AFP USA

Donald Trump returns to the White House in two weeks with everything seemingly going his way — from stronger grassroots support than ever to a cowed billionaire class and a demoralized opposition.Yet a chaotic and polarized Republican Party on Capitol Hill threatens to frustrate his ambitions for a legacy-defining second term unless he is able to master the political equivalent of herding cats.The Republican rank-and-file reveres Trump’s “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) agenda of tax cuts, tough border controls and boosted fossil fuel production, but long-simmering disagreements on how to get it into law are starting to boil over.”Our members are ready to get to work and we have hit the ground running, as we promised everyone we would on the campaign trail,” an upbeat Mike Johnson, who leads the Republicans in the House of Representatives, told reporters this week.But Johnson’s troops have been locked in an increasingly heated debate with their Senate colleagues over whether to pass Trump’s entire agenda in one giant, all-or-nothing package or break it up into smaller chunks.Top MAGA policy aides have argued that a piecemeal approach would allow Trump to notch a straightforward early win on border security without having to get bogged down in more contentious fights.But House Republicans worry that, with their threadbare and fractious majority, they will only get one swing at this — and that renewing Trump’s fast-expiring 2017 tax cuts will fall by the wayside if it is peeled off from immigration reform.- ‘Big, beautiful bill’ -Trump muddied the waters in his inimitable style by flip-flopping on his own preference.”I like one big, beautiful bill and I always have, I always will,” Trump told reporters on Tuesday. “But if two is more certain, it does go a little bit quicker, because you can do the immigration stuff early.”The fight is just one of many potential speed bumps as Trump races against time to make his mark before the Republican iron grip on Washington is potentially weakened by midterm elections in just 22 months. The former real estate mogul, 78, is already behind the pace he set on winning his first term in 2016, when the Senate took important procedural steps towards passing his priorities before he set foot on Pennsylvania Avenue.Trump has previewed other upcoming battles — from reversing President Joe Biden’s offshore drilling restrictions to acquiring Greenland and the Panama Canal — that could drag the administration into court.But support from a Supreme Court bolstered by three of Trump’s own nominees seems more assured than an easy ride in Congress.Trumpist Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin acknowledged during a leadership challenge in the House last year that a disunited rank-and-file on Capitol Hill could be Trump’s biggest frustration.”The Republican Party, it’s like trying to herd cats. Everyone is going in different directions,” he told Fox News.Trump has already demonstrated that he is not above rolling up his sleeves and wading into the fray. – Charm offensive -He micro-managed Republicans through the recent House leadership election, upbraiding lawmakers by telephone in the middle of votes for ticking the wrong box, and strategizing in daily phone calls with key players.He has spent much of the post-election period on a charm offensive targeting high-profile business executives and key Republican interest groups at Mar-a-Lago, the oceanfront redoubt that he calls his “Winter White House” in Florida.Having won what critics see as tacit concessions from leading press barons and tech CEOs that he can expect less friction in 2025 than he got in 2017, Trump was due in Washington on Wednesday to build trust with Senate Republicans.A dinner is planned at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday with Republican governors — heavyweight, largely independent-minded politicians needed by Trump to execute his program at a state level — and various lawmakers are dropping by on Saturday.Trump also plans a giant bash for the entire Senate Republican group in the coming weeks, US media reported. On the Democratic side, leaders in Congress have pledged to work with Republicans to improve people’s lives — but also to hold Trump’s feet to the fire over campaign promises.”They are now in the majority. They now have the responsibility,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the floor of the chamber on Tuesday.”We and the American people will be watching.”

Tech giant Meta has rolled back restrictions around topics such as gender and sexual identity, a sweeping move advocacy groups fear will fuel hate speech.The change coincides with the company’s shock announcement on Tuesday that it was ending its third-party fact-checking program in the United States and adopting a crowd-sourced model to police misinformation similar to the Elon Musk-owned X.The latest version of Meta’s community guidelines said its platforms — which include Facebook and Instagram — would now permit users to accuse people of “mental illness or abnormality” based on their gender or sexual orientation.The updated version also struck out previous restrictions on referring to women as “household objects or property,” Black people as “farm equipment” and transgender or non-binary people as “it.””We’re getting rid of a number of restrictions on topics like immigration, gender identity and gender that are the subject of frequent political discourse and debate,” Joel Kaplan, Meta’s chief global affairs officer, wrote in a blog post.”It’s not right that things can be said on TV or the floor of Congress, but not on our platforms.”But advocacy groups quickly voiced concern that the policy shift threatened the safety of marginalized communities.”Removal of fact-checking programs and industry-standard hate speech policies make Meta’s platforms unsafe places,” said Sarah Kate Ellis, president of the advocacy group GLAAD.”Without these necessary hate speech and other policies, Meta is giving the green light for people to target LGBTQ people, women, immigrants, and other marginalized groups with violence, vitriol, and dehumanizing narratives.”Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, in a video announcing the changes, claimed the previous restrictions on immigration and gender were “just out of touch with mainstream discourse.””What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions and shut out people with different ideas, and it has gone too far,” Zuckerberg said.The move comes just weeks before Donald Trump returns to the White House with his Republican Party also back in control of Congress after fiercely attacking social media speech restrictions during the election campaign.Gender identity issues were also a key line of attack by Trump and Republicans against their Democratic opponents.After the move was announced on Tuesday, CyberWell, a nonprofit focused on combating online antisemitism, denounced the “systematic lowering of the bar” by Meta on policies against hate speech and harassment.”This change particularly undermines the safety of all marginalized communities,” CyberWell executive director Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor said in a statement.

A-list actors, musicians and other celebrities were among the tens of thousands of people affected by terrifying wildfires tearing through Los Angeles on Wednesday.The entertainment capital was besieged by out-of-control blazes burning on multiple fronts, with Hollywood events including a glitzy awards show and a Pamela Anderson film premiere cancelled as firefighters battled nearby flames whipped up by hurricane-force winds.Hundreds of homes were destroyed in the swanky Pacific Palisades area, a favorite spot for celebrities where multimillion-dollar houses nestle on beautiful hillsides, while another inferno devastated parts of Altadena, to the east.Mandy Moore, the singer and “This Is Us” actress, told followers on Instagram she had fled with her children and pets from the path of the Altadena fire. “Trying to shield the kids from the immense sadness and worry I feel. Praying for everyone in our beautiful city. So gutted for the destruction and loss. Don’t know if our place made it,” she wrote.Emmy-winning actor James Woods posted a video on X showing flames engulfing trees and bushes near his Pacific Palisades home as he got ready to evacuate, and shortly afterwards said all the fire alarms were going off.”I couldn’t believe our lovely little home in the hills held on this long. It feels like losing a loved one,” Woods said.”Star Wars” star Mark Hamill told his followers on Instagram that he had fled his Malibu home on Tuesday.”Evacuated Malibu so last-minute there were small fires on both sides of the road as we approached PCH,” he wrote, referring to the Pacific Coast Highway, a scenic road that connects seafront settlements.Hamill said he and his wife Marilou York, along with a pet dog, had gone to their daughter’s Hollywood home to escape what he dubbed the “most horrific fire since ’93.”- Premieres cancelled -Meanwhile, several major Hollywood events were abruptly called off due to the disaster.The annual Critics Choice Awards gala, which honors the year’s best in film and television and is attended by dozens of A-list stars, was postponed from this Sunday to January 26.Anderson’s premiere for “The Last Showgirl” was scrapped due to the unfolding disaster, while Paramount also cancelled a glitzy red-carpet screening of the Robbie Williams musical film “Better Man.”Netflix pulled the plug on a press conference for its Golden Globe winner “Emilia Perez.”A live announcement to unveil this year’s Screen Actors Guild nominations was abandoned on Wednesday morning, in favor of a simple press release.Filming of Los Angeles-based shows such as “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Hacks” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live” was paused. And the Universal Studios theme park was closed for the day due to the extreme winds and fire conditions.- ‘Burn’ -Steve Guttenberg — star of 1984 comedy “Police Academy” — was among those helping get people out of Pacific Palisades as the fire began spreading on Tuesday.The “Cocoon” actor expressed frustration at how some of those fleeing the blaze had abandoned their cars on one of the only roads in and out of the ritzy neighborhood.”If you leave your car… leave the key in there so a guy like me can move your car so that these fire trucks can get up there. It’s really, really important,” he told a live television broadcast.Reality TV personalities Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt from “The Hills,” an MTV show that ran until 2010, said they had lost their house after evacuating.”I’m watching our house burn down on the security cameras,” Pratt wrote on Snapchat.