Billionaires Butting Heads, A Basin Disappearing, & A Radioactive Bouquet

Hello, readers – happy Thursday! Today, we’ll be talking about DOGE, the Middle East, Trump complaining about Putin (again), Haiti’s next steps, Bove’s nomination, the Colorado River Basin, and radioactive flowers.

Here’s some good news: Harvard University will hand over 175-year-old photographs to a South Carolina museum devoted to African American history. The photographs, believed to be the earliest taken of enslaved people, will be relinquished as part of a settlement with a woman who says she is one of the subjects’ descendants.

“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.” – Confucius

Bidding The Billionaire Goodbye

Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill” is causing a not-so-pretty rift in Washington. Yesterday, Trump backer Elon Musk said in an interview with CBS that he was “disappointed” by the “massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decreases it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing.” 

Soon after that interview aired, the Tesla CEO announced his departure from Washington, saying his “scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end.” “The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.” DOGE has targeted just $150 billion in government budget cuts, under 8% of the $2 trillion Musk had promised.

Musk received quite the going-away present, too. A federal judge granted a DOGE team access to the Bureau of the Fiscal Service yesterday (which basically acts as the federal government’s checkbook). Before the decision, just one DOGE employee was allowed to access the service, but now more DOGE workers will be able to get their hands on the system with the proper training. Will they follow the training, though? Who knows.

Want To Know More?

• Trump asking Congress to help with $9.4 billion in DOGE cuts (Axios) 

• Judge rules suit challenging DOGE and Elon Musk's power over government can continue (NPR)

Humanitarian Aid And A Side Of Gunfire

While Israel has kind of, sort of ended its blockade on Gaza, the enclave is receiving just a trickle of humanitarian aid after two and a half months of hunger. On Tuesday, an American group named the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) began handing out a limited amount of food to Palestinians at flimsily-constructed distribution centers guarded by Israeli soldiers. Two predictable things happened at the site: there was barely enough food to feed even 2% of Gaza’s population, and Israeli forces fired on a crowd of people in line for food. 

While Israel claims that the gunfire was “warning shots” meant to keep the crowd in line, the U.N. has said that most of the 47 injuries recorded at the site were due to gunshots. Video footage clearly shows multiple gunshots going off as people flee for their lives, but the GHF has told the media that “no shots were fired at Palestinian crowds.”

Israel’s war in Gaza and abroad has continued despite the incident – yesterday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed that the IDF “eliminated” Mohammed Sinwar, Hamas’ leader in Gaza. Sinwar was reportedly killed in a massive airstrike on Khan Younis’ European hospital on May 13. Israeli missiles also landed in Yemen yesterday, striking the country’s Sana'a International Airport – the IDF claimed that “the aircraft that were attacked were used by the Houthi terrorist regime.”

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Putin The Pressure On

• Donald Trump is very hurt about how his buddy, Vladimir Putin, is conducting his war in Ukraine, and he’s letting the international media know exactly how he feels. In an Oval Office briefing yesterday, the president said, “I'm very disappointed at what happened a couple of nights now where people were killed in the middle of what you would call a negotiation. I'm very disappointed by that,” Trump said. 

• While Trump was venting his feelings, the Germans were proceeding with their usual efficiency. Yesterday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz promised to help Kyiv develop its own long-range missile systems, which it will one day be able to use without all the restrictions that Western countries put on the missiles they’ve given to Ukraine. “Ukraine will be able to fully defend itself, including against military targets outside its own territory” with the missile systems, Merz said in a press conference on Wednesday.

Yeah, “Blackwater” Doesn’t Sound Ominous At All

• When is a gang not a gang? When you incorporate it as a private U.S. military contractor, of course! Yesterday, Haiti’s government announced that it would be working with notorious mercenary group Blackwater to try to combat the Caribbean nation’s massive gang violence problem. 

• The company – headed by Trump supporter Erik Prince – has apparently been operating in Haiti since March. The firm has been working on setting up a network of drones that is supposed to kill alleged gang members from the sky, though the mercenaries have yet to announce any “successes” thus far.

• You might remember the company’s name for that one time its mercenaries murdered 17 Iraqi civilians in 2007, or the time that Blackwater contractors fired 70 rounds into a car because one of the group’s own mercenaries had his gun go off in his own vehicle.

More Mixed Nuts

• French paedophile surgeon who abused hundreds sentenced to 20 years in jail (BBC)

• Brussels to propose ‘pragmatic’ 90 percent climate target for 2040 (Politico)

• Tate brothers face rape and trafficking chares in the UK (AP)

• Namibia holds its first genocide remembrance day to mark mass killings by colonial ruler Germany (AP)

• Swiss glacier collapse destroys parts of village (Guardian)

Going A-Bove & Beyond

• President Trump announced yesterday (on Truth Social, of course) that he’s nominating his former personal lawyer, Emil Bove, to serve as a federal appeals court judge on the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers courts in Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Bove, who operated as a DOJ official in recent months, helped to purge career law enforcement officials across the DOJ and FBI, and played a big part in the DOJ's decision to drop the criminal corruption prosecution of New York City Mayor Eric Adams.

• “Emil is a distinguished graduate of Georgetown Law, and served as Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York for nearly a decade, where he was the Co-Chief of the Terrorism and International Narcotics Unit. Emil is SMART, TOUGH, and respected by everyone,” Trump wrote. “He will end the Weaponization of Justice, restore the Rule of Law, and do anything else that is necessary to, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN. Emil Bove will never let you down!”

Facin’ The Basin Music

• A new study has found that the Colorado River Basin has lost 27.8 million acre-feet of groundwater in the past 20 years – that’s about the full capacity of Lake Mead, the largest reservoir in the United States. The basin provides water to approximately 40 million people across seven states and to millions of acres of farmland. Groundwater isn’t always front-of-mind for people, given that it’s…well, underground, so it’s not as visible.

• “Groundwater is disappearing 2.4 times faster than the surface water,” said Jay Famiglietti, a hydrologist and the study’s senior author. “Everyone in the U.S. should be worried about it, because we grow a lot of food in the Colorado River basin, and that’s food that’s used all over the entire country,” he added. “These days, we’re also supporting a number of data centers and computer chip manufacturers, and these are essential to our economy.”

More Nuts In America

• Sen. Tommy Tuberville launches run for governor of Alabama (NBC)

• Judge temporarily blocks Trump administration action over congestion pricing (ABC)

• Sen. Cory Booker expands upon historic Senate floor speech for new book, 'Stand' (Politico)

• RFK Jr threatens ban on federal scientists publishing in top journals (Guardian)

Honey, I’m Home, And I Brought You Some Potentially Radioactive Flowers!

• Remember that time Obama “drank” the water in Flint, Michigan at the peak of the town’s water crisis? Well, Japan’s prime minister is pulling a similar stunt, though he doesn’t even have to pretend to drink water on CNN. Instead, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has promised the Japanese public that he will use decontaminated radioactive soil from the Fukushima nuclear plant to grow flowers outside his office.

• The Fukushima nuclear plant was destroyed in March of 2011, when a massive tsunami slammed into Japan’s eastern coast. The disaster saw large amounts of nuclear waste from the plant contaminating local water and soil. While decontamination efforts are still ongoing, the Japanese government is looking to put the disaster in its rearview mirror – last year, Japan released some decontaminated water into the ocean, and it’s looking to further rehabilitate its image with this soil stunt. Personally, we won’t believe it’s clean until we see Ishiba grow some fruit and eat it.

More Loose Nuts

• Mysterious object spotted in our galaxy is emitting X-rays and radio waves, astronomers say (CBS)

• Delta flight erupts into chaos as pigeons fly around main cabin (NBC)

• Texas governor signs online safety law in blow to Apple and Google (BBC)

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Team Thoughts

Kayli - All I can think about with the Fukushima flowers is that it’s going to grow into something wild like the Jumanji vines.

Marcus - I was going through videos of politicians “drinking” decontaminated water from different places, and somehow an 80-year-old Biden took a bigger sip than Obama. Crazy.

Editor In Chief: Kayli Woods

Head Writer: Marcus Gee-Lim

Designer: Joe Stella