all pretty confusing because we're not actually sure if he's going to impose any sanctions on Russia. He has said that he might do.

But at the moment, if you were to ask me, does he have a specific policy approach? All we know is that he just wants the war to end in Ukraine. How that happens, we just don't know.

Was erwarten wir? Es wird. Er und Präsident Zelenskyy haben gesagt, dass sie es gemacht haben, nachdem Mr. Zelenskyy ihm das Statement gesendet hat, dass er Mr. Trump für eine starke Führung freut. Donald Trump hat sogar in seinem Antrag an den Präsidenten gesagt, dass er sicher war, dass der Krieg erreicht werden könnte.

Aber es gibt diese Gespräche, die nächste Woche in Saudi-Arabien stattfinden, wo der US-Envoy Steve Witkoff mit ukrainischen Offizieren gehen wird, und das betrifft Herrn Zelensky, wo sie einen initialen Zerstörer und dann ein Framework für einen längeren Vertrag diskutieren. Ob nächste Woche in irgendeinem Art und Weise Zerstörer endet, wer weiß, weil Donald Trump auch gesagt hat, dass er

Er will nach Saudi-Arabien, um mit Präsident Putin zu sprechen.

Er ist es wirklich. Und er hat so viel gehofft und er bleibt es so, dass die Kriege nie angefangen hätten, hätte er Präsident gewesen. Und er hat auf der Kampagnenstraße versprochen, dass er die Kriege am Tag 1 beenden würde. Offensichtlich ist das nicht passiert. Es gibt viele Gerüchte, dass er in einem Schuss des Nobelpreis-Prizes sein will. Deshalb will er diese Kriege beenden.

Aber es gibt Druck. Nomiya Iqbal in Washington.