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Blanche Was Once Seen as Tempering Trump’s Tactics. Now He’s All In.

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Glenn Thrush
The ascendancy of Todd Blanche shows how the practices that were initially deemed out of bounds even in President Trump’s Justice Department seem to be the order of the day.

© Doug Mills/The New York Times

Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, during a cabinet meeting at the White House in May.
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House Passes G.O.P.’s $70 Billion Immigration Bill

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Catie Edmondson
The vote gave final passage to Republicans’ megabill to fund immigration enforcement through the remainder of President Trump’s term, clearing it for his signature.

© Ashley Wu/The New York Times

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Watchdog Group Skeptical of Vows to End Trump Administration’s $1.8 Billion Fund

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Alan Feuer
The group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, doubled down on its request to a federal judge to issue a formal order stopping the fund from being set up.

© Eric Lee for The New York Times

The Justice Department has promised both in writing and in sworn testimony that it will not proceed with the plan.
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Social Security Benefits Could Be Cut in 6 Years Unless Congress Acts

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Tara Siegel Bernard and Margot Sanger-Katz
The trust fund for the program, which supports roughly 68 million Americans, is on schedule to be depleted in the next six years. Benefits could be cut on average by 22 percent.

© Dave Sanders for The New York Times

To avoid a benefit reduction, lawmakers would need to raise taxes or reduce checks.
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U.S. and Iran Zero In on Four Nuclear Issues in Talks

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: David E. Sanger
With the cease-fire proving tenuous, negotiations between the two nations are in flux, but have advanced to outline potential paths forward on difficult questions about Iran’s nuclear program.

© Arash Khamooshi/Polaris for The New York Times

Tehran this week. Hard-liners in Iran could derail what American officials have described as the hazy outlines of an accord.
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Bill Gates Said to Have Hired Ex-House Oversight Chief to Advise on Epstein Testimony

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Annie Karni
Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, has retained Jake Greenberg, the former top investigative counsel to the House Oversight Committee.

© Calla Kessler for The New York Times

Bill Gates has been preparing to testify privately in the House Oversight Committee’s investigation of Jeffrey Epstein.
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The Holdup at the Center of the Iran Talks, and Trump’s Baseless New Claims of Voter Fraud

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Tracy Mumford · Will Jarvis · Margaret Kadifa · Jake Lucas · Ian Stewart · Erika Solomon · Devlin Barrett · Casey Newton and Lisa Lerer
Plus, “I’m busy, but you can talk to my A.I. twin.”

© Arash Khamooshi/Polaris for The New York Times

President Trump has repeatedly said that the United States and Iran were coming close to a deal to end the war. It is not clear that they are actually any closer at the moment.
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Trump Previews Fall Strategy With Baseless Claims of California Vote Fraud

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman
The president is using the slow count of mail ballots in California to renew his effort to cast doubt on election outcomes he doesn’t like, despite a lack of evidence of any widespread fraud.

© Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

By baselessly framing the rise of a candidate for Los Angeles mayor as a Democratic scam, President Trump has extended his long-running project to erode public faith in elections.
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Governor’s Visit to ICE Detention Facility Is Strictly Limited, She Says

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Ana Ley and Mark Bonamo
Gov. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey said she was not allowed to speak with immigrants at the Delaney Hall detention center.

© Dakota Santiago for The New York Times

Gov. Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey had been trying for weeks to tour Delaney Hall, an immigration detention center in Newark.
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A Timeline of Donald Trump and Lindsey Graham’s Relationship Before the South Carolina Primary

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Bayliss Wagner and Meg Felling
Once one of President Trump’s fiercest critics, the South Carolina senator has dramatically shifted his posture over the years. Will it pay off on Tuesday in his primary?

© Tierney L. Cross/The New York Times, Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, left, and President Trump.
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Pentagon Again Revises Religious Categories for Troops

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: John Ismay
The Defense Department made the change after lawmakers objected to its original list, which did not include the Latter-day Saints among traditions labeled Christian.

© Kenny Holston/The New York Times

Senator Mike Lee of Utah objected to a Pentagon policy memo excluding Mormons from being categorized as Christian.
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Trump Wants to Call the Shots. But in Iran, He Keeps Hitting His Limits.

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Anton Troianovski
President Trump is grappling with his own version of the sort of Middle East crisis that beset his predecessors, and that he promised to avoid.

© Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times

President Trump insists that he has not violated his campaign pledge to avoid “endless wars,” even though a conflict he called “a little excursion” in March has entered its fourth month.
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Trump Nominates Blanche for Attorney General, Setting Up Confirmation Fight

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Devlin Barrett and Glenn Thrush
As acting attorney general, Todd Blanche has shown a willingness to execute the president’s maximalist demands. Whether the Senate will confirm him remains unclear.

© Demetrius Freeman for The New York Times

Todd Blanche’s role in the attempted creation of President Trump’s $1.8 billion payout fund gave rise to tensions with Senate Republicans, who will now have to decide whether to confirm him.
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Judge Throws Out Trump Administration’s Policy Imposing $100,000 Fees for H-1B Visas

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Zach Montague
The ruling voided “in its entirety” a policy from September requiring companies to pay $100,000 fees for H-1B visa petitions.

© Brian Snyder/Reuters

Judge Leo T. Sorokin wrote that the Trump administration’s policy appeared to step on Congress’s “exclusive power” to levy taxes.
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Ken Paxton’s Former Defense Lawyer Endorses James Talarico

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: J. David Goodman
The lawyer, Dan Cogdell, helped save Mr. Paxton from criminal charges and an impeachment, but now he says the Texas attorney general has “lost sight of his mission.”

© Jordan Vonderhaar for The New York Times

Dan Cogdell, a defense attorney for Ken Paxton, at the State Capitol in Austin during Mr. Paxton’s impeachment trial in 2023.
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How Elon Musk’s Friendship With the F.C.C. Smooths the Way for SpaceX’s I.P.O.

✇NYT - Top Stories
By: Cecilia Kang
Brendan Carr, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, has greenlighted regulatory requests for the company’s Starlink satellite internet service and lavished praise on its chief executive.

© Eric Lee for The New York Times

Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission.
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