☕ The US and Ukraine's big deal

It’s Wednesday.

This morning, air safety is back in the headlines after two separate incidents across the country where major airlines were forced to abort landings because of traffic on the tarmac. In one incident at Chicago’s Midway International Airport, a private jet unauthorized to be starting its journey meant a Southwest Airlines plane was forced to abort landing at the last minute, while a similar incident happened at DC’s Reagan Airport.

Despite all of this, experts are quick to remind us that flying on US commercial aircraft is one of the safest ways to travel. How are you feeling about flying?

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Some headlines from this morning:

The House of Representatives has narrowly passed a huge government spending bill, one of the first significant pieces of legislation to advance President Trump’s 2025 agenda. In the lead-up to the vote, some Republicans had expressed disapproval with the budget, with some saying the $2 trillion in spending cuts did not go far enough. There are still a number of steps before the spending plan becomes law - the budget that passed last night will have to be ‘reconciled’ with another budget currently being looked at by the Senate, before being sent to the White House for a final signature.  

Keir Starmer has announced the UK will increase its defense spending in response to Europe entering a "dangerous new era” in recent months. Starmer, who is due to meet with President Trump at the White House on Thursday, told Parliament the UK would increase defense spending to 2.5% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 2027, an increase of 0.2%. The PM said it was the UK’s “biggest sustained increase in defence spending since the end of the Cold War”.

Iran says it will not speak with the US about its nuclear program as it faces President Trump’s ‘maximum pressure’ campaign which saw new US sanctions imposed on Iranian oil earlier this week. President Trump’s Iranian objective is to stop them obtaining a nuclear bomb. Since President Trump withdrew from the Iranian Nuclear Deal in his first term, which limited Iran’s capacity to make nuclear weapons, no new deal has been reached. Iran’s official policy is that they are not pursuing a nuclear bomb, but Western countries fear otherwise.

The Trump administration will end a century-long tradition by allowing its press team to select which news outlets can closely cover the presidency, replacing the independent body that previously made these decisions. Press Secretary Karoline Levitt says rotating traditional media and adding streaming services will "modernize" coverage and prevent D.C.-based journalists from monopolizing access. Meanwhile, a judge upheld - at least temporarily - the White House's ban on the Associated Press but called it "problematic" and expedited the trial date.

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This week, the non-governmental department known as DOGE, which has been cutting government funding mostly through massive staff cuts, has faced its first real roadblocks - some from inside DOGE itself and some from President Trump’s cabinet.

Let us catch you up on DOGE’s ups and downs this week.

The US Digital Service

Twenty-one DOGE employees have resigned from the organisation, leaving a co-signed letter which said their resignation was a protest against the ‘[dismantling] of critical government services’.

The employees worked at the United State Digital Service when it was integrated into DOGE via an executive order and have special expertise stemming from previous careers in the tech industry.

They also warned that new Musk hires are ‘ideologues’ who have a limited technical understanding of government and the systems over which they have responsibility.

Responses welcome

An email sent at the request of Elon Musk which asked civil servants to account for the work they did last week was labelled as voluntary by personnel officials on Monday.

Confusion continued however when President Trump, during a meeting with the French President on Tuesday, said the idea was ‘genius’ and that employees who failed to respond would be fired or ‘semi-fired.’

Heads of government departments, who were nominated by President Trump, have had a mixed response, with many instructing their employees not to respond to the email or emphasising a response was voluntary.

Reactions

Musk and the White House dismissed the protest resignation, with Musk taunting his prior employees saying they were likely to be fired soon regardless.

Word of the varied reactions to Elon’s email have fueled reports that department heads and senior White House officials are clashing with Musk and his team as his actions infringe on their authority.

Press Secretary Karoline Levitt said this was false and that they were all working towards the same goal.

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Ukrainian President Zelensky is expected in Washington on Friday to sign a draft deal reached between the US and Ukraine in which Ukraine will pay for past American aid with its mineral resources. The deal comes after a week of intense pressure was mounted on the Ukrainian president to find a way to pay the US back. Here’s what we know.

Some background

Recently, many countries around the world commemorated the three year anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine which has led to Russia occupying 20% of Ukraine's territory.

On 12 February this year, President Trump broke years of US non-communication with Russia when he conducted a 90-minute call with Vladimir Putin which resulted in the commencement of peace negotiations.

Pursuing a peace deal, US and Russian officials have had one meeting which excluded both Ukrainian and European officials and, since, President Trump has become more sympathetic to the Russian perspective, condemning Ukrainian aggression last week.

The minerals

Ukraine has vast mineral wealth, including stores of 22 of the 34 critical minerals, as well as gas and oil. Importantly it has 20% of the world’s graphite, essential for electric vehicles.

The original deal rejected by President Zelensky was for the Ukrainians to give up to $500 billion in proceeds from their mineral resources to the US with no guarantee the US would continue to support Ukraine.

The deal

The Ukrainians have agreed to establish a Reconstruction Investment Fund into which 50% of revenue from Ukrainian minerals would be paid into the fund until Ukrainian contributions totalled $500 billion.

In return, the US would reinvest the money from the fund into the development of “stable and economically prosperous Ukraine.” President Trump added that in addition to the money already paid by the US ($119 billion), Ukraine would receive military equipment and the right to fight on.

Reactions

Ukrainian officials have said they agreed to the deal because the terms offered by the US were more favourable and they were told this was the first step towards a bigger deal.

US officials said that the US will have economic interest in Ukraine which will deter Russia.

President Trump praised the deal as “very big” and conceded that if a peace deal is struck some peacekeeping troops would be needed in Ukraine, an idea Russia has fiercely resisted in the past.