Matter

The Clippers got the backup center they have yearned for when Brook Lopez agreed to a two-year, $18-million deal, according to people not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

Lopez, who spent the last seven seasons with Milwaukee, averaged 13 points, 5.0 rebounds and shot 37.3% from three-point range.

Lopez will be the backup to starting center Ivica Zubac, and he gives the Clippers depth and experience at the position.

The 7-1 Lopez still is a good rim-protector, averaging 1.9 blocks per game last season. Lopez has won an NBA championship with the Bucks.

Donald Trump’s coalition has always been a Frankenstein’s monster — stitched together from parts that were never meant to coexist.

Consider the contradictions: fast-food fanatics hanging out with juice-cleanse truthers chanting “Make America Healthy Again” between ivermectin doses, immigration hardliners mixing with business elites who are “tough on the border” until they need someone to clean their toilets or pick their strawberries, and hawkish interventionists spooning with America Firsters.

Dogs and cats living together — mass hysteria — you know the bit.

Navigating these differences was always going to be tricky. But in recent days — particularly following Israel’s bombing of Iran, an operation widely believed to have been greenlit by Trump — the tension has reached new highs.

Signs of strain were already emerging earlier this year. We got early hints of discord during the “Liberation Day” tariff fiasco — where Trump declared an “emergency” and imposed steep tariffs, only to suspend them after they riled markets and spooked his business-friendly backers.

The tariff blunder was a harbinger of things to come. But it was the House’s passage of Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” — a budgetary monstrosity that self-respecting Freedom Caucus deficit hawks should’ve torched on principle — that truly exposed the rift.

Enter Elon Musk, the billionaire tech bro and MAGA ally, who publicly trashed both the bill and Trump in a flurry of posts. He even referenced Trump’s name reportedly appearing in Jeffrey Epstein’s files — a claim that, though unverified, was tantamount to “going nuclear.”

But before there was enough time to say “Republican civil war,” Musk deleted his mean tweets, adding to the evidence that this is still Trump’s party; that modern Republicans view deficits the way the rest of us view library late fees — technically real, but nothing to lose sleep over; and that ketamine is a hell of a drug.

The next internecine squabble was over immigration. Trump proudly ran on rounding ’em all up. Mass deportations! Load up the buses! But then it turned out that his rich buddies in Big Ag and Big Hospitality weren’t so keen on losing some of their best employees.

So Trump floated a carve out to protect some “very good, long time workers” in those particular industries.

It even started to look like some exemptions were coming — until his Department of Homeland Security said “no mas.” (The raids will presumably continue until the next time a farmer or hotelier complains to Trump in a meeting.)

But the real fissure involves some prominent America First non-interventionists who thought Trump was elected to end the “forever wars.”

In case you missed it, Israel has been going after Iran’s nuclear capabilities with the same gusto that Trump aide Stephen Miller applies to deporting Guatemalan landscapers, and Trump is all in, calling for an “unconditional surrender” of the Iranian regime.

This didn’t sit well with everyone in the MAGA coalition.

“I think we’re going to see the end of American empire,” warned Tucker Carlson on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast. “But it’s also going to end, I believe, Trump’s presidency — effectively end it — and so that’s why I’m saying this.”

And Carlson (co-founder of the Daily Caller, where I worked) didn’t stop there. “The real divide isn’t between people who support Israel and those who support Iran or the Palestinians,” he tweeted. “It’s between warmongers and peacemakers.”

Then he named names, alleging that Fox’s Sean Hannity, radio firebrand Mark Levin, media titan Rupert Murdoch and billionaire Trump donors Ike Perlmutter and Miriam Adelson were among the warmongers.

Trump hit back, calling Tucker “kooky” and repeating his new mantra: “IRAN CAN NEVER HAVE A NUCLEAR WEAPON.”

It’s tempting to see this spat as the beginning of a schism — a break that might finally yield a coherent Trump Doctrine, at least, as it pertains to foreign policy (possibly returning the GOP to a more Reaganite or internationalist party). But that misunderstands the nature of Trump and his coalition.

These coalitional disagreements over public policy are real and important. But they mostly exist at the elite level. The actual Trump voter base? They care about only one thing: Donald Trump.

And Trump resists ideological straitjackets.

If Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu rubs him the wrong way next week (as he did by congratulating Joe Biden in 2020), or if Israel’s military campaign starts slipping in the polls, Trump could flip faster than a gymnast on Red Bull.

There is no coherent philosophy. No durable ideology. What we’re watching is a guy making it up as he goes along — often basing decisions on his “gut” or the opinion of the last guy who bent his ear.

So if you’re looking for a Trump Doctrine to explain it all — keep looking. There isn’t one.

There’s only Trump.

Matt K. Lewis is the author of “Filthy Rich Politicians” and “Too Dumb to Fail.”

Israel has struck some of Iran’s most vital oil and gas facilities, the first such attacks despite decades of rivalry between the Middle Eastern nations, raising fears of a widening conflict and threatening turmoil for the markets.

Late on Saturday, Iran’s Ministry of Petroleum said Israel struck a key fuel depot, while another oil refinery in the capital city of Tehran was also in flames, as emergency crews scrambled to douse the fires at separate sites.

Iran has also partially suspended production at the world’s biggest gasfield, the South Pars, which it shares with neighbour Qatar, after an Israeli strike caused a fire there on Saturday.

The latest round of exchange of projectiles began on Friday after Israel launched attacks on Iran’s military and nuclear sites and assassinated several top military officials and nuclear scientists. Tehran retaliated by firing ballistic missiles and drones at multiple cities in Israel amid global calls for de-escalation.

According to Iranian state media, Israeli attacks have killed at least 80 people, including 20 children, and wounded 800 others over the past two days. Israeli authorities said that 10 people had been killed in Iranian strikes, with over 180 injured.

Israel’s unprecedented and sudden attacks on Iran’s energy facilities are poised to disrupt the oil supplies from the Middle East, and could shake up global fuel prices, even as both countries threaten each other with even more intense attacks.

So, what are the key energy sites in Iran hit in Israeli attacks? And why do they matter?

Which major facilities were hit in Israeli attacks?

Iran holds the world’s second-largest proven natural gas reserves and the third-largest crude oil reserves, according to the United States government’s Energy Information Administration (EIA), and its energy infrastructure has long been a potential target for Israel.

Before the current spiral in their conflict, Israel had largely avoided targeting Iranian energy facilities, amid pressure from its allies, including the US, over the risks to global oil and gas prices from any such attack.

That has now changed.

On Friday, Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz warned that if Iran retaliated to its attacks, “Tehran will burn”.

Late on Saturday, major fires broke out at two opposing ends of the Iranian capital — the Shahran fuel and gas depot, northwest of central Tehran, and one of Iran’s biggest oil refineries in Shahr Rey, to the city’s south.

While Iran’s Student News Network subsequently denied that the Shahr Rey refinery had been struck by Israel, and claimed it was still operating, it conceded that a fuel tank outside the refinery had caught fire. It did not explain what sparked the fire.

But Iran’s Petroleum Ministry confirmed that Israel had struck the Shahran depot, where firefighters are still trying to bring flames under control.

The Israeli aerial attacks also targeted the South Pars field, offshore Iran’s southern Bushehr province. The world’s largest gasfield is the source of two-thirds of Iran’s gas production, which is consumed nationally. Iran shares the South Pars with its neighbour Qatar, where it is called the North Field.

The strikes triggered significant damage and fire at the Phase 14 natural gas processing facility and halted an offshore production platform that generates 12 million cubic metres per day, reported the semiofficial Tasnim news agency.

In a separate Israeli attack, fire reportedly broke out at the Fajr Jam gas plant, one of Iran’s largest processing facilities, also in the Bushehr province, which processes fuel from South Pars. The Iranian Petroleum Ministry confirmed that the facility was hit.

Why are these sites important?

The Shahran oil depot is one of Tehran’s largest fuel storage and distribution hubs. It has nearly 260 million litres of storage capacity across 11 tanks. It is a vital node in the capital’s urban fuel grid, distributing petrol, diesel, and aviation fuel to several terminals across northern Tehran.

The Tehran Refinery, located just south of Tehran, in the Shahr-e Rey district, operated by the state-owned Tehran Oil Refining Company, is one of the country’s oldest refineries, with a refining capacity of nearly 225,000 barrels per day. Experts warn that any disruption to this site — whatever the cause of the fire — could strain fuel logistics in Iran’s most populous and economically significant region.

Down south, the offshore South Pars gasfield in the Gulf contains an estimated 1,260 trillion cubic feet of recoverable gas, accounting for nearly 20 percent of known global reserves.

Meanwhile, the hit on the Fajr-e Jam Gas Refinery, in Bushehr province, threatens to disrupt Iran’s domestic electricity and fuel supplies, particularly for the southern and central provinces, which are already under huge stress. In Iran, blackouts cost the economy about $250m a day, according to the government’s estimates.

Uncertain global markets

Adding to the uncertainty in global markets, Iran has noted that it is considering closing the Strait of Hormuz amid the intensifying conflict with Israel – a move that would send oil prices soaring.

The Strait of Hormuz, which splits Iran on one side and Oman and the United Arab Emirates on the other, is the only marine entryway into the Gulf, with nearly 20 percent of global oil consumption flowing through it. The EIA describes it as the “world’s most important oil transit chokepoint”.

The Israeli attacks on Friday, which spared Iran’s oil and gas facilities on the first day of the fighting, had already pushed oil prices up 9 percent, before they calmed just a bit. Analysts expect prices to rise sharply when oil markets open again on Monday.

Alan Eyre, a distinguished diplomatic fellow at the Middle East Institute, told Al Jazeera that Israel was trying to push the US into participating in its attacks on Iran. “Ultimately, Israel’s best case scenario is to encourage, if not regime change, then the toppling of this regime,” he said.

“Iran’s options are very limited; they have to respond militarily to save face domestically [but] it is very unlikely that Iran can cause enough damage to Israel internally or put enough pressure to stop bombing,” Eyre said.

“Iran does not have many allies in the international community – and even if it did, Israel has shown that it is spectacularly unwilling to listen to international opinion,” added Eyre.

In this episode of Reframe, Ken Roth and Silvia Fernandez discuss what international justice means today, exploring the significance of the ICC and asking if the “court of last resort” can withstand threats and sanctions by global superpowers and uphold the rule of law.

A claim by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem that an immigrant threatened the life of President Trump has begun to unravel.

Noem announced an arrest of a 54-year-old man who was living in the U.S. illegally, saying he had written a letter threatening to kill Trump and would then return to Mexico. The story received a flood of media attention and was highlighted by the White House and Trump’s allies.

But investigators actually believe the man may have been framed so that he would be arrested and deported from the U.S. before he got a chance to testify in a trial as a victim of assault, a person familiar with the matter told the Associated Press. The person could not publicly discuss details of the investigation and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

Law enforcement officials believe the man, Ramon Morales Reyes, never wrote a letter that Noem and her department shared with a message written in light blue ink expressing anger over Trump’s deportations and threatening to shoot him in the head with a rifle at a rally. Noem also shared the letter on X along with a photo of Morales Reyes, and the White House also shared it on its social media accounts. The letter was mailed to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office along with the FBI and other agencies, the person said.

As part of the investigation, officials had contacted Morales Reyes and asked for a handwriting sample and concluded that his handwriting and the threatening letter didn’t match and that the threat was not credible, the person said. It’s not clear why Homeland Security officials still decided to send a release making that claim.

In an emailed statement asking for information about the letter and the new information about Morales Reyes, the Department of Homeland Security said “the investigation into the threat is ongoing. Over the course of the investigation, this individual was determined to be in the country illegally and that he had a criminal record. He will remain in custody.”

His attorneys said he was not facing current charges and they did not have any information about convictions in his record. The revelations were first reported by CNN.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s records show Morales Reyes is being held at a county jail in Juneau, Wis., northwest of Milwaukee. The Milwaukee-based immigrant rights group Voces de la Frontera, which is advocating for his release, said he was arrested May 21. Attorney Cain Oulahan, who was hired to fight against his deportation, said he has a hearing in a Chicago immigration court next week and is hoping he is released on bond.

Morales Reyes had been a victim in a case of another man who is awaiting trial on assault charges in Wisconsin, the person familiar with the matter said. The trial is scheduled for July.

Morales Reyes works as a dishwasher in Milwaukee, where he lives with his wife and three children. He had recently applied for a U visa, which is carved out for people in the country illegally who become victims of serious crimes, said attorney Kime Abduli, who filed that application.

The Milwaukee Police Department said it is investigating an identity theft and victim intimidation incident related to this matter and the county district attorney’s office said the investigation was ongoing. Milwaukee police said no one has been criminally charged at this time.

Abduli, Morales Reyes’ attorney, says he could not have written the letter, saying he did not receive formal education and can’t write in Spanish and doesn’t know how to speak English. She said it was not clear whether he was arrested because of the letters.

“There is really no way that it could be even remotely true,” Abduli said. “We’re asking for a clarification and a correction from DHS to clear Ramon’s name of anything having to do with this.”

Balsamo, Bauer and Licon write for the Associated Press.

As the “Mothers of the Movement” came on stage to talk about the deaths of their children and endorse Hillary Clinton at the Democratic National Convention, chants emerged from the crowd: “Black lives matter!”

Geneva Reed-Veal, standing in a half circle with eight other black mothers, attempted to quiet the audience.

“Give me two moments to tell you how good God is. Give me a moment to say thank you,” said Reed-Veal, whose 28-year-old daughter, Sandra Bland, died in jail after being pulled over for a traffic stop in 2015. “We are not standing here because he’s not good. We are standing here because he’s great.”

What followed was one of the most powerful moments of Tuesday’s convention, as the mothers held back tears to speak about the deaths that ignited a national debate about police reform and race relations.

“So many of our children gone but not forgotten,” Reed-Veal said. “I’m here with Hillary Clinton because she is a leader and a mother who will say our children’s names. Hillary knows that when a young black life is cut short, it’s not just a personal loss. It is a national loss. It is a loss that diminishes all of us.”

The short speeches, which followed a video of Hillary Clinton meeting and praying with the mothers, who have joined her at campaign events across the country, gave the Black Lives Matter movement one of its highest-profile moments. Officially, Black Lives Matter has not endorsed a presidential candidate, but the women are among the movement’s best-known names.

The deaths have spurred hundreds of demonstrations across the U.S. over the last four years and raised the pressure on both major political parties to deal with the issue of gun violence and racial disparities.

Full convention coverage »

Mothers of African Americans killed by gun violence speak at the Democratic National Convention. More coverage at latimes.com/trailguide

“You don’t stop being a parent when your child dies,” said Lucia McBath, whose 17-year-old son, Jordan Davis, was shot and killed in Jacksonville, Fla., in 2012. “I am still Jordan Davis’ mother. His life ended the day he was shot and killed for playing loud music. But my job as his mother didn’t.”

“Hillary Clinton isn’t afraid to say black lives matter,” she said. “She isn’t afraid to sit at a table with grieving mothers and bear the full force of our anguish. She doesn’t build walls around her heart. Not only did she listen to our problems, she invited us to become part of the solution.”

The segment provided a window into how the Clinton campaign is responding to pressure to address race relations and police reform while acknowledging the dangers police officers face after a series of deadly shootings around the country.

Pittsburgh Police Chief Cameron McLay, who has been praised for his handling of protests in his city, introduced the mothers after saying Americans should “respect and support our police officers while at the same time pushing for these important criminal justice reforms.”

Sybrina Fulton, the mother of Trayvon Martin, said that while she “didn’t want this spotlight” she would do everything she could “to focus some of that light on a path out of this darkness.”

Fulton praised Clinton for having “courage to lead the fight for common-sense gun legislation” and a “plan to repair the divide that so often exists between law enforcement and the communities they serve.”

Day Two of the Democratic National Convention in less than 3 minutes. Full coverage at latimes.com/trailguide

The speakers included:

Fulton, the mother of 17-year-old Martin, who died after being shot by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman on Feb. 26, 2012, in Sanford, Fla. A jury acquitted Zimmerman of all charges related to Martin’s death on July 13, 2013.

Lezley McSpadden, the mother of 18-year-old Michael Brown, who was shot by Darren Wilson, a white Ferguson, Mo., police officer on Aug. 9, 2014. The shooting caused days of unrest in the St. Louis suburb, raising questions about police use of military equipment and bringing scrutiny to the issue of racial disparities between police and the communities where they work. On November 21, 2014, a grand jury decided not to indict Wilson in Brown’s death.

See the most-read stories in National News this hour >>

Gwen Carr, the mother of 43-year-old Eric Garner, who died after a police officer put him a chokehold in Staten Island, N.Y., on July 17, 2014. In a bystander video that went viral, Garner can be heard repeatedly saying, “I can’t breathe,” while being restrained by police. The phrase became a protest mantra, especially after a jury decided to not indict the officer, Daniel Pantaleo, on Dec. 13, 2014. The Department of Justice is currently investigating the case.

Reed-Veal, the mother of 28-year-old Bland, who was found hanged with a trash bag in a Waller County, Texas, jail on July 13, 2015. Three days before, Bland was stopped for a traffic violation and got into an argument with the state trooper who stopped her, resulting in her arrest. After a dash-cam video was released, a Bland family lawyer argued that the officer did not have probable cause for the stop. Family members disputed a medical examiner’s ruling that her death was a suicide. In December 2015, a grand jury decided not to indict her jailers in connection with Bland’s death. The trooper is facing a misdemeanor charge.

Lucia McBath, mother of 17-year-old Jordan Davis, who was shot by Michael Dunn in Jacksonville, Fla., on Nov. 12, 2012. The shooting occurred after Dunn, who is white, complained that the music Davis and his friends were playing in their car was too loud, and an argument ensued. After a first trial ended in a mistrial, Dunn, a software developer, was found guilty of first-degree murder.

Maria Hamilton, the mother of Dontré Hamilton, who was fatally shot by a white police officer in Milwaukee on April 30, 2014. Protests ensued after charges were not brought against the officer, Christopher Manney.

Cleopatra Pendleton-Cowley, the mother of 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, who was shot by two gang members in a Chicago park on Jan. 29, 2013. The shooters were arrested and charged with first-degree murder, and First Lady Michelle Obama attended Pendleton’s funeral.

Annette Nance-Holt, the mother of 16-year-old Blair Holt, who died on a Chicago Transit Authority bus in May 2007 after trying to shield a friend from a gang member’s shots.

Wanda Johnson, the mother of 22-year-old Oscar Grant, who died after being shot by a white Bay Area Rapid Transit officer on New Year’s Day in 2009. The officer, Johannes Mehserle, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to two years in prison in 2010. Mehserle received credit for time already served and was released on June 13, 2011.

Notably absent was Samaria Rice, the mother of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who died in November 2014 after being shot by police in Cleveland while he played in a park with a replica pellet gun. Rice has declined to endorse Clinton or Trump.

No candidate is “speaking my language about police reform,” Samaria Rice recently told Fusion, saying she wants “a lot on the table, not a little bit of talk, a lot of talk about police brutality, police accountability, making new policies, taking some away, and just reforming the whole system.”

She has also been critical of President Obama.

“He may mention something about it, but he’s not really going to go into details about it and hold the government responsible for killing innocent people,” she said in the same interview, echoing similar criticisms from some activists.

Even before their speeches, the appearance of the Mothers of the Movement had caused controversy. The Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police said its members were “shocked and saddened” that widows of fallen police officers were not included in the lineup.

“It is sad that to win an election, Mrs. Clinton must pander to the interests of people who do not know all the facts, while the men and women they seek to destroy are outside protecting the political institutions of this country,” the police group said in a statement.

The mothers aren’t strangers to the campaign trail. Several have been featured in a Clinton TV ad that aired in Chicago and St. Louis and the campaign has also covered their airfares to Democratic debates.

Not all the family members of black Americans who have died in high-profile police-involved incidents have been Clinton supporters. Erica Garner, the daughter of Eric Garner, has been a strong supporter of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Still, Tuesday’s group represented one of the strongest lineups of black activists involved in any recent presidential campaign campaign.

“We must bring awareness.… Don’t wait until tragedy knocks on your door,” Carr said in a recent ABC News segment on her support of Clinton, which also addressed violence against police.

“This is a bad time to be a good cop in this country,” Reed-Veal said in the same segment. “OK? We need to remember they have lives too.”

[email protected]

Jaweed Kaleem is The Times’ national race and justice correspondent. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.

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UPDATES:

7:35 p.m.: This article was updated with more details about the speeches.

6:20 p.m.: This article was updated after the women spoke.

This article was originally published at 4:40 p.m.

Israel’s intensified attacks on Gaza have killed more than 130 Palestinians in a matter of hours, as ceasefire negotiations continue. Horrific videos show people in pieces and on fire following strikes on tents sheltering displaced civilians.