Breaking: In a joint statement at the end of yesterday's U.S.–Iran summit in Switzerland, Qatari and Pakistani mediators said "encouraging progress has been made" during 18 hours of negotiations. Here's the backdrop:

Last Wednesday, the U.S. and Iran signhed a deal to end the war.

• Since then, Iran said it was closing the Strait of Hormuz again (though it didn't in practice, per U.S. officials), Israel intermittently bombed Lebanon, and President Trump threatened to seize and toll the strait, kill Iran's peace negotiators, and send Syria in to fight Hezbollah.

Why it matters: A week after the ceasefire deal was announced, both the U.S. and Iran are pushing it to the limit, Axios' Ben Berkowitz and Barak Ravid write.

• At the same time, the two sides met in Switzerland to hammer out a longer-term nuclear agreement — a sign that both sides remain engaged despite significant differences.

🇨🇭 Driving the news: High-level talks at the Bürgenstock resort, which concluded early this morning local time, are being led for the U.S. by Vice President JD Vance, with envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.

• They ran nearly nonstop into the night and went ahead even after Iran said it was closing the strait, a U.S. diplomat said.

Representatives from the U.S., Iran, Pakistan and Qatar appeared pleased with the talks' progress, according to the diplomat.

• The U.S. and Iran agreed on a roadmap for reaching a final nuclear deal within 60 days, according to the joint statement by Qatari and Pakistani mediators.

💥 Friction points: To make the deal stick, several things need to happen.

• 🇮🇱 Israel and Hezbollah must keep a fragile ceasefire.
• 🇮🇷 Iran must continue to allow commerce to flow through the Strait of Hormuz.

👀 What we're watching: Technical teams will remain in Switzerland to continue negotiations.

• Go deeper: Inside the marathon talks.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is taking on OpenAI and Anthropic with a rival AI vision: cheaper models, more user control and political messaging that wins the public's trust, The Wall Street Journal reports.

• "You can't say: Hey, all white-collar jobs are gone, and this could even be a weapon, and we will use all the power to build data centers," Nadella told the Journal. The public, he predicted, won't tolerate just a few models and companies "doing all of the learning for the world."

Why it matters: Nadella, who has long played the role of elder statesman in the AI race, didn't directly name OpenAI or Anthropic. But his blistering critique "made clear that Microsoft is seeking to steer the AI race away from a future dictated and controlled by frontier model-builders."

💡 The context: Nadella previewed his criticisms in an essay on X a week ago. "In my view," he wrote, "our priority has to be building a frontier ecosystem, not just a frontier model, so value flows broadly across every company, every industry, and every country."

• Journal gift link.

President Trump said twice in two days last week that he doesn't want to be associated with Herbert Hoover, who served during the early years of the Great Depression.

• "I have one primary wish as president, in terms of people: I never want to be the late, great Herbert Hoover," he told Marc Caputo on "The Axios Show."
• Earlier, at his G7 press conference in France, Trump said: "I've studied presidents — some good, some bad, some great. … And the one president I did not want to be was the late, great Herbert Hoover."

Why it matters: Trump often says out loud what he's really thinking, when most politicians would stifle such musings.

Between the lines: Trump has spent years fearing that a single crash could swallow his presidency, the way the Depression swallowed Hoover's, Axios' Zachary Basu writes.

• Trump floated it as early as 2018, when he privately asked aides whether he could fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell — warning that Powell's rate hikes would "turn me into Hoover."
• Flashback: The split-screen illustration at the top of this story is a rerun from a story Mike wrote 7½ years ago, "Trump fears being turned into Hoover."
• In January 2024, Trump predicted an economic crash under President Biden and said he hoped it would land before the election "because I don't want to be Herbert Hoover."

🗳️ The parallels run deeper than rhetoric: Hoover — the 31st president, from 1929-1933 — and Trump were both elected as wealthy businessmen promising executive competence.

• Hoover signed the Smoot-Hawley tariffs, now remembered as a protectionist blunder that worsened the Depression.
• Trump made tariffs the core of his economic project, betting that the policy most associated with Hoover's failure could fuel a great American comeback.

Read more.

📱 Go deeper: Watch Marc Caputo's interview with President Trump.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer resigned today after months of turmoil in his government, setting up Britain to install its seventh leader in a decade.

• Starmer will stay on as a caretaker until a new Labour leader is chosen in the next few weeks, just as the country stares down an economic crisis tied to the war in Iran.

Months of anger over policy U-turns and the Epstein scandal that embroiled his ambassador to the U.S. had left Starmer weakened.

• "Six years ago, I inherited a Labour Party that was politically, financially, and morally bankrupt," he said in a farewell address.

Labour will open a leadership contest to pick his successor before Parliament returns in September. Former Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham is seen as a front-runner.

• Read more.

Only a small fraction of data- center opponents actually live near one, Axios' Megan Morrone writes from new polling by a consulting firm that counsels leading AI labs and tech startups.

• Why it matters: The findings by Milltown Partners, shared first with Axios, show data centers have become a stand-in for broader anger at an AI future many Americans don't want but fear they'll have to pay for.

By the numbers: Milltown surveyed 6,872 registered voters between May 10 and May 20, recruited from online panels. The margin of error is 3 points.

• 49% support a moratorium on new data centers, while only 16% oppose.
• Just 8% of respondents who oppose data centers say they know of any data centers near their home.

🔬 Zoom in: The split suggests many voters aren't categorically anti-data center, but are wary of the pace and terms of the buildout.

• Both Steve Bannon on the right and Bernie Sanders on the left have attacked AI as a threat to working people.
• Milltown Partners researcher Tom Brookes says: "This isn't happening in a vacuum. The AI transformation is arriving at a time when Americans already feel angry, insecure and pessimistic."

⚡ The industry's response: Nvidia says one of the biggest complaints about data centers — water use — could become much less of a problem, Axios' Amy Harder writes.

• The company unveiled a new cooling system that it says can dramatically reduce the amount of water and energy needed to run AI data centers.

More on the poll ... Nvidia's announcement.

"Dexit" — shorthand for companies ditching Delaware as their legal home — is gaining traction after Elon Musk's clash with the state's courts, Michael Steinberger writes in The New York Times Magazine.

• Why it matters: Delaware is the legal domicile of roughly two-thirds of Fortune 500 companies and "has become the de facto arbiter of U.S. corporate law."

Keep reading (gift link).

President Trump ordered immediate repairs to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool yesterday after alleging vandalism had damaged the recently renovated landmark, Axios' Rebecca Falconer writes.

• The president said on Truth Social that he had personally inspected the damage.
• An administration official said five people had been arrested, five others cited and 14 police reports filed in connection with alleged vandalism at the pool.

Trump said Saturday that vandals "poured corrosive and destructive chemicals into the Pool."

• The National Park Service has poured hydrogen peroxide into the pool to treat the algae, which The Wall Street Journal notes can be used as a paint remover.

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Serena Williams, 44, will play singles at Wimbledon after almost four years away from tennis.

• Williams has accepted a wild card to play both singles and doubles at the tournament, which starts next week. She'll play doubles with her sister Venus, who's 46.
• Her most recent singles match was a loss in the third round of the 2022 U.S. Open.

Go deeper.