Key highlights from today
• Senate vote: A day after voting to limit President Donald Trump’s Iran war powers, the Senate walked back its rebuke. The late-night vote on Wednesday came after Trump expressed frustration with Senate Republicans.
• GOP tensions: Trump and Sen. Bill Cassidy, who recently lost to a Trump-endorsed primary opponent, clashed sharply over the war in Iran during a closed-door meeting at the Capitol, according to multiple people in the room.
• Trump nixes housing bill signing: The tense lunch came just hours after Trump dropped a bombshell by canceling plans to sign a bipartisan landmark housing affordability bill until he gets action on his controversial elections overhaul legislation.
• NATO meeting: Trump also met with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte at the White House. The US president, who has repeatedly trashed the alliance, said he wouldn’t be attending next month’s summit if it weren’t in Turkey.
Our live coverage has ended
Please scroll through the posts below for key moments from today.
Senate walks back rebuke of Trump over Iran war
One day after adopting a resolution aimed at removing US military forces from the conflict with Iran, the Senate walked back its rebuke of President Donald Trump’s handling of the war, rejecting an attempt to advance a similar war powers measure.
GOP Sens. Rand Paul and Bill Cassidy, who had previously voted to rein in the president’s war powers on Iran, changed their votes this; Paul voted present and Cassidy voted against advancing the resolution. GOP Sens. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski once again voted for the resolution, while Democratic Sen. John Fetterman again voted against it. The final tally was 47-50-1.
Read more on this story here.
Park Police release video of person near Reflecting Pool after Trump’s claims of vandalism
US Park Police released video Wednesday night of someone near the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool saying they are trying to identify the individual “in connection with a Destruction of Government Property investigation.”
Police did not specify what they are alleging the person did.
The video — shot from a long distance — shows an individual kneeling down by the edge of the pool and reaching their hand into the water as other people milled about nearby.
It is unclear in the 30 second video what the person is doing when they reached into the water — Park Police highlighting the moment with a circle around the person.
Police say “the incident” happened last Friday around 3:30pm and ask for the public’s help in identifying the person.
President Donald Trump began asserting over the weekend that the visible problems with the reflecting pool were caused by “Vandals.”
Trump said on Truth Social Tuesday that six people have been arrested and seven people “have been cited, for the damage they did to our Country’s now beautiful Reflecting Pool.”
The Justice Department in a court filing Wednesday night said, “the tops of roughly 70 fence posts were thrown into the Reflecting Pool.” The filing did not include any images of the fence posts in the pool.
The filing is part of a lawsuit filed in May by a nonprofit group that’s called into question the legality of decisions by officials to bypass certain regulatory steps in order to complete Trump’s Reflecting Pool renovation project on a quick timeline.
The Justice Department said in the filing that work to repair the pool won’t begin until after July 4.
Cassidy briefed on Iran by top White House officials following tense lunch with Trump
Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy said he received a “thorough briefing” on Iran from Vice President JD Vance and special envoy Steve Witkoff at the White House after a tense exchange with President Donald Trump on Capitol Hill earlier Wednesday.
“I want to thank Vice President Vance and Special Envoy Witkoff for the thorough briefing this afternoon on Iran. I appreciate the quick invitation to the White House to address many of my concerns,” Cassidy posted on X Wednesday evening.
In the month since Trump put a decisive end to Cassidy’s congressional career, the Louisiana Republican has become one of the president’s sharpest critics in the halls of the US Capitol. His concerns about the Iran war came to a head during Trump’s appearance at a Senate GOP lunch on Wednesday.
Trump sticks to script while marking America’s 250th anniversary
President Donald Trump largely stuck to script and forewent his traditional hours-long rally-style remarks while delivering a speech on the National Mall for the kickoff of the “Great American State Fair” Wednesday evening.
The president — who often departs from prepared remarks to reflect on a variety of topics at length — spoke for about 30 minutes, during which he touted his administration’s accomplishments, his efforts to renovate the nation’s capital and the upcoming events around the country’s 250th anniversary.
His veered into the political at times, criticizing his predecessor, former President Joe Biden, while highlighting efforts to disband the Department of Education and curtail transgender rights.
And he offered high praise for the US military, pointing to this year’s operations in Venezuela and Iran while hinting at more to come.
“How good is our military? Iran was essentially finished one hour, Venezuela was finished, and I guess we have other things in store, but we don’t want to get carried away,” he said.
For the most part, Trump focused on what he views as his victories since returning to office, including renovations to the Reflecting Pool, which has been plagued with issues since it reopened last week, and construction of the White House ballroom, which is unpopular with the American people and has faced legal challenges.
The speech — which clocked in at just under 30 minutes from start to finish —marked one of the shorter addresses of Trump’s second term to date. As the Marine Band began to play his signature walk-off song, “YMCA” by The Village People, Trump quickly departed the stage, declining to remain for the second verse.
Trump touts DC renovations to celebrate nation's 250th birthday
President Donald Trump on Wednesday touted his efforts to remake Washington, DC, to commemorate the nation’s 250th anniversary, honoring what he calls the “golden age of America.”
“The great civilizations of history did not wallow in aging ruins of the past. They built new cities, they created new monuments, and they forged towering legacies that still inspire the world after hundreds and even thousands of years,” Trump said as he kicked off the “Great American State Fair” on the National Mall.
Trump boasted about efforts to repair fountains and monuments around the nation’s capital, his ballroom project at the White House, his plans to build a triumphal arch and “National Garden of American Heroes,” as well as his repairs to Lafayette Park and the Reflecting Pool.
Several of those projects, however, have been held up by logistical and legal challenges. Trump dismissed concerns about the Reflecting Pool and vowed to fix it, even telling the audience the pool “looks perfect already.”
What is the "Great American State Fair" that Trump is kicking off?
President Donald Trump is hosting the opening ceremony of the “Great American State Fair” Wednesday evening after artists bailed on a concert series for the Trump-backed event.
The festival on the National Mall — which runs from June 25 through July 10 —is being put on by Freedom 250, a Trump-aligned nonprofit that’s organized a plethora of other 250th events.
All of the artists who have pulled out suggested they were misled about the event’s political associations.
Trump, who first teased the idea of a state fair on the campaign trail in 2023, has billed it as a patriotic World’s Fair featuring pavilions created by every US state and territory.
All 50 states and territories will be represented, but several states are not directly taking part, with most of those citing concerns about costs. Some local groups and companies volunteered to stand in for those that declined to organize booths.
Though the states’ displays are nonpartisan, Trump’s agenda will loom heavily over the fair, beginning with Wednesday night’s speech, which he’s billed as a “Make America Great Again rally.”
Thune acknowledges Senate GOP’s lunch with Trump was a "one-sided conversation"
Senate Majority Leader John Thune acknowledged that the Senate GOP’s lunch with President Donald Trump was largely a “one-sided conversation,” rather than a true back-and-forth.
When asked if senators were able to express to Trump that some of his priorities, including a voter ID and proof of citizenship bill and eliminating the filibuster, do not have enough support, he replied, “It was kind of a one-sided conversation, so I just don’t think it was the, it wasn’t the place to do that.”
“I talked to him after the event,” Thune added. “I think it kind of went like maybe most people expected. He was pretty fired up about a couple of issues, and so people heard him out, but, but I think in the end we all realize that to be successful and effective, we’ve got to, we’ve got to pull the team together.”
Pressed on what was accomplished by the meeting, the GOP leader said they needed to “get some of the issues out there.”
“I think it’s important,” he told CNN. “It’s an intra-family discussion, and, and you know, it helps get some of the issues out there, airs them out in that respect to accomplish the objective.”
Dozens of states may face massive new costs in their food stamps programs
As many as three dozen states may have to start paying a portion of their residents’ food stamps benefits for the first time because of high rates of mistakes in their payments to recipients.
The US Department of Agriculture on Wednesday released the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program payment error rate for fiscal year 2025 – a key metric for determining what share of benefits states will have to shoulder starting in October 2027. Nationally, the payment error rate is 10.62%, but the figure varies widely depending on the state.
The new expense is part of President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which made sweeping cuts to the nation’s safety net programs, including food stamps. One provision of the package requires states with payment error rates of 6% or higher to pick up between 5% and 15% of the benefit costs. Their first year’s tab will depend on their error rate in fiscal years 2025 or 2026.
The federal government has paid the full cost of food stamps benefits and will continue to do so in states with payment error rates below 6%.
(States with very high error rates in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, the formal name for food stamps, are getting a one-year reprieve from having to start paying a share of food stamp benefits.)
The affected states could be on the hook for as much as $9 billion in benefit payments, according to the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
“If states can’t fully cover these huge new costs by raising taxes or cutting other services, they’ll need to further restrict access to SNAP or potentially end the program entirely – with dire consequences for struggling families & the broader economy,” Katie Bergh, senior policy analyst at CBPP, posted on X.
The added cost comes at a time when states are struggling to put in place other changes to their SNAP programs as required by the “big, beautiful bill,” most notably an expansion of work requirements to more recipients.
Cassidy recounts Trump confrontation: "I'm not going to be bullied”
Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy recounted to reporters his testy exchange with President Donald Trump earlier Wednesday, saying it came after the president wondered aloud to the room of GOP senators why they would vote for a resolution to curb his war powers in Iran.
“The President was wondering why people would vote for the War Powers Act. I asked him if that would be a rhetorical question, a real question. He said, ‘real’. And so, as we begin to speak, the president didn’t want to hear my question, interrupted me,” Cassidy said.
The Louisiana senator continued, “I didn’t care to be interrupted. I felt like I was trying to get answers for the American people, and I’m not going to be bullied when I’m trying to get answers for the American people, and so, so it escalated from there. At some point it de-escalated.”
Asked by reporters if the president called him a lunatic, as CNN has reported, Cassidy did not deny it.
“Can I imagine that the President called me things that would be said on a school – on a playground? Yeah, I can imagine that,” he said.
Nor did he deny referring to the president as “brother,” which CNN also reported. Cassidy told reporters, “I don’t think that’s really important to the story.”
"Not helpful": Murkowski warns that Trump is getting in his own way with SAVE America Act
Republican senators warned on Wednesday that President Donald Trump is holding up his own agenda – and potentially jeopardizing electoral victories in the fall – by derailing Congress’s plans with unrealistic demands.
“It’s not helpful,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski told CNN’s Manu Raju of Trump’s recent moves to stall his own director of national intelligence nominee and refuse to sign a popular bipartisan housing bill over his insistence that the Senate pass his signature voter ID bill.
“If he chooses to hold up his own agenda because he wants action on the Save Act, that’s, I guess, his call. It is not helpful to him. It’s not helpful to the country, and it’s not moving the needle. If you don’t have the votes, sir, you don’t have the votes,” she said.
Pressed on if Trump is harming GOP chances of keeping the majority in the midterms, she responded, “I’m just going to say I don’t think it helps. People want us to, to be able to deliver on priorities, absolutely, and they want to focus on things that they’re talking about back home.”
“When they see the internal chaos that’s going on, I don’t think it helps, I don’t think it helps those who are, are up for election. I don’t think it helps our colleagues,” she said.
Sen. Kevin Cramer, a Trump ally, said the president could be more helpful in driving a clear message to voters.
“It would be helpful for him and his followers to hear about these successes that he’s supportive of, much like the working family tax cuts, much like funding ICE and border protection, you know, obviously, much like a good, a good housing bill, taking a victory lap has benefits for future legislation, for sure,” he said.
Trump declines to say if he'd veto housing bill after upending signing
President Donald Trump declined to say Wednesday if he’d veto the bipartisan housing bill that he suddenly announced earlier in the day he wouldn’t sign.
“I said I’m not signing the housing bill,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked if he’d veto it, going on to say that he wants “see what happens” with the “SAVE America Act,” referring to the controversial elections overhaul bill.
The housing bill is set to eventually become law whether Trump officially signs it or not. Longstanding rules say if the president does not sign a bill lawmakers passed within 10 days while Congress is in session — excluding Sundays — a bill will become law.
And even though Trump could veto it, Congress could override that veto by passing the legislation again with a two-thirds supermajority in the House and Senate — a threshold that the bill already cleared in its initial trip through both chambers of Congress.
Trump decries Senate's Iran rebuke, saying it interrupted negotiations
President Donald Trump decried a bipartisan rebuke from the Senate of his war with Iran, saying the timing of the vote this week was inconvenient.
“We’re doing great in our negotiations with Iran, right in the middle of one of the key things, which we’re going to get anyway,” he told reporters in the Oval Office, describing the progress he said was interrupted by the vote.
“We have breaking news. The Senate has voted that they’d like Trump to stop the war. So Iran sees that, they go, ‘What’s that all about?’ No, you know it’s meaningless,” he said.
The Senate adopted a resolution on Tuesday directing the president to remove military forces from the conflict with Iran, a significant rebuke to Trump and a strong message that the war lacks support in Congress.
Trump says he wouldn't go to NATO summit if it weren't in Turkey
President Donald Trump said Wednesday he would not have decided to go to the upcoming NATO summit if it were not in Turkey.
“Well, except for the fact that it was being held in Turkey by President Erdogan, I don’t think I would have gone to it,” Trump said in the Oval Office during a meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
Trump said he would “not have gone for most people” but was asked by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
“So I’m going out of respect to President Erdogan,” Trump said.
Why Trump and NATO have a tumultuous relationship as chief visits White House
NATO chief Mark Rutte will visit Trump at the White House Wednesday, just two weeks ahead of a critical NATO summit in Turkey. And while Rutte has cultivated a largely positive relationship with President Donald Trump, the US leader has a rocky relationship with NATO.
Trump has threatened to withdraw from the alliance and questioned whether it’s valuable for the United States, who he argues is underwriting Europe’s security, to remain a member. In recent months, that sentiment was on full display, as the United States entered into a conflict with Iran.
The NATO alliance itself dates back 77 years, and American and European security structures have become intertwined during that time. But Trump did not consult his European and NATO allies before launching the war in Iran and has lashed out at the alliance and individual leaders over their unwillingness to get involved and assist in securing the Strait of Hormuz.
But, at the same time, he’s also taken credit for boosting members’ defense spending and periodically reaffirms his commitment to NATO’s collective defense agreement.
In addition to the Iran war, another thorny point in the NATO-Trump relationship was the US president’s threat to use military force to take Greenland.
Trump asserted that controlling Greenland — a territory of NATO ally Denmark — was necessary for national security and he would take it “whether they like it or not.” That drew quick condemnation from allies and rattled the entire Western alliance. Trump later dropped it, but still threatened tariffs against those who opposed his grab — deepening the rift.
Trump acting like "petulant child" backing out of signing housing bill, Warren says
Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren, one of the co-authors of the bipartisan housing bill, accused President Donald Trump of prioritizing personal gain over American families after he canceled a signing of the passed legislation earlier today.
Americans are struggling with the cost of everything right now, Warren said, from housing to healthcare to groceries.
“This was at least one chance to push back against that, and Donald Trump — we got all the way to the finish line — and like a petulant child, he says he’s not gonna do it,” Warren told CNN.
Republicans and Democrats worked together for months to come up with “meaningful provisions” that are included in the bill, she said in an interview on MS NOW earlier Wednesday. Each of those pieces in the legislation are aimed at helping local municipalities build more housing supply in a way that works for them, Warren said.
As for reversing his decision to sign the housing bill in order to put more pressure on lawmakers to pass the “SAVE America Act,” Warren said “it just makes no sense.”
“He wants to make his case and he can’t even make his case to all the Republicans about changing voting laws,” she said.
CNN’s Dugald McConnell contributed reporting to this post.
Cassidy describes confrontation with Trump on Iran war
In the month since President Donald Trump helped put an end to Sen. Bill Cassidy’s career in Congress, the Louisiana senator has become one of the president’s sharpest critics.
So when the two stood face to face in a Wednesday meeting in the Capitol, the ingredients were there for a blowup.
The testy back-and-forth began, according to Cassidy, as Trump demanded to know why members of his own party — including Cassidy — voted with Democrats a day earlier to rebuke the president’s military authority in Iran.
“He asked, ‘why would anybody vote for the War Powers Act?’” Cassidy recalled after the meeting. “I stood and said, ‘you have not told the American people what’s going on. It was supposed to last four weeks, it’s lasted four months. Our original objectives have not been achieved, and I want to know what’s going on.’”
From there, according to multiple sources in the room, a furious Trump went after Cassidy, raising his voice. Cassidy recalled that he “lost his temper” and said he was shouting back with the same “tone and volume” of the president.
Cassidy said the friction was so intense that, “at some point my guys next to me said ‘ok, Bill, sit down,’ and so I sat down and tried to de-escalate.” Cassidy blamed his “Irish” temper for the outburst but made clear he was not regretful about his demands for information on Iran.
“I make no apologies for standing up to the president, if you will, trying to demand that more information be shared with the Senate and more information be shared with the American people,” Cassidy said. “I am sticking up for the American people, even if I’m speaking to the president.”
Cornyn says Trump preached unity but talked “about things which were not exactly unified”
Sen. John Cornyn, who lost a primary weeks ago to Trump-backed Ken Paxton, was in the middle of recounting the lunch to an interested Democratic colleague when reporters mobbed him to get a readout of the closed-door meeting with the president.
“The president closed by preaching unity,” Cornyn said. “But he spent the entire hour talking about things which were not exactly unified.”
Rick Scott told Trump the votes aren't currently there for election bill in private meeting
One of the major questions going into President Donald Trump’s meeting with Senate Republicans was whether it would be conveyed to Trump directly that there simply are not the votes to pass the election overhaul legislation that the president has stalled all other action in Congress over.
GOP Sen. Rick Scott told CNN he was the one to deliver that message during the closed-door lunch meeting.
“I said this is this is where we are today” Scott said. “I’m a business guy. You have to live in reality.”
Scott, who supports passing the legislation and was the one to initially invite Trump to the lunch, then laid out the different options Republicans have at their disposal to try and get it passed, including breaking the legislation down into pieces, pushing it through a complex process known as reconciliation or even eliminating the filibuster.
Scott relayed that Trump is not focused on how Republicans pass it, just that it becomes law.
“He’s not saying how you have to get something done, but he wants to get the Save America Act passed. He really believes it’s a key to this fall,” Scott said.
Although senators did not walk out with a clear resolution, Scott said the meeting “created a venue for people to have a conversation.”
Johnson will meet with Trump on Thursday amid mounting crisis over "SAVE America Act" demands
Speaker Mike Johnson will meet with President Donald Trump on Thursday to discuss the growing legislative crisis facing congressional Republicans over the White House’s “SAVE America Act” demands, according to a person familiar with the meeting.
With Trump suddenly escalating his demands for the elections overhaul bill, he’s put Johnson and GOP leaders in a difficult position: They can’t get anything major done in either chamber because the president’s voter overhaul bill has no way of passing Congress.
That includes Trump’s abrupt announcement on Wednesday that he would not sign Congress’s bipartisan housing bill until the “SAVE America Act” is passed.
