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Darline Graham, Lindsey Graham’s sister, sworn in to serve remainder of his Senate term

2026-07-14T18:37:58.539Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/14/politics/darline-graham-lindsey-graham-senate

Darline Graham, the late Sen. Lindsey Graham’s younger sister, was sworn into the Senate on Tuesday to serve out the remainder of her brother’s term after his sudden death over the weekend.

She was appointed to the seat by South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster and will remain in the Senate until January 2027. Graham is the first woman to represent South Carolina in the Senate. As she serves out the remainder of her brother’s term, a special primary election will take place August 11 to replace the late Republican lawmaker in November’s general election to determine who will next hold the seat for the upcoming six-year term.

Asked by CNN how she is doing and what the moment is like for her, Graham said, “Hanging in there, appreciate you being here,” as she left the Senate floor following her official swearing in.

Graham, 62, has not previously held elected office but has a long history of public service in the state of South Carolina. She has served as a commissioner for the South Carolina Commission for the Blind and has long worked with people with disabilities.

After their parents died within 15 months of each other, she became orphaned at age 13 in 1976. Lindsey Graham — the first in his family to attend college, and a member of the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps — became his sister’s legal guardian.

The siblings were close their entire lives, Darline Graham told CNN’s Dana Bash in a 2015 interview after her brother launched his bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. “Even when my parents were alive, they worked really long, hard hours running a small business. So even then, he was a caregiver to me,” she said.

Lindsey Graham, a longtime Republican from South Carolina and ally of President Donald Trump, died following an aortic dissection, according to a preliminary finding from the Washington, DC, medical examiner. He was 71.

Throughout US history, governors have at times chosen family members to take over Senate seats for their loved ones, frequently with a spouse picked to step in. Former Vice President Hubert Humphrey’s wife is one example; Muriel Humphrey filled her husband’s Senate seat after he passed away, as did Hattie Caraway after her husband died in office in 1931. Caraway went on to become the first woman elected to the Senate in her own right in 1932.

Lincoln Chafee was appointed to fill his father’s Rhode Island Senate seat. Sen. Lisa Murkowski was appointed by her own father to take over his Senate seat after he became Alaska’s governor in 2002 — a controversial decision at the time.

The Senate chamber during Graham’s swearing in on Tuesday was a testament to the respect her new colleagues held for her late brother. Almost every Republican seat was filled, and many Democrats attended as well. Jared Kushner and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, both of whom had worked with the late Sen. Graham on international issues, sat in the galleries. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a longtime colleague of Lindsey Graham, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, a fellow South Carolinian, joined senators on the floor during the ceremony. Several House members from South Carolina also attended, including GOP Reps. Ralph Norman and Joe Wilson as well as Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer spoke with Darline Graham just before the ceremony, and GOP Sens. Katie Britt and Tim Scott escorted her to the dais, where Sen. Chuck Grassley administered her oath of office. Graham’s family in the gallery was emotional, as was Sen. Joni Ernst, who held tissues in her hand. The chamber rose to a standing ovation after the oath was administered, and Britt and Scott led Graham to her late brother’s desk. Scott placed the Bible Graham had used during her swearing in on the desk, resting his hand on it for a moment.

After Senate GOP Leader John Thune and Senate GOP Whip John Barrasso had shaken Graham’s hand, other senators crowded around to introduce themselves and say hello. They eventually formed two lines, with Graham alternating between each to greet her new colleagues. As the Senate began voting on advancing the annual defense policy package, senators were still taking turns to speak with her.

This story has been updated with additional details.

CNN’s Eric Bradner contributed to this report

House GOP leaders break logjam on the floor after conservative revolt

July 14, 2026 / 3:24 PM EDT / CBS News

By Caitlin Yilek Politics Reporter
Caitlin Yilek is a politics reporter at CBSNews.com, based in Washington, D.C. She previously worked for the Washington Examiner and The Hill, and was a member of the 2022 Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellowship with the National Press Foundation.

Read Full Bio

Washington — The House on Tuesday finally broke an impasse that had stalled most legislative action on the floor as GOP holdouts sought to leverage their votes to force the Senate to act on President Trump’s top priority, the SAVE America Act.

The Senate’s inability to pass the controversial voting and elections bill has frustrated Mr. Trump and hardliners in the House, who have held up other GOP priorities in response. The SAVE America Act would require proof of citizenship documentation to register to vote in federal elections and photo ID requirements to vote, among other restrictions.

Most holdouts relented on Tuesday, allowing a party-line procedural vote to move forward. The vote tees up debate and final votes on a handful of bills, including an annual appropriations bill to fund the State Department. House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, plans to attach the SAVE America Act to that legislation before sending it to the Senate.

Last month, hardliners blocked a similar plan from Johnson, which would have merged the elections bill with the annual defense policy bill, known as the National Defense Authorization Act, before it went to the Senate.

GOP Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, who has led the charge in the lower chamber for the SAVE America Act, said Monday that she would go along with Johnson’s latest plan, as long as the elections bill is attached to “all the appropriation bills and all must-pass bills.”

“If John Thune strips it out in the Senate that will be on him and the entire country should be watching what he does,” she said.

The House GOP’s gambit to force the Senate to pass the elections bill is certain to be dead on arrival across the Capitol, where the SAVE America Act lacks even a simple majority of support. Since 2024, the House has passed three versions of the bill, and all have stalled in the upper chamber.

Though Johnson appeased conservatives on the SAVE America Act, he also faced obstacles with members who are pushing for a vote on a border crackdown bill, which passed the House in 2023 but never got a vote in the Senate.

GOP leaders held open the first vote of the day for about an hour as Johnson and hardliners engaged in a heated discussion on the floor as the speaker tried to shore up support on the subsequent vote that would unlock the gridlock.

GOP Rep. Chip Roy of Texas declined to give specifics about what Johnson agreed to on border security to sway him and other conservatives to advance the procedural measure.

“We made progress on the areas that I’ve been public about on border security, birthright, other issues,” he said. “We’re moving a bill next week in some form or fashion.”

“It was enough to say we’ll move forward in good faith,” Roy said.

House leaders have repeatedly had to cancel votes as they navigate a narrow majority, which gives more power to rank-and-file members to stall legislative business until their demands are met. The chaos has left the lower chamber with little time to work through other legislative priorities ahead of its five-week recess, which begins at the end of next week.

“We have a dysfunctional House,” GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska said. “The Republicans are the minority in the House right now. We have about 10, 20 people who are potentially their own party. They maybe caucus with Republicans, but more often than not, they vote against Republicans.”

Trump’s plan to make daylight saving time permanent to get a vote in House

July 14, 2026 at 2:40 p.m. EDT / The Washington Post

The bipartisan Sunshine Protection Act would end the practice of switching clocks twice per year.

Sunlight falls on the U.S. Capitol. (Al Drago/Reuters)

By Anna Liss-Roy and Dan Diamond

The House could vote Tuesday to end Americans’ practice of switching their clocks twice per year, delivering a win for President Donald Trump, who has called for permanent daylight saving time over the objections of medical groups and lawmakers who represent Midwestern states.

Lawmakers seek to counter China, Iran repression tactics on US soil

2026-07-14T18:24:25.8Z / Reuters

Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA) speaks during a rally in support of congressional candidate Connie Chan in San Francisco, California, U.S., May 29, 2026. REUTERS/Manuel Orbegozo Purchase Licensing Rights

• Summary

• Bill would add up to 10 years to prison sentences for convicted offenders
• Measure would give federal law a first definition of transnational repression
• Senate staffers said China’s ethnic unity law directly prompted the bill

WASHINGTON, July 14 (Reuters) – U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday introduced a bipartisan bill to increase penalties for foreign ‌government agents who threaten people on U.S. soil, a move aimed at countering the rise of what officials call “transnational repression” by countries such as China and Iran.

The bill, put forward by Democratic Senator Adam Schiff and Republican Senator John Curtis, comes after ​China’s ethnic unity law went into effect on July 1, establishing what Beijing says is its right ​to target certain critics beyond its borders.

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That Chinese measure was a direct factor in ⁠the introduction of the “Stop Transnational Repression Act,” Senate staffers told Reuters.

Should it become U.S. law, it would ​for the first time give a federal definition for such crimes and increase potential prison sentences for convicted ​individuals by up to an additional 10 years.

“This is a bipartisan effort to counter a national threat that reports show is only expanding in scope, with new and brazen efforts by countries like China trying to expand its intimidation of those not ​in lock step with the regime,” Schiff said.

Curtis called transnational repression “an attack on both our sovereignty and ​our freedoms.”

Some Chinese communities in the U.S. who oppose China’s ruling Communist Party, as well as pro-democracy activists and supporters of Taiwan, ‌Tibetan ⁠and Uyghur causes, have complained that Beijing sends agents and others to harass, spy on and intimidate them.

China says accusations that it conducts such operations are baseless. Its embassy in Washington did not respond immediately to a request for comment on the legislation.

The bill defines transnational repression, in part, as any effort by a ​foreign state’s agent or proxy “to ​harass, coerce, or threaten ⁠a person, including by force or reasonable fear of death.” Codifying the term under U.S. law will serve as a “heightened deterrent for foreign actors,” it says.

Human rights ​non-profit Freedom House says that China is behind most documented cases of such ​repression globally, with ⁠319 stemming from the country since 2014.

A New York man was found guilty in May of acting as an unregistered agent of the Chinese government after federal prosecutors alleged that he operated a “secret police station” on behalf of ⁠Beijing ​in Manhattan.

Separately, two men were
sentenced this year
to 10 years and ​15 years in prison for what the Justice Department said was a plot directed by Iran’s government to stalk and kill an Iranian-American ​human rights activist.

Reporting by Michael Martina; Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Don Durfee and Sanjeev Miglani

Darline Graham Nordone, Lindsey Graham’s sister, sworn in to succeed him

July 14, 2026 at 3:05 p.m. EDT / The Washington Post

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) on Monday appointed Graham Nordone to serve the final six months of her brother’s term.

Darline Graham Nordone, left, arrives to be sworn in to the Senate with Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota). (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

By Theodoric Meyer

Darline Graham Nordone, the sister of the late senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina), was sworn in to succeed him on Tuesday, filling the vacancy created by Graham’s unexpected death on Saturday.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) on Monday appointed Graham Nordone to serve the final six months of her brother’s term. President Donald Trump had also endorsed the idea.

“It is such a privilege to get to finish some of his important work, and I promise to work hard over the next several months to support the president and carry forward the efforts of my brother on behalf of the citizens of South Carolina and the United States,” Graham Nordone said Monday.

Graham Nordone, 62, is the first woman to represent South Carolina in the Senate. She has not said whether she will run for a full term. The filing period for the Aug. 11 special primary election opens July 21.

Senators in both parties lined up on the Senate floor after she was sworn in to talk to her and shake hands.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) said Tuesday that Republicans would figure out Graham Nordone’s committee assignments after she was sworn in.

Bipartisan senators introduce Russia sanctions and tariff bill Lindsey Graham championed

July 14, 2026 / 3:29 PM EDT / CBS News

By Arden Farhi Washington bureau managing editor
Arden Farhi is the managing editor for CBS News’ Washington bureau. He has covered several presidential campaigns and the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations. His executive producer credits include “The Takeout with Major Garrett” and the CBS News original podcast “Agent of Betrayal,” and his work has been recognized with two Emmy Awards, a DuPont Award and a NY Festivals gold medal.

Read Full Bio

A bipartisan group of senators introduced a bill championed by Sen. Lindsey Graham that would impose sanctions on top Russian figures and heavy tariffs on the biggest buyers of Russian oil.

The “Sanctioning Russia Act of 2026” aims to squeeze Russian leaders in an effort to bring the Kremlin’s four-year war on Ukraine to an end. It would target Russia’s energy sector, a significant revenue source for its Ukraine war, by placing financial penalties on purchasers of those products. The White House has signaled its support for the bill, CBS News reported last week.

The text of the bill had been finalized before Graham met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last week in Kyiv, according to a Senate aide. Graham died suddenly Saturday shortly after he returned to the U.S.

“Passing this legislation right now would be a fitting tribute to Senator Graham’s fierce support for Ukraine’s freedom,” Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said in a statement Tuesday.

The measure would impose mandatory sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin, his top deputies, the Russian military, Russian banks and energy companies, foreign entities doing business with Russia and Russia’s shadow fleet of oil tankers.

It would block Americans from buying Russian debt or doing business with the Russian government or its energy sector.

Tariffs of up to 100% would be imposed on the top five purchasers of Russian oil, currently China, India, Slovakia, Hungary and Azerbaijan.

And the top five purchasers of Russian natural gas would also face tariffs: China, France, Belgium, Japan and Hungary. Countries whose natural gas purchases account for less than 15% of Russia’s total natural gas exports would be exempted.

Under the legislation, the U.S. would reevaluate the top five purchasers of Russian energy every 180 days. Lawmakers hope to push these countries to buy energy from alternate sources to increase financial pressure on Moscow.

The president would have the flexibility to exempt certain entities if he provides justification to Congress.

“Putin’s war against Ukraine has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, and it must end. Lindsey Graham believed that getting this legislation passed and signed into law would be the most consequential thing he achieved in his career,” GOP Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama said in a statement Tuesday.

By 1 p.m. Tuesday, 26 cosponsors supported the bill, and that number was expected to grow, Senate aides said.

GOP Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio, who traveled with Graham to Kyiv, said Sunday that he’s hopeful the Senate will soon pass the bill as “one of the legacies” of Graham, who died suddenly Saturday.

Republican Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas said in a post on X Sunday that he plans to introduce a House version of the Russia sanctions legislation this week, urging Congress to “pass it in his honor.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham’s final Kyiv visit

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/heres-what-lindsey-graham-told-margaret-brennan-about-his-ukraine-visit-one-day-before-his-death/

Here’s what Lindsey Graham told Margaret Brennan about his Ukraine visit one day before his death

(05:31)

Trump says Thursday address will focus on ‘free and fair elections’

2026-07-14T16:50:53.913Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/07/14/politics/trump-thursday-speech-elections

President Donald Trump plans to use part of a primetime speech Thursday to discuss new findings about the security of American elections, among other topics — setting up yet another high-profile opportunity for the president to dispute the results of the 2020 election he lost.

Speaking in the Oval Office two days ahead of the planned address, Trump affirmed the speech would focus on elections and a “couple of other things.”

Officials said the speech is still being finalized, but Trump was expected to discuss several topics. He’s still deeply mired in his conflict with Iran, with nightly strikes in the country as he seeks a path to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Even as that war appears to be restarting, however, Trump framed the elections portion of his Thursday speech as the centerpiece.

“It’s really, really big news, and our country has to shape up,” he said during a meeting with Iraq’s prime minister.

“It doesn’t get bigger, because without free and fair elections, you don’t have a country,” the president added. “We’ll be discussing other things too, but it’s going to be a very big announcement.”

Trump announced Thursday’s speech on social media on Monday, but did not specify a topic. He said it would begin at 9 p.m. ET. In interviews since then, he has been coy about what, specifically, he planned to discuss.

“It’s just going to be a speech, like a lot of my speeches,” he told radio host Hugh Hewitt shortly after the initial announcement.

Primetime presidential addresses are a rarity, and usually reserved for major updates intended to reach a wide audience. White House officials typically ask broadcast networks to preempt their usual programming; it wasn’t clear whether such a request had been made for Trump’s speech this week.

Election integrity has been a fixation of Trump’s for years. He has long insisted that irregularities marred the 2020 election, which Joe Biden won. And he’s repeatedly excoriated Congress for not passing his elections overhaul bill, which has stalled in the Senate, even refusing to sign a bipartisan measure to bring down the cost of housing as he pressured lawmakers to clear the elections legislation.

Both Republicans in Congress and White House staff have pushed Trump to focus more on affordability as the midterms approach but, as the upcoming speech illustrates, he’s adamant about continuing to talk about his perceived election issues.

The upcoming speech is just the latest example. Since retaking office last year, Trump has instructed his administration to use the vast resources of US spy agencies to either cast doubt on American elections or question the notion that foreign powers have meddled in them.

CIA Director John Ratcliffe last year declassified a memo that criticized spy agencies’ analytic work in concluding that Russia influenced the 2016 presidential election because it wanted Trump to win. Even so, the memo didn’t directly contradict any previous US intelligence.

Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s now-former director of national intelligence, was keenly focused on trying to support his false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Gabbard was present in Fulton County, Georgia, in January as FBI agents executed a search warrant related to the 2020 election — an extraordinary move for a spy chief.

Gabbard’s office also obtained voting machines from Puerto Rico and probed them for vulnerabilities, but the flaws they found were, by and large, old and known to the election community.

The use of intelligence resources to support Trump’s election lies hasn’t slowed with Gabbard’s departure last month.

Bill Pulte, the housing agency executive who replaced Gabbard on an acting basis, “may find out some things about the rigged elections … I think he wants to do it very much,” Trump told reporters last month.

Trump’s pick for a permanent director of national intelligence, US attorney and ex-SEC chairman Jay Clayton, faces a Senate confirmation hearing on Wednesday. Before the president tapped him for the job, Clayton echoed some of Trump’s election rhetoric when he commented on California’s election in June: “On the integrity side, we’re doing an absolutely terrible job, and the American people are right to question it,” Clayton told CNBC.

In his second term, Trump has also dismantled many of the government organizations set up in his first term to alert the public about foreign influence operations aimed at US elections. The Trump administration has accused those federal programs of censoring Americans and conducting domestic interference in US elections.

Trump aides have previously expressed concern that declassifying intelligence — even with the intent of inoculating the American public from foreign influence operations — could amount to meddling in US politics.

After Trump won the 2024 election, a planning document used by his transition team and reviewed by CNN said the Justice Department and the FBI should revisit how they communicate threats to the public, “e.g. in announcing indictments of foreign hackers or getting involved in threats to election security in partisan ways.”

This story has been updated with additional reporting and context.

Alejandra Jaramillo and Kaitlan Collins contributed to this report.

Johnson scores win as conservative rebels end House floor blockade over voter ID bill

July 14, 2026 2:43pm EDT / Fox News

Rep Anna Paulina Luna voted ‘yes’ after Johnson paired the Trump-backed SAVE America Act to the appropriations bill

By Adam Pack , Tyler Olson, Fox News

NEW You can now listen to Fox News articles!

House conservatives ended their weeks-long blockade of the House floor Tuesday, handing Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., a key victory after the rebellion brought legislative business to a standstill for nearly a month.

The House successfully passed a procedural vote 215-211, teeing up votes on an appropriations bill funding the State Department, legislation making daylight saving time permanent and a measure seeking to improve veterans’ benefits.

Johnson also agreed to pair the State Department funding bill with the SAVE America Act, prompting several conservative holdouts to flip their votes after demanding the House increase pressure on the Senate to pass the stalled measure.

Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla., was the lone Republican to oppose the rule, while all Democrats voted “no” during a party-line procedural vote.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., talks with reporters at the U.S. Capitol on June 10, 2026.(Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

The conservatives had blocked all major House legislation since late June in an effort to force GOP leaders to hold floor votes on the Trump-backed SAVE America Act and a sweeping border security bill.

Given House Republicans’ slim majority, Johnson could afford to spare just a handful of GOP defections.

The speaker has been under mounting pressure to get the House moving again and advance a backlog of legislation ahead of the November midterm elections.

GOP leaders are racing to draft the blueprint for a third “big, beautiful bill” in addition to clearing government funding bills before the Sept. 30 deadline and a potential supplemental package covering the price tag of the Iran war.

Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., who was among the GOP rebels who effectively shut down the chamber to pressure the Senate to pass the SAVE America Act, agreed to unlock the floor after Johnson proposed pairing the election measure with the State Department appropriations bill.

Johnson sought to attach the SAVE America Act to the House’s version of an annual defense policy bill before the July 4 recess, but Luna continued the blockade anyway.

“If John Thune strips it out in the Senate, that will be on him and the entire country should be watching what he does,” Luna wrote on social media Monday.

Chairwoman Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., attends a House Oversight Subcommittee hearing in the Rayburn building on June 30, 2026.(Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc. via Getty Images)

TRUMP TAKES UNUSUAL STEP, LETS BIPARTISAN HOUSING BILL BECOME LAW UNSIGNED AMID SAVE PRESSURE CAMPAIGN

Thune, who is supportive of the SAVE America Act, has repeatedly insisted that the votes do not exist in the upper chamber to pass the Trump-backed legislation amid unified opposition from Democrats.

That leaves House Republicans with little leverage to force Senate action on the SAVE America Act.

Some of the GOP holdouts had also threatened to oppose the rule unless House Republican leadership agreed to schedule a vote on a border security package.

Members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus are advocating for a vote on the Permanent Trump Secure Border Act, which would codify several Trump executive orders targeting illegal immigration, including and end to catch-and-release policies.

“We need to deliver on codifying border security, deal with the birthright citizenship issue,” Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, said. “These are all issues people that I represent care about intently and that we’ve talked about doing, and we need to deliver.”

In a potential sign of trouble for GOP leadership, some holdouts criticized Johnson’s planned legislative goals for the week.

“Making Daylight Saving Time permanent won’t matter at all if we don’t have election integrity,” Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, wrote on social media Monday, referring to the SAVE America Act. “Priorities.”

Self voted “yes” during the procedural vote.

The GOP rebels’ hardball tactics frustrated many House Republicans, who argued the strategy risked backfiring and paralyzing the conference’s legislative agenda.

Rep. Ralph Norman speaks to reporters as he leaves a House Republican Conference meeting at the Cannon House Office Building in Washington, D.C., on May 20, 2026.(Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

“There’s a small group of Republicans who are upset at the Senate, as I think all of us are,” Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., told Fox News Monday. “But I don’t know how … if you’re upset at the Senate, why do you take it out on the conservative Republican agenda in the House?”

But some conservatives argued the House should do whatever it takes to get the SAVE America Act to President Donald Trump’s desk.

Trump has repeatedly said the election integrity measure is his top legislative priority. He even refused to sign a bipartisan housing bill last week aiming to boost supply and lower costs in protest of the SAVE America Act.

“We shouldn’t vote on anything else unless it has the SAVE [America] Act, period,” Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., said Monday.

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“Ideally, the Senate ought to take it up every day and make them vote on it and do a talking filibuster and keep them up all night,” he continued. “That’s the best course of action. I don’t think they’ll do that.”

https://www.foxnews.com/video/6399634536112

US indicts Russians alleged to be at center of major cybercrime network

2026-07-14T16:53:14.383Z / CNN

The US Justice Department on Tuesday announced the indictment of three Russians who prosecutors say were at the center of a major cybercrime network that allegedly helped hackers target hospitals, schools and banks across the US, causing $62 million in damages.

The indictment targets one of the more brazen services provided by and for cybercriminals: so-called “bulletproof hosting” services, which lease internet infrastructure to hackers and claim to offer safe haven from law enforcement.

US prosecutors accused two Russian men, Aleksandr Volosovik and Kirill Zatolokin, of operating a bulletproof-hosting provider from a corporate office in St. Petersburg, Russia’s second largest city. A Russian woman, Yulia Pankova, is also charged in the criminal conspiracy. The charges include conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering.

The Russia-based company, Media Land, has supported numerous criminal groups who have claimed dozens of victims, the Justice Department alleged. The company was incorporated in 2015, according to Russian business records, and is based in a semi-industrial part of St. Petersburg. The State Department is now offering up to $10 million for information on the company and its executives as the US government investigation into Media Land continues.

CNN has requested comment from an email address associated with Media Land.

US and European law enforcement have tracked Volosovik, Zatolokin and Pankova for years. When the US Treasury Department sanctioned them last year, it released a photo of Zatolokin holding a weapon and wearing a Media Land t-shirt.

“To this day, they are likely still shielding criminal activity,” Brett Leatherman, assistant director of the FBI’s cyber division, told CNN, referring to Media Land.

The FBI will be watching to see if the crackdown on Media Land leads cybercriminals to seek out other bulletproof hosting services, Leatherman said.

“We’re looking for that now — to understand where those shifts may be and what opportunities are available to us in law enforcement and in the intelligence community to target those,” he added.

Michael DeBolt, president and chief intelligence officer at security firm Intel471, described bulletproof hosting providers as “fuel to the cybercrime underground.”

“Whether its deploying malware, hosting illicit marketplaces, launching ransomware or safeguarding stolen digital goods, Media Land’s impact should be measured by the years of criminal activity it has supported, enabled and sustained,” DeBolt told CNN.

The FBI, Secret Service and other law enforcement agencies have for years conducted operations to disrupt ransomware gangs, which extract hundreds of millions in ransoms annually from victims. While some officials in the Biden administration floated the idea of banning ransom payments, the idea was ultimately shelved because of the adverse impacts it might have on certain victims.

With Russia continuing to harbor the hackers, FBI agents are trying to chip away at the problem by targeting the ransomware groups’ computing tools, some of which are based outside of Russia.

The law enforcement operations have produced results: millions of dollars in cryptocurrency seized and prolific hackers arrested and extradited. But by other measures, the problem is getting more brazen and concerning. To augment their hacking, a Russian-speaking crime group has been hiring people to show up to major US law firms and plug-in USB sticks, CNN reported last month.

CNN has requested comment from the Russian embassy in Washington, DC.

Tuesday’s indictment is one of a raft of Western law enforcement and intelligence actions related to Russian criminal or state-sponsored hacking in the last week. The British government and European Union on Monday accused the Russian FSB intelligence service of trying to hack the Polish power grid last year in an attack that could have cut power for half a million people. For its part, Dutch intelligence accused Russian state-backed hackers of “systematically” breaching video cameras in Europe to surveil military transport routes and weapon deliveries to Ukraine.

Leatherman, the FBI official, said the US government continues to regularly warn about the Russian state-backed hacking because, after an initial lull following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, “we have seen, probably over the last year or so, an uptick in Russian cyber targeting of the United States.”

CNN’s Darya Tarasova contributed reporting.

Senate Democrats block must-pass defense policy bill over Iran war objections

2026-07-14 3:48 PM EDT / CBS News

Washington — Senate Democrats blocked a must-pass annual defense policy bill from moving forward on Tuesday as they voiced opposition to the Trump administration’s handling of the war with Iran.

“The NDAA, in my view, has become a referendum on the Iran war,” Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut told reporters Tuesday.

In a 50 to 46 vote, the Senate opposed an initial procedural vote to advance the National Defense Authorization Act. Senate Majority Leader John Thune voted against it a move that allows him to bring up the bill again.

Democrats have harshly criticized how the Trump administration has moved ahead in the Iran conflict without approval from Congress. The 1973 War Powers Resolution dictates that the president must report to Congress within 48 hours of deploying forces if lawmakers haven’t authorized a declaration of war, and caps any unauthorized engagement at 60 days. But the Trump administration has maintained that hostilities “terminated” in April, until they began again in recent days.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized the timing of the vote to proceed to the NDAA, noting that the White House formally notified Congress on Monday that hostilities have resumed in Iran.

“Yet Republicans want the Senate to take up the NDAA, the defense bill, as though none of this is happening?” Schumer said ahead of the vote. “As though Congress can debate the nation’s central national security bill while ignoring the nation’s most urgent national security crisis? We cannot. I will be voting no.”

The New York Democrat railed against President Trump for “waging an unauthorized war, defying bipartisan majorities in Congress, refusing to level with the American people about the cost, the mission, or the end game.”

“The NDAA cannot become a permission slip for that recklessness that we see occurring in Iran,” he added. “Donald Trump does not get to drag the American people deeper into a war he cannot explain and does not know how to end, and then demand Congress look the other way.”

The NDAA sets lawmakers’ defense priorities and usually passes with broad bipartisan support. Thune urged Democrats to support the bill Tuesday morning, saying he was hopeful that the Senate could pass the bill soon and begin working with House and White House counterparts to get it over the finish line.

“Republicans are ready to go,” Thune said. “The question is, how will Democrats vote today?”

Thune said he saw “no reason” for Democrats to oppose, but he argued that “Democrats have allowed the politics of obstruction to determine so many of their actions for the last year and a half.”

“I certainly hope that Democrats won’t now put politics ahead of support for our men and women in uniform,” he said. “But that’s up to them.”

Thune praised the legislation for putting a “heavy emphasis on unmanned systems, especially drones and counterdrone measures,” along with continuing shipbuilding efforts “to strengthen our Naval fleet.” In terms of air power, Thune touted how it would “help ensure we maintain a force of at least 1,800 fighters,” while supporting the new B-21 long-range strategic bomber.

The South Dakota Republican highlighted in particular how the bill builds on efforts in last year’s NDAA to reform defense acquisition, including by allowing multi-year procurement contracts. He also touted the bill’s 3.6% pay raise for troops, along with other investments in education, housing, health care and childcare.

“Our colleagues on the Armed Services Committee have put forward a strong bill — a strong bill for our national security and for the men and women who defend our nation,” Thune said.

Trump reverses course on Hormuz tolls

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/trump-says-us-military-doesnt-need-to-be-in-iran-reverses-course-on-strait-of-hormuz-tolls/

Trump reverses course on Strait of Hormuz tolls, says U.S. military doesn’t need to be in Iran

(06:22)