President Trump's threat to bomb Iran's water supply would constitute his most dramatic breach of the laws and norms designed to protect civilians in wartime, Axios' Zachary Basu and Dave Lawler write.

• Why it matters: The Iran war is the biggest test of what Trump's contempt for "politically correct" war-fighting looks like in practice.

His administration has already signed off on Israeli assassinations of political leaders, threatened "no quarter" for enemy combatants, and initially rejected responsibility for a mass-casualty strike on an elementary school.

• But the U.S. has been almost exclusively targeting Iran's military and nuclear program up to now.
• The threat to hit civilian infrastructure shows how intent Trump is on finding ways to increase the pressure on Tehran, even if that means flouting the generally accepted principles of warfare.

🖼️ The big picture: Trump criticized the Geneva Conventions during his 2016 campaign, lamenting that soldiers were "afraid to fight." He vowed to bring back waterboarding and "a hell of a lot worse."

• Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, then a Fox News host, spent Trump's first term lobbying privately and on air to secure pardons for soldiers convicted of war crimes.

Zoom in: With the Iran war now entering its second month, Trump threatened yesterday to "completely [obliterate]" Iran's power plants, oil wells and "possibly all desalinization plants" if a deal isn't reached soon.

• Like other countries in the severely water-stressed region, Iran relies heavily on desalinated water.
• A senior U.S. official told Axios the idea was to use strikes to pressure Iran to negotiate: "The Iranians want this to stop, too. Don't be mistaken. Their economy is broken. A couple of sorties, they will have no power. A couple of Israeli sorties, they will have no water. There is a lot to lose if there's no accommodation. Everyone will have to give, but we can get there."
• The official cautioned that Trump has made no decision, and "he wants to make sure that things are proportionate in this war."

👓 Between the lines: International humanitarian law explicitly prohibits attacks on objects indispensable to civilian survival, including drinking water installations. Power plants, by contrast, can be deemed lawful targets if they serve a military purpose.

• Trump stated his intent plainly, writing that the strikes would be "in retribution for our many soldiers" Iran has killed over the last 47 years.
• Reprisals against civilians — also known as collective punishment — are explicitly prohibited under the Geneva Conventions.

Keep reading.

HOUSTON — As nuclear energy deals pile up, executives face a huge challenge: How to build multiple plants quickly, Axios' Chuck McCutcheon writes.

• Why it matters: Nuclear is seen as critical to powering AI data centers, but the supply chains, workers and permits needed to build plants haven't kept pace.

🔮 At last week's CERAWeek energy conference, industry officials predicted that companies' willingness to try new approaches — particularly with AI — will speed things up.

• Nvidia and Microsoft are joining forces to use AI tools to streamline nuclear construction, using virtual replicas that let engineers test changes.
• Aalo Atomics says it cut permitting time by 92% using Microsoft's Generative AI for Permitting solution, saving about $80 million a year.

The goal is a "copy and paste" approach, said Aalo's Jon Guidroz. "We need to build this [nuclear] stuff the way server racks and data centers get built."

• Getting a qualified workforce fully up to speed to build many plants will take time, said Ross Ridenoure, Hadron Energy's chief nuclear officer.
• "There will be, I think, a shortage initially, until the training programs catch up with the demand," he told Axios.

The bottom line: Hyperscalers are bringing a much-needed sense of urgency, said TerraPower president and CEO Chris Levesque.

• Keep reading.

Capitalism has left some people behind, JPMorgan Chase chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon said on a new episode of "The Axios Show" out later this week — and he wants his bank to help create economic opportunities for as many of them as possible.

• Dimon tells Axios CEO Jim VandeHei: "I've been speaking about the fraying of the American dream for years. And I think you have to acknowledge that there's a flaw," especially for lower-income Americans.

🏦 The bank is launching an ambitious multiyear program today called the American Dream Initiative. The plan is to invest money and resources into small businesses, affordable housing and job training across the country.

• The program aims to support small businesses by unlocking more access to capital, coaching, and tools for tasks like payroll and invoicing.

Why it matters: Dimon is betting that juicing economic opportunity at the local level is not just good for business, but for the U.S. as a whole.

• "America's military strength is also predicated on economic strength," he said. "And that economic strength is somewhat predicated on life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness — and equal opportunity. So if you want to have an equal opportunity country, you need to do some of these things to give people more opportunity."

Watch the clip ... Read the announcement.

Heavy social media users are less likely to think democracy is the best form of government and more likely to stray from democratic norms, Axios' Avery Lotz writes from new polling by Gallup and the Charles F. Kettering Foundation.

• Among U.S. adults who don't use social media or use it for less than an hour a day, 72% and 73%, respectively, rank democracy as the best form of government.

The share slips to 57% among those who spend five or more hours a day on social media.

• Keep reading.

Rahm Emanuel wants to shift billions of dollars from building new ICE facilities to funding community colleges — arguing they'll become more critical as AI disrupts the job market.

• Why it matters: It's Emanuel's latest attempt to get ahead of other potential 2028 candidates with early policy proposals, especially on AI, tech and education.

Emanuel — former mayor of Chicago, White House chief of staff, House Democratic Caucus chair and U.S. ambassador to Japan — is proposing to take 20% of the $38.3 billion the Trump administration plans to spend on ICE detention centers and divert it to community colleges.

• "The priority for Americans should be education, not detention," Emanuel wrote.
• Emanuel, 66, will highlight the plan later this week on ABC's "The View" and with four college stops in South Carolina — historically a key state in the Democratic presidential primary.

🔬 Between the lines: Ahead of an expected 2028 White House run, Emanuel — who is out of office — has been rolling out a brisk cadence of policy proposals to try to frame the debate early.

• Emanuel has proposed banning social media for anyone under 16, blocking all federal employees and their family members from betting on prediction markets, and mandating that all federal officeholders across all three branches of government retire at age 75.
• Read Rahm's proposal ... Share this story.

🎒 First look: The Aspen Institute is convening a bipartisan group to study and shape the future of American education amid AI's workforce disruption, Axios' Colin Demarest reports.

• The Rising Generations Strategy Group will be led by former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo (D) and former Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.). Keep reading.

The U.S. has a key advantage in weathering the Iran war-triggered energy shock that was missing in previous episodes of overseas tumult: an economy that has become substantially less energy-intensive, Axios Macro co-author Neil Irwin writes.

• Why it matters: Higher prices at the gasoline pump, for jet fuel and for diesel will no doubt hurt. But both the average household and the economy as a whole have more capacity to weather the hit than in the past.

Over recent decades, the share of U.S. economic activity has increased in service industries that demand less energy. And the sectors that do require large-scale energy resources have become more efficient.

• Consider 1991, when the Persian Gulf War created an oil price shock that contributed to a recession that cost President George H.W. Bush his reelection. At the time, the U.S. used 6.1 million barrels of oil a day.
• Now, America uses 7.5 million barrels of oil a day. That's up 23% in 35 years. But GDP has risen by about 400% over that same span.

Keep reading.

Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a professor at the Yale School of Management who is one of the nation's premier CEO whisperers, is out today with "Trump's Ten Commandments: Strategic Lessons from the Trump Leadership Toolbox," including "Reducing Complexity to Simplicity" and "The Role of Grandeur, Image, and Heroic Aura."

• Why it matters: "Like him, loathe him, or try in vain to look past him, Trump is the most consequential leader on the planet right now," Sonnenfeld told me. The professor calls his book an "objective leadership analysis by [someone] who has known him for a quarter century."

🌴 Sonnenfeld met Trump in 1992. The mogul's trademark seduction began: The two later conversed at Trump Tower, over lunch at one of Trump's golf clubs, at the Connecticut home of Larry Kudlow, and at a Sonnenfeld CEO summit at the Waldorf Astoria in Manhattan.

• Based on all those years of studying Trump, Sonnenfeld says the tactics include "divide and conquer, the sleeper effect of constantly repeating false information with unshakable confidence, starting negotiations by giving the other side a bloody nose rather than a handshake of trust, centralizing all power [in your own hands], personal grandiose branding on everything."

The bottom line: "The key insight about how Donald Trump leads is that he is the sun around which all else must revolve in the Trump solar system," Sonnenfeld concludes. "Power must not reside in institutions, collectives, or equals; all power must radiate from Trump himself. If he is not at the center of an event, then in his retelling, it is not important, or it did not happen."

• More on the book.

President Trump last night unveiled the first renderings of the presidential library he plans to build on prime Miami real estate after he leaves office.

• A nearly two-minute video on Truth Social depicts it towering over the city's existing skyscrapers, suggesting the shrine could become the tallest building in South Florida.

The mock-ups show space for an Air Force One 747 jet, a Marine One helicopter and several other aircraft.

• Plans also include a large golden statue of Trump in an auditorium (pictured below) and a golden escalator reminiscent of the one the president famously descended in 2015 at Trump Tower in Manhattan.

Between the lines: Local officials will have little say over the project — including its height — after Florida barred cities and counties from regulating presidential libraries, Axios' Marc Caputo notes.

• The state handed over the 2.63-acre plot of land, formerly a parking lot for Miami Dade College, to Trump's library foundation last year for $10.

✈️ Also yesterday, the pro-Trump state lawmakers who control Tallahassee gave Trump another gift when Gov. Ron DeSantis signed legislation officially renaming Palm Beach International Airport to "the President Donald J. Trump International Airport."

• The name change becomes official on July 1. More on the airport.

Watch the library video.