1/ The truce between Israel and Hamas entered its fifth day after 12 more hostages held in the Gaza Strip were released in exchange for 30 Palestinians detained in Israeli prisons. Under the current truce, Hamas has released 81 hostages, while Israel has freed 180 Palestinians from prison – many of whom were detained but never charged. The U.S., meanwhile, urged Israel that any offensive in southern Gaza after the truce must be designed to avoid “significant further displacement” of Palestinian civilians. More than 1.7 million people have been displaced in Gaza, where health officials say the death toll has surpassed 14,500 since the start of the conflict. The World Health Organization also warned that disease may kill more Gazans than Israel’s bombardment if the enclave’s health system is not repaired. The United Nations added: “The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains catastrophic.” (NBC News / CNN / Washington Post / New York Times / Associated Press / ABC News)

  • Biden Navigates Divisions Over Gaza Inside the White House and Beyond. “Biden is facing deep anger over his solidarity with Israel among supporters and even from some staff members who have said they feel disenchanted with the president.” (New York Times)

2/ Hunter Biden offered to testify publicly before the House Oversight Committee in response to a Republican subpoena. Hunter Biden’s lawyer accused Republican lawmakers on the committee of selectively leaking information from closed-door depositions with other witnesses in his ongoing impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden, saying: “We have seen you use closed-door sessions to manipulate, even distort the facts and misinform the public. We therefore propose opening the door.” House Oversight Chairman James Comer, however, rejected the idea of a public hearing, saying: “Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else. That won’t stand with House Republicans.” Comer added: “We expect full cooperation with our subpoena for a deposition but also agree that Hunter Biden should have the opportunity to testify in a public setting at a future date.” The House Republican inquiry has not provided any direct evidence that Joe Biden has committed any wrongdoing. The White House also accused House Republicans of abusing their power and “throwing spaghetti” at the wall after failing to produce evidence to support their allegations. (Associated Press / Politico / New York Times / Axios / ABC News / Washington Post / CNN)

3/ The political arm of the Koch network endorsed Nikki Haley for the 2024 Republican nomination. Americans for Prosperity Action said it believes that nearly 75% of Republican voters are ready to move on from Trump, despite the twice-impeached former president – who tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election, encouraged a deadly insurrection at the Capitol, and is the subject of four felony indictments – having a commanding lead in the race for the GOP nomination in virtually every poll with less than two months until the Iowa caucuses. AFP said the Republican party has been choosing “bad candidates who are going against America’s core principles,” suggesting that Haley “offers America the opportunity to turn the page on the current political era.” (Axios / Associated Press / NPR / New York Times / Washington Post / ABC News)

💩 Dept. of This Guy Shouldn’t Be President Again.

  1. Fulton county prosecutors do not intend to offer plea deals for Trump, Mark Meadows, or Rudy Giuliani. “Prosecutors reached plea deals in quick succession with the former Trump lawyers Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis and Kenneth Chesebro – who all gave ‘proffer’ statements that were damaging to Trump to some degree – as well as the local bail bondsman Scott Hall.” (The Guardian)

  2. Ex-Trump attorney John Eastman urged the court to set an earlier final plea date, calling the “Fulton County District Attorney’s Office proposal of June 21 ‘arbitrary and capricious.’ In the filing, Eastman attorney Wilmer Parker III said that the final plea date should be set earlier in the year ‘so that Defendants who do not have lifetime United States Secret Service protection and who are not running for election to an office can exercise and have their right to a jury trial completed within 2024.’” (NBC News)

  3. Trump Seeks to Use Trial to Challenge Findings That 2020 Election Was Fair. “The federal judge overseeing Donald Trump’s upcoming election interference trial said in a ruling Monday that the former president’s attempt to subpoena what his legal team dubbed ‘missing’ records from the House Jan. 6 committee appeared to be a ‘fishing expedition’ that was not in good faith.” (NBC News / New York Times)

  4. Bid to hold Trump accountable for Jan. 6 violence stalls at appeals court. “A three-judge panel of the appeals court is mulling a thorny constitutional question that hangs over each of the cases: whether Trump can be sued over his speech to an angry crowd on Jan. 6, 2021, just before the deadly riot at the Capitol. Since the panel considered whether Trump has immunity, Trump has surged to the front of the GOP presidential primary pack and been charged criminally twice for his efforts to subvert the 2020 election.” (Politico)

  5. Pence told investigators he originally planned to skip the electoral certification on Jan. 6. “Speaking with special counsel Jack Smith’s team earlier this year, former Vice President Mike Pence offered harrowing details about how, in the wake of the 2020 presidential election, then-President Donald Trump surrounded himself with ‘crank’ attorneys, espoused ‘un-American’ legal theories, and almost pushed the country toward a ‘constitutional crisis,’ according to sources familiar with what Pence told investigators.” (ABC News)