Trump travel ban, Putin call and Musk’s ‘kill the bill’
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Today, Trump bans citizens of 12 countries from coming to the U.S. Congressional Republicans grapple with a displeased Elon Musk. Putin vows to retaliate for Ukraine's drone attack. And gamers line up for Nintendo's Switch 2 launch. It's Thursday, June 5th. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the frontlines in 10 minutes every weekday.

I'm Jonah Green in New York. And I'm Carmel Crimmins in Dublin. The recent terror attack in Boulder, Colorado, has underscored the extreme dangers posed to our country by the entry of foreign nationals who are not properly vetted, as well as those who come here as temporary visitors and overstay their visas. We don't want them. President Donald Trump announcing a ban on citizens of 12 countries from entering the United States.

He cites Sunday's incident in Colorado in which an Egyptian man tossed a gasoline bomb into a crowd of pro-Israel demonstrators as an example of why the new restrictions are needed. Egypt is not on the list of banned countries, but Afghanistan, Haiti, Iran, Libya and Yemen are some of the countries that are. The ban takes effect on June 9th.

Jeff Mason is our White House correspondent. Jeff, Trump's first travel ban from his first term in office caused quite a bit of confusion. Is it clear how this is going to play out? I don't think it would be accurate to say it's all very clear, but I do think that they have taken time this time around

to button it up a little bit more than they did during the initial time that they had this order in the first term. That said, I do think it's likely that this will face legal challenges, which is what happened with the ban during the first term as well. One thing that the order did make clear is that visas that people already had before June 9th for immigrants and non-immigrants will not be revoked.

But that still raises questions about implications for people who were planning to come to the country, who may already be in the visa process but haven't received it yet. Do we know why these specific countries have been included? So the White House said that these countries have been targeted because of lack of good enough vetting for these individuals and also in some cases because countries were not accepting nationals back.

And breaking news on another travel ban: Trump has barred all foreign national Harvard students from entering the US. For now, it's a six-month suspension, with Trump citing national security concerns as the reason. Harvard says it's yet another retaliation that violates the Ivy League schools' First Amendment rights.

A U.S. judge has ruled that hundreds of Venezuelans deported from the U.S. to El Salvador must be given the chance to challenge their detentions, and the Trump administration must facilitate the legal challenges. The United States has vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution that demanded an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Meanwhile, a humanitarian crisis continues to grip the enclave.

On Wednesday, no aid was distributed by the U.S.-backed organization as it pressed Israel to boost civilian safety. Hospital officials have said that more than 80 people were shot dead and hundreds wounded near distribution points in a three-day period from Sunday. At least 11 people have died and dozens injured in a crowd surge outside a cricket stadium in Bengaluru, India.

Authorities say fans were celebrating Royal Challengers Bengaluru's first Indian Premier League title win. And Trump has directed White House counsel to investigate whether former President Joe Biden's aides covered up his alleged mental decline. The investigation will also look into whether aides unlawfully used an auto pen to sign policies on his behalf. Biden says he was responsible for the decisions made during his administration.

Another day, another dollar. $2.4 trillion, that is. That's the latest estimate from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office on how much Trump's tax and spending bill would add to the deficit. That price tag is why Elon Musk, former Doge head, is urging his followers on X to call their senators and tell them to, quote, kill the bill. Reporter Bo Erickson has been running around Capitol Hill all day

So, Beau, how are lawmakers weighing all of this?

There's a lot of consternation about Musk's comments. Our colleague Nandita Bose just reported that a White House official told her that Musk's attempt to kill this bill is infuriating those folks at the White House. And this White House official told her that top White House aides have been in meetings all day long working to try to prevent Musk from derailing this legislation. So we expect this to be an

ongoing hurdle for the Republicans. But at the same time, Musk's deficit concerns are emboldening some of the fiscal hawks up here in the Senate who are now considering this package. Speaking of Musk, the White House is now also trying to codify his Doge funding cuts into law, essentially requesting that Congress revoke funding it had already appropriated. What do we know about this?

The Trump administration has sent up what's called a rescissions package, and that's really just a funding reduction package. But this needs to be approved by the lawmakers who have already approved this spending. And this is creating kind of an issue with some Republicans up here on Capitol Hill because some of this funding is going to cut the program PEPFAR. And what PEPFAR stands for is the U.S. President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.

And in fact, the White House budget chief of Russell Vogt, he was on Capitol Hill and he was asked twice by a Republican congressman from Missouri. His name is Mark Alford about the PEPFAR cuts.

I went to the congressman after and asked if he was satisfied with the administration's answer. I'm just concerned that this program that saved 26 million lives is going to be kaput. That House Republican is not alone. On the other side of Capitol Hill, Senator Susan Collins, a moderate Republican from Maine, she is also speaking out against these PEPFAR cuts. And

This is key because just a few Republicans in each chamber could really stop this funding reduction package from passing. It's Switch 2 Day on markets, the launch of Nintendo's next-generation gaming device. And they're already sold out. Yumi Oe got hers after applying for a sales lottery in Tokyo. Oh my god!

Nintendo got 2.2 million applications for its sales lottery on the My Nintendo store in Japan. And pre-orders at Target sold out in less than two hours. So it's going to be weeks or months before you can walk into a store and buy a Switch 2. The launch is going to be a test of Nintendo's supply chain management during President Trump's trade war. The gaming device is manufactured mostly in China and sold out of Japan.

And investor expectations for the new device are high. Nintendo's shares have gained almost 30% so far this year. President Trump says that Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to retaliate against Ukraine over its massive drone attack. The two leaders spoke on the phone on Wednesday. Trump says they had a good call, but not one that will lead to peace anytime soon.

Our U.S. foreign policy editor, Don Durfee, is in Washington. Don, what did we learn from this call? Well, we learned that Vladimir Putin is really worried about these really significant attacks that Ukraine launched, most significantly against the number of Russian air bases, attacks that had destroyed some long-range nuclear-capable bombers that Russia has.

as well as some attacks on bridges. And in the call with Trump, he was basically saying, we are going to have to respond to this, which I think had a couple of purposes. One was just to warn the U.S. that there was going to be a military response. And it was probably also to signal to Trump that we have these negotiations going on. But I think Putin is signaling that our position has just hardened and it's Ukraine's fault in his eyes.

So where does this leave peace talks? Yeah, so I think we need to be clear that the talks have not been going anywhere. The Russians had shown up to the latest round of talks with a series of demands that are just unacceptable to the Ukrainians. So in a way, you could say that Ukraine's attack has given Putin a sort of a ready excuse to not really come to the table.

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And for today's recommended read: How did Ukraine pull off that audacious attack deep inside Russia? 117 cheap short-range drones and wooden sheds with retractable roofs are part of the answer. A link to the story and graphic on Operation Spider's web is in the pod description. For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app. Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast player.

We'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show.