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Trump is trying to deny a key reality in his war — and it's costing him: columnist

President Donald Trump seems to be denying a key reality in the war in Iran, and it's costing him at the negotiating table, according to one columnist.

Bob Kagan, a columnist and neoconservative scholar, discussed the war in Iran on a new episode of "The Bulwark Podcast" with host Tim Miller on Wednesday. Kagan argued that Trump doesn't seem to accept the reality that the U.S. lost the war back in March, and that Iran is basically "shaking Trump down for money" at the negotiating table.

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Internet mocks Trump for saying 'I don't care about the midterms': 'The GOP does'

President Donald Trump on Wednesday said he was in no rush to make a deal with Iran, claiming that despite the country's attempts to coerce him into securing negotiations ahead of elections "I don't care about the midterms" — something the internet disagreed with him about.

Trump was speaking to his cabinet during a meeting at the White House when he made the comment.

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'Truly unstable' Trump's new 'unhinged' proposal gave Iran the upper hand: expert

Donald Trump has handed Iran a stunning victory while simultaneously raising questions about his stability to American allies with a proposal so "divorced from reality" that it exposes the administration's complete lack of strategic planning.

So wrote New York Times columnist Tom Friedman, a Middle East expert, who said on Tuesday that Trump's misguided Iran war strategy has already inadvertently given Tehran a far more potent weapon than any nuclear capability: the realization that it can hold the global economy hostage at will with no end in sight.

Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gambled that multibillion-dollar weapons systems could bomb Iran into surrendering its nuclear program. They relied entirely on Netanyahu's promise that the Iranian regime would collapse like "a house of cards after a few weeks of heavy bombing," Friedman wrote.

Instead, they enabled Iran to discover what Friedman calls a weapon of "mass disruption" — cheap drones capable of closing the Strait of Hormuz, the world's most critical oil chokepoint.

"Now, and forever, Iranians will know that we know that Tehran can shut off the world's most important oil tap anytime it wants. This new source of leverage for the Iranian regime is priceless," the columnist explained.

Trump's latest proposal in a Truth Social Memorial Day post exposed the catastrophic consequences of waging war without scenario planning or expert input with the president writing that he is "mandatorily requesting that all Countries [in the region] immediately sign the Abraham Accords."

The columnist pointed out that Trump even claimed allies told him they "would be honored" if Iran itself joined the accords. "If Iran signs 'it will be the most important Deal that any of these Great, but always in Conflict Countries, will ever sign,'" he wrote. "Nothing in the past, or in the future, will surpass it."

Friedman posed the question: "On what planet of the Milky Way Galaxy would this regime in Tehran, which is practically founded on hatred of Israel, just up and make peace with it after this war?"

The proposal was so unexpected and so divorced from Middle Eastern political reality that Friedman labeled it as "unhinged" and a cause for concern.

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Trump officials to send Ebola-exposed Americans to Kenya rather than bring them home: NYT

The Trump administration wants to send U.S. citizens living abroad who are exposed to the deadly Ebola virus to Kenya rather than bring them home, according to new reporting by the New York Times.

Three people familiar with the Trump administration's plans spoke with the NYT, which noted that previous administrations brought Americans home for observation and treatment.

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Republican governor squirms when pressed about impact of Trump's policies on his state

Republican Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo avoided answering a direct question about President Donald Trump's tariff policies and their impact on the tourism-reliant state during a recent interview.

Lombardo spoke to 2 News Nevada in an exclusive interview last week and appeared visibly uncomfortable with denouncing Trump's tariffs, which have led to a tourism crisis in the state that heavily depends on travelers, especially in cities like Las Vegas. The loss of global tourism has hit the state's economy and become a serious concern among Nevada lawmakers ahead of the midterm elections this fall, according to Politico.

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'Surprise rejection' hammers Trump as red state throws redistricting push in trash

South Carolina's Republican-majority Senate voted to stop a measure to push a new congressional map forward — an open rejection of President Donald Trump's demand for redistricting, according to reports.

As early voting began on Tuesday for the already scheduled June primary, a measure to accept a redrawn congressional map failed in the state's Senate in a 20-24 vote, NBC News reported.

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'This is a disaster': Trump's stated goals from February thrown in his face on MS NOW

The number of goals Donald Trump set out on Feb. 28 when he launched the unprovoked attack on Iran was held up to the light by MS NOW’s David Rohde on Tuesday morning, who made clear the president's war so far has been a failure.

Well beyond the Strait of Hormuz stalemate that has the Trump administration grasping for an answer, Rohde singled out five claims that the president made when he announced the attack, with only one coming to fruition -- and even that appears doubtful after this weekend's events.

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Trump just went 'all in' while holding 'weak hand' with threat to foreign allies: MS NOW

Middle Eastern nations that were on the receiving end of a threat from Donald Trump over the holiday weekend called his bluff because he no longer carries the weight he thinks he does.

That was the claim made by MS NOW host Joe Scarborough and Washington Post columnist David Ignatius on Monday morning after the affected nations balked.

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Ex-GOP strategist blasts Trump and MAGA military infiltration: ‘America’s most despicable'

Steve Schmidt, former Republican operative, had a scathing response to the Trump administration and MAGA on Memorial Day.

The co-founder of the anti-Trump group The Lincoln Project described "MAGA's ultimate disgrace" and called President Donald Trump and his White House "America's most despicable men and women."

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US strikes Iranian missile site and boats near Strait of Hormuz in 'self-defense': report

The United States confirmed it had targeted military facilities in Iran on Monday in "self defense," CNN reported.

Military officials have confirmed they targeted a series of Iranian facilities in Bandar Abbas responsible for attacking U.S. war ships in the Strait of Hormuz, according to CNN. Explosions could be heard near the base and in other cities.

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'He’s desperate': Ex-insider reveals Trump's eagerness to end war being used against him

Former National Security Advisor John Bolton warned on Monday that Iran can sense how "desperate" President Donald Trump is to secure a deal that its leaders are "playing him."

Bolton told CNN anchor Pamela Brown that as negotiations drag on, Tehran has sensed Trump's weaknesses — and that the president might not fully understand Iran's level of "fanaticism of what's left of the regime and the people who are in power." Bolton argued that Trump's worldview throughout his life has been that he can negotiate with anyone, and that's not the case with this military conflict and adversary.

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WHO fires back at Rubio over criticism and cites 'lack of understanding' over Ebola crisis

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros ⁠Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned Monday that the swiftly spreading Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda “will get worse before it gets better,” as a deadly delay in detecting infections has responders to the epidemic “playing catch-up.”

“The outbreak is spreading rapidly,” Tedros said during a virtual ministerial meeting on the matter. “So far, 101 cases have been confirmed in DRC, with 10 confirmed deaths. But we know the epidemic in DRC is much larger. There are now more than 900 suspected cases and 220 suspected deaths.”

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Trump's close ally 'more isolated than ever' and considering abandoning 2028 run: report

Vice President JD Vance has been put in a tough position and has been considering whether he wants to run for president in 2028 or give up on the move, according to a new report from The Daily Mail published on Monday.

With National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard announcing her exit from the Trump administration last week, Vance could be in a more vulnerable position as his "most senior non-interventionist ally is gone." Vance, like Gabbard, had expressed skepticism and concerns about the Iran war behind closed doors, according to insiders.

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