Bob Menendez’s Corruption Trial Begins This Week

“President Biden will designate Kenya on Thursday as a ‘major non-NATO ally,’ a move that reflects the president’s determination to deepen relations with the East African nation even as other countries — including Russia and China — are racing to do the same,” the New York Times reports. CNN: Biden looks to counter China’s influence as he rolls out red carpet for Kenya.

“Having spent months assuaging Democratic fears about the election by pointing to their fundraising lead over Donald Trump, the Biden team reported this week that it had brought in less money in April than Trump’s campaign claimed to have raised alongside the RNC,” Politico reports. “Privately, aides have two main explanations.

“Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said his Bharatiya Janata Party has already won a majority of the seats contested in the parliamentary elections due to end next week, putting him in a position to return to office for a third term,” Bloomberg reports.

“The new leader of Taiwan barely had time to unpack his presidential office before China’s military surrounded the island on Thursday, in a large-scale show of force that risks locking the two sides in a fresh cycle of escalation,” the Wall Street Journal reports. “Growing mistrust of Beijing helped propel Lai Ching-te to the presidency, which he assumed earlier this week.

“Since the first American shipments of sophisticated weapons to Ukraine, President Biden has never wavered on one prohibition: President Volodymyr Zelensky had to agree to never fire them into Russian territory, insisting that would violate Mr. Biden’s mandate to ‘avoid World War III,’” the New York Times reports. “But the consensus around that policy is fraying.

A key adviser to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is stepping away from his presidential campaign, citing an “increasingly hateful and divisive atmosphere” that “no longer aligns with my values,” the New York Times reports. “Angela Stanton King, the campaign’s adviser for Black engagement, announced her departure in a statement on social media on Tuesday evening, five months after she was added to the campaign’s payroll.”