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Officials in Cuba reported an islandwide blackout Monday as deepening energy and economic crises continue to strain a crumbling power grid. It marked the third major outage in four months. A separate blackout just over a week ago affected western Cuba, leaving millions without electricity. President Miguel Díaz-Canel warned Friday that the island has gone more than three months without oil shipments, relying instead on solar power, natural gas and aging thermoelectric plants. Cuba has blamed the crisis on a U.S. energy blockade, while U.S. President Donald Trump warned in January of tariffs on any country that sells or provides oil to the island. This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.

President Donald Trump issued a baffling statement after the World Baseball Classic (WBC) semifinal game on Monday night. Venezuela and Italy faced off in the WBC semifinal, with Venezuela besting the Italians 4-2. After the game, Trump took to Truth Social to express his pleasure with the outcome. "Wow! Venezuela defeated Italy tonight, 4-2, in the WBC (Baseball!) Semifinal. They are looking really great. Good things are happening to Venezuela lately!" Trump posted. "I wonder what this magic is all about? STATEHOOD, #51, ANYONE?"Trump's comments came at a time when his administration is facing increased scrutiny for its foreign policy. Earlier this year, the Trump administration arrested Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro on gun charges and brought him to New York to face trial. The Trump administration has also bombed multiple alleged drug boats in the Caribbean, killing more than 130 people, without providing evidence that the boats were connected to the drug trade. Political analysts and observers shared their reactions on social media. "Delusional," political commentator Intare Batinya posted on X. "Venezuela is a sovereign nation, not a potential 51st state. Stick to golf and leave the geopolitical magic to the experts. Annexing a country over a baseball game is a new level of unhinged.""This guy is so obsessed with making it about him that he might show up to Miami tomorrow with Maduro in chains," writer Matt Burnell posted on X. The U.S. and Venezuela will play in the WBC final on Tuesday.

President Donald Trump's call for reinforcements to open the Strait of Hormuz just created the "worst of all possible worlds," according to one analyst. On Monday, Trump made several contradictory statements about whether the U.S. needs other countries to help it open the Strait of Hormuz, which accounts of 20% of all global energy trade. The Iranian regime has effectively closed the Strait to the U.S. and Israeli ships in retaliation for the two countries' conducting a coordinated bombing campaign in Iran that began in late February. Van Jones, a former Obama administration advisor, argued on CNN's "NewsNight" with Abby Phillip that the Trump administration's inability to deal with this problem in advance has created the "worst of all possible worlds." "My only point is it's this kind of ready-fire-aim stuff," Jones said about the administration's strategy in Iran. "There could have been a situation where you had the economic pressure, then the protests, then the military strikes, and you might actually have regime change. Now, we have the worst of all possible worlds, and it's not clear how to get out of it." Analysts have noted that Iran's blockade of the Strait of Hormuz is its "strongest card" against Trump, meaning the country is unlikely to bend easily on the issue. That puts Trump in an awkward position in a war that he has struggled to justify at home. A recent Washington Post poll found that 65% of Americans don't believe Trump has adequately explained the goals of the U.S. in deciding to bomb Iran.

Brazilian police released on Monday three Israeli tourists who this weekend got involved in a disturbance with pro-Palestine residents of a beachfront city in the country’s tropical northeast

Effective closure of strait of Hormuz also affecting Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, which have brought in crisis measuresSri Lanka is introducing a shorter four-day working week to preserve its shrinking fuel and gas reserves, as the Middle East conflict continues to severely disrupt energy supplies in the region.Countries across south Asia are facing crippling shortages of fuel and LPG gas, which are used for everything from home cooking to cremating bodies, as most supplies have been held up in the Gulf since the US and Israel began bombing Iran. Continue reading...

Charlie Kirk Show hosts Blake Neff and Andrew Kolvet pressed for the defeat of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), an ally of President Donald Trump, by hosting his two opponents, Paul Davis and Mark Lynch."I have been very loud about my criticisms of Sen. Lindsey Graham, the neocon warmonger from South Carolina, who has just seemed to stay in office for a very long time," Kolvet said on Monday's broadcast. "Charlie Kirk — Charlie always called him Lady Graham, as he called it... I'm pretty sure that's what a lot of people call him."The host pointed to a 2023 quote from Kirk: "The base is done with neocons who want to spend our money to bomb faraway lands.""Feels very relevant to our current moment," Kolvet told Davis. "And I'm saying, as long as it's not Lindsey Graham, I'm excited. That's how I feel right now.""Well, as of today, Lindsey Graham's going down," Davis replied. "He's way below 50%. In South Carolina, we have a runoff state. So top two people going to runoff two weeks later.""I'm a guy who's been MAGA from the jump," he continued. "I helped President Trump as a volunteer get elected. I served in his first term. I was what they call one of his killers."For his part, Lynch criticized Graham for pledging to send South Carolinians to fight in the Middle East."Well, the people in South Carolina have said, 57% of them back when we polled in May, that they will not vote for Lindsey Graham again," Lynch explained. "They love Trump. They know Trump endorsed Lindsey, but that endorsement won't save him this time.""You're not taking our children over there for your bloodlust financial gain," he added. "And we say no to that in South Carolina, and enough's enough. We've had enough in Lindsey.""I think that's the bloodlust really resonates," Kolvet remarked. "It resonates with me. It resonates, I'm sure, with Blake. And of course, it resonated with Charlie."

Disgraced crypto executive Sam Bankman-Fried is betting that Trump's well-documented willingness to pardon allies who lavish praise on his administration will extend to him, even as influential Republicans urge the president to reject his bid for freedom.Bankman-Fried, 32, is currently serving a 25-year sentence handed down in March 2024 for orchestrating a multibillion-dollar fraud scheme through his now-defunct cryptocurrency exchange FTX.According to Politico, the jailed executive's legal team is aggressively lobbying Trump and his crypto-friendly inner circle for a pardon — a move that's already drawing pushback from Republicans who built their political brands on cryptocurrency advocacy."The guy's a piece of s--t," said Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH), a longtime crypto enthusiast who has championed industry-friendly legislation. "The guy shouldn't be pardoned. The guy should go to jail for a long, long time."From behind bars, Bankman-Fried has mounted a calculated charm offensive on X. His account has lauded the Trump administration's drug pricing initiative, praised Trump's economic stewardship, and positioned the president as crypto's savior. He's also given a jailhouse interview to Tucker Carlson, where he blamed his conviction on "Biden's lawfare machine," drawing a parallel to the federal indictments Trump faced after leaving office."I hope the president doesn't fall for that," said Sen. Cynthia Lummis, a Wyoming Republican known as the Senate's "crypto queen." "He hurt a lot of people. He should have to spend some time contemplating that."Rep. Mike Flood of Nebraska, a rising Republican voice on the House Financial Services Committee, expressed disbelief at the brazenness of Bankman-Fried's pardon campaign."He crashed the car, man. He engaged in massive fraud," he said. "Wall Street's not needing him back to fix any problems. He helped us identify a problem by committing a massive amount of fraud — and we rewarded him with a long stay in a federal prison."Trump has already demonstrated a willingness to pardon controversial crypto figures. He granted clemency to Changpeng Zhao, former CEO of the crypto exchange Binance, who pleaded guilty in 2023 to money laundering-related charges. On his second day back in office, Trump also fulfilled a campaign promise by freeing Ross Ulbricht, founder of the dark web marketplace Silk Road.Still, a pardon for Bankman-Fried faces long odds. Trump told The New York Times in January he has no plans to pardon Bankman-Fried, with no indication his stance has shifted. That said, the aggressive lobbying campaign reflects a broader pattern: Trump has handed out pardons to numerous white-collar criminals, many of whom orchestrated costly influence operations. The White House declined to comment on whether a Bankman-Fried pardon remains a possibility.You can read more here.

President Donald Trump announced that he had "essentially" won the war against Iran and complained that it was "unfair" for the country to close its Strait of Hormuz after the so-called victory.During a press conference on Monday, Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy asked Trump why he could not immediately open the Strait."Now that you've announced that the U.S. has destroyed all of Iran's mine-laying ships, why can't the U.S. just immediately reopen the Strait of Hormuz?" Doocy wondered."Well, we could, but it takes two to tango," Trump argued. "We have to get people to take their billion-dollar ship and and, you know, drive it up.""They can cost up to $2 billion. So they don't want to take a chance that, gee, I think you'll be okay. They got to know it," he continued. "We don't know if they even set any mines."Trump noted that it only took one mine-laying ship from Iran to destroy vessels in the Strait."So it's a little unfair," he griped. "You know, you win a war, but they have no right to be doing what they're doing. But we're hitting them very hard, and today is a big day where we're pounding a certain area that has very much to do with the strait.""In addition, we do have other nations coming in," the president added. "You need people to watch and people to see. We have other nations coming in."