Trump inauguration countdown, Gaza hostages release and TikTok restored
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Today, Donald Trump will be sworn in for his second term at a critical juncture for the world. In Gaza, Israeli hostages are beginning to return to their families, while Gazans attempt to return to whatever homes they have left. And TikTok reboots in the U.S. after Trump promises to stall the ban. It's Monday, January 20th. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes every weekday.

I'm Tara Oaks in Liverpool. Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. Recently, I asked Mint Mobile's legal team if big wireless companies are allowed to raise prices due to inflation. They said yes. And then when I asked if raising prices technically violates those onerous two-year contracts, they said, what the f*** are you talking about, you insane Hollywood a**hole?

So to recap, we're cutting the price of Mint Unlimited from $30 a month to just $15 a month. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes. See details. Donald Trump will be sworn in as US president today. A triumphant political comeback with promises to secure retribution against his political enemies and transform the role of the US on the world stage.

On the eve of his inauguration, Trump bathed in red and blue lights, reinforced his ambitious plans for his first day to roars of approval from thousands of supporters. With historic speed and strength and fix every single crisis facing our country, we have to do it. He mentioned several campaign promises, from immigration crackdowns to removing diversity, equity and inclusion from the military.

And promised to release classified documents surrounding the assassinations of JFK and Martin Luther King Jr. Tim Reed was at the D.C. rally and spoke to fans outside the arena. The queue must be at least a mile long to try and get a seat. It's an arena that only holds 20,000 people. And it's also the arena where Trump's post-inaugural parade is going to be held because the events have been moved indoors.

It's a cold and rainy day here but as I've seen many times before in the last two years

Trump's supporters are never diminished by the weather when they want to see their hero. Supporters like Val Torgeman and Michelle McGibbon from Denver, Colorado, who plan to stand in line all night for a chance to make it into the festivities today. So you're going to camp out. You know how cold it's going to be. I know. And we also found out that you can't bring anything with you because they won't let you in. So you literally just have your coat and your clothes on and you just...

The traditional parade down Pennsylvania Avenue past the White House will now take place indoors at the Capital One Arena. The swearing-in itself will take place at noon local and was moved indoors for the first time in 40 years due to the extreme cold. Trump has promised a flurry of executive orders on day one, and you can hear more about his immediate plans in our weekend special episode. There's a link in the pod description.

But the rally was also a chance for him to celebrate what he sees as early victories. Perhaps most beautiful of all, this week we achieved an epic ceasefire agreement as a first step toward lasting peace in the Middle East.

And this agreement could only have happened as a result of our historic victory in November. Trump, like his predecessor President Joe Biden, claiming credit as the long-awaited Gaza ceasefire takes hold. But I'm glad to report that the first hostages have just been released. The three female hostages have been reunited with their families and have been identified as Romy Gonen, Doren Steinbrecher and Emily Damari.

We caught up with our Israel and Palestinian Territories Bureau Chief, James McKenzie, after they were released.

It's a classic sort of mixed emotion, I think. Everyone's, of course, really thrilled to see these three young women come back. There is some disagreement about the broader hostage deal itself. The National Security Minister, Itamar Ben-Gavir, one of the big hardliners in the government, resigned over the deal. A lot of people think that it leaves the remaining 64 hostages who aren't included in the first batch

They don't think that the ceasefire will hold and they don't think those people will come back. And then there are others who oppose the deal because it does leave Hamas still standing in Gaza. Severely weakened, of course, but as we saw, there was quite a show of strength from Hamas. On the ground in Gaza this morning, men armed police on the streets, police directing traffic, that kind of thing. And in the West Bank, thousands turned out to welcome freed Palestinian prisoners.

And we saw displaced Gazans taking their belongings and returning to their homes, or what's left of them.

It's going to be one of the major challenges in the weeks, months ahead in how to rehouse this population. Almost all of Gaza has been displaced. Huge squades of the territory are completely destroyed. People are going to have to have somewhere to live. And that's just a tremendous problem that the world community is going to have to grapple with in some way.

The ceasefire deal wasn't the only thing Trump and his supporters celebrated at the pre-inauguration rally. — And as of today, TikTok is back. — He told the crowd he had to save the app. — …and the United States will do what we call a joint venture.

And there's no risk. We're not putting up any money. Trump says he'll extend the period of time before the ban takes effect. And he'd like the United States to have a 50% ownership position in that joint venture. TikTok told users in a welcome back message. As a result of President Trump's efforts, TikTok is back in the U.S.

David Shepardson has been covering the TikTok ban and all the back and forth. Late on Saturday night before the deadline kicked in, the app disappeared from Google and Apple's app stores. So what TikTok said in the run-up to that was they needed a definitive, affirmative statement that the law would not be enforced in order for it to stay up. But what's clear is

The statement that President-elect Trump put out that said companies would not face any enforcement actions for what they did before he took office and after was enough protection for companies to allow TikTok to go back online. So it's back for now, albeit with some performance issues. But what happens next? This really is setting up a real challenge, right? Because this law is very clear. It says TikToks

TikTok is banned unless ByteDance sold the app by January 19th. And it gave the president, and there's a debate whether President-elect Trump can do it past the 19th, a one-time 90-day extension of that deadline if he can certify to Congress that they have binding agreements in place to complete a sale and a full divestiture within 90 days. Now, so far, there's no evidence of that. And we just don't know enough about what's going on behind the scenes. But

A lot of lawmakers have said, unless they meet that very high burden, they should not be allowed to be turned back on. President Trump should not give the OK. And we've heard that TikTok CEO Shuzi Chu plans to attend the presidential inauguration. But what happens politically after today? So I think if TikTok comes back on fully, I think rightfully, President Trump can take credit because I think without his robust support, it's hard to imagine this happening.

But it's definitely a very, you know, we're definitely seeing a very big point of dissension between traditional conservative Republicans who are very hawkish on China and people who say, well, he's the dealmaker. He can get this done. And as well as everything else, Trump is casting a long shadow over markets. He and his wife, Melania, have each launched new cryptocurrencies ahead of his return to the White House.

Kamal Grimans is here with more. That's right, Trump's digital coin is soaring. It's topped $11 billion in market value after launching on Friday and features an image of him from his assassination attempt back in July.

Melania Trump launched her own coin on Sunday. Its market cap is just shy of $2 billion. The moves actually caught the crypto world by surprise, and some people in that community are worried it's going to undercut efforts for crypto to be taken seriously. Meme coins like these initially started out as an industry insider joke,

They typically don't have any business model or cash flows, and there are plenty of joke tokens out there. Now, if traditional coins are more your thing, I'm thinking gold coins specifically, do check out the latest episode of my podcast, Reuters Econ World. It's all about gold and why it's soaring right now. Costco Teamsters have overwhelmingly voted in favor of a US-wide strike. They're entering their final round of talks to reach a new contract ahead of a January 31st deadline.

The union represents more than 18,000 Costco workers. In Colombia, at least 80 people have been killed and thousands displaced after talks between the government and the National Liberation Army, or ELN, guerrillas collapsed. The defense minister accusing them of targeting community leaders and former members of the FARC rebels. The ELN says that the demobilized FARC rebels have returned to arms.

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And for today's recommended read, how some LA fire victims are saying they won't try to rebuild, faced with challenges including toxic ash and soaring construction costs. There's a link to the story in today's pod description. For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com and the Reuters app. Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast player. And we'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show.