Good Tuesday morning. Smart Brevity™ count: 1,691 words … 6½ mins. Thanks to Noah Bressner for orchestrating. Copy edited by Bill Kole.
🚨 Situational awareness: The Trump administration will deploy Border Patrol agents to Raleigh today in an expansion of its immigration crackdown in North Carolina, Axios Raleigh’s Zachery Eanes and Mary Helen Moore report.
- Hundreds of National Guard troops deployed to Chicago and Portland, Ore., are being sent home.
🗽 Axios BFD, our fourth annual dealmakers summit, returns to Manhattan today at 2 p.m. ET. You’ll hear from dealmaking powerbrokers Sequoia Capital partner Roelof Botha, RedBird Capital Partners founder Gerry Cardinale,entrepreneur Emma Grede & more. Tune in here. 1 big thing: Trump’s mortal moment 
Photo illustration: Maura Losch/Axios; Photos: Rick Friedman/Corbis via Getty Images, U.S. Department of Justice
It’s too early to call President Trump a lame duck. But Congress is ready to clip his wings over the Epstein files, Axios’ Marc Caputo reports.
Why it matters: Today’s expected House vote to release the files — over Trump’s initial objections — will mark the first time this term that a GOP-led congressional chamber will so openly defy him.
- The vote’s inevitability led him to change tack, bless the vote — and look the weakest he’s been since his inauguration.
🥊 Reality check: Trump isn’t a weak president. He wields unprecedented influence in his party, which controls Congress. The GOP base loves him.
- But today’s vote will show that some laws of political physics still apply to the gravity-defying Trump, who’s grappling with the karma of setting the mess in motion.
“House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide, and it’s time to move on from this Democrat Hoax,” Trump posted Sunday on Truth Social, in a rare admission of defeat.
- Trump said yesterday that “sure” he’ll sign the bill if it passes the Senate and reaches his desk: “‘I’m all for it.”
Trump’s Sunday statementcame only after four Republicans balked at White House pressure and agreed to vote with Democrats to release the Justice Department’s investigative files into the convicted sex offender.
- “We were told it wouldn’t make the floor — and then all of a sudden he makes this statement and gives us a hall pass,” a House Republican told Axios. “So a lot of us are taking it.”
President Trump arrives to speak at the McDonald’s Impact Summit in D.C. yesterday. Photo: Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters
The backstory: The Epstein vote, which was preceded by hairline fractures of dissentwithin the GOP, comes two weeks to the day after Republicans suffered bigger-than-expected election losses in Virginia and New Jersey.
- The results echoed other elections this year, and reflected polls showing Trump’s popularity decliningas economic anxiety rises.
- And the GOP is riven by an internal feud over antisemitism and Israel policy.
🔎 Inside the room: White House staff, veterans of Trump’s winning campaign last year, say they’re built for the challenges ahead and, like the president, will just power through. But there’s a growing recognition in Trump’s inner circle that something needs to change.
- “What we lack is an enemy that unites us and divides them,” one Trump adviser said.
- Said another: “The Trump team has been through worse. We survived. We know we’re in this era where everything is accelerated. Just a year ago, we won the presidency, and Congress and Democrats looked finished. Now look where we are. It’ll change.”
A senior administration official said Trump threw in the towel because he realized the Epstein files vote was “a major distraction” that kept Republicans from talking about his tax cuts, immigration policy and peace deals.
- A top Republican said:“It’s more amazing this [Epstein vote] didn’t happen sooner … Only four Republicans defied him at first. If anything, it’s like: Wow, this guy has a lot of power still. But he’s not all-powerful.”
Share this story. 2. 🏗️ Mapped: Trump’s growing business empire 
Data: The Trump Organization. (The Serbia tower project isn’t listed on The Trump Organization website, but recently gained political approval.) Map: Erin Davis/Axios Visuals
Protests in Serbia last week over a planned Trump Tower in Belgrade were just the latest example of the president’s business empire rubbing up against U.S. foreign policy, Axios’ Dave Lawler writes.
- Why it matters: Officially, the president has handed management of his real estate portfolio to his sons. But for some governments around the world, it may be hard to entirely separate President Trump’s business from Trump himself.
🔭 Zoom in: Serbia’s government passed a law this month to fast-track development of the future Trump Tower Belgrade by an investment firm founded by Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law.
- The project is backed by strongman President Aleksandar Vučić, who has tried to court Trump while facing mass protests at home.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt denied that Trump or his family engaged “or ever will engage” in conflicts of interest.
- “The media’s continuedattempts to fabricate conflicts of interest are irresponsible and reinforce the public’s distrust in what they read,” she said in response to questions for this story. The Trump Organization did not respond to requests for comment.
Zoom out: It’s not the first Trump-branded project that’s reportedly been expedited by a foreign government during Trump’s second term — or the first to face backlash.
- Work was allowed to begin earlier this year on a massive hotel and golf development outside Hanoi without all the required legal and environmental reviews, while Vietnam was also holding high-stakes trade talks with the Trump administration, according to a New York Times investigation.
🎨 The big picture: Investment funds backed by Gulf states or royals have poured money into Kushner’s investment fund and the Trump family’s crypto venture, for example.
- Those countries — the UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — also struck massive dealswith the Trump administration for AI chips and arms.
- Keep reading.
🇸🇦 Driving the day: Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is expected to meet Trump at the White House this morning, Axios’ Barak Ravid writes.
- Trump said yesterdayhe’ll approve the sale of F-35s to Saudi Arabia, making the kingdom the first Middle Eastern country other than Israel to obtain the advanced fighter jets. Go deeper.