US President Donald Trump held a victory rally in Las Vegas on Saturday, wrapping up a tumultuous week that saw him double down on promises to reshape American politics and culture.
He was back in front of an adoring crowd in the nation’s gambling capital hours after a dramatic late-night purge of internal federal agency watchdogs, and a narrow confirmation victory for one of his most controversial cabinet picks.
After visits to disaster sites in North Carolina and California, the Vegas stop was a feel-good campaign-style event for the president.
A relaxed Trump laughed and joked his way through a modified version of his pre-election stump speech, including repeatedly bashing his prdecessor and one-time opponent, Joe Biden.
“Since I became the 47th president at noon on Monday, I’ve been moving with urgency and historic speed to fix every single calamity of the Biden administration that they’ve created,” he told cheering supporters.
“This week alone, I took nearly 350 executive actions to reverse the horrible values and betrayals that we inherited from a group of people that didn’t know what the hell they were doing.”
Trump won Nevada in the 2024 election — the first Republican candidate to take the state in 20 years — and he said he was back to thank voters.
He pledged to follow through on a pre-election promise to make tips tax-free — an enormously popular move in a city built on the hospitality industry.
The speech was in sharp contrast with his visits Friday to communities devastated by floods and wildfires, during which he threatened to shut down FEMA — the US federal disaster agency.
“FEMA is incompetently run, and it costs about three times more than it should cost,” he said during a combative briefing with local politicians and firefighters in Los Angeles.
The three-leg tour was Trump’s first trip outside Washington since his inauguration as president on Monday.
His first week has been marked by an avalanche of daily executive orders and proclamations.
Among them was the controversial pardoning of hundreds of people who took part in the assault on the Capitol in January 2021, something he told his audience — including Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes — he was “very proud” to have done.
Other orders ran the gamut from climate change to gender identity, and abortion access to migrant deportations.
Although many of the measures will likely be challenged in court, their sheer volume and variety have laid down a marker for his second term in the White House.
– New Pentagon chief sworn in –
Shortly after arriving in Vegas, it emerged that Trump had sacked — with immediate effect — the independent inspectors general of at least 12 federal agencies.
The late-night firing of officials charged with rooting out fraud, waste and abuse capped a series of directives widely seen as ensuring a federal bureaucracy that is acquiescent and loyal.
“This is a chilling purge, and it’s a preview of the lawless approach Donald Trump and his administration is taking far too often as he is becoming president,” the Senate’s top Democrat Chuck Schumer said.
There was no immediate indication of who Trump would bring in to fill the void — or if the officials would be replaced at all. A number of legal experts said the sudden terminations could violate a federal law requiring a 30-day notice of dismissal.
Trump’s first week back in the Oval Office has also been notable for confirmation hearings for his cabinet picks — some of them highly contentious.
On Saturday, one of the most divisive choices — former Fox News co-host Pete Hegseth — was sworn in as defense secretary.
Late Friday, Hegseth secured Senate confirmation as the new Pentagon chief by the narrowest of margins when a 50-50 tie was broken by Vice President JD Vance.
It was only the second time in history a vice president has had to intervene to save a cabinet nominee.
Three Republican senators voted against Hegseth, who has been buffeted by allegations of alcohol abuse, sexual misconduct and general fears about his experience and ability to lead the world’s most powerful military.
The 44-year-old is a former Army National Guard officer who until recently worked as a co-host for Fox News — one of Trump’s favored television channels.
Agence France-Presse
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