POLITICS

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom did something this week that most politicians would only in a nightmare: He announced that the federal government is investigating him and his wife.

The revelation, delivered in a direct-to-camera 4½-minute video set against a backdrop of U.S. and California flags, became a top headline across the country.

In the upside-down politics of the Trump era, that was exactly as intended.

“He seems to be wearing this as a badge of honor because his brand is being the strongest opponent of Donald Trump,” said Thad Kousser, a professor of political science at UC San Diego. “The ability to show that you’re going on offense and that you know how to effectively fight back against this president is part of making your case for office.”

As he eyes a run for president in 2028, an antagonistic relationship with President Trump is Newsom’s political currency.

So when friends and former employees said the FBI and Internal Revenue Service had knocked on their doors and asked about him and his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, last Wednesday, the governor took advantage of the situation to boost his political profile.

“Mr. President, come after me,” Newsom said in the video he posted online. “I’m not going anywhere, and the country is watching.”

Newsom, who is in his final year as California’s governor, has not declared his intent to run for president, though his claim that Trump is targeting him because he’s considering a bid for the White House was an open acknowledgment of his thoughts about the future. Announcing the probe himself — before federal authorities had a chance to describe it on their terms — allowed him to get ahead of and try to discredit any findings as a “personal vendetta” long before potential charges are brought.

Celinda Lake, a Democratic strategist and national pollster, said Newsom publicly defending his wife could also play well with voters.

“He’s positioned himself as the front-runner because he’s the one who’s under attack,” Lake said. “Primary voters love it when he engages Trump, and I think the combination of engaging Trump and then also the sexism of going after your wife is just a real home run for a primary electorate that’s 59% female.”

The video released Monday seemed similar to a speech Newsom delivered after Trump sent federal troops to Los Angeles last summer.

That address, in which he countered Trump’s version of events and challenged the president to come after him instead of women and child immigrants, made Newsom the captain of the Democratic response to the unprecedented deployment and ended his attempt to play the part of respectful statesman and ease political tensions following the 2024 election.

Liberals have since seemed to relish Newsom’s near-constant derision of the president on social media.

But David McCuan, a professor of political science at Sonoma State University, said casting the case as another instance of Trump’s political weaponization ignores questions about the murky timeline and origin of the investigation.

Newsom’s aides point to Trump saying that the governor should be arrested during last summer’s anti-ICE protests as evidence that he personally called for the inquiry. The claim has gained oxygen — and been echoed by other Democratic leaders in the state — while going largely unchallenged by federal officials. The Justice Department has declined to comment, as has the White House.

A source familiar with the matter, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly, said two federal probes have been going on for about a year, and that they originated not from Washington, D.C. but from conversations between whistleblowers and federal prosecutors based in Sacramento. The probes are linked to Newsom’s former chief-of-staff, Dana Williamson, and Siebel Newsom’s taxes, the source said.

Newsom’s critics have also noted that federal prosecutors under the Biden administration had pursued questions about his involvement in a state lawsuit against Activision Blizzard Inc., a major video game distributor, before Trump retook office.

“This is something that could lead to other elements that blow up, so there’s a risk,” McCuan said.

Newsom’s aides described the investigation as a fishing expedition, with federal authorities searching for anything they can use against the governor.

They said federal authorities appeared to initially investigate allegations that turned up nothing about the Activision case before refocusing their questions on nonprofits and other entities tied to the couple. Investigators also asked about personal information related to the family’s household, Newsom’s office said.

McCuan said three nonprofits that surround the couple have received millions of dollars from donors and political interests and are not subject to campaign finance limits.

The California Partners Project is a nonprofit that promotes gender equity. The Representation Project is an avenue for Siebel Newsom’s documentary films. The California State Protocol Foundation uses private donations to pay for gubernatorial expenses and was founded under former Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

“It’s a long-running game,” McCuan said. “It’s just the Newsom first couple has perfected it and moved it forward.”

Newsom getting out ahead of prosecutors and framing their probes as nothing but a “witch hunt” — borrowing a phrase often used by Trump during his own previous prosecutions — carries risk.

If prosecutors do turn up evidence of wrongdoing, Newsom’s decision to parade his indignation could backfire.

Publicly challenging Trump also runs the risk that the president could instruct the Justice Department to dig in deeper on an investigation that might have otherwise petered out.

But Lake and others said there’s no placating Trump, who has targeted Newsom and other Democrats.

While traditional politics suggest facing federal charges could sink Newsom’s political ambitions, the rules have been thrown out under Trump.

“You know the last person who got tied up in courts on the campaign trail?” Kousser asked. “That was Donald Trump, and nothing elevated Donald Trump more than doing courthouse press appearances and being seen as the target of an unfair political prosecution.”

EVIAN-LES-BAINS, France — The United States could soon reimpose sanctions on Russian oil shipments after President 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 production. 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 Mohamed 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.

Superville, Corbet and Madhani write for the Associated Press. Madhani reported from Geneva. AP writers Jill Lawless and Samuel Petrequin in London, Collin Binkley in Washington and Illia Novikov in Kyiv contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — Ever since Kevin Warsh was nominated by President Trump in late January to lead the Federal Reserve, a question has lingered: Will he seek to raise interest rates to tame inflation or cut them as Trump has long demanded?

On Wednesday, Warsh may provide the first hints of an answer when he oversees his first Fed policy meeting as chair and holds a news conference afterward. Bond markets, which can swing sharply on a chair’s pronouncements, will be watching particularly closely for any signs of which way he leans.

“We expect the press conference to be pivotal,” Jonathan Pingle, an economist at investment bank UBS, wrote in a note. “This will be Kevin Warsh’s first public appearance as Chair. … We do not really know what his policy views are.”

Economists say Warsh will likely aim for a neutral approach, largely because he is taking over the Fed at a challenging time. Rising inflation has made it all but impossible for the Fed to cut interest rates anytime soon, which could stimulate growth and further raise prices. Hiring has improved noticeably since the beginning of the year, removing another key rationale for rate cuts. And the other 11 policymakers on the Fed’s rate-setting committee — including Warsh’s predecessor, former chair Jerome Powell — are split on whether an increase in the Fed’s key rate will be needed or if it can stay unchanged.

High inflation puts Fed in tough spot

Oil prices have fallen sharply on news that the U.S. and Iran have reached an initial deal to end their war, which could eventually cool inflation. Yet it’s unclear whether a permanent agreement can be reached.

“The right thing to do now is wait and see,” said William English, an economist at the Yale School of Management and a former top Fed economist.

Inflation has jumped to a three-year high of 4.2%, the government said last week, mostly because of higher gas prices. Even Trump has backed off a bit from his relentless demands for lower rates, and instead has argued that rate hikes — which the Fed undertakes to cool the economy and slow inflation — aren’t necessary.

In an interview earlier this month on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Trump said, “Kevin is fantastic and I want him to do whatever he wants,” but added, “there’s no reason to raise rates.”

On Wednesday, the Fed is widely expected to keep its key rate at about 3.6%, where it has remained since last December. When the Fed reduces its rate, over time it can lower other borrowing costs for things like mortgages, auto loans, and business loans.

Changes likely to dash hopes for those seeking lower rates

Still, some changes are expected, which will disappoint those hoping for lower borrowing costs: The Fed is likely to drop language that suggests its next move will be a rate cut, and instead adopt wording that is more neutral. Several Fed policymakers in recent weeks have said that the Fed’s most likely next move is a hike, rather than a cut.

The central bank is also scheduled to release its quarterly economic projections, which include forecasts for how the Fed’s key rate will change over the next three years, on Wednesday. In March, those projections suggested the Fed would cut its rate once this year. Yet on Wednesday they will likely show no change in 2026, with maybe one or two cuts next year, economists say.

Warsh has criticized the projections for providing too much “forward guidance” to financial markets and leading Fed officials to stand by their forecasts for too long, even as the economy changes. Fed watchers will look closely to see if Warsh participates in the quarterly projections. If he doesn’t submit his own forecasts, it could be a sign he will seek to get rid of them entirely in the coming months.

Warsh to bring a new approach to Fed leadership

Outside of policy, Warsh is expected to bring a different style to the Fed than Powell, according to people who’ve worked with him. He wants Fed policymakers to give fewer speeches, have more debates behind closed doors and will likely avoid commenting on the daily ups and downs of the economy. Powell was relatively plainspoken and straightforward, while Warsh has suggested he sees the famously oracular Alan Greenspan, the Fed’s chair from 1987 to 2005, as a model.

“He’s just going to say less, because he doesn’t find that stuff very helpful,” said Robert Tetlow, a former senior policy adviser at the Fed.

Randall Kroszner, an economist at the University of Chicago who served on the Fed’s governing board from 2006 to 2009, when Warsh was also a governor, said the new chair would likely focus on bigger-picture questions, such as how AI will impact the economy. He will avoid thornier issues, such as whether tariffs raise inflation, which Powell was willing to address.

By avoiding such hot-button issues, the Fed could attract less negative attention from the White House, Kroszner said.

“He’s going to stay away from those,” Kroszner added. “If the Fed is to maintain its independence, it needs to maintain its focus.”

While seeking Trump’s nomination, Warsh called for “regime change” at the Fed and criticized the central bank for not preventing the 2021-22 inflation surge, when prices jumped 9.1% in a year, the biggest spike in four decades.

Yet Kroszner said Warsh will likely to seek to build consensus around changing things like the Fed’s communications policies, rather than imposing them. So far, former Fed officials say he hasn’t sought to fire top staff.

“He’s not there to break things,” Kroszner said.

During his Senate confirmation hearing in April, Warsh said he would focus on quelling inflation.

“Inflation is a choice, and the Fed must take responsibility for it,” he said then.

If he acts on that sentiment by keeping rates unchanged — or even raising them — Trump could end up disappointed in another Fed chair. He often threatened to fire Powell, whom he also appointed, for not cutting rates deeply enough.

“There’s at least a risk here that six months down the road, Trump is fulminating about how he didn’t get what he wanted from Warsh, and he’d like to fire Warsh,” English said.

Rugaber writes for The Associated Press.

Walking through Budapest, it is impossible not to notice the contradictions. Hungary is a member of NATO, a member of the European Union, and a beneficiary of decades of Western integration. At the same time, Chinese companies are building multibillion-dollar factories, Russian energy remains essential, and Viktor Orbán spent years cultivating close ties with both Moscow and Beijing. 

From Caracas, many would interpret this reality as an anomaly. Perhaps for a country so accustomed to contradictions, it is a window into the world that is coming. Or into the world that already arrived.

For decades, international politics was dominated by a relatively straightforward question: whose side are you on? The Cold War forced countries to choose between Washington and Moscow, although Venezuela took a novel approach in the second half of its democratic period. Even after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the American unipolar moment sustained the assumption that development, prosperity, and international integration were ultimately synonymous with Westernization.

The twenty-first century has proven more complicated. Turkey purchases Russian weapons while hosting American bases as a NATO member. India participates in strategic partnerships with the United States while maintaining longstanding military and energy ties with Moscow. The United Arab Emirates hosts capital, companies, and citizens from virtually every geopolitical camp. Hungary, home to CPAC Europe and a destination for both Chinese investment and Western conservative movements, has perhaps turned this logic into a national strategy more successfully than any other European country.

These countries are not neutral. Nor are they non-aligned in the classical Cold War sense. They are states that have learned to maximize their options in a multipolar world.

Time to embrace multipolarity?

For years, discussions about Venezuela’s future have been framed as a choice between opposing models. Would the country resemble Cuba or Colombia? Nicaragua or Costa Rica? Would a transition imply a return to the Western consensus that shaped much of Latin America after the Cold War?

Five months after January 3 and the beginning of a period of unprecedented American tutelage, those questions appear increasingly outdated.

The symbolism of recent weeks is difficult to ignore. While Delcy Rodríguez was in India seeking to deepen energy ties with one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, General Dan Caine was simultaneously in Caracas discussing security cooperation with Venezuelan authorities. In the traditional chavista worldview, these developments would have belonged to rival geopolitical universes. In today’s Venezuela, they increasingly appear as part of the same strategy.

Venezuela arrives at this reality from a different place. Questions of external influence, compromised sovereignty, competing centers of power, and tutelage have played a far larger role here than among our neighbors.

The concept of regime learning refers to the ways political systems adapt in order to survive. In Venezuela, that process has already transformed the country’s economic model. Price controls have largely been abandoned. The private sector is in a slow process of rehabilitation. In short, revolutionary orthodoxy has repeatedly yielded to political necessity.

Regime learning does not only change how states govern. It changes how they understand the world.

What is becoming apparent in 2026 is that the same process may be transforming Venezuela’s geopolitical posture.

The Bolivarian Revolution was founded on a particular assumption. Venezuela would help construct an alternative pole of power, aligned with actors such as Cuba, Russia, Iran, and eventually China. The goal was not merely to diversify partnerships. It was to build a geopolitical project capable of challenging American influence in the hemisphere.

Twenty-five years later, the lesson learned appears remarkably different.

Arriving late to the game

Russia became absorbed by its invasion of Ukraine. China proved willing to defend its own interests, but not necessarily those of its partners. Iran remained geographically distant and economically constrained. Cuba, despite years of leeching off the Venezuelan state, proved largely incapable of defending the revolution against genuine external pressures. The experience of governing under sanctions, isolation, economic collapse, and great-power competition appears to have produced a different conclusion: dependence on any single external patron creates vulnerabilities.

The logical response is not non-alignment, but rather hedging.

Instead of anchoring Venezuela to a single geopolitical camp, the emerging strategy appears designed to maintain productive relations with several simultaneously. Security cooperation with Washington. Oil exports to India. Commercial ties with China. Investment from the Gulf. Access to Western financial markets. None of these relationships are mutually exclusive. In fact, they reinforce one another.

To some extent, there is nothing uniquely Venezuelan about this. Much of Latin America already operates in a multipolar environment. Governments across the ideological spectrum maintain economic ties with China while preserving political, commercial, and security relationships with the United States. Yet Venezuela arrives at this reality from a very different place. Questions of external influence, compromised sovereignty, competing centers of power, and political tutelage have played a far larger role in Venezuelan politics than in most neighboring countries.

The lesson Venezuela appears to be learning is neither socialist nor liberal, neither anti-Western nor fully Western.

In some respects, the country’s experience over the last quarter century has more in common with the dilemmas faced by some post-communist European states (like Ukraine) than with those of Colombia, Peru, or Ecuador. Venezuela is never going to become Switzerland, nor is it going to become India. It lacks the geography, the institutions, and the scale required for either role. Yet it may be discovering a different path, one better suited to its circumstances: not a great power, not a neutral sanctuary, but a medium-sized energy producer whose strategic value derives from its ability to remain relevant to multiple centers of power simultaneously.

This is what makes Hungary such a useful comparison. Not because Hungary represents a political model for Venezuela, nor because Viktor Orbán and Nicolás Maduro are comparable figures. If anything, a Venezuelan transition led by María Corina Machado would likely have more in common ideologically with a post-Orbán government than with Orbán himself. Yet that is precisely the point. Even a post-Orbán Hungary would remain a member of NATO and the European Union, continue attracting Chinese investment, and remain constrained by the economic and energy relationships accumulated over decades. Hungary is useful because it illustrates a broader phenomenon: the emergence of states whose prosperity depends less on belonging to a bloc than on remaining useful to several at once.

Viewed from this perspective, Venezuela’s current trajectory increasingly resembles neither Cuba nor the Colombia of the early 2000s. It is not moving toward the permanent isolation of the former, nor toward the straightforward Western alignment of the latter under Álvaro Uribe. Instead, it is beginning to occupy an intermediate position, one that may become increasingly common in a multipolar world.

The Bolivarian Revolution aspired to create a twenty-first-century Cuba. Five months after January 3, its most enduring geopolitical legacy may be the emergence of an oil-rich Hungary in the Caribbean.

Regime learning does not only change how states govern. It changes how they understand the world. After 25 years of revolution, sanctions, collapse, and adaptation, the lesson Venezuela appears to be learning is neither socialist nor liberal, neither anti-Western nor fully Western. It is something more pragmatic: in a multipolar world, survival belongs to those who can make themselves useful to everyone.

MADISON, Wis. — A federal judge on Tuesday declined to overturn a Wisconsin judge’s obstruction of justice conviction for helping a man evade immigration officers who showed up at a courtroom looking to detain him.

The case against Hannah Dugan, who resigned from the Milwaukee County Circuit Court following her conviction, was an early test of how the courts would respond to President Trump’s sweeping immigration crackdown.

Trump allies branded Dugan as an activist judge, while her supporters said she was unfairly targeted.

U.S. District Judge Lynn Adelman postponed Dugan’s sentencing June 3 to consider arguments about whether he should overturn her conviction. But in his ruling Tuesday, Adelman said Dugan’s conviction would stand. He did not immediately set a sentencing date.

“The court’s decision is wrong,” Dugan’s legal defense team said in a statement.

Questions about a similar case in Virginia

Dugan’s attorney had argued that her conviction in helping Eduardo Flores-Ruiz leave the courthouse was invalid and should be overturned. He said that was necessary because a federal appeals court in April overturned a key Virginia immigration case that the judge and prosecutors had cited in Dugan’s case.

In the Virginia case, an immigrant who was in the country illegally was detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and later escaped. He was recaptured and indicted on a charge of obstructing a pending immigration proceeding.

The federal appeals court found that the ICE action did not constitute a “pending proceeding,” as is required under the federal obstruction law.

Dugan’s attorneys argue that she should not have been charged because there was no “pending proceeding” against the immigrant in her courtroom being sought by ICE agents, only a warrant filed for his arrest. The filing of a warrant does not constitute a “proceeding” under the law, Dugan’s attorneys argued.

Prosecutors countered that the facts in the Virginia case are different and don’t apply to Dugan’s. They also argued that other cases support Dugan’s conviction.

Adelman said the attempted arrest of Flores-Ruiz did count as a “pending proceeding,” in part because it was a planned and targeted operation rather than an arrest resulting from a random encounter.

“Defendant argues that ICE was acting as a law enforcement agency here,” Adelman wrote. “But this ignores the fact that, unlike, say, the FBI, ICE can issue its own warrants and adjudicate and effectuate a removal, as it did with Flores-Ruiz, without the involvement of a court. This makes a difference.”

Dugan faces 5 years in prison, but will likely get probation

Dugan, 67, faces up to five years in prison after a jury convicted her Dec. 19, 2025, but she is unlikely to be sentenced to time behind bars. Federal sentencing guidelines generally call for probation for defendants like her, who have no criminal history and are convicted of a nonviolent crime.

Dugan resigned from her position as a Milwaukee County circuit judge two weeks after her conviction amid threats of impeachment from Republican state lawmakers. She had been a judge for nine years.

The Trump administration brought the case against Dugan as the president pressed ahead with his sweeping immigration crackdown. Trump’s administration and his allies branded Dugan as an activist judge, while Dugan’s attorneys said she was being unfairly targeted and argued, unsuccessfully, that she was immune from being charged because she was a judge.

Dugan’s case marked the first time that a state judge in Wisconsin went to trial on charges of obstructing immigration agents. She was acquitted of concealing an individual to prevent arrest, which is considered a misdemeanor.

Dugan helped an immigrant wanted by ICE agents

On April 18, 2025, immigration officers went to the Milwaukee County courthouse after learning Flores-Ruiz had reentered the country illegally and was scheduled to appear before Dugan for a hearing in a state battery case.

Dugan confronted agents outside her courtroom and directed them to the chief judge’s office because she told them their administrative warrant wasn’t sufficient grounds to arrest Flores-Ruiz.

After the agents left, she led Flores-Ruiz and his attorney out a private jury door. Agents spotted Flores-Ruiz in the corridor, followed him outside and arrested him after a foot chase. A week later, FBI agents arrested Dugan in the courthouse, leading her outside in handcuffs.

Flores-Ruiz was deported in November.

Bauer writes for The Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — As Spencer Pratt fell behind in the Los Angeles mayoral primary, an unexpected group began claiming election fraud: people tracking the Republican’s success on prediction markets, the increasingly popular online exchanges on which people can make bets on almost anything.

“Crazy how much voter fraud can be done with mail in ballots,” one user following bets on the mayoral race wrote last week on Kalshi, one of the top trading platforms.

“Same old California fraud,” said another who had bet that Pratt would win.

Election fraud claims extended to social media, where a handful of influencers who post content for prediction market platforms questioned the ballot count. “It’s a dead heat on Kalshi,” one user wrote on social media. “Is CA cheating to get Spencer Pratt out?”

Kalshi told the influencers to delete the posts, which violated company guidelines. Polymarket, the other leading platform, directed them to remove the paid partnership label from those posts.

The amplification of election misinformation by users who had money staked on the mayoral race adds a new twist to evolving scrutiny of prediction markets, and scholars say the ability to bet on elections broadly raises questions about whether the exchanges could alter how Americans engage in democracy.

“Elections are not a game,” said Davina Hurt, director of government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University. “[If market] probabilities begin influencing donor decisions, media attention, the energy around [campaign] volunteers — at that point, markets aren’t just observing the election. They’re a part of it.”

Fans of the exchanges say they are powerful tools that can help decision makers, and company leaders have touted them as highly accurate predictors that can act as an antidote to misinformation and provide election insights.

“By shifting focus from ‘what people say’ to ‘where they put their money,’ and filtering out social media noise and pundit bias, we are providing a level of clarity and predictive power that cannot be matched,” said Kalshi spokesperson Dani Lever .

But these markets’ rapid rise has also raised a host of questions among members of Congress, state lawmakers and others — about betting on elections, wars and other political events, about potential insider trading, and about whether the platforms should be left to self-regulate. Some states are also in legal battles with the federal government over whether the activity amounts to gambling, which they seek to regulate.

“It’s like we’re in the 1930s with financial markets — we have some things that we want to regulate and restrict [as a country], and we’re sort of in the early stages of trying to lay out what the rules are,” said Koleman Strumpf, an economist at Wake Forest University.

Concerns about insider trading

The discourse around the Los Angeles mayoral race was the latest to raise questions at the intersection of prediction markets and politics. Earlier this year, an Army soldier was indicted after allegedly using his knowledge of the planned U.S. operation to capture former Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro to make bets on it, winning more than $400,000. He has pleaded not guilty.

Around the same time, several anonymous users reportedly earned $2.4 million combined by making remarkably prescient bets on the Iran war, prompting concern in Congress about insider trading. And during the primary elections, Kalshi fined a few politicians for betting on themselves, while the Justice Department began investigating a former congressman on similar charges.

Kalshi co-founder Luana Lopes Lara speaks at a conference in Santa Monica, Calif., in April.

(Anna Webber / Inc.)

The episodes set off a debate in Washington. The Republican-led House Oversight Committee opened an investigation into potential insider trading, and a bipartisan group in Congress has introduced a flurry of bills seeking to put up guardrails. It remains unclear whether any will pass this session.

The chatter in Congress appeared to lead the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, which regulates prediction markets, to propose a new framework last week to govern issues raised by lawmakers, such as potential betting on wars. Commission Chair Mike Selig said the proposal would allow for scrutiny of suspicious activity “while letting legitimate markets move forward pursuant to the public interest.”

The markets commission under former President Biden was viewed as somewhat skeptical of prediction markets; the agency under President Trump — whose eldest son holds advisory positions at both Polymarket and Kalshi — has been seen as more favorable to the industry. The federal government has sued several states over their attempts to regulate the markets under state laws banning sports gambling and other measures.

Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who has introduced legislation on the topic, said the agency’s framework would benefit the industry at the expense of the public interest.

The agency lacks “the leadership, will and investigative staff needed to confront the dangers of election misinformation, insider trading, and more,” Schiff said, “and seems content to allow the industry to police itself.”

Making bets

As California’s primary neared, people staked their dollars on the state’s races in droves. On Kalshi, trading volume on one contract about who will win the L.A. mayoral race in November had reached more than $117 million as of Tuesday.

Prediction market users trade on the outcome of future events, making money if they’re correct and losing money if they’re wrong. Someone can purchase a contract on the prediction that L.A. Mayor Karen Bass will win in November, a yes contract, or on the prediction that she will lose, a no contract.

On Tuesday, Bass contracts on Kalshi were selling at 63 cents each for yes and 38 cents for no, meaning the market was forecasting a 63% chance of her winning. Users receive $1 per contract if their prediction is correct, creating a profit on their initial investment.

Prediction markets generally create more accurate forecasts than political polls, according to Strumpf, whose research has examined 30 years of prediction markets in various forms.

Many of the issues critics raise are theoretical and have not been seen in practice, Strumpf said. By his analysis, there is no evidence that the markets have ever influenced an election outcome. He said serious traders tend to do extensive research in order to make money, meaning their bets are educated.

Rep. Mike Levin (D-San Juan Capistrano), who has introduced legislation to prohibit event contracts involving terrorism, war, assassination and deaths, said the platforms may be useful in some cases but shouldn’t be left to police themselves. He said he’s concerned that the markets create “all the wrong incentives” for people, including political candidates and officials, to abuse inside knowledge.

“I don’t trust them to self-regulate at all,” Levin said of the companies. “The federal role should be guardrails that are reasonable and pragmatic.”

‘The sanctity of our elections’

Skeptics’ concerns regarding elections largely center around the markets’ introduction of a new way for money to potentially influence politics.

They say the desire to elevate a candidate’s market odds could create an incentive for market manipulation, and they worry that the votes of Americans using the market could be influenced by their desire to profit.

“This has real impacts for the sanctity of our elections,” said Assemblymember Maggy Krell (D-Sacramento), who raised concerns about how prediction markets could impact the democratic process in a March letter to the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission. (California lawmakers are looking at the issue, a spokesperson for Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas (D-Hollister) said, though none of the bills introduced this year have yet moved forward.)

The platforms create a potential new channel “for dark money to flow into our elections,” Krell said. “Specifically, someone who’s opposing or supporting a candidate could potentially use sites like Kalshi to elevate that candidate and impact the entire pool.”

The industry has endeavored to “get out in front” of concerns by creating their own policies aimed at preventing insider trading, market manipulation and other issues, said attorney Ronak D. Desai, partner and head of the congressional practice at the Washington law firm Paul Hastings.

Kalshi has a ban on those practices and has banned markets tied directly to death and war, Lever said. It also screens all new users and, in the first quarter of this year, blocked more than 100 potential insider trades and referred more than 20 cases to law enforcement.

In the case of the military member who bet on the United States’ operation in Venezuela, for instance, Polymarket caught the activity and referred the case to the Justice Department, a spokesperson said. The company has referred nearly 100 cases of suspicious activity to law enforcement, he said.

Election markets are not offered on Polymarket’s U.S. exchange — though users in the U.S. and other countries that ban the company’s international exchange are widely reported to access it using online tools.

“Polymarket prohibits trading based on stolen information, illegal tips, or information obtained in breach of a duty of trust, confidentiality, or other legal obligation,” the Polymarket spokesperson said in a statement.

Aaron Klein, senior fellow in the Center on Regulation and Markets at the Brookings Institution, predicted that pressure for further regulation would continue to mount.

“The top goal of a society is to have free and fair elections,” Klein said. “At a time in our nation’s history where people are doubting the integrity of elections and foreign governments are stoking those flames, we ought to be pretty careful.”

As Arnold Schwarzenegger makes final preparations to take office as governor on Monday, the California political establishment is scrambling to adjust to the abrupt shift of power from Democrats to Republicans.

The inauguration of the Republican governor before thousands of spectators outside the domed Capitol in Sacramento will end five years of near-total Democratic Party control of state government.

Even if Schwarzenegger is not the ideological match of the Capitol’s conservative Republicans, his takeover of the governor’s U-shaped office suite ensures a radical change in the political dynamics of Sacramento.

Elected in a historic voter revolt against his Democratic predecessor, Schwarzenegger will take power with “a mandate directly from the people to come and change the way business is being done here — and what is being done,” said Schwarzenegger communications director Rob Stutzman. “It’s a mandate to step forward and lead.”

In large part, the fate of Schwarzenegger’s agenda depends on Democrats who still dominate both houses of the Legislature and hold every other statewide elected office. By and large, they are unsure of what to expect as he arrives in the capital he portrayed during the recall race as a sinister pit of unscrupulous politicians. At this point, Schwarzenegger elicits a mix of hope, wariness and fear.

“I don’t think anyone now is saying, ‘Let’s go to battle with him,’ ” said Steve Barkan, a campaign strategist for Democrats. “Folks are trying to figure out how to work with him.”

To set a congenial tone, Schwarzenegger has paid visits to the capital’s leading Democratic officeholders, including Senate leader John Burton of San Francisco and Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson of Culver City. He has also made discreet stops at the offices of two labor leaders: Bob Balgenorth of the State Building and Construction Trades Council and Dean Tipps of the Service Employees International Union. Given the millions of dollars that labor spent to keep its ally Gov. Gray Davis in office, union leaders had expected hostility from Schwarzenegger.

“My fears were diminished somewhat by the meeting,” Balgenorth said. “It was quite a show of humility, quite an olive branch.”

But labor leaders, like Democratic lawmakers, wonder whether Schwarzenegger’s symbolic gestures portend any genuine change in the combative partisanship of Sacramento.

“The question is: Does anything ever flow out of it?” said John Hein, government relations chief at the California Teachers Assn. “Is he going to keep those conversations going and keep those people involved?”

Within the Legislature, the most immediate consequence of Schwarzenegger’s arrival is the sudden empowerment of the Republican minority. Democrats outnumber Republicans, 48 to 32 in the Senate and 25 to 15 in the Assembly.

Under Davis, Republicans were unable to stop Democrats from passing hundreds of laws they opposed, most notably those resisted by business leaders. Among them were measures imposing health-coverage mandates on employers and strict new pollution controls on auto makers. The Republicans’ only significant role was to block Democrats from raising taxes by keeping them from mustering the required two-thirds vote.

But now, one of Schwarzenegger’s main tools for setting the state’s agenda will be the power to veto legislation passed by Democrats, and he is counting on fellow Republicans to protect him against veto overrides, which also need a two-thirds vote.

Republican legislators, in turn, are apt to influence his administration in a way that was impossible under a Democratic governor. Their conservative voter base is nearly the same as Schwarzenegger’s. So is their pool of campaign donors. Like Schwarzenegger, Republican legislators are strong advocates of business and have chilly relations with labor.

“They are no longer shut out of the game,” said Darry Sragow, a key campaign strategist for Assembly Democrats.

For Schwarzenegger, the first big challenge is to find a way out of the same severe fiscal troubles that hastened the downfall of Davis. His pledge not to raise taxes vastly complicates the task.

On Monday, Schwarzenegger will make it even more difficult: He plans to sign an executive order to rescind the tripling of the so-called car tax. The rollback will please millions of motorists and fulfill a key campaign promise. But if he also makes good on a pledge to make whole the local governments that receive the car tax revenue, it will widen the projected $10-billion budget hole next year to $14 billion.

To close the gap, Schwarzenegger faces tough choices. If he relies on spending cuts alone, the severity of the hits to higher education, health care and other programs would spark an uproar among Democrats and, most likely, a public outcry.

If he backs a mix of program cuts and tax hikes — as Davis did — he not only would face resistance from GOP lawmakers but also would risk erosion of his own political base. Schwarzenegger’s call for fiscal restraint was his main appeal to conservative voters put off by his liberal views on social issues.

To break from the political bind, Schwarzenegger aides have floated a plan to borrow as much as $20 billion to balance the books. The proposed debt, along with a state spending cap long sought by Republicans, would be put before voters in March. Schwarzenegger could frame the ensuing campaign as a choice between borrowing or tax hikes, then claim a voter mandate for either one, depending on the results.

The proposal would be a gamble for Schwarzenegger. On its face, it appears to contradict his pledge during the recall campaign to “teach politicians in Sacramento that they can’t spend money we don’t have.” Repayment of the debt, with interest, could drain nearly $40 billion from the state treasury — and away from public services — over perhaps three decades.

Still, over the last three years, Davis and the Legislature relied heavily on borrowing to break budget deadlocks. The bond plan would again spare the Legislature — and Schwarzenegger — from the political pain of tax hikes and draconian spending cuts. Republicans have already welcomed the plan.

“All we’re doing is cleaning up the final mess of Davis,” said Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield, the newly named Assembly GOP leader.

The proposal would offer an early test of Schwarzenegger’s clout because it requires a quick deal with the Legislature. Lawmakers would have to approve it by Dec. 5 to qualify it for the March ballot, exposing Schwarzenegger to a major vote of confidence by Democrats less than three weeks after he takes office.

But many Democrats oppose a spending cap, and their initial reaction to the debt plan has been lukewarm.

“I’m just not confident at this point that that’s the right way to go,” Wesson said. “That’s a lot of dough to be responsible for.”

State Treasurer Phil Angelides, a Democrat preparing to run for governor in 2006, has been most outspoken against the plan.

He said Friday it would be “a huge mistake” for Schwarzenegger to “follow a reckless path of massive deficit borrowing, and to masquerade such borrowing as ‘the answer’ to California’s budget crisis.”

So far, though, few Democrats have challenged the new governor, who draws immense media attention to Sacramento at a time when legislators suffer from dismal poll ratings. The recall election exposed a deep vein of voter anger that jolted incumbents of both parties, and in that context, few appear eager to take on Schwarzenegger.

“For anybody to be obstructionist would be going against what Californians want to have happen,” Wesson said.

Some Democrats worry that voters could next lash out against them. Despite a political map that keeps a solid majority of legislative seats safe for Democrats, a top party operative in the capital said some “very nervous members are fearful that a well-known popular movie star is going to go out and do active campaigning and fund-raising against them, and that’s got them all freaked out.”

It remains to be seen whether Schwarzenegger will use his fame to campaign against those who cross him. But his power to raise money was on display Saturday at an Indian Wells desert resort, where he was the star attraction at a sold-out fund-raiser for Republican legislative campaigns.

*(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Inauguration broadcasts

Several Southern California television stations will air special programs and provide live coverage of the inauguration of Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor on Monday. The swearing-in ceremony is scheduled to take place on the Capitol steps in Sacramento at 11 a.m.

KCBS-TV Channel 2: Live coverage, 11 a.m.

KNBC-TV Channel 4: Special news coverage, 10 a.m.; Live coverage, 11 a.m.

KABC-TV Channel 7: Special news coverage, 10 a.m.; Live coverage, 11 a.m.

KCAL-TV Channel 9: Live coverage, 11 a.m.

Los Angeles Times

Paula Corbin Jones’ lawyers asked a judge in Little Rock, Ark., to order President Clinton to pay nearly $500,000 in legal reimbursements after he was found in contempt of court in her sexual harassment case. Their proposal came a month after U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright found Clinton in contempt for giving intentionally false testimony about his relationship with Monica S. Lewinsky. Wright ordered Clinton to pay Jones’ lawyers any expenses they incurred as a result of his false testimony. In a letter to Wright, Clinton lawyer Robert S. Bennett said Clinton will “object to the amount of the claim by Ms. Jones’ attorneys.”

WASHINGTON — Law enforcement officials disrupted “planned attacks” meant to target the UFC cage-fighting show staged at the White House this past weekend for President Trump’s birthday, and multiple people were in custody, FBI Director Kash Patel said on Tuesday.

The nature of the potential threat was not immediately disclosed, with additional details expected to be released once charges are unsealed later Tuesday.

Five people were arrested from states including Ohio, Missouri and California, said a law enforcement official familiar with the matter. The official spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public.

The FBI learned about the possible threat on June 10, four days before the mixed martial arts extravaganza on the White House’s South Lawn, “and thanks to the rapid action of the FBI, our partners, and the Department of Justice in a multi-state operation, multiple individuals are now in custody and allegedly planned attacks were stopped cold,” Patel said in a post on X on Tuesday morning.

The Secret Service “worked around the clock to identify those responsible and hold them accountable,” Director Sean Curran said in a separate statement.

Trump, who celebrated his 80th birthday at the UFC event on Sunday, sought to tie the fights to larger celebrations of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Speaking to reporters Tuesday in Évian-les-Bains, France, where he was attending the Group of Seven summit, Trump said he had not been briefed on the thwarted plot.

Tucker writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Darlene Superville in Évian-les-Bains, France, contributed to this report.

NEW YORK — A nationwide network of charitable foundations is encouraging its members to emphasize their positive contributions to American life, a 250th anniversary campaign aimed at quelling what it calls the “greater intensity” of scrutiny felt from the federal government and populist movements.

Popular notions of philanthropy as merely a game for the ultrawealthy to fund partisan projects and commit fraud have left the sector vulnerable to political attacks, as the Council on Foundations sees it, influencing policies that hamper essential community services. The advocacy group, which represents about 1,000 nonprofits, hopes to overcome what CEO Kathleen Enright calls the sector’s “perception gap” with its “Generosity Builds” campaign, launched Monday.

Enright believes most Americans don’t recognize their reliance on the charitable sector. Just about 1 in 20 adults said they or anyone in their immediate family received nonprofit services in the past year, according to a 2023 Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy report.

“This week, I got an MRI at Georgetown University Hospital, I participated in my church at St. Columba’s, my daughter was inducted into National Junior Honor Society. Four or five nonprofits have been instrumental in my life this week,” she said. “Folks just aren’t putting that tag on it.”

And that tag is growing increasingly important, Enright said. Last year, negotiations over President Trump’s tax and spending bill included proposals to levy new taxes on private foundations that Enright said would have taken resources from communities if they made it into the final law.

The battle over defining what nonprofits actually do has recently been amplified from the highest rungs of the Trump administration, which has upended decades of partnerships built with nonprofits. Trump froze, cut or threatened a sweeping range of social service grants characterized by the White House as “government largesse that’s often riddled with corruption, waste, fraud, and abuse.” More recently, the Department of Justice charged the Southern Poverty Law Center — a civil rights nonprofit accused by Republicans of targeting conservatives in its work tracking extremists — with defrauding donors through payments to informants.

Vice President JD Vance described the Ford Foundation, the Gates Foundation and the Harvard University endowment as “cancers on American society” back as a 2021 U.S. Senate candidate, telling Tucker Carlson that “we are actively subsidizing the people who are destroying this country and they call it a charity.”

“All across our country, we have nonprofits — big foundations — that are effectively social-justice hedge funds,” he said in a talk that year on “woke capital.”

Narratives about nonprofits being “overly politicized” or wasteful are “extreme minority stories” that don’t reflect how philanthropy operates, according to Enright.

Across many surveys, trust in the nonprofit sector has remained higher than most others. But its impact is sometimes difficult to measure and explain. The sector hasn’t faced an environment this challenging in almost six decades, according to Kathryn Thomas, the vice president of communications for the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation in Flint, Michigan.

She cited the congressional effort to increases taxes on foundations’ investment incomes and acknowledged the Trump administration’s federal funding cuts.

“In an era when everything is under partisan attack and there’s so much polarization, we really have to do a better job of emphasizing why we exist,” Thomas said.

Enright said the story of philanthropy is not one where a rich person “saves the day.” She sees growing concerns about billionaires’ influence fueling suspicion about philanthropists’ motivations. Some argue the charitable sector allows moneyed interests to decide how tax dollars are spent rather than elected officials.

The campaign will emphasize that most donors “have just a little bit more than they need and therefore want to give back,” she said, especially at the local level.

“Money does not solve problems. It’s a tool that creative people and institutions inside communities use to solve problems,” she said. “The real heroes of most of these stories are nonprofit leaders, religious leaders, civic leaders who just roll up their sleeves and get something done — but do it with some financial underpinning by charitable foundations.”

That’s the story told by the Gulf Coast Community Foundation in Sarasota, Florida. A 10-apartment affordable housing complex for military veterans opened last year with the foundation’s support.

The area has an “embarrassingly high” number of veterans without housing, according to Jon Thaxton, the foundation’s director of policy and advocacy. Many are priced out in Sarasota, increasingly a luxury destination with high real estate prices.

Local donors had been trying to build a similar project when they approached the foundation in 2020 for help. Thaxton secured land already vested for affordable housing, corralled $2.2 million in donations, got $800,000 from the city and won the backing of their U.S. representatives.

The foundation’s leaders believe their track record made that possible. Phillip Lanham, the president and CEO, noted the project was completed across multiple election cycles and a pandemic, suggesting that community foundations are well situated to “play the long game.”

“Most people think that foundations like us deal with money and donors. We really don’t. We deal with relationships and trust,” Thaxton said. “That’s our commodity. That’s what we earn. That’s what we save. And that’s what we contribute back to the community.”

The Council on Foundations will also elevate examples of early, ordinary philanthropists as part of its case for philanthropy as an integral “part of the American story.” Enright credited a formerly enslaved man with donating land in North Carolina that became an African Methodist Episcopal church that endures as a pillar of the local community.

Lillian Kuri, the president and CEO of the Cleveland Foundation, welcomed the focus on everyday philanthropists. The Cleveland Foundation is considered the first community foundation, established in 1914 by lawyer Frederick Harris Goff as a way to fund durable change in the city.

The foundation aims to find new ways to expand today’s tent of philanthropists dedicated to improving their surrounding areas. It announced new investments this week in a fund dedicated to turn vacant industrial land into job-ready work sites. They’ve also launched a fund that allows donors to invest in major Northeast Ohio companies, supporting local business growth while that money increases into a sizable amount that can be donated to nonprofits.

“Generosity cuts across everybody,” she said, adding that community foundations offer “a way for everyday people — not just the largest, wealthiest people — to participate in the change they want to see in their communities.”

Pollard writes for the Associated Press.

WASHINGTON — The terms of a deal to end President Trump’s war with Iran remained a secret on Monday as both sides claimed victory and the months-long conflict reached a nebulous end.

The memorandum of understanding, providing a rough framework to conclude the war, was signed digitally Sunday, with a ceremony scheduled to take place on Friday in Switzerland, U.S. officials said.

Trump hailed the document as a breakthrough after months of negotiations. Yet its broad contours remained unclear more than a day after the deal was announced, as each side offered conflicting public messaging about what had been agreed.

Iran said it would continue regulating traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic paradigm shift from the prewar status quo that was denied by the White House. The two sides expressed disagreement over whether the status of Iran’s ballistic missile program would be addressed in future negotiations, or whether Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon was a part of the deal.

And Trump administration officials rejected Iranian claims that the United States would provide immediate sanctions relief as misleading “spin.”

Hours later, another U.S. official suggested that Iran, in fact, might receive some relief at the front end.

“We are prepared to release frozen funds, and we are prepared to release sanctions,” a senior U.S. official told reporters on a call. “And we’ll do some small gestures of that in the beginning, if they make some small gestures to us that show they’re willing to meet their commitments as well.

“We’ll know over the next two to three weeks whether those understandings will turn into actual agreement,” the official added.

Trump started the war in February citing Iran’s nuclear program, which had expanded after he withdrew from a prior nuclear agreement negotiated by President Obama. That deal capped more than two years of intensive diplomacy but ultimately failed under the weight of political criticism from Republicans — led by Trump — over its inclusion of sanctions relief for Tehran.

Trump administration officials said the new agreement would include a commitment from Iran not to develop or purchase nuclear weapons — a vow the Islamic Republic has repeatedly made through the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the Obama-era deal and a religious edict from the late supreme leader. Yet the enforcement mechanisms for policing Iran’s nuclear work were left to negotiate another day.

Iran could get sanctions relief

In an interview with CBS News, Vice President JD Vance acknowledged that Iran could get significant sanctions relief — and up to $300 billion in reconstruction funds — if they abide by U.S. terms, such as the full reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most important commercial waterways.

“Our expectation is that the strait is going to be opened in a toll-free way for the long term, and that’s the sort of thing that we’re going to figure out in these technical negotiations,” Vance said.

In a separate interview, he described the president’s policy as “extending an open hand” to Tehran.

“The hard-liners of the Iranian system will overemphasize the benefits that Iran gets,” he added, “while underemphasizing all the things that they have to concede, and all the things that they have to provide, in order to get these benefits.”

Uncertainty across the region

The news of peace came with a sense of bewilderment and uncertainty in a region that suffered as collateral damage through months of war.

Sunni Arab states that once hoped Iran would emerge weakened from the war issued tepid support for an agreement that could ultimately leave the fate of their oil exports at the whims of an emboldened adversary. And Israeli leaders, across the political aisle, expressed deep concerns over the deal in private, warning they would not be bound by an agreement to which they were not a party.

Israel’s decisions moving forward — particularly in Lebanon— may ultimately decide whether the agreement survives over the next 60 days, when Washington and Tehran plan on ironing out its more technical details.

Hours after word of the signing came out, a stream of cars crowded the highway leading to southern Lebanon, full of displaced families desperate to check on homes and villages they hadn’t seen for more than 100 days.

They did so in defiance of Lebanese officials, who called on people to remain where they were until an official end to war in Lebanon — a secondary front in the larger U.S.-Israel war on Iran that has nevertheless seen staggering levels of destruction.

A woman and her children return to their Lebanese village Monday following the ceasefire announcement.

(Mohammed Zaatari / Ap Photo/mohammed Zaatari)

In the more than three months since the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah attacked Israel, nearly 3,800 people have been killed, and almost a quarter of the country’s 6 million people are displaced. Israeli troops occupy more than 10% of Lebanese territory, leaving a trail of destruction that has seen swaths of the country’s south all but razed.

‘Everything is gone’

None of that discouraged Hassan Shareef from leaving where he was staying in Beirut at 7 a.m. to head to Nabatieh, one of south Lebanon’s largest cities and a frequent target of Israeli strikes in recent weeks, to check on his tailoring business.

“I wasn’t afraid. I had to come. But what I saw would make you cry,” he said. “Everything is gone. My house, I can’t live in it. And the business is destroyed.”

Aqeel Khalaf, an herbalist, hit the road in the early morning with his brother, son and daughter-in-law. They reached Nabatieh in two hours.

Yet it was less of a homecoming than Khalaf hoped: Israeli troops were still stationed near his village, a few miles down the road from where he stood in Nabatieh’s central market. Their house was tantalizingly close, but for the moment it might as well have been on the moon.

“It’s hard for me, but the Lebanese army told us we can’t go yet. We have no choice,” Khalaf said. “Maybe in 24 hours, when things crystallize with the deal.”

He could at least check on his shop here in the central market, though he already knew there would be damage: The family regularly checked satellite images of the area and saw the building was hit about a week ago.

Standing before it, Khalaf saw how the wall of the adjacent building had toppled onto the ground floor, flooding the shop with rubble and coating everything with a film of fine gray dust. A nearby blast had collapsed the roof.

“Nabatieh was hit very hard this time,” he said. Still, he could salvage something, he said, pointing to his son as he fished out boxes of herbal treatments from under the rubble.

Two ceasefires in the last two months, forged during U.S.-led talks between the Lebanese and Israeli governments but without Hezbollah or Iran’s involved, were broken as soon as they were announced. A previous ceasefire from November 2024 saw Hezbollah stop all attacks while Israel continued military operations in south Lebanon.

This iteration of the truce appeared to have more success: On Monday, Hezbollah launched no missiles but announced an attack on an Israeli force to stop its advance; and the Israeli military mostly stayed its fire as well, barring a number of shelling incidents and a drone strike on a car in the village of Kfar Tebnit that injured a journalist and killed one person, according to Lebanese media.

Obstacles to a durable peace

Lebanese army units, meanwhile, deployed in parts of the south, barring motorists from reaching areas near Israeli troops. Lebanon’s army remained on the sidelines during the war, but 30 soldiers, including a general, having been killed in Israeli attacks since March 2. Hezbollah attacks killed at least 30 Israeli soldiers and one civilian contractor.

Obstacles to a more durable peace remain. Israeli officials insist on freedom of action against Hezbollah, and they will create a so-called security zone in Lebanon indefinitely so to protect Israel’s northern border. For its part, Hezbollah says it will respond to any attack and will continue fighting until Israel withdraws.

Though the truce appeared to be holding for now, Khalaf, who had raced to reopen his Nabatieh shop after the 2024 ceasefire, was waiting this time. For now, he would take what stock he could and open a shop in Sidon or Beirut.

“We have to work and feed our families. But the damage is too much this time. I’ll come back when things are better,” he said. “And my home too. When I get to see it, even if it’s a mound of rubble, I’ll pitch a tent on it and rebuild.”

Wilner reported from Washington and Bulos from Nabatieh.

The Trump Department of Justice going after people who make the president mad or even sad is nothing new, in this dangerous age when the presidency is increasingly about placating the desires of the old man in the Oval Office.

Leticia James, James Comey, Adam Schiff. Most recently, E. Jean Carroll, who sued President Trump personally and won a huge settlement on her claim that he sexually assaulted her. Now, the Department of Justice is investigating her for potential perjury.

It would be easy to think of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s announcement Monday that the U.S. Department of Justice is now targeting his wife, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, as just another addition to that list.

But this attack on Siebel Newsom (alleged attack, anyway — the Department of Justice has not confirmed she is a target) is something much darker in our slide into authoritarianism. While the details of what is being investigated are murky and the president hasn’t chimed in yet, it has all the appearances of the Trump administration seeking to stop a political rival who has a real shot at knocking MAGA out of the top office.

“It’s not just random or accidental that the wife of a major presidential candidate is being investigated,” Steven Levitsky, a professor of politics at Harvard University, told me Monday. “That’s the nature of selective prosecution and that is a pillar of authoritarian rule.”

Levitsky is an expert on authoritarian regimes, and how they take and keep power. His point that Newsom is a viable challenger may seem obvious — Newsom himself is already fundraising off of it. But this particular alleged investigation bears a moment of pause because it is not the regular decline of justice we have been witnessing to this moment.

“This is different,” he said. “This is forward-looking persecution.”

Until now, Levistky points out, Trump has screamed and hollered for the prosecution of those who have wronged him in the past, sometimes even the distant past. Yes, he’s disgraced the Department of Justice with the demand it function as his own personal hammer of retribution, even putting his own personal attorney, Todd Blanche, in charge when Pam Bondi wasn’t accommodating or successful enough at stomping perceived enemies and quashing the Epstein files.

But those prosecutions have largely been grievance-based, not aimed at keeping power.

Going after Siebel Newsom seems more like a forward-looking, preemptive strike targeting Newsom ahead of the 2028 election through every decent man’s Achilles’ heel, his family.

In fact, the right-wing media — which is closely tied to the whims of the White House — has been targeting Siebel Newsom for months.

In particular, Siebel Newsom has been attacked for her work as a documentary filmmaker who focuses on female empowerment and parsing how and why we have the gender norms that we do when it comes to masculinity and femininity. I’ll let you figure out how popular that is in MAGA world, where real women make sandwiches.

Conservative commentator Sean Hannity has gone after Siebel Newsom for saying she sometimes changes the gender of a book’s character from “he” to “she” when she’s reading to her children. Fox News has attacked her for daring to give her boys dolls to play with, leading some MAGA influencers to label her “psychotic” or “abusive.” Right-wing icon Megyn Kelly called her a “nutcase” for sharing the tragic story of her sister’s death when Siebel Newsom was 6.

And other media have focused on the fact that some of the films she has been involved with have been approved for use in California schools, leading to conspiracies that Newsom used his influence to force his wife’s “woke” agenda on kids, by which we are apparently talking about the liberal plagues of decency and inclusion.

Newsom’s office said that in recent weeks, relatives, friends and business associates of the family have been contacted by investigators from the FBI and IRS. Siebel Newsom also does work around online safety for children, but it seems likely that any attention would focus on these films, and related nonprofits, and the perennially popular MAGA boogeyman of schools forcing ideologies on kids. Throw in Siebel Newsom’s company making even a dollar, and the way the IRS can find problems with any tax return, and you’ve got about 10,000 hours of right-wing propaganda.

So whether the pressure to target Siebel Newsom came from the White House or not, Newsom’s announcement raises the troubling specter that this administration is getting more serious about remaining in control by kneecapping potential replacements before they grow too strong.

In his Monday video, Newsom urged Trump with mano a mano bravado to come after him as much as he wanted, but to leave his wife and family out of it. But I would not underestimate Siebel Newsom, who showed her strength when she testified against disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein, laying out publicly a private, painful tale.

Siebel Newsom’s office told me she’s fine being part of any fight against Trump.

“There are clearly no boundaries to what Donald Trump will do to get his way or to challenge those who get in his way,” Siebel Newsom said in a statement.

The “governor and I will continue to speak truth to power because the American people deserve so much more.”

By coming out in advance of any official announcement of an investigation by the Department of Justice, Siebel Newsom and her husband may be able to take control of the narrative, something Trump detests.

That pushback, Levitsky said, is critical, not just for them, but more importantly for all of us. After last year, when so many institutions and individuals crumbled in the face of Trump’s power, the strength of our democracy increasingly depends on those with political capital standing up to him.

Coming out punching first does just that.

For UFC boss Dana White, heavyweight Josh Hokit’s post-fight behavior at UFC Freedom 250 on Sunday crossed a line.

On Monday, the mixed martial arts promotion’s president and chief executive told Time reporter Sean Gregory via text he is “completely against saying nasty and false things about people’s families” in reference to Hokit’s tasteless comment about Michelle Obama. During the White House spectacle in front of President Trump and others, Hokit was interviewed after his technical-knockout victory over Derrick Lewis and propped up a false conspiracy about the former first lady, declaring “Michelle Obama is a man.”

Hokit, who has a history of making tasteless comments after his fights, including the same Obama jab, drew mixed reaction from the UFC Freedom 250 crowd — and also from social media users, with some repeating the false claim in the comments on Hokit’s Instagram page and others chiding it. White, who has panned Hokit’s remarks in the past, did so again.

“Everyone knows my position on free speech but I hate that kind of nonsense,” White’s text added.

Hokit insulted Obama months after Trump faced backlash in February for a racist social media video that depicted President Obama and the former first lady as apes. Amid mounting public criticism, the White House took down the video and blamed an unnamed aide.

Michelle Obama, clearly on Hokit’s mind on Sunday, was busy with other matters over the weekend: preparing with her husband to open their Obama Presidential Center in Chicago. The museum and library hosts its grand opening Thursday and will be open to the public Friday.

Times staff writer Ana Ceballos contributed to this report.

A federal immigration judge has granted asylum to a woman orphaned in Iran in the 1970s and adopted by an American war veteran, whom immigration officials threatened this year with deportation to the country with which the U.S. is now at war.

Judge Andrew Fishkin’s ruling probably ends a months-long ordeal for the California woman, one of thousands adopted from abroad who were never granted citizenship because of bureaucratic loopholes between adoption and immigration law.

The woman has lived in the United States since she was adopted by American parents as a toddler and has no criminal record. The Associated Press is not naming her because she worries her legal situation remains tenuous as the administration has time to appeal. A federal judge has allowed her to use a pseudonym, “Ms. S,” in her challenge to the government’s determination of her immigration status.

The woman received a letter from the Department of Homeland Security in February that ordered her to appear for removal proceedings, saying she is subject to deportation because she overstayed her visa in March 1974 at 4 years old.

The woman, 56, described what came next as a terrifying and humiliating few months.

She grew up in a Christian, military family on a farm in Wisconsin and was taught to be patriotic. But the documents she received from the government described her as an “alien;” some said she did not understand English, which is the only language she speaks.

Immigration officials told her she was being arrested, but was released and tracked with an ankle monitor. She bought new pants to try to hide it and taught herself not to cross her legs in work meetings, terrified it would threaten the corporate job in healthcare she’s held for almost two decades.

They fingerprinted her and took her DNA. She said she was obviously weeping in the mug shot they snapped of her.

She prepared herself to be detained: She put her bills on autopay and gave her friends a key to her home.

Her lawyer, Emily Howe, said the government had the power to agree she is an American citizen.

“Instead they treated her like a terrorist, like she was the worst of the worst criminals,” Howe said. “It felt very Big Brother, very Orwellian.”

The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the record on an individual case.

The Associated Press profiled the woman in 2024 as part of a story about how many international adoptees were left without citizenship because their American adoptive parents failed to naturalize them.

The woman’s parents were living in Iran, where her father was working for a U.S. government contractor, in the 1970s. He was retired from the Air Force as a lieutenant colonel. He’d been held for years a prisoner of war in Germany during World War II.

The couple found the toddler at an orphanage and returned to the U.S. with her in 1973 and soon completed the adoption. At that time, parents had to separately naturalize adopted children. The woman’s parents have since died.

She didn’t learn she hadn’t been naturalized until she applied for a passport at 38 years old. She still doesn’t know how the oversight happened. She searched her father’s papers and found a letter from a lawyer, dated 1975, that said he was working with immigration officials, “it appears this matter is concluded,” and billed her father for his services.

She filed a federal lawsuit this month trying to prohibit the government from removing her and forcing it to grant her citizenship.

She has long believed she should be considered a U.S. citizen: She has a Social Security card, and a driver’s license and has been legally allowed to work and pay taxes for decades. It’s only the immigration agency that denies she is a citizen. She suspects her paperwork was lost, probably when militants seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979.

Fishkin seemed to agree: He wrote in his ruling that documents from that embassy are not available to her or to the U.S. government. He declared her a refugee, entitled to work in the U.S. His ruling puts the woman on a pathway to being recognized as a citizen.

She’d felt hopeful, she said, when she learned her court date before Fishkin was scheduled for her late father’s birthday. She always felt like she needed to protect not only herself but also her father’s legacy. He was a conscientious military official, she said, who would not have knowingly allowed such a glaring oversight that left his daughter in legal limbo.

Galofaro writes for the Associated Press.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday accused the Justice Department of launching — at President Trump’s request — a baseless and politically-motivated investigation into him and his wife, First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom.

“After calling for my arrest last year, Donald Trump directed his Department of Justice to investigate me,” Newsom said. “And just in the last week, I’ve learned his campaign has reached my own home: to get me, he’s coming after my wife, Jen.”

Newsom adamantly denied any wrongdoing by him or his wife. The White House referred questions to the Justice Department, which declined to comment.

A source familiar with the matter who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly told The Times that there are two probes underway, one related to Newsom’s former chief of staff, Dana Williamson, and one related to Siebel Newsom’s taxes.

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The source said both investigations have been ongoing for about a year; were launched by prosecutors in Sacramento based on information provided by whistleblowers and other local sources in California; and were not the result of directives out of Washington or the White House.

Newsom said that in recent days, “federal agents have knocked on the doors of family friends and former employees,” and have been “demanding records,” “digging through years and years of random documents” and “abusing the grand jury process” in a quest to find any kind of wrongdoing by him or his wife.

“Not because they found a crime. Because they are simply trying to find one,” he said.

Newsom did not describe the specific nature of the alleged probe, the line of questioning faced by friends and employees or the types of records taken or reviewed by federal investigators. But he alleged that Trump instigated the probe because Newsom is considering running for president in 2028, and because Trump “hates that I’ve consistently called him out — over and over again — for his lies and deceit.”

“He has turned the levers of government into his own personal power ministries to reward cronies and to try to jail his opponents,” Newsom said.

Newsom cited Justice Department investigations of several other of the president’s political opponents, including Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), New York Atty. Gen. Letitia James, former FBI director James Comey, former Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell and former vice presidential candidate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

“One by one, anyone who has challenged Donald Trump has ended up on his hit list,” he said. “And today, I proudly join that list.”

This article will be updated.

Well, that just happened.

The president held a cage fight on the White House South Lawn, complete with flyovers, fireworks, mini-skirted “octagon girls” and the surrealistic sight of mixed martial arts fighters striding through historic White House rooms flanked by National Medal of Honor winners.

Despite wide public disapproval for Sunday’s event and much scathing commentary about the political and psychological messaging of Donald Trump’s choice of a Vegas-like spectacle to celebrate his 80th birthday, and the country’s 250th, the sky did not fall, the original Constitution in the nearby National Archives did not tear in two and none of the fighters passed out from the heat or bug bites.

Things didn’t even get bloody until the final match in the fifth hour, when Justin Gaethje kicked and punched the crap out of widely favored Ilia Topuria.

Even so, it was impossible to emerge from watching UFC Freedom 250 without feeling punch-drunk.

Not because of the fighting; because of almost everything that was not the fighting.

Beginning with Paramount+, owned by the Trump-friendly Ellison family’s Paramount Skydance, which recently received Justice Department clearance for its highly controversial acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.

The jarring sight of past UFC matches being seemingly projected onto the Jefferson Memorial and the Capitol gave way to a series of poorly produced “historical” moments in which UFC fighters were cast as inheriting the same “fighting spirit” that motivated this nation’s Founding Fathers, past presidents and war veterans. Down to the inevitable strains of the Village People’s “Y.M.C.A.” (the baffling anthem of MAGA), the event projected a macho-man view of patriotism that was just as ghastly as many feared it would be.

UFC fighters are indeed dedicated and talented athletes who have overcome all manner of personal obstacles. But to compare them with Thomas Jefferson or American soldiers storming the beaches of Normandy is absurd and more than a little insulting.

The tens of thousands of UFC and Trump fans who gathered on the South Lawn and the Ellipse, however, were clearly having a very good time. Proceedings were delayed an hour by the threat of storms, but the weather cooperated in the end. “The President’s Own” United States Marine Band, and in particular, soloist Staff Sgt. Hannah Davis, gave masterful performances throughout. And while the Claw, the 600-ton steel structure arching above the Octagon, certainly looked like the first stage of an alien attack during the day, it put on a pretty terrific (if more than a little Vegasy) light show at night.

For those watching from home, however, these bright spots were glimpsed and heard infrequently, drowned out by the endless hyperbolic intonations of commentators (including Joe Rogan, who initially criticized the event), the long and invariably self-aggrandizing introductions of the various participants and the onslaught of frequently militaristic commercials, more than a few of which, included ads for Ram, featured UFC President and Chief Executive Dana White.

Which isn’t surprising when you think about it. White’s longtime support for the president culminated in his organization covering the event’s $60 million in production costs, and from the moment a smiling White joined Trump as he made his way through the White House to the front row, the event served as an almost-six-hour ad for the UFC.

Though I am not a UFC fan, I realize that showmanship is key to the sport’s wild and increasingly broad popularity. Championship matches, which rarely last longer than 30 minutes and sometimes much less, are inevitably preceded by hours of participants making all manner of florid claims and trash-talking their opponents. (Which may explain Trump’s fondness for the UFC.)

But when all of this strutting, preening and wild-eyed reaction revolves around what was, for better and worse, a series of rules-free brawls being force-fed into a narrative about this country’s enduring strength, what emerges is not so much a sporting event as it is a piece of naked and nationalistic propaganda.

Which came to a head in the final fight. After the six previous matches concluded rather quickly with bloodless knockouts (a UFC record), the fight between American Gaethje and the German-born, Georgia and Spain-representing Topuria lasted much longer. Gaethje, introduced as “the most violent man in the most violent sport,” left the lightweight champion’s face such a mess that even Rogan was shocked.

By all metrics, including Topuria’s refusal to go down, it was the best fight of the night. But hearing the crowd chant “USA, USA” as the bloody blows fell … well, let’s just say it was not everyone’s notion of a presidential birthday celebration.

Some have suggested that Trump staged the event in the hope of regaining the support of young men who helped him win the last election. Even if that was not the case, it was difficult to view UFC Freedom 250 in any way nonpartisan (especially after British former heavyweight champion Tyson Fury strode out of the White House wearing a “Trump for Prime Minister” hat).

Yes, several of the six non-American participants entered to Spanish or Portuguese songs (why so much fuss then about Bad Bunny at the Super Bowl?) but some of the winners are longtime MAGA supporters and made that very clear — Bo Nickal thanked Trump for being the only one “to have the balls” to stage such an event while Josh Hokit followed up his thanks to “my lord and savior Jesus Christ” with “Michelle Obama is a man. Am I right, America?”

Because it was Trump’s birthday after all.

Photo: Las Brisas del Cuyuní gold mining area, as posted by reporter Fritz Sánchez on June 10

Donald J. Trump turned back to breaking out big news on Truth Social about Venezuela on a Friday evening, like it’s a movie premiere. On June 12, he claimed US forces had killed Héctor Guerrero Flores, AKA El Niño Guerrero, who was the number 1 of the Venezuelan mega-gang Tren de Aragua, TDA. That same week, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth had promised that a great announcement about drug trafficking was on the way. Naturally, it was the boss who had to reveal the news on prime time. But people in Venezuela were already on alert after news broke, mid-week, that the Venezuelan armed forces, FANB, were attacking the mines near the village of Las Claritas.

Amid a rain of AI-generated fakes and videos coming from other contexts that flooded social media, we were able to see real videos from people on site, showing two Superpuma choppers shooting at targets on land, bringing support to special forces on the ground. The main hypothesis at that point was that they were raiding the compound of AKA Johan Petrica, a TDA co-founder. With Trump’s announcement on Friday, we learned that the trophy was Guerrero, whose whereabouts were unknown since Maduro agents raided the Tocorón prison where the TDA capo had his headquarters.

This is not about drugs, but gold

You may associate TDA with drugs and terrorism, but in this case drugs are secondary. Years ago, TDA turned into a big criminal organization in Venezuela by displacing other gangs or turning them into subsidiaries, by dealing in a wide array of crimes that went from drug trafficking to kidnapping, classic mafia extortion and non-violent scams. When they were able to expand from that Tocorón prison in Aragua state that Guerrero, then an inmate, turned into a fortress, they not only started to venture in the rest of the continent but fought to control the lucrative mining pole of Las Claritas, in the massive state of Bolívar, where international mining companies were expelled by Chavez’s expropriation.

Killing Guerrero is more relevant for the White House as a propaganda piece than as a real hit against drug trafficking in the Americas. It serves to justify the incursion in Venezuela and to give US voters another win amid the Iran fiasco and the lack of results in Cuba.

The military-managed Mining Arc was theoretically the legal frame. We are talking about one of the biggest reserves of gold on the planet. Just look at the numbers mentioned by Lorena Meléndez in this piece. By establishing a presence there, TDA got a cut from human trafficking, the black market of mining supplies and gas, and of course the production and export of minerals. As happened throughout the gang’s history, its involvement in the drug industry prospered because they had corrupt officials in their payroll. Until the regime’s priorities changed, Maduro ordered to raid Tocorón and impose a new Bukele-style prison regime where gangs don’t control jails. Guerrero went elsewhere, likely after reaching an agreement with chavismo that saw him leave his old turf unharmed. TDA continued taking part in the mines business in Bolivar, but sharing the place with other gangs.     

This is not law enforcement but business

The kinetic attack on Guerrero, that seems to have taken place at the start of last week, and the FANB raids that came after must be read as part of the Rodríguez interim government to comply with everything Team Trump is demanding from them. Yes, TDA is a criminal organization and Guerrero was guilty of many crimes, but what we must see here, rather than a legitimate Venezuelan government fighting crime, is an illegitimate regime clearing a terrain with the help of a foreign army to allow the return of foreign companies. We mustn’t compare this event with the killing of Pablo Escobar in Medellín in 1993. It’s not that the Venezuelan authorities made the commitment of restoring the rule of law. Actually, we haven’t seen any legal procedure here. There’s no transparency or accountability, we don’t know what happened to the civilian population or whether any rights were respected there. It’s the same level of State violence and lack of due process that the police and military have deployed in poor communities for years.

This is happening because, after US special forces removed Maduro and his wife on January 3, the remaining chavista officers met in Caracas with CIA Director John Ratcliffe (on January 16), US Interior Secretary Doug Burgum (March 4), US Southern Command commander Francis Donovan (in February and May), and more recently the highest military officer from that country, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Dan Caine (June 3). All of them had issued instructions to their Venezuelan counterparts and the top echelons of the chavista regime, including Delcy Rodríguez, related to the improvement of local conditions to allow US companies to invest in Venezuela. This is why the regime has been dismantling Chávez-era laws that discourage foreign investment in oil and mining, why Interior Secretary Burgum has praised Venezuela’s potential for the mining business, and why the armed forces seem to be clearing Las Claritas to take the area back to what is was when companies like Gold Reserve and Crystallex were operating there, instead of a gang ruling over thousands of semi-slaved informal miners.

Of course, taking over the mines from the gangs sounds like rule of law is being restored, but the fact is that it was done with the same opacity that has been the norm regarding this whole Washington-Caracas relationship that appeared when the smoke of January 3 dispersed in the air.  

This is not only business but also propaganda

This followed the same script of the kinetic attacks on boats that preceded the incursion of January 3: the social media post with the video, Trump taking the lion’s part of the story, followed by a more formal confirmation by the Rodríguez administration and the SouthCom. After months of repeating that everything’s fantastic in Venezuela and people like Burgum telling Trump that Venezuelans were about to raise statues of him in the cities, Trump needed to underline with a new spectacular event his old narrative of TDA as the spearhead of Maduro’s war against the US. In fact, most of Trump’s post of last Friday goes on trashing Joe Biden, as if Trump was still in the presidential campaign using the TDA trope to win the 2024 election.

The Trump government, which is testing the limits of US institutions, has attacked Venezuela to complete a story (the one about Maduro, TDA and Cartel de los Soles) and to open an investment horizon where business allies of the presidential family would have a head start.

Killing Guerrero is more relevant for the White House as a propaganda piece than as a real hit against drug trafficking in the Americas. It serves to justify the incursion in Venezuela and to give US voters another win amid the Iran fiasco and the lack of results in Cuba. For chavismo, instead, the killing of Guerrero has another meaning. The Maduro regime routinely denied that TDA existed; the Rodríguez regime, coherently, refused to mention TDA or even Guerrero in its Friday night statement. But for Delcy Rodríguez and her minister of Defense Gustavo González López, the operation is a message for three audiences that need some convincing about the case for leaving them in power: the Republican Party, the CEOs of foreign mining and oil companies, and the Venezuelan business community. For Delcy Rodriguez, those three audiences must see that the peace and order they need will come from her, not María Corina Machado.  

This isn’t a game of countries but of tight elites

The operation in Las Claritas is a clear example of the true nature of what’s happening between Venezuela and the US.

Everybody is saying that Venezuela is being controlled by the US. It’s more precise to say that the Rodríguez regime is being controlled by the Trump administration. What tends to be described as a relationship between two countries is in practice a relationship between two very specific models of power and networks of political and economic relationships. On one side, a dictatorship where an unelected president simply took the place of a dictator removed by force, but that continues to control the Venezuelan population under the same legal framework that suspended the people’s rights, and that shows flexibility in some matters (releasing some political prisoners, admitting back some exiled politicians) to generate favorable headlines in the global media. On the other side, a North American government that is testing the limits of US institutions and that attacked Venezuela to complete a story (the one about Maduro, TDA and Cartel de los Soles) and to open an investment horizon where business allies of the presidential family would have a head start. So far, Rodríguez and Trump need each other, and are making decisions on Venezuela that have improved the expectations on the economy, but so far have failed to improve the living conditions for most of the population.    

The Venezuelan armed forces seem compliant

In a continent so reluctant to allow US military presence, this operation shows the extent to which the Venezuelan armed forces—which according to the Trump administration has given sanctuary to terrorists and are led by a drug-trafficking military mafia designated as terrorist—are cooperating with the Southern Command (that narrative may be simplistic, we must say, but is not completely false). The same FANB that talked about the US as a mortal enemy during a quarter century failed to down a single drone in January 3, when their commander in chief was being captured in the main fort of the country, and now meets with the highest echelons of the US armed forces and cooperates with them in killing Venezuelans citizens on Venezuelan soil. We are not only seeing high-level officials like Defense Minister González López and Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello meeting American generals and doing, apparently, what the Americans want, even if González and Cabello are still under US sanctions, accused of several serious crimes that do not expire. Our Political Risk Report sources say that middle-rank officers are happy to cooperate with the US military.

Why? We can speculate that men under threat like Cabello are complying to avoid the fate of Maduro, hoping that they just need to wait until Trump is out of the picture and the US looks elsewhere. But, what about the many officers and soldiers who benefit from the corrupt State that Chávez and Maduro built for them, to buy their allegiance? If foreign companies are coming to Venezuela to exploit gold under contracts with the State, what will happen with the bribes those officers were collecting by allowing the gangs to operate the mines? 

How deep, sincere and stable is the US-FANB military and intelligence cooperation that made it possible to locate and kill the leader of the Tren de Aragua?

The next target will be harder to hit

Another question is who’s next. Now that a powerful message was sent with the obliteration of Guerrero’s last hideout, we must assume that the next targets will be the other Venezuelan gangs, the colectivos that ceased to be of use for chavismo, and Colombian guerrillas (ELN and FARC dissidents, all of them designated terrorists), which also have interests in the mines in other parts of the country. If Abelardo De la Espriella wins the Colombian election, military pressure from that country should increase as well on those armed actors.

The Venezuelans gangs are vulnerable. Colombian guerrillas, on the contrary, have survived for decades and know how to mix with civilians. Not even the Plan Colombia during the Uribe administrations was enough to eradicate them. However, the Trump and Rodríguez governments don’t need to push all armed actors to extinction or to make Venezuela a country free of paramilitary and gangs. For the moment, they just need to clear exploitation sites, logistical routes, ports and main cities. All the places foreign executives and their families would need for a safe relocation in Venezuela.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court agreed Monday to hear a Trump administration appeal and decide if “criminal aliens” may be held indefinitely while they fight deportation.

The case to be heard in the fall could give the administration more power to arrest and hold immigrants, including green card holders, who have criminal records.

The government’s lawyers say immigration laws call for deporting non-citizens with “aggravated felonies” on their records. And in such cases, they say these people may be held for months or even years while their claims are before the immigration courts.

Judges have been split on whether non-citizens fighting deportation have a right to a bond hearing and a chance to go free if they pose no risk to public safety.

The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York ruled for a pair of green card holders who faced deportation to the Dominican Republic and Jamaica. Both had been convicted of assaults that were characterized as aggravated felonies under the immigration laws.

However, the appeals court said their “prolonged detention” was unconstitutional if they were given no bond hearing and no chance to go free.

They were represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, whose lawyers urged the court to turn down the appeal.

“For the first time in this litigation, the government argues that civil detention ‘does not implicate any fundamental rights’ and so the Due Process Clause affords the detained men no protections—substantive or procedural,” they wrote.

In the past, they said the Supreme Court had accepted the “bedrock principle” that detained persons may have a right to seek their release on bond.

One of the two men had left this country and returned to Jamaica, the ACLU lawyers said. But Solicitor Gen. D. John Sauer urged the court to rule on the issue.

The detained men “have no procedural due-process right to a bond hearing on whether they are a flight risk or danger to the community,” he told the court. “Individualized findings about flight risk and danger are irrelevant” under the immigration laws which called for “mandatory detention based on their aggravated-felony convictions alone.”

SACRAMENTO — If Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Legislature truly believe that slow vote counting is a horrible problem — which it’s not — right now is the time to fix it.

They’re crafting a new state budget. And they could choose to spend the money needed to help counties hire more temporary election workers, buy more sophisticated vote-counting machines and add space for all of it.

That’s the only way to significantly speed up vote counting and mute the MAGA drivel about California being a national “laughingstock.”

How much money?

“We’ve suggested $55.5 million,” says Kim Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation, which pushes to improve the election process.

“That’s not a lot in the big scheme of the state budget.”

She’s right. It’s essentially pocket change in a proposed budget still being negotiated that tentatively totals $356 billion.

But don’t bet on much of it being allotted for swifter vote counting.

Regardless of all the potshots at California from cable news panelists about our “embarrassing” elections, faster vote tallying doesn’t seem to be a high priority for the Legislature.

Democrats are justifiably much more concerned about protecting poor people’s healthcare, in-home services for seniors and the unraveling safety net as the Trump administration and GOP Congress slash federal funding.

Federal cutbacks aside, the state for years has been spending more money than it takes in despite tax revenue exceeding expectations. Sacramento has a severe deficit spending problem that is projected to last for a while.

So, allocating more money to speed up vote counting by a few days isn’t very high on the governor’s and legislative leaders’ to-do lists.

“The reality is elections currently are underfunded,” says Assembly Elections Committee Chairwoman Gail Pellerin, a Democrat who was Santa Cruz County’s chief elections official for 27 years.

She also says, referring to demands for faster counting: “The media outlets want to call the races and be the first. And that’s what this is all about.”

I don’t disagree. By our nature, we journalists are anxious to report fresh news, including the outcomes of elections. And we become impatient when vote counts roll in seemingly at a snail’s pace.

But come on, it’s not a horrendous burden on the public to wait a few days for an accurate vote count.

It does, however, provide an excuse for President Trump and MAGA Republicans to regurgitate unfounded accusations that elections won by Democrats are “stolen” from the GOP.

“Look what’s happening in California … it’s a rigged election,” Trump bellowed in a June 7 interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” with Kristen Welker. “They’re cheating on the election.”

When Welker challenged him for evidence, Trump heatedly replied: “They’re crooked just like you’re crooked. Your press is crooked. And ‘Meet the Press’ is crooked. … You’re either crooked, or you’re stupid.”

To put this in context, the Trump diatribe came immediately after he called police officers attacked by Jan. 6 Capitol invaders “a bunch of dirty cops” and “crooked cops.” The Trump-inspired rioters were trying to prevent Congress from certifying President Biden’s “rigged” election.

It’s constantly puzzling why millions of Americans take this unhinged man’s blatherings so seriously. But they do.

And when the president lies about ballot fraud, it erodes public confidence in the integrity of our election system and undermines democracy. Americans become even more cynical and polarized.

So, the governor, Legislature and counties would do everyone a favor by investing in a faster vote count.

“It’s a problem,” Alexander asserts. “The slow vote count has become the norm in California, but it’s not normal for a democracy. It opens the door for false fraud claims.”

Much of the slow count results from tallying mail ballots, which amount to at least 80% of votes cast. They take longer to process, largely because each voter’s signature on the ballot’s envelope needs to be checked against one on file.

So, California could speed up counting by mailing out fewer ballots. Now, every registered voter gets one. We could go back to requiring voters to request an “absentee” ballot.

But forget that. We’re right to make it easy for people to participate in democracy — as long as safeguards are maintained to prevent fraud.

Some counties have taken advantage of a new law that allows a voter to drop off a filled-in mail ballot inside a voting center. There, it’s handled like an old-fashioned ballot that’s filled out at a booth. This significantly reduces processing time. But many counties say they need more state money to implement the program. I have no idea why.

Counting also is slow, of course, because lots of voters wait until election day — or near it — to cast their mail ballot. That clogs the system.

If the ballot is postmarked by election day, it’s allowed seven days to reach vote processors. Trump and fraud conspirators want to trash all ballots arriving after election day. That would speed up counting. But it’s un-American.

California election officials also try to pressure voters into mailing their ballots early. Rubbish.

Election day should mean something. It’s a day citizens are allowed to vote — whether they hand their ballot to a clerk at a voting center or drop it in the mail. They’ve got a right to take their sweet time in concluding what the wisest voting decisions are.

After all, the government allows us to drop our tax return in the mail on April 15 each year — and is very happy to receive our check a few days later. They process that check plenty fast.

“There’s nothing wrong with a slow count,” says Rick Hasen, a UCLA law professor who specializes in election law. “But it‘s a major problem because, unfortunately, it’s a manufactured crisis that can undermine public confidence. And it has gotten worse.”

So, Sacramento needs to undermine the demagogic manufacturers by stepping up vote counting while keeping elections virtually fraud-free.

What else you should be reading

The must-read: Trump prosecutor in L.A. pushing unusual public search for voter fraud during ongoing count
California love: From the scene of South L.A.’s erupting sidewalks, 5 questions for Bass and Raman
The L.A. Times Special: Who loved Bass, Raman and Pratt the most? A district-by-district breakdown

Until next week,
George Skelton

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WASHINGTON — Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky was admitted to a hospital Sunday, his spokesperson said, but there was no immediate information about why he was there or his prognosis.

McConnell, 84, was the longest-serving Senate leader in history before stepping aside from that role while finishing his final term, which ends in January.

“Senator McConnell was admitted to the hospital this morning. He is receiving excellent care,” spokesperson David Popp said in a statement without elaboration. It was not immediately clear whether McConnell was in Washington, Kentucky or elsewhere.

McConnell’s health has been a subject of scrutiny for years.

He fell and sprained his wrist while walking out of a GOP luncheon in December 2024. He was hospitalized with a concussion in March 2023 and missed several weeks of work after falling in a Washington hotel. After he returned, he twice froze up during news conferences that summer, staring vacantly ahead before colleagues and staff came to his assistance.

McConnell had polio in his early childhood, and he has long acknowledged some difficulty as an adult in walking and climbing stairs. In addition to his 2023 fall, he tripped and fell in 2019 at his home in Kentucky. He had surgery for a fractured shoulder.

McConnell was first elected to the Senate in 1984 and was the Republican leader from 2007 until 2025, serving as both majority and minority leader during that period.

He remains active in the Senate, showing up for work when the chamber is in session, and recently chairing public hearings and grilling officials from his perch as chair of the Senate appropriations subcommittee on defense. He has intermittently used a wheelchair to navigate the Capitol and is routinely accompanied by his security detail, as a former congressional leader.

WASHINGTON — President Trump said Sunday that the United States and Iran have reached a framework agreement to end the war in the Middle East, a breakthrough in months of negotiations aimed at ending the conflict.

The deal, described by diplomats as a memorandum of understanding, commits Tehran to forgo the development or acquisition of nuclear weapons in exchange for helping reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and the paced release of its assets frozen overseas, upon the signing of the deal Friday in Switzerland.

Trump said he has also authorized “the immediate removal of the United States Naval blockade” on Iranian imports.

“Ships of the World, start your engines. Let the oil flow!” Trump wrote in a social media post Sunday evening. It was the president’s 80th birthday.

The full details of the agreement have not been released. Many details — including how Tehran would give up, destroy or dilute its fissile material, or whether Iran would continue treating the international strait as its sovereign waters — will continue to be negotiated in the coming days.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Sunday that mediators are planning to hold a series of meetings this week to “lay the foundation for the technical talks and the official signing ceremony.”

“We would like to thank the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran for their commitment to finding a diplomatic solution to the conflict,” Sharif wrote in a post on X.

The Associated Press reported that negotiations on outstanding issues like Iran’s nuclear program would continue over the next 60 days, according to two senior Pakistani officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Vice President JD Vance told Fox News that the White House is “still figuring out the logistics” on whether he or Trump will attend the signing ceremony.

“What we know is that we have a lot of work to do, but a very big win for the American people tonight,” Vance said.”We are just going to keep on working at it, keep on driving energy prices down, keep on ensuring that region of the world is less than a basket case and finally, and most importantly, celebrate, that we can say with confidence Iran will never have a nuclear weapon.”

Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, confirmed the agreement on state television but said Iran would not start implementing it until it was signed on Friday. He said the deal followed over 14 hours of talks in Tehran with a representative from Qatar, another mediator.

Iranian state TV showed a banner asserting: “US was forced to sign an agreement to end the war.”

Iran’s commitment to refrain from pursuing nuclear weapons would simply repeat a vow Iran has made several times before, including in its signing of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and its nuclear deal brokered with international powers under the Obama administration over 10 years ago.

Iran has 972 pounds of uranium that is enriched up to 60% purity, a short, technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90%, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Under the 2015 international agreement with Iran abandoned by the first Trump administration, Iran’s uranium enrichment was capped at less than 4%, monitored by IAEA inspectors.

The vagueness of the new agreement, the demand for further negotiations to flesh out its details, and the pacing of sanctions relief for Iran are all likely to draw criticism of the president, who launched his political career in 2015 by attacking President Obama’s newly signed nuclear deal as a historically bad agreement.

That deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, followed two years of painstaking negotiations that were predicated on a similar, yet more detailed framework, called the JCPOA.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a Sunday morning interview on CBS’ “Face the Nation” that the the difference between the JCPOA and how the Trump administration is handling negotiations is the “threat of military force.”

“The huge difference is we did this from a position of strength,” Hegseth said. “That military might will stay as long as necessary.”

And, as in 2015, Israeli leadership across the political aisle remains deeply skeptical of the agreement, pronouncing they will not be bound by a deal to which they are not a party.

In a phone interview with the New York Times on Sunday afternoon, Trump called Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister of Israel, a “very difficult guy.”

“To be honest with you, he should be very thankful to us for doing this. Because if Iran had a nuclear weapon, Israel wouldn’t be around for two hours,” Trump said.

Since the U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran that started the war Feb. 28, there have been 3,468 confirmed deaths in Iran, according to independent monitors. In addition, 13 U.S. service members have been killed, and the Israeli war with Hezbollah has killed 2,679 in Lebanon as well as 23 Israelis, including eight civilians.

When Vice President Dan Quayle tarred Murphy Brown as a symbol of the “poverty of values” that he claims helped fuel the Los Angeles riots, it was more than another bizarre turn in an already screwball political ride. His attack on “lawless social anarchy” resonates with the rhetoric of the Religious Right. That is no accident. This group assumes great importance as the Bush-Quayle campaign faces the tricky dynamics of a three-way race in the fall.

Quayle’s scolding also exposed a common theme in GOP legislative primaries throughout California, particularly in Orange and San Diego counties. How Republican voters respond could define the soul of the state GOP, the political future of Gov. Pete Wilson and the direction of public policy and spending.

Four years ago, the Religious Right mobilized around the politics of evangelists like Pat Robertson. Now the Robertson crowd has joined with other pro-life groups in stealth campaigns to capture low-visibility local offices.

This strategy has quietly surfaced in California. In GOP primaries in 13 legislative districts, a statewide coalition of Christian fundamentalists is fielding and financing right-wing candidates against moderates backed by Wilson loyalists. Among the more prominent contests:

— Conservative fundamentalist Barbara Alby, of Sacramento’s Capitol Christian Center, is challenging incumbent B.T. Collins (R-Carmichael), the governor’s hand-picked candidate, for the 5th Assembly District nomination.

— In Pasadena, Bill Hoge, running for the GOP nomination in the 44th A.D., enjoys the backing of several fundamentalist Christian groups. Former La Canada-Flintridge Mayor Barbara Pieper, a pro-abortion rights Republican with long-time ties to Wilson, is the moderate candidate.

— Redondo Beach Mayor Brad Parton is the Right’s man in the South Bay’s 53rd Assembly District. Campaign literature from opponent Dan Walker, a Torrance City Council member, blasts Parton for his “attempts to impose his fundamentalist religious views on others.”

On economic issues, there’s little difference among GOP contenders. Most are fiscal conservatives who oppose new taxes and support pro-business agendas. The split comes over social issues. Couched in terms of “traditional family values,” the Right’s agenda is relentlessly anti-gay, anti-choice and anti-Wilson.

Since Wilson took office last year, he’s made it clear he wants to remake the California Legislature into an instrument of his moderate political will. To do that, he has to break the grip of conservatives in the GOP Assembly caucus. That’s what the 1992 primaries were supposed to accomplish. But caucus hard-liners, whose goal is to dump Wilson allies from leadership posts, have joined with the Religious Right to take on Wilsonistas.

The most intense battles are being fought in the governor’s back yard–San Diego. A string of right-wing victories there could be fatal to Wilson’s policy agenda and to his political viability.

For a while, the governor’s people worked to keep this unhappy political prospect suppressed. But when Wilson learned how well organized the conservatives were, he dropped his neutrality and endorsed four GOP moderates running for the Assembly in the San Diego area. Since all four districts lean Republican, the GOP nominee should have the advantage in the general election.

In the 75th, right-wing candidate Connie Youngkin, head of San Diego’s Operation Rescue, trumpets herself as a “Pro-Family Tax Fighter.” She has downplayed her anti-abortion rights activism in the face of attacks from Wilson’s candidate, Poway Mayor Jan Goldsmith.

The nomination battle in the 77th pits political consultant Steve Baldwin, and his army of Christian activists, against former Chula Vista Mayor Greg Cox. Baldwin, who helped engineer Religious Right victories in 1990 races for local offices, opposes abortion and gun control. Wilson-endorsed Cox does not.

In the 78th, former Assemblyman Jeff Marston, a pro-choice moderate, faces Dan Van Tieghem, executive director of the Christian Coalition of California. And in the 76th, Wilson likes former Del Mar Mayor Ronnie Delaney against anti-abortion conservative Dick Daleke.

Conservatives Youngkin, Baldwin and Van Tieghem have all been targeted by the California Abortion Rights Action League as “Enemies of Choice.” Their nominations could assume added importance if the U.S. Supreme Court, as expected, tosses the abortion-rights issue to the state legislatures. These religious conservatives would also likely wield long budget knives, first and most deeply, at health and social welfare programs.

What’s all this got to do with California’s primary?

Religious fundamentalists have boosted their voting numbers by “in-pew” registration drives. Add to this the fact that conservatives tend to be better organized, more motivated and more ideologically committed than middle-of-the-road voters. They turn out.

And with so many competitive races, turnout will likely determine many a political race.

If turnout is low, the extremes of both parties–liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans–will benefit, which means that the Legislature will likely remain factionalized and frozen.

The U.S. Senate races might be affected as well, particularly the tight contests for the six-year seat. On the GOP ballot, a low turnout could help conservative commentator Bruce Herschensohn. But if moderate Republican women come out to support pro-choice candidates running for the Legislature and Congress, pro-choice Rep. Tom Campbell might benefit.

In any case, despite the whining of press and pundits, the California primary is not irrelevant. The stakes are high this year. They include the definition of this state’s goals and priorities. And the selection of leaders capable–or incapable–of moving toward them.

California voters won’t be conned to the polls just to protest or confirm presidential nominees. But they can’t stay home, if they care at all about the future of their communities and state.

Here, too, turnout will tell the tale.