The New York Times - Alan Rappeport / The U.S. is looking to cut off Iran’s access to military components
 

• The United States plans to impose new sanctions on Iran in the coming days to punish it for the attacks on Israel over the weekend, U.S. officials said on Tuesday. 

• Jake Sullivan, the U.S. national security adviser, said in a statement that the sanctions would target Iran’s “missile and drone program” and entities that support the country’s military groups. 

• “These new sanctions and other measures will continue a steady drumbeat of pressure to contain and degrade Iran’s military capacity and effectiveness and confront the full range of its problematic behaviors,” Mr. Sullivan said.

• The European Union is considering expanding economic sanctions against Iran’s weapons program to punish it for last weekend’s attack on Israel and try to prevent any escalation of violence across the Middle East, the bloc’s top diplomat said on Tuesday.

   

Euractiv - Alexandra Brzozowski / New fund to balance future EU enlargement impact needed, Letta report says
 

• With some EU member states and sectors likely to be exposed more than others by the European Union’s future enlargement rounds, a new fund is needed to compensate for imbalances, according to a draft report by former Italian prime minister Enrico Letta, seen by Euractiv. 

• “Setting a clear direction for the integration of new members into the EU represents one of the main challenges for the next years,” Letta states in the report, naming the area as one of the three key choices the EU has to make. 

• The bloc’s focus on pursuing enlargement should not lie “merely on the goal itself but on the careful execution of its implementation” and “more specifically on the methods and timing of such expansions”. 

• European Council President Charles Michel stated last year that the bloc should be ready to enlarge by 2030 if it wants to remain “credible, ” kicking off a debate about internal reforms that must be pursued before this could happen.

  
  Related article: The Guardian - Jon Henley / Support for Ukraine at stake as Croatia votes in parliamentary election

Financial Times - Alex Rogers and Sam Learner / Donald Trump falls $75mn behind Joe Biden in money race as donor base shrinks
 

• Donald Trump has raised $75mn less for his presidential bid than Joe Biden and has 270,000 fewer unique donors now than at the same stage of his run for the White House four years ago. 

• The findings, from a Financial Times analysis of federal campaign data, raise new questions about how the former president’s shrunken base will sustain him through costly court cases and what is expected to be the most expensive presidential race ever. 

• The Trump campaign and affiliated political action committees have attracted roughly 900,000 donors from July 2023 through the first quarter of 2024, compared with 1.17mn donors in the equivalent period of the 2020 race, according to the FT’s analysis of federal data. 

• President Biden has also opened up a massive fundraising advantage, the data shows, raising $165mn over the first three months of the year — $75mn more than pro-Trump groups, which raised just under $90mn.

   

The Washington Post - Regine Cabato and Rebecca Tan / Philippines plans ambitious exercise with U.S. as concerns over China grow
 

• The Philippines and the United States are preparing to hold their most ambitious joint military exercise yet next week as tensions between the Philippines and China escalate in the South China Sea, according to more than a dozen officials. 

• For the first time since the annual exercise started in 1991, the Philippines and the United States will conduct joint naval drills beyond the 12 nautical miles of the Philippines’ territorial waters, in parts of open sea claimed by China, officials said. More than 16,000 soldiers from the two militaries will operate out of a joint command center to perform four major activities with a focus on countering maritime and air attacks. 

• Officials said in interviews that in one operation, troops will simultaneously secure two islands along the western and northern coasts of the Philippines before transporting High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, or HIMARS, onto the islands for live-firing exercises. 

• In another operation, Philippine naval vessels will debut a newly procured ship-based missile system, working with U.S. Air Force squadrons to strike and sink a decommissioned ship, said officials.

Our opinion reads for today:
 

• Financial Times - John Paul Rathbone and Mehul Srivastava / Ukraine’s air defence struggle shows risks to Israel 
• Project Syndicate - Dani Rodrik / America’s Manufacturing Renaissance Will Create Few Good Jobs