The Trump administration is recalling nearly 30 U.S. ambassadors and senior career diplomats to ensure embassies align with President Donald Trump’s “America First” agenda, a move critics say could weaken U.S. credibility abroad.

The State Department declined to name those affected, with a senior official calling the recalls a routine step for new administrations. The official said ambassadors are the president’s representatives and must advance his policy priorities.

However, officials familiar with the matter said the recalls largely affect career Foreign Service officers posted to smaller countries, where ambassadors are traditionally non-partisan. Those ordered back to Washington were encouraged to seek other roles within the State Department.

The American Foreign Service Association said some diplomats were notified by phone without explanation, calling the process “highly irregular” and warning that such actions risk harming morale and U.S. effectiveness overseas. The State Department did not respond to the criticism.

The move, first reported by Politico, comes as Trump seeks to place loyalists in senior roles during his second term, after facing resistance from the foreign policy establishment in his first.

Democrats have criticised the decision, noting that around 80 ambassadorial posts remain vacant. Senator Jeanne Shaheen said the recalls undermine U.S. leadership and benefit rivals such as China and Russia.

U.S. President Donald Trump is preparing to significantly expand his immigration crackdown in 2026, backed by billions of dollars in new funding, even as political opposition grows ahead of next year’s midterm elections.

ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection are set to receive an additional $170 billion through September 2029, enabling the administration to hire thousands of new agents, expand detention facilities and increase enforcement actions, including more workplace raids. While immigration agents have already been surged into major U.S. cities, many economically critical workplaces were largely spared in 2025.

The plans come amid rising public unease over aggressive tactics, including neighborhood raids and the detention of some U.S. citizens. Trump’s approval rating on immigration has fallen from 50% in March to 41% in mid-December, according to recent polling.

The administration has also revoked temporary legal status for hundreds of thousands of Haitian, Venezuelan and Afghan migrants, expanding the pool of people eligible for deportation.

About 622,000 immigrants have been deported since Trump took office in January, short of his goal of 1 million deportations per year.

White House border czar Tom Homan said arrests will increase sharply next year as staffing and detention capacity grow. Critics warn that expanded workplace enforcement could raise labor costs and deepen political and economic backlash ahead of the elections.

U.S. negotiators met Russian officials in Florida on Saturday for the latest talks aimed at ending Russia’s war in Ukraine, as President Donald Trump’s administration tries to coax an agreement out of both sides to end the conflict, Reuters reported.

The Miami meeting followed U.S. talks on Friday with Ukrainian and European officials, the latest discussions of a peace plan that has sparked some hope of a resolution to the conflict that began when Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev told reporters after meeting U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner that the talks were constructive and would continue on Sunday. A White House official said the talks had concluded for the day.

“The discussions are proceeding constructively. They began earlier and will continue today, and will also continue tomorrow,” Dmitriev said.

Marco Rubio, Trump’s top diplomat and national security advisor, had said he might also join the talks.

U.S., Ukrainian and European officials earlier this week reported progress on security guarantees for Kyiv as part of the talks to end the war, but it remains unclear if those terms will be acceptable to Moscow.

A Russian source told Reuters that any meeting between Dmitriev and the Ukrainian negotiators had been ruled out.

In Kyiv, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday that Ukraine would back a U.S. proposal for three-sided talks with the United States and Russia if it facilitated more exchanges of prisoners and paved the way for meetings of national leaders.

“America is now proposing a trilateral meeting with national security advisers — America Ukraine, Russia,” Zelenskiy told local journalists in Kyiv.

U.S. intelligence reports continue to warn that Putin intends to capture all of Ukraine, sources familiar with the intelligence said, contradicting some U.S. officials’ assertions that Moscow is ready for peace.

Putin offered no compromise during his annual press conference in Moscow, insisting that Russia’s terms for ending the war had not changed since June 2024, when he demanded Ukraine abandon its ambition to join NATO and withdraw entirely from four Ukrainian regions Russia claims as its own territory, Reuters reported.

Kyiv says it will not cede land that Moscow’s forces have failed to capture in nearly four years of war.

Ukraine’s top negotiator Rustem Umerov said U.S. and European teams on Friday held talks and agreed to pursue their joint efforts.

“We agreed with our American partners on further steps and on continuing our joint work in the near future,” Umerov wrote on Telegram of the discussions in the United States, adding that he had informed Zelenskiy of the outcome of the talks.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Rubio told reporters on Friday that progress has been made in discussions to end the war but there is still a way to go.

“The role we’re trying to play is a role of figuring out whether there’s any overlap here that they can agree to, and that’s what we’ve invested a lot of time and energy and continue to do so. That may not be possible. I hope it is. I hope it can get done this month before the end of the year.”