Putin Dumps Cold Water Over Trump’s Celebration of Their Phone Call

After getting off the phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin, President Trump told the world that Putin would “immediately” start negotiating a ceasefire with Ukraine. Putin told a completely different story.

“The U.S. president expressed his position regarding a cessation of hostilities and a ceasefire, and also acknowledged that Russia likewise favors a peaceful settlement of the Ukrainian crisis. We simply need to identify the most effective paths toward peace,” Putin said after the meeting, refusing to publicly commit to a ceasefire.

“We agreed with the U.S. president that Russia will propose and is ready to work with the Ukrainian side on a memorandum concerning a possible future peace treaty. This would outline several provisions, including a framework for resolution, the timeline for potentially concluding a peace agreement, and other relevant details, such as the possibility of a temporary ceasefire if corresponding agreements are reached.”

“At the same time, I want to emphasize that, overall, Russia’s position is clear,” Putin said after the call. “Our main objective is to eliminate the root causes of this crisis.”

From Trump’s angle, this looks like a kumbaya moment attached to a lavish deal.

“There is a tremendous opportunity for Russia to create massive amounts of jobs and wealth. Its potential is UNLIMITED,” Trump wrote on Truth Social after the call. “Likewise, Ukraine can be a great beneficiary on Trade, in the process of rebuilding its Country. Negotiations between Russia and Ukraine will begin immediately.”

Trump has given the Kremlin a financial out, allowing it to back Ukraine further into a corner with no commitment to any sort of deal—or even negotiations for a deal—and no accountability. And while these ceasefire talks fall flat, the Kremlin launched its largest drone attack on Ukraine to date, killing 11 people over the weekend.

Putin’s statement does not instill confidence in a Russian ceasefire. So much for ending the war on day one.

Walmart may be wading through dangerous waters with Donald Trump’s administration after announcing that the president’s tariffs would likely lead to price increases for consumers.

During CNBC’s Squawk Box Monday, co-host Andrew Ross Sorkin asked Tennessee Senator Bill Hagerty about the president’s recent outrage at Walmart. The mega retail chain’s CFO warned last week that consumers might start to see higher prices on products as soon as June.

“In the short term, if Walmart decides that they have to raise prices, do you think that that’s un-American, effectively?” Sorkin asked.

“I think Walmart’s gonna have to make some decisions; Walmart has the broadest base of American clients there is. I think they’re gonna be very careful about how they do this. I know that they’ve received some criticism from the president. I think they need to think hard,” Hagerty replied.

Walmart’s CFO had explained that Walmart imports a third of its merchandise and food from other countries, with China being the largest supplier, followed by Mexico, Canada, India, and Vietnam, making it vulnerable to supply chain disruptions sparked by Trump’s sweeping reciprocal tariff policy. He also said that it wouldn’t be easy to adapt to changes in demand sparked by fluctuations in pricing.

Trump had hit back at the retail corporation in an angry post on Truth Social Saturday. “Walmart should STOP trying to blame Tariffs as the reason for raising prices throughout the chain,” he wrote.

The president advised Walmart, which had made more money than it expected, to “EAT THE TARIFFS” and not increase prices on consumer goods. CNBC reported that Walmart had beat earnings estimates but fallen short on sales.

“I’ll be watching, and so will your customers!!!” the president warned.

On Sunday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was asked whether Trump’s “Eat the tariffs” line meant that he wanted American companies to be “less profitable.” Bessent confirmed that Walmart CEO Doug McMillon had told him the company planned to “eat some of the tariffs.” The rest would likely still fall on consumers.

Last week, the White House announced that it had negotiated a lowered tariff rate of 30 percent on Chinese imports to the U.S. for the next 90 days.

The president’s tariffs on China appear to have backfired.

Last week, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that U.S. tariffs on China would temporarily decrease to 30 percent from 145 percent for the next 90 days. The suspension followed a meeting in Geneva where Bessent and other U.S. officials met with their Chinese counterparts and temporarily put aside some of their differences. In exchange, China said it would lower its import tariff on American products to 10 percent from 125 percent. Both nations agreed to maintain a reciprocal tariff rate of 10 percent.

But countries “from Seoul to Brussels” have taken notice of the exchange, observing that tougher tactics against Trump appear to be the best recourse against the punishing tariffs, Bloomberg reported Sunday.

“This shifts the negotiating dynamic,” Stephen Olson, a former U.S. trade negotiator, told Bloomberg. “Many countries will look at the outcome of the Geneva negotiations and conclude that Trump has begun to realize that he has overplayed his hand.”

The Trump administration is running out of time to secure what it had promised would be “90 deals in 90 days” on U.S. trade—and other foreign leaders are realizing that they have better cards than they originally thought, leading them to play the waiting game rather than participate in a frenzied lineup for potential trade relief from Washington.

South Korea’s leading presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung has indicated that there’s no need to rush negotiations with U.S. trade officials. Japan’s Trade Minister Yoji Muto skipped a meeting with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer in South Korea last week.

“We will keep time limits in mind during negotiations, but we have no intention of compromising our national interests by becoming overly fixated on them,” Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said in Parliament Monday.

And some nations could be banking on the fact that the U.S. will be the first to feel the sting of Trump’s tariffs, forcing a policy change from within.

“The economic pain is more immediate and broad-based in the U.S., and this deal can be seen as the Trump administration acknowledging that,” Robert Subbaraman, head of global markets research at Nomura Holdings Inc, told Bloomberg.

Senator Rick Scott thinks that people who won’t work are choosing not to have health care.

The Florida Republican made the outrageous statement in an interview on Fox and Friends Monday morning, responding to Charles Hurt’s leading question about “one of the sticking points” of the GOP’s budget bill being “about paying able-bodied 30-year-old men without dependents welfare with no work requirement.”

“Why do some of your colleagues have a problem with that?” Hurt asked Scott. The Florida senator then responded with his pronouncement.

“If you don’t want to work, you’re the one that decided you don’t want health care. That’s number one. Number two: Medicaid is supposed to be for children that don’t have health care and people with chronic illness,” Scott said.

Scott’s perception of Medicaid is horrible. It fails to take into account people whose illnesses prevent them from working, those whose jobs don’t offer health insurance, or those who want to work but can’t get jobs for multiple reasons, such as serving as a caregiver or having a criminal record.

And aside from that, Scott’s own background betrays his massive hypocrisy. Before he entered politics, Scott was the head of Columbia/HCA, one of the country’s biggest for-profit hospital chains, which was found responsible for the largest Medicare and Medicaid fraud case in the country’s history, receiving $1.7 billion in fines. The company “systemically defrauded” federal health care programs while paying kickbacks to its physicians.

Scott knows quite well that the real waste and fraud in health care is from companies like his own, which made him one of the wealthiest people in Congress. He has never faced consequences for his role in the fraud, serving as Florida’s governor and later a senator. Perhaps, though, he should keep his mouth shut when it comes to attacking people who depend on the government health care service.

The White House has officially opened its doors to a website accused of spreading Russian propaganda.

Press secretary Karoline Leavitt welcomed Zero Hedge’s Liam Cosgrove to the new media seat Monday—who predictably proceeded to relay conspiracy theories when given an opportunity to ask the first question at the morning press briefing.

Zero Hedge is a financial blog started under a pen name by Bulgarian-born former investment banker Daniel Ivandjiiski, and has been accused by U.S. intelligence officials of publishing articles crafted by Moscow-controlled media. The site has also spread conspiracy theories about Covid-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement, and circulated fake quotes from politicians. The site amassed a large alt-right (now mainstream) audience, including racists, antisemites, and conspiracy theorists. Now it’s being granted an even larger platform and preferential treatment from the White House.

Cosgrove asked two questions. The first was about whether Donald Trump planned to stop “financing foreign wars” in Ukraine and Gaza, during which Cosgrove managed to laud Trump and take a shot at Joe Biden. The second was about an old conspiracy theory resurfaced by the president himself.

“So, over the weekend, President Trump posted [on] Truth Social, a video highlighting what most people call the ‘Clinton body count,’” Cosgrove said. “Which is the strange number of suicides that seem to happen in Clinton circles—”

As Cosgrove spoke, Leavitt was visibly holding back a smile.

Cosgrove took issue with reporting from The Washington Post that Trump’s Truth Social post had amplified “false” conspiracy theories. Although it wasn’t mentioned in the video shared by the president, Cosgrove raised the apparent suicide of Mark Middleton, a former aide to President Bill Clinton who had been a point of contact between the White House and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, as his own evidence of the “Clinton body count.”

“That’s just a lead-in to my question about the most famous Clinton-related suicide, which is that of Jeffrey Epstein. There’s still a lot of questions about the Epstein files—” Cosgrove continued, asking whether the White House planned to release information that would connect Epstein’s trafficking activities to intelligence agencies, “even potentially as part of a blackmail ring with potential ties to the Israeli government.”

In a classic Leavitt nonanswer, she said that more information about Epstein would be released soon because Attorney General Pam Bondi had said she would release more information soon.

The White House opened up its briefing room to “new media” in January and has made way for a revolving door of professional journalists, podcasters, and influencers. This crowd has inevitably included several MAGA talking heads, including content creators from Breitbart, the right-wing video platform Rumble, BreakingPoints, the Daily Wire, former Newsmax host Mark Halperin, and the right-wing substack Washington Reporter.

Republicans in the House Budget Committee passed Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” on their second try late Sunday, advancing his 2017 tax cuts for multimillionaires and corporations closer to the House floor.

And by Monday morning, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was plainly lying about the impact of the forthcoming legislation.

“Is the president OK with this bill adding to the deficit?” a reporter asked.

“This bill does not add to the deficit. In fact, according to the Council of Economic Advisers, this bill will save $1.6 trillion, and the president absolutely understands and hears the concerns of fiscal conservatives and of Americans who want to get our fiscal house in order,” Leavitt responded.

“That’s what the intention of this bill is. There’s $1.6 trillion worth of savings in this bill,” she continued. “That’s the largest savings for any legislation that has ever passed Capitol Hill in our nation’s history.”

Where Leavitt acquired that number is not clear, but other, non-administration-related estimates say otherwise.

Trump’s tax cuts for corporations and multimillionaires is estimated to add trillions to the national deficit. The reconciliation bill’s final deficit price tag has yet to be determined, but last week, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget released a report indicating that the proposal was expected to add somewhere between $3.8 trillion and $5.3 trillion to the national deficit over the next 10 years. As of the time of publishing, the U.S. deficit is currently at $36.8 trillion.

To offset the hike, Republicans proposed cutting $880 billion from Medicaid by way of adding work requirements and booting undocumented immigrants off the public health coverage program (undocumented immigrants are ineligible to receive Medicaid, though lifesaving care under EMTALA can be covered by emergency Medicaid).

To alleviate the whopping deficit growth, the bill also didn’t follow through on things that Trump had promised to his base, such as stripping taxes from tips, overtime pay, and Social Security benefits.

The bill initially stalled Friday due to a far-right flank in the committee that remained skeptical of adding such a significant sum to the national debt. In a statement prior to the vote, Representative Chip Roy—who voted “no” last week but flipped his vote to “present” on Sunday—said that the bill fell “profoundly short.”

Stephen Miran, the chair of the Trump administration’s Council of Economic Advisers, is possibly best known for his plan to correct the U.S. deficit by weakening the dollar—something he’s dubbed the “Mar-a-Lago Accord.” Miran, a Harvard-trained economist, has other controversial theories that have made him an outlier among his peers.

In addition to his dollar-weakening stratagem, Miran has been a vocal proponent of Trump’s tariff plan, pitting him against dozens of Nobel Prize–winning economists who have warned since Election Day that the MAGA leader’s stiff tariff increases and tax cuts would spell disaster for the average American.

Columnists have labeled Trump’s bill the second coming of Reagonomics, promising to slash taxes for the wealthy while leaving the rest of the U.S. population to scramble for the trickle-down, a wealth distribution theory that economists, think tanks, and newspapers have concluded doesn’t “hold up.”

CBS News CEO Wendy McMahon announced Monday that she is resigning from her position.

She is the second executive to quit in opposition to the network considering settling a $20 billion defamation lawsuit from President Trump over bogus allegations over how an episode with Kamala Harris was edited before the 2024 election. Bill Owens, the executive producer of 60 Minutes, was the first. 

“Championing and supporting the journalism produced by the most amazing stations and bureaus in the world, celebrating the successes of our shows and our brands, elevating our stories and our people.... It has been a privilege and joy,” McMahon wrote in a statement to CBS employees. “At the same time, the past few months have been challenging. It’s become clear that the company and I do not agree on the path forward. It’s time for me to move on and for this organization to move forward with new leadership.”

That “path forward” seems to involve capitulating to Trump.

Trump has been particularly aggressive towards the media in his second term, and one massive network has already fallen in line out of fear. In December, ABC News agreed to settle a $15 million Trump defamation lawsuit that legal experts think they could have won.  

Now, the Trump administration is set on making CBS heel. Last month, the president threatened to use the FCC against the network. 

“They should lose their license! Hopefully, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), as headed by its Highly Respected Chairman, Brendan Carr, will impose the maximum fines and punishment, which is substantial, for their unlawful and illegal behavior,” Trump posted. “CBS is out of control, at levels never seen before, and they should pay a big price for this. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”

This story has been updated.

The MAGA fringes still very badly want “Jeffrey Epstein didn’t kill himself” to be a thing.

On Sunday, Fox News’s Maria Bartiromo grilled FBI Director Kash Patel and his deputy director, Dan Bongino, over the far-right conspiracy that the wealthy sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein didn’t commit suicide but was killed in prison in 2019 to prevent him from incriminating the Clintons and other world leaders.

“You said Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide. People don’t believe it,” Bartiromo said bluntly to Patel on the Sunday show.

“Well, listen, they have a right to their opinion. But as someone who has worked as a public defender, as a prosecutor, who’s been in that prison system, who’s been in that metropolitcal detention center, who’s been in segregated housing—you know a suicide when you see one,” Patel replied. “And that’s what that was.”

“He killed himself,” Bongino chimed in. “I’ve seen the whole file. He killed himself.”

Those answers led to some grumblings on Truth Social.

“Ok ‘he committed suicide’ so can you explain why the cameras were shut off during that ‘suicide,’” one poster pondered. “He was on suicide watch, and the guards just left. How dumb do you take the American people to be? There are No coincidences.”

“Ok let’s recap, one [of] the most secure detention centers, guards fell asleep, cameras didn’t work, medical examiner stated that the neck injury wasn’t consistent with a suicide, but now you want us to believe that it was, what a crock!” wrote another disappointed MAGA acolyte. “I’m seriously disappointed in Bongino and Kash.”

On Monday, the Epstein question was brought up again at White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s briefing, this time by Liam Cosgrove, a “reporter” for the far-right conspiracy website ZeroHedge.

Cosgrove began his question by referring to a video Trump posted on Truth Social peddling a conspiracy theory accusing Bill and Hillary Clinton of murdering their political rivals and covering them up as suicides.

“That’s just a lead-in to my question about the most famous Clinton-related suicide, which is that of Jeffrey Epstein,” Cosgrove said. “There’s still a lot of questions around that case. You’ve released phase one of the Epstein files; what was missing from that was any connection to his ties to intelligence agencies, and that’s really the whole story—not just trafficking young girls, doing it on behalf of intelligence agencies and even potentially as part of a blackmail ring with potential ties to the Israeli government. So for phase two, when can we expect it? Will it have information pertaining to those aspects of the Epstein case?”

Leavitt sidestepped the question completely. “I would [refer] you to the Department of Justice on [Attorney General Pam Bondi’s] timeline,” she replied.

While Epstein’s long history of sexual abuse and the powerful connections he maintained (like Bill Clinton and Donald Trump) are deeply disturbing, it’s clear that this prime MAGA theory is beyond logic. They couldn’t care less about the numerous victims. For them, it’s the Clintons who killed Epstein because they’re pedophiles, and Trump should investigate and expose the entire Democratic Party for being pedophiles too. That’s why they won’t take no for an answer.

Vice President JD Vance has reportedly decided to skip visiting Israel on Tuesday due to the country launching a massive operation to expand its massacre in Gaza.

Axios, citing a senior U.S. official, reported Monday that Vance didn’t want to visit Israel because he didn’t want his trip to indicate that the Trump administration was endorsing Israel’s expanded operation at the same time that the White House is trying to push for a ceasefire and hostage deal. Officially, Vance says that “logistical” issues prevent the trip from taking place.

But Vance’s snub of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, coupled with President Donald Trump’s decision not to visit Israel during his Middle East trip last week, suggest that the White House isn’t happy with Netanyahu’s decisions regarding Gaza right now. Netanyahu is stubbornly refusing any agreements to end Israel’s 19-month war on the Palestinian territory, which has caused a human rights catastrophe.

White House envoy Steve Witkoff has been pressing Israel and Hamas to accept an updated proposal for a ceasefire deal that would free the remaining hostages in Gaza. But Israel has begun mobilizing troops for Operation Gideon’s Chariots, which would forcibly displace two million Palestinians from the territory in a shocking display of ethnic cleansing.

For now, Israel has resumed allowing humanitarian aid into Gaza after two months, responding to pressure from the Trump administration and Europe. Trump even said last week that “a lot of people are starving” in Gaza, a rare acknowledgment of the humanitarian crisis Israel has caused in the territory.

That crisis only continues to worsen as Israel now seeks to begin wider ground operations in Gaza. More than 53,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed since October 2023, which is very likely an undercount, with nearly 3,200 killed since Israel resumed airstrikes in March, following a brief ceasefire. This doesn’t include people dying due to famine and starvation caused by Israel’s aid restrictions. It’s going to take a lot more than a missed visit to end the onslaught.

Donald Trump is threatening to sue American businesses for discussing the apparently cozy relationship he has with Qatari leadership.

In a post on Truth Social Sunday, the president publicly threatened to sue ABC News for reporting on the super luxury jumbo jet he received as a gift from Qatar.

“Why doesn’t Chairman Bob Iger do something about ABC Fake News, especially since I just won $16,000,000 based on the Fake and Defamatory reporting of Liddle George Slopadopolus,” Trump wrote, referring to a December arrangement in which ABC agreed to donate $15 million to Trump’s presidential library to settle his defamation lawsuit against the anchor.

“He was given warnings, but just couldn’t be restrained by ‘management.’ Now I see they are at it again, and I again give these SleazeBags fair warning!” he said.

The jet was widely interpreted as a foreign bribe, including by longtime supporters of the president’s agenda, such as far-right influencers Ben Shapiro and Laura Loomer. It was one of the most lavish gifts ever bestowed on a U.S. president.

“The wonderful country of Qatar, after agreeing to invest more than 1.4 Trillion Dollars in the United States of America, deserves much better than Misleading (Fake!) News. Everyone, including their lawyers, has been told that ABC must not say that Qatar is giving ME a FREE Boeing 747 Airplane, because they are not,” the president continued online, apparently incensed that a news organization was doing its job.

“Instead, and as Fake News ABC fully knows and understands, this highly respected country is donating the plane to the United States Air Force/Defense Department, AND NOT TO ME,” he posted. “By so doing, they are saving our country, and the American Taxpayer, hundreds of millions of dollars. ABC Fake News is one of the WORST.”

Claiming that the plane is going toward the Defense Department is a convenient workaround that would allow Trump to ethically accept the pricy present, since it is obviously illegal for a president (or any U.S. public officeholder) to accept gifts “of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State,” per the Constitution’s foreign emoluments clause.

Except that the plane is not actually being donated to the American people. Instead, Trump is opting to use the luxurious aircraft as his new Air Force One until “shortly before he leaves office,” at which point he will transfer ownership of the plane to his presidential library foundation, sources with knowledge of the arrangement told ABC News.

Richard Briffault, a Columbia Law School professor, told NPR News Trump’s decision to accept the jumbo jet is a “pretty textbook case” of violating the emoluments clause, clarifying that if Trump hands the jet over to his library after leaving office, then it’s “not really a gift to the United States at all.”

“[Gifts are] designed to create good feelings for the recipient and to get some kind of reciprocity,” Briffault told NPR. “But the thing that [Trump] can give, of course, is public policy—weapons deals or whatever. And then, of course, it’s an incentive to other countries to give similar gifts as another way of influencing presidential decision-making.”