This is C.I.'s "The Snapshot" for today:
In igniting a war against Iran on Feb. 28, President Trump billed the U.S. campaign as an unprecedented step toward transforming the Middle East and terminating the threat from what he called a “wicked, radical dictatorship.”
Roughly 100 days later, as the United States and Iran have reached a somewhat vague memorandum of understanding to end the war, skeptics are expressing bafflement over what exactly has transformed.
Neither the war nor the agreement ended what U.S. and Israeli officials regard as the main threats emanating from Iran. The country’s nuclear program, while heavily damaged, was not eliminated — its fate punted to future negotiation.
The same goes for its ballistic missiles, which the deal does not address. Iran’s authoritarian regime endured, albeit with new leaders. Its proxies remain a threat to the region. Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militia in Lebanon, persisted in attacking each other.
U.S. President Donald Trump was forced to backtrack on a previous claim that the U.S. doesn't "need" oil from the Middle East.
An embarrassing video clip montage created by MediasTouch shows Trump making remarks on at least two occasions amid the Iran war that the U.S. has "so much oil and gas" and is "totally independent of the Middle East." However, while speaking at length about the Iran deal struck earlier this week, Trump admitted that global oil reserves were running low, which put pressure on the White House to strike a deal with Iran to reopen the Hormuz Strait.
CBS News’s Margaret Brennan began her interview with UN Ambassador Mike Waltz Sunday by citing some uncomfortable statistics on American attitudes toward the Iran war.
“Our CBS News poll out this morning shows that more than three-quarters of Americans want to end the conflict now,” Brennan said of the war with Iran — as a graphic on screen showed the exact number to be 78%. “With 69% saying the conflict with Iran was not worth the costs for the U.S. More than half — 57% — say the president’s war with Iran created more problems than it solved. And two in three say the administration reached agreement with Iran mainly because it wanted the conflict to be over.”
Brennan turned to Waltz saying, “Ambassador, the war is unpopular, as you just heard, but how it ends matters, as you know.”
She continued, “CBS’s Olivia Gazis is reporting that senior members of Trump’s national security team, including Secretary [Marco] Rubio, remain doubtful Iran will comply with this deal’s terms. The CIA director presented [President Donald] Trump with intelligence indicating inconsistencies with Iran’s commitments. So, if even the president’s own team doubts this is a win, how do you sell this to the public?”
This morning, Vice President JD Vance touched down in Switzerland for the first round of talks with Iran. The stated goal: extending last week’s interim mediated ceasefire and the Memorandum of Understanding signed by President Donald Trump into a more permanent peace in the 110-day US-Israeli war on Iran. But as those talks continued, Trump lost no time in taking to social media and Fox News to threaten Iran.
“Iran must immediately stop their highly paid PROXIES in Lebanon from causing trouble,” Trump wrote on his platform Truth Social Sunday morning. “Iran must immediately stop their highly paid PROXIES in Lebanon from causing trouble. If they don’t, we’ll hit Iran very hard again, just like we did last week, only harder!!!”
Lebanon’s civil defense reported that Israeli strikes had killed at least 16 people on Saturday morning, and the country’s health ministry said at least 47 people were killed on Friday. In response, Iran once again closed the Strait of Hormuz shipping pathway, which before the war carried a fifth of the world’s oil and gas, saying the US violated its deal to end the war by allowing Israel to continue to bomb Lebanon.
Meanwhile, in the Bürgenstock resort near Lake Lucerne where the talks are being held, Vance said that “great progress” was being made, without being explicit about the steps that had been taken. He noted that the gathering would “allow us to sit together as teams for the first time in history,” with the goal of turning “over a new leaf to transform our relationship with the people of Iran, and to extend an outstretched hand.”
Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, a lead negotiator, said Iran’s military is prepared to react to Trump’s verbal aggression. “They better be careful with their statements; our armed forces are ready to respond in a different way,” he wrote on X. Iranian officials reportedly walked out of Sunday’s talks, protesting Trump’s threats.
A Washington Post report today reveals the devastating human toll of the war. “Months after the war began with a wave of US and Israeli airstrikes on February 28, the scale of civilian casualties and destruction in Iran remains difficult to measure,” Post reporters Dylan Moriarty and N. Kirkpatrick wrote.
In a single airstrike, 100 buildings were damaged in one civilian neighborhood in Tehran. Almost a third of the city has been hit by US and Israeli missiles. One report on civilian harm puts the death toll from late February to mid-April at 1,701 civilians, including 307 children. Across both Iran and Lebanon, over 7,000 people have been killed since mid-February, according to official casualty figures.
Agricultural workers historically form a massive pillar of Republican support. That traditional loyalty is cracking ahead of the midterm elections.
According to The Washington Post, more than 300 farms filed for bankruptcy last year. Agricultural debt will likely hit a staggering $624.7 billion.
Rural approval for President Donald Trump fell to 50 percent in a recent Reuters-Ipsos poll. High fertilizer prices linked to the conflict in Iran have left families struggling.
Nebraska farmer Scott Thomsen shared his shifting views with the newspaper.
“I’m pretty disenfranchised as a voter right now, and I think I’m not the only one,” Thomsen said. “Either I’m going to completely sit these elections out, or I’m going to vote down the line, incumbents out.”
Midterms are the start of November. Basically four months from now, people will be voting. And Chump's not giving them reasons to vote for Republicans. His actions have annoyed and pushed away voters. John Stoehr observes:
Donald Trump has been dealt a humiliating blow by a new poll about his Iran peace deal.
Trump announced the long-awaited peace deal during his trip to the G7 conference in France last week.
The 14-point memorandum of understanding, which halts the fighting for 60 days, follows months of negotiations, with Washington and Tehran struggling to reach agreement on such key issues as the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz and the future of Iran’s nuclear program.
But his opponents have blasted the arrangement for containing significant concessions to the Iranian regime while deferring U.S. demands to later negotiations.
New polling shows that most Americans do not believe the deal has accomplished its primary objective.
According to a CBS News/YouGov survey conducted June 17-19, 2026, among 2,519 U.S. adults, 69 percent of Americans believe Iran’s nuclear program has not been stopped, undermining one of the central justifications for the military campaign.
After the Trump administration upended the world’s largest foreign aid provider last year, terminating thousands of programs and firing nearly all of its staff, its plan for the agency was clear: Eliminate it entirely.
But because it is a congressionally created agency, President Donald Trump needed lawmakers’ permission to do so. So this year, Trump officials asked Congress for permission to shutter the U.S. Agency for International Development and dramatically reduce federal spending on food, medicine and lifesaving work around the world.
Congress said no. Lawmakers, who hold the government’s purse strings and have oversight of federal agencies, wanted USAID to remain, even in its diminished form. They detailed precisely how much the State Department should spend on foreign aid and for what, including $9.4 billion on global health to treat and prevent maladies like HIV, tuberculosis and malaria, and more than $5 billion on emergency humanitarian aid. They also insisted on regular, detailed reports about how the administration was spending the money.
Trump signed the bill, enshrining their orders into law.
Now, eight months into the fiscal year, Trump officials are failing to follow many of those orders, ProPublica has found. Officials have delayed spending on global health, have not issued funds for some projects and have labeled money destined for humanitarian aid as “unallocated” to control how it can be spent, according to a ProPublica review of government records and interviews with legal experts, current and former government employees, and members of Congress. And when lawmakers have asked about their actions, officials often have not responded.
The White House and Congress have been battling over federal spending since Day 1 of the Trump administration, setting up a constitutional crisis — a breakdown of the division of power among the three branches of the federal government, according to several legal scholars.
Nowhere has that crisis been more visible than with foreign aid. Last year, the administration took the unprecedented step of gutting USAID, terminating thousands of aid programs and letting funding expire, all without permission from Congress. Lawmakers did little to stop it.
Now, in defying Congress on foreign aid that Trump himself agreed to spend, the administration is quietly escalating the battle.
“It is a huge grab of power from the president, taking powers away from Congress,” said David Super, a professor of law and economics at Georgetown University and a leading scholar on administrative and constitutional law.
USAID was created by Congress decades ago as a means of promoting American diplomacy and soft power around the world. As ProPublica previously reported, when Trump officials dismantled the agency last year, stopping payments on thousands of lifesaving programs that provided food, medicine and other supplies to impoverished nations, many people died, including children.
Even with USAID in shambles, Congress has made clear that it expects the administration to continue providing foreign aid — in some cases, at nearly the level it did in previous years.
“It’s proof that there is still broad, bipartisan support for America showing up in the world, helping people and working with our allies and partners on shared challenges, not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because it directly benefits us,” said Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, the ranking member of the Senate committee with oversight of foreign aid funds. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the committee’s chair, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
In other news, Trina and I both warned repeatedly ahead of Tulsi's confirmation hearing and vote that Trashy Garbage's relationship with Guru Chris should prevent her from being named head of DNI. Well . . . Jennifer Bowers Bahney (MEDIAITE) notes:
A wild new story on former Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and her Hare Krishna guru’s influence on her policy actions has sent shockwaves through social media.
Sunday’s Washington Post article by investigative journalist Jon Swaine comes just days after Gabbard stepped down to manage her husband’s cancer treatments.
Swaine wrote that Gabbard grew up in “eccentric religious leader” Chris Butler’s breakaway Hare Krishna group that has been described by some ex-members as a “cult,” although the group denies that characterization.
Swaine set out on a year-long investigation to learn whether the “reclusive guru been secretly trying to steer Gabbard’s actions as a public official.” He reviewed tends of thousands of documents, declaring that “Their content was extraordinary.”
“Dozens of attached memos appeared to document directives and advice for Gabbard from her time in Congress. Some contained instructions on what legislation she should propose, which policies she should embrace and how she should conduct herself on television. They had an air of authority,” Swaine wrote.
Research fellow Kareem Rifai wrote on social media, “This is an utterly insane story: 25,000 documents reviewed by WaPo indicate that throughout Tulsi’s career, her political moves were controlled by her guru, cult leader Chris Butler. This woman was leading the world’s largest intelligence apparatus.”
The Washington Post obtained more than 25,000 memos and other documents exchanged between Gabbard and Butler that appeared to reveal instances in which Butler gave Gabbard direction on several issues, according to the report. There were other instances in which Butler sharply criticized the former Representative from Hawaii as "mealymouthed" over one bill she introduced.
"Dozens of attached memos appeared to document directives and advice for Gabbard from her time in Congress," the report reads in part. "Some contained instructions on what legislation she should propose, which policies she should embrace, and how she should conduct herself on television. They had an air of authority. A memo about a proposal to partition war-torn Iraq into three states quoted an unnamed person as saying it was 'time for TG to come up with this idea.'"
Democrats’ new report exposes how Trump and Republicans have driven up costs and broken promises to American families
“While Donald Trump and Republicans dream up new ways to line their billionaire buddies’ pockets and give giant corporations even bigger tax breaks, Democrats are united in the fight to lower families’ costs and deliver universal child care.”
Warren Remarks (Youtube) | Child Care Affordability Agenda (PDF)
Washington, D.C. - Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) joined Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash.) in announcing the next pillar of Senate Democrats’ affordability agenda: a new Senate Democratic vision to make child care more affordable, more available, and higher quality for families across the country. Democrats’ policy framework stands in stark contrast to Republicans’ policies, which have led to skyrocketing costs and exacerbated the child care crisis.
“Universal child care is the best investment we can make in bolstering the middle class,” said Senator Warren. While Donald Trump and Republicans dream up new ways to line their billionaire buddies’ pockets and give giant corporations even bigger tax breaks, Democrats are united in the fight to lower families’ costs and deliver universal child care. Together, we’ll get it done.”
“Trump and Republicans have made finding reliable and affordable child care an impossible feat," said Leader Schumer. “They have waged an all-out war on the child care sector, hurting those who are the most vulnerable among us: children. Senate Democrats are focused on a Day One solution to the child care crisis that includes affordable child care that meets parents’ needs while investing in the infrastructure, workforce, and early childhood programs. As Republicans continue to fund tax cuts for their billionaire buddies, Democrats are laser-focused on the issues that Americans actually care about — affordability.”
“When I go back home there is not a single parent saying, ‘What I really want—is higher prices and more war mongering.’ That may seem fine to an out-of-touch billionaire like Trump but working families don’t ‘love’ inflation. Instead, the issue that comes up the most is no surprise to any parent: It’s child care. Trump’s latest budget short changes child care, while blowing up war spending,” said Senator Murray. “Trump says we can’t afford child care. The truth is we can’t afford to ignore child care. This year, Senator Warren and I announced our Child Care for America Working Group—a coalition dedicated to lowering costs and delivering affordable and accessible high quality child care for all families across the country. Now, we’re making this a central focus of our caucus’s long-term affordability agenda with Leader Schumer. This is a priority for families—so Democrats will make it a priority in Congress.”
Child care costs are one of the largest financial burdens facing American families today. President Trump and Republicans have abandoned American families, leaving many unable to find affordable, high-quality child care. In the wake of this crisis, the senators released the Democrats’ vision to lower child care costs and expand access to high-quality care for American families across the country, helping parents, children, and child care workers alike.
Earlier this week, the senators released a new “Broken Promises” report exposing how Republicans' policies have wreaked havoc on child care and harmed families across the country. The report detailed how families cannot afford child care, how it’s hard to find affordable high-quality child care, how Trump is attacking our federal child care and early childhood education experts, and how Republicans are actively undermining the child care sector. This new report is part of Senate Democrats’ year-long initiative to address the cost of living crisis Trump and Republicans have created. So far, Democrats have focused on the rising cost of housing, historic food and grocery prices, skyrocketing energy costs, and slashes to health care.
Senator Warren has led the fight to make child care available and affordable for working families:
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In May 2026, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) joined the Center for American Progress’ IDEAS Conference to deliver a speech on the need for universal child care.
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In March 2026, U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.), longtime leaders on child care, along with Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Bobby Scott (D-Va.), established a new working group as the latest major push in Democrats’ fight to lower costs and deliver child care for every American family.
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In March 2026, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani published an op-ed in USA Today calling for the Democratic party to commit to making universal child care a central part of its platform.
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In February 2026, U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), along with Representative Mike Quigley (D-Ill.), led over 40 colleagues in pressing the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Administration for Children & Families (ACF) on how the Trump Administration’s immigration policies are shrinking the child care workforce and driving up costs for American families.
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In February 2026, at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Personnel, Ranking Member of the Committee Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) questioned military leaders on the impact of poor barrack conditions and inadequate child care on service member morale and readiness.
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In February 2026, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) teamed up in the fight to deliver universal child care for American families.
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In February 2026, at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Personnel, Ranking Member Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) delivered opening remarks calling for improving the quality of military barracks, better pay for child care workers so military families can have the child care support they need, and tracking the impact of Republicans’ health care cuts for service members and their families.
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In January 2026, U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Reverend Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) led Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.), Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), and Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) in announcing a new investigation into how the Trump administration’s cuts to affordable child care programs are affecting rural families.
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In September 2025, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Representative Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.) led over forty lawmakers in reintroducing the Child Care for Every Community Act, legislation that would expand access to affordable child care to every American family, offer high-quality early education to every child, and create good jobs for our early educators.
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In May 2025, In a response to U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren’s (D-Mass.) letter to the Department of Defense (DoD) demanding clarity on the department’s plans to address allegations of child abuse in its Child Development Centers (CDCs), the DoD revealed a pattern of incompetence in its oversight of child care services.
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