Plus: Supreme Court Begins Opinion Season With Anti-Straight Discrimination Case; Mo News At Walmart HQ

Good afternoon,

The NBA Finals kick off tonight between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers as basketball fans across the country tune in for the culmination of the 2025 season.

How to watch: OKC will host the Pacers tonight at the Paycom Center with an 8:30 pm ET tip-off on ABC.

The Thunder have won 18 more games this season than the Pacers — the biggest difference for any Finals matchup in 44 years.

If you — like many of us here at Mo News — are more interested in international politics than the NBA, we are hosting a deep dive workshop on the Israel-Gaza conflict over on the Mo News Premium page tonight at 8 pm ET/5 pm PT. Sign up here!

Mo News Team

🚨 ONE IMPORTANT THING

Trump: Musk Has ‘Trump Derangement’ Syndrome After Leaving The White House — Musk Fires Back With Epstein Bombshell & Impeachment Calls

Well, that didn’t take long — the First Friendship between Elon Musk and President Donald Trump imploded Thursday, with the two lobbing insults at each other, with Musk responding “yes” to a post calling to impeach Trump.

From the Oval Office Thursday, Trump said he’s “very disappointed in Elon,” accusing Musk of having “Trump derangement syndrome,” flipping his support after leaving the White House (just over a week ago), and trashing Trump’s “big, beautiful” tax cut bill.

Musk fired back in real time on X:

And then…

INSIDE THE FIGHT
Trump claimed Musk’s recent public criticism of the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill Act’ — the sweeping tax cut, spending, and immigration enforcement bill the Senate is now revising after the House passed it before Memorial Day — stems from his rollback of Biden-era EV tax credits.

Musk, live tweeting on X during the president’s remarks, said “Keep the EV/solar incentive cuts in the bill, even though no oil & gas subsidies are touched (very unfair!!), but ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill.”
The billionaire, and former leader of DOGE, has issue with the the bill’s price tag, which the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates it will increase the federal deficit over the next decade by $2.4 trillion.

Musk also resurfaced Trump’s tweets from over a decade ago that criticized increasing the federal deficit.

He then said the president would not have won the election without his help and claimed the full Jeffrey Epstein files haven’t been released because Trump is named in them and called for Trump to be impeached and replaced by Vice President JD Vance.

Musk also said that he is going to end the SpaceX Dragon program.

The Dragon Spacecraft have been relied upon for years to keep the International Space Station Supplied and operating. Ending the program means the International Space Station will need to depend on Russia.

Check out the Mo News IG for the latest and how we have DJed this break in IG stories. 🎶

🚨 ONE IMPORTANT THING

Supreme Court Sides Unanimously With Woman Alleging Reverse Sexual Orientation Discrimination

The Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously ruled that an Ohio woman can pursue her claim of being discriminated against at work for being straight — easing the path for some reverse discrimination cases.

The justices’ decision affects lawsuits in 20 states and the District of Columbia, where courts had previously set a higher bar for members of majority groups — such as those who are male, white, or straight — to sue for discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.

INTO THE DECISION
Lower courts had ruled that people in those groups needed to show “background circumstances” that demonstrate a pattern of discrimination. Today’s ruling means that group no longer will need to show those circumstances.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, one of three liberal justices on the court, wrote the opinion of the court, siding with the Ohio woman Marlean Ames who argued that it was unconstitutional to have different standards for different groups of people.
- “Congress left no room for courts to impose special requirements on majority-group plaintiffs alone,” Jackson wrote.
- Conservative Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a concurring opinion that some of the country’s “largest and most prestigious employers have overtly discriminated against those they deem members of so-called majority groups.”

Ames asked the Supreme Court to revive her discrimination case after lower courts said she didn’t meet the higher burden of proof.
- She claimed the Ohio Department of Youth Services denied her a promotion and demoted her because she’s straight. The Supreme Court revived her case but didn’t rule on whether discrimination occurred.

Larger trend at play: In 2023, the Court struck down race-conscious affirmative action in college admissions. Since then, President Trump has ordered an end to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives in the federal government and vowed to target universities that implement such programs. This ruling could empower opponents of DEI initiatives to bring more legal challenges.

HEADS UP
June is when the biggest opinions of the Supreme Court’s nine-month term, which began in October, start to come out. About half of the Court’s 62 merits-based cases — those that rule on the legal principles at stake — have yet to be released.

In the coming weeks, we’re watching for rulings on whether judges can block Trump’s birthright citizenship order nationwide, the constitutionality of Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming care for minors, and a case weighing religious rights against public school policies over LGBTQ-themed books.

These rulings come as the Court has faced an unprecedented number of emergency actions this term as federal judges have regularly blocked President Trump’s executive orders. These emergency decisions — known as the “shadow docket” — can be issued at any time and have disrupted the Court’s normal calendar. In contrast, merits decisions are released on a regular schedule at 10 a.m. on opinion days.

🚨 ONE BUSINESS THING

Mo News Exclusive: How Walmart Is Navigating Trump’s Tariffs And AI Innovations

Walmart, the largest private employer in the world, does not want to be your “grandparents' Walmart anymore."

That’s what Walmart Executive Vice President Dan Bartlett told Mo News this week at the companies annual shareholders meeting in Bentonville, Arkansas. Walmart calls it “Associate’s Week” as they brings more than 5,000 Walmart employees from around the world to the company’s headquarters as the retail giant showcases its plans for the future.

THE WALMART PULL
90% of Americans live within 10 miles of a Walmart store. If Walmart were a country, its GDP-equivalent would almost put it in the G20. And, given its reach, ti has a pretty good gauge for consumer sentiment and the economy.

"If something is happening in America, there's a good chance it's happening at a Walmart or in a Walmart parking lot. We are really a mirror of society,” Bartlett said.

And with massive changes happening in technology and politics — especially around Trump’s tariffs — the company is trying to stay ahead.

WHERE WALMART IS HEADED
Bartlett said the company is doing everything it can to shield customers from tariff increases, but it says it is being forced to raise some prices. The company avoids weighing in on President Trump’s policies because Walmart serves both Republicans and Democrats, Bartlett said.

Some items, like bananas (Walmart’s top seller), are unavoidable imports. New 10% tariffs on those goods make it harder — but Bartlett says two-thirds of Walmart’s U.S. inventory is still made, grown, or assembled in America.

On technology, Walmart is preparing for a future where shopping becomes nearly automatic. The company is developing “Sparky” an AI assistant that will anticipate customer needs, manage household inventory, and even coordinate drone or in-home delivery.

It comes as the company’s aims to grow sales by 4% annually without significantly increasing its U.S. workforce — a trend toward e-commerce and automation that raises questions about the future of retail labor, which employs 1 in 10 American workers.

“If you look back in history, anytime there’s been massive innovation, there’s also been disruption. It’s the responsibility of both elected officials and companies to make sure employees are given the tools and opportunities to grow — through training, upskilling, and career development. We’re investing significant time and resources into that, including offering tuition-free education and other support,” Bartlett said, emphasizing Walmart anticipates having roughly the same number of employees in five years — but doing different jobs.

Listen to the full conversation with Dan Bartlett on the Mo News Premium Podcast — including reflections on AI, tariffs, global leadership, and the best career advice he ever got from his old boss, President George W. Bush. Join Mo News Premium today!

⏳ SPEED READ

🚨NATION

Trump announces travel ban on 12 countries (MO NEWS)
Supreme Court blocks Mexico’s suit against U.S. gunmakers (MO NEWS)
Trump, China's Xi discussed trade deal in long-awaited call (ABC)
A Massachusetts student arrested by ICE on his way to volleyball practice has been released (AP)
Biden dismisses Trump inquiry into his cognitive decline as a ‘distraction’ (GUARDIAN)

🌎 AROUND THE WORLD

Israeli military recovers two hostages' bodies in southern Gaza (BBC)
Russian strike kills 5 in Ukraine, including a 1-year-old, hours after Trump-Putin call (AP)
Japan’s annual births fall to record low as population emergency deepens (CNN)
New Zealand MPs who performed haka in parliament given record suspensions (GUARDIAN)

📱BUSINESS, SCIENCE & TECH

Credit card company launches TV commercial made with artificial intelligence (MO NEWS)
Canadian wildfire smoke continues to worsen air quality in several US states (ABC)
Procter & Gamble slashing up to 7,000 jobs amid restructuring effort (FOX)
Breakthrough in search for HIV cure leaves researchers ‘overwhelmed’ (GUARDIAN)

🎬 SPORTS & ENTERTAINMENT

Diddy’s ex-girlfriend testifies under pseudonym in rapper’s sex trafficking trial (FOX)
Nintendo Switch 2 draws long lines and excited gamers (NBC)
Harry Potter star Tom Felton to reprise role as Draco Malfoy on Broadway (BBC)
New York City production of A Chorus Line announced, and then cancelled (THEATERMANIA)
Aaron Rodgers plans to sign with Steelers, sources say (ESPN)

ICYMI FROM THE 📲

n case you missed it… Historian and author Yuval Noah Harari believes humans in their current form won’t exist in 1,000 years.

On MSNBC Tuesday, Harari said that humans “absolutely won’t be around” in 1,000 years in their current form due to climate change, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology.

Instead, he suspects future human beings will be of a different species similar to how today’s humans are different from Neanderthals or chimpanzees. Something to think about…