President Donald Trump will welcome Bahrain Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa to the White House on Wednesday. It’s the latest example of how the president has courted Arab leaders from the Gulf, where Trump recently visited.

The United States and Bahrain have signed an agreement that will pave the way for the two countries to enter into a formal civilian-nuclear cooperation deal as the Trump administration ramps up efforts to enhance global energy security.

Here’s the latest:

Trump slams his own supporters as he tries to move past Epstein ‘SCAM’

Trump faces mounting criticism from his political base over the Justice Department’s failure to release much-hyped records in Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking investigation.

“Their new SCAM is what we will forever call the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax, and my PAST supporters have bought into this ‘bulls—,’ hook, line, and sinker,” he wrote on his Truth Social site Wednesday morning.

He goes on to say: “Let these weaklings continue forward and do the Democrats work, don’t even think about talking of our incredible and unprecedented success, because I don’t want their support anymore! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

▶ Read more about Trump’s Epstein crisis

Rubio says US ‘very concerned’ by surge in Israel-Syria violence, seeking a restoration of ceasefire

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters he had just been on the phone with “relevant parties” and hoped to have an update later Wednesday.

“We want the fighting to stop because we had a ceasefire,” he said. “Overnight it broke down, so we’re talking with both sides, all the relevant sides, and hopefully we can bring it to a conclusion.”

Earlier Wednesday, the Israeli military launched are airstrikes in the heart of Damascus, hitting the Syrian Defense Ministry headquarters and near the presidential palace in the hills outside the capital.

Clashes have raged for days in the southern Syrian city of Sweida between government forces and Druze armed groups, and Israel has launched dozens of strikes targeting government troops and convoys. Israel says the strikes are in support of the religious minority group, and has vowed to escalate its involvement.

▶ Read more about the fighting in Syria

Trump to sign Louisiana senator’s fentanyl bill into law

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., asks a question during a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee hearing, Wednesday, June 18, 2025, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib)

Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy’s office says he has been pushing the HALT Fentanyl Act since 2021.

The bill would make permanent a 2018 emergency rule that classifies the synthetic opioid and its knockoffs as Schedule I controlled substances. That change would result in harsher sentences for possession of the drug.

The White House has a bill-signing ceremony scheduled for Wednesday afternoon.

US and Bahrain pave the way for a civilian-nuclear cooperation deal

The U.S. and Bahrain signed the agreement as the Trump administration ramps up efforts to enhance global energy security.

The deal will open up negotiations on what is known as a “123 agreement.” It will allow U.S. and American companies to invest in and construct nuclear energy projects in Bahrain, an island nation off the coast of Saudi Arabia with a population of around 1.5 million people.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Bahraini Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani signed the memorandum of understanding on Wednesday, after Rubio signed a similar agreement with Malaysia last week.

“The United States is prepared to be partner with any nation on Earth that wants to pursue a civil nuclear program that clearly is not geared towards weapons and or threatening the security of their neighbors,” Rubio said.

Huckabee makes surprise visit to Netanyahu’s trial

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee’s visit to the courthouse was a rare act of involvement in his host country’s internal affairs. It comes after Trump condemned the trial as a “witch hunt.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is accused of fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in three separate cases.

Huckabee said Wednesday’s appearance was a matter of “representing what the president has said repeatedly.”

“The president has made his position very clear,” Huckabee said ahead of his visit to the courthouse in Tel Aviv. “It’s a personal thing for him. He considers the prime minister a friend.”

After the visit, Huckabee reposted Trump’s call for the trial to be thrown out and added the comment: “My conclusion? Trump is right…again.”

▶ Read more about Trump and Netanyahu’s relationship

A look inside a lab making the advanced fuel to power growing US nuclear energy ambitions

Near signs that warn of radioactive risk at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a half-dozen workers from the nuclear power company X-energy are making what appear to be gray billiard balls. Inside, they’re packed with thousands of tiny black spheres that each contain a speck of uranium enriched beyond what today’s power plants use.

The United States is chasing a new age of nuclear power that banks on domestic production of reactor fuel like X-energy is making, and though the work at Oak Ridge is unfolding across just 3,000 square feet, X-energy and others are already revving up for big production.

President Trump set a goal of quadrupling domestic production of nuclear power within the next 25 years, signing executive orders in May to speed up development. A new wave of advanced nuclear reactors could be operational around 2030.

But just like cars won’t run without gas, those plants won’t run without fuel. To expand nuclear energy long-term, the nation must maximize its nuclear fuel production, according to Trump.

▶ Read more about US nuclear energy ambitions

Wholesale inflation can indicate where inflation might be headed

Economists also watch it because some of its components, notably measures of health care and financial services, flow into the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge — the personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, index.

Inflation began to flare up for the first time in decades in 2021, as the economy roared back with unexpected strength from COVID-19 lockdowns. That prompted the Fed to raise its benchmark interest rate 11 times in 2022 and 2023. The higher borrowing costs helped bring inflation down from the peaks it reached in 2022, and last year the Fed felt comfortable enough with the progress to cut rates three times.

But it has turned cautious this year while it waits to see the inflationary impact of Trump’s trade policies. Trump has aggressively stepped up pressure on the Fed to cut rates, a move that threatens the central bank’s independence.

US producer prices unchanged, with wholesale inflation remaining under control

U.S. wholesale inflation cooled last month, despite worries that Trump’s tariffs would push prices higher for goods before they reach consumers.

The Labor Department reported Wednesday that its producer price index — which tracks inflation before it hits consumers — was unchanged last month from May and up 2.3% from a year earlier. Both measures came in below what economists had expected.

Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core producer prices were also unchanged from May and up 2.6% from June 2024.

The report on wholesale inflation came a day after the Labor Department reported that consumer prices last month rose 2.7% from June 2024, the biggest year-over-year gain since February, as Trump’s sweeping tariffs pushed up the cost of everything from groceries to appliances.

Trump’s schedule, according to the White House

Some Republicans remain skeptical of the rescissions package

Maine Sen. Susan Collins, the Republican chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said she was particularly concerned about a lack of specifics from the White House.

“Nobody really knows what program reductions are in it,” Collins said. “That isn’t because we haven’t had time to review the bill. Instead, the problem is that OMB has never provided the details that would normally be part of this process.”

The Office of Management and Budget acts as a nerve center for the White House, developing its budget, policy priorities and agency rule-making.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said she didn’t want the Senate to be going through numerous rounds of rescissions.

“We are lawmakers. We should be legislating,” Murkowski said. “What we’re getting now is a direction from the White House and being told: ‘This is the priority and we want you to execute on it. We’ll be back with you with another round.’ I don’t accept that.”

Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Collins and Murkowski joined with Democrats in voting against the Senate taking up the measure, but the large majority of Republicans were supportive of Trump’s request.

Trump administration says it is ending deployment of 2,000 National Guard troops in Los Angeles

Chief Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell announced the decision Tuesday in a statement.

Roughly 4,000 National Guard troops and 700 Marines had been deployed. It was not immediately clear how long the rest would stay. The troops were tasked with protecting federal buildings and guarding immigration agents as they carry out arrests.

The president ordered the deployment of about 4,000 California National Guard troops and 700 active-duty Marines in early June to respond to protests against immigration raids in and around Los Angeles.

Their deployment went against the wishes of Gov. Gavin Newsom, who sued to stop it.

A district court judge initially said Trump acted illegally in deploying the Guard over Newsom’s opposition, but an appeals court said the administration could keep control of the troops. The case is ongoing.

Newsom said the National Guard’s deployment to L.A. has pulled troops away from their families and civilian work “to serve as political pawns for the President in Los Angeles.”

Employees at the nation’s consumer financial watchdog say it’s become toothless under Trump

The lights are on at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and employees still get paid. But in practice the bureau has been mostly inoperable for nearly six months. CFPB employees say they essentially spend the workday sitting on their hands, forbidden from doing any work by a White House directive.

The bureau is supposed to help oversee banks and financial services companies and take enforcement action in case of wrongdoing. During its 15-year existence, the CFPB has returned roughly $21 billion to consumers who were cheated by financial services companies.

Instead its main function now seems to be undoing the rulemaking and law enforcement work that was done under previous administrations, including in Trump’s first term.

One employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the directive forbids staffers from discussing their jobs publicly, said outsiders would be amazed at how little work is being done. Employees are reluctant even to talk to one another, for fear a conversation would be considered a violation of the directive.

Another worker described the drastic shift in mission, from trying to protect consumers to doing nothing, as “quite demoralizing.”

▶ Read more about the CFPB and some of its consumer cases dropped under Trump

America’s only rare earth producer gets a boost from Apple and Pentagon agreements

MP Materials announced a new $500 million deal with the tech giant Tuesday to produce more of the powerful magnets used in iPhones as well as other high-tech products like electric vehicles.

The news follows last week’s announcement that the Defense Department would invest $400 million in shares of the Las Vegas-based company, establish a floor for the price of key elements and ensure that all magnets made at a new plant in the first 10 years are purchased.

That unusual direct investment makes the government MP Materials’ largest shareholder.

“This is the kind of long-term commitment needed to reshape global rare earth supply chains,” Benchmark Mineral Intelligence analyst Neha Mukherjee said in a research note on the Pentagon deal.

Rare earths are a key concern in ongoing trade talks. China dominates the market and imposed new limits on exports after Trump announced widespread tariffs. When shipments dried up, the two sides sat down in London.

Trump administration fires 17 immigration court judges across 10 states, union says

Seventeen immigration court judges have been fired in recent days, according to the union that represents them, as the administration pushes forward with its mass deportations of immigrants.

“It’s outrageous and against the public interest that at the same time Congress has authorized 800 immigration judges, we are firing large numbers of immigration judges without cause,” said Matt Biggs, president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, which represents the judges.

The firings come as the courts have been increasingly at the center of the administration’s hard-line immigration enforcement efforts, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers arresting people as they appear for court proceedings.

A spokeswoman for the Executive Office of Immigration Review, which is the part of the Justice Department that oversees the courts, said via email that the office would not comment on the firings.

Judge says Trump administration can’t use travel ban to keep 80 refugees out of the US

U.S. District Judge Jamal Whitehead in Seattle said in his ruling late Monday that the president’s June order banning entry by people from 12 countries “expressly states” that it does not limit the ability of people to seek refugee status.

The order includes a provision that says nothing in it “shall be construed to limit the ability of an individual to seek asylum, refugee status, withholding of removal, or protection under the CAT, consistent with the laws of the United States.”

In his ruling, Whitehead said “by its plain terms, the Proclamation excludes refugees from its scope.”

Barring refugees from entering would limit their ability to seek refugee status and therefore run counter to the order, the judge added.

He ordered the administration to immediately resume processing 80 “presumptively protected refugees” who were rejected based on the travel ban.

The State Department did not immediately have comment Tuesday.

Department of Homeland Security criticizes court ruling delaying end of protections for Afghans

The appeals court decision temporarily delayed the department from removing protections from some Afghans living in the U.S.

DHS said in May that it was ending Temporary Protected Status for 11,700 people from Afghanistan in 60 days. That status had allowed them to work and meant the government couldn’t deport them.

It was supposed to expire Monday, but an appeals court stepped in late in the day and issued a one-week stay while it hears arguments from both sides.

Reacting Tuesday, DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement: “Temporary Protected Status (TPS) was never intended to be a de facto asylum program, yet it has been abused as one for decades.”

“The Trump administration is restoring integrity to our immigration system to keep our homeland and its people safe,” it continued, “and we have the law, the facts, and common sense on our side.”

Republicans look to tweak Trump’s request for $9.4 billion in spending cuts

Senate Republicans worked Tuesday to slightly scale back the president’s request for the cuts in previously approved spending as they tried to build momentum before a key test vote.

The amended package removes proposed cuts to a program known as PEPFAR that is credited with saving millions of lives since its creation under then-President George W. Bush to combat HIV/AIDS.

The change could help the bill’s prospects. Congress has until Friday to get a bill to Trump’s desk for his signature or the spending stands.

The president is looking to claw back money for foreign aid programs targeted by his Department of Government Efficiency and for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The change preserving about $400 million for PEPFAR takes the total savings in the measure down to about $9 billion.

Bondi dodges questions about Jeffrey Epstein and FBI deputy director

The attorney general is seeking to press ahead with a business-as-usual approach in the face of right-wing outrage that has plunged the Justice Department into turmoil.

Pressed by reporters during an announcement about drug seizures, Bondi sidestepped questions about the fallout of the administration’s decision not to release more records related Epstein investigation. Amid calls from some members of Trump’s base for her resignation, Bondi made clear she has no plans to step down.

“I’m going to be here for as long as the president wants me here,” Bondi said. “And I believe he’s made that crystal clear.”

Bondi was also asked about Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino, with whom she clashed last week over the Epstein files. Bondi would not answer whether she believes he should remain in his role, saying only that she would not discuss personnel matters.

China does have wind farms. Trump claims otherwise

Trump falsely claimed that China is lacking in wind farms, despite its role in their production.

“China makes windmills. But how many wind farms do you see in China?” he asked. “I haven’t seen any lately. Sort of crazy.”

China is the world’s largest manufacturer of wind turbines, producing more than half of the supply. However, it is also installing them in China at a record pace.

In total, China has 1.3 terawatts of utility-scale wind and solar capacity in development, which could generate more electricity than neighboring Japan consumed in all of 2023, according to a report from the Global Energy Monitor released last week.

Trump: ‘We are way ahead of China’

The president boasted during a summit on energy and AI that the U.S is far ahead of China when it comes to developments in artificial intelligence.

“We believe America’s destiny is to dominate every industry and be the first in technology,” he said.

Democrats say Trump’s State Department cuts undermine US at home and abroad

Congressional Democrats are criticizing the Trump administration’s budget and personnel cuts at the State Department, saying they rob the country of massive expertise and institutional knowledge and damage America’s standing abroad in the world.

Top Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs Committee took issue with defenses of cuts offered by the deputy Secretary of State for Management Michael Rigas, who argued that the budget and personnel reductions were needed to streamline diplomacy and make it more efficient. Rigas’ testimony was the first from a senior department official since Friday when more than 1,300 career civil servants and foreign service officers were fired as part of the administration’s broader revamp of the executive branch of government.

“This is a dark time for American diplomacy,” said the top Democrat on the panel, Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York. “President Trump continues to isolate the United States, alienate our allies and create space for our adversaries like Russia and China to fill the void.”

Rigas said a proposed roughly 50% cut in the department’s budget is intended not to punish diplomats but rather to “make the State Department a more efficient and effective organizations better able to advance the core interests of the American people.”

House Speaker breaks with Trump on Epstein saga

House Speaker Mike Johnson appears to be breaking with Trump over the handling of the Jeffrey Epstein criminal investigation and is calling for the Justice Department to “put everything out there and let the people decide.”

The Louisiana Republican said Attorney General Pam Bondi needs to come forward and explain what happened. Bondi earlier this year had made claims that officials were reviewing a “truckload” of evidence, but last week the Justice Department concluded that Epstein did not leave behind a “client list” and that public disclosure of more information would not be appropriate.

The lack of revelations has angered many MAGA loyalists, particularly after some had expected more transparency and accountability based on previous comments from Trump during the campaign.

“The White House and the White House team are privy to facts that I don’t know. This isn’t my lane. I haven’t been involved in that, but I agree with the sentiment to put it out there,” Johnson told conservative podcaster Benny Johnson.

Tens of billions for Pennsylvania

Trump announced a $92 billion investment from 20 technical, agricultural, and energy companies in Pennsylvania.

He described it as the “biggest private investment in Pennsylvania history,” calling it a “triumphant day for the people of the commonwealth and the United States of America.”