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Greenpeace has confirmed to our colleague Nina Lakhani that they will appeal a verdict in North Dakota on Wednesday ordering them to pay an energy firm more than $660m.
This concludes our live coverage of the day in US politics for Wednesday. We will return, refreshed and ready to tackle Thursday’s developments in a matter of hours. Until then, here are some of the day’s most significant moments:
Speaking from the podium of the White House briefing room, Donald Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, accused federal judges of ruling against the president for partisan reasons.
The Washington Post reports that the Trump administration is working on a plan to create a buffer zone along the southern border in New Mexico that would be occupied by active-duty US troops, empowered to detain migrants who cross into the United States unlawfully.
The White House told reporters that Donald Trump plans to sign an executive order on Thursday directing the secretary of education, Linda McMahon, to “take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure [of] the Department of Education”.
A federal judge on Wednesday denied a request for a restraining order to block Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” from taking over of the US Institute for Peace, after the institute accused Musk’s team of occupying the building by force.
Republican senator Lisa Murkowski said she was “disturbed” by the way federal workers have been treated but would not be “cowed” by the threat of a well-funded primary challenger backed by Musk’s fortune.
A North Dakota jury found Greenpeace liable for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to an energy company over protests against a pipeline being constructed in the state. Greenpeace said they will appeal the order for them to pay more than $660m in damages.
Officials at the US Federal Reserve cut their US economic growth forecasts and raised their projections for price growth as they kept interest rates on hold.
The Washington Post reports that the Trump administration is working on a plan to create a buffer zone along the southern border in New Mexico that would be occupied by active-duty US troops, empowered to detain migrants who cross into the United States unlawfully.
According to the Post’s report:
Those discussions have been underway for weeks, and they center, in part, on a section of border in New Mexico, officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to disclose details of the plan. In effect, the move would turn the buffer zone into an expansive satellite military installation, potentially allowing a greater portion of the Defense Department’s mammoth budget to pay for President Donald Trump’s border crackdown while creating new legal jeopardy for those caught trying to slip into the country from Mexico, these people said.
The effort would enable the most significant use yet of active-duty forces at the border under Trump, though any move to militarize the southern border’s buffer zone is certain to raise questions about whether employing the military in this way runs afoul of the Posse Comitatus Act, a federal law that prohibits active-duty troops from most law enforcement missions. …
By militarizing the buffer zone, the theory goes, any migrant apprehensions made by service members would be tantamount to catching trespassers on a military base: The troops involved would simply hold them until law enforcement arrives.
Calls to militarize the southern border are not new, but so far they have existed more in the realm of political rhetoric than reality.
In 2022, Blake Masters, a Senate candidate enthusiastically backed by Peter Thiel, the same tech billionaire who bankrolled JD Vance’s campaign that year, ran a campaign ad promising to do just that.
In 2018, Trump announced during a White House meeting with then defense secretary Jim Mattis, “we are going to be guarding our border with our military. That’s a big step”.
Although Trump’s announcement sparked a flurry of reports, in the Washington Post and elsewhere, that he was serious about the proposal, it was never enacted at scale.
One big difference between 2018 and 2025, however, is that Trump will not have to convince a sober, former general like Mattis to carry out his plan to divert military resources to domestic law enforcement, since his current defense secretary is a former weekend TV host who is far less likely to object.
Reuters reports that Donald Trump plans to sign an executive order on Thursday directing the secretary of education, Linda McMahon, to “take all necessary steps to facilitate the closure [of] the Department of Education and return education authority to the States, while continuing to ensure the effective and uninterrupted delivery of services, programs, and benefits on which Americans rely”.
A group of Democratic state attorneys general already filed a lawsuit last week seeking to block the Trump administration from dismantling the department and halt the previously announced firing of nearly half of its staff.
Trump has repeatedly called for eliminating the department, but closing it would require an act of Congress, which created the department in 1979.
Republicans have called for the department to be closed for decades, perhaps most famously in 2011 when then Texas governor Rick Perry pledged to eliminate it, along with the commerce department and another agency that slipped his mind, if elected president.
Greenpeace has released another statement after the Morton county jury found Greenpeace entities in the US (Greenpeace Inc, Greenpeace Fund), and Greenpeace International, liable for more than $660m earlier today.
The legacy environmental group has vowed to fight on against what they condemn as Energy Transfer’s “meritless Strategic Lawsuit Strategic lawsuits against public participation (Slapp)”.
A Slapp is a form of civil litigation increasingly deployed by corporations, politicians and wealthy individuals to deliberately wear down, bankrupt and silence critics including journalists, activists and watchdog groups.
“This case should alarm everyone, no matter their political inclinations,” said Sushma Raman, interim executive director Greenpeace Inc, Greenpeace Fund. “It’s part of a renewed push by corporations to weaponize our courts to silence dissent. We should all be concerned about the future of the first amendment, and lawsuits like this aimed at destroying our rights to peaceful protest and free speech. These rights are critical for any work toward ensuring justice – and that’s why we will continue fighting back together, in solidarity. While big oil bullies can try to stop a single group, they can’t stop a movement.”
“We are witnessing a disastrous return to the reckless behavior that fueled the climate crisis, deepened environmental racism, and put fossil fuel profits over public health and a livable planet. The previous Trump administration spent four years dismantling protections for clean air, water, and Indigenous sovereignty, and now along with its allies wants to finish the job by silencing protest. We will not back down. We will not be silenced,” said Mads Christensen, Greenpeace international executive director.
This lawsuit is one of the largest so-called Slapp cases ever filed. Most US states and several countries have put legal protections in place to protect advocates. But in North Dakota – and 15 other states – no anti-Slapp statutes exist. In the US, two bipartisan efforts to pass federal anti-Slapp legislation have not gone anywhere.
Greenpeace will appeal today’s ruling to the North Dakota supreme court.
In February 2024, Greenpeace International filed a lawsuit in a Dutch court to recover “all damages and costs it has suffered as a result of ET’s back-to-back, meritless lawsuits”. This is the first test of a new European law aimed at curbing malicious lawsuits intended to silence journalists, rights activists and public watchdogs.
“Energy Transfer hasn’t heard the last of us in this fight. We’re just getting started with our anti-Slapp lawsuit against Energy Transfer’s attacks on free speech and peaceful protest,” said Kristin Casper, Greenpeace international general counsel. “We will see Energy Transfer in court this July in the Netherlands.”
A federal judge on Wednesday denied a request for a restraining order to block Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” from taking over of the US Institute for Peace, after the institute accused Musk’s team of occupying the building by force.
The emergency ruling from US district judge Beryl Howell came after Musk’s team gained access to the headquarters of the independent, non-profit organization funded by Congress, with the help of police officers.
This was perhaps the most aggressive assertion of power by Musk’s aides as they sweep through the federal government with little regard for the actual function of the offices they seek to slash.
Howell was critical of the way Musk’s team had entered the building but said she was not going to order a temporary halt to their takeover. USIP had asked the judge to stop Musk’s team “from completing the unlawful dismantling of the Institute”.
USIP’s lawsuit was “messy”, Howell said, since it was filed on behalf of only five board members and not the entire USIP board, and the ousted president was not a plaintiff.
Still, the judge said she was disturbed by the way Musk’s team had entered USIP with armed police, which she described as “terrorizing”.
“I have to say I am offended on behalf of the American citizens,” Howell said, adding that USIP staff had been treated “abominably”.
On a visit to her home state of Alaska on Tuesday, Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski said she was “disturbed” by the way federal workers have been treated but would not be “cowed” by the threat of a well-funded primary challenger backed by Elon Musk’s fortune.
In remarks to state lawmakers, Murkowski spoke up for Alaska’s 15,000 federal workers, who she said do valuable work.
Speaking to reporters later, Murkowski said that she refused to “compromise” her integrity by remaining silent and suggested that her Republican colleagues in Washington were too afraid of Musk’s power to criticize his chaotic rampage through federal agencies.
“I’m going to take the criticism that comes and it may be that Elon Musk has decided that he’s going to take the next billion dollars that he makes off of Starlink and put it directly against Lisa Murkowski. And, you know what? That may happen. But I’m not giving up … one opportunity to try to stand up for Alaskans,” she said.
“I get criticized for what I say and then everybody else is like, ‘Well, how come nobody else is saying anything?’ Well, figure it out. Because they’re looking at how many things are being thrown at me and its like ‘Maybe I just better duck a cover.’ It’s why you’ve got everybody just zip-lipped, not saying a word. Because they’re afraid they’re going to be taken down, they’re going to be primaried.”
Murkowski, who voted to convict Donald Trump in his Senate trial in 2021, following his impeachment for inciting the January 6 riot, defeated a candidate backed by Trump in 2022 to win reelection. In 2010, after she lost her party primary to a Tea party challenger, she won the general election as a write-in candidate.
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, gave Senator John Fetterman a silver-plated beeper as a memento of the American lawmaker’s visit to his office in Jerusalem on Wednesday.
Video of the two men exchanging gifts was posted online by Netanyahu’s office.
Netanyahu’s gift was a reference to Israel’s attack on Hezbollah operatives in Lebanon last September, in which the Mossad sent an encrypted message to thousands of booby-trapped pagers which suddenly exploded.
The exploding pagers, and walkie-talkies, killed dozens of people, including several children, and wounded thousands as the devices were detonated as Hezbollah operatives went about their daily lives, surrounded by civilians and family members.
Fetterman, who has disappointed former supporters by taking Israel’s side throughout its mass slaughter in Gaza, laughed and thanked Netanyahu. “When that story broke, I was like, ‘Oh, I love it. I love it’”, Fetterman said. “Thank you for this”.
Fetterman presented Netanyahu with a framed image of a memorial in Philadelphia to his brother Yoni, who was killed in 1976 while leading the Israeli commando raid in Entebbe, Uganda, to free Jewish passengers on a plane hijacked by Palestinian and German militants.
The Netanyahu brothers had spent part of their youth in the Philadelphia suburbs, where their father taught medieval Jewish history and Hebrew literature.
The US senator’s friendly social call took place shortly after the Israeli prime minister broke a ceasefire by ordering renewed bombing of Gaza, killing another 400 Palestinians, including children, and fired the head of the Shin Bet intelligence agency, prompting massive street protests.
‘This is the end of a chapter, but not the end of our fight,’ said Greenpeace USA interim executive director Sushma Raman.
“Energy Transfer knows we don’t have $660m. They want our silence, not our money.”
Greenpeace has confirmed to our colleague Nina Lakhani that they will appeal a verdict in North Dakota on Wednesday ordering them to pay an energy firm more than $660m.
Steven Donziger is perhaps the best-known member of the trial monitoring committee that has been in court throughout the Energy Transfer v Greenpeace case.
Donziger is an environmental lawyer who won a multibillion-dollar judgment in Ecuador against Chevron over contamination in the Lago Agrio region, but ended up under house arrest for years, after the oil giant countersued him, initially seeking up to $60bn in damages. (While the demand for monetary damages was dropped before trial, the company won its suit, and Donziger was later found guilty of contempt of court, disbarred and jailed for six months. Despite support from 34 lawmakers, a campaign for Joe Biden to pardon Donziger before he left office this year ultimately failed).
Here, in a video released this week before the verdict, is how Donziger explains what is at stake in this legal effort to silence dissent he compares to the government’s arrest of Mahmoud Khalil:
This post was amended on 21 March 2025 to provide more information about Steven Donziger.
Here is some useful background on the lawsuit against Greenpeace, from an article published last month by our colleagues Nina Lakhani and Rachel Leingang.
Energy Transfer Partners, a Dallas-based oil and gas company worth almost $70bn, had accused Greenpeace of defamation and orchestrating criminal behavior by protesters at the Dakota Access pipeline (Dapl).
The anti-pipeline protests in 2016 and 2017 were organised by Standing Rock and other Sioux tribes and supported by more than 300 sovereign tribal nations, inspiring an international solidarity movement after Energy Transfer’s private security unleashed attack dogs and pepper spray against nonviolent protesters.
Tens of thousands of people from across the country and world participated in the Dapl protests, and Greenpeace was among scores of non-profit groups that supported the Standing Rock tribe’s opposition to the pipeline.
But Energy Transfer alleges in court filings that thousands of protestors were “incited” to come to North Dakota thanks to a “misinformation campaign” by Greenpeace.
The lawsuit has been widely denounced as a classic strategic lawsuit against public participation (Slapp) – a form of civil litigation increasingly deployed by corporations, politicians and wealthy individuals to deliberately wear down and silence critics including journalists, activists and watchdog groups.
For more, read the whole article, here:
A team of 12 independent prominent civil rights attorneys and advocates who monitored the Greenpeace trial amid concerns about judicial bias and violations of due process released the following statement deploring the verdict:
It is our collective assessment that the jury verdict against Greenpeace in North Dakota reflects a deeply flawed trial with multiple due process violations that denied Greenpeace the ability to present anything close to a full defense. Attorneys on our team monitored every minute of the proceedings and found multiple violations of due process that denied Greenpeace its right to a fair trial. The problems included a jury that was patently biased in favor of Energy Transfer, with many members working in the fossil fuel industry; a judge who lacked the requisite experience and legal knowledge to rule properly on the complex First Amendment and other evidentiary issues at the center of the case; and incendiary and prejudicial statements by lawyers for Energy Transfer that tried to criminalize Greenpeace and by extension the entire climate movement by attacking constitutionally-protected advocacy.
Our fear that this was an illegitimate corporate-funded SLAPP harassment case was confirmed by our observations. We will be issuing a full report documenting these violations and larger flaws in the case in the coming weeks. While the trial court verdict is in, the case is far from over. Greenpeace has a right to appeal to the North Dakota Supreme Court and ultimately to the U.S. Supreme Court. Our committee will continue its work monitoring this critically important case that raises troubling concerns for all advocates in the country.
The monitors who released the statement include: Marty Garbus, a trial attorney who has represented Nelson Mandela, Daniel Ellsberg, Cesar Chavez, and Vaclav Havel; Natali Segovia, director of Water Protector Legal Collective; Steven Donziger, an environmental and human rights advocate (and Guardian US columnist); Jeanne Mirer, president of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers; Scott Wilson Badenoch, Jr., a fellow of the American Bar Foundation; Wade McMullen, a distinguished fellow of the Human Rights Institute at Georgetown University Law Center.
As our colleagues Rachel Leingang and Nina Lakhani report, a jury in North Dakota has decided that the environmental group Greenpeace must pay hundreds of millions of dollars to the pipeline company Energy Transfer and is liable over defamation and other claims over protests in the state nearly a decade ago.
Greenpeace, which had denied the claims, said in a statement after the verdict that lawsuits like this were aimed at “destroying the right to peaceful protest”; constitutional rights experts had expressed fears that case could have a wider chilling effect on free speech.
Here is the complete statement on the verdict from Deepa Padmanabha, senior legal advisor, Greenpeace USA, sent to the Guardian:
What we saw over these three weeks was Energy Transfer’s blatant disregard for the voices of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. And while they also tried to distort the truth about Greenpeace’s role in the protests, we instead reaffirmed our unwavering commitment to non-violence in every action we take. After almost eight years, we were proud to share our story with the people of Mandan and beyond. To be clear, Greenpeace’s story is not the story of Standing Rock; that is not ours to tell, despite the allegations in the lawsuit. Our story is how an organization like Greenpeace USA can support critical fights to protect communities most impacted by the climate crisis, as well as continued attacks on Indigenous sovereignty. We should all be concerned about the future of the First Amendment, and lawsuits like this aimed at destroying our rights to peaceful protest and free speech. Greenpeace will continue to do its part to fight for the protection of these fundamental rights for everyone.
Kristin Casper, the general counsel for Greenpeace International said:
The fight against Big Oil isn’t over today, and we know that the truth and the law are on our side. Greenpeace International will continue to campaign for a green and peaceful future. Energy Transfer hasn’t heard the last of us in this fight. We’re just getting started with our anti-SLAPP lawsuit against Energy Transfer’s attacks on free speech and peaceful protest. We will see Energy Transfer in court this July in the Netherlands. We will not back down, we will not be silenced.
Read Rachel and Nina’s detailed report on the verdict, and its implications here:
A North Dakota jury has found Greenpeace liable for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to an energy company over protests against a pipeline being constructed in the state.
The verdict stems from a lawsuit filed by Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners, which sought $300m in damages from Greenpeace for defamation and orchestrating criminal behavior by protesters at the Dakota Access pipeline in 2016 and 2017. Greenpeace has warned paying such a large judgment could bankrupt their US operation.
Here’s more on the verdict:
Last week, the Trump administration asked the supreme court to quickly overturn lower court rulings that blocked its attempt to curtail birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants.
The Associated Press reports that the request may also offer the conservative-dominated bench the opportunity to cut down on the practice of a single judge halting a policy nationwide. But, for whatever reason, the justices do not seem interested in ruling quickly on the issue.
Here’s more, from the AP:
The Supreme Court seems to be in no hurry to address an issue that has irritated Republican and Democratic administrations alike: the ability of a single judge to block a nationwide policy.
Federal judges responding to a flurry of lawsuits have stopped or slowed one Trump administration action after another, from efforts to restrict birthright citizenship to freezes on domestic and international spending.
While several justices have expressed concern about the use of so-called nationwide, or universal, injunctions, the high court has sidestepped multiple requests to do something about them.
The latest plea comes in the form of an emergency appeal the Justice Department filed with the court last week, seeking to narrow orders issued by judges in Maryland, Massachusetts and Washington that prohibit the nationwide enforcement of an executive order signed by President Donald Trump to restrict birthright citizenship.
The justices usually order the other side in an emergency appeal to respond in a few days or a week. But in this case, they have set a deadline of April 4, without offering any explanation.
The Trump administration’s cancellation of an affordable repayment plan for student loans has prompted a lawsuit from the American Federal of Teachers, the Guardian’s Michael Sainato reports:
A top teachers union has sued the US Department of Education after it stopped processing applications for affordable repayment plans of student loans last month and disabled the online application for the programs.
The American Federation of Teachers, or AFT – one the country’s largest unions, representing 1.8 million workers – filed a lawsuit alleging the sweeping action violates federal law.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington DC, seeks a court order to restore access to these programs.
Another court order last month shut out borrowers of student loans from participating in four income-driven repayment (IDR) plans, which tie income to student loan payments, designed to keep payments affordable and avoid defaults on loans.
“By effectively freezing the nation’s student loan system, the new administration seems intent on making life harder for working people, including for millions of borrowers who have taken on student debt so they can go to college,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the AFT. “The former president tried to fix the system for 45 million Americans, but the new president is breaking it again.”
The Democratic Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, is standing by his vote to fund the government, even as the calls for him to step aside grow.
“I believe so strongly I did the right thing for all the flack I’m getting,” Schumer said in an interview on Morning Joe.
He said he understood Democrats’ desire to stand up to Trump, but warned that forcing a shutdown was not the way to do it. “Let’s stand up to him smart. Let’s not give him the keys to the kingdom.”
One major activist group, Indivisible, has already called on Schumer to resign as leader and constituents are raising the issue at town halls. According to Axios, at least two House Democrats responded yes when asked at a town hall whether Senate Democrats need new leadership.
Schumer this weekend cancelled several stops on a tour for his forthcoming book, citing security concerns after progressive groups announced plans to protest the New York Democrat’s decision to lend his vote to a Republican funding bill.
Schumer has argued that he does not support the bill, but feared a government shutdown at the exact moment Donald Trump and Elon Musk are trying to downsize the federal workforce would have been a far worse outcome.
“If we shut down the government and they started doing all these bad things, in a month, those folks would be saying, hey, save Medicaid, save our rural hospitals, save this, save that, and we’ll say we can’t, there’s a government shutdown. And then they would come to us and say, so why’d you let it happen?” Schumer argued on Morning Joe. “I prevented that from happening, and I think my caucus, no matter which way they voted, understands that.
The House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, has declined to say publicly whether he continues to support Schumer. On Tuesday the former House speaker Nancy Pelosi offered a sharp critique of Schumer’s strategy: “I myself don’t give away anything for nothing. I think that’s what happened the other day,” she said, according to Politico. Unlike Jeffries, Pelosi said she still has confidence in Schumer’s leadership.
Officials at the US Federal Reserve cut their US economic growth forecasts and raised their projections for price growth as they kept interest rates on hold.
“Uncertainty around the economic outlook has increased,” the central bank said in a statement, as Donald Trump’s bid to overhaul the global economy with sweeping tariffs sparks concern over inflation and growth.
Policymakers at the Fed expect inflation to increase by an average rate of 2.7% this year, according to projections released on Wednesday, up from a previous estimate of 2.5%.
They expect US gross domestic product (GDP) – a broad measure of economic health – to rise by 1.7% this year, down from an estimate of 2.1% in December. Officials also revised down their projections for GDP growth in 2026 and 2027, to 1.8%.
Uncertainty is “unusually elevated”, the Fed chair, Jerome Powell, cautioned, as the Trump administration attempts to engineer radical economic change. Some of the increase in the Fed’s inflation expectations was “clearly” due to tariffs, he said.