Washington, DC

1. Dem majority without Maine?
2. US, Iran trade fire
3. Managing AI blowback
4. AI stake skepticism
5. Google exec speaks
6. Rubio’s UFC meet
7. NY socialist rises
8. The Dan Sullivan wars

PDB: Lawmakers move to crack down on government censorship

Melania Trump, Bessent launch savings accounts for foster youth … House to vote on short-term FISA extension … World Cup begins

Dems: Maine not the only path to majority

In 2025, no path to a Democratic Senate majority would have omitted Maine. That’s starting to change, Semafor’s Burgess Everett reports. Democrats aren’t giving up on Graham Platner, but some can see a path to the Senate majority that doesn’t rely on Maine and would require flipping four seats in Ohio, Iowa, Texas, North Carolina, or Alaska. “We have many opportunities. And that map has grown wider as the American people have gotten to see the awful impact of the Trump policies,” Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., told Semafor. He and Sens. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., and Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., say they are staying out of the race for now, and Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., is openly antagonizing Platner. Top Democrats are keeping Maine on the board to create as many paths to the majority as possible — until and unless the race doesn’t appear winnable.

US-Iran strikes raise Hormuz fears

The US and Iran exchanged fire again, straining an already fragile ceasefire and pushing oil prices up. President Donald Trump said Iran would “pay the price” for not making a deal, while Tehran declared the Strait of Hormuz closed once more and said it had hit two oil tankers in the channel. Trump said that the US military had escorted ships carrying 100 million barrels of oil through the strait, but that is just five days of normal throughput. Brent crude jumped overnight, with higher global energy prices manifesting in inflation and monetary policy: Markets are pricing in a European Central Bank rate hike today, and now expect at least one Federal Reserve rate increase by year-end.

Nvidia exec touts data center benefits

Josh Parker has a tough job. As the artificial intelligence boom is greeted by a skeptical America, Nvidia’s head of sustainability wants to educate policymakers and the public about the positive impacts that the technology — and especially data centers — can have on communities. “I don’t think it’s irrational for people to have anxiety about the future, because AI is so transformative, and we’re entering an era of unknowns and transformation,” Parker told Semafor. He contended, however, that data centers’ adverse impacts, including higher electricity costs, are smaller than people think and “the benefits are very, very significant.” Parker touted tax benefits offered by some states to encourage data center construction and jobs created by the projects. He argued that data centers “strongly support energy affordability” by incentivizing grid upgrades, plus technologies that make them “assets to the grid.”

— Morgan Chalfant

AFL-CIO skeptical of govt AI stakes

AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler is skeptical of a proposal that leading AI firms cede equity to the Trump administration in order to distribute their returns among Americans, she told Semafor’s Eleanor Mueller. “We think that our plan forward is actually a more responsible way to use technology to benefit the people,” Shuler said in an interview about how the union federation plans to center AI in upcoming elections coming out of its annual convention. Ceding equity, she said, “is not something that has necessarily been our vision of how this economy can work better for working people.” Shuler also said unions will try to influence state and local AI legislation and to turn the technology into “a key driver” in upcoming elections: “The only organized force left in the country to rebalance those scales is the labor movement,” Shuler said.

Why Google refused quantum funding

Google refused funding from the Trump administration for quantum computing because of “conditions” that would’ve slowed the company down, the COO of Google’s quantum arm told Semafor. Charina Chou told Reed Albergotti at a Semafor Tech summit in San Francisco that the tech giant wants “to move as quickly as we can to a quantum computer,” and so turned down its share of the $2 billion in federal quantum investments announced last month. Chou also said that due to the Trump administration’s immigration and visa policies, the “climate is challenging” for American firms recruiting international tech talent. Pete Shadbolt, whose company, PsiQuantum, did accept the federal funding, said the White House’s interest in funding quantum research is “natural” given the technology’s “profound geopolitical implications.” “I try to spend as much time as I can building the quantum computer, but I do run around Washington,” he said.

Dana White’s diplomatic match

Secretary of State Marco Rubio is signing a memorandum of understanding this afternoon — not with Iran, but with UFC president and Trump friend Dana White. The signing is a warm-up of sorts for the much-anticipated (and unusual) UFC fight card on the White House lawn, and marks the latest foray of the Trump administration into US sports culture. While specifics of the MOU remain under wraps, the State Department says it will mark a new “partnership to enhance sports diplomacy initiatives and collaborate on the global growth of mixed martial arts.” Today’s Rubio-White event also emphasizes Trump’s personal affinity for sporting events — and may help UFC’s effort to grow globally. Critics have blasted Trump’s upcoming UFC fight, and some even filed a lawsuit last week to try to stop the event from moving forward.

— Shelby Talcott

Espaillat challenger leads 39-35 in poll

A democratic socialist backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani leads Rep. Adriano Espaillat in this month’s Democratic primary for New York’s 13th Congressional District, according to polling conducted for Justice Democrats by Data for Progress. Darializa Avila Chevalier, a grad student and organizer of the Gaza protests at Columbia University, leads Espaillat 39-35; the interviews with 319 likely primary voters were conducted June 3-9, during which time Mamdani released an ad supporting Avila Chevalier, and Espaillat responded with an ad claiming his challenger deleted tweets that called Joe Biden a “rapist” and used a four-letter word to attack Kamala Harris. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is standing with Espaillat, and the congressman’s allies have cried foul on Mamdani for endorsing against a Democrat who supported him after the 2025 primary, when others stuck with former Gov. Andrew Cuomo or stayed neutral.

— David Weigel

GOP seeks probe of other Dan Sullivan

The Dan Sullivan wars are entering a new phase. National Republicans are asking the Federal Election Commission to probe Dan J. Sullivan and an Alaska political operative over Sullivan’s run against Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, R-Alaska, according to a complaint first shared with Semafor. The National Republican Senatorial Committee alleges that Amber Lee, who runs a “consulting firm with an exclusively progressive client roster” and worked for a pro-Mary Peltola super PAC, hasn’t been paid for her work helping launch Dan J. Sullivan’s campaign. The complaint says Lee may have extended credit “outside the ordinary course of business for political campaign consultants and therefore likely made an excessive contribution to a federal candidate.” NRSC spokesperson Nick Puglia said Peltola’s allies don’t “think the rules apply to them. The FEC must immediately investigate and sanction Fraud Dan Sullivan and Amber Lee for breaking federal law.”

— Burgess Everett

Why Democrats rejected Steyer in California

As Tom Steyer became the least-successful self-funding candidate in modern US political history this week, his initial years in Democratic politics felt like a fever dream. Steyer, who liked to say that he became a hedge fund billionaire “by accident,” joined Democratic politics at the start of its modern crisis. In 2014, the party despaired at the success of the Koch donor network — decades of right-wing philanthropy that paid off in the tea party movement. That election ended up being a Democratic disaster, with non-college-educated support for the party collapsing, presaging the rise of Trump. Steyer’s runs for president and governor didn’t work, either. Why couldn’t he pull it off? Steyer’s 12 years as a “donor-doer” left behind quite a lot for his party, but as he grew more ambitious, he embodied the Democrats’ problems.

Beltway Newsletters

Punchbowl News: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer appeared to back Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich., in the state’s three-way Democratic primary, saying “I think she has the best chance to win.”

Playbook: President Trump is “increasingly frustrated with everyone, from his own team to the Senate,” a MAGA world operative said, adding: “He’s p*ssed, and people are not recognizing the level of p*ssed that he is.”

Axios: Interim intelligence director Bill Pulte called outgoing DNI Tulsi Gabbard on T