Trump admin live updates: White House drops NASA nominee with Musk ties

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said President Donald Trump again urged Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to lower interest rates during a meeting at the White House on Thursday.

"The president did say that he believes the Fed chair is making a mistake by not lowering interest rates, which is putting us at an economic disadvantage to China and other countries. And the president's been very vocal about that, both publicly and now I can reveal privately as well," she said.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about the calls from Republicans to speak with former President Joe Biden's aides about alleged mental declines during his time in office.

The press secretary said that former first lady Jill Biden should be the one answering questions.

"Jill Biden was certainly complicit in that cover-up," Leavitt said. "There's documentation, video evidence of her clearly shielding her husband away from the camera."

Leavitt speculated that the former first lady is still lying.

"She still thinks the American public are so stupid that they're going to believe her lies," she said.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about Elon Musk's criticism of President Donald Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill Act" to fund his legislative agenda. Musk had said the bill would add to the deficit and undermine the work of the Department of Government Efficiency.

"Well, the president is very proud of the one big beautiful bill, and he wants to see it pass. He wants to set it to get to work on it and send it to his desk as quickly as possible," Leavitt said.

"Of course, as you know, Elon Musk announced last night his departure as an official government employee from the Trump administration. We thank him for his service. We thank him for getting DOGE off of the ground and the efforts to cut waste, fraud and abuse will continue," she continued.

Asked again to respond directly to Musk's criticisms, Leavitt only said the White House believes the bill will lead to savings.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about ongoing negotiations for a ceasefire in Gaza.

"I can confirm that Special Envoy Witkoff and the president submitted a ceasefire proposal to Hamas that Israel backed and supported," Leavitt told reporters. "Israel signed off on this proposal before it was sent to Hamas. I could also confirm that those discussions are continuing, and we hope that a ceasefire in Gaza will take place so we can return all of the hostages home, and that's been a priority from this administration from the beginning. I won't comment further as we are in the midst of this right now."

Asked if Hamas has accepted the proposal, Leavitt said not to her knowledge but if that becomes the case there will be an announcement from the administration.