WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trumpwho helped push the term “ fake news ” into the mainstream, now seems to have a new favorite subject: fake math.

During a Thursday event announcing a deal with drugmaker Regeneron to lower the cost of its pharmaceutical productsTrump defended his past claims that prices on prescription medications had been cut by well over 100% — something that is mathematically impossible without manufacturers dropping prices to zero and then presumably paying consumers to use their product.

Trump acknowledged having boasted that his efforts to lower drug prices had reduced what consumers pay by “500%, 600%.” But he added, “We also sometimes say 50%, 60%” and called it a “different kind of calculation” that could go up to “70, 80 and 90%.”

“People understand that better,” Trump said. “But they’re two ways of calculating” and “either way, it doesn’t make any difference.”

There could indeed be two ways of calculating such things — but the difference is very important. One is correct. The other is nonmathematical.

It was one of several times Trump used his own — but incorrect — math during the drug pricing event. He claimed the 7 1/2-week-and-still-going Iran war actually fell within the four- to six-week timeline he predicted early on. The president also brought up the crowd size for his 2017 inauguration — a subject that led onetime top Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway to unwittingly make the phrase “ alternative facts ” famous.

Trump’s incorrect take on percentages — something he has long repeated — came just after his health chief, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., brought up the issue on his own during the same Oval Office event Thursday.

Kennedy noted that he was reminded of his exchange the previous day with Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., at a congressional hearing when she said that claiming price cuts exceeding 100% might suggest “companies should be paying you to take their drugs.”

Kennedy said during the hearing that Trump “has a different way of calculating.”

On Thursday, Kennedy argued that drug manufacturers had raised prices on popular medications by more than 100% and that Trump was then cutting the price down substantially — meaning he was wiping out percentages of costs worth more than 100%.

“If the drug was $100, and it raised the price to $600, that would be a 600% rise,” Kennedy said — even though that’s incorrect. Six hundred is indeed 600% of the original 100 value, but the increase from one to the other is actually only 500%.

Kennedy then continued, “And the president used that mathematical device.”

But no such device exists for the way Trump characterizes it — at least not when math is done correctly.

Something can increase in price by more than 100%. A product that increases from $1 to $2.10 has increased by 110%. But prices cannot be reduced by more than 100% without being pushed to a value of $0 — or reduced 100% of the full price — and then into negative territory, where consumers presumably would need to be paid for using a product.

In a subsequent question-and-answer session with reporters during the price announcement event, meanwhile, Trump offered another dash of fake math for how long the war in Iranwhich began Feb. 28, had been going on.

Asked about the war having exceeding the four to six weeks he originally suggested it would last, Trump argued that he’d actually met his own timeline because Iran’s military was “decimated” by then.

The U.S. and Iran agreed to a ceasefire this month, and Trump announced this week that he was extending it. But neither side says the war is overand a conclusion that hasn’t been achieved certainly did n’t occur in the four to six weeks that have already elapsed.

Trump also brought up his 2017 inaugural crowd size issue on Thursday, when talking about renovations at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. He noted that Martin Luther King Jr. had drawn hundreds of thousands of people to the National Mall for his “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963 and claimed: “I had the same exact crowd. Maybe a little bit more,” arguing that pictures of both events backed him up.

“I actually had more people,” Trump added. “But that’s OK.”

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — President Donald Trump has ordered the U.S. military to “shoot and kill” small Iranian boats that deploy mines in the Strait of Hormuzannouncing the move Thursday a day after Iran again displayed its ability to thwart traffic through the channel.

Trump also announced that a ceasefire in Lebanon would be extended by three weeks.

His post on social media about the small boats came shortly after the U.S. military seized another tanker associated with the smuggling of Iranian oil, ratcheting up a standoff with Tehran over the strait through which 20% of all crude oil and natural gas traded passed during peacetime.

“I have ordered the United States Navy to shoot and kill any boat, small boats though they may be … putting mines in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump posted, adding that U.S. minesweepers “are clearing the Strait right now.”

“I am hereby ordering that activity to continue, but at a tripled up level!” he added.

The decision to extend a pause in fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon came during a meeting at the White House between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the United States.

Meanwhile, it was still unclear when, or if, the U.S. and Iran would meet again in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, where mediators are trying to bring the countries together to reach a diplomatic deal ending that conflict.

Negotiations initially planned this week have not happened. Iran insists it will not attend until the U.S. ends its blockade on Iranian ports and ships. The White House insists it will not take part until Tehran opens the strait to international traffic.

Pope Leo XIVreturning home from a trip to Africa, urged the U.S. and Iran to return to talks to end the war.

Footage shows US forces on deck of tanker

The Defense Department released video footage of U.S. forces on the deck of the oil tanker Majestic X, which was seized in the Indian Ocean. The ship had been flying a Guyanese flag, though the South American nation of Guyana said it was not registered there

The footage emerged a day after Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard attacked three cargo ships in the strait, capturing two of them, in an assault that raised new concerns about the safety of shipping through the waterway.

The powerful head of Iran’s judiciary, Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeisaid three “violating ships” in the strait were “subject to enforcement” Wednesday.

“The show of strength by the armed forces of Islamic Iran in the Strait of Hormuz is a source of pride,” he wrote Thursday on X, claiming the Americans “lack the courage” to approach the strait.

Ship-tracking data showed the Majestic X in the Indian Ocean between Sri Lanka and Indonesia, roughly the same location as the oil tanker Tifani, seized earlier by American forces. It had been bound for Zhoushan, China.

Majestic X previously was named Phonix and had been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2024 for smuggling Iranian crude oil in contravention of U.S. sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

Guyana said in a statement the Majestic X was not registered in the South American nation.

“While the name of the vessel has changed, the (International Maritime Organization) number remains recorded in the international database as PHONIX. There is no record of this vessel or name in Guyana’s registry. Therefore, the ship is FRAUDULENTLY flying the Guyana flag,” Guyana’s Maritime Administration Department said.

There was no immediate response from Iran about the seizure.

Trump claims leadership rift in Iran

Trump this week extended a ceasefire to give the Iranian leadership more time to come up with a “unified proposal” on ending the war, while maintaining an American blockade of Iranian ports.

In a post Thursday, Trump claimed a leadership rift between moderates and hard-liners was confounding Iran. “Iran is having a very hard time figuring out who their leader is! They just don’t know!” Trump said.

Trump has repeatedly said during the ceasefire that began April 8 that his team is dealing with Iranian officials who want to make a deal, while acknowledging that his decision to kill several top leaders has come with complications.

Iran’s president and its parliament speaker posted statements on social media declaring the country has no hard-liners or moderates.

“We are all Iranians and revolutionaries,” they said.

A spokesperson for the Iranian Foreign Ministry said Trump’s claim of a leadership rift was a “deflection.” Other Iranian officials said on social media that the country was united.

Trump, while speaking to reporters at the White House, pushed back against questions about the conflict exceeding the four-to-six-week timeline that he and aides previously set for the war.

“I don’t want to rush myself,” Trump said, adding that the U.S. “took the country out” militarily in the first four weeks.

“Now all we’re doing is sitting back and seeing what deal” can be made. “And if they don’t want to make a deal, then I’ll finish it up militarily,” Trump said.

He said he would not use a nuclear weapon against Iran.

Meanwhile, three aircraft carriers were in the region after the USS George H.W. Bush arrived in the Indian Ocean. One carrier was in the Arabian Sea and another was in the Red Sea, military officials said.

Talks between Lebanon and Israel lead to truce extension

Trump said a second round of talks between Israel and Lebanon in Washington “went very well” and resulted in a ceasefire extension for Israel and the Hezbollah militant group.

“The United States is going to work with Lebanon in order to help it protect itself from Hezbollah,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

The latest war between Israel and Hezbollah started after Israel and the U.S. launched attacks on Iran and the Tehran-backed militants fired rockets into northern Israel. The ceasefire first took effect for a 10-day period starting Friday.

Underscoring the truce’s fragility, Israel’s military said it struck missile launchers in Lebanon that had fired into its borders. Hezbollah said it fired at the Israeli town of Shtula in response to Israeli attacks on the Lebanese village of Yater.

Lebanon’s public health ministry said an Israeli airstrike killed three people further north, in the area of Nabatiya. The Israeli military said it killed three militants who launched a missile toward an Israeli warplane.

Each side has accused the other of breaching the truce.

Trump reiterated that the U.S. continues to demand that Iran stop it’s backing of Iranian-allied militias in the Mideast, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, as part of any deal between Washington and Tehran to end the U.S. war on Iran.

“Yeah, they’ll have to cut that,” Trump said to a reporter’s question about aiding Hezbollah. “That’s a must.”

Threats to shipping persist

Since the Feb. 28 start of the war between Iran, Israel and the United States, over 30 ships have come under attack in the waters of the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman.

The threat of attack, rising insurance premiums and other fears have stopped traffic from moving through the strait. Iran’s ability to restrict traffic through the strait, which leads from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean, has proved a major strategic advantage.

Jakob Larsen, the head of maritime security for BIMCO, the largest international association representing shipowners, said in a note Thursday that most shipping companies need a stable ceasefire and assurances from both sides of the conflict that the strait is safe for transit.

The threat of mines, he wrote, was a “particular concern” if traffic might return to normal levels one day.

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Madhani reported from Washington, and Keaten reported from Geneva.

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This story has corrected that the Majestic X oil tanker had been flying the Guyanese flag not the Guinea flag.

WASHINGTON (AP) — To President Donald Trumpthe Kennedy Center is a “tired, broken, and dilapidated” building in urgent need of repair. To artists like Jane Fonda and Billy Porterit’s a protest site symbolizing the administration’s effort to reshape the nation’s cultural institutions.

For the Kennedy Center’s new leadership, it’s a gargantuan structure corroded by water damage so severe that steel in some places is tissue-thin.

Away from the political controversy that has consumed the iconic performing arts venue for the better part of Trump’s second term, Matt Floca, the Kennedy Center’s new executive director and chief operating officerguided a group of journalists through the building on Wednesday. They viewed the outdoor terrace overlooking the Potomac River, along with parking decks, loading docks, an electrical vault and the Opera House stage.

A theme emerged at virtually every stop: The water damage was real, apparent in some places through discoloration and pooling. Some pieces of equipment, including several 800-ton chillers that help cool the building, are decades old and in need of replacement.

And the building is so massive — sprawling across more than 1.5 million square feet — that repairs will require time to finish.

Two years of timein fact.

Trump plans to shutter the building for a massive renovation slated to begin in July, supported by nearly $257 million provided by Congress to fund repairs. The institution is expected to turn to private donors to help support refurbishing some of the building’s more exclusive areas, such as lounges.

The Kennedy Center is hardly the first fixture of the Washington skyline to undergo lengthy renovations. The Smithsonian Castle, one of the most recognizable buildings along the National Mall, has been closed for renovations since 2023. The Washington Monument was shrouded in scaffolding from 1998 to 2001 and covered again at points in 2013 and 2014 to repair earthquake damage.

None of those changes, however, were guided so closely by a sitting president.

The president is hands-on with this renovation

Trump, who is also trying to build a ballroom on the grounds of the former East Wing of the White House and is pushing for the construction of a triumphal arch near Arlington Cemetery, is deeply involved in the Kennedy Center plans. That’s in line with the far more hands-on approach he’s taken to the institution during his second term, ousting its previous leadership and replacing it with a handpicked board that named him chairman.

His name is now bolted to the building’s facade along with that of John F. Kennedy, the slain president that the venue memorializes.

“It’s a public building, and I completely acknowledge that, but the president is really great at this, and I think his input is invaluable,” Floca said. “He’s in the details, and it’s amazing. I really respect the input he’s given.”

As Trump tightened his grip on the building, artists abandoned the institution in droves, prompting concern that the closure is more of an effort to cover for plunging sales. The Kennedy Center hasn’t released sales figures.

Floca considered doing the repairs individually but insisted it was his recommendation to Trump to close the building and move forward with the renovation all at once.

“When the President asked: ‘How do you make these projects the best? How do you make them really excellent and deliver them efficiently?’ my recommendation was you close the building and you do everything over a definite period of time, two years,” he said.

He acknowledged that once the building is closed, staffing will be “pretty bare bones.”

“We’re working on all of those plans now and exactly what those numbers will be after July,” he said. “And we will staff up before reopening.”

Still, the tour offered the institution something of a reset opportunity after more than a year of tumult, demonstrating the need for repairs while easing some fears. A bipartisan group of lawmakers and their staff, along with representatives for Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser and some corporate and individual donors, have received a similar walk-through.

There will be scaffolding around the building but the construction won’t be so dramatic that someone could see through the building. That’s notable considering Trump has suggested the steel supporting the structure could be “ fully exposed.”

It’s not entirely clear how much change will be apparent to the general public once the Kennedy Center reopens. Much of the structural repair, which will unfold during the renovation’s first year, will happen in the building’s private core.

The venue’s more public elements, including the red-on-red decor of the Opera House, are expected to be maintained, though with some updating. There aren’t plans at the moment to change the presidential boxes.

Quotes attributed to Kennedy will stay on the building’s walls and the famous bust of the former president that sits outside the Opera House will be there again when the building reopens.

“I can’t think of any JFK changes,” Floca said.

It’s unclear, however, whether there will be additional tributes to Trump, who will be in the final months of his presidency when the public can return to the building.