Senate holds vote marathon on amendments to big beautiful bill – as it happened

Donald Trump has just taken to social media to warn that failing to pass his big bill will mean “a whopping 68% tax increase, the largest in history”.

Here’s the president’s full post on his Truth Social platform:

Republicans, the One Big Beautiful Bill, perhaps the greatest and most important of its kind in history, gives the largest Tax Cuts and Border Security ever, Jobs by the Millions, Military/Vets increases, and so much more. The failure to pass means a whopping 68% Tax increase, the largest in history!!!

Elon Musk has pledged to unseat lawmakers who support Donald Trump’s sweeping budget bill, which the tech billionaire has criticised because it would increase the country’s deficit by $3.3tn.

Musk wrote on X:

Every member of Congress who campaigned on reducing government spending and then immediately voted for the biggest debt increase in history should hang their head in shame! And they will lose their primary next year if it is the last thing I do on this Earth.

Musk later added that if “insane spending bill passes, the America Party will be formed the next day”.

Maanvi Singh and agencies report that with these threats – lobbed at lawmakers over social media – the world’s richest man has launched himself back into a rift with the US president he helped prop up.

You can read the full report here:

As reported a little earlier, following Musk’s denouncement of Republican efforts to pass the budget bill, he said he would back representative Thomas Massie, a Trump critic, and pledged to found a new political party he called the “America party”.

• This is Adam Fulton picking up our live coverage

Today So Far

Thirteen hours since voting began, the Senate still has not passed Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” which would enact his domestic tax and spending agenda – and add an estimated $3.3tn to the national debt over the next decade. The vote is expected to be tight – Republicans can only afford to lose three votes for the legislation to pass and two senators have already expressed they’re firm no’s – Rand Paul and Thom Tillis.

As we await news on that front, here are the top headlines we’ve followed so far today:

• In a series of posts on social media, tech billionaire Elon Musk, who spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars in support of Trump’s candidacy, denounced Republican efforts to pass the president’s budget bill. Later, Musk pledged to found a new political party he called the “America Party” and support candidates who did not back the budget bill in future elections.

• The Senate parliamentarian found that Republicans can include a provision that would block Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood in the “big, beautiful bill”.

• Trump signed an executive order overturning sanctions on Syria today and issued a memorandum on US policy toward Cuba. The president’s executive order revokes sanctions on Syria while maintaining sanction’s on the country’s former president Bashar al-Assad. In a separate memo, Trump directed the federal government to enforce a statutory ban on US tourism to Cuba and continue an economic embargo on the island nation.

• On the US Agency for International Development’s last day, former presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush delivered remarks praising staffers and The Lancet medical journal published research finding the agency had prevented more than 91 million deaths globally, including 30 million deaths among children. The Lancet added that the dismantling of USAID could result in 14 million additional deaths by 2030.

• A federal judge has ruled that Kilmar Ábrego García must remain in jail, citing fears that the Trump administration may deport him ahead of his trial if he is released. Earlier this week, the same judge ordered Ábrego García released ahead of his trial on smuggling charges. Ábrego García’s attorneys have characterized the charges as an attempt to justify the Trump administration’s mistaken deportation of Ábrego García earlier this year.

• Trump has dropped his lawsuit against pollster J Ann Selzer and the Des Moines Register, according to a court filing today. Trump sued Selzer and the newspaper after it published a poll finding that Kamala Harris would win Iowa in the presidential election by three percentage points.

• Congressmembers must give the Department of Homeland Security a week’s notice before visiting immigration detention facilities, according to new department guidance. Visits on shorter notice must be approved directly by department secretary Kristi Noem. Federal law allows lawmakers and their staff to visit immigration detention facilities unnanounced to oversee the conditions inside such facilities. Meanwhile, Trump will travel tomorrow to the opening of the new – and highly controversial – immigrant detention facility in the Florida Everglades, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz”.

• The Trump administration sued the city of Los Angeles over policies limiting city cooperation with federal immigration authorities, continuing a confrontation over Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation efforts in the largely Democratic city. The lawsuit, filed by the justice department, alleges that policies barring city resources from aiding in immigration enforcement operations or collecting information about individuals’ citizenship status violate federal law.

• The Trump administration informed Harvard University that its investigation found that the university violated federal civil rights law over its treatment of Jewish and Israeli students, putting its federal funding further at risk.

• Trump will host Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on 7 July. Israel’s strategic affairs minister Ron Dermer will also meet with officials at the White House this week for talks on Iran and a new push for a ceasefire in Gaza. Israel’s ongoing and relentless bombardment on Gaza killed at least another 38 civilians today.

• Trump wrote to Fed chair Jerome Powell again urging him to lower interest rates. Attacking Powell and members of the Fed board of governors, who he accused of failing to do their jobs, the president said today that he believes interest rates should be lowered to about 1%.

• Trump has suggested there won’t be a trade deal with Japan, saying that Japan would be the recipient of a letter related to trade, following pledges by his administration to send letters to countries outlining tariffs they would need to pay to the UA.

• The Trump administration appealed a federal judge’s decision to strike down an executive order targeting law firm Perkins Coie over its past legal work for Hillary Clinton and others.

The US Department of Homeland Security has for the first time built a national citizenship database that combines information from immigration agencies and the social security administration.

The database was created in collaboration with the “department of government efficiency” (Doge) in an effort to bridge the gaps between disparate information sources to make it easier to determine whether someone is a citizen, according to NPR, which first reported the details of the database.

The database is the result of an expansion of the systematic alien verification for entitlements (Save) program, made up of smaller databases within the homeland security department, and an integration with information from the Social Security Administration. The centralized repository is searchable and can be accessed by state and local election officials to look up the names of anyone trying to vote to determine if they are citizens, according to NPR. Until now, election officials had to ask potential voters for documents verifying their citizenship or rely on a hard-to-navigate patchwork of databases.

In response to a request for comment, the DHS said: “Integration with the Social Security Administration (SSA) significantly improves the service offered by Save.”

Previously, agencies involved in voting were required to use numbers issued by the DHS to look up voter registrations, which they may not have had access to but may have been more likely to possess social security numbers, according to the statement. The citizenship database may also soon integrate state department of motor vehicles (DMV) data, NPR reported.

The DHS statement also describes the motivations for the creation of the database: “Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary Noem, USCIS is moving quickly to eliminate benefit and voter fraud among the alien population.” Voter fraud is rare in the US, experts say; consequences include fines or jail time.

The citizenship database is one of the first results of Doge’s efforts to gain access to and merge information on Americans from agencies across the federal government, including the Internal Revenue Service, in the first few months of the Trump administration.

The Senate parliamentarian has found that Republicans can include a provision that would block Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood in the “big, beautiful bill,” the New York Times and Politico report, citing Senate Democrats.

In a statement, Democratic senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley said: “Republicans will stop at nothing in their crusade to take control of women’s bodies.”

Researchers at Yale University have calculated that the highest income Americans will save tens of thousands of dollars under Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill”.

The top 10% of taxpayers would save $10,000 a year under the budget bill – while the top 0.1% of taxpayers would save nearly $100,000 a year, according to the Yale Budget Lab.

“Changes to taxes and Medicaid and SNAP spending proposed by the Senate budget reconciliation bill would result in a decline of 2.9 percent (about $700) in income for the bottom quintile, but an increase of 1.9 percent (about $30,000) for the top 1 percent,” the report found.

In a series of posts on social media, tech billionaire Elon Musk, who spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars in support of Donald Trump’s candidacy, is denouncing Republican efforts to pass the president’s budget bill.

“It is obvious with the insane spending of this bill, which increases the debt ceiling by a record FIVE TRILLION DOLLARS that we live in a one-party country – the PORKY PIG PARTY!!” Musk wrote. “Time for a new political party that actually cares about the people.”

Musk added that “every member of Congress who campaigned on reducing government spending and then immediately voted for the biggest debt increase in history” will “lose their primary next year if it is the last thing I do on this Earth.”

Early in his presidency, Trump granted Musk oversight of a newly formed Department of Government Efficiency, but the duo’s friendship imploded in a widely publicized social media feud concerning the Republican spending bill earlier this month.

Donald Trump will host Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on 7 July, Axios is reporting, citing an Israeli official.

The Freedom Caucus – the ultraconservative blog in the House of Representatives – has said that the legislation currently being voted on in the Senate is “not what we agreed to”, underscoring conservative discontent in the House with the direction of Trump’s “big, beautiful bill”.

In a post on X, lawmakers said:

The House budget framework was clear: no new deficit spending in the One Big Beautiful Bill.

The Senate’s version adds $651bn to the deficit — and that’s before interest costs, which nearly double the total.

That’s not fiscal responsibility. It’s not what we agreed to.

The Senate must make major changes and should at least be in the ballpark of compliance with the agreed upon House budget framework.

Republicans must do better.

The Senate’s version of the legislation would add at least $3.3tn to the national debt over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

That could pose major problems in the House, which approved a cheaper version last month by a single vote and has to give final approval to the bill.

Donald Trump has suggested there won’t be a trade deal with Japan, saying that Japan would be the recipient of a letter related to trade, following pledges by his administration to send letters to countries outlining tariffs they would need to pay to the United States.

“I have great respect for Japan, they won’t take our RICE, and yet they have a massive rice shortage,” he said in a Truth Social post. “We’ll just be sending them a letter, and we love having them as a Trading Partner for many years to come.”

Trump did not say what terms would be outlined in the letter. He has previously said he will be sending letters to trading partners to establish tariff rates ahead of the 8 July expiration on the pause on his “reciprocal” tariffs.

Leavitt confirms that Trump will sign an executive order terminating US sanctions on Syria – as reported earlier by CBS News – following through on his decision in May to unwind the measures to help Syria rebuild after 14 devastating years of civil war.

Leavitt adds that some sanctions on former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad and other individuals will remain in place. Sanctions would remain on Assad’s associates, human rights abusers, drug traffickers, people linked to chemical weapons activities, the Islamic State and ISIS affiliates and proxies for Iran, she says.

“[Trump] is committed to supporting a Syria that is stable, unified and at peace with itself and its neighbors,” Leavitt says, noting Trump’s meeting with Syria’s new president Ahmed al-Sharaa during his recent trip to the Middle East.

“This is another promise made and promise kept by this president to promote peace and stability in the region,” she adds.

Leavitt says the White House is “confident” the big, beautiful bill will get the votes needed in the Senate.

She says Trump has been “working hand in hand” with Senate majority leader John Thune and House speaker Mike Johnson who will meet the president again later today.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt is briefing reporters now. I’ll bring you all the key lines here.

Donald Trump has said that the United States’ interest rate should be 1% or less, adding that Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell and members of the Fed board of governors have failed to do their jobs.

He wrote on Truth Social:

If they were doing their job properly, our country would be saving trillions of dollars in interest cost. We should be paying 1% Interest, or better!

The Trump administration has sued the city of Los Angeles over its immigration policies, claiming that the city’s law discriminates against federal law enforcement by treating them differently to other law enforcement authorities, NBC News reports.

Filed in the central district of California, the lawsuit notes that Donald Trump “campaigned and won the presidential election on a platform of deporting the millions of illegal immigrants the previous administration permitted, through its open borders policy, to enter the country unlawfully”. It claims that the city’s law and policies obstruct the enforcement of immigration laws.

Attorney general Pam Bondi said in a statement:

Sanctuary policies were the driving cause of the violence, chaos, and attacks on law enforcement that Americans recently witnessed in Los Angeles. Jurisdictions like Los Angeles that flout federal law by prioritizing illegal aliens over American citizens are undermining law enforcement at every level — it ends under President Trump.

It comes weeks after protests over the administration’s highly aggressive and hostile deportation agenda exploded in Los Angeles after Trump took the extraordinary decision to deploy the national guard and active US marines to the city. The anti-Ice protesters - along with city mayor Karen Bass and state governor Gavin Newsom - have subsequently become key targets for Trump and his allies.

The United States has revoked visas for members of Britain’s Bob Vylan punk-rap duo after they led anti-IDF chants during their set at the Glastonbury music festival over the weekend that the state department and the BBC, which broadcast the event, said were antisemitic.

“The @StateDept has revoked the US visas for the members of the Bob Vylan band in light of their hateful tirade at Glastonbury, including leading the crowd in death chants. Foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not welcome visitors to our country,” US deputy secretary of state Christopher Landau said in a post on X.

Earlier today, the British broadcaster said it regretted not stopping its livestream of Saturday’s event, which included on-stage chants of “death, death to the IDF,” a reference to the Israel Defense Forces, and “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be, will be, inshallah, it will be free”.

In Israel that phrase is often taken as a call for its destruction and a denial of its right to exist. On the other hand, many dispute that characterization, saying it simply reflects a deeply held desire for a state in which the Palestinian people can live in their homeland as free and equal citizens.

Bob Vylan, known for mixing grime and punk rock, tackles a range of issues including racism, homophobia and the class divide in their songs and has previously voiced support for Palestine.

Its lead vocalist, who goes by the stage name Bobby Vylan, appeared to refer to the weekend performance in a post on Instagram, writing:

I said what I said.

Teaching our children to speak up for the change they want and need is the only way that we make this world a better place.

The state department did not immediately give more details as to the names of those who had visas revoked and what kind of visas they were.

Bob Vylan is scheduled to play some concerts in the US in November.

Here’s my colleague Michael Savage’s explainer on the controversy:

Donald Trump’s administration has appealed a federal judge’s decision to strike down an executive order targeting law firm Perkins Coie over its past legal work for Hillary Clinton and others.

The justice department filed a notice of appeal to the US court of appeals for the District of Columbia circuit challenging the 2 May ruling by US district judge Beryl Howell.

The appeal could give one of the country’s most influential courts its first chance to weigh the president’s orders singling out law firms, which the justice department has argued fall within his authority.

Three other judges in Washington federal court have rejected executive orders against law firms WilmerHale, Jenner & Block and Susman Godfrey. The justice department has not yet filed appeal notices in those cases.

Trump in February launched a pressure campaign against law firms he perceived as aligned against him and the interests of his administration. His executive order against Perkins Coie accused the firm of taking part in an effort to “steal” the 2016 election for Clinton.

The order, issued in March, sought to strip government contracts from the law firm’s clients and to restrict attorneys at the firm from entering federal buildings.

The administration’s executive orders against WilmerHale, Jenner and Susman Godfrey contained similar provisions.

Perkins Coie’s lawsuit, like the cases from rival firms, said the executive order violated US constitutional protections for speech and other measures, and was designed to intimidate lawyers from representing clients Trump might disfavor.

Howell agreed, rebuking the president in a strongly worded 102-page ruling.

“Settling personal vendettas by targeting a disliked business or individual for punitive government action is not a legitimate use of the powers of the US government or an American president,” wrote Howell, an Obama appointee.

Republican-appointed US district judges John Bates and Richard Leon also ruled against the Trump administration in the cases brought by Jenner and WilmerHale, respectively. Democratic-appointed US district judge Loren AliKhan ruled similarly in the case brought by Susman Godfrey.

Nine other firms have pledged nearly $1bn in free legal services and made other concessions in settling with the White House to avoid being targeted by Trump.

Trump is planning to visit the new immigration detention facility in the Florida Everglades, according to governor Ron DeSantis.

“When the president comes tomorrow, he’s going to be able to see,” DeSantis told reporters. He added that “I think by tomorrow, it’ll be ready for business.”

The Florida governor said he spoke with Trump over the weekend. He also said the site obtained approval from the Department of Homeland Security.

The facility, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” has drawn protests over its potential impact on the local ecosystem and criticism that Trump is trying to send a cruel message to migrants. Some Native American leaders have also opposed construction, saying the land is sacred.

The detention facility is being built on an isolated airstrip about 50 miles west of Miami, and it could house 5,000 detainees. The surrounding swampland is filled with mosquitos, pythons and alligators.

The United States will restart trade negotiations with Canada immediately after Canada scrapped its digital services tax targeting US technology firms, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett has said.

“Absolutely,” Hassett said on Fox News when asked about the talks restarting.

Donald Trump asked the Canadians to take the tax off at the G7 meeting in Canada, he said.

It’s something that they’ve studied, now they’ve agreed to, and for sure, that means that we can get back to the negotiations.

Ottawa rescinded its digital services tax on tech giants, which would’ve come into effect today, after Trump abruptly called off trade talks on Friday amid a dispute over the levy and threatened new tariffs on Candian goods.

Treasury secretary Scott Bessent has warned that countries could still face sharply higher tariffs on 9 July even if they are negotiating in good faith, adding that any potential extensions will be up to Donald Trump.

Bessent, who earlier floated the idea of negotiating extensions, told Bloomberg Television that he expects there to be “a flurry” of trade deals leading up to the 9 July deadline, after which 10% US tariff rates on goods from many countries are set to snap back to Trump’s 2 April announced rates of 11% to 50%.

“We have countries that are negotiating in good faith, but they should be aware that if we can’t get across the line because they are being recalcitrant, then we could spring back to the 2 April levels. I hope that won’t have to happen,” Bessent said.

Donald Trump is scheduled to sign executive orders at 2.30pm ET today, according to his schedule.

One of the orders will pertain to easing US sanctions on Syria, CBS is reporting. Last month, Trump announced he would lift sanctions on Syria as part of measures to help the country rebuild after 14 devastating years of civil war, after meeting Syria’s president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, in Saudi Arabia.

EU trade commissioner Maroš Šefčovič has said he will fly to Washington tomorrow for trade talks.

“We are absolutely focusing on ... a positive outcome,” he told reporters.

The Senate resumed its final debate on the “big, beautiful bill” this morning after a marathon weekend of adjusting legislation to fit parliamentarian rulings and appease particular senators.

During the lengthy vote-a-rama, senators will be able to offer an unlimited number of amendments related to the enormous proposed legislation. Democrats will be at the heart of this, seeking to amend the huge bill that will enact Trump’s domestic agenda.

I’ll bring you any key developments here.

Today, Senate Republicans will try to pass Donald Trump’s sweeping tax-cut and spending bill, despite divisions within the party about its expected $3.3tn hit to the national debt.

They are set for a marathon session in which the minority Democrats are allowed to offer an unlimited number of votes, part of the arcane process Republicans are using to bypass Senate rules that normally require 60 of the chamber’s 100 members to agree on legislation.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released its assessment yesterday of the bill’s hit to the $36.2tn debt, figuring that it would add about $800bn more than the version passed last month in the House of Representatives.

Democrats, meanwhile, hope the latest, eye-widening figure could stoke enough anxiety among fiscally minded conservatives to get them to buck their party, which controls both chambers of Congress. Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said yesterday:

Republicans are doing something the Senate has never, never done before, deploying fake math and accounting gimmicks to hide the true cost of the bill. Republicans are about to pass the single most expensive bill in US history to give tax breaks to billionaires while taking away Medicaid, SNAP benefits and good-paying jobs for millions of people.

The Senate narrowly advanced the tax-cut, immigration, border and military spending bill in a procedural vote late on Saturday, voting 51-49 to open debate on the 940-page megabill.

Trump on social media has hailed the progress as a “great victory” for his “great, big, beautiful bill.” In a separate post on Sunday, he added: “We will make it all up, times 10, with GROWTH, more than ever before.”

Trump wants the bill passed before the 4 July holiday. While that deadline is one of choice, lawmakers will face a far more serious deadline later this summer when they must raise the nation’s self-imposed debt ceiling or risk a devastating default.

If the Senate succeeds in passing the bill, it will then go to the House, where members are also divided, with some angry about its cost and others worried about cuts to the Medicaid program. Republicans can afford to lose no more than three votes in either chamber to pass a bill the Democrats are united in opposition to.

Donald Trump’s administration informed Harvard University that its investigation found that the university violated federal civil rights law over its treatment of Jewish and Israeli students, the Wall Street Journal is reporting, putting its federal funding further at risk.

In a letter sent to Harvard president Alan Garber today and seen by the Journal, attorneys for the administration said the investigation found that Harvard knew Jewish and Israeli students felt threatened on its campus and acted with deliberate indifference.

“Failure to institute adequate changes immediately will result in the loss of all federal financial resources and continue to affect Harvard’s relationship with the federal government,” the report quoted the letter as saying.

Reuters could not immediately confirm the report. We’ll bring you more on this as we get it.

Israel is continuing its relentless bombardment of Gaza after tens of thousands of Palestinian people fled eastern parts of Gaza City in the north of the territory on Sunday after Israel warned of a major new offensive.

At least 25 people were killed in Israeli airstrikes on Monday, health authorities said in an updated toll, including 10 people killed in Zeitoun in southern Gaza City.

Two people seeking aid were also killed by Israeli fire near an aid distribution centre in southern Rafah, sources at the Nasser medical complex told Al Jazeera.

The attacks come as Israeli officials are due in Washington for a new ceasefire push by the US, which is fuelling the war by providing weapons to the Israeli military.

Israel’s strategic affairs minister Ron Dermer is expected at the White House later today for talks on Iran and Gaza, an Israeli official said.

In Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet is expected to convene to discuss the next steps in its widening assault on Gaza.

The Israeli prime minister has been accused of deliberately prolonging ceasefire negotiations – and blocking their progress – to ensure his own political survival by having the war continue.

You can follow our live coverage on the crisis here:

Edward Helmore and Robert Mackey

Thom Tillis announced yesterday that he will not run for re-election to the US Senate next year, one day after the North Carolina Republican’s vote against Donald Trump’s signature piece of domestic legislation prompted the president to launch a barrage of threats and insults – as well as promise to support a primary challenger to defeat him in their party’s 2026 primary.

Tillis said in a statement sent to reporters:

In Washington over the last few years, it’s become increasingly evident that leaders who are willing to embrace bipartisanship, compromise, and demonstrate independent thinking are becoming an endangered species.

As many of my colleagues have noticed over the last year, and at times even joked about, I haven’t exactly been excited about running for another term. It’s not a hard choice, and I will not be seeking re-election.

Shortly after Tillis refused to support the “one big beautiful bill” in a procedural vote in the Senate on Saturday, Trump attacked the senator on his social media platform, Truth Social, accusing Tillis of grandstanding “in order to get some publicity for himself, for a possible, but very difficult re-election”. He also wrote that Tillis is making a “BIG MISTAKE for America, and the Wonderful People of North Carolina!”

In a subsequent post, Trump threatened Tillis by saying he would meet with potential candidates to challenge him in a Republican primary in the battleground state. “Numerous people have come forward wanting to run” against Tillis, Trump wrote Saturday night. “I will be meeting with them over the coming weeks, looking for someone who will properly represent the Great People of North Carolina and, so importantly, the United States of America.”

Before Tillis announced his decision Sunday to retire from the Senate, Trump continued to attack him on social media, writing: “Tillis is a talker and complainer, NOT A DOER! He’s even worse than Rand ‘Fauci’ Paul!”

Tillis was one of two Senate Republicans, along with Rand Paul of Kentucky, to vote against the bill championed by the president. Dr Anthony Fauci was the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases during Trump’s first presidency, and once a key adviser on the Covid-19 pandemic whose support of lockdowns and vaccines made him a hate figure for Trump’s base.

Trump’s attacks came hours after Tillis said in a statement that he “cannot support” the current form of the president’s spending bill. He pointed to expected cuts to Medicaid that he said would “result in tens of billions of dollars in lost funding for North Carolina, including our hospitals and rural communities”.

Nearly 300 current and recently terminated employees of the US Environmental Protection Agency published a declaration of dissent today, outlining five major concerns about how the Trump administration’s politicization of science and severe job cuts were undermining the agency’s mission.

The declaration to administrator Lee Zeldin was sent as another expected round of staff reductions looms and as the agency undergoes a major reorganization, including the dissolution of its office of research and cancelling of billions of dollars in grants.

The reorganization will consolidate several key offices, reflecting plans to cut regulatory red tape and promote more fossil fuel energy development, as laid out in Donald Trump’s executive orders.

“Today, we stand together in dissent against the current administration’s focus on harmful deregulation, mischaracterization of previous EPA actions, and disregard for scientific expertise,” said the 278 EPA employees who wrote and signed the letter in their personal capacities, including 174 who signed their full names.

The declaration is similar to one sent earlier this month by employees of the National Institutes of Health to its director to protest the politicization of research and disruption of scientific progress.

The EPA employees said their five main concerns are the partisan rhetoric and misinformation shared in EPA communications; disregard for the agency’s own scientific assessments; abandoning environmental justice while slashing funding; dismantling the research office; and creating a culture of fear.

They said:

Your decisions and actions will reverberate for generations to come. EPA under your leadership will not protect communities from hazardous chemicals and unsafe drinking water, but instead will increase risks to public health and safety.

Donald Trump on Sunday threatened to cut New York City off from federal funds if favored mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist, “doesn’t behave himself” should he be elected.

Mamdani, meanwhile, denied that he was – as the president said – a communist. But he reaffirmed his commitment to raise taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers while saying: “I don’t think that we should have billionaires.”

In an interview with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo, Trump argued that a Mamdani victory was “inconceivable” because he perceived the candidate to be “a pure communist”.

He added: “Let’s say this – if he does get in, I’m going to be president, and he’s going to have to do the right thing, or they’re not getting any money. He’s got to do the right thing or they’re not getting any money.”

More than $100bn flows to the city from the federal government through different entities and programs, according to the city’s comptroller last year.

Speaking Sunday with NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Mamdani said, “no, I am not” a communist.

He also said that he had “already had to start to get used to the fact that the president will talk about how I look, how I sound, where I’m from, who I am – ultimately because he wants to distract from what I’m fighting for”.

Donald Trump said he is weighing forcing journalists who published leaked details from a US intelligence report assessing the impact of the recent American military strikes on Iran to reveal their sources – and the president also claimed his administration may prosecute those reporters and sources if they don’t comply.

In an interview Sunday with Fox News host Maria Bartiromo, Trump doubled down on his claim that the 21 June airstrikes aimed at certain Iranian facilities successfully crippled Iran’s nuclear program. He insisted the attacks destroyed key enriched uranium stockpiles, despite Iranian assertions that the material had been relocated before the strikes.

Trump dismissed the leaked intelligence assessment in question – which suggested the strikes only temporarily disrupted Iran’s nuclear development – as incomplete and biased. The report, circulated among US lawmakers and intelligence officials, concluded that the damage inflicted was significantly less than what Trump’s administration had publicly claimed.

The president has attacked both Democratic lawmakers and members of the media for sharing portions of the classified analysis. He then threatened legal consequences for those responsible.

Canada scrapped its digital services tax targeting U.S. technology firms late on Sunday, just hours before it was due to take effect, in a bid to advance stalled trade negotiations with the United States.

Canadian prime minister Mark Carney and US president Donald Trump will resume trade negotiations in order to agree on a deal by 21 July, Canada’s finance ministry said in a statement, Reuters reported.

Trump abruptly called off trade talks on Friday over the tax targeting US technology firms, saying that it was a “blatant attack.”

He reiterated his comments on Sunday, pledging to set a new tariff rate on Canadian goods within the next week, which threatened to push US-Canada relations back into chaos after a period of relative calm.

The breakdown in trade talks comes after the two leaders met at the G7 in mid-June and Carney said they had agreed to wrap up a new economic agreement within 30 days.

Canada’s planned digital tax was 3% of the digital services revenue a firm takes in from Canadian users above $20 million in a calendar year, and payments were to be retroactive to 2022.

It would have impacted US technology firms, including Amazon, Meta, Alphabet’s Google and Apple, among others.

Iran criticised US president Donald Trump’s shifting stance on whether to lift economic sanctions against Tehran as “games” that were not aimed at solving the problems between the two countries.

“These [statements by Trump] should be viewed more in the context of psychological and media games than as a serious expression in favour of dialogue or problem-solving,” foreign ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei told a press conference on Monday.

Trump had said he is not speaking to Iran and was not offering the country “anything”, as he claimed that America “totally obliterated” Tehran’s nuclear facilities when it struck them earlier this month.

Trump’s comments, posted to Truth Social this morning, followed reports that his administration had discussed possibly helping Iran access as much as $30bn to build a civilian-energy-producing nuclear program.

The reported proposal would mark a major reversal in policy for Trump, who exited Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran in 2018, claiming the sanction relief and unfreezing of assets provided Tehran with “a lifeline of cash”.

Trump wrote:

Tell phony Democrat Senator Chris Coons that I am not offering Iran ANYTHING, unlike Obama, who paid them $Billions under the stupid “road to a Nuclear Weapon JCPOA (which would now be expired!), nor am I even talking to them since we totally OBLITERATED their Nuclear Facilities.

Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of US politics with senators scheduled to start voting on a potentially long list of amendments to Donald Trump’s “one big beautiful bill” beginning at 9 am EDT.

Yesterday, Republicans in the Senate Republicans pushed Trump’s sweeping tax cut and spending bill forward in a marathon weekend session even as a nonpartisan forecaster said it would add an estimated $3.3tn to the nation’s debt over a decade.

The estimate by the congressional budget office of the bill’s hit to the $36.2tn federal debt is about $800bn more than the version passed last month in the House of Representatives.

“Republicans are doing something the Senate has never, never done before, deploying fake math and accounting gimmicks to hide the true cost of the bill,” Democratic Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said as debate opened on Sunday.

The Senate only narrowly advanced the tax-cut, immigration, border and military spending bill in a procedural vote late on Saturday, voting 51-49 to open debate on the 940-page megabill.

Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, one of two Republicans who voted to block the bill, explained his position in a speech to the Senate, saying White House aides had failed to give Trump proper advice about the legislation’s Medicaid cuts.

“What do I tell 663,00 people in two years, three years, when president Trump breaks his promise by pushing them off of Medicaid because the funding’s not there anymore,” Tillis said, referring to his constituents.

Tillis said he would not seek re-election next year, after Trump threatened to back a primary challenger in retribution for Tillis’ Saturday night vote against the bill.

On Sunday, Trump celebrated Tillis’ announcement as “Great News!” on Truth Social and issued a warning to fellow Republicans who have concerns over the bill. “REMEMBER, you still have to get reelected. Don’t go too crazy!” Trump wrote in a post.

Tillis’ North Carolina seat is one of the few Republican Senate seats seen as vulnerable in next year’s midterm elections.

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In other news:

• Donald Trump has said he is not speaking to Iran and was not offering the country “anything”, as he claimed that America “totally obliterated” Tehran’s nuclear facilities when it struck them earlier this month. Trump’s comments, posted to Truth Social this morning, followed reports that his administration had discussed possibly helping Iran access as much as $30bn to build a civilian-energy-producing nuclear program.

• The University of Virginia received “explicit” notification from the Trump administration that the school would endure cuts to university jobs, research funding and student aid as well as visas if the institution’s president, Jim Ryan, did not resign, according to a US senator. In an interview with CBS, Virginia Democrat Mark Warner defended Ryan – who has championed diversity policies that the president opposes – and predicted Trump would similarly target other universities.

• Donald Trump said he was weighing forcing journalists who published leaked details from a US intelligence report assessing the impact of the recent American military strikes on Iran to reveal their sources. The president also claimed his administration may prosecute those reporters and sources if they don’t comply.

• The president threatened to block New York City from receiving federal funds if favoured mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, “doesn’t behave himself” should he be elected. Mamdani, meanwhile, denied that he was – as the president claimed – a communist. But he reaffirmed his commitment to raise taxes on the wealthiest New Yorkers while saying: “I don’t think that we should have billionaires.”

• Blood-sucking ticks that trigger a bizarre allergy to meat in the people they bite are exploding in number and spreading across the US, to the extent that they could cover the entire eastern half of the country and infect millions of people, experts warn.

• Iran’s ambassador to the UN said the Islamic republic’s nuclear enrichment “will never stop” because it is permitted for “peaceful energy” purposes under the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. “The enrichment is our right,” Iravani told CBS News.