Donald Trump has announced plans to lift sanctions on Syria after holding talks with Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, describing it as an effort to “give them a chance at greatness”.
The announcement came as the White House also confirmed that Trump would meet with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former rebel commander whose forces helped overthrow Bashar al-Assad in 2024. It would be the first face-to-face meeting between a US president and a Syrian leader since 2000, when Bill Clinton met with the late leader Hafez al-Assad in Geneva.
Sharaa’s pitch to Trump for sanctions relief included access to Syrian oil, reconstruction contracts and to build a Trump Tower in Damascus, according to sources who spoke to Reuters.
“I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness. It’s their time to shine,” Trump said at an investment forum on Tuesday in Riyadh. “We’re taking them all off. Good luck Syria, show us something very special.”
Here are the key Trump administration stories of today:
Trump announces $142bn US-Saudi arms deal and Syrian sanctions relief
The United States and Saudi Arabia have signed a $142bn arms deal touted by the White House as the “largest defence sales agreement in history”. Trump announced sanctions relief on Syria alongside the Saudi arms deal, in the first stop of his four-day diplomatic tour to the Gulf states aimed at securing big deals and spotlighting the benefits of Trump’s transactional foreign policy.
Top Democrat to obstruct DoJ picks over Trump jet gift
The Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, announced on Tuesday he would obstruct all Trump administration justice department nominations until the White House provided answers about plans to accept a luxury aircraft from Qatar for presidential use.
The move has ignited controversy over the constitutional and security implications of accepting a foreign government’s offer to provide what would become the new Air Force One. Schumer called the proposed arrangement “not just naked corruption”, likening it to something so corrupt “that even [Russian president Vladimir] Putin would give a double take”.
US tech firms secure AI deals as Trump tours Gulf states
A swath of US technology firms announced deals in the Middle East as Trump trumpeted $600bn in commitments from Saudi Arabia to American artificial intelligence companies during a tour of Gulf states.
Among the biggest deals was a set signed by Nvidia. The company will sell hundreds of thousands of AI chips in Saudi Arabia, with a first tranche of 18,000 of its newest “Blackwell” chips going to Humain, Saudi Arabia’s sovereign-wealth-fund-owned AI startup, Reuters reported. Cisco on Tuesday said it had signed a deal with G42, the AI firm based in the United Arab Emirates, to help the company develop that country’s AI sector.
Federal grand jury indicts Wisconsin judge over alleged obstruction
A federal grand jury has indicted a Wisconsin judge who was arrested by the FBI last month on allegations that she helped an undocumented immigrant avoid federal authorities.
Hannah Dugan, a county circuit court judge in Milwaukee, was charged on Tuesday with concealing a person from arrest and obstruction of proceedings.
Trump must realise Putin is an obstacle to peace, Zelenskyy says
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he hopes the current period of frantic diplomacy and high-stakes gambits between Russia and Ukraine will end with Trump understanding that Vladimir Putin is the real obstacle to a peace deal.
“Trump needs to believe that Putin actually lies. And we should do our part. Sensibly approach this issue, to show that it’s not us that is slowing down the process,” said Zelenskyy, speaking to a small group of journalists, including the Guardian, in his office at the presidential administration in Kyiv.
RFK Jr and his grandchildren swam in DC creek contaminated by sewage
The US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, has revealed that he went swimming with his children in a Washington DC creek that authorities have said is toxic due to contamination by an upstream, aging sewer system.
The “Make America healthy again” crusader attracted attention for the Mother’s Day dip in Dumbarton Oaks Park with his grandchildren Bobcat and Cassius, which he posted about on X. He was also accompanied by relatives Amaryllis, Bobby, Kick and Jackson.
Harvard hit with $450m more in cuts
Eight federal agencies will terminate a further $450m in grants to Harvard University, the Trump administration announced on Tuesday, escalating its antagonization of the elite institution over what officials frame as inadequate responses to antisemitism on campus. The latest cuts follow a $2.2bn freeze, bringing total federal penalties against Harvard to $2.65bn.
What else happened today:
Catching up? Here’s what happened on 12 May 2025.
