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US President Donald Trump on Tuesday defended his decision to pardon the 1,500-plus people who were charged and convicted of assaulting police officers during the January 6, 2021, US Capitol riot, despite having run as an ally of law enforcement.

"I am the friend of police, more than any president who's ever been in this office," he said.

Trump told reporters at the White House that those he pardoned have already served years in prison, claiming murderers often aren't charged for their crimes.

"We pardoned people who were treated unbelievably poorly," he said.

US President Donald Trump moved quickly to remake the Department of Homeland Security on Tuesday, firing the heads of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) and Coast Guard before their terms are up, and eliminated all the members of a key aviation security advisory group.

Trump's immigration policy changes drew the most attention at Homeland Security, but he is also making changes at the rest of the massive agency.

Members of the Aviation Security Advisory Committee received a memo on Tuesday saying the department is eliminating the membership of all advisory committees as part of a "commitment to eliminating the misuse of resources and ensuring that DHS activities prioritize our national security".

The aviation security committee, which was mandated by the Congress after the 1988 PanAm 103 bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, will technically continue to exist but it won't have any members to carry out the work of examining safety issues at airlines and airports.

Before Tuesday, the group included representatives of all the key groups in the industry — including the airlines and major unions — as well as members of a group associated with the victims of the PanAm 103 bombing.

The vast majority of the group's recommendations were adopted over the years.

It wasn't immediately clear how many other committees were effectively eliminated on Tuesday or whether other departments will take similar actions. A similar safety group advises the Federal Railroad Administration on new rules and safety issues in that industry.

TSA administrator David Pekoske was fired even though he was originally appointed by Trump during his first term and was in the middle of what was supposed to be Pekoske's second five-year term in the job.

Pekoske oversaw the army of airport security workers who screen passengers to help keep flights safe. But a recent string of stowaways discovered onboard flights and hiding inside wheel wells of planes renewed questions about aviation security.

The firing of Coast Guard Commandant Adm Linda Fagan eliminated the armed forces' first female service chief who had served since 2022.

That move was met with shock by some Democratic members of Congress.

Senator Maria Cantwell, ranking member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, credited Fagan with having a commitment to fixing a decades-long culture of sexual assault within the Coast Guard and the prestigious service academy in Connecticut.

Cantwell said during a Tuesday interview on CNN that Fagan's firing is "appalling".

Under Fagan's watch, the US Coast Guard apologised in 2023 for not taking "appropriate action" years ago when it failed to adequately handle cases of sexual assault and harassment at the academy.

The service also acknowledged it did not widely disclose its six-year internal investigation into dozens of cases from 1988 to 2006, known as Operation Fouled Anchor.

Last year, however, Fagan received bipartisan criticism for not being cooperative enough with congressional investigations into the abuse.

Rep Joe Courtney, whose district includes the Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut, said in a statement: "President Trump's unprecedented decision on day one to fire a service chief ahead of her scheduled departure is an abuse of power that slanders the good name and record of Admiral Fagan."

In addition to those firings, Trump will also appoint a new administrator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency who he has criticised harshly for the way it responded to disasters like Hurricane Helene last fall and the California wildfires. It is customary for the head of that agency to be replaced every time a new president takes office.

US President Donald Trump on Tuesday repeated that he expects to speak with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin “very soon” as he once again called for an end game in the nearly three-year-old Russian invasion of Ukraine, and claimed that the conflict would have never happened had he been the president.

“Russia never would have gone into Ukraine. I had a very strong understanding with Putin. That would have never, ever happened. He disrespected Biden. Very simple. He disrespects people. He’s smart. He understands. He disrespected Biden,” Trump said.

Trump said he is ready to meet Puti anytime, but warned at the same time that he would likely impose sanctions on Russia if the latter does not come to the negotiations table on the issue of Ukraine.

“It sounds likely,” Trump told reporters when asked if the US will impose additional sanctions on Russia if Putin doesn't come to the negotiation table.

“The war should have never started. If you had a competent President, which you didn't, the war wouldn't have happened. The war in Ukraine would have never happened if I were the president,” Trump said.

“Also, the Middle East would have never happened because Iran was broke,” he added.

Responding to a query, Trump said he is ready to meet Putin anytime.

“Anytime they want, I'll meet. Millions of people are being killed... It's a vicious situation and they're now largely soldiers. A lot of people have been killed and the cities look like demolition sites,” he said.

"The thing with Ukraine is that many more people died than what you're reporting. You're not reporting the real numbers, and I'm not blaming you for that. I'm blaming maybe our government for not wanting to release those numbers," Trump told reporters.

Asked if the US will continue sending weapons to Ukraine, or will he turn off the tap soon, Trump said he is looking into the matter.

"We'll look into that. We're talking to (Volodymyr) Zelenskyy. We're going to be talk with President Putin very soon, and we'll see how it all happens. We're going to look at it very soon," he said.

"One thing I do feel is that the European Union should pay a lot more than they're paying, because under Biden, I mean, we're in there for USD 200 billion more. Now it affects them... We have an ocean in between, right? The European Union should equal us. We're in there for USD 200 billion more than the European Union. I mean, what are we, stupid? I guess the answer is yes," the president said.

Trump also said that Ukraine President Zelensky told him that he would like to have peace.

"He's told me that wants to have peace very strongly, but it takes two to tangle. We'll see what happens. Anytime they want, I'll meet. I'd like to see that end. Millions of people are being killed. It's a vicious situation," he said.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has an answer for US President Donald Trump about his idea of renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the “Gulf of America”: “He can call it whatever he wants on the American part of it.”

Sheinbaum on Tuesday had been working through the raft of executive orders from Trump that relate to Mexico, emphasising Mexico's sovereignty and the need for dialogue, but when she got to the renaming of the Gulf of Mexico, she couldn't help but laugh.

“He says that he will call it the Gulf of America on its continental shelf,” Sheinbaum said. “For us it is still the Gulf of Mexico, and for the entire world it is still the Gulf of Mexico.”

Trump said in his inaugural address Monday that he will change the name, an idea he first brought up earlier this month during a news conference.

“A short time from now, we are going to be changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America,” he said. Hours later he signed an Executive Order to do it.

Sheinbaum projected on a large screen at her daily press briefing Trump's order called “Restoring Names that Honour American Greatness.”

The order says that within 30 days, the US secretary of the interior will rename “the US Continental Shelf area bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the States of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida and extending to the seaward boundary with Mexico and Cuba.” Americans and Mexicans diverge on what to call another key body of water, the river that forms the border between Texas and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas. Americans call it the Rio Grande; Mexicans call it the Rio Bravo.

The first time Trump mentioned the idea of changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico, Sheinbaum responded sarcastically suggesting instead renaming North America as “América Mexicana” or “Mexican America.” This time, she just briefly insisted: “For us and for the entire world it will continue to be called the Gulf of Mexico.”