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Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. This is Tom Ambrose, and I will be bringing you all the most recent developments over the coming hours.

Trump Dismisses Greene's Danger Concerns

We begin with the news that Donald Trump intensified his criticism of Republican lawmaker Marjorie Taylor Greene on the weekend, despite his reversal on resisting the release of the Jeffrey Epstein documents.

He continued to dismiss her claim that his remarks were endangering her and stated he did not think anyone was targeting her. Greene said on the previous day that Trump’s social media posts had triggered a wave of menaces aimed at her.

“Marjorie ‘Traitor’ Greene,” he said, referring to the congresswoman. “I don’t think her life is in danger... I don’t think anybody is concerned for her,” the president told the press before boarding Air Force One on Sunday evening.

Greene, a US House of Representatives member from Georgia who was long known as a staunch Trump supporter, has lately taken positions at odds with the commander-in-chief. She said on Saturday she has been contacted by security companies warning about her security and that strong criticisms against her have previously led to death threats.

Jeffrey Epstein Documents Disclosure Push

This dispute occurred while the President encouraged his GOP colleagues in Congress to vote for the publication of records concerning the late disgraced financier Epstein, changing his earlier resistance to such a action.

His message on his social media platform followed Speaker Johnson said earlier that he thought a vote on making public justice department files in the Epstein case should help dispel claims “that he [Trump] has something to do with it”.

Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform on Sunday: “GOP lawmakers should support unsealing the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide.

“And it’s time to put behind us this political stunt orchestrated by Radical Left Lunatics in order to distract from the Great Success of the GOP, including our recent Victory on the Democrat ‘Shutdown’,” he added.

Although the President and Epstein were seen together decades ago, the president has claimed the two men had a disagreement before Epstein's legal troubles. Emails released last week by a congressional panel showed the disgraced financier, who died by suicide in jail in 2019, thought the President “was aware of the girls,” though it was uncertain what that phrase meant.

Other Updates

• GOP representative Thomas Massie had questioned the President over whether the US president was making a “final attempt” to keep the complete records on the late convicted criminal Jeffrey Epstein from being disclosed by initiating a fresh investigation. The congressman and Democratic congressman Ro Khanna, the two US representatives leading the bipartisan push to make all the documents in the possession of the authorities public both raised fresh concerns about the actions by the White House.
• US forces carried out a further strike on an alleged narcotics smuggling boat in the eastern Pacific on Saturday, resulting in the deaths of three individuals aboard, the Pentagon said on the following day. “Information confirmed that the boat was engaged in illicit narcotics smuggling, traveling on a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying drugs,” the military command announced in a message on online platforms.
• The President said the United States may open talks with President Maduro, the Venezuelan president, who is under escalating pressure from Washington during a significant US military buildup in the Caribbean region. “We may be having some discussions with Maduro, and we’ll see how that turns out. They would like to talk,” the commander-in-chief said on that day, in one of the first signs of a possible path to defusing the growingly strained situation in the region.
• Donald Trump on the weekend brushed aside concerns about right-wing pundit the commentator's recent discussion with a extremist figure known for his antisemitic views, which has caused a schism within the Republican party. Trump defended Carlson, saying the ex-media personality has “said positive remarks about me in the past.” He said if he wants to speak with Nick Fuentes, whose supporters consider themselves working to preserve the nation's cultural heritage, then “people have to make up their own minds.” He did not condemn Carlson or the activist.
• The President indicated on that day that he plans to meet with New York City’s mayor-elect Mamdani and said they will “reach an agreement”, in what could be a detente for the Republican president and Democratic rising star who have cast each other as political foils. He has for months criticized the mayor-elect, falsely labelling him as a “communist” and forecasting the decline of his city, NYC, if the democratic socialist were chosen.
• A group of seventeen transgender military personnel has sued the federal government for refusing them retirement benefits and benefits. The legal filing, filed in a US court, characterizes the administration's action against them as “unlawful and invalid”.