And the Interesting Thing is On June 26
Israel-Iran Ceasefire and Oblierategate Enter Third Day, President Suggests US and Iran Will Meet Next Week as Iran Supeme Leader Releases Proof of Life Video Message
As the Iran-Israel ceasefire enters a second day, President Trump announced that U.S. and Iranian officials will talk next week, giving rise to cautious hope for longer-term peace. Trump told reporters that he was not particularly interested in restarting negotiations, though. “I don’t care if I have an agreement or not,” Trump said, suggesting Iran was too badly damaged to even consider rebuilding its program. “They’re not going to be doing it anyway. They’ve had it.”
Here’s what we know this morning:
· Iran’s foreign ministry has declined to confirm whether Iranian and US delegations will meet next week. “We don’t have anything to say about the US’ contradictory statements about diplomacy and negotiations,” foreign ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said at a news conference in Tehran on Thursday. “We need to ensure the parties are serious or whether this is just another tactic of sowing discord in the region and my country.” Baghaei claimed that there had been many contradictions from US officials. “While they were discussing diplomacy, just two days before our meeting, they gave Israel the green light to attack Iran. So, is there any trust left?” he said.
· In his first comments since the ceasefire announcement, Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, took to X to, in a series of posts, congratulate “the great nation of Iran” for its “victory over the fallacious Zionist regime. With all that commotion and all those claims, the Zionist regime was practically knocked out and crushed under the blows of the Islamic Republic.” He also offered congratulations “on our dear Iran’s victory over the US regime. The US regime entered the war directly because it felt that if it didn’t, the Zionist regime would be completely destroyed. It entered the war in an effort to save that regime but achieved nothing. The Islamic Republic delivered a heavy slap to the US’s face. It attacked and inflicted damage on the Al-Udeid Air Base, which is one of the key US bases in the region. The fact that the Islamic Republic has access to key US centers in the region and can take action whenever it deems necessary is a significant matter. Such an action can be repeated in the future too. Should any aggression occur, the enemy will definitely pay a heavy price.
· Khamenei also delivered a televised address, saying the US military action was never about nuclear issues or nuclear enrichment - but about "surrender.” One day it’s about human rights, another day it’s about women’s rights, then it’s about the nuclear issue, then about the missiles, but actually at its core, it has always been about one thing: they want Iran to surrender.” He then added Trump called on Iran to "surrender", but his comments were “too big for the mouth of the president of the United States. "For a great country and nation like Iran, the very mention of surrender is an insult.”
· Rafael Grossi, the director general of the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said the centrifuges at Fordow, one of Iran’s most important nuclear enrichment facilities, are “no longer operational” following U.S. strikes. “On the basis of satellite images, we can deduct quite precise conclusions on the consequences of the bombing,” Grossi told French radio station Radio France Internationale Thursday. “Given the power of these bombs and technical characteristics of the centrifuges, we do know that they are no longer operational, simply because of the vibration, which causes considerable, important physical damage,” Grossi said. “I know the plant very well, it’s a network of tunnels with different types of activity,” Grossi said. “What we saw on the pictures corresponds more or less to the enrichment hall, that’s what’s been hit.”
· The “obliteration” messaging campaign has become a whole-of-government priority. The Administration is circling the wagons around the president’s repeated claims that Sunday’s airstrikes “obliterated” the nuclear sites targeted in Sunday’s air raids, despite an initial assessment by defense intelligence officials that the strikes may have set back Iranian nuclear ambitions by perhaps three to six months. In a statement posted to X, CIA Director John Ratcliffe said that Iran’s nuclear program has been severely damaged by last weekend’s U.S. military strikes.” CIA can confirm that a body of credible intelligence indicates Iran’s nuclear program has been severely damaged by the recent, targeted strikes, this includes new intelligence from an historically reliable and accurate source/method that several key Iranian nuclear facilities were destroyed and would have to be rebuilt over the course of years.”
· Director of national Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, whom the president has said multiple times during the last week that he didn’t care what she said or accused her of being wrong in her March testimony to Congress suggesting that Iran was not actively developing nuclear weapons, also took to X to show some degree of relevance, writing: New intelligence confirms what the president has stated numerous times: Iran's nuclear facilities have been destroyed. If the Iranians chose to rebuild, they would have to rebuild all three facilities (Natanz, Fordow, Esfahan) entirely, which would likely take years to do. The propaganda media has deployed their usual tactic: selectively release portions of illegally leaked classified intelligence assessments (intentionally leaving out the fact that the assessment was written with "low confidence") to try to undermine President Trump’s decisive leadership and the brave servicemen and women who flawlessly executed a truly historic mission to keep the American people safe and secure.
· At the NATO summit yesterday, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth fiercely criticized media outlets like CNN and The New York Times for publishing the leaked assessment downplaying the success of U.S. strikes. He claimed the internal report—soon confirmed as real but labeled "preliminary" and of "low confidence"—was strategically leaked to undermine the mission and to twist intelligence for political impact. He suggested to the assembled reporters that “the instinct of CNN, the instinct of the New York Times, is to try to find a way to spin it for their own political reasons to try to hurt President Trump or our country. They don’t care what the troops think. They don’t care what the world thinks. They want to spin it to try to make him look bad based on a leak. Of course, we’ve all seen plenty of leakers, and what do leakers do? They have agendas,” he continued. “And what do they do—do they share the whole information? Or just the part that they want to introduce?” This is rich, coming from the same person who leaked sensitive attack plans with a journalist on an unsecure phone. After accusing the press of having political motives, he announced that the FBI would investigate the leak.
Axios is reporting that The Trump administration plans to limit sharing classified information with Congress following the leak of the DIA assessment, quoting a White House official as saying that "We are declaring a war on leakers. The intelligence community is figuring out how to tighten up their processes, so we don't have 'Deep State' actors leaking parts of intel analysis that have 'low confidence' to the media." Congressional Democrats were already at the administration for refusing to brief some members before the bombings and delaying classified briefings for members of Congress, so the White House's plans to further restrict the sharing of classified information are likely to provoke a new round of criticism. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called on the White House to “immediately undo” its decision to limit classified information sharing. “The administration has no right to stonewall Congress on matters of national security,” Schumer said on the Senate floor. “Senators deserve information, and the administration has a legal obligation to inform Congress precisely about what is happening right now abroad.”
· While traveling back to Washington following the NATO summit, the president took to Truth Social to unleash a particularly nasty attack on a CNN journalist who broke news of an intelligence leak about the Iran strikes. “Natasha Bertrand should be FIRED from CNN! I watched her for three days doing Fake News. She should be IMMEDIATELY reprimanded and then thrown out “like a dog.” She lied on the Nuclear Sites Story, attempting to destroy our Patriot Pilots by making them look bad when, in fact, they did a GREAT job and hit “pay dirt” — TOTAL OBLITERATION! She should not be allowed to work at Fake News CNN. It’s people like her who destroyed the reputation of a once great Network. Her slant was so obviously negative, besides, she doesn’t have what it takes to be an on-camera correspondent, not even close. FIRE NATASHA!” CNN clapped back on Wednesday, saying in a statement that the network stood “100% behind Bertrand’s journalism” and that of her colleagues. “We do not believe it reasonable to criticize CNN reporters for accurately reporting the existence of the assessment and accurately characterizing its findings, which are in the public interest,”
· The president announced on Truth Social yesterday that Defense Secretary would hold a press conference Thursday to defend B-2 bomber pilots’ “dignity” the DIA assessment only set Iran’s nuclear program back by months. “Secretary of Defense (War!) Pete Hegseth and Military Representatives will be holding a Major News Conference tomorrow at 8 A.M. EST at the Pentagon to fight for the Dignity of our Great American Pilots. “These Patriots were very upset! After 36 hours of dangerously flying through Enemy Territory, they landed, they knew the Success was LEGENDARY, and then, two days later, they started reading Fake News by CNN and The Failing New York Times. They felt terribly! Fortunately for them and, as usual, solely for the purpose of demeaning PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP, the Fake News (Times and CNN) lied and totally misrepresented the Facts, none of which they had (because it was too soon, there were no Facts out there yet!). The News Conference will prove both interesting and irrefutable,” he concluded.
And the interesting thing is, to provide air support for the Hegseth press conference and messaging for administration officials and allies, the White House released a “report” supporting the president’s obliteration claims. In the very subtly titled Iran’s Nuclear Facilities Have Been Obliterated — and Suggestions Otherwise are Fake News the report catalogs favorable comments, many from the president and administration officials, or aligned outside groups. Why does this matter beyond providing glimpses into the president’s emotional state? By demanding fealty to his narrative and immediately ruling out objective analyses that might counter the narrative, the president and the administration are replacing facts with confirmation bias. After the president’s reaction to the initial DIA assessment, can Hegseth really sign off on any report that shows anything less than the president’s preferred classification of “obliteration?” This is what happens in Pyongyang and other murderous regimes, it shouldn’t happen in the U.S.
Federal Reserve Chair Testifies on Capitol Hill for 2nd Straight Day
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powel was back on Capitol Hill Wednesday, this time speaking to the Senate Banking Committee as part of his semiannual monetary policy testimony. He submitted identical written remarks to what he submitted yesterday while testifying Tuesday before the House Financial Services.
During the Q&A, Powell said that Federal Reserve officials are having trouble assessing the potential fallout from the president’s trade policy because there is no historical comparison. There isn’t a lot of modern learning here,” Powell said. “The tariffs during President Trump’s first term were one-sixth of the size they are now.” That lack of precedent is what’s leading to the Fed’s uncertainty around instituting any policy changes for the time being.
“We have to be humble about our estimates,” said Powell. “Transmission into inflation may be more than we think or less than we think which is why we want to take our time.” The central bank, he said, is waiting to see who will end up paying for the majority of these tariffs and how tariffs will show up in measured inflation. “If we make a mistake here, people will pay the cost for a long time.”
Some Republican members ramped up criticism of this stated “wait-and-see” approach, suggesting Powell’s reluctance to slash rates reflects political bias against the Trump administration’s tariff agenda. Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH) accused the Fed chair of allowing “political concerns” to shape interest-rate policy, while Sen. Pete Ricketts (R-NE) questioned whether Powell’s public cautions were “anti-tariff statements dressed up as economic forecasts.” These attacks amplified calls from the President, who has publicly mused about replacing Powell before his term ends in 2026.
Not all lawmakers endorsed the partisan critique. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), one of the most vulnerable Senate Republicans in the 2026 midterms, praised Powell’s deliberative approach, noting that even large retailers struggle to gauge the ultimate impact of tariffs on consumer prices. “We’ve never had tariffs on this scale before,” Tillis said, supporting the Fed’s insistence on data before policy shifts. Democrats, for their part, warned that undermining Fed independence for short-term political gain risks long-term damage to economic stability.
When pressed on fiscal policy, Powell struck a measured tone: while he declined to endorse specific tax or spending proposals, he warned that America’s borrowing path is unsustainable in the long run. “We don’t know where the tipping point is,” he admitted, cautioning that rising debt-service costs could crowd out productive investment over time
Powell also responded to questions from committee Chair Tim Scott (R-SC) about reported cost overruns connected to the refurbishment of the Fed’s headquarters in Washington, DC. Scott and five other committee Republicans released a letter dated June 24, asking about reports of “lavish renovations” to Fed facilities that has led to an increase in the projected cost from $1.9 billion to $2.5 billion, and about the “politicization” of the central bank.
Without refuting Scott’s assertion that expenses for the project had ballooned from to $2.5 billion, Powell said a number of media reports about materials and amenities being installed were false. “We do take seriously our responsibility as stewards of the public’s money,” said Powell on Wednesday when questioned by the Senate Banking Committee about those plans. “No one wants to do a renovation of a historic building,” said Powell. “Leave that to your successors.” The Fed chair said that the building wasn’t safe and needed to be updated.
“All of the inflammatory things the media carried are not in the current plan,” said Powell. “There is no VIP dining room, no new marble, no special elevators. No new water features, no beehives, and no roof terrace gardens.”
And the interesting thing is, as expected, the president continued his public bullying and personal invective directed at the Fed Chair prior to the start of the hearing, describing him at various points in a press avail at the NATO summit “an average mentally person,” “low IQ,” “a probably a very political guy,” before concluding that “I think he's a very stupid person, actually.” He then said, "He goes out pretty soon, fortunately, because I think he's terrible…I know within three or four people who I'm going to pick," Trump told reporters when asked if he is interviewing candidates to replace Powell. The leading contenders reportedly include former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, National Economic Council head Kevin Hassett, current Fed Governor Christopher Waller, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. The Wall Street Journal reported last night that the president is considering naming the next Fed Chair this summer, in a bid to undermine Powell, who still has 11 months to go in his term. As the report notes, “Because the new chair wouldn’t take office until next May, announcing the pick this summer or fall would be far earlier than the traditional three-to-four-month transition period. An early announcement could allow the chair-in-waiting to influence investor expectations about the likely path for rates, like a backseat driver, attempting to steer monetary policy before Powell’s term ends.”
Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Remain in Jail While Judge Weighs Arguments over Potential Deportation
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man mistakenly deported to El Salvador this year, is set to remain in jail for a few more days as his attorneys and federal prosecutors determine whether he’ll be deported if released. The decision came as Abrego Garcia was expected to be released from jail and placed into Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody following a court hearing Wednesday afternoon.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes, who on Sunday filed a 51-page ruling denying the government’s motion to detain Garcia, presided over the hearing. She denied the prosecution's request to keep Garcia in custody and ordered that he be released on his own recognizance, subject to home detention, GPS monitoring, periodic drug testing, and other standard conditions. Yet she also recognized the futility of imposing those terms if ICE immediately re-detains him. “I can’t order ICE to take any particular actions with respect to Mr. Abrego in this case. The most I can do is request the U.S. Attorney’s Office to encourage cooperation from Homeland Security.” She urged the Justice Department to leverage its relationship with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to keep Garcia in U.S. custody until trial.
Acting U.S. Attorney Rob McGuire, who has said in court and in filings that one of the reasons he wants Abrego Garcia to stay in jail is to ensure that he remains in the country and isn’t deported by ICE, told the judge during Wednesday’s hearing that he would do “the best I can” to secure the cooperation of the DHS, which includes ICE. But the prosecutor noted, “That’s a separate agency with separate leadership and separate directions. I will coordinate, but I can’t tell them what to do.”
After Wednesday's hearing, Holmes ordered Abrego Garcia's lawyers to file court papers laying out their arguments by noon on Thursday, and gave the government until noon on Friday to respond. Holmes said she will issue a ruling at some point after that. Until then, Abrego Garcia will remain in the custody of the U.S. Marshals.
And the interesting thing is, as the hearing was underway, U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw,, denied the Department of Justice’s motion to stay Judge Holmes’ order.
The DOJ claimed in arguments to Crenshaw that if Holmes’ decision stood, Abrego Garcia would likely be transferred to ICE custody and would be removed from the U.S. a second time. His deportation would irreparably harm the government’s criminal case, the department said. Crenshaw said the DOJ’s argument “defies logic,” noting that the government was claiming that “it may suffer irreparable harm completely of its own making.” “If the Government finds this case to be as high priority as it argues here, it is incumbent upon it to ensure that Abrego is held accountable for the charges in the Indictment,” Crenshaw wrote. “If the Department of Justice and DHS cannot do so, that speaks for itself.” Crenshaw, however, will allow prosecutors to file a brief in support of a motion to revoke the magistrate’s release order in a hearing scheduled for July 16.
CDC Vaccine Panel Rocked by Announcement to Review Childhood Vaccine Schedule and Kennedy’s Hire of Anti-vax Ally
The reconstituted Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) kicked off its first meeting yesterday following Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr’s purge of 17 scientific experts in immunology, epidemiology, and public health with a handpicked panel of vaccine “skeptics” (a colloquialism for opposing vaccines) and like-minded members tied to litigation against vaccine manufacturers or financial interests in alternative therapies.
New ACIP Chair, Dr. Martin Kulldorff, dismissed from Harvard over vaccine skepticism and noted purveyor of covid and vaccine misinformation, opened the meeting by outlining the objectives of the panel. "Secretary Kennedy has given this committee a clear mandate to use evidence-based medicine when making vaccine recommendations, and that is what we will do. Vaccines are not all good or bad. If you think that all vaccines are safe and effective and want them all, or if you think that all vaccines are dangerous and don't want any of them, then you don't have much use for us.” Okaaay.
He also took a dig at the press coverage of the dramatic changes to the panel and the number of newly appointed members with a history of hostility to vaccines. "Some media outlets have been very harsh on the new members of this committee, issuing false accusations and making concerted efforts to put scientists in either a pro- or anti-vaccine box," Kulldorff said. "Such labels undermine critical scientific inquiry, and it further feeds the flames of vaccine hesitancy." It’s worth noting that the flames of vaccine hesitancy are fanned by people with little expertise spending hours on Joe Rogan-podcasts or social media influencers more than the media reporting on previous comments that new appointees have made in the past.
Kulldorff, also raised eyebrows when he announced that ACIP would establish a new workgroup to study and evaluate the cumulative effects of the recommended vaccine schedule, including the "interaction effects between different vaccines, the total number of vaccines, cumulative amounts of vaccine ingredients and the relative timing of different vaccines." He added that “the number of vaccines that our children and adolescents receive today exceed what children in most other developed nations receive and what most of us in this room received when we were children.”
Another new workgroup will look specifically at "vaccines that have not been subject to review in more than seven years.” Topics they will take up include the universal recommendation to administer the hepatitis B shot on the day of birth; how children are immunized against measles, mumps, rubella and varicella, or chicken pox; as well as the timing of the measles vaccine to resolve religious objections among some parents.
These new areas of focus are already making some who study vaccines nervous about the future direction of ACIP. "They're signaling interest in revisiting long-settled questions around vaccine safety, opening up issues that have been focal points of critics of vaccines for decades and giving them the legitimacy that comes with this previously well-respected government advisory committee," said Jason Schwartz , associate professor at the Yale School of Public Health.
Prior to the hearing it was revealed that Secretary Kennedy tapped Lyn Redwood—a nurse who led Children’s Health Defense, the anti-vaccine advocacy group he founded—to join the CDC’s Immunization Safety Office as a special government employee. She will join the CDC office responsible for overseeing most of the agency's work and data to probe potential safety risks from vaccines, including databases used by health officials to collect and analyze reports from the public and health care systems. She’s slated to brief ACIP this afternoon on her debunked concerns about the vaccine preservative thimerosal causing autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders.
In a report briefly published on the CDC's website before this week's meeting, the agency cited several studies turning up no evidence of thimerosal causing neurodevelopmental disorders, and warned of significant methodological issues with a handful of studies that did. "Considering the breadth of evidence and consistency in results from multiple population-based studies conducted in several countries with various study designs, the evidence does not support an association between thimerosal-containing vaccines and autism spectrum disorder or other neurodevelopmental disorders," the CDC said in its now-deleted report.
And the interesting thing is, as the ACIP meeting was taking place in Atlanta, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) committee met to consider the nomination of President Trump’s pick for the director of CDC, Dr. Susan Monarez. At the beginning of the hearing, Monarez was clear in her support for vaccines—a topic that would put her at odds with the HHS Secretary that oversees the CDC. While her prepared remarks were largely silent on the issue of vaccines, when asked, she told the committee that "I think vaccines save lives. I think that we need to continue to support the promotion of utilization of vaccines.”
Monarez also stood apart from Kennedy on her views on autism, and whether there is any link between it and childhood vaccinations—which Kennedy has long raised as a potential reason for rising rates of autism diagnoses. "I have not seen a causal link between vaccines and autism.” Kennedy, in his own confirmation hearing, refused to acknowledge that there is not a link between vaccines and autism. Also, when asked if she holds any prejudice against mRNA vaccine technology, which Kennedy has disparaged, she said: "I have no prejudice against mRNA platform or any other approach that is being taken to develop vaccines."
Her nomination is expected to pass out of the HELP Committee, and she is expected to be confirmed by the full Senate.
That’s all for today. See you back here again tomorrow!