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Trump reiterates threats to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges

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Trump reiterates threats to bomb Iran’s power plants and bridges

President Trump speaks as Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth (center) and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine look on during a news conference at the White House on April 6.

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President Trump repeated threats to Iran during during his Monday press conference, including against Iran’s civilian infrastructure if a deal to end the war is not reached by Tuesday night at 8 p.m. ET. Negotiations, he said, must include an open Strait of Hormuz.

“Every bridge in Iran will be decimated by 12 o’clock tomorrow night, where every power plant in Iran will be out of business, burning, exploding and never to be used again. I mean complete demolition by 12 o’clock, and it will happen over a period of four hours if we wanted to, we don’t want that to happen,” Trump told reporters.

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He added: “We may even get involved with helping them rebuild their nation.”

After days of flip-flopping messaging, vacillating from demanding Iran open the Strait of Hormuz to telling U.S. allies it’s up to them to open it to an Easter Sunday profanity-laced social media post demanding Iran open it, Trump said a successful negotiation would have to include “free traffic of oil.”

“We have to have a deal that’s acceptable to me and part of that deal is going to be, we want free traffic of oil and everything,” he said.

Asked about his mixed messages about the status of the war, and whether it was winding down or ramping up amid his latest threats, he said: “I don’t know. I can’t tell. It depends what they do. This is a critical period. They have a period of, well, till tomorrow, at eight o’clock.”

Trump said he can’t discuss a potential ceasefire, but the U.S. has “an active, willing participant on the other side” of negotiations.

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Asked if he’s concerned that bombing of power plants and bridges would amount to war crimes, Trump said, “No. I hope I don’t have to do it.”

He opened the press conference by describing the successful rescue mission for the downed airman over the weekend.

Trump spent several minutes describing the rescue mission, calling his decision to authorize the rescue as “risky” and “hard.”

“But in the U.S. military. We leave no American behind,” he said. The president claimed Iran “got lucky” when they took out the U.S. fighter jet.

CIA Director John Radcliffe, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Dan Caine all recounted the rescue operation at the press conference — Trump’s first since the U.S. and Israel launched a war with Iran more than a month ago.

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The news conference comes days after Trump formally addressed the nation from the White House last week and said the conflict would end “shortly.” At that address, he criticized other countries, though didn’t name any specifically, and said it was up to others to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the route through which 20% of the world’s oil is transported.

Iran’s closure of the strait during the war has led to a jump in gas prices globally, hitting around $4 per gallon last week in the U.S.

The president has also been threatening a surge in strikes on Iran Tuesday, unless the strait is reopened by tomorrow evening.

“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran,” Trump said on social media over the weekend, “Open the F***in’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH!”

The post comes as negotiations between the U.S. and Iran have made some progress. A 45-day ceasefire proposal was submitted to the U.S. and Iran on Sunday. On Monday, Trump called the proposal “a significant step.”

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The president has repeatedly said the war would last roughly six weeks. But now, in its sixth week, the timeline on when the war would end and how achievable Trump’s objectives are remain unclear.

For weeks, Trump has been moving the goal posts on the administration’s goals with Iran, including whether the U.S. will remove Iran’s uranium stockpiles. Trump has also suggested that the U.S. could end the war but strike Iran again later if they aim to build up nuclear defenses.

Polling shows that Americans oppose the war in Iran. Even among Republican supporters of the president, his approval rating has dipped. A CNN poll released last week showed that Republicans who strongly approve of Trump’s job performance dropped to 43%, compared to 52% in January.

High costs, including gas prices, remain a top of mind concern for voters heading into the midterm elections in roughly six months. On Monday, Trump said the high prices might last into the summer.

“We’re never going to let them have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said of Iran. “And if we have to pay a little extra for fuel for a couple of months, and we’ll do that, but we’re never going to allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon.”

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One Person Who Appears to Be Missing From King Charles’s U.S. Itinerary: Prince Harry

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One Person Who Appears to Be Missing From King Charles’s U.S. Itinerary: Prince Harry

One meeting that appears to be absent from King Charles III’s carefully planned schedule in the United States this week is any reunion with Prince Harry.

On a four-day state visit intended in part to repair bruised U.S.-British relations, Charles’s itinerary currently includes no plans to see Harry, his 41-year-old son, who lives in California with his wife, Meghan, and their two children.

Buckingham Palace officials declined to comment when asked whether the king and his younger son would meet. Charles and Queen Camilla are scheduled to be in Washington on Tuesday and New York on Wednesday before departing on Thursday.

The family fell out publicly when Harry, who holds the title Duke of Sussex, withdrew from royal duties in 2020 and relocated to California in an act of self-exile. In the years since, their relationship has been tested again and again.

Harry wrote a tell-all memoir about growing up in the royal family and produced a six-part Netflix series about his relationship with Meghan, which detailed his rift with his brother, Prince William, with whom he remains estranged. And he pursued a lawsuit challenging the decision by British authorities to withdraw his family’s publicly-financed security protection during their visits to Britain.

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In an interview last May, Harry told the BBC that the lawsuit — which he lost — had become a “sticking point,” further distancing him from his father. He expressed concern for the king’s health, following his father’s diagnosis with an undisclosed form of cancer the year before.

“I would love reconciliation with my family,” Harry said in that interview.

Last September, Charles and Harry met for the first time in 19 months, an encounter that some hoped represented a rapprochement. The BBC reported that they spent around an hour together, having tea privately in Clarence House, the king’s London residence.

In the months since, the rift has been overshadowed by another, more damaging family scandal. The king’s brother, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, was arrested amid allegations that he had shared confidential government information with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew, whose royal titles were previously stripped over his ties to Mr. Epstein, has denied wrongdoing.

Andrew’s withdrawal from royal life has contributed to an image of a shrunken and fractured royal family. Speaking days after Andrew’s arrest with Britain’s Channel 4 News, Harry did not directly address the subject of his uncle but acknowledged, with an awkward chuckle, that there had been “a lot of stuff in the news.”

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Feds conducting raids connected to welfare fraud investigation in Minnesota

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Feds conducting raids connected to welfare fraud investigation in Minnesota

Federal law enforcement agencies are conducting a series of raids connected to the Somali fraud investigation in Minnesota on Tuesday morning, federal authorities have said.

The raids are not part of an immigration enforcement operation.

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“Today the FBI with federal, state and local law enforcement is involved in court-authorized law enforcement activity as part of an ongoing fraud investigation,” a spokesperson for the Department of Justice said.

At least 22 federal search warrants were executed in Minnesota on Tuesday morning, a senior Justice Department official told NBC News. It was not immediately clear how many total raids occurred.

At least one of the raids appears to be at the Somali Senior Center and Adult Day Services facility, as federal law enforcement can be seen going in and out of the building.

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King Charles Will Speak of ‘Reconciliation and Renewal’ During Address to Congress

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King Charles Will Speak of ‘Reconciliation and Renewal’ During Address to Congress

King Charles III of Britain will acknowledge on Tuesday that his country has had its differences with the United States, but he plans to tell a joint session of Congress that the “two countries have always found ways to come together,” according to a preview of his remarks by Buckingham Palace.

The king’s speech is a centerpiece of his first visit to the former colonies as Britain’s monarch. It comes at a fraught time for the relationship between the two governments, with President Trump mocking Prime Minister Keir Starmer for refusing to join the war in Iran.

But in his speech, the king plans to say that the story of the two countries over the past 250 years has been marked by “reconciliation and renewal,” and has produced what he will call “one of the greatest alliances in human history.”

The king and Queen Camilla began planning for their American trip months before the tensions emerged between Mr. Trump and Mr. Starmer. And British officials and representatives of Buckingham Palace have repeatedly said the king does not get involved in day-to-day politics or foreign policy.

But privately, officials have said they are hopeful that the core message in the king’s speech might help to soothe tensions between the president and the prime minister. The palace said he will argue that shared democratic values are woven deeply into the fabric of both countries.

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Palace officials said the king will briefly reference the shooting at the White House correspondents’ dinner on Saturday, offering sympathy to Mr. Trump and those who attended.

But he will focus on the things the United States and Britain have done together. In particular, palace officials said, he will speak about cooperation in the Middle East and Ukraine and will take note of the NATO defense pact and the submarine partnership with Australia and the United States.

Mr. Trump has been particularly brutal in his assessment of the British Navy, calling the country’s battleships “toys.” The palace said the king will speak with particular pride about the Royal Navy and its successes.

Mr. Trump has said he is a fan of the royals, often citing the fact that when he was 6, he watched the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, the king’s mother.

The royal couple’s arrival at Joint Base Andrews kicked off two days of pomp and circumstance in Washington. The king, dressed in a blue suit, and the queen, wearing a pink coat dress, listened as the U.S. military band played the national anthems of Britain and the United States.

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The king and queen were greeted by the State Department’s top official in charge of protocol. They walked through an honor cordon of U.S. military personnel before heading to the White House for their first formal stop.

There, the royal couple met briefly with Mr. Trump and Melania Trump, the first lady, and viewed a new White House beehive.

The hive, on the South Lawn, is shaped like a miniature White House and is the home for two new bee colonies. Mrs. Trump last week unveiled the latest work of presidential apiculture, the science of maintaining honey bee colonies for pollination, honey production and wax.

The first official White House bee colonies were installed in 2009 by Michelle Obama, the first lady at the time. The bees supported pollination of the White House vegetable garden that Mrs. Obama created as part of her push for healthy eating.

Hives installed by Mrs. Obama support as many as 70,000 bees during peak summer months, according to the White House, and can produce up to 225 pounds of honey a year. The Trump administration said Mrs. Trump’s new hive could increase production to over 255 pounds of honey annually.

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The visit to the White House beehive is a nod to the king’s longstanding interest in environmental issues and conservation.

There are four beehives in the gardens around Buckingham Palace and two more outside Clarence House, the official residence of the royal couple. The official royal website notes that the queen produces honey that is sold at the store Fortnum & Mason to raise money for charity.

Monday’s events concluded with a garden party for the king and queen at the British Embassy. The guest list included White House officials like Stephen Miller, the deputy chief of staff, and his wife, Katie Miller; the House speaker, Mike Johnson; and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

The president and the king will have a private meeting on Tuesday before the king addresses Congress in the afternoon. Mr. Trump will host a state banquet for the royal couple on Tuesday evening.

The king and queen will head to New York City on Wednesday morning, where they will lay a wreath at the Sept. 11 memorial and participate in a gala that evening. The king will also visit a youth organization in Harlem, and the queen will participate in an event at the New York Public Library.

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On Thursday, the royal couple will lay a wreath at Arlington National Cemetery and travel to rural parts of Virginia.

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