JUST BEAUTIFUL:  House Republicans are pushing forward with budget and spending plans in the first efforts to put the Trump agenda into legislation rather than executive orders.

  Their plan is to cut spending on food stamps, clean energy subsidies, and  Medicaid … healthcare for the poor … while pulling off the carnival trick of increasing spending on the military and immigration enforcement, while cutting food stamps and subsidies for clean energy, and eliminating taxes on tips and overtime pay, 

  What President Trump calls his “big beautiful bill” would preserve his first-term tax cuts through his current term. Republicans in high tax state, particularly New York, are fighting to increase the limit on the state and local tax deduction from $10,000 to at least $30,000. 

BIRTHRIGHT: The Supreme Court hears arguments today on President Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship. The case may also determine whether a single federal judge can block an executive action while lawsuits over its legality wend their way up through the courts.

  On his second day in office Trump signed an order to end automatic citizenship for anyone born in the US as guaranteed by the 14^th Amendment, and a federal judge blocked it.

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE: 

— Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and three other administration officials, including Mehmet Oz, published an Op-Ed in the NY Times calling for able-bodied people on welfare to be required to work. In a long-running debate about welfare they say, “The increased share of welfare spending dedicated to able-bodied working-age adults distracts from what should be the focus of these programs: the truly needy.”

  This is a basic Republican-Democrat argument. Democrats tend to look at welfare as a benefit, Republicans see it as a giveaway. Kennedy and his colleagues write, “For many, welfare is no longer a lifeline to self-sufficiency but a lifelong trap of dependency.”

— As the health secretary pushes to eliminate cavity-fighting fluoride from public water supplies, the Food and Drug Administration will work to pull from the market fluoride supplements for children. 

  The supplements are sometimes the alternative where there is no fluoride in the tap water. Despite years of research and experience with the safety and efficacy of fluoride for fighting tooth decay, Kennedy and the FDA are joining the anti-science movement within the Trump administration.

— Kennedy — and we’ll say again that he’s the secretary of health and human services —  testified yesterday before Congress that, “I don’t think people should take medical advice from me.” 

— Deaths by drug overdose in the US fell by 30,000 last year, according to the Centers for Disease Control, just as the Trump administration is looking to cut funding for drug-fighting programs credited with reducing the numbers.

— A federal judge ordered the immediate release of Badar Khan Suri, a postdoctoral fellow at Georgetown University arrested in March and threatened with deportation. Judge Patricia Giles in Virginia said the government failed to provide evidence for why Suri should be detained and  had not identified any statements he had made that represented a threat to US interests, as the government claimed.

  Giles said Suri’s release was necessary to “disrupt the chilling effect” his detention likely had on others who have been critical of Israel. 

BAD RAP: Singer Cassie Ventura, the former girlfriend of rap mogul Sean Combs, testified in federal court yesterday that Diddy and his companies paid her the previously undisclosed sum of $20 million to settle her lawsuit against her lover of 10 years. 

  Ventura sued Combs in November 2023, accusing him of raping her, physically abusing her, and forcing her to have sex with male prostitutes while he watched. That lawsuit fed the federal indictment that now has Diddy on trial for sex trafficking and racketeering.

  The pregnant Ventura also said Combs blackmailed her with the threat of releasing videos of her in sex parties.

  While Ventura has testified over recent days, television analysts have focused on whether she was a willing participant,  giving little mention to the drugs and prostitutes employed in Diddy’s sex parties that sometimes went on for days.

THE WAR ROOM: Israeli troops are bulldozing the city of Rafah in southern Gaza, destroying one of the last refuges for displaced Gazans. While blocking food and water into Gaza, Israel has destroyed something like 90 percent of the housing in all of Gaza.

  Israel is waiting to confirm whether an air strike on Tuesday killed Hamas militant leader Muhammad Sinwar, the younger brother of Yahya Sinwar, an architect of the Hamas October 7th massacre killed by Israeli troops  last year. 

  The younger Sinwar is considered one of Hamas’s top military, but more important that his death is whether it would make a difference. Senior leaders have been killed before and Hamas fights on. Although Sinwar is a hard liner against making concessions to Israel, there are others who hold the same position.

  And from the Israeli standpoint, they want to eradicate Hamas, not just eliminate troublesome leaders. 

THE SPIN RACK: California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who’s moving politically toward the middle in what could become a run for president, called on his state legislature to scale back health care for undocumented immigrants to help balance the state budget, backing away from his previously stated goal of “universal health care for all.” — After the state’s voters shot down a near-total abortion ban on the ballot last November, Missouri lawmakers are giving it another try with an amendment to the state constitution. — Boeing signed a deal to make $96 billion worth of jets for Qatar. This came just days after President Trump agreed to accept the gift of a $400 million 747 to be used as Air Force One. 

BELOW THE FOLD: HBO has changed the name of its streaming service Max, which used to be HBO Max, back to HBO Max. Now, would you like to rent or buy the movie you’re watching tonight?

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