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Environmental Protection Agency staff members across the country have been told by supervisors they are prohibited from communicating with grantee partners they are supposed to supervise and monitor, according to multiple sources inside the EPA and others working directly with the agency.

And many nonprofit organizations and other EPA grant recipients have found themselves frozen out of accessing their federal funds without notice or explanation.

“I have never experienced anything like this,” said Melissa Bosworth, who runs a small nonprofit organization based out of Denver that had been administering an EPA award approved by Congress last May for tribal, school and local municipalities in the mountain west.

Nonprofit leaders from across the country with EPA grants and contracts describe weeks of a communication blackout. Bosworth said her local contacts at the EPA’s Region 8 office stopped responding within days of President Donald Trump’s inauguration. She and her partnering organization, Montana State University, noted they reached out repeatedly to their local point of contact but got no response.

ABC News reached out to the EPA’s Region 8 office for comment.

Then, at the end of February, she received formal notice that her grant had been terminated. The purpose of the grant was to help cities, tribes and schools in rural Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas gain access to federal funding for projects focused on clean drinking water, disaster preparedness, emissions reduction and food security.

The termination notice, reviewed by ABC News, suggested her contract might have been canceled because of the president’s executive order to shutdown diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

“It was about helping fight disparities on behalf of small cities and rural schools,” she said. “So often it is the big universities and big institutions that have the expertise to get funds. I worry the disparity for rural America, tribes and the smallest communities will get worse.”

Bosworth has a son with autism, and her business partner gave birth last month to a baby with severe medical challenges. They both have now been laid off.

“We thought there was a good chance they would try to terminate our contracts, but without any actual communication, we did not have anything formal to fight against,” Bosworth told ABC News. “We did not know what was real, if we could spend money or how to ask questions. I wonder if the ambiguity was part of the strategy.”

While the communication blackout appeared to be sweeping in multiple regional offices and consequential for grant recipients, it did not seem to apply to all EPA staff nationwide.

Even before receiving the termination notice, Bosworth said she struggled to access her EPA grant. She and dozens of other nonprofit leaders from California to Tennessee said they have been frozen out of the government payment system off and on, without explanation or notice.

In an EPA regional office in Philadelphia, staff members described being told in meetings with EPA political appointees based in Washington, D.C., that they are still not permitted to process new awards or even communicate with grant award recipients as late as last week. The edict came despite recent court rulings blocking the administration’s proposed federal funding freeze.

And when local EPA staffers pressed their regional bosses about the communications blackout, those bosses told them to comply because they did not want to risk doing anything to jeopardize their jobs, according to multiple sources.

As part of his work advising agencies to reduce spending and cut staff, Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency have promised transparency and increased oversight over how taxpayer dollars are going out the door. Experts who work in grant management as well as former EPA officials argue the lack of communication will result in the opposite — less transparency and no oversight.

“The preponderance of evidence is that many program officers are under some kind of gag order, making it nearly impossible for them to do their jobs,” one former EPA official under the Biden administration told ABC News. “If you care about abuse in federal spending, this makes no sense and is absurdly hypocritical.”

Typically, EPA staff works closely with nonprofit organizations and local government partners who have been awarded grants, conducting oversight and answering and asking questions about how the government money is being spent.

Rebecca Kaduru, president at Institute for Sustainable Communities, based in Nashville, said she has lost access to the payment system at least once a week for the last month. Her organization had two EPA grants until last month, when one was terminated.

The effective gag order has left nonprofit leaders, local governments and tribes stunned and unsure about how to move forward in spending the EPA grants they were awarded.

Kaduru explained the strain of chaos of the last few months.

“Do I fire staff because I can’t pay payroll? But if I do, I am not compliant with the grant that says I have to have staff and keep our website,” she said on the phone. “It is very high risk for nonprofits.”

On Monday, EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the agency had decided to terminate over 400 contracts with nonprofit organizations around the country.

“Working hand-in-hand with DOGE to rein in wasteful federal spending, EPA has saved more than $2 billion in taxpayer money,” Zeldin wrote in a statement. “It is our commitment at EPA to be exceptional stewards of tax dollars.”

The EPA did not respond to questions about which contracts exactly were canceled or why, but it appeared environmental justice and community change grants were hit particularly hard in this week’s cuts.

Over 100 organizations received community change grants last year, totaling more than $1.6 billion, as part of environmental justice work funded through the bipartisan Infrastructure Reduction Act in 2022. The grants focus on helping low-income, disadvantaged and often rural communities fight air and water pollution, create green spaces and invest in renewable energy and disaster preparation.

On Tuesday, Zeldin also sent an internal memo to all regional administrators saying that the agency planned to eliminate all environmental justice positions and offices immediately.

“With this action, EPA is delivering organizational improvements to the personnel structure that will directly benefit all Americans,” the memo, which ABC News reviewed, said.

Many nonprofit leaders who received termination notices in the last few weeks expressed frustration that they were not given the chance to explain their work and said the savings, in their view, were overblown. The news comes as agency leaders were also told to draft plans with a deadline of this week for further staffing reductions.

In terms of savings, in a recent post, Zeldin claimed he saved taxpayers over $12 million by canceling the contract with Kaduru’s organization, for example. However, in actuality, it was an $8 million grant, with over half of it already spent.

Speaking to a joint session of Congress last week, Trump said his administration wants to focus on pollutants, saying, “Our goal is to get toxins out of our environment, poisons out of our food supply and keep our children healthy and strong.”

Both current career EPA staff as well as nonprofit partners said the cuts and the closure of environmental justice offices will make this work harder.

“I think it is a shame they are not looking into what we do — asking what we actually do,” Kaduru said. “It is a shame because those environmental justice programs in particular are really are good programs, and I think there is an unfortunate misunderstanding about what environmental justice [is].”

America’s closest neighbors, Canada and Mexico, excoriated President Donald Trump for slapping historic tariffs on goods from their countries.

Trump’s broad tariffs went into effect on Tuesday morning, along with increased duties on goods from China, a move that prompted a swift retaliation from Beijing as well as threats from officials in Canada and Mexico.

Hours after the trade war broke out, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said on Tuesday afternoon that Trump may soon offer Canada and Mexico a pathway to relief from tariffs placed on some goods covered by North America’s free trade agreement.

“I think he’s going to work something out with them — it’s not going to be a pause, none of that pause stuff. But I think he’s going to figure out: you do more and I’ll meet you in the middle some way and we’re going to probably [be] announcing that tomorrow,” Lutnick told Fox Business.

Goods entering the U.S. from Mexico and Canada will carry a 25% tariff, while those from China will be subject to a 10% increase on existing tariffs, according to the White House. U.S. tariffs are at their highest level since 1943, Yale’s Budget Lab said.

On Feb. 27, Trump alleged that illicit drugs such as fentanyl had continued to enter the U.S. through Mexico and Canada despite agreements reached last month to address the issue.

Since September, nearly all fentanyl seized by the U.S. came through the Southern border with Mexico, according to the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, or CBP, a federal agency. Less than 1% of fentanyl was seized at the Northern border with Canada, CBP found.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sharply criticized the tariffs, calling them a “dumb” policy that does not “make sense.”

The reason for the tariffs is based on a false allegation about Canada as a major source of drugs entering the U.S., Trudeau added.

“It’s an example of [Trump] not really being able to see what it is that he wants, because even the excuse that he’s giving for these tariffs today of fentanyl is completely bogus, completely unjustified [and] completely false,” Trudeau said.

Trudeau also slammed Trump for warming relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin in discussions about the Russia-Ukraine war. “They’ve chosen to do this while appeasing Putin,” Trudeau said.

In response, Canada slapped a 25% retaliatory tariff on $30 billion worth of goods. Tariffs on an additional $125 billion worth of products will take effect in 21 days, Trudeau said.

“We will not back down from a fight,” Trudeau added, saying Canadians would punish the U.S. with their pocketbooks.

“We are going to stop consuming American products,” Trudeau said, pointing to public anger spotlighted at recent sporting events during which Canadians booed the U.S. national anthem. “We are going to continue to boo the U.S. anthem. We aren’t booing the America people — just this unjust policy.”

Ontario Premier Doug Ford, who leads the nation’s most populous province, said his government could end a contract with Elon Musk-owned satellite internet service Starlink and shut off power to the U.S.

“We will retool for new markets and new customers,” Ford said.

Hours after Trudeau’s remarks, Trump vowed to impose additional tariffs in response to Canada’s countermeasures.

“Please explain to Governor Trudeau, of Canada, that when he puts on a Retaliatory Tariff on the U.S., our Reciprocal Tariff will immediately increase by a like amount!” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

Meanwhile, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum also slammed the tariffs and announced plans to impose retaliatory tariffs.

Sheinbaum rebuked remarks made by Trump on Monday alleging that “vast amounts of fentanyl” have entered the U.S. from Mexico. Sheinbaum cited CBP data showing that seizures of fentanyl from Mexico declined 50% between October 2024 and January 2025.

“There is no motive or reason, nor justification that supports this decision that will affect our people and our nations,” Sheinbaum said. “We have said it in different ways: cooperation and coordination, yes; subordination and interventionism, no.”

Sheinbaum said she will speak over the phone with Trump on Thursday, and if no deal can be reached, she’ll announce the tariff and non-tariff measures at a rally on Sunday.

China’s response

Within minutes of the new U.S. tariffs taking effect, China unveiled on Tuesday its initial response by placing additional 10% to 15% tariffs on imported U.S. goods, like chicken, wheat, soybeans and beef.

Those duties will be on top of similar tariffs imposed back during the first Trump administration’s trade war in 2018. Some of those tariffs are already at 25%, though Beijing issued some waivers as a result of the 2020 “phase one” trade deal.

The new Chinese tariffs are set to come into effect for goods shipped out next Monday, March 10.

“President Trump continues to demonstrate his commitment to ensuring U.S. trade policy serves the national interest,” the White House said in a statement.

Stock prices tumble

A see-saw trading session on Tuesday ended with stocks having fallen markedly.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 670 points, or 1.5%; while the S&P 500 fell 1.2%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq ticked down 0.3%.

Shares of retail giant Target fell 3% on Tuesday, following an earnings release from the company that cited “tariff uncertainty” as a potential impediment for the business. Walmart’s stock price dipped about 2.5% on Tuesday, while Amazon shares inched down 0.6%.

Shares of Best Buy plummeted more than 13%. The sharp drop came after Best Buy CEO told analysts that price increases are “highly likely” as a result of the tariffs.

Higher costs for car production could also pose a challenge for U.S. automakers, many of which depend on a supply chain closely intertwined with Mexico and Canada.

Shares of Ford tumbled nearly 3% on Tuesday, while General Motors dropped about 4.5%. Stellantis — the parent company of Jeep and Chrysler — saw shares decline more than 4%.

United Autoworkers, which represents workers at Ford, General Motors and Stellantis, applauded the tariffs as a means of preventing carmakers from replacing U.S. workers with low-paid employees abroad.

“Corporations have been driving a non-stop race to the bottom by killing good blue-collar jobs in America to go exploit some poor worker in another country by paying poverty wages,” UAW said in a statement to ABC News.

“Tariffs are a powerful tool in the toolbox for undoing the injustice of anti-worker trade deals,” UAW added. “We are glad to see an American president take aggressive action on ending the free trade disaster that has dropped like a bomb on the working class.”

ABC News’ Zunaira Zaki and Anne Laurent contributed to this report.

The 2025 Oscars are here and just ahead of Hollywood’s biggest night, we’re taking a look at all the best actress nominees.

This year’s best actress nominees include Cynthia Erivo, Karla Sofía Gascón, Mikey Madison, Demi Moore and Fernanda Torres.

The 97th Oscars will take place Sunday, March 2, at 7 p.m. ET/4 p.m. PT at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood.

The ceremony will be televised on ABC and stream live on Hulu for the first time.

Read more about each best actress nominee below.

Cynthia Erivo

Erivo earned her best actress nomination for her portrayal of Elphaba Thropp in director Jon M. Chu’s film adaptation of the musical, “Wicked,” based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 book “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West.”

The 1995 book was inspired by L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.”

Erivo starred alongside Ariana Grande’s Glinda in the 10-time Oscar nominated film, which explored the complex friendship between the two witches. Since “Wicked’s” release, Erivo’s epic battle cry riff at the end of the film during the iconic song, “Defying Gravity,” has gone viral on social media and her performances has been praised by critics and fans alike.

Erivo has also received nominations for several awards, including a Golden Globe for best performance by a female actor in a motion picture — musical or comedy, a Critics Choice Award for best actress, a BAFTA award for leading actress and Screen Actors Guild Award for outstanding performance by a female actor in a leading role.

At the National Board of Review Gala in January, Erivo told “Good Morning America” about how much Elphaba means to her: “She’s always gonna be in my heart, I don’t think she’s ever gonna go anywhere. But I kind of like that.”

Karla Sofía Gascón

Gascón made history for being the first openly trans actor to earn an Oscar nomination for her performance in “Emilia Pérez.”

The actress played Emilia Pérez, a Mexican drug cartel leader, who with the help of a lawyer played by Zoe Saldaña, fakes her death and undergoes gender-affirming surgery. Emilia attempts to right the wrongs of her past years later and reconnect with her former wife, played by Selena Gomez, and her children.

The film has taken home major wins at several awards shows this season, including four Golden Globe Awards and three Critics Choice Awards. It is also the most-nominated film at this year’s Oscars with 13 nominations.

But it hasn’t been without controversy. Some have taken issue with the film’s portrayal of the trans community, which critics and LGBTQ advocates, including GLAAD, have called harmful and “a step backward for trans representation.” Director Jacques Audiard has also faced criticism for topics related to the film, including his previous comments of Spanish language and his depiction of Mexican cartels and their victims in the film, among other topics.

Despite the mixed reaction to the film, Gascón has already won several awards for her performance. At the Cannes Film Festival in 2024, she earned the best actress award along with her co-stars Selena Gomez, Adriana Paz and Zoe Saldaña. Gascón was also nominated for a Golden Globe, a Critics Choice Award for best actress and a Screen Actors Guild Award for outstanding performance by a female actor in a leading role.

However, the conversation around the film drastically shifted when many of Gascón’s past tweets, which spanned several years and were written in Spanish, were brought to light in January. In them, she took aim at Islam, calling the religion “INCOMPATIBLE with Western values,” Oscar’s diversity, China’s involvement in the coronavirus pandemic and the 2020 death of George Floyd. Since her tweets resurfaced, Gascón has deactivated her X account and apologized.

The director addressed Gascón’s tweets in an interview with Deadline earlier this month and called her past comments “inexcusable” and said that she needs to “take accountability for her actions.” Gascón responded to Audiard’s comments and vowed to stay silent “to allow the film to be appreciated for what it is.”

Mikey Madison

Madison’s performance as Ani, a young sex worker, in the Sean Baker-directed film “Anora,” also earned her her first Oscar nomination. In the film, Ani gets her chance at a Cinderella story when she meets and impulsively marries the son of an oligarch. Her fairytale ending crumbles when her husband’s parents set out to get the marriage annulled.

The role earned Madison a Critics Choice Award nomination, Golden Globe nomination and a BAFTA Award nomination.

Madison described how the role of Ani has changed her life while speaking to “Good Morning America” at the National Board of Review Gala in January. “I think it really evolved the way that I work as an artist and how I want to approach future projects or characters in the future,” she said.

The film sparked conversation when Madison revealed in Variety’s “Actors on Actors” conversation with Pamela Anderson that she was offered an intimacy coordinator but declined the use of one on set during her explicit nudity and sex scenes, because she and her co-star, Mark Eydelshteyn, “wanted to keep it small” with director Sean Baker and Baker’s wife, Sammy Kwan, who was a producer on the film.

“I think we were able to just really streamline it, shoot it super quickly and there are less sex scenes, more sex shots, that’s what Sean likes to say,” Madison added. “It was a very positive experience for me.”

Her comments drew mixed responses from intimacy coordinators, critics and fans, with some supporting her making her own decision and others insisting that intimacy coordinators should be mandatory on set.

According to SAG-AFTRA’s guidelines on intimacy coordinators, the implementation of an intimacy coordinator “will allow productions to run more efficiently, provide a safety net for performers and establish specialized support that empowers both cast and crew.”

Demi Moore

Moore took on her most daring role yet as Elisabeth Sparkle in the Coralie Fargeat-directed film, “The Substance.” A risk that paid off and helped her earn several awards already this season, including a Golden Globe for best performance by a female actor in a motion picture, musical or comedy and a Critics Choice Award for best actress.

The film follows Moore as a fading celebrity, who takes a black-market drug, which temporarily creates “a younger, more beautiful, more perfect” version of herself. The only catch is that Moore’s character must share her time with her new self and the balance must be respected.

At the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, Moore said she saw Fargeat’s script as a “challenge in the best way.”

“I look at material that pushes for things that push me out of my comfort zone and if something scares me a little bit, I usually know that there’s an opportunity that on the other side it will make me a better person and hopefully a better actor,” she said.

She added, “I think that this really touched on so many themes that we all face. We all seek a certain sense of validation, belonging — and by Coralie doing it in a way that took us to the extreme, I think it really allows for you to kind of step into it in a totally unique way.”

Fernanda Torres

Torres’ powerful performance in the Walter Salles-directed film, “I’m Still Here,” has already earned her a Golden Globe for best performance by a female actor in a motion picture, drama. She was also awarded the Virtuoso Award at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

Torres made history at the time Oscar nominations were announced when she became the second Brazilian actress to earn an Oscar nomination. Her mother, Fernanda Montenegro, who was nominated for best actress in 1998 for her role in “Central Station,” was the first.

In “I’m Still Here,” Torres plays Eunice Paiva, an activist and mother who is forced to reinvent herself after the disappearance of her husband amid military dictatorship in 1971 Brazil.

Days after Oscar nominations were announced, Torres was back in the news when a decades-old skit she was a part of on the Brazilian TV show, “Fantastico,” resurfaced. In the skit, Torres portrayed multiple characters, including one with blackface.

She apologized in a lengthy statement shared by Deadline. “At that time, despite the efforts of Black movements and organizations, the awareness of the racist history and symbolism of blackface hadn’t yet entered the mainstream public consciousness in Brazil,” she wrote. “Thanks to better cultural understanding and important but incomplete achievements in this century, it’s very clear now in our country and everywhere that blackface is never acceptable.”

“This is an important conversation we must continue to have with one another in order to prevent the normalization of racist practices then and now,” she added. “As an artist and global citizen, and from my open heart, I remain attentive and committed to the pursuit of vital changes needed to live in a world free from inequality and racism.”

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After a weekend of confusion, the Trump administration on Monday afternoon told federal agencies they don’t have to direct workers to comply with Elon Musk’s request for information about their activities at work, and that doing so is voluntary, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

The Office of Personnel Management — effectively the human resources agency for the federal government — updated agency human resources officers on a Monday call over Elon Musk’s call for the Trump administration to fire federal workers who did not reply to an email asking them to submit an email listing their accomplishments from the previous week.

Adding to the confusion are Trump’s own comments Monday, when he told journalists in the Oval Office there was a “lot of genius” behind Musk’s proposal, and that workers would be “sort of semi-fired” if they don’t respond.

OPM did not respond to a request for comment on the instructions given to federal agencies.

In the latest effort by the Department of Government Efficiency to investigate efficiency and reduce the size of the government, employees were asked in an email from the Office of Personnel Management on Saturday to list five accomplishments over the previous week and reply by 11:59 p.m. ET on Monday.

Musk threatened on social media that employees would face termination if they do not comply. The original email sent to employees did not include such an ultimatum, leaving some employees unaware of the threat.

However, some federal agencies told employees not to respond to the OPM email, some advised that employees should reply and others said that replying is “voluntary,” creating uncertainty among the rank and file.

Musk’s ultimatum raised questions about how much authority he holds in the government. While the White House argued in a court filing that Musk has no true power, Musk doubled down on his ultimatum Monday morning, warning that “Those who do not take this email seriously will soon be furthering their career elsewhere.”

Trump endorsed the email while taking questions Monday with French President Emmanuel Macron.

“I thought it was great because we have people that don’t show up to work, and nobody even knows if they work for the government,” Trump said. “So, by asking the question, ‘Tell us what you did this week,’ what he’s doing is saying, ‘Are you actually working?’”

“And then if you don’t answer like you’re sort of semi-fired or you’re fired because a lot of people are not answering because they don’t even exist,” Trump said.

Asked later Monday about the change in OPM policy, a White House official said, “DOGE is moving fast, at the direction of POTUS, and that’s exactly the point.”

“It’s all about efficiency, even internally,” the official added.

In a statement, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “Everyone is working together as one unified team at the direction of President Trump. Any notion to the contrary is completely false.”

Mixed messages

Federal employees on Saturday began receiving the OPM email with the subject line “What did you do last week” that demanded they list “5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and CC your manager,” according to multiple sources and an email reviewed by ABC News.

The subject line came from Musk’s playbook: “What did you get done this week?” is the same message he sent to the CEO of Twitter (now X) Parag Agrawal before Musk bought the company and fired the CEO.

A spokesperson from the Office of Personnel Management said Saturday that “agencies will determine any next steps.”

Yet management at multiple agencies told their staff that they were waiting on further guidance and, in some cases, told them to hold off on replying, according to multiple sources.

Employees at the Justice Department were told that they did not need to respond to the OPM request, according to an email obtained by ABC News. The Defense Department told employees who received the email to “please pause any response.” The Pentagon official filling in as the Department’s top personnel officer said that DOD would review any performance of personnel according to its own procedures, but added that “when and if required” it would coordinate responses to OPM’s email.

Newly confirmed FBI Director Kash Patel also told staff to “please pause any responses” to the email.

Employees at agencies including the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the United States Department of Energy were told by senior staff that they were waiting on further guidance and, in some cases, told to wait for further notice before responding.

NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro informed employees on Monday before OPM’s guidance went out that responding to the email was optional and that not responding would have “no impact to your employment,” according to an email obtained by ABC News.

“Employees may have already responded or may still choose to respond. You are not required to respond, and there is no impact to your employment with the agency if you choose not to respond,” Petro wrote in the email.

Other agencies directed employees to reply. Speaking to Fox News on Monday morning, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy explained why his employees should respond to Musk’s email.

“If you can’t come up with five things that you did, maybe you shouldn’t be employed here,” Duffy said, calling it an “easy task” that “happens in the private sector all the time.”

Leadership at the Treasury Department sent an agency-wide email Monday morning instructing all employees — including those at the IRS — to comply with OPM’s email by the deadline, according to an email obtained by ABC News.

However, the email still left some employees confused, particularly because it does not clarify whether failure to respond by the deadline could result in termination.

Federal workers who don’t follow Musk on social media could be unaware there’s an ultimatum on the table. While the administration did ask federal employees to list their accomplishments, the email did not state that those who failed to respond by the deadline would be fired.

Employees across agencies told ABC News they hadn’t seen Musk’s threats until they were asked for their reaction to them.

One IRS employee told ABC News that when they asked their direct managers whether not responding would result in them being fired, they were told, “We are only to adhere to official emails and ignore any directives not communicated through official channels.”

Another employee in management at the IRS said staff are “freaking out.”

Managers at the Department of Veterans Affairs told employees to respond to the email. One manager at the agency told ABC News that workers are “scared.”

“It’s not an exaggeration,” they said. “Everybody is afraid they are going to lose their jobs on a daily basis. There’s this fear that you’re going to open your email and you will be terminated.”

How much authority does Musk have?

It is not clear if Musk has the authority to terminate employees in this manner. However, he continues to act as if he does, threatening employees on Monday morning with administrative leave if they do not return to work this week.

White House lawyers attested in federal court that Musk “has no actual or formal authority to make government decisions.”

Trump aides have also said publicly that Musk is operating in an advisory capacity as a special government employee.

While Trump has said that Musk cannot do anything without his approval, the president has publicly heralded Musk as the leader of DOGE and lauded him for the job he’s doing in that capacity. On Saturday, shortly before the OPM email went out, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform, “ELON IS DOING A GREAT JOB, BUT I WOULD LIKE TO SEE HIM GET MORE AGGRESSIVE.”

-ABC News’ Devin Dwyer, Peter Charalambous, Selina Wang, Emily Chang and Michelle Stoddart contributed to this report.

Some Republicans are facing pushback in their hometowns as President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency make severe cuts across the federal government, both through sweeping employee terminations and looming budget cuts.

Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Ga., faced a grilling from his constituents on DOGE’s and Trump’s massive cuts at a town hall Thursday night.

“We are all fricking pissed off about this — you’re going to hear it,” a constituent told McCormick.

McCormick was interrupted multiple times as he tried to defend Trump and Musk’s efforts to overhaul the federal government and the thousands of firings across the United States.

“By and large, the president has great purview over where this money goes,” McCormick said at one point, before the crowd started to shout him down. “You can go and yell whenever you want, but I can’t understand 10 people, let alone 100 people, at once.”

A main point of contention was the firing of hundreds of workers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, based in Atlanta and roughly 20 miles from the town of Roswell, where the meeting was held.

“It is a fact of budgets, based on whose in control of the government, where that money goes,” McCormick said, prompting more shouting.

“The conservative approach is to take this in a slow and methodical way so that you make sure you do it right, and that’s not happening,” a constituent shouted back.

DOGE wasn’t the only tense topic the Georgia congressman faced. Some voters also brought up Trump’s recent comments on Ukraine.

When asked about Trump claiming Ukraine was responsible for its own invasion, McCormick said, “I want Ukraine to win, and President Trump said he wants Ukraine –,” before he was cut off by more shouting.

Another constituent, who introduced herself as Virginia and said she was a direct descendent of Revolutionary War orator Patrick Henry, said she took issue with a recent Trump post in which he promoted a photo of himself in a crown.

“Tyranny is rising in the White House, and a man has declared himself our king, so I would like to know … what you, congressman, and your fellow congressmen are going to do to reign in the megalomaniac in the White House,” she said, leading to a standing ovation from the crowd.

“When you talk about tyranny, when you talk about presidential power, I remember having the same discussion with Republicans when Biden was elected,” McCormick responded, to boos and shouts from the audience.

McCormick arguably faced the toughest crowd so far this week, though Rep. Scott Fitzgerald, R-Wisc., also heard strong objections from his constituents about Trump’s collaborations with Musk.

“How can we be represented by you, if you don’t have a voice in Congress?” a woman asked Fitzgerald, according to video from WTMJ-TV’s Charles Benson.

“The end result of the fraud and abuse that has been discovered already –” Fitzgerald began answering before being shouted down by the disappointed audience.

“Certainly the discussion in and around DOGE and with the probationary moves that have already been done, they’re going to have be scrutinized at some point,” Fitzgerald said.

In a town hall on Wednesday, Rep. Tracey Mann, R-Kansas, was pressed repeatedly on where he would draw the line with Trump and Musk’s federal overhaul.

“Is there anything that Trump and Elon could do that you would not support?” a constituent asked. “Tell me, tell me what you would not support.”

“They’re going through the government in way that’s never been done,” Mann responded, avoiding detailing what he would not support.

Rep. Nick Begich, R-Alaska, also was grilled by his constituents during a virtual town hall Monday night. However, due to the virtual format, Begich’s team was able to maintain control over the town hall, though the livestream received more than 2,000 comments.

“I’m a lifelong Republican,” one constituent named Joel said, according to Alaska Public Radio. “But I am in the majority, I think, with a lot of Americans, a lot of Alaskans, that are really concerned that we have an executive branch that is more than willing to push or remove the guardrails that are on the executive branch, and what we need from Congress and from the courts is to play that checks and balances role.”

“Look, the Congress has certain roles and responsibilities. The executive does as well,” said Begich, who noted he is a member of the “DOGE caucus.”

“And if the Congress or the executive branch steps outside of its constitutionally defined boundaries, the courts step in and realign and say, ‘Hey, you’re out of bounds,’” he added. “To the extent that the executive branch may or may not have exceeded that authority, there will be an opportunity in the courts for that to be challenged, and I would expect many of these challenges to be brought to the Supreme Court.”

Another constituent pressed Begich on this, asking in a post on the livestream, “When are you going to express your authority to hold the president accountable to the Constitution?”

In the wake of the pandemic, many lawmakers haven’t returned to holding traditional in-person town halls, preferring to reach a larger audience virtually while having more control over situations that melt down.

While some voters in these town halls have supported DOGE, even constituents in deep-red districts, who say they’re Republican voters, are upset with what they’re seeing.

“I’m a registered Republican voter, and this administration has gone absolutely off the tracks long ago,” remarked one man on a telephone town hall with Rep. Stephanie Bice, R-Okla. “All of these things really concern me.”

Rep. Randy Feenstra, R-Iowa, noted that some of his constituents were fired then rehired, and he told locals to come to him if they have any problems.

“We had seven researchers that had gotten caught up in the cuts. They’re back to work — we just had to make the calls. … With offices in USDA, there were some cuts — they’re getting restored,” he said. “If you have concerns, please come to me.”

Rep. Cliff Bentz, R-Oregon, was questioned by a constituent on how the federal firings were carried out.

“I’m all for fiscal responsibility and downsizing the government, and we’ve been through downsizing before. And you can do it in a way that is humane and treats people with dignity and doesn’t fire them on the spot for performance when we all know how hard these people work,” a woman said with tears in her eyes.

Bentz didn’t directly respond to the remark, instead thanking the woman and the audience and encouraging people to share thoughts or comments with his team.

When asked by ABC News’ Mary Bruce on Friday what response he has to those who voted for him who are concerned after his first month in office, Trump touted that he has the highest poll numbers “of any Republican president ever” — despite his approval rating being worse than every other president at this point in his term since 1953, with the exception off Trump’s own first term, according to Gallup polling data.

“They like the job that we’re doing. They like the job that Elon is doing. He’s doing something that a lot of people wouldn’t have the courage to do,” he added, refusing to address those who spoke out in the town halls. “So, it’s actually just the opposite. … People are thrilled. They can’t even believe it’s happening.”

Earlier Friday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about growing criticism from the public on DOGE and Trump’s executive orders, including among conservatives.

“I love how the media takes a few critics when the overwhelming response from the American people is support for what this administration is doing. If you look at the public polling, 70% of Americans, according to CBS, believe that President Trump is delivering on the promises he made,” Leavitt said, adding that Trump’s actions amount to precisely what he campaigned on.

“There should be no secret about the fact that this administration is committed to cutting waste, fraud and abuse,” she added. “The President campaigned on that process campaigned on that promise. Americans elected him on that promise, and he’s actually delivering on it. And this is something that Democrats promised they would do for decades. President Trump is just the first president to get it done.”

When Laura, a federal employee for the Department of Agriculture in the Midwest, got an email offering her a chance to resign with pay through September or otherwise face the prospect of termination, she took it.

Laura had been in rural development, helping people access home ownership, for about six months. She knew mass terminations were likely to effect her because she was a probationary worker, a government status for employees with less than a year in their role.

“I saw the writing on the wall,” said Laura, who declined to use her last name out of fear of retaliation.

But one week after she received confirmation of her acceptance into the “deferred resignation program,” she woke up to an email informing her she’d been terminated anyway.

“No phone call, no nothing,” she said. Then, like many federal employees, Laura immediately lost access to her work communications.

Laura is part of a group of federal employees across multiple agencies who were suddenly fired last week due to their probationary status, despite having accepted the offer from a government-wide email titled “Fork in the Road.”

The federal workers have since faced days of conflicting information from their agencies about their futures, with many, like Laura, in the dark without access to their work email.

Roughly 200,000 government employees were categorized as probationary, the group targeted by the Trump administration’s first wave of mass firings last week. Neither the White House nor the federal agencies have publicly disclosed how many of those nearly 200,000 employees were laid off, and within that group, it’s not clear how many people were mistakenly terminated despite accepting the “Fork in the Road” offer, which about 75,000 workers did, according to the White House.

Asked for clarity on employees who were terminated despite taking the deferred resignation offer, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the human resources arm of the government, said “OPM’s guidance to agencies is to honor the deferred resignation offer for those who took it.” The Department of Agriculture declined the comment.

President Donald Trump, asked recently if he has any concerns about how the mass firings across government had played out, said no. “No, not at all. I think we have to just do what we have to do,” Trump said. The president said he was elected to make the government “stronger and smaller,” and acknowledging that “in some cases, they’ll fire people and then they’ll put some people back.”

Some federal workers have been contacted by their agencies on their personal email and cell phone, informing them that they still qualify for the deferred resignation program and need to opt-in again by Friday. But they worry that others who were terminated will slip through the cracks, unaware that they can still qualify for the deferred resignation program.

“It’s all very disorganized,” Laura said. “My best piece of advice is definitely reach out to your leadership.”

For Laura, it was only through her own patchwork research that she found out that she might still be eligible for the offer and then called her supervisor, who confirmed.

She’d found a colleague on LinkedIn, Nick Detter, who worked as a natural resource specialist for the Department of Agriculture in Kansas. Detter, also a probationary employee, had taken the deferred resignation program for the same reason as Laura — and, like her, still received a termination notice.

But Detter had refused to turn in his work laptop, hanging on to his email communications until there was more clarity on the deferred resignation program.

Detter told Laura he’d received an email on Tuesday afternoon, days after she’d been terminated and had to turn in her access to work communications, which said that the department “intend[ed] to honor the terms of the [deferred resignation program].”

Detter, who’d spoken to multiple news outlets about his situation, continued to get a flood of messages from colleagues who were in the same position.

One colleague said his supervisor had explicitly told him that probationary employees were never supposed to qualify for the deferred resignation program, so to take the termination letter as final.

But then Detter and his colleagues received another email, nearly a week after their initial terminations, apologizing for the “lack of, or conflicting information” and the “confusion” that being fired may have caused.

“This notice serves to clarify that as an employee on probationary or trial period status who may have opted into the Deferred Resignation Program (DRP), you are NOW eligible to participate in DRP,” the email said.

“We apologize for the lack of, or conflicting information, surrounding the DRP and any confusion your termination notice may have caused.”

The email instructed recipients to reply by Feb. 21 with “your continued intention to participate,” and said employees would be reinstated by Feb. 24.

Still, many questions remain for the federal workers, like whether they’ll receive a paycheck for the days they were unsure of their work status, or whether they can have confidence that they’ll receive one going forward.

Already, the process had been tumultuous. They had watched as OPM sent FAQs reassuring federal workers that the program was legitimate and encouraging them to take it. Billionaire Elon Musk, who had sent a near-identical email to employees at Twitter after he took it over, also enthusiastically supported the offer.

But many unions pushed back, warning their employees that there was no precedent for such a move and that people who accepted it could be left high and dry. A legal challenge delayed the program timeline, pausing it and pushing the deadline to accept the offer to Feb. 12, but ultimately allowing it to proceed. And then, mass terminations across dozens of agencies began.

“I don’t know that I have a ton of confidence in the offer after this experience,” Laura said. At this point, she said, she’s holding on to the benefit of being able to at least say she resigned, rather than was terminated, if she needs to filed for unemployment or apply for other jobs.

Detter said he initially had high hopes for the restructuring outlined in the Fork in the Road email, encouraged by pledges to increase efficiency and have more merit-based systems for promotions and pay.

“But in my experience over the last month with this whole thing, that’s not what this has been. This has just been slash and burn,” he said.

Even after receiving the email apologizing for the mistake, a lawyer for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, said he still felt that he was in the same situation as when he’d first been fired a week ago.

The former CFPB employee said he took the deferred resignation offer because he was working remotely, which the Fork in the Road email warned would no longer be tolerated. As the primary income earner for his wife and young children, he wanted to “play it conservatively,” he said.

“But the sand keeps shifting every day,” he said.

Though his supervisors have told him that he will now get the deferred resignation offer despite his termination last Tuesday and he has signed a contract, he said there is reason to be skeptical.

He’s watching closely for his next paycheck, and he worries about the future of his agency, which has been all but shuttered by the Trump administration in the last few weeks.

“If our agency is fully dismantled and the assets end up being moved away, I don’t know what my agency is paying me with,” he said.

“I’m effectively in the same position I was a week ago when I was just terminated, feeling like I need to support a family of four. I still need to find a job, I still need to find a sure thing,” he said.

The battle between New York federal prosecutors and President Donald Trump’s Justice Department continued Friday as another prosecutor resigned over the order to dismiss Mayor Eric Adams’ bribery case.

Hagan Scotten, the assistant United States attorney for Southern District of New York, blasted Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove in a letter one day after acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Danielle Sassoon resigned over her refusal to follow through with the Justice Department’s request.

“In short, the first justification for the motion — that [former U.S. Attorney] Damian Williams’s role in the case somehow tainted a valid indictment supported by ample evidence, and pursued under different U.S. attorneys is so weak as to be transparently pretextual,” Scotten wrote.

“The second justification is worse. No system of ordered liberty can allow the Government to use the carrot of dismissing charges, or the stick of threatening to bring them again, to induce an elected official to support its policy objectives,” he added.

Scotten, an Army veteran who served in Iraq and clerked under Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Brett Kavanaugh before he was appointed to the Supreme Court, chastised the president and the administration.

“I can even understand how a Chief Executive whose background is in business and politics might see the contemplated dismissal-with-leverage as a good, if distasteful, deal,” he wrote.

“If no lawyer within earshot of the President is willing to give him that advice, then I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion. But it was never going to be me,” he added.

The letter came hours after what several former and current federal justice officials dubbed the “Thursday afternoon massacre,” when six people involved with the case resigned and pushed back against the U.S. attorney general’s office.

Sassoon resigned Thursday over the Justice Department’s request to end the federal bribery case against the mayor.

The Justice Department planned to remove the prosecutors handling the mayor’s case and reassign it to the Public Integrity Section in Washington, D.C.

However, as soon the Public Integrity Section was informed it would be taking over, John Keller, the acting head of the unit, and his boss, Kevin Driscoll, the most senior career official in the criminal division, resigned along with three other members of the unit, according to multiple sources.

Chad Mizelle, the chief of staff for Attorney General Pam Bondi, pushed back against the defiant prosecutors in a statement Friday afternoon contending Adams’ prosecution was politically motivated.

‘The fact that those who indicted and prosecuted the case refused to follow a direct command is further proof of the disordered and ulterior motives of the prosecutors. Such individuals have no place at DOJ,” he said.

Gov. Kathy Hochul, who has the power to remove Adams from office, called the Department of Justice’s moves “unbelievably unprecedented” during an interview on MSNBC Thursday night.

“This is not supposed to happen in our system of justice,” she told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow.

Hochul, however, declined to discuss the possibility of removing the mayor.

“The allegations are extremely concerning and serious. But I cannot, as the governor of this state, have a knee-jerk, politically motivated reaction, like a lot of other people are saying right now,” she said. “I have to do it smart, what’s right, and I’m consulting with other leaders in government at this time.”

The Rev. Al Sharpton, a longtime ally of Adams, said in a statement Tuesday that he was convening with other Black clergy to discuss the situation but he already raised concerns about the mayor’s allegiances.

“President Trump is holding the mayor hostage,” Sharpton said.

Four prominent New York City Black clergy members — the Revs. Johnnie Green, Kevin McCall, Carl L. Washington and Adolphus Lacey — wrote a letter Wednesday calling on the mayor not to run for reelection this year.

“Eric Adams had every right to prove his innocence and many of us were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, but that’s not what has happened,” they wrote.

Adams, a former NYPD officer and Democrat who previously registered as a Republican, was accused by federal prosecutors of taking lavish flights and hotel stays from Turkish businessmen and officials for more than a decade.

He and his staff members also allegedly received straw campaign donations to become eligible for New York City’s matching funds program for his campaigns, according to the criminal indictment that was issued in September.

In exchange, Adams allegedly used his power as Brooklyn borough president and later as mayor to give the foreign conspirators preferential treatment for various projects and proposals, including permits for the Turkish consulate despite fire safety concerns, the indictment said.

Adams pleaded not guilty, has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and claimed without any basis that he was being politically targeted by the Biden administration, even though the probe covers many years before Biden was in office.

Adams’ primary opponents have called for him to step down since the indictment, as have other New York Democrats, such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

The mayor, however, appeared on “Fox and Friends” on Friday with Trump “border czar” Thomas Homan and reiterated he was not only staying in office but he would run for reelection as a Democrat. The deadline to change parties is Friday.

“People had me gone months ago, but, you know what, I’m sitting on your couch,” Adams told the hosts.

The mayor remained silent during the interview when Homan discussed Trump’s deportation policy and called on Hochul to resign for not cooperating with the federal office.

Adams, however, did light up and smile when the “border czar” discussed their partnership. The mayor announced Thursday the city would allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents into Rikers Island jail, a major shift in the city’s policies.

“If he doesn’t come through, I’ll be back in New York City, and we won’t be sitting on the couch,” Homan said with a laugh. “I’ll be in his office, up his butt, saying, ‘Where the hell is the agreement we came to?’”

Sassoon prosecutor warned in a letter that the close relationship between the Trump administration and Adams crossed a line.

In her letter to Bondi, Sassoon repeatedly suggested Justice Department leadership, including Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, was explicitly aware of a quid pro quo that was suggested by Adams’ attorneys.

Sassoon alleged Adams’ vocal support of Trump’s immigration policies would be boosted by dismissing the indictment against him.

Sassoon’s letter detailed a January meeting with Bove and counsel for the mayor, where she says Adams’ attorneys put forward “what amounted to a quid pro quo,” after which Bove “admonished a member of my team who took notes during that meeting and directed the collection of those notes at the meeting’s conclusion.”

“Although Mr. Bove disclaimed any intention to exchange leniency in this case for Adams’s assistance in enforcing federal law, that is the nature of the bargain laid bare in Mr. Bove’s memo,” Sassoon wrote in her letter.

Bove accused Sassoon of insubordination and rejected her claims. Trump told reporters Thursday he was not involved with the Justice Department decisions this week and claimed the SDNY prosecutor was fired, although he did not name her.

Adams also denied the allegations Friday.

“It took her three weeks to report in front of her a criminal action. Come on, this is silly,” he told the “Fox and Friends” hosts.

He released a statement later in the day reiterating his claim

Adams said, “I want to be crystal clear with New Yorkers: I never offered — nor did anyone offer on my behalf — any trade of my authority as your mayor for an end to my case. Never.”

The dismissal, which is without prejudice, meaning it can be brought again, specifically after the November election, according to Bove’s request, has yet to be formally filed in court or reviewed by a judge.

ABC News’ Oren Oppenheim contributed to this report.

The stunning fallout over the Justice Department’s move to drop the criminal corruption prosecution of New York Mayor Eric Adams continues to have ripple effects, resulting now in the resignations of at least six top department officials who have refused to sign onto the case’s dismissal, sources told ABC News.

The push to drop the case has led to at least three more top supervisory officials within the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section to resign, sources said. The officials joined now-former acting US attorney for Manhattan Danielle Sassoon and two other career leaders of the department’s Public Integrity Section — which is tasked with prosecuting some of the most politically sensitive corruption cases pursued by the department.

Sassoon submitted her resignation Thursday, just days after the Justice Department sought to end the federal bribery case against Adams.

Prior to her resignation, Sassoon sent a letter on Wednesday to Attorney General Pam Bondi repeatedly urging Bondi to reverse course on dropping the criminal corruption case against Adams, as ordered in a letter earlier this week from acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove.

“The reasons advanced by Mr. Bove for dismissing the indictment are not ones I can in good faith defend as in the public interest and as consistent with the principles of impartiality and fairness that guide my decision-making,” Sassoon wrote.

In the letter, Sassoon repeatedly suggested DOJ leadership, including Bove, were explicitly aware of a quid pro quo suggested by Adams’ attorneys, saying Adams’ vocal support of Trump’s immigration policies would be boosted by dismissing the indictment against him.

“Rather than be rewarded, Adams’s advocacy should be called out for what it is: an improper offer of immigration enforcement assistance in exchange for a dismissal of his case,” Sassoon writes. “Although Mr. Bove disclaimed any intention to exchange leniency in this case for Adams’s assistance in enforcing federal law, that is the nature of the bargain laid bare in Mr. Bove’s memo.”

Sassoon was appointed by President Donald Trump in January to lead as acting U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York after Damian Williams stepped down from the role following Trump’s election victory. Trump’s permanent choice to lead the Southern District, Jay Clayton, has yet to be confirmed.

Sassoon’s resignation followed days of tension between the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan and leaders in the Justice Department over the bribery and campaign finance case against Adams.

On Monday, Bove sent a memo that told Sassoon, “You are directed, as authorized by the Attorney General, to dismiss the pending charges in United States v. Adams.”

To date, the office has not filed a motion to dismiss with the court.

On Jan. 31, Sassoon was drawn into a conversation at DOJ headquarters in Washington about the future of the case.

Sassoon’s letter detailed the meeting with Bove and counsel for the mayor, where she says Adams’ attorneys put forward “what amounted to a quid pro quo,” after which Bove “admonished a member of my team who took notes during that meeting and directed the collection of those notes at the meeting’s conclusion.”

“It is a breathtaking and dangerous precedent to reward Adams’s opportunistic and shifting commitments on immigration and other policy matters with dismissal of a criminal indictment,” Sassoon said. “Nor will a court likely find that such an improper exchange is consistent with the public interest.”

Adams’ lawyer balked at that notion following Sassoon’s resignation, “The idea that there was a quid pro quo is a total lie. We offered nothing and the department asked nothing of us.”

Sassoon’s letter claimed that the U.S. Attorney’s Office had already proposed seeking a superseding indictment against Adams under the new administration that would bolster the case with an additional obstruction conspiracy charge.

“We have proposed a superseding indictment that would add an obstruction conspiracy count based on evidence that Adams destroyed and instructed others to destroy evidence and provide false information to the FBI, and that would add further factual allegations regarding his participation in a fraudulent straw donor scheme,” Sassoon said.

She noted that Bove’s contention that dismissing the indictment against Adams is warranted because it has interfered in his abilities to enforce federal immigration laws “does not bear scrutiny.”

“It does not grapple with the differential treatment Adams would receive compared to other elected officials, much less other criminal defendants,” Sassoon said. “And it is unclear why Adams would be better able to aid in immigration enforcement when the threat of future conviction is due to the possibility of reinstatement of the indictment followed by conviction at trial, rather than merely the possibility of conviction at trial.”

Sassoon closes the letter noting she remains “baffled by the rushed and superficial process by which this decision was reached, in seeming collaboration with Adams’s counsel and without my direct input on the ultimate stated rationales for dismissal.”

The failure to immediately heed the directive irked DOJ leadership, including Bove and Bondi.

“That case should be dropped. It was dead at the directive of Emil so that case should be dropped,” Bondi told reporters on Wednesday.

The Justice Department planned to remove the prosecutors handling the mayor’s case and reassign it to the Public Integrity Section in Washington, D.C. However, as soon the Public Integrity Section was informed it would be taking over, John Keller, the acting head of the unit, and his boss, Kevin Driscoll, the senior most career official in the criminal division resigned, according to multiple sources.

It is now unclear who will take over the Adams case and how soon it might be dropped, the sources said.

The decision to drop Adams’ case has led to an upheaval in the senior most ranks of an already embattled Justice Department.

Bove admonished Sassoon over her repeated refusals to sign off on the dismissal in a letter responding to her resignation.

“You lost sight of the oath that you took when you started at the Department of Justice by suggesting that you retain discretion to interpret the Constitution in a manner inconsistent with the policies of a democratically elected President and a Senate-confirmed Attorney General,” Bove said in the letter obtained by ABC News.

“The Justice Department will not tolerate the insubordination and apparent misconduct reflected in the approach that you and your office have taken in this matter,” Bove added.

Bove claimed that Sassoon had suggested that Trump pardon the mayor instead of asking DOJ to drop the case. Bove said the proposal “reveals that your office’s insubordination is little more than a preference to avoid a duty that you regard as unpleasant and politically inconvenient.”

“Your oath to uphold the Constitution does not permit you to substitute your policy judgment for that of the President or senior leadership of the Justice Department, and you are in no position to suggest that the President exercise his exclusive Article II authority to make your job easier,” Bove said in his letter.

He disputed what he calls “strained” suggestions by Sassoon that there was a “quid pro quo” involved in dropping the case against Adams.

“This is false, as you acknowledged previously in writing,” Bove said. “The Justice Department is charged with keeping people safe across the country. Your office’s job is to help keep the City safe. But your actions have endangered it.”

According to Bove’s letter, the assistant U.S. attorneys “principally responsible for the case” have been placed on off-duty administrative leave pending investigations of their conduct by the attorney general’s office and DOJ’s Office of Professional Responsibility. He further noted their access to electronic devices has been revoked, and he ordered Sassoon and other trial attorneys to preserve any records they may have related to the case.

Adams had pleaded not guilty to a five-count indictment that accused him of accepting years of luxury travel gifts in exchange for, among other things, persuading the fire department to approve the opening of the new Turkish consulate in Manhattan — despite the lingering safety concerns of inspectors.

Trump weighed in on the situation Thursday, claiming without any details or evidence that the acting U.S. attorney for SDNY was fired.

“I don’t know if he or she resigned, but, that U.S. attorney was fired,” the president told reporters during a news conference at the White House.

Adams and Trump have become more close since the election, with the mayor meeting with Trump privately several times. At the last minute, Adams cancelled his appearances at Martin Luther King Jr. Day events in New York to attend the inauguration.

The mayor has denied that he asked Trump to drop the charges or grant a pardon.

When asked Thursday if he ordered the Justice Department to drop the case Trump replied, “No, I didn’t. I know nothing about it.”

In a letter to the Southern District of New York on Monday, Bove questioned the timing of when the charges were brought, suggesting the case was part of the Biden administration’s weaponization of the Justice Department, according to sources.

Bove also said the case adversely affected Adams’ ability to help the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration, the sources added.

In New York, Adams is facing increasing scrutiny and some calls to resign.

Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado called Thursday night for New York City Mayor Eric Adams to resign, writing in a post on X, “New York City deserves a Mayor accountable to the people, not beholden to the President. Mayor Adams should step down.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, meanwhile, said she is still processing and thinking through the situation. Asked on Thursday night by MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow about what she might do about theoretically removing Eric Adams from his position, Hochul called the Department of Justice’s moves “unbelievably unprecedented… This is not supposed to happen in our system of justice.”

But she said she did not want to commit to any specific action with Adams. “The allegations are extremely concerning and serious. But I cannot, as the governor of this state, have a knee-jerk, politically motivated reaction, like a lot of other people are saying right now — I have to do it smart. What’s right? And I’m consulting with other leaders in government at this time.”

“This just happened; I need some time to process this and figure out the right approach,” she added later.

Federal prosecutors were instructed to dismiss the case without prejudice, meaning it could come up again. However, Bove wrote nothing could happen until after this year’s mayoral election.

Despite that threat, Spiro expressed confidence Adams would not be prosecuted.

“There is no looming threat,” Spiro said at a press conference Wednesday. “This case is over.”

Any motion to dismiss the case would have to be formally filed in court and reviewed by the judge.

Heather Stambaugh, a high school teacher in rural Ohio, said she sees the impact of federal funding every day in her classrooms.

It opens up opportunities for individual aides to work one-on-one with high-need students, she said, or to lead small group learning sessions that help students achieve “light bulb” moments they may not have otherwise.

“At the end of the day, this is the next generation of doctors and lawyers, business executives,” Stambaugh told ABC News. “But they’re not going to have as many opportunities if we don’t have enough staff and we don’t have the tools.”

Federal funds from the Department of Education support programs, resources and sometimes even staffing to address educational barriers faced by low-income, low-performing, disabled and rural students, among others.

If the department is dismantled, as President Donald Trump and some Republican lawmakers have said they hope to do, public school K-12 educators fear these programs could be diminished.

“The first people that are going to feel that are second- and third-graders who are getting specific reading interventions that will help them be closer to grade level. I have high schoolers who are reading well below a ninth-grade level, and that would only get worse,” Stambaugh said. “And then to wonder to yourself will this child be able to read a medical document to sign? Will this child be able to conduct just the general business of life? Because at the bare minimum, that’s what schools are offering.”

Detroit high school teacher Rodney Fresh said he’s seen students that might have been considered “a throwaway child by society … become a productive member of society when they graduate” because of the Michigan school’s career and technical programs, which get federal funding.

“I’ve seen students where traditional schooling hasn’t necessarily been beneficial, but we get them in supportive career tech programs that are supported by federal finances, and they excel. They find their niche,” Fresh told ABC News.

Established in 1980 by Congress, the department is intended to collect data and research on schooling and education, direct supportive funds to targeted communities, and investigate and enforce civil rights anti-discrimination law. It’s the smallest Cabinet-level department, with less than 5,000 employees.

The department does not dictate or implement policy on school curriculum.

President Trump said he wants to eliminate the department and “send all education work and needs back to the States,” according to Trump’s Agenda47 campaign.

Trump’s team hasn’t clarified what it would mean to give the power back to the states, though he has cited the use of “block grants” by the federal government as a way to further expand school voucher programs.

In the ongoing efforts to dismantle the Department of Education, lawmakers have recommended redirecting program enforcement and funds to other federal departments.

“The federal Department of Education has never educated a single student, and it’s long past time to end this bureaucratic Department that causes more harm than good,” U.S. Senator Mike Rounds said when introducing legislation to dismantle the department.

A statement from his office continued, stating: “Despite its inefficiencies, there are several important programs housed within the Department. Rounds’ legislation would redirect these to Departments of Interior, Treasury, Health and Human Services, Labor and State.”

ABC News has reached out to the White House and the Department of Education for comment.

“Many of the concerns that people have with education and the direction of education this country, whether it be curriculum, instruction or even instructional materials, are not handled by the Department of Education,” Rep. Jahana Hayes, a Democrat on the House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education, said in an interview with ABC News.

“Those are already local decisions that are handled by local boards of education, state boards of education. So all of that is handled locally.”

Federal funding makes up 11% of school revenue nationwide, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

However, the weight this funding carries is heavier for some states than others; federal dollars make up roughly 20% of South Dakota school revenue and 19% of revenue in Mississippi and Montana. These are the biggest recipients of federal dollars in the country, the NCES noted.

States like New York, New Jersey and Connecticut are among the smallest recipients, with federal dollars making up just 5% of school revenue.

Among the grants and funds delivered by the department are Title I funding and Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) funding. These federal financial assistance programs are geared towards communities facing high levels of poverty or disabled populations. They can support services like additional reading and mathematics instruction and staffing, speech or behavioral therapy, after-school and summer programs.

Across Ohio, the state’s Coalition for the Education of Children with Disabilities reports that almost 16% of students have a disability of some kind.

Stambaugh said she sees the role that federal funding plays for the disabled students in her classrooms each day. She noted the money subsidizes the salaries or pay for tutors, individual aids for highly disabled children and intervention specialists aimed at helping struggling readers and performers.

Getting rid of federal funding, Stambaugh argued, “gives our highest vulnerability students less one-on-one attention, less individualized education, and it puts them at greater risk to be even further behind the peers that they’re already testing behind.”

In Detroit, where about 84% of kids are eligible for free and/or reduced-price lunch, schools have become more than a place for students to learn.

For those who come to school hungry, need a place to wash and dry their clothes, or need additional help with literacy and math after class, federal funding helps schools run additional services for students in need, according to Fresh.

“For some students, I become a counselor, a social worker, a big brother, a dad, and so I don’t think you ever really get to just turn off from being a teacher,” said Fresh. “I think it’s a 24/7 job.”

Title I and IDEA were established through Congress, just as the Department of Education was, and it would take Congress to lead their undoing, some lawmakers told ABC News.

Hayes told ABC News that she expects Trump and billionaire businessman and Trump confidant Elon Musk to “strangle the funding” of the department if it can’t be dismantled.

“What we’re seeing through some of the actions with other organizations is that we are dealing with an administration that is not following the rules as they’ve been established,” Hayes said. “The Department of Education was set up by an act of Congress, and can only be dismantled by an act of Congress.”

Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has already made sizable cuts to the Education Department – slashing 89 independent research contracts at the department’s Institute of Education Sciences worth nearly $900 million, according to DOGE’s post on X and confirmed by a department spokesperson on Feb. 11.

But with the thin Republican majority in the House and Senate, it’s unclear just how likely it would be for Congress to dismantle the department completely.

Utah Republican Rep. Burgess Owens told ABC News it’ll be a congressional numbers game to take down the Education Department, but noted that he has to “see if executive order can really do that or not.”

“All the things will be tested,” he said.

Owens, who supports dismantling the department, said that issuing block grants to states could serve as a replacement for the department’s programs, adding that there would have to be some state accountability for funds.

“If this is not working, let’s be innovative. Let’s be creative, and we figure out something else,” he said.

This is a KFF Health News story.

In Arkansas, state health officials announced a stunning statistic for 2023: The total number of abortions in the state, where some 1.5 million women live, was zero.

In South Dakota, too, official records show zero abortions that year.

And in Idaho, home to abortion battles that have recently made their way to the U.S. Supreme Court, the official number of recorded abortions was just five.

In nearly a dozen states with total or near-total abortion bans, government officials claimed that zero or very few abortions occurred in 2023, the first full year after the Supreme Court eliminated federal abortion rights.

Those statistics, the most recent available and published in government records, have been celebrated by anti-abortion activists. Medical professionals say such accounts are not only untrue but fundamentally dishonest.

“To say there are no abortions going on in South Dakota is ludicrous,” said Amy Kelley, an OB-GYN in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, citing female patients who have come to her hospital after taking abortion pills or to have medical procedures meant to prevent death or end nonviable pregnancies. “I can think of five off the top of my head that I dealt with,” she said, “and I have 15 partners.”

For some data scientists, these statistics also suggest a troubling trend: the potential politicization of vital statistics.

“It’s so clinically dishonest,” said Ushma Upadhyay, a public health scientist at the University of California-San Francisco, who co-chairs WeCount, an academic research effort that has kept a tally of the number of abortions nationwide since April 2022.

The zeroing out is statistically unlikely, Upadhyay said, and also runs counter to the reality that pregnancy “comes with many risks and in many cases emergency abortion care will be needed.”

“We know they are sometimes necessary to save the pregnant person’s life,” she said, “so I do hope there are abortions occurring in South Dakota.”

State officials reported a sharp decline in the official number of abortions after the Supreme Court overruled Roe v. Wade in June 2022.

• Arkansas reported zero abortions in 2023, compared with 1,621 in 2022.
• Texas reported 60 in 2023, after reporting 50,783 abortions in the state in 2021.
• Idaho reported five in 2023 compared with 1,553 in 2021.
• South Dakota, which had severely restricted abortions years ahead of the Dobbs ruling, reported zero in 2023 compared with 192 abortions in 2021.

Anti-abortion politicians and activists have cited these statistics to bolster their claims that their decades-long crusade to end abortion is a success.

“Undoubtedly, many Arkansas pregnant mothers were spared from the lifelong regrets and physical complications abortion can cause and babies are alive today in Arkansas,” Rose Mimms, executive director of Arkansas Right to Life, said in a press statement. “That’s a win-win for them and our state.”

A spokesperson for the Arkansas Department of Health, Ashley Whitlow, said in an email that the department “is not able to track abortions that take place out of the state or outside of a healthcare facility.” State officials, she said, collect data from “in-state providers and facilities for the Induced Abortion data reports as required by Arkansas law.”

WeCount’s tallies of observed telehealth abortions do not appear in the official state numbers. For instance, from April to June 2024, it counted an average of 240 telehealth abortions a month in Arkansas.

Groups that oppose abortion rights acknowledge that state surveillance reports do not tell the full story of abortion care occurring in their states. Mimms, of Arkansas Right to Life, said she would not expect abortions to be reported in the state, since the procedure is illegal except to prevent a patient’s death.

“Women are still seeking out abortions in Arkansas, whether it’s illegally or going out of state for illegal abortion,” Mimms told KFF Health News. “We’re not naive.”

The South Dakota Department of Health “compiles information it receives from health care organizations around the state and reports it accordingly,” Tia Kafka, its marketing and outreach director, said in an email responding to questions about the statistics. Kafka declined to comment on specific questions about abortions being performed in the state or characterizations that South Dakota’s report is flawed.

Kim Floren, who serves as director of the Justice Empowerment Network, which provides funds and practical support to help South Dakota patients receive abortion care, expressed disbelief in the state’s official figures.

“In 2023, we served over 500 patients,” she said. “Most of them were from South Dakota.”

“For better or worse, government data is the official record,” said Ishan Mehta, director for media and democracy at Common Cause, the nonpartisan public interest group. “You are not just reporting data. You are feeding into an ecosystem that is going to have much larger ramifications.”

When there is a mismatch in the data reported by state governments and credible researchers, including WeCount and the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive health research group that supports abortion rights, state researchers need to dig deeper, Mehta said.

“This is going to create a historical record for archivists and researchers and people who are going to look at the decades-long trend and try to understand how big public policy changes affected maternal health care,” Mehta said. And now, the recordkeepers “don’t seem to be fully thinking through the ramifications of their actions.”

A culture of fear

Abortion rights supporters agree that there has been a steep drop in the number of abortions in every state that enacted laws criminalizing abortion. In states with total bans, 63 clinics have stopped providing abortions. And doctors and medical providers face criminal charges for providing or assisting in abortion care in at least a dozen states.

Practitioners find themselves working in a culture of confusion and fear, which could contribute to a hesitancy to report abortions — despite some state efforts to make clear when abortion is allowed.

For instance, South Dakota Department of Health Secretary Melissa Magstadt released a video to clarify when an abortion is legal under the state’s strict ban.

The procedure is legal in South Dakota only when a pregnant woman is facing death. Magstadt said doctors should use “reasonable medical judgment” and “document their thought process.”

Any doctor convicted of performing an unlawful abortion faces up to two years in prison.

In the place of reliable statistics, academic researchers at WeCount use symbols like dashes to indicate they can’t accurately capture the reality on the ground.

“We try to make an effort to make clear that it’s not zero. That’s the approach these departments of health should take,” said WeCount’s Upadhyay, adding that health departments “should acknowledge that abortions are happening in their states but they can’t count them because they have created a culture of fear, a fear of lawsuits, having licenses revoked.”

“Maybe that’s what they should say,” she said, “instead of putting a zero in their reports.”

Mixed mandates for abortion data

For decades, dozens of states have required abortion providers to collect detailed demographic information on the women who have abortions, including race, age, city, and county — and, in some cases, marital status and the reason for ending the pregnancy.

Researchers who compile data on abortion say there can be sound public health reasons for monitoring the statistics surrounding medical care, namely to evaluate the impact of policy changes. That has become particularly important in the wake of the Supreme Court’s 2022 Dobbs decision, which ended the federal right to an abortion and opened the door to laws in Republican-led states restricting and sometimes outlawing abortion care.

Isaac Maddow-Zimet, a Guttmacher data scientist, said data collection has been used by abortion opponents to overburden clinics with paperwork and force patients to answer intrusive questions. “It’s part of a pretty long history of those tools being used to stigmatize abortion,” he said.

In South Dakota, clinic staff members were required to report the weight of the contents of the uterus, including the woman’s blood, a requirement that had no medical purpose and had the effect of exaggerating the weight of pregnancy tissue, said Floren, who worked at a clinic that provided abortion care before the state’s ban.

“If it was a procedural abortion, you had to weigh everything that came out and write that down on the report,” Floren said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention does not mandate abortion reporting, and some Democratic-led states, including California, do not require clinics or health care providers to collect data. Each year, the CDC requests abortion data from the central health agencies for every state, the District of Columbia, and New York City, and these states and jurisdictions voluntarily report aggregated data for inclusion in the CDC’s annual “Abortion Surveillance” report.

In states that mandate public abortion tracking, hospitals, clinics, and physicians report the number of abortions to state health departments in what are typically called “induced termination of pregnancy” reports, or ITOPs.

Before Dobbs, such reports recorded procedural and medication abortions. But following the elimination of federal abortion rights, clinics shuttered in states with criminal abortion bans. More patients began accessing abortion medication through online organizations, including Aid Access, that do not fall under mandatory state reporting laws.

At least six states have enacted what are called “shield laws” to protect providers who send pills to patients in states with abortion bans. That includes New York, where Linda Prine, a family physician employed by Aid Access, prescribes and sends abortion pills to patients across the country.

Asked about states reporting zero or very few abortions in 2023, Prine said she was certain those statistics were wrong. Texas, for example, reported 50,783 abortions in the state in 2021. Now the state reports on average five a month. WeCount reported an average of 2,800 telehealth abortions a month in Texas from April to June 2024.

“In 2023, Aid Access absolutely mailed pills to all three states in question — South Dakota, Arkansas, and Texas,” Prine said.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit in January against a New York-based physician, Maggie Carpenter, co-founder of the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine, for prescribing abortion pills to a Texas patient in violation of Texas’ near-total abortion ban. It’s the first legal challenge to New York’s shield law and threatens to derail access to medication abortion.

Still, some state officials in states with abortion bans have sought to choke off the supply of medication that induces abortion. In May, Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin wrote cease and desist letters to Aid Access in the Netherlands and Choices Women’s Medical Center in New York City, stating that “abortion pills may not legally be shipped to Arkansas” and accusing the medical organizations of potentially “false, deceptive, and unconscionable trade practices” that carry up to $10,000 per violation.

Good-government groups like Common Cause say that the dangers of officials relying on misleading statistics are myriad, including a disintegration of public trust as well as ill-informed legislation.

These concerns have been heightened by misinformation surrounding health care, including an entrenched and vocal anti-vaccine movement and the objections of some conservative politicians to mandates related to COVID-19, including masks, physical distancing, and school and business closures.

“If the state is not going to put in a little more than the bare minimum to just find out if their data is accurate or not,” Mehta said, “we are in a very dangerous place.”