THE WAR ROOM: President Trump undercut his own secretary of State yesterday, announcing on social media that he was pausing his “project Freedom” to escort shops through the Strait of Hormuz because “Great Progress has been made toward a Complete and Final Agreement with Representatives of Iran.” He said the escort operation is paused for a short period “to see whether or not the Agreement can be finalized and signed.”

  Secretary of State Marco Rubio only hours earlier during  a lengthy press conference said that Operation Epic Fury … otherwise known as the war on Iran … is over and has been replaced by Project Freedom, the effort to escort as many as 1,500 stranded ships through the embattled Strait. He didn’t mention a pause.

  Rubio said that the War Powers Act, the requirement to have congressional approval for military action after 60 days, no longer applies because the operation has changed.

  Rubio also said that President  Trump and a string of presidents before him have said that the War Powers Act is unconstitutional, effectively claiming that the current administration doesn’t have to obey it even though the Supreme Court has not ruled as such.

DIRE STRAITS: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth claimed yesterday that the passage of two ships through the Strait of Hormuz earlier this week is proof that the strait is open to traffic even though an enormous US military presence remains to protect shipping. Hegseth repeated that the Iranian military is utterly destroyed and powerless, yet it takes destroyers, fighter jets, and helicopters to get a ship safely through the strait.

  Like Rubio, Hegseth was out of tune with Trump.

  Both the US and Iran claim control of the Strait. Iran announced a new system in which ships seeking to transit will receive an email laying out regulations from the “Persian Gulf Strait Authority,” including the requirement to get  a permit. 

  Secretary of State Rubio complained in his press conference that Iran is breaking international law by blocking an international waterway, neglecting to note that Iran is doing so because they are fighting a war.

BILLION WITH a B: Senate Republicans injected an extra $1 billion into an immigration enforcement bill for security enhancements to President Trump’s $400 million White House Ballroom that he originally said would be paid for with $250 million in private money.

  Trump has insisted in recent weeks that the ballroom would be not so much for dining and dancing as for national security. His plans include an elaborate bunker.

  The Sente bill doesn’t mention the ballroom. It says the money would be for “security adjustments and upgrades” to “support enhancements by the Secret Service relating to the East Wing Modernization Project.”

  Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer posted on social media that, “Republicans looked at families drowning in bills and decided what they really needed was more raids and a Trump ballroom.” 

INFINITE SCROLL:

— Commissioners in Palm Beach County, Fla., approved a trademark and licensing agreement with President Trump’s family business in the process of renaming Palm Beach International Airport as President Donald J. Trump International Airport.

— The Trump administration is firing off lawsuits this week.  

  The equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed a lawsuit against The NY Times, claiming the paper gave an editing position in the real estate section to an unqualified multi-racial female rather than a white male who already worked in that section.

  The Department of Education also launched a title IX discrimination investigation into all-female Smith College for admitting trans women. A statement from the DOE says it is investigating Smith for “admitting biological men and granting them access to women-only spaces, including dormitories, bathrooms, locker rooms, and athletic teams.”

— Indicating that Donald Trump’s influence still reaches deep into the Republican party, five out of seven candidates for the Indiana legislature endorsed by the President defeated incumbents who had voted against congressional redistricting. Trump takes revenge against Republicans who oppose him.

THE OBIT PAGE: Jack Thornell, the Associated Press photographer who took the Pulitzer-winning photo of civil rights campaigner James Meredith moments after being shot on a Mississippi highway in the spring of 1966, died last month in Metairie, Louisiana. He was 86.

  The photo captures Meredith as he falls to the pavement. You can see the face of the shooter, Aubrey James Norvell, rising out of the ditch to Meredith’s right. It remains one of the iconic images of white violence against civil rights activists.

  Meredith survived and Norvell served 18 months of a five-year sentence.

  Thornell was only 26 at the time but he photographed seminal moments in the civil rights fight. He also got the only images of the governor of Mississippi, Ross Barnett, blocking Meredith’s university enrollment in 1962, and the perp walk  of the Klan-member sheriff, Lawrence Rainey, as he was arrested by the FBI in the infamous murders of three civil rights workers.

  About the Meredith shooting, Thornell later said that in the moment he was afraid he didn’t get the shot because he was using the wrong lens.

THE SPIN RACK: The US military struck another suspected drug boat in the Eastern Pacific yesterday, bringing the death toll to at least 190. — Health authorities say that the hantavirus that killed three people on a cruise ship may be a rare strain the spreads from human to human. It’s usually spread by rodents.

BELOW THE FOLD: Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was the target of protests this week as he paid $10 million to be a host of the Met Gala, the annual charity showcase for over-the-top fashion. Bezos is considered to have gone over to the dark side in cozying up to the Trump administration and gutting the staff of The Washington Post while paying $40 million for a vanity documentary about First Lady Melania Trump.

  An online headline in the Post said about its boss, “This year’s Met Gala proved one thing: The real devil who wears Prada is Jeff Bezos.”

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