Republicans in recent years have tried to match President Donald Trump’s populism with tentative steps toward union-friendly rhetoric. Their policies have not always kept pace, but that may be changing in a small way.

The House of Representatives last week passed a Democratic-sponsored labor bill with the help of 20 Republicans who “broke party lines to support the measure,” said Time. The Faster Labor Contracts Act would amend federal law to “accelerate contract negotiations between newly unionized workplaces and their employees.” The right of workers to unionize is “crucial to improving wages, hours, working conditions and so much more,” said Rep. Pete Stauber (R-Minn.). It was the latest example of union-friendly Congressional Republicans “flexing their muscles” in the face of “furious” opposition from the GOP’s traditional free-market conservatives, said The Hill. The move is part of a “larger war” over the party’s future as it has “made inroads with unions” under Trump.

What did the commentators say?

Congressional politics “are shifting in labor’s favor,” Timothy Noah said at The New Republic. The House recently passed two other bills to restore collective bargaining rights to federal workers, thanks to a “breakaway Republican faction” that joined Democrats to provide a majority vote in support of labor rights. The union-friendly bills still face “dismal odds” in the GOP-controlled Senate. Nonetheless, the House passage of those measures demonstrates that House Speaker Mike Johnson is “losing control over his caucus.” And 20 GOP votes to defy party leadership for a pro-union measure might be a “sign that labor solidarity is starting to undermine partisan solidarity.”

The latest pro-union bill is a “gift to the cultural left,” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. Republicans who joined Democrats to pass the measure may “think they’re burnishing their populist credentials,” but they are actually “selling out their constituents to the progressive left.”

The vote to speed contract negotiations between businesses and new unions “isn’t only about wages,” said the Journal editorial. Instead, it will likely provide cover for those unions to force firms to provide reproductive and gender-affirming care coverage as part of their benefits packages. “We wonder if Republicans know what they’ve voted for.”

What next?

Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Cory Booker (D-N.J.) are sponsoring the Senate version of the act, said The Washington Examiner. Hawley is a union-friendly Republican and a social conservative, but the bill is running into opposition from other religious conservatives who say it will “require employers to cover abortion and transgender medical procedures.” Those objections “show that giant corporations are desperate to kill legislation that would help American workers,” said a spokesperson for Hawley.

The debates arrive at a time when “many union voters have turned” on Trump over rising prices and the war in Iran, said The Washington Post. Trump won 45% of union voters in 2024 on the strength of “his promise to restore U.S. manufacturing jobs.” The discontent could be meaningful in November. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations is vowing to turn out 16 million union voters for the midterm elections.

Earlier this week, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators delivered a letter to the National Science Foundation urging Acting Director Brian Stone to “reverse course” on a Trump administration plan to dismantle the “vital” Ocean Observatories Initiative. Comprising “over 900 unique deep-sea buoys and other instruments,” the OOI “provides insights into changing ecosystem conditions and extreme weather events,” said the group. The administration’s plan threatens the “safety of our coastal communities” and undermines the U.S.’s “ability to monitor coastal environments, marine currents and extreme weather events.”

What did the commentators say?

The National Science Foundation’s order to remove Initiative equipment from coastal waters off Alaska, North Carolina and Washington came with “no warning and no scientific review” last month, said The Associated Press. The program had been “slated to run another 15 to 20 years.” Pulling back now “reflects the further lack of understanding that the current administration has of scientific value and scientific merit,” said Craig McLean, who was the acting chief scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration during the first Trump term, to The New York Times. Dismantling the OOI pushes the U.S. “back yet again into a rear seat in global scientific leadership.”

OOI data on “waves, currents, salinity, the soundscape for marine mammals, carbon dioxide levels, alkalinity and more” has been a “godsend to public researchers, hazard planners and private companies alike,” said The Bulwark. The loss, for example, “could well be existential” for North Carolina’s “tourism-dependent Outer Banks economy” and will be “pretty problematic for the rest of us, too.” The change is “pulling the plug on some of the most important science being done,” said retired coastal geologist and East Carolina University teacher Stanley R. Riggs to the outlet.

The plan to shutter the OOI was originally “laid out by conservative strategist the Heritage Foundation,” said Oceanographic Magazine. The group’s Project 2025 authors “explicitly targeted the network” for its contributions to climate change research. Dismantling the ocean monitoring system “marks another step” in Trump’s “rollback of science and climate initiatives,” said The Guardian. It also comes amid Trump’s “push to expand deep-sea mining and loosen fishing regulations.”

“Preserving and improving OOI” and oceanographic science overall is “critical to advancing U.S. ocean science,” said the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine in a statement. Doing so takes on additional significance as “other countries, including our competitors,” are “increasing their investments in ocean science and advancing their capacities.”

These cuts are “part of a broader retreat from environmental and climate-related science” by this White House, the AP said. Federal law requires congressional notification “at least 30 days in advance of any planned decommissioning of agency-owned facilities.” Instead, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) “learned of the dismantling through news reports.”

“The alarm bells just went off,” said Merkley to the AP. “None of us” were given advance notice.

What next?

The National Science Foundation should respect “congressional intent and legal direction,” which is “clearly to maintain the operation of this cost-effective research system,” said the bipartisan Senate group in their letter. Any subsequent efforts to alter oceanographic research should follow a “thorough evaluation of OOI, including engagement with the marine science community and other impacted stakeholders.” The foundation must “cease this expensive, destructive and, crucially, illegal action at once,” a separate group of Democrats said in a letter signed by members of the House Committees on Science, Space, and Technology and Natural Resources.

For scientists who work with the OOI’s shared data, the program’s closure is only part of the frustration. “If we want to put [the instruments] back out again, we need people who know how to do it,” said Hilary Palevsky, a marine biogeochemistry and oceanography professor at Boston College, to The Guardian. However, the team with that exclusive expertise is “being dismantled along with the infrastructure program itself.”

Data collection for the OOI is a “huge engineering challenge,” said Palevsky in a separate interview with the Times. Researchers can’t simply leave “notes for the next person who comes in. There’s a lot of expertise that has the potential to be lost.”

Emmanuel Macron has home-field advantage during the ongoing G7 summit in the resort town of Évian-les-Bains, and the French president wants the involved countries to help him deal with Chinese trade, which he feels is unbalanced. Though China isn’t a G7 member, it has an advantage of its own given its power in the global trade market. So Macron may have to perform a delicate balancing act.

What did the commentators say?

The French president largely expects the G7 nations to “converge on the need to tackle a flood of subsidized Chinese exports that is disrupting global markets,” said Politico. But it is becoming increasingly clear that “credible action is one deliverable he won’t be able to land.” Macron is pushing for Europe and the U.S. to come together for a solution, but meetings are “unlikely to deliver answers to the problem.”

The problem is two-pronged: Beijing is “curling its lip” at Macron, while Europe and the U.S. are “diverging on how to contain China’s $1.2 trillion trade surplus,” said Politico. Macron wants the EU to present a unified front on China, and Europe has “made strides on its China policy since the Covid-19 pandemic” but “still struggles to align internally,” said The Chicago Council on Global Affairs. And the “squeeze is tightening from both directions.”

France and Macron’s ultimate goal during the summit is to “make the reduction of global imbalances and inequalities the priority and position the G7 as a space for dialogue among the major advanced industrialized democracies,” said the Chicago Council. Macron also believes that talks between China and France “signal a ‘new willingness’ by China, the U.S. and Europe to coordinate economic approaches,” said Bloomberg.

The American factor also looms large, as President Donald Trump appears to be “ready to use the G7 stage to berate allies for what he views as inadequate support,” said the Council on Foreign Relations. With this in mind, Macron’s “challenge may be less about advancing his personal initiatives than managing the summit itself.” He may find himself “confronting two sets of competing summit agendas: the one it planned and the one that geopolitical events — and Trump — have created.”

What next?

The Évian-les-Bains summit will be Macron’s last; his term as French president expires in 2027, and he is ineligible to run again. The United States is hosting the next G7 summit, meaning Macron “will seek to keep the flame alive as he passes the torch to the United States,” said the Council on Foreign Relations. China, meanwhile, maintains that it is ready and willing to engage in economic cooperation with the EU, even as these discussions come “against the backdrop of talks in Europe over possible new restrictions to counter China’s export surge,” said Bloomberg.

“All countries should uphold openness and cooperation, take an objective view of the comparative advantages of different countries, foster a free and facilitative trading environment and practice true multilateralism,” Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Guoqing said during a conference call with France, according to Chinese state news agency Xinhua. He also “called for prioritizing development, improving global governance and promoting inclusive growth of the world economy.”

Host Emmanuel Macron is expected to pull out all the stops for this week’s G7 summit to prove that this gathering of the world’s richest democracies still matters in an age of strongman politics.

In one of his last big diplomatic set pieces before his presidential term winds down next year, Macron “will seek to paper over divisions” between Donald Trump and the other six leaders, said Euronews. Top of the agenda will be trying to “forge common positions on how to end the war in Ukraine”, on the resumption of traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, and on “the development of safer technologies”.

What did the commentators say?

The summit is being held in the alpine spa town of Évian-les-Bains. The last time the G7 met here was in June 2003, when the US had invaded Iraq despite “the strident objections of France and Germany”, said Mark Landler, France editor of The New York Times. Then-US president George W. Bush “got chilly handshakes” but he worked hard with the other leaders “to maintain the veneer of like-minded countries uniting to confront the perils of an unruly world”. Two decades later, it’s the same town but another American war in the Middle East, and any “veneer” of unity has been “stripped away”.

The G7 is “a forum created to solve geopolitical crises but it was excluded from the US-Israeli planning for war” with Iran, said Flavia Krause-Jackson, Bloomberg’s Europe editor. And it was ignored by the US in both the diplomacy for and the timing of the peace deal, which Trump announced the day before the summit, with the signing taking place after it ends.

The truth is that while, collectively, the G7 nations – France, Italy, Germany, the US, the UK, Canada and Japan – might account for 45% of global GDP, individually, few would count as one of the world’s “biggest or indeed most powerful economies”, said Jonathan Moules in the Financial Times. And Trump would clearly rather play geopolitics with Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping than waste time building consensus with leaders he views as weak.

For their part, Canada and Europe “no longer view the US as a partner on key issues such as climate change and security”, said Landler in The New York Times. And some even see America as a “threat”, given Trump’s “deepening disdain for Nato” and his repeated pursuit of Greenland. Across the group, there are “diverging opinions” on “how far to pull away from the US” but that’s certainly the direction of movement.

What next?

Expectations of what this three-day summit can achieve are “already low”, said Clea Caulcutt on Politico. “Despite all the efforts of the French presidency, the G7 format has lost much of its relevance,” an EU official told the website.

“They will talk, but I’m not sure anything will come out of it,” said a former French official. And even if it did, “any gains secured could be fleeting” with such a mercurial US president. In the end, it’s really all about keeping up appearances. As one European diplomat put it bluntly: “It will be a success if there is a family photo.”

Summer used to be time for teens to get a part-time job, earn a few bucks and pile up some work experience. Now cultural and economic shifts are making that tradition a thing of the past.

America’s teenagers “face a bleak job outlook heading into summer,” said Yahoo Finance. Rising oil prices, automation and artificial intelligence are all part of the problem. Work is simply more difficult to find for teens. But today’s young people are also increasingly turning to “club sports, extracurriculars, college prep and even content creation” as an alternative to lifeguarding at the local pool or flipping burgers at fast-food restaurants.

What did the commentators say?

If a young person “can only work one day a month” because of their extracurricular commitments “there’s no point in really hiring them,” Jesse Lauritsen of Washington D.C.’s Zeke’s Coffee said to NPR. That could be a problem as those teens get older and move into the full-time workforce. Employers tend to look for signals that new workers are “ready to go and they have what it takes,” ZipRecruiter’s Nicole Bachaud said to Yahoo. Without a summer job, they are not getting that experience.

“Youths aren’t bothering to get summer jobs,” Stephen Moore said at The Washington Times. Working a low-paying seasonal gig can teach vital lessons in how to “show up for work on time, be nice to the foreman and do a little extra to get noticed.” Federal data suggests only about a third of teens are seeking summer work, down from 50% in earlier decades. The change is “deeply troubling” because studies indicate that the “earlier one begins working, the more successful they are likely to be later in life.” One solution would be to create a lower teen minimum wage of $5 or $6 an hour to “incentivize employers to hire them for starter jobs.”

Teens have “found better opportunities” than taking summer work, Roland Fryer said at The Wall Street Journal. Summer hiring projections are the “weakest since the government began counting in 1948,” but the “classic” teen summer gig has been “disappearing for nearly half a century” for good reason. Time “spent folding shirts at the Gap” is less valuable than building a college resume, with a “lifetime payoff” that is “significantly larger.” U.S. teenagers are not being turned away from summer jobs. “They stopped wanting them.”

What next?

The issue has taken on political dimensions. Oklahoma voters will soon decide a referendum to gradually raise the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour. Doing so could “make things even worse by pricing many teenagers out of the market,” Ray Carter said at the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs. But a higher minimum wage could provide stability that is the “difference between staying in school and dropping out” for lower-income young workers, Jill Mencke said at the Oklahoma Policy Institute. The referendum is Tuesday.

As the UK reels from anti-immigration protests, its neighbours on the continent are driving through a massive overhaul of their migration and asylum rules.

From today, all 27 EU states must follow a single set of rules on border screening and asylum procedures that include expanded detention and fast-track removal powers. The new Pact on Migration and Asylum will be backed by a shared digital database, and the establishment of “return hubs” outside EU borders for failed asylum-seekers. The aim “is to end a patchwork system where someone arriving in Greece faces an entirely different legal reality than someone arriving in Germany”, said Euronews.

It’s unclear what knock-on effect these stricter, uniform EU rules will have on UK asylum claims and irregular arrivals. But some are already warning that it could make Britain more attractive to migrants – just as tensions around immigration rachet up.

What did the commentators say?

There is “growing recognition” that, to curtail “the rise of hard-right parties” across the continent, “centrists must be able to show that they are responding to their citizens’ concerns about ­increasingly uncontrolled immigration”, said The Times’ editorial board.

The EU’s new goal is to “reduce irregular arrivals, speed up procedures” and “limit the number of people who fall off the radar” within the bloc, said Politico. Member countries that “receive the most migrants” will also get more support, either in the form or cash “or the relocation of migrants from one country to another”.

But the new deportation rules “will enable what more than 80 human rights organisations call ‘ICE-style’ detection, raids, detention and offshore return practices across Europe”, said geopolitical analyst Shada Islam in The Guardian. One MEP “quite rightly calls the pact a ‘legal arsenal serving a xenophobic ideology’”. All the talk of control and deterrence hides “what the European Network Against Racism calls an ‘imagined whiteness’, a political construct that defines who naturally belongs to Europe and who remains a permanently suspect outsider”.

The impact on the UK “is likely to be uneven”, said the UK in a Changing Europe think tank. It’s possible that, if Europe is rejecting asylum claims more quickly, “some rejected applicants may attempt onward movement toward the UK”. But “stronger” border enforcement in the EU may reduce overall “movement towards the north”.

No, more illegal migrants may now “look to Britain, which has no returns deals and weaker defences”, said James Crisp, Europe editor of The Telegraph. “One such weakness is the soft border with Ireland.” We can’t harden that border without threatening the Good Friday Agreement and Brexit treaties. Keir Starmer could use his much-vaunted EU reset negotiations “to pitch for an EU-wide migrant return deal” but that would mean “agreeing to European Commission migrant quotas”, which “could be politically suicidal”.

What next?

The ambition of the EU pact “is already running into reality”, said EuroNews. Member states are not signing up to anything like their share of asylum-seeker relocations, “with Hungary and Slovakia committing to none.”

For the UK, the “more realistic” approach is to push for greater intelligence sharing and more cooperation on migration, said The Telegraph’s Crisp. Both “Northern Ireland and Ireland are struggling to adapt to the challenges of modern migration”, so if everyone wants to “preserve and protect a common travel area that has lasted more than a century, they need to find a way to ensure its safeguards are still fit for purpose”.

Police have deployed water cannons to quell another night of violent protests in Belfast, and “civil war predictions seem to be increasing by the hour,” said John Harris in The Guardian.

Despite the family of stabbed Belfast man Stephen Ogilvie insisting that “unrest is not welcome”, online figures including Elon Musk and Tommy Robinson have fuelled anger, promoted protest, and are pushing the idea of a civil unrest – not only in Northern Ireland but also in the rest of the UK. Online fury is starting to have tangible consequences in the real world.

What did the commentators say?

This is not the first time “far-right figures” have used “incendiary language” to target ethnic minorities and migrants, said Shane Raymond in The Journal. Violent disorder in Southampton after Henry Nowak’s murder, “weeks of riots” last year in Northern Ireland, and the Stockport riots in 2024 were all triggered online. Misinformation, snowballing quickly on social media, played a large part in this week’s Belfast protests: there were even claims that the victim was a child, and had died from their wounds – that “was shared by an Irish county councillor”.

This is a “new type of civil disobedience”, said Finn McRedmond in The New Statesman. Northern Ireland’s “sectarian angst” has been replaced by a simmering resentment shared throughout England and the rest of the British Isles. It is “all connected now”: the “new atavistic rage of our time” is binding “north and south, east and west” in a “more straightforward form of ethnic conflict”.

Social media is being used to recast Britain as a “violent dystopia”, said Harris in The Guardian, and “smooth the path to power of some of the most terrifying politicians Britain has ever seen” – including “king of the civil war genre”, Nigel Farage. A vision of Britain in perpetual crisis is fed into “algorithmically curated video feeds” of fighting and riots. Politicians need to understand what people are seeing on phones “so overused that their screens are full of cracks” – “much like their owners’ understanding” of what is still a “largely stable country”.

Claiming we are on the verge of a civil war is “not only unconvincing, but potentially harmful”, said Jonathan Portes of the UK in a Changing Europe academic think tank. Throwing the term around “distracts from underlying issues”, contributing instead to a “more polarised and less constructive political environment”. Yes, “trust in institutions has declined”, but “this is neither new nor unique to the UK”. What is new is the rhetoric of crisis emerging from “fringe spaces” to “mainstream commentary”. This “exaggeration” is not “harmless” but “protest is not insurgency, and polarisation is not civil war”.

What next?

“It’s past time to moan about values and tolerance,” said The Times’ editorial board. Keir Starmer has condemned the Belfast protests but his “bemused and drifting government has done nothing to tackle the root cause”: a perception, however erroneous, that legal and illegal immigration “is out of control”.

Some suggest the solution is an end to the open border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland but that’s a “keystone” underpinning the Good Friday Agreement. What’s needed is “more intensive cooperation” with Ireland, and above all, Starmer needs to recognise the “explosive dimensions of immigration” and its “exploitation” by bad actors. Failure to do so would be a “national security risk”.

Kemi Badenoch’s call to scrap equalities guidelines for police and other public bodies has opened up a new front in the culture wars amid tensions over the death of Henry Nowak and riots in Belfast sparked by a knife attack by a Sudanese asylum seeker.

The Tory leader said the landmark Equality Act 2010 does offer a valuable “shield” against discrimination. But the Public Sector Equality Duty, which places an active requirement on public bodies to demonstrate the promotion of equality, had become a legal “minefield”, she said. It should be repealed “in its entirety”.

What did the commentators say?

Comparisons have been made between Henry Nowak and George Floyd, “but a more accurate precedent” for the murder of 18-year-old student Nowak would be the case of Stephen Lawrence”, said Andrew Doyle, the author of “Free Speech and Why It Matters”, in The Washington Post. That “horrific crime led to a much-needed overhaul of police practice” characterised by institutional racism.

Today, UK policing suffers from a “different form of institutional bias, which prioritises group identity and the tenets of diversity, equity and inclusion over impartial and rigorous law enforcement”. Nowak’s death “should lead to a similarly urgent reappraisal”.

By “incubating” diversity, equality and inclusion guidelines in the public sector, Labour and the Conservatives have “presented Reform UK with an open goal”, said The Times. With the Makerfield by-election coming up on 18 June, Nigel Farage has “weaponised the Nowak case”, alleging institutional “anti-white prejudice” and a “two-tier” justice system, giving fresh impetus to Reform’s calls to scrap the Equality Act entirely.

Keir Starmer is “right” to claim that Farage is “playing politics with a tragedy” but the PM “downplays genuine concerns about politicised policing”. In this febrile political atmosphere, it is Badenoch’s “common sense” approach that “emerges from this debate with most credit”, said The Times.

Badenoch’s response “should be commended for its sensible and responsible tone”, said The Independent. While suggesting improvements to the Equality Act, her speech “was in effect a strong defence of the principles behind it” and has Farage’s “simplistic slogans on the run”.

Given the recent “attacks on transgender rights” in the UK, “it is perhaps not surprising that the equalities consensus is all but dead now even with race”, said David Maddox in The Independent. Farage’s colourful rhetoric wins headlines but he remains a “policy vacuum”, so Badenoch has “spied her opportunity” to take the lead in “a policy arms race on the right of politics to own the culture wars agenda”.

What next?

Badenoch’s intervention has turned the “once uncontroversial” public sector equality duty into the “new battleground in Britain’s culture wars”, said Aamna Mohdin in The Guardian. She linked equality guidelines to the Bank of England’s decision to replace historical figures on banknotes with images of British wildlife.

But experts in equality law say many of the examples cited by critics “misunderstand its purpose and how it operates in practice”. They stress that the duty “does not require public organisations to provide a particular service or introduce a particular policy”.

Human rights barrister Karon Monaghan said the attack on equality guidelines in the public sector fuelled the right-wing attack on anti-discrimination provisions more broadly, including the Equality Act. “Do we want a society where women can be paid unequally, where black people can be told they can’t have a job, where disabled people can’t get into work?” she said.

With Farage and now the Tories expected to make scrapping “woke” equality rules a major part of their campaign at the next general election, “we may get our answer” then, said Mohdin.

President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Office of National Intelligence has thrown a contentious congressional battle into an even more precarious state. Appointee Bill Pulte’s off-color past, lack of requisite qualifications and history of pursuing Trump’s personal vendettas against perceived enemies have some lawmakers thinking twice about reauthorizing Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), a controversial warrantless wiretapping law. Already worried about how this White House would use the authorities granted by the law, Democrats now point to the controversial nomination as further justification to vote against the polarizing spy powers.

What did the commentators say?

A bipartisan Senate group working toward reauthorizing the provision had been “expected to deliver the votes necessary to move ahead” with their plan last week, said The New York Times — until Democrats’ “anger” over Pulte being named “prompted an almost unanimous retreat from the emerging deal” on Friday. The failed vote reflected “growing unease” with Pulte’s having led a “campaign of retribution” on Trump’s behalf while leading the Federal Housing Finance Agency, as well as his “lack of national security experience.”

The “very nature” of America’s surveillance data collection is “now going to be put in the hands of somebody who has a history of seeking out private information for political gain,” said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), per Semafor. “Everything’s up in the air now,” said Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, a ranking member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, per The Times.

Democrats are “threatening to let the government’s spy powers lapse,” said Axios. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) has “suggested that Democrats would vote en masse against renewing FISA” because of Pulte, said Punchbowl News, echoing Warner’s “similar threat.”

It is “absolutely outrageous” that Democrats would “try to play politics right now,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) at a press conference last week. Among Republicans, however, opponents of the FISA renewal include “longstanding surveillance skeptics” who have been “some of the loudest voices within the conference” advocating for stronger warrant rules, said Politico. Now, Republicans “will likely need at least some Democratic support in the House” on top of a minimum seven Democrats in the upper chamber to reauthorize the FISA bill before a June 12 expiration deadline, said The Hill.

The GOP is “going to need some help from Democrats, obviously,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) to reporters after Friday’s failed vote. Despite acknowledging that the “timing arguably wasn't the best” for Trump to announce Pulte’s appointment during the FISA negotiations, Thune “notably defended” Pulte from allegations he’d “targeted Trump’s opponents” at the Federal Housing and Finance Agency, said Punchbowl reporter Laura Weiss on X.

Pulte may not be “statutorily qualified” for the role, said Texas Republican Rep. Michael McCaul on ABC’s “The Week.” But failing to renew Sec. 702 during this summer’s World Cup and semiquincentennial celebrations would be the “most grossly irresponsible thing I’ve seen Congress do in my 22 years in office.”

What next?

Once “on track to pass a compromise bill after protracted negotiations” with Democrats, Republicans now “believe the renewal could be held up” past the June 12 deadline, said Reuters. The White House should “plan for a potential significant gap in foreign intelligence collection,” said Senators Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) in a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio this past weekend.

In their letter, the Republican senators “blamed the situation ​on Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer,” Reuters said. However, on “one level,” the letter means “they’re acknowledging reality,” said Connecticut Rep. Jim Himes (D) on CBS’s “Face The Nation.” Pulte’s appointment has “taken 702 reauthorization off the table.”

Last week’s scuttled extension deal is now “empowering privacy hawks in both parties,” said Politico. Section 702 critics feel they “have momentum to kill any FISA deal” that doesn’t address their policy concerns, “whether Pulte gets yanked from his acting leadership post or not.”

President Donald Trump holds firm sway over the GOP and its voters. But his grip on Republican-controlled Congress may be slipping.

Trump’s White House “appears to be losing momentum” with a legislative agenda that has “stalled in Congress,” said Vox. His proposed “anti-weaponization fund” to reward allies “went down in flames after some unusual pushback from Republican lawmakers.” And Trump’s GOP allies are pushing back on personnel picks like Bill Pulte for acting director of national intelligence and Todd Blanche to serve as attorney general. House Republicans last week also “failed to block an effort to halt the Iran war,” said Politico, the “latest sign” that some members of the president’s party are “willing to buck him” on occasion.

What did the commentators say?

Trump is a victim of his own “petty revenge tour,” Chris Hayes said at MS NOW. The president recently demonstrated his mastery over the GOP by backing successful primary challenges to party figures like Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). Those “spurned” figures will remain in Congress through the end of the year, though they “don’t appear eager to bail out the president” and the more controversial aspects of his legislative agenda.

Republicans in Congress have mostly been “invertebrates” during the Trump years, Rex Huppke said at USA Today. They are showing the “faintest signs of embryonic spines” now that midterm elections are approaching and they will face constituents who “can’t afford gas or hamburger meat” because of the president’s policies. The GOP remains “largely in lockstep” with the president, but the “cracks will spread and deepen” the closer we get to November.

The midterm threat might be “stronger than the sway of a president who will be a lame duck” after the election, Jay Evensen said at The Deseret News. The president’s poll numbers “have dropped, even in Utah.” Congress has largely “abdicated its role” as a check on the power and corruption of the presidency, but “maybe that’s changing.”

Senate Majority Leader John Thune “sounds like a man who’s had it with President Trump,” said Mike Zapler at Axios. The GOP leader has pushed back on the anti-weaponization fund and the president’s primary endorsements against Senate incumbents. “None of us controls what the president does,” Thune said to reporters, per the outlet.

Trump is reacting to the “widening rift” with Congress with a “blend of indifference and hostility,” said Isaac Arnsdorf and Natalie Allison at The Washington Post. He “lambasted” House Republicans who helped pass the Iran war measure and “brushed off” objections to his appointment of Pulte to the intelligence post. The president “does not think he needs Congress” as much as lawmakers might think and “feels no need to accommodate them.”

What next?

GOP opposition only goes so far. House Republicans this week are expected to approve long-delayed funding for immigration and border enforcement, said CNBC. The bill will fund those Trump priorities through the rest of his term.

Henry Nowak would “still be alive today” if Britain and Europe had “stood their ground against the politics of self-hatred and the mass invasion of migrants”, said J.D. Vance on X. The “proper response – the only response – is righteous anger”.

The “most outspoken member” of an “evangelistic” administration, Vance’s ire does seem to have a “particular focus on the UK”, said The Times. He has commented on protests around abortion clinics, and told Keir Starmer that there have been “infringements on free speech” in Britain.

Vance is now using the Nowak murder to “bolster” his narrative of Britain as a “once powerful nation” “pandering to liberalism”. This could just be a reminder for American voters that the Republican Party retains an “uncompromising approach to wokeism, borders and policing” in the upcoming mid-terms. But if Vance is anointed successor to the Maga movement, comments such as these could be a sign of things to come.

What did the commentators say?

“J.D. Vance is wrong to intervene in the controversy around the murder of Henry Nowak,” said The Telegraph in an editorial. That said, “there is a good deal of hypocrisy on show”: Labour Remainers had no issue with Barack Obama “intervening” in the Brexit debate, and have had “no compunction about condemning Donald Trump over domestic US policy. “Inevitably, politicians welcome foreign interference only if it suits their arguments”, when “it would be far better if each stayed out of the other’s business”.

Vance was “surely right” to call out the “politics of self-hatred” in the British justice system, said Ameer Kotecha in The Spectator. It is “perfectly legitimate” for the US to comment publicly on what is happening in the UK. The government’s reaction, arguing he has “crossed a red line of diplomatic protocol”, has been hypocritical and “frankly pathetic”.

Britain is just as guilty. For instance, the Labour Party sent 100 activists to campaign for Kamala Harris in 2024. “Rather than engage in shameless pearl-clutching, Starmer’s government should listen to what our closest ally is telling us.”

Interventions like Vance’s are “deepening the split between the Trump administration and Britain’s Labour government”, said Dominic Green in The Wall Street Journal. The division is inherent. Where Vance sees a mission to “stabilise values and societies after decades of self-inflicted confusion”, Britain sees “Bible-bashing and race-baiting”, and hears “only atavistic calls to the wrong kind of identity politics”.

This “political opportunism” against Britain goes far deeper than the vice president, said James Schneider in The New Statesman. “The exploitation of Nowak’s death is of a piece with a clear US state strategy, one which turns Europe into a source for American rhetoric.” Vance talks about Britain “not as an equal, but as a provincial outpost of the imperial system, nominally independent and permanently available for correction”.

What next?

Vance’s stance could have implications for the next election on this side of the Atlantic, said Gaby Hinsliff in The Guardian. If Vance remains in the White House as vice president, “or even as Trump’s successor” after the US elections in 2028, it’s hard to imagine him “standing idly by” when the UK goes to the polls, likely in 2029.

At best, the reaction to the Nowak intervention shows us that “plenty of Britons still reflexively dislike being lectured by Americans”. Yet, it has also warned us “not to take our political sovereignty for granted. Sooner or later, we may need to defend it.”

President Donald Trump’s executive order that voluntarily allows artificial intelligence companies to receive more government oversight marks a shift in the White House’s attitude about AI. It seems Trump, Republicans and even some Democrats are changing their tune.

What did the commentators say?

The order signed by Trump is “relatively toothless” because most major AI companies “already had agreements in place that allowed the government to preemptively test their models for safety risks,” said The Atlantic. But it is also “meaningful in that the president is doing something — anything — about AI” given that when Trump retook office, he largely “signaled to tech companies that he would stay out of the way.”

National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett previously said the administration was considering federal guidelines that would “require AI models to go through an evaluation process similar to that used by the Food and Drug Administration,” said The Hill. This idea seemed to fizzle out as AI advocates became “concerned that an evaluation process from the White House could strangle development.”

The order that was signed “nonetheless represents a sea change in Washington’s willingness to tighten oversight of the technology,” said Politico. For the “first time it’s on a piece of paper, a structure and a process,” former Trump adviser Steve Bannon told the outlet. Some argue that Democratic politicians were already doing the same thing. “This executive order is implementing a voluntary regime to do pre-deployment evaluations of models for security risks,” Saif Khan, a tech adviser under former President Joe Biden, told Politico. “That is the thing that the Biden administration was doing.”

What next?

It is unclear where the Trump administration may go next with AI. The “entire chaotic saga — a wishy-washy White House, confused statements from populist and tech-elite Trump whisperers — is only the latest in a long string of strange, often contradictory AI policy positions,” said The Atlantic. There is a chance Trump could change his mind again, as his policies on the matter have been “inconsistent, if not incoherent, almost since the day he retook office.”

While Trump says he is focused on AI security, his White House has also slashed major portions of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA), the “government agency that aims to protect the nation against hackers,” said The Atlantic. The budget cuts mean CISA is “heading into the AI era with shrinking resources and a diminished role,” said Axios, which could pave the way for future vulnerabilities. Many fear the agency “no longer has the capacity to help utilities, banks and other critical infrastructure operators prepare for a coming wave of AI-fueled cyberattacks.”

Others believe that both sides of the aisle have it wrong. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) wants to ban data centers and is currently “calling for the government to own 50% of AI companies” — and it “would be easier to dismiss his ideas if they weren’t partially built on bipartisan consensus,” said The Washington Post editorial board. But U.S. tech policy works, and the “U.S. is a wealthy country because it doesn’t engage in the kind of government ownership schemes that Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are fond of.”

Israel and Iran have traded tit-for-tat strikes, in defiance of Donald Trump, for the first time since a fragile ceasefire was agreed in April.

The Israeli Air Force confirmed hitting military targets in western and central Iran, in response to Iranian missile attacks on its own air bases. Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had attacked the air bases after an Israeli strike on an alleged Hezbollah site in southern Beirut.

This escalation is a “major test for negotiations”, said CNN. Donald Trump said both sides must “stop shooting”, and told the media he had urged Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu not to retaliate to the Iranian attack. “We are very close to a final deal with Iran,” he told Israel’s Channel 12 News. “It is going to be a good deal. I don’t want it to blow up because of what is happening now.”

What did the commentators say?

Tensions between Iran and Israel have been heightening over Lebanon, said Maziar Motamedi at Al Jazeera. The Lebanese government was alarmed by Israeli troops crossing its Litani River last month. And, despite reports that Trump had convinced Netanyahu not to target Beirut, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps warned last week that “there will be no calm in the region” if Israel continued its occupation of southern Lebanon. The Israeli strike on the alleged Hezbollah site crossed “an unofficial red line for Tehran”.

Israel’s decision to strike back at Iran was “deliberate”, said Alex Winston in The Jerusalem Post. “It could not afford to leave unanswered” Tehran’s retaliation for the strikes in Lebanon. Had it not responded, “the message to Tehran would have been pretty clear”: “any Israeli response to Hezbollah could be framed by Tehran as a provocation, allowing Iran to fire directly at Israel while assuming that American diplomatic pressure would keep Jerusalem’s hands tied”.

Netanyahu’s decision to defy Trump’s instructions underscores a relationship that is increasingly at odds on how to prosecute the war on Iran, said The Wall Street Journal. “Under pressure from his political allies and the opposition to respond to the Iranian missile barrage”, the Israeli PM’s order to resume direct attacks on Iran “threatened to escalate a conflict that has been largely contained”.

What next?

Iran has now announced “a halt to the operations of the armed forces”. Mediation efforts “are naturally continuing”, said Esmail Baghaei, spokesperson for the Iranian foreign ministry, earlier today, but he warned that Iran believes the US “bears responsibility for the Israeli regime’s aggression”. No one would believe that the Israeli regime would take action “without coordination with the US,” he said. America will “be responsible for the consequences of any escalation in tensions”.

Tehran has also used its Houthi proxies in Yemen to threaten a blockade of the Bab al-Mandab Strait if Israel continues to escalate its use of force. The route is “another vital artery connecting major trade routes between Europe, Asia and the Arab world”, said CNN; closing it “would compound the worldwide economic pressure” generated by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

As Pride Month begins in the U.S., numerous Republican governors have “bestowed alternative titles” for Pride Month that “both supporters and opponents view as counterprogramming,” said The Associated Press. But this is just one of several ways the current Republican Party’s stance on LGBTQ+ rights has revealed itself during President Donald Trump’s time in office.

What did the commentators say?

The GOP governors of both Indiana and Tennessee “rebranded June as Nuclear Family Month to celebrate units made up of ‘one husband, one wife and any biological, adopted or fostered children,’” said the AP. Alabama deemed June Strong Families Month, whose “proclamation says fathers are ‘the head of the household.’” And Utah and Arkansas christened June as Fidelity Month, which “emphasizes fidelity to faith, country and family.” The “contest over the month of June reflects decades-long culture war questions, exacerbated by partisan polarization and a sense that red and blue states increasingly represent different values,” said Deseret News.

The current White House has also attempted to “enact a nationwide ban on transgender girls participating in girls’ sports,” expel transgender service members from the military and prevent “transgender Americans from having their gender on their passport,” said Roll Call. These efforts are a result of “rank animus against transgender people,” Jessica Clarke, a law professor at the University of Southern California, told the outlet. The “legislation dovetails with administration efforts and state laws intended to curb the rights of transgender Americans,” said Roll Call.

While both of Trump’s presidencies have been defined by anti-LGTBQ+ stances, his second term efforts are “more far-reaching and extreme than those he put in place during his first term,” said The 19th. Civil rights groups pushed back against Trump’s anti-trans executive orders during his first four years in office, but the courts are “not as friendly as they once were,” Mike Zamore, the national director of policy and governmental affairs at the American Civil Liberties Union, told the outlet. These groups shouldn’t assume that a court case “that was successful in the first Trump administration would necessarily prevail this go around.”

What next?

The Republican ramp-up against the LGBTQ+ movement is likely here to stay, as “every Democratic president since Bill Clinton in 1999 has signed a Pride proclamation each year — and no Republican president has,” said the AP. There also appear to be changing public views on whether same-sex marriage should be legal, which is “largely because more Republicans oppose them” now than before Trump retook office.

Approval of “same-sex marriage, moral acceptance of gay and lesbian relations and endorsement of gender changes are all down from peaks reached in the early 2020s,” according to a recent Gallup survey. The poll of 1,001 adults found that 65% of Americans support same-sex marriage. While this still represents a majority of Americans, it is also “down six percentage points from the peak in 2022 and 2023.”

Many people also appear to be going back on their acceptance of the transgender community, according to Gallup’s results. The “share of Americans who consider changing one's gender morally acceptable has declined eight points over the past five years, to 38%,” said Gallup.

“Right now, it’s like the AI industry has a gas pedal but it doesn't have a brake pedal,” Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark told the BBC.

Anthropic recently overtook OpenAI, the makers of ChatGPT, as the world’s most valuable AI start-up. But Clark has called for a global freeze in AI development, warning that humans risk losing control of the technology. He revealed that 80% of the code that Claude, the company’s chatbot, is operating on was written by Claude itself. And reaching 100% is only a couple of years away.

Clark and his research colleague, Marina Favaro, have suggested that work at Anthropic could undergo “a meaningful slowdown or pause” if other AI tech firms were prepared to do the same. “If it were possible to effectively slow the development of this technology to give ourselves more time to deal with its immense implications, we think that would likely be a good thing,” they wrote in a blog post.

What did the commentators say?

Better regulation “would keep AI systems in their lane”, said David Krueger, a specialist in responsible AI, in The Guardian. We should insist companies have “clear and well-scoped purposes” for their AI tools, and “demand evidence that they are fit for purpose”. And they should report statistics and data so that we can see if their product is being used in ways that “deviate from its intended purpose”.

But the “safest, sanest” option is to “stop racing” to make AI smarter. The creation of Moltbook (a forum for AI agents that humans can only observe) is one of the “increasingly alarming warning signs” that “rogue AI agents” could be on their way. “We need to make sure” that rogue AI isn’t “capable of threatening humanity, by agreeing to enforceable, international limits on AI capabilities and AI development”.

There are some hopeful signs in the US. On Tuesday, Donald Trump signed a “much-awaited” executive order to establish a measure of vetting for AI companies, said Politico. It was “messy, muted and far less ambitious than Silicon Valley’s critics had hoped for” but it does mark a “sea change in Washington’s willingness to tighten” AI oversight. The new voluntary process of sharing new models with the US government, so that security risks can be identified and addressed before the technology is released, could “soon pave the way for mandatory vetting, federal pre-approval of advanced AI systems and other regulations”.

Some may think it “meaningful” that Trump is “doing something – anything – about AI”, said The Atlantic, but this executive order is “relatively toothless”. He wants to look like he’s being robust, to “score points” with the public, but, in fact “he is not saying or doing anything substantive at all”. The window for serious government regulation, anywhere in the world, is “rapidly closing”; “hopefully, it is not already gone”.

We’re missing the point, said John Burn-Murdoch in the Financial Times. “AI’s capacity to deliver genuine value has been vastly exaggerated.” In one US study, researchers tracking software developers before and after they adopted AI tools found an initial “explosive” increase in productivity (300% more files created or edited) but, after verification and review, just a 30% “uplift” in the number of releases. These are “powerful new tools” but it’s going to take some time before they can interact with current workflow “processes and structures” without friction or bottlenecks.

What next?

Trump’s executive order is a “good first move in creating a safer tech ecosystem”, said Jen Easterly, former director of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, in The New York Times. But a voluntary framework, predicated on mutual cooperation between private companies and the US government, “cannot guarantee” effectiveness. And, let’s not forget, a “principle enshrined in an executive order is only as durable as the administration that issued it”.

For this step to be a positive one, in an American context at least, the legislative branch needs to follow suit. The responsibility of building an AI environment that is “innovative, trusted and resilient” ultimately lies with the US Congress.

China’s manufacturing might is overwhelming Europe, and Europe is gearing up to push back. A trade war could be in the offing as Brussels seeks to protect the continent’s workers and factories from a flood of inexpensive imports from state-backed Chinese manufacturers.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is aiming for a “major crackdown on subsidized Chinese imports,” said Politico. Europe cannot “be the victim of a predatory strategy that is destroying our industry,” EU industrial strategy chief Stéphane Séjourné said to the outlet.

China is warning it will retaliate against any EU action. Europe is “going further and further down a radical path,” said state-run social media account Yuyuantantian, per The Wall Street Journal. The tit for tat could further unsettle a global economy already rattled by President Donald Trump’s trade policies and fallout from the Iran war.

What did the commentators say?

The Chinese economy is “taking everyone down,” Michael Schuman said at The Atlantic. The country has become a “government-subsidized, export-driven manufacturing juggernaut” that is “alienating trading partners.” That includes Europe, where Chinese imports are “costing Germany 10,000 manufacturing jobs a month.” The success of China’s export strategy may make its businesses seem “unstoppable,” but its continuation relies on the “assumption that other countries will continue to absorb China’s exports.” Beijing may instead be pushing its rivals to embrace a “protectionism that depresses prosperity for everyone.”

“What, precisely, is the problem with Chinese surpluses?” Martin Sandbu said at the Financial Times. Chinese car imports have indeed increased in recent years, but that merely “displaced imports from elsewhere.” The overall number of vehicles shipped into the EU has “remained steady” during that time. Europe could benefit from manufacturing competition “as a spur to faster productivity improvements at home.” That would be good both for European businesses and “for consumers.”

The EU may be “finally waking up to China,” Peggy Corlin and Luca Bertuzzi said at Euronews. The reassessment “has been long in the making” after “decades of deepening economic dependence.” But Europe is not entirely united on the issue. Germany, for example, is still focused on “securing market access for German companies in China,” while Spain is welcoming a “growing share” of Chinese investments. “Political will” is the “key determining factor” in what happens next.

What next?

Europe’s search for solutions is “increasingly urgent,” said The New York Times. EU officials are worried about the “imminent collapse of industry,” Jeromin Zettelmeyer, the director of the Bruegel think tank, said to the outlet. “The tone is basically panic.”

Curbing imports could ultimately be “profoundly tricky” in a European marketplace where consumers have become “hooked on what China is selling,” said the Times. The issue may soon come to a head. “Global economic imbalances” will be on the agenda for the G7 Summit of European and North American leaders later this month.

Parties contesting the Makerfield by-election are “locked in a war of words” over how much support there is for insurgent “far-right” party Restore Britain, said Kitty Donaldson in The i Paper.

An early poll by Survation puts support for Rupert Lowe’s Restore at 7%, with Labour at 43% and Reform UK at 40%. Labour supporters hope that Restore could split the right-wing vote and usher in Andy Burnham, who is expected to mount a leadership challenge to Keir Starmer should he win the by-election.

For Nigel Farage, Reform’s leader and long the champion of the right, this situation is “ironic”, said Melanie Phillips in The Times. “The axiom that the revolution eats its own” is “generally associated with the left. Now it has arrived on the right.”

What did the commentators say?

A Farage pivot has already begun, said The Economist. To date, his “vision of ‘colour blind’ politics” has been a “success”. But following the recent reaction to the murder of Henry Nowak – Farage called for the public to respond “with pure, cold rage” and declared that “white lives matter too” – it is clear that the Reform leader has “embraced a new, uglier way of thinking”.

This “dark turn” seems to have been prompted by the “threat” posed by Lowe. The Restore leader said “the killer should be executed and his family deported” following his life sentence. “Targeting the angry, and making them angrier, could be a winning formula” for Reform in the new fragmented political landscape.

It is clear that Farage and his allies are “visibly rattled” by Restore, said Robert Shrimsley in the Financial Times. Though Farage may not fear being “superseded” by Lowe, a split on the right could “cost him seats”. A “confident” Farage would “have to hold his nerve” and tackle Lowe at the next general election.

Restore could even be a blessing in disguise for Farage. Lowe and Co. could serve as a “decontamination chamber” to rid his own party of more extreme voices, in turn making Reform more palatable and within the “admittedly shifting” boundaries of “political decency”. All of this, of course, hinges on “how frightened Farage feels. But the last thing an already polarised nation needs is a new bidding war on the anti-immigrant right.”

Restore’s “march into culture warzones” like climate change and social integration is “profoundly depressing”, said Rosa Prince in Bloomberg. The party is “heavily backed” by “racially fixated billionaire” Elon Musk, who “regularly shares” its posts on his platform, X. Indeed, it may have been Musk’s endorsement of Lowe to lead Reform that led to the birth of Restore. Clips from a YouTube interview with Maga figure Tucker Carlson have also been “viewed millions of times”, adding to Lowe’s more than 1.3 million Facebook followers. Digital “ubiquity” and a “splintering” political system have fuelled the rise of both Reform and Restore. “We’re all poorer as a result.”

“Then there is Lowe himself,” said James Heale in The Spectator. Though undoubtedly on the charge, he is not infallible. At 68, Lowe must now “do in a decade what Farage managed in three”. Farage has “withstood 30 years of muckraking and press sleuthing. Is Lowe ready for the same?”

Lowe is already under investigation by the parliamentary watchdog after a complaint was made against him, and there is a perceived discord between his “clubbable” character in person and his online persona. As his party’s prominence grows, Lowe will also face pressure to “disavow comments his activists have made”. With the belief that Reform’s immigration policies are “insufficiently robust” as one of the party’s founding principles, Restore will also “inevitably struggle to keep its base onside”.

What next?

“Restore hopes to provide more than just a distraction” in the Makerfield by-election, said Nick Gutteridge in The Telegraph. Though the official, albeit small-sample, poll put Restore at around 7%, data collected by 300 Restore activists and released by Lowe claimed that “almost a quarter of households” said they would vote for Restore. “The claims were met with incredulity online and dismissed by political opponents.”

“You don’t need to be John Curtice to see what this means,” said Brendan O’Neill on Spiked. “The 7% being hoovered up by Restore’s oddball door-knockers is thwarting a potential Reform win.” It may be a “two-horse” race between those who believe Andy Burnham can “resuscitate the corpse of Labour” and those who are “taking a punt on the populists of Reform”. Restore is, in fact, “shaving support from Reform, is giving the listless, dull-eyed horse of technocracy its best shot of winning”.

Support for Restore could make a “critical difference” to the result in Makerfield, said Phillips in The Times. Regardless, “whoever occupies No. 10 after this by-election”, and perhaps the general election, “will be presiding over a country that has become an explosive tinderbox”.

New Jersey Congressman Tom Kean Jr. won his GOP primary election yesterday, a notable event given that he has not been seen in public for months. And the question of his whereabouts is drawing increasing scrutiny.

The mystery is “frustratingly unsolved,” said The New York Times. Kean last cast a vote in Congress on March 5, then was sidelined by what his aides vaguely described as a “personal medical issue” from which he is expected to recover. Voters, journalists and House colleagues “haven’t seen or heard directly from Kean” since then, and it is “still unclear” when he might return to work or the campaign trail, said CNN.

Kean is “focused” on “recovery” and expects to return to work “within a matter of weeks,” he said in a Tuesday night post on X. But his ongoing and mostly unexplained absence is “rattling” Kean’s GOP allies, who worry the “massive public relations failure” will damage the party’s ability to defend his “critical swing seat” in November, said CNN.

What did the commentators say?

Kean “owes voters” answers about “his mystery illness,” The Bergen (N.J.) Record said in an editorial. His absence has coincided with House debates about the “Iran war, funding for the Department of Homeland Security and other critical issues.” His team spent weeks creating the “illusion of a fully functioning representative” by sending out a “steady stream of first-person social media posts and news releases” before acknowledging his medical issue in late April. New Jersey voters deserve a representative “who is straight with people about his own capabilities.”

The lack of transparency is a “slap in the face to voters,” Max Burns said at MS NOW. Kean is one of several House members who have gone “missing in action” in recent years. Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.) missed weeks of votes after undergoing eye surgery, then announced her retirement. Kean and Wilson “can’t be blamed for battling health issues,” but they owe more candor to their constituents. And if they are “unwilling or unable” to work, they should “make way for someone with the capacity to serve.” The duo has a “right to privacy” but also a “duty as public servants to represent their voters.”

What next?

The congressman’s absence has not interfered with the operation of his political machine. At least five speeches in his name “have appeared in the Congressional Record” during his leave from Congress, said Roll Call. While it is “not uncommon” for House members to publish speeches in the record they did not deliver in the chamber, Kean’s “frequent submissions” while he is away have “raised eyebrows.”

Kean’s congressional district is “among the country’s most competitive,” said The Washington Post. The GOP “cannot hold the majority without this seat,” an anonymous operative said to the outlet. Republicans urgently need to know if Kean is “capable of running for reelection and winning.”

Kean still snagged President Donald Trump’s endorsement in the midterms, said The Hill. Kean “will never let you down!” Trump said on Truth Social.

The war in Ukraine is unwinnable and could bring down the Russian economy. That’s the emerging assessment among Russia’s power brokers, as Vladimir Putin faces mounting challenges on the battlefield and at home.

Kremlin propagandists may still be “projecting confidence about the outcome of the war”, said Igor Gretskiy, of the Estonian-based International Centre for Defence and Security, but there’s been “a marked shift in mood” among Russia’s political and business elites. It’s no longer their “default assumption” that Russia will achieve its objectives.

What did the commentators say?

Setbacks have been mounting on several fronts, said Gretskiy. “First, the cracks in the Russian economy became impossible to ignore”, with the federal budget “deeply out of balance” and the deficit at the end of April nearly double what was planned for the whole of 2026.

“In the most serious sign of internal division” since Russia invaded Ukraine four years ago, senior Russian government officials have warned Putin that spending on the war “is on an unaffordable path”, said Bloomberg.

Then there is the military situation itself. Ukrainian drone attacks are causing severe disruption to Russia’s logistical networks and supply lines to the front, and long-range strikes have hit Russian oil-production infrastructure and even threatened Moscow. The Russian army is no longer able to grind out incremental capture of Ukrainian territory, and one million of its soldiers are thought to have been killed or wounded since hostilities began.

We’re in a situation where “the capabilities of both sides are comparable”, said Russian political scientist Vasily Kashin on Russia in Global Affairs. “Historically, such wars have only extremely rarely resulted in the complete destruction of one side.” Russia can have no hope “of annexing new large Ukrainian territories” when “it lacks the capacity to sustainably control and manage” them, and its goal of eliminating the Kyiv regime is “fundamentally unattainable at this stage”. The publication of such a damning analysis is “a further sign of growing dissent at the top of Russia’s political establishment”, said Catherine Belton, Russia reporter for The Washington Post.

“Sustaining the war machine” is also “eroding” the president’s “social base”, said anti-Putin activist Alexey Sakhnin in Jacobin. A recent poll by Moscow’s independent Levada Center suggests that 62% of Russians favour peace talks with Ukraine, with only 27% expressing support for continuing the war.

What next?

There are parliamentary elections in September, so the Kremlin will want to ensure that “increasingly evident war fatigue” doesn’t “affect the cohesion” of Putin’s system”, said exiled Russian politician Vladimir Kara-Murza in The Washington Post last week.

But if events continue to turn against him, Putin may feel he has not choice but to roll the dice and go for broke, Tatiana Stanovaya of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Foundation told The Post’s Belton: “To a great degree, escalation is the only way to respond to a situation which you can’t control.”

Donald Trump “lashed out” at Benjamin Netanyahu last night in an “expletive-laden call” with the Israeli PM about the country’s actions in Lebanon, according to US officials speaking to news site Axios. The official paraphrased Trump’s remarks as: “You’re fucking crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me. I’m saving your ass. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this.”

Trump himself described the call as “very productive”, saying he had demanded Israel abandon plans for a “major raid” and that Netanyahu had “turned his troops around” as a result.

The Israeli prime minister is caught between Donald Trump’s demands to end the bombardment of Lebanon, which threatens peace talks with Iran, and domestic pressure to escalate the campaign against Hezbollah, which has seen the Israeli army moving deeper into Lebanon and escalating air strikes.

What did the commentators say?

Since the 7 October attacks, Netanyahu has “struggled to assure Israelis he will keep them safe” against Iran and its proxies, said The Times. There was already “mounting frustration in Israel at the failure to defang Hezbollah”, said the Financial Times’ Jerusalem correspondent, James Shotter. Most polls suggest Israelis “favour more aggressive action” against the group, and Netanyahu’s “climbdown” to Trump provoked criticism from “across the political spectrum”.

National security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, of his own coalition, urged him to ignore Trump’s demands and ratchet up the campaign against Hezbollah. “This is the time to tell our friend, President Trump – ‘no’,” Ben-Gvir wrote on X. Naftali Bennett, the right-wing former prime minister “widely regarded as one of Netanyahu’s main rivals” in the crucial upcoming election, accused him of “losing control over Israeli sovereignty”.

Netanyahu is also worried that any US-Iran deal will “leave Israel’s core concerns – Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium, its ballistic missile program and regional proxy network – largely unaddressed”, said Tal Shalev of CNN’s Jerusalem bureau.

For more than three decades, Netanyahu has “defined himself as the leader who would confront Iran’s nuclear ambitions”. But a recent poll from Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies found that 45% of Israelis believe the situation with Iran has worsened compared to before 7 October; only 31% believe it has improved. Nearly half believe Israel will probably not win, or has already lost, the war against Iran.

“It’s hard to overstate how deeply Netanyahu views this moment as a possible personal and political defeat,” Danny Citrinowicz, senior researcher at the institute, wrote on X. “Mr. Iran” may be forced to accept an agreement that “not only legitimises the very regime he sought to weaken but also exposes the collapse of his long-standing Iran doctrine”.

Ultimately, Netanyahu has to defend his own citizens, said The Jerusalem Post in an editorial. Northern Israel is “under constant rocket and drone fire”. Hezbollah had used the ceasefire as a “tactical opportunity” to regroup and rearm. It has “no intention of genuinely ending hostilities”; its purpose remains the destruction of Israel. The ceasefire “prioritised a quick diplomatic achievement for Washington” over the security needs of Israel; extending it further would mean “trading Israeli lives for a few more days of quiet”. The US negotiations with Iran over Lebanon “are certainly not worth the lives of Israeli citizens”.

What next?

Just hours after Trump announced the ceasefire agreement, Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon resumed. At least eight people have been killed today, according to Lebanese state media.

In a statement, Netanyahu said that he had told Trump that Israel would continue its operations. “Our position remains the same,” Netanyahu wrote. The Lebanese government, which wants Hezbollah to disarm, has begun direct negotiations with Israel today.

Iran continues to insist that any ceasefire between the US and Iran hinges on peace in Lebanon, with a senior military officer saying today that resumption of war with the US is “inevitable”.

Even before a Russian drone hit a Romanian apartment complex last week, European leaders were worried that Vladimir Putin is preparing to amplify his war beyond the Ukrainian territory he has failed to conquer.

There is “growing fear” that Putin will undo the current stalemate by “expanding the conflict to Europe,” said The Wall Street Journal. The Kremlin has made “increasingly bellicose threats” against neighboring Baltic states, and Russian drones approached Lithuanian airspace last month. Putin broadly aims to “threaten the whole European security architecture,” Benjamin Haddad, France’s minister for European affairs, said to the outlet. Russian leaders are encouraging such fears. European authorities “have unilaterally entered into a war with Russia” by supporting Ukraine, the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said on X after the Romanian incident. “The peaceful sleep is over.“

What did the commentators say?

Putin might be “starting to think about the next war,” David Ignatius said at The Washington Post. He might see the opportunity to strike “before European nations fully rearm,” and while U.S. President Donald Trump is “treating NATO like a punching bag.” The Russian leader might soon decide that his moment to “challenge NATO and impose a new order is closing.” A continent-wide war is a “chilling prospect.“

A new Russian attack is “plausible,” and NATO is “vulnerable” unless member countries “get their act together,” Alexander Gabuev, the director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, said at The New York Times. Putin sees NATO as a “major threat to Russia’s security.” The organization’s defense sector now “produces more tanks, shells and missiles” than before the Ukraine invasion. And Putin has surrounded himself with “sycophants” who are “afraid to speak the truth.” Europe is entering “the most dangerous period.“

Europe “needs to be united to fend off Russian aggression,” Tom Clifford said at the Kyiv Post. Ukraine’s defense against invasion is “protecting Europe,” but that does not mean Europe’s leaders “have secured the continent” from Russia’s war-making. Putin knows European opposition is “less than it should be.” The democracy embraced by Europe since World War II “always has to be fought for.”

What next?

The Russian drone that hit Romania on Friday “has only added to the wariness Europeans feel” as the war in Ukraine persists, said The New York Times. Moscow’s ongoing “campaign of cyberattacks and sabotage against critical infrastructure” is a warning to NATO countries and an attempt to force a conclusion to the war in Ukraine. Putin is attempting to “reestablish some form of dominance” to settle the war “from a position of strength,” Ivo Dalder, a former U.S. ambassador to NATO, said to the outlet.

Ukraine’s wartime success “should not lead us to underestimate Russia,” Peter Dickinson said at The Atlantic Council. Many Europeans seem “unimpressed” by the threat. But Moscow’s “expansionist agenda” and “well-armed military” signal that Russia will “remain a hostile power” as long as Putin is in charge.

The Trump administration’s moves to cut foreign aid and end ties with the World Health Organization could be making it more difficult to halt the latest Ebola outbreak in Africa.

Public health experts believe White House policies are “weakening critical networks” that respond to outbreaks in a “densely populated, politically unstable part of the world,” said Axios. The dismantling of U.S. support has “left the region dangerously exposed,” leading to the likelihood that Ebola was spreading “for some time” before it was detected, International Rescue Committee’s Heather Reoch Kerr said in a statement, per the outlet.

The Trump administration is pushing back against the criticism. The U.S. is “working with international partners” and “supporting response efforts” in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Health and Human Services spokesperson Andrew Nixon said in a statement to Axios.

What did the commentators say?

“This is what happens when you defund Ebola prevention,” Sara Herschander said at Vox. There are “no vaccines or treatments” for the strain of virus at the heart of the current outbreak and the disease is spreading quickly “under the heavy shadow of U.S. foreign aid cuts” that “gutted” Ebola detection and response programs. Many of the experts and researchers who once would have guided the response are “simply not there anymore.” The U.S. has now pledged $23 million in emergency funding to Congo and Uganda, but “you can’t expect a bandaid to make up for the damage.”

The Ebola outbreak is a story of “institutional erosion,” Columbia University’s Thoai D. Ngo said at Newsweek. U.S. aid “helped build laboratory networks, train field epidemiologists, establish emergency operations centers” and other public health infrastructure that made it possible for epidemics to be “detected early and contained quietly.” That system is being “hollowed out,” which is short-sighted. “Global health security is domestic health security.”

The world “doesn’t have to fail” the test posed by Ebola, Michael T. Osterholm, the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said at The Washington Post. It is “not fair” to place blame for the outbreak at the “feet of the Trump administration.” This virus emerged in an “unstable area of Congo” and is able to avoid detection by Ebola tests designed to find more common strains. But the U.S. can choose to once again deploy its resources to help contain dangerous diseases, even when they emerge in foreign lands. That choice would protect Americans “at home and abroad from a highly lethal illness.”

What next?

American infectious disease experts “have been barred from speaking directly with the World Health Organization,” said CNN. The Trump administration-issued ban — which applies to officials at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases — was in place for the recent hantavirus outbreak aboard a cruise ship but was “relaxed slightly” for the Ebola outbreak.

These restrictions “hobble quick cooperation” in disease response, health officials said, per CNN. The United States has “written off most of the institutions with global health,” Jeremy Konyndyk, the president of Refugees International, told the outlet.

The rise of artificial intelligence depends on the construction of giant new data centers to supply the necessary computing power. But Americans do not want the facilities in their neighborhoods.

Backlash to data centers is “bipartisan and growing across the country,” said 404 Media. States and cities are outlawing the “noisy, power and water hungry buildings” in a fight that could “shape American politics for years to come.” Seven in 10 Americans oppose building a data center in their area, said Gallup, higher than the 53% who would oppose a nuclear plant nearby. Industry leaders are now fretting over their inability to win public opinion that is “increasingly aware and skeptical,” said Business Insider. The tech sector “hasn't done a good job of explaining itself,” said Flexential CEO Ryan Mallory, whose company develops and operates the data centers.

What did the commentators say?

The backlash to AI “could get very ugly,” Lila Shroff said at The Atlantic. A “record number of proposed projects” were canceled during the first quarter of this year after “local pushback.” In April, an Indianapolis councilman found a “NO DATA CENTERS” note under his doormat after somebody shot at his house 13 times.

The fights over data centers will likely only “intensify,” as the facilities “stimulate local economies” but also take “physical and environmental tolls” on the places they are built, said Shroff. And though AI opponents may not be able to stop Anthropic from distributing its Claude model, “they can raise concerns about new construction at a local city-council meeting.”

“Nobody wants this in their backyard,” Sara Pequeño said at USA Today. In Utah, officials overrode local opposition to approve a giant new center that will consume “more than two times the energy used in the entire state.” Rural areas across the country face similar proposals. Data centers are “almost certainly here to stay” because of the computing power needed to keep up with “our ever-growing reliance on AI.” But Americans “clearly don’t feel great” about having them nearby.

The “brewing populist resistance” to data centers is a “critical new front in the fight against tech-enabled authoritarianism,” Astra Taylor and Saul Levin said at The Guardian. A local fight over land use can double as opposition to “job-eating algorithms, distorting deep fakes and autonomous drone strikes.” It also portends the next big electoral fight. AI is “shaping up to be a key fault line” in both this year’s midterms and in 2028.

What next?

The canceled data center projects are “sapping confidence” among AI investors, the investment bank Jefferies said in note to clients, per Axios. The pushback could become a “financial liability for AI labs if it continues to curb access” to the computing power artificial intelligence requires, the outlet said.

The backlash movement has one notable new ally. Erin Brockovich, the activist portrayed in an Oscar-winning performance by Julia Roberts, has launched a new website tracking proposed and under-construction data centers. The map “captures the real-world footprint” of the AI race, she said on the site.

Iran has signalled that any peace deal must include an end to Israel’s offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon. But it’s unclear if the US could get Israel to agree to that, even if it wanted to.

Despite last month’s ceasefire, Israel has continued to pound Lebanon with airstrikes, killing at least 608 people, according to the World Health Organization. Yesterday, in response to a Hezbollah attack on its military posts, Israel launched one of its most intense waves of bombings, saying it had hit more than 100 Hezbollah targets. “I have ordered an even greater acceleration of our operations,” Benjamin Netanyahu said. “We will intensify our blows, increase our firepower, and we will crush them.”

What did the commentators say?

“Lebanon is in danger of becoming an overlooked but increasingly deadly sideshow”, as both Israel and Hezbollah violate the ceasefire, said Tom Kington in The Times. Israeli troops are occupying swathes of southern Lebanon, and won’t withdraw unless Hezbollah disarms. But the Iran-backed group says it won’t stop attacking Israeli positions until Israel withdraws. “The result has been a stand-off.”

Hezbollah is “waiting for a cue from Iran, which in turn depends on how Iran’s talks with the US go”, Michael Young, of the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Centre in Beirut, told The Times. “If Iran emerges stronger from its clash with the US, Hezbollah will feel reinvigorated.” They will “be able to say they resisted and claim victory”. Meanwhile, Israel will be trying “to torpedo any deal”.

Washington is “pressuring” Lebanon’s leaders to disarm Hezbollah or else “face more Gaza-style destruction”, said Rami G. Khouri, a policy analyst at the American University of Beirut, in Al Jazeera. It has also “tied financial support” for the country’s reconstruction to “Beirut’s compliance with US-Israeli terms”. The Lebanese government faces “a disgruntled, deeply impoverished population, exasperated by relentless Israeli attacks”.

April’s ceasefire agreement heralded “weakened US-Israeli positions in the region”, as well as dealing “deep political blows” to Netanyahu and gifting “new diplomatic leverage” to Iran and Hezbollah. Having survived their “existential” battles and now pressing for permanent ceasefires, they could “weaken Israeli postures and help reshape Lebanon’s internal dynamics”.

“But far-right members of Netanyahu’s coalition are pushing him to challenge” Donald Trump on the “ceasefire with Hezbollah”, said The Guardian’s chief Middle East correspondent, Emma Graham-Harrison. “It is time for the prime minister to bang on Trump’s table and inform him that we are returning to war in Lebanon,” said Itamar Ben-Gvir, the national security minister, on social media. “There is an urgent need to put an end to the threat posed by Hezbollah’s explosive drones,” the finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, posted on Telegram. Hezbollah has “ignored repeated requests to stop firing at Israel”, a US official told Reuters. Israel will never “​passively absorb attacks on its forces and civilians”.

But Tehran won’t accept such attacks on its proxy, either, Danny Citrinowicz, a Middle East expert at the Atlantic Council, told The New Yorker. Lebanon is of “real strategic importance” to Iran; Hezbollah is “a vital element” of its “so-called Axis of Resistance”. So Trump “has a mountain to climb”. If he wants an agreement with Iran, he will have to “force Netanyahu’s hand on Lebanon”.

What next?

On Friday, delegations from Israel and Lebanon will meet for direct talks in the US, in preparation for further negotiations on 2 and 3 June.

The shaky US-Iran ceasefire, meanwhile, is under increasing strain: Iran has said US strikes near the Strait of Hormuz on Monday were a “gross violation”, and validated its “deep suspicion”. The US said its attacks were “defensive”.

But “even if Lebanon is part of a US-Iran peace deal, the Lebanese people will be wary”, said Kington in The Times. After all, April’s Pakistan-brokered ceasefire between the US, Israel and Iran, supposedly included Lebanon – but Israel “denied this was the case and launched 100 attacks in a few minutes”.

SpaceX, Anthropic and OpenAI are all preparing initial public offerings, competing for investor cash that could determine who ends up the winner of the artificial intelligence era.

The three companies “could make 2026 the biggest year for U.S. IPOs,” said the Financial Times. The competition has been “sharpened” by familiarity: SpaceX chief Elon Musk departed OpenAI in 2018 (and recently lost a lawsuit against the ChatGPT parent) followed by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei leaving OpenAI in 2020. Now the AI rivals are positioning themselves to “command the deepest pool of capital.” All are hoping to “ride a wave of AI enthusiasm” among investors, but stock markets may be less enamored of the AI sector’s “vast cash burn” than private backers have been.

There is still enthusiasm. The artificial intelligence giants are “well-run, high-growth businesses,” said Rob Hilmer, the founder of Goanna Capital, to the Financial Times.

What did the commentators say?

The success of the IPOs depends on if the AI startups “can keep growing at the ridiculous rates they’ve achieved so far,” Parmy Olson said at Bloomberg. OpenAI says it will bring in $280 billion in revenues by 2030, up from about $25 billion now. To achieve that goal, the company’s corporate customers “must plug its technology into a broader array” of uses including “sales, finance, healthcare, human resources, logistics” and more. But many potential business clients are “keeping generative AI at bay” amid questions about whether it is “reliable enough for use in high-stakes decision-making.” Claude and ChatGPT will eventually be worked into corporate workflows. “The issue is how long that might take.”

A critical question: “How bad is the burn?” Beatrice Nolan said at Fortune. OpenAI’s need for “data centers, chips and cloud capacity” requires it to spend a lot of money, and its IPO filing will help investors determine if the company can turn a profit sooner than later. The answer “will matter to the whole AI industry.” If investors are willing to subsidize a “company spending at this scale” that will suggest the market “still has tolerance for AI’s cash bonfire.” If not, life could become “more complicated for the next wave of AI listings.”

What next?

Investors are enthusiastic about AI, but some experts warn the “novel technology comes with new risks,” said The Wall Street Journal. The sector has great potential, but the markets have “not factored in the cost of the vulnerabilities these systems could create,” Navrina Singh, the CEO of Credo AI, said to the outlet. That creates an unsettled market. “Everything is evolving so quickly,” said Jeffrey Bernardo, the CEO of Augustine Asset Management.

The IPOs could be derailed by “abundant and cheap” artificial intelligence available from Chinese labs like DeepSeek, said CNBC. There is also a “wave of Western challengers” such as Nvidia, Cohere, Reflection and Mistral that are “building cheaper, smaller, more efficient alternatives” than Anthropic and OpenAI. By the time their IPOs come to fruition, the “central premise of their valuations may already be gone.”

Donald Trump’s claim that the US and Iran are closing in on a peace deal has already been met with widespread criticism within his own Republican party.

The details haven’t been made public but Iran is said to have agreed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, without charging tolls, and dispose of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium. In return, the US would cease hostilities, unfreeze billions of dollars of assets, and gradually remove economic sanctions.

But Republican Senator Ted Cruz said it would be a “disastrous mistake” to leave Iran “able to enrich uranium and develop nuclear weapons, and having effective control over the Strait of Hormuz”. And Senator Roger Wicker, chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, warned that the emerging deal “would not be worth the paper it is written on”.

What did the commentators say?

The “grim reality” is that, by closing the Strait of Hormuz, Iran has “leverage” over peace talks, said the Financial Times’ chief foreign affairs columnist Gideon Rachman. And now the US seems poised to agree to a deal that “threatens to leave Iran in a stronger position than before the war began”. Trump likes to “deride” the nuclear non-proliferation agreement that Barack Obama negotiated with Iran in 2015, but this looks in many ways “worse”. Perhaps the US president “should have reread” his book, “The Art of the Deal”.

Eli Groner, a former director-general of Benjamin Netanyahu’s office, said Iran’s knowledge that it can now close the Strait of Hormuz at any point “is a victory far deeper and more strategic than any point-scoring military achievement”. His summary? “Disaster.”

The framework of the deal described by US officials would be “a series of compromises, well short of the capitulation that Trump sought”, said David Ignatius in The Washington Post. Iran hasn’t accepted his demand that its highly enriched uranium be delivered to the West, nor has it agreed to give up its “right to enrich” in the future. But Trump “doesn’t appear to have any better options” to escape what has become “a military morass and a strategic dead end”. Tehran “can claim victory simply by having survived” the US assault.

Some Republicans are arguing that “peace could bring a pay-off for voters” by lowering petrol prices and easing inflation as oil tankers start to move through the Strait of Hormuz again, said CNN’s Stephen Collinson. But recovery from the strait’s closure will take time and won’t “immediately improve global economic prospects or affordability in the US”. Trump “can’t win politically”: given that a majority of Americans oppose the war, he would face a huge “backlash if he ordered new strikes”.

There’s no way to spin this humiliating “catastrophe”, Middle East expert Danny Citrinowicz, a fellow at the Atlantic Council, told The New Yorker. Rather than toppling the Iranian regime, the US and Israel have “ended up strengthening” it. It’s hard to imagine Tehran will just “give up its nuclear material” – to Trump or anyone else – because “they’re so much in the driver’s seat” here. Iran is already rebuilding its missile capacity and still has most of its launchers. Now we have “a more radicalised regime that can rush into a nuclear bomb and still have a conventional missile capacity. It’s a shit show.”

What next?

We have “reached a conclusion on a large portion of the issues under discussion”, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Esmail Baqai told a news conference in Tehran yesterday. “But to say that this means the signing of an agreement is imminent – no one can make such a claim.” The two sides were not discussing Iran’s nuclear programme “at this stage”, he added.

This is “not a final settlement”, said the BBC; this “memorandum of understanding” seems simply to involve a 60-day extension of the ceasefire and a plan for further negotiations on “some of the thorniest issues”, including the nuclear one. That timeline seems “rather compressed, given the complexity of the issues”, said CNN’s Collinson. “History shows Iran would love to drag the United States into a prolonged period of inconclusive diplomacy that lasts months or years.”

After months of stoking speculation over which Republican he would endorse in the acrimonious Texas Senate primary runoff race, President Donald Trump on Wednesday finally made his choice between Attorney General Ken Paxton and incumbent Sen. John Cornyn. But by throwing his political heft behind Paxton, a candidate whose skeleton-filled closet risks turning off general election voters, Trump may have instigated a major GOP schism in a reliably red state.

What did the commentators say?

Trump’s “eleventh-hour decision” to endorse Paxton, a “longtime MAGA ally,” gives the embattled attorney general a “late boost over establishment Republicans’ preferred candidate,” said Politico. Cornyn’s camp, however, fears that nominating the “scandal-plagued Paxton” could “put control of the Senate at risk and cost the party hundreds of millions of dollars to defend the seat this fall.” Paxton “would be an albatross around the neck of our candidates,” said Cornyn at a campaign event just hours after Trump’s endorsement, per KTSM 9 News. If nominated, Paxton “would likely lose” to Democrat James Talarico in November.

Republican senators “appeared stunned and livid” as news of Trump’s endorsement reverberated across Washington, said The New York Times. Many in the caucus “had been urging” the White House to back Cornyn, “whom they saw as a stronger candidate in a general election.” Trump’s “decision to do otherwise amounted to a slap at” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), who is “an institutionalist like” Cornyn.

“I’m sad personally for John Cornyn, and I hope he’s successful in his election regardless,” said one Republican senator to The Hill. “I’m sad for the institution.” It is “as much about President Trump sending a message to John Thune as the leader of the Senate as it is about an endorsement of Ken Paxton,” said longtime Trump ally Steve Bannon to The Wall Street Journal.

Made after “months of waffling,” Trump’s decision to endorse Paxton reflected the president’s “renewed conviction” that he “maintains an iron grip on the party following recent electoral victories,” said the Journal. Trump likely saw “recent internal polling,” was “convinced Paxton was pulling ahead with GOP primary voters” and “wanted to be on the winning side,” said Larry Sabato, the director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, to the Houston Chronicle. Trump picking Paxton “isn’t a shock given their history,” said the outlet. Not only has Paxton “golfed with Trump,” but he attended Trump’s 2021 “Stop The Steal” rally that preceded the January 6 insurrection and had “filed a petition with the Supreme Court to challenge the 2020 presidential election results in swing states for Trump.”

“Already the most expensive primary in history,” the Paxton-Cornyn race is also the “most expensive runoff ever,” said MS NOW. Some Republicans worry that it will “cost the GOP even more to keep the Senate seat red,” as the broader race, thanks to Trump’s intervention, has now grown “more competitive.”

Texas has “long been a great white whale” for Democrats, said The Hill. With a “uniquely strong nominee in James Talarico,” the party hopes that Trump’s “boost of Paxton could leave them with a vulnerable opponent” in November.

What next?

“Prolonged Republican infighting,” coupled with “growing anti-Trump sentiment,” has created a Texas race “more competitive than anyone would have predicted a year ago,” said The New Yorker. Democrats, “wary after years of predictions” that statewide wins are “just around the corner,” are now “allowing themselves to hope again, cautiously.”

We’ll learn “soon enough how GOP voters in Texas respond” to Trump’s backing of Paxton, said MS NOW. It’s “worth appreciating” that many Texas conservatives “believe Paxton can win.” But if he clinches the nomination over Cornyn next week, the GOP will “have to spend heavily” on Paxton’s behalf with “money they won’t have to spend elsewhere.”

Should Cornyn lose to Paxton, Trump will “face the prospect” of his joining a group of “lame duck senators more willing to buck his demands,” said the Times. Still, some Republicans are sticking with Trump’s choice, at least publicly. “You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out the pathway for Paxton is there,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) to the outlet. “What we’ve got to do is raise a lot more money now.”

Forty-two athletes, including swimmers, weightlifters and sprinters, will compete in Las Vegas on Sunday in the first Enhanced Games.

Little in sport has “caused as much controversy – nor provoked as many questions – as the Enhanced Games”, said BBC sports editor Dan Roan. “Those behind it claim it is here to stay, and could soon expand to more events and other disciplines.”

But there is another side to the spectacle of juiced-up competitors trying to beat the world record in their discipline. Earlier this year, the company behind the event, Enhanced, launched a range of personalised performance and longevity medicines to sell to the public.

What did the commentators say?

Proponents of the games say the aim is “to challenge sporting norms by allowing athletes to push their potential with legal drugs under strict medical oversight”, said Chris Kenning in USA Today. “The approach is, let’s not be naive and pretend it’s not happening,” said Enhanced CEO Max Martin. “Let’s just take what’s happening in the shadows, put it out in the open.”

But that’s not sensible, say some sports medicine experts. “It’s akin to me saying I’m going to make smoking safe by supervising you while you’re smoking,” Aaron Baggish, professor of medicine at the University of Lausanne, told Yahoo Sports.

Most critics though “overlook the fact that the Enhanced Games is making obvious what society has always quietly accepted”, said Byron Hyde, philosopher of science and public policy at Bristol University, on The Conversation – namely “that most people are willing to watch athletes risk harm when the entertainment is good enough”. Brain trauma is the “potential price of boxing entertainment”, so “why the outrage about pharmaceutical enhancement risks?”

For Baggish, the “primary concern” is the message the event sends to the public that using these substances when taking part in sports “is in any way, shape or form OK. That’s the really scary thing.”

That appears to be one of the goals of the organisers. Aron D’Souza, founder of the Enhanced Games, told The Independent in 2024: “This is the route towards eternal life.” The games will “bring about performance-medicine technologies that then create a feedback cycle of good technologies, selling to the world, more revenue, more R&D, to develop better and better technologies”. Ultimately, “it’s about being a better, stronger, faster, younger athlete for longer. And who doesn’t want to be younger for longer?”

But, said The Economist, “the real purpose of the games is to push the limits of what the public sees as the acceptable use of performance-enhancing drugs”. The event is taking place “at a time when concerns are being raised over the medicalisation of Western society”, said Roan. Social media and ‘looksmaxxing’ are being “blamed for fuelling demand for weight-loss injections, cosmetic treatments and performance substances”.

What next?

The Enhanced Games “speak to a vision of the future in which medicines, rather than being simply used to treat disease, can extend human longevity and enhance well-being”, said The Economist.

But on Sunday, the athletes involved will effectively be the guinea pigs for this idea, albeit ones who have “burned bridges, risked their future livelihoods or their health”. And with the launch of Enhanced’s consumer business, “more and more people may soon be wagering their bodies on a chance to roll back the clock”.

Two things are true: Cruise ships can be breeding grounds for disease. Americans love cruises anyway.

Expedition cruise lines “haven’t experienced any slowdown in bookings” following the deadly hantavirus outbreak on the MV Hondius, said The Wall Street Journal. Oceangoing travelers “generally understand the realities” of long boat journeys, Expedition Cruise Network CEO Akvile Marozaite said to the newspaper. Despite the scary headlines, industry experts “expect a record number of people” to take cruises this year, said The Associated Press. The sector “seems to be somewhat Teflon” to the bad publicity, Cornell University’s Robert Kwortnik said to the outlet.

What did the commentators say?

“Why would anyone go on a cruise?” Dave Schilling said at The Guardian. The Hondius drew worldwide attention, but a separate ship that was briefly quarantined with a rash of stomach flu cases was largely overlooked by the media. The stories are “piling up” about cruise ships being ocean-bound “fetid petri dishes.” There is not “one thing” a cruise offers “that isn’t available in the safe bosom of dry land.” Cruises will remain popular anyway. If Covid-19 “didn’t kill” enthusiasm for the excursions, “I think the industry is safe.”

People who criticize cruises are “wrong about nearly everything,” Nicole Russell said at USA Today. The hantavirus outbreak “won’t dampen my desire to go on a cruise.” There may be many stories of “terrible things happening on cruise ships,” but they are “worth the risk” because they can provide an “affordable, joy-filled family vacation.” Cruises, like life, are a “trade-off.” And life is “meant to be lived.“

“Do I think cruises are worth it, health-wise?” epidemiologist Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz said at Slate. The answer is a “bit complicated.” Cruises are “absolutely great places for illnesses to thrive,” but there is not a “great deal of evidence showing that infections are more likely” than on land. It is possible that people “just generally come into contact with lots of others on vacation.” Meyerowitz-Katz is considering taking his own family on a cruise. After weighing both the risks and benefits, “it doesn’t seem like the worst idea in the world.“

What next?

People planning to take a cruise should “practice great hand hygiene,” said CNBC. They should also “get up-to-date on your vaccines” before departing. And they should “keep a safe social distance” if illness rears its head. Best to stay clear of anyone who is coughing, “has difficulty breathing or is exhibiting fever,” Wellness Equity Alliance’s Dr. Tyler B. Evans said to the outlet.

The Hondius’ next voyage is already planned, said Forbes. After arriving in the Netherlands, the ship is to be “disinfected using chlorine and peroxide,” and the crew quarantined. Two scheduled voyages for the Hondius were canceled, but the plan “pending successful cleaning” is to sail in June from the Svalbard islands to the North Pole.

The UK’s net migration dropped sharply to 171,000 in the year to December 2025, the lowest outside the pandemic since 2012. But nobody seems to care.

A survey commissioned by the think tank British Future found only 16% of people believed net migration had fallen in 2025 compared with the previous year, while 49% thought it had increased. The poll of 3,003 adults in the UK “also suggests public concern is being shaped more by asylum and small boat crossings”, said the BBC Verify’s Rob England.

While net immigration figures have been falling (the number to December 2024 was 331,000), Labour and Conservative MPs “are speaking in a more hostile way about immigration than at almost any other time in the last century”, said The Guardian. The number of far-right and anti-immigration protests “has increased 15-fold since Labour took power in July 2024”, said The Telegraph.

What did the commentators say?

“It’s little wonder voters think net migration is going up when the only debate we have is about how to bring it down,” British Future’s director Sunder Katwala said. “We should be having a conversation about how to manage the pressures and gains of migration to Britain.”

“The difference in tone towards issues relating to asylum, immigration and human rights under this Labour administration compared to previous ones is stark,” said Alexander Horne in The Spectator. “These issues are now portrayed as problems to be solved.” New polling from YouGov also showed that Labour Party members have backed Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood’s tougher immigration policies by a two-to-one majority.

The net migration figures came as Andy Burnham’s allies signalled he would back Mahmood’s controversial immigration policies should he become Labour leader. “For Andy, migration is a moral issue as much as anything, showing people who’ve lost faith in politics that we do have control and we can do good,” one source told The Guardian. “We need to tell a positive story about the contribution of migration to our country, but we cannot do that unless people trust that the people they vote for have control over our borders.”

Mahmood’s closeness to Keir Starmer has led many to believe that she and her reforms will be jettisoned if the PM leaves Downing Street. “This is a pity for the country,” said Andrew Tettenborn in The Critic. Mahmood has thought deeply about immigration and she “overtly embraces the idea that settlement in the UK must be a privilege and not something there almost for the taking”. Despite criticism from within her own party, the voters Labour needs to woo – “the just-about-managing, the fed-up and those from the Red Wall” – care a “great deal for immigration control and a great deal for removing obstacles to it”.

But politicians should be wary of swinging too harshly one way or the other on immigration, said Sarah O’Connor in the Financial Times. “After the 2016 Brexit referendum, public concern about immigration fell”. Then it surged again “when the Conservative government liberalised visa routes for students and care workers between 2019 and 2022”. Now Mahmood has taken a restrictive turn.

What is happening is that successive governments are over-interpreting and over-reacting to a change in public opinion, “which reacts in turn, prompting a sudden swing the other way”. These frequent changes in immigration policy are bad for employers, migrants and the economy but also corrosive of trust between politicians and the public.

And yet “the tragedy of all this is that it’s not happening because politicians ‘aren’t listening’ to the public on immigration”. Rather, “it’s because they are listening too much”.

What next?

Mahmood’s proposed reforms “have caused a slow-bubbling revolt on the backbenches”, said Ethan Croft in The New Statesman, so whether they will survive a Commons vote remains to be seen.

Russian forces last month lost more territory to Ukraine than they were able to capture. The first of such occurrences in nearly two years, this marks an ignominious milestone and potential turning point in Moscow’s years-long invasion effort. At the same time, Russia is losing soldiers faster than it can recruit and deploy them. While the Ukraine front remains an active war zone that has left deep scars on both nations, there is a growing sense among observers that momentum has shifted in Kyiv’s favor.

What did the commentators say?

Russia’s conspicuously “diminished” Victory Day parade this month “signaled its vulnerability,” said The Economist. That sentiment was an “accurate reflection of Russia’s battlefield setbacks,” as well as the country’s “fear of the growing effectiveness of Ukraine’s long-range strikes.”

Russia’s weakened position can be traced to a confluence of three factors, said The Economist, citing research from the Institute for the Study of War: Ukrainian “ground counter-attacks and mid-range strikes,” the end of Russia’s “illicit use of Starlink terminals in Ukraine” and the Kremlin’s “paranoid throttling of the Telegram messaging app at home.” At the same time, Russia’s “exaggerated territorial ambitions and aggressive territorial demands” have run “completely counter to battlefield reality,” said the Institute.

May marks the fifth consecutive month in which Russia has lost “more soldiers than it can replace,” said National Security Journal. Ahead of an expected fifth summer of violence, Russia’s invasion “continues to falter” as the “fortunes of the war” seem to be “trending less and less in Russia’s favor.” Ukraine’s military technological advances have “not been the only key element” in Kyiv’s “recent battlefield gains.” Rather, they come amid Russia’s “growing command-and-control problems within its own military.”

Communications failures “contributed significantly to Russia’s problems” on the battlefield, said the Atlantic Council. After SpaceX “cut the Russian army’s illicit access to the satellite-based Starlink system” this spring, some Russian commanders were “forced to rely on inaccurate maps” showing “exaggerated gains.” In other cases, clusters of Russian troops were deployed “without adequate communication tools or coordination,” leaving them “highly vulnerable to Ukrainian counterattacks.”

All this comes as the public mood within Russia is “souring,” said Alexander Baunov at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center. The Putin government has “unceremoniously violated” the terms of its social trade-off offered to the public — that “you can live outside of the war, but you cannot be against it” — and now “society is angry.” Russian authorities have also banned the use of “popular foreign messaging apps” because they are “nontransparent” and boosted the “homegrown” Max app as an alternative. But the “implication” of Max’s transparency “has not gone unnoticed, and people feel their privacy has been rudely invaded.”

Russians “increasingly chafe” at the “restrictions on their liberties” imposed “in pursuit of a battlefield victory that now appears to be unattainable,” said Noah Rothman at the National Review. Moscow lacks “freedom of action” in the theater of battle and has “lost the ability to dictate the tempo of events,” while its economy contracts “following several years of war-driven growth.”

What next?

The Russian military’s “recent communications problems” are “unlikely to persist in their current form indefinitely,” said the Atlantic Council. Moscow has already explored a “range of alternatives, including relay drones and satellite links.” But it will probably take a “number of years for the Russian military to replicate the same level of efficiency previously provided by Starlink.”

Russia’s flagging battlefield progress is a problem for Putin, who has “insisted that Russia’s victory in the war is inevitable,” said CNN. That promise has “always been flawed,” given how “slow and incredibly costly the Russian advances have been.” Still, the momentum shift of late “feels like an inflection point in the war,” said Sir Lawrence Freedman, an emeritus professor of war studies at King’s College London, to The Economist. “If the Russians have nothing to show for their efforts, I would not be surprised if in some places things start crumbling.”

Rising Ebola cases in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are ringing alarm bells across a region still scarred by previous outbreaks of the highly contagious viral disease. The World Health Organization has declared a “public health emergency of international concern”.

At least 540 suspected cases and 131 suspected deaths have been reported by DR Congo’s health minister, and two cases have been confirmed in neighbouring Uganda. But the WHO’s initial sampling suggests the outbreak is potentially much more widespread.

And what makes this outbreak “extraordinary”, said the WHO, is that it’s caused by the rare Bundibugyo strain of the Ebola virus. This has a lower fatality rate (about 35%) than the more common Zaire or Sudan strains (up to 90% and 50% respectively) but there is no licensed Bundibugyo-specific vaccine or treatment – and the tests for it do not appear to work very well.

What did the commentators say?

Experts are alarmed that this outbreak “has been able to spread for weeks undetected across a densely populated ​area”, said Reuters. It took weeks to identify it as the Bundibugyo strain and then pinpointing cases was “slowed by limited diagnostic capacity”, with only six tests possible per hour.

The lack of a vaccine is why I am in “panic mode”, Jean Kaseya, the director-general of Africa-Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, told Sky News. And ongoing attacks by Islamic State-backed militants in Ituri, the province at the centre of the outbreak, are “restricting surveillance and rapid response operations”.

Ituri is “rebel-held territory”, close to “porous borders” with Uganda and South Sudan that communities cross constantly, said The Times. That’s certainly one factor that’s “making containment so difficult”. Bundibugyo is also “among the least studied of the Ebola strains”: this is only the third outbreak on record.

We reached a “critical moment”, said the BBC’s health correspondent James Gallagher. Most Ebola outbreaks are small but specialists are still “haunted” by the largest, which started in 2014 and killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa. This time, there is a “significant threat” not only to DR Congo and Uganda but also South Sudan and Rwanda. But that doesn’t mean we’re “in the early stages of a Covid-style pandemic”. The risk to the rest of the world “remains tiny”.

DR Congo has “extensive experience in dealing with Ebola outbreaks”, and its response is “significantly stronger today than it was a decade ago”, Daniela Manno, of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, told the BBC’s Gallagher. But recent US-led foreign-aid cuts have taken their toll. Containing the 2014 outbreak “relied on US leadership from USAID”, said Devi Sridharm, chair of global public health at the University of Edinburgh, in The Guardian. But “the USAID team dedicated to Ebola-like diseases was cut by Elon Musk”. Since Donald Trump withdrew the US from the WHO, the organisation’s emergency-response budget has shrunk by 37%. UK foreign-aid funding has also “fallen to its lowest level in two decades”.

The worry “is less about this becoming a global pandemic” (unlikely, as Ebola only spreads through contact with infected body fluids), and more about “the devastation it can cause” to the region and its “already fragile” healthcare systems. But this is an “interconnected world”: “if your neighbour’s house is on fire, you don’t wait and watch; you help to put it out before the fire spreads to yours.”

What next?

The WHO is sending a team of experts to Congo and, on Friday, will host an emergency scientific consultation of researchers, clinicians, public health bodies and funders. “The cash-strapped organisation has already released almost $4 million (£3 million) to combat the outbreak,” said the BBC, “but much more may be needed.” Public health officials are also considering using a combination of the existing approved vaccines for the Zaire and Sudan strains.

But communities in the region “have little trust in government or external aid agencies”, said Sridhar. If Ebola spreads to a major urban hub, it will be “much more difficult to stop”.

“I don’t think that, in two months, we will be done with this outbreak”, Anne Ancia, the WHO’s representative for the DRC, told reporters in Geneva at the World Health Assembly. The 2014 Ebola outbreak took two years to end.

Just days after he waved goodbye to Donald Trump, Xi Jinping is hosting another world leader, a man the famously opaque Chinese leader has described as his “best friend”.

Vladimir Putin arrives in Beijing today for the two-day summit, their second in less than a year and their 40th, at least, overall. Their “carefully cultivated friendship” is defined by “highly personal rituals” involving vodka, lakeside tea, sports events and even making pancakes, said the South China Morning Post.

It’s obvious what a war-fatigued and internationally isolated Russia seeks from China, on whom it relies for drones and economic support. But it’s less obvious what the now far more powerful China wants from its unstable neighbour.

What did the commentators say?

The timing of Putin’s visit, days after Trump’s, “sends an unmistakable signal”, said The Economist. Xi is emphasising that even if he can “stabilise relations” with the US, it won’t “come at the expense of his ‘no limits’ partnership” with Putin. Those ties could “grow deeper yet” because of the US war in the Middle East. Xi and Putin could share intelligence about Trump’s military action against Venezuela and Iran, whom both count as allies.

Xi could “exploit his newfound leverage” – the balance of power has “shifted dramatically” since Russia’s full-scale invasion – to “secure more sensitive military technology and know-how”. China now produces most of its own weapons, many based on Russian designs; it could now seek “more high-end assistance” in nuclear and ballistic missile areas. Russia is “thought to have been sharing” drone data and expertise garnered from its experience in Ukraine.

A “key aim” for China is “more reliable and sustainable energy supplies”, said Deutsche Welle. China is concerned about dependence on seaborne imports, which account for about 90% of its oil. The blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and the global disruption to supplies make Russian oil a “more attractive” prospect, and Western sanctions on Russian exports mean China can “secure Russian energy at a discount”.

“China and Russia are like a couple in the same bed with different dreams,” said Claus Soong of the Mercator Institute for China Studies. A weakened Russia, or even the collapse of Putin’s regime, would “pose immediate strategic risks for Beijing”. There are signs of cooling since the unlimited friendship they proclaimed in 2022, before Russia invaded Ukraine, but “Russia still has more to offer” than Europe.

Any deals will likely be on Chinese terms, Alexander Gabuev, director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center think tank, told the BBC. “Russia is fully in China’s pocket, and China can dictate the terms.”

But despite the asymmetry of power, the pair share vital interests – security along their 2,670-mile (4,300km) border, and China’s market for Russia’s oil, gas and other materials, said Ankur Shah, BBC Global China Unit editor. Russia’s war in Ukraine is also an “asset to Beijing as it considers its options for a potential invasion of Taiwan”. Russia still has some niche military technologies it can sell. But Moscow’s “big advantage” is “its ability to stand its ground”. Russia “may be the junior partner, but it’s also a proud one”.

What next?

Xi’s meeting with Trump, the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, and cooperation across energy, trade and security are all expected to be part of the discussions tomorrow, said CNN’s senior China reporter, Simone McCarthy.

Both Beijing and Moscow are “weighing up whether to play any role in helping to end a US-Iran conflict”. This could “potentially win each goodwill” with the US, but both also want to use Trump’s actions to “advance their own vision of a world that’s not dominated by American power”.

Any concrete agreements, however, are “unlikely to be made public”, said The Economist. “As during previous visits, announcements are likely to be broad in scope but thin on detail.”

Ukraine in recent months has slowed Russia’s invasion to a near-halt and forced Moscow to ramp up its own security measures. Kyiv’s homegrown drone technology and techniques are now in demand around the world. These accomplishments have come despite diminished U.S. support for Ukraine’s warfighting efforts.

What did the commentators say?

The fight against Russia is “going better than you think,” said Vox. Kyiv still relies on the “fickle U.S. government” for Patriot missiles and battlefield intelligence, but Ukrainian leaders have “more confidence” in their ability to withstand the invasion than they did a few months ago. The “Ukraine line is not really in danger of breaking” even though Russia has “sustained enormous casualties” in attempts to advance, military analyst Franz-Stefan Gady said to the outlet. Ukraine might not be winning the war at this point, said Vox, but it “doesn’t appear to be losing.” Its leaders now believe Ukraine “no longer needs the United States as much” as it did early in the war, said The New York Times.

Ukraine “has finally given up” on President Donald Trump, Phillips Payson O’Brien said at The Atlantic. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is “aggressively seeking new diplomatic and military partners” and has sent drones to strike Russian oil facilities despite U.S. warnings against doing so. American leaders have “reduced what little weaponry” they were sending to Ukraine and pressured Zelenskyy to cede territory in exchange for peace. But Ukraine’s ability to adapt with reduced American support “has been startling.”

It is “significant” that Ukraine is “reversing the trend” of Russia’s progress in the war, The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. One sign: Russian leader Vladimir Putin scaled back his country’s usual Victory Day parade in early May out of apparent fears of a Ukrainian drone strike. It is clear the “tide may be turning against Russia” after four years of war. That is an opportunity for the U.S. to “increase support for Ukraine so it can keep the pressure on Russia” and bring the struggle to an end.

The war will not end unless Ukraine inflicts a “decisive defeat” on Russia that poses a “direct threat to Putin’s regime,” Andrew A. Michta said at 19FortyFive. Putin’s military is “well positioned to continue” thanks to the backing of China’s industrial might and money flowing in from oil sales. Trump’s pressure on Zelenskyy to negotiate is a “signal to Moscow that its strategy is working.”

What next?

The U.S. is now looking to Ukraine for help in the war against Iran. The two sides this month signed an agreement to potentially “export military technology to the U.S.” and manufacture Ukranian-designed drones in the United States, said CBS News. Kyiv has “sent drone interceptors and pilots to the Middle East” to defend Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates against Iranian attacks. Ukraine is a “hub for drone innovation,” said the Financial Times. That is expertise the U.S. now needs.

Is Britain ungovernable? That is the question many are asking after a dramatic week in Westminster that potentially fired the starting gun on a Labour leadership race that could give the UK its seventh prime minister in a decade.

This latest political “merry-go-round has prompted soul-searching”, said Charlie Cooper on Politico. A G7 economy and “former global hegemon”, Britain is “increasingly a picture of political instability and economic stagnation”.

What did the commentators say?

After securing his election win, Keir Starmer promised to be honest with voters about “how tough this will be. And frankly, things will get worse before they get better.” But less than two years on, said Cooper, it is the parties on the extremes “offering quick and direct solutions” – such as Reform’s pledge to slash immigration or the Greens with promises of wealth taxes – “that now win a hearing with voters”.

With few in parliament able to “combine policy nous, real-world experience and the ability to sell a vision and convey hard truths”, the “constant churn” among PMs is “an indictment of leadership in the country”, said Tej Parikh in the Financial Times. “In a democracy, politics and policies are a reflection of the public too”, but “Britons struggle” to accept some necessary “trade-offs”.

Ending the pension “triple lock” is just one example of this. Throw in rising “expectations of government”, the electorate’s lack of patience and the declining “calibre of public discourse” and “it is little surprise Britain gets cakeist and myopic leaders, who are low on reform and high on easy answers”.

The electorate is “furiously disillusioned and disappointed” but the hard truth is that this “omnicrisis” of low productivity, a housing shortage, social care strain, welfare reform and ballooning national debt is not “easy to answer”, said Isabel Hardman in The i Paper.

“Failing to answer” these questions “leaves Britain hobbled in the long-term” and leaves voters feeling “let down by the politicians who they elect and pay to be honest and take the difficult decisions on their behalf”. Doing something about this would require “a leader who doesn’t care about social media storms or polling fluctuations or the complaints of focus groups” and is able to “switch off all that noise and fixate on the real problems”.

What next?

For too many people, the change they voted for in 2024 and repeatedly tell pollsters and focus groups they want “hasn't come fast enough”, said TUC general secretary Paul Nowak in The Mirror. It “hasn’t been all doom and gloom” but “the good work the government has done” – renationalising the railways, ending the two-child benefit cap and upgrading workers’ rights – “has been overshadowed by too many self-inflicted mistakes and a failure to shout proudly about those achievements”.

“Anyone who wants to replace Starmer has to start by accepting that he has done good things – just not enough and not at scale”, said Aditya Chakrabortty in The Guardian. Then they must “turn and face the country and tell us what they would do better”.

A “deep and justified pessimism” is gripping the UK. The feeling is that “tomorrow will be worse than today, that our children will not enjoy the same standards of living that we have done. That is what any Labour leadership contest must address.”

Many voters have a “palpable sense that the system is rigged against them”, said Nowak. Whoever is in No. 10 “today, tomorrow, in five years or in 10”, they “will have to fix the broken social contract”.

With Democrats looking toward the 2026 midterm elections, they are pushing an anti-corruption agenda in hopes of persuading voters. The party has called for laws against corruption to be placed on the books and repeatedly accused President Donald Trump of corrupt practices. Democrats are hoping this strategy, coupled with Trump’s plunging approval ratings, can help them win in November.

What did the commentators say?

Democrats unveiled an anti-corruption task force in their attempts to “claw back control of Congress from Republicans,” said The Associated Press. The task force will look to “overhaul ethics rules and protect access to the ballot.” Democrats aim to implement the same playbook used in Hungary against former Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who “was ousted by an opposition campaign with an anti-corruption message.”

The New Democrat Coalition, a caucus of 115 moderate House Democrats, has also released a plan to “crack down on loopholes that could assist insider trading, prediction-market schemes and cryptocurrency scams that any members of Congress or officials in the Trump administration engage in, including the president,” said NOTUS. Insider trading is already illegal, but “there is a growing concern among both parties that some members are profiting off their jobs.” Democrats are hoping the anti-corruption effort will “earn the trust of Americans” ahead of the election.

Democrats are also arguing that they care more about weeding out corruption than Republicans. Democratic officials have noted in campaigns that FBI Director Kash Patel “dismantled the agency’s public corruption team, which had previously been deployed to help monitor possible criminal activity,” said ProPublica. Over 200 Democrats have additionally aligned themselves with the End Citizens United PAC, which commits to “rejecting corporate PAC money, supporting a ban on congressional stock trading and working to end dark money in politics.”

What next?

Despite Democrats having a unified message around anti-corruption practices, voters in “battleground districts still do not give Democrats any advantage over the GOP when it comes to cleaning up corruption in the capital, showing how difficult it might be for the party to break through on the issue,” said the HuffPost. The End Citizens United PAC has urged candidates to “use anti-corruption arguments to underscore Democrats’ near-universal messages about affordability,” arguing that this will push them over the edge in November.

Some have cited Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) as an example of a politician successfully running an anti-corruption platform. “Nobody is articulating this kind of frame better than he is doing right now,” Tiffany Muller, the president of End Citizens United, said to HuffPost. But “gaining an advantage on the issue may require heading into territory some Democrats are uncomfortable with,” such as supporting “anti-corruption ideas more typically favored by the right, including term limits.”

If the Democrats win in the midterms, Trump’s “brand of corruption” will begin to wane in November and “go away in three years,” Ian Bremmer, the president of the global consultancy firm Eurasia Group, said to Semafor. The president is “putting his own best interest, and his family’s interests and his inner circle’s interest above those of the country,” Bremmer added. “Some of that is vainglorious.”

Wes Streeting, who quit as health secretary yesterday, has endorsed Andy Burnham as having the “best chance of winning” the Makerfield by-election. That fact should “override factional advantage or propping up one person”, Streeting said on X.

Pending approval from Labour’s ruling National Executive Committee, Burnham is set to stand in the northwest constituency, providing him with the chance to return to Parliament and challenge for the party leadership.

But with rising support for Reform UK in the region, and Labour plummeting in the polls, this will not be easy. How this by-election plays out “could decide the future direction of the country”, said the Manchester Evening News.

What did the commentators say?

Burnham contesting a seat vacated by Josh Simons, former chair of the Labour Together think tank, was “not high on my bingo card for this year”, said Ben Walker in The New Statesman. “Yet the logic behind the move is clear.” It is clearly “a pitch for prime minister”.

But Burnham’s return to Westminster is a “difficult proposition”, if the recent by-election in Gorton and Denton is anything to go by. “Yet, to state the obvious, this would be no ordinary by-election.” Makerfield is a “very different” constituency, and though it is only a “railway line away from Gorton, politically and culturally it is another world entirely”.

Taking into account Burnham’s popularity having been mayor of Greater Manchester since 2017, and exit-poll data from the Gorton and Denton contest, Britain Predicts forecasts a Labour hold, but “only narrowly”, by three points ahead of Reform. Whatever the result, the Makerfield by-election could be “one of the most totemic and decisive” in modern British history.

This is a “high-stakes gamble for everyone involved”, said Tim Shipman in The Spectator. “But then, in Labour politics right now, everything is.” The Makerfield seat is far from safe, despite being held by Labour since it was created in 1983. Simons won with a “majority of only around 6,000 over Reform” in 2024.

Nigel Farage’s party will contest the seat “with all guns blazing” and would be wise to select a “hyper local” ex-Labour supporter to stand, depicting Burnham as a “carpetbagger” who “takes your vote for granted”. With Keir Starmer unlikely to block Burnham standing, as he did in Gorton and Denton, the PM’s position is now “somewhat in the hands of Farage”.

A lot rests on Burnham’s “personal popularity” to get him over the line, said Ollie Corfe in The Telegraph. A YouGov poll this month shows his +4% net favourability score as the only positive rating of any senior Westminster politician (Starmer -46%, Angela Rayner -33% and Streeting -28%).

He will have to combat the disintegrating “Red Wall” in the northwest, where Labour has just lost 372 councillors, while Reform gained more than 400. Neighbouring St Helens saw one of the “most dramatic results” in the entire local elections, with Reform winning 71% of all seats.

The path to Westminster is a “route paved with thorns” that might yet end with the mayor of Greater Manchester’s “hopes in tatters”, said Stephen Bush in the Financial Times. And for Labour, the “stakes could not be higher”.

If Burnham does win, his reputation as a slayer of Reform would “only be enhanced”, and “his march to the leadership he has coveted for so long would then surely be unstoppable”. But if he loses to a Reform candidate, the public will question whether any Labour candidate can win. “Burnham’s defeat would secure Starmer as prime minister: but it could well confirm that he is on course to be Labour’s last prime minister.”

What next?

For the by-election to go ahead, several processes need to happen, said Jamie Grierson in The Guardian. By convention, the Labour chief whip – currently Jonathan Reynolds – will start the process by “moving the writ”, formally asking Parliament to start the election process. Once the writ has been moved, a by-election must take place between 21 and 27 working days later, and usually held on a Thursday.

This should take “about five to six weeks”, said The Guardian, which means the earliest Burnham could return to Westminster, if he wins, would be “early July”. Once achieved, “he could trigger a leadership contest, which he would be expected to win, potentially unchallenged”.

The war in Iran is still simmering, but President Donald Trump may already have eyes on his next target: Cuba’s Communist government.

An invasion of Cuba “could be imminent,” said Axios. The administration last week “imposed additional sanctions on Havana” amid a “worsening humanitarian crisis” of food shortages and power blackouts exacerbated by a U.S. blockade of oil shipments to the island nation. The U.S. has also surged surveillance flights off of Cuba’s coast, said CNN, and Trump on Friday suggested he might send an aircraft carrier to the region.

The president is “growing impatient” that “months of sustained U.S. pressure” have not caused the Communist regime to collapse, said NBC News. Trump speaks about Cuba “as if he wants to make it the 51st state,” a former U.S. official told the outlet.

What did the commentators say?

Trump knows “he can’t bomb his way to victory” in Iran, Heather Digby Parton said at Salon. He instead appears willing to start “yet another military operation” closer to U.S. shores. Invading Cuba seemed “less likely as the quagmire in Iran has developed,” but the president may see pivoting back to the Western Hemisphere as a way to “distract from his failure in Iran.” Cuba is in weakened condition right now. A quick victory might be achievable. “The real question is what happens then.”

It is “not clear how it’s supposed to end,” Joseph Zeballos-Roig said at MS NOW. The Trump administration “has yet to release a basic strategic road map” of its aims or how to achieve them. The U.S. has long wanted economic and political reforms to “loosen the Cuban government’s tight grip on its citizens,” but Havana should not be underestimated. The regime has “managed to foil the well-laid plans of 13 presidents dating back to Dwight Eisenhower.”

The Trump administration is unlikely to install a “new democratically disposed government” in Havana, Renee Pruneau Novakoff said at The Cipher Brief. But it is “realistic” to demand the regime boot Russian and Chinese intelligence operations from its shores. That “important milestone” would allow the U.S. and Cuba to “move forward with the relationship” between the two countries. Beyond that, however, “regime change will have to be a Cuban affair.”

What next?

Senate Republicans are “cautioning” Trump against a Cuba attack, said The Hill. The U.S. should remain “focused on where we are and that is trying to get the Strait of Hormuz opened up,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said to reporters. “I want less war, not more,” said Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.). GOP senators last month blocked a resolution forbidding military action, said the outlet, but sentiment in the party is “shifting as a military operation against Cuba appears more likely.”

It is possible Trump will hold back, said Reuters. “Cuba is asking ⁠for help, and we are going to ​talk!!” the president wrote Tuesday on Truth Social. He did not provide more details.

It has generally been the case that younger Americans are more optimistic than their older counterparts about finding jobs. But a recent survey shows that tune has changed in a major way. Perceptions have gotten so bad that the gap between how young Americans and older Americans view the job market is now the widest in the world. There are several reasons why people in their early 20s can’t secure jobs, and AI isn’t the only factor.

What did the commentators say?

In 2025, only “43% of Americans ages 15 to 34 said it was a good time to find a job,” said a Gallup survey of 1,000 adults. Compared to the 64% of Americans ages 55 and older who said the same, the 21-point difference is the “largest gap of any country in job market perceptions between younger and older adults.” It’s “rare for younger adults to be significantly less positive about local job conditions than the oldest age group,” especially in developed countries; in “only five other places — China, Serbia, the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong and Norway — does this pattern hold.”

Many of these younger Americans “have higher education and aren’t yet working full time,” Benedict Vigers, a senior news writer at Gallup, said to Axios. AI definitely plays a part in this less-than-stellar job market, as it is “gutting entry-level roles,” Sam Hiner, the co-founder and executive director of the Young People’s Alliance, said to the outlet. The “corporate landscape” is also “often heavily reliant on social capital over qualifications,” further contributing to the “pessimism.”

A higher competitive edge among young people is additionally making it harder to secure jobs. “You speak with your peers, and you realize that every single one of us are competing for the same opportunities,” Amelia Sexton, a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said to Axios. Gender may weigh in as well, as the “American labor market is tilting away from men,” said The Wall Street Journal. In the past year, nearly all job growth “has come from healthcare and social assistance, a sector with a dearth of men,” and “sectors with heavily male workforces have been losing jobs.”

What next?

It is clear from the data that there is a “generational rift in Americans’ views of economic opportunity,” said The Associated Press. With the midterm elections on the horizon, the split among young and old is “likely to continue fueling generational divides in politics, where younger voters have focused on economic issues such as housing costs and have registered less faith in institutions.”

The greater optimism among older generations also comes from people who “aren’t actually job hunting — they’re retired or already employed, so they judge the market abstractly without personal stakes,” said Entrepreneur magazine. Older Americans are “far more likely to own homes and have savings, insulating them from the housing and cost-of-living shocks driving young workers’ pessimism.”

The negativity felt by young job-seekers is an “incredibly new phenomenon,” Vigers said to the AP. Gallup’s 2025 poll was the first time the organization found younger Americans to be more pessimistic than people in other countries about job prospects, and that trend looks primed to continue. “Has this happened in most other advanced economies? The answer is a resounding no.”

Andy Burnham might be the bookmakers’ favourite to replace Keir Starmer as Labour leader, despite his lack of a Westminster seat, but he certainly isn’t the bond market’s favourite.

In fact, gilt traders see the Greater Manchester mayor as the “biggest threat” of all the potential candidates, said the Financial Times. He troubled investors last year when he suggested the country should not be “in hock” to the bond market. Six out of 10 fund managers picked Burnham as the candidate that would “trigger the most negative market reaction”.

Burnham has said his comments on the bond market were misinterpreted, but the political project he espouses and the vision he offers for the country’s future – Manchesterism – remains highly divisive. Critics see it as “mostly vibes and boosterism” that “relies on a bottom-up localism” difficult to scale at a national level, said PoliticsHome. Others see it as our potential economic and political saviour.

What did the commentators say?

Manchesterism is a “horrifically overused phrase” about how my city “does things differently”, said Stephen Topping in the Manchester Evening News. But it’s true. Manchesterism is “‘place-based’ rather than party political”. It involves “public services working closer together, and in partnership with both the private sector and community groups, to ensure the benefits of a stronger economy can be felt by more people”.

The Greater Manchester region has become the UK’s fastest growing economy over the past decade, “at more than double the rate of the national average”. Devolution has been critical: the “trailblazer” deal struck in 2023 has allowed Greater Manchester to “take public control of key services” such as the bus network, which has improved living standards and boosted the local economy. Those who have worked closely with Burnham believe Manchesterism “could work in other parts of the UK”, though it would pose “a radical departure from the UK’s largely centralised economy”.

Burnham’s programme has begun “delivering affordability and economic dynamism” by “regaining public control” of essential services, said Mathew Lawrence, director of progressive think tank Common Wealth, in The New Statesman.

Energy, water, housing, transport and care are “domains of inelastic demand” and “existential need”. So market governance of the supply side “produces rent extraction” and underinvestment. The public “pays twice: through higher bills” and taxes to fund support. But public control of essentials eliminates the privatisation premium. “Rebuilding public provision is not the alternative to fiscal prudence. It is fiscal prudence.”

Manchesterism might be the “buzzword of the day”, but it’s simply people projecting their “pipe dreams” on to Burnham’s “blank canvas of soft-left localism”, said Daniel Johnson in The Telegraph.

“The irony is that 19th-century Manchesterism was more or less the opposite of what the Labour Party now thinks it means.” Manchester was “both the laboratory and the showcase of the Industrial Revolution”, the “citadel of free trade”. It had nothing to do with Burnham’s “municipal socialism”. His proposed solution to Britain’s economic woes is “a muddled melange of municipal meddling, including tax hikes and more borrowing”. What Britain needs is the 19th-century version, which Burnham doesn’t understand.

The vision of Manchesterism Burnham outlined in January is, in practice, an industrial strategy – and there is “nothing new about those”, said Christopher Snowdon in The Critic. Economists have long criticised them for “misallocating resources, crowding out private investment, picking losers, and forcing taxpayers to bail out industries that are only kept on life support for political reasons”. How, exactly, can Manchesterism “stop us being in hock to the bond markets” when Manchester City Council is “one of the most indebted in the country”.

What next?

Burnham is planning to reassure the bond market that his possible election to Labour leader would “not trigger a financial meltdown”, said The Telegraph. Sources say he is planning to endorse a pamphlet outlining a framework for Manchesterism, setting out how it could be rolled out across the UK and “the wider economic theory behind his ideas”.

But the uncertain national landscape, in which voters are moving both further left and further right, could make the success of Manchesterism “a challenge for anybody”, Sarah Longlands, chief executive of the Manchester-based Centre for Local Economic Strategies, told Manchester Evening News.

Manchesterism is still in its early stages, yet for all the benefits devolution has brought, Greater Manchester is still “a tale of two cities”, with a great income and opportunities divide exacerbated by the cost of living crisis. “Growth in Greater Manchester has to be for everybody – otherwise, what’s the point?” Longlands said.

El Niños arrive every few years, inflicting drought, flooding and other climate destruction across the globe. Climate scientists are predicting “potentially the biggest El Niño event since the 1870s” in the coming months, said State University of New York at Albany’s Paul Roundy, per The Washington Post. Rising temperatures in the equatorial Pacific Ocean waters could “shift patterns of droughts, floods, heat, humidity and sea ice across the planet,” said the outlet, as well as create a “higher frequency of heat waves” across much of the United States. Such dramatic shifts could have a “profound impact on human society and human well-being,” said climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe to the Post.

El Niños are natural phenomena, but could prove combustible when combined with global warming. The coming El Niño might “lock Earth into a hotter climate” with “lasting changes in heat, rainfall and drought patterns” around the world, said Inside Climate News. Researchers believe the newest cycle “could permanently push” the planet past the 1.5 degrees Celsius warming milestone long seen as the threshold for “potentially irreversible climate impacts” likely to affect food production, human health and the global economy.

What did the commentators say?

The world is about to learn “how much climate disruption we can manage at the moment,” David Wallace-Wells said at The New York Times. The biggest recorded El Niño in 1877 produced famine that killed millions of people in Egypt, India and China and elsewhere, often followed by epidemics of “malaria, plague, dysentery, smallpox and cholera” that further harmed “famine-weakened populations.” The next El Niño may not “produce nearly as much human suffering as the one of 150 years ago.” But it is “almost certain” to make 2027 the “hottest year on record by some margin.”

“Prepare for bedlam,” Bill McKibben said on The Crucial Years Substack. “We get lots more” fires and floods “when the temperature tilts sharply up” as happens during an El Niño. The coming cycle may offer “final proof that global warming is actually accelerating sickeningly,” coming atop a “higher baseline temperature” produced by the “steady warming of the planet.” The likely weather disasters could set in motion the “next, pivotal chapter of the climate fight.” The ugly truth: “We are ever further into the great overheating.”

What next?

“A lot has changed” since the 1877 El Niño, said The Washington Post. Advances in climate monitoring make the world “much more prepared to deal with the consequences” of massive weather shifts.

It will still be a challenge. “Hotter, drier weather across Asia” could damage crops while farmers on the continent “grapple with fertilizer shortages” caused by the Iran war, said Reuters. El Niño could also “dump more rain ​on Europe and the United States,” affecting U.S. corn and soybean harvests. The uncertainty may prompt farmers to hedge their planting plans. “Why spread expensive fertilizer on a crop that is going to be poor anyway?” said Vitor Pistóia at Australia’s Rabobank to the outlet.

For nearly a quarter of a century, Vladimir Putin has led the Russian Federation as one of the most successful authoritarians on Earth. But more than four years after launching an all-out invasion of Ukraine, the Russian president synonymous with Moscow’s kleptocratic rule finds himself in unfamiliar territory. Russia is now roiled by rumors of organized unrest with months to go before parliamentary elections, while Putin himself faces allegations of extreme isolation and a weakening grip on power.

What did the commentators say?

There is a sense of “mounting unease within the Kremlin” as it grapples with domestic and economic problems plus “increasing signs of dissent and setbacks on the battlefield in Ukraine,” said CNN, citing a report from a European intelligence agency. The Kremlin has “dramatically increased” Putin’s security, even installing surveillance systems “in the homes of close staffers” in measures “prompted by a wave of assassinations of top Russian military figures and fears of a coup.” Putin is “increasingly concerned” about an alleged “plot by members of the Russian political elite to topple him, or even assassinate him with drones,” said The Times. The president and his family have “stopped visiting their luxury residences” and Putin is spending “weeks at a time in bunkers.”

The report focuses on “growing internal tensions” between Putin and former Defense Minister and current Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu, said the Kyiv Post. Considered a “potential coup risk” for his “continued influence within the military leadership,” Shoigu has not “personally” been linked with hard evidence to “any wrongdoing.” The arrest this past March of one of Shoigu’s deputies was “presented in the report” as a “sign of weakening informal protections among the elite” that has contributed to the tensions.

Putin’s slipping power is “not only about falling approval ratings,” said The Economist. Russia’s future is “no longer discussed” in terms of what Putin “will decide” but as “something that will unfold independently of him — and possibly already without him.” This waning authority comes from a “confluence” of factors, including rising wartime costs and a “growing demand for rules among elites who have been forced back into Russia, along with their capital.” Shifting geopolitical winds and the collapse of Russia’s previous “social contract,” in which the state “stayed out of people’s private lives while citizens stayed out of politics,” have created a “situation which in chess is known as a Zugzwang: when every move worsens the position.”

This isn’t to say that “revolution is imminent” or that the 73-year-old Putin “will be sidelined soon,” said The Wall Street Journal. Nevertheless, the “change in mood is remarkable” compared to “just last December,” when Russia was “buoyed by hopes” of a Moscow-friendly, Trump-negotiated ceasefire with Ukraine.

Changes in national mood notwithstanding, the “sudden spate” of coup-oriented reporting stemming from the “conveniently anonymous ‘European intelligence agency’” looks “suspiciously more like a psyop meant to generate paranoia in the Russian elite than a serious assessment,” said The Spectator. Europe has a “desperate appetite” for a “deus ex machina, for some miraculous end to the Ukraine war,” and a coup to oust Putin “certainly fits the bill.” Still, this would “hardly be the first time” intelligence services “succumbed to the temptation to provide their masters with what they want, not need, to hear.”

What next?

For the time being, Moscow “understands that there could be serious discontent ahead” and has accordingly “decided to allow low-level discontent to manifest itself,” said former Putin adviser Marat Gelman at the Journal. As things stand, Putin has “enough resources to crush any civil revolt.”

“In Russia, they say that things don’t happen fast, but when they happen, they happen fast,” former U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan said to the Journal. While he “wouldn’t have said it a year or two ago,” civic revolt is “possible now.”

Fresh off a world tour, Vice President JD Vance was in Iowa this week to boost GOP Rep. Zach Nunn in his reelection bid, as Republicans scramble to defend their congressional majorities by November. But no political visit there can escape speculation stemming from Iowa’s role as the nation’s first presidential caucus state. Vance’s Iowa excursion may have been an example of a vice president dutifully doing what the party requires of him. It might also have been a soft launch of a much bigger effort from the veep’s camp.

What did the commentators say?

Vance’s trip to Iowa was “billed as a White House message to American workers” on top of being an “effort to promote Nunn,” NBC News said. But Vance’s appearance, his “first to the state as vice president,” had “added political weight” and an “expectation that the visit would be the first of many for him.” Although most of Vance’s remarks in Iowa “traced back to the midterm elections and, specifically, Nunn’s race,” he also “carefully recognized each of the high-ranking Republicans in the room” in a speech “loaded with personal touches, including biographical details” from his “Hillbilly Elegy” memoir.

Not only do Iowan Republicans see a “high-profile” visit like Vance’s as helping “build momentum” for Republicans ahead of the midterms, Iowans are also “constantly gauging national figures as potential presidential candidates,” said Iowa Public Radio. Iowa Republicans see someone who comes to help in the midterms “as a team player,” State GOP Chair Jeff Kaufmann said to the outlet. That, in turn, “helps” if they “choose later to run for president.”

In a state “more freighted with presidential expectations than any other,” Vance used his time to “woo influential Iowans,” including “Kaufmann, evangelical leader Bob Vander Plaats and conservative talk show host Steve Deace,” said The New York Times. “I’ve never supported Trump in a primary,” Deace said to the outlet. Vance, however, is the “leader in the clubhouse for me” in 2028.

Vance’s “association” with Trump’s agenda presents a “high-risk, high-reward proposition” that could “make or break his political future,” Politico said. “That’s the risk of being part of an administration,” Iowa GOP strategist David Kochel, who has advised multiple presidential campaigns in the state, said to the outlet. “This is the Kamala Harris problem.” With Trump not on the ballot this year, Vance “keeping his supporters engaged” in November could be “critical” for holding Nunn’s seat, said Iowa’s KTIV. But Trump himself is “underwater in districts that he won in 2024,” Puck said, including in Nunn’s, where Republicans are “just one point” ahead of Democrats.

During his speech, Vance attempted to “project loyalty” to Trump, despite the administration’s push for a war in Iran that Vance “privately signaled he was not eager to see the United States enter,” The Washington Post said. Vance had also been “slow to return” to Iowa as veep, “even as other ambitious Republicans,” including Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas, “trekked here for widely attended conservative summits and dinners in 2025.”

What next?

Vance is currently the “overwhelming front-runner” for the GOP presidential nomination in 2028, even as he “remains unpopular with the broader electorate,” the Times said. And “unlike other cabinet officials” serving at the pleasure of the president, Vance can campaign for the future “while keeping his day job.”

Still, despite speculation over Vance’s Iowa visit, there was “no special reason the vice president came here this week, as opposed to closer to the general election,” the Post said, citing multiple sources with knowledge of Vance’s schedule. Iowa was “merely next on the White House’s list of swing-state House districts for Vance to visit.” Said one source, simply: “Gotta go to Iowa eventually.”

“Labour has gone from its loveless landslide to having no political heartland in the UK to call its own,” said Adam Boulton in The i Paper.

Reform UK has made sweeping gains across England in the local elections, while the SNP is likely to be the largest party in Scotland. Labour has already admitted it is not going to form the next government in Wales.

Keir Starmer has declared he is “not going to walk away and plunge the country into chaos”. However, amid rumours of challenges from former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner, Health Secretary Wes Streeting and Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham, Labour’s poor performance in the local elections could prove the tipping point for the PM.

What did the commentators say?

“Kingmaker” Ed Miliband has reportedly privately suggested to Starmer he should set out a “timeline for his departure” after the results, said Steven Swinford in The Times. Though the former party leader is “supportive” of Starmer, he is worried that Labour may “descend into a bitter and damaging leadership contest”.

Both Rayner and Streeting are thought to have the support of the 81 Labour MPs needed to “trigger a contest”. Rayner reportedly does not see the ongoing HMRC investigation into her tax affairs as a “barrier to putting herself forward”. Burnham has also “emerged as the preferred candidate of powerbrokers on Labour’s soft left”. They believe an “orderly transition to his leadership over a period of months is the only way to avert a bloody civil war”, with reports of a backbench MP standing down to accommodate his return to Westminster.

Indeed, it may appear an “obvious conclusion” – that changing the leader would make its problems “go away”, said Boulton. “Obvious but wrong.” Inexperienced Labour MPs – “more than half” of whom were first elected in 2024 – had “supped full on the bloodshed” of five axed Conservative leaders before the general election. But they “failed to notice that such a butcher’s bill did not ultimately improve the Tories’ fortunes”. The reality is they have a “poor leader who has led them into an electoral catastrophe, but without him, things could always get worse”.

Starmer may be on the end of one of the party’s “worst set of election results in history”, but he may “take solace” in his potential challengers also “facing heavy losses in their own patch”, said Kiran Stacey in The Guardian. Labour lost control of Tameside in Greater Manchester, Rayner’s local council, and “struggled” across the northwest, impacting Burnham. Experts also expect Labour to “do badly” in Streeting’s home council of Redbridge in northeast London.

Labour MPs will have a “terrible sinking feeling”, said political strategist James Frayne in The Telegraph. They won’t know which way to turn, but the “great risk” for them is “looking like they’re part of the problem”. Staying silent implies a weakened party is becoming more divided, but appearing to “trot” out excuses for Starmer “risks downplaying the prospect of a straightforward Farage majority at the next election. That’s not a risk that anyone with any hope of a future in the Labour Party can take.”

It is “hard to deny” that Starmer’s days are “numbered”, said Simon Walters in The Independent. But the question remains: “how is any replacement going to make things better for Labour?” Starmer “may not set the pulse racing” but he is “decent and honest”, as well as making the right calls over Iran, and “standing up to Donald Trump with courage and quiet dignity”. Until someone raises “convincing solutions” to current issues, those who are “indulging in a petty blame game” in Westminster “should be careful what they wish for”.

What next?

Votes were still being counted, but the Labour “post-mortem” had already begun, said Ethan Croft in The New Statesman. Amid the “necessary evasions and sugar-coating of damage control”, there are “hard-headed calculations” about which direction the party should turn. Over the next few days expect everyone on the Labour left and right to use the results to “validate what they already believed”, and to “argue for policies and strategies they were already advocating for the party’s future”.

Those on Labour’s right are “confident” the results “vindicate” Shabana Mahmood’s “hardline” stance on immigration, believing the party must do more to “neutralise” Reform on Labour’s own terms. Those on the left of the party, however, think this is “precisely the consequence of pursuing that brand of politics”, and is also why they are being “walloped” by the Greens.

A new skirmish looms in President Donald Trump’s trade wars. The treaty that binds the U.S., Canada and Mexico markets together is up for review, but tensions are rising and could scuttle or undermine the pact.

A “war of words” has pushed review of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) to the “breaking point,” said Axios. The three countries must decide by July 1 whether to continue the accord for another 16 years, but U.S.-Canada discord stands in the way. Canada has raised U.S. hackles by moving to deepen trade ties with Europe and China in the wake of Trump’s imposition of tariffs last year.

Canada has been “taking advantage of the American economy and people for decades,” an administration spokesperson said to The New York Times. Canadians do not need a “small deal that disadvantages us,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said to CBC News. The treaty’s implosion would have “far-ranging economic effects,” said Axios, affecting the supply and trade of cars, crude oil and natural gas.

What did the commentators say?

The tense negotiations “reveal how serious the fissures” have become between the U.S. and Canada, Michael Froman said at the Council on Foreign Relations. Trump’s tariffs against America’s northern neighbor have “ushered in a new wave of ‘Canada first’ patriotism” that has been hard on trade, tourism and goodwill between the two countries. But Canada is “condemned by geography” to deal with the U.S., and the U.S. is dealing with rising inflation and gas prices. The treaty should be reaffirmed quickly. The “last thing” the United States needs at the moment is a “major trade crisis.”

Canada “should call Trump’s bluff” on trade talks, Peter Jones said at The Walrus. Ottawa “has more leverage than it thinks” because the U.S. economy is weakening under the weight of the country’s increasing national debt. The United States needs “stuff” that Canada makes, and “our market is an attractive one for American businesses.” Trade has “greatly benefited America.” Canada should remember that at the negotiating table. “We have cards too.”

Trump’s hardball trade tactics are “doing reputational damage” to the U.S. and “undermining the American economy,” Mary Anastasia O’Grady said at The Wall Street Journal. The survival of USMCA is “important for American investors, workers, businesses, farmers and ranchers” and scuttling it is “bound to inflict wounds on lots of American companies.” It will also raise prices on American consumers amid an affordability crisis. “That sounds like a bad political strategy.”

What next?

Expect more “drama” as the USMCA review deadline approaches, said NOTUS. There will be “threats to withdraw, threats to break it up” and “maximal demands” by the United States, said former Commerce official William Alan Reinsch to the outlet.

Experts believe ending the pact is the “least likely option,” said NOTUS. U.S. business leaders are “bracing” for a showdown. There is much at stake: Exports to Mexico and Canada “support millions of domestic jobs generating trillions of dollars.”

Zack Polanski has reason to be pleased with his ­leadership of the Green Party so far.

Membership has ­tripled since he took over last September, and the party has made “great electoral strides”, said The Times. It is polling strongly and is forecast to “make gains in Labour’s London strongholds” in today’s local elections.

But “there is a darker side”. Polanski, himself Jewish, “appears intent on exploiting” anger on the left over Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. As he works to cultivate a new, populist base, he “seems not to recognise”, or is unwilling to confront, antisemitism within his party – although it is “staring him in the face”.

What did the commentators say?

Greens are “often lionised as nicer and kinder than other parties”, said The Telegraph. But how do voters square the party’s “‘anti-racist’ credentials” with “the revolting online behaviour of many” of its candidates?

Two standing in Lambeth, Sabine Mairey and Saiqa Ali, were arrested last week on suspicion of stirring up racial hatred online. One shared a post suggesting an attack on a synagogue “isn’t antisemitism” but “revenge” for Israel “murdering people”. Other candidates have defended the 7 October massacres, questioned whether “Zionism is a mental illness” and “implied that antisemitism is justified”.

Polanski provoked outrage when he suggested police tackling the armed suspect in the Golders Green terror attack had used excessive force. Antisemitism “appears to have become normalised on the left, a dog-whistle used to win votes”, said The Telegraph.

No one is suggesting that Polanski himself is “some frothing-at-the-mouth anti-Semite”, said Tom Slater in The Spectator. But the accusation that the party “has become a magnet for anti-Semites”, and “a key voice” in downplaying the growing threat” to Britain’s Jews, is “hardly unfounded”.

Polanski, when asked about the spate of arson attacks on synagogues and the torching of four Hatzola ambulances, came out with “the already-infamous lines”: “Now, there’s a conversation to be had about whether it’s a perception of unsafety or whether it’s actual unsafety, but neither are acceptable.”

But those comments to Haaretz have been widely “misrepresented”, said Owen Jones in The Guardian. What Polanski said was that he feels pro-Palestine marches “have been perceived as unsafe by some Jewish people and safe by others, including himself”. Other journalists have accused Polanski of using his Jewish identity as “a political shield”. How does their treatment of Polanski square with his party’s “repeated, explicit condemnations of antisemitism?” Yes, there have been “allegations of vile antisemitism” by party candidates, and “a small number of examples” from a party that has nearly quadrupled in size since September – but “to extrapolate from these” and “smear an entire party” is “cynical”.

Polanski has condemned any antisemitic remarks, saying this was “not an abstract idea” for him. “As a Jewish person, those comments disgust me,” he told the BBC on Sunday. But, he added, “I don’t believe we have a particular problem compared [with] wider society and other political parties”.

What next?

Polanski’s vocal support for Palestine and his “consistent condemnation of Israeli crimes and excesses undoubtedly contributed to the party’s surge in support”, said Tony Greenstein, from the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, on Al Jazeera.

But it has also triggered an antisemitism smear campaign “almost identical to the one that eventually saw Jeremy Corbyn and his leftist, pro-Palestine supporters ousted from the Labour Party”. How the Green leader responds “will determine not only the future of his party, but potentially the direction of British politics”.

In effect, Polanski “still has a real shot at carrying his party to power”, but he could lose it all “if he repeats Corbyn’s mistakes and tries to appease his bad-faith critics”.

The Green Party is “facing a test on antisemitism”, said Ailbhe Rea in The New Statesman. In a “quite extraordinary development”, the deputy leader Mothin Ali encouraged some of the suspended candidates to “take legal action against the party”.

Polanski said the main lesson he needs to learn from Corbyn is to “navigate antisemitism allegations better”. He is “absolutely correct”. But how and when he plans to do so have “not yet become clear”.

Hantavirus is typically spread by exposure to rodent droppings. That’s concerning enough. But health experts are alarmed that a deadly ship-borne outbreak of hantavirus might be spreading from human to human.

The possibility of person-to-person transmission of hantavirus is “very, very surprising and obviously a very rare occurrence,” Kari Debbink of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health said to NPR. Three people aboard the MV Hondius cruise ship have already died from the outbreak, and there are several other suspected cases among the 147 passengers and crew.

A typical rodent-caused outbreak could be resolved by “taking people off the ship,” the University of Michigan’s Emily Abdoler said to the network. But the possibility of a human-transmitted disease means “taking folks off the ship doesn’t stop the spread.”

Passengers aboard the Hondius have been isolated in their cabins in a “lockdown reminiscent of the Covid-19 pandemic,” said The Associated Press. Authorities are being cautious but also warning the public against panic. The Andes strain of hantavirus at issue “requires very close, prolonged contact” to spread between people, KFF Health News’ Céline Gounder said on “PBS NewsHour.” That’s “very different” from Covid or flu viruses that can be “transmitted much more easily through the airborne respiratory route.”

What did the commentators say?

The outbreak is “serious and frankly a bit unnerving,” Katherine J. Wu said at The Atlantic. A human-transmitted hantavirus could “pose an additional threat” to people at the ship’s destination or to healthcare workers treating the sick. The ship’s passengers will eventually disembark, but officials cannot yet say the risk that passengers and crew “will pose to the broader global community.” Making the investigation more difficult: The cruise ship environment where “strangers are constantly schmoozing” makes it easy for people-to-people viruses to spread but difficult for medical professionals to track the source.

There’s “no reason for panic,” Lisa Jarvis said at Bloomberg. A “handful of cases of a deadly virus” is understandably sufficient to “raise all our hackles” following the Covid pandemic. Hantavirus is “ubiquitous” in parts of the United States such as the desert Southwest, while actual “infections are still rare.” The current outbreak is “unlikely to turn into anything bigger.”

The World Health Organization was “built to manage” emergencies like this, Krutika Kuppalli said at Stat News. Indeed, the WHO is “coordinating the response.” But the U.S. government has not been able to take advantage of the information generated by the agency, having withdrawn from the WHO in 2025. And the outbreak should be a “warning sign to the U.S.” of the costs of that decision.

What next?

The Hondius “remains at sea” while regional leaders “clash over its docking,” said The New York Times. Spain has said the ship can dock in the Canary Islands, but regional government officials have “objected to the ship docking there.” The isolated passengers are keeping themselves busy with “reading, watching movies, having hot drinks and that kind of thing,” said travel influencer Kasem Hato to the Times.

Donald Trump has paused the US operation shepherding ships through the Strait of Hormuz to see if a lasting peace deal with Iran can be agreed. But there remains scepticism on both sides that a permanent end to the conflict is near.

The ceasefire, which was extended indefinitely by Trump on 21 April, “opened up a chance for diplomacy that looked for a short time as if it might make progress”, said BBC international editor Jeremy Bowen. A first round of talks in Pakistan ended without agreement, but while both America and Iran “want to have a deal” they have “different deals in mind and are sticking to their red lines”.

Trump is demanding the immediate reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of global oil and gas exports pass, and cast-iron restrictions on Iran’s nuclear capabilities. Tehran wants an end to the war, guarantees against future attacks, a withdrawal of US forces from around Iran, the release of frozen Iranian assets worth billions of dollars and the lifting of sanctions.

What did the commentators say?

Iran has “slightly softened” its proposal around the US blockade of the Strait, but on the two biggest issues – enrichment of uranium and transferring its highly enriched uranium – both sides remain “far apart”, Paul Musgrave, from Georgetown University in Qatar, told Al Jazeera.

Kenneth Katzman, from the New York-based nonprofit Soufan Center, said Iran’s mistrust of Trump remains a bigger obstacle.

This is partly driven by the president’s “increasingly contradictory statements about the United States’ strategy” and the administration’s “shifting timeline for the war’s end”, which has been “one of the clearest examples of its flip-flopping messaging”, said Julia Ledur in The Washington Post.

Trump “clearly wants to end the war in Iran”, said Katrin Bennhold in The New York Times. At first, “he tried scare tactics” but his ultimatums “proved flexible and his threats to wipe out a civilisation empty (at least so far)”. He is now trying “to inflict financial pain on the Iranian leadership” but his blockade isn’t “faring much better”.

Trump’s “conviction that more economic or even military pressure will bring about Iran’s capitulation is deeply flawed”, said Steven Erlanger in the NYT. Officials and analysts say it is a “misreading of the Islamic republic’s strategy, psychology and capability for adaptation”.

What next?

For now, “diplomacy is not entirely frozen”, said Barak Ravid and Marc Caputo on Axios, as Trump’s envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff are still in contact with Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi.

But things could still go either way. One senior US official said: “There are talks. There are offers. We don’t like theirs. They don’t like ours. We still don’t know the status of the [Supreme Leader]. And they’re carrying messages by hand to caves or wherever he or whoever is hiding. It slows the process down.

“It’s either we’re looking at the real contours of an achievable deal soon, or he’s going to bomb the hell out of them.”

“But if history is any guide, there’s a real chance the war continues to drag on,” said Will Walldorf, from the Defense Priorities think tank, in Foreign Policy.

This is because a “few core elements that have turned past conflicts into forever wars are present in this one, too”. These include “high resolve by the weak, erosion of cost-benefit thinking by the strong, and weak institutional constraints to war-fighting on at least one side”. Combined, they mean that “resisting the expansion of the Iran conflict into a forever war won’t be easy”.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order last week creating a new pathway for working-class Americans to save for retirement. But what will the “Trump IRAs” actually accomplish?

About 56 million Americans “lack access to an employer-sponsored retirement plan at work,” said CNBC. The president’s order in 2027 will create a new website, TrumpIRA.gov, where those workers can “research, compare and enroll in private-sector individual retirement accounts” on their own. Low-income working Americans may even be eligible for a yearly matching contribution of $1,000 from the federal government.

The program could amount to the “largest potential expansion of retirement coverage since Social Security,” Teresa Ghilarducci, the director of the Wealth Equity Center at the New School for Social Research, said to MarketWatch. Other experts say the new effort needs a “more robust match and automatic enrollment” to truly help more workers secure their retirement, said Axios. But “that requires legislation” to pass through Congress.

What did the commentators say?

Trump’s new retirement plan “carries big political risks,” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. There is “nothing to stop Americans” from setting up and contributing to their own IRA accounts without the government acting as a “broker and quasi-sponsor” of private retirement efforts. But IRAs that come with a “government imprimatur” might “squeeze out other private savings options.” Helping Americans save for their senior years is a “worthwhile goal” better achieved by “easing fiduciary regulations” for employer-sponsored plans while “bringing down inflation and growing real wages.”

The president’s proposal requires Congress’ backing to “have teeth,” Elizabeth O’Brien said at Barron’s. Legislation is needed to expand income eligibility for the matching contribution and to “make participation in Trump IRAs automatic.” Workers can already open their own IRAs but often do not “due to lack of knowledge, time to navigate the process or money to contribute.” Without new laws to back Trump’s plan, the new executive order will end up a “well-intentioned effort aimed at a real problem that doesn’t break new ground or live up to the hype.”

Legislation to automatically enroll workers in retirement funds would “create more problems than it solves,” the Cato Institute’s Romina Boccia said at The Washington Post. Such efforts also do “little to solve” the broader issue of “Social Security’s deteriorating finances.” The program faces “long-term shortfalls” of up to $28 billion that could result in benefit cuts starting in 2032. If the president and Congress really want to help Americans have a secure retirement, “they could instead focus on fixing Social Security” and help the seniors “who rely on the program as their primary source of retirement income.”

What next?

Workers making less than $35,000 a year will be eligible for the $1,000 matching contribution, said NBC News. The Trump administration will work with Congress to “significantly expand this program,” and it is “looking forward to legislation this year,” Kevin Hassett, the director of the White House’s National Economic Council, said at the executive order signing.

For more than a century, British politics has been a contest between two parties. That could end with Thursday’s local and devolved elections.

Reform UK is currently leading on 25%, said Politico’s poll of polls on 30 April, with the Conservatives and Greens tied on 18%, and Labour on 17%. The Liberal Democrats are just a few points behind. In Scotland, the Scottish National Party is hoping to secure an overall majority in Holyrood, while Plaid Cymru is on course to lead the devolved government in Wales.

“We’re going to see records tumble. We are living in unprecedented circumstances,” the UK’s leading polling expert, John Curtice, told The Times. “The basic assumptions of British politics – there isn’t enough space for a party to the right of the Tories or the left of Labour – have gone.”

What did the commentators say?

The fracturing of the electorate was already evident at the last general election, but has been turbo-charged over the past two years as “binary tribalism has been replaced by retail politics”, said The Times in an editorial. Voters are “more promiscuous in their favours” and, following a decade and a half of stagnant living standards, “they are prepared to take a punt on insurgent parties without kicking the tyres”.

The result is that a “nation that has long prided itself on moderation and stability” is now experiencing an “anti-establishment revolt of the sort that has gripped countries from the US and Argentina to Germany”, said Irina Anghel for Bloomberg. Reform and the Greens look set to pick up hundreds of former Labour and Conservative seats. This represents a “power shift” that would “reinforce insurgents’ local networks and party organisations across the country, helping to forestall any restoration of the two-party system by the next general election”.

“It’s the Dutch-ification of British politics,” said Simon Hix, a politics professor at the European University Institute. “Everyone used to make fun of the Netherlands, where 17 parties get elected to parliament, but this trend is happening everywhere in the world.”

“Of course, the popularity or otherwise of all parties ebbs and flows over time” and as recently as the 2017 general election Labour and the Conservatives won a massive 82.4% of the vote between them, said BBC political editor Chris Mason. “But the longer-term trend is clear”: in recent years, the “palette of popular political parties has widened” beyond the Tory-Labour duopoly.

What next?

The dawn of genuine five-party politics – or seven-way if you include nationalist parties in Scotland and Wales – in Britain “spells problems for the political system” beyond the immediate aftermath of Thursday’s vote, said Sky News data journalist Alicja Hagopian.

In the short term, electoral fragmentation “brings governability into question”, said the Financial Times. Voters are “largely moving from one left-leaning party to another, or from one right-leaning party to another, but coalitions of left and right can be hard to build”. Britain’s first-past-the-post system also “creates particular problems of democratic legitimacy”. It means that as voting fragments, candidates are elected with an ever-smaller share of votes cast. In January, Reform won a council seat from Labour in Wales with a vote share of just 22%.

“Choice is good for democracy. It gives a fairer representation of what people actually want,” said Rob Ford, professor of political science at the University of Manchester. “But this puts our electoral system for local elections under pressure, because first-past-the-post is not designed for fragmented competition between five strong parties.”