THE WAR ROOM: The so-called truce with Iran in which the gunfire never stopped expired yesterday, leaving President Trump with a war he’s claimed to have won without being able to end it.

  Trump is fighting for control of the Strait of Hormuz, the channel for 20 percent of the world’s oil, while trying to restore the Middle East to its relative state of calm before the US and Israel attacked Iran. The President declares that the entire purpose is to deny Iran a nuclear weapon while Iran has learned that threatening passage through the Strait is more powerful than a nuke.

  Trump repeated yesterday in the Oval Office that Iran wants to “make a deal, but they’re not going to make the kind of a deal that I feel is necessary.” He has been unable to force Iran into an agreement.

  Trump also said the US could declare the Strait of Hormuz a territory of the United States. “We control it with the blockade, and I like the idea of declaring it a territory,” he said.

THE FOUTAINHEAD: President Trump is pushing the Navy to redesign its new class of aircraft carriers to move the control tower known as the “island” forward, making the carriers look like they did in World War II.

  The new carriers have the island in the rear quarter of the deck. They used to be in the middle and that’s where Trump would like to see them.

  This comes on top of Trump ordering the catapult systems to be returned to steam rather than the new electromagnetic. All of this requires re-designs and delays costing multiple billions of dollars.

  The Gerald R. Ford is the first of the new carriers with the rear island design. The John F. Kennedy is undergoing sea trials while two other carriers are under construction and would require a major re-do.

INFINITE SCROLL:

— Facing a tough and somewhat embarrassing question from CNN reporter Kristen Holmes yesterday, President Trump went on the personal attack followed by an attack on Holmes by the House Communications office.

  “Jon Ossoff said you’d rather travel with your aide Natalie Harp and build the ballroom than do your job as president,” Holmes said. “What is your response?”

  Two things: Ossoff is a Democratic senator from Georgia and possible presidential candidate. Harp is President Trump’s beautiful blonde aide who is rarely more than two feet from him.

  Trump accused Holmes of being “a loud boisterous person,” and said, “be quiet, be quiet.” He accused Holmes and CNN of being “fake news.”

  Later, the White House press machinery attacked Holmes on Twitter/X saying, “Someday, your children will come across your disgusting and inhumane question. They will be sickened and embarrassed to have a parent be so callous and vindictive. It’s quite troubling.”

— President Trump, who claims that mail-in balloting is rife with fraud, voted by mail in today’s Florida primary. 

LEGAL RAP: Thirty years after the Las Vegas murder of rising rap star Tupac Shakur, a jury heard opening arguments in the trial of a man accused of being instrumental in the drive-by shooting that killed Shakur.

  Prosectors say they intend to prove that  Duane Keith Davis, 63, a former gang banger from Compton, California, acquired a .40-caliber Glock pistol and in a white Cadillac filled with associates, chased Shakur to his death. Davis is not accused of actually pulling the trigger, but just participating would qualify him for murder charges. 

  Warring members of the Crips and Bloods were in Las Vegas that night in 1996 for a Mike Tyson prize fight. After the fight Shakur himself got into fisticuffs with Davis’s nephew and in gang culture that called for retribution.

  The evidence is thin, but counting heavily against Davis are his own words in his 2019 memoir, “Compton Street Legend” in which he wrote, “Them jumping on my nephew gave us the green light to want to do something.” 

THE OBIT PAGE: Tommy John, the lefty pitcher who gave his name to elbow-saving ligament surgery, died of bladder cancer in Florida at age 83.

  Throwing the ball for 26 seasons, John had one of the longest careers in professional baseball. But hurling a pitch in July of 1974 he heard a “pop” and his arm turned into a noodle. “The only thing holding my elbow together was the skin and the nerve running through the joint,” he wrote in his memoir.

  The first-time ever surgery, which became known as “Tommy John” surgery, consisted of replacing the ligament with a tendon grafted from John’s right wrist. Holes were drilled in the humerus and ulna bones, above and below the elbow, and the tendon was wound through the holes in a figure-8 shape. He was given a chance of one in 100 of returning to the mound.

  John won more than 300 major league games, more than half of which he pitched after his ground-breaking surgery.

 THE SPIN RACK: Tech behemoth Meta goes to trial today in a $200 billion lawsuit brought by four states accusing the company of making its platforms addictive for children, like cigarettes. — More American children are receiving permission to let them go to school without the routine childhood shots vaccines, the centers for Disease Control reports. Roughly 4 percent of kindergartners in the United States were given a nonmedical exemption for at least one vaccine during the 2025-26 school year, an 18 percent jump from the previous year, the CDC reports. — South Carolina Republican Rep. Nancy Mace has had her guns tattooed. She has described the tattoos as “the pain that I need to feel” and a way to “reclaim” both her identity and body. After failing to be nominated for governor, Mace’s political career appears to be ending in January.

BELOW THE FOLD: Some people just don’t like being tracked in their travels. Reports are increasing about license plate readers being shot, spray-painted, and cut down.

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