Washington, D.C. correspondent Ana Radelat is taking a few well-earned days off to enjoy some time on the Chesapeake Bay (though it looks a little rainy there today!), so I’ll do my best to fill in.
Foreign policy was in the news this week — especially the prospects for peace in Ukraine.
President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin planned to meet in Anchorage, Alaska, on Friday for talks that were expected to focus on ending the war — though European leaders and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky were left out of the summit.
Trump warned 0f “very severe consequences” if Putin didn’t agree to stop the war and also said he hoped for a trilateral meeting with Putin and Zelensky.
The president also commented on another hot spot — the war in Gaza — telling Axios that the Hamas ruling authority couldn’t stay in the Palestinian region. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced plans for Israel to attack and occupy Gaza City.
Meanwhile, a federal court on Wednesday ruled that the Trump administration could suspend or terminate billions of dollars of funding for foreign aid that Congress has approved.
Shortly after he took office in January, Trump directed the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development to freeze spending on foreign aid.
The court that heard the case — U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit — concluded that grant recipients challenging the freeze did not meet the requirements for a preliminary injunction restoring the flow of money.
Trump also raised hackles this week by deploying the National Guard and federal law enforcement to police the District of Columbia — though, as the New York Times reports, the federal government already has a lot of control in the district.
Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, the U.S. House Minority Leader, criticized the move and said it had “no basis in law.”
Trump cited “total lawlessness” as the reason for the crackdown, though statistics show violent crime in the city is at a 30-year low.
In case you missed it:
▪️Ana Radelat wrote about the “big, beautiful” budget act’s cuts to SNAP (the official name for food stamps) and how Minnesota counties might now need to foot more of the program’s bill.
▪️She also reported on the impact of Trump administration policies on farmers, getting mixed reviews from those who talked with MinnPost at last week’s Farmfest. Among the pros: likely higher prices for sugar beet producers; among the cons: uncertainty over tariffs.
▪️Locally, Matthew Blake looked at Minnesota’s new “red flag” law and how use of the law — intended to keep people who might hurt themselves or others from accessing guns — is on the rise.
▪️And Shadi Bushra considered the unlikely chance of congressional redistricting in Minnesota in the near future in light of the gerrymandering snafu in Texas. One takeaway: It likely won’t happen here until 2032.
Thanks! Ana will be back next week.
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