Obama says ‘doubtful’ that any Iran deal will be different than past
Former President Barack Obama speaks with “Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts in an interview at the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago on June 13, 2026. (ABC News)
(NEW YORK) — Former President Barack Obama is sharing his thoughts on President Donald Trump’s handling of Iran, saying recently that he is skeptical that real progress will be made.
Obama spoke with “Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts on Saturday, one day prior to Trump’s announcement that the United States and Iran had reached a deal that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz and end the U.S. naval blockade.
The exact points of the deal remain unclear. A senior administration official told reporters Friday that it would reopen the Strait of Hormuz and lead to “the dismantling” of Iran’s nuclear program and the U.S. getting Iran’s highly enriched
The expected deal comes eight years after Trump withdrew the U.S. from a previous nuclear agreement with Iran – led by the Obama administration in 2015 – that Trump described at the time of withdrawal as the “worst deal ever.”
In the interview Saturday, ahead of the new deal being announced, Obama told Roberts that he was “doubtful” any deal with Iran put forward by the Trump administration would be “significantly different” from the 2015 deal that his administration put in place.
“It is doubtful that any agreement that arises is going to be significantly different or a significant improvement from the deal that we had in the first place and had worked for, for a long stretch of time before we, the United States, pulled out of it,” Obama told Roberts in the interview, which took place at the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago.
Obama also expressed hope that the fighting in the region would come to an end and urged policymakers to prioritize diplomacy over military action.
“I’m hopeful that bombing stops and ordinary people are no longer suffering as a consequence of the war,” he continued. “Then in retrospect it’s a reminder that on a lot of difficult foreign policy problems — the notion that we can just bully our way or bomb our way to solutions — may sometimes seem appealing, but the fact of the matter is that taking the time to explore diplomacy and exhaust the possibilities of coming up with deals that don’t solve 100% of the problem but solve 80%, 90% of the problem while avoiding the necessity of going to war.”
“You’d think we would’ve learned that lesson by now,” he continued. “But it seems like every so often we have to relearn that lesson again.”
Trump first announced “major combat operations” against Iran on Feb. 28, with joint U.S.-Israeli strikes targeting military, government and infrastructure sites.
After an initial ceasefire and unsuccessful U.S.-Iran talks in Pakistan in April, negotiations continued as the ceasefire was extended.
Following Trump’s June 14 announcement on social media that a new deal had been reached, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi confirmed the deal had been finalized and said it would be signed in Switzerland on Friday.
“All of our positions and important issues are included in the draft understanding,” Gharibabadi said in a statement to Iranian state media.
Tune into “Good Morning America” on Wednesday, June 17, from 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. on ABC for more of Robin Roberts’ interview with former President Barack Obama.
Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation Chairman Ted Cruz and ranking member Sen. Maria Cantwell hold a news conference with NCAA athletes and coaches about the Protect College Sports Act, Sept. 14, 2026, in Washington, D.C. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump celebrated the Senate’s passage of the Protect College Sports Act, saying that the legislation will “save college sports” and is a “really big deal.”
“This is a really big deal. It will not only save college sports, it will save the colleges themselves,” Trump wrote in a Monday night social media post.
Trump has long been an advocate for this legislation and said in August that he would sign the bill “immediately” if it came across his desk — urging both the House and Senate to advance it.
On Monday night, the Senate passed the act with a vote of 77-22, bringing a massive restructuring of college athletics one step closer.
The legislation establishes a federal framework for college athletics to create one set system over the current patchwork of differing state rules. It creates one rulebook on how athletes can earn money from their name, image and likeness (NIL) and puts a cap on the amount of money schools can directly share with their athletes.
But it’s not just about money. The bill also deals with transfers, eligibility and media rights. Athletes can transfer to another school one time without losing a year of eligibility and student-athletes are given five years of eligibility with exceptions for certain circumstances such as a serious injury. The legislation also gives colleges the ability to negotiate broadcasting agreements collectively to give them more control over how their games are marketed and distributed.
Supporters of the bill say that it will add much-needed stability to the world of college athletics that has rapidly changed in recent years due to increasing NIL deals and frequent transfers. Senators — including Sen. Ted Cruz — argue that creating one national set of rules will reduce uncertainty and establish clear guidelines for compensation, eligibility and media rights.
“This bill puts an end to the chaos plaguing college athletics. It protects NIL opportunities because student athletes deserve the opportunity to benefit from their talent, without being taken advantage of by unscrupulous agents and backdoor deals, it creates clear, enforceable rules for eligibility and transfers. It protects our traditions and rivalries,” Cruz said on the Senate floor ahead of Monday’s vote.
While the bill received bipartisan support in the Senate on Monday, there were still concerns from many senators, largely around the amount of leverage the bill gives to the NCAA. The NCAA will now be in charge of overseeing school compliance on certain portions of the bill while also being granted immunity from federal antitrust lawsuits when enforcing its rules.
Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, one of the bill’s opponents, argued that the legislation could give the NCAA greater legal protection and authority without giving athletes an equivalent role in negotiating the rules that govern them.
“You don’t need a bill of this sweeping scope to address what are a set of minor but important practices in college athletics that have gotten out of control. We could have either passed a very narrow bill here to address the agent issue and the transfer issue, or we could have done what happens in most industries, which is just say to the NCAA and to the colleges, tough luck. Congress isn’t going to come in here and micromanage your relationship with the athletes. If you want to work something out, sit down and talk to the athletes about it,” Murphy said.
On Monday night, the NCAA thanked the senators who supported the legislation and looked ahead to the next hurdle: House passage.
“The NCAA thanks the many senators who sponsored this bill — including Senators Cruz, Cantwell, Schmitt and Coons — as well as the many other senators who voted for the bill, for their bipartisan effort to protect this uniquely American tradition of college sports in the decades to come,” the NCAA wrote in a social media post. “Now the bill moves to the U.S. House of Representatives and there is much work left to do to ensure student-athlete benefits are codified into federal law and future generations of young people can access those benefits and use college sports as the launching point for their careers.”
The bipartisan piece of legislation still faces obstacles in the House.
The Congressional Black Caucus has come out against the bill because they believe it doesn’t include strong enough protections and economic opportunities for Black athletes. Additionally, some conservative House members have expressed criticism for similar legislation, arguing the government is trying to have too much oversight over college sports.
The House remains out of session for their midterm recess and it is unlikely that they will be called back to Washington early to consider the legislation.
So while the legislation is now in the red zone, it’s going to take more than a “tush push” to get it into the end zone and onto the president’s desk.
Students walk through the halls between classes at Rippowam Middle School on September 14, 2020 in Stamford, Connecticut. (John Moore/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Nayleen Escalante-Villatoro, a sixth grader at Brookland Middle School in Washington, D.C., has struggled significantly with attending school.
She said whenever there are family problems that force her mother to take off work, she has to step in.
“Me and my older sibling stay home to watch the little ones,” Nayleen told ABC News, adding, “It makes me feel stressed because I’m missing school and I’m not learning.”
This not only frustrates Nayleen, but it also impacts her studies: “I have to do a lot of makeup work after all the missing assignments that I haven’t done,” she added.
Kids like Nayleen face a multitude of challenges at school — when they’re there.
From the rigors of learning how to read and write to addressing mental health concerns and outside distractions, students juggle more than just their classroom workloads. A combination of these issues and other societal factors has fueled an attendance crisis that’s led to a spike in student chronic absenteeism — defined as missing at least 10% of the school year — in recent years, according to experts who spoke to ABC News.
While one in three students nationwide experienced chronic absenteeism during the 2021-2022 academic year, the rate is declining, from up to 30% to roughly 24% by the start of the past school year, according to estimates from the Return 2 Learn tracker reviewed by ABC News.
Government officials are also collecting data on K-12 chronic absenteeism but the Department of Education recently told ABC News it couldn’t yet provide it. Its National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) told ABC News in 2023 that chronic absenteeism increased from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
However, there’s been no silver bullet to the problem. Different states have taken their own approach, from going door-to-door to check on students to providing high-impact tutoring at school. Education and health experts also emphasize family engagement, community relationships, extracurricular activities and outdoor recreation are potential solutions for chronically absent students.
Hedy Chang, CEO of Attendance Works, a nonprofit focused on addressing absenteeism, said that when kids aren’t showing up to school, it’s an indication that engagement isn’t happening.
“When you treat it as a matter of engagement, that’s when we build the relationships with families, which make them trust schools and it builds a relationship so that we can actually find out what are the underlying causes of why kids aren’t showing up,” Chang told ABC News.
United Family Advocates Executive Director Joanna Lack is calling for more attention to those underlying causes. Lack worked on the issue for many years as the chief performance officer in Camden, New Jersey, and has since transitioned to the non-profit organization dedicated to keeping families safe and together.
“We’ve been looking at the wrong problem instead of opening up the hood and saying ‘What’s actually going on here?'” she said.
Home life among ‘constellation’ of issues
Student absenteeism is often correlated with household or child welfare problems that impact the student’s school life, according to UFA’s Lack.
“Chronic absenteeism is like the symptom that you experience, but it’s not the disease, and we’ve been treating it like it’s the disease,” Lack said.
The Department of Health and Human Services does not have a specific initiative targeting chronic absenteeism. However, Head Start and the Family Opportunity, Resilience, Grit, Engagement-Fatherhood (FORGE) program under the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) both aim to improve outcomes in child welfare and enhance early childhood education, according to HHS officials.
Chang said there isn’t an urgent need for new federally funded programs or aid, just better use of ones that are available.
“I need existing programs to think about how they use chronic absence data to collaborate and work together to support kids and families and make sure the kids who need their resources, or the schools that need their resources, are getting it,” she said.
There’s a “constellation” of issues that contribute to increased absences, from child welfare involvement to unstable housing, but Lack noted that families are complex and kids don’t come in silos.
Activity makes a ‘huge difference’
Nayleen is one of the thousands of students across the country who participate in extracurricular activities through the SCORES program, which creates safe environments where young people can build connections with their communities, according to its website. She said DC SCORES — which provides soccer, poetry, and service-learning programs — has helped her return to class more regularly.
She explained that playing soccer with DC SCORES has empowered her and she looks forward to talking to her coach after attending school.
“It helps me because whenever I’m going through stuff he will understand me,” she said. “Sometimes he will help me. He will sit down and have a talk with me,” she said, adding, “Whenever I’m down, he will ask me if I’m OK.”
At the last month’s inaugural National Executive Forum on Health and Outdoor Recreation, which combined outdoor recreation industry and health leaders to promote using recreation as a pillar of public health, experts told ABC News that recess makes a “huge difference” for holistic growth in adolescents.
Outdoor Recreation Roundtable President Jessica Turner emphasized that being outside is fundamental to student health.
“We’ve stepped back so far from incorporating the outdoors into our lives and to step back into it doesn’t take very much,” Turner told ABC News. “It’s not a heavy lift.”
Schools supporting parents and kids
Chang, of Attendance Works, said chronic absenteeism isn’t inevitable.
She stressed that schools are starting to adopt more effective family engagement strategies for those dealing with attendance issues.
Shavar Jeffries, CEO of the KIPP Foundation, which operates the largest public charter school network in the nation, has utilized some simple yet effective solutions to correct absenteeism.
Jeffries told ABC News that when a student doesn’t show up, they call the family “immediately.”
“‘Johnny, Mary, didn’t come to school today. We really need them because they are going to miss an opportunity to learn,'” he said, adding “Then, frankly, sometimes we also say: You got to figure it out.”
“Get your baby to school because they can’t learn to fulfill that potential if you’re not able to do that,” Jeffries added.
U.S. President Donald Trump, Prime Minister of Denmark Mette Frederiksen and Prime Minister of Greenland Jens-Frederik Nielsen hold up the proclamations during the signing of a security pact between the U.S., Denmark and Greenland during the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 22, 2026. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump signed a security deal with the prime ministers of Greenland and Denmark on Tuesday on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.
“This has been an amazing journey with tremendous people,” Trump said of Denmark’s Mette Frederikson and Greenland’s Jens-Frederik Nielsen.
“This is tremendous for Europe and for the United States, for everybody, and for Greenland,” Trump said. “It’s going to be incredible, and the people of Greenland have been so nice. The people of Denmark have been amazing, and so I know it’s going to be a long-term, fantastic relationship.”
The agreement comes after months of escalating rhetoric from Trump, who has repeatedly threatened to take over the territory citing national security purposes. Trump’s threats, including refusing to rule out taking the territory by military force, sowed tension between the U.S. and its European allies and sparked consternation from Greenlanders.
Greenland, which is an autonomous territory of Denmark, resisted Trump’s calls to “take over” the island via acquisition or military force. Danish leaders said they were open to negotiating new frameworks for the U.S. military’s presence, but that the sovereignty of the territory was a red line.
The text of the trilateral agreement reveals some red tape that constrains what Trump administration officials have billed as the “complete ability” to do what it deems necessary in Greenland.
While the deal appears to fall short of the “Complete and Total Control” by the U.S. that Trump once called for, it does grant the U.S. ability to expand its military footprint in Greenland.
The deal gives Greenland and Denmark the authority to review requests from the U.S. to build unmanned military installations “under accelerated governmental approval procedures.”
Frederikson praised the agreement, saying that it was “bigger and better” than the deal struck with the U.S. in 1951.
“Seventy-five years ago, we entered into an agreement about the defense of Greenland. Today we are signing an even bigger and better agreement, a deal that can last forever,” she said.
“Mr. President, you have been very clear. You don’t want adversaries to come too close. I fully agree, and with this deal, they are not,” she added.
Under the 1951 agreement amended by the new pact, the U.S. already enjoyed wide latitude to scale up its bases and military footprint on the island.
Nielsen acknowledged that the U.S. national security concerns are legitimate and praised the negotiation process that led to the agreement.
“The security landscape in the Arctic is changing, and we recognize the long term security threats that you, Mr. President, have rightly spoken about. It is for that very reason that we have insisted on engaging in a constructive dialog,” he said. “Your security is our security, and our security is your security.”
Nielsen called the agreement historic and a “win-win-win” for all parties.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte posted on X, “This agreement, along with NATO’s growing role in securing this vital region, enhances our collective security and supports a safer and more stable future for us all.”
In a post on his social media platform last Friday, Trump declared, “At my direction, we worked with representatives of Denmark and Greenland to guarantee that the United States will FOREVER have the complete ability to do what is necessary in Greenland in order to secure and defend the security of Greenland, and the United States of America.”
The text of the deal affirms released Tuesday states that the U.S. can “modernize and expand its activities” at its existing Pituffik Space Base and says it can establish additional bases at Narsarsuaq and Mestersvig, following specific terms that the signatories had already agreed to.
If the U.S. wants to expand its footprint beyond that, the agreement requires that it puts forward a proposal that all parties will “immediately convene” to review via a standing committee that was established by an earlier memorandum of understanding.
If no agreement is reached within 90 days, the deal specifies that the proposal will then be elevated to the deputy minister level, and if that fails to the minister level — secretary of state and equivalents. The text does not say what would happen if those consultations don’t end in a consensus.
The deal gives Greenland and Denmark the authority to review requests from the U.S. to build unmanned military installations “under accelerated governmental approval procedures.”
While the agreement details the U.S. military’s right of free access to land, air and sea routes, it does not appear to materially advance privileges granted by the 1951 defense pact.
The agreement also bars non-NATO from establishing military installations in Greenland unless the three parties agree to make an exception.
The agreement also bans countries and individuals from countries that are either not NATO members or partners nor members of the European Union from having control or significant influence over “Particularly Sensitive Sectors” that includes critical infrastructure and the extraction of resources. The deal puts Greenland in charge of ensuring these prohibitions are upheld under its current or future investment screening laws.
The agreement specifies it has no end date and it plans for a contingency in which Greenland declares its independence from Denmark. An independent Greenland will agree to remain a member of NATO, athough that decision would likely not be entirely up to Greenland, the U.S. or Denmark — joining the alliance requires the approval of all NATO members and an independent Greenland would have to go through the application process.
