Trump updates: King Charles invites US president for second UK visit

Thank you for joining our live coverage of day 39 of the second term of President Donald Trump.

You can find our story on US peace negotiations with Russia here.

And learn about how Canada and Mexico are preparing for impending tariffs in March here.

• In a subdued visit to the White House, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has warned against granting concessions to Russia as the US negotiates a peace deal in Ukraine: “History must be on the side of the peacemaker, not the invader.”
• President Donald Trump, meanwhile, said that  the US was “very well advanced” on a peace deal and played up his impending meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday.
• He also expressed optimism about a prospective deal to gain access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals, saying Americans would be “ digging our hearts out” in the Eastern European country.
• Starmer delivered an invitation from King Charles III for Trump to visit the UK, which he immediately accepted.
• Workers at the US Agency for International Development (USAID) had a 15-minute window to clear out their offices, as Trump and his adviser Elon Musk move to shutter the agency.
• Musk has used his social media platform to attack telecommunications company Verizon, saying its technology is putting systems of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) at risk.
• The Washington Post has reported that the FAA may cancel a contract with Verizon in favour of Musk’s satellite communications company Starlink.

The US Social Security Administration is preparing to lay off at least 7,000 people from its workforce of 60,000, The Associated Press has reported, citing an anonymous source.

A second anonymous source has told the AP that the workforce reduction could be as high as 50 percent.

The layoffs are part of the Trump administration’s intensified efforts to shrink the size of the federal workforce through the Elon Musk-run Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

On a page on its website called a “Wall of Receipts”, DOGE has listed the termination of office leases for dozens of Social Security sites across Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Kentucky, North Carolina and other states.

It’s unclear how the layoffs would impact benefits for the 72.5 million US recipients of social security benefits, which include retirees and children. Advocates and Democratic lawmakers have warned that the layoffs will reduce the agency’s ability to serve recipients in a timely manner.

Some say cuts to the workforce effectively amount to a cut in benefits.

“The Social Security Administration is already chronically understaffed. Now, the Trump Administration wants to demolish it,” Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, an advocacy group for the popular public benefits programme, told the AP.

It’s expected that Zelenskyy will sign this minerals deal, a deal that Ukrainians hope will appease Donald Trump.

Trump in the news conference today said that the deal will be signed, and he sees that as being the foundation of a lasting relationship with Ukraine and a massive stepping stone to initiating some sort of peace initiative.

But there are a whole host of questions that still need to be answered, certainly with respect to the kinds of concessions that the Americans are expecting the Russians to make, chief of which would be territorial concessions.

We’ve heard repeatedly over the last couple of days – including yesterday from Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov during meetings in Qatar – that any discussion of territorial concessions being held by Europeans who are pushing Trump on that was nothing short of deceit.

We heard today from the Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov saying exactly the same thing, that this was not to be discussed and that these areas are Russian now.

A vast majority of Ukrainians are sceptical of this peace deal. On the one hand, people are desperate for peace after three years of war. But there is also this vague awareness that there is this show going on behind them – trying to push for some sort of peace – that they feel that they are being left out of.

It was a muted visit to the White House for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, as he and Trump revisited the topic of peace in Ukraine, while avoiding the prospect of contradicting each other in public.

Starmer, a former human rights lawyer, did emphasise that his government would not back a peace that “ rewards the aggressor” – in this case, Russia.

Trump, meanwhile, underscored the importance of negotiating with “both sides” in the pursuit of a ceasefire.

Here are some images from their visit together.

A vote in the Iowa state Senate has teed up a historic bill that will strip gender as a category protected under the state’s Civil Rights Act.

Critics say it is the latest attack on LGBTQ rights under a Trump administration that has emboldened the far right.

Logan Casey, director of policy research at the think tank Movement Advancement Project, told The Associated Press news agency it is the first case of legislation to strip explicit non-discrimination protections based on gender identity.

The bill is expected to pass the Iowa state House and be signed into law.

Proponents of the bill have championed the change, saying that the original language was not meant to protect transgender identity. They point out that language about sexual orientation and gender was added to the civil rights law in 2007, long after its original 1965 passage.

They also oppose measures that would allow transgender individuals access to toilets and sports teams that align with their gender identities.

But protesters converged on the state capitol, chanting, “No hate in our state!”

Trump has made several broadsides against transgender rights since taking office for a second term, including by restricting military service and participation in women’s sports.

Reporting from Washington, DC, Al Jazeera correspondent Alan Fisher said that the meeting between Trump and Starmer resulted in “a lot of broad strokes” – and few specifics.

But while the two leaders played up the historic alliance between the US and the UK, there were tensions left unsaid.

“They want US security guarantees,” Fisher said of the UK delegation. “They want to underpin any peacekeeping operation they take part in in Ukraine with the knowledge that – as Keir Starmer said – if Putin wants to restart our push forward into Ukraine, they have the guarantee that the US will come to their support.”

But Fisher pointed out that, when asked about the mutual defence pact in the NATO alliance, Trump sidestepped the question.

“It’s clear that the way Donald Trump is looking at Vladimir Putin is not the way that Keir Starmer is looking at him,” Fisher said. “But Keir Starmer does not want to upset Donald Trump by saying, ‘We need you on our side’.”

Starmer has reiterated his call for Gaza to be reconstructed and for a two-state solution between Israel and Palestine in his news conference with Trump.

“The last few weeks of the ceasefire have been very impactful,” he said.

He cited the release of British-Israeli captive Emily Damari, as well as the images of thousands of Palestinians “marching through rubble” as they returned to their homes in the north of Gaza.

“We have to do everything we can to ensure that the ceasefire continues so that more hostages can be returned and so that aid can be brought in that’s desperately needed,” he said. “And we need to allow Palestinians to return and to rebuild their lives, and we must all support them in doing that. And yes, I believe that the two-state solution is ultimately the only way for a lasting peace in the region.”

Trump added, “It’s a terrible situation.”

But he addressed neither plans for Gaza reconstruction nor the two-state solution.

A new government report has added evidence that the HPV vaccine is preventing cervical cancer in young women, contradicting Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr, who has said the vaccine is dangerous.

The report, published today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), found that rates for precancerous lesions decreased by about 80 percent among 20- to 24-year-old women in screenings from 2008 to 2022.

HPV, or human papillomavirus, is very common and spread through sex. Most HPV infections cause no symptoms and clear up without treatment, but others can develop into cancer, leading to some 37,000 cases a year.

In a 2019 video posted on the anti-vaccine nonprofit Children’s Health Defense website, Kennedy had called the HPV vaccine Gardasil “the most dangerous vaccine ever invented”.

Kennedy also played an instrumental role in organising mass litigation against drugmaker Merck over its HPV vaccine, Gardasil.

Experts have said that Canada plays a relatively small role in fentanyl smuggling into the US. Less than 1 percent of the fentanyl seized by US authorities is found at the US-Canada border, according to government statistics.

But Trump has repeatedly claimed that Canada is a major source of fentanyl, and he has used the claim to pressure the country into imposing more severe border restrictions.

That was a theme he reprised in a sit-down today with UK Prime Minister Starmer in the Oval Office.

“ The drugs continue to pour into our country, killing hundreds of thousands of people,” Trump said.

When pressed about the 1-percent statistic, Trump replied that it means Canadian officials are not intercepting enough drug traffickers.

“They’re only apprehending 1 percent. You’re right about that,” Trump said.

“It’s a little more than that, but they should be apprehending much more, because a lot comes through Canada. And as Mexico gets stronger in terms of the border, it goes up to Canada and a lot of drugs are coming in through Canada. We can’t have that.”

Right-wing influencer brothers Andrew and Tristan Tate, who are under investigation in Romania on allegations including human trafficking, have arrived in the US after authorities lifted travel restrictions imposed on the pair as part of the case.

The brothers, who have dual UK and US citizenship and are fervent supporters of Donald Trump, left Romania’s capital Bucharest on Thursday morning.

The Romanian anti-organised crime agency DIICOT said it had approved “a request to modify” their travel ban.

It wasn’t clear under what conditions they were allowed to leave Romania, but their departure came after Romania’s Foreign Minister Emil Hurezeanu said this month that a Trump official had expressed interest in the brothers’ legal case. The minister insisted it didn’t amount to pressure.

Asked about the flight during today’s news conference, Trump said, “I know nothing about it.”

British Prime Minister Starmer – who has come under scrutiny over whether he would challenge Trump about potential pressure on Romania – said, “It’s important that justice is done, and human trafficking is obviously, to my mind, a security risk.”

Billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have repeatedly come under fire for their drastic cuts to government services.

And on Wednesday, in a cabinet meeting, Musk acknowledged mistakes had been made.

“One of the things we accidentally cancelled very briefly was Ebola — Ebola prevention,” Musk said. “I think we all want Ebola prevention, so we restored the Ebola prevention immediately.”

Democrats have since highlighted that Uganda is in the midst of its eighth Ebola outbreak since 2000 — and that, contrary to Musk’s claims, DOGE’s efforts did result in a halt in Ebola-fighting services, according to aid workers.

“Democrats won’t stand for this,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer wrote on social media.

Trump is slated to speak on Tuesday to a joint session of Congress — and Democrats have announced they have selected a representative to present their rebuttal.

Their speaker will be Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, a newly elected US senator and former member of the House of Representatives.

Slotkin’s recent victory in Michigan was seen as a major Democratic victory, as the state tilted rightward in the 2024 elections.

She will also serve as a reminder of the many federal workers facing layoffs under Trump’s second administration. Slotkin herself served as an analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) before pursuing political office.

“She will offer a bold vision of hope, unity, and a brighter future for everyone, not just the wealthy few at the top,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement announcing the choice.