A forthcoming book chronicling the first year of Donald Trump's second administration alleges that his treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, made a series of disparaging remarks about Volodymyr Zelensky ahead of the Ukrainian president's visit to the White House early last year.

Regime Change was co-authored by the New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, based on "hundreds of interviews and unprecedented reporting from deep within the administration's most closely guarded rooms," according to the Simon & Schuster website. It is set to be published on Tuesday, June 23.

According to excerpts published by The Guardian on Saturday, Bessent referred to Zelensky as a "little f****r" and a "special-needs child for the Europeans," and called him "Mr. Bean on crack."

Donald Trump threatened to “take over” Iran if the Strait of Hormuz was not immediately re-opened, the president told Fox News.

His latest round of threats came in response to news Saturday that Iran was once again closing the key waterway, just days after signing an agreement to ensure that traffic could flow through.

Iran announced that it would close the Strait of Hormuz after Israeli forces continued an all-out assault into Lebanon aimed at dislodging Hezbollah militants.

A severe heatwave gripped much of Europe on Sunday, with temperatures nearing 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), prompting nationwide warnings, transport disruption and signs of strain on wildlife and at tourist hotspots.

The heat surge ‌on June 21, the summer solstice in the northern hemisphere and typically the start of the three hottest months of the year, raised concerns of an early and persistent onset of extreme conditions.

New College of Florida to acquire USF Sarasota-Manatee in deal that leading Democratic lawmaker says ‘reeks of grift’

A liberal arts college seized by Florida’s hard-right governor, Ron DeSantis, and transformed into a model for conservative higher education is to triple in size after state Republicans engineered a hostile takeover of a rival university’s campus.

New College of Florida, which is controlled by DeSantis’s hand-picked board of trustees, will acquire the Sarasota-Manatee campus of the University of South Florida (USF) next month in a deal described by a leading Florida Democrat as “a grift”.

The transfer of the 32-acre, 2,000-student facility, which has a new six-story residential hall and $44m student center, will significantly expand the footprint of the 900-student New College that the governor has touted as a blueprint for his “anti-woke” agenda.

The transfer will proceed despite almost universal opposition from USF students and faculty, education leaders, and the local business community, who say popular, thriving programs including nursing, tourism and hospitality, will end.

When the Elon Musk-affiliated Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) swept through Washington in 2025, slashing the workforce of federal agencies, the ramifications were far-reaching.

Those decisions are now drawing renewed scrutiny as the New World screwworm, a parasitic threat to livestock and other animals, resurfaces in Texas, and questions emerge about whether federal agencies have enough resources to contain it.

White House officials have for months delayed the release of a U.S. government report that outlines what it describes as significant vulnerabilities in the nation's voting machines ahead of the November midterms, according to three sources familiar with the matter.

The report, produced by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, concludes that voting ‌machines could be further safeguarded by, for example, updating their software, the sources said. It does not say the vulnerabilities have led to votes flipping, but examines security gaps in how the machines are used during U.S. elections.

Some White House officials have argued the report could undermine voter confidence, particularly among Republicans. Others have said they do not believe the report goes far enough in supporting Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 presidential election was rigged, the three sources said. Some Democrats said privately they worried Gabbard’s probe into voting machines would be used by the administration to push states to use paper ballots.

The Justice Department released a memo this week that quietly calls into question decades of civil rights protections for Americans with disabilities and stirred fear and anger among advocates and families.

The memo, an opinion from the Office of Legal Counsel, argues that states do not have to provide in-home or community-based care to people with disabilities who need support. These services allow many disabled Americans to continue to live, learn and work at home or in their own communities, among family and friends.

"It is now the position of the United States government that people with disabilities don't have a right to be part of their communities," says Alison Barkoff, a health law and policy professor at George Washington University who led disability law and policy efforts during both the Obama and Biden administrations. "I can't overstate how significant this change in position is."

Donald Trump on Saturday announced that federal authorities had made “multiple arrests” of people he said were vandalizing the Reflecting Pool as he struggled to explain why the $14-million-plus rehabilitation project he launched for the nation’s 250th anniversary seemingly backfired.

Trump said his predecessors had let the pool turn an algae-stained green and that he’d line it with “American flag blue” so it better reflected the Washington Monument. But after the new pool was unveiled, its blue tinge quickly became a familiar green. Workers treated it with chemicals to kill the algae, but then the painted blue lining on the bottom began to peel.

Unclear if threat has been carried out or if move will jeopardise talks with US scheduled for Sunday

Iran has said it is closing the strait of Hormuz after waves of Israeli strikes in Lebanon in a move that threatens to derail the fragile interim peace deal with the US, signed just days ago.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps warned ships not to approach the strategic waterway, which before the war carried a fifth of global oil and liquid gas supplies, citing what it called Israeli crimes in Lebanon and a US violation of commitments to establish a ceasefire there.

It was unclear if the threat had been carried out, or if it would jeopardise talks in Switzerland scheduled for Sunday that were supposed to start the process of turning the current interim agreement between the US and Iran signed this week into a more detailed deal covering Iran’s nuclear programme.

Social Circle announces homeland security has canceled plans to convert warehouse to detain up to 10,000 people

The small town of Social Circle in rural Georgia has announced that the Department of Homeland Security has cancelled plans to turn a warehouse into what would have been one of the largest immigration detention centers in the country.

The cancellation appears to be one of seven around the country, according to reporting elsewhere, and part of a reversal under new homeland security director Markwayne Mullin in the Trump administration’s plans to buy up warehouses and boost detention capacity – after spending $1bn on the effort in recent months.

The federal government purchased the Social Circle warehouse for $128m in early February – nearly five times its assessed value of $29m last year, city manager Eric Taylor told the Guardian shortly after the sale went through.

Iran re-closed the Strait of Hormuz Friday instead of heading to Switzerland for nuclear negotiations, citing Israel’s refusal to pull forces out of southern Lebanon and US forces’ ongoing presence in the region.

In a statement read over maritime radio channels, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said the US was in violation of the memorandum of understanding between Washington and Tehran, which President Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian signed Wednesday.

“Since Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon, the complete lifting of the naval blockade, and the withdrawal of American terrorist forces from the Persian Gulf and the region are among the main conditions of the agreement between Iran and the United States, the Strait of Hormuz will remain closed until these conditions are met,” it said. “All ships are requested, for the sake of their security and safety, not to approach the Strait of Hormuz. Any vessel that defies this directive will be targeted.”