White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt slammed Democrats' hypocritical position ahead of DOGE's Social Security audit. Leavitt defended President Donald Trump and Elon Musk's objectives on "Hannity" Monday, pointing out that former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton championed rooting out waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars. A federal judge on Tuesday declined to block Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency from accessing government data and firing federal employees. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan declined to grant the plaintiffs' request to issue a temporary restraining order, citing what she said was their failure to demonstrate evidence of "irreparable harm" caused by DOGE's access. "Plaintiffs legitimately call into question what appears to be the unchecked authority of an unelected individual and an entity that was not created by Congress and over which it has no oversight," Chutkan, an Obama appointee, said Tuesday. "In these circumstances, it must be indisputable that this court acts within the bounds of its authority. Accordingly, the Court cannot issue a TRO, especially one as wide-ranging as Plaintiffs request, without clear evidence of imminent, irreparable harm to these Plaintiffs. The current record does not meet that standard." Russia and the U.S. agreed Tuesday to start working toward ending the war in Ukraine and improving their diplomatic and economic ties, the two countries’ top diplomats said after talks that reflected an extraordinary about-face in U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump. In an interview with The Associated Press after the meeting, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the two sides agreed broadly to pursue three goals: to restore staffing at their respective embassies in Washington and Moscow, to create a high-level team to support Ukraine peace talks and to explore closer relations and economic cooperation. He stressed, however, that the talks — which were attended by his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, and other senior Russian and U.S. officials — marked the beginning of a conversation, and more work needs to be done.