Key takeaways from Trump’s keynote address in Riyadh
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Trump pledged to remove all sanctions against Syria, saying they had served an important function, but it was now time for the country to move forward. He said: “I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness. It’s their time to shine. We’re taking them all off. Good luck Syria, show us something very special.” His secretary of state Marco Rubio will meet with the Syrian foreign minister in Turkey on Thursday, Trump said.
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Syria has welcomed Trump’s remarks regarding the lifting of US sanctions imposed on Damascus as a “new start” in the country’s reconstruction path, according to a post from foreign minister Asaad Shibani on X. Shibani thanked Saudi Arabia for facilitating the removal of the US sanctions.
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Rubio will be going to Turkey on Thursday to attend the Ukraine-Russia talks, Trump said, adding: “The talks could produce some good results.”
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Trump called Iran the “most destructive force” in the Middle East and threatened that if the US’s “olive branch” to reach a nuclear deal is rejected “and [Iran] continues to attack their neighbors then we’ll have no choice but to inflict massive maximum pressure”. He reiterated that Iran can’t have a nuclear weapon. “The choice is theirs to make,” Trump said, adding: “This is not an offer that will last forever.”
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Trump announced that his Middle East tour will add $1tn in investment to the US. In addition to the Saudi purchase of $142bn of US military equipment announced earlier, Trump said there will also be this week multibillion dollar commercial deals with Amazon, Oracle, AMD, Uber, Johnson & Johnson and others.
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Trump said he hopes Saudi Arabia will “soon” join the Abraham Accords, a series of normalization agreements between Israel and Arab countries, but said they would do it in their own time.
Key events
A federal judge ruled that President Donald Trump is allowed to use the Alien Enemies Act to deport members of Tren de Aragua, but found that his administration failed to provide adequate notice before carrying out the removals.
US district judge Stephanie Haines’s decision contrasts from those of several other federal judges who have ruled that Trump’s use of the wartime law was unlawful.
Haines argued that the president has the authority to deport individuals affiliated with a foreign terrorist organization, a label Trump has applied to Tren de Aragua.
“Having done its job, the Court now leaves it to the Political Branches of the government, and ultimately to the people who elect those individuals, to decide whether the laws and those executing them continue to reflect their will,” Haines wrote in her 43-page ruling.
Catherine Shoard
Robert De Niro attacks Trump in Cannes speech: ‘This isn’t just America’s problem’
The actor Robert De Niro has – after a brief period of abstention – returned to his robust public critique of Donald Trump, using his Palme d’Or acceptance speech at the Cannes film festival to newly attack the US president.
Speaking during the opening ceremony of the 78th film festival in France, De Niro said that the US’s re-elected commander-in-chief posed a global threat.
“In my country, we are fighting like hell for the democracy we once took for granted,” he said. “That affects all of us here, because art is the crucible that brings people together, like tonight. Art looks for truth. Art embraces diversity. That’s why art is a threat.”
As applause broke out in the Grand Lumiére, Cannes’ largest cinema, De Niro continued:
“That’s why we are a threat to autocrats and fascists. America’s philistine president ha[s] had himself appointed head of one of our premier cultural institutions [the Kennedy Center]. He has cut funding and support to the arts, humanities and education.”
Read the full story here:
Here are some images of Syrians in Damascus celebrating the announcement by President Trump of plans to ease sanctions, taking a step toward normalizing relations between the US and the country’s new government:
Senator Lindsey Graham traveled to Turkey to hold talks with officials and assess the current situation in Syria.
“I am very inclined to support sanctions relief for Syria under the right conditions,” Graham said in a statement. “However, we must remember that the current leadership in Syria achieved its position through force of arms, not through the will of its people.”
President Trump announced plans to ease sanctions on Syria and pursue normalization of ties with its new government. He is slated to meet Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday.
Democratic-led states sue over Trump’s attempt to tie grants to immigration policies
A coalition of 20 states led by Democratic administrations filed two lawsuits aiming to stop the Trump administration from forcing them to cooperate with immigration enforcement in order to receive billions of dollars in transportation, counterterrorism and emergency preparedness grant funding.
Filed in federal court in Rhode Island, the lawsuits contend that the US Departments of Transportation and Homeland Security are unlawfully pressuring states to adopt the Republican president’s strict immigration policies by leveraging federal funding.
“He’s treating these funds, which have nothing to do with immigration enforcement and everything to do with the safety of our communities, as a bargaining chip. But this is not a game,” said California attorney general Rob Bonta. “I’ll continue taking the President to court each time he breaks the law and puts Californians’ interests on the line.”
William Christou
The White House has confirmed that Donald Trump will meet with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former rebel commander whose forces helped overthrow Bashar al-Assad in 2024. The informal meeting will be the first face-to-face meeting between a US president and a Syrian leader since 2000, when Bill Clinton met with the late leader Hafez al-Assad in Geneva.
Speaking at an investment forum on Tuesday, Trump said that he planned to lift sanctions on Syria after holding talks with Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan “to give them a chance at greatness”.
Sharaa’s pitch to woo the US president offered access to Syrian oil, reconstruction contracts and to build a Trump Tower in Damascus in exchange for the lifting of US sanctions on Syria.
Though the details of the sanctions relief were still unclear, Sharaa’s team in Damascus was celebrating.
“This is amazing, it worked,” said Radwan Ziadeh, a Syrian writer and activist who is close to the Syrian president. He shared a picture of an initial mockup of Trump Tower Damascus. “This is how you win his heart and mind,” he said, noting that Sharaa would probably show Trump the design during their meeting in Riyadh on Wednesday.
Trump’s negotiations in the Middle East have been characterised by big-ticket investment deals, and those appeared to play a role in his reversal of US policy on Syria as well.
Sharaa, who is keen to normalise relations with the US, has reportedly offered Trump a number of sweeteners including the Trump tower in Damascus, a demilitarised zone by the Golan Heights that would strengthen Israel’s claim to the territory it has occupied since 1967, diplomatic recognition of Israel, and a profit-sharing deal on resources similar to the Ukraine minerals deal.
The idea to offer Trump a piece of real estate with his name on it in the heart of Damascus was thought up by a US Republican senator, who passed on the idea to Sharaa’s team.
“Sanctions in Syria are very complicated, but with Trump, he can [get] most of them lifted. It is a great opportunity,” Ziadeh said.
The day so far
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In a major policy shift, Trump announced that the US will lift all sanctions on Syria “to give them a chance at greatness”. He said the sanctions had served their purpose at the time, but now it was time for the country to move forward, a move welcomed by the UN and Syrian government. He said: “I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness. It’s their time to shine. We’re taking them all off. Good luck Syria, show us something very special.” US sanctions had been weighing heavily on the new Syrian regime, threatening its ability to rebuild from the Assad era. It has also been reported that Trump will “say hello” to Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh tomorrow, which would be the first meeting between US and Syrian leaders in 25 years. His secretary of state Marco Rubio will also meet with the Syrian foreign minister in Turkey on Thursday.
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Trump threatened Iran to take his “olive branch” and reach a nuclear deal or face “maximum pressure”. He called Iran the “most destructive country in the Middle East” and, reiterating that they can’t have a nuclear weapon, added:“The choice is theirs to make. This is not an offer that will last forever.”
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US secretary of state Marco Rubio will be going to Turkey on Thursday to attend the Ukraine-Russia talks, Trump announced. He had suggested he wanted to go himself, but he is sending Rubio along with envoys Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg, as was reported earlier today.
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Trump said his Middle East tour, which kicked off in Saudi Arabia today, will add $1tn in investment to the US. In addition to the Saudi purchase of $142bn of US weapons announced earlier, Trump said there will also be this week multibillion dollar commercial deals with Amazon, Oracle, AMD, Uber, Johnson & Johnson and others. A swath of US tech firms including Nvidia and Cisco also secured AI deals with Saudia Arabia and the UAE respectively. MBS also pledged to invest $600bn in the US during a lunch with Trump, including $20bn in artificial intelligence data centres, purchases of gas turbines and other energy equipment worth $14.2bn, nearly $5bn in Boeing 737-8 jets, and other deals. But details of the specific commitments remained vague, the numbers put out by the White House did not total $600bn, and some of the programs began under Joe Biden’s administration.
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US senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said he is placing a blanket hold on all justice department nominees in response to Donald Trump’s acceptance of a $400m luxury jet as a gift from Qatar’s royal family. It is the first time Schumer has ever placed a blanket hold on a set of presidential nominees, and he intends to keep the hold in place until the Trump administration answers his questions about the jet. On the Senate floor this morning, Schumer described it as “not just naked corruption, it is also a grave national security threat”. Trump faces a rare backlash from the likes of Maga faithfuls Ben Shapiro and Laura Loomer over the “palace in the sky”.
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The Trump administration said eight federal agencies will terminate another $450m in grants to Harvard University, on top of $2.2bn in federal funding that it canceled last week.
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Trump encouraged Saudi Arabia to join the Abraham Accords and normalize relations with Israel — but added that “you’ll do it in your own time.”
Politico notes the ideological shift for US foreign policy in Trump’s keynote address earlier at the US-Saudi investment forum: “More realpolitik, less values-based intervention.”
As Trump laid out in his speech, this Middle East trip epitomizes a sharply new isolationist and transactional direction for the US.
‘Far too many American presidents have been afflicted with the notion that it’s our job to look into the souls of foreign leaders and use US policy to dispense justice for their sins,’ Trump said. It was a striking comment coming in front of MBS, who the CIA has concluded ordered the assassination of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.
‘The so-called nation builders wrecked far more nations than they built,’ Trump added, saying he would focus instead on promoting American interests.
Lauren Gambino
Malcolm Kenyatta, one of two Democratic National Committee vice-chairs who could be forced to run again for his seat, said the credentialing committee’s recommendation that the February contest did not follow the party’s gender-parity rules was a “slap in the face”, but insisted the decision was based on procedure and not politics.
On Monday, after a three-hour meeting, the DNC’s credentials committee voted to void the results of a February contest that elevated Kenyatta and activist David Hogg as vice-chairs. The decision puts the issue before the full voting body of the DNC. If adopted, it would force Kenyatta and Hogg to run again for their roles due to the party not following proper parliamentary procedures.
“I’m pissed that this challenge was successful, especially when I won in such a resounding way,” Kenyatta wrote on X. But he took issue with the “nonsense” framing that the vote was a way to push out Hogg, who has clashed with DNC officials over his pledge to spend money challenging “asleep-at-the-wheel” Democrats through a separate organization he heads, Leaders We Deserve.
Ken Martin, the DNC chair, has endorsed a plan to force DNC officials to remain neutral in party primaries, saying: “We can’t be both the referee and also the player at the same time.” A vote to adopt that proposal – effectively forcing Hogg to choose between his role at Leaders We Deserve and his vice-chair position at the DNC – is set to take place during a DNC meeting in August.
The challenge over the vice-chair election results was brought by one of the losing candidates in the vice-chair contest, Kalyn Free, who said the February contest failed to abide by the party’s gender-parity rules and as a result disadvantaged the female candidates.
Touting the work he has done since his election, Kenyatta wrote: “I worked my ass off to get this role and have done the job every day since I’ve held it.”
This story is complex and I’m frustrated— but it’s not about @davidhogg111 . Even though he clearly wants it to be.
— Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (@malcolmkenyatta) May 13, 2025
In a statement on Monday, Hogg acknowledged that the credentialing challenge was brought on procedural grounds, but said it was “also impossible to ignore the broader context of my work to reform the party which loomed large over this vote”.
The DNC has pledged to remove me, and this vote has provided an avenue to fast-track that effort.
Faisal Ali
At the end of this clip is the moment Donald Trump was asked by a reporter after he left a conference hall in Riyadh this afternoon whether he’d meet with Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa. Trump’s voice couldn’t be made out be made out in the clip but he clearly nodded and appeared to say: “I think so.”
Syria welcomes lifting of US sanctions as a ‘new start’ for reconstruction
Syria has welcomed Donald Trump’s remarks regarding the lifting of US sanctions imposed on Damascus as a “new start” in the country’s reconstruction path, according to a post from foreign minister Asaad Shibani on X.
Shibani thanked Saudi Arabia for facilitating the removal of the US sanctions.
UN welcomes lifting of US sanctions on Syria
Faisal Ali
The UN’s special envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, has welcomed the lifting of US sanctions on the new government in Damascus in a social media post.
Pedersen said the move was “crucial to enabling the delivery of essential services, including health & education, reviving the Syrian economy, unlocking meaningful support from the region, & enabling many Syrians to contribute actively to a national effort to rebuild their country”.
Trump calls on Fed to cut rates, saying prices of ‘practically everything’ are down
Donald Trump has repeated his call for the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates, saying prices for gas, groceries and “practically everything else” are down, while also repeating his criticism of Fed chair Jerome Powell.
He wrote on Truth Social:
No Inflation, and Prices of Gasoline, Energy, Groceries, and practically everything else, are DOWN!!! THE FED must lower the RATE, like Europe and China have done.
What is wrong with Too Late Powell? Not fair to America, which is ready to blossom? Just let it all happen, it will be a beautiful thing!
As my colleague Lauren Aratani reported earlier, officials at the Fed feel that while the pace of inflation has slowed, they expect Trump’s tariffs to have an impact on prices, even if only temporary. Economists also expect price increases to get worse this year. Many companies have not had to increase prices yet, as many of the goods being sold now were imported before the new tariffs were implemented.
“Certainly the risks to higher inflation [and] higher unemployment have increased,” Powell said at a press conference last week, adding that tariffs could delay inflation from reaching the Fed’s target rate of 2% by at least a year. “We would, at least for the next, say, year, not be making progress toward those goals if that’s the way tariffs shake out.”
This is contrary to what Trump has been saying about tariffs and the impact they have had on prices. Trump insists that any inflation is a holdover from the Biden administration, though Trump has been in the White House for over three months.
Trump to ‘say hello’ to Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh on Wednesday – Axios
Donald Trump is expected to greet with Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh on Wednesday, Axios is reporting, citing two sources familiar with the plan.
Earlier in a pivotal announcement, Trump said he was lifting all sanctions on Syria to “give them a chance at greatness”, less than six months after the brutal regime of Bashar al-Assad was rapidly toppled.
Axios reports that, asked by journalists earlier if he expects to meet with al-Sharaa during his visit to Saudi Arabia, Trump replied: “Yes, I think so.” A White House official later told Axios:
The president agreed to say hello to the Syrian president while in Saudi Arabia tomorrow.
But this makes it no less significant. Per Politico:
It’s nonetheless a striking encounter with a man who’s still on the US terrorist list — and the first meeting between US and Syrian leaders since 2000. The US sanctions have weighed heavily on the Syrian economy, threatening al-Sharaa’s ability to rebuild the country since the rebel leader ousted the Assad regime five months ago.
Trump said during his speech at the US-Saudi investment forum that he had decided to lift sanctions on Syria following conversations with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as well as with Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman. “Oh, what I do for the crown prince,” Trump said in reference to MBS before making the announcement.
The “brutal and crippling” sanctions had served their purpose at the time but were no longer needed, said Trump, adding:
Now it is their time to shine. We are taking them all off. Good luck Syria. Show us something very special.
In a further sign of normalizing US-Syria relations, Trump said his secretary of state Marco Rubio will meet with the Syrian foreign minister on Thursday in Turkey.
Key takeaways from Trump’s keynote address in Riyadh
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Trump pledged to remove all sanctions against Syria, saying they had served an important function, but it was now time for the country to move forward. He said: “I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness. It’s their time to shine. We’re taking them all off. Good luck Syria, show us something very special.” His secretary of state Marco Rubio will meet with the Syrian foreign minister in Turkey on Thursday, Trump said.
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Syria has welcomed Trump’s remarks regarding the lifting of US sanctions imposed on Damascus as a “new start” in the country’s reconstruction path, according to a post from foreign minister Asaad Shibani on X. Shibani thanked Saudi Arabia for facilitating the removal of the US sanctions.
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Rubio will be going to Turkey on Thursday to attend the Ukraine-Russia talks, Trump said, adding: “The talks could produce some good results.”
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Trump called Iran the “most destructive force” in the Middle East and threatened that if the US’s “olive branch” to reach a nuclear deal is rejected “and [Iran] continues to attack their neighbors then we’ll have no choice but to inflict massive maximum pressure”. He reiterated that Iran can’t have a nuclear weapon. “The choice is theirs to make,” Trump said, adding: “This is not an offer that will last forever.”
-
Trump announced that his Middle East tour will add $1tn in investment to the US. In addition to the Saudi purchase of $142bn of US military equipment announced earlier, Trump said there will also be this week multibillion dollar commercial deals with Amazon, Oracle, AMD, Uber, Johnson & Johnson and others.
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Trump said he hopes Saudi Arabia will “soon” join the Abraham Accords, a series of normalization agreements between Israel and Arab countries, but said they would do it in their own time.