The Crumbling Of Graham Platner & The U.S. Is Back At War

Hi readers, happy Thursday! Today we’re covering Trump’s war with Iran and NATO, Mitch McConnell’s missing person case, global inflation, Ukraine’s quest for Patriots, Graham Platner’s withdrawal from Maine’s Senate race, the Fed under new leadership, and a cheap but weird new mosquito repellant.

“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” ― Mark Twain

Back To War With Iran (And… Spain?)

Aaaand we’re back to square one. Yesterday at the NATO summit in Turkey, Trump announced that the U.S.-Iran ceasefire was “over” in the wake of Iranian attacks on commercial ships traveling through the Strait of Hormuz. That remark was made just a few hours after the U.S. launched strikes on multiple targets in Iran as a response to Tehran’s aggression, which it followed up on by launching a second wave of strikes on targets near the Strait of Hormuz, as well as launching its first attacks on Iranian infrastructure since the April 18 ceasefire. Iran eventually responded with strikes on U.S. bases in Kuwait and Bahrain.

After that last round of strikes, Trump told reporters that Iranian negotiators had “called a little while ago” and “want to make a deal.” While he’s a well-known deal enjoyer, the president added, “I just don't know if they're worthy of making a deal. I don't know that they're going to honor the deal. They're sort of crazy, to be honest.” 

At last year’s NATO summit, Trump lashed out at allied countries for their lack of defense spending, calling on them to come to this year’s meeting with plans to raise military spending to at least 3.5% of their GDP by 2035. One country that didn’t do its homework was Spain, which refused to commit to the new spending target. “Spain doesn’t agree to anything, and you shouldn’t carry them,” Trump told NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte upon hearing the news. He then turned to U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, telling him, “I don't want to do any trade with them, alright? I don't want anything to do with Spain. Cut off all trade with Spain, please, including visits, OK?” Bessent agreed, but it’s not clear exactly what will come of this – Trump actually threatened to cut off trade with Spain in March, but that spat ended with trade relations in a normal state. Experts say that the White House could invoke the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to block Spanish imports.

The McConnell Mystery Deepens

It turns out that a few other people are also searching for Mitch McConnell! After the senator was taken to the hospital on June 14 (a 911 dispatch call at his house on that date involved emergency medical personnel giving an unnamed person CPR for cardiac arrest), his staff have gone mostly radio silent, offering vague promises that the 84-year-old is “receiving excellent care” and “continuing to improve.” 

On Tuesday, Trump confidante and far-right influencer Laura Loomer claimed McConnell “100% has severe brain damage and is a vegetable” in a tweet that still hasn’t been deleted. According to her, the senator was the person who was administered CPR for cardiac arrest, making it unlikely that he was on lengthy phone calls about political strategy like some Republican leaders are claiming. 

While it’s not clear what is really going on with McConnell’s health (besides that it’s not good), we do know one thing – if the senator is declared dead or leaves his post before August 3, Kentucky’s government would be compelled to hold a special election for a temporary replacement. Yesterday, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (a Democrat) took a step towards solving the mystery, sending a public letter to McConnell asking for an update on his health. “Over the last several weeks, Kentuckians have grown increasingly concerned about the health and well-being of Sen. McConnell,” he wrote. “As Governor — and a fellow public official who understands the commitment we’ve made to the people we serve — I am requesting the Senator provide an update on his current health status.”

A Big Year For Inflation

• According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the threat of global inflation looms large this year. Yesterday, the institution released its “World Economic Outlook” report for 2026 – the brief predicts that annual inflation will rise from 4.1% in 2025 to 4.7% this year, before eventually slowing down to 3.9% in 2027. While the IMF says prices are expected to rise, it also thinks that economic growth will decrease from 3.5% in 2025 to 3% this year. Both of those predictions are below what the financial giant predicted in April, and are the result of the U.S.-Israel-Iran conflict clogging global trade.

• “The most imminent risk” to the global economy “stems from developments in the Middle East,” the IMF wrote. “Re-escalation of geopolitical tensions would hurt growth and compound inflationary pressures.” The report also touched on global oil reserves, which are running low after governments across the globe opened their oil taps to keep prices down – they “could reach stress levels should supply disruptions persist or hoarding gather steam,” the report said, indicating serious dangers for global oil prices.

A Paucity Of Patriots

• Yesterday’s NATO summit was a bittersweet affair for Ukraine. As expected, NATO members pledged $80 billion in military aid to Kyiv for the rest of the year, but the country had its hopes dashed in its quest for the interceptor missiles used in Patriot air defense systems.

• Over the past few months, Russia has increased its ballistic missile attacks on targets in Ukraine – including multiple strikes over the past two days – and Patriot air defense batteries are the best in the world at detecting and intercepting high-speed ballistic missile strikes. The problem is that these batteries are expensive (a battery and full complement of interceptor missiles costs $1 billion), and the missiles they use are scarce (just 600 are made per year).

• In order to defend against Russia’s attacks, Kyiv wanted to purchase existing interceptor missiles from the U.S. Unfortunately for Ukraine, Trump is unwilling to part with his missiles – instead, he decided to grant the country a license to manufacture the missiles on its own. “I think they can produce them very quickly once we explain it,” he said, adding that he hadn’t notified manufacturers Lockheed Martin and Raytheon about the license, “but that'll work out alright.”

Additional World News

• Andy Burnham's path to becoming prime minister (BBC) 

• Trump: US aircraft carrier shot at by 'Islamic Republic of Japan' (NHK)

• Le Pen Launches Presidential Campaign, in a Twist for French Politics (NYT, $)

• China, Taiwan brace for Typhoon Bavi, possibly the most powerful storm in years (Reuters)

• Takeaways: Trump leaves NATO summit declaring 'a lot of love' with allies after a rocky start (AP) 

• Revealed: landmark Scottish AI project has no prospect of meeting renewables promise (Guardian)

Graham Platner Crumbles

• Graham Platner, the Democrats’ embattled nominee for Maine’s Senate seat, has decided to suspend his campaign. After months of assorted controversies in the leadup to the November midterms, the straw that broke the camel’s back turned out to be a sexual assault allegation from a woman whom Platner was in a relationship with in 2021, which we covered earlier this week. 

• In a video posted on Wednesday night, Platner said that the Democratic mainstream and corporate media outlets were “using these allegations to take away all of the things we need to run a campaign,” acting “as judge, jury and executioner” for his political ambitions. He continued to state that the allegations were “not remotely true,” claiming they were attacks from “large forces ... working against [him] personally.” But he seemed to accept the political reality of his situation, adding, “For the movement to continue, it can’t be me. For that reason, we are suspending campaign operations.” 

The Fed Is Figuring It Out

• Yesterday, the Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee released the minutes from its first meeting under the leadership of newly-appointed Fed Chair Kevin Warsh. That meeting, held on June 16 and 17, saw participants argue over the possibility of interest rate changes. While committee members were split on the possibility of future rate hikes or cuts, the committee unanimously agreed to keep rates steady within the 3.5%-3.75% range for now.

• Looking toward the future, a dot-plot of committee members’ expectations seems to point to the possibility of another interest rate hike sometime this year, which would be followed by one rate cut in 2027 and another sometime in 2028.

• As for the economic outlook (according to the minutes), the committee predicted “that inflation would remain elevated in the near term and then begin to decline as the effects of tariffs and energy price increases wane and other supply disruptions related to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz diminish. Participants judged that the risks to the inflation outlook were still tilted to the upside.” While they noted that AI-related trends will likely push up prices in the tech and electricity sectors in the short term, Warsh predicted that widespread productivity gains from AI adoption will actually lower prices in the long term.

Additional USA News

• GLP-1 use reaches new high in US (Semafor)

• Graham Platner just dropped out. Here’s who could replace him. (Politico)

• Navy Identifies Crew Member Lost in Arabian Sea Helicopter Crash (NYT, $)

• Trump says he will ask Supreme Court to rehear birthright citizenship case (Reuters)

• Prosecutors focus on the hours after Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer turned himself in (NPR)

• Family demands an independent probe after ICE officer fatally shoots a man in Houston (AP)

Sometimes An Attractor Is The Best Repellent

• Malaria is one of the leading causes of death in low-income nations across the world. The disease is transmitted by mosquitos, and causes fever, fatigue, headaches, comas, and sometimes death. It infects roughly 282 million people a year, claimed 610,000 lives in 2024 alone, and has also been shown to be a significant burden to the economies of the countries where it’s prevalent. 

• One of the biggest problems in the fight against malaria is that the chemicals used to repel mosquitos and the drugs used to treat the disease are prohibitively expensive to the people who need them most. In a recent study (not yet published in a journal), researchers showed that lotions containing catnip oil can be “just as effective as DEET,” which is the most prominent mosquito repellant currently in use.

• “We found that a 6% catnip oil was just as effective as Deet, and the 2% catnip oil was only marginally less effective than that,” said the study’s lead author. “Deet is out of the price bracket for most rural Ugandan subsistence farmers, so buying commercially available mosquito repellents is just not practicable. We wanted to make a repellent, which is highly efficacious, but also allows local people to be involved in the production cycle so that it costs a minimal amount of money,” he added. The study didn’t indicate whether the new mosquito repellent trick would turn out to be a cat attractor as well, but the researchers hope that their findings might lead communities to start cultivating catnip which could help them protect themselves from malaria.

Additional Reads

• What happens to your brain in space? (BBC) 

• The right (and wrong) way to gossip with your neighbors (Vox) 

• Almost $1 billion later, the US still can’t make a medical glove (Bloomberg) 

• China wants to solve the hardest problem in robotics – making hands (Guardian)

• Peter Thiel’s Husband Sued a Flight Attendant Who Says He Assaulted Her on a Private Jet (Wired, $)

• Execs Confused and Horrified by the Huge AI Bills After Thinking They Could Replace Workers for Free (Futurism)

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