|
1. In global news, the negative impact of U.S. influence was evident on multiple fronts. • The U.S. and Iran traded military strikes after President Trump said Washington is “reinstating” a blockade on Iran in the Strait of Hormuz. The attacks come as Iran and the U.S. both vie for control of the strait, through which a fifth of all traded crude oil and natural gas once passed in peacetime. • U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio launched a campaign to dismantle the International Criminal Court (ICC), claiming the global tribunal was interfering with U.S. military and law enforcement operations at the expense of American sovereignty. The plan involves pressuring other nations to abandon the court, including plans to punish nations that refuse to do so with sanctions, travel bans and visa revocations. • Former leading USAID administrator Atul Gawande told the New Yorker, that Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)’s work to dismantle U.S. foreign assistance has already been responsible for some 700,000 deaths, and that number is likely to reach the millions. 2. Congress had another busy week with both hearings and legislative action. • In his Senate confirmation hearing, Todd Blanche, President Trump’s pick for attorney general, faced tough questioning—from Democrats and some Republicans—over issues that have dogged the Justice Department for the past 18 months. Some of the questions concerned the so-called anti-weaponization $1.8 billion slush fund for Trump’s allies, Blanche’s personal relationship with Trump and the Epstein files. • House Republicans released a fiscal blueprint for the $95 billion party-line budget reconciliation package GOP leaders hope to pass later this summer. The bill would add $73 billion in military and intelligence spending, $12 billion in farm assistance and $10 billion in election-related matters, which some members are hoping to use on grants to encourage strict voter ID laws as a substitute for passing the SAVE America Act. • Senate Democrats blocked debate on the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), objecting not only to the Iran war but also to provisions that would more closely integrate the U.S. and Israeli militaries. The bill sought to authorize much of the $1.15 trillion military budget proposed by Trump, and it fell well short of the 60 votes it needed to advance in the Senate. 3. A series of killings committed by ICE agents brought new attention to the deadly impacts of the Trump administration’s cruel deportation regime. • Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero and Lorenzo Salgado Araujo are two of the latest victims of ICE violence in Maine and Texas. Both men were shot to death by ICE agents in the last few days, sparking protests. • President Trump overturned a suspension of ICE traffic stops that multiple law enforcement sources said had been implemented after the fatal shootings in Texas and Maine. ICE agents had been instructed to immediately suspend most vehicle stops during immigration enforcement operations nationwide. Trump then weighed in, insisting that vehicle stops continue. • Dozens of people held at the ICE detention facility known as Camp East Montana in El Paso, Texas, say they were either beaten by guards or witnessed others being beaten, according to a new report issued by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). The report also says people held at Camp East Montana recounted being denied necessary medical care, forced to live in filthy conditions and fed inedible meals. • The Supreme Court, at the very end of its term, ruled June 25 that the government is allowed to stop asylum seekers from physically setting foot in the country, effectively keeping them from applying for asylum. The Trump administration had sought to revive a policy first attempted by the Obama administration of stemming the flow of asylum seekers by physically preventing them from setting foot over the border.
|
