The internal politics at the Washington Post are almost as dramatic as those in the corridors of power that the newspaper covers. Uncertainty about the future of the money-losing, Bezos-owned publication intensified yesterday when staff were notified that British media veteran Robert Winnett, who was hired to lead its newsroom, will not be joining the company after all.

Winnett’s decision to stay in the UK came after WaPo reporters dug up allegations that their incoming boss had engaged in ethically murky (at least by American media standards) news-gathering earlier in his career in London.

• Winnett was hired to be WaPo’s executive editor by his former colleague and fellow Brit Will Lewis, who himself was recently brought on as CEO and tasked with guiding the Post back to profitability.
• But shortly after Lewis took the reins at the newspaper that broke Watergate, he may have attempted to kill a story about his alleged role in covering up the British phone tapping scandal and later possibly pressured subordinates not to cover the topic.

The controversy has angered and demoralized staff at a time when many WaPo staffers are busy covering the race for another top job: the US presidency.

How did we get here?

Like many news brands, the Washington Post is in dire straits. It’s lost half of its readership since 2020 and ended last year $77 million in the red. Lewis is attempting a major overhaul involving the creation of an additional newsroom tasked with producing content for social media aimed at “untapped audiences,” per the Wall Street Journal.

The search for a new executive editor began three weeks ago, after Sally Buzbee left the position, dissatisfied with an impending demotion in the newsroom shake-up.

What does Bezos think? The paper’s billionaire owner briefly weighed in on the situation from his Mediterranean yacht vacation earlier this week, emailing staff to say he supported Lewis’s course and expects WaPo to maintain its high standards.

The British are coming: Though Winnett is staying put, many American media companies are bringing on editors and executives from across the pond for their reputed ability to deftly navigate rough waters with limited resources.—SK

Micro-EVs are being hailed as the “next big thing” in urban transportation, with McKinsey projecting a whopping $470b market. That’s just one of many reasons why 3,700+ investors have invested in Eli Electric Vehicles.

Eli’s award-winning EVs are 70% smaller than sedans and twice as energy efficient as regular EVs. Hundreds of these micro-EVs have already been sold in Europe, and they’re now gearing up to launch in the US this year.

If you missed out on investing in Tesla while it was private, now there’s a chance to invest in “the Tesla of micro-EVs” by joining Eli’s latest private raise.

Only five days remain to invest in Eli’s current round before it closes on June 27.

SCOTUS upholds ban on domestic abusers owning guns. In an 8–1 decision, the Supreme Court refused to strike down a federal law barring people with restraining orders against them for domestic violence from having firearms (Clarence Thomas dissented). Under the Second Amendment, the government is still allowed “to disarm individuals who present a credible threat to the physical safety of others,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the majority. The ruling contrasts with other recent ones expanding gun rights, and it limits a 2022 decision requiring laws restricting guns to have a historical analogue, which led to many new legal challenges.

The FDA approved its first menthol-flavored vapes. The FDA authorized the sale of four menthol-flavored e-cigarette products from Njoy (a brand owned by tobacco giant Altria). It’s the first time the agency has signed off on menthol vaping cartridges, having previously banned several menthol and other flavored products over concerns about their appeal to teens. But in approving the Njoy products, the agency acknowledged the health benefits for adults of flavored vapes over traditional tobacco cigarettes.

Regulators are not impressed by big banks’ living wills. Since being too big to fail is not considered enough of a plan, regulators have required big banks to have wind-down procedures in place since 2008, and the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. are not happy with the latest ones several banks submitted. Regulators said the living wills drafted by Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and Bank of America all had weaknesses that called into question whether they could be implemented in a crisis, especially in terms of dealing with their ample derivatives portfolios. The banks will have to address the issues in their 2025 submissions.

The contest for the Oval Office is heating up in the friends-in-high-places department: Campaign financial disclosures for May were filed this week, revealing a power hour of a fundraising month.

Some of the biggest spenders were:

• Investor/banking scion Timothy Mellon, who gave $50 million—this election cycle’s largest donation yet—to Donald Trump’s allied super PAC the day after the former president’s felony conviction.
• Former NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who donated about $20 million to President Joe Biden’s campaign and a joint Biden–DNC fundraising committee.

Trump and the RNC outraised Biden and the DNC last month for the first time this year, logging $141 million in May gifts to Biden & co.’s $85 million. The MAGA super PAC also raised $68 million, compared to the Biden-allied super PAC’s $39.5 million. The current president’s war chest is a record $212 million, and the former president’s pile is $170+ million, per the New York Times.

Other friends of Don include…the Winklevoss twins. They donated $1 million worth of bitcoin each, but the amounts were just refunded for exceeding fundraising limits (which don’t apply to gifts made to super PACs). Blackstone CEO Stephen A. Schwarzman, Las Vegas magnate Miriam Adelson, and several oil and shipping execs are also on the former president’s side.

Support for Joe also came from…hedge fund manager George Soros’s PAC, designer Tom Ford, a Zillow co-founder, and the owner of the Atlanta Falcons. And Thursday, Melinda French Gates made her first-ever political endorsement when she announced that she’s backing Biden (potential donation TBA).—ML

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No one’s more booked and busy this summer than Europe with the Eras Tour, the Euros, and the upcoming Olympics. But the Continent’s economic boom owes its biggest thanks to Steve from Milwaukee downing gallons of port in Lisbon.

You might feel the deja vu of your friends posting “Florence reccs???” every June, but this summer, an unprecedented number of Americans really are taking a European vacation. Europe expects to host a record number of tourists from the US, thanks to a strong dollar. American tourists are targeting southern Europe in particular, putting some countries’ post-lockdown rebound in hyperdrive.

• Italy, Spain, Greece, and Portugal brought in nearly a third of the EU’s total international tourism dollars last year, which equates to $500+ billion.
• Portugal specifically has seen a massive influx of US tourists, driving tax revenue up 20% last year in the capital city of Lisbon.

It’s not all wine windows and sunny beaches. Tourist dollars can be fickle and give policymakers tunnel vision. The cost of living for residents has skyrocketed in places like Lisbon, while overcrowded destinations like Venice have implemented anti-tourism fees, and locals in Spain’s Balearic and Canary Islands protested visitors.—MM

Get ready to forswear a whole lot of avocado toast because housing prices just hit a record high. Last month, the median price for an existing home in the US rose to $419,300, the highest it’s been since the National Association of Realtors started keeping track in 1999. Those price tags, coupled with sky-high mortgage rates, weren’t good for home sales: Sales of previously owned homes are at a 30-year low and don’t seem to be picking up in what’s usually the busy season. Prices are staying high despite falling sales in part because there isn’t much available on the market. That means if more homeowners start selling, price growth may slow down and then perhaps you can finally have your brunch and own your place, too.