Plus: Trump blames vandalism for Reflecting Pool algae ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

Richard Hall | June 23, 2026

Hello there! Welcome to The Brief’s new redesign. We would love to hear your thoughts: thebrief.

Today, we have coverage from our London bureau of what comes next after the resignation of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, as well as the latest in the saga of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, the Iran deal, and a look at the differing fortunes of right-wing parties in Europe and Latin America.

Make sure you scroll to the bottom to play our new word game, Linked. Today’s starting words are “mouse” and “bass.” Let us know how you get on!

Five Must-Reads

Vice President JD Vance declared in Switzerland that the U.S. “laid a successful foundation” in the first phase of peace talks with Iran, but a skeptical Congress is questioning whether the agreement being negotiated is worth pursuing at all. —TIME

The Trump Administration is seeking to raise the price tag for immigrants applying to become naturalized U.S. citizens by hundreds of dollars. A proposed rule from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would increase the cost by 75%, from $760 to $1,330, and the cost of submitting the form online would increase by 80%, from $710 to $1,280. —TIME

President Donald Trump blamed vandalism for persistent issues with the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, which reopened on June 6 after more than $16 million in renovations to make the pool appear “American flag blue.” The pool’s new blue paint appeared to be peeling off less than two weeks after its completion, and it has been plagued by an algae bloom that has given the water a green tint. —TIME

Prime Minister Keir Starmer resigned on Monday, clearing the way for Britain to get its seventh leader in 10 years. Andy Burnham, the newly sworn-in Member of Parliament for Makerfield, is set to replace him. Analysts tell TIME he is on course for a coronation, not a competition. —TIME

Artificial intelligence may be able to spot health problems in electrocardiograms that humans miss. A clinical trial evaluating the effectiveness of AI in diagnosing heart issues at NewYork-Presbyterian likely saved the life of at least one patient. —New York Times

IN FOCUS

The right rises in Latin America, and stumbles in Europe

In the United Kingdom, a comprehensive election victory by a Prime Minister-in-waiting may have put the brakes on a rising nationalist wave. In Colombia, just days later, right-wing nationalist Abelardo de la Espriella emerged as the narrow victor in the country’s presidential election.

The two elections, on opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean, provide a snapshot of the shifting fortunes of the global right.

Latin America has seen a wave of conservatives elected to power in the past year, in Chile, Honduras, Costa Rica, and now Colombia. Rising crime rates and immigration have fueled a backlash from voters, who have trended toward electing leaders promising strong-arm tactics over longer-term approaches favored by progressives.

They have also been boosted in some cases by the Trump Administration, which has shown a renewed interest in backing its ideological kin to the south.

“They’re very much aligned with Trump in terms of going after the left-wing radicals in their countries, and issues around security and migration, which becomes sort of the rallying point for a lot of these candidates,” Enrique Roig, vice president of the nonprofit Human Rights First and a former State Department official, tells TIME.

Andy Burnham with colleagues from the Parliamentary Labour Party at the Houses of Parliament in London, as he returns to the House of Commons to take up his seat after winning the Makerfield by-election, Monday June 22, 2026. YUI MOK/ASSOCIATED PRESS

In Europe, a seemingly inevitable march of right-wing victories across the continent, fueled largely by anti-immigrant sentiment, has been interrupted in Hungary by the defeat of Viktor Orbán in April, the failure of Giorgia Meloni’s flagship reforms in Italy in March, and now in the U.K.

Andy Burnham, who is now likely to replace Starmer as Prime Minister, won a convincing victory against Nigel Farage’s ascendant Reform UK, which swept local and regional elections in May.

Burnham came away with a majority almost twice that of his predecessor in the Makerfield by-election, about 20% ahead of Reform. The anti-immigrant Reform won more than half the vote there in May, and over performed across the North as a whole. The former mayor of Greater Manchester chose thedistrict as the location of his return to Parliament to show he could defeat the party in a general election.

E.J. Dionne, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, noted it was the third by-election in which voters in significant numbers cast tactical ballots to defeat Reform.

“What’s becoming clear in Britain is that while the nationalist right has built a solid quarter of the vote, a majority rejects the far right,” he tells TIME. “This shouldn’t be over-generalized across Europe…but there does seem to be a hard ceiling on the nationalist right’s support.”

Dionne adds that an anti-Trump backlash and a decline in immigration may be dimming the appeal of the hard right in Europe, but says that the normalization of its politics in France and Germany suggests it “remains a threat.”

ONE NUMBER

210

The death toll from the U.S. bombing campaign against suspected drug smuggling boats in the eastern Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea has risen to more than 210 since it began in early September, according to a tally by the Associated Press.

The U.S. military announced on Sunday night that it had carried out a strike against “a vessel operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations.” Two people were killed and there were six survivors, it said.

The strike comes as U.S. lawmakers have continued to press for the release of the unedited video of one of the first strikes of the campaign, following reports that survivors from the attack were killed in follow-up strikes.

Experts have said the Trump Administration’s justification for bombing the suspected cartel boats is legally questionable.

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS

A VIRAL MOMENT

Burnham’s sealed train

The normally staid BBC dispatched helicopters to follow Andy Burnham as he traveled by train from Greater Manchester to London following his by-election win, ending his exile from national politics.

More than one commentator jokingly compared the pomp of the occasion to the eight-day 1917 train journey of Vladimir Lenin returning from his own exile in Switzerland to Petrograd, after which, came a revolution.