Wednesday, May 28 | By Alexis Simendinger & Kristina Karisch |
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| ▪ Trump warns Putin, and many others ▪ Senate GOP divisions threaten budget bill ▪ Tuberville launches Alabama gubernatorial bid ▪ Israel faces international pushback over Gaza |
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©️ Associated Press | Evan Vucci and Grigory Sysoyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool |
Trump expands list of targets for his ire |
President Trump on Tuesday blasted Russian President Vladimir Putin while also taking aim at Harvard University, the state of California and various courts. On any given day at the White House, the message is the muscle. "What Vladimir Putin doesn't realize is that if it weren't for me, lots of really bad things would have already happened to Russia, and I mean REALLY BAD," Trump said in a Tuesday post on Truth Social. "He's playing with fire!" Trump, frustrated that a ceasefire and peace talks are not Putin's immediate priorities, continued to criticize Russia as it aims drones and missiles at Kyiv. Russia's foreign minister on Tuesday said Trump and Putin had agreed to an exchange of prisoners, but details were scarce. ▪ The New York Times: Satellite images suggest Russia plans to restart a seized Ukrainian nuclear plant. ▪ The Hill's Niall Stanage writes in his latest Memo that Trump's eagerness to try to end the more than three-year war following Russia's invasion makes no mention of any additional U.S. military aid to Ukraine. The president's escalating ire with Putin is closely watched by GOP lawmakers and by members of Trump's base. (Read more on the lingering questions for the MAGA loyalists later today in Emily Brooks's The Movement newsletter; click here to sign up and get it in your inbox.) Meanwhile on Tuesday, the administration took aim at familiar domestic targets. It sought to reel back all remaining federal contracts granted to Harvard. Separately, Trump threatened to revoke federal funding from California over a transgender high school track and field athlete who qualified over the weekend for the state championship meet. The president instructed local authorities to block the student from participating. The Justice Department also sued the state of North Carolina and its Board of Elections Tuesday while alleging an "inaccurate voter list" and raising provisions of a Trump executive order signed in March. The administration also instructed U.S. embassies to pause interviews with foreign students for visas as it weighs requiring new social media vetting of those seeking to study in the U.S., according to a cable dated Tuesday and signed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. TRUMP'S THREATS to withhold federal funding from New York City because of a congestion pricing toll program he opposes were temporarily blocked by a federal judge Tuesday. Separately, the president's executive order punishing law firm WilmerHale was struck down by a federal judge. And NPR and Colorado public radio stations sued the Trump White House in federal court Tuesday over the president's executive order to block congressionally appropriated funds to NPR and PBS. "It is not always obvious when the government has acted with a retaliatory purpose in violation of the First Amendment. 'But this wolf comes as a wolf,'" said the legal filing for the public broadcasters. At the same time, Trump is fending off ethics questions and assertions he is unabashedly padding his personal wealth through the office he holds. "The Trumps are hardly the first presidential family to profit from their time in power, but they have done more to monetize the presidency than anyone who has ever occupied the White House," The New York Times reported on Sunday. "The scale and the scope of the presidential mercantilism has been breathtaking." The White House maintains that Trump complies with conflict-of-interest restrictions that apply to the president. "Either the general public never cared about this," Paul Rosenzweig, a former senior counsel to Ken Starr's investigation of former President Clinton, told the Times, or "the public did care about it but no longer does." ▪ Bloomberg News: The Trump family's money-making machine. ▪ The New Yorker: Donald Trump's politics of plunder. ▪ The Hill: Trump plans a major military parade June 14, his birthday, at a time when critics say he is ruling like a dictator. Trump Media and Technology Group, the parent company of Truth Social whose largest shareholder is the president, said on Tuesday it would raise $2.5 billion from institutional investors to invest in Bitcoin, continuing its transformation from a social media company into a financial services and crypto play, The New York Times reports. TRUMP'S PARDONS on Tuesday included a Virginia sheriff convicted of bribery; reality TV stars convicted on bank fraud and tax evasion charges; and a man who pleaded guilty to tax crimes whose mother fundraised for the president. |
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Smart Take
with Blake Burman |
| Lawmakers are out of town this week, but that hasn't stopped questions from forming about how President Trump's House-passed "big, beautiful bill" is being received in the Senate. Already, several Republican senators have raised various concerns. I spoke with former White House deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley about the bill's fate. "These senators have constituents they are worried about, and they are trying to let them know they are fighting for the people who put them in office," he told me. Gidley added that one person to keep an eye on is Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), who has voiced concerns about spending. That stood out to me because when I interviewed Johnson earlier this month, he told me he's focusing on making the case of returning spending to "reasonable" pre-pandemic levels. |
Burman hosts "The Hill" weeknights, 6p/5c on NewsNation. |
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- The Health and Human Service Department under Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. withdrew the existing recommendation Tuesday for the coronavirus vaccine for healthy pregnant women and healthy children.
- What's a TACO trade? It's Wall Street-speak referring to the president and on-again, off-again tariff threats: "Trump Always Chickens Out."
- Join The Hill's June 5 half-day summit, "Invest in America," at 8 a.m. EDT featuring titans from Washington and Wall Street. Participants share insights about economic developments, tariffs, artificial intelligence, crypto, taxes and more. RSVP HERE.
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©️ Associated Press | Manuel Balce Ceneta |
BIG, BEAUTIFUL SENATE BATTLE: House passage of Trump's "big, beautiful bill" to fund domestic priorities sparks frictions between Senate GOP moderates and conservatives. Republican centrists, including Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and Thom Tillis (N.C.), want to ease House GOP cuts to Medicaid and green energy incentives. Conservatives, meanwhile, want even less government. Some, including Sens. Rick Scott (Fla.) and Ron Johnson (Wis.), seek greater federal savings and want to repeal clean energy features of 2022's Inflation Reduction Act. Each faction possesses sufficient votes (four) to be able to block a Senate package, setting the stage for an intra-party standoff that could stretch into August. Complicating the calculus for Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) is Sen. Rand Paul's (R-Ky.) early declaration that he won't vote for the bill as long as it includes a $4 trillion increase in the debt ceiling. Whatever changes senators make must eventually pass the House, where Republicans control a slim 220-to-212-seat majority. Identical legislation must be approved by both chambers before it can go to Trump for his signature. The Hill's Alexander Bolton reports observers are skeptical that the debate in the Senate will end in June. "I would be shocked if it did not go past July 4," said a Senate Republican aide. "There are going to be a lot more twists and turns in this road, but we're going to get it done." Here's a roadblock: Tech billionaire Elon Musk is criticizing the Republican megabill in a major break with Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.). His disapproval could add significant firepower to fiscal hawks' push for deeper deficit reduction targets. "I was disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit … and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing," Musk said in an excerpt from a CBS interview, posted late Tuesday. "A bill can be big or it can be beautiful. But I don't know if it can be both." One senator to watch: Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who is staking out his spot as a populist defender of Medicaid. The senior senator from Missouri — who as state attorney general once signed on to a lawsuit seeking to overturn the Affordable Care Act — has made his position clear: He will not support the House's bill because it cuts Medicaid benefits. Earlier this month, Hawley wrote in a New York Times op-ed that slashing health care for the working poor "is both morally wrong and politically suicidal." "Republicans need to open their eyes: Our voters support social insurance programs," Hawley wrote. "More than that, our voters depend on those programs." ▪ Axios: Trump's drug price plan may hinge on Congress. ▪ The Hill: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) criticized Congress for not moving to codify cuts implemented by Trump's Department of Government Efficiency. AI IN THE STATES: House Republicans seek to ban state regulation of artificial intelligence (AI), sparking debate among the tech community and lawmakers over its implications for the emerging tech. The proposal passed the House on Thursday morning as part of a sweeping tax and spending bill. Now, it faces an uphill battle in the Senate in the wake of procedural rules and potential resistance from some GOP senators. The Hill's Miranda Nazzaro breaks down what to know. |
- The House will meet at 11 a.m. Thursday.
- The Senate will hold a pro forma session on Friday at 7 a.m.
- The president will sign executive orders at 2 p.m. at the White House.
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©️ Associated Press | Stefan Jeremiah |
GUBERNATORIAL BID: Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R) is running for governor, creating a primary opening for his Senate seat. Tuberville, a first-term senator and former football coach for Auburn University, made the decision official during an interview with Fox News after months of mulling over the gubernatorial bid. "I'm a football coach. I'm a leader. I'm a builder. I'm a recruiter and we're going to grow Alabama," he said. "I'll be running every weekend, doing the things I need to do to make sure that I can get over the threshold and win this governor's race, come back to Alabama and work with President Trump." Tuberville's decision also comes after a roller-coaster tenure on Capitol Hill, especially during former President Biden's time in office. The Alabama Republican's most notable fight came throughout 2023 when he put a hold on all military promotions over the Pentagon's then-policy allowing servicemembers to be reimbursed for travel to receive abortion care in the wake of the Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade. The battle lasted 10 months before he relented due to internal GOP pressure. The Hill: Who could replace Tuberville in the Senate? MALE VOTERS: Democrats are grappling with how to win back young male voters, fearful that without a course-correction the party will cede more ground to Republicans heading into 2026 and 2028. A report released this month by the Democratic data firm Catalist found the party saw a 6-point drop in support among men aged 18 to 29 years old between 2020 and 2024, including substantial drops among Black, Latino and Asian American and Pacific Islander young men specifically. Members of the party say that Democrats need to shore up their identity among the key demographic and better address their economic anxieties, among other prescriptions, amid concerns that the party could further backslide with that voting bloc. Democrats outraised and outspent Trump in 2024, but several strategists and aides say their problems run much deeper than raising money. "The challenges that Democrats are having right now you can't completely buy your way out of," Democratic strategist Joel Payne told The Hill's Amie Parnes. "You can't spend your way out of the type of political challenge that we're in right now. It's going to take more than spending and trying to overwhelm the other side with your bank account." ▪ The Hill: A series of key primaries will take place over the summer, setting the stage for general election matchups this November. Here's what to watch. ▪ The New York Times: Six months later, Democrats are still searching for the path forward. The party's standing is startlingly low after a defeat that felt like a cultural rejection. What comes next? |
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©️ Associated Press | Abdel Kareem Hana |
ISRAEL: Amid Israeli threats to launch a sweeping ground offensive throughout Gaza, mediators are working to urgently broker a ceasefire and free the remaining hostages there. But Israel, Hamas and the U.S. have sent conflicting messages in recent days about progress in truce talks, even as Trump appeared to ramp up pressure to end the war. Meanwhile, a controversial new aid group — backed by Israel and the U.S. — said it started operating in Gaza on Monday, despite objections from the United Nations and other humanitarian groups. Its American executive director abruptly resigned, saying the organization couldn't operate independently. Under intense international pressure, Israel began letting some food into Gaza last week. Aid organizations have called it a "drop in the bucket" given the level of need. ▪ The Guardian: Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said his country is committing war crimes in Gaza, and that "thousands of innocent Palestinians are being killed, as well as many Israeli soldiers." ▪ Reuters: Germany's foreign minister threatened unspecified measures against Israel on Tuesday and said Berlin would not export weapons used to break humanitarian law. ▪ The Economist: Triple trouble for Israel as its furious allies bail. ▪ The New York Times: Netanyahu, wary of a diplomatic solution to curbing Iran's nuclear program, continues to press for military action that would upend Trump's push for a negotiated deal. "TRUE NORTH STRONG AND FREE": Britain's King Charles III outlined Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney's government priorities during a speech to Parliament on Tuesday. The monarch, who is the head of state of Canada, showed support for Ottawa in the face of Trump's threats to annex Canada and make it the 51st state. "Many Canadians are feeling anxious and worried about the drastically changing world around them. Fundamental change is always unsettling," he said in the speech, switching between English and French. Charles praised Canada as a "force for good" in the world. "As the anthem reminds us: The true north is indeed strong and free," he said, earning applause from lawmakers. Axios: What to know about King Charles's Canada speech and how it relates to Trump. |
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- Trump can show strength by getting tough with Putin, by The Washington Post editorial board.
- We exposed fraud at Enron and WorldCom. Don't let history repeat itself, by Sherron Watkins and Cynthia Cooper, guest essayists, The New York Times.
- Trump's threats cast dark clouds over this year's NATO summit, by James Kitfield, opinion contributor, The Hill.
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©️ Associated Press | Egypt Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities |
And finally … 🔎 Archaeologists discovered three new tombs in Luxor, Egypt, home to thousands of burial sites, officials said Monday. Archaeologists located tombs dating to the New Kingdom period (1550–1070 B.C.) and identified the names and titles of their owners through newly discovered inscriptions. The findings come in the lead-up to the highly anticipated opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum, expected this summer. The museum will showcase more than 100,000 artifacts from Egypt's rich ancient heritage. |
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