BOSTON (AP) — Celtics president of basketball operations Brad Stevens and team owner Bill Chisholm want to make one thing clear: The decision to trade perennial All-Star Jaylen Brown wasn’t arrived at lightly.
But from their perspective, it was necessary to give the franchise the flexibility it needs to compete with the changing landscape of an NBA in which managing the team’s balance sheet will be more important than retaining multiple homegrown stars with pricey contracts.
That said, Stevens said Monday that he is fully aware of the criticism that surrounds Boston’s front office in the aftermath of its stunning decision last week to trade Brown to the Celtics' division rival Philadelphia for Paul George and multiple draft picks.
“As Jaylen and I sat down in early June and we talked about potential future in Boston and elsewhere, I told him if we were ever to trade Jaylen that would be a sad day for me personally,” Stevens said. “And certainly the emotions that all of us have felt... I do think we are empathetic and understand. This is a really hard thing.”
Hard, but also what Stevens said the front office collectively deemed vital for the ability of the Celtics to compete going forward despite coming off back-to-back 50-plus win regular seasons following their 2024 NBA championship.
“The path looked a little bit more challenging to me,” Stevens said. “I might be wrong. I’m not going to stand up there and be defensive about that. But the path looked a little bit more challenging with 70% of our (salary) cap, and such a high percent of our usage tied into two players.”
Brown enters next season with more than about $185 million remaining on the then-record, five-year, $304 million contract he signed with Boston in July 2023. Had he stayed, the team would have to decide whether to give him a two-year extension of around another $140 million.
That, combined with the almost $190 million left on Jayson Tatum’s $314 million deal, was deemed too much for the Celtics to carry and maintain roster flexibility.
George will make $54 million this coming season, which combined with Jayson Tatum’s $58 million will constitute about 70% of the Celtics’ salary cap in 2026-27.
With George having only one season and a player option remaining after that, Stevens said the future flexibility and draft compensation is what they value.
Additionally, Chisholm was adamant that there was no directive from him about keeping the salary cap at a certain level.
“This was all about basically trying to win, and really trusting in our process,” Chisholm said.
Stevens also defended against a sentiment that the trade return, which includes two first-round picks and two second-round picks, was low.
In George, the Celtics get back a six-time All-NBA and nine-time All-Star wing, but a player who has played 50 or more games just three times since 2019 (74 in 2023-24) due to various injuries.
“We like Paul. Paul’s a really good player,” Stevens said. “We’re not very far removed from all sitting, in our series against Philadelphia and watching Paul be a guy that could carry you...but also play a complementary role on both ends of the floor at the highest of levels."
Stevens spent a fair portion of Monday’s news conference pushing back on the suggestion by Brown that he was kept in the dark about the Celtics’ plans.
In a statement posted on his social media platforms after the trade became public, Brown said he had mixed emotions after the 2024 NBA Finals MVP learned he was being dealt away from the only NBA team he’s known.
That night he took to the streaming platform Twitch to elaborate on what he described as a lack of communication at points during the trade process.
“I wasn’t thrilled with how the conversation was facilitated. I did feel like it was a lack of respect,” Brown said. “At one point it was fine, and then out of nowhere it just went left. I definitely think there’s more to it."
Stevens said that he didn’t feel the team’s relationship with Brown was irreparable even after initially including Brown in a failed trade offer to Milwaukee for Giannis Antetokounmpo.
“I will say we had several talks. If he feels that way, then I’m sorry about that,” Stevens said.
Along with ending Brown’s 10-year tenure in Boston, it also ends the nine-year partnership between Brown and Tatum, who played in seven conference finals and two NBA Finals together – ultimately propelling team to the 2024 title.
Tatum celebrated the duo in an Instagram post in the days after Brown’s trade.
“From first round exits to winning a champ together and respect for you as a player and as a person,” Tatum wrote.
Stevens said Tatum was not consulted about the decision to ultimately trade Brown.
“I know how little I sleep. I don’t think anybody else needs to feel that,” Stevens said.
AP NBA: https://apnews.com/nba
FILE - Boston Celtics' Jaylen Brown plays during Game 6 in a first-round NBA basketball playoff series Thursday, April 30, 2026, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum,File)
FILE - Boston Celtics forward Jaylen Brown (7) drives to the basket against Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid, right, during the first half of an NBA basketball game, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2025, in Boston. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa,File)
FILE - Boston Celtics guard Jaylen Brown (7) drives to the basket against Philadelphia 76ers forward Paul George (8) during the first half of Game 2 of a first-round NBA playoffs basketball series, April 21, 2026, in Boston. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)
President Donald Trump is responding to global outrage over his intervention with FIFA during the World Cup. The president said he didn’t initially know what a red card was or what its consequences were, but when he learned it could keep star U.S. forward Folarin Balogun out of Monday’s knockout match against Belgium, he felt compelled to call FIFA president Gianni Infantino asking for a review.
On Monday afternoon, a FIFA appeals judge dismissed Belgium’s legal challenge fewer than eight hours before kickoff. The Belgian soccer body “is not a party to the proceedings and, as such, has no standing to appeal the decision,” FIFA said in a statement.
Trump rang a ceremonial bell Monday as the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq opened, reflecting how much he's counting on the stock market as he promoted the launch of Trump Accounts for children, which Republicans created in their 2025 tax and spending cuts bill.
And Trump will meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa on Wednesday at the NATO summit in Turkey, as Kyiv tries to refocus his attention on the conflict with Moscow and as Trump publicly mused about Syria’s role in the Middle East.
The Latest:
Folarin Balogun is in the United States’ starting lineup for Monday’s World Cup round of 16 match against Belgium after his red-card suspension was lifted by FIFA in a decision that sparked an uproar across the sport.
Balogun’s red card was assessed for stepping on an opponent’s ankle last Wednesday during the Americans’ 2-0 win over Bosnia-Herzegovina, triggering an automatic one-game suspension.
Following a phone call from Trump to FIFA’s president, FIFA’s disciplinary committee suspended the discipline for a year, prompting the European governing body UEFA to call the decision “unprecedented, incomprehensible and unjustifiable.”
Belgium’s attempt to have FIFA reinstate the suspension was denied by FIFA’s appeals committee, which said the Belgian federation lacked standing.
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Trump’s mass pardons for supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol don’t apply to a Virginia man charged with planting pipe bombs near the national headquarters of the Democratic and Republican parties on the eve of the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, a federal judge ruled Monday.
U.S. District Judge Amir Ali refused to dismiss the case against Brian J. Cole Jr., concluding that Trump’s blanket pardons for Jan. 6 rioters explicitly applied only to people who were convicted of crimes related to the attack on the Capitol.
Cole was arrested nearly a year after Trump’s parsons. He is accused of placing two pipe bombs outside the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee headquarters. The devices didn’t detonate before law enforcement officers discovered them.
Prosecutors have said that Cole gave a confession after his arrest, telling FBI agents that he felt “bewildered” by conspiracy theories related to the 2020 presidential election and “something just snapped.”
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Democrats began pulling their endorsements for Graham Platner after an allegation surfaced that he had forced an on-again-off-again girlfriend to have sex.
Rep. Ro Khanna, a California Democrat who had stood by Platner even as the Senate candidate was hit with prior allegations, said: “I’ve been very clear that sexual assault or violence against women is a red line. These allegations are very serious and credible. Graham Platner should drop out from the race. I am withdrawing my endorsement.”
Also dropping their endorsements were Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego and the Democratic-leaning political group End Citizens United.
Top leaders inside the Maine Democratic Party also called on Platner to drop out of the race, a seat considered key to Democrats’ efforts to try to secure a majority in the Senate.
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The relationship between Donald Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino, long in the making, is now at the center of one of the great World Cup controversies, sparking anger, disbelief and questions about the integrity of global sport’s biggest tournament.
Trump’s intervention in the lifting of U.S. forward Folarin Balogun’s one-match suspension has shone the spotlight on his close ties with Infantino. It has led to furor from Belgium — the U.S. team’s opponent in the round of 16 match on Monday — as European soccer’s governing body, UEFA, accused FIFA of crossing a “red line.”
The highly contentious call comes on the back of Infantino’s campaign to strengthen relations with Trump, the leader of the co-host of the biggest World Cup ever.
FIFA’s stunning decision to lift the suspension of a star U.S. player has riled the host country’s next World Cup opponent, Belgium, and sent soccer fans -- and political leaders -- into a frenzy over the influence President Donald Trump may have had over the extremely rare ruling.
Hours before kickoff, FIFA dismissed Belgium’s challenge to the most-debated political intervention in a World Cup in decades. That means forward Folarin Balogun is eligible to play on Monday night in Seattle. A win would send the U.S. to the quarterfinals, which would be the best U.S. result at a men’s World Cup since 2002.
Balogun had faced a mandatory ban from Monday’s match after receiving a red card last week. But FIFA lifted his suspension on Sunday following a call Trump made to the global soccer organization’s president, Gianni Infantino.
In its decision to let Balogun play against Belgium, FIFA cited article 27 of its disciplinary code, which says a “judicial body” can “fully or partially suspend the implementation of a disciplinary measure.” Balogun could yet get that one-game suspension on top of any future punishment if he commits a similar offense again in the next year.
While FIFA didn’t elaborate on how it reached its decision, the global soccer organization’s president, Gianni Infantino, insisted in a social media post that FIFA’s disciplinary committee acted with independence and judged cases such as Balogun’s on “applicable regulations and the specific facts.” Article 27 doesn’t lay out any requirements for which cases are eligible under the rarely used rule.
President Donald Trump said Monday that he’s building a granite helipad on the White House lawn, insisting that the landing area is needed to accommodate new, more powerful presidential choppers.
Confirmation of the project came as construction crews had already begun working on the helipad on the South Lawn, where the president had UFC build a temporary arena for a cage fight celebrating his 80th birthday. He said the project would be privately funded and estimated its cost at up to $6 million.
“It’s got the seal of the White House on it in granite, in carved granite,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “It’s really a beautiful thing.”
The president did not offer details on how long the work would take. It is the latest major construction project he has overseen in an effort to increasingly mold the White House in his own image.
Trump offered his playlist as he wrapped more than 40 minutes of remarks in Washington, D.C.’s heat that was held shortly after an earlier, lengthy press event in the Oval Office.
“Should we put on a little music, yes?,” he asked. “This way you don’t have to talk to each other. You just have to listen to music.”
“So we’re going to put on a little music, the Trump playlist, OK, and we’ll have a little fun,” Trump said.
“YMCA” began to play as the White House press pool was escorted back indoors.
Minaj got a shoutout from Trump as he spoke at a Rose Garden luncheon after an earlier event to highlight the accounts.
The musical artist had joined Trump in January for an earlier announcement about the “Trump Accounts” for children born during his second term.
Trump said Monday that Minaj is “great” and “so respected.”
Minaj has described herself as Trump’s “number one fan.”
In rare comments during a photo op ahead of his meeting with Chile’s foreign minister, Secretary of State Marco Rubio echoed Trump by saying “it was the right decision to reverse” Balogun’s penalty.
Rubio acknowledged that “there’s a lot of drama around” the decision. But he mused about why Belgium would want to possibly win a match “if everyone will argue you didn’t really win it because their best, or their leading scorer was not on the pitch.”
Rubio joked that maybe it was “turning into an international incident” ahead of the NATO leaders summit in Turkey this week.
“Maybe we’ll bring it up at NATO tomorrow or with the Belgians and everybody else,” Rubio told reporters Monday, laughing. “I just hope the match will go on, everyone will be at full strength and the winner will be the winner.”
Calling Sen. Ted Cruz “a friend of mine,” in the Oval Office earlier on Monday, Trump said the Texas Republican was the only potential Supreme Court nominee who could get unanimous approval for the post from the Senate.
Trump talked at length about how the two were “great friends” before they duked it out for the GOP nomination during the 2016 presidential campaign, “but then it came together better than ever before.”
Cruz has been laying the groundwork for a possible run at the presidency again, stumping for Republican candidates in early-voting states including South Carolina. Frequently floated by Trump for a post on the high court, Cruz has said he would decline it, preferring to stay in politics and policy.
Trump reviewed several of his White House renovation projects at a lunch on the Rose Garden patio for his investment accounts that bear his name for children born during his second term.
He referenced work being done to the columns on the Pennsylvania Avenue entrance to the mansion and said he was having layers and layers of paint removed.
Trump also talked about the ballroom he’s building and his decision to replace the lawn in the Rose Garden with patio stone.
“We’re putting a lot of love back into the White House,” he said.
The United States’ 250th birthday carries ambitions to galvanize Americans behind nationwide community-service drives and patriotic brand launches. Well-known U.S. nonprofits hope to inspire a record-setting level of volunteerism, while major companies such as Walmart and Coca-Cola are sponsoring tributes and selling limited-edition merchandise.
But the private sector’s unifying ambitions have been met with a mixed response, complicated by an uneasy national mood. Fewer Americans see their country as exceptional compared to 10 years ago, according to a recent survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, part of a broad decline in patriotic sentiment. Views of the American flag — a prominent feature of semiquincentennial celebrations — are divided by politics, age and race.
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The Hamas militant group said Monday it had dissolved its government in Gaza and is preparing to transfer power to a technical committee backed by the United Nations as part of a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal.
Hamas did not say whether it planned to take the crucial step of disarming or handing over security to an international force, but described its decision as evidence of its commitment to Gaza’s reconstruction after years of war.
It was unclear if the move, announced by a lower-level official, would lead to any meaningful change on the ground.
The Board of Peace, led by Trump with the mandate of governing and rebuilding Gaza, said it would assess the impact of the Hamas announcement based on “actions, not promises” and stressed in a statement on X that the technocratic committee must control all weapons in Gaza, as laid out in the ceasefire agreement.
Speaking Monday on the morning show “Fox & Friends,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “calls openly for the annihilation of Israel.”
Turkey and Israel have acrimonious relations. Erdogan frequently accuses Israel of committing genocide in its war in Gaza, triggered by the deadly Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel.
Turkey was barred from the F-35 program in 2019, after it purchased Russian-made S-400 missile defense systems. However, Trump, who has warm relations with Erdogan, has hinted ahead of his planned visit to Ankara for the NATO summit that the sales could soon resume.
Netanyahu said selling Turkey F-35s would “upset the power balance in the Middle East, which is ultimately guaranteed by Israeli air superiority and also, I think, by America’s posture in the Middle East.”
Israel’s Air Force depends on hundreds of U.S. fighter jets, including F-35s, F-16s and F-15s.
The president has drawn sharp criticism after financial disclosures showed his family made more than $1 billion in crypto last year.
He says his sons are running the family business, the Trump Organization, while he’s president.
“I don’t talk to them,” Trump said, adding, “I’m allowed to, I think.”
But he also said he doesn’t bother because being president is more important: “This office is a much higher calling.”
Trump also offered a dubious history lesson, suggesting that, as president, George Washington had two desks — one for business matters and another for the presidency.
“He had two desks in the same room,” Trump said. “And so, you’re allowed to. But I choose not to. I don’t talk to my kids about, you know, this stuff.”
He added “we’re building a helipad” that will feature the presidential seal and be made of granite.
The plan marks yet another building project for Trump, who has shaped the White House and its grounds in his own image in myriad ways.
Asked whether SpaceX shares would be donated for use in Trump Accounts, the president instead talked about how TikTok helped him become president again.
Citing a news segment about the social media app’s purported dangers, Trump said he had seen that he is “No. 1 on it,” then questioned how dangerous it could actually be.
“I think it helped me win the election in a landslide, if you want to know the truth,” he said.
As for SpaceX, Trump said he’s “a cheerleader for geniuses” and speaks to many of them, including Elon Musk, who founded the rocketmaking company.
Asked about his role in getting Balogun’s red-card penalty suspended, Trump acknowledged calling Infantino and asking that FIFA take a second look.
The president said he didn’t initially know what a red card was or what its consequences were. When he found out that it could keep Balogun out of Monday’s match against Belgium, Trump said he felt compelled to intervene.
“All I did was ask for a review,” Trump said to press at the White House. “I didn’t think it was a foul,” he added. “I thought it was two great athletes that crashed each other and got entangled.”
He said the red card was a “horrible” call, arguing that the slowed-down video review made it look worse than it was.
“That’s very unfair,” he said. “How do you penalize them for a game that hasn’t been played?”
“Capitalism” has been the word du jour of the Trump Accounts event, with speakers talking about how the investment vehicles will energize children about financial investing.
But Trump found a way to weave in a reference to the opposing socioeconomic system of communism — applying the label to the Democratic socialist candidates whose primary wins have energized many anti-Trump voters.
Asked by a reporter if the program would go down as one of his “signature policy achievements,” Trump took the opportunity to accuse these candidates in the upcoming midterm elections of being “communists” who “want to destroy our country.” The rhetoric is reminiscent of similar narratives he has employed throughout his political career.
Speaking alongside the president, Sen. Ted Cruz began his remarks by thanking Trump for working to get FIFA to reverse Balogun’s red card penalty of a one-game suspension.
“On behalf of all Americans, thank you for getting rid of that ridiculous red card,” Cruz said. “It was spectacular. There was a reason the FIFA trophy sat here for as long as it did.”
Cruz appeared to be referring to a White House visit by FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who in a rare move brought the World Cup trophy.
Trump thanked FIFA over the weekend after he and the White House intervened to enable Balogun to play in Monday’s match against Belgium.
“I think we’re getting much closer than people realize. And President Putin wants it to end, I will tell you that very strongly,” Trump said Monday while talking to press at the White House. He added that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also wants to end the war “now.”
The war and efforts to end it are forecast to be a central topic at the upcoming NATO summit this week. Trump plans to meet with Zelenskyy at the meeting in Turkey.
“I think we’re going to get it ended,” Trump said. “It’s been a terrible situation.”
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, center, arrives ahead of the NATO Summit in Ankara, Turkey, Monday, July 6, 2026. (Abdullah Güçlü, Pool Photo via AP)
FILE - President Donald Trump speaks during a media conference at the end of the NATO summit as Secretary of State Marco Rubio, right, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth listen in The Hague, Netherlands, June 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
A worker wades through the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool as crews install fireworks ahead of the America 250 July 4th celebration on the National Mall, Thursday, July 2, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Nathan Howard)
FILE - President Donald Trump holds the FIFA World Cup Winners Trophy as FIFA President Gianni Infantino looks on during an announcement in the Oval Office of the White House, Aug. 22, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
