Trump’s meeting with Syria’s new president could mark a turning point for the Mideast

As a result of the cuts, a senior official with the U.N. Population Fund, which promotes sexual and reproductive health, says lives will be lost and lives will be “less lived.”

Andrew Saberton, the fund’s deputy executive director for management who returned from Afghanistan over the weekend, told U.N. reporters Wednesday that 6.3 million Afghans, mostly women and girls, are losing access to “life-saving care.”

The Trump administration has canceled foreign aid contracts including to Afghanistan, where more than half the population needs humanitarian assistance to survive.

The U.S. cuts are forcing the fund, known as UNFPA, to reduce the number of midwives it supports by half, Saberton said. And in 2026 the agency will only be able to support 418 community facilities compared to 982 today.

In addition, he said, “Hundreds of health centers in remote areas and mobile clinics are being forced to close, health workers are being laid off, supplies are running out, and lives are at stake.”

The group of more than 500 members of the Connecticut Bar Association said it decided to issue the statement due to “mounting concern across the legal profession.”

“Our deep commitment to this nation’s Constitution and laws, and to democracy, brings us together to state publicly what has so often been taken for granted but what must now be said again aloud,” according to the letter, which does not mention the Trump administration by name.

The letter affirms that judges should not be threatened with impeachment or violence because of their rulings and that lawyers have the right to choose who they represent without fear of retaliation from the government. It also states the government must follow court orders and underscores the rights to counsel, due process, free speech and freedom of association.

“We recognize that we, as lawyers, have a special duty to safeguard the law,” the letter reads. “To that end, we stand today shoulder-to-shoulder, lawyers in the Constitution state, to proclaim again these Constitutional guarantees.”

The lawsuit was filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., by the United Mine Workers of America, the American Federation of Teachers, National Nurses United and 10 other labor organizations.

It focuses on the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, which was gutted during a tornado of layoffs this year that by some estimates cut about 850 of the agency’s roughly 1,000 employees.

At a Congressional hearing on Wednesday, U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said he is reversing the firing of about 330 NIOSH workers. But the lawsuit seeks to reinstate all NIOSH staff and functions, arguing that the cuts flouted express directives from Congress and are illegal.

A spokesperson for Kennedy did not comment specifically on the lawsuit, but sent a statement that said that “NIOSH’s essential services will continue as HHS streamlines its operations. Ensuring the health and safety of our workforce remains a top priority for the Department.”

Hey, Riley. Thanks for reaching out. AP’s Amanda Seitz and Seung Min Kim covered this announcement from yesterday. Here’s some of their reporting to help answer your question:

It’s unclear what — if any — impact that Trump’s executive order will have on Americans, especially those who have private health insurance. The federal government has the most power to shape the price it pays for drugs covered by Medicare and Medicaid.

However, the price that millions of Americans covered by private insurance pay for drugs is even harder for the agency to manipulate.

Trump’s promised new — but uncertain — savings on drug prices, just hours after the Republican-led House released its new plan to trim $880 billion from Medicaid.

Americans are unlikely to see relief on rising drug costs quickly because of the order, said Rachel Sachs, a health law expert at Washington University.

“It really does seem the plan is to ask manufacturers to voluntarily lower their prices to some point, which is not known,” Sachs said. “If they do not lower their prices to the desired point, HHS shall take other actions with a very long timeline, some of which could potentially, years in the future, lower drug prices.”

Acting Navy chief Adm. James Kilby told a House appropriations subcommittee that the series of accidents on the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier and its strike group are under investigation and “we are committed to learning what happened and preventing it from happening again.”

“Accountability actions are being taken or will be taken,” said Kilby. The commander of the Truman was relieved of duty after a collision in February, but Kilby’s remarks Wednesday suggested more actions are likely coming.

In recent weeks, two F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jets were lost in the Red Sea. Last week, a jet landing on the Truman went overboard when there was a failure with the system that hooks and catches the aircraft on steel wires as they hit the ship’s flight deck. The two pilots ejected. And the previous week, a fighter jet slipped off the Truman’s hangar deck, as sailors were towing the aircraft into place in the hangar bay.

In February, the Truman was involved in a collision at sea with a merchant vessel near Port Said, Egypt.

In a fourth, separate incident, the guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg mistakenly shot down an F/A-18 in December, after ships earlier shot down multiple Houthi drones launched by the rebels. Both aviators in that incident survived. The Gettysburg is part of the Truman strike group.

The U.S. president will next fly to the United Arab Emirates on Thursday.

U.S. Judge Jeffrey S. White in Oakland blocked the Trump administration from arresting, detaining or transferring about two dozen international students whose legal status was abruptly terminated as part of a national crackdown.

White said he is pondering a national injunction that would apply to all international students. Judges in other parts of the U.S. have ordered similar protections for individual plaintiffs.

At least 4,700 international students had their visa records terminated en masse in early April by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, often without notification to the students or to their schools.
ICE then reversed course and began reinstating students’ visa records in a government database that maintains their legal status.

Following the state dinner, a brief ceremony was held for the World Cup soccer tournament. After being hosted by Qatar in 2022, the next one will be in the U.S. in 2026.

Trump held aloft a ball from the last tournament, which he signed along with Al Thani.

Second-term U.S. Rep. Shri Thanedar of Michigan has introduced seven articles of impeachment against the Republican president, which are all but certain to fail.

Thanedar, who represents a safely Democratic Detroit-area district, is facing multiple primary challengers for a second time as some Democrats seek to shake up the party following the 2024 election.

Adrian Hemond, a Michigan-based political strategist, said the impeachment effort is likely to drive fundraising and mobilize support for Thanedar’s primary race, even as it is destined to fail. The move may also be an attempt to “box out” Thanedar’s primary challengers from media attention early in the race, he said.

“So it’s smart politics for him,” Hemond said.

▶ Read more about Thanedar and his effort to impeach Trump

Al Thani, the emir of Qatar, asked Trump to use American pressure to bring peace to Gaza, where Israel has renewed its military operations.

Qatar has been an important stage for negotiations, and it has served as an intermediary for Hamas.

Al Thani also told Trump that he worried about him during last year’s assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“I prayed for your recovery and your safety,” he said.

While attending the state dinner, the president repeated his desire for a peaceful resolution to Iran’s nuclear program and suggested the ball is in Tehran’s court.

“The non-friendly is a violent course and I don’t want that.” He added that “it’s their decision.”

He urged Qatar to help reach an agreement.

“It’s a perilous situation, and we want to do the right thing,” he said. “We want to do something that’s going to save maybe millions of lives. Because things like that get started and they get out of control.”

The president and his wife, Melania, are set to host a signing ceremony in the White House Rose Garden, a White House official said.

The first lady traveled to the Capitol in March to lobby Congress to pass the Take It Down Act.

The House sent the bill to the White House on April 28 for the president’s signature.

After Trump signs the measure into law, it will become a federal crime to knowingly publish or threaten to publish such imagery without a person’s consent. Websites and social media companies also would have 48 hours to remove such material after a victim requests it.

The White House official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss scheduling decisions not yet announced.

At a Congressional hearing on Wednesday, Kennedy said he is rescinding the terminations of about 330 employees of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

About 850 of the agency’s roughly 1,000 employees were laid off by the Trump administration, according to estimates from a union and affected employees.

Earlier this week, a judge in West Virginia ordered that jobs be restored within NIOSH’s respiratory health division in Morgantown, although her ruling didn’t specify a number.

Kennedy said that of the 330 people being reinstated, about a third work in Morgantown, a third work at a NIOSH site in Cincinnati and a third work in a World Trade Center Health Program that has staff in several locations.

TheHead of Oxfam America said that as Trump travels to the region, starvation is expanding across Gaza, with children hardest hit.

Abby Maxman said the humanitarian response is at a “virtual standstill” because of Israel’s over monthslong blockade of aid and essential goods.

She called on Trump to focus on securing a full and permanent ceasefire, ending the siege on Gaza, and securing safe access for humanitarian aid.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper’s ruling came after the legal group filed a lawsuit alleging the Justice Department had retaliated against it by canceling grants for its Commission on Domestic & Sexual Violence.

The grants cancellation came shortly after Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a memo barring department employees from participating in ABA-sponsored events during work time, noting that the legal group had recently sued the federal government. The department had said the grants no longer aligned with its priorities.

The judge said the ABA would likely succeed on the merits of its lawsuit, though he said his order does not bar the department from canceling the grants for “permissible and truly nonretalitatory reasons.”

Dozens of higher education organizations are taking a stand against the Trump administration’s attacks on prestigious universities, calling on the government to “reforge” its ties with academia.

In a Wednesday statement, more than 50 groups said the nation suffers when research grants are “held hostage for political reasons and without due process.” It said all Americans benefit from the technology and medical advances produced through the government’s partnership with colleges.

The groups implore the government to respect colleges’ autonomy over their campuses. The signers include the American Council on Education, which represents hundreds of university presidents.

The Trump administration has cut research funding at Harvard, Columbia and other universities, framing it as an effort to root out antisemitism.

After nearly an hour of shaking hands, the receiving line was over. Trump and Al Thani are now participating in a state dinner at the Lusail Palace.

The president seemed impressed by the building. “Nice house!” he exclaimed.

Hey, Jose. Thanks for the question. The meeting between Trump and interim Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa was the first encounter between the two nations’ leaders in 25 years and one that could mark a turning point for Syria as it struggles to emerge from decades of international isolation.

AP reporters Zeke Miller, Jon Gambrell and Aamer Madhani wrote about the meeting. Here’s some of their reporting:

The meeting, on the sidelines of Trump’s get-together with the leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council, marks a major turn of events for a Syria still adjusting to life after the over 50-year, iron-gripped rule of the Assad family, and for its new leader, who once had a $10 million U.S. bounty for his arrest.People across Syria cheered in the streets and set off fireworks on Tuesday night to celebrate, hopeful their nation — locked out of credit cards and global finance — might rejoin the world’s economy when they need investments the most.

The Trump-al-Sharaa meeting took place behind closed doors. The White House later said it ran for just over 30 minutes, making al-Sharaa the first Syrian leader to meet an American president since Hafez Assad met Bill Clinton in Geneva in 2000.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan joined the meeting between Trump, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and al-Sharaa via a phone call. Turkey was a main backer to al-Sharaa and his rebel faction.

U.S. sanctions — along with similar measures by other countries — have led to shortages of goods from fuel to medicine, and made it difficult for humanitarian agencies to operate fully.

Companies around the world struggle to export to Syria, and Syrians struggle to import goods of any kind because nearly all financial transactions with the country are banned. That has led to a blossoming black market of smuggled goods.

Experts say it will take time, and the process for lifting the sanctions is unclear. But Trump’s decision to ease sanctions could bring much-needed investment to the country.

▶ Read more about sanctions on Syria

Screams of “RFK kills people with AIDS” erupted during Kennedy’s opening statements to a Senate committee on Wednesday.

Dozens of federal health workers and offices dedicated to HIV/AIDS research have been shuttered under Kennedy’s watch.

Kennedy was delivering remarks about the agency’s proposed budget when several women began screaming, causing him to jump from his chair. U.S. Capitol Police escorted the disrupters out.

“That was a made for C-SPAN moment,” said Sen. Bill Cassidy, the Republican chair of the committee.

Top administration officials, including Pete Hegseth, Scott Bessent and Susie Wiles, were there. So was Chris Ruddy, the founder of Newsmax, and Kelly Ortberg, the Boeing chief executive who had earlier in the day signed a deal to sell planes to Qatar.

Trump stood with Al Thani to greet a procession of guests at the dinner. The line stretched down a palace hallway. Elon Musk, the world’s richest person and a top adviser to the president, was one of the attendees.

The United States says it will pursue sanctions against any country, group or person that provides fuel, war material or other resources to Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

Last week, Trump announced that the U.S. would halt its strikes on the Houthis, an Iran-backed rebel group that agreed to stop its attacks on American vessels in the Red Sea.

Acting U.S. ambassador Dorothy Shea told a U.N. Security Council meeting on Wednesday that Iran has enabled Houthi attacks “with military, logistical, and intelligence support.”

“This council must not tolerate Iranian defiance of its resolutions and should impose consequences on sanctions violators using the tools at its disposal,” she said.

The presidential motorcade has pulled up at the Lusail Palace outside the capital of Doha. There were palm trees and flags for the U.S. and Qatar, plus about two dozen camels.

A federal judge on Wednesday ordered that a Georgetown scholar from India be released from immigration detention after he was detained in the Trump administration’s crackdown on foreign college students.

Khan Suri was arrested by masked, plainclothes officers on March 17 outside his apartment complex in Arlington, Virginia. Officials said his visa was revoked because of his social media posts and his wife’s connection to Gaza as a Palestinian American. They accused him of supporting Hamas, which the U.S. has designated as a terrorist organization.

By the time Khan Suri’s petition was filed, authorities had already put him on a plane to Louisiana without allowing him to update his family or lawyer, Khan Suri’s attorneys said. A few days later, he was moved to Texas.

Kennedy said he would “probably” vaccinate his children against measles today, if given the option.

Rep. Mark Pocan, a Democrat of Wisconsin, questioned Kennedy during the House hearing on his proposed budget for the nation’s health department, which would cut billions of dollars from infectious disease, medical research, maternal health and preschool programs.

After giving his answer, Kennedy demurred, saying he doesn’t want to seem like he’s dispensing advice. And he would not directly answer whether he’d vaccinate his kids against chickenpox or polio.

“My opinions about vaccines are irrelevant,” Kennedy said. The health department will eventually “lay out the pros and cons” of vaccines in guidance, he said.

For a former real estate developer with flamboyant tastes, this week’s trip has been a tantalizing glimpse at the wealth of his oil-rich hosts.

Trump has marveled at the “perfecto” marble in Qatar and praised the “gleaming marvels” in Saudi Arabia. He’s also groused about the “much less impressive” plane that serves as Air Force One.

The president’s envy will likely fuel his plans to upgrade the White House, which he’s talked about renovating and expanding.

▶ Read more about Trump’s reactions to his Arab hosts’ wealth

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is making first appearances as health secretary before Congress — the House appropriations committee Wednesday morning and Senate health committee in the afternoon.

Senators have questions about the thousands of job he’s eliminated at the $1.7 trillion Department of Health and Human Services, the steep cuts he’s made to vaccination campaigns and his response to a measles outbreak that’s sickened 1,000 people.

His agency’s budget request includes a $500 million boost for his “Make America Healthy Again” initiative to promote nutrition and healthier lifestyles while deeply cutting infectious disease prevention, maternal health and preschool programs. Kennedy is sharing “his vision on how HHS’ transformation will improve health outcomes, eliminate redundancies to save the American taxpayer, and streamline operations to improve efficiency and service,” an agency statement says.

▶ Read more on Kennedy’s return to Capitol Hill

Al-Sharaa told a visiting Republican congressman last month in Damascus that he was “open” to negotiating a normalization of relations between Syria and Israel.

Rep. Marlin Stutzman, an Indiana Republican, also asked the interim Syrian leader about signing an Abraham accord, pushed by the United States to normalize relations between Arab nations and Israel.

Al-Sharaa responded that “after some negotiations, he would be open to the Abraham accords,” Stutzman recounted Wednesday by phone.

Al-Sharaa’s overriding goal was a free and unified Syria, with hopes of rebuilding its damaged economy through tourism, trade and commerce, Stutzman said.

“We have to watch day to day, and see what his actions are,” the congressman said.

House Democratic lawmakers are urging Republicans to schedule a vote if Trump accepts a free Air Force One replacement from Qatar.

Rep. Ted Lieu, vice chair of the House Democratic Caucus, argued that congressional approval is required.

“People need to ask: Why is a foreign country trying to give this massive gift to Donald Trump?” Lieu said. “Think about the precedent it would set.”

Trump has stressed that the plane would initially be donated to the Defense Department. After his term ends, he says it would be donated to a future presidential library.

Mike Johnson declined to weigh in on Trump’s plans to accept a free plane from Qatar to replace Air Force One.

“It’s not my lane,” the Republican leader said at a Wednesday news conference, although he later said he believes the emoluments clause doesn’t apply because the gift would go to the country, not to Trump himself.

Johnson said that he’s “not following all of the twists and turns” of the process as he focuses on passing a budget reconciliation bill.

Super Micro Computer surged 12.7% Wednesday after signing a partnership agreement with Saudi Arabian data center company DataVolt.

The benchmark S&P 500 index that sits at the center of many 401(k) accounts has erased all its losses since Trump escalated his global trade war and is back to within 4.2% of its all-time high set in February.

Trump has delayed his most severe tariffs against America’s trading partners, but some import taxes remain and uncertainty continues to hang over businesses and consumers. The on-again-off-again nature of Trump’s trade policy has left companies unable to plan ahead and consumers nervous about spending.

A Biden-era rule due to take effect Thursday would have limited the number of artificial intelligence chips that could be exported to certain international markets — including Middle Eastern countries Trump is visiting this week — without federal approval.

The rule sorted more than 100 countries into tiers of export restrictions. “These new requirements would have stifled American innovation and saddled companies with burdensome new regulatory requirements,” the Commerce Department stated in its guidance.

Other nations and U.S. chipmakers Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices were opposed. Microsoft President Brad Smith told the Senate this week that the rule sent “a message to 120 nations that they couldn’t necessarily count on us to provide the AI they want and need.”

Press secretary Karoline Leavitt’s statement says Trump urged al-Sharaa to:

• diplomatically recognize Israel
• “tell all foreign terrorists to leave Syria”
• help the U.S. stop any resurgence of the Islamic State group
• assume responsibility for over a dozen detention centers holding some 9,000 suspected Islamic State members

These prisons are run by U.S.-backed and Kurdish-led forces who agreed last month that all border crossings with Iraq and Turkey, airports and oil fields in the Northeast would be brought under the central government’s control by the end of the year.

Trump’s desire for Syria to take over the prisons also signals the potential of a full American military withdrawal from Syria.

The U.S. president lavished compliments on Al Thani as they signed economic and defense agreements.

Trump said the Qatari leader reminds him of the Saudi crown prince, who he had just visited. He called them both “tall, handsome guys that happen to be very smart.”

Trump and Al Thani sat next to each other for the signing of a number of agreements:

• The first had Qatar buying airplanes from Boeing, the American aerospace company whose chief executive attended the event.
• Next up was a defense deal and the purchase of military drones.
• The final cooperation agreement was signed by Trump and Al Thani themselves.

Trump said it was the largest order of jets in the company history, worth over $200 billion.

Eric Trump attended a recent cryptocurrency conference in the United Arab Emirates with Zach Witkoff, a founder of the Trump family crypto company, World Liberty Financial, and son of Trump’s do-everything envoy to the Mideast, Steve Witkoff.

During the conference, a state-backed investment company in Abu Dhabi announced it had chosen USD, World Liberty Financial’s stablecoin, to back a $2 billion investment in Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. Critics say that allows Trump family-aligned interests to essentially take a cut of each dollar invested.

“I don’t know anything about it,” Trump said when asked by reporters about the transaction on Wednesday.

It’s not just the “gesture” of a $400 million luxury plane that President Donald Trump says he’s smart to accept from Qatar. It’s not even that the Trump family has fast-growing business ties in the Middle East that offer the potential of vast profits.

It’s the combination of these things and more — deals between a family whose patriarch oversees the U.S. government and a region whose leaders are fond of currying favor through money and lavish gifts — that’s raising concerns about their impact on U.S. policy.

Before Trump began his visit to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, his sons Eric and Donald Jr. traveled the Middle East extensively in recent weeks, drumming up business for The Trump Organization. Eric Trump announced plans for an 80-story Trump Tower Dubai in the UAE’s largest city.

Asked before this trip if Trump might meet with people tied to his family’s business, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said it’s “ridiculous” to “suggest that President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit.”

“The president is abiding by all conflict of interest laws,” she said.

Administration officials have brushed off such concerns that Trump’s policy decisions could bleed into his family business interests, noting that Trump’s assets are in a trust managed by his children. A voluntary ethics agreement also bars The Trump Organization from striking deals directly with foreign governments, but unlike during his first term, allows deals with private companies abroad.

“The president is a successful businessman,” Leavitt said, “and I think, frankly, that it’s one of the many reasons that people reelected him back to this office.”

▶ Read more about Trump’s business connections in the Mideast

Benjamin Netanyahu said Emmanuel Macron is echoing “despicable propaganda” from Hamas. He accused Macron of “demanding that Israel surrender and reward terrorism.”

Macron had called Netanyahu’s decision to prevent all aid including food and medications from entering the Palestinian territory a “disgrace.”

Gaza’s 2.3 million people rely almost entirely on outside aid to survive and now face famine. Nearly half a million Palestinians could starve while 1 million others can barely get enough food, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a leading international authority on the severity of hunger crises.

Netanyahu’s statement Wednesday said Macron had “once again chosen to stand with a murderous Islamist terrorist organization” while Israel fights “for its very existence” following the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attack.

“It sounds good on paper but in practicality, it’s a disaster,” Trump said in February when he signed an executive order freezing enforcement of the law. “It’s going to mean a lot more business for America.”

Supporters see this law as an undeniable force for good in a corrupt world, a groundbreaking anti-bribery statute that has brought powerful businessmen to heel for secretly paying off foreign government officials to win contracts abroad.

Detractors say it unfairly hobbled American companies while foreign rivals, not so encumbered, swooped in.

▶ Read more on Trump’s suspension of this law

Trump’s dealmaking in Qatar comes amid controversy over the country’s offer — which Trump said he’d accept — of a luxury Boeing 747-8 that the U.S. could use as Air Force One.

Qatar has also played a central role in pay-to-play-style scandals around the globe:

• Israeli authorities are investigating allegations that Qatar hired close advisers to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to launch PR campaigns to improve the Gulf nation’s image among Israelis.
• Two European Union lawmakers were accused of taking money from Doha in a scandal dubbed “Qatar-gate.”
• U.S. prosecutors in 2020 accused Qatar of bribing FIFA executive committee members to secure the tournament in 2022.
• In 2024, RTX Corp., the defense contractor formerly known as Raytheon, agreed to pay more than $950 million to resolve allegations that it defrauded the U.S. government and paid bribes to secure business with Qatar. Doha always has denied wrongdoing.

▶ Read more about today’s developments during Trump’s Mideast tour

Trump sat down with Al Thani for a brief meeting at the beginning of his visit, and the U.S. president marveled at the government palace.

“As a construction person, I’m seeing perfect marble,” said the former real estate developer. Trump described it as “perfecto.”

Trump also thanked Qatar for the ceremonial greeting, including an escort of riders on camelback.

“I haven’t seen camels like that in a long time,” he said.