Trump hopes calls to Putin, Zelensky will make progress toward ceasefire, former POWs scrutinizing impostors receiving VA benefits, USS Truman leaves Middle East after eventful deployment, budget process has host of unanswered questions.
1. President Donald Trump is hoping separate phone calls Monday with Russian leader Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will make progress toward a ceasefire in the war in Ukraine. Trump expressed his hopes for a “productive day” Monday — and a ceasefire — in a social media post over the weekend. His effort will also include calls to NATO leaders. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed to the media on Monday that Putin and Trump will speak. Trump has struggled to end a war that began with Russia’s invasion in February 2022, and that makes these conversations a serious test of his reputation as a dealmaker after having claimed he would quickly settle the conflict once he was back in the White House, if not even before he took office.
2. When the number of former prisoners of war receiving benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs nearly doubled without explanation, an American survivor of the “Hanoi Hilton” wanted answers. Mike McGrath, a Vietnam veteran who spent six years in captivity and now investigates false military claims, said his research points to impostors receiving Veterans Administration POW benefits. The VA offers a different explanation. Officials say the surge in POW figures stems from a confusing accounting system that may count the same veteran more than once across multiple conflicts. The department also acknowledged it does not track where a veteran was held captive.
3. The aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman has left the Middle East after a deployment marked by the loss of three fighter jets and weeks of nearly constant flight operations in a U.S. bid to cripple Houthi militants in Yemen. Truman, the destroyer USS Jason Dunham and the cruiser USS Gettysburg are now in the U.S. 6th Fleet area of operations as part of a routine deployment, Cmdr. Tim Gorman, a spokesman for the fleet, said in a statement Monday. The 6th Fleet AOR includes the Mediterranean Sea. The statement did not say when Truman and the other ships left the Red Sea, which is part of the U.S. 5th Fleet area of operations, citing operational security. But open-source intelligence analysts said on X that satellite imagery showed Truman and Gettysburg transiting the Suez Canal north toward the Mediterranean on Saturday. Navy images posted online showed Truman operating in the Mediterranean on Sunday.
4. Congress will head into its Memorial Day recess at the end of this week with a host of unanswered questions about the annual budget process, including a detailed plan of what the White House hopes to fund — and cut — in fiscal 2026. Last week, both Republicans and Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee expressed frustration that the administration still has not released in-depth budget plans for federal departments and agencies, despite the current fiscal year being halfway complete. White House officials on May 2 released a “skinny” budget plan with broad funding goals for the year, but said a detailed plan will come later this summer. Appropriators said that limits much of their work, which typically takes six to nine months after the president’s budget outline.
5. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that his decision to resume aid to Gaza after a weekslong blockade came after pressure from allies who said they would not be able to grant Israel the support it needs to win the war so long as there were “images of hunger” coming out of the Palestinian territory. Israel has faced condemnation from the U.N., aid groups and some European allies for its blockade of goods into the war-ravaged territory, including food, fuel and medicine. On Sunday it said it would allow a “basic” amount of aid into Gaza to prevent a “hunger crisis” from developing. Food experts have already warned that the blockade risked sparking famine in Gaza, a territory of roughly 2 million people.
- News