House Passes Ukraine Aid Bill, Defying Republican Leaders

ST. PETERSBURG - Vladimir Putin rejected Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s offer of face-to-face talks on Friday, saying he saw no point in meeting and repeating that Russia will keep pressing its war aims in Ukraine. Zelenskyy had proposed a ceasefire during negotiations and suggested a third-country meeting. Putin called the letter rude. Zelenskyy replied that Moscow was choosing war again.

BEIRUT - Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem called the renewed ceasefire with Israel “futile” and “humiliating” for Lebanon on Friday, even as Israeli warplanes and drones kept striking the south.

The UN has now doubled its Lebanon aid appeal to nearly $640 million, saying the war has driven a “severe and deteriorating” humanitarian crisis. More than one million people are displaced. The truce, for now, looks a lot like the last one: announced loudly, then shelled quietly.

PARIS - French anti-terrorism prosecutors have opened a preliminary probe into suspected torture and war crimes over Israel's treatment of activists detained after a Gaza-bound flotilla was intercepted last month. The activists say they were abused in custody. Israel denies the accusations. France has already banned far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir over the episode.

TIVAT - European leaders meeting in Montenegro said the EU needs to speed up membership talks with six Western Balkan countries, and prove it can still enlarge at all. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz backed a gradual integration plan, while European Council President António Costa called enlargement the bloc’s most important geopolitical investment. The summit comes as Brussels tries to keep the region from drifting elsewhere.

WASHINGTON - President Trump said Bill Pulte will serve only in an acting role as director of national intelligence, and that he is interviewing permanent candidates for the job.

Trump also told the Wall Street Journal he wants Pulte to "start the process" of shrinking the office, which oversees the nation's 18 intelligence agencies. He called the ODNI unnecessary and said it should maybe even be terminated. Pulte is still running the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The purge, apparently, starts with paperwork.

PROVIDENCE - A federal judge in Rhode Island on Friday blocked Trump administration rules that had frozen asylum, green card and work permit decisions for people from 39 countries. Chief Judge John McConnell called the policy arbitrary and contrary to federal law, saying it left thousands in legal limbo for months. The administration had tied the pause to national security after the Washington shooting. The ruling restores a process that should never have been stopped.

WASHINGTON - Sens. Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican, and Cory Booker, a New Jersey Democrat, asked a federal judge Thursday to keep blocking the Justice Department's $1.7 billion anti-weaponization fund, calling it a threat to Congress's power and the Constitution. They said the program could pay Jan. 6 rioters and violates the Spending, Appropriations and Appointments Clauses. The Justice Department now says the fund is not going forward, but still wants the lawsuits tossed.

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department said Friday it will drop a plan tied to President Trump that would have used taxpayer money to pay people who claimed political persecution. It was the department's clearest signal yet that the idea is being shelved. The fund had been pitched at $1.8 billion, which is a lot of public money to spend on grievance claims.

BATON ROUGE - Meta's Mark Zuckerberg wanted a massive data center, and Louisiana leaders wanted the company to pick their state. Getting to yes took a lot of negotiation and secrecy, according to Bloomberg reporter Riley Griffin.

The deal is now being sold as a huge win for Louisiana. It also says something about how these projects get done: quietly, with a lot of public optimism and very little public detail until the ink is dry.

CUPERTINO - Netflix named Jay Hoag, the founding general partner of venture firm TCV, as chairman after Reed Hastings left the board this week.

The move gives the streaming company a chairman with deep Silicon Valley ties and a long record of backing tech bets. It also closes the loop on a board seat once held by one of Netflix's founders. Not exactly a revolution. More like Netflix keeping the grown-ups in the room.

SAN ANTONIO - Jalen Brunson scored 30 points and the Knicks erased a 14-point deficit to beat the Spurs 105-95 in Game 1 of the NBA Finals.

Victor Wembanyama took the blame for San Antonio's late collapse, saying he was “bad tonight” and “not worried in the slightest” about the response. The Spurs shot 36 percent and were outscored 23-14 on second chances. Game 2 is Friday, and the pressure is already real.

NEW YORK - Aaron Judge’s stress fracture in his first right rib will keep him off the field for at least four to six weeks, and maybe longer once he starts ramping back up. Judge said the injury began with a dive in Houston on April 26, then got worse in Sacramento. The Yankees recalled Spencer Jones to fill the roster spot. Judge said he fought it as long as he could.

SARATOGA SPRINGS - The Belmont Stakes is back at Saratoga Race Course on Saturday, and the 1 1/4-mile trip should suit the Kentucky Derby crowd just fine. Renegade is the 2-1 favorite, with Derby winner Golden Tempo at 9-2 and Chief Wallabee at 3-1. Golden Tempo skipped the Preakness, so the Triple Crown stays out of reach again. The question is whether Saratoga gives him the same setup twice.

LONDON - Anthony Head, the British actor who made Rupert Giles feel like the only adult in Sunnydale, has died at 72. His daughters said he died peacefully of complications from pneumonia, surrounded by family.

Head became a familiar face on television through Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Merlin, Little Britain and Ted Lasso, where he played the sour club owner Rupert Mannion. He also worked on stage and in films. Co-stars called him kind, wise and generous. That sounds right. Some actors leave a mark; he left a whole shelf of them.

LOS ANGELES - Taylor Swift has released “I Knew It, I Knew You,” the country-leaning song she wrote and co-produced for *Toy Story 5*.

The video is built entirely from *Toy Story* footage and centers on Jessie, who inspired the track. Variety reports the song had been secret since February, when a small Pixar team got a version with it and a decoy cut without it was made for everyone else. Swift said writing it felt like “coming home at the same time.”

PARIS - Marjane Satrapi, the Iranian-French author and filmmaker behind Persepolis, has died at 56. French President Emmanuel Macron’s office announced her death Thursday, and her family said she died of “sadness” a little more than a year after her husband, Mattias Ripa, died.

Persepolis, her black-and-white memoir of growing up during the Iranian Revolution, became a bestseller and later an Oscar-nominated animated film. Macron called her a leading figure in French culture and an artist devoted to freedom. For a generation of readers, she made exile feel immediate and personal.