Tax bill, DC shooting, Trump-Ramaphosa and police reform rollback
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Today, two Israeli embassy staff are killed in a shooting in Washington, D.C. Trump confronts the president of South Africa with false claims of white genocide. A judge says Trump officials violated a court order over an attempt to deport migrants to South Sudan. And the U.S. Justice Department pulls back on police reforms ahead of the anniversary of the police killing of George Floyd.

It's Thursday, May 22nd. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes every weekday. I'm Tara Oaks in Liverpool. And I'm Jonah Green in New York.

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First to Washington, D.C., where two Israeli embassy staff have been shot and killed outside the Capital Jewish Museum. Pamela Smith is the chief of the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department. The suspect chanted, free, free Palestine while in custody. The detained suspect has been identified as 30-year-old Elias Rodriguez from Chicago.

The man and woman were a young couple about to be engaged, according to the Israeli ambassador. The shooting has drawn swift condemnation from around the world, with US President Donald Trump posting on social media, These horrible DC killings, based obviously on anti-Semitism, must end now. You can follow along on Reuters live page for the latest developments.

Staying in Washington and the House of Representatives has passed Trump's budget bill by a single vote. The bill would fulfill many of Trump's campaign pledges and saddle the country with trillions of dollars in debt. The vote came after a marathon push that kept lawmakers debating the bill through two successive nights as House Speaker Mike Johnson made tweaks to satisfy various factions of his party.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa had hoped to discuss trade and critical minerals in his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump.

Instead, what he got was the American president confronting him with false claims of a white genocide in South Africa. When they take the land, they kill the white farmer. And when they kill the white farmer, nothing happens to them. He even played a video purporting to show evidence of this, which Ramaphosa politely refuted.

People who do get killed, unfortunately, through criminal activity are not only white people. Majority of them are black people. Jeff Mason is at the White House. So Jeff, what did you make of this?

It's another example of how the president has used the Oval Office as a cudgel in some ways. He certainly did that when President Zelensky of Ukraine was here for the first time and has done it again today with Ukraine.

the South African president. I would note, however, that President Ramaphosa had a different strategy himself. He came in prepared for an aggressive reception and remained poised throughout, did not sort of bite back, and even brought along a couple white golfers as people who could appeal to President Trump.

He joked that he was sorry he didn't come bearing a free plane for Trump, which was a reference to the 747 that Qatar gifted him. And as you mentioned, he had these two golfers. Do you find that world leaders are considering this as they approach Trump, ways to kind of mollify the U.S. president so that they don't get Zelensky'd?

Absolutely. I think the I think world leaders who are coming to the White House are preparing and have studied what happened with Zelensky and are coming, if not with gifts, they are certainly coming with an attitude of stay calm, be prepared, know your brief and also know what's coming at you in terms of the grievances that the president has.

And speaking of that 747, the Pentagon says the U.S. has accepted the $400 million jetliner, which was a gift from Qatar. The Air Force has been asked to find a way to rapidly upgrade it for use as a new Air Force One.

Israel has allowed 100 aid trucks into the Gaza Strip, carrying flour, baby food and medical equipment. But the UN says that distribution issues mean that no aid has yet reached people in need. A U.S. judge says that President Trump's attempt to transfer immigrants to South Sudan violated a judicial order.

On Tuesday, District Judge Brian Murphy ordered the administration not to let a group of migrants being flown to South Sudan leave the custody of U.S. immigration authorities. And yesterday, the judge said the migrants appeared to have been deported in violation of his previous order not to deport migrants to countries other than their own without the opportunity to contest their deportations.

The White House in a statement called Murphy a far-left activist judge, while a spokesperson for the Homeland Security Department called his ruling deranged. Jonah spoke to immigration reporter Ted Hessen in Washington. Ted, first, why is the White House deporting these men, many of whom are not from South Sudan, to South Sudan?

U.S. officials have long struggled to deport some migrants to their home countries because their countries won't accept them or they're slow to accept them. But in the case here, what's different is that in recent weeks, we've seen first the Trump administration attempt to deport migrants to Libya and now to South Sudan. And I

I actually asked the question to a DHS official at a press conference as to why South Sudan. It wasn't answered, but I think what we see is that these are potentially scary places for migrants to go if they're not from these nations. In the case of South Sudan, it's a

place where there's been ongoing conflict and a civil war that ended in 2018, serious considerations that that could resume, and similar issues in Libya. And these are people who are coming from countries that don't have a connection to that place. So it could potentially be fearsome, the idea that you could be a migrant in this country, and when you're deported, you're sent somewhere that you don't speak the language and you've never been to before.

What is the potential penalty for violating this court order? The judge said today that he did not plan to deal with criminal contempt at the moment. But he also said that as this unfolds, if he finds there was contempt and that his order was flouted by the administration, that he could hold anyone from the lowest level official to the highest level official accountable.

Sunday marks the fifth anniversary of the death of George Floyd, whose murder by a white police officer was a catalyst for the racial justice movement in the US.

But the Justice Department is now rolling back police reforms that came about in the wake of Floyd's murder. The DOJ is abandoning efforts to secure court-approved settlements with Minneapolis and Louisville, despite the fact its police departments were found to have routinely violated the civil rights of Black people. Reporter Sarah Lynch covers the Justice Department.

What we saw happen with the undoing of essentially all of the police accountability work that was done in the Biden administration is unprecedented. During Trump's first term, there was an effort to put the brakes on this type of work. They never went so far as to rescind findings of wrongdoing. So why is the DOJ doing this?

Hermite Dillon, who is the Assistant Attorney General at the Civil Rights Division, had a number of different criticisms for these consent decrees, which are essentially court-approved settlements with cities to implement a variety of reforms in police departments. You know, she said that they cost too much money, they stretch on for too long, and it really involves too much of micromanaging in the matters of local police. And that instead of

punishing essentially an entire police force for misconduct of one or two, the department should instead focus on perhaps prosecuting individual police officers who may have committed acts of misconduct that merit prosecution.

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And for today's recommended read, The Battle for Superstar AI Talent. Top tech companies are shelling out millions to attract and retain top talent in a field where AI researchers can earn more than $10 million a year. We'll drop a link to that story in the pod description. For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app.

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