Today in One Sentence. Inflation topped 4% for the first time in three years; Trump responded to the inflation report by saying “I love the inflation,” calling the numbers “great,” and arguing that prices would fall “like a rock” when the Iran war he started ends; the U.S. bombed Iran for a second straight night after Trump said Tehran had taken “too long to negotiate” and would “pay the price”; Maine Democrats nominated Graham Platner to challenge Susan Collins in a race that will likely to decide control of the Senate; Trump signed the nearly $70 billion bill to fund ICE and Border Patrol through the rest of his term; a top Justice Department official planned to seek compensation from Trump’s “Anti-Weaponization Fund” and asked to recuse himself from work on it; and Trump directed his acting director of national intelligence to “execute the immediate and needed downsizing” of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence while asking Congress to temporarily extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

1/ Inflation topped 4% for the first time in three years. The Labor Department reported that prices rose 0.5% from April and 4.2% from a year earlier – up from 3.8% in April. Energy accounted for more than 60% of the monthly increase, with gas rising 7% in May, and up more than 40% from a year ago. Real average hourly earnings, meanwhile, fell 0.7% from a year ago, meaning inflation has outpaced wage growth for a second straight month. (NPR / CNN / NBC News / Bloomberg / Wall Street Journal / Politico / Reuters / Associated Press / Washington Post)

2/ Trump responded to the highest inflation reading in three years by saying “I love the inflation,” calling the numbers “great,” and arguing that prices would fall “like a rock” when the Iran war he started ends. Trump then claimed that the U.S. had been “taking out millions of barrels of oil” and that “the other night” it “took out […] 22 ships,” adding: “Nobody knows it. You know who doesn’t know about it? Iran, until right now.” Trump later called it a “secret mission” that helped to move more than “100 MILLION Barrels of Oil” and more than 200 commercial ships through the strait, declaring: “The UNITED STATES of AMERICA CONTROLS the Strait of Hormuz — NOT Iran.” Energy Secretary Chris Wright, meanwhile, said he wasn’t aware the U.S. was taking millions of barrels out of Iran, but said the military had helped some tankers transit the Strait of Hormuz. (CBS News / The Hill / ABC News / CNBC)

3/ The U.S. bombed Iran for a second straight night after Trump said Tehran had taken “too long to negotiate” and would “pay the price.” Central Command said that it began “additional self-defense strikes” against “multiple targets in Iran,” but didn’t identify the targets. Iran, however, accused the U.S. of hitting drinking-water reservoirs. Trump, who repeatedly claimed that a peace deal was close, accused Iran of “playing us for suckers” and said, “We hit them hard yesterday, and we’re going to hit them hard again today.” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth claimed the strikes would “advance our military interests and also enhance our diplomatic position,” adding: “If we need to negotiate with bombs, we’ll negotiate with bombs.” The strikes followed Iran’s overnight attacks on U.S. bases in Bahrain, Kuwait, and Jordan after earlier U.S. strikes near the Strait of Hormuz in response to an Iranian drone colliding with an American Apache helicopter. (Associated Press / Reuters / Axios / New York Times / Bloomberg / Washington Post / The Guardian / ABC News / NBC News / CNN / CNBC)

4/ 🟦🟥 Primaries: Maine Democrats nominated Graham Platner to challenge Susan Collins in a race that will likely to decide control of the Senate. Despite months of controversy over Platner’s past conduct, old Reddit posts, sexually explicit texts, and allegations from former girlfriends that he denied or attributed to a “very dark period” after his military service, the Marine veteran and oyster farmer won about three-quarters of the vote. Collins ran unopposed for a sixth term in a state Trump lost in 2024. Elsewhere, Trump-backed South Carolina Lt. Gov. Pamela Evette advanced to a June 23 runoff for governor, while Rep. Nancy Mace failed to advance. In Nevada, Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo and Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford won their primaries. (ABC News / Associated Press / NBC News / Wall Street Journal / Washington Post)

5/ Trump signed the nearly $70 billion bill to fund ICE and Border Patrol through the rest of his term. The law gives ICE $38 billion, Border Patrol $26 billion, and another $5 billion for unforeseen costs. Republicans stripped out $1 billion tied to Trump’s White House ballroom security and the $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” payout fund. (Politico / Associated Press / CBS News)

6/ A top Justice Department official planned to seek compensation from Trump’s “Anti-Weaponization Fund” and asked to recuse himself from work on it. Patrick Davis, the assistant attorney general for legislative affairs, said his phone and email records were subpoenaed while he investigated “Russiagate” as a congressional staffer, making him a potential claimant to a fund that he was responsible for defending to Congress. The Justice Department, however, said Davis temporarily recused himself “out of an abundance of caution,” and later decided recusal was unnecessary. (Politico)

7/ Trump directed his acting director of national intelligence to “execute the immediate and needed downsizing” of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence while asking Congress to temporarily extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, is set to take over June 19 while keeping that job, despite having no intelligence or national security experience. House Intelligence Committee Democrats have demanded that Pulte undergo a full security review, including his finances, foreign contacts, and a polygraph, before assuming the post, warning that “a security clearance granted under executive authority is insufficient to safeguard classified information.” Trump claimed he needed a short-term extension of the surveillance law, which lets the government collect foreigners’ communications overseas without a warrant but can also sweep up Americans’ communications with those targets, to allow time to choose and confirm a permanent DNI. (Wall Street Journal / Politico / New York Times / Washington Post / CNBC / The Guardian / Bloomberg)

The 2026 midterms are in 146 days; the 2028 presidential election is in 881 days.