Up First from NPR - Trump's Party Problems, Trump & Netanyahu Tension, Russia Economic Forum

Episode Date: June 4, 2026

President Trump says he'll nominate acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to permanently lead the Department of Justice, even as his now-scrapped anti-weaponization fund continues to complicate a major immigration enforcement bill in Congress.President Trump confirms he cursed at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and called him crazy in a heated call that halted planned strikes on Beirut, exposing growing tension between the two longtime allies over the direction of the war. And Russia's political and business elite have gathered in St. Petersburg for President Putin's showcase economic forum, which Ukrainian drones struck just hours before it began.Want more analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.Today’s episode of Up First was edited by Kelsey Snell, Tina Kraja, Tara Neill, Mohamad ElBardicy, and John Stolnis.It was produced by Ziad Buchh and Nia Dumas.Our director is Christopher Thomas.We get engineering support from Neisha Heinis. Our technical director is Carleigh Strange.And our deputy Executive Producer is Kelley Dickens.(0:00) Introduction(02:01) Trump's Party Problems(05:53) Trump & Netanyahu Tension(09:57) Russia Economic ForumSee pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

Republicans joined Democrats in the House to pass a resolution to limit the president's war powers. More Republicans are pushing back on President Trump over the war in Iran and his anti-webonization fund. Is Congress reasserting its power? I'm Steve Inskeep with Lel Faville, and this is up first from NPR News. The president says he cursed at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and called him crazy in a call that may have helped to stop more planned strikes on Beirut. is it maybe we got to stop this. We've got to stop it.

Israel's war in Lebanon is complicating talks with Iran. Now there's a new ceasefire. Will it actually stop the attacks? And Ukrainian drones struck St. Petersburg as Russia was kicking off President Putin's Economic Forum. What does the gathering reveal about how Russia sees the world and its war? Stay with us. We'll give you the news you need to start your day.

President Trump says he's going to nominate acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to take on the role permanently. Blanche is Trump's former personal lawyer. He's been at the Justice Department since early in the administration, so he's been on hand for the president's efforts to undermine court rulings and turn the department into a weapon for his retribution campaign. Blanche also oversaw the Justice Department's creation of a $1.8 billion fund to compensate people who claim to have been wrongfully targeted by the government, a fund that dismayed even many Republicans. Joining us now is NPR congressional reporter Sam Greenglass. Good morning, Sam. Hey, Leila. So Blanche testified before Congress this week that the fund is dead. Is that enough for some senators?

Well, Senate Majority Leader John Thune spent the last 24 hours telling his Republican colleagues that it should be enough and that they should feel confident moving forward today with a vote on billions of dollars for immigration enforcement, which had been stalled by pushback over this fund. But that did not satisfy some of these Republican senators like John Cornyn of Texas. He said the only way to ensure the fund is. dead is for Congress to put a stake through it. And, you know, not long after the Senate voted to proceed to debate yesterday, President Trump was asked whether this fund was actually dead. It's, uh, I'd have to ask the lawyers. I don't know. I know one thing. The weaponization. Are you talking about the weaponization fund? The weaponization fund, uh, as far as I'm concerned, was a beautiful thing. We've already seen two amendments by Republicans to try and block this fund for good, though even if they do attract enough votes to pass, it is unclear if Senate rules will allow them in this unrelated $70 billion measure to fund ICE and border patrol for three years.

So this dispute over money to potentially compensate people who storm the capital on January 6th may imperil one of Trump's top priorities funding immigration enforcement. Okay, this seems to be another example of Trump undercutting Republicans in Congress and then in turn his own agenda. Oh, totally. But Republicans like, retiring Senator Tom Tillis of North Carolina say what Trump is doing is self-sabotage. Tillis, who's also raised concerns about Blanche's statements on January 6th,

called out Trump's pick for Acting Director of National Intelligence, Bill Pulte, Wednesday on CNBC. My God, you put forth this restitution fund when we're trying to get Homeland Security funded for three years, and you think that's going to go well in the same week? You put an incendiary attack dog like Pulte out on the agenda? while we're trying to get 702 authorized and he would be one of the major users of it. It's like whoever these people are in the White House need to get the hell out of the White House.

Tillis is referring to an expiring section of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act or FISA, the White House, top Republicans, and Democrats want to renew it. But now some Democrats say they won't unless Trump drops Pulte. Some Senate Republicans are also concerned about Pulte asked about his qualifications.

Intelligence Chair Tom Codin only said, I have no observations on the matter. Are you seeing other places where Republicans are frustrated with the president? Yeah. Another example this week was over in the House, where four Republicans joined with Democrats to pass a war powers resolution to try to force Trump to pull back forces from the conflict with Iran. This still has to pass the Senate, and Trump can veto it.

So practically it doesn't mean much, but this is still a significant rebuke. You know, Trump has shown he's happy to vanquish Republicans he deems insufficiently loyal. So you've got more lawmakers questioning whether trying to be loyal is actually worth it, and that's making for a really unpredictable time in Congress. NPR Sam Greenglass. Thank you, Sam.

You're welcome. Israel and Lebanon agreed to renew a ceasefire that had really never taken hold. Their diplomats worked out new terms while meeting in Washington. President Trump also spoke the other day with Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu and has said that he called Netanyahu crazy,

for his plan to expand the tax in Lebanon. For more, we're joined by NPR's Greg Miree in Tel Aviv. Hi, Greg. Hi, Leila. So what exactly have Israel and Lebanon agreed to this time? Yeah, the Israeli and Lebanese government delegations met at the State Department and agreed to try again on a ceasefire after the last one just collapsed. Now, this is significant if it works, but lots of reasons to be skeptical,

and we're already seeing some evidence of that. Obviously, it would be good for Israel and Lebanon, and it would also remove a key obstacle to a possible agreement in the Iran war. Iran is the big backer of the militant group Hezbollah, and it said it would stop the indirect negotiations with the U.S. If Israel keeps waging this military operation in Lebanon, it says there must be ceasefires in both countries. So this agreement holds some promise, but with lots of caveats. What are the caveats? Yeah, the Israeli and Lebanese governments reached this agreement. Hezbollah was not part of the talks.

Hezbollah is supposed to halt attacks and its forces are supposed to leave southern Lebanon under the deal. Now, Israel's defense minister, Israel Katz, has already said that for now, Israel will remain on Lebanese territory and continue its operational activity on the ground. Also, the Lebanese media is reporting new Israeli attacks today. And a Hezbollah official, speaking to NPR on condition of anonymity because he's not authorized to speak publicly, said the group has informed Lebanon's president that it won't agree to the ceasefire unless Israeli forces leave southern Lebanon. Yeah, and the last ceasefire really never took hold. The South has been hit hard with dozens of villages flattened so many dead. So I'll have to see how this plays out on the ground. Right now has the focus shifted to diplomacy compared to just a few days ago?

Yeah, it has, at least for the moment. I mean, at the beginning of the week, the Israeli military operation was expanding rapidly. Netanyahu also said he'd ordered the Air Force to bomb Hezbollah strongholds in the capital Beirut. And this is when Iran stepped in and said it would stop negotiations with the U.S. And Trump really seems to want a deal with Iran. So this grabbed his attention and he then got on the phone and had a heated call with Netanyahu. Trump reportedly used an expletting. and called Netanyahu crazy. Trump was asked about this yesterday in the New York Post Pod Force One podcast with Miranda Devine. I did. I wouldn't say angry. I was a little bit perturbed at his constantly fighting with Lebanon. You know, at some point, I said, maybe we've got to stop this.

We've got to stop it. So for his part, Netanyahu told CNBC that he and Trump have differences, but, quote, we can disagree in the morning and by the afternoon we have common action. And what's going on with the ceasefire in Iran? It seems increasingly shaky. Yeah, Iran unleashed a large salvo yesterday and the main target was Kuwait, including the country's airport. Video shows a drone slamming into the main passenger terminal, part of a wider attack that killed one person and injured more than 60. Kuwait says Iran fired more than a dozen missiles and more than a dozen. drones. Now, the U.S. has hit a number of Iranian targets over the past week, but yesterday was one of the

most intense exchanges of fire since that ceasefire took effect almost two months ago. That was NPR's Greg Miree. Thank you, Greg. Sure thing, Leila. Russia's political and business elite are gathered in that country's former imperial capital, St. Petersburg, for a marquee economic forum this week. Yeah, the event is considered a pet project of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Normally, at an economic forum, you hear prominent speakers droning on. Instead, the city was attacked on Wednesday by Ukrainian drones. NPR's Charles Mains is at the event in St. Petersburg. Hi, Charles. Hi, Lila. So did these drone attacks disrupt the event? Well, you know, they happened just hours before the start of this St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. And while the drones didn't disrupt the proceedings,

they certainly cast a shadow, a literal one. There are plumes of smoke lingering over the city's skyline as people arrived. It's certainly not the welcome. that President Putin had hoped for. This is really his conference to promote Russia's economic might and the country as a sure investment bet despite Western sanctions. Yet these attacks are a reminder. Ukraine can still strike inside Russia, including in and around major cities like St. Petersburg, even days before Putin is due to address the forum. Well, let's talk about what the forum is going to do. I mean, it has a bit of everything, business, geopolitics. Tell us about it. Yeah, very much so. And much of it really promoting a Kremlin worldview. There's a

a lot of talk of conservative values, of multipolarity. This is the idea that the world is moving away from a U.S.-led global order to one where countries like Russia and China and the global south have more power. And Russia's clash with the West over Ukraine is never far from view. There are these elaborate stands promoting military hardware or newly occupied territories of Ukraine that the Kremlin claims are now part of Russia proper. One session I attended yesterday looked at the long-term threats to Russia where several panelists, I think you can.

safely describe as Russian nationalist, argued that, in never mind Ukraine, Russia needs to prepare for an existential war with the West. That includes Alexander Dugin, a political philosopher I had a chance to meet with. You might consider him something like a Steve Bannon-type figure in the Russian political scene. Let's listen. Now, Russia is awakening to confront the pretension of the West to be universal, to be hegemonic, to be the unique power in the world, with the fact. is all the means we have. And where does the U.S. figure in all this? I mean, particularly given President Trump's attempts to mediate negotiations to end the war in Ukraine?

Yeah, you know, it's interesting. A year ago, there was so much enthusiasm here that Trump would end the war in Russia's terms and deliver Ukraine. You don't really hear that much anymore. Yet the Trump administration is present, in a way. I was just watching Rodney Cook, who's overseeing Trump's White House Ballroom Project and currently heads the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, take part in a cultural roundtable

where he talked about his deep affinity for Russia. And he's certainly not the only American to do so. Among all these official delegations from about 130 countries, you'll also find an American far-right influencers. For example, I just ran into the video blogger Candice Owens. You'll also see representatives from Europe's far right, including Germany's AFD party.

All of this suggesting that Russia is making conservative alliances that go far beyond the politics of the current moment. Charles Mainz in St. Petersburg, Thank you, Charles. Thanks, Leila. And that's up first for Thursday, June 4th. I'm Leila Fault. And I'm Steve Inskeep.

Today's up first was edited by Kelsey Snell, Tina Criah, Tara Neal, Miguel Noseous, Mohamed al-Bardisi, and John Stolnes. It was produced by Ziat Butch and Nia Dumas. Our director is Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from David Greenberg, and our technical director is Carly Strange. Our deputy executive producer is Kelly Dickens. Join us tomorrow.