US news
Trump’s brutal message to Spanish chef as president wields White House axe
A well-known Spanish chef was among four people fired in a Truth Social post by US president Donald Trump.

Early on Tuesday, returning US president Donald Trump publicly fired the Spanish chef José Ramón Andrés Puerta, better known simply as José Andrés, dismissing the 55-year-old from his White House role with a brutal social-media message.
A well-known TV chef and restaurateur, José Andrés had been appointed by former president Joe Biden as co-chair of the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness, and Nutrition in 2022.
Within hours of Trump’s return to the Oval Office, however, the Spaniard - who also holds American citizenship, and is the founder of the non-profit organization World Central Kitchen - was told his services would no longer be required.
“YOU’RE FIRED!”
In a post on his social-media platform Truth Social, Trump also dismissed Mark Milley, Brian Hook and Keisha Lance Bottoms from their roles within governmental bodies, amid a promise to purge “over a thousand” Biden appointees.
“Our first day in the White House is not over yet!” Trump wrote. “My Presidential Personnel Office is actively in the process of identifying and removing over a thousand Presidential Appointees from the previous Administration, who are not aligned with our vision to Make America Great Again.
“Let this serve as Official Notice of Dismissal for these 4 individuals, with many more, coming soon:
“Jose Andres from the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition, Mark Milley from the National Infrastructure Advisory Council, Brian Hook from the Wilson Center for Scholars, and Keisha Lance Bottoms from the President’s Export Council—YOU’RE FIRED!”
Trump, who was sworn in as the 47th US president on Monday lunchtime, became well known for using the phrase “you’re fired” during his period as the star and co-producer of the reality-TV show The Apprentice.
When Trump and José Andrés traded lawsuits
Trump and José Andrés have previous. In 2016, the latter had been due to open a restaurant at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, DC, but he pulled out of the deal after Trump made disparaging remarks about undocumented immigrants, referring to them as “criminals” and “rapists”.
Trump responded by suing José Andrés, who counter-sued. The pair reached a settlement in 2017.

Milley among Biden’s last-minute pardons
Milley, who was chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2019 to 2023, was among four people issued with pre-emptive pardons by Biden on Monday, just hours before the Democrat left office.
The 66-year-old, whose spell as the US’s top military officer overlapped with Trump’s first term in the White House from 2017 to 2021, has previously been labeled as “treasonous” by the re-elected commander-in-chief.
In a Truth Social post in September 2023, Trump claimed Milley deserved “death” for going behind his back in the final period of his opening tenure as president, by speaking to a Chinese general to offer reassurances that the US was not planning a military attack on the Asian nation.
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