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Category: Associated Press

  • Trump’s Iran deal greeted with skepticism and scrutiny on Capitol Hill

    WASHINGTON — Republicans on Capitol Hill said Monday they need more information about the agreement between the United States and Iran announced by President Donald Trump, and some are expressing skepticism as they ask the White House for details.

    The agreement announced Sunday to end the war in Iran, set for a ceremonial signing Friday in Geneva, is centered around reopening the Strait of Hormuz and lifting the United States’ naval blockade in the region, along with financial incentives for Iran if it meets certain benchmarks. But Senate Republicans and Democrats who returned to Washington on Monday said there were still many unanswered questions about the deal and they need thorough briefings before it is finalized.

    “I just don’t know enough about it,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) told reporters in the Capitol. “Even the people who follow this stuff closely up here don’t know that much about it.”

    Congressional leaders and intelligence committees generally receive higher-level intelligence briefings before rank-and-file members, and they are notified of major developments before they are announced. But Thune said he had not been personally briefed on the deal.

    “I think that my understanding of what it entails — and, again, not having seen anything — it would require, I think the issues are going to be compliance, and how are you going to enforce that,” Thune said.

    Thune’s concerns were echoed by several other GOP senators.

    “If it’s a secret deal then how can I take it seriously?” asked Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina.

    Vice President JD Vance told ABC News on Monday that the White House would release the text this week, “and what everybody will see is that Iran doesn’t get a dime of money unless they perform their obligations.”

    Senators have questions about details

    Trump has not yet explained how his agreement will address Iran’s nuclear program, including who will be in charge of verifying that Iran is in compliance and who will destroy or remove highly enriched uranium believed to be buried under nuclear sites that were badly damaged by U.S. strikes last summer.

    A memorandum of understanding also includes the possibility of releasing Iran’s frozen funds, sanctions relief, and a $300 billion fund to help rebuild Iran if Tehran meets certain benchmarks, senior U.S. officials told reporters Monday. But the document has not been released.

    Thune said he wants to know more about the conditions on the financial incentives for Iran. He said the deal would be a “good one” if the incentives are conditioned upon Iran winding down its nuclear program and getting rid of the enriched uranium, “preventing them from having a nuclear capability in the future.”

    Sen. John Kennedy (R., La.) said he is hopeful but “until you see the final document, it’s hard to make an assessment.”

    “I go into it very skeptical of the government of Iran,” Kennedy said. “They learn to lie before they learn to talk. So any agreement we make with them has to have guardrails. It has to have a way to judge through independent inspection if they’re doing what they say they’re doing.”

    Senate could have a vote

    Under the Iran nuclear agreement review act passed by Congress during the Obama era, any deal the U.S. reaches concerning Iran’s nuclear material must be submitted within a certain amount of time to Congress for review. But it is up to Congress whether that happens — it is not required.

    President Barack Obama’s 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran, known as the JCPOA, was submitted for what’s called a vote of disapproval in the Senate. The outcome did not roll back the agreement, but put the senators on record with their support or opposition.

    Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close ally of Trump and a longtime hawk on Iran, has appeared skeptical over the emerging agreement. He said he is “pulling for a deal” but Congress will need to review and vote on it, and he wants to see the memorandum that the two countries have agreed on.

    “The way Iran describes it, it’s awful. The way we describe it, it makes sense to me,” Graham (R., S.C.) said. “Let’s look at it and see what it actually is.”

    Graham has said he wants Vance, whom he called “the architect of the deal,” to present it to lawmakers.

    Vance responded to Graham on Monday, saying in the interview with ABC that he would “caution Lindsey Graham and anybody else not to believe the hard-liner propaganda in Iran, but to believe what’s actually in the agreement.”

    Even though Iran’s new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, is the son of the last supreme leader, and Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard still has significant authority in Iran, Vance told CNN in a separate interview that “fundamentally, it is a much different group of people.” He insisted that the conflict had unlocked much more direct communication with high-level Iranian officials and that the relationship was “fundamentally transformed.”

    Next steps in Congress unclear

    Most Senate Republicans said they want to review the deal, but it was still unclear whether they would have a vote, or if Congress could pass it.

    Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri said he doesn’t think an up-or-down vote is necessary.

    “You have the camp that wants us to lose and then you have a camp that wants a forever war,” Schmitt said. “President Trump’s not in either one of those camps, and neither am I.”

    Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) said he expects the Senate will get the final say. But he praised Trump for making “the single most consequential decision of his presidency” by attacking Iran.

    “I think he made America safer,” Cruz said. “The president as commander in chief acted decisively to stop that ayatollah from getting nuclear weapons.”

    Sen. James Lankford, an Oklahoma Republican who serves on the Intelligence Committee, said he expects there are still many more steps to the process before any package would come to Congress for review.

    “Seems like early reports are showing that this is kind of the first step,” he said. “Once we have a final agreement, we need to take it up and pass it. … If you want a long-term agreement it’s got to be law.”

    Democrats ask what has changed

    Democrats questioned how the deal will improve upon the U.S. position before the war — and how it differs from Obama’s 2015 nuclear deal.

    “For all his critique of JCPOA, we had international observers, we actually had an alliance there that included the Europeans, and Russia and China were all signatories,” Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, told CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday.

    Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) said there are more questions than answers, including what happens to the Iranian nuclear program and sanctions on Iranian oil.

    Trump has spent “tens of billions of dollars” and service members and Iranians have died, “and he still cannot explain how one family in Massachusetts is better off,” Warren said.

    Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said an end to what has been a costly and unpopular war would be a good resolution, but he wants to hear more details.

    “An off ramp is good because it was a war that should have never been started,” he said.

  • Pizza Hut, overtaken by the arrival of delivery culture, will be sold for $2.7 billion

    Pizza Hut, the 68-year-old chain that has long struggled with growing competition and outdated restaurants, will be sold for $2.7 billion by parent company Yum Brands.

    Yum said Tuesday that the private equity firm LongRange Capital will buy Pizza Hut, excluding the mainland China business, for about $1.5 billion.

    The mainland China Pizza Hut will be purchased by Yum China Holdings Inc. for approximately $1.2 billion, the company said. China is Pizza Hut’s second-largest market outside the U.S., accounting for 19% of sales.

    Yum Brands, which also owns KFC and Taco Bell, began to explore its options for Pizza Hut in November. Last year, Yum Brands’ global sales rose 5% but Pizza Hut’s sales fell 2%.

    In February, Yum Brands announced plans to close 250 U.S. Pizza Hut locations. Pizza Hut had 19,974 restaurants worldwide at the end of last year.

    “Pizza Hut has long been the weak link in Yum’s portfolio,” Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData, wrote Tuesday. “Despite efforts to revitalize the brand and shut underperforming locations, it has become increasingly clear that pushing the division back into growth will require a level of investment and patience that Yum is just not prepared to commit to.”

    Pizza Hut was founded in 1958 in Wichita, Kan., by two brothers who borrowed $600 from their mother to open the store. They chose the name because their sign only had room for eight letters.

    Pizza Hut’s familiar red roof debuted in 1969 and by 1971 it was the top pizza chain in the world by sales. PepsiCo acquired Pizza Hut in 1977 but spun off its restaurant division — which became Yum Brands — in 1997.

    By the 1980s, Domino’s was the fastest-growing U.S. pizza company, buoyed by its promise of 30-minute delivery. As carryout and delivery grew in popularity, Pizza Hut was saddled with large, dine-in restaurants.

    The chain has been further pinched in recent years by the growth of DoorDash, Uber Eats, and other restaurant delivery companies which marketed access to a slew of cuisines besides pizza.

    By selling Pizza Hut, Yum Brands can focus more on its brands with stronger sales, Yum CEO Chris Turner said.

    “Under LongRange and Yum China, Pizza Hut will be well positioned for future growth with ownership that brings deep expertise in the restaurant industry,” Turner said in a statement.

    Yum Brands, based in Louisville, Ky., expects the sale in U.S. and China to close in the third quarter. The company’s stock closed up 1.9% Tuesday.

  • U.K. military investigates after Russian warship fires warning shots at yacht in the Channel

    LONDON — A Russian warship fired warning shots at a U.K.-registered pleasure yacht in the English Channel on Tuesday, authorities said, an incident that caused no damage but illustrated heightened tensions between the two countries.

    Britain’s Defense Ministry said it was investigating an “incident” after the yacht reported being fired on by a Russian navy vessel about 23 miles south of the Isle of Wight, outside U.K. territorial waters.

    There were no reports of injuries or damage to the sailing yacht, which continued its journey from the U.K. toward France.

    The BBC reported that the yacht, which has no motor, had drifted toward the Russian vessel in foggy conditions.

    Russia’s Defense Ministry said the crew of the frigate Admiral Grigorovich tried to contact the yacht when it was seen sailing on a “dangerous course in close proximity with the warship.” It said the ship’s crew launched flares and issued sound signals when the yacht did not respond.

    “After the distance had closed to 150 meters (500 feet), the frigate’s commander decided to fire warning shots across the vessel’s bow using small arms,” the ministry said. It said the yacht then changed course and sailed away.

    The ministry said the ship’s crew “acted in strict accordance” with international navigation rules to avoid a collision.

    Russian warships passing through the English Channel are routinely shadowed by the Royal Navy, and patrol vessel HMS Mersey was monitoring the Russian ship at the time of the reported incident. The ministry said it was investigating Tuesday’s incident.

    The British military said last month that it had monitored the Admiral Grigorovich throughout April as the Russian ship escorted six Russia-linked civilian vessels near the U.K.

    The altercation occurred two days after British commandos boarded and detained a sanctioned tanker in the Channel that is suspected of being part of the Russian “shadow fleet.” Officials are not linking the two events.

    The tanker’s captain, an Indian national charged with shipping Russian oil in violation of international sanctions over Moscow’s war on Ukraine, was ordered held in jail after appearing Tuesday in court.

    The British military has had several close encounters with Russian vessels in the region and warned Moscow in November that it was ready to deal with any incursion into its territory after the spy ship Yantar was detected on the edge of U.K. waters north of Scotland.

    In April, Britain and Norway said they had tracked a Russian attack sub and two spy submarines operating north of the U.K. for several weeks.

    A Royal Navy frigate, aircraft, and hundreds of personnel spent weeks following the Russian vessels and prevented them from carrying out “nefarious” activities against underwater infrastructure, then-Defense Secretary John Healey said.

    He accused Moscow of using the distraction of the Iran war to ramp up malign activity against Europe.

    Five years ago, Russia said one of its warships fired warning shots and a warplane dropped bombs in the Black Sea to force the British destroyer HMS Defender out of an area near Crimea that Moscow claimed as its territorial waters.

    The U.K. denied that account and insisted its ship wasn’t fired upon. It was the first time since the Cold War that Moscow acknowledged using live ammunition to deter a NATO warship, reflecting the growing risk of military incidents amid soaring tensions between Russia and the West. The incident occurred about six months before Russia invaded Ukraine.

  • Trump signals swift return of sanctions on Russian oil as G7 refocuses on Ukraine

    EVIAN-LES-BAINS, France — The United States could soon reimpose sanctions on Russian oil shipments after President Donald Trump and fellow leaders at the Group of Seven summit of major industrialized democracies moved Tuesday to put the war in Ukraine back on top of their agenda, more than four years after Russia launched its full-scale invasion.

    The Iran war has recently overshadowed Ukraine, but Trump said he wants to shift the focus following the announcement of an agreement to end the 3½-month-old conflict in the Gulf.

    Trump said Iran will soon be “back in the rearview mirror.”

    Trump said the sanctions on Russia that were eased during the Iran war to help lower oil prices can go back in place as more oil moves through the Strait of Hormuz.

    “Soon we’ll be able to do that because the oil is now flowing,” Trump told reporters in Evian, the French spa town close to the Swiss border that is hosting the summit. “We’re in a position to do that soon.”

    The U.S. in March temporarily eased some sanctions on some Russian oil shipments as crude prices sharply increased. The waiver has been extended.

    Zelensky joins G7 leaders for talks

    Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky joined the G7 leaders for talks on the war in his country. They wrapped quickly, after just 75 minutes.

    Zelensky said Ukraine is serious about peace while Russia toys with world leaders. “The entire ‘Seven’ supports Ukraine unanimously today,” he said.

    Zelensky added that G7 leaders supported Ukraine’s need for more Patriot missiles and discussed how to increase production by licensing it. Patriot missiles are able to counter Russian ballistic missile attacks on Ukraine’s power grid and cities.

    As the U.S. under Trump has cut back aid to Ukraine, France and its European allies are now the biggest providers of military and financial support to Kyiv.

    Trump downplayed the impact of the Russia-Ukraine war on the U.S. but lamented the death toll.

    “The whole thing is ridiculous,” Trump said. “So, yeah, I’m going to do whatever I can.”

    Meanwhile, the U.K. announced new sanctions targeting the “shadow fleet” Russia uses to ship oil and gas, and the finance networks used by Moscow to evade Western sanctions. The ships targeted include several recently purchased by Russia to transport liquefied natural gas from its sanctioned Arctic LNG 2 project.

    Russia fires again at Ukraine’s biggest cities

    Hours before the summit began Monday, Russia fired hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles at Ukraine’s biggest cities in a barrage that killed 11 people and set fire to a religious landmark.

    The attacks came after Zelensky and Putin spoke separately by phone with Trump on Sunday, the U.S. leader’s 80th birthday.

    While campaigning in 2024 for a return to the White House, Trump claimed he could end the Russia-Ukraine war within 24 hours of taking office. However, negotiations have faltered and Trump has acknowledged it has proved much harder than he thought.

    Ukraine on Monday officially started European Union membership negotiations, launching a process that will require its government to commit to years of political reforms even as it fights the Russian invasion.

    Ukraine sees EU membership as a security guarantee for a stable future once the war ends. Its best guarantee would be membership in the NATO military alliance, but the Trump administration insists that cannot happen, and others are wary of Ukraine joining while the war continues.

    Trump says he may send Iran deal to Congress

    The U.S.-Iran ceasefire deal got plenty of attention at Tuesday’s sessions, with Trump voicing his openness to sending the deal to Congress for review. The text has not been made public.

    “I like the idea, send it to Congress please,” Trump said at the start of a meeting with United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on the summit’s sidelines. He added, “I mean, who wouldn’t approve it?”

    Republicans on Capitol Hill say they want Trump to provide more information about the agreement, with some expressing skepticism that the deal can deter Iran from pursuing a nuclear weapon.

    Trump also met with the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani. The Gulf nations are not part of the G7, but French President Emmanuel Macron extended invitations to their leaders at a fraught moment for their region.

    Trump also expressed frustration over Israel’s continued hostilities with the Iranian-backed militia Hezbollah in Lebanon, telling reporters he’s “not happy with the way Israel has handled themselves with Lebanon and with Hezbollah.”

    Trump said Israeli operations to target Hezbollah “should have been able to deal with them faster,” adding: “It just goes on forever. And when that happens, it throws a negative light on the big deal. And that’s the deal with Iran.”

    Macron said France and other Western partners are “ready to take action very quickly” to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz peacefully to ease the economic impact of rising oil prices. France and the U.K. have championed a mission to restore maritime security there as soon as conditions allow.

    The G7 comprises France, the United States, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom. Other guest nations, including Brazil, India, Kenya, and South Korea, were invited to participate in some discussions.

  • Trump moves oversight of special education and civil rights out of the Education Department

    WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s administration is further dismantling the Education Department, moving oversight of special education and civil rights to other agencies.

    The Department of Justice will take on enforcement of civil rights in education, while the Department of Health and Human Services will oversee special education. With the transfers announced Tuesday, the vast majority of Education Department functions now have been assigned to other agencies.

    Trump, a Republican, campaigned on shutting down the Education Department, saying he would “move education back to the states where it belongs.” While only Congress can close the department, Trump’s education secretary, Linda McMahon, a billionaire and former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment, has formed agreements with other federal agencies to handle much of her department’s work.

    McMahon said the agreements align federal responsibilities with the agencies best positioned to support them.

    “The Trump Administration has been clear: as we scale back federal micromanagement when it hinders success, we are equally committed to bolstering the efficacy of federal oversight where it is essential,” McMahon said in a written statement.

    Critics warn of impacts to student services

    Advocates said the changes would create uncertainty around services relied upon by millions of students and families.

    “As is too often the case, traditionally underserved students — including students with disabilities, Black and Latino students, multilingual learners, students from low-income backgrounds, and students in rural communities — will bear the greatest burden created by this reckless decision, to which the disability and civil rights communities have already been vehemently opposed,” said a written statement from EdTrust, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that advocates for educational equity.

    The Education Department already has offloaded some of its programs through 10 earlier internal agreements, but the agencies involved in Tuesday’s announcement — the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services and the Office for Civil Rights — were among the most closely watched.

    The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services manages billions of dollars in grants and oversees state compliance with the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The Office for Civil Rights, which has been thinned by mass layoffs, investigates complaints of discrimination at the nation’s schools and universities.

    The Department of Justice also will take over work protecting student privacy and will provide some training and advisory help to schools.

    While HHS and the Department of Justice will take over most day-to-day duties of the assigned offices, the Education Department will continue to perform some tasks, such as responding to audits and issuing final determinations in civil rights cases, that it is explicitly required to do by law.

    The agreements are scattering education programs to agencies that do not have the expertise to manage them, said Sen. Patty Murray (D., Wash.).

    “Instead of helping kids get a great education, this administration is spending its time, energy, and taxpayer resources fixated on where employees sit and illegally trying to shutter the Department of Education,” Murray said in a written statement.

    Rachel Gittleman, president of the union that represents department employees, said the moves will create chaos for families, students, and schools.

    “This will leave our most vulnerable students and families who have been shut out of our education system without the services they need and without protection when they face discrimination,” Gittleman said in written a statement.

    Families of students with disabilities opposed the decision

    The transfer of special education to Health and Human Services most alarmed disability advocates, who say oversight of whether schools are adequately serving children with disabilities is best handled by education experts — not medical experts.

    “The IDEA is intended to equip students as they learn alongside their peers, not cure them — the HHS is not prepared to oversee and administer the IDEA program effectively. Health and education systems speak in entirely different languages, including variations in terminology, training, and disciplines,” said Jennifer Coco, interim executive director of the Center for Learner Equity.

    The Education Department said McMahon spent over six months in listening sessions with families, advocates, and educators to better understand concerns around how the department’s dismantling could affect special education. Many families raised concerns about obstacles to obtaining proper services for their children, but Coco said participants in those sessions were united in their opposition to moving special education oversight out of the Education Department.

    “I think we agree on the problem,” Coco said. “We have stark disagreement on the solution and these transfers today don’t feel like a solution to that problem.”

  • California Gov. Gavin Newsom says Trump’s Justice Department is investigating him and his wife

    Federal agents have questioned friends and associates of Gov. Gavin Newsom of California and his wife, Newsom said Monday in a video in which he accused President Donald Trump of using the Justice Department to punish a political enemy.

    The full scope of any investigation remains unclear. But Newsom’s aides say part of the federal investigation appears to focus on his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom. Former employees of the governor and people affiliated with his wife’s nonprofit groups are among those who have been questioned by agents, according to the governor’s office.

    A person familiar with the matter confirmed that multiple federal investigations were underway related to the governor, including one looking at his wife’s finances. But the person disputed Newsom’s assertion that the investigations were politically motivated and said they had been initiated by federal law enforcement officials in California, not launched by officials in Washington. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly.

    Newsom, a Democrat, described the investigation as a fishing expedition in which federal agents had started sifting through “years and years of random documents” and knocking on the doors of family friends and associates of the Newsoms to try to find evidence of an unspecified crime.

    “Donald Trump isn’t just coming after me because of my mean tweets,” Newsom said in the video. “He’s coming after me because I am considering running for president.” He added, “To get me, he’s coming after my wife.”

    Several people associated with the Newsoms have been contacted by federal agents in the past week, according to the governor’s office. Newsom’s aides believe the agents have also subpoenaed banking records but said they had seen no written evidence of that.

    An FBI spokesperson and a Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment. A White House official referred all questions to the Justice Department.

    Siebel Newsom, who calls herself California’s first partner, is a documentary filmmaker whose work focuses on the social impacts of sexism. She founded a nonprofit organization called the Representation Project that advocates for gender equity, in part by developing educational materials based on her documentaries.

    Siebel Newsom also owns a film-production company called Girls Club Entertainment. It is listed as a contractor of the Representation Project on the nonprofit’s tax returns. Tax records show that the Representation Project makes annual payments to Girls Club Entertainment. In 2024, the nonprofit paid Girls Club Entertainment $161,250 for film production work.

    Siebel Newsom is also a co-founder of the California Partners Project, a nonprofit that works to get more women onto corporate boards, address the gender pay gap, and make technology safer for children. Some of the donors that support the California Partners Project are groups with business before the state government.

    For years, critics have raised the possibility of self-dealing, but no public evidence of wrongdoing by any of the entities tied to Siebel Newsom has surfaced, and it remains unclear what precise issues and actions investigators have been asking questions about.

    Newsom has reported soliciting $4.3 million in donations to the California Partners Project since 2020, according to disclosures filed with the state’s ethics agency. That includes $1.8 million from a Native American tribe that has an agreement with the state to operate a casino in Sonoma County. In California, public officials must disclose donations to charities that are made at the official’s request.

    Another nonprofit group with ties to Newsom is called the California Protocol Foundation. Its board includes some of Newsom’s top advisers during his time as governor and previously as the mayor of San Francisco. The foundation pays for initiatives that the governor says he does not want state taxpayers to cover, including his travel overseas for conferences and other meetings.

    Newsom’s office said the investigation is a fresh attempt to smear him after the federal prosecution of his former chief of staff revealed no misconduct by the governor. The former chief of staff, Dana Williamson, pleaded guilty last month to three felonies in a corruption case.

    One of the crimes Williamson pleaded guilty to was lying to the FBI about information she had access to while working in Newsom’s office. In her plea agreement, Williamson said she gave her former business partner confidential information about state litigation that involved one of their clients and then lied about it when questioned by the FBI.

    The agreement does not name the client, but details in the indictment align with a sex-discrimination lawsuit that California regulators filed in 2021 against video game maker Activision Blizzard. The company had been a client of Williamson’s consulting business before she joined Newsom’s office. In 2022, Newsom fired the state lawyer leading the suit against Activision, prompting complaints that he was interfering.

    When Williamson was indicted last year, her attorney said that federal agents first approached her during the Biden administration. She was working for Newsom at the time, and the agents asked her if she would cooperate in an investigation of the governor. She replied that she had no information to give them because she had never witnessed any criminal conduct by Newsom.

    Earlier this year, Newsom’s office responded to questions from Trump’s Justice Department about his 2022 termination of the lawyer involved in the Activision lawsuit, according to a spokesperson for Newsom. Then the communication from federal officials ceased, the spokesperson said.

    The latest inquiries into associates of Newsom and Siebel Newsom began around the time Trump said that he planned to nominate Todd Blanche as attorney general, according to the governor’s office.

    Blanche had previously defended Trump in three of the four criminal cases he was facing.

    Nominated to be the No. 2 official at the Justice Department at the beginning of Trump’s second term, Blanche — now the acting attorney general — has pursued prosecutions of Trump’s perceived enemies. He also signed an agreement granting the president and his companies immunity from audits of past tax returns to settle a $10 billion lawsuit the president brought against his own government earlier this year.

    Newsom has been highly critical of Blanche’s nomination to the top Justice Department position, recently calling Blanche “the guy covering up the Epstein Files” and saying he “gave Trump and his family a lifetime pass to commit tax crimes.”

    (END OPTIONAL TRIM.)

    Newsom, in his video address, mentioned that Trump had called for his arrest last year, and he said he was proud to join the “hit list” of people standing up to the president. He accused Trump of “selling the presidency” for golf course approvals, cryptocurrencies and a private jet, and pledged to continue calling out what he saw as corruption from the White House.

    “You can subpoena my records. You can investigate me. You can harass me,” Newsom said. “Put my name on every and any enemies list you have, but leave my wife and family out of your personal vendetta.”

    This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

  • Iran and U.S. reach an initial deal to end the war and open the Strait of Hormuz but challenges remain

    DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The United States and Iran reached an initial agreement Monday that would extend their shaky ceasefire and lead to the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, but significant challenges remain to ending the war, including whether Israel will continue its offensive in Lebanon.

    Details of the deal have not been made public. The U.S. said it was signed electronically on Sunday but that it will not be implemented until a formal signing. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, a key mediator, said that will happen Friday in Geneva. Even if the strait — a crucial waterway for the world’s oil and natural gas — fully opens then, it will likely take months for the global energy crisis sparked by its closure to ease.

    Israel joined the U.S. in launching the war on Feb. 28, but it is not party to the deal. The Israeli defense minister said Monday that the country would not withdraw from land seized in Lebanon, where Israel is fighting the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group.

    A spokesperson in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Israel will continue to defend itself against any threat to its security. That alone could scuttle the deal, since Iran has insisted any agreement to end the war include an end to the fighting in Lebanon.

    The agreement also faces other major challenges. It gives just 60 days to decide what to do about Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium and its nuclear program — which the U.S. and Israel worry could be used to build an atomic weapon, despite Tehran’s insistence that the program is peaceful. It took years for Iran and world powers to negotiate a 2015 agreement to rein in Tehran’s nuclear program.

    President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew the U.S. from that accord in his first term, setting the stage for the tensions that culminated in the current war, which has killed thousands across the Middle East, including the top leaders of Iran’s theocracy, and raised the prices of fuel, food, and other basic goods far beyond the region.

    The Strait of Hormuz won’t open until the deal is signed

    Early in the war, Iranian attacks on ships brought traffic in the Strait of Hormuz — through which a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas passed before the conflict — to a near standstill. Trump implemented a blockade in response.

    Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, said Iran would not start implementing the agreement until after the signing ceremony. The U.S. military said the blockade will remain in place “pending execution” of the deal.

    “Do not attempt to cross until explicit direction is given,” it said Monday in an advisory to merchant ships.

    Trump, who faced pressure to end the war ahead of congressional midterm elections in November, said that “a lot of great things are going to happen in the Middle East right now.”

    “Very importantly, the oil is plummeting down, and the stock market is shooting up like a rocket today,” he said Monday at the G7 summit in France.

    While the agreement provides for the “immediate” opening of the strait and lifting of the blockade, the process will take time because there are mines in the strait, and ships are unwilling to risk traversing it, according to a senior U.S. official who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss outlines of the agreement.

    Details remain scant but expected soon

    A second senior U.S. official told reporters that details of the agreement would be released within the next two days.

    The memorandum of understanding includes the possibility of releasing Iran’s frozen funds, easing sanctions, and creating a $300 billion fund to rebuild Iran — all of which would be tied to Iran meeting benchmarks, the official said.

    The officials said technical talks would begin on Friday after the signing ceremony and that Vice President JD Vance would lead negotiations for the U.S.

    Israel says it won’t withdraw from Lebanon

    The success of the deal rests at least partially on what happens between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Israel’s bombing of Beirut’s southern suburbs on Sunday nearly derailed the negotiations, and a previous attack led Iran to fire on Israel and Israel to fire back.

    Defense Minister Israel Katz said Israel plans to stay “indefinitely” in land it holds in Lebanon, Syria, and the Gaza Strip. He also threatened that if Iran attacks Israel over its strikes in Lebanon, Israel will strike Iran with “great force.”

    Asked where Israel stands on the deal, David Mencer, a spokesperson in Netanyahu’s office, told the Associated Press that Israel and the U.S. remain fully aligned on preventing Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. But he added that Israel will not tolerate attacks from Hezbollah on its territory.

    Israel and the U.S. began the war apparently in lockstep, but the war has created deep fractures in that close relationship, with Trump eager to end a conflict that is deeply unpopular with the American public and Netanyahu intent on destroying Hezbollah. Trump appears to have grown increasingly frustrated with the Israeli leader, even occasionally publicly insulting him, including telling the New York Times on Sunday that he was a “very difficult guy.”

    Many Lebanese travel to check on homes

    In a sign of the deal’s fragility, the Lebanese army called on residents not to rush to return to border villages, saying they should follow military instructions because of the danger of “Israeli violations and aggression.”

    Many Lebanese who had fled following Israeli evacuation orders and intense fighting were heading south, however, to check on their homes. Celine Fayad, driving south, said she will test how far she could go. Her village, Aitaroun, is along the border with Israel. It was among the first to be occupied and lies in ruins.

    “We were expecting to return,” she said. “Thanks to Iran.”

    Ali Haidar was among the first to return to Nabatiyeh, the southern city at the heart of the latest Israeli military operations, where many central buildings have been reduced to dust.

    “This used to be our home, our childhood home where we have all of our memories. This is where we grew up. Now it’s gone,” Haidar said. “We will return to rubble and sand. It’s better than being displaced.”

    Hezbollah, meanwhile, credited Iran with a “major achievement” in reaching the agreement, which it said could lead to “the full liberation of our land, the return of our prisoners to their homeland and families,” and reconstruction of war-devastated areas.

    Along with praising the deal, the militant group said it was committed to resisting Israel “until full withdrawal is achieved.”

    World leaders welcome the deal

    Despite the uncertainties, world leaders from Europe to China welcomed the agreement. French President Emmanuel Macron, who is hosting Trump and other world leaders at a Group of Seven summit this week, said France and other Western partners are “ready to take action very quickly” to help restore normal shipping traffic in the strait once the U.S. and Iran agree to such a mission.

    Others have expressed caution that the deal remains tentative. Luxembourg’s foreign minister, Xavier Bettel, noted: “It’s a long time till Friday.”

  • Lawmakers fight to stop the Trump administration’s dismantling of a $386M ocean observatory project

    SEATTLE — A group of Democratic senators and one Republican, as well as two Democratic House committees, sent letters Monday to the National Science Foundation asking it to reverse course on its plan to dismantle a sprawling ocean monitoring network, with House lawmakers going further and accusing the agency of acting illegally.

    The Ocean Observatories Initiative is a network of more than 900 ocean sensors built at a cost of $386 million. Over the last decade it has tracked ocean circulation, marine ecosystems, climate change, and extreme weather, producing data freely available to the public and informing more than 500 scientific publications. The project was slated to run another 15 to 20 years.

    The National Science Foundation had directed the removal of most of the system’s instruments from waters off Oregon, Washington, Alaska, North Carolina, and Greenland by 2027 — a decision scientists said came with no warning and no scientific review. The independent federal agency, which was established by Congress, described the move not as a cancellation but as a “descoping” aligned with a strategy to prioritize “evolving scientific priorities and emerging technologies.” The Trump administration’s proposed 2026 budget had included a 55% cut to the agency.

    “Supreme stupidity”

    “It just seems like this is supreme stupidity and a violation of the fundamental distribution of powers in our Constitution,” Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon told the Associated Press. “This program is authorized, it’s funded, and for the administration to shut it down without direction from Congress violates that vision in which the people’s representatives decide what’s done and funded, and the executive branch executes that vision.”

    Merkley and Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska co-led the letter, which was also signed by Democratic Sens. Edward Markey and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell of Washington, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, and Ron Wyden of Oregon. It urged the National Science Foundation, or NSF, to halt the dismantling of the Ocean Observatories Initiative and conduct a thorough review, including consultation with the marine science community, before any further action is taken.

    “Eliminating most of this complex ocean monitoring system threatens the safety of our coastal communities while undermining our nation’s ability to monitor coastal environments, marine currents, and extreme weather events,” the senators wrote.

    In a sharper rebuke, Democrats from the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee and the House Natural Resources Committee sent a joint letter demanding the agency “cease this expensive, destructive, and — crucially — illegal action at once.” The letter was led by Reps. Zoe Lofgren and Jared Huffman of California, the top Democrats on their respective committees, and was signed by 23 Democratic members from each panel.

    In a June 3 statement, the NSF said its decision drew in part on a 2025 National Academies report on the future of ocean science. “NSF remains committed to ocean science and will continue working with the scientific community on high-priority research objectives,” it wrote.

    Cuts seen as sign of broader retreat

    The ocean observatory cuts are part of a broader retreat from environmental and climate-related science under President Donald Trump’s Republican administration, which has moved to scale back research programs, reduce staffing at agencies including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, and ease emissions regulations.

    Federal appropriations law requires the NSF to notify the House and Senate Appropriations Committees at least 30 days in advance of any planned decommissioning of agency-owned facilities or assets valued at more than $2.5 million. The House letter said no such notification had been transmitted.

    Merkley said he learned of the dismantling through news reports.

    “It was like the alarm bells just went off,” he said. “None of us knew about this, and there didn’t appear to have been any consultation or any scientific commission or stakeholders that were leading to this.”

    Merkley said his office is still confirming whether formal notification was given, but he added: “If there was no notification, this would appear to be illegal.”

    He and Murkowski planned to file legislation Monday that would prohibit the NSF from spending federal funds to decommission instruments until a thorough review has been completed.

    Pulling buoy off Oregon coast

    Scientists are scheduled to begin pulling the first buoy off the Oregon coast on Tuesday.

    In their letter, the senators cited the approaching El Niño — a periodic Pacific warming that disrupts weather patterns and supercharges marine heat waves — as evidence the cuts are particularly ill timed.

    “The loss of this deep-water observation system would threaten our ability to prepare for and monitor future El Niño events,” they wrote, warning coastal communities, fishermen, and emergency responders would be left without crucial information.

    “Instead of paying for the valuable insights that can be gleaned from the 10-years-and-counting continuous monitoring, taxpayers are now paying for research vessels to span the ocean dredging up hundreds of pieces of instrumentation. This is pathetic,” the House letter states. “In a time of strained resources, the NSF is wasting time and money to destroy its own scientific infrastructure.”

  • Trump arrives at G7 summit looking for momentum after announcing a deal to end the Iran war

    EVIAN-LES-BAINS, France — President Donald Trump started his visit to the G7 summit of leading industrialized nations on Monday by declaring his agreement aimed at ending the U.S. war with Iran is a potential breakthrough for global security and a chance for the U.S. to finally turn the page in its relationship with longtime adversary Iran.

    The Republican U.S. president sought to make clear that he arrived in Evian-les-Bains with the wind at his back for talks with G7 leaders, including some who have been sharply critical of his management of the 15-week-old conflict, which has led to a surge in global energy prices — though he did not immediately seem willing to lay out the details of what was in the emerging deal.

    Some of those details are still to be negotiated in talks over the next 60 days, though Trump said the memorandum of understanding would likely be released after it’s signed on Friday.

    “I think a lot of great things are going to happen in the Middle East right now, and very importantly the oil (price) is plummeting down and the stock market is shooting up like a rocket today,” Trump said at a meeting with the summit’s host, French President Emmanuel Macron, before they joined a working dinner with other leaders.

    “The Iran deal that we made is going to bring a lot of success to the world,” he said.

    Deal could change G7 dynamic

    Trump has had friction with Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni over failing to consult them before the decision to go to war. But sealing an agreement before jetting off to the summit might change the dynamic of the three-day gathering.

    Macron at the start of Monday’s meeting congratulated Trump for finding a way to an agreement.

    “It’s a very important matter for peace of the whole world,” Macron said.

    Trump has pushed back on the four European leaders — members of the NATO military alliance — for their lack of support for the U.S. in the conflict.

    He’s expected to discuss with leaders the demining of the Strait of Hormuz. Britain and France have expressed interest in assisting with the demining once the conflict is paused. Fear of potential mines is among the reasons tanker traffic has come to a halt during the war, and quickly clearing them will be crucial to regaining the confidence of commercial vessels.

    Macron on Monday said France was ready to move within days to deploy assets, including mine-clearing vessels, to the region to help.

    Senior U.S. officials told reporters that while the agreement provides for the immediate opening of the strait and lifting of the U.S. naval blockade, it will take weeks for traffic to return to previous levels.

    Macron invited the leaders of three nations that aren’t part of the G7 — Egypt, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates — to take part in a session on the Middle East on Tuesday, when Iran is expected to be a central focus.

    Trump faces questions about financial incentives for Tehran

    Trump had fiercely criticized President Barack Obama for the 2015 nuclear agreement, which Trump argued failed to stop Tehran from advancing toward a weapon and funneled billions of dollars into the Islamic Republic’s coffers.

    In 2018, Trump exited the deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, and the European Union were also signatories to the pact.

    Trump in an interview on Sunday with the New York Times pushed back on comparisons to the Obama-era nuclear deal. “We negotiated from strength,” Trump said. “He was basically paying them off.”

    But Trump hasn’t explained how his agreement will address some key issues about Iran’s nuclear program, including who will be in charge of verifying that Iran is complying with the agreement and who will destroy or remove 972 pounds of highly enriched uranium believed to be buried under nuclear sites that were badly damaged by U.S. strikes last summer.

    The memorandum of understanding includes the possibility of releasing Iran’s frozen funds, sanctions relief, and a $300 billion fund to help rebuild Iran — all of which would be tied to Tehran meeting certain benchmarks aimed at assuaging White House concerns, senior U.S. officials told reporters on Monday.

    Some Democrats and hawkish critics say Trump has failed to explain how the financial relief in his agreement will differ from what Obama did in the 2015 nuclear deal.

    “For all his critique of JCPOA, we had international observers, we actually had an alliance there that included the Europeans, and Russia and China were all signatories,” Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, told CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday.

    Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close ally of Trump and an Iran hawk, expressed skepticism, saying that Congress will need to review and vote on any nuclear deal with Iran, and said he expects Vice President JD Vance — “the architect of the deal” — to present it.

    “I am somewhat concerned that Iran’s view of the agreement seems different than what the American negotiating team is claiming,” Graham said on social media.

    Trade irritants and the war in Ukraine are also a focus

    Leaders are expected to discuss a range of economic and trade issues. Trump told the New York Post he’s warned Macron the U.S. will “have no choice” but to slap 100% tariffs on French wines unless ​Paris eliminates its digital tax on American tech companies, renewing a long-running threat from him that dates to his first administration.

    Wines and ​spirits exported to the U.S. from the European Union currently face ​a 15% ⁠tariff.

    In an interview with broadcaster TF1, Macron said Monday that it’s not “for the United States to decide what European or French law should be.”

    Macron also invited Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for a working session with G7 leaders on Tuesday to discuss the Russia-Ukraine war.

    At the moment, Zelensky is not scheduled to hold one-on-one talks with Trump while they’re both in France, but Trump on Sunday held separate phone calls with Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

    Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters that Trump emphasized the need to end hostilities with Ukraine and stated his readiness to influence European allies and Kyiv toward that goal, including at the G7.

    Zelensky had offered to meet Putin with Trump and European leaders at the G7 gathering, but the Kremlin didn’t reply, a Ukrainian official familiar with the matter told the Associated Press. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

    Putin is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes, and France would be obliged as an ICC member to arrest him. The United States and Russia both oppose the court.

    Trump suggested that, after an Iran deal, he’ll now have greater bandwidth to focus on the Russia-Ukraine war.

    “Now that this is finished, we’re going to be focusing on that,” he said, referring to diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting that followed Moscow’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.

  • Wisconsin beagle farm closing and hundreds of its dogs will be sent to a Florida rescue group

    MADISON, Wis. — A Wisconsin beagle breeding farm that’s been the site of recent violent protests is closing, and its remaining dogs are being taken in by a Florida rescue group.

    Big Dog Ranch Rescue announced Monday that it has reached an agreement for the permanent closure of Ridglan Farms and the transfer of its 475 remaining beagles starting this week.

    “Not one dog will remain,” Lauree Simmons, the group’s founder, said in a news conference at a farm in Wisconsin. “No more breeding, no more testing, no more anything.”

    The rescue group said some of the beagles will go to other rescue groups while others will be sent to its Florida and Alabama campuses, where they will be spayed, neutered, and prepared for adoption.

    The group bought roughly 1,500 of the farm’s more than 2,000 beagles in April for an undisclosed price.

    About 200 dogs were transferred from the farm starting Monday morning, according to Simmons. Another 125 will be moved Tuesday. The transfer of the remaining beagles will happen in August, as they are still puppies.

    Simmons called on protesters to refrain from further demonstrations as it says Ridglan Farms has committed to permanently closing its dog breeding, sales, research, and testing operations.

    She said her group and others are “working closely” with the Trump administration to stop funding studies that subject dogs to invasive and painful experimentation.

    “Our focus now should be on supporting these dogs as they transition into their new lives,” Simmons said. “These dogs will get to experience safety and a normal life for the first time.”

    Ridglan Farms, in a statement Monday, said all the dogs being transferred are “happy, healthy animals” with “extensive” state and federal inspection documentation.

    “We hope these dogs will continue to flourish in their new homes,” the farm said, adding that the “years-long harassment campaign targeting the research facility’s owners, staff, and neighbors comes to an end.”

    The dog breeding and research business is located in Blue Mounds, a small town about 25 miles southwest of the capital, Madison.

    Animal activists have been pushing for years to have dogs at the facility adopted, not sold to other research facilities.

    Beagles are the most common breed of dog used for animal testing, primarily because of their smaller size and gentle temperament, according to Big Dog Ranch Rescue.

    In April, police used tear gas and pepper spray to repel a large group of animal welfare activists that stormed the farm in an attempt to take beagles from the facility. Protesters also broke into the facility in March and took 30 dogs, leading to dozens of arrests.

    Ridglan Farms agreed in October to give up its state breeding license as of July 1 as part of a deal to avoid prosecution on felony animal mistreatment charges.

    The firm has denied mistreating animals, but a special prosecutor determined that Ridglan Farms was performing eye procedures that violated state veterinary standards.