The Daily Brief — May 20, 2026
Trump critic loses primary, Minnesota bans prediction markets, US indicts former Cuban president, and more
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Trump Critic Massie Loses House Primary
Rep. Thomas Massie, one of President Trump’s most outspoken Republican critics in Congress, lost his Kentucky GOP primary yesterday to Trump-endorsed retired Navy SEAL officer Ed Gallrein.
Massie is a seven-term congressman who pushed to release the Jeffrey Epstein files and opposed the war with Iran. Trump and his allies spent heavily to punish Massie for breaking with the president, resulting in the most expensive US House primary on record.
The election result extended Trump’s record of unseating Republicans who cross him. Sen. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, another vocal Trump critic, lost his primary a few days ago.
Voters in several other states also cast primary ballots yesterday. In Georgia, Trump-backed Lt. Gov. Burt Jones and billionaire health care executive Rick Jackson advanced to a June runoff for governor after no candidate cleared 50%. Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger — who drew national attention in 2020 for rejecting Trump’s request to overturn Georgia’s presidential result — did not advance.
Minnesota Becomes First State to Ban Prediction Markets
Minnesota has become the first state to ban prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket, setting off an immediate legal fight with the Trump administration over who gets to regulate the industry. Prediction markets let users wager real money on future events, including elections, weather, and sports.
The law makes it a crime to host, promote, or facilitate platforms that let users bet on future events and would force those sites to leave the state or face felony charges. The law takes effect August 1.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal agency that oversees these markets, quickly sued in federal court to block the law. The CFTC argues that prediction markets are federally regulated financial products and that states cannot ban them outright.
Prediction markets are already under scrutiny from state and federal lawmakers after a pattern of unusually well-timed trades placed just before major Trump announcements. In two high-profile cases, individuals have been accused of using the platforms for insider trading. Kalshi suspended three traders tied to a House race, and a US special forces officer was indicted for betting on the US military’s capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and making roughly $400,000.
Senate Advances Resolution to Block Further Strikes on Iran
The Senate voted yesterday to advance a war powers resolution that would bar President Trump from launching additional military strikes on Iran without congressional approval.
Trump has already passed the 60-day deadline under the War Powers Resolution, which requires a president to end unauthorized hostilities — not necessarily to pull troops from the region — unless Congress has voted to authorize the military action. He argues the war ended when a ceasefire took effect last month, so the deadline doesn’t apply.
The vote, 50–47, was to bring the resolution to the floor for debate, not a final vote on the proposal itself. Four Republicans — Sens. Rand Paul, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and Bill Cassidy, who voted yes for the first time after losing his reelection primary to a Trump-backed challenger — joined nearly every Democrat. Sen. John Fetterman was the lone Democrat opposed.
It is unclear when the Senate will hold a final vote. A companion measure would also need to pass the Republican-controlled House, where similar measures have failed so far, and Trump would be expected to veto it. Overriding a presidential veto requires a two-thirds majority in both chambers.
DOJ Expands Trump Settlement to Bar IRS Audits of Past Filings
The Justice Department expanded its settlement with Trump yesterday to block the IRS from pursuing audits or tax claims against Trump, his family, and his businesses over past tax filings.
The addendum, posted on the DOJ website, says the government is “forever barred and precluded” from pursuing examinations or investigations of tax returns filed before May 18, 2026. The DOJ said the language applies only to pending audits of past returns, not to future ones. It was added a day after the department announced the broader settlement of Trump’s lawsuit over the leak of his tax returns.
That settlement created a $1.776 billion fund to compensate people who say they were unfairly targeted by the Biden administration.
The Trumps and the Trump Organization had sued the IRS, alleging the agency failed to stop a former contractor from leaking Trump’s returns to the press. Those records showed Trump paid little or no federal income tax in 10 of the 15 years leading up to his 2016 presidential election. Trump dropped the lawsuit yesterday in exchange for the Justice Department’s creation of the fund, which it calls the “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”
Justice Department Indicts Former Cuban Leader Raúl Castro
A federal grand jury has indicted former Cuban leader Raúl Castro over the 1996 downing of two civilian planes that killed four people, three of them US citizens. The planes belonged to Brothers to the Rescue, a Miami-based group whose volunteer pilots searched for Cuban refugees stranded at sea and dropped anti-government leaflets over the island.
On Feb. 24, 1996, two Cuban fighter jets shot down two of the group’s aircraft. An international civil aviation body later concluded the planes were over international waters. Federal prosecutors charged Castro under a law that lets the US prosecute the killing of US nationals abroad.
The case centers on Castro’s alleged role in ordering the attack. Castro, now 94 and the younger brother of late Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, was Cuba’s defense minister in 1996. He later served as president from 2008 to 2018.
An arrest is highly unlikely. Cuba and the US have no extradition treaty, meaning Cuba is under no obligation to hand Castro over. Castro has never set foot in the United States.
Mosque Victims Credited with Preventing Larger Attack
Authorities have identified the three men killed in the shooting at the Islamic Center of San Diego this week as Amin Abdullah, 51, Mansour Kaziha, 78, and Nader Awad, 57. Abdullah, a father of eight, was the mosque’s security guard. Kaziha and Awad were longtime members of the congregation.
Police also identified the suspected shooters as Cain Clark, 17, and Caleb Vazquez, 18. Both were later found dead of apparent self-inflicted gunshot wounds in a vehicle several blocks away. Investigators are treating the shooting as a hate crime.
Police and the FBI said they recovered extremist writings and online material expressing anti-Muslim, antisemitic, racist, and misogynistic views. NBC News reported that investigators are working to authenticate a 75-page document allegedly written by the two suspects that references “accelerationism” — a white supremacist ideology that promotes political violence to create a white ethnostate — and uses Nazi imagery and anti-LGBTQ rhetoric.
Police said the shooting began shortly before noon outside the mosque in San Diego’s Clairemont neighborhood, while about 140 children were attending classes inside, roughly 15 feet from the gunmen. Surveillance footage showed the shooters entering the mosque after killing Abdullah. They moved through the building. After spotting Kaziha and Awad in the parking lot from the window of one of the rooms, they went outside and killed them too.
Ebola Outbreak Raises Global Alarm as US Tightens Screening
At least 134 people have died in an Ebola outbreak spreading through the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, according to the latest figures the two countries reported to the CDC.
The CDC said the countries had logged 536 suspected cases, 105 probable cases, and 34 confirmed cases as of yesterday. The outbreak involves the Bundibugyo strain of the virus. Two confirmed cases — one of them fatal — are in Uganda, both in people who had traveled from the DRC. The CDC said no further spread has been reported in Uganda.
The US State Department has urged Americans not to travel to the DRC, Uganda, or South Sudan. The CDC has put enhanced screening in place for travelers who have been in Ebola-affected areas of those three countries within the past three weeks, and has barred them from entering the US for 30 days.
Senate GOP Advances Immigration Funding Bill
Senate Republicans advanced their $72 billion immigration funding bill today, clearing it for a possible full Senate vote as soon as this week. The bill would fund ICE and Customs and Border Protection officers through 2029, with $30.73 billion for ICE and $22.57 billion for CBP to hire, train, pay, and equip personnel.
The Senate Budget Committee voted 11–10 today along party lines to send the measure to the floor, a day after the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee passed it.
Republicans are moving the package through reconciliation, a process that lets a simple majority pass a budget and bypass the 60-vote threshold needed to overcome a filibuster.
That fast track comes with a limit: under the Senate’s Byrd rule, reconciliation bills cannot include provisions the chamber’s rule-keeper deems unrelated to the budget. Republicans stripped out several provisions that the rule-keeper flagged last week. Trump has set a June 1 deadline for passing it.