WASHINGTON (AP) — Key U.S. agencies, including the FBI, State Department and the Pentagon, have instructed their employees not to comply with cost-cutting chief Elon Musk’s latest demand that federal workers explain what they accomplished last week — or risk losing their job.

The pushback from appointees of President Donald Trump marked a new level of chaos and confusion within the beleaguered federal workforce, just a month after Trump returned to the White House and quickly began fulfilling campaign promises to shrink the government.

Administration officials scrambled throughout the weekend to interpret Musk’s unusual mandate, which apparently has Trump’s backing despite some lawmakers arguing it is illegal. Unions want the administration to rescind the request and are threatening to sue.

Some officials are resisting. Others are encouraging their workers to comply. At some agencies, there was conflicting guidance.

One message on Sunday morning from the Department of Health and Human Services, led by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., instructed its roughly 80,000 employees to comply. That was shortly after the acting general counsel, Sean Keveney, had instructed some not to. And by Sunday evening, agency leadership issued new instructions that employees should “pause activities” on the request until noon Monday.

“I’ll be candid with you. Having put in over 70 hours of work last week advancing Administration’s priorities, I was personally insulted to receive the below email,” Keveney said in an email viewed by The Associated Press.

Keveney laid out security concerns and pointed out some of the work done by the agency’s employees may be protected by attorney-client privilege: “I have received no assurances that there are appropriate protections in place to safeguard responses to this email.”

Musk’s team sent an email to federal employees on Saturday giving them roughly 48 hours to report five specific things they had accomplished last week. In a separate message on X, Musk said any employee who failed to respond by the deadline — set in the email as 11:59 p.m. EST Monday — would lose their job.

Pushback to Musk’s demand

Democrats and even some Republicans were critical of Musk’s ultimatum, which came just hours after Trump encouraged him on social media to “get more aggressive” in reducing the size of the government through his Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

Sen. John Curtis, R-Utah, was among the members of Trump’s party who had concerns.

“If I could say one thing to Elon Musk, it’s like, please put a dose of compassion in this,” Curtis, whose state has 33,000 federal employees, said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “These are real people. These are real lives. These are mortgages. ... It’s a false narrative to say we have to cut and you have to be cruel to do it as well.”

On ABC’s “This Week,” Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., questioned the legal basis the Trump administration would have for dismissing tens of thousands of workers for refusing to heed Musk’s latest demand. The email did not include the threat about workers losing their jobs.

For Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., there was no doubt: “The actions he’s taking are illegal,” he said on “Face the Nation.”

Trump mocked the affected workers in a meme Sunday on his social media network. The post featured a cartoon character writing a list of accomplishments from the previous week led by, “Cried about Trump,” “Cried about Elon,” “Made it into the office for once,” and “Read some emails.”

Some federal agencies aren’t complying

Newly confirmed FBI Director Kash Patel, an outspoken Trump ally, instructed bureau employees to ignore Musk’s request, at least for now.

“The FBI, through the Office of the Director, is in charge of all of our review processes, and will conduct reviews in accordance with FBI procedures,” Patel wrote in an email confirmed by the AP. “When and if further information is required, we will coordinate the responses. For now, please pause any responses.”

Ed Martin, the interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, sent his staff a message Sunday that may cause more confusion. Martin noted that he responded to Musk’s order.

“Let me clarify: We will comply with this OPM request whether by replying or deciding not to reply,” Martin wrote in the email obtained by the AP, referring to the Office of Personnel Management.

“Please make a good faith effort to reply and list your activities (or not, as you prefer), and I will, as I mentioned, have your back regarding any confusion,” Martin continued. “We can do this.”

The night before, Martin had instructed staff to comply. “DOGE and Elon are doing great work. Historic. We are happy to participate,” Martin wrote at that time.

Officials at the Departments of State, Defense and Homeland Security were more consistent.

Tibor Nagy, acting undersecretary of state for management, told employees in an email that department leadership would respond on behalf of workers.

“No employee is obligated to report their activities outside of their Department chain of command,” Nagy wrote in an email.

Pentagon leadership instructed employees to “pause” any response to Musk’s team as well.

“The Department of Defense is responsible for reviewing the performance of its personnel and it will conduct any review in accordance with its own procedures,” according to an email from Jules Hurst, deputy undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness. “When and if required, the Department will coordinate responses.”

The Homeland Security Department told employees that “no reporting action from you is needed at this time” and that agency managers would respond, according to an email from R.D. Alles, deputy undersecretary for management.

Job cuts across the government

Everett Kelley, president of the 800,000-member American Federation of Government Employees, said in a letter Sunday to the administration that it should rescind Musk’s request and apologize to all federal workers by the end of the day.

“We believe that employees have no obligation to respond to this plainly unlawful email absent other lawful direction,” he wrote, describing Musk as “unelected and unhinged.”

Thousands of government employees have already been forced out of the federal workforce — either by being fired or through a “deferred resignation” offer. There is no official figure available for the total firings or layoffs so far, but the AP has tallied hundreds of thousands of workers who are being affected.

Musk on Sunday called his latest request “a very basic pulse check.”

“The reason this matters is that a significant number of people who are supposed to be working for the government are doing so little work that they are not checking their email at all!” Musk wrote on X. “In some cases, we believe non-existent people or the identities of dead people are being used to collect paychecks. In other words, there is outright fraud.”

He has provided no evidence of such fraud. Separately, Musk and Trump have falsely claimed in recent days that tens of millions of dead people over 100 years old are receiving Social Security payments.

Meanwhile, thousands of other employees are preparing to leave the federal workforce this coming week, including probationary civilian workers at the Pentagon and all but a fraction of U.S. Agency for International Development staffers through cuts or leave.

___

Peoples reported from New York. Associated Press writers Byron Tau, Ellen Knickmeyer, Matthew Perrone and Tara Copp in Washington and Valerie Gonzalez in McAllen, Texas, contributed to this report.

YORK, Pa. (AP) — Workers at a Pennsylvania hospital who were injured during a shooting that left the gunman and a police officer dead were reported “medically stable” Sunday as the hospital remained closed to visitors, according to the hospital.

Investigators were still piecing together what happened a day after a man armed with a pistol and carrying zip ties headed straight to the intensive care unit at UPMC Memorial Hospital in York and took staff members hostage before he was killed by police in a shootout that also left an officer dead.

A doctor, a nurse, a custodian and two other police officers were shot and wounded in the attack at the central Pennsylvania hospital on Saturday, authorities said. A fourth hospital staffer was injured in a fall.

UPMC officials said injured staff members were “progressing in their recovery” but visitors would not be allowed for the time being as the hospital beefed up medical campus security.

“We know that families and visitors are vital to helping patients heal, and we are working toward making visitation possible again,” the hospital said in a statement.

Authorities have said little about the shooter’s motive.

York County District Attorney Tim Barker said while the investigation is in its early stages, it appears the shooter had previous contact with the hospital’s ICU earlier in the week for “a medical purpose involving another individual” and he intentionally targeted the workers there.

Gunfire erupted after officers went to engage the shooter, whom authorities identified as 49-year-old Diogenes Archangel-Ortiz. He was holding at gunpoint a female staff member who had her hands bound with zip ties when police opened fire, authorities said.

The officer who died was identified as Andrew Duarte of the West York Borough Police Department.

Duarte was a law enforcement veteran who joined the department in 2022 after five years with the Denver Police Department, according to his LinkedIn profile. He described receiving a “hero award” in 2021 from Mothers Against Drunk Driving for his work in impaired driving enforcement for the state of Colorado.

“Officer Duarte’s bravery and commitment to upholding the law are a testament to the selflessness shown daily by those who have dedicated themselves to protecting and serving,” Pennsylvania State Lodge Fraternal Order of Police said in a statement.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, who ordered flags be flown half-staff to honor Duarte, said he met Saturday evening with Duarte’s parents and fellow officers who were wounded. The two wounded officers, from Northern York County Regional and Springettsbury Township police departments, were reported in stable condition.

“Their willingness to run toward danger helped save the lives of others,” Shapiro said on the social platform X. “I’m grateful to them and all law enforcement who answered the call today in York.”

UPMC Memorial is a five-story, 104-bed hospital that opened in 2019 in York, a city of about 40,000 people.

The shooting is part of a wave of gun violence in recent years that has swept through U.S. hospitals and medical centers, which have struggled to adapt to the growing threats. Such attacks have helped make health care one of the nation’s most violent fields, with workers suffering more nonfatal injuries from workplace violence than workers in any other profession, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

SADDLE BROOK, N.J. (News 12) - A New Jersey woman is back at the pet shop she has owned for five years after a harrowing ordeal.

On Monday, a customer came into the store and shot her with a crossbow, according to police.

“Sometimes we have a lot of people at that time, but that particular day there was nobody here,” store owner Katarina Ruk said.

Ruk says 53-year-old Raymond Carey, a longtime customer, came into the store around 6 p.m.

“He said something when he went to the back, but I couldn’t hear, so I went through this aisle here and when I got closer to him, I said ‘What did you say? I didn’t hear you,‘ That’s when I saw him pull the crossbow out of a small bag that he had and he just shot me like that,” Ruk said.

When he went to grab another arrow to shoot her with, she says she knocked the crossbow of his hand.

“If I had not taken that, I’m sure he would have killed me. I took out the arrow that I had in my mouth and I went outside running asking for help,” Ruk said,

Ruk ran to a nearby bike shop for help. She told employees there to call the police. She was taken to the hospital for her injuries.

“I had to get three teeth pulled from my bottom jaw on the left side. I have two broken that are probably going to have to come off in three to four weeks,” she said.

Ruk’s lips and tongue were also cut.

She is expecting to fully recover in about five months but says the physical trauma is nothing compared to the emotional trauma.

“He’s in jail, but it’s like now I have that insecurity feeling on me,” she said.

Carey faces attempted murder charges.

Ruk says Carey came into the store frequently and was generally quiet. She says she has no idea why he shot her.

(CNN) – Why did the alligator cross the road?

It certainly wasn’t to help a turtle get to the other side.

The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service shared video of the moment when a gator stopped traffic at the Arthur R. Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge in Florida.

The video shows the reptile walking across the street while holding onto a turtle with its teeth.

While some online have joked about how helpful the gator was by helping the turtle cross the road, adult alligators are known to eat turtles along with other fish, snakes, small mammals and birds.

KILGORE, Texas (KLTV/Gray News) - A former instructional aide was arrested for allegedly having a relationship with a student.

Kayla Nicole O’Dell, 34, is accused of being in a relationship with a Kilgore Independent School District student.

She was employed at the school from August 2023 until January 2025, when an investigation started into possible educator misconduct involving her.

After the investigation, the district said that the results were given to law enforcement officials.

O’Dell is being held in the Gregg County Jail without bond.

ATLANTA, Ga. (WANF/Gray News) - A lawsuit has been filed in Georgia federal court by one of the passengers on the Delta Airlines flight that crashed at Toronto Pearson International Airport.

The lawsuit was filed by Marthinus Lourens, a Texas resident who was on the Delta airplane when it flipped over while trying to land at the airport on Feb. 17.

The lawsuit claims Lourens suffered severe injuries to his head, back and face from the crash.

“During the crash sequence, Mr. Lourens was belted in his seat, which prevented him from sustaining life-threatening injuries,” the lawsuit states. “As the plane rolled upside down, Mr. Lourens was drenched with jet fuel.

Experiencing the crash and being suspended upside by his seatbelt while drenched with jet fuel, in a burning plane, caused Mr. Lourens to suffer severe emotional distress and mental anguish.”

The lawsuit was filed in the Northern District of Georgia Atlanta Division.

CBS News reported this lawsuit is the first the airline is facing following the crash.

Earlier this week, Delta Airlines said they were offering $30,000 to passengers who were aboard the flight.

Delta declined to comment on pending litigation.

LAREDO, Tex. (KGNS) - For the first time this year, the Laredo City Council is addressing ongoing immigration policies, and the fear that some may have.

During Laredo’s City Council meeting on February 18, a Laredo attorney informed community members about their rights when dealing with immigration authorities.

The attorney, David Almaraz, stresses that citizen or not, you have rights. “You have the right not to answer certain questions. You have the right to remain silent. You have to right to ask for an attorney,” he advised.

Councilmember for District 3, Melissa Cigarroa, put the presentation on the agenda. She explained that she finds these conversations important within a border community, especially one like Laredo, where over 95% of people are Latino according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

She added that as immigration continues to be a focus point, it’s important for local government to inform people about their civil rights. “There are people who still feel that it is only criminals who are here without papers that are being targeted. In reality, we’ve heard cases where everyone is getting caught and round-up whether you have papers or not,” she said.

Almaraz states that in situations like that, people should remain polite and follow directions, and if asked about your immigration status, you have the right to remain silent.

He mentioned a few things to consider in such a situation. “Do not resist. Just say ‘I need a lawyer, can I call my lawyer?’ especially if they may be undocumented or have problems with their visas. You can also say ‘Can I call my immigration lawyer’ and they have to let you make a phone call.”

Moving forward, he believes local governments need to push back against policies being touted nationwide.

“Can ICE come into our school? Well, they’ve been doing it in other cities, and they keep saying, ‘No no it’s not going to happen here.' Whatever is happening in other places can and will happen here,“ Amaraz said.

Though no other council members spoke for or against the current situation, Cigarroa hopes the city council will draft a resolution that incorporates the perspectives of immigrant rights organizations in Laredo and establishes a united front on immigration policy.

Information that was provided during the presentation can be found here.

OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — Steve Bannon was accused of making a Nazi salute as he concluded a speech at a conservative gathering where President Donald Trump is slated to speak this weekend, but Bannon said Friday the gesture was merely a “wave.”

Bannon, who once served as Trump’s chief strategist and helped lead his 2016 Republican campaign, was onstage at the Conservative Political Action Conference outside of Washington on Thursday evening when he extended his right arm in the air, his palm flat, after imploring the crowd to “Fight! Fight! Fight!” — a reference to what Trump shouted after an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, during last year’s campaign.

The gesture drew immediate backlash due to its similarities with the right-arm salute linked in history to the Nazis and their allies.

“Steve Bannon’s long and disturbing history of stoking antisemitism and hate, threatening violence, and empowering extremists is well known and well documented by ADL and others,” the Anti-Defamation League, an antisemitism and human rights watchdog, wrote on X in response. “We are not surprised, but are concerned about the normalization of this behavior.”

Meanwhile, French far-right National Rally president Jordan Bardella said he had cancelled his scheduled speech at CPAC on Friday in reaction to what he described as “a gesture referring to Nazi ideology.”

“While I was not present in the room, one of the speakers allowed himself, out of provocation, a gesture referring to Nazi ideology. As a consequence, I made the immediate decision to cancel my speech,” Bardella said in a written statement.

Bannon, speaking to a French journalist from Le Point news magazine on Friday, said the gesture was not a Nazi salute but was “a wave like I did all the time.”

“I do it at the end of all of my speeches to thank the crowd,” Bannon said.

Bannon, whose “War Room” podcast is extremely popular on the right, also blasted Bardella for his decision to cancel, calling him “unworthy to lead France.”

“He’s a boy, not a man,” Bannon said, according to video posted by correspondent Claire Meynial.

He echoed those comments later Friday, telling The Associated Press, “If he canceled because I waved to the crowd like I did at the Front National seven years ago ... he’s not a man and he will never be the leader of France.”

Online, some far-right users suggested Bannon had made the gesture purposely to “trigger” liberals and the media, while others distanced themselves. Nick Fuentes, a far-right influencer and Trump ally who uses his platform to share his antisemitic views, said in a livestream that Bannon’s salute was “getting a little uncomfortable even for me.”

Bannon’s gesture came at the end of a speech in which he repeated lies about the 2020 election, which Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden, and continued to press for Trump to serve a third term, something the Constitution explicitly bars.

“The future of America is MAGA. And the future of MAGA is Donald J. Trump,” he said. “We want Trump in ’28!”

Bannon is not the only person in Trump’s orbit whose gestures have come under scrutiny.

Trump adviser Elon Musk drew criticism last month after he slapped his hand on his chest and then extended his arm out in a speech at Capital One Arena celebrating Trump’s inauguration. But extremist monitors and experts said it was unclear what Musk was trying to convey to the crowd.

Musk “made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute,” the ADL concluded.

Musk also pushed back. “Frankly, they need better dirty tricks,” he posted on X several hours after he left the stage. “The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is sooo tired.”

Marshall Lerner, a Jewish conservative who attended CPAC but had not seen Bannon’s appearance or gesture, said he was bothered by how some critics look to link Trump’s Make America Great Again movement with Nazism and mentioned the criticism of Musk.

“It’s like saying if the Nazis got up in the morning and they ate breakfast and Trump got up in the morning and ate breakfast, he is doing things that the Nazis are doing,” Lerner said. “That’s silly. That’s ridiculous. That doesn’t make any sense.”

CPAC chairman Matt Schlapp defended Bannon, writing on X that he participated in the passing of resolutions in strong support of Israel and in opposition to antisemitism as they kicked off the conference.

“I stand w Israel and Bannon,” Schlapp wrote.

This year’s gathering, held in Oxon Hill, Maryland, has drawn a who’s who of conservative leaders and Trump administration officials, including numerous Cabinet members. Vice President JD Vance addressed the convention earlier Thursday.