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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Iran and the United States will hold a sixth round of negotiations over Tehran’s rapidly advancing nuclear program this Sunday in Oman, the sultanate’s foreign minister said Thursday, as regional tensions have spiked in recent days.

The announcement by Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi comes as the U.S. is drawing down the presence of staffers who are not deemed essential to operations in the Middle East and their loved ones due to the potential for regional unrest.

Meanwhile, there have been warnings that ships could be targeted in regional waters over the tensions.

Al-Busaidi made the announcement on the social platform X.

“I am pleased to confirm the 6th round of Iran US talks will be held in Muscat this Sunday the 15th,” he wrote.

Iran had been saying for days that there would be talks, but Oman, which is serving as the mediator, had not confirmed them until now.

There was no immediate comment from the U.S.

Reaching a deal is one of several diplomatic priorities being juggled by U.S. President Donald Trump and his trusted friend and Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff. An accord could see the U.S. lift some of its crushing economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for it drastically limiting or ending its enrichment of uranium.

But a failure to get a deal could see tensions further spike in a Middle East on edge over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.

Iran’s economy, long ailing, could enter a free fall that could worsen the simmering unrest at home. Israel or the U.S. might carry out long-threatened airstrikes targeting Iranian nuclear facilities. And Tehran may decide to fully end its cooperation with the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog and rush toward a bomb.

Iran and the U.S. have held previous talks in Muscat and Rome.

Attorneys for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man arrested by the government and sent to an El Salvador prison in error and then returned to the United States last week, argue in a court filing Wednesday that he man should be freed from jail pending trial.

“Mr. Abrego Garcia asks the Court for what he has been denied the past several months — due process,” attorneys for Abrego Garcia wrote in a memorandum opposing prosecutor’s efforts to keep him detained.

Abrego Garcia was returned to the United States on Friday to face federal charges that he was involved in a scheme to transport people in the United States who are not legally able to be in the country. He was in federal custody Wednesday night.

Abrego Garcia’s attorneys argued in Wednesday’s memo that he is not a flight risk, as prosecutors have argued. His attorneys say legal standards to keep him detained have not been met.

“The government isn’t even entitled to a detention hearing in this case — much less detention. Mr. Abrego Garcia should be released,” his attorneys wrote.

An arraignment and detention hearing is scheduled for Friday in Tennessee.

Abrego Garcia, 29, was arrested in Maryland on March 12, and the Department of Homeland Security claimed he was a member of the gang MS-13, which he denied.

The government then deported him Abrego Garcia to El Salvador where he was imprisoned in the Center for Terrorism Confinement — despite an immigration judge’s previous order that he not be sent to El Salvador.

A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return to the United States, which administration officials resisted.

The Trump administration then asked El Salvador to return Abrego Garcia to the United States last week to face human smuggling charges filed in Tennessee.

The case became a high-profile battle over whether the Trump administration was bound to return Abrego Garcia under the federal judge’s order. El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said at the White House in April that he would not return Abrego Garcia.

The matter went to the Supreme Court, which disputed the language of “effectuate” in the judge’s order but ruled that the Trump administration was required to “facilitate” the return of Abrego Garcia.

The two-count federal indictment unsealed in Tennessee charges Abrego Garcia with one count each of conspiracy to unlawfully transport illegal aliens for financial gain and unlawful transportation of illegal aliens for financial gain.

The indictment alleges that from about 2016 to 2025, he and others conspired to bring migrants illegally to the United States from Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Ecuador and elsewhere, through Mexico and across the Texas-Mexico border.

Abrego Garcia and a co-conspirator “ordinarily picked up the undocumented aliens in Houston, Texas area” after they had crossed the border, the indictment alleges.

The pair then would transport “the undocumented aliens from Texas to other parts of the United States to further the aliens’ unlawful presence in the United States,” the indictment says.

Chris Newman, an attorney who represents Abrego Garcia’s family, said last week that the Trump administration for months engaged in “a campaign of disinformation, defamation against Kilmar and his family.”

Israel is considering taking military action against Iran — most likely without U.S. support — in the coming days, even as President Donald Trump is in advanced discussions with Tehran about a diplomatic deal to curtail its nuclear program, according to five people with knowledge of the situation.

Israel has become more serious about a unilateral strike on Iran as the negotiations between the United States and Iran appear closer to a preliminary or framework agreement that includes provisions about uranium enrichment that Israel views as unacceptable.

A unilateral strike or action by Israel against Iran would be a dramatic break with the Trump administration, which has argued against such a step.

The Trump administration is awaiting a response from Iran about a proposed framework of a nuclear deal, and Trump has publicly said Tehran has become more hard-line in its negotiations.

The notion of a new front in a simmering conflict has prompted the Trump administration to order all embassies within striking distance of Iranian missiles, aircraft and other assets (including missions in the Middle East, Northern Africa and Eastern Europe) to send cables with assessments about danger and about measures to mitigate risks to Americans and U.S. infrastructure, according to two sources familiar.

U.S. and other officials are on alert awaiting the possibility of Israel’s striking Iran, the officials said.

The White House has not briefed senior lawmakers on the issue, according to that aide and a U.S. official.

One major concern is Iran’s retaliating against U.S. personnel or assets in the region for any action.

Israel, which relies on intelligence or other direct and logistical assistance from the United States, may be in a position to take unilateral action against Tehran, the source familiar said. The sources familiar and officials were not aware of any planned U.S. involvement in the possible action. The United States could support with aerial refueling or intelligence sharing rather than kinetic support, but the sources and officials were not aware of plans for that, either, at this point.

U.S. officials have announced that the voluntary departure of nonessential employees from the region. And the Defense Department announced the voluntary departure of military families from locations all across the U.S. Central Command area of operations.

The CENTCOM commander, Gen. Erik Kurilla, was due to testify on Capitol Hill on Thursday, but the hearing was postponed late Wednesday without explanation. A source familiar said Kurilla had to focus on this unfolding situation.

Another possible factor: Iran is rebuilding its strategic air defenses, and manned strikes will soon be exponentially more dangerous for Israeli pilots. In October, Israel damaged nearly every one of Iran’s strategic air defense systems (mainly S-300s), but much of the damage was to the radars or other parts that can be rebuilt. It’s possible Israel’s window for manned strikes, without being threatened by Iran’s coordinated strategic air defenses, is closing.

While Israel would most likely prefer U.S. military and intelligence support for strikes — especially against Iranian nuclear facilities — it showed in October that it can do a lot alone.

Michael Knights of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy said the evacuation of nonessential staff members at the U.S. Embassy in Iraq will send a message to Tehran that Trump will not necessarily hold Israel back from launching a threatened attack on Iran.

“It’s about trying to get Iran to respect the president’s wishes,” Knights said.

Iran has failed to meet a two-month deadline Trump set to reach an agreement on the country’s nuclear activities, and he is frustrated, he said.

Both Knights and a source with knowledge of the matter said it was unclear whether Israel would undertake a limited military strike now or wait until nuclear negotiations played out further.

Trump has expressed growing frustration over Iran’s stance at recent indirect talks, portraying Tehran as inflexible and slow-moving.

“They’re just asking for things that you can’t do. They don’t want to give up what they have to give up,” Trump told reporters Monday. “They seek enrichment. We can’t have enrichment.”

The Indiana Pacers didn’t need one of their signature improbable comebacks to win Game 3 of the NBA Finals. And because of it, the Oklahoma City Thunder, once the heavy favorite to claim the league championship, will now need a rally of their own to keep their title hopes alive.

During a bravura fourth quarter Wednesday in Indianapolis, the Pacers unleashed their best defense of the series and hustle on offense to force Oklahoma City into uncharacteristic mistakes and earn a 116-107 win and a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven series.

NBA history suggests that the significance of this victory is hard to overstate: The team that wins Game 3 of an NBA Finals tied 1-1 goes on to win the series 80.5% of the time.

Game 4 is Friday in Indianapolis.

Oklahoma City scored only 18 points in the fourth quarter while making only six of its 17 shots, and it was outscored by 14 points in the game’s decisive final 12 minutes. Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the league’s Most Valuable Player, was held to just 1-of-3 shooting over that span largely under the harassing defense of Pacers forward Pascal Siakam.

Gilgeous-Alexander finished with 24 points but needed 20 shots, and he committed six turnovers.

Indiana is 24-3 this season when it holds opponents to fewer than 110 points — including 14-0 at home.

“It wasn’t all bad,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said. “But we definitely have to play our style and impose our will for more of the 48 minutes if we want to come on the road and get a win.”

Tyrese Haliburton scored 22 points with 11 assists and nine rebounds in a performance that was drastically more aggressive than three days earlier in a series-tying loss in Oklahoma City.

Yet the Pacers’ hero Wednesday was reserve Bennedict Mathurin, who failed to play even a single second during the opening quarter yet went on to score 27 points over his next 22 minutes. It was the highest-scoring performance by a reserve in the Finals since 2011, and his offensive outburst helped Indiana’s reserves outscore Oklahoma City’s 49-18.

At halftime, holding a 64-60 lead, Indiana looked like a different team from the one that returned from Oklahoma City with a 1-1 split.

It had scored more points in transition — one of the secrets of the team’s postseason success — in just two quarters than it had scored in either of the two previous games. Indiana finished with 17 fast-break points, nearly tying its total from the first two games of the series.

And the Pacers’ reserves had scored 30 points by halftime, which was not only nearly half the team’s total but also 19 more than Oklahoma City’s own bench, the same unit that had decisively swung Game 2 in the Thunder’s favor.

Indiana point guard TJ McConnell and Mathurin were primarily responsible for that turnaround by the Pacers’ bench. Shortly after they entered, the Pacers trailed by eight points, but McConnell had soon pestered the Thunder into three steals, including two in the backcourt. After turning up the pressure with each steal, McConnell gestured to his home crowd to turn up the noise.

And after having made five shots total in the first two games of the series, Mathurin made five of his six shots in the first half alone of Game 3.

“This is the kind of team that we are,” Pacers coach Rick Carlisle said. “We need everybody to be ready. It’s not always going to be exactly the same guys that are stepping up with scoring and stuff like that. But this is how we got to do it, and we got to do it as a team. And we’ve got to make it as hard as possible on them.”

Their play earned Indiana a halftime lead. Yet Indiana’s poor finish to the third quarter, scoring just five points over the final five minutes, earned it an uphill challenge, and a five-point deficit, entering the final quarter. Oklahoma City’s vulnerability — perhaps its only one — was its lack of playoff experience, and it made the series’ return to Indiana a critical opportunity for the Pacers.

Oklahoma City indeed displayed unexpected flaws. Its 19 turnovers were its most of these playoffs.

Yet despite their youth, the Thunder at times also showed steely resolve. Rather than become rattled by playing on the road, Thunder All-Star Jalen Williams, in only his third season, led Oklahoma City out of tight jams with both his scoring and his passing late in the third quarter, and his layup with seven minutes to play in the fourth quarter helped erase what had been a four-point Indiana lead.

But Indiana, so good at comebacks throughout this postseason, played superbly in the final minutes in building and protecting its lead.

“I was proud of the way we bounced back from a rough ending to the third quarter,” Carlisle said. “That was something that could have shaken us up a lot.”

First with five minutes to play, and again just 35 seconds later, the Pacers grabbed two offensive rebounds that turned into four points when the Thunder failed to box out. Breakdowns like that helped Indiana extend its lead to eight with 3:20 to play.

“They really outplayed us in the fourth,” Daigneault said.

The Thunder have already faced a similar position in these playoffs, when they lost two of the first three games against Denver in the second round and ultimately came back to win the series.

DENVER — A Colorado funeral homeowner who pleaded guilty to leaving a woman’s corpse in the back of a hearse for over a year and improperly stashing the cremated remains of at least 30 people has been sentenced to 18 months in prison, the Denver District Attorney’s Office announced.

Miles Harford, 34, pleaded guilty in April to one felony count of abuse of a corpse and one misdemeanor count of theft. He faced other counts, including forgery and theft, that were dismissed as part of his plea agreement.

His 18-month sentence is the maximum sentence under Colorado law for the charges.

“Nothing will ever undo the terrible pain that Miles Harford caused so many families, but it is our hope that this sentence will provide the family and friends of the deceased with some measure of justice,” Denver District Attorney John Walsh said in a statement Monday. “Harford systematically and shockingly violated his professional and moral obligations, and, for that, he is now being held accountable.”

Harford was arrested last year after the body of a woman named Christina Rosales, who died of Alzheimer’s at age 63, was found in the back of his hearse, covered in blankets. Her remains had been there for about 18 months. Authorities said he had provided the Rosales family with the cremated remains of a different person that he misrepresented as Rosales.

Police also found the cremated remains of other people stashed in boxes throughout Harford’s rental property, including in the crawlspace.

Prosecutors said he treated the bodies and remains “in a way that would outrage normal family sensibilities.”

Harford’s sentencing follows years of other gruesome funeral home cases in Colorado, including one where the owners were accused of storing nearly 200 bodies in a decrepit building and giving families fake cremated remains.

WASHINGTON — Defense Department officials say troops who cheered and jeered Tuesday at President Donald Trump’s political statements at a rally at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, did not violate military regulations, but a former military legal officer said they did just that.

During the speech, uniformed soldiers yelled in support of Trump’s political statements and booed former President Joe Biden and California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

“Do you think this crowd would have showed up for Biden? I don’t think so,” Trump said to boos about Biden.

Trump made other comments about Newsom and about Karen Bass, the mayor of Los Angeles, where protests against the administration’s crackdown on immigrants have been taking place and where Trump has ordered thousands of National Guard members and active-duty Marines deployed in response. Other Trump comments about the “fake news media,” transgender people, protesters in California and flag-burning also drew boos from the uniformed military members in attendance.

Trump is known for his rallies at which he goes after and pokes fun at political enemies and other issues, but typically he makes those remarks at political events, not on U.S. military bases.

Such overt political activity on a base is the prerogative of the commander in chief. But military leaders would typically frown upon troops’ reacting the way they did as inconsistent with military good order and discipline, and, according to one expert, it is a violation of military regulations found in the Uniform Code of Military Justice, or UCMJ.

Presidents of both parties often use troops as political props and put them and their commanders in difficult positions by doing so, but Trump’s speech took that to a new level, said Geoffrey DeWeese, a retired judge advocate general who is now an attorney with Mark S. Zaid PC. (Zaid has represented whistleblowers on both sides of the aisle, including one who filed a complaint about Trump’s call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2019 that led to Trump’s impeachment, and he was one of the people whose security clearances Trump revoked this year.)

“It’s a sad tradition to use the military as a backdrop for political purposes,” DeWeese said. “To actively attack another president or a sitting governor and incite the crowd to boo, that’s a step in a dangerous direction, that really says we want to politicize the military, that sends a bad message.”

DeWeese said there were likely to have been violations of the UCMJ.

“I would be cringing if I was a senior officer and it happened under my watch,” he said.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said repeatedly that he wants to take politics out of the military by removing diversity, equity and inclusion programs and banning service by transgender service members.

Kori Schake, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute who worked at the State Department and the National Security Council under former President George W. Bush and at the Pentagon under former President George H.W. Bush, said in an email that commanders at Fort Bragg should have done a better job preparing troops there.

“It’s terrible,” she wrote. “It’s predictably bad behavior by the President to try and score political points in a military setting, and it’s a command failure by leaders at Ft Bragg not to prepare soldiers for that bad behavior and counsel them not to participate.”

The Pentagon said in a statement that there had been no violation of the UCMJ and suggested the media was against policies that Trump has championed.

Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell also alleged in a statement that the media “cheered on the Biden administration” and its policies regarding the Defense Department “when they forced drag queen performances on military bases, promoted service members on the basis of race and sex in violation of federal law, and fired troops who refused an experimental vaccine.”

“Believe me, no one needs to be encouraged to boo the media,” Parnell said. “Look no further than this query, which is nothing more than a disgraceful attempt to ruin the lives of young soldiers.”

On Wednesday, Army officials at Fort Bragg addressed the sale of some MAGA merchandise at the event, which was planned in cooperation with a nonpartisan organization, American 250.

“The Army remains committed to its core values and apolitical service to the nation,” Col. Mary Ricks, a spokeswoman for the Army’s 18th Airborne Corps at Bragg, said in a statement. “The Army does not endorse political merchandise or the views it represents. The vendor’s presence is under review to determine how it was permitted and to prevent similar circumstances in the future.”

The Army’s own new field manual, published recently, says the apolitical nature of being a U.S. soldier is what contributes to the public trust.

The Army “as an institution must be nonpartisan and appear so, too,” says the new field manual, “The Army: A Primer to Our Profession of Arms.”

“Being nonpartisan means not favoring any specific political party or group. Nonpartisanship assures the public that our Army will always serve the Constitution and our people loyally and responsively.”

U.S. troops can participate in political functions, just not while on duty or in uniform, the book says.

“As a private citizen you are encouraged to participate in our democratic process, but as a soldier you must be mindful of how your actions may affect the reputation and perceived trustworthiness of our Army as an institution,” it says.

Ananda Lewis, a former MTV VJ, has died at the age of 52.

Lakshmi Emory, whom Lewis once described as a “phenomenal sister” in a birthday message, shared news of her death in a June 11 Facebook post.

“She’s free, and in His heavenly arms,” she wrote next to a black-and-white photo of Lewis. “Lord, rest her soul.”

Emory did not share additional details, including Lewis’ cause of death.

Lewis was an MTV staple in the late ‘90s, hosting “Total Request Live” and video countdown show“Hot Zone.” She also hosted her own talk show “The Ananda Lewis Show” in 2001.

Lewis was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer in 2019, but later revealed that she opted against the double mastectomy doctors recommended at the time.

In a January 2025 op-ed for Essence, Lewis shared that she tried alternative methods to monitor her breast cancer, including cuting out alcohol, sugar, monthly ultrasounds, high-dose vitamin C IVs, hyperbaric chamber sessions and qigong exercise, among others.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, she discovered that her tumor had grown and underwent genetically targeted fractionated chemotherapy, which is a treatment that destroys cancer cells without harming healthy ones, according to Cleveland Clinic.

However, a PET scan done in October 2023 confirmed that her cancer had progressed to Stage 4 cancer. This time, she shared that she underwent treatment at an integrative facility.

While Lewis had previously said she regretted refusing to undergo mammograms out of fear of radiation exposure, she urged the importance of women getting informed and learning about prevention.

In her 2025 Essence piece, she wrote, “Going into 2025, I would say to women: Do everything in your power to avoid my story becoming yours. If I had known what I know now 10 years ago, perhaps I wouldn’t have ended up here.”

Adding, “I encourage people to look at the information and studies that exist. Seek them out, learn from them and apply the changes to your life, so that you can continue to thrive and live as long as you can.”

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., said he was “uninvited” to an annual White House picnic typically attended by members of Congress and their families, framing the move to reporters on Wednesday as retribution for his opposition to key components of President Donald Trump’s agenda.

“They’re afraid of what I’m saying, so they think they’re going to punish me, I can’t go to the picnic, as if somehow that’s going to make me more conciliatory,” Paul said. “So it’s silly, in a way, but it’s also just really sad that this is what it’s come to. But petty vindictiveness like this, it makes you — it makes you wonder about the quality of people you’re dealing with.”

Paul, who said he attended picnics hosted by Presidents Biden and Obama, told reporters he called the White House earlier today to secure tickets to the annual picnic but was told he was not invited to the event. He said he had family members flying to Washington D.C. to attend the event, including son, daughter-in-law and six-month old grandson, whom he noted owns a “Make America Great Again” hat.

“I just find this incredibly petty,” Paul told reporters.”I have been, I think, nothing but polite to the President. I have been an intellectual opponent, a public policy opponent, and he’s chosen now to uninvite me from the picnic and to say my grandson can’t come to the picnic.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a series of questions, including whether Paul was ever invited to the event and if Trump was directly involved in the decision to “uninvite” him.

As Trump pushes Republicans to pass a package of measures to fund much of his domestic agenda by Independence Day, Paul is among the Senate Republicans poised to make that milestone unreachable, joining fiscal hawks in the party to balk at legislation the Congressional Budget Office estimates said would add $2.4 trillion to the national deficit.

In addition to his belief that the funding package would “explode the debt,” the three-term senator has criticized spending cuts in the bill as “wimpy and anemic,” called planned Medicaid changes in the legislation “bad strategy” and proposed cutting billions in funding from the bill for Trump’s border wall.

“In private, there’s quite a few people in there who actually do think we could save some money and are open minded to it, and believe the administration should justify the numbers,” Paul told reporters after a two-hour meeting on the bill Wednesday. “Even if you’re supportive, and I am supportive of border security, but I’m just not supportive of a blank check.”

Paul said this week he plans to vote “No” on the legislation and speculated today it may be among the reasons for the rescinded invitation.

“I’m arguing from a true belief and worry that our country is mired in debt and getting worse, and they choose to react by uninviting my grandson to the picnic,” Paul said. “I don’t know, I just think it really makes me lose a lot of respect I once had for Donald Trump.”

Trump has frequently lashed out at Paul in response to the sustained opposition, deriding the senator on Truth Social for his criticisms.

“Rand Paul has very little understanding of the BBB, especially the tremendous GROWTH that is coming. He loves voting ‘NO’ on everything, he thinks it’s good politics, but it’s not,” Trump wrote last week.

Paul has emerged as a chief critic to Trump’s fiscal policy, and has intensely criticized his decision to place tariffs on major U.S. trading partners, arguing they will push the country into a recession.

The libertarian conservative was one of four Republican senators to back a Democratic resolution to block the implementation of Trump’s Canadian tariffs, predicting at the time that the import penalties would “threaten us with a recession” and calling Trump’s decision to place tariffs on major U.S. trading partners “a terrible, terrible idea.” The effort has so far stalled in the House.

Paul also joined Democrats in introducing a bipartisan resolution to undo the reciprocal tariffs Trump placed on dozens of countries, this time by terminating the national emergency he declared to implement the global penalties, arguing that Trump had exceeded his presidential authority.

“Tariffs are taxes, and the power to tax belongs to Congress—not the president. Our Founders were clear: tax policy should never rest in the hands of one person,” Paul said in a statement on the bipartisan effort. “Abusing emergency powers to impose blanket tariffs not only drives up costs for American families but also tramples on the Constitution. It’s time Congress reasserts its authority and restores the balance of power.”

That effort failed to pass the Senate.

Paul’s differences with Trump even extend to the military parade taking place on Saturday, which the lawmaker likened to parades in countries led by dictators.

“I wouldn’t have done it,” Paul said on Tuesday. “The images you saw in the Soviet Union and North Korea. We were proud not to be that.”

But still, in the face of his criticisms of Trump, Paul appeared to view the rescinded invitation as a shock, noting that even Democratic lawmakers remain invited to the White House picnic.

“I think I’m the first senator in the history of United States to be uninvited to the White House picnic,” Rand told reporters. “Literally, every Democrat is invited, every Republican is invited, and to say that my family is no longer welcome, kind of sad actually.”

This is a free article for Diddy on Trial newsletter subscribers. Sign up to get exclusive reporting and analysis throughout Sean Combs’ federal trial.

U.S. government prosecutors have presented the drug-dazed, marathon sexual encounters known as “freak offs” as part of Diddy’s sweeping criminal conspiracy. But in a forceful cross-examination of Diddy’s ex-girlfriend “Jane” today, his legal team attempted to recast the “freak offs” as consensual trysts.

Here’s what you need to know about Jane’s fifth day on the stand:

• Jane, answering questions from defense attorney Teny Geragos, said she initiated some “freak offs” with Diddy. Diddy’s lawyers entered as evidence photos of a room, decorated by Jane, filled with rose petals and balloons. When asked if she suggested a “hotel night” with two other men on that occasion, Jane said yes. “Yes, that was my suggestion,” she replied. Diddy was “excited about that.”
• In late August 2022, after Jane had a tryst with Diddy and a sex worker named Paul, she told the rapper how much she enjoyed such sexual encounters. Jane texted Diddy that she was “having so much fun,” adding that she would “never take this for granted and will always make sure you are taken care of.”
• Jane wept on the stand after recounting telling Diddy in a text message that he was a “blessing” in her life. “I have never had a man take care of me like you do,” Jane wrote to Diddy a day after one of their “hotel nights.” She added: “You’re the reason for my child’s joy, it means the world to us, I love you baby.”
• Jane testified she urged Diddy to stay off drugs and eat healthy food for 30 days. Diddy suggested a “sobriety party” — a “hotel night” without drugs, she said. The October 2023 party lasted between 12 and 18 hours; Jane had sex with three men, she testified. “I resent him for how much I loved him and couldn’t say no to him,” she said. “I resent him for all of it.”

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🔎 The view from inside

By Adam Reiss, Chloe Melas and Katherine Koretski

The prosecutors are seeking to remove one of the jurors — Juror #6 — who Diddy’s defense lawyers claim is among the panel’s Black members. It’s not exactly clear what’s behind the prosecution’s request, though it has cited a “lack of candor.”

“We were very reluctant to put in this letter. It appeared to be a lack of candor with the court that raises serious issues with us,” Maurene Comey, one of the prosecutors, told the court today. “We did not want to do this. We were compelled to do that.”

In other news: Diddy, wearing what appeared to be a light orange sweater and khaki pants, stood up and faced the audience in the courtroom before proceedings got started today. He seemed to be mouthing words to someone.

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🗓 What’s next

Tomorrow: “Jane” is expected to return to the stand for more cross-examination. We’ll be live-blogging the key moments.

BTW: Every night during Diddy’s trial, NBC’s “Dateline” will drop special episodes of the “True Crime Weekly” podcast to get you up to speed. “Dateline” correspondent Andrea Canning chats with NBC News’ Chloe Melas and special guests — right in front of the courthouse. Listen here. 🎧

Under normal circumstances, moderating inflation and a weakening labor market would make an easy case for interest rate cuts.

But these aren’t normal times, and a scattering of headwinds on the horizon have made Federal Reserve officials leery of easing monetary policy for fear that the inflation fight isn’t over.

That sentiment is setting up an intensifying conflict between the White House and the central bank that could result in President Donald Trump taking the unusual step of naming a “shadow” chair whose responsibility it would be to watch over the Fed and Chair Jerome Powell until a permanent chief can be installed next year.

There is “fresh buzz” around the idea that Trump could announce his choice to succeed Powell soon, “as a shadow Fed chair in the interim,” until the central bank chief’s term ends, Krishna Guha, head of global policy and central bank strategy at Evercore, said in a note Wednesday.

“The idea would be to accelerate the timeframe over which the administration can put its stamp on the Fed and influence rates markets while avoiding the nuclear option of trying to fire Powell,” Guha wrote.

The practicality of such a move is sketchy. There are no imminent vacancies on the Fed’s board of governors — save for Powell, a frequent Trump target whose term as head of the central bank expires in May 2026, though his governorship runs until 2028.

Moreover, the impact of such a “shadow chair” likely would be minimal. It takes seven votes on the Federal Open Market Committee to move policy, and it would be hard to find more than one or two right now who would be in favor of the aggressive interest rate cuts Trump is seeking.

Still, at least telegraphing now who he wants as chair could sent an important message to markets about the path Trump wants to see the Fed to take. The stakes were raised Wednesday following a comparatively benign inflation report showing prices up just 0.1% in May, and after Vice President JD Vance joined Trump in urging the Fed to cut rates.

The stakes for a new chair

The candidate list for chair seems to have been narrowed, and Trump noted Friday that he expects to make his preference public soon. White House officials did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

The list of apparent finalists includes former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, current Governor Christopher Waller, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett. Each has assets and liabilities, but the most important quality could be a tilt towards sharply lower rates, with an aggressive timetable.

“I think Trump’s going to pick someone who’s going to be uber-dovish,” billionaire investor Paul Tudor Jones said during a Bloomberg News interview Wednesday. “We are fiscally constrained. We’re going to have budget deficits of 6% plus [compared to gross domestic product] as far as the eye can see. One of the major offsets if I was the president would be to lower my interest rate costs by appointing a Fed chair who is as dovish as could possibly be.”

Powell has been reluctant to push for cuts until the longer-term effects of Trump’s tariffs can be better gauged.

As Jones sees it, Trump has no other choice than to swing away from the moderate-to-hawkish Powell with the U.S. in a “debt trap” that eventually will cause a market revolt.

The budget deficit is heading toward $2 trillion for 2025 and actually is above 6% of GDP. Costs to finance the $36 trillion debt are estimated at $1.2 trillion this year and likely could be headed north of that as Treasury yields remain lofty. The easiest way for the U.S. to ease some of that burden would be Fed rate cuts that at least would ease some of those financing costs, which are running higher than any other budget category except Social Security and Medicare.

So which way does Trump turn?

Evaluating the candidates

Guha, the Evercore analyst, sees positives and negatives in each prospective candidate.

Warsh, he said, “has direct Fed policy experience, is well-known to markets and Fed officials, and has the benefit of being perceived as being independent while maintaining cordial and constructive relations with the Trump administration.”

His downside: A leaning toward hawkishness on inflation and away from expansionary balance sheet policies that have been the Fed’s hallmark since the financial crisis of 2008.

On Bessent, who emerged this week as a favorite, according to a Bloomberg report, his upside is market bona fides and stature as the “adult in the room” in the organized chaos of the Trump administration. However, a lack of monetary policy experience and perception of being “too close to the Trump administration, and not sufficiently independent,” could work against him perception-wise, Guha said.

More of a longshot, Hassett has solid economic credentials but limited monetary policy experience and might, Guha said, also be perceived as being too close to the administration.

Finally, Waller has the benefit of a folksy demeanor while his recent statements advocating “good news” rate cuts later this year could put him in good standing with Trump. However, he could pay a price for supporting the 50 basis point rate cut last September, ahead of the November presidential election.

For Trump, the challenge will be to pick someone credible who shares his vision on lower rates and easier policy and who can get through a Senate confirmation where Republicans hold the advantage, albeit a fragile one, and leadership that still wants an independent central bank.

“Hopefully, whoever is selected is an individual that feels strongly that monetary policy should be set consistent with the dual mandate and not be politically influenced,” former Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren said during a CNBC interview Wednesday. “But that remains to be seen.”