Happy Friday! Jonathan Dupiton, host of the Rich and Unemployed podcast, was sentenced to seven years in federal prison for a $3.8 million unemployment fraud scheme. Turns out the secret to being rich and unemployed is crime.
And, if you haven’t had enough Dispatch in your life, listen to Jonah on NPR, Sarah on The Gist, and watch her appearance tonight on Real Time with Bill Maher!
Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories
White House Reclassifies Medical Marijuana
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche signed an order on Thursday to reclassify both FDA-approved marijuana drug products and state-licensed medicinal marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule III, loosening federal restrictions on its use. Previously, as a Schedule I drug, the substance had been considered to have “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse,” according to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the same classification as heroin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), and others. Now, medical marijuana will be classified as having “moderate to low potential for physical and psychological dependence,” placing it in the same category as drugs such as ketamine, anabolics, and testosterone. “This action recognizes the longstanding regulation of medical marijuana by state governments and the need for a common-sense approach to this reality,” the Justice Department said in a press release.
- The DEA will also create a new system for state medical marijuana providers to register with the federal government, allowing them to deduct business expenses from their federal taxes.
- While the reclassification does not apply to recreational use, the Trump administration said it’s setting a hearing on June 29 to begin the process of “fully” reclassifying marijuana.
- “These actions will enable more targeted, rigorous research into marijuana’s safety and efficacy, expanding patients’ access to treatments and empowering doctors to make better-informed healthcare decisions,” Blanche tweeted on Thursday.
U.S. Forces Board Iranian Oil Tanker
The Defense Department announced on Thursday that U.S. forces boarded a stateless oil tanker in the Indian Ocean, the M/T Majestic X, which had previously been sanctioned for shipping Iranian oil and had been caught sailing under a false flag. A video shared by the Defense Department shows U.S. troops landing on the ship as helicopters hovered overhead. The boarding comes one day after Iranian forces seized two cargo ships—one Liberian-flagged and one Panamanian-flagged—and on Thursday, Trump said on Truth Social that he had directed the Navy to “shoot and kill any boat” caught laying mines in the Strait of Hormuz. To learn more about the economic impacts of the Strait of Hormuz closure, read yesterday’s TMD.
- The Iranian regime executed a civilian, Sultan-Ali Shirzadi-Fakhr, for his alleged participation in the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran—a dissident group the Iranian regime designates as a terrorist organization while further accusing him of collaborating with Israeli intelligence officials.
- The New York Times reported that new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei sustained severe facial burns, a hand injury, and leg wounds requiring a prosthetic in the February airstrike that killed his father.
- The Times also reported that the U.S. military spent between $28 billion and $35 billion on its 38-day war with Iran, consuming more than 1,100 long-range stealth cruise missiles and 1,200 Patriot interceptors and leaving global munitions stockpiles significantly depleted.
Justice Department Prepares Denaturalization Cases
The Justice Department has made a list of 384 foreign-born naturalized U.S. citizens with the intention of filing denaturalization cases to strip them of their citizenship, according to the New York Times. Senior agency officials reportedly told colleagues in a meeting last week that the Justice Department would soon assign civil litigators from across 39 regional offices to bring the cases against the targeted individuals. Denaturalization is legally permitted when a naturalized citizen is shown to have obtained citizenship through fraud or willful misrepresentation of material facts, but it’s unclear what specific allegations led the administration to target these individuals, or who they are. In that meeting, Francey Hakes, director of the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, reportedly said these are only “the first wave of cases” and that pursuing denaturalization cases was a “White House initiative.” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told the Times that “this isn’t a White House initiative—it’s federal law.” She also told the outlet, “Citizenship fraud is a serious crime,” adding that those who became naturalized citizens through “fraud and deceit will be held accountable.” The 384 people involved have not been identified.
- In December, the Trump administration launched an alternative means of obtaining U.S. residency through its “Gold Card” visa program, costing $1 million for each applicant, and on Thursday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told a House Appropriations subcommittee that only one foreign national has been approved so far, but “hundreds” have applied.
- Reuters reported on Thursday that the Trump administration was considering increasing the maximum cap on South African refugees—white Afrikaners—by more than twice its current limit, from 7,500 to 17,500.
Lebanon and Israel Agree to Ceasefire Extension
U.S., Lebanese, and Israeli officials met at the White House on Thursday in a second round of talks this month, during which they agreed to extend the current ceasefire—set to expire on Monday—by three weeks. Israel and Lebanon’s delegations were led by their respective ambassadors to the U.S., Israeli ambassador Yechiel Leiter and Lebanese ambassador Nada Hamadeh Moawad. Trump said the pair met with him in the Oval Office, along with Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, and U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Michel Issa. Trump said in a Truth Social post that the U.S. would “work with Lebanon to help it protect itself from Hezbollah.” Trump added that he would host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun “in the near future.”
- The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it attacked Hezbollah fighters who had crossed the military’s demarcation zone in southern Lebanon and advanced towards Israeli troops, posing an “immediate threat.”
- Israeli prosecutors filed charges against two Israeli Air Force technicians, accusing the pair of carrying out “security offenses on behalf of Iranian intelligence elements,” including providing sensitive information about Israeli fighter jets and military sites to foreign agents.
- The pair also allegedly took photographs of the residences and streets of senior Israeli officials, including former IDF chief Herzi Halevi and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
Ukrainian Drones Strike Russian Command Post
Ukrainian commander Maj. Robert Brovdi said that Ukrainian forces on Wednesday launched a drone attack on a Russian Federal Security Service command post located in the Russian-occupied eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk, killing 12 officers of Russia’s principal domestic security agency and injuring 15 more. Brovdi said the aerial attack involved “eight precision strikes on the target.” Reuters reported on Thursday that in another drone strike that day, Ukraine targeted an oil-pumping station operated by the Russian state-owned oil pipeline company Transneft, igniting a fire at the site. Last week, a large fire spread at a Russian oil refinery in the Black Sea port city of Tuapse following a Ukrainian drone strike, which local Russian officials said on Thursday they had finally managed to extinguish after it burned for four days.
- Ukrainian intelligence officials and police officers announced Thursday that they uncovered a Kremlin-engineered plot to recruit Ukrainian children to commit criminal wrongdoing, and said two Ukrainian minors had been separately planning attacks on their respective schools after being recruited online by Russian agents.
- After Hungary dropped its veto, the European Union approved a $106 billion loan package to cover Ukraine’s economic and military needs for two years.
After a long day of negotiating, House GOP leaders last Friday were ready to put on the floor a bill to reauthorize, for five years—with some reform—a key federal warrantless surveillance power set to expire on April 20.
Unfortunately for Speaker Mike Johnson, the vote—which he called at around midnight—failed. A group of 12 Republicans voted with almost all Democrats to kill the procedural vote to tee up the bill, and when Johnson called for a vote on an 18-month extension of the program at around 2 a.m., 20 Republicans voted with Democrats to once again tank the procedural vote.
In the end, the House passed a 10-day extension by unanimous consent, and the Senate did the same later that day, punting the deadline to extend the program to April 30. And so, Congress now has less than a week to pass a bipartisan deal to reauthorize the surveillance power.
But what does Section 702 actually do? Why has a program that was once almost automatically reauthorized become such a sticking point for members of both parties? And what kind of compromise could keep it alive past April 30?
Today’s Must-Read
In Other News
Today in America
- The Justice Department charged Army soldier Gannon Ken Van Dyke with insider trading, wire fraud, and commodities fraud, alleging he made more than $409,000 betting on the removal of Nicolás Maduro on the prediction market Polymarket.
- Trump is reportedly planning to nominate David Cummins—a senior vice president at Serco, the U.S. subsidiary of the U.K.-based government services contractor Serco Group—to serve as the next administrator of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).
- The Justice Department reached a $1.25 million settlement agreement with Carter Page—who served as a campaign adviser to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, and in 2020 sued the federal government over claims that U.S. intelligence officials illegally surveilled his travel to Russia—according to a new filing that Solicitor General John Sauer submitted to the Supreme Court.
- North Carolina authorities arrested an 18-year-old woman for allegedly plotting to attack a Jewish synagogue in Houston “to kill as many Jews as possible by driving through a congregation at a synagogue,” according to a state district judge.
- Administration officials told the Washington Post that Trump is planning to invite Russian leader Vladimir Putin to the Group of 20 (G20) leaders’ summit, which is set to be hosted at the Trump-owned Doral golf resort in Doral, Florida, near Miami, in December. Russia has said it has received an invitation.
- White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios sent a memo to federal agency chiefs, warning that Chinese-linked online users have attempted to “expose proprietary information” of leading American AI platforms and copy their products.
Around the World
- The International Criminal Court ruled that former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte must stand trial for crimes against humanity charges brought against him, ruling that there were “substantial grounds” to believe he was involved in a government scheme to kill alleged criminals.
- A commission previously launched by the Tanzanian government to investigate violence that occurred around its October election found that at least 518 people were killed from election-related unrest during and after the October election. However, the commission blamed anti-government protesters for inciting the violence.
- An adviser to the European Union’s highest court, the Court of Justice, determined that an agreement between Italy and Albania—which, if made official, would transfer migrants to the coastal Balkan nation while the Italian government processes their asylum claims—did not violate EU rules.
- Argentine officials arrested a Colombian national suspected of being involved in the 2025 assassination of the Colombian senator and presidential hopeful Miguel Uribe Turbay. Argentina plans to extradite the suspect to Colombia.
- U.K. Minister for Digital Government and Data Ian Murray confirmed that personal health records for about 500,000 Brits were found being sold on the Chinese-based e-commerce marketplace Alibaba.
- Pavel Durov, the CEO and co-founder of the Telegram messaging platform, said that the Russian government delivered a summons to his former residence, naming him as a suspect in a criminal case nearly two months after the Kremlin announced it was investigating terrorism allegations leveled against the tech entrepreneur. Durov noted that it had been two decades since he had last resided at the Russian address.
On the Money
- For the first time in the tech company’s history, Microsoft will reportedly offer voluntary buyouts through a one-time retirement program to about 7 percent of its U.S. workforce.
- Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders “overwhelmingly” voted to approve Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion acquisition offer, but opposed the proposed compensation packages to the film studio’s top executives.
- A group of several U.S. energy executives, led by an unnamed senior Energy Department official, reportedly visited Venezuela last week to meet with the country’s acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, to discuss details for potential contracts with the South American country and receive assurances that their invested assets would not be seized or compromised by its government.
- OpenAI released GPT-5.5, a substantial step up over GPT-5.4 in coding and reasoning that performs on par with Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.7 model.
- China-based DeepSeek debuted preview versions of its trillion-parameter, open-source V4 Flash and V4 Pro AI models, which the company acknowledged still lag leading U.S. systems by three to six months.
- A new Financial Times-Focaldata survey of 4,000 workers in the U.S. and U.K. found that more than 60 percent of top earners use artificial intelligence daily at work, compared with just 16 percent of those in lower-paid roles.
Worth Your Time
- “How Bruce the Parrot Landed Atop the Pecking Order, Without a Beak” (New York Times)
- Derek Thompson explores why the share of Americans who report being happy has tanked despite the country growing wealthier. (Substack)
- Sheryl Gay Stolberg reports on how the White House risks losing the support of the ‘Make America Healthy Again’ movement. (New York Times)
- Noah Smith examines the true state of the American manufacturing industry. (Noahpinion)
- Jason Cammisa on why the now-discontinued Tesla’s Model S is “the most significant car of the last 75 years.” (Hagerty)
- Out today: Michael, Fuze, and Over Your Dead Body in theaters; Apex and If Wishes Could Kill on Netflix and Half Man on HBO Max; and new music from Noah Kahan, Kehlani, Foo Fighters, Ringo Starr, Meghan Trainor, Jason Aldean, At The Gates, Angélique Kidjo, Friko, Carla dal Forno, and Failure.
Presented Without Comment
Financial Times: Polish PM Questions Whether US Is ‘Loyal’ to Europe’s Defense
Donald Tusk told the FT that Europe’s “biggest, most important question is if the United States is ready to be as loyal as it is described in our [Nato] treaties,” as he warned that Russia could attack an alliance member in “months”.
…
“This is something really serious. I’m talking about short-term perspectives, rather months than years,” Tusk said in reference to a potential Russian attack. “For us, it’s really important to know that everyone will treat the Nato obligations as seriously as Poland,” he said.
Also Presented Without Comment
Mediaite: Trump’s New Navy Secretary Previously Warned ‘Witchcraft’ Had ‘Taken Over’ a Californian City
