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Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei speaks to the crowd during a commemoration ceremony held to mark the first anniversary of the death of former President Ebrahim Raisi and his entourage in Tehran, Iran, on May 20, 2025.
What We’re Watching: Iran rejects US nuclear offer, Musk-Trump divorce goes public, Mongolian PM resigns
Iranian leader pours cold water on nuclear deal
US President Donald Trump’s hopes of clinching a quick and easy nuclear deal with Iran appear to be dashed, after Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei described the White House proposal – sent on Saturday – as “rude and arrogant.” The rejection comes days after a UN nuclear watchdog reported that Iran’s uranium is approaching weapons-grade levels. Even so, “Iran isn’t rejecting diplomacy and talks are likely to continue,” says Eurasia Group’s Iran expert Gregory Brew.
A Big Beautiful ‘Abomination’
“A disgusting abomination” – that’s how Tesla owner Elon Musk described the House Republicans’ “Big Beautiful Bill” on Tuesday afternoon, as his divorce from Trump grows increasingly public. Following Musk’s comment, some of the very people who passed the House bill are also now expressing buyer’s remorse. It looks like the chainsaw-wielding Musk has instead turned to throwing wrenches…
Mongolian PM steps down
Prime Minister Luvsannamsrai Oyun-Erdene has resigned following protests about alleged corruption. Mongolia is a sprawling, resource-rich former-Soviet satellite surrounded entirely by Russia and China. Unlike anyone else in the neighborhood, it has maintained a functioning multiparty democracy since the early 1990s, but this resignation marks a setback. A successor to Oyun-Erdene will be named within 30 days.Polish presidential candidate Karol Nawrocki, flanked by his family, during an election night rally in Warsaw, Poland, on June 1, 2025.
What We’re Watching this week: Poland retains a right-wing president, UN Security Council to vote on new members, & More
A conservative comeback in Poland
In a major blow to Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s hopes of finally enacting his liberal and pro-Europe agenda, Law and Justice-backed candidate Karol Nawrocki defeated liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski in the final round of Poland’s presidential election. Nawrocki won 50.89% of the vote in the head-to-head runoff. His win means a conservative will retain the presidency – Andrzej Duda had served for the previous decade – so there will continue to be a cap on what Tusk can achieve, given the president’s veto power.
Five new countries to enter the UN Security Council villa
The United Nations Security Council on Tuesday will elect five new temporary members to serve for the next two years, with Algeria, Guyana, South Korea, Sierra Leone, and Slovenia each set to end their terms this year. The 15-member council, which has five permanent members — China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States — tries to soothe global disputes, but has faced criticism for its failure to reform.
Guess who’s back?
The US Senate is back in session after its two-week Memorial Day hiatus, and it has something major on its docket: Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill. Before the break, the House passed the bill by a single vote, but Republicans in the upper chamber have already said they’d like to make some alterations. If they do, the House will have to vote on the bill again. Penny for your thoughts, Speaker Mike Johnson?U.S. President Donald Trump speaks next to U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), on the day of a closed House Republican Conference meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 20, 2025.
We read the “Big, Beautiful, Bill” so you don’t have to
Republicans have a math problem—and it’s turning into a political one. As the party in full control of government moves to advance its sweeping policy agenda, internal divisions are surfacing over what to prioritize: tax cuts or budget cuts.
On Tuesday, Donald Trump met with House Republicans in an effort to rally them behind the so-called “One Big, Beautiful Bill”—a 1,116-page budget package. The bill would boost border security, and make Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent. Those tax cuts are projected to add over $5 trillion to the national deficit.
This is the problem: How do you give funds to expensive policy priorities, without ballooning the deficit – which many Republicans adamantly oppose?
Enter the budget hawks. The House Freedom Caucus sees the Republican unified government as a rare opportunity to dramatically scale back government spending. But keeping the Trump tax cuts in place while reducing the deficit would require deep budget cuts. And despite efforts to target government “waste,” it's nearly impossible to achieve the scale of savings they want without touching some of the biggest drivers of federal spending: Medicare, Medicaid, defense, and Social Security.
With cuts to defense and Social Security — the largest two expenditure categories — largely off the table because of their near-universal popularity among Republican voters, the Freedom Caucus has zeroed in on Medicaid, which funds medical care for low-income people. Their proposals include stricter work requirements, excluding undocumented immigrants from coverage, and reducing the amount of Medicaid funding that states get from the federal government. These changes could leave millions more Americans without health insurance.
But moderate Republicans are pushing back, warning that such drastic cuts could be politically damaging. Polls show that 75% of Republicans view Medicaid favorably, and the program is more prevalent in red states than blue.
As GOP communications strategist Douglas Heye put it, “They could be biting their own voters,” if the cuts are too steep. Trump seems to understand this political calculus. In Tuesday’s closed-door meeting, he reportedly told Republicans: “Don’t fuck around with Medicaid.”
Another major sticking point is the cap on state and local tax, AKA SALT, deductions. A group of moderate Republicans from high-tax states has warned they’ll oppose the bill unless the cap is raised—an adjustment that would further reduce the federal revenue needed to offset the growing debt.
But if you’re thinking, surely you don’t need 1,116 pages just for some tax proposals and Medicaid referendums, you’re correct. There are a lot of other policies in this bill worth knowing about:
- It increases the debt limit by $4 trillion.
- It creates MAGA accounts – short for Money Account for Growth and Advancement – which would authorize the Treasury to create tax-preferred savings accounts for children, and give each child $1,000 initial deposit.
- It eliminates most of Biden’s clean energy provisions, like the electric-car tax credit, and strikes the majority of the programs in the $1 trillion Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.
- It appropriates $500 million to update government agencies with AI technology.
- It eliminates the $200 excise tax on firearm silencers.
All of that extra pork could be on the table as negotiations heat up.
“When you're in this stage of negotiations, it’s not about how much gets added—it’s about what gets cut,” says Heye.
The House is expected to start making final cuts in the early hours of Wednesday —with voting as early as 1 AM— with debate stretching into Thursday. Holdouts are pushing to get the bill to a place they can claim as a victory for their faction -- before ultimately, and inevitably, falling in line. The goal is to send the bill to the Senate before the Memorial Day weekend kicks off.
But the fight is far from over. The Senate will have its own priorities—and its own fractures — to manage. Experts say the chance of a bill, no matter how big or beautiful, is slim before July 4th.
The Graphic Truth: Does the child tax credit alleviate child poverty in the US?
Buried behind the headline provisions of the House Republicans’ “Big, Beautiful Bill” is a clause that increases the child tax credit from $2,000 to $2,500 per child per year. If the bill passes, it would mark the second time that President Donald Trump has raised the credit: he increased it from $1,000 to $2,000 in 2017 as part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. The chart shows the level of the benefit over the last 15 years, and compares it to child poverty rates.
Members of US and Russian delegations, led by US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Russian President Vladimir Putin, attend a meeting in Moscow, Russia, on April 25, 2025.
Putin and Zelensky’s diplomatic dance
Both Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky have called for direct Russia-Ukraine talks in Istanbul this Thursday.
Behind these calls for talks, though, is a battle over whether the US will continue funding Zelensky’s army.
Here’s the bottom-line: Putin won’t stop the war. He hopes instead that US President Donald Trump will grow frustrated (or bored) with the quagmire and withdraw support for Kyiv. That, Putin believes, would allow Russia to seize more of Ukraine.
Zelensky will keep calling for a ceasefire to persuade Trump – who toyed with the idea of coming to Istanbul on Thursday – that Putin’s the problem, in hopes of keeping some US support in place.
In the Philippines, Duterte edges latest edition of family feud
The battle for power in the Philippines is fought between two families: the Marcoses and Dutertes. Monday’s midterm elections favored the latter.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s partners look set to retain the Senate, but allies of Vice President Sara Duterte – who faces an impeachment trial – won more seats than expected. Duterte’s conviction is now less of a surefire bet.
In spite of the politics, House Republicans seek extra Medicaid requirements
When one House committee released its plan for adjusting Medicaid, it omitted the cuts that some ardent deficit hawks in the Republican Party sought. However, it still includes changes that could leave millions of recipients uncovered.
Politically, this is a risky move – polls show huge support for the welfare program. Fiscal conservatives in the GOP, though, will feel that the party must do it now, while they hold unified control of Congress.
US House Speaker Mike Johnson talks with reporters in the US Capitol on May 8, 2025.
GOP retreats on Medicaid cuts
US House Speaker Mike Johnson is walking a tightrope on Medicaid — and wobbling.
After intense pushback from moderate Republicans, Johnson abandoned some of the GOP’s most aggressive proposals to cut federal funding for Medicaid, including a plan that would cap the federal government’s per capita grants to states for the program.
The background: A budget framework passed earlier this year commits Congress to slashing some $1.5 trillion in spending in order to fund the extension of President Donald Trump’s first term tax cuts without further ballooning the deficit.
Why the climbdown?The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 5.5 million Americans would lose coverage under the mooted cost cuts. More than 70 million Americans are currently enrolled in Medicaid, a program that is viewed positively by nearly 80% of the country, according to recent polls.
What’s the president’s position? Trump has said he will not touch entitlements, including social security and Medicaid, which further narrows the GOP’s realistic options.
The president has imposed a deadline of Memorial Day for a “big beautiful” budget bill. We’re watching to see how the Republicans close the gap, without turning off the tap.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland on February 20, 2025
Will Republicans really slash Medicaid?
This week, House Republicans are expected to vote on a budget measure that would fund an extension of President Donald Trump’s first-term tax cuts by taking an axe to one of America’s key entitlement programs: Medicaid.
What’s Medicaid? A joint federal and state program that funds medical care for low-income people. About a quarter of Americans are enrolled directly, and two-thirds say they or their family members have benefitted from the program.
What would the measure do? Slash $2 trillion from the federal budget over the next decade, including about $800 billion from Medicaid. The Medicaid cuts would come by placing per-capita limits on federal funding, narrowing states’ tax options for funding Medicaid, and imposing work requirements on recipients.
The debate: The GOP says these measures will root out waste and abuse, shift more of the burden onto states, which know their own needs better, and incentivize recipients to get off the dole.
Critics say the sweeping reductions would harm the poor by slashing their access to health care while funding tax cuts that disproportionately benefit the wealthy.
What’s Trump saying? He said he would “love and cherish” Medicaid, along with its related old-age benefit programs, Medicare and Social Security, which the GOP has said it wouldn’t touch. But Trump has also endorsed the budget resolution.
How the people see it: Strong majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents view Medicaid favorably, according to recent polling by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
The GOP’s dilemma: The party is committed to cuts in taxes and spending, but several GOP districts with large populations of Medicaid recipients are up in arms. And given the GOP’s razor-thin House majority, and unified Democratic opposition, the Republicans can’t afford to lose more than a single vote in the House.
Hunter Biden, son of U.S. President Joe Biden, departs federal court n Wilmington, Delaware.
House set to vote on Biden impeachment inquiry
So far, it looks like the House GOP has the votes, with many of the Republicans who were skeptical six months ago – most from Biden-won districts – coming on board. While they are still concerned about potential backlash in their districts, the desire to force subpoenas and White House cooperation is changing their minds.
The pro-inquiry ranks got a boost on Friday when Hunter Biden was charged by a federal court for allegedly failing to pay millions in income taxes. The House has subpoenaed Biden to testify in a closed-door hearing on Wednesday. Biden agreed on the condition that the hearing be public, citing concerns that his statements would be taken out of context. The House refused, setting up the potential for a legal showdown if Biden fails to appear.
While there has not yet been any hard evidence of wrongdoing by the president himself, Republicans frequently point to a 2018 video, where President Biden speaks about withholding a loan until guarantee until a prominent Ukrainian official – with links to a Ukrainian gas company that Hunter is on the board of – was fired. Republicans need to build a bridge between Hunter Biden’s vices and their accusations that his father committed high crimes and misdemeanors. The GOP points to potential links between If they fail to do so, Republicans risk the inquiry appearing to be a form of revenge for the impeachments of Donald Trump, which could jeopardize Republicans in swing districts.