Ken Paxton won easily in the most expensive Senate primary campaign in US history. Credit: Reuters 

Last week in this newsletter, I wrote about Trump’s revenge tour - his crusade to oust Republican political incumbents who had prompted his ire for one reason or another.

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Yesterday in Texas, another incumbent was defeated by a Trump-backed challenger. But as I explore here, the case of Senator John Cornyn, beaten by state Attorney General Ken Paxton, is a bit different – and so is the lesson to be learned.

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Unlike the defeats of Congressman Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, two recent Trump targets, Cornyn hadn’t done anything notable to attract the president’s wrath. In fact, he had been assiduously courting Trump’s support - including introducing a bill two weeks ago to name a highway in Texas after the president.

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In the end, it was all for nought.

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Take note of the timing of Trump’s endorsement of Paxton, however. It didn’t come at the beginning of the race. In fact, after Cornyn eked out a narrow lead in the first round of balloting in March, it appeared Trump might back the incumbent senator. Instead, Trump tossed his support behind Paxton well after it appeared likely the attorney general would win.

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The themes Paxton ran on should sound familiar. He said Cornyn was too old, too timid, too aligned with the political establishment and too out-of-touch with Texas conservatives. He rode the same kind of grassroots populist wave of discontent that has powered Trump for the past decade.

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While Paxton’s victory might be characterised as another example of the strength of the president’s endorsement, its timing suggests Trump was following his base - which, at least in Texas, is still hungry for firebrand conservatives and wary of longtime Washington politicians. 

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The takeaway: Trump has been able to harness the forces of conservative populism, but Tuesday’s results show he cannot always control them. They could still be a power in Republican politics well after Trump has left the scene.

Government supporters came out to back Raúl Castro last week. Credit: EPA

Will Grant 

Cuba correspondent

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Raúl Castro is a revered figure to Cuban revolutionaries. The man who first introduced Fidel Castro to Che Guevara was the second-in-command on the island for decades before eventually becoming president himself. 

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For them, then, his indictment for murder over the events of 30 years ago was nothing less than sacrilege. In the dawn light on the Malecón, Havana’s waterfront promenade, government supporters gathered outside the US embassy to protest the charges against their most important living revolutionary. The charges were political, they said, nothing more than a pretext to military intervention.

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But did they fear war was imminent, I asked? 

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“There can still be a negotiated solution to this,” argued student leader Bruno, “but the US Justice Department isn’t doing their part.”

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Still, a state-organised demonstration doesn’t represent everyone. In a late-night protest in Old Havana, residents demanded electricity after a 24-hour-long blackout. Most worryingly for the authorities, even when the lights came back on, many stayed on the streets to chant “Libertad” – freedom – a while longer. 

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In private, some once-committed socialists are losing faith. “I don’t know what Trump is planning,” a woman in her 70s told us. “But whatever it is, I just hope he gets on with it. We can’t go on like this.”

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No, it’s… “unidentified anomalous phenomena” (UAP).

The Department of Defense released its latest batch of previously classified material on alleged UFO sightings on Friday. Experts said the 160 or so files made public contain new videos of UAPs - but no conclusive evidence of alien technology or extraterrestrial life. Watch a fighter jet shoot one down in a now declassified video here.

Footage from Michigan in 2023 was among the videos released. Credit: Department of Defense