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USA has paused a $14bn arms sale to Taiwan, amid significant pressure from China. The shipment was expected to include equipment vital to the island’s defence, but just a week after Trump visited Beijing for meetings with Xi, the deal has been put on hold. US said it was pausing the deal because it needed to preserve its stockpile for the war in Iran – but in the same message, it insisted it still had enough weapons. Hung Cao, the acting US navy secretary, said: “Right now we’re doing a pause in order to make sure we have the munitions...

The Trump administration and GOP lawmakers are seeking to win over U.S. farmers, a core constituency for the president during his 2016 and 2024 White House wins that has been aggravated by rising prices caused by his trade policies and the Iran war. Ahead of a midterm election season where the GOP is working to win every vote it can, the White House and its allies in Congress are reaching out to farmers in red and blue states alike. On the way back from Beijing after his summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, President Trump assured farmers that they would...

President Trump traded millions of dollars worth of technology stocks since the start of 2026, new disclosures released on Thursday show. In a report filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, Trump revealed that he bought and sold shares of companies including Nvidia, Palantir and Oracle. The disclosures came amid the Trump administration’s trip to China, where tech CEOs including Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Apple’s Tim Cook accompanied the president. The disclosures show that Trump made more than a dozen purchases and sales of Nvidia shares from January through March. That included a purchase listed between $500,001 and $1,000,000...

The US is heading toward a federal debt load that could reach 175% of gross domestic product over the next three decades unless Congress takes corrective action, according to a new special report from the Wells Fargo Investment Institute. But the firm's Global Fixed Income Strategy Team stopped well short of sounding an alarm for investors, arguing instead that the trajectory, while troubling, remains manageable. The report draws on Congressional Budget Office projections and Treasury Department data to paint a detailed picture of the country's fiscal position. The debt-to-GDP ratio is already expected to hit 101% in 2026, matching its...

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s White House counterterrorism director Sebastian Gorka told The Post that he believes China intentionally flooded the United States with fentanyl in a present-day “Opium War” designed to weaken America through the “targeted killing” of its citizens. Gorka unloaded the blistering assessment Monday in a “Pod Force One” interview with The Post’s Miranda Devine — before Trump departed Tuesday afternoon for a state visit to Beijing that is expected to focus on trade relations. “They see our city on a hill as the newest version of the British Empire, and it is now payback time for the...

Wholesale prices in April posted their highest annual increase in more than three years, signaling more nettlesome inflation as pipeline costs intensify.The producer price index rose a seasonally adjusted 1.4% for the month, much higher than the 0.5% Dow Jones consensus forecast and the upwardly revised 0.7% March increase, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Wednesday. This was the largest monthly gain since March 2022.On an annual basis, the index was up 6%, the biggest increase since December 2022.

West Texas Intermediate (WTI), futures on NYMEX, is 2.6% higher to near $98.00 during the European trading session on Tuesday. The oil price gains sharply amid growing doubts that the temporary ceasefire between the United States (US) and Iran, announced in early April, would last long. Tensions between the US and Iran have renewed as US President Donald Trump stated, on Monday, that Iran’s proposal was “stupid”, adding, “Ceasefire is on life support.” The renewed uncertainty over the US-Iran permanent resolution has prompted fears of a prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital passage to almost 20% of...

Fox News contributor Mark Thiessen joined anchor John Roberts on Thursday to discuss the latest developments in President Donald Trump’s negotiations to end the conflict in Iran, which Thiessen warned risked putting the U.S. in a weaker position. Roberts introduced Thiessen and noted, “He’s got a new column out today in the Washington Post titled ‘Trump Risks Snatching Defeat From the Jaws of Victory.’” Roberts continued: You’re offering the president some advice here, including on X, where you said: “Here’s what Iran sees after being warned not to. They hit UAE and fired on a U.S. ship, and we didn’t...

OK. I have been doing my best to read the Trump tea leaves, figure out the Art of the Deal, and parse all the information out there so that I can figure out Donald Trump's strategy in the Iran War. I thought I had a good handle on it, and until the past few days, Trump's behavior accorded pretty well with my overall theory. Trump's strategy appeared to have been to pressure Iran into full and complete capitulation on the issues of nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles (which exist to make attacking Iran nearly impossible), and to get the Strait of...

Could this be the endgame? On Wednesday, while talking to reporters in the Oval Office, President Trump implied that a deal with Iran was imminent - and stated that they have agreed to give up their nuclear weapons program..@POTUS: "Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon, and they won't — and, they've agreed to that, among other things." pic.twitter.com/Z8ynfQpS7Y— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) May 6, 2026The Center Square's Washington, D.C., Bureau Chief, Sarah Roderick-Fitch, has more.During a Wednesday afternoon news conference in the Oval Office, Trump indicated that Iran has agreed not to have a nuclear weapon – a stipulation in...

You know how gas prices are already skyrocketing? Well... Fire reported at the Fujairah Oil Industry Zone in the UAE following an Iranian drone strike. pic.twitter.com/Kps0lfvJRF— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) May 4, 2026Fujairah is the only UAE refinery that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway between the Arabian Gulf and Iran that is currently locked down by Iranian mines/rockets and the U.S. Navy. The region produces a third of the world's oil, and a crucial percentage (hundreds of millions of barrels daily) are bypassing the strait by using the Fujairah refinery. Or ... they were (no word yet on how this...

A superyacht linked to one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's key allies has sailed through the Strait of Hormuz, despite the ongoing blockade of the critical shipping channel. The 142m-long (465 ft) multi-deck luxury boat, named Nord, is linked to sanctioned Russian billionaire Alexei Mordashov. It travelled from Dubai to Muscat, Oman, over the weekend - one of few private vessels to transit through the strait in recent months. Iran held high-level talks with Russia this week as its standoff with the US over the strait's re-opening continues. Approximately one-fifth of global oil and LNG supplies normally pass through the...

President Donald Trump on Tuesday said he believes the United States is “going to end up with a great deal” with Iran to end the weeks-long war. “I think they have no choice,” Trump said during an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” when asked what he expected to come out of a second round of peace negotiations with Iran. “We’ve taken out their Navy, we’ve taken out their Air Force, we’ve taken out their leaders,” the president said. “We’ve taken out their leaders, frankly, which does complicate things in one way, but these leaders are much more rational,” Trump said....

Kevin Warsh, the 56-year-old former Federal Reserve governor, was in the hot seat for his Senate Banking Committee confirmation hearing and said his Fed would be independent from the White House. Warsh fielded questions on issues ranging from his views on monetary policy to his sprawling and complex personal finances to his ties to the Trump White House. He would become the wealthiest Fed chair if confirmed. Questions about the Fed’s long-cherished independence have dominated the discourse surrounding the central bank during President Donald Trump’s second term. Warsh gave a qualified endorsement of Fed independence — but noted he doesn’t...

Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer and her top aides and family members routinely sent personal messages and requests to young staff members that are now under review by the department’s inspector general. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer and her former deputy chief of staff sent texts asking employees to bring wine to them during trips for the department. Sometimes the requests came in the middle of the workday. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer’s husband exchanged text messages with young female staff members, as did her father. Some of the young women were instructed by Ms. Chavez-DeRemer and the former deputy chief of staff to “pay attention” to...

Tuesday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) said the evidence that Iran was an imminent threat to the United States was not there.Co-host Joe Kernen said, “You have such a tough job. I asked Senator Scott, and he said, I love Senator Paul because you never waver, but everybody wavers. I was going to ask you about war powers, and the Constitution is messy, and to stick with it as you do in the real world, it’s hard. I don’t know why you even have this job. It must be so difficult at this point for you, right?...

Key points: >Consumer confidence plunged to a record low in April as fears mounted over rising energy prices and the broader impact of the Iran war, according to a University of Michigan survey. >The drop in sentiment coincided with a sharp spike in inflation expectations, with respondents seeing prices up 4.8% in a year from now, a full percentage point rise from the March reading. Consumer confidence plunged to a record low in April as fears mounted over rising energy prices and the broader impact of the Iran war, according to a University of Michigan survey Friday. The university’s headline...

Whether you like it or hate it, the war in Iran has definitely had the effect of exposing some of the ridiculous fantasies in the world to a serious dose of reality. Consider the UK. After implementing an expansive welfare state in the latter 20th century (e.g., free health care for all!), the UK since 2000 has gone all-in on the idea of an energy system free of hydrocarbon fuels. The 2008 Climate Change Act — passed with an overwhelming majority including support from all major political parties — committed the UK to 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050....

Many Americans were skeptical of Elon Musk’s grandiose claims that DOGE would take a “chainsaw” to federal spending. One “tax nerd” was so skeptical he decided to “bet his life savings” on Musk’s promises being a flop — and it paid off big time, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal. Musk has seen his approval rating descend as he has taken a more publicly active role politically, plus ongoing criticism and litigation over his management of his social media platform X and support for far-right politics in Europe. He jumped into his work with the Department of...

The husband of Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer has been barred from the department’s headquarters after at least two female staff members told officials that he had sexually assaulted them, according to people familiar with the decision and a police report obtained by The New York Times. The women said Ms. Chavez-DeRemer’s husband, Dr. Shawn DeRemer, had touched them inappropriately at the Labor Department’s building on Constitution Avenue. One of the incidents, during working hours on the morning of Dec. 18, was recorded on office security cameras, the people said. The video showed Dr. DeRemer giving one of the women an...