Is President Trump finally tired of winning? asked Shawn McCreesh in The New York Times. Asked in a Cabinet meeting two weeks ago if he feels pressure to end the Iran war before November’s elections, Trump airily replied, “I don’t care about the midterms.” In the context of Iran, Trump’s “posture of nonchalance” is defensible. Presidents shouldn’t let politics sway their thinking on matters of war. But GOP lawmakers are starting to wonder if Trump couldn’t care less about their party’s bleak electoral prospects. Republicans trail Democrats by 7.6% in the generic ballot, dragged down by Iran, high gas prices, Trump’s slumping approval rating (38% and falling), and the belief—shared by 77% of Americans, including most Republicans—that Trump’s policies have driven up the cost of living. Without a course correction, the GOP could lose both the House and Senate in November, a prospect suddenly more likely after Trump’s endorsement lifted Ken Paxton, the scandal-drenched MAGA loyalist, over incumbent Texas Sen. John Cornyn in last week’s primary. But instead of assuring cash-strapped Americans that he feels their pain, Trump spends his days constructing “pricey pet projects,” from his gilded White House ballroom to a 250-foot triumphal arch. These don’t seem like the actions of someone who’s especially bothered “about what’s coming after the summer.”

“Don’t be fooled,” said Frank Bruni, also in the Times. Trump’s ego won’t let him confess his midterm anxieties. But beneath the “bluster and makeup, he’s sweating.” Look at how hard he’s pressured red-state legislatures to redraw their electoral maps to gain a handful of seats in November, and how he’s “haranguing congressional Republicans” to pass new voting laws to depress Democratic turnout. And the electoral landscape this fall might not be as grim for Republicans as it looks now, said Mene Ukueberuwa in The Free Press. Progressives are pushing Democrats toward nominating class warriors like Maine’s Graham Platner and Michigan’s Abdul El-Sayed, potentially alienating moderate voters in what would otherwise be “easily winnable races.”

I suspect Trump is relaxed about the midterms because “there might be political upside regardless of who wins,” said Abby McCloskey in Bloomberg. If the House and Senate turn blue, Trump will gain the scapegoat that his second term has lacked. He can blame “any and all shortcomings on Congress’s new Democratic majority.” And if empowered Democrats push left-wing legislation and try to impeach him, Trump will get to replay his favorite roles: “victim of the elite” and “protector against the progressive tide.” There’s a Jan. 6–size hole in such analyses, said Joel Mathis in his Substack newsletter. Trump’s indifference to the midterms more likely flows from the fact that he has plans in place—this time fully thought-out—to ignore or reverse the results “unless they are favorable to him.”

None of this explains why Trump suddenly cares so little about his popularity, said Paul Waldman in MS.now. Perhaps he’s contemplating his post-2029 legacy. He may be comfortable with being loathed by two-thirds of the country “so long as there are gigantic buildings with his name on them.” And his newfound indifference to approval ratings may be liberating. Trump has spent his life trying “to free himself of any and all constraints”—the law, civility, political norms, international alliances—“so he can do whatever he wants.” The interests of his party, and Americans, are just more things tying him down. “And he’s going to cut those cords.”

What happened

President Donald Trump abruptly ended an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” broadcast Sunday after Kristen Welker challenged his assertions that last week’s California primaries and the 2020 election were “dirty” and “rigged.” During the interview, taped at a farm in Wisconsin, Trump “made a series of false, misleading or exaggerated comments,” NBC News said, including that he “didn’t promise” no new conflicts or “guarantee no war.”

Who said what

Trump “repeatedly pledged not to involve the United States in war,” The New York Times said, including in his 2024 victory speech, when he said, “I’m not going to start a war.” During Welker’s interview, Trump “appeared to become agitated” when she asked about the purportedly defunct $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund, The Washington Post said. And when she pressed Trump for evidence that there was cheating in California’s notoriously slow election count, he raised his voice, called Welker “either stupid or crooked” and said the “fake, dirty press” knows about the “rigged” elections. “Let’s call it quits because I’ve had enough,” Trump said. “Thank you, darling. Have a good time.”

What next?

Welker said that Trump later agreed that heavy rain on the metal barn roof had caused audio complications and agreed to sit down for another interview at an undisclosed time.

What happened

Iran and Israel on Sunday night fired missiles at each for the first time since a U.S.-backed ceasefire took effect in April. Iran said it targeted an Israeli air base in response to Israeli strikes in Lebanon, and Israel said it retaliated by striking military targets in western and central Iran. Israel also said it intercepted a missile from Yemen.

President Donald Trump told Fox News earlier that the U.S. was not involved in Israel’s strike on Beirut’s suburbs and “I’m not happy about it.” After Iran launched missiles at Israel, Trump warned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu not to imperil peace talks by firing back, according to several news reports. “I call all the shots,” Trump told the Financial Times. Netanyahu “doesn’t call the shots.”

Who said what

Trump told Netanyahu to stand down because “we are close to doing something good in terms of a deal,” a U.S. official told Axios, and Netanyahu “pseudo-agreed.” Israel “has responded enough, they don’t need to respond anymore,” Trump told Israeli public broadcaster Kan. “We can achieve peace after 3,000 years.” No “self-respecting country in the world would tolerate such an attack, and neither will Israel,” Israel’s U.S. ambassador, Yechiel Leiter, said on X.

What next?

The tit-for-tat attacks continued Monday morning and “threatened to drag the wider Middle East back into a regional war,” The Associated Press said.

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.

President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) has no known national security experience. But the new interim intelligence director, Bill Pulte, does have a history of going after Trump’s rivals. And this combination is raising alarms in Congress.

The 38-year-old Pulte is an “unusual selection” to be the interim intelligence chief following Tulsi Gabbard’s resignation, said The Hill. Before leading the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) under Trump, he owned a construction company and private equity firm and has “no high-level national security experience.”

Pulte at FHFA “proved his loyalty to the president by combing through the mortgages of Trump’s enemies,” said Talking Points Memo. His inquiries led to federal mortgage-fraud cases against New York Attorney General Letitia James and Fed Governor Lisa Cook.

Pulte has “deep experience managing the most sensitive matters in America,” Trump said, per The Hill. But the president’s GOP allies are concerned. “We don’t need a weaponized DNI,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said to reporters, per Axios.

‘Vocal attack dog’

“Everybody hates Bill Pulte,” said The New Republic. That may not be entirely correct — Trump is clearly a fan — but Pulte has a knack for inspiring bipartisan revulsion even within Trump’s own cabinet. At a 2025 event involving White House officials, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Pulte he was “going to kick his ass,” according to Bessent’s testimony in a Senate hearing this week, per CBS News.

Pulte’s willingness to scrap with Trump’s enemies both online and through official channels has earned him a reputation as a “vocal attack dog,” said The Washington Times. But his dearth of national security credentials may be a challenge. The law that created DNI says the director “shall have extensive national security experience.”

The office was created after 9/11 to ensure the coordination of the nation’s various intelligence agencies. But Pulte’s history of fractiousness may not make him a “promising person” to get “top officials to work together,” David A. Graham said at The Atlantic.

‘Senate GOP rebellion’

Trump’s announcement of Pulte as his choice prompted pushback from Democrats. Pulte’s willingness to investigate the president’s enemies demonstrates he “can’t be entrusted to protect our national security,” said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), per Roll Call.

The pick has also prompted a “Senate GOP rebellion,” said Axios. Pushback is coming from Thune, along with Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas). So Pulte might not have the support to get Senate confirmation for the long term.

Senate Democrats may tank efforts to “renew a powerful surveillance program” over the Pulte pick, said The Guardian. Reapproval of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was already facing obstacles but has an even more difficult path forward, said Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) to NPR, as long as “someone with no intelligence background” and a “record of misusing private information” is in the running to lead DNI.

What happened

President Donald Trump on Thursday said his administration was pouring more than $700 million into reviving the struggling coal industry. The funds will reopen one coal-fired power plant, extend the life of 13 others, subsidize coal mining and export operations and build the first two new coal-burning plants since 2013. Trump said he was invoking the 1950 Defense Production Act to intercede in the market. The money for the new coal-fired plants had been allocated by Congress for clean energy technologies.

Who said what

This is the “latest in a series of extraordinary efforts” Trump has taken to “improve the fortunes of coal, the most polluting of the fossil fuels and a favored industry” in his White House, The New York Times said. Energy experts “quickly attacked the subsidies as irrational” since “burning coal is one of the least economic methods of producing power,” The Washington Post said. The half-dozen coal plants Trump has kept open through emergency orders have cost “ratepayers tens of millions of dollars.” He has concurrently “clamped down on renewable energy,” said The Associated Press, blocking wind and solar projects and “ending clean energy tax credits.”

What next?

Analysts said Trump’s investments “could run into trouble if a future president cracked down on the coal sector,” the Times said.

What happened

Lawyers at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts on Thursday ordered President Donald Trump’s name stripped from the building by June 12 and “immediately” removed from marketing materials, staff signatures and other documents. The order follows a federal judge’s ruling last week that Trump had unlawfully appended his name to the storied arts institution, designated by Congress as a living memorial to the assassinated 35th president.

Who said what

The Trump-picked board “acted beyond its authority” when it added his name to the institution, the Kennedy Center general counsel’s office said in a memo to staff. “Expunging Trump’s name throughout the center would be the most tangible setback” in his quest to “take over” the venue, The Washington Post said, and the memo was the “first indication that the Kennedy Center plans to comply with the judge’s order.” Trump was “incensed” by last week’s ruling, The New York Times said, and Kennedy Center leaders had quickly “indicated that they planned to appeal.”

What next?

The general counsel’s memo said the center was “considering its options” regarding the judge’s temporary halting of plans to shut the arts venue down for two years for renovations and “will provide further guidance shortly.”

“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.

What happened

President Donald Trump on Tuesday named Bill Pulte, director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, as acting director of national intelligence, replacing retiring DNI Tulsi Gabbard. A “real estate scion with no clear national security credentials,” Pulte will “continue in his post at FHFA” as well as coordinating the 18 U.S. intelligence agencies, The Associated Press said.

Who said what

The 2004 law that created the nonpartisan DNI position says any nominee “shall have extensive national security expertise.” Trump said on social media that Pulte has “deep experience managing the most sensitive matters in America, the safety and soundness of the Markets.”

Democrats “offered wall-to-wall condemnation of the appointment,” Politico said, and Republicans “were cautious, if not downright skeptical.” Pulte’s only qualification is that “he has shown that he is willing to do anything that President Trump wants, legal or otherwise,” said Sen. Mark Warner (Va.), the top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee. “We don’t need a weaponized DNI,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said. “We need professionals there.”

What next?

Warner said putting a Trump loyalist with a history of weaponizing financial records in charge of so much sensitive information would make it harder to reauthorize the Section 702 surveillance program before its June 12 expiration. Making Pulte the permanent DNI would require Senate confirmation.

What happened

President Donald Trump on Monday said Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to stop their fighting, hours after Iran signaled it was ending peace talks over Israel’s escalating campaign in Lebanon and Israel said strikes on Beirut were imminent. After a “very productive call” with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and “a very good call with Hezbollah” through “highly placed” intermediaries, Israel’s troops “turned back” from Beirut and Hezbollah “agreed that all shooting will stop” if Israel doesn’t “attack them,” Trump said on social media.

Who said what

Trump initially responded to reports Iran was abandoning peace talks by telling CNBC he “couldn’t care less” and thought they had “started to get very boring.” But he then said Iran’s “problem is with Israel” and he would ask Netanyahu “what’s going on with Lebanon.” Trump then “lashed out” at Netanyahu in an “expletive-laden call,” Axios said, citing three sources. One U.S. official summarized Trump’s remarks: “You’re f---ing 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.”

What next?

Lebanon’s embassy in Washington confirmed that Hezbollah had agreed to the U.S.-proposed truce. Netanyahu said Israeli forces “will continue to operate as planned in southern Lebanon” and “will attack terror targets in Beirut” if “Hezbollah does not cease attacking our cities and citizens.”

What happened

The Trump administration on Monday signaled a retreat from its $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund after Senate Republicans reiterated that it jeopardized President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda and a pair of court orders imperiled its prospects. The Justice Department said it “disagrees strongly” with U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema’s decision to temporarily freeze the fund but “will abide by the court’s ruling.”

The fund, which bipartisan critics characterize as a scheme to funnel taxpayer money to Jan. 6 Capitol rioters, is “dead for now,” a senior administration official told Axios. “How dead it is is what’s being worked on,” an official told CNN.

Who said what

Senators returned to Washington on Monday, 10 days after Republicans scuttled a vote on a $72 billion filibuster-proof ICE-Border Patrol bill due to discomfort with the fund. Some administration officials “privately expressed relief” that Brinkema’s ruling offered a “way out of what most had seen as a mess of the Trump team’s own making,” The New York Times said.

But Republicans “cast serious doubt on whether the president would ultimately be willing to kill off the fund” and suggested they needed “firmer assurances that he would follow through,” said the Times. The “best way to handle it is if the administration decides to shut it down themselves,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters, and killing the fund permanently “would be the ideal outcome.”

What next?

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) told colleagues that “no matter what Republicans do, we will force them to vote” on shutting down the “slush fund before one cent goes out the door.”

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”.

What happened

President Donald Trump will headline the “Great American State Fair,” a 16-day event on the National Mall to celebrate America’s 250th birthday, event organizers said Saturday. Freedom 250 — the public-private group he created to run semiquincentennial activities — said that Trump “will personally kick off this historic celebration,” hours after he suggested he replace the “highly paid, Third Rate ‘Artists’” who dropped out due to the event’s partisan overtones.

Who said what

Trump early Saturday said on social media he wanted to hold “an AMERICA IS BACK Rally” where he — the “Number One Attraction anywhere in the World, the man who gets much larger audiences than Elvis in his prime” and “THE GOAT!” — would give a “major speech” to rally the country. He then posted that Freedom 250 should hold a “giant MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN RALLY, for 250, instead of having overpriced singers, who nobody wants to hear, whose music is boring, and yet who do nothing but complain.”

What next?

After Martina McBride, Young MC, Morris Day and the Time, the Commodores and Poison’s Bret Michaels pulled out, the only confirmed acts are Vanilla Ice, Flo Rida and Milli Vanilli’s Fab Morvan. A senior administration official told The New York Times that someone will likely be fired over the concert rollout “mess.”

He’s a “thin, limpish, bespectacled 94-year-old grandfather” whose revolutionary days are long gone, said Daniel DePetris in The Telegraph, yet he’s a wanted man in the US for all that. Raúl Castro has been a dominant figure in Cuba’s communist regime since his brother Fidel seized power in 1959.

Cuba’s defence chief from 1959 to 2008 and its president from 2006 to 2018, he still wields great influence behind the scenes. So it’s quite something that the US attorney general has now charged him with a murder he’s said to have been involved in back in 1996 – the fatal downing of two civilian planes over the Straits of Florida.

The four victims of that attack, three of them US citizens, had been working for Brothers to the Rescue, an NGO dedicated to helping Cuban refugees and dropping anti-communist leaflets over the island. Castro is accused of having instructed his fighter pilots to “knock them down into the sea when they show up”.

‘Warning for a deaf regime’

You could see this coming, said Diario de Cuba (Madrid). The Trump administration has been demanding that Havana open up its economy and end political repression; yet despite heavy US sanctions and an oil blockade imposed in January, the regime has made no more than limited concessions – allowing Cubans in exile to found companies back home, for example. So the indictment of Raúl Castro is a “warning for a deaf regime”. And quite possibly an effective one.

The regime was badly shaken when, in January, Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro was captured by US forces in a surprise raid on Caracas. And US Attorney General Todd Blanche has hinted something similar might occur in Cuba. Asked how he intended to bring Castro to trial in America, he cryptically replied there are “all kinds of different ways”.

Bringing in Castro would be a major blow to the regime, said CNN (Atlanta). Regarded as his late brother’s “more disciplined and discreet” enforcer, Raúl Castro remains “the power in the shadows”. And his family holds immense economic as well as political clout: GAESA, the military-run conglomerate Castro founded in 1995, controls 70% of the economy on some estimates: Cuba’s tourist industry is just one of the sectors it dominates.

Markets empty, prices soaring

That economy is now suffering its “greatest crisis” since the collapse of its close ally the Soviet Union, said The Washington Post. The oil embargo has driven it to the brink. “Havana looks like a bombed-out city,” said Yunior García Aguilera on 14YMedio (Havana). Its buildings, crumbling from decades of neglect, are “split open like broken ribs”. With no petrol to run dustbin trucks, rubbish is being burnt in the streets. People wade through “toxic clouds”, side-stepping sewage and hopping over pot-holes. “Plastic, rotten food and patience are all ablaze.”

And with no imports reaching the island, Cubans have to eat what’s grown locally, said CiberCuba (Valencia). Which isn’t much. Rice production had plummeted even before the fuel crisis. Without fuel for crop dusters, tractors or irrigation, farmers have “reverted to using oxen, buffalo, horses, windmills, and solar pumps”. Markets are empty, prices are soaring. Most Cubans have begun skipping meals.

The US hopes such suffering will spark a “mass uprising” and cause the regime to implode, said Fabio E. Fernández Batista in El Salto (Madrid). But such is the repressive nature of the regime, that seems unlikely, which is why not a few Cubans now hope that “Saint Donald” will come to the rescue, even “if it means bombs falling” on their homeland.

And the US appears “increasingly willing” to seek regime change in Cuba through military means, said Nahal Toosi on Politico (Washington) – by an air strike or possibly even a ground invasion. The signs are all there: there’s been a reported spike in US surveillance flights off Cuba, and last week the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz was sent to the Caribbean. Some assume the ongoing failure of his war in Iran will hold the US president back. Don’t bet on it. It’s never a good idea “to predict what the capricious Trump will do”.

Migrant deaths in federal custody hit an all-time high this year, as the Department of Homeland Security executes President Donald Trump’s anti-immigration policies across the nation. Between October 2025, when the federal fiscal year began, and April 2026, at least 29 people died in DHS custody according to government data, “already surpassing 2004’s toll of 28, the previous record,” said NPR.

Suicides, in particular, have exploded at an “alarming” rate, said The Associated Press. And with tens of thousands of migrants still concentrated in DHS camps across the country, mortality rates have become a regular feature of the agency’s current tenure.

‘Something is going profoundly wrong’

The rise in deaths at DHS facilities comes as “detention numbers have skyrocketed during the Trump administration,” said NPR. Trump officials “denied there’s been a spike in deaths” and “attributed the increase to the large number of people in detention” overall. The increase in deaths is “because we do have the highest amount in detention that ICE has ever had since its inception in 2003,” said outgoing ICE Acting Director Todd Lyons at a congressional budget hearing in April.

That an “unprecedented number” of DHS detainees have taken their own lives is an “indication that authorities are failing to properly oversee the detention” of their tens of thousands of charges, said the AP. “Something is going profoundly wrong from any kind of public health or mental health perspective,” said epidemiologist Dr. Sanjay Basu, the co-author of a new study on mortality and suicide rates among ICE detainees, to NPR. “This is one of those alarming, sudden increases.”

Last year saw “more than 1,000 emergency requests” to 911 made from multiple detention centers around the country, 28 of which were prompted by “serious incidents of self-harm,” said NBC News. One detainee “swallowed a razor blade,” another “drank cleaning chemicals” and “at least three cut their own wrists.” Suicides among people in DHS custody are “tragic and rare,” an ICE spokesperson said in a statement to the outlet. Upon seeing “signs of a detainee being at risk for suicide,” detention center staff follow a “strict prevention and intervention protocol to ensure the detainee’s health and well-being is protected.”

‘Preventable’

More detainees have died in DHS custody last year than in any year in at least two decades, said CNN, with 2026 “on track to be even higher.” But many of the past year’s deaths “appear to have been preventable.” In “more than a dozen cases,” the “deadly outcomes” stemmed in part from “substandard treatment by at-times understaffed medical teams dealing with escalating detainee populations.”

California’s Adelanto ICE Processing Center and the Camp East Montana in El Paso, Texas, have each seen three migrant deaths in their respective facilities — the “most out of ICE’s sprawling detention operation,” said NPR. ICE has “repeatedly asserted” that all detainees are screened for “medical, dental and mental health conditions” within 12 hours of arrival, said the AP. But reviews of ICE’s own inspection reports and jail records show “three of the nine facilities where ICE detainees died by suicide have struggled to meet that standard.”

What happened

A $9.7 billion Pentagon contract with Dell Technologies announced this week sent the company’s stock soaring, likely boosting President Donald Trump’s more than $1 million investment in the company, The New York Times and The Washington Post reported Thursday. “Government ethics watchdogs are sounding the alarm” not only because Trump “potentially stands to gain financially” from the Dell deal, the Post said, but also because he “has repeatedly praised the company at public events” since acquiring the shares earlier this year.

Who said what

The Dell investments were among more than 3,600 trades executed in Trump’s investment portfolio from January through March, according to a mandatory filing released this month. The Trump family has “argued that the president does not personally control the trading,” but the president’s financial accounts “are not in a traditional ‘blind trust,’” the Times said. And his Dell purchase “draws new attention to the inherent problems” with the family’s “widespread investments” in military drones, cryptocurrency, mining and prediction markets while Trump “oversees policy and government purchase decisions for those same sectors.”

What next?

Presidents are exempt from an ethics law that prohibits official self-enrichment. Congress should “revisit the arrangement whereby we rely on the president’s own sense of integrity rather than law to avoid conflicts of interest,” Greg Williams from the Project on Government Oversight told the Post.

What happened

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Thursday his department has been working to create a $250 bill bearing President Donald Trump’s portrait, and he showed off a mockup ordered by U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach. “At present, no living person can be on U.S. currency,” under a 1866 law, Bessent said during a press conference. “We will stick to the law” but “have prepared in advance” in case Congress passes “proposed legislation” authorizing the Trump banknote.

Who said what

The Treasury Department is “moving proactively” and doing “due diligence” in response to legislation introduced by Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.), a spokesperson said. That “Donald J. Trump $250 Bill Act” has “since stalled out, with no actions” since February 2025, CBS News said. Trump has “also pushed for the creation of a $1 coin bearing his image,” The New York Times said, and is “having his signature added to U.S. currency this year,” as he endeavors to “honor himself while commemorating the nation’s 250th birthday.”

What next?

New banknotes can take “more than a decade to design and produce,” The Washington Post said, and typically require “extensive coordination” with the Federal Reserve and Secret Service to add “dozens of embedded security features” to prevent counterfeiting.

What happened

The Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the magazine columnist who won $88.3 million in civil judgments against President Donald Trump after federal juries found he sexually abused her and defamed her by lying about the assault, CNN and other news organizations reported Wednesday. The investigation reportedly centers on whether Carroll committed perjury in a 2022 deposition when she said her lawsuit received no outside funding.

Who said what

Two weeks before the 2023 trial, Carroll’s lawyers informed the judge and Trump’s lawyers that billionaire Reid Hoffman’s nonprofit had paid some of her legal expenses. The judge “permitted Trump’s attorneys to question Carroll again in a deposition,” but “said he saw no issue with Carroll’s credibility,” CNN said. In 2024, a three-judge federal panel handling Trump’s appeals “dismissed the claim that Carroll had lied in her deposition,” The Guardian said.

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, who “has approved a growing number of inquiries into the president’s enemies,” is “said to have recused himself” from this matter because he represented Trump in the case, The New York Times said. Instead, senior Justice Department leaders “referred the investigation to federal prosecutors in Chicago,” where Hoffman’s nonprofit is based, said CNN.

What next?

The probe “may not necessarily result in charges being brought against Carroll,” Reuters said. But if it does, said ABC News, a number of the DOJ’s investigations “into foes of Trump” have “faced significant obstacles in the courts and grand juries.”

Any path President Donald Trump takes to end the war with Iran is bound to generate a lot of dissatisfaction among his GOP supporters and advisers. Hawks like Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) continue to “press for more aggressive U.S. military action,” Daniel R. DePetris said at the Los Angeles Times, and Republicans “consider anything short of Iran’s total surrender a failure.” But Trump’s in-house political strategists want a quick end to the unpopular war to “minimize political repercussions against the Republican Party” in November’s midterm elections. Trump clearly wants the deal that he keeps promising to the U.S. public, yet accomplishing that may put him at odds with Republicans who “would consider anything short of Iran’s total surrender a failure.”

‘A bad option and a worse one’

The president “seems conflicted,” said DePetris. He’s “fed up with the current situation” but also “afraid of escalation,” said Danny Citrinowicz, of The Atlantic Council, to The New Yorker. The president is “fed up with the current situation,” but he is also “afraid of escalation,” the Atlantic Council’s Danny Citrinowicz said in an interview with The New Yorker. Escalation probably will not work “because the Iranians are not going to capitulate.” The other option to end the war, then, is a deal that provides both money and sanctions relief to the Islamic regime in exchange for the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. Trump’s choices are “between a bad option and a worse one.”

“Will Trump bail out Iran’s regime?” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. Inflation pressures at home are likely behind the president’s desire to “reopen the Strait even on Iran’s terms.” But a “bad deal would leave him worse off politically” even if domestic prices recede. Iran’s regime was beset by domestic crises that the war has exacerbated. A “half victory” by Iran now “would hurt America’s standing — and Mr. Trump’s.”

The issue is not Trump “terminating the conflict too soon,” Jacob Heilbrunn said at The Spectator. It is “that he began it in the first place.” The war is undermining both his presidency and U.S. military power, and the idea that escalation would result in Iran’s surrender “defies credulity.” The ugly truth illustrated by the Hormuz closure is that Trump “does not hold the cards.”

‘Leaving core issues unsolved’

Trump is looking to get a ceasefire deal now and “deal with the toughest problems later,” said The New York Times. He took the same approach in Gaza, where he brokered a truce last year. That effort ended the fighting but left issues of Hamas’ future and the rebuilding of Gaza to be figured out at a later date. So far that has not happened. Such an approach can be a way for Trump to “claim victory while leaving the core issues unsolved.”

“Doubling down” on the war remains a possibility, Ravi Agrawal said at Foreign Policy. But that would come with “uncertain benefits” and “much more potential pain.” We may soon find out one way or another, as the U.S. on Monday conducted strikes on Iranian positions, a sign the temporary truce is faltering.

What happened

President Donald Trump on Tuesday spent more than three hours at Walter Reed Medical Center for his fourth publicly disclosed medical exam since returning to office last year. The White House did not release any details of the exam, but “everything checked out PERFECTLY,” Trump, who turns 80 next month, said on social media.

Who said what

Trump’s unusually frequent exams have put his health “under renewed public scrutiny after he has worked to dismiss concerns over his age and stamina,” The Associated Press said. He “frequently casts himself as more energetic and fitter than Joe Biden,” who left office at age 82 after “facing questions about his fitness for the job,” Reuters said.

Trump’s “health and fitness have been central to his political identity,” but as an “aging president, he now receives some of the same questions that dogged Biden — namely, whether he is mentally and physically fit” enough, The Washington Post said. “Independent doctors” have called the White House’s explanations for Trump’s bruised hands, neck rash, swollen legs and “occasional sleepiness” at meetings “insufficient.”

What next?

It was “not immediately clear whether the White House would release details” from Trump’s clinical exam to “support his claim” of good health, The New York Times said.

What happened

Republican redistricting efforts in Alabama and South Carolina were blocked Tuesday, stalling President Donald Trump’s mid-decade gerrymandering campaign. South Carolina’s GOP-led state Senate thwarted a plan to cancel an ongoing primary and swap in a new map that would erase the state’s lone Democratic and majority Black district. In Alabama, a panel of federal judges temporarily blocked the state GOP’s proposed map, saying it was “tainted by intentional race-based discrimination.”

Who said what

The 12 South Carolina GOP senators who “effectively killed” the Trump-backed gerrymander cited “numerous” concerns, from practical and political to procedural, said The Post and Courier. “Neither my conscience nor my common sense is going to let me stop an election that’s already underway,” state Sen. Richard Cash (R) said before the vote. The “rebuke from fellow Republicans came as a shock to Trump’s political operation,” Politico said. But “even without the extra seat” or two, Republicans “have an overall edge in the redistricting war.”

What next?

In Alabama, the three-judge panel, which includes two Trump appointees, said the state had to use a court-ordered 2024 map that includes two substantially Black districts. Alabama said it would immediately appeal to the Supreme Court.

What is a third-country deportation?

It’s the removal of a migrant or asylum seeker to a country with which he or she has no legal or personal ties. While only about 17,500 of the more than 800,000 people deported so far during President Trump’s second term have been sent to third countries, those removals are a key part of his immigration agenda. His administration has brokered transfer deals with at least 33 nations—most of them poor and corruptly run—and has paid at least $44 million to those countries in connection with the deportation agreements.

The Department of Homeland Security argues the policy is needed to remove migrants who are “so uniquely barbaric that their own countries won’t take them back.” But most third-country deportees have no criminal record, and most have been granted some form of legal relief that bars the government from shipping them home, where they may face torture, persecution, or death. Some migrants have been removed suddenly from detention centers and flown to countries in Africa, Latin America, or Central Asia with abysmal human rights records. “They took us, they put us on a plane, and they chained us by our hands and feet,” said one Colombian deportee, who didn’t know until mid-flight that his destination was the Democratic Republic of Congo, an active war zone. The U.S., said Nicole Waddersheim of the nonprofit Human Rights Watch, “is doing enforced disappearances.”

Where are deportees being sent?

About 90% have been transferred to Mexico under a Biden-era agreement that let federal agents at the southern border turn back migrants during the 2021–23 immigration surge. But Trump has tried to speed up the pace of deportations by shipping migrants to any country that will take them. In February 2025, 200 people— including 81 children—from countries including Iran, Afghanistan, Angola, and China were flown on two planes to Costa Rica; many of those deported had tried to claim asylum in the U.S. Weeks later, Homeland Security shipped 261 mostly Venezuelan men to the brutal CECOT prison in El Salvador; many reported being tortured and sexually assaulted at the facility. The administration paid El Salvador more than $4 million to hold the men, whom it accused on scant evidence of being gang members. After four months at CECOT, the Venezuelans were sent to their home country. The administration then began looking farther afield for third-country destinations, striking deals with countries including Eswatini, Equatorial Guinea, Rwanda, and South Sudan.

Is this policy legal?

That’s being contested in federal court. The Immigration and Nationality Act outlines a procedure for third-country deportations, and in June 2025 the Supreme Court ruled the administration could deport migrants to countries other than their own without giving them a “meaningful opportunity” to raise fear-based claims of torture. The following month, Immigration and Customs Enforcement said officers could “immediately” begin sending migrants to “alternative” countries, with as little as six hours’ notice. Other courts, though, have rejected the agency’s legal justifications for specific removals: A U.S. district judge last week ordered the Trump administration to return to the U.S. a 55-year-old Colombian asylum seeker with diabetes, hyperlipidemia, and hypothyroidism who was deported to Congo—even after the country refused to accept her because it couldn’t provide sufficient medical care. The plaintiff “meets the standard for irreparable harm,” said Judge Richard Leon, “up to and including death.”

What conditions do deportees face in third countries?

Some have described landing in tropical locations without receiving the appropriate vaccinations and then being locked up by local authorities. Those sent to Eswatini, Africa’s only absolute monarchy, were immediately ferried to a moldy, bug-infested maximum-security facility where, one Laotian migrant told his lawyer, he felt “like a caged animal.” At least two of 26 migrants sent to Cameroon contracted malaria, and journalists who have tried to contact them have had their phones and laptops confiscated. In Equatorial Guinea, deportees are held under armed guard at a remote hotel; some have contracted typhoid fever. Weeks after 11 deportees arrived in Ghana, 10 were driven to its border with Togo and told to cross over on foot. That was especially terrifying for two of the female deportees.

Why was that?

Because they were Togolese and had fled to the U.S. to escape the threat of genital mutilation and forced marriage. “In this country, nobody can help me,” said one of the women, who is now in hiding in Togo. U.S. law prohibits asylum seekers from being sent to their home country if their “life or freedom would be threatened.” But there’s no legal mechanism to stop a migrant from being deported to a third country, which then transfers them home. In November, 50 humanitarian parole recipients from Ukraine were flown to Poland and then escorted across the border to their wartorn homeland. One man on the plane “was a 36-year-old who came to America as a child 20 years ago,” said a deportee. “He hardly speaks any Ukrainian.”

Are more deportations in the works?

The Trump administration is drawing up plans to send 1,100 Afghan nationals currently housed at a U.S. military base in Qatar to Congo. The group includes former interpreters and special forces that fought alongside U.S. troops. Here in the U.S., more than 24,000 migrants have received third-country removal orders and are awaiting deportation. “It is a country I don’t know, I have no family there, I don’t speak their language,” said Bolivian asylum seeker José Yugar-Cruz, 37, who is set to be deported to Congo. “I keep thinking it’s a nightmare that I will wake up from.”

“He came, he saw, he left without much to show for it,” said David Smith in The Guardian. Throughout his state visit to Beijing two weeks ago, President Trump slathered compliments on Xi Jinping, praising China’s president-for-life as a “great leader” who is “very tall.” But Trump’s flattery got him nowhere. After 43 hours, he flew home having secured only the “vague outlines” of a few commercial deals, no agreement to slow the AI arms race, and no help on Iran, which China could pressure to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. In fairness, Trump did extract a promise from Xi to send him seeds from some rosebushes he admired.

Trump reciprocated with a far more valuable gift, said The Economist: doubt over U.S. support for Taiwan. Despite a Reagan-era commitment to never negotiate with China over arms sales to the island nation — which Beijing considers a rogue province — Trump said he was delaying approval of a $14 billion weapons sale to Taiwan, calling it a “good negotiating chip” in talks with Beijing. As for America’s long-standing posture of strategic ambiguity on whether U.S. forces would defend Taiwan from a Chinese attack, Trump told reporters on the flight home: “The last thing we need right now is a war that’s 9,500 miles away.”

“Not so fast,” said Gerard Baker in The Wall Street Journal. Trump says a lot of things, particularly in the “afterglow” of a state visit. But Secretary of State Marco Rubio quickly clarified that our Taiwan policy is “unchanged,” and U.S. law requires Washington to give Taiwan the means to defend itself. But the change in China’s posture was unmistakable. An emboldened Xi warned of looming “clashes and even conflicts” over Taiwan and cautioned Trump to avoid the “Thucydides trap,” whereby a declining power’s fear of a rising one draws both into war. Once the classical reference was explained to our president, Trump insisted Xi had been slighting America’s decline under “Sleepy Joe Biden.” But Xi’s meaning was plain, as is China’s new “confidence.”

It’s easy to overlearn the lessons of history, said Lydia Polgreen in The New York Times. In his chronicle of the Peloponnesian War (431–404 B.C.), the ancient Greek historian Thucydides charts the violence that erupted when Athens — an ambitious power much like Xi’s China — “challenged the pre-eminence of Sparta.” That scenario has repeated throughout history, “with the ambition and aggression of the challenger almost always ending in bloodshed.” But the current threat to the U.S.-led global order is not China so much as the chaos Trump has unleashed with his bullying of allies, his self-sabotaging tariffs, and his epic miscalculation in Iran. “America is overthrowing America.”

Xi should check his hubris, said Ross Douthat, also in the Times. For the record, Sparta defeated upstart Athens in the Peloponnesian War, and the post-Covid U.S. economy has actually outpaced China’s in recent years. Longer term, China’s “crashing” birth rate — now one child per woman and falling — will make it “incredibly difficult” to sustain economic growth. As for the Thucydides trap, “China shouldn’t worry,” said Paul Krugman in his Substack newsletter. America is declining, but we’re not about to “lash out at a rising China” while we’re led by a self-absorbed, “pathetic” president whose main message to Americans, upon returning home, was that Xi has nice ballrooms and therefore he deserves one, too. If you want classical analogies, “think of America right now as the Roman Empire under Caligula, although Caligula didn’t do anything like as much damage.”

What happened

President Trump’s retribution tour rolled on with two more rivals losing to Trump-endorsed challengers in primaries last week, further cementing his hold over the Republican Party. Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie, an outspoken libertarian critic of Trump’s war in Iran and his handling of the Epstein files, lost by nearly 10 percentage points to former Navy SEAL Ed Gallrein. It was the most expensive House primary in history, drawing more than $32 million in ad spending. The president intensified his attacks on Massie in recent weeks, calling him “a moron” at the National Prayer Breakfast, and urging supporters to vote for his handpicked challenger. In Louisiana, voters swept out Sen. Bill Cassidy, who tried but failed to overcome his decision to vote to convict Trump in his 2021 impeachment trial. That “disloyalty,” Trump wrote on social media, “is now a part of legend.”

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) may be next on the chopping block after an emboldened Trump endorsed his primary challenger, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Trump called Cornyn “a good man,” but said he wasn’t “supportive of me when times were tough.” Brad Raffensperger, who defied Trump’s attempt to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results, also got trounced in his gubernatorial primary, finishing behind two pro-Trump candidates. In Pennsylvania, retired firefighter and union leader Bob Brooks—endorsed by both the Keystone State’s moderate Gov. Josh Shapiro and progressives like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders—won a crowded Democratic congressional primary in a closely watched swing district.

What the columnists said

“Massie’s defeat may be the end of GOP dissent,” said Mary Ellen Klas in Bloomberg, at least among elected officials who still need to face voters. Massie voted with Trump 90% of the time. But he “dared to challenge the president over his abandoned campaign promises,” and he got crushed by Trump-faithful older voters. GOP lawmakers don’t answer to their constituents or even their own values anymore. The man in the Oval Office alone “commands absolute loyalty.”

Yet Trump has created a “conundrum,” said Shane Goldmacher in The New York Times. He seems “more keen to leverage his popularity with the MAGA base” to settle scores than “to repair his image among the independents his party will need” in November’s midterms. His approval ratings continue to crater, including in one New York Times/Siena survey that shows only 26% of independents support the job he’s doing.

The Paxton endorsement made “Chuck Schumer’s day,” said The Wall Street Journal in an editorial. The well-respected Cornyn “has been a reliable vote” for Trump for years and has shown “four terms over” that he can beat Democrats in November. The scandal-ridden Paxton, on the other hand, has been impeached by his own party, been accused of bribery, and confessed to infidelity. It’s no surprise that polls show he’s locked in a “dead heat” with Democratic nominee James Talarico, who could help flip the Senate. If that happens, “Trump will deserve ‘COMPLETE AND TOTAL’ credit, as he likes to put it.”

What happened

In a move that stunned government ethics experts, the Trump administration last week rolled out a $1.8 billion fund to compensate supposed victims of Biden-era “lawfare” and barred the IRS from pursuing “any and all” pending tax claims against the president, his family, or his businesses. “This is one of the single most corrupt acts in American history,” said Donald Sherman of the non-partisan Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. The “anti-weaponization” fund, set at $1.776 billion in a nod to America’s founding, was created by the Justice Department to settle a $10 billion suit President Trump brought against the IRS for failing to stop the leak of his tax returns during his first term. Acting attorney general Todd Blanche said the fund will compensate people targeted under Biden for “political, personal, or ideological reasons,” and that Trump and his family will not receive payouts.

Blanche refused to rule out payment to rioters convicted of assaulting police in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Trump said he wasn’t involved in creating the fund, but that it would aid people who were “imprisoned wrongly” and who “turned out to be right.” Democrats assailed what they called a “slush fund” for Trump’s allies. It’s “nothing short of the sitting president of the United States looting from the Treasury for his own gain,” said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.). Two police officers who clashed with rioters on Jan. 6 sued to block the fund, saying it would help “finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence” in Trump’s name. Sen. John Thune, the top Senate Republican, said he was “not a big fan” of the fund and expected it to receive a “full vetting” from lawmakers.

What the columnists said

This is Trump’s “most brazen theft of taxpayer cash yet,” said Andrew Egger in The Bulwark. Everything about this “obscene” setup is designed to “short-circuit all outside accountability.” Blanche’s order says the U.S. has “no liability” for “misuse of the funds.” And the five-person panel Blanche will pick to run the fund will not only get to “keep secret how they’re making disbursement decisions, they can also keep a lid on who’s getting paid.” This is “emperor stuff” and grounds for impeachment under any Congress with “a shred of dignity.”

Trump’s IRS lawsuit was bad, said National Review in an editorial. But this “boondoggle” is even worse. It amounts to a new government program not authorized by Congress, created under the “fictional pretense” of settling a dubious lawsuit the presiding judge seemed poised to throw out. The disbursement of the money through the U.S. Judgment Fund—a pot of money used to settle lawsuits against the U.S.—“may be legal.” But there’s “nothing in the Constitution that requires Congress to passively let this sort of thing happen.”

The “most egregious part” is the dropping of all tax audits of Trump and his family, said Jamelle Bouie in The New York Times. It shields them from “any scrutiny of their business deals and financial arrangements,” and comes just after financial disclosures revealed that Trump bought and sold stocks worth at least $220 million—including in companies he’s promoted—in the first quarter of the year. The financial stakes for Trump are significant: In 2024, the Times reported Trump could face a more than $100 million tax liability.

This grift couldn’t be more blatant if Trump walked out of Fort Knox with a “shopping cart filled with gold bullion,” said David Rothkopf in the Daily Beast. And it’s just the cherry atop a vast “campaign of corruption.” He’s accepted a luxury jet from Qatar, solicited donations “to projects designed to glorify him,” doled out pardons to deep-pocketed donors, sold Trump watches and other “swag,” and engaged in shady crypto ventures that have tripled his wealth to an estimated $6.5 billion. “We are no longer a shining city on the hill. We are instead a stinking cesspool of corruption, a republic for the rapacious.”

Look beyond the pure corruption and you’ll see an even uglier message in this fund, said Jonathan Chait in The Atlantic. Trump has all but declared that he’s going to use this $1.8 billion to reward the insurrectionists who were punished for trying to violently overturn his 2020 election loss. He could have handed out that cash toward the end of his term, but he’s doing it now—as the midterms approach and his popularity plummets—“to communicate directly that loyal allies can expect lavish rewards.” As Republicans sit quietly or tut-tut from the sidelines, “his intentions grow only more naked.”

‘America long ago solved its dog problem. But what about the cats?’

Bruce M. Beehler at The Washington Post

Cats are a “mass killer of North America’s native birds and mammals,” but “for anyone who cares about both cats and wildlife,” the “free-ranging felines raise tricky policy issues,” says Bruce M. Beehler. The “answer for house cats is clear: treat them like dogs.” The “more difficult challenge is unowned cats,” which “should be captured, vaccinated, neutered and either put up for adoption or relocated.” Even “with a more aggressive approach, a return to balance will take years.”

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‘Trump’s monument to nothing now a Memorial Day insult’

The Boston Globe editorial board

The “once unbroken vista across the Potomac River leading to Arlington National Cemetery” is now “something of a construction zone — as plans proceed apace for President Trump’s triumphal arch on Memorial Circle,” says The Boston Globe editorial board. The arch “will stand in the way of a president more obsessed with monuments than with honoring the fallen service members.” Could “there be a more stark contrast to the row upon row of simple white gravestones?”

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‘Long shot’

Aymann Ismail at Slate

The “stigma among Black women in particular about owning a firearm” comes “from a lack of awareness, but also an apparent systemic effort to keep guns out of the hands of Black and brown people,” says Aymann Ismail. Though “many gun stores and ranges have made recent strides in increasing the diversity of their staff, some ranges can feel intimidating when you don’t see someone who looks like you.” As the “debate gains more traction, much of it still unfolds at the margins.”

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‘Europe is slowly getting ready to ditch America’

Luke McGee at Foreign Policy

In his “second term, Trump had a real opportunity to shape the world in his image and restore the United States’ place as the undisputed leader of the free world,” says Luke McGee. But he “has continued to lash out at allies,” and “Europeans are responding in kind.” Europe “cannot replace the security infrastructure provided by Washington overnight,” but it “can slowly move away from U.S. overreliance by making long-term decisions that return strategic sovereignty to Europe.”

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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.”

A rare event occurred last week, said Fred Kaplan on Slate: President Trump posted a completely accurate observation on social media. Commenting on Iran’s response to a US ceasefire proposal, he declared it “totally unacceptable”.

He’s right about that. Iran’s statement – which included no concessions and a long list of demands, including war reparations, the lifting of all sanctions and Iran’s continued control over the Strait of Hormuz – read like something “the winner of a war would issue”. The question is, what can Trump do about it?

He has repeatedly threatened to resume bombing Iran if the regime rejects his peace proposals, but it’s hard to see what that would achieve. If the 38 days of devastating air strikes that began on 28 February failed to bring Tehran to heel, what difference would obliterating a few more targets make?

‘Wiggle out of this conflict’

“If this isn’t checkmate, it’s close,” said Robert Kagan in The Atlantic. Trump halted the bombing campaign on Iran “not because he was bored, but because Iran was striking the region’s vital oil and gas facilities”. If he’s not willing to accept the risk of more such retaliation, or to mount a full-scale ground and naval war to remove the Iranian regime, “walking away now could seem like the least bad option”.

Trump, to his credit, shows no sign of wanting to “wiggle out of this conflict” or sign some meaningless deal, said Noah Rothman in National Review. He’s rightly determined to stop Tehran getting a nuclear weapon. But to succeed, he’ll need to solicit the public’s support for this project, which requires showing a bit more patience and “humility”. He’s not going to win people over by branding all critics “stupid”, or dismissing the inflationary effects of the war. He recently claimed that he was motivated only by the nuclear issue, saying “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation at all”. That quote is going to be used against him in countless Democratic campaign adverts.

‘We will all reap the whirlwind if Iran comes out of this stronger’

Trump’s rudeness and arrogance has also made Nato allies very disinclined to come to America’s aid, said Thomas L. Friedman in The New York Times. Which is too bad, as the administration could really do with their help. The reality is that it’s in all of our interests to fix the Iran situation. It will be terrible for Europe if Tehran is allowed to decide who can and who can’t pass through the Strait of Hormuz.

And it will be worse still for the Arab Gulf states that rely on the channel, endangering their modernising, pluralistic reforms. “The Dubai model is precisely the one Tehran wants to destroy.” It’s understandable that Nato allies are loath to help Trump, but make no mistake: “we will all reap the whirlwind if Iran comes out of this stronger”.

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.”

What happened

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) on Thursday abruptly adjourned the Senate for a weeklong break, scuttling plans to get a $72 billion filibuster-proof ICE–Border Patrol funding bill to President Donald Trump’s desk by a self-imposed June 1 deadline. The “most urgent reason for the delay” was the Senate GOP’s “boiling anger” over Trump’s $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund, Semafor said. In another “striking setback that exposed fractures within the GOP,” The New York Times said, House GOP leaders canceled a vote to compel the end of the Iran war after it became clear it would pass.

Who said what

The GOP “retreats on both the budget bill and the war powers resolution reflected a pivot” away from “unquestioningly” deferring to Trump, the Times said. The opaque $1.8 billion fund is a “Trump priority,” but it faces “widespread opposition” from Senate Republicans, The Wall Street Journal said, alongside near-universal condemnation from Democrats, so the must-pass reconciliation bill “gave senators leverage to dig in their heels.”

The special budget process Republicans are using to pass the bill “allows a long series of amendment votes,” The Associated Press said, and “as it became clear” that Democratic amendments to kill or curtail the fund would pass with bipartisan support, Thune called a timeout. The fund “is in real trouble — and it should be,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) told the Times on Thursday.

What next?

“By leaving Washington,” Republicans left the “anti-weaponization” fund “intact and without any of the guardrails they might want to impose,” the Journal said. Thune said his party “will pick up where we left off” when they return from vacation.

For months, the Trump administration has increased pressure on Cuba through harsher sanctions, a crippling oil blockade and threats to “take” the island.

Now Washington has sharply escalated tensions by indicting the 94-year-old former Cuban president, Raúl Castro (brother of Fidel). The US Justice Department said the charges relate to the 1996 downing of two unarmed civilian planes by the Cuban military, when Raúl was armed forces minister. The incident, which killed four people, triggered one of the worst crises in US-Cuban relations since the Cold War.

Following the US capture and ousting of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro following a similar indictment, which deprived the Cuban Communist Party of a key ally, many fear the indictment suggests Donald Trump’s desire for regime change in Havana is intensifying.

Who is Raúl Castro?

Alongside Fidel, Raúl helped lead the guerrilla war that toppled the US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista in 1959, and launched the Cuban communist revolution.

As Fidel’s defence minister for decades, Raúl built a “powerful base within the military and Cuban state”, said Reuters. He also helped defeat the US-organised Bay of Pigs invasion. After Fidel became ill in 2006, Raúl stepped in as acting president before formally taking over in 2008. Although he resigned as president in 2018 and leader of the Communist Party in 2021, he is widely considered one of the most powerful men in the country, and one of the fathers of the revolution.

He retains the official title of “army general” and holds “significant influence” over the Communist Party and armed forces. The current president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, is “widely seen as relying on ​Castro’s guidance for major decisions”.

What happened to the planes in 1996?

After the collapse of its main financial supporter, the Soviet Union, Cuba suffered an “extreme economic emergency” of blackouts, and shortages of food and fuel, said BBC News Mundo – much like today. Thousands fled to Florida on rafts. A Miami-based group of Cuban exiles, Brothers to the Rescue, tried to help the migrants, and dropped anti-regime leaflets over the island. Havana “began denouncing the air incursions”, branding the group “terrorists”.

In 1996, Cuban fighter jets shot down two of the group’s planes, killing all four men on board – three of whom were US citizens. The attack sparked “strong international condemnation”, including against Raúl, and the US “significantly tightened” sanctions. Most organisations say the planes were in international airspace, although Cuba has always insisted otherwise. Many analysts believe Fidel was trying to “prevent a possible rapprochement with the US”, which could “spur political and economic reforms” that would “jeopardise his absolute power”. The case still “retains enormous symbolic and political weight” for Cubans, on and off the island.

What is the significance of the indictments?

Families of the four pilots who were killed “cheered the indictments, which they had been demanding for three decades”, said NBC News. It is a “politically powerful decision”; Florida’s large, politically active population of Cuban émigrés exert “outsized leverage” on US presidents, particularly Trump. Miami’s members of Congress would have the White House “do the same to Castro” as it did to Maduro, said The Miami Herald.

And the decision to unseal the indictments on 20 May “carries particular significance”, said The New York Times. On the same date in 1902, the US formally ended its years-long military occupation of the former Spanish colony. Many in the US still celebrate it as Cuban independence day. But for others, said Michael Bustamante, director of Cuban American studies at the University of Miami, the Trump administration is “hearkening back to this moment when the US did treat Cuba as its backyard”.

Will it lead to war between the US and Cuba?

This indictment could “doom any lingering chance of a deal to avoid armed conflict”, said CNN’s Havana Bureau Chief Patrick Oppmann. Trump claims Cuba is “desperate” to make a deal, but “he said the same about Venezuela and Iran”.

The charges have “fired up” the anti-Castro Cuban exile community in Miami. Many hope Fidel’s revolution is “crumbling”, with Trump’s oil blockade pushing the island “closer to the brink”. They are arguing “against any accommodation with Havana”. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a Cuban-American and “staunch foe of the Castros”, said the leadership “needs to go”.

The charges “lay the groundwork for a possible military operation by the US to extradite him”. But unlike in Venezuela, where Maduro’s military “quickly fell in line with Trump’s demands”, Cubans are “likely to react far more belligerently”. There is “little chance” that Raúl will be going anywhere, “much less a Miami courtroom”. Díaz-Canel has said US action would trigger a “blood bath”; the regime “may choose to go down fighting”. After all, in Cuba, every official speech “ends with the cry of ‘Fatherland or death!’”

‘Why Mexico’s cartels are so hard to defeat’

David Mora at Foreign Affairs

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum “has revamped the government’s campaign against criminal organizations,” says David Mora. This is “emblematic of Mexico’s standing in the fight against organized crime,” as “two decades of a military-led ‘war on drugs’ have brought the country no closer to peace.” Sheinbaum is “now trying to strike a difficult balance, still relying on the military as the state’s most effective bulwark against criminal groups but also strengthening the intelligence and investigative bodies.”

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‘iPads in kindergarten? No wonder our kids are falling behind.’

Nicole Russell at USA Today

Some “technology use in schools makes sense, but increasingly, schools seem overly dependent on it to teach subjects that can easily be taught — and learned — without a tablet,” says Nicole Russell. Educational decline “began around 2013,” and “not coincidentally, that’s roughly when iPads began making their way into classrooms.” Technology “isn’t the only reason students are falling behind, but it’s clearly playing a major role.” Technology “should be a tool that supports education, not the foundation.”

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‘MAGA still loves Trump. What does that mean for November?’

Anita Chabria at the Los Angeles Times

America “voted in primary elections and the big winner was President Trump,” as “his enemies — and by that I mean anyone who has ever done anything other than grovel — were defeated in elections across the country,” says Anita Chabria. Is it “now crystal clear that it is a party that will follow its leader, no matter the consequence — even personal ruin?” If Trump “wields this much power over his base, what does it mean for the November general election?”

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‘How an anti-immigrant and antisemitic conspiracy theory became US policy’

Luis F. Carrasco at The Philadelphia Inquirer

The “‘great replacement theory’ posits that a shady cabal of elites (read: Jews) is plotting to flood Western countries with immigrants, effectively ‘replacing’ the native (read: white) population,” says Luis F. Carrasco. That “this anti-immigrant and antisemitic conspiracy theory now undergirds U.S. policy is chilling and should never be normalized.” For “people who may have reasonable objections to unchecked immigration,” the U.S. is “very far from economic or law-and-order arguments here,” and “dangerously so.”

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After decades of maintaining steady numbers of American service members at sites across Eastern Europe, the United States has begun quietly shifting where and how it deploys troops along Russia’s doorstep. This month, the Pentagon “abruptly” halted an already underway deployment of some 4,000 soldiers to Poland as “part of a larger troop reduction,” fueled in part by President Donald Trump’s “anger over Europe’s refusal to aid in the war with Iran,” said The Washington Post. Similar reductions and withdrawals have been ordered for other American military assets in the region, and White House figures are defending the moves as part of Trump’s America First ethos.

‘Growing rift’

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s “last-minute decision” to pause the planned Poland deployment took Pentagon officials and European allies “by surprise,” said Politico. It is the latest instance of an “abrupt personnel move” that has “blindsided both sides of the Atlantic.”

The Pentagon has largely employed the easier process of canceling deployments “as opposed to yanking forces already stationed there,” The Associated Press said. In addition to nixing the planned Polish deployment, Hegseth’s orders also “led to the cancellation of an upcoming deployment to Germany of a battalion trained in firing long-range rockets and missiles.” Hegseth “scrapping plans” for a “long-range fires battalion to be stationed in Europe,” marks a “significant loss for the continent,” said the Post.

The change in troop levels comes as Trump has “repeatedly criticized NATO countries for not participating in the Iran war,” said CNN. Trump has also lashed out at German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who has said the U.S. is “being ‘humiliated’ by Iran.” The move “reflects a growing rift between the administration and traditional European allies” that has been exacerbated by a “lack of support for the Iran conflict,” the AP said.

‘Overreacting’

Changing the Poland deployment was “not an unexpected, last-minute decision,” said the Pentagon to the Post. However, the military declined to “provide clarification on when the process started and when the order to depart was given,” the outlet said. Pressed on the changes, Vice President JD Vance also downplayed their significance. “We're not talking about pulling every single American troop out ⁠of Europe,” said Vance on ABC News Tuesday. The move merely shifts “some resources around in a way that maximizes ​American security,” and “frankly, a lot of the European media is overreacting to this.”

Polish lawmakers visiting Washington this week “welcomed U.S. statements clarifying” that the troop drawdown was a “temporary measure,” said the Post. Warsaw has also “lobbied to host some of the U.S. troops set to be withdrawn from Germany,” using the argument that “Poland already has the infrastructure needed to accommodate additional American forces,” said Polish broadcaster TVP World.

For now, the White House’s “broader strategy remains unclear,” said Politico. The upcoming German withdrawal is “still in the planning stages.” While it would be a “relatively minor drawdown of the 38,000 U.S. troops in the country,” it also signals to European allies that “they could pay a price for publicly disagreeing with the White House. “

What happened

Two police officers who helped defend the U.S. Capitol from a mob of President Donald Trump’s supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, sued in federal court Wednesday to block anyone, including the rioters who beat them, from receiving payouts from his $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization” fund. House Democrats separately proposed legislation challenging the fund and promised a robust investigation if they win control in November.

Who said what

Using Trump’s “taxpayer-funded slush fund to finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name” would be “the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century,” former Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn and D.C. Metropolitan Police Officer Daniel Hodges said in their lawsuit. “No statute authorizes” this “corrupt sham, and its design violates the Constitution and federal law.”

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told Congress that anybody could apply for compensation, including Jan. 6 rioters. “It’s abhorrent” to harm law enforcement, he told CNN, but “people that hurt police get money all the time” from suing the government.

What next?

Opponents of the fund “face high hurdles” to blocking the payouts if “Congress, controlled by Trump’s fellow Republicans, stays silent,” Reuters said. But if Hodges and Dunn can “demonstrate they have been harmed in some way,” they have several viable legal paths.

What happened

President Donald Trump’s controversial agreement with the Justice Department to set up a $1.8 billion fund for alleged “weaponization” victims was quietly expanded Tuesday to permanently bar the IRS from auditing Trump or his businesses. The one-page addendum, signed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, says the federal government is “FOREVER BARRED and PRECLUDED from prosecuting or pursuing” claims against Trump or “related or affiliated individuals.”

Who said what

Trump “received no direct financial payout” from the new fund, The Wall Street Journal said, but Tuesday’s “unprecedented blending of personal and governmental interests” between “Trump as a taxpayer and the Trump administration” could “bring a significant financial benefit to the billionaire president and his family.” The agreement “most likely wiped away” a long-running audit that could have cost Trump “more than $100 million,” The New York Times said, and “also puts an end to any other audit” pertaining to tax returns already filed. Trump set up a “slush fund to enrich his own friends,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said during a hearing with Blanche, and now he’s also “looting from the Treasury for his own gain.”

What next?

It’s uncertain “whether anyone would have standing to challenge the agreement in court,” the Journal said. “Congress could step in, but such a move likely would require Republican votes over Trump’s objections.”

What happened

Republican candidates endorsed by President Donald Trump won or advanced in primaries Tuesday night in Georgia, Alabama and Kentucky, and unseated Trump’s top target of the night, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.). A seven-term libertarian-leaning lawmaker, Massie had angered Trump by opposing his Iran war and spending bills and leading the charge to release the Jeffrey Epstein files. He lost to Navy veteran Ed Gallrein by 10 percentage points in the most expensive House primary in history.

Who said what

Trump “notched several other wins” Tuesday night, Politico said, including engineering Rep. Andy Barr’s (R-Ky.) primary victory for the Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R). Trump’s “revenge campaign” also blocked Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger from advancing to the GOP’s gubernatorial runoff.

The winner of the Georgia runoff — Trump-endorsed Lt. Gov. Burt Jones or healthcare executive Rick Jackson — will face former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (D) in “what is expected to be another hard-fought race for the state’s top office,” The New York Times said. In Alabama, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R) and former Sen. Doug Jones (D) won their respective primaries and will face each other in the state’s gubernatorial race.

What next?

Trump’s next chance to “flex his influence” and “reshape” the GOP “looms in Texas,” said CNN. His recent endorsement of the “controversial” and scandal-plagued Attorney General Ken Paxton could crush Sen. John Cornyn (R) in next week’s runoff vote.

‘The world cannot afford to fail women, children and adolescents’

Cyril Ramaphosa and Pedro Sánchez at Al Jazeera

In “too many parts of the world, giving birth still comes with more fear than hope,” say South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. The “true measure of global progress is not found in financial markets or summit declarations” but in “whether a woman survives pregnancy and childbirth, whether a child is vaccinated and nourished and whether an adolescent can grow up healthy.” No “woman or girl should be denied access to life-saving care.”

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‘Why everything feels more expensive’

Roland Fryer at The Wall Street Journal

A recent poll “found that 83% of Americans say it’s harder to buy a home than it was for previous generations,” and “they aren’t wrong,” says Roland Fryer. But the “explanation is more complicated than either side’s populists admit.” The “culprit is structural, not political.” Productivity gains “tend to concentrate in goods — cars, clothing, televisions, food — as technology steadily drives prices down.” Before “indicting the economy, consider what 50 years of growth actually delivered.”

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‘Why Trump’s stock trades are so exceptionally corrupt’

Michael A. Cohen at MS NOW

Donald Trump is the “most corrupt president in American history,” says Michael A. Cohen. In the “first quarter of the year,” he “made more than 3,700 financial trades,” and the “conflicts of interest and personal corruption are simply astonishing.” Even “if it’s true that Trump is not involved in these stock purchases, the mere appearance of a conflict of interest is why, in the past, presidents have avoided day trading.” With “Trump, there’s always a worse tale to tell.”

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‘During National Police Week and beyond, law enforcement officers merit respect’

Randy Robertson and Josh McKoon at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

During National Police Week, Americans “pause to honor the brave men and women who put on the badge and willingly place themselves in harm’s way to protect our communities,” say Randy Robertson and Josh McKoon. We “remember the officers who made the ultimate sacrifice,” but “today, law enforcement officers are being asked to do more with less.” We “also must recognize the burden carried by the families of law enforcement officers,” as “they make sacrifices, too.”

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What happened

The Justice Department on Monday announced a $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund” for “victims of lawfare and weaponization,” potentially including those who participated in the U.S. Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021. The fund is part of a settlement President Donald Trump reached with his Justice Department to drop his $10 billion claim over an IRS leak of his tax records. The money will be doled out by five people appointed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, though Trump can fire them. Shortly after the announcement, Treasury Department General Counsel Brian Morrissey resigned, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Who said what

The Justice Department said Trump and his family will receive apologies but no payments from the fund. But the “highly unusual” settlement forges a “pipeline to funnel taxpayer money” to Trump’s allies, The New York Times said, and is an “apparent effort to skirt oversight by a judge” who “expressed concern” that Trump’s lawsuit “represented self-dealing between the president and a department run by his former defense lawyer.”

“This is one of the single most corrupt acts in American history,” Donald Sherman, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said in a statement. “The machinery of government should never be weaponized against any American,” Blanche said in a statement. This “slush fund” is “nothing but a racket” for Trump to hand taxpayer money “to his private militia of insurrectionists, rioters and white supremacists,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.).

What next?

Blanche is “expected to be pressed on the fund when he testifies” on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, The Associated Press said.

‘Class warfare is smoldering in America — and it’s about to catch fire’

Austin Sarat at The Hill

In April, an arsonist “set fire to a warehouse used by a major corporation in Los Angeles,” which “should be a wake-up call to political leaders that they urgently need to address the growing despair felt by many Americans,” says Austin Sarat. Some “seem to have gotten the message. But at the national level, unfortunately, all signs are pointing in the opposite direction.” The arsonist “channeled the feelings of millions of Americans who have been mistreated.”

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‘Trump says he can do “anything I want” to the island. It doesn’t belong to him.’

The Guardian editorial board

In Cuba, the U.S. “wants economic reform, the closure of Chinese and Russian intelligence posts, and reportedly the removal of President Miguel Díaz‑Canel,” which “would reinforce the administration’s message that it controls the Americas,” says The Guardian editorial board. Cuba’s “highly educated population is ripe for change that would allow older generations dignity, and give younger ones opportunity.” Instead, they “appear to face ongoing collapse.” Donald Trump “talks of ‘taking’ Cuba. But it belongs to the Cuban people.”

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‘Why aren’t there more Covid-19 memorials?’

Miles Howard at The Boston Globe

Finding a “Covid memorial felt like finding a rare heron in a nearby marsh. Why aren’t there more of them?” says Miles Howard. The pandemic “deprived millions of Americans of their loved ones and robbed millions more of their long-term health.” In the “aftermath of tragedy, remembering those we lost and the sacrifices of those who lived can help us find meaning and closure.” More “cities and towns could step up,” as memorials “give our grief somewhere to go.”

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‘The meme-stock economy is coming for your 401(k)’

Nitish Pahwa at Slate

If Americans “already thought the stock market’s booming reactions to this geopolitically chaotic economic moment were irrational — well, it’s about to get much more surreal,” says Nitish Pahwa. Investors are “looking to what may become the biggest IPOs in history, courtesy of artificial intelligence.” The “incoming IPO wave is rewriting stock market rules in real time so that companies can attract massive public investment with fewer safeguards, less transparency and more risk pushed onto ordinary investors.”

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What happened

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) lost his bid for reelection, placing third in Louisiana’s Republican primary on Saturday. Rep. Julia Letlow, the candidate endorsed by President Donald Trump, came in first and will face state Treasurer John Fleming in a June 27 runoff.

Cassidy’s defeat was the “latest example of Trump’s unrivaled power over the Republican Party,” even amid “persistent inflation” and “sagging approval ratings,” The Associated Press said.

Who said what

Cassidy was one of seven Senate Republicans who voted to convict Trump in 2021 for trying to remain in office after his 2020 defeat, but he has “rarely bucked Trump since he returned to the White House,” The Washington Post said. Cassidy is a “disloyal disaster” and a “terrible guy,” Trump said on social media Saturday morning, before later celebrating his defeat: “That’s what you get by voting to Impeach an innocent man.”

“Insults only bother me if they come from somebody of character and integrity,” Cassidy said in his concession speech. “Our country is not about one individual,” and if you lose in a democracy, “you don’t pout. You don’t whine. You don’t claim the election was stolen.” Cassidy spent five years “sucking up” to Trump, all for nothing, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) said on ABC’s “This Week” Sunday. He “paid a price last night. And guess what? I think he deserved it.”

What next?

Cassidy’s “suddenly pointed criticism” of Trump “suggests he could quickly turn into a headache for the White House” during his final months in office, Politico said.

Chinese president Xi Jinping told Donald Trump last week that he hoped the US and China could avoid the “Thucydides trap”. He was referring to an ancient Greek theory of war that has become a staple of geopolitical commentary in recent years. But what was he implying – and what do classical battles have to do with current US-China relations?

What is the Thucydides trap?

It’s the theory that, when a rising power threatens to displace an established power, the result is often war.

It is named after Athenian general and historian Thucydides, whose account of the Peloponnesian War between Sparta and Athens 2,430 years ago included the observation that “the growth of power of Athens, and the fear that this instilled in Sparta, made war inevitable”.

The implication is that, if an established superpower “manages the rising power badly”, it can feel “obliged to go to war when that’s not necessarily the only option”, said David M. Pritchard, an associate professor of Greek history at the University of Queensland, on The Conversation.

The Thucydides quote was re-popularised in the 2010s by US political scientist Graham Allison. He identified 16 moments in the past 500 years when a rising power threatened to dominate a major ruling power, and pointed out that 12 of them resulted in war.

How does it apply today?

In 2026, the established superpower is the United States, and the rising power is China. There is tension between the two over trade and tariffs, and over China’s claims to sovereignty over Taiwan. Analysts believe there’s a danger of both sides misinterpreting each other’s actions. The US may see Beijing’s expansion as aggressive and a challenge to US influence, while China may see US alliances and military presence in Southeast Asia as attempts at containment.

So, according to the Thucydides trap, if Washington insists on a policy of confrontation with Beijing, war will be the likely outcome. Xi’s remarks were “an entirely unsubtle warning, and even a threat”, said Aaron MacLean on The Free Press. He was not voicing a “friendly expression of a shared desire for peace”; he was making it clear that, to avoid conflict, the US must “radically change” its “attitudes and actions”, and “accommodate” itself “to a Chinese-led world order”.

Is it historically accurate?

“Many scholars of ancient Greece take issue with the way the term is used today,” said Pritchard on The Conversation. The word “trap” implies Sparta “made a mistake in 431BC and could’ve handled things better”. But Sparta “had good reason to fear the rising Athenians”, who were “stripping allies off Sparta left, right and centre”. It was pressure from their remaining allies that pushed the Spartans to act against Athens. And, although it took them 27 years, they won.

Nonetheless, there are lessons to be learned from the Peloponnesian War. It “may be foolish” for an established superpower to “check the rise of an emerging one”; although Sparta managed to do so, it came “at a terrible cost”. Decades of war wiped out much of its fighting population and forced it to depend on unreliable allies, triggering its eventual decline. If it had found a way to accommodate Athens and its ambitions, Sparta could have continued as a superpower “well into the fourth century”.

What happened

Chinese President Xi Jinping hosted President Donald Trump for a lavish tea ceremony on Friday, the second and final day of their summit in Beijing. The two leaders exchanged niceties throughout the high-profile state visit, marking a “departure from turbulence of the relationship in recent years,” said CNN. But Xi also warned Trump not to “mishandle” the situation with Taiwan, the island China has long claimed as its own sovereign territory.

Who said what

China and Taiwan could “enter into conflict” if the U.S. handles the ongoing tensions poorly, pushing the “entire China-U.S. relationship into an extremely dangerous place,” Xi said, according to Chinese state media. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said America’s policy on Taiwan remains “unchanged.” Despite Xi’s “stark” warning, the “pomp-filled” meeting was mostly “friendly and relaxed,” said Reuters. Trump said the leaders had “made some fantastic trade deals,” but did not immediately elaborate.

What next?

On the back of the summit, China is expected to announce an agreement for “double-digit billion purchases” of American agricultural goods, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said. Trump returns to Washington later Friday.

‘Why Spain is standing up to Donald Trump’

Ishaan Tharoor at The New Yorker

Spain has “denied the U.S. access to its military bases for operations linked to Iran,” and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez “seemed to revel in the clash,” says Ishaan Tharoor. Sánchez’s “criticism of the war has set him up as a conspicuous foil to Trump” and Spain’s “stand is a matter of principle, consistency and adherence to the importance of international law.” The nation “has a distinctly different relationship with the United States than countries such as Britain, France and Germany do.”

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‘The real reason why people are losing trust in universities’

Elizabeth Bradley at USA Today

The “recent and widely discussed Yale report on the loss of public trust in higher education offers a sophisticated reflection” but the “study — and the broader national discourse it represents — suffers from a significant case of tunnel vision,” says Elizabeth Bradley. By “centering the debate on the selective few, we are effectively ignoring the heart of the trust problem.” The media “attention on higher education too often focuses on a critique of the most selective institutions.”

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‘Remote work made life easier. It also made us rusty.’

Renée Loth at The Boston Globe

Supporters of a “return to office — mostly business interests, of course — cite improved productivity,” but “another argument for dragging ourselves back to the office gets far less attention: the need to reboot the workplace social skills that have atrophied,” says Renée Loth. The “office is a petri dish of human interaction,” and the “grit, wisdom and compassion it takes to thrive in an office environment are virtues that protect and enrich experiences throughout a whole lifetime.”

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‘Trump’s “weird war” on wind power will jeopardize our energy future and cost Americans billions’

Michael Hiltzik at the Los Angeles Times

Donald Trump’s “weird war against wind is full-blown,” and on “some level, this crusade resembles Trump’s misguided effort to revive the American coal industry,” says Michael Hiltzik. Trump is “waging an explicitly partisan and ideological battle,” and his “anti-wind program is part of his campaign to dismantle U.S. renewables policy because of its roots in the Biden administration.” What’s “especially wasteful about Trump’s crusade against wind power is that it’s almost certain to be time-limited.”

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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.

What happened

Consumer prices last month shot up 3.8% from a year earlier, the biggest year-over-year uptick since May 2023, the U.S. Labor Department reported Tuesday. The heated inflation was driven largely by a 28% year-over-year jump in gasoline prices tied to President Donald Trump’s war with Iran.

Who said what

The latest consumer price index underscored how “daily life in America is getting more expensive,” The New York Times said. Airfares were up 21% from a year ago and food prices rose 3.2%, with coffee prices jumping 19% and tomatoes up 40%. Trump’s tariffs are “still slowly filtering through to some goods,” The Wall Street Journal said, but the war “has presented a much quicker and more obvious shock that could be hard to reverse.”

Asked Tuesday if cost-of-living concerns were motivating his dealmaking with Iran, Trump said “not even a little bit.” His only concern is Iran’s nuclear program, he said. “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody.”

What next?

In a separate report Tuesday, the Labor Department said real average hourly wages fell 0.5% from March to April, meaning “most workers are effectively taking a pay cut even as the White House touts its economic record,” The Washington Post said.

With the Supreme Court set to rule on President Donald Trump’s challenge to birthright citizenship, an oft-cited practice is at the center of it all. The practice, called birth tourism, has become commonplace for women who want their kids to have U.S. citizenship. But the Supreme Court may further support the Trump administration’s anti-immigration stance by cracking down on it.

‘Side issue into a main argument’

Birth tourism occurs when pregnant women from other nations “travel to the U.S. for the purpose of giving birth, thereby obtaining citizenship for their babies,” said The Philadelphia Inquirer. The practice is regularly mentioned by legal scholars, yet birth tourism is “actually rare, despite the outsized role it’s gained in the debate over citizenship.” There are about 26,000 cases of birth tourism in the U.S. annually, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

While this is just a small fraction of the 3.5 million yearly U.S. births, the White House has “elevated what was once a side issue into a main argument for revocation,” said the Inquirer. It is part of Trump’s “aggressive immigration agenda that includes attempts to restrict birthright citizenship,” said Newsweek. Trump signed an order banning birthright citizenship in 2025, triggering a “series of legal challenges now before the Supreme Court” given that the practice is enshrined in the 14th Amendment.

The Trump administration continues to use birth tourism as a primary point of contention when presenting its case to the court. Immigration laws have “spawned a sprawling industry of birth tourism as uncounted thousands of foreigners from potentially hostile nations have flocked to give birth in the United States in recent decades, creating a whole generation of American citizens abroad with no meaningful ties to the United States,” U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer said in oral arguments to the Supreme Court.

‘The scale of the problem is marginal’

Even though the White House has positioned birth tourism as a major factor in why birthright citizenship should be overturned, proponents “say that the scale of the problem is marginal,” said The New York Times. They typically “argue that it can be addressed through regulation and law enforcement without eliminating what has long been considered a central tenet of the United States — equality at birth, regardless of race, religion or the immigration status of the parents.”

Republicans have long used birth tourism as a way to highlight criminal enterprises. In 2019, officials in California “arrested three people who operated multimillion-dollar birth tourism companies and had charged as much as $100,000 to Chinese couples” for a luxury bundle that included “housing, nannies and shopping excursions to Gucci,” said the Times. GOP lawmakers have also “cited birth tourism in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory that has looser visa requirements and is closer to China.”

Support for overturning birthright citizenship remains low. Nearly two-thirds of Americans, 65%, think citizenship “should be granted to all children born on American soil, no matter the circumstances,” according to a recent AP-NORC survey of 2,596 adults. Republicans are less convinced; only 44% are in favor of birthright citizenship. “It’s fundamental to sovereignty, being able to determine who is a citizen,” said Jessica Vaughan, the director of policy studies for the Center for Immigration Studies, to the Times.

A series of European leaders have been singled out for criticism by a frustrated Donald Trump over recent months, said The Guardian. Currently, it's Germany's chancellor who “finds himself in Washington's crosshairs”.

Friedrich Merz provoked the president's wrath last week by telling a class of schoolchildren in his home region of Sauerland that America lacked a clear strategy in Iran and was being “humiliated”. Trump swiftly hit back, calling Merz “totally ineffective” and threatening to shrink America's military presence in Germany. Two days later, the Pentagon announced the withdrawal of 5,000 of the more than 36,000 US troops stationed in Germany. Trump subsequently suggested that many more could be pulled out. He has also threatened to raise tariffs on European car imports from 15% to 25%, a step that would hit Germany hardest.

Awkward timing

This row arrives at a terrible time for Merz, who is struggling in the polls, said The Economist. However, it remains to be seen whether the troop withdrawals actually happen. Trump threatened to pull out 12,000 troops in his first term, but that plan was later cancelled. German bases such as Ramstein are “crucial hubs for American power projection, not least in the Middle East”. German officials are more concerned by the decision to cancel the deployment of a US intermediate-range missile unit to Germany.

This deployment, agreed in 2024 by President Biden, was “explicitly intended to send a message of strength to the Kremlin, a tangible signal of deterrence”, said Hubert Wetzel in Süddeutsche Zeitung. Trump's cancellation of the plan last week, after yet another long phone call with Vladimir Putin, could “almost be interpreted as an invitation to the Kremlin”. Nato's credibility ultimately depends on the belief that the US would come to Europe's aid in a crisis, but how sure can anyone be of that now?

Political misstep

Given how much Europe depends on America, its leaders really need to stop provoking Trump, said Wolfgang Munchau on UnHerd. Merz was of course right that the president entered the Iran war without a strategy, but it was foolish of him to talk of America being “humiliated”. More careful language is required. For all the talk of creating strategic autonomy, the reality is that Europe is miles away from being able safely to decouple from the US. It hasn't even agreed a joint defence strategy. The Europeans are in “dangerous denial”, always quick to criticise the US while persistently failing to address their own powerlessness. “Now Trump has called their bluff. No wonder they hate him.”