In a wide-ranging interview with three of my colleagues, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said the U.S. and its European allies should be doing more to support his country in its fight against Russia. He specifically proposed that NATO planes begin shooting down Russian missiles over Ukraine.

“What’s the problem?” Zelensky asked. “Why can’t we shoot them down? Is it defense? Yes. Is it an attack on Russia? No. Are you shooting down Russian planes and killing Russian pilots? No. So what’s the issue with involving NATO countries in the war? There is no such issue.”

Over nearly an hour, Zelensky spoke with frustration and bewilderment at the West’s reluctance to take bolder steps to ensure that Ukraine prevails. He offered a forceful rebuttal to U.S. hesitation, and urged the Americans to send advanced defense systems and permit his military to fire U.S.-provided weapons into Russia.

His pleas come at a critical time. Russian forces today closed in on a town in Ukraine’s northeast, seeking to push back Ukrainian troops from the border before more American weapons arrive. Zelensky insisted that the only way to defend against such assaults would be to use Western weapons to strike at military targets inside Russia.

The U.S. and Europe’s primary reason for opposing such attacks — fear of nuclear escalation — is overblown, Zelensky said, because Vladimir Putin “may be irrational, but he loves his own life.”

Check out the full interview.

The defense rested its case, without Trump’s testimony

The lawyers defending Donald Trump in his New York criminal trial rested their case this morning after calling just two witnesses, neither of whom were the former president. By deciding not to testify, Trump forfeited his opportunity to defend himself in front of the jury. But he also avoided what could have been a major error.

The judge dismissed the jurors until next Tuesday, when closing arguments are set to begin. This afternoon, Trump’s lawyers and the prosecution gathered with the judge to hash out jury instructions. Here’s why those dry legalities could be so important.

Republicans are trying to reverse course on mail voting

Republican groups are spending millions of dollars this year promoting voting by mail, which eliminates the chance of a voter becoming too busy or too apathetic (or too snowed in) on Election Day. Party officials have focused the effort in particular on battleground states like Pennsylvania.

But it might be tough to convince today’s Republican voters, who for several years have been told by Trump and other Republicans that mail voting is riddled with fraud. “They don’t trust the system,” said Candace Cabanas, a Republican candidate in Pennsylvania who lost a special election in February after getting trounced in mail voting.

In related news, several primaries are being held today, including a challenge to Fani Willis, the district attorney who is prosecuting Trump in Georgia. Here’s what we’re watching.

The U.S. halted a secret Guantánamo transfer

The Biden administration was poised to send about a dozen detainees at Guantánamo Bay to Oman for resettlement last year. A military plane was on the runway, and the prisoners’ belongings had been collected. But then Hamas attacked Israel, and the U.S. abruptly halted the secret operation.

The detainees scheduled for the transfer — roughly a third of the 30 that remain at the prison — had been cleared for resettlement by national security review panels. But Democrats in Congress raised concerns about the potential for instability in the Middle East after the Oct. 7 attack.

‘Kairos’ won the International Booker Prize

Jenny Erpenbeck’s “Kairos,” a novel about a torrid love affair in the final years of East Germany, won the International Booker Prize, the prestigious award for fiction translated into English.

Erpenbeck was honored this afternoon alongside Michael Hofmann, who translated the book, at an event in London. They will split the prize of 50,000 British pounds, or about $63,500. After its publication in English last year, some reviewers suggested that Erpenbeck could be a future winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature. “Kairos” is a tear-jerker, Dwight Garner wrote.

Here are the finalists that it beat out.

Cannes meets a younger version of Trump

You might not think that the liberal-leaning attendees of the Cannes Film Festival would enjoy a Donald Trump biopic. Potential buyers of the film are skeptical. But this week’s premiere of “The Apprentice,” starring Sebastian Stan as Trump and Jeremy Strong as his fixer Roy Cohn, received mostly favorable reactions.

Trump, on the other hand, called the film — which depicts him sexually assaulting his wife, Ivana — “malicious defamation” and threatened legal action.

They’re getting their mahjong on

Many young Asian Americans grew up watching their parents or grandparents play mahjong, the 19th-century Chinese tile game of strategy and luck. Some grew to love it, but the game has been more closely associated with an older generation.

Several new groups are hoping to change that, including the Green Tile Social Club in Brooklyn, which recently hosted its first tournament. Attendees spread out over two dozen tables as a D.J. played electronic music. “When I realized there were people around our age that loved playing mahjong,” one competitor said, “I just hopped in immediately.”

Have a rejuvenated evening.

Thanks for reading. I’ll be back tomorrow. — Matthew

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