of the american taxpayers, on behalf of military veterans, they've been pushed out. >> before hampton dellingerof the office of special counsel, no relation to the office of the same name that prosecuted president trump. dellinger's office is where federal workers can bring employment complaints and where so-called whistleblowers, government employees, can report wrongdoing. >> so, if a person sees fraud, for example, in the department of defense and they're afraid of telling their supervisor because they think there will be retaliation, they go to you. >> they can. and that was a decision not by me but by congress, that employees in the executive branch who are seeing something going wrong inside an agency need a safe place to go that's still in the executive branch but that is outside of the agency. >> and it works. a recent report said whistleblowers helped the office of special counsel find $110 million that was owed to veterans and uncovered the over-prescription of opioids at a v.a. clinic. >> thank you for considering my nomination to head the office of special counsel. >> dellinger is a

joining us now for his first interview since ending this fight is hampton dellinger. he's now the former head of the office of special counsel. mr. dellinger, it's really nice to meet you. thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me. >> i'm sorry that this was your last day. >> yeah. i'd rather be at work. >> yeah, well, tell me about your job. tell me what your job was. >> well, for. >> almost a year, i was the place that if you're a federal government whistleblower and you see wrongdoing happening on your job in the government, you could come to my office and report it. i could initiate an investigation. and if you happen to be retaliated against for blowing the whistle, i could help protect you. >> that job, for obvious reasons, when you think about checks and balances, is an independent job. one in which congress created the job. yes. >> 50 years ago. >> congress created the job and created it in such a way that the president couldn't come in and say, i don't like what this guy is doing protecting these whistleblowers. get him out. i want my own guy in the

joining us now for his first interview since ending this fight is hampton dellinger. he's now the former head of the office of special counsel. mr. dellinger, it's really nice to meet you. thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me. >> i'm sorry that this was your last day. >> yeah. i'd rather be at work. >> yeah. well, tell me about your job. tell me what your job was. >> well, for almost a year, i was the place that if you're a federal government whistleblower and you see wrongdoing happening on your job in the government, you could come to my office and report it. i could initiate an investigation. and if you happen to be retaliated against for blowing the whistle, i could help protect you. >> that job, for obvious reasons, when you think about checks and balances, is an independent job, one in which congress created the job. yes. >> 50 years ago. >> congress created the job and created it in such a way that the president couldn't come in and say, i don't like what this guy is doing protecting these whistleblowers. get him out. i want my own guy in there,

direct results of what hampton dellinger did, more. >> than 5000. >> people at usda who yesterday were told they must be reinstated to their jobs. after dellinger today himself announced that he is ending his one man fight to stay at his post at the office of special counsel, which looks after whistleblower rights, which looks after the rights of government employees to not be fired for corrupt or improper reasons. he left that. >> job today. >> after an appeals court ruling basically made clear that he must. >> but take him as a case. >> study here. >> because his one man, one. >> month fight to not go quietly. saved the jobs of thousands of people who were improperly fired by trump. >> and that. >> fight set the bar. >> and set. >> the tone. >> for what it. >> means to. >> refuse to go quietly. >> and to make as much good trouble. >> as you can every single. >> day that you can, for. >> as long as. >> you can. >> joining us. >> now for his first interview since ending this fight is hampton dellinger. he's now the former head of the office of special counsel. >> mr. dellinger, it's re

hampton. dellinger. dellinger. >> oh, my god, you know me. >> too well.n to hampton dellinger story before everybody else was. i just want to note she was she was committed to the questioning around it, which made sense to me. my question is, just, are we supposed to leave? pam bondi's brother got his job because he's because of merit or because he's pam bondi, his brother? >> yeah, well. so. >> michael, i. >> i'm pretty sure. >> it's not merit. >> i mean, look, this is. >> a great story for you to be covering because. >> it is really. >> important for people. >> to see that this is the infiltration. >> of yet another institution and trying. >> to put people. >> in place who are going to be loyalists and. >> that. you know. >> ed martin. >> what he has. >> been doing has caused. >> all sorts of people, from the aba to former people who worked in that very office. >> republicans and democrats should. >> you know, career apolitical. >> people talking about. >> just how insidious his conduct is. and one. >> of the things. that has. >> led to. >> is people fi

>> yeah, this this guy hampton dellinger. he was in a position called special counsel, not robert mueller. totally different thing fighting for workers in the federal government. and his case. it is the crux of all of these court cases about who can donald trump fire in the federal government? can he fire dellinger himself from this role? that's supposed to have some independence that congress set up? and today he said he was trying to keep his job after being fired by trump. an appeals court yesterday said, sit on the sidelines while we figure this out in court. and so dellinger today said, i'm dropping my lawsuit. i'm not going to continue pushing this because there's a possibility that i have long odds at the supreme court. they could want to expand the power of the president to. allow someone else that trump wants in that job instead of him. he would not have his job while this goes through the courts. so he's stepping aside. there's going to continue to be fights over this, over the firing of people in positions like ham

hampton dellinger was fired last month, despite being confirmed by the senate last year to a five-yearo the law, he can only be removed for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office. the justice department says it will file an appeal. >>> meantime, the firing of top lawyers at the pentagon is also drawing fire. charlie d'agata reports. >> reporter: the firings at the pentagon are now reaching beyond joint chiefs chairman cq brown and chief of naval operations admiral lisa franchetti to the top lawyers in the army, navy, and air force judge advocates general. defense secretary pete hegseth ordered the jag firings. >> we want lawyers who give sound constitutional advice and don't exist to attempt to be roadblocks to anything. >> reporter: among other responsibilities, jag's provided advice to u.s. senior military officers on the rules of warfare and are sometimes embedded with forces on the battlefield to ensure they adhere to them. cory shockey head of defense policy at the american enterprise institute is troubled by the firings. what concerns you most about the relief of

it is good. >> to see you. >> i want to ask you. >> about. >> hampton dellinger. we talked a little bit on the show yesterday. >> about the role that dellinger. >> plays, the. >> the importance. >> of having. >> a person. >> who is in charge of. >> protecting government. >> employees and whistleblowers who may. >> come forward. >> of course, donald trump moved to fire dellinger courts, as simon was just reading in that intro, have paused that firing. your response to where. >> we. >> find ourselves in these, in this moment where. folks who are supposed to have. >> that. >> type of oversight. >> and protective mechanism. >> are at risk. >> of being. >> replaced by. trump loyalists. and your feelings on whether or not the. >> supreme court. >> will uphold that ruling? >> yeah. well, i mean, it's very obvious that donald trump does not adhere to the rule of law and that he thinks he can do whatever he wants, and he's got his people all over washington, all over tv saying that he's got this unitary executive power. and i think he believes that the supreme court is goin

. >> hampton dellinger. >> the. >> special counsel. he's not jack smith. he's not. robert mueller, he's not john durham. he's a different kind of special counsel. he's a person that investigates. complaints from the federal civil service. and then argues on their behalf if he thinks they should be reinstated. so he's the guy that's really at the center of a lot of these fights over donald trump and his power to fire people in the executive branch. not only is he the person that's arguing for, say, 6000 probationary workers at the department of agriculture to get reinstated, which is something that he successfully argued yesterday, at least temporarily, for them to go back to their jobs. he is also at the center of trump wanting to be able to fire people. right? trump wants to remove dellinger from his job. a lower court reinstated him temporarily. now it's at an appeals court. they said, no, actually, we can let him stay. sit out for now. we're going to look at this into the spring. they're going to hear legal arguments, at least on paper, into april. they'll probab

of a federal judge ruled that president trump's effort to fire hampton dellinger as unlawful and thatellinger must be allowed to continue serving his five-year term. meanwhile, over the weekend at yosemite national park in california more than 100 protesters gathered to express outrage over the staff cuts at national parks and forests. they were part of a national effort dubbed protect your parks protests. protesters gathered in san francisco near the golden gate bridge, in montana at yellowstone park and kentucky to support cam nelson. hallie. >> yamiche alcindor, thank you. >>> overseas now. israel has paused all the humanitarian aid entering gaza today. you see the long lines of trucks waiting to get through the rafah crossing along the border with egypt. it's after hamas refused to accept israel's proposal to temporarily extend a ceasefire deal there. the israeli prime minister says they stopped the aid because he says hamas steals it. hamas is slamming the move, calling it blackmail. >>> here in the u.s., anger building in parts of florida after a black man was shot and killed th

this after being fired by president trump hampton dellinger's announcement comes one day after a federal court green lighted his termination indicating that the supreme court may ultimately side with the trump administration in this. this all comes as a judge is now ordering a president to release foreign aid payments 6:00 p.m. monday to usaid contractors and nonprofits who challenged the freeze adding he will weigh a timeline for releasing the rest of the funds. some relief for the trump administration and other federal judge has declined to immediately stop mass fires core part of the administration's effort to dismantle the agency move forward we clearly got some problems. and so we are determined to correct those problems. where it ends up is going to be, of course, something we will see in the future. >> a state department saying sayingthat he are examining exig investigations and inquiries for those potential criminal referrals back over to you. >> ainsley: thank you so much, todd. >> we will see where that goes. usaid is one of the lisa murkowski has said i want them to stay in al

hampton dellinger is the head of the office of special counsel. dellinger has a five year term under law and this his termination is unlawful since the office of special counsel is independent. on saturday vaccination ruled against the government allowing dellinger to remain in his job. she has called, this quote, extraordinary difficult constitutional issue civil service rules tying the president's hands. union contracts in the public sector might violate executive control over the executive branch. >> there are now about 100 federal lawsuits against trump's policies with 21 rulings already blocking the president's moves, at least temporarily. much of this is likely heading to the supreme court in the months ahead. bret? >> bret: mike, thank you. >> the president campaigned on ending this war. he will end this war. is the commander-in-chief. >> zelenskyy dictator. >> he did find every opportunity to blame on every issue. >> the white house has become an arm of the kremlin. >> i thought that, you know, politics stops at the waters' edge. >> bret:

a lower court had denied the president permission to dismiss hampton dellinger. the u.s.the case while it was playing out in lower courts. dellinger is expected to appeal today's decision, which was a win for the trump administration. [angelic music] >> in tonight's focus on faith today is ash wednesday. you may see that for many christians, catholics it marks the beginning of leapt 40-day period of repentance for easter faith and how to make it more accessible. fox news senior correspondent benjamin hall and actor mark wahlberg partner and investor in the prayer app. called hallow. >> it's ashe w ash wednesday anu got your ashes on already. start off what those ashes mean for you. >> for me obviously it's the start of lent. and it's a reminder that i need to do more. and i need to be better. and there are things that are in my life that are distracting and take me away. relationship and getting closer to god. excited about lent and excited about people come up to me and talked to me how especially with the hallow app. it's touched their lives got them to start going back

a court ruled that a key watchdog, the special counsel we have talked about on this program, hampton dellinger fact, he cannot be reinstated for his job. they took him out of that watchdog post, and today he announced he's not going to appeal the case because it would just take too long. that's a critical watchdog function. now he's out of that job. amna: there's a lot of court action to keep track of here, but there's also news about contractors and organizations that are dealing with the federal funding freezes. what do we need to know about that? lisa: right. first i want to talk about the freezing of grants and loans that were affecting a lot of organizations around this country. there was a temporary ruling put in place. a judge now has said that that needs to stay in force much longer. here is what the judge wrote when he blasted trump's funding freeze. he wrote: "this fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of government. here, this executive put itself above congress.” judge mcconnell in that case saying, he's not against executive power, but this is a

hampton dellinger made the announcement a day after a federal appeals court in washington sided with trump administration. dellinger was expected to take his case all the way to the u.s. supreme court but acknowledged that his odds of prevailing were not good. also tonight, a federal judge has ruled the president's dismissal of a member of a national labor relations board was unlawful. the judge says gwinn wilcox must be allowed to continue in her role. ♪ >> the house has censured texas democrat al green over his disruption during president trump's address to congress tuesday. several democrats voted with republicans to censure crean. many others participated in a demonstration during that house session. soonier national correspondent aishah hasnie shows us from capitol hill. >> the house come to order, clear the well, please. clear the well. >> pay offs speech tuesday night. [shouting] >> as house speaker mike johnson read aloud the condemnation, a group of democrats started singing we shall overcome. republicans shouted back, kick them out. democrat leader heax blasting the g.o.p.

hampton dellinger, who heads up the federal office that oversees whistleblower protections and civil service protections. trump tried to fire him, too. that is apparently illegal. dellinger has fought it vociferously in the courts, including one trip already to the supreme court. and it looks like another trip to the supreme court is probably on the way. but in the meantime, while he has been reinstated, he told the merit systems protection board to weigh in on the mass firings at usda, which appeared to be blatantly illegal. that board did weigh in on them. they had to fight their own firings along the way to get there, but they fought them. and now those more than 5000 workers at usda must be reinstated. a ruling by a federal judge in california on the illegality of mass firings carried out by trump's office of personnel management. that ruling appears to have stopped trump, for now, from going ahead with his plan to fire more than 5000 people from the department of defense, quote, the pentagon's planned firing of 5400 employees has been temporarily delayed after a federal court de

. >> anna hampton dellinger. >> was appointed. >> to a five. >> year term by president biden, and. >>ned. >> a civil service. >> board to. >> block the trump. >> administration's effort. >> to fire. >> thousands of federal workers who are in a probationary status. >> so trump. >> fired him. >> but a federal district. judge ruled that the firing was illegal. and as this. >> was going. >> on, dellinger. >> won an order. >> reinstating more than 5000 fired agriculture department. >> workers for at. least 45 days. >> and he was about to seek similar. >> relief. >> for tens of thousands of other. >> fired employees. >> when, as. >> you said. the u.s. court of appeals. >> for the. >> d.c. circuit issued a ruling wednesday night. that allowed trump's firing of. >> dellinger to. >> take effect. >> and that's when. dellinger threw in the towel. >> take a listen. >> to what he told rachel maddow. >> it was going to be months, maybe a year before i'd get a final answer. i'd be on the sidelines the whole time. and i've seen the damage over the past month or so. that can happen in days, sometimes

hampton dellinger, head of the office of special. >> counsel. >> which, as you know, has a lot of different> their functions is to protect whistleblowers. >> and to protect. >> folks who want to come forward. >> and do the right thing. trump administration fires dellinger. you got two different sets of judges that say they put a freeze on that. the freeze goes to today on that firing. so can. >> you both bring. >> us up to speed on the status of employment? and also what happens if that person who's. >> supposed to protect. >> government employees who are whistleblowers suddenly is replaced with a trump loyalist? well, right now the courts have held, you know, there's orders in place to keep him in the position as it should be. it's high stakes. we filed a complaint before the office of special counsel. it concluded that the probationary employees had been, you know, fired in violation of the law and has asked for an investigation and issued an important finding there. and so there's a lot at stake for not just federal employees, but for people across the country. when you have watchdogs an

special counsel hampton dellinger says that he is unlikely to win at the supreme court, and is dropping his case to remain in his role. the social security administration is telling employees that they are not allowed to look at news websites while at work. a memo obtained by cnn says that employees are prohibited from accessing general news, sports and online shopping sites on work issue devices, and that's effective immediately. the agency claims that it will reduce risk and protect sensitive information. certainly a lot to get to. for more now, let me welcome in kadia goba in washington. she is a politics reporter for semafor. great to have you this morning. so far in the president's term, we haven't seen a lot of public gop dissent on trump's plans. but but on this issue of tariffs, you are hearing gop leaders raise concerns. listen. >> almost every industry in kentucky is gone and said it will hurt our industry and push up prices of homes and cars. and so i'm going to continue to argue against tariffs. >> should he back off of it. if it goes if it starts to hurt the constituents. >

hampton dellinger, the head of the office of special counsel, will remain in his post for now after ad

hampton dellinger.e to remove him. but in. >> these other cases, at least. >> early on. >> the courts. >> are preserving. >> the status quo, saying that the trump administration cannot. >> have its. >> way while the litigation is ongoing. >> and so do you. do you basically think it's just far too early to glean anything? or do you think that the fact that so many of them are being paused and that, as i've told viewers, part of the trump strategy is to overdo it completely, claim powers they obviously don't have, like, oh, they're going to rewrite the constitution with an executive order. i mean, that's that's just not ever been allowed. and then rush some of them to the supreme court. do you have any view based on the early indicators of that strategy? >> i try. >> to not. >> read too much into. >> the early. >> moves, but some of these cases are now at the preliminary injunction stage. >> that's a sort. >> of middle of the road. sort of. >> a process. >> where judges. >> are deciding whether to block t

in fact, hampton dellinger, who recently prevailed in a case against the administration, had this to say about the efficacy of court challenges on the rachel maddow show. so let's hear that. >> but the other issue, rachel, is it was going to be months, maybe a year before i get a final answer. i'd be on the sidelines the whole time. and i've seen the damage over the past month or so. that can happen in days, sometimes even hours, to these federal agencies when the laws aren't being followed. and so the idea of trying to come back in a year and fix what i think might be broken forever in terms of the independence of my agency, was not something that i thought i could do. >> so, leah, if the courts are the last clear chance here, is this even a backstop that we should count on or that we should be reveling in? it seems like waiting for litigation to play out is as bad as the actual assault on the rule of law. >> it's better than nothing, but it is certainly not ideal, and it is not going to fix all of the gaps that are currently plaguing our government. i mean, if you look at and consi

the white house attempted to fire special counsel hampton dellinger without cause.ger's office protects whistleblowers from retaliation. on saturday, judge amy berman jackson declared that he is entitled to stay in his job. she says ruling otherwise would offer the president a constitutional license to bully officials in the executive branch into doing his will. the trump administration is expected to appeal some 800 people working at the national oceanic and atmospheric administration are out of their jobs after another round of federal terminations. last week, the trump administration fired probationary employees, generally those who have been in their positions for a year or less, including scientists and specialists who study weather patterns and climate systems. at least 100 of the laid off employees worked for the national weather service, and some worked in the hurricane research division, which focuses on improving forecast data and accuracy. well, now concerns are being raised about the already understaffed agency's capabilities as extreme weather season ap

hampton dellinger, who was the head of the office of special counsel, had opposed the administration's terminate probationary federal government employees. all right. turning back to the market stocks looking to keep the momentum going after putting a stop to the sell off around president trump's tariffs. we'll take a look at futures this morning. you can see in the red across the board. the dow looks like it would open more than 400 points lower. for more let's bring in jeff kilburg founder and ceo of cam financial, also a cnbc contributor. jeff, good morning. good to see you. >> good morning frank. how are you. >> all right. so we had an up day yesterday largely on the idea of tariff concessions futures under some heavy selling pressure right now. what do you make of this action that we're seeing in the premarket? >> frank i think what we're. >> seeing pre-market. >> the vix up almost 10%. we're seeing. >> the s&p 500 on. >> its. lows right now down about. >> 70 points. >> i think this is part of the negotiations. this is exactly what president trump and the. >> white house. >> wants

we've also seen with hampton dellinger, who has been fighting his way through the court system when it comes to to federal watchdogs that are being fired. he dropped his case today after losing that. we'll see where these limits go. elie honig as always, great to have you. thank you. and thanks to everyone. joining us tonight, cnn news night with abby phillip is up next. >> tonight, delays and delusions. donald trump postpones. tariffs one more time. >> as. >> his promise to make america rich again clashes with job cuts, mirroring the great recession. plus, muzzling musk, the president takes away elon's hatchet and replaces it with a scalpel while promising his cabinet will get a say in what? surgically removed from the federal bureaucracy. also clever or cringe democrats choose a tiktok trend. as a way to fight back in the trump era. live at the table scott jennings, ashley allison, chris sununu and social hinojosa americans with different perspectives aren't talking to each other, but here they do. good evening. i'm abby phillip in new york. let's get right to what america is talking

we've also seen with hampton dellinger, who has been fighting his way through the court system when

we've also seen with hampton dellinger, who has been fighting his way through the court system when ito federal watchdogs that are being fired. he dropped his case today after losing that. we'll see where these limits go. elie honig as always, great to have you. thank you. and thanks to everyone. joining us tonight, cnn news night with abby phillip is up next. >> tonight, delays and delusions. donald trump