Trump 2nd term updates: Trump attends the Super Bowl

USAID staff have been informed via email that all direct-hire personnel will be placed on administrative leave globally as of Friday, Feb. 7, except for core leadership and mission-critical staff, according to an email obtained by ABC News.

Staff were informed of the decision in an email titled, "The Path Forward."

The news comes after Elon Musk, the head of the Department of Government Efficiency, said he was "in the process" of "shutting down" the agency with the backing of President Donald Trump, as part of efforts to trim the size of the federal government and eliminate waste.

USAID, which stands for the U.S. Agency for International Development, oversees foreign aid, disaster relief and international development programs.

-ABC News' Will Steakin

A federal judge on Tuesday night blocked the Trump administration from enforcing an executive order that would require housing transgender women in male prisons, determining that the policy likely violated the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth – nominated to the bench by President Ronald Reagan – granted a temporary restraining order that blocks enforcement of the executive order and requires the Bureau of Prisons to house prisoners in facilities corresponding to their identifying gender.

The order also required the Bureau of Prisons to continue providing medical care to transgender inmates, including hormone therapy to treat gender dysphoria.

Three transgender women brought the lawsuit last month after the Bureau of Prisons notified them they would be transferred to male facilities following Trump’s executive order that required the federal government to only recognize two sexes.

According to the Department of Justice, 16 transgender women in total are housed in female penitentiaries managed by the Bureau of Prisons, which intended to transfer them to facilities corresponding to their sex at birth.

-ABC News' Peter Charalambous

In a resurfaced interview from February 2024, President Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, referred to the Gaza Strip as "waterfront property" and said the embattled land is "very valuable."

The former property dealer who is married to Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, made the comments in an interview at Harvard University discussing the Israel-Hamas war.

"Gaza’s waterfront property could be very valuable… if people would focus on building up livelihoods," Kushner told Professor Tarek Masoud at the time.

"It’s a little bit of an unfortunate situation there, but from Israel’s perspective I would do my best to move the people out and then clean it up," Kushner added.

Kushner's remarks from last year are facing renewed attention after Trump on Tuesday proposed that the United States "take over" the Gaza Strip, "level the site" and rebuild it.

“We have an opportunity to do something that could be phenomenal,” Trump said. "And I don't want to be cute. I don't want to be a wiseguy. But the Riviera of the Middle East, this could be something that could be -- so this could be so magnificent."

The Senate confirmed Pam Bondi to serve as attorney general by a vote of 54-46.

The only Democrat to vote yes on Bondi was Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania.

Bondi is seen as one of Trump's most loyal defenders, who represented him during his first impeachment, boosted his efforts to sow doubts about the 2020 election and stood by him during his New York criminal trial.