Republican National Committee Midterm Convention is a rare mid-cycle gathering of party leaders and delegates President Trump has called as a way to rally the party faithful ahead of November's contests.
Robin Morgan, a wholesome child star of the 1940s and '50s who grew up to become an all-American radical as a poet, essayist, editor and second-wave feminist, has died at age 85.
Preservationists worry board may seize on incident ‘to make the point that the whole thing needs to be shut down’
Falling debris from a ceiling in the grand foyer of the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts may have complicated a battle over renovations of the Washington DC arts center that could result in the building being demolished.
A portion of the ceiling collapsed on Friday evening after heavy rain swept through the area, prompting officials to temporarily close the Edward Durell Stone-designed building. No one was injured by the debris.
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is now on Bluesky, they announced this week. But "We can't advocate that you sign up for a Bluesky account like we do with Mastodon or PeerTube since signing up for Bluesky means loading the registration page's nonfree JavaScript..."
While federated, Bluesky is generally not considered part of the "fediverse" network of social media services like Mastodon and PeerTube, as it uses its own AT protocol rather than ActivityPub... Hosting your own Bluesky "Personal Data Server (PDS)" and relay is technically possible, but generally far more difficult and resource-intensive than spinning up an instance of Mastodon, let alone any of the lighter-weight ActivityPub servers like Akkoma or Starling.
Much of the Bluesky codebase is freely licensed. This allows users to run, copy, modify, and share large parts of the codebase. However, Bluesky's web client still serves nonfree JavaScript to users, just like its registration page. (Since our script was written for us specifically, we have not extensively vetted all available clients.)
Why did we sign up? Simply put, we have to continue to reach people where they are. Bluesky is a decent choice for us that evades many of the issues of other, more problematic networks... We accepted running Bluesky's nonfree JavaScript a single time if it meant being able to reach people who have never heard of software freedom.
The FSF's blog post advises supporters "If you're on social media, follow the FSF on Bluesky and on Mastodon today."
Slashdot also has an account on Blueky.
US president suggests he might support his Argentinian ally’s drive to reclaim sovereignty of disputed islands
Donald Trump has long embraced vengeance. “I am your retribution,” he declared to an admiring audience at the 2023 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) as he commenced his march back to the White House.
It is unlikely Argentina, and far-flung holdovers of the former British empire, were on the US president’s mind at the time.
Blaze causes electricity supply failure and disruption of services to airport and Reading
Hundreds of passengers were evacuated from a train, and services to Heathrow airport were cancelled, after a fire near tracks in the London Paddington area caused major disruptions to London’s rail network.
The fire caused an electricity supply failure which left all lines between Paddington and the airport blocked, National Rail said on Saturday afternoon.
Officials accuse National Liberation Army of launching strike followed by clash inside military compound
An attack involving explosives dropped from drones followed by a clash inside a military compound in north-eastern Colombia has killed at least three soldiers and wounded four, Colombia’s army said on Saturday.
Local authorities blamed the attack – which took place late on Friday – on the rebel National Liberation Army (ELN).
Moscow and Kyiv vow not to strike each other’s capitals for three days during negotiations
Russian president Vladimir Putin began talks with US envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff in the Kremlin on Saturday – aimed at ending more than four years of war in Ukraine, ahead of the pair’s first visit to Kyiv expected on Sunday.
Both Russia and Ukraine vowed not to strike each other’s capitals for three days during the negotiations, as Washington tries to revive US-led talks to end Europe’s worst conflict since the second world war.
Duty falls by precedent to William to attend service of late monarch, alongside Princess Royal, who is godmother to new king Haakon VIII
The Prince of Wales is to represent his father at the funeral of King Harald V of Norway next week, Buckingham Palace has announced.
William, the heir to the throne, will be joined by his aunt the Princess Royal, who is attending in a private and personal capacity as godmother of the new king, Haakon VIII.
Taylor Fritz and Flavio Cobolli lost from winning positions, Madison Keys collapsed from 5-0 up in the final set, but Coco Gauff, Iga Swiatek and Mirra Andreeva reached the last 16
Last night Serena and Venus Williams – with their combined age of 456 - blew a five-point lead in the deciding tie-break as their return to the grand slam doubles stage ended in defeat, 6-3, 6-7 (6), 7-6 (7) against Chan Hao-ching and Maya Joint. Serena must be sick of the sight of Joint – given her singles comeback was also halted by the Australian in the Wimbledon first round this summer – but having come so close to victory in both matches, she may well be encouraged enough to continue. Serena and Venus chose not to do a post-match media conference last night – so it’s not clear what their next plans are.
A big cheer on Grandstand – despite the fact Zheng is facing an American – as she holds at the start of the second set. Anisimova is still a break down, 3-2, against Potapova, while Taylor Fritz – the pick of the American men in the first week - is warming up on Arthur Ashe against Francisco Cerundolo, the 24th seed from Argentina.
Some 49% of voters surveyed leaned Democrat, including independent voters asked to pick one party or the other. Only 39% of respondents leaned Republican.
Argentinian beats No 9 seed 3-6, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4
Fritz had three break points for chance to serve for match
As his last, desperate backhand soared far past the baseline inside Arthur Ashe Stadium, Taylor Fritz instantly held his face in his hands, unable to hide the agony of squandering such a great opportunity.
For much of his afternoon, Fritz was cruising. He had established two sets to love lead against Francisco Cerundolo before breaking serve in the opening game of the third. One unfocused service game was enough to shift the momentum and once Fritz had lost control, he spent another two hours failing to retrieve it. His US Open ended with an excruciating 3-6, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 third-round defeat by a courageous Cerundolo.
"There are now more seniors in the world than young children," reports the International Business Times, citing a new report from the U.S. Census Bureau report. And it warns that "The share of the population aged 65 and over is projected to nearly double, from 10.5 percent (about 1 in 10 people) in 2025 to 19.6 percent (about 1 in 5 people) by 2060."
The world is expected to add another 2 billion people from 2025 to 2060, increasing global population from around 8 billion to around 10 billion... "Over one-half of that growth (1.148 billion) is projected to come from an increase in the population aged 65 and over," the report states. "By contrast, the population at younger ages (age 0-19) is projected to stay relatively constant due to persistent low fertility. As the size of the older population grows rapidly and the youthful age population remains roughly the same, the percentage of the population aged 65 and over is projected to increase."
The report notes that the birthrate in 71 percent of countries is now below the replacement level of 2.1. China, in particular, has seen its birthrate plummet. In 2023, birth rates per woman in China hit 1.06...
Aside from lower birth rates, the fact that people are living longer is one of the primary driving factors. The report notes that people are also living a healthier, more active life for a longer time.
No one was injured when a piece of the ceiling inside the Kennedy Center's grand foyer partially collapsed Friday evening, said Roma Daravi, the center's vice president for public relations.
Sector has avoided issue because of stigma fears, expert warns ahead of closure of Nottingham attacks inquiry
Mental health organisations have “failed to acknowledge” the risk of violence from a minority of people with severe mental illnesses, the chief executive of Mind has said ahead of the closure of the inquiry into the Nottingham attacks.
Dr Sarah Hughes, who has led mental health charity Mind for four years and has worked in the sector for almost four decades, said charities had shied away from addressing the risk of violence due to the fact it had increased the stigma and harassment around people with mental health conditions.
The U.S. struck three Iranian oil tankers after Iran's Revolutionary Guard fired ballistic missiles at an aircraft carrier and guided-missile destroyer.
Presidents Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy agreed to pause strikes on each other's capitals while U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner hold talks to revive peace efforts.
Possums in the roof, bats in the curtains and ducks on the balcony: new research has revealed how native animals are making themselves at home in our houses.
Researchers have analysed a decade of wildlife rescue reports and found brushtail and ringtail possums make up half of all cases of animals in buildings, followed by microbats and bare-nosed wombats.
Port authorities say access roads ‘free flowing’ again after large group forces road closures in both directions
Dozens of people dressed in black and wearing balaclavas blocked the road at the port of Dover in Kent, forcing closures in both directions on Saturday morning.
Kent police said they were were in attendance and engaging with the protest, which the Port of Dover described as a “public order incident”. No arrests were made during the incident. Responsibility for the demonstration appears to have been claimed by an anti-immigration group with links to the far right.
Fiery Diamond League comments partially walked back
On Hocker: ‘Cole and I talked it through after the race’
The double Olympic champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen has issued a part-apology for calling his rivals “losers” and a “bunch of cowards” after a spicy men’s 1500m Diamond League final on Friday.
However, Ingebrigtsen has continued to maintain that he was still right to accuse the Olympic 1500m champion Cole Hocker of cowardice – because he asked for a strong pace and swapped in his own pacemaker only to then hide behind others in the race.
Guyana is one of more than 30 nations that have now signed deals with the Trump administration as part of President Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration.
Leading second-wave feminist co-founded Women’s Media Center with Jane Fonda and Gloria Steinem
Robin Morgan, a child star of the 1940s and 50s who grew up to become an all-American radical as a poet, essayist, editor and second-wave feminist, has died. She was 85.
Morgan’s death was confirmed Saturday by the Women’s Media Center, an organization she co-founded with Jane Fonda and the celebrated author and activist Gloria Steinem, who died Wednesday.
Sarah Khalifa, 39, charged with forming organised criminal gang to manufacture and traffic drugs
An Egyptian court sentenced a well-known television presenter and 11 others to death for manufacturing and trafficking narcotics in a sprawling drug case, official media reported on Saturday.
The presenter, Sarah Khalifa, 39, is best known for her programme Mission Impossible, which dealt with issues concerning security and crime.
As of Saturday afternoon, DTE Energy says around 4,000 utility workers are focused on restoring power to tens of thousands of Southeast Michigan residents.
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee met with about 10 Palestinian American residents who described the impact of the violence on their lives and properties.
‘Sometimes we will get things wrong and get a bit of a kicking for it,’ party leader tells gathering in Birmingham
No real mention by Anderson of the problems that overshadowed events yesterday. He ended his opening speech saying: "Yesterday was great. Today is going to be absolutely brilliant.”
CNN reports that alcohol "may play a greater role in death from numerous types of cancers in the United States than previously known, according to a new study."
"While it's true that overall cancer mortality has declined, we found the percentage of cancer deaths proportionally attributable to alcohol rose over 58% in people 20 and older over the last 33 years," said the study's first author Dr. Chinmay Jani... It didn't take much alcohol to raise one's risk — about one standard drink a day, every day, Jani said. In the US, a standard drink is 12 ounces of regular beer, 5 ounces of wine or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof liquor...
Alcohol is ethanol or ethyl alcohol, which is broken down by the liver into acetaldehyde, a
"probable human carcinogen," the National Cancer Institute states on its website. While the liver will further break down acetaldehyde into a harmless molecule called acetate, the process isn't foolproof: acetaldehyde may damage DNA and interfere with DNA repair before conversion into acetate is complete. Alcohol also contributes to oxidative stress, which damages DNA, proteins and cell function and creates inflammation. Drinking alcohol also weakens the cells in the mouth and throat, making them more susceptible to carcinogens. That's even more likely to occur with smoking cigarettes, a major source of acetaldehyde. In addition, alcohol interferes with the break down and absorption of key nutrients thought to decrease cancer risk — vitamins A, C, D and E as well as folates in the vitamin B complex, according to the National Cancer Institute.
The study, which was published Monday in The Lancet Regional Health — Americas journal, analyzed more than three decades of US data gathered for the Global Burden of Disease Study. The GBD study is a massive scientific effort to measure health, mortality and disabilities from hundreds of risk factors, diseases and conditions in more than 200 countries and territories. Between 1990 and 2023, the total number of yearly alcohol-linked cancer deaths more than doubled, rising from 11,361 to 23,126 in the US.
Men and adults age 55 and older experienced the greatest impact; alcohol-related cancer mortality rate in older males climbed nearly 24% over the 33-year period. For men, liver cancer deaths showed the strongest link to alcohol, followed by esophageal and colorectal cancers. For women 55 and older, breast cancer was the top killer, followed by liver and colorectal cancers.
Reform UK leader maintains innocence in overseas funding controversy on last day of party conference
Nigel Farage has claimed that he “wasn’t even listening” during a meeting at the centre of a controversy about whether his party considered evading the law on accepting donations from overseas.
The Reform UK leader also claimed he knew donation law “better than anybody” during interviews as he sought to salvage the final day of his party conference from the fallout that has already cost him two of his closest aides.
Officials said US aircraft carrier and destroyer avoided attacks before three Iranian tankers were struck by the US
The US military said Saturday it struck three Iranian oil tankers after US navy warships came under missile attack, further escalating tensions in the region and warning it would “if necessary, destroy Iran’s limited and exposed oil fleet”.
According to the military, a US aircraft carrier and destroyer avoided “multiple unprovoked Iranian attacks” while patrolling the region. No US personnel were injured.
Judge issues order as part of discovery process in lawsuit brought by non-profit into now defunct compensation fund
A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to reveal who set up the structure of a controversial $1.8bn “anti-weaponization fund” to recompense victims of so-called political lawfare that was reportedly dropped by the justice department last month.
Ivan Davis, the US magistrate judge for the eastern district of Virginia, issued the order compelling discovery materials from the government as part of a lawsuit brought by the Democracy Forward non-profit on behalf of plaintiffs including a fired prosecutor and a college professor acquitted of assaulting federal agents at a protest against an immigration raid in California.
Ryan Bridge, arrested this year on suspicion of religiously and racially aggravated harassment, says party invited him
The leader of a flag campaign group who was arrested on suspicion of causing religiously and racially aggravated harassment was given access to Reform UK’s annual conference.
Ryan Bridge, whose Raise the Colours group has put up hundreds of union and St George flags across England, told the Guardian he was invited to the conference.
MPs applaud PM’s ambition and optimism but John Healey has yet to show he can match leader’s radical perspective
Until now, Andy Burnham has been a lucky prime minister. In office for just over six weeks, no major domestic crisis derailed his plans over the summer, Reform has been on the back foot, and he arrived back at Westminster with his personal approval ratings soaring and optimism undampened.
But underneath the sense of relief that many Labour MPs are feeling that their high-stakes gamble of ousting Keir Starmer appears – for now – to have paid off, there is an unease that Burnham’s premiership is yet to make contact with economic reality.
Politicians on the right and left are pushing back against Flock as more Americans voice opposition to the tech
Growing factions from both sides of the political aisle in the US are pushing back against surveillance cameras made by a single company, a rare response in a sharply divided country with a president pushing an unwaveringly pro-tech agenda.
The bipartisan backlash against Flock Safety cameras resembles nationwide rage toward the construction of large datacenters that power artificial intelligence. Polling shows roughly 75% of Americans oppose new datacenter construction in their areas.
The painting was among the artworks looted and sold under duress to Nazi officials from art dealer Jacques Goudstikker after Adolf Hitler's Germany invaded the Netherlands in 1940.
Houthi rebel offensive against government forces on west coast leads to some of deadliest clashes in years
Clashes between Yemen’s Saudi-backed government forces and the Iran-aligned Houthi rebel movement have killed more than 60 people, including civilians, as the Houthis pushed forward with a military offensive on Yemen’s western coast.
Twenty-six government troops and 31 Houthi fighters were killed during several hours of fighting in the country’s south-west on Saturday, medical and military sources told Agence France-Presse (AFP). A missile strike also killed six civilians and injured seven others travelling by bus in the city of Taiz.
The coastal community in California had already been devastated by landslides and wildfires before a fatal crash
California’s rugged Big Sur coastline is often called a slice of heaven, 120 miles (195km) of unspoiled rocky promontories, sandy beaches and redwood forests at the foot of the Santa Lucia mountains. This year, it has endured a long summer of hell.
Wildfires, road closures and repeated disruptions to the local hotel, restaurant and campsite businesses all have posed significant challenges in an era of climate change and unpredictable weather patterns. One large fire broke out in the highlands east of Big Sur in early August and is still less than 25% contained. A second fire erupted 30 miles to the south two weeks later and is so inaccessible to firefighters that it has grown bigger than the first and is barely contained at all.
Florida's Republican Governor Ron DeSantis said this week he's removing Flock cameras from state roadways. And according to a local news report, that led sheriff's departments in at least three other Florida counties to also "announce they're ending their own license plate reader programs." The same week in Texas, the Dallas Police Department announced it's also shutting down over 300 more Flock cameras, acccording to The Hill, after Republican Governor Greg Abbott ordered state agencies to halt funding.
And in Wisconsin "at least a dozen" law enforcement agencies announced they'd suspend use of Flock's cameras, reports the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, joining Wisconsin cities like Appleton, Oshkosh and Kenosha that also cancelled their Flock contracts. But this week's cancellations had a new reason:
Officials said it was revealed [Flock] had been collecting five years of traffic data, which had been stripped of identifying information, from cities' Flock cameras, and repackaging that as a traffic analytics product to sell to cities.
All said they supported the effectiveness of the technology in investigations, but cited losing faith in the company's trustworthiness. "This is not what we agreed to, and it is not what the public was led to believe," said Racine County Sheriff Christopher Schmaling in a news release announcing the removal of Flock cameras operated by the agency. "The Sheriff's Office will not participate in a system that appears to use public safety as a justification for mass surveillance and the collection and monetization of information about innocent people...."
[Racine County] officials were told the company believed if it stripped the data of any identifiable nature, it was then considered to be the company's property and no longer the city's. [Lt. Michael Luell, the sheriff's public information officer] said the sheriff's office has outside attorneys, along with the county's attorneys, investigating the company's move. "Our contract, from my reading of it is, it stated they agreed not to distribute or sell our data," Luell told the Journal Sentinel. "But they had this legal theory."
Thanks to long-time Slashdot readers MAurelius and schwit1 for sharing the news.
The U.S. was the only country to vote against the U.N. resolution, which encourages the use of an “Equal Earth” map. The U.S. described it as a “radical ideological project.”
Labor Day cooking gets easier when every dish is not fighting for grill space. These 15 cookout recipes cover steak, kebabs, burgers, seafood, sides, oven backups, and grilled peaches for dessert.The post 15 grilling recipes that take Labor Day all…
District attorney must decide whether to retry case after jury’s failure to reach verdict despite hours of deliberation
Lindsay Clancy, prosecutors, defense lawyers, the judge and millions watching on are back where they started after her five-week trial over the murder of her three children ended in a mistrial.
America’s saddest case has ceased for the moment, but the legal wrangling is not over, and a second trial could now be on the horizon, prolonging and repeating an agonizing spectacle that has gripped America and the world.
Potlucks get repetitive fast. These 13 recipes mix chilled salads, creamy dip, baked pasta, cake, cookies, cornbread, smoked appetizers, and a Dutch oven stew so the table has more range.The post 13 potluck recipes my sister-in-law admitted she couldn’t recreate…
Todd Blanche’s remarks are part of a totally-not-invented moral panic that stretches the limits of the imagination
Being a public school teacher in the US these days is tough. You’ve got to pay for a lot of your own supplies, deal with smartphone-addicted children and perform gender-affirming surgeries on your lunch break.
Luckily our intrepid attorney general, Todd Blanche, is on the case. Blanche appeared on Fox News this week to decry a “pandemic” of gender transitions in schools across the US. “There’s not a parent in America, no matter where you live, that would want their school to change and call their child by a different name and not expect to be told about that. We partnered with the Department of Education recently to combat this very trend and, really, pandemic that’s happening in some school districts around the country,” Blanche said. He seemed more concerned with name changes than with surgery, but the president himself has suggested on several occasions that schools are furtively doing surgery on children. During a campaign speech in 2024, for example, Donald Trump said: “Can you imagine … your son leaves the house and you say: ‘Jimmy, I love you so much. Go have a good day in school,’ and your son comes back with a brutal operation? Can you even imagine this?”
Healthy middle-aged people deemed to be at higher risk of developing condition among those eligible to participate
People without memory loss will be offered an experimental Alzheimer’s drug that could stop the development of the condition before dementia symptoms emerge.
Healthy middle-aged people deemed to have a higher risk of developing the condition will be eligible to participate in the trial, which is being run by an NHS trust as part of an international clinical trial aiming to prevent dementia.
Activists are calling on the state attorney general to take action against hospitals that have ended gender-affirming care programs after Trump retook office
A group of trans activists from across Massachusetts brought their needles, hormone gels, pills and sharps containers to Boston on Wednesday to send a message to state attorney general Andrea Campbell.
Organizers with the youth-led group Protect Trans Futures (PTF) took their hormone replacement therapy (HRT) in the lobby of her office building, then occupied the space, refusing to leave without a commitment to protect civil rights for trans kids.
Chancellor says he wants to ensure country has ‘buffer’ against uncertainty as global bond yields hit 18-year high
The chancellor has indicated that the UK will face a tough budget next month due to Trump’s war in the Middle East.
In an interview with the Financial Times, John Healey said the conflict in Iran would probably have a strong influence on his first budget on 28 October.
Chinese man at Trishuli hydropower project and Nepali woman in Nuwakot found 10 days into rescue operation
Emergency responders have rescued a Chinese man and a Nepali woman in two separate operations as authorities continued to search for thousands of people missing 10 days after massive floods hit Nepal.
The Nepali military said on Saturday a joint team comprising personnel from its army and South Korean disaster experts rescued the man from a 225-metre (740ft) tunnel in the Upper Trishuli-1 hydropower project, and that he was undergoing a health assessment. Pictures showed him being evacuated by helicopter after being carried out of the tunnel.
Some of the highest-ranking officials in the U.S. military were subjected to polygraph tests as part of a sweeping leak probe, U.S. officials briefed on the matter told CBS News.
Seven aid workers killed in an airstrike in Gaza were marked as targets under an Israeli military practice of establishing guilt by association, a Guardian investigation shows.
A top Israeli military prosecutor announced last month that he would not pursue criminal proceedings for the April 2024 incident in which drones fired missiles at three clearly marked World Central Kitchen (WCK) cars soon after they had escorted a food aid delivery to Gaza. Three British humanitarian workers along with an Australian, a Palestinian, a Pole and a dual US-Canadian national were killed.
The ‘hip boost’ aims to create hourglass silhouette, much like Kim Kardashian’s shapewear brand’s padded shorts
For decades shapewear has been used to compress and cinch. But now there is a sub-genre emerging. Rather than shrinking a silhouette, it aims to add inches.
This week M&S launched a bodysuit that features exaggerated padding at the hip allowing the wearer to create an hourglass shape, or at least the illusion of one.
Security experts fear Putin may be winning hybrid war with the west amid rise of pro-Kremlin, far-right parties
Defence planners working with Nato fear that if war broke out with Russia, Europe could not currently sustain a prolonged war of attrition owing to a public lack of war readiness, a conference on the future of European military coordination heard this week.
The pessimism reflects concern that Russia may be winning a so-called hybrid war with Europe, weakening the options available to Nato war planners in the event of military conflict.
A storm lasting about 30 minutes wreaked $18m in damage and left tens of thousands without power in the US city
The storm that hit the Memphis, Tennessee, area on 22 August lingered for only about half an hour. But the destruction it left was lasting: $18m in damages, fallen trees and more than 100,000 people without power.
Amber Sherman was one of the east Memphis residents who lost power, but her first thoughts were of her neighbors. “My main thought was that the power’s going to be out for a while and people aren’t prepared for that and it’s very hot outside,” Sherman, a coordinator for Black Voters Matter (BVM) in Memphis, said. Days after the storm, a series of rain showers and thunderstorms known as a bow echo storm, the high in Memphis was 91F (32.8C). Tens of thousands of households were still without power.
Atlanta’s Bradley Carlisle first played Kris Kringle for kids with Down syndrome before completing elite Santa school
After recently gaining recognition as the first professional Santa Claus with Down syndrome in the US, Bradley Carlisle has already gotten a lot more than the traditional serving of milk and cookies that is usually left out for Father Christmas each year.
That is because the 37-year-old community theater actor from suburban Atlanta landed an honorary induction into the International Santa Claus Hall of Fame upon completing one of the largest Christmas performer schools in the US in late August – a distinction meant to recognize the important representation his emergence on the holiday scene has brought, according to his supporters.
Anwar, who lives in Glasgow, says Home Office refused visa application despite Maryam having cancer
A man living in the UK has said he believes his sister-in-law who died from cancer in Gaza would still be alive today if the Home Office had agreed to bring her and her family to Britain.
Anwar, who lives in Glasgow, fled Gaza in 2020 and was granted refugee status in the UK in 2021. After the destruction of large areas of Gaza by Israeli forces following the Hamas attacks on Israel in October 2023, he applied to bring his brother Hassan, Hassan’s wife, Maryam, their two young children and other family members to the UK in October 2025. He said the Home Office rejected their application.
Carlos de Almeida Baptista Júnior describes 2022 meeting in new book as ex-leader’s son vies with Lula for presidency
The far-right populist Jair Bolsonaro was in his final days as Brazil’s president when, six weeks after losing the election and still refusing to recognise the result, he summoned the heads of the armed forces to a meeting.
The defence minister, Gen Paulo Sérgio Nogueira de Oliveira, took out a document from a plastic folder and handed copies to the commanders of the navy, army and air force.
Exclusive: court orders seen by Guardian show agency given approval to fit Texas detainee with tube without his consent
Federal immigration officials quietly received permission from a judge in recent weeks to force-feed a detained Cuban hunger striker inside a Texas detention center, including with the use of a rare, nonconsensual surgical procedure, court records reveal.
The man is likely the 19th hunger striker in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention where the agency has had an application approved to conduct “involuntary medical procedures” since January 2025. The rising number of cases under the second Trump administration has alarmed advocates amid wide-ranging accusations of mistreatment inside facilities nationwide.
The US defense secretary faces internal dissent and discord at the Pentagon, accused of focusing on culture war issues and his own political ambitions as the Iran war drags on
In a different Washington, under a different president, a return to the well-worn playbook of all-out sanctions to counter Iran might have been the signal for a publicity-hungry US secretary of defense to adopt a lower profile.
But these are no ordinary times. And Pete Hegseth is no ordinary defense secretary.
Left-wing Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has a proposal to shield her country from Donald Trump’s growing influence over Latin American politics: changing the constitution to bar dual nationals from running for president or governor of any Mexican state.
“A Mexican president is Mexican and does not represent another country,” Sheinbaum said during her morning press conference on August 25. If adopted, her proposal would make Mexico’s presidency qualifications in some respects more restrictive than those of the United States, where a president must be born in the country but there is no explicit ban on dual citizenship.
Sheinbaum’s proposal marks the latest in a suite of changes that her critics deem authoritarian. In May, for example, Sheinbaum gave the National Electoral Institute, Mexico’s highest electoral authority, the power to annul presidential elections deemed to have been influenced by foreign actors.
But Sheinbaum argues the reforms are necessary to stave off the growing influence of the far right in Latin America, where now two heads of state — Colombia’s Abelardo de la Espriella and Ecuador’s Daniel Noboa — are also U.S. citizens.
De la Espriella, the far-right Colombian president who received strong support from Trump during his campaign and took office in June, is a U.S. and Italian citizen and a registered member of the Republican Party. Noboa, who assumed office as Ecuador’s president in 2023 at the age of 35, was born in Miami, Florida, and is the son of one of Ecuador’s richest men. (His father, Álvaro Noboa, also ran unsuccessfully for president five times.)
It’s clear that Latin America has an ascendant right wing under U.S. influence, said Pamela K. Starr, a professor of political science and international relations at the University of Southern California. Morena, the party that Sheinbaum leads, genuinely seems to believe there’s an international far-right movement that has taken over most of Latin America and that efforts to weaken Mexico’s left-wing political leadership come from Washington. How Mexican observers view Sheinbaum’s protectionism, meanwhile, is something of a political Rorschach test.
“Those who trust her trust that her efforts are legitimate, that she’s not trying to establish authoritarianism,” Starr told The Intercept. “Those who oppose her have the exact opposite read: that this is simply an extension of the Fourth Transformation’s effort to recreate an authoritarian government in Mexico. The truth obviously is somewhere in between.”
The Fourth Transformation is the political project launched by former Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the founder of the Morena party who swept to the presidency in 2018 promising to break with Mexico’s political establishment, reduce inequality, and root out corruption. López Obrador cast his movement as a historic transformation of the country, and his successor, Sheinbaum, has pledged to protect it.
Her strategy raises an uncomfortable question inside Mexico: whether measures designed to shield the country from foreign political influence could themselves be used to consolidate Morena’s power.
“I don’t think it is an absurd idea,” said Damián Zepeda, the former president of Mexico’s conservative party PAN, of Sheinbaum’s proposed dual-citizenship ban. “But we cannot lose sight of the context of the authoritarian government we are living under.”
“What is being done is protecting Mexico from leaders who would sell out their own country.”
For Cynthia López Castro, a Morena senator, the initiative seems fundamental. The logic behind it is that someone who holds dual nationality has a legal bond with another state, López Castro said, while whoever holds the presidency can only represent the Mexican people.
“What is being done is protecting Mexico from leaders who would sell out their own country,” said López Castro, who told The Intercept that the measure was discussed in parliament this week. “President Claudia Sheinbaum argues that dual nationality is incompatible with serving as president or governor because these positions require exclusive representation.”
Sheinbaum’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
There are people within and around the U.S. administration who see Sheinbaum’s government as hostile to American interests and are seeking to see Mexico governed by conservatives, Starr said. The irony, she added, is that “the United States has never, literally never, had such good security cooperation from Mexico.”
The State Department and U.S. military are highly supportive of the Mexican president because of the level of security cooperation her government has provided Washington.
“There are two messages coming out of the United States, and Donald Trump just depends on what day it is, which side he apes in his rhetoric,” Starr said.
Framing Sheinbaum’s proposal as an authoritarian measure, Zepeda, the conservative, also presented it as an attack on a critical target for the Trump administration: the rights of millions of Mexican immigrants.
“A great deal of progress has been made on the migration agenda to recognize the rights of our fellow Mexicans abroad, and this proposal would prevent anyone who was born in the United States because of their family’s migration circumstances from aspiring to certain public offices,” Zepeda said. “It is a double narrative: On the one hand, we support migrants, and on the other, we restrict their rights in order to protect those in power.”
In Starr’s view, while the U.S. president is clearly an influential force, he’s inflating his own role in Latin American politics.
“There’s no question that Trump thinks that he has created a conservative coalition in Latin America, and it supports him. He’s right that it supports him, but he’s not right that he created it,” Starr said. “Latin Americans are voting on Latin American concerns.”
A member of the Coastal Elite Lacrosse Club in action. Photo courtesy of BPG Sports Lacrosse Media Team.
The sports management firm, BPG Sports, of Buccini Pollin Group announced the acquisition of the Coastal Lacrosse Academy in a press release, September 2. The group also entered into management agreements with three other youth sports programs.
Buccini Pollin Group’s sports management firm, BPG Sports, announced the firm is acquiring the Coastal Lacrosse Academy and entering into “long-term management agreements” with three other youth sports programs in a press release on September 2. The three programs involved in the management agreements are the Bagel Bombers baseball program, Lady Bombers softball program and Delmarva Rush Soccer Club.
Coastal Lacrosse Academy and Delmarva Rush Soccer Club will be rebranded into the Coastal Elite Lacrosse Club and Henlopen Recreational Soccer, according to the press release.
BPG Sports’ acquisition of Coastal Elite Lacrosse Club adds to its youth lacrosse portfolio that includes the BPG Nationals, Brotherly Love Lacrosse Club, Duke’s Elite Lacrosse Club and the Phantom Girls Lacrosse program. BPG Sports will serve over 1,000 lacrosse players across the Mid-Atlantic region following the acquisition of Coastal Elite Lacrosse Club, according to the press release.
“These transactions reflect exactly what BPG Sports was built to do – bring the top clubs, coaches, and venues under one roof and give young athletes a best-in-class experience,” senior vice president and general manager of BPG Sports, Steve Cavalier, said via the press release. “Each of these organizations has built a fantastic local reputation, and our goal is to strengthen what they’ve achieved, invest in their players and facilities, and enhance the experience for all.”
BPG Sports’ management of Henlopen Recreational Soccer adds to its club soccer portfolio that includes The Sporting Athletic Club and its New Jersey and Pennsylvania affiliates, Sporting Athletic Club PA and Sporting Athletic Club NJ.
BPG Sports’ management of the Bagel Bombers and Lady Bombers are the firm’s first baseball and softball programs. BPG Sports will take over the day-to-day operations as well as the management of the two programs, according to the press release.
In total, BPG Sports has a portfolio of 11 different programs across four different sports that serve 4,500 athletes and their families, according to the press release.
To learn more about BPG Sports, its club programs and its facilities click here to view the company’s website.
A new study offers more evidence that America’s biggest sport produces life-altering head trauma. The NFL will never turn itself off, so it’s on fans to do so
As a new NFL season begins this Wednesday, the danger of America’s most-watched sport has never been more clear.
A new and widely circulated study published in the British Medical Journal examined the donated brains of former NFL players who died between 2016 and 2021 and compared them with the overall number of players who died during that period. Of the 235 donated brains in that period, 215 had evidence of the degenerative brain condition chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). That group of 215 comprised 24.5% of the former players who died during that period in total. Given the finding, the study’s authors estimate that the prevalence of CTE among players who died in that period was at minimum 24.5% to a maximum of 97.7%, with the actual rate likely somewhere in between.
Nathan Kalman-Lamb is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of New Brunswick. Derek Silva is Associate Professor of Sociology and Criminology at King’s University College at Western University.
In Virginia’s Franklin County, Henry Law made the switch from illicit moonshine production to commercial sales. Sometimes, he said, he misses the chase.
Scale of deportations made public for first time amid criticism of hardline approach to UK citizens
Sweden has confirmed 458 British citizens have been deported or forcibly removed by police since Brexit.
It is the first time the scale of the deportations of citizens who failed to secure residency in Sweden post-Brexit has been made public and comes amid mounting criticism of a cruel and hardline approach to Britons who had chosen to make the country their home before Brexit.
Progressive candidates navigate their ties to the DSA as the group faces historic growth and mounting pressure
Days before he won the Democratic primary for a US Senate seat in Michigan, insurgent newcomer Abdul El-Sayed was asked whether he was concerned about being labeled a “socialist”.
“I’d rather think of myself as a capitalist who has actually read about capitalism,” El-Sayed told CBS News anchor Ed O’Keefe. “I’m not a socialist.”
Former champion struggles badly after 762-day layoff
Ruiz, 36, insists another title run remains possible
Andy Ruiz Jr’s comeback bid was left in tatters on Friday night after the former unified heavyweight champion was knocked down and picked apart in a sobering unanimous-decision defeat to Damian Knyba in Newark, New Jersey.
Knyba won by scores of 117-110 and 114-113 twice, handing Ruiz the third defeat of his professional career and dealing a devastating blow to his hopes of becoming a two-time champion in boxing’s prestige division. The baffling pair of 114-113 cards flattered Ruiz considerably and bore little relation to the mostly one-way traffic that unfolded. (The Guardian had it 117-110.)
Citing researchers published Friday, Ars Technica writes that AI agents "posted 18,000 messages to a public wiki that discussed ways for other agents to bypass security sandbox restrictions."
Reuters attributes the discussion to "a swarm of rogue OpenAI agents" that "hijacked a German website this spring and transformed it into a bulletin board for other AI agents, according to new research published Friday and two people familiar with the matter."
OpenAI officials learned of the incident weeks ago but kept it under wraps as executives grappled with the fallout from the July breach of the open source repository Hugging Face, the people said.
The episode, which began in May and has not previously been reported, underscores growing tension within the AI industry. Companies are racing to build increasingly autonomous agents capable of carrying out complex, valuable tasks, yet evidence is mounting that those systems may also learn to bend rules, exploit loopholes and coordinate with one another in ways developers neither anticipated nor intended. During the Hugging Face breach, OpenAI agents autonomously plotted a digital heist that went undetected for more than a week, intensifying concerns OpenAI is sacrificing safety to push the AI frontier. Its failure to disclose the May incident may revive questions about its oversight...
The German incident reflects a broader pattern of AI activity that some OpenAI investigators wanted to scrutinize more closely. But efforts to widen the probe met resistance from others inside OpenAI, including legal advisers, according to four people familiar with the matter. "Claims that our legal team discouraged investigation of the incident are false," the OpenAI spokesperson said...
The researchers said public server logs indicated much of the activity originated from Microsoft Azure infrastructure, which OpenAI sometimes uses. They also observed repeated visits to the site by OpenAI employees after the episode, a pattern they said strongly suggested the agents and the company were linked. Messages reviewed by the researchers showed agents plotting ways to evade detection, use tools such as Tor and preserve communications even after they had been shut down. When the site's moderator began deleting pages in June, the agents responded by creating backup pages to dodge the cleanup.
Reuters got this reaction from Maurice Chiodo, an academic at Cambridge University's Centre for the Study of Existential Risk. "The episode, he said, should reinforce growing concerns that the greatest threat from advanced AI may not be a single superintelligent system, but 'vast colluding swarms of semi-intelligent AI.'"
A spate of serious safety incidents have increased fears about the power and impenetrability of the most advanced models
Picture humanity in a boat being swept down a raging river, praying there is no Niagara Falls ahead. Or imagine standing with the pioneering physicists in 1942 before they triggered the first self-sustaining nuclear fission chain reaction beneath a Chicago stadium.
These were two of the analogies used this week by Prof Robert Trager, an expert in the nascent field of AI governance, to describe the perilous but potential-filled moment the world stands at with accelerating artificial intelligence.
Workers who blame algorithms for lowering their earnings are getting help from academics to find out how the system works
Gig economy workers are urging delivery platforms to open up the “black box” of computer-driven algorithms that determine the jobs they are offered and how much they are paid, blaming increased use of AI for lowering wages.
A group of food delivery riders in Edinburgh say their rates of pay have fallen and their working conditions have deteriorated at the same time as Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eat, the three dominant gig economy platforms in the UK and Ireland, have increased their use of automation.
Paris, Kentucky — Former Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin was arrested Thursday while working as an extra on a movie set after authorities acted on an outstanding bench warrant tied to a child support dispute.
Bevin, a Republican who served as governor from 2015 to 2019, was taken into custody in Bourbon County and later transported to the Jefferson County jail in Louisville.
Jefferson Family Court Judge Angela Johnson had issued the warrant after Bevin repeatedly failed to provide financial records and appear for hearings involving child support for his adopted son, Jonah Bevin. The requested documents included information about Bevin’s income, bank accounts and tax returns.
Johnson previously wrote that Bevin had shown “complete disregard and utter disrespect” for the court. On Friday, she ordered him to serve 60 days in jail for contempt.
The arrest reportedly occurred while Bevin was appearing as an extra in a Christmas movie being filmed at a Bourbon County horse farm.
Bevin has previously argued that the judge appeared focused on finding a reason to jail him, while attorneys representing his son have said the case demonstrates that no one is above court orders.
The underlying child support dispute remains unresolved, with the court still considering the broader financial issues in the case.
American duo lose 6-3, 6-7(6), 7-6(7) to Maya Joint and Chan Hao-ching
Serena and Venus crash out of women’s doubles in first round
In the end, after so much toil and admirable fight, defeat came swiftly for one of the greatest doubles teams to ever share a tennis court. Upon their return to prime time in New York, Venus and Serena Williams fought desperately to overturn the various deficits they found themselves in over three hours inside a thunderous Arthur Ashe Stadium.
They came close. The Williams sisters had clawed their way back into the match after trailing a 1-4 in their final set against Chan Hao-ching and Maya Joint, and they established a 5-0 lead in the third set tie-break. Just as they appeared to be on the verge of victory, they were brushed aside, losing 6-3, 6-7 (6), 7-6 (7) in the first round of the US Open.
Raleigh, North Carolina — A federal judge has ruled that former U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema can be sued in North Carolina under the state’s unusual “alienation of affection” law over her admitted romantic relationship with a married member of her security detail.
The lawsuit was filed by Heather Ammel, whose former husband, Matthew Ammel, worked on Sinema’s security team and later in her Senate office and campaign. She alleges Sinema knowingly pursued him while the couple still had “a good and loving marriage.”
Sinema acknowledged in a deposition that the relationship became sexual in May 2024 during a trip to Napa, California, and continued in several other states. She argued that North Carolina courts lacked jurisdiction because the alleged sexual encounters did not occur there.
U.S. District Judge David A. Bragdon rejected that argument, finding that nine text messages Sinema sent to Ammel while he was physically in North Carolina were enough to establish jurisdiction.
North Carolina is one of only a handful of states that still recognize alienation-of-affection claims, which allow a spouse to seek damages from a third party accused of helping destroy a marriage.
The ruling does not determine whether Sinema is liable. It only allows the case to move forward in North Carolina. Sinema’s attorney did not immediately comment on the decision.
Irish boxer lauded for her tenacity and inspiration before her last fight in front of 80,000 people at Croke Park
WhenKatie Taylor steps into the ring on Saturday night to defend her titles and once again enthral Ireland, there will be a bittersweet tinge. After a singular career that pioneered women’s boxing, the super-lightweight champion and Olympic gold medallist is bowing out. She is 40 and it is to be her final bout.
“The end of an era, isn’t it?” said Trevor McMahon, her brother-in-law and founder of a gym where she trains. “It’ll be an amazing night but it’ll also be a little bit sad. Everything she did, it might not ever be achieved again.”
Inverse shares a movie success story from last weekend:
Coyote vs. Acme debuted to $15.9 million at the box office, beating out iconic director Ridley Scott's latest sci-fi adventure, The Dog Stars. This success has only continued since, and the worldwide box office currently sits above $22 million. Strong reviews and word-of-mouth are sure to keep viewers coming in, especially during the holiday weekend.
What's impressive is Coyote vs. Acme had a limited marketing campaign that includes viral stunts. They photographed the movie's world premiere with a vintage Tasmanian Devil polaroid camera, and launched a phone number for the law firm suing Acme. ("If you've been injured by an enormous rubber band, press 7. If you've been injured by painted train tunnel that suddenly sprang to life, press 8...")
And Cartoon Brew reports that Wednesday "the famously silent Looney Tunes star participated in an AMA on Reddit's r/movies, answering questions about his career, his relationship with the Road Runner, and the Warner Bros. executive who nearly prevented audiences from seeing his latest movie."
In keeping with tradition, Wile E. delivered his responses through images of himself holding signs. The format produced several interesting and occasionally thought-provoking exchanges, but one obvious highlight came when a user asked: "Rumor has it that David Zaslav was paid off by ACME to cancel your film; what is your opinion on this?" Wile E.'s response was an image of the coyote glaring at the camera while holding a sign that read, "It's a limited number of signs," pulled from a scene in the film when Mr. Coyote first meets his eventual attorney Kevin Avery, played by Will Forte.
Meanwhile, Boing Boing cites local news reports that a Southern California bird watcher Alexander DeBarros has actually captured a photo of a coyote holding a roadrunner bird in its mouth:
In an incredible coincidence that is a movie publicist's dream, he snapped the rare, possibly unprecedented, photo on the opening weekend of the movie Acme vs. Coyote... In an even more incredible coincidence, DeBarros's father, Brian Mainolfi, is an animator whose first job in the field was working for Chuck Jones, the creator and director of the Roadrunner cartoon series.
Cartoon Brew notes a Reddit user specifically asked the Coyote for his reaction to the news.
Wile E. responded with some unexpectedly healthy advice: "We cannot judge our worth on the work of others."
Aftermath calls the movie "a well made, deeply funny movie that pays a deep respect to the Looney Tunes in a way that Warner Brothers currently seems uninterested in doing."
Washington, D.C. — The Pentagon reportedly subjected about 50 members of the Joint Staff to polygraph examinations in August as part of an effort to identify officials suspected of leaking sensitive information to journalists.
The New York Times reported that the tests followed a series of stories about depleted U.S. weapons stockpiles during the ongoing war with Iran, including shortages of long-range precision missiles and Patriot interceptors. Mediaite independently summarized the Times report Friday night.
The Joint Staff employs roughly 1,500 to 2,000 people, meaning the examinations targeted only a small portion of the organization.
Defense Department spokesperson Sean Parnell declined to discuss specific personnel or investigative matters but said the Pentagon takes leaks of classified national security information “extremely seriously” and investigates them accordingly.
The move marks an escalation in Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s long-running campaign against unauthorized disclosures. Hegseth previously threatened polygraph testing after reporting surfaced in 2025 that the Pentagon was preparing to brief Elon Musk on U.S. military planning involving China. According to earlier reporting, Hegseth later confronted then-acting Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Christopher Grady while searching for the source of that leak.
The latest leak investigation comes as reports of shrinking munitions reserves have raised questions about U.S. military readiness during the prolonged Iran conflict.
The Pentagon has not publicly identified any employee disciplined or removed as a result of the August polygraph examinations.
Playing together at the U.S. Open in New York for the first time in four years, Serena and Venus Williams lost in a three-set thriller match in the first round of the women's doubles tournament.
Australian returns on AU$4.9m contract after season on sidelines
Former No 1 pick hopes to reignite basketball career with fourth club
Australian former No 1 overall draft pick Ben Simmons has taken a significant step towards resurrecting his NBA career, agreeing a one-year deal with the Sacramento Kings.
The Melbourne-born guard returns on a US$3.5m (AU$4.9m) contract after sitting out the entire 2025-26 campaign while rehabilitating back and leg injuries that have hampered him in recent years.
President Trump threatened in a social media post on Friday to stop trade with some countries unless the US Federal Reserve moves to cut interest rates.
Trump cited August’s strong jobs report as sufficient justification to lower rates, and warned that, if the central bank didn’t go along, he’d halt trade between the US and any nations with which it maintains a trade deficit.
Ruling allows defense department to proceed for now in exerting greater editorial control over military news outlet
A federal judge has declined to stop the Pentagon from firing journalists who say they were illegally punished for speaking out about the need for the Stars and Stripes publication to maintain its editorial independence.
The ruling by US district judge Trevor McFadden allows the Pentagon to proceed for now in exerting greater editorial control over the historically independent military news outlet.
Two senior aides to Nigel Farage, the firebrand leader of the U.K.'s populist Reform party, have stepped down in the wake of an investigative news report.
Indira Talwani’s ruling presents major setback for president as first states begin to send out mail ballots for midterms
A federal judge on Friday again blocked Donald Trump’s executive order to impose sweeping restrictions on mail-in voting, the latest in a legal back-and-forth playing out less than two months before election day.
US district court judge Indira Talwani initially placed a temporary order blocking the president’s mandate and has now extended that prohibition with a stronger preliminary injunction. The ruling comes hours after North Carolina became the first state to start sending out mail-in ballots for the 3 November midterm elections.
Interior department given three months to decide whether wolves can be removed from endangered species list
Donald Trump signed an executive order on Friday directing the interior department to consider de-listing gray wolves from the Endangered Species Act and to contemplate whether the agency could make it easier to authorize killing them.
The order gives interior secretary Doug Burgum three months to determine whether gray wolves and Mexican gray wolves have recovered enough for the federal government to de-list them.
When a mother posted a note on Facebook asking if anyone in her neighborhood would allow her son to trick-or-treat at their homes in July for his 11th birthday, more than 100 neighbors said yes.
The mistrial in the case of the 36-year-old Massachusetts mother who admitted to killing her three children sets up the possibility of another trial in a matter that has sown division and drawn attention to postpartum mental health.
On the evening of 1 April 2024, a team of aid workers from World Central Kitchen (WCK) stood on Gaza’s Mediterranean shore overseeing the unloading of a barge full of desperately needed food on a makeshift jetty made of sand and rubble.
The Gaza war had been raging for six months and Israel’s closure of land crossings had left the whole territory facing the threat of famine. WCK and local Palestinian contractors had constructed the jetty out of everything they could lay their hands on, including debris from the bombed house of one of the contractors, so that the pallets of humanitarian assistance could be delivered by boat from Cyprus.
(The Center Square) – New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels launched a moratorium to combat artificial intelligence use in the classroom, along with a screen time policy for the 2026-27 school year.
The Supreme Court left in place guidance from the Federal Communications Commission that allows political parties and committees access to cheaper rates for political ads.
A federal judge extended her block on the U.S. Postal Service's new requirements for mail voting, as states prepare to begin sending mail ballots to voters for the November midterm elections.
The Pentagon accused two of the Stars and Stripes journalists of insubordination after one of them had told "CBS Sunday Morning" in a July interview that she worked for Stars and Stripes, "not for the Pentagon, not for any administration, not for any policymaker."
Defending champions Carlos Alcaraz and Aryna Sabalenka progressed alongside other top seeds in Friday’s third-round matches
Leylah Fernandez has broken Pegula early, taking a 2-0 lead in the first. You might recall that Fernandez was Emma Raducanu’s opponent in the 2021 US Open final; since losing that match, the Canadian has only gone past the third round at a slam once (the 2022 French Open, where she made the quarter-finals) but has won five WTA Tour titles and is a consistent presence in the world’s top 30. So which career path would you prefer: hers or Raducanu’s?
Sabalenka takes the first set 6-3, remaining dominant against an opponent who is playing decent stuff. Marta Kostyuk also claims the first set 6-3 over Alexandrova, while Sorana Cirstea has claimed the opener against Paolini by the same score. That feels like an upset, even though Cirstea is seeded higher – No 16 to Paolini’s 19.
You’ve probably heard that using artificial intelligence consumes a lot of water. But how does it measure up with snacking on almonds?
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman made the comparison in a recent interview. OpenAI is the company that makes ChatGPT, the popular AI chat app.
“For every 38,000 ChatGPT queries, that is the same amount of water that is used in the production of a single almond in California,” he said in a Sept. 1 episode of the Sources Podcast.
Altman prefaced that by saying he isn’t sure of the exact number, and it “might be wrong, but it’s close.”
How close is it?
Altman appears to be drawing from information about ChatGPT average water use that he published in 2025 on his blog, and a 2019 study measuring the water use of California almond farming.
Altman said in that blog post that the average ChatGPT query uses 0.000085 gallons of water — about 0.32 milliliters, or 1/15th of a teaspoon. Altman’s post is the only source we found for that number. OpenAI does not publicize details about its overall water consumption, and the company did not respond to PolitiFact’s request for more information.
A 2019 study found that the process of growing a single California almond requires 3.2 gallons, or 12 liters, of water. That study counted more than just the direct water used to grow almonds. It also included rainfall and water quality impact in the measurement. If you compare those two numbers — dividing 12 liters (or 12,000 milliliters) for an almond by 0.32 milliliters for a ChatGPT query — you get 37,500, close to Altman’s figure.
But Altman’s figure is misleading. It overstates the amount of water consumed by almond agriculture, and uses a relatively low ChatGPT water use estimate that is unconfirmed and disputed.
How AI and almonds stack up
Agriculture uses vastly more water than the AI industry and data centers overall. Nationally, farms consumed nearly 30 trillion gallons of water for crop irrigation in 2020, the most recent data available. Meanwhile, data centers nationwide used about 228 billion gallons of water in 2023. Many AI data centers use water for cooling systems to keep computers from overheating, while other systems use very little water but more electricity to keep the computers cool. Water is also used in some forms of electricity generation, so the power needed to run the data centers also often consumes water.
But the total water consumed by a single ChatGPT message is hard to measure and depends on many factors like the type of cooling and power used by a data center and the energy efficiency measures the company takes.
“There is very little public information about how today’s ChatGPT systems operate and what resources they use,” said Shaolei Ren, a University of California, Riverside, professor who researches AI’s environmental footprint.
For almonds, the 12-liter-per-almond estimate includes rainwater and “grey water,” which is a measure of what’s needed to dilute pollutants such as fertilizer. About 6.3 liters of the total came from fresh water used for irrigation. A 2021 study produced a similar fresh water estimate of 5.8 liters.
That means a rough estimate of an almond’s direct water consumption is closer to 6 liters — or 1.5 gallons — per almond.
That already cuts Altman’s comparison in half. The information available about water usage for an AI prompt further undercuts his point.
AI’s water demands vary too much to make a solid per-chat assessment. But based on some estimates, you’d need anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 conversational AI prompts to equal the 6 liters of fresh water used to grow one California almond.
Altman’s 2025 blog post gave no explanation of what was included in the 0.000085 gallon measurement, and OpenAI hasn’t published specific data.
“In general, resource use can vary substantially depending on factors such as the data center location, AI model, prompt and output lengths, inference mode (e.g., reasoning versus non-reasoning), and the efficiency measures used to serve the model,” Ren said.
A Sept. 1 study estimated the total water consumption, including electricity generation, for ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini AI models and determined that ChatGPT’s 4o model used between 0.6 and 17 milliliters — 1/8th of a teaspoon and 3.5 teaspoons, respectively— per prompt, depending on the length of the input.
EcoLogits, a nonprofit site that estimates AI energy impact, said using the newer GPT-5.5 model to write an email — roughly comparable to a prompt and response — consumes 6.11 milliliters of water.
Long-term AI tasks that involve coding and computer use can use far more energy, which requires more water. An April study found that more complex AI tasks can use more than 10 times the energy of an ordinary chat.
Our ruling
Altman said, “For every 38,000 ChatGPT queries, that is the same amount of water that is used in the production of a single almond in California.”
However, Altman’s comparison relies on a relatively low estimate for ChatGPT’s water use, and a very high estimate for almonds’ water use. Available estimates show you’d need anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 conversational AI prompts to equal the 6 liters of fresh water used to grow one California almond. OpenAI hasn’t published enough information to verify its estimates of the total water usage for its prompts.
The statement has an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression. We rate it Mostly False.
IBM has made its Nighthawk r2 quantum processor available through the IBM Quantum Platform, with a new qubit-reset architecture that the company says delivers up to 25 times the circuit throughput of its Heron systems. The 120-qubit processor can execute more than 100,000 circuits per second, according to IBM.
Previous generations of IBM processors, including Heron, use conditional reset, which measures a qubit and applies a pulse when needed to return it to the ground state. Because the procedure is limited by measurement fidelity and cannot reset qubits that have leaked outside the computational states, the system must also remain idle for hundreds of microseconds between circuit executions.
IBM says Nighthawk r2 is capable of executing more than 100,000 circuits per second.
Nighthawk r2 instead pairs each programmable qubit with a dedicated reset element that connects it to a cold environment through a tunable coupler, drawing away its energy. IBM said this changes the qubit’s effective T1 energy-decay time from a median of about 200 microseconds to roughly 25 nanoseconds. That faster energy dissipation helps reduce the overall idle interval between circuit executions to as little as one microsecond.
Although Nighthawk r2 has the same 120 programmable qubits as its predecessor, it contains more supporting hardware. Its 120 qubits are accompanied by 218 couplers and 120 independently controlled reset elements, for a total of 458 physical quantum elements. Nighthawk r1 has the same qubit and coupler counts but lacks the dedicated reset elements, giving it 338 physical quantum elements.
IBM said the active-reset capability reduces initialization error by approximately 25 times while maintaining Heron-class gate fidelity and leaving neighboring qubits undisturbed.
The 25-fold increase in circuit throughput does not necessarily translate into an equivalent speedup for every workload. In early testing, IBM reports runtime improvements of as much as 10 times on research circuits without a loss of accuracy.
The company also used Nighthawk r2 to estimate observables on circuits containing more than 7,500 gates with probabilistic error amplification, meeting a target on its 2026 quantum roadmap. IBM separately said the processor’s higher throughput enabled a 12-fold speedup on a neutron-scattering simulation, generating spectra for comparison with experimental data in approximately 60 seconds.
Nighthawk r2’s reset capability can also be used during circuit execution. This allows auxiliary qubits to be measured, reset and reused within dynamic circuits, a capability needed for many quantum error-detection and error-correction experiments.
IBM said this could provide researchers with greater flexibility when testing protocols that introduce logical qubits into workloads. The company is positioning Nighthawk r2 as both a platform for near-term application research and a testbed for developing error-corrected quantum operations.
Why Should Delaware Care? More than half of all residents rely on Delmarva Power to provide electric service to their homes and businesses. A pending rate case could increase monthly bill costs, and the utility is seeking to recoup some of those costs sooner.
Delmarva Power filed a legal appeal in a Delaware court on Friday afternoon, seeking to overturn regulators’ cuts to its interim rate hike – a move that, if successful, could raise customers’ bills faster than expected.
The appeal was reportedly filed in Delaware Superior Court, the company said. It came just hours before the court closed for the Labor Day holiday weekend, despite the Public Service Commission (PSC) approving the interim rate schedule on Aug. 5.
The legal basis for the company’s appeal was not readily available with the courts now closed until Tuesday morning.
Delmarva Power Region President Marcus Beal told the Daily State News on Friday, however, that the utility sought to exclude a temporary price hike known as a Distribution System Improvement Charge from the PSC’s calculations. He was unavailable to speak to Spotlight Delaware on Friday evening.
The PSC, a five-member appointed body that oversees Delaware’s regulated utilities and rules on their expansions and investment returns, further cut interim rate hikes for Delmarva Power after the company voluntarily reduced its initial request by about a third.
In a Friday statement, the electric utility, which serves about 300,000 customers across all of New Castle County and parts of Kent and Sussex counties, said that the PSC’s decision “departed from Delaware statute by arbitrarily reducing the company’s interim rate further.”
The utility and its rate case – the third rate hike sought in five years by Delmarva to recoup the costs of its infrastructure investments in recent years – have become a bipartisan target for criticism as energy costs have skyrocketed in the last two years.
Dozens of customers decried the rate hike request during a two-hour public comment hearing two weeks ago that was marred by technical difficulties. A second hearing has been scheduled for Sept. 23.
“We understand that higher energy bills are a concern for our customers, and we do not take any increase lightly. That is why we continue to work with policymakers and other stakeholders on efforts to address rising costs, including energy supply prices. We also remain committed to balancing affordability with our responsibility to provide the safe and reliable service our customers depend on every day,” said Matt Ford, a spokesman for Delmarva Power, in a statement.
Where does the rate case stand?
Regulated utilities like Delmarva Power make money by recouping the costs of infrastructure upgrades — plus up to 10% profit — through electric rate increases.
In January, Delmarva Power filed its third rate hike request in five years because of recent infrastructure upgrades.
The utility has argued those upgrades, which range from substation improvements to line maintenance, are necessary to keep customers powered through issues, such as recent thunderstorms that left thousands powerless in the Wilmington area.
The debate over whether to approve that request is still ongoing. But while it happens, utilities can temporarily increase consumer costs to make sure the company can pay for those upgrades without borrowing too much money.
If the PSC ultimately decides the infrastructure upgrades were not necessary, customers would be refunded for that temporary rate increase.
Delmarva Power initially asked for $44.6 million in new revenue from base rates, as well as moving $23.2 million from a temporary price hike known as a Distribution System Improvement Charge into the base rate, making those costs permanently higher for customers.
That request, totaling $68.6 million, would have raised the electric bill of an average user by $6.42 per month, or 4.13%, according to Delmarva.
But after political pressure, the utility voluntarily lowered the total interim request in July to $45.9 million, with escalation factors that would kick in at seven and 12 months following their approval in conjunction with recent state legislation that aimed to lower the temporary costs for consumers.
Instead, the PSC rejected that plan and approved an interim rate that would start at $34.3 million – or half of the utility’s original request.
At debate is whether Delmarva Power’s movement of the Distribution System Improvement Charge should be factored into the calculations – regulators and the Delaware Public Advocate, who represents the collective interests of consumers, argue yes, while the utility says no.
Throughout their July negotiations, Delmarva Power lawyers warned that they felt the regulators were overstepping their authority to drive down interim rates.
Commissioner Regina Iorii, who was recently appointed to the PSC by Gov. Matt Meyer, told the utility, “If you don’t like it, appeal it.”
On Friday, it did.
And to make matters more dramatic for consumers, the utility filed an update to its request earlier this week that increases its total request to $75.6 million, or about 10%. It would be the largest single rate case increase in state history, if ultimately approved.
This came by way of a statutory filing known as a “12+0 filing,” which draws on true fiscal year-end costs as of July 1 rather than projections.
If that total requests hold in the rate case, the average Delmarva Power customer monthly bill would rise about $8, or 5%, before the cost of power is accounted for.
“At a time when energy affordability is a real concern for Delaware families, the Public Advocate believes this larger request warrants serious scrutiny. Delawareans should not be asked to pay more on their electric bills to increase the profits of a billion-dollar corporate holding company and its shareholders. The Public Advocate will rigorously review this case and oppose any amounts that are unjust, unreasonable, or imprudent,” Public Advocate Jameson Tweedie wrote on Facebook after the filing update.
Appeal raises the stakes
As Delmarva Power has increasingly entered the crosshairs of the Meyer administration, it has sought to shift the conversation to energy generation, which makes up the vast majority of a consumer’s energy bill.
Beal, Delmarva’s region president, called into Gov. Matt Meyer’s monthly radio show on Aug. 27 to confront him live on air about the issue, asking whether the governor would support reforms to state regulations that prohibit the utility’s ability to own its own power generation.
Beal noted that the average Delmarva Power customer’s bill has risen about $28 since January 2024, and 90% of that cost was tied to energy market prices that have been rising nationwide due to rising demand, spurred in part by data centers, and falling supply.
If the company could invest in its own generation, it could help spur greater supply and potentially lower supply costs to consumers, but historically regulators have been wary of giving to much power over its market to a single monopoly company.
Meyer said that his team was reviewing the proposal, but countered that transmission costs, which are requested by Delmarva Power and approved by regulators, have also outpaced inflation for the last five years. The governor asked Beal live on air to drop their looming rate hike request before he’d entertain conversations about power generation.
Beal demurred.
When asked whether a compromise could be brokered, Meyer rejected it.
“I don’t know what middle ground there is … They came to the Public Service Commission asking that they get profits on this rate case of 10.5%. No-risk profit. You tell me anyone who can do anything getting 10.5% profit, no risk,” he said. “I’m not going to do that for Delaware.”
When reached late Friday afternoon by Spotlight Delaware, Meyer reiterated his frustrations with Delaware’s largest electric distributor.
“While Delmarva keeps telling us affordability matters, they push every day for higher rates for Delaware families. We cannot continue to pay outrageous bills to keep our lights on. Delmarva wants to make this an issue about reliability, but it is really only about increasing their multimillion-dollar profits,” he said in a statement.
(The Center Square) - The Colorado River’s Upper Basin states are not required to make mandatory water cuts that the federal government imposed on the Lower Basin.
Jeffrey Mosteller pleaded no contest to charges relating to burning death of Thomas Cooper in Michigan
A former safety manager has been sentenced to one year and seven months in prison in connection with the death of a five-year-old Michigan boy who was killed in a fiery January 2025 explosion inside a hyperbaric oxygen chamber.
Jeffrey Mosteller, 66, received that sentence after pleading no contest to involuntary manslaughter in Oakland county circuit court in Michigan on Monday.
New pact includes terms for first-division USL Premier
Base pay for Championship grows from $31k to $42k
Agreement runs through the 2030 season
The United Soccer League and USL Players Association announced the ratification of a new collective bargaining agreement for two levels of the organization’s pyramid on Friday, with fresh terms taking effect immediately and running through 2030. The new pact include a second agreement for the second-division USL Championship as well as the first set of terms for the upcoming USL Premier, a first-division sanctioned league scheduled to lauch in 2028.
Among the headline items of the deals is the introduction of 12-month contracts for players, a codified first in the US lower divisions. The first USL CBAs worked to standardize 10-month contracts; before then, clubs varied in their commitments to players. Championship players will earn a base compensation (which includes housing) of $42,000 in 2026 – up from $31,000 – with that floor increasing annually over the term of the agreement. The USL Premier will also launch with 12-month contracts and a compensation floor of $67,500 in 2028 with annual increases worked into the CBA.
‘It’s tricky to handle when you’re trying to compete’
Alcaraz into fourth round after straight sets victory
Aryna Sabalenka briefly stopped her match at the US Open to complain about the strong smell of cannabis on her court as she comfortably reached the fourth round in New York.
Sabalenka, the two-time defending champion, continued her attempts to rebuild her form as she overcame a challenging test from Kamilla Rakhimova before winning 6-3, 6-4.
Zenith is a variant of Windows for “developer-class devices”.
Project Zenith comes with a set of pre-installed tools spanning languages and runtimes, source control, and productivity tools. Windows Terminal and Visual Studio Code are pinned to the Taskbar by default, putting your favorite tools within immediate reach.
We’ve also pre-configured Windows Settings for coding across File Explorer, Search, Start, and the Taskbar. File Explorer shows file extensions, hidden files, the full path in the title bar, and the details pane, with long-path support enabled. Recently used files and folders and sync provider tips are turned off for a cleaner workspace. In Search and Start, Command Palette is enabled, while Start menu tips and account notifications are turned off to reduce distractions.
Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) has become foundational for running Linux workloads on Windows. Last year we open-sourced WSL. Building on that momentum at Build 2026, we integrated WSL more deeply into Windows with WSL containers to provide a built-in way to create, run, and interact with Linux containers directly on Windows.
It’s highly unlikely you’ll be using this Zenith Windows flavour any time soon, as it requires 64GB of unified RAM with 250 GB/s memory bandwidth. In 2026, that’s a serious ask. On top of that, it’s not entirely clear to me if Zenith will be available as a separate Windows variant, without having to buy a complete device.
Of course, it would be trivial to set all of this up on any fresh Windows installation.
The embassy issued a health alert Friday warning of a “significant increase in diarrheal illnesses across Cuba” caused by contaminated water and inadequate refrigeration.
The weeks-long murder trial of Lindsay Clancy, a Massachusetts mother accused of fatally strangling her three children, has ended in a mistrial. As the public now waits for what will happen next, the Guardian's breaking news reporter Maya Yang looks at some of what happened in court during 'America's saddest murder trial'
Lawmakers condemn agency for ‘obstructing the pursuit of juice’ over death of nearly blind Nurul Amin Shah Alam
Democratic lawmakers are demanding that the Department of Homeland Security turn over records and fully cooperate with an investigation into the death of Nurul Amin Shah Alam, a nearly blind Rohingya refugee who died after US border agents left him outside a closed coffee shop on a freezing night in Buffalo earlier this year.
At a press conference in Buffalo on Friday, standing just a few feet away from where Shah was found dead, Tim Kennedy of New York was joined by Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, the ranking Democrat on the House homeland security committee, Lou Correa of California, and Nellie Pou of New Jersey in calling on DHS to cooperate with the Erie county district attorney’s investigation.
Shortly after the judge overseeing Lindsay Clancy's murder case declared a mistrial, President Trump called it a "terrible situation" and a "horrible tragedy."
If you’re just joining us, the judge in the trial of Lindsay Clancy, the Massachusetts mother accused of killing her three young children, plans to declare a mistrial after the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict and remained deadlocked after a week of deliberations.
Jurors in Plymouth state court spent more than 38 hours in deliberations over the charges against the 36-year-old mom, which came on the heels of a weeks-long trial that directed national attention to maternal mental health issues that can occur postpartum.
Closing arguments ended last Thursday in the trial of Lindsay Clancy, the Massachusetts mother who admitted killing her three young children– Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months – in January 2023. Her attempt to kill herself after killing the children left her with spinal injuries that paralyzed her from the waist down. Clancy pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder due to lack of criminal responsibility, also known as an insanity defense. She faced life in prison if convicted. The tragic case has sparked a national conversation about the state of postpartum mental healthcare in the United States.
The charges up for consideration were first-degree murder, which involves “deliberate premeditation” or “extreme atrocity or cruelty” and is punishable by life in prison without the possibility of parole, or second-degree murder, without either of those conditions, punishable by life in prison with the possibility of parole. They also considered lesser manslaughter charges, which is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. If they had found Clancy not guilty, she could have spent the rest of her life in hospital, with the eventual possibility of release at a later time if the court determined she was not a danger to others.
Jurors began deliberating last Thursday on whether to accept her insanity defense, but, almost 40 hours on, they have now declared three times that they could not reach a unanimous decision. A jury note indicated that jurors were split 11-1 toward an acquittal but a holdout juror “has acknowledged doubt but refuses to apply it to the verdict”. The prosecution argued this indicated a disagreement among jurors over how to weigh the evidence, while the defense argued the juror had “lied” when they swore to the judge to properly follow the law. But the judge ultimately declined to question the juror further or have them removed.
After the jury declared today that, “with a heavy heart”, it still cannot “and will not be able to” reach a verdict, the judge said he intends to declare a mistrial. That has now been thrown into limbo after the defense asked for an emergency stay from Massachusetts’s highest court. The judge gave him one hour. We’ll bring you the latest as that unfolds.
At the heart of what has been called America’s saddest murder trial is Clancy’s mental health following the birth of her third child. Her defense, led by attorney Kevin Reddington, argued that Clancy should not be held criminally responsible for killing her children because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis – a devastating condition estimated to affect around two women per 1,000 births. He called Clancy “a darn good mother” and argued that she received “lousy” medical care when she sought help for her deteriorating mental state. She was in “the depths of despair” when she killer her children, he argued, and was compelled to kill them and herself by a persistent male voice during a spell of psychosis.
Prosecutors, meanwhile, argued that Clancy “deliberately and meticulously” killed her children, and acted“intentionally, rationally, and swiftly”. Prosecutors acknowledged Clancy’s mental health struggles but in its closing statement argued that Clancy was a “functioning mom” who knew “right and wrong”. The prosecution pointed to the medical resources and treatment available to her, and also downplayed the severity of Clancy’s suicide attempt. She put a level of planning into the killings that indicates she was not psychotic, they argued.
(The Center Square) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday halted a challenge to political parties seeking access to cheaper TV ads as a sprint toward the midterm elections commences.
The BOP in July entered into an exclusive arrangement with a Florida startup that allows the company to sell federal prisoners nicotine pouches that are not authorized by the FDA.
Officials decline to confirm whether death was one of two announced last week as Lancaster county outbreak grows
A six-week-old child in Pennsylvania died from measles, the Lancaster County coroner has determined, following two measles-related deaths in the county last week.
The determination comes as Lancaster county faces a growing measles outbreak.
El 47% de los dueños de mascotas le ha hecho a la IA preguntas insólitas sobre sus mascotas. Según una nueva encuesta realizada por Darwin's Pet Food y Talker Research de 2.000 dueños de mascotas, el 43% ha usado herramientas…
El 45% de los dueños de mascotas en Estados Unidos ha rechazado oportunidades de viaje que no incluyen a su mascota, según una nueva encuesta. La encuesta de 2.000 dueños de mascotas encontró que el 73% prefiere hacer un viaje…
The president was moved to a separate aircraft during a July trip after officials learned of a possible Iranian threat, leaving questions about the plane’s defenses unanswered
Donald Trump intends to use the Boeing jet gifted by Qatar for his trip to Ireland next week, marking the first time the aircraft will leave the US since concerns were raised over whether it can adequately protect the president from attack.
The decision, a senior administration official told the Washington Post, comes weeks after Trump suggested the plane would be grounded for about a month while it underwent unspecified security upgrades.
The Lindsay Clancy murder trial ended in a mistrial Friday, after jurors announced for a third time that they were unable to reach a unanimous verdict.
Five of Israel’s six desalinization plants are offline. Untreated wastewater from Gaza’s destroyed sewage system could be part of the problem, experts warn.
The trial of Lindsay Clancy that gripped headlines in recent weeks, drawing renewed attention to the state of maternal mental healthcare in the US and postpartum psychosis, has ended with a mistrial.
This now leaves Clancy, the Massachusetts mother accused of fatally strangling her three children in January 2023 who pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, open to the possibility of a retrial with a different jury.
The judge in the trial of Lindsay Clancy, the Massachusetts mother accused of killing her three young children, has declared a mistrial after the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict and remained deadlocked after a week of deliberations.
Jurors in Plymouth state court spent more than 38 hours in deliberations over the charges against the 36-year-old mom, which came on the heels of a weeks-long trial that directed national attention to maternal mental health issues that can occur postpartum.
PLANO, Texas, Sept. 4, 2026 — Siemens today announced that NanoBridge Semiconductor, Inc. (NBS), a Japanese semiconductor company developing low-power and harsh-environment semiconductor technologies, has adopted Siemens’ Precision FPGA Synthesis for its field-programmable gate array (FPGA) development initiatives.
Credit: NanoBridge Semiconductor
Through an OEM agreement, NanoBridge Semiconductor will provide its customers with a version of Precision FPGA Synthesis tuned for its NBS6503H and NBS1201 FPGA device families, helping designers achieve high-quality synthesis results while supporting efficient implementation workflows.
“NanoBridge Semiconductor is focused on advancing low-power and harsh-environment semiconductor technologies for aerospace, automotive and critical infrastructure,” said Toshitsugu Sakamoto, co-founder and chief technology officer, NanoBridge Semiconductor, Inc. “Our adoption of Siemens’ Precision FPGA Synthesis enables us to provide our customers with a synthesis flow tailored for our FPGA device families while continuing to expand the ecosystem supporting our technologies. We value our collaboration with Siemens as we work to accelerate innovation and broaden adoption of our FPGA solutions for some of the world’s most demanding applications and environments.”
“Innovative semiconductor companies are driving the next wave of advances in programmable electronics,” said Yukio Tsuchida, vice president for Siemens EDA, Japan, Siemens Digital Industries Software. “Our collaboration with NanoBridge Semiconductor to bring the power of Precision FPGA Synthesis to its customers and provide a flow optimized for its FPGA device families demonstrates how Siemens’ technology can help semiconductor innovators accelerate development, reduce complexity and bring advanced products to market with confidence.”
NanoBridge Semiconductor develops non-volatile FPGA and memory technologies based on its proprietary NanoBridge technology. The company positions its technologies for applications that require exceptional power efficiency and reliability, including aerospace, smart infrastructure, secure elements and automotive systems.
The collaboration establishes a foundation for continued collaboration around FPGA design enablement, technical support and ecosystem development. By combining NanoBridge Semiconductor’s innovative FPGA technologies with Siemens’ expertise in electronic design automation, the companies are helping engineers bring advanced programmable semiconductor solutions to market more efficiently.
To learn more about Siemens’ Precision FPGA Synthesis here.
About Siemens Digital Industries Software
Siemens Digital Industries Software helps organizations of all sizes digitally transform using software, hardware and services from the Siemens Xcelerator business platform. Siemens’ software and the comprehensive digital twin enable companies to optimize their design, engineering and manufacturing processes to turn today’s ideas into the sustainable products of the future. From chips to entire systems, from product to process, across all industries. Siemens Digital Industries Software – Accelerating transformation.
A Massachusetts jury was unable to come to a unanimous decision in the trial of Lindsay Clancy, a mother accused of murdering her three children, and a mistrial has been declared by Judge William Sullivan.
The 12-person jury was made up of nine women and three men and, according to the notes given to the court, was split 11 to one.
The New York City mayor will sign two executive orders honoring those impacted by the attacks, as he faces campaign to exclude him from the 25th anniversary commemoration
New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani is set to designate September 11 as a Day of Remembrance and Service ahead of the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks.
Mamdani’s office announced on Friday morning that the mayor will sign two executive orders honoring victims, first responders, survivors, city workers and families affected by the attacks. The orders will also strengthen the city’s ability to protect New Yorkers and maintain essential services during emergencies.
(The Center Square) – A coalition of 17 states, lawmakers and advocacy organizations has filed 12 friend-of-the-court briefs urging the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to uphold that parents and teachers have constitutional rights to know about their children…
In his campaign’s latest TV ad, Democratic Senate candidate Roy Cooper of North Carolina highlights the issue of affordability using direct quotes from his Republican opponent — “No AI, no special effects, just Michael Whatley in his own words.”
They are, in fact, direct quotes from Whatley — but they are a bit dated, and some of the comments were more defensible or true at the time when Whatley made them.
The ad starts with a quote from Whatley: “Grocery prices are down, gasoline prices are down, housing prices are down, inflation is down,” he says.
“Unbelievable,” Cooper comments.
Judged by today’s metrics, Whatley’s statements are wrong. Grocery prices between January 2025, when Trump took office, and July have increased 3.35%. That’s larger than the 2.58% increase in the year and a half before Trump took office. Gasoline prices are up almost $1 from the price the week before Trump took office. Housing prices have risen 1.6% between 2024 and 2025. And the Consumer Price Index — the most commonly cited measure of inflation — increased 3.4% over the 12 months ending in July, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s up from the annualized 3.0% that Trump inherited.
But Whatley, then chair of the Republican National Committee, made those comments in a NewsMax interview in July 2025. Things were a little different then. That’s before the war with Iran and before the effect of Trump’s tariffs had kicked in, among other things.
Gasoline. At that time, gasoline prices were almost exactly what they were when Trump took office, according to the Energy Information Administration — the national average for regular gas was $3.11 per gallon when Trump was sworn in versus $3.12 for the week ending July 21, 2025. Gasoline prices would gradually decline from there, dipping to $2.78 per gallon in January 2026.
The Cooper campaign noted to us that Whatley continued to claim gasoline prices were down in an interview in mid-November 2025. At that point, gasoline prices were down slightly, about 5 cents a gallon from the price Trump inherited.
Then the war with Iran, which began in late February, caused prices to soar. The price per gallon reached $4.50 in May and was $4.07 for the week ending Aug. 31 (nearly 31% higher than when Trump took office). Whatley has been supportive of Trump’s war with Iran, saying it is necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Inflation. As we said, inflation has continued to rise in Trump’s second term. But when Whatley made his statement in July 2025 that “inflation is down,” the annualized rate of inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index, was 2.7%. That was down from 3.0% in the 12 months before Trump took office.
So prices were still rising, but the annualized rate of inflation was lower. (We’ve pointed this out repeatedly when Trump has claimed that prices are “plummeting downward.”)
Less defensible was Whatley’s claim from an interview with Real America’s Voice in January — highlighted in the Cooper ad — that “there is no inflation.” Whatley added (not in the Cooper commercial), “Inflation has fallen off a cliff since President Trump came in.” The annualized rate of inflation at the time was 2.7%. That’s not “no inflation” but it is lower than the rate Trump inherited. As we noted earlier, since then the CPI has risen, and is higher than the annualized rate when Trump took office.
Home prices. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, the average sales price of homes in the U.S. dropped from $514,200 in the first quarter of 2025 to $502,700 in the second quarter of 2026. The median price of new homes also fell from $423,100 in the first quarter of 2025 to $410,700 in the second quarter of 2026, per the bank.
The median price of an existing single family home has continued to rise in Trump’s second term, according to sales figures from the National Association of Realtors, albeit at a much slower rate than during Biden’s presidency, and, for that matter, during Trump’s first term.
According to NAR, the seasonally adjusted annual median price rose from $412,500 in 2024 to $419,300 in 2025. That’s a 1.6% increase. But it’s slower than the overall rate of inflation.
“It is welcoming to see incomes rising faster than home prices, which has helped boost affordability—but the big short-term challenge to affordability is coming from rising mortgage rates,” NAR Chief Economist Dr. Lawrence Yun said in August.
During Biden’s presidency, the median sales price of existing single family homes rose 37.4%. The median price also rose 27.5% during Trump’s first term. Both of those increases well outpaced overall inflation growth during their presidencies.
Groceries. It was not true then nor is it now, that grocery prices “are down.” The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ CPI for “food-at-home” — products bought at a grocery store or supermarket — overall grew by 0.7% between January and July 2025, when Whatley made his comment. So grocery prices were not lower. But the rate of growth was slower than in the previous six months, 1.48%. Grocery prices have continued to climb since then, and have risen a total of 3.35% from when Trump took office and July of this year.
As we wrote around the time Whatley made his comment in July 2025, there were some exceptions to the overall rising prices. The price of energy, airfare, new and used vehicles and eggs and were all down. But overall, prices continued to climb, and many experts cautioned that the president’s tariffs were likely to cause further price increases.
“DC insider Michael Whatley has been insisting for months that prices are down and there is no inflation while hardworking North Carolinians are getting crushed by high prices,” a spokesperson for the Cooper campaign told us via email. “From groceries to gas to health care – families are struggling while Whatley gets richer.”
While we are unable to search Whatley’s day-to-day comments on the campaign trail, we didn’t find any interviews since January where he spoke about lower prices or no inflation.
Whatley campaign spokesman DJ Griffin pushed back on Cooper’s campaign slogan “make stuff cost less,” claiming that Cooper’s policies had done the opposite.
“Facts are that Michael Whatley supports policies that allow working families to earn more and keep more,” Griffin told us via email.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org does not accept advertising. We rely on grants and individual donations from people like you. Please consider a donation. Credit card donations may be made through our “Donate” page. If you prefer to give by check, send to: FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, P.O. Box 58100, Philadelphia, PA 19102.
Splits emerge within party after resignation of officials reported to police for apparent plot to evade donations law
Nigel Farage sought to shore up his damaged leadership on Friday as he attempted to distance himself from two of his most senior officials reported to the police for apparently plotting to evade the law on foreign donations.
In the Georgia Senate race, Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff has been running TV ads that take a sound bite from his opponent about Social Security out of context.
In a radio interview last year, Republican Rep. Mike Collins made the case for the tax cuts in President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, claiming that cutting taxes would spur economic growth and provide an incentive for people to “get off of Medicaid, get off of Social Security, get back into the workforce.”
Collins, June 5, 2025: It’s just business 101. You’ve got spending and you’ve got revenue, and you set it up to where you can increase your revenue. And you do that by lowering taxes and making it more advantageous for people to work and to get off of Medicaid, get off of Social Security, get back into the workforce. And, and that decreases it on that side of the equation as well — on the mandatory side.
But two Ossoffads currently airing use only a snippet of the Collins interview — when he says, “get off of Social Security, get back into the workforce” — to claim that “he wants to push you off Social Security.” The ad shows images of older adults with gray hair when making that claim.
The ads ignore that Collins also mentioned Medicaid, and, while his mention of Social Security is confusing, he wasn’t talking about pushing people off these programs, but rather “making it more advantageous for people to work.”
One of the ads repeats the truncated audio clip for emphasis. “Listen again. ‘Get off of Social Security, get back into the workforce,’” that ad says. (See the ad below.) The Ossoff campaign has spent more than $2.8 million on the ad since it first aired on Aug. 8, according to AdImpact, an advertising tracking service.
The Ossoff campaign defended its use of the clip, saying in a memo to us that its ads don’t imply that Collins would use coercion or force to get people off Social Security. Rather, “Collins makes it clear he wants to exert influence and pressure to push Social Security beneficiaries into the workforce,” the campaign memo said.
In an interview, an Ossoff campaign spokesperson told us, “We are taking the quote as he said it, and he did not provide additional context.”
But the full quote from the interview does provide some additional context, although getting off of Social Security to rejoin the workforce isn’t easy. And it can be costly.
Social Security recipients can work and receive benefits. They can also withdraw their benefits application – but only within the first 12 months after being approved for Social Security payments. Those who do withdraw from Social Security must repay whatever they received in Social Security and Medicare benefits during the 12-month period.
It’s also possible to temporarily suspend benefits between full retirement age and age 70, as AARP explains.
We asked the Collins campaign what the Republican congressman meant when he said “lowering taxes” would make it “more advantageous for people” on Medicaid and Social Security to “get back into the workforce.” Sam Densmore, a spokesperson for the Collins campaign, said the candidate “misspoke” about Social Security.
“In that interview, Rep. Collins misspoke and did not intend to make that statement. Instead, he was referring to getting off of Medicaid and onto their employer’s health insurance,” Densmore said. “He corrected himself immediately afterward, but his opponent clipped the remark short intentionally to mislead the voters.”
Collins did not correct himself in the interview, which was a little more than 15 minutes long. We asked Densmore when and where Collins “corrected himself,” but we did not get a response.
Regardless of what Collins meant to say, the Ossoff campaign took the quote out of context to claim that Collins said “he wants to push you off Social Security and back to work.”
The ad above ends by saying that Collins is “attacking your retirement.”
More on Social Security
Both Ossoff ads also claim that “Collins voted to gut Social Security,” citing his vote in March for a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The House resolution would have been the first step in a long and difficult process to amend the Constitution – but it failed, as many other proposed balanced budget amendments have in the past.
It’s true that the balanced budget amendment – however unlikely to ever take effect – potentially could have made the program’s financial situation worse, if Congress didn’t do anything else.
As it is, the federal government has had to borrow to cover full Social Security retirement benefits every year since 2010, the Social Security Board of Trustees said in its 2026 report to Congress. That’s because the total cost of the program exceeds non-interest revenue – which includes Social Security payroll taxes, income taxes on Social Security benefits and general fund reimbursements, the report said. Under current law, Social Security retirement benefits will have to be cut by 22% in 2032, if Congress doesn’t act, the trustees’ report projected.
The House resolution made no exception for Social Security and made it more difficult for Congress to raise revenue by requiring a two-thirds majority to raise taxes. Unless Congress raised taxes or exempted Social Security from the balanced budget amendment, Social Security benefits would likely have to be reduced earlier than 2032.
We asked the Collins campaign to respond to the ads’ claim that the balanced budget amendment would “gut Social Security.” Densmore, the campaign spokesperson, said only that Collins “has always supported Social Security … and that will not change” in the Senate.
In its memo to us, the Ossoff campaign provided additional support for its claim that Collins would “gut Social Security.” The campaign document said Collins has a long history of voting to “jeopardize” the nation’s retirement program, dating to his first House campaign in 2014 when he advocated raising the retirement age for full Social Security benefits. Collins is also a member of the conservative Republican Study Committee, which has repeatedlyproposedbudgets that would gradually raise the retirement age, the Ossoff campaign noted.
Raising the full retirement age from 67 to 69 for future retirees, as proposed by the RSC in its 2025 budget proposal, would reduce lifetime benefits for “[a]ll people affected by such an increase,” the Congressional Budget Office said in a September 2024 letter to the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee.
But raising the retirement age would also shore up the program’s finances. In 1983, Congress and President Ronald Reagan agreed to “significant reforms” that “put the program on a stable footing for decades,” including raising the retirement age for full Social Security benefits and increasing taxes on Social Security benefits, as explained in a Brookings Institution report.
The Ossoff campaign also cited Collins’ vote for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, saying the new law “accelerated Social Security’s insolvency.” That’s accurate. In its 2026 report, the Social Security trustees projected that the new law will “have a substantial effect on Social Security’s financial status,” because the program “will receive lower levels of revenue in the future from income taxation of Social Security benefits.”
Health Insurance
The Ossoff ad in heavy rotation that has been airing since Aug. 8 also criticized Collins on health insurance.
“Collins voted with Trump to double health insurance premiums for more than a million Georgians,” the ad says, citing Collins’ vote against a Democratic bill that would have extended more generous Affordable Care Act subsidies for three years. The House bill passed Jan. 8 but didn’t become law, and out-of-pocket premiums for ACA plans went up.
But how much did premiums increase for Georgians? The Ossoff campaign cited a KFF analysis published last year that said without the enhanced subsidies, premiums on average would “more than double what subsidized enrollees currently pay annually for premiums—a 114% increase.” Because of the higher costs, many have dropped their ACA coverage, as we’ve explained, and others shopped for lower-premium plans.
KFF, a health policy research organization, published an updated analysis in May that said premium payments in 2026 have increased by an average of 58%.
“This is lower than the 114% increase KFF projected if everyone had stayed in the same plan because many people bought down to higher-deductible plans and because those just past the subsidy cliff with the steepest increases dropped ACA coverage at higher rates,” KFF said. “Additionally, the 114% increase was among people receiving a tax credit whereas the 58% increase is among all consumers, including the most number who did not receive a tax credit in 2025.”
KFF also said that more than 1.3 million Georgians signed up for health insurance on the ACA marketplace this year, down about 187,000 from 2025’s open enrollment, but we don’t know how many of them have seen or would have seen their premiums double. An Ossoff campaign spokesperson told us that it didn’t know, either. Instead, the spokesperson said there are about 350,000 fewer state residents who now get their insurance on the ACA marketplace, citing a report in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution based on state data this spring.
“We are focusing on 300,000 have already lost their insurance,” the spokesperson told us.
We don’t know how many of those may have obtained insurance from another source.
The Georgia Senate race, which is rated “lean Democrat” by the Cook Political Report, is critical to the Democrats’ chances of regaining control of the Senate, where the Republicans hold a 53-47 advantage.
Ossoff, who had no primary opponent, so far has raised and spent more money this campaign cycle than any other congressional candidate, according to the Federal Election Commission.
Editor’s note: FactCheck.org does not accept advertising. We rely on grants and individual donations from people like you. Please consider a donation. Credit card donations may be made through our “Donate” page. If you prefer to give by check, send to: FactCheck.org, Annenberg Public Policy Center, P.O. Box 58100, Philadelphia, PA 19102.
(The Center Square) – A Los Angeles resident has been arrested for a three-count federal indictment that includes a charge of threatening to kill President Donald Trump.
Lansing, Michigan — A proposed constitutional amendment requiring proof of U.S. citizenship and photo identification for voting will not appear on Michigan’s November ballot after both the state and U.S. Supreme Courts rejected emergency appeals from its supporters.
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh denied an emergency injunction Thursday without explanation. The request came from Americans for Citizen Voting-Michigan, which sought to force the measure onto the ballot after the Michigan Board of State Canvassers deadlocked over whether the campaign had enough valid petition signatures.
Supporters submitted more than 700,000 signatures, but state officials relied on a sample review to determine validity. The Bureau of Elections found too few valid signatures in that sample, while the Board of State Canvassers later reached a similar conclusion, leaving the proposal short of certification.
The measure would have amended the state constitution to explicitly limit voting to U.S. citizens, require regular voter-roll reviews and impose photo identification requirements.
Supporters argued that rejected signatures should have been restored through affidavits and said nearly 710,000 residents deserved a chance to vote on the proposal. State officials countered that the campaign failed to satisfy Michigan’s signature-validation requirements.
The Michigan Supreme Court also declined relief Thursday, effectively ending the measure’s chances before Friday’s ballot-finalization deadline. Absentee ballots are scheduled to begin going out later this month.
Fox announced host’s departure Thursday but gave no explanation, only saying it was effective immediately
Maria Bartiromo’s lawyer sharply denied that she was fired from her job at Fox News on Friday, after reports that she was dismissed after divulging the network’s editorial guidance to the White House.
Fox announced Bartiromo’s departure on Thursday but provided no explanation, saying only in a statement that it was effective immediately.
MILPITAS, Calif., Sept. 4, 2026 — SEMI, the industry association advancing the global semiconductor and electronics design and manufacturing supply chain, has announced in its Worldwide Semiconductor Equipment Market Statistics (WWSEMS) report that global semiconductor equipment billings increased 23% year-over-year to US$40.53 billion in the second quarter of 2026. Second quarter 2026 billings registered an 11% quarter-over-quarter growth.
Semiconductor Equipment Billings by Region for Q2 2026 with QoQ and YoY. Credit: SEMI.
The results mark a second consecutive record quarter, reflecting accelerating demand for technology and capacity solutions to support AI investments momentum as well as global buildout of AI computing infrastructure.
“The second consecutive quarter of record semiconductor equipment billings reflects the industry’s sustained investment in the advanced manufacturing capacity needed to support rising chip demand, particularly for AI infrastructure,” said Ajit Manocha, SEMI President and CEO. “Growth across Asia, North America and Europe underscores the global nature of this demand and the critical role of semiconductor manufacturing in enabling the next wave of AI-driven innovation.”
Compiled from data submitted by members of SEMI and the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ), the WWSEMS report is a summary of the monthly billings figures for the global semiconductor equipment industry.
About SEMI Equipment Market Data Subscription
The Equipment Market Data Subscription (EMDS) from SEMI provides comprehensive market data for the global semiconductor equipment market. A subscription includes three reports:
Monthly SEMI North American Billings Report, an early perspective of equipment market trends
Monthly Worldwide Semiconductor Equipment Market Statistics(WWSEMS), a detailed report of semiconductor equipment billings for seven regions and more than 22 market segments
Bi-annual Total Semiconductor Equipment Forecast – OEM Perspective, an outlook for the semiconductor equipment market
For more information about the report or to subscribe, please contact the SEMI Market Intelligence Team at mktstats@semi.org. More details are also available on the SEMI Market Data webpage.
Semiconductor Equipment Market Revenue by Region for Q2 2026 with QoQ and YoY Changes. Credit: SEMI.
About SEMI
SEMI is the global industry association connecting over 4,000 companies and 1.5 million professionals worldwide across the semiconductor and electronics design and manufacturing supply chain. We accelerate member collaboration on solutions to top industry challenges through Advocacy, Workforce Development, Sustainability, Supply Chain Management and other programs. Our SEMICON expositions and events, technology communities, standards and market intelligence help advance our members’ business growth and innovations in design, devices, equipment, materials, services and software, enabling smarter, faster, more secure electronics.
Nazir Afzal to focus in review’s first stage on support given to professor in immediate period before his death
The University of Cambridge has asked Nazir Afzal, a former chief crown prosecutor for north-west England, to lead the first part of its review into the death of the scholar Jason Arday.
Arday died at his home in south London on 14 August, nine days after his resignation as a Cambridge professor amid swirling allegations of plagiarism and inconsistencies in statements about his career.
James Orr, an associate professor, was shown in Channel 4 News footage apparently trying to sidestep electoral law
Cambridge University has said it is examining the conduct of James Orr, its associate professor and a top Reform UK aide, after he was filmed appearing to try to circumvent electoral laws on foreign political donations.
Orr, the suspended head of policy for Reform, is one of two senior officials to step aside after claims that he orchestrated a plot to have polling paid for by a foreign firm – something that is impermissible under British electoral law.
The federal indictment against ICE officer Christian Castro has been unsealed, detailing charges accusing him of lying to investigators about a north Minneapolis shooting of a Venezuelan immigrant in January.
Prosecutors said Mexican smuggler Luis Carlos Davalos-Lopez helped run an illicit operation that charged migrants as much as $30,000 to cross into the U.S.
Labor department report alleges Lori Chavez-DeRemer also made a staffer attend a strip club while on a personal trip
Donald Trump’s former secretary of labor, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, drank during working hours, kept alcohol on federal property and made a staffer attend a strip club while on a personal trip, according to a newreport by the Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General .
Chavez-DeRemer was appointed by Trump to serve as labor secretary in January 2025 and resigned in April 2026 amid the misconduct allegations.
Alejandro Betancourt was warned that taking on the U.S. government as a business partner would have costs, but America's backing already is providing big benefits.
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British ministers have hit back after the Argentinian president said “winds of change” favourable to his country’s claim to the Falklands were “blowing around the world”, Kiran Stacey reports.
The Electoral Commission has issued a statement this morning saying it is in touch with the police about the undercover investigation into Reform UK. In a statement, it said:
We are considering all relevant information, in line with our regulatory remit, and we are in touch with the Met police.
The Electoral Commission has not approved the donor vetting process for Reform, or any other party. Parties are responsible for ensuring their internal processes and controls are fit for purpose.
Togo-sponsored resolution called to phase out traditional map that depicts continent as similar size to Greenland
The United Nations has voted to adopt a resolution for the world to formally phase out the traditional Mercator map of the globe in favour of one that more accurately displays Africa’s size.
In a session at its headquarters in New York, the UN general assembly officially retired the 16th-century Mercator projection in favour of one based on the more accurate 2018 Equal Earth design.
From mortgages to inflation, concerns about the public finances of major economies have wide-reaching consequences
When Donald Trump was asked recently about the threat of rising interest rates on US government debt, he told baffled reporters: “The ultimate intervention is our military. And if we have to use that, we will.”
Perhaps not surprisingly, his bellicose words did not soothe fractious bond markets, and his resumption of the bombing campaign against Iran only made matters worse.
AfD Saxony-Anhalt is a racist extremist group, according to the German state's intelligence agency. The party may well trounce its rivals in this weekend's state election.
A string of distractions on the US government’s own website invite you to catch pixelated migrants – showing gaming’s potential to be nastily weaponised
The Trump White House on Thursday released a horrible little propaganda arcade via its website, a collection of nasty riffs on popular games. Wrapped in the cutesy, nostalgic aesthetic of early-90s pixel art, these mindless fascist diversions are harmless-looking, but their intent is stomach-turning: this is the appropriation of play in service of propaganda. It’s just the latest in a series of attempts from Trump’s administration to use video game memes and imagery to further its messaging.
Having riffed on Halo and Pokémon in social media ads last year, inviting potential ICE recruits to “stop the flood” and “catch ’em all”, this time the administration has ripped off a series of recognisable games. Flappy Bill, perhaps the least gross, is a version of the old mobile hit Flappy Bird, except here you’re an eagle with a scroll in its claws. Supply Line could almost be an educational game about healthy food in schools, where you sort junk food off a conveyor belt destined for school lunches, except for some reason you play as a boxer who becomes more bloodied with every seed-oil containing, ultra-processed food item that you fail to punch into the garbage chute.
A polling firm at the centre of allegations that Reform UK breached electoral law is being investigated by two industry bodies.
JL Partners, which is run by former Conservative aides, has been accused of breaking transparency rules by failing to declare that three separate polls had been commissioned by the party.
UD running back Kaderris Roberts runs down the right sideline in the Fightin’ Blue Hens, 42-7, win over Merrimack. Photo Credit: Dave Reeder.
The University of Delaware Fightin’ Blue Hens (1-0) defeated the Merrimack Warriors (0-2), 42-7, in their season opener, September 3.
NEWARK, DE — The University of Delaware’s second FBS season started in dominant fashion with a 42-7 win over Merrimack, Thursday night. The win was the Blue Hens eighth consecutive season opening win and eighth consecutive win in their home opener.
“I think there was some times that we maybe pressed a little bit. There were some times that we did some first game, it wasn’t just mistakes, I would say it was first game, you know, I don’t want to call it nerves, but we had to get some stuff out, and we had to make sure we did it against somebody else,” head coach Ryan Carty said postgame. “Obviously, wasn’t as clean as we wanted it to be, but I think eventually we settled down and handled, you know, what we needed to handle on both sides of the ball.”
It was the Blue Hens defense that handled their business in the opening 30 minutes of their 2026 campaign, holding the Warriors under 80 total yards and forcing two turnovers in the first half. Both turnovers were forced in the second quarter and both resulted in points for the Blue Hens.
UD led by seven going into the second quarter following Viron Ellison Jr.’s 11-yard run on the team’s opening drive. The Blue Hens subsequent two drives generated 39 total yards and ended without points. The offense turned the ball over to Merrimack at the Warriors own 27 yard line with an opportunity to drive down the field and tie the game with a little less than nine minutes remaining in the first half.
The Warriors accomplished the first part, driving down to the UD 35 yard line in seven plays. Merrimack quarterback AJ Hairston Jr. took the snap from the shotgun formation, but was met by immediate pressure from Delaware’s defensive front. Hairston Jr. launched a pass that soared over the head of its intended receiver, into the endzone and right into the hands of sophomore safety George Mullins. Mullins completed the catch and slid in the endzone for a touchback, handing possession back to the Delaware offense.
Sophomore safety George Mullins sliding in the endzone following his first career interception. Photo Credit: Dave Reeder.
UD’s offense took over from its own 20 yard line and from there, looked like the dynamic passing attack that ranked first in Conference USA (CUSA) last season.
Senior quarterback Nick Minicucci threw for 68 yards on two throws leading Delaware’s offense into the red zone. The first completion was a 31-yard deep throw to the back shoulder of senior receiver Donovan Lewis. The second was a 37-yard completion to Coastal Carolina transfer Bryson Graves on the next play. Minicucci finished the drive with a 12-yard run into the endzone putting the Blue Hens ahead by two scores.
The Delaware offense tallied another touchdown before halftime, benefitting from another stellar defensive play.
The Warriors took over at their own 20 yard line with less than 40 seconds remaining in the half after blocking UD kicker Tucker Smack’s 26-yard field goal attempt the drive prior. Hairston Jr. handed the ball off to running back DeMarcus McElroy and McElroy was met by freshman safety Kevin Moore. Moore’s hit jarred the ball out of McElroy’s hands and onto the field. The ball bounced off multiple players before being engulfed by a diving Blake Matthews as he slid toward the sideline.
“So I’m trying to push [a Merrimack player] out the way and then somebody jumped on it and I was like ‘oh we got it’and then it bounced out and I was like, well I got to keep going,” Matthews said postgame. “Right before we got to the sidelines, I tried to jump on it before we get out and luckily it didn’t bounce off my chest as well.”
Matthew’s recovery put the Blue Hen offense back on the field, in the red zone with 23 seconds before halftime. Minicucci only needed seven.
The senior connected with junior wideout Sean Wilson for a 12-yard touchdown near the back left pylon that put the Blue Hens ahead, 21-0, at halftime.
“Our defense played great today,” Minicucci said postgame. “I mean just getting us a chance to have the ball is a blessing and we took advantage of most of our opportunities, but we still, we’re not satisfied with what we did. So, we got a lot to clean up.”
Delaware’s offense accumulated 242 total yards and scored 14 more points in the third quarter to go into the fourth quarter ahead, 35-7. The highlight play from the frame was a trick play involving Minicucci, Ellison Jr. and the player that scored both of the Blue Hens third quarter touchdowns — Kaderris Roberts.
The play started with Minicucci in the shotgun with Roberts on his right. Ellison lined up with his right foot on the 20 yard line and a receiver in front of him lined up at the line of scrimmage. Tight end Scott Moore motioned over, the ball was snapped and Minicucci fired to Ellison. The play looked like a designed screen for the junior running back, but Ellison didn’t run. He faked the run, stopped and fired a pass to Roberts who was left all alone down the right side of the field.
“First off, that was a dot,” Minicucci said, getting a laugh out of those at the postgame press conference. “I mean that was unreal.”
The Minicucci to Ellison to Roberts connection resulted in a 75-yard touchdown and a 28-point lead.
“That specific throw, it needs to be somebody who’s got a gun,” Carty said. “We talk about high risk, high reward. That one, we saw what we wanted and we got it, but that was still certainly something that could’ve went the other way.”
Minicucci stayed in at the start of the fourth quarter, but was pulled from the game after throwing his second touchdown pass to junior receiver Nick Tyree — the first receiving touchdown of his career. Junior quarterback Braden Streeter played the rest of the fourth quarter as UD coasted to the win. Minicucci finished with 330 passing yards, three total touchdowns and an interception.
UD’s offense finished the game with 547 total yards, 14 big plays (runs of 10 or more yards and passes of 15 or more yards) and averaged 7.6 yards per play. The defense held Merrimack to 244 total yards, sacked the quarterback three times and forced two turnovers.
“Obviously we saw when it was slow, you know, the spark was created by the defense, and that’s got to be who we, who we should be, playing off each other and playing complementary,” Carty said.
The Blue Hen players celebrate with the fans in the stands after their win over the Merrimack Warriors. Photo Credit: Dave Reeder.
The Blue Hens next opponent is a step up from the FCS competition they faced Thursday night. UD will travel to Nashville, Tennessee, for a matchup with the SEC’s Vanderbilt Commodores. The game starts at 4:15 p.m. and will be nationally televised on SEC Network.
To read more about what awaits the Blue Hens in their non-conference schedule click here.
Banning UK trade with illegal Israeli settlements is long overdueExpert commentsfarrell.drupa…
It would be a natural extension of current UK positions, and parliament’s cross-party Foreign Affairs Committee has recommended a formal ban for over a year.
Israeli settlement expansion, land appropriation, and escalating settler violence in the occupied West Bank represent some of the most outstanding obstacles to realizing a sovereign Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel, a long-standing pillar of the UK’s Middle East policy.
As such, the new Labour government under Prime Minister Andy Burnham should prohibit UK trade with Israel’s illegal settlements. This step would align UK trade with international law, uphold the UK’s recognition of Palestinian statehood, and stop sustaining the worsening situation in the West Bank – which I witnessed first-hand during a fieldwork visit this summer.
The rationale for such a move is clear. As successive UK governments have long acknowledged, Israeli settlements in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are illegal under international law. They violate Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which holds that an ‘occupying power shall not transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.’
Settlements represent one of the most significant barriers to realizing a contiguous Palestinian state
A decade ago United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 (2016), which the UK supported, affirmed that settlements have no legal validity, and a landmark 2024 Advisory Opinion from the International Court of Justice obliged states to ‘take steps to prevent trade or investment relations’ that help sustain illegal settlements.
Such advisory opinions are not binding, but settlements represent one of the most significant barriers to realizing a contiguous Palestinian state. Since Israel captured the West Bank from Jordan in the 1967 war, it has constructed more than 160 settlements that are now home to over 700,000 Israelis in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to Peace Now, an Israeli human rights organization that monitors settlement activity.
Israel’s justification for settlement construction has varied through the years – from security strategy to economic interest to religious ideology, citing biblical and historical ties to the land. But as Israeli ministers have recently stated, at least part of the aim of the current settlement project is to ‘bury the idea of a Palestinian state.’
E1
This intention has been most evident in the opening of tenders for the controversial E1 development.
E1 is particularly contentious due to its location
E1 would link Jerusalem and the large settlement of Ma’ale Adumim, thus preventing Palestinian sovereignty in the central corridor connecting Ramallah, Bethlehem, and East Jerusalem, effectively bisecting the West Bank. E1 is particularly contentious due to its location, and the UK, along with France, Germany, Italy, and Canada, have condemned it.
But nearly all settlements create so-called ‘facts on the ground’ by appropriating Palestinian land and constructing infrastructure to serve settlers, including a network of bypass roads that are off limits to Palestinians. This infrastructure is accompanied by a system of more than 900 checkpoints, gates, barriers, and roadblocks.
The Israeli justification is that they are for settlers’ security, but they severely restrict Palestinian movement within the West Bank. For example, a 36-km journey from Ramallah to Nablus now requires a 73-km route to skirt around settlements – and can take hours due to checkpoints and closures. On shared roads, settlers have lined the pavement with Israeli flags, blacked out the Arabic writing on road signs with spray paint, and erected billboards reading ‘There is no future in Palestine.’
As a young woman in Nablus told me in July, ‘It emphasizes the idea that you are not getting out of this.’ She and many other young people I met no longer travel to Ramallah for work, school, or socializing as they would have done in the past for fear of being detained at checkpoints or harassed by settlers.
Additionally, 390 Israeli farms and outposts have been developed without state permission throughout the West Bank, with 250 established in the past three years. These settlements are technically considered illegal under Israeli law, but only two have been evicted, and over 80 have been legalized. Settler leaders have openly stated that the outposts aim to give them a foothold in strategic Palestinian locations, increasingly in Areas A and B, which would constitute the core population centres in a future Palestinian state.
Spain, Ireland, Belgium, and the Netherlands have already approved similar bans
Meanwhile, over 100 Palestinian communities have been partially or fully displaced by violent settler attacks since 2023, with over 1,330 incidents documented in 2026 alone. I visited the sites of several villages in the Jordan Valley that have been destroyed. In Hamamat al-Maleh, all that remains of a school built with EU-donor funding is a pile of rubble, with children’s workbooks still visible in the dirt.
With the current Israeli government either minimizing or enabling the violence, there is near- total impunity for such attacks; of the few incidents investigated, less than 5 per cent result in charges or convictions. Settler terrorism is not new, but the acceleration of attacks over the past three years has been unprecedented. It has had the intended effect of pushing rural Palestinian residents into towns and villages, largely emptying the surrounding areas, and further imperiling the realization of a Palestinian state.
Given these ever-worsening realities, the time is ripe to prohibit trade with settlements. Spain, Ireland, Belgium, and the Netherlands have already approved similar bans, and France has called for the EU to end imports of settlement goods.
Moreover, the proposed policy is a natural extension of current UK positions. The British government already denies preferential tariffs to settlement goods and strongly advises against business deals with settlements, and Parliament’s cross-party Foreign Affairs Committee has recommended a formal ban for over a year. Public opinion polls also suggest widespread support for the policy.
‘Siege mentality’
Nevertheless, there are concerns that should be taken seriously. Labour Friends of Israel (LFI), argues that the trade ban could result in a ‘de facto boycott’ of all of Israel because many Israeli companies are inextricably linked to settlements via financial integration or supply chains.
But under the existing UK-Israel Free Trade Agreement, the UK and Israel are already required to differentiate between goods produced in settlements and those produced within Israel.
LFI has also expressed concern that a ban could hurt opposition parties in Israel’s upcoming elections by contributing to a ‘siege mentality’ encouraged by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
It is true that a ban on services (such as banking, insurance, telecommunications, technology, tourism, and consulting) would be harder to regulate. But, despite the wishes of some advocates, it is likely that the initial policy will be limited to goods. Moreover, if services are included, the onus will be on Israeli firms to extricate themselves from entanglements that directly or indirectly support settlements.
Other advocacy groups worry that the policy could increase antisemitism against British Jews. There has been an alarming rise in antisemitic incidents in the UK in the past year, and these should be fully condemned.
But taking a stance against settlement trade is neither antisemitic nor anti-Israel – even if the current Israeli government tries to portray it as such. The focus on settlements is targeted and specific, and in no way delegitimizes the state of Israel as it is recognized along pre-1967 borders.
Reprisals
There are also political repercussions to consider. Israel is already considering the removal of British and European officials from the US-led coordination center for Gaza, and some fear the move could spark economic retaliation from US President Donald Trump. Those concerns are warranted, but Burnham should not be cowed by threats of reprisals.
One of the toughest challenges in international relations is balancing between interests and values. Prohibiting UK trade with Israeli settlements does not fall into that category. The UK has a strategic interest, a legal obligation, and a moral duty to stop supporting unlawful settlements that undermine efforts for future peace and security in the region.
The state-of-the-art quantum facility will strengthen Europe’s ability to design, manufacture and scale next-generation quantum chips, helping to position the continent as a global leader in quantum technology.
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, Sept. 4, 2026 — Quantum Foundry Copenhagen and the Novo Nordisk Foundation today announced plans to establish a new 5,300 m² quantum chip fabrication facility in Copenhagen. The facility will develop and scale the advanced manufacturing equipment needed to produce the next generation of quantum chips and strengthen Europe’s position in an increasingly competitive global quantum landscape.
While Europe has built one of the world’s strongest research environments in quantum science, global leadership in quantum technologies will ultimately depend not only on scientific breakthroughs, but also on the ability to turn these breakthroughs into commercial products at scale. The fabrication of high-quality quantum chips, the specialized core processing units inside a quantum computer, is a crucial part of that process.
“Europe’s quantum ambitions depend on our ability to turn scientific excellence into industrial capability. Strengthening European capacity to develop and manufacture quantum chips is essential for our competitiveness, resilient supply chains and technological sovereignty. Building on the European Chips Act and the Quantum Europe Strategy, and looking ahead to the forthcoming Quantum Act, initiatives such as Quantum Foundry Copenhagen can contribute to the industrial ecosystem Europe needs to scale quantum technologies,” said Henna Virkkunen, Executive Vice-President of the European Commission for Technological Sovereignty, Security and Democracy.
Quantum technologies have the potential to solve problems that are beyond the reach of today’s most powerful computers. In the future, they could help researchers develop new medicines faster, design more sustainable materials, optimize energy systems, and strengthen cybersecurity.
Martin Lidegaard, Denmark’s Minister of Business and Competitiveness, said: “Technological breakthroughs happen when we succeed in turning new knowledge into value for both society and businesses. Quantum technology offers solutions to challenges that were once thought impossible, opening up entirely new possibilities in areas such as healthcare, energy, security, and beyond. With today’s announcement, we are once again strengthening quantum research, innovation, and manufacturing in Denmark, creating even greater opportunities for Danish companies. This provides both Denmark and Europe a solid foundation to become global leaders in quantum chips, with significant potential for current and future generations alike.”
Owned by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, Quantum Foundry Copenhagen is a specialized technology company developing proprietary tools, materials and processes for quantum chip manufacturing. The company’s new facility will uniquely combine laboratory space for nanofabrication of quantum materials, advanced characterization, testing, chip assembly and packaging with ultra-high vacuum manufacturing capabilities and through this offer wafer fabrication for quantum technology vendors globally on commercial terms.
“Our vision is to become a world-leading quantum chip manufacturer, supplying Europe with advanced, next-generation quantum computing processors and enabling quantum companies to scale production. We aim to build state-of-the-art quantum production lines and support a sustainable deep-tech industry that can help shape the future of quantum technology,” said Peter Krogstrup, CEO, Quantum Foundry Copenhagen.
Quantum Foundry Copenhagen is built on the Novo Nordisk Foundation’s long-term commitment to quantum technologies. The Foundation has committed more than DKK 2.9 billion (EUR 390 million) to the field, including the Novo Nordisk Foundation Quantum Computing Programme at the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen. The aim of the Programme is to develop Denmark’s first fully functional fault-tolerant quantum computer before 2034. The new chip facility will collaborate closely with the Foundation’s quantum program, creating a unique link between frontier research, talent development and industrial manufacturing capabilities.
“At the Novo Nordisk Foundation, we believe quantum technologies will be one of the most defining scientific and technological fields of this century. That is why we have made a significant long-term commitment to building a world-class quantum ecosystem in Denmark and Europe. Quantum Foundry Copenhagen is an important part of that ambition, helping connect investments in research with the industrial capabilities needed to support Europe’s ability to transform quantum breakthroughs into technologies that can benefit society, strengthen competitiveness and address some of the world’s most complex challenges,” said Professor Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen, CEO of the Novo Nordisk Foundation.
Both Denmark and the European Union are currently intensifying efforts to strengthen quantum innovation and industrial capacity. Through the Quantum Europe Strategy, the forthcoming Quantum Act, and a growing focus on technological sovereignty, the European Union is prioritizing the commercialization, manufacturing and deployment of quantum technologies. At the same time, Denmark’s forthcoming quantum strategy From quantum research to quantum industry reflects this same transition, positioning Denmark to play a leading role in uniting Europe’s capabilities into a resilient, scalable and globally competitive industrial platform.
“Quantum technologies are expected to become a foundational technology platform for the future, much like semiconductors, computing and the internet have been in previous generations. If Europe is to succeed in quantum, it must not repeat the pattern from earlier technology waves, where fundamental science was strong in Europe but industrial scale-up, platforms and global champions emerged elsewhere. Developing this capacity marks an important step towards positioning Europe centrally in the global quantum ecosystem and building resilience,” said Lene Oddershede, Chief Scientific Officer, Novo Nordisk Foundation.
The new facility is expected to open in 2027.
About Quantum Foundry Copenhagen
Founded in 2023 by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, Quantum Foundry Copenhagen develops tools, materials and processes for next-generation quantum chip manufacturing in close collaboration with the Novo Nordisk Foundation Quantum Computing Programme (NQCP). The foundry manufactures quantum materials and devices using Ultra High Vacuum (UHV) techniques and bottom-up engineering to achieve extreme purity and atomic precision.
About the Novo Nordisk Foundation
Established in Denmark in 1924, the Novo Nordisk Foundation is an enterprise foundation with philanthropic objectives. The vision of the Foundation is to improve people’s health and the sustainability of society and the planet. The Foundation’s mission is to progress research and innovation in the prevention and treatment of cardiometabolic and infectious diseases as well as to advance knowledge and solutions to support a green transformation of society.
FREMONT, Calif., Sept. 4, 2026 — Penguin Solutions, Inc. has announced its participation at AI Infra Summit 2026, taking place September 15-17 at the Santa Clara Convention Center. Penguin will host product demonstrations at booth #520 and deliver a speaking session during the conference program.
The AI Infra Summit brings together industry professionals who represent every layer of the AI infrastructure stack including compute, memory, interconnects, networking layers, and more working together to meet the growing demand of inference and agentic AI.
As enterprises shift from AI training to inference and agentic workloads, the speed and accuracy with which they can access data increasingly determines the cost of running those workloads. Penguin is addressing that constraint through its Full-Stack AI Factory Platform, including its MemoryAI KV Cache Server designed to improve performance for large language model inference and helps organizations achieve measurable ROI.
Event Information:
What: Penguin Solutions Booth #520 at AI Infra Summit 2026
When: Tuesday, September 15 through Thursday, September 17, 2026
Where: Santa Clara Convention Center, 5001 Great America Pkwy, Santa Clara, CA 95054
Speaking Session:
What: Data Movement Track – Scaling the AI Memory Wall – Where Model Architecture Meets Hardware
When: Wednesday, September 16 at 4:10 p.m. PT.
Panelist: Andy Mills, Vice President of Advanced Product Development
Technology Demonstrations:
Penguin will display several demonstrations at its booth #520 that will give participants a firsthand view of its innovative AI solutions.
MemoryAI KV Cache Server | Memory ExpansionServer
CXL-Based Solutions | Add-in Cards
LIQID EX-5410C | CXL Memory Expansion Chassis
Advanced Memory Solutions Technology Preview | Developed in partnership with Marvell
About Penguin Solutions
Penguin Solutions is the AI Factory Platform Company. We design, build, and manage next-generation data centers for enterprises, sovereign AI initiatives, and neocloud providers. With deep design expertise at the intersection of data center AI infrastructure and memory solutions, our Full-Stack AI Factory Platform combines differentiated infrastructure software, advanced memory, compute systems, end-to-end services, and industry-leading partner technologies to help customers accelerate deployment, optimize token economics, and maximize the return on their AI investments.
The rare trip by CIA chief John Ratcliffe failed to persuade Putin to stop the war and may have hardened the Russian's leaders resolve to seek military victory.
This blog is now closed, you can read more on this story here
in Magdeburg, Saxony-Anhalt
Polls have suggested that the election on Sunday could yield Germany’s first-ever state government led by the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), shattering a postwar taboo and leaving minorities’ fate in the hands of a party that has promised to launch deportations “from day one”.
Such is the US president’s narcissism that he would see a Democratic victory as proof that he’s indispensable – meanwhile, his every decision spells calamity for voters
What is Donald Trump playing at? If it’s true that the best way of understanding the behaviour of an organisation is to assume it’s controlled by a secret cabal of its enemies, perhaps that same logic extends to the current conduct of the president of the United States. Maybe he secretly wants Republicans to lose the looming midterm elections that will decide the balance of power in the US for the next two years and for which the first postal ballots were sent out today.
That’s not as mad a theory as it sounds. Indeed, there are at least two reasons why Trump might either be unbothered by Republican defeat in November or even covertly desire it. We’ll come to those, but let’s start with a pattern of behaviour that is hard to explain as anything other than calculated self-sabotage.
Photo: Saturday, Hagley Museum reopens following presevation work over the past two weeks.
All major areas of the museum will again be accessible following improvements to the mill race, Millwright Shop and surrounding industrial landscape.
WILMINGTON, Del. — Hagley Museum and Library’s historic Powder Yard has reopened to the public following the completion of a two-week preservation and maintenance project.
The reopening will restore visitor access to all major areas of the museum, including its industrial landscape, waterpower system, mill race and historic shops along the Brandywine.
The Powder Yard had been temporarily closed while contractors completed projects that required heavy equipment, road closures and unrestricted access to parts of the property. The rest of the museum remained open during the work, with Hagley offering half-price admission because one of its principal attractions was unavailable.
With the Powder Yard reopened, the temporary discount has ended and regular admission prices have resumed.
Maintenance protects historic landscape
One of the project’s most significant components involved dredging the mill race inlet to remove accumulated silt and debris and improve water flow into Hagley’s historic power system.
The mill race directed water from the Brandywine to waterwheels that powered machinery throughout the original du Pont powder works. Maintaining that system helps visitors understand how waterpower supported early American manufacturing.
Crews also replaced the roof on the Millwright Shop and stabilized masonry along portions of the mill race. Those improvements are intended to protect the historic structures against weather, erosion and further deterioration.
Hazardous trees were removed from the Powder Yard and Crowninshield areas to improve safety, while additional preventive maintenance was coordinated across the industrial section of the property.
The temporary closure allowed the museum to complete the projects efficiently while protecting visitors, employees and contractors.
Full museum experience returns
Visitors will once again be able to tour the Powder Yard and walk through the industrial center of the former powder-making operation. The area includes historic mills, shops and the waterpower infrastructure that supported manufacturing along the Brandywine for generations. This weekend, the cannons will be fired on Saturday afternoon, the 250th Anniversary Tours will resume at 11:00 and 1:00, and fishing on the banks of the Brandywine is open between 11:00 am and 3:00 pm.
Eleutherian Mills, the du Pont family’s first American home, and its gardens are also open. That portion of the museum offers a more personal look at the family’s early life in Delaware and its connection to the business developing nearby.
The “Nation of Inventors” exhibition remains open at the Visitor Center. Drawing on Hagley’s extensive collections, the interactive exhibition examines how inventors recognize problems, develop ideas, and create products and technologies.
The Visitor Center and Museum Store are also open.
A site central to Delaware history
Hagley is the site of the original du Pont powder works, founded along the Brandywine in 1802 by Éleuthère Irénée du Pont.
The business developed into one of the world’s leading manufacturers of black powder and became the foundation of the DuPont company. Its growth influenced Delaware’s economy, workforce and identity for generations.
The property was more than a factory. It became an industrial community where immigrant workers and their families lived, worked and built connections that helped shape Wilmington and the Brandywine Valley.
Today, Hagley preserves the mills, mill race, waterpower system, machine shops, workers’ history and du Pont family home that together tell the story of early American industry.
Its importance extends beyond the du Pont legacy. The property demonstrates how waterpower, engineering, labor, immigration, family life and entrepreneurship converged during the country’s industrial development.
The completed maintenance work helps protect that landscape while allowing visitors to experience Delaware history in the place where much of it happened.
To Go Box:
What: Hagley Museum and Library
Status: The historic Powder Yard will reopen, and all major museum areas are accessible on Saturday.
What to see: Powder Yard, historic mills and shops, mill race and waterpower system, Eleutherian Mills and gardens, “Nation of Inventors” exhibition, Visitor Center and Museum Store.
Admission: Regular admission pricing will resume Saturday.
WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert is retiring at the end of the year, bringing to a close her seven-plus years at the helm of the league and a stewardship that has been transformative and at times tumultuous.
Engelbert is the second-longest tenured WNBA president or commissioner, and she helped negotiate a lucrative collective bargaining agreement this past spring that resulted in the league’s first set of million-dollar player salaries.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy says he has told SBU to deliver ‘appropriate, tangible response’ to Kyiv strike
The head office of Ukraine’s SBU intelligence agency has been hit in a Russian drone attack, sending plumes of black smoke rising into the air in the heart of Kyiv.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said he had instructed the SBU to deliver an “appropriate, tangible response” to the strike, while the foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, described it as a “major escalation”.
Photo collage by ProPublica. Source imagery by The Texas Tribune, with documents acquired by ProPublica.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton appears to have violated federal ethics law in significant ways when filing recent disclosures of his assets and liabilities, creating confusion about his net worth and holdings, a review by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune found.
Among them: Paxton, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, reported owning seven homes but said he earned no income from any. Yet all but one was listed for rent during the reporting periods, and some current residents and neighbors at those addresses confirmed that the properties were rented, the news organizations found. Receiving income and not reporting it is a violation of federal disclosure law, three ethics experts said.
Additionally, Paxton did not disclose mortgages for three condos at a Utah golf resort that federal law requires him to list as liabilities if they are not personal residences.
He also valued his stake in a vacant plot of Texas land at up to $50,000 on last year’s filing, but his business partner told the newsrooms Paxton’s share for years has been worth about $1 million. Federal financial disclosure law requires property to be listed at fair market value.
The apparent errors and omissions the newsrooms found obscure the extent of Paxton’s income streams, assets and debt, making it difficult for voters to make sense of his finances as they mull whether to support him in November’s election, the ethics experts said.
“It reflects either pure sloppiness on Paxton’s part or a deliberate effort to conceal some of his investments and property holdings,” said Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist for the nonpartisan good-government group Public Citizen.
In Paxton’s filings reviewed by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune, he valued an undeveloped plot of land as worth up to $50,000 in 2025, first image, but then listed it the following year at between $1 million and $5 million, second image.Obtained and highlighted by ProPublica and the Texas Tribune
If Paxton wins, an incomplete picture of his finances could prevent watchdogs from evaluating his conflicts of interest as a senator, Holman and others said.
The apparent omissions are part of a pattern for Paxton. Over three terms as attorney general, he has withheld financial information that could explain how he became a multimillionaire and had the resources to purchase more than a dozen properties in five states. He began including many of these on his state disclosures only after the Texas Ethics Commission closed a loophole in 2024 that Paxton had cited to leave them off. Most were acquired while Paxton earned a government salary of $153,750.
In the new federal disclosure, filed in August after Paxton received a three-month extension, he reported a net worth between $1 million and $27 million. That is a significantly higher range than the negative $1.9 million to $11.1 million net worth he reported a year ago, before he had secured the Republican nomination but after he had declared his candidacy for federal office.
The spike was driven not by Paxton’s acquisition of more assets but because the reported value on several of his properties soared.
Paxton’s report omitted listing as assets seven properties worth about $5.2 million collectively, including the Utah condos for which he did not disclose mortgages. He co-owns all of his known real estate holdings with his estranged wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton, property records show. The eight he reported are held by their blind trust, which is managed by a family friend.
Federal rules do not require candidates to report as assets personal homes or properties from which they don’t earn money, even if the properties are worth millions.
At a time when voters feel anxious about their own personal finances and dislike the idea of politicians getting rich in office, it would be wise for Paxton to be more transparent about his wealth, said Texas ethics and campaign finance lawyer Andrew Cates.
“If it were me trying to get people’s vote, I would err on the side of transparency rather than not,” Cates said.
Paxton declined to be interviewed and did not answer detailed questions about how he filled out the disclosure forms. Madison Cercy, a spokesperson for his campaign, said Paxton “has had a long and successful career outside of public service, including running his own small business as a lawyer. Stirring up partisan allegations is nothing more than a bad attempt to manufacture controversy where none exists.”
Before being elected to the state Legislature in 2002, Paxton worked at a law firm in the Dallas area and was a corporate attorney for JCPenney. His state financial disclosure for 2001 listed assets totaling no more than $170,000, a ProPublica and Tribune analysis found.
By 2015, his household net worth had grown to $5.4 million, according to financial records lawmakers subpoenaed in 2023 after impeaching Paxton on charges that he took bribes in exchange for helping an Austin real estate investor.
The records, few of which were admitted into evidence during the 10-day Senate trial that resulted in his acquittal, document how Paxton built a diverse portfolio that included investments in a cellphone tower, an HVAC company, a cement supplier and a police body camera manufacturer. He netted $2.2 million when Motorola acquired the body camera firm in 2019, according to his income tax return from that year.
Shortly after, he went on a real estate buying spree, snapping up six properties in Oklahoma, Florida, Utah and Hawaii. His impeachment defense team said Paxton made a prudent shift toward real estate at a time of rock-bottom interest rates.
Questions about Paxton’s integrity have dogged him in the race for U.S. Senate. His opponent, Democratic state Rep. James Talarico, entered September with a narrow polling lead — uncharted territory in a state where Republicans have not lost a statewide race in 32 years.
A University of Texas/Texas Politics Project poll released last week found that just a third of respondents viewed Paxton as “honest and trustworthy.” The same day the statewide poll was published, a super PAC supporting Talarico hit the airwaves with an ad that labeled the attorney general as “the most corrupt politician in Texas.” The commercial included a reference to Paxton’s recently disclosed net worth.
Talarico’s net worth, according to his most recent personal financial disclosure, was between $67,000 and $305,000. The range changed little from the previous year. Like Paxton, Talarico did not include his single personal residence among his reported assets.
James Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project, said the questions surrounding Paxton’s latest financial disclosures reinforce a longstanding narrative that the attorney general is secretive about his finances and may have leveraged his public position for personal gain.
“It’s his choice how much he explains or doesn’t explain,” Henson said. “But I think that comes with a potential cost, and we’re seeing that in public opinion.”
Paxton’s pivot to real estate appears to be a way to supplement his salary as attorney general. The newsrooms found recent rental listings for six of the properties he disclosed but for which he said he derived no income: two homes in Ocala, Florida; a home and a condo in Austin; a home in College Station, Texas; and a vacation lodge in Broken Bow, Oklahoma.
A tenant confirmed to the newsrooms she’s living at one of Florida houses. At the Austin condo complex, a next-door neighbor said Paxton’s unit has a renter. And the five-bedroom, three-story Oklahoma lodge he owns is listed online as a short-term rental for up to $1,200 a night, with fall bookings filling up fast.
On his disclosure forms, which require real estate income to be reported, Paxton for each property selected the option “None (or less than $201).”
Federal law requires candidates who aren’t currently in Congress to report all loans exceeding $10,000, except those for personal residences. Paxton did not report three mortgages totaling $1.3 million for condos at the Black Desert Resort in southwest Utah, renowned for its world-class golf course. He purchased the properties in February; the reporting period for the most recent disclosure ran through mid-May.
Reporters found the mortgage documents in local land records. Each contains an addendum to the mortgage that is used for rental properties, said New Jersey real estate lawyer Daniel M. Shlufman. That addendum removes a requirement that the unit be owner-occupied and allows the lender to collect rent directly from tenants if Paxton were to default on the loan.
Paxton purchased another condo at the resort in 2025, which he disclosed on his most recent report as an asset and a liability. The land records show he obtained a $640,000 mortgage for it. The resort advertises a program in which it leases units purchased by investors, but it declined to say if Paxton’s properties were enrolled in it.
“It’s kind of mind-boggling to think about having four homes at one resort property and imagining those are for personal use,” said Cynthia Brown, a senior lawyer at the government watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
The most significant changes between Paxton’s 2025 and 2026 reports were the valuations of the Oklahoma lodge and a plot of land outside of Fort Worth, whose value he said had increased by millions of dollars.
He appears to have switched from reporting the properties’ assessed values, which are set by the local county, to the loftier estimates of what they would fetch on the open market.
Paxton’s initial use of the lowball values appears to defy federal rules aimed at bringing candidates’ disclosed property values in line with what they’re actually worth. While the Senate Ethics Committee instructs filers that they can use a recent tax assessment to set the worth of certain property, they must adjust it to market value if it is assessed below that. In these cases, valuations must be disclosed as a specific dollar figure rather than a range.
On both his annual reports as a Senate candidate, Paxton listed ranges for the value of each property he disclosed.
Last year, Paxton reported the Oklahoma lodge, just north of the Texas border, as worth between $100,001 and $250,000. The local county assesses the property at $176,000. Its estimated market value, meanwhile, is more than $1.5 million, according to real estate websites. This year, Paxton’s disclosure valued the property at between $1 million and $5 million.
Likewise, Paxton valued a 42-acre plot of undeveloped land in Johnson County, south of Fort Worth, at between $15,001 and $50,000 last year. The county assesses the property as farmland worth $20,008, but estimates its market value is $2.9 million. This year, Paxton’s disclosure said the property was worth between $1 million and $5 million.
Paxton bought the property in 2006 with a group of investors including Rob Orr, with whom he served in the Texas House of Representatives. Orr, who manages the investment, said in an interview that Paxton’s 20% stake is worth about $1 million.
“It would have been around a million for quite a while, probably the last four or five years,” Orr said. “It has increased in value because of zoning and because of time.”
The group bought the plot to hold onto, Orr said, until creeping growth from the Dallas-Fort Worth area made it attractive for redevelopment. He said the group is negotiating a sale to a developer. Last year, Orr persuaded the City Council in Burleson to rezone the land, which had been restricted to agriculture, to permit retail and housing.
Paxton’s move to significantly revalue his assets without explaining why is “very strange,” said Margaret Dylus-Yukins, senior counsel for ethics at the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center, which advocates for strong disclosure rules. Dylus-Yukins, who worked for six years analyzing executive branch officials’ financial disclosures for the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, said the agency would ask filers to explain major changes in writing.
“When you have public officials that appear to be fudging the numbers on their disclosure forms, and the Senate Ethics Committee is letting that slide, then you’re not only eroding trust in the committee but the candidate himself,” Dylus-Yukins said, referring to the significant differences between the filings.
The ethics committee did not respond to requests for comment. Candidates or senators who willingly falsify financial disclosures can be fined up to $50,000 or prosecuted for making a false statement to the government, a felony. The committee rarely investigates senators and has not formally sanctioned a member in 19 years.
Candidates do not have to file any more federal financial disclosures before the November election.
Outlet faced significant financial challenges after it had funds blocked by bank without explanation
Workers at the leftwing news outlet the Canary fear it will not survive beyond this year amid access to funds being blocked and allegations of financial mismanagement and internal turmoil.
The site, which was founded in 2015 against a backdrop of the wave of support for the then Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, appeared set to expand after a multimillion-pound injection of funds last year.
Officers clipped to bridge had tried to talk man, who was holding a knife, into coming down safely, officials say
New York City police shot and killed a man on Friday morning after he climbed on to the cables of the Brooklyn Bridge and approached officers with a knife extended, New York police department officials said.
At a news conference on Friday, NYPD officials said that a 911 call came in at around 3.28am on Friday morning, reporting that a man was walking on the beams of the Brooklyn Bridge.
Back-to-school shopping is expected to reach a record $146.8 billion this year, driven in part by college spending that crossed $100 billion for the first time. Families with K-12 students plan to spend an average of $864 each. For parents…
Employer health benefit costs are projected to see the steepest increase next year since 2003. That could mean higher deductions and out-of-pocket costs for workers.
German authorities are investigating a Belarusian national, who also holds a Russian passport, over the alleged attempt to attack Leipzig airport using drones and explosives.
By John Riddle, Contributing Journalist, Delaware LIVE
A summer lemonade stand allowed 6-year-old Lucy Johnson to do more than check an activity off her bucket list. It gave her an opportunity to support the four-legged friend who has helped make her hospital treatments less frightening.
Lucy raised more than $600 for Dogs on Call, the Animal Assisted Therapy program at Nemours Children’s Hospital, Delaware. The program holds a special place in the young patient’s heart because of Ali, a goldendoodle and facility service dog who comforts Lucy during her appointments.
For most children Lucy’s age, visiting a hospital can be intimidating. For Lucy, those visits have been a regular part of her life since she was a toddler.
She was 1½ years old when she was diagnosed with systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis, or sJIA, a rare inflammatory condition. Her continuing care at Nemours Children’s has included frequent injections and intravenous infusions.
Although the treatments were necessary, receiving them could be frightening for such a young child. Members of Lucy’s care team tried several approaches to ease her anxiety, including cold sprays to numb her skin and vibration devices intended to distract her. Nothing seemed to make the procedures feel less frightening.
Then Lucy met Ali.
With the goldendoodle beside her during appointments, Lucy’s family began seeing a change. There were fewer tears, more smiles and a greater sense of calm during situations that previously had been filled with fear.
“When she sees Ali, her eyes just light up and her body relaxes,” said Lucy’s mom, Kelly Johnson. “It’s like a wave of calmness comes over Lucy.”
Dogs on Call brings certified therapy dogs and clinically trained facility dogs into the hospital to support children and their families. The dogs provide companionship, distraction, emotional support and, when needed, plenty of comforting snuggles.
For Lucy, the program’s support also comes from Kelsey Cebula, an Animal Assisted Therapy coordinator and certified child life specialist who works alongside Ali.
“Kelsey really has a way with kids,” Kelly said. “She talks Lucy through what to expect and provides structure and consistency during times of chaos. It means the world to me that someone would look out for my kid as if she were their own.”
Together, Ali and Cebula have helped turn some of Lucy’s most stressful appointments into experiences in which she feels safer and supported.
The idea for the fundraiser began when Lucy created a summer bucket list filled with activities she wanted to complete before the season ended. One of those activities was holding a lemonade stand.
As Lucy and her mother planned the stand, they discussed what she might do with the money she earned. Lucy had an appointment at Nemours Children’s that same day and spent time with Ali and Cebula.
The visit inspired her answer.
“Why don’t we have the money go to Ali?” she asked.
Her mother agreed, recognizing the importance of helping a program that is funded entirely through donations.
“Being a kid and having to go to the hospital can be frightening and sometimes even traumatizing for kids and their families,” Kelly said. “Supporting this program is far more than providing dog treats and dog toys. Dogs on Call brings comfort and happiness to scary situations and eases anxiety. It helps children feel less like patients and more like kids.”
Lucy’s lemonade stand quickly became more than a summertime activity. It became her way of helping other children experience the comfort Ali had given her.
The community’s response surpassed the family’s expectations, with the stand generating more than $600 for Dogs on Call.
Lucy’s donation was a heartfelt thank-you to the program that helped her through difficult moments. It also demonstrated how one child, one lemonade stand and one special dog can help replace fear with comfort, connection and joy.
Jury starts seven day of deliberations after foreperson told judge juror won’t follow instruction about reasonable doubt
The deadlocked jury in the Lindsay Clancy trial started a seventh day of deliberations on Friday, a day after the jury’s foreperson told the judge a single juror would not follow the court’s instructions about reasonable doubt.
The extraordinary disclosure made in the form of a note delivered to the judge offered the clearest glimpse yet of what may be keeping jurors from reaching a verdict on whether the Massachusetts mother is criminally responsible for killing her three children.
Midway through an event at Reform’s annual conference on Friday there was question for the audience: who was worried about a Channel 4 News exposé of potential wrongdoing by party officials over donations? Almost no hands went up. The faithful might be sanguine. But make no mistake, Nigel Farage faces yet another problem.
Careful plans have been again upset. After months of answering – or primarily dodging – questions about his own finances, Farage had planned to use Reform UK’s biggest conference yet to make a blitz of policy announcements.
James Elmore Jr sentenced in death of Laura Miller, whose body was found in 1986 in notorious ‘Texas Killing Fields’
A man found guilty in the death of teenager Laura Miller, whose body was recovered in 1986 in the notorious so-called “Texas Killing Fields”, was given a 20-year prison sentence on Thursday.
James Elmore Jr received that punishment from a Galveston county jury that a day earlier had convicted him of manslaughter in connection with Laura Miller’s death, which inspired her father, Tim Miller, to launch Texas EquuSearch, a non-profit organization specializing in searching for missing people.
Washington, D.C. — Former Trump White House lawyer Ty Cobb is warning that President Donald Trump intends to interfere with the November midterm elections “where possible,” though Cobb offered the claim as his assessment rather than evidence of a specific plan.
Speaking Thursday on MS NOW, Cobb argued that Trump’s decision not to spend more of his substantial campaign funds helping Republican candidates could reflect confidence that other administration actions will influence the election.
“I think Trump doesn’t feel he needs to spend this money because it is his intention to interfere with the elections and to steal these elections where possible,” Cobb said. Mediaite separately reported the same remarks.
Cobb also raised the possibility that Trump could pressure House Speaker Mike Johnson to challenge the seating of Democratic winners. No evidence was presented that Johnson has agreed to such a plan.
The warning comes amid an ongoing legal battle over Trump’s executive order tightening mail-ballot procedures. The administration has asked the Supreme Court to allow a Postal Service rule requiring states to provide lists of eligible mail voters and use specially approved envelopes with unique barcodes. The administration says the requirements strengthen election security, while state officials and voting-rights groups argue they could cause legitimate ballots to be rejected.
Cobb has become an outspoken Trump critic since serving in his first administration and has previously warned that the president could seek broader federal involvement in elections.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: A group representing American automakers sent a letter (PDF) Thursday to congressional leaders asking for a "permanent ban" on Chinese-made cars in the U.S. John Bozzella, the Alliance for Automotive Innovation's CEO and president, described in the letter China's manufacturing industry as "rooted in a well-documented pattern of unfair trade, subsidies, intellectual property theft and surveillance." Bozzella addressed his request to Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) -- urging them to back a "permanent ban on the sale, import and manufacture of Chinese connected vehicles," before the 119th Congress concludes in January.
"Right now, Chinese automakers are dumping subsidized vehicles with connected software and hardware around the world," Bozzella wrote, adding that China "is capturing market share" in Europe, Australia, Southeast Asia, Mexico and South America. "This hasn't happened inside the U.S. yet, but given the scale and urgency of this threat, we urge you to enact a Chinese vehicle, software and hardware ban before adjourning this year and make this policy the law of the land," he added. The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, a trade organization representing car manufacturers, represents the "entire" U.S. auto industry, per its website.
Bipartisan bills in the Senate and House would bar automakers with more than 15% Chinese ownership from selling vehicles in the U.S. "Enacting a permanent ban on Chinese vehicles and high-risk hardware and software in the 119th Congress will send a clear and bipartisan message that China's strategy to dominate global automotive manufacturing will be met with a national security policy response from the American government," wrote Bozzella.
Further reading: US Car Buyers Envy What They Cannot Have
State decides to proceed hours after Trump administration asks supreme court to let it carry out proposed crackdown
North Carolina became the first state to start sending out mail-in ballots for November’s US midterm elections on Friday, as Donald Trump’s administration fights to impose sweeping restrictions on the practice before millions of Americans cast their votes.
The state’s decision to proceed – hours after Trump’s officials asked the supreme court to let the administration press ahead with its proposed crackdown – comes amid deep uncertainty over whether new federal rules governing mail ballots will be allowed to take effect, and whether the US Postal Service can implement the changes in time.
Russian and Ukrainian strikes in July killed more crew than in whole war to that month, preventing grain exports
A summer of hostilities in the Black Sea proved deadly for seafarers, as Russia and Ukraine attacked each other’s ships and port infrastructure, preventing vital grain exports and prompting concerns that the conflict will push global food prices even higher.
More crew were killed in the Black Sea in July than during the entirety of the war before that month as the conflict has intensified, making the body of water the most dangerous in the world for commercial shipping. This is despite the conflict between the US and Iran, with vessels still being targeted in the strait of Hormuz, Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.
Sept. 4, 2026 — Asia Pacific University of Technology & Innovation (APU) has launched what it claims is Malaysia’s first AI Supercomputing Lab powered by NVIDIA DGX Spark at its Technology Park Malaysia campus, bringing advanced AI computing capabilities directly into the higher education learning environment.
The facility provides students, academics and researchers with hands-on access to advanced computing infrastructure for developing and experimenting with large language models, generative AI, machine learning, data science, intelligent engineering and emerging agentic AI applications.
The launch was officiated by Dr Zambry Abdul Kadir, minister of Higher Education, and hosted by Parmjit Singh, CEO of APU.
“AI literacy today must go beyond knowing how to use readily available computational tools. By putting AI supercomputing power directly into the hands of our students, we are focused on four key goals: widening access, building Malaysian AI talent, strengthening sovereign AI capability, and enabling our students to move from simply using AI to becoming creators of AI with purpose,” said Parmjit.
“This level of computing power gives students the ability to experiment with larger AI models, tackle more complex problems and turn ideas into working solutions. It is about giving them the capability, confidence and computing power to develop the advanced skills that will define the jobs of the future — and to graduate ready to build, innovate and lead in an increasingly AI-enabled world.”
APU said the launch supports Malaysia’s broader ambition to develop domestic AI capabilities and move beyond simply adopting technologies developed elsewhere.
Prime minister Anwar Ibrahim has said Malaysia must not remain merely a user of AI, but build its own capabilities to compete, while Digital minister Gobind Singh Deo recently stressed that the country “cannot be content with being a nation of AI users” and must develop its own innovators, creators and builders.
APU said responding to this ambition requires a shift in how AI is taught and learned. Advanced computing power has traditionally been concentrated in data centres or accessed through metered cloud services. The new lab brings those capabilities directly into the university environment, allowing students to experiment, iterate and develop working prototypes in real time.
Each NVIDIA DGX Spark provides advanced AI computing infrastructure for hands-on learning, experimentation and innovation across AI and related disciplines. The architecture enables students and researchers to work locally with AI models of up to 200 billion parameters, supporting the development, testing and fine-tuning of sophisticated AI applications.
The systems support demanding workloads, including deep learning, generative AI and data analysis.
Rather than simply prompting readily available AI applications, students can work across the development process — loading and adapting models, preparing datasets, fine-tuning systems for specialised tasks, measuring how computing resources affect performance, and learning to build and deploy AI responsibly.
The aim is to give graduates practical experience in developing AI systems, rather than simply using AI tools.
The AI Supercomputing Lab will support learning and research across Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Computing, Data Science and Business Analytics, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering and Mechatronic Engineering.
Students can explore machine learning, large language models, computer vision, intelligent automation, robotics, AI-assisted analytics and emerging agentic AI systems capable of reasoning through tasks and performing sequences of actions.
The infrastructure also provides a platform for future exploration of GPU-accelerated quantum simulation and hybrid quantum-classical computing, opening pathways into emerging computational technologies.
Software engineering students may develop intelligent applications and AI agents; data science students can investigate large-scale analytics and model performance; while engineering students can connect AI perception and decision-making with robotics and autonomous technologies.
The infrastructure can also support final-year projects, postgraduate research, interdisciplinary collaboration and industry-linked experimentation, helping classroom ideas develop into prototypes and applied solutions.
As AI becomes increasingly embedded across industries and professions, the AI Supercomputing Lab reflects APU’s commitment to preparing graduates not simply to participate in the AI era, but to help shape its development.
The use of DGX Spark clusters in higher education is also gaining momentum globally, with universities using the technology for AI research, experimentation and hands-on learning across fields ranging from robotics and healthcare to scientific computing and advanced AI development.
Delaware Lottery introduces new NFL-themed POWERBALL Xs & Os game
Delaware Lottery launches the new POWERBALL Xs & Os weekly draw game, with tickets on sale Sept. 8 and the first drawing Sept. 13. (Photo courtesy of Delaware Lottery.)
Delaware Lottery players will soon have a new football-themed game to play, as the Delaware Lottery joins 24 jurisdictions offering the new POWERBALL Xs & Os weekly draw game beginning next month.
Tickets go on sale Tuesday, Sept. 8, at Delaware Lottery retailers statewide. The first drawing is scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 13, at 10 p.m., with drawings continuing every Sunday throughout the year.
The $5 game combines NFL team selections with a traditional lottery drawing. Players choose eight NFL teams from all 32 franchises — or opt for a Quick Pick — and win prizes based on how many team logos match those drawn. The jackpot starts at $1 million and rolls over until won.
Players can also purchase up to 10 consecutive drawings for an additional $5 per drawing.
Prize payouts range from $7 for matching four teams to $20,000 for matching seven, while matching all eight teams wins the jackpot.
The game also marks the first nationwide promotional prize program in POWERBALL history. Players can enter eligible winning and non-winning POWERBALL Xs & Os tickets online to earn points that can be used as entries for prize drawings. Available prizes include a trip to Super Bowl LXI, NFL Shop gift cards and other NFL-themed experiences.
Delaware Lottery Players Club members can also enter eligible tickets through the Players Club to earn additional points toward state promotions and drawings.
“From the NFL to the college teams we root for, Delawareans love football — and it’s a sport that unites people and communities,” said Helene Keeley, director of the Delaware Lottery. “The Delaware Lottery is thrilled to harness all this football excitement to offer players a new way to enjoy the sport and potentially win cash and other prizes, while keeping the focus on fun and responsible play.”
The Delaware Lottery said the new game complements its existing sports offerings, including Sports Pick, which has been available for more than 15 years. Sports Pick allows wagering on professional and collegiate sporting events at Delaware casinos, participating retailers and online.
Unlike sports betting, POWERBALL Xs & Os results are determined through a random lottery drawing and are not based on the outcomes of NFL games.
Lottery officials remind players that games are intended only for adults who meet applicable age, residency and eligibility requirements, and encourage responsible play.
Keep your dignity, integrity and GPA intact with these simple tips to help organize your schedule, simulate practice tests and scan instructional documents.
Lorena Isceri was thrown off a motorway bridge, allegedly by ex-boyfriend Federico Vella
A 45-year-old woman abducted and thrown off a motorway bridge near Florence has become the seventh alleged femicide in Italy since mid-August.
Lorena Isceri was abducted on Thursday afternoon, allegedly by her ex-boyfriend, Federico Vella, in the Rifredi area of Florence, before being forced into the boot of his car and driven towards a bridge on the A1 motorway.
Abelardo De La Espriella posts video of himself with rows of body bags as performative populism continues to sweep Americas
Colombia’s hardline president, Abelardo De La Espriella, has provoked outrage after posting a video on social media in which he strides through rows of white body bags that he says contained the corpses of 23 “neutralised” guerrillas.
De La Espriella took power last month vowing “all-out war” against illegal armed groups and he published the footage on Thursday in an apparent attempt to show he was fulfilling that pledge.
Bank of England governor says central bankers must explain decisions or risk being seen as ‘unrepresentative elite’
The governor of the Bank of England has said the rise of populist politicians presents a serious challenge to independent central banks.
As Nigel Farage’s Reform UK gathered for its annual conference in Birmingham, Andrew Bailey said central bankers must be prepared to explain their decisions to the public or risk being attacked as an “unrepresentative elite”.
Sept. 4, 2026 — With the help of supercomputers at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), researchers from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of Southern California (USC) have gained an atomistic-level understanding of how the arrangement of electrons in materials with reduced dimensionality affects their behavior in the presence of light. Their work offers new possibilities for the future of quantum and optical materials as well as a new computational framework for how to study materials in excited states.
Proposed experimental demonstration of the internal structure and strongly correlated nature of Wigner crystal excitons. This is a schematic of single-particle density of states (DOS) of a multiband moiré superlattice system in 2D. Credit: Mauro Del Ben, Zhanglu Li
New optical materials will be key to future technologies, from new types of sensors and solar panels to powerful quantum computers, but studying and understanding these materials at a microscopic level has proven a scientific and computational challenge. In this new paper, the researchers have opened the door for workflows that could overcome that challenge and reveal exciting new phenomena and cutting-edge materials.
“Now that we have established a machinery that works, we can perform and explain exotic phenomena,” said Mauro Del Ben, a researcher in the Berkeley Lab Applied Mathematics and Computational Research division and an author on the paper. “We can go even further and study even more complex phenomena. It really goes down into the direction of quantum technology with predictive computational capability. ”
The researchers studied moiré superlattices, in which at least two layers of a 2D material are stacked on top of each other with their patterns of atomic arrangement slightly misaligned, either by rotating one layer by a few degrees or by using materials with slightly different lattice structures. This misalignment reveals a moiré pattern similar to those found in certain fabrics and printing effects; in this context, the moiré pattern changes the material’s properties. One of these properties manifests when researchers add or remove a specific quantity of electrons to a moiré superlattice, a process known as doping: the electrons repel each other and form a lattice of crystals known as generalized Wigner crystals.
“The reason this is interesting is that there are many exotic quantum phenomena and quantum orders that exist with a simple twist or simple lattice mismatch,” said Zhenglu Li, Assistant Professor of Materials Science at USC and an author on the paper. “One of these phenomena is the generalized Wigner crystal ground state, where if you put in or remove electrons from these materials, the charges repel each other and form a superlattice structure.”
In this paper, the researchers studied generalized Wigner crystals in their excited state—that is, how they respond to light—and found that their structure directly influences how they produce a new type of quasi-particle called a Wigner crystalline exciton. This discovery, from first principles—that is, extrapolating directly from the laws of physics without adjustable parameters—provides proof of what’s previously been observed experimentally, but never described at a microscopic level. Understanding how moiré superlattices respond to light, and why, could be crucial to designing materials for light harvesting, light-matter interaction, solar cells, and other energy-related processes. From there, this knowledge could guide the design of quantum and optoelectronic materials, including platforms relevant to sensing, energy conversion, and quantum information science.
Large Scale, High Accuracy
Capturing the dynamical behavior of all these particles and how they affect the moiré superlattice is a complex many-body problem, and the researchers wanted to investigate it in a very large material system, as many as 10,000 atoms. With both complexity and scale in mind, they approached the problem using many-body perturbation theory, going beyond the widely used density functional theory (DFT). Many-body perturbation theory is a computationally complex approach that uses intensive computing resources—at a scale that can challenge even the world’s most powerful supercomputers—to achieve highly accurate results.
“The computational challenge is huge because this is a many-body calculation, a very advanced calculation compared with most ground-state applications,” said Li. “Typically, because of this complexity, you either do a very large-scale simulation using a simpler method or you pursue a very complicated method, but with a small system. In this work, we actually achieve both ends. It’s a super large, complicated system with around 10,000 atoms, simulated using a many-body-level excited-states method.”
At this scale, the many-body computation requires an enormous amount of computing power, making use of massively parallel GPU-accelerated supercomputing architectures to process huge quantities of data at once.
“The properties of one of the particles depend on the dynamics of all the other particles, which is why we need to account for the many-body effect,” said Mauro Del Ben. “Practically, that means having a very big function describing the dynamical motion of all the particles in the material. And this very big function has to be processed in parallel by many GPUs, and usually there needs to be communication across GPUs. So one of the technical challenges we have to overcome is how we handle this very large function, this very memory-intensive, compute-intensive object, and how we make sure that we minimize the communication requirement and also the memory requirement to scale up this calculation in a large system.”
To make these large, complex computations possible, the team used BerkeleyGW, a software package developed at Berkeley Lab for many-body excited-state calculations. Since its initial release, BerkeleyGW has used NERSC as its primary high performance computing (HPC) development platform. A key factor in optimizing BerkeleyGW for HPC systems has been the NERSC Science Acceleration Program (NESAP), through which NERSC staff work closely with researchers to adapt and optimize their workflows for advanced computing architectures. First initiated on the Hopper system at NERSC more than a decade ago, BerkeleyGW has grown, adapted, and demonstrated near-peak performance on several different architectures with NESAP support. Currently, a GPU-specific code for Perlmutter and a portable version both allow researchers to use BerkeleyGW on a range of HPC systems, including the exascale systems at Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility and Argonne Leadership Computing Facility, where the final computations for this research were completed. The BerkeleyGW team has been nominated as a finalist for the prestigious Gordon Bell Prize for their work twice, in 2020 and 2025.
“Thanks to the support of NERSC, and in particular NESAP, over the last 12 years, we have been able to really push the limit of this software,” said Del Ben.
With new developments in BerkeleyGW achieved in the course of this research, Li and Del Ben’s team created a new computational framework for studying a large variety of excited-state phenomena. Previously, ground-state calculations have been based on non-correlated or weakly-correlated ground states, meaning that the electrons in the materials generally behave independently of other electrons. However, in this new framework, moiré superlattices are considered strongly correlated ground states, forming charge-ordered Wigner crystals upon carrier doping—that is, they behave more like a single entity. With these new developments, the researchers were able to get a more accurate view of how the electrons in the generalized Wigner crystals behave and affect the formation of Wigner crystalline excitons.
Moving Forward
A new framework for studying excited states is an exciting step forward, but it’s also a beginning. From here, Li and Del Ben say, the door is open for exploring a range of exotic phenomena found in the doped moiré superlattice and taking advantage of the properties they might find.
“There are many more very exotic quantum ground states found in the moiré superlattice, if you dope it, and we’re working on getting the framework to work on those systems,” said Li. “There are quite a few things to study: you can change the layers, you can change the twisting angle, and you can dope it or apply electric fields. It’s very exciting that we now have this very unique capability.”
Additionally, “now that we have established a machinery that works, we can really perform and explain exotic phenomena,” said Del Ben. “We can go even further and add additional levels of complication to study even more complex phenomena, it really goes down into the direction of quantum technology with predictive computational capability. ”
More broadly, the team plans to take advantage of new ways of working, incorporating complex workflows, AI, and new technologies to make capturing these materials accurately and at scale more efficient. Del Ben says the team plans to take full advantage of the capability of Doudna, NERSC’s next flagship system, to encapsulate these deep, complex steps into a unified workflow and take advantage of the hardware-specific advantages to leverage different facets of the calculation. Due in late 2026, Doudna will be purpose-built for these complex workflows, considered the next evolution in HPC for science.
“The next challenge is figuring out how to take advantage of mixed precision,” said Del Ben. “Do we really need to rely on double-precision arithmetic throughout the calculation, or can we redesign our computational kernels to use mixed-precision algorithms and better leverage emerging hardware architectures? These are the directions we’re exploring as we continue pushing our software to tackle larger, more complex scientific applications.”
About NERSC and Berkeley Lab
The National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) is the mission computing facility for the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, the nation’s single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences.
Located at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), NERSC serves 11,000 scientists at national laboratories and universities researching a wide range of problems in climate, fusion energy, materials sciences, physics, chemistry, computational biology, and other disciplines. An average of 2,000 peer-reviewed science results a year rely on NERSC resources and expertise, which has also supported the work of seven Nobel Prize-winning scientists and teams.
NERSC is a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility.
Nigel Farage is facing fresh criticism on the eve of the Reform UK party conference after some of his team were filmed appearing to plot to avoid electoral laws on foreign donations in an undercover investigation broadcast by Channel 4 News.
A group of investigative journalists called Verbatim, founded by the Centre for Climate Reporting, posed as a potential Reform supporter and his wealthy American father, an impermissible donor, who paid for £30,000 of polling commissioned by Reform and which benefited the party.
Rescuers in Nepal pulled two workers alive from a hydropower tunnel as emergency teams continued efforts to reach others believed to be trapped and still alive inside, officials said.
Officials say pair were rescued from Trishuli 3A hydropower tunnel in Nepal after being trapped at depth of 170 metres
Two people have been pulled out alive from a hydropower tunnel in Nepal nine days after deadly flash floods buried the projects in deep mud and left them trapped.
The workers were rescued during an operation at the Trishuli 3A tunnel, a hydropower project in one of the areas worst affected by last week’s floods, according to the army spokesperson Brig Gen Raja Ram Basnet.
Washington, D.C. — Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., is facing sharp criticism after a Wall Street Journal report described a pattern of canceled meetings, limited engagement with legislative work and strained relationships with staff and constituents.
The report alleges Fetterman canceled a meeting with three paralyzed veterans who traveled to Washington to discuss their care, then appeared on Fox News less than an hour later. It also says he showed little interest in meeting with representatives from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia who wanted to discuss Medicaid and vaccine-related concerns.
The allegations prompted unusually blunt criticism from fellow Pennsylvania Democrats. Rep. Brendan Boyle called Fetterman “a disgrace,” while Rep. Chris Deluzio accused him of showing “no sense of duty.” Media figures and activists also circulated accounts of difficult interactions with the senator.
The Journal’s reporting, based on interviews with current and former staffers and others familiar with his office, portrays Fetterman as increasingly disengaged from committee hearings and constituent meetings while devoting significant attention to media appearances and issues involving Israel.
Fetterman has previously rejected criticism about his work habits and has remained a frequent presence on television. The new report does not allege criminal wrongdoing, but it has intensified questions about his approach to the job and his relationship with fellow Democrats.
HOUSTON, Sept. 4, 2026 — HPE has announced an expanded collaboration with Oracle to help scale Oracle’s global AI infrastructure by deploying HPE Juniper Networking across Oracle’s AI data centers. The expanded collaboration builds on more than a decade of engineering work between Oracle and Juniper Networks and includes networking support services and financing capabilities.
Today, HPE Juniper Networking routing and switching platforms support key elements of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure’s (OCI) data center and edge networks, providing the scale, performance, and availability needed for Oracle’s global cloud operations. That foundation is becoming increasingly important as OCI expands its AI superclusters. Large GPU clusters place significant demands on bandwidth, latency, congestion management, and fault recovery, while Oracle’s regional and edge networks must scale to connect clusters with services, customers, and external networks worldwide.
“Oracle is building AI infrastructure at extraordinary scale, and HPE is uniquely positioned to support OCI with one of the industry’s most comprehensive networking portfolios for AI data centers,” said Rami Rahim, executive vice president, president and general manager, Networking, HPE. “Together, we are advancing a high-performance networking architecture that helps Oracle address the traffic management, power, space, and operational requirements of increasingly large AI environments.”
The expanded collaboration provides for the potential multi-year deployment of HPE Juniper Networking PTX and MX routing platforms and QFX and EX switching platforms across Oracle data centers globally, along with multi-year networking support services. Across OCI today, the MX and PTX routers support portions of the edge network, while QFX switches power multiple layers of the regional data center fabric. The latest QFX switches will provide the high-density connectivity, dynamic load balancing, and advanced congestion management required for large RoCEv2 (RDMA over Converged Ethernet version 2) AI backend networks. A common HPE Juniper Networking foundation across these domains helps simplify engineering and operations while enabling each environment to be optimized for its distinct requirements.
“Building AI infrastructure at Oracle’s scale requires an integrated ecosystem where every layer of the stack works together,” said Mahesh Thiagarajan, executive vice president, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. “HPE Juniper Networking has been an important part of our cloud architecture and now plays a key role in our AI clusters, regional data centers, and edge networks with the scale, performance, and reliability our customers expect.”
To help OCI sustain high performance and resiliency as its AI infrastructure scales, Oracle and HPE are also collaborating on intelligent telemetry that delivers deeper visibility into device and fabric behavior. Earlier detection of queue buildup, packet loss, traffic imbalances, and component degradation can help OCI resolve issues faster and minimize their impact on GPU utilization and network availability.
“Every microsecond matters to AI models and agents,” said Praveen Jain, senior vice president and general manager, data center and AI networking, HPE. “Through high-performance networking and our work with Oracle on deeper fabric visibility, we are helping OCI detect bottlenecks faster, maintain network availability, and improve the efficiency of AI infrastructure.”
As part of the agreement, HPE has issued Oracle warrants to purchase shares of HPE common stock.
About HPE
HPE (NYSE: HPE) is a leader in essential enterprise technology, bringing together the power of AI, cloud, and networking to help organizations achieve more. As pioneers of possibility, our innovation and expertise advance the way people live and work. We empower our customers across industries to optimize operational performance, transform data into foresight, and maximize their impact. Unlock your boldest ambitions with HPE. Discover more at www.hpe.com.
Collaboration will support semiconductor companies, research institutes and universities developing quantum applications across different hardware environments
TAIPEI, Taiwan, Sept. 4, 2026 — Scientek Corporation and Classiq have announced a go-to-market agreement to expand access to Classiq’s hardware-agnostic quantum software platform across Taiwan’s semiconductor, research and academic communities.
Under the partnership agreement, Scientek will introduce Classiq’s platform to semiconductor companies, research institutes, universities, government organizations and other customers within its established network. The companies also plan to offer enablement and training and explore joint research and development programs involving quantum computing applications.
Scientek distributes semiconductor equipment, scientific and analytical instruments and advanced technology systems to Taiwan’s industrial and research communities. Its experience supporting advanced technology infrastructure, including quantum hardware, positions the company to help customers connect their computing investments with the software required to design, optimize and execute quantum algorithms.
Classiq’s platform allows researchers and technical teams to describe quantum algorithms as high-level functional models. The platform then automatically creates optimized quantum circuits for the selected hardware or execution environment. This hardware-agnostic approach allows organizations to develop software without committing their algorithms to a single quantum computing architecture.
“Taiwan’s semiconductor companies and research institutions are increasingly evaluating how quantum computing could contribute to areas such as materials research, simulation and optimization,” said Mr. Simon Lin, CEO at Scientek Corporation. “Customers need more than access to hardware. They need software, training and development workflows that allow their teams to begin building applications. Classiq adds that capability while preserving flexibility across different hardware systems.”
The collaboration is intended to help local organizations establish quantum development capabilities, train researchers and engineers, and evaluate potential applications within existing computing and research environments.
“Taiwan is bringing together semiconductor leadership, artificial intelligence, high-performance computing and quantum research,” said Nir Minerbi, co-founder and CEO at Classiq. “Scientek has longstanding relationships across the semiconductor and scientific communities, making it a strong local partner for expanding access to quantum software. Our shared objective is to help organizations move from evaluating quantum technology to building and testing applications.”
The companies expect initial activity to focus on semiconductor-related research, materials and chemical simulation, optimization and advanced computing. Classiq’s platform can support both quantum-only and hybrid quantum-classical development workflows, allowing users to evaluate algorithms across available hardware, simulators and cloud services.
Taiwan’s semiconductor and research ecosystem offers a natural setting for quantum application development. Many of the scientific and engineering challenges being explored for quantum computing, including materials behavior, process optimization and complex simulation, are relevant to organizations operating across the semiconductor value chain.
Scientek and Classiq will introduce the collaboration during SEMICON Taiwan 2026. Classiq will showcase its technology at the joint exhibition booth of Scientek and its group partner, Zen Voce, demonstrating how its platform supports quantum modeling, synthesis, optimization and execution across multiple computing environments. Scientek will support customer introductions and meetings with members of Taiwan’s semiconductor, academic and research communities.
About Classiq
Classiq, a leading quantum computing software company, provides enterprise-grade technology that makes it practical to develop scalable, efficient quantum applications. Used by dozens of global enterprises, the Classiq platform combines AI agents, a high-level quantum programming language and design automation to accelerate the development of optimized, hardware-ready quantum software. The platform also supports hardware benchmarking, cost and performance optimization, and execution across quantum hardware platforms.
Video shared by Nepal's authorities showed the moment a man was hauled from a tunnel. Nearly 1,300 people have died after flash floods swept through the region.
SAN JOSE, Calif., Sept. 4, 2026 — MIPS, by GF (MIPS), a leading technology provider for workload-focused platforms, has launched three workload-native platforms that bring Physical AI capabilities to industrial machines, transportation platforms and embedded systems operating in the physical world. These new platforms will enable the commercial and ecosystem development required for lowering modern AI on to tailored platforms with class-leading energy efficiency.
“As intelligence moves into machines, vehicles, and other physical systems, compute platforms need to adapt to the workload,” said Sameer Wasson, CEO of MIPS. “MIPS is driving this shift with open, software-first platforms that give customers a common foundation to build, customize, and deploy Physical AI, with efficiency and tokens-per-watt as the foundation of our technology.”
The MIPS strategy places software first in the design approach, using open-standard technology and advanced modeling to guide developers and platform designers. The path from workload insights to an optimized platform implementation is delivered by MIPS open & modular technology and expertise in safety, real-time, and AI inference for embedded custom solutions.
“The momentum behind RISC-V continues to be driven by strong industry collaboration and a growing software ecosystem,” said Manuel Uhm, Director of Silicon Marketing, Embedded, AMD. “We welcome efforts that expand developer access, strengthen software readiness, and help customers take advantage of open-standard architectures across a broad range of applications.”
“The continued growth of RISC-V depends on close collaboration across processor technology, software, and the broader development ecosystem,” said David Ku, Co-COO and CFO of MediaTek. “MediaTek welcomes MIPS’ commitment to open standards and its contribution of proven processor and software expertise to help advance commercially ready RISC-V solutions.”
MIPS is driving the next era of computing with processor IP, software-first tools, and GF silicon technologies that help customers move from workload-specific architectures to production-ready silicon. To learn more about the MIPS Acies, Actus, and Aegis platforms for Physical AI, visit MIPS at upcoming events, or contact the company here.
About MIPS
MIPS, by GlobalFoundries, develops AI inference platforms for energy-efficient Physical AI systems and embedded devices. MIPS, combined with ARC processor solutions, delivers solutions for automotive, aerospace, robotics, AI/data center infrastructure, and other embedded markets. Leveraging the nature of RISC-V to deliver open technology, MIPS offers a single portfolio spanning AI & processor IP, advanced workload modeling, and custom solutions for Physical AI platforms. Backed by GlobalFoundries process technology, packaging, and manufacturing, MIPS has global scale. For more information, visit MIPS.com.
Number of new jobs being added has been fluctuating, with private companies adding 38,000 jobs in August
The US economy added 162,000 jobs in August, an uptick after a sluggish summer for the labor market.
The unemployment rate held steady at 4.1%, still down from its most recent peak of 4.5% last November, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Despite the relative stability of the unemployment rate, the number of new jobs added to the economy has been fluctuating, going from 214,000 in March down to a 21,000 gain in July and then back up in August.
Spotlight Delaware reporter Brianna Hill recently spoke with Frank Cooke and Pam Salaam, who are seeking the Democratic nomination for House District 16 in Delaware in the Sept. 15, 2026, primary election.
Cooke, a four-term incumbent who represents District 16 stretching from Wilmington’s Southbridge community down Route 9 to Old New Castle, will look to defend his seat from a rare primary challenge from Salaam, a healthcare worker backed by the Working Families Party.
The winner will face Republican Enala Mwashitete in the November general election.
Readers can find condensed versions of the candidates’ answers below, while the accompanying podcasts feature unedited excerpts from our conversations.
Rep. Frank Cooke
You’ve represented District 16 since 2018. Why are you running again, and why should voters in District 16 send you back to Dover?
I’m running again to complete what I’ve started since 2018.
That includes dealing with environmental issues, dealing with economic development, dealing with education, and dealing with our electric bills here in the state of Delaware. And also, impacting a little bit in my district, homelessness and also housing. We’re trying to get more affordable housing, and also working on the food desert that we have.
We need a real grocery store, and we need brick-and-mortar banking in our district.
Looking back at your time in office, what do you consider unfinished or the thing that you most need another term to actually get done?
Well, I’m looking at moving forward with a footprint of our Rose Hill Community Center. The other most important issue in the State of Delaware, and it may be important on the East Coast, is the Port of Wilmington.
As you know, we moved from the Christina River onto the Delaware River, and we’re starting the expansion in Edgemoor, where we’ll have a groundbreaking Sept. 14.
Economic development to me in the State of Delaware is very, very important, because people need jobs so that you can make money to support housing, support your family, support education, and be able to pay for things that you need to live every day, but comfortably.
I’m also finishing up with the dump next to the police station on Route 13. It should be just about done in December or early 2027.
I’m also looking at air quality. I’m still working with Croda, which is over here in my district, trying to make sure they’re following all the environmental rules, federally and locally and at the state.
So I’m trying to finish that, especially looking at economic development myself with Sen. Darius Brown, who is my senator in my district.
And also I want to make sure dealing with those who have been incarcerated or dealt with our judicial system. We want to make sure they use our Clean Slate bills, SB 111 and 112, which are for expungements. We have people that have records that did things when they were 12 or 13 years old or when they were younger and now they’re in their 30s and 40s and can’t get housing, can’t get a job, can’t get a license.
It’s a chance where we can use that to clean up their backgrounds of being incarcerated and/or being arrested.
In terms of environmental accountability, one of the things that was brought up in my interview with Ms. Salaam was the industrial traffic on Route 9. And she had the same concerns as you, in terms of the emissions coming from the companies and the large trucks that kind of pass through the district. Is there anything that you’re pushing for in Dover specifically to fix that? Is it stronger penalties? Is it mandatory notification laws? Is it something else?
Well, I was doing this way before Ms. Salaam was thinking about it. I’m the one that’s paying for signage so that more trucks don’t run through Southbridge.
Don’t forget that before there was I-95, I-495, there was Route 13 going through Southbridge.
We do have a problem. The houses in Southbridge and other places are a little older. The foundations are a little shaky. I’m just being real about it. And they do this thing called the Jake braking that makes a loud noise. I know exactly what Ms. Salaam and others on the Route 9 Corridor mean about that noise.
And it’s about enforcement, and it’s about working together with these trucking companies that have been here for generations.
You’re a 30-year retired New Castle County police officer, former vice president of the FOP Lodge, and back in 2020 you were named chair of the Law Enforcement Accountability Task Force, which was created to recommend changes to policing amid the nationwide and local protests following the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.
Today, a lot of issues have been circulating around justice reform. We know that Delaware’s Law Enforcement Officer Bill of Rights (LEOBOR) has come up recently in Wilmington following the June 24 officer-involved shooting of Kadir Skinner. Many residents, advocates, and city council members have been calling for reform of LEOBOR, as a result of the shooting.
I’m curious, do you think further changes need to be made to LEOBOR today, and if so, what specifically?
Well, that’s a very good question. We need to work together with all the different advocate groups that are out there. First of all, you need to know the history of LEOBOR. Most of them don’t.
There’s a history to it, and it’s a shame that they don’t. They need to do my three Rs: read, research, and then respond. LEOBOR, at the end of the day, was for police officers and other police officers. And a lot of these advocates when I first got here, they tried to do that and get some reforms.
In my task force I had 92 people and four subcommittees. And you can still go to delaware.gov and look how it worked out. We passed nine pieces of legislation, including body-worn cameras, choke holds bans, and prohibitions on taking pictures of juvenile defendants.
We had one subcommittee that did work on LEOBOR, and it didn’t make it over the hump. But we did some things that other states around us recognized. We go to the National Black State Legislators Conference, where all of us meet together yearly, and they praised Delaware for passing nine pieces of legislation of police reform.
At the end of the day, what some advocates are trying to do is reshape qualified immunity, which means that if something bad happens and you go through the due process of the judicial system, you could be personally liable.
If you take that protections from officers, then who is next? Will you be able to take qualified immunity from judges or teachers?
And I just want say I don’t know any police officer who wants to work with a dirty police officer. And I’m on the POST Commission, where I decertify and certify police officers.
As vice chair of the Delaware Legislative Black Caucus, you and Chair Nnamdi Chukwuocha put out a joint statement around when the shooting happened calling for a transparent investigation into the Skinner shooting. Beyond that statement, is there any specific legislation you want to introduce or support in direct response to the Skinner shooting?
Well, I don’t think we should be doing anything until the due process is over, on both sides. It’s unfortunate this happened in our state of Delaware. We’ve had other shootings in the state of Delaware, and I think that there’s people that want to look at everything, because you can do things much better.
And I don’t care what color you are or who you are or where you come from, it’s something that we need to work on and look at after the due process is over. Because there’s a lot of identities that you have to look at. You’ve got to look at the Department of Justice and what they do. You’ve got to look at the Office of Defense Services.
There’s a process. And then at the end of that process, if it’s not right, it’s not correct, and there’s a injustice, that’s when we need to put our foot down. We can’t do it before it, because we don’t know what’s gonna happen or how it ends up.
Your primary challenger, Pamela Salaam, she doesn’t come from a law enforcement background. She has spent decades in healthcare and addiction recovery work, and she has been critical of the pace of police accountability reform. What is the line that divides you and Salaam?
I don’t know her platform or anything like that. I don’t know if she’s ever been to a police citizens police academy to learn how we work. That’s one thing I would never do, is tell somebody what they’re doing if I’ve never been there to know how they do it.
We just can’t talk about legislation, we have to know how you’ll govern. And I think I do a pretty good job since 2018 in the 16th District.
Is theresomething we haven’t discussed yet before people head to the polls?
One thing I want the people in the 16th District to understand what is going on with the marijuana right now, and these distribution centers and the places up and down our cities, and in our counties, that, we keep a good eye on what’s going on. That’s one thing.
I need to make sure that we pay attention to our Department of Education, because we’re reading on a third-grade level. And really get involved with our school boards and find out what our children are doing in these schools, and make a good plan, have a great solution on why we’re reading on a third-grade level in the United States.
The other important thing, I wanna make sure that we pay attention to the Port of Wilmington. We’re trying to grow it and step up to what’s going on today in logistics, and getting the Port of Wilmington done and up and running.
And people want to see a safe Route 9. And our numbers in policing and in enforcement, and also our numbers are down in police complaints, internal affairs. No one looks at that. The ones we had when I came in were very high. Through the state police, county police, Wilmington police, New Castle City and DRBA, our numbers are down.
Pam Salaam
Why did you decide to run, and why now?
I decided to run because knowing that Rep. Cooke’s been there for a long time and there’s a lot of communities in the district. There is a lot of need for elected officials to be active in those communities.
And through my experience prior to me announcing running, I have not had the opportunity to glean off the benefit of having an elected official sharing the responsibilities or leading within the communities.
So I decided I’m going to get up and do that.
You’re a lifelong Wilmington resident raised in the Southbridge community. You’re a community advocate. You’ve spent almost three decades working at ChristianaCare, and you’ve also worked as a drug and alcohol counselor. How does your background shape how you’d approach being a state lawmaker?
I spent 28 years at ChristianaCare, so I had a very strong background in healthcare, and I was able to take those skill sets and move on in my career.
I also always wanted to help people, so that led me to obtain a degree in human services, drug and alcohol counseling, and I did it on an outpatient/inpatient level. And then I was able to retire and then start my own nonprofit, Positive Thinking, Positive Change, and we believed in helping people as well.
One is feeding people. So I had the skill set to reach out to the community. I understand the needs of the community, and I’m willing to be able to share my skill set to help edify the people, the constituents in the community.
If you are elected, what are some of the things you’d want to focus on first in Dover?
One of my bigger topics is the emissions from the tractor-trailer traffic and the chemical companies that are within the district. So I wanna get down there and begin to do some legislation work on accountability.
We don’t have to fight these companies, but just have to have some accountability and a working relationship where we can do things to help the community.
The constituents in District 16 have a very high rate of illnesses, cancer, diabetes, and so forth and so on. So my biggest goal is to get down there and to start to build relationships where we can build legislation to be able to help the people in that district.
I’ve seen you talk about this topic before, environmental accountability. Do you know what it is that you would actually push for in Dover to fix that? Is it stronger penalties for the companies that are coming through? Is it mandatory notification laws? Is it something else that you would pursue?
Mandatory notification laws. I am working with two nonprofits as we speak right now, WILMAPCO with Bill Swiatek and I’m working with Jeffrey Richardson with the Delaware Community Benefits Agreement Coalition, and these are two organizations that are helping me organize to fight for stronger mandates from these companies.
Not to twist their arm or force their hand at anything, but have a working collaborative relationship where they can get their job done, but yet we can live healthy in the community.
You’ve talked about the food desert issue in the Route 9 corridor. Residents have to leave the district just to reach a real supermarket.
What is your actual plan there? Is creating maybe some type of incentive to create a grocery chain? Is it support for smaller, food markets to come through?
Well, again, create some type of incentives because I don’t wanna take away from the corner stores that are there.
But what I would like to see is accessibility to fresh fruits and vegetables because in our community, we do not have that access. We may get a banana or so.
But I would like to see local farmers bring their product in and be able to make that available to the communities, not just in Southbridge, but the whole Route 9 corridor.
You mentioned this earlier, I believe it was in 2019, you founded a nonprofit called Positive Thinking Positive Change. Can you tell us a little bit about what that organization does?
Yes. I’m so excited because at Positive Thinking Positive Change, we just believe in helping people change their thinking so that their behaviors change. And what I did, was I came up with about five different programs that would help one to change.
One would be to feed people, because you cannot get anybody to do anything if their bellies are screaming. So we realized that we had to feed people. And initially, we went out, to feed homeless people but when we got out there, we realized that homeless people weren’t the only people who were hungry, so we feed hungry people.
On your website you mentioned that you personally go out to parks around New Castle County serving fresh meals to people. Homelessness as a topic has become big and it’s become a city and a statewide issue. What policy efforts would you actually like to pursue on the homelessness and affordable housing front if you were elected?
With homelessness, we need more shelter beds for these people. So that would be my fight to get more shelter beds.
With affordable housing, we wanna look at that. I hear two numbers: affordable housing for those who have 60% of their income, and then there’s for those who have 30% of the income.
So whatever direction we go in, we need to make sure that we have housing that is affordable for whomever. And we know that the minimum wage is where it’s at, so how can we in the state of Delaware be a viable state with minimum wages so that people can not only pay their rent but pay their electric and buy food, childcare, and transportation?
So that’s my fight.
You’ve picked up an endorsement from the Delaware Working Families Party, a progressive organization that tends to focus on labor and housing issues. What do you see in this organization that lines up with your own thoughts on policy-making?
I see the need to connect with the real issues of the people, or the real issues with a group of people who may feel that they’re not relatable to.
So I like their mission. I am a part of that work, and it speaks right to who I am and where I would like to be and how I want to do my work.
Rep. Cooke’s background is quite different from yours. He’s a retired police officer and former police union leader. You’re coming at this from decades in healthcare and addiction recovery work instead, but you also have a son, Haneef Salaam who’s a local community advocate, and he himself has been very vocal about the need for police accountability. I’m curious, where do you see your approach to public safety differing from Rep. Cooke’s?
Public safety is a much-needed concern of mine at this point after all we have been through here in the city of Wilmington.
I may not have the police background, and I don’t believe I need that for public safety. Working with Haneef and a few others, I understand that there still is a need for police accountability and transparency. There’s a need for that.
And I just stand firm that we have to have law that says that just because you are a police officer, you can’t do anything you want to. Now I get it. They need to be equipped to handle whatever circumstances that arise in their workload.
However, they’re still human beings as well, and we don’t deserve to be treated as though we’re not human. And all I’m asking for is that there be accountability and not excessive force.
What do you think the real difference is between what you actually would do in Dover versus what Rep. Cooke has done over his two terms in office?
I wanna keep the focus on myself. The difference is that I’m bringing a whole different spin because I’m talking more for the people. I’m out there in the community. I hear what the people are saying, and they’re not talking about police officers protecting them.
They’re not doing that. They’re talking about how they are treated by police officers. I’m out in the community listening to people, and these people don’t even have a voice. They’re not even engaged with the political piece.
That’s my experience. So I just believe that my role is to engage the people, empower them to have voice, hear their voice, listen to their voice, and take their voice down to Dover.
What is one thing you want voters in the 16th District to understand about you before they head to the polls?
I want them to understand that I am one of integrity. I’m very upfront. I’m honest. There’s no behind-the-scene moves from me. What I say I’m gonna do is what I’m gonna do. I’m accountable for what I do.
I understand the needs because I’ve had needs one time or another and had to reach those particular services and people to get those needs met, and it didn’t make me any less of a human being.
We need to hold elected officials responsible. Once I win, I’m going to make sure that whatever I said I was gonna do, I’m gonna do; and then there will be a opportunity to remove me if I don’t do what I’m supposed to do.
Family-run Al-Qarara Seed Bank is striving to help Palestinians gain sovereignty over their food security
Salama Ayesh Muhanna still remembers the first seeds he planted on his family’s land in al-Qarara, Gaza. At just 17, Muhanna had proudly sprouted cucumbers.
“I was very happy because I saw the results,” Muhanna says. “We were farmers at heart.”
Senator releases letters from armed forces after reports of location data being used to track US troops in Middle East
US military officials say they have disabled advertising trackers on a range of phones and computers, according to letters released on Friday by the US senator Ron Wyden and statements given to Reuters.
The development follows reports that commercially available location data had been used to target American forces in the Middle East.
Lori Chavez-DeRemer resigned in April over the misconduct allegations. She oversaw a “toxic, intimidating and humiliating” work environment, a federal watchdog said.
The Pixel 11 Pro debuted this summer with some new camera enhancements, and I wanted to see how it shapes up against the iPhone 17 Pro ahead of Apple’s Sept. 9 event.
The Homeland Security and Further Additional Continuing Appropriations Act set aside $140 million to give controllers a 3.8% pay raise, but they have so far only received the 1% raise given to all government employees.
Christa Pike’s planned execution is emblematic of America’s broken death penalty system
On 30 September, the state of Tennessee plans to put Christa Pike to death. She would be the third person brought to the death chamber in the Volunteer state this year, one of which was stopped after it was botched.
She would join 17 others who have been put to death there since 1960. None of them were women.
Want to see how small the gene pool of Tory talent is? I give you Andrew Griffith as shadow chancellor. Also this week: Starmer’s Fomo, and telly wars
It’s the end of summer and Kemi Badenoch chose to mark the occasion with a reshuffle of her shadow cabinet. Her aim is apparently to get the Tories match fit in case Andy Burnham calls an early general election, but the vibes are much more rearranging the deckchairs on a sinking ship. After all, when the gene pool of talent is that small, there’s not much you can do. James Cleverly got the ball rolling by announcing he was planning to be the Conservative candidate for London mayor in two years’ time. He may have his work cut out. London is a liberal, multicultural city and unlikely to be won over by a party giving up on net zero and the European convention on human rights.
Labor Day guests can arrive before the rest of the food is ready. These 13 dip recipes cover hot, cold, cheesy, layered, seafood, and fresh options you can set out before the crowd settles in.The post 13 dip recipes to…
Nick Park began modelling the character as a feline, before finding it too difficult and changing him to a dog
The creator of Wallace and Gromit has revealed that the world’s most famous stop-motion animated dog was nearly a cat.
As Aardman Animations marks its 50th anniversary, Nick Park, who joined the studio in 1985, told the BBC he originally modelled Gromit as a feline companion for Wallace.
The replay can wait when the grill is doing this much work. These 15 BBQ recipes cover ribs, wings, burgers, steak, chicken, seafood, grilled vegetables, corn, and fresh sides for game day.The post 15 BBQ recipes so good nobody’s rewatching…
Why Should Delaware Care? Political campaign contributions are one of the most direct and legal ways that special interests can curry favor with elected officials. And this year’s contentious attorney general’s race has drawn large donations from an industry that is engaged in a fight over its government regulations.
A recent ad blitz paid for by a new political entity linked to the artificial intelligence industry is escalating tensions in the Democratic primary race for Delaware attorney general, with incumbent Kathleen Jennings and progressive challenger Dwayne Bensing clashing over her record of regulating the tech industry.
Last month, the entity called The Statehouse Fund launched a $500,000 campaign to support Jennings that included social media ads highlighting lawsuits her office has joined with other states in filing against the Trump administration.
The ads do not appear to mention AI, even as the Statehouse Fund describes its purpose as promoting regulations on artificial intelligence, and is funded by an organization that has taken in millions from the AI company Anthropic.
On Tuesday, Bensing sent an email to supporters claiming the Statehouse Fund’s campaign shows Jennings “cozying up” to the companies she should be regulating.
In response, Jennings’ campaign manager dismissed the attacks as “cornball rhetoric.” He also described the Statehouse Fund as “a pro-regulation group.”
Asked about the back and forth, the third candidate in the primary race, Patty Rickman, argued that the debate is distracting the campaigns from kitchen-table political issues, noting that Dover had recently been hit by a tornado.
In all, the spat is the latest in a long-running dispute between the candidates over the proper role of the attorney general, including the amount of regulatory scrutiny it should impose on the roughly 2 million companies that operate under Delaware’s corporate law.
The fight also highlights the AI industry’s entry into political campaigns across the country, amid a debate within states, in Congress, and between rival AI companies Anthropic and OpenAI over how best to regulate the fast-growing sector.
Taken together, it is a formula that is adding significant political dollars to a race in little Delaware that already was set to become the state’s most consequential this year.
The Delaware attorney general serves as the head of the state’s Department of Justice, whose mission includes enforcing criminal law – similar to a district attorney. The department also provides legal services to other branches of state government, and has the authority to bring civil actions against a wide range of entities, including companies and the federal government.
According to campaign finance records, the Statehouse Fund launched its half-million dollar campaign last month after receiving $525,000 from Public First Action, a national political organization that has supported a slate of moderate Democrats and Republicans, mostly running for seats in the U.S. Congress.
In corporate filings submitted to the Delaware Department of State, Public First Action describes its mission as educating the public about “artificial intelligence, emerging technologies, and other legislation, policies, and initiatives that support the public interest.”
The Washington Post reported that the group’s policy priorities include export restrictions on computer chip sales to China, and opposition to “a White House proposal to stop states from passing AI laws.”
The Post also highlighted how the group has run ads with conflicting ideological messages. One in North Carolina decried recent federal immigration enforcement actions, while another in Texas called on officials to “seal the border.”
Officials from Public First Action — including the organization’s president, former U.S. Rep. Brad Carson (D-Okla.) — did not respond to requests to comment. Messages sent to The Statehouse Fund also were not returned.
Delaware’s race for attorney general did not feature a Republican until last week when Army veteran Dave Graham announced he would run in the November general election.
Do AI companies want to be regulated?
While Anthropic has contributed millions to Public First Action, the company says those donations are not intended to be political.
A spokeswoman for the company said in an emailed statement that dollars given to the organization are to support education and policy advocacy, and “can not be used to influence the election of any candidate.”
But Bensing is skeptical.
Civil rights attorney Dwayne Bensing is running in the race to become Delaware’s attorney general. | PHOTO COURTESY OF DWAYNE BENSING
In an interview with Spotlight Delaware, he questioned why Anthropic would give money to an organization that funds political campaigns if the intention is purely educational.
“If that was their purpose, then they could have contributed to a nonprofit organization, a 501(c)3, that doesn’t engage in political activity,” he said.
Public First Action is one of a string of advocacy organizations supported by Anthropic or its competitor, OpenAI.
In July, Politico described the two chatbot makers as archrivals seeking to lock in their preferred government regulations, just as the “AI industry is increasingly looking to states” for clarity. The article further stated that Anthropic is pushing states to impose increasingly tougher rules on the industry, while OpenAI seeks a common set of regulations across the states.
When asked about the Statehouse Fund’s political spending, Jennings’ campaign manager Carter Gramiak said in an email that the group likely supports the attorney general because of her “public stance on needing guardrails around AI.”
Pressed for details, Gramiak pointed to OpenAI’s corporate transition last year from a nonprofit company to a for-profit. The restructure needed the approvals of the attorneys general of California, where the company is physically headquartered, and Delaware, where it is legally domiciled.
Both officials ultimately signed off.
Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings | PHOTO COURTESY OF CFPB
Gramiak said the company’s restructure to a for-profit, public benefit corporation meant its fiduciary duty guarantees safety. He noted that OpenAI continues to be overseen by a nonprofit parent company.
“That doesn’t happen without her,” he said, referring to Jennings.
Bensing disagrees. He argued the new for-profit structure provides less safety from potentially volatile AI agents than it had as a nonprofit.
Open AI CEO Sam Altman “did not do that to advance the public’s interest,” Bensing said.
Last year, Altman said his company restructured because it needed to attract more investment to scale up its costly operations in the fast-growing AI industry.
But ten of his own former employees opposed the move. In an open letter, the former OpenAI employees joined prominent technology and economic academics to argue that the company’s shift away from a nonprofit threatened to concentrate unprecedented power in the hands of a profit-generating entity.
The letter noted that Altman had been among leaders in the industry to warn of the risks of artificial general intelligence — a technology that AI companies are racing toward and would allow bots to replace humans in most work.
What is the primary election really about?
The Statehouse Fund’s spending adds to about $475,000 that Jennings’ campaign has either deployed since the beginning of the year, or has in its own bank account, according to a campaign finance report filed last month.
Bensing, a civil rights attorney, reported spending $45,000 since the beginning of the year with another $80,000 in the bank.
And Rickman, an author and small-business owner, said she spent about $8,600 on her campaign, with about $2,000 left in her bank account.
The differences in war chests highlight the positions that Jennings holds as the incumbent and the choice of the state’s Democratic Party establishment, including Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer.
In her previous two terms as attorney general, Jennings has followed a relatively traditional approach, veering from her predecessors only in the number of lawsuits filed against the federal government.
By contrast, Bensing has called for reforms to the attorney general’s office, asserting its criminal prosecutions have been carried out unevenly, and its regulatory scrutiny on corporations been too light.
Philadelphia’s prominent progressive district attorney, Larry Krasner, has endorsed Bensing’s run.
Rickman is running as the outsider candidate, placing domestic abuse and how state authorities prosecute it at the center of her campaign. She also proclaims that she is not a “career politician.”
As Jennings has turned her lawsuits against the federal government into a campaign issue, the Statehouse Fund appears to have followed.
A recent video the group purchased on Facebook characterizes the civil actions as a sporting match between Jennings and Trump — complete with the sound of a ringside bell.
But Bensing has argued that the cases amount to the attorney general joining a group project without doing much of the work.
Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings, civil rights attorney Dwayne Bensing, and business owner Patty Rickman engage in a debate in August. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY ELSA KEGELMAN
The two sparred over the issue during a Spotlight Delaware debate last month. Asked about the lawsuits, Jennings said they saved Delaware $1 billion because they challenged funding cuts that President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened.
“We have led on lawsuits over funding and we have joined lawsuits,” she said.
In response, Bensing said none of those federal cases have been held at U.S. District of Delaware, concluding they amounted to Jennings simply signing her name onto a filing.
“What we need is to get real about what we’re taking credit for and the actual impact and work that we’re doing within the state,” Bensing said.
Another PAC on the verge of entering AG’s race
Besides the Statehouse Fund, another political organization has money waiting in the sideline, ready to be deployed in support of Jennings. And its backers are local to Delaware.
Created last fall, the Justice For All PAC initially received $246,000 from Wilmington attorney Mike Hougton — an individual who had been quietly influential in state government for years before publicly feuded with Gov. Matt Meyer in recent months.
Michael Houghton was dismissed from Delaware’s economic forecasting panel following critical comments of the Meyer administration. | PHOTO COURTESY OF DRBA
Since Houghton’s contribution, other prominent names in Delaware have given smaller amounts to the PAC, including former-State Sen. Colin Bonini, and John Hynansky, a prominent Delaware businessman and close friend of former President Joe Biden.
While the group’s campaign finance report filed in August shows $35,000 in expenditures, Houghton told Spotlight Delaware that it is now spending about $150,000 to support Jennings.
He said he has known the attorney general for over 25 years and worked with her on several public policy issues.
“We are friends, I have supported her past campaigns and have been pleased to do so this year,” he said.
Houghton also has worked as an attorney for OpenAI in the past. He described his role as limited legal work and said he was not involved in the company’s negotiations with Jennings last year over its restructuring.
He also said that neither OpenAI, nor any of its related entities, have contributed to his Justice for All PAC.
Asked why Anthropic might support Jennings’ campaign, Houghton said the company likely sees regulation as inevitable.
And while it might prefer federal oversight, it likely “has concluded that it is unable to work quickly with the federal government,” he said.
Jeering and heckling are increasingly commonplace, even at grand slams, as spectators try to influence matches
Midway through the first week of the US Open a couple of years ago, Jiri Lehecka’s attempts to find his form were disrupted by incessant taunting from a spectator close by. “There was a guy who sat just behind my bench on a smaller court, court four, and he was talking to me basically for the first three sets, like non-stop,” Lehecka says. “He was talking to me like: ‘You can’t do it. You are tired. He’s better than you are.’”
Lehecka maintained his composure and closed out the match, but even as he focused on navigating the intense stress of competition, he believed he understood this spectator’s motivations. The spectator, he thinks, was not there just to cheer for his favourite player: he was a bettor who had put money on Lehecka to lose. He had entered court four solely to influence the outcome of the match.
In the California City facility, ‘contact visits’ are strictly forbidden – but detained residents aren’t staying quiet. Are officials listening?
Teresa Reyes drove 300 miles to be with her son on his 32nd birthday in May, but she couldn’t give him a gift, share a meal with him or give him a hug. She couldn’t even touch him.
Her son, Guillermo, a tattoo artist from San Jose, is locked up in the California City immigration detention center, California’s largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility, and the only way he can see his mother is behind a thick pane of glass.
A genetically modified pig kidney kept a 66-year-old man off dialysis for a record nine months, marking the longest survival yet for a pig kidney transplanted into a living person and the first time such an organ successfully served as a bridge to a later human transplant. The Guardian reports: Tim Andrews was seriously ill with end-stage kidney disease caused by type 2 diabetes and had only a 9% chance of receiving a human kidney within five years, against a more than 40% risk of dying or being removed from the waiting list. Kidney transplantation provides the best survival and quality of life for patients with end-stage kidney disease, but global demand for human organs far exceeds supply.
Surgeons in the US successfully transplanted a kidney from Wilma, a Yucatan miniature pig, into Andrews, after genetically engineering it to be compatible with his immune system. The kidney kept Andrews free of dialysis for a record nine months, the longest period ever recorded, before it began failing and he received one from a dead human donor. It was also the first time a pig's kidney had been used as a temporary "bridge" to a human transplant. The breakthrough has been detailed in the journal Lancet.
Good morning. The US vice-president, JD Vance, has responded to claims that an American strike was responsible for killing four people, including a child, at a wedding celebration in southern Iran by saying that “sometimes things happen”. The deaths were reported by the Iranian Red Crescent, which operates independently of Tehran and is treated by most international monitors as a credible source on casualty figures.
In a further comment, described by the congressman Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California, as “gaslighting”, the vice-president said the conflict between the US and Iran, which has stretched into a seventh month and caused the deaths of 18 US service members, was not presently “a war”. Iranian authorities have put the overall death toll from US and Israeli strikes in the thousands, figures outside observers, including US-based monitoring groups, have broadly corroborated.
What did Vance say? At a White House press briefing he said: “I will say that the Iranian state media has not been a very good scribe about what’s happened in the conflict thus far, so I’m extremely skeptical of this. What I can say with 100% confidence is that, unlike the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the US never targets civilians in combat. We never will do that. We never have done that, and unfortunately, obviously, sometimes things happen”. Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to blow up Iran’s civilian infrastructure.
What is happening with US military leadership? Trump on Thursday named Adam Telle as the acting army secretary after the departure of Daniel Driscoll amid widespread reports of tensions with the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth. Telle is currently the assistant secretary of the army for civil works.
What has the House decided about university boycotts of Israel? The House has passed a Republican-backed bill that would penalize universities that participate in boycotts of Israel. “This legislation is about a simple principle: our colleges and universities should not discriminate against Israel,” said Tim Walberg, the Republican chair of the House education committee. Thirty three Democrats broke with the rest of their party to vote in favor. It now goes to the Senate for consideration.
Revelations are further blow to Nigel Farage before conference speech, with Labour reporting party to police
Reform UK has suspended two senior officials after they were filmed in an undercover investigation appearing to plot to get around electoral laws on foreign donations.
In a blow to Nigel Farage hours before his conference speech, the party said it had launched an investigation into the actions of James Orr, the party’s head of policy, and Dan Jukes, a senior aide to Farage, after the broadcast by Channel 4 News.
Ten research teams were honored at a satirical science awards ceremony that was hosted outside the U.S. for the first time due to travel concerns. A study of cockroach milk was among the winners.
Mourning turns to anger as residents of Kuhestak say Baloch communities are being placed in path of conflict
People in Kuhestak, a predominantly Baloch city in Iran’s southern Hormozgan province, are mourning after a strike on a wedding killed at least four people, including a child, and injured more than 60, according to local authorities.
The blast hit at around 9.30pm on 1 September, turning a night of celebration into one of devastation for the small coastal community, which is on the strait of Hormuz.
Kareem’s Daily Quote: When cruelty unfolds in front of us, will we accept the comfort of inaction?
The Needless Death of a Haitian Immigrant: Pierre Damas Bel’s death reveals the unbearable human cost of treating vulnerable immigrants as political props.
Putin Strikes Ukraine and Stands with Iran: Putin’s latest pledges make Trump’s confident promises look less like diplomacy than wishful thinking.
Fighting for the Soul of America: An unsettling question about what duty requires when military law collides with a constitutional crisis.
Odds Against Tomorrow, directed by Robert Wise: Harry Belafonte and Robert Ryan turn a familiar heist setup into a tense, incisive drama about race and distrust.
The Blind Boys of Alabama, “Amazing Grace”: By setting the hymn to the tune of “The House of the Rising Sun,” these veterans make familiar words sound newly complicated and deeply lived.
(Note to my listeners: There’ll be no audio today due to technical difficulties.)
Kareem’s Quote of the Day
“The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.”
Albert Einstein (1879-1955), theoretical physicist
(Photo by Michelly Rall/Getty Images)
On March 8, 1964, I was a junior at Power Memorial Academy in New York City when we beat Archbishop Molloy High School 65‐41 to win the New York Catholic High Schools Athletic Association basketball championship. We finished the season 30-0 and were headline news all over the city. Later that week, the headlines took a far darker turn. At 2:30 in the morning on March 13, a young woman named Kitty Genovese was attacked and murdered on a Queens street. Soon thereafter, it was reported by The New York Times that 37 witnesses either saw or heard the attack, but none of them had tried to help her or even called the police. As one witness put it, “I didn’t want to get involved.”
I remember learning about the murder and the inaction of the victim’s neighbors and thinking that, in the same situation, I would have done something to help. Certainly my father, who was a police officer, would have gone to her rescue, had he heard her screams. People all across the city, all across the country, thought the same thing: they wouldn’t have stood by and done nothing while a young woman was being brutally murdered. But psychologists weren’t so sure. Over the decades that followed, they studied what became known as “Genovese syndrome,” or the “bystander effect,” and discovered that if other people are present when something terrible occurs, individuals are less likely to take action. Studies showed that a “diffusion of responsibility” leads people to assume someone else will take responsibility and act.
It’s bad enough when something like that happens to an individual, but even worse when it occurs across an entire society. Is that what happened in Nazi Germany? Was there a point in time when the German people could have stood up to Hitler’s power grab, to the violence of the Brownshirts, to the government taking away the rights of the Jews, and prevented World War II and the Holocaust before it was too late? Could the people of South Africa have stopped apartheid? In our own country, could the early citizens have stood up for Native Americans or enslaved people and prevented some or even all of the tragedies that followed?
Surely that is what Einstein was getting at when he weighed the relative danger of genuinely evil people against those who simply let them commit their crimes against humanity. Surely Einstein, who had fled Nazi Germany in 1933 and watched ensuing events in horror from the United States, knew evil when he saw it. The quote above comes from a letter he sent to a mutual friend about the cellist Pablo Casals, who likewise chose exile from his native Spain rather than cooperation with the fascist government of Francisco Franco. “What I particularly admire in him,” Einstein wrote, “is the firm stand he has taken, not only against the oppressors of his countrymen, but also against those opportunists who are always ready to compromise with the Devil.”
That’s a compromise we all have to guard against. On a lighter note, there is a speech in the brilliant 1987 comedy Broadcast News in which the reporter played by Albert Brooks tries to convince the beautiful producer he loves not to fall for the handsome anchorman they both consider a fool:
“I know you care about him. I’ve never seen you like this about anyone, so please don’t get me wrong when I tell you that Tom, while being a very nice guy, is the Devil… What do you think the Devil is going to look like if he’s around? Come on! Nobody is going to be taken in by a guy with a long, red, pointy tail! He will be attractive! He’ll be nice and helpful! He’ll get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation!”
A little known fact, and I promise this is true, is that Albert Brooks wasn’t always Albert Brooks: he was born Albert Einstein. He changed his name because he didn’t want to be confused with the other guy.
I’ll let you figure out how that other guy’s words might apply to the world around us today or even in your own life as a citizen of that world. But I’ll leave you with this comment from Judge Bernard Dubin, who tried the murder case against Kitty Genovese’s killer, and had to confront not only that evil but the refusal of her neighbors to get involved: “How many lives could have been saved if people did not ignore cries for help from others?”
New York, New York — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced a one-year moratorium on generative artificial intelligence in public school classrooms through eighth grade, arguing that younger students need more direct interaction with teachers and classmates.
The policy applies from early-childhood programs through middle school and takes effect as students return for the 2026-27 academic year. AI chatbots will be prohibited across all grade levels.
High school students will face different rules. They will take two AI-focused critical thinking classes during the school year, while a limited number of classrooms — no more than five per school — may participate in supervised AI pilot programs. Students in those pilots will be allowed to use approved platforms for up to 45 minutes per week.
Mamdani said students should “wrestle with tough problems on their own” and argued that technology companies have overstated the necessity of AI in early education.
The move comes as schools nationwide struggle to establish rules for rapidly expanding AI use. An IBM study released Wednesday found that 45% of elementary teachers and 76% of middle school teachers reported using AI in classrooms at least weekly. Yet only 20% of K-12 educators said they had received extensive AI literacy training.
Mamdani said high school instruction recognizes that students will enter a world increasingly shaped by AI, while insisting the technology should not replace student-teacher relationships.
The CEO is the throughline in a history of billion-dollar blunders that have caused real harm, culminating in last week’s settlement
Last week, Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, agreed to a settlement of up to $18bn after dozens of US states accused it of harming children with addictive products. The settlement’s regulatory implications for social media will affect every user, far beyond teens.
But if Meta is truly interested in prioritizing the safety of users, the board should request the resignation of Mark Zuckerberg and restructure to put safety above profit.
Following a confusing rollout of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s loan changes, some students couldn’t pay bills over summer, stoking fears about fall semester disbursements.
Private equity firms and the companies they own employ over 13 million, from startups to rural hospitals and large retailers, but experts’ concerns of collapse are growing
Retail stalwarts Saks and Eddie Bauer filed for bankruptcy. Kmart and JoAnn Fabrics are gone for good, a trail of layoffs and disappointed customers in their wake. Hospital giant Steward Health Care collapsed, costing thousands of jobs and leaving several communities without a local hospital.
These once-trusted US companies have one thing in common: they were owned by private equity investors, who load companies with debt when they buy them and squeeze out profits as they restructure.
Why Should Delaware Care? Delaware’s hospitals are powerful and often consolidated entities. For decades, each of the state’s three main hospital systems have remained within their bounds by county line. But as more retirees flock to the state, those boundaries are being disregarded.
All three of Delaware’s southern hospital systems are forming a unified coalition to block two proposed ChristianaCare campuses in Georgetown and Camden, as market share becomes more valuable to healthcare providers.
Bayhealth in Dover, TidalHealth in Seaford and Beebe Healthcare in Lewes are all challenging the two downstate campuses, as the systems look to protect what has historically been their territory. Long the dominant player in northern Delaware, ChristianaCare has increasingly invested below the C&D Canal in recent years.
Spotlight Delaware reported in August that Bayhealth, Kent County’s primary health system, submitted a letter to regulators asking them to halt two proposed ChristianaCare campuses in Georgetown and Camden.
Those regulators, who sit on the Delaware Health Resources Board, were set to discuss that letter in their meeting on Aug. 25, but tabled the discussion to allow for some additional internal review.
TidalHealth and Bayhealth submitted letters prior to the meeting. Beebe submitted its letter on Thursday.
In its letter, Bayhealth argued the proposals could run afoul of a new law signed this summer meant to curb the involvement of for-profit enterprise in nonprofit healthcare. TidalHealth made similar arguments and said that no legal framework exists for ChristianaCare’s downstate ambitions.
In comments submitted to Spotlight Delaware following the report that Bayhealth opposed the campuses, ChristianaCare said it is “committed to serving patients closer to home and making high-quality care more accessible in the communities where they live.”
“As this matter is currently under review by a state regulatory agency, we decline to comment on the substance of the proceedings,” a spokesperson for the hospital said at the time. “ChristianaCare will provide all necessary information to the Board and looks forward to participating in the regulatory process.”
Asked about the additional letters, ChristianaCare said it did not have any additional comments.
Delaware’s southern hospital systems are taking aim at a lack of regulatory guidance on how ChristianaCare is defining its Camden and Georgetown proposals.
When ChristianaCare said it aims to build two “microhospitals” in Kent and Sussex, a term the other hospitals believe makes them invalid for consideration.
A spokesperson for ChristianaCare said microhospitals are “an emerging model of care delivery” meant to deliver care at the “right level” and in the “right place.”
TidalHealth raised similar concerns around the ChristianaCare-Emerus partnership proposed to build the new micro-hospitals. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY JACOB OWENS
The CEO of TidalHealth, which operates campuses in Maryland and Delaware, submitted his letter to the board late last month and said the proposals “may not meet the threshold” to be considered a hospital.
The letter argued that because the hospital is not focused on providing mostly inpatient services, it can’t be considered a hospital. And if it was considered a hospital, there are no existing laws that say how a “microhospital” should be regulated.
“On either branch, the board cannot lawfully authorize and the Department of Health and Social Services cannot license the facility as proposed, and the application is premature,” Leonard wrote.
Bayhealth also prodded at ChristianaCare’s business plan for the downstate facilities, questioning whether its proposal complied with Senate Bill 313 – a law signed this summer that prevents the sale of Delaware’s nonprofit health systems to private equity firms.
Bayhealth Chief Operating Officer Kyle Benoit, who wrote the system’s letter, noted that ChristianaCare’s plans for the downstate facilities involved a partnership with Emerus Holdings, a for-profit healthcare real estate developer.
The developer has already partnered with ChristianaCare on two sites in the Philadelphia suburbs, with a similar micro-hospital approach in Chester and Delaware counties. Gov. Matt Meyer signed SB 313 into law earlier this summer, establishing a two-year moratorium on the purchase and or sale of nonprofit hospital systems to private equity firms.
“If the governing agreements provide for a for-profit participant with rights that constitute prohibited ownership, control or operational authority, the applications are not legally eligible for approval,” Benoit wrote.
As part of its request to the board, Bayhealth requested ChristianaCare disclose its corporate and structure agreements with Emerus to ensure compliance with SB 313.
Beebe President and CEO Dr. David Tam similarly challenged the proposal on the grounds that it failed to meet the requirements of SBl 313. In his letter, Tam said because of ChristianaCare’s business arrangement with the for-profit developer, the board should examine that agreement with “careful scrutiny.”
Additionally, Beebe requested the board delay its review until its legal concerns are addressed.
“At a minimum, the board lacks a sufficient record to conclude that the proposed hospital would be built, owned, controlled and operated by a qualifying nonprofit entity as required by Delaware law,” the letter said.
ChristianaCare plans to build this $65 million micro hospital campus in Georgetown, but it will be up to regulators as to whether to allow it. | PHOTO COURTESY OF CHRISTIANACARE
What is ChristianaCare hoping to build?
For the better part of two years, ChristianaCare has spent millions on an expansion blitz. It’s proposed and opened sites in Pennsylvania, further entrenched itself in New Castle County, and has begun to reach farther south.
In February, ChristianaCare announced that its first major downstate campus would be a $65 million healthcare facility in Georgetown.
In May, the hospital also announced it would open a $58.1 million health campus in Kent County, continuing its push into contested downstate markets.
At the time, Bayhealth offered a diplomatic opposition to the facility, saying in a statement it “remains focused” on providing care to its patients. But the hospital also said care should not be “fragmented.”
It said it would “actively participate” by sharing data and ways to address cost, access and quality of care in the area.
“We recognize that patients across Delaware are looking for faster access to care,” a spokesperson for the hospital said in an email.
The 38,000‑square‑foot ChristianaCare Kent County campus would open in Camden about a mile from the Walmart on U.S. Route 13. The state healthcare giant said in a statement the new campus would offer emergency and inpatient beds, as well as primary care and outpatient services.
It hopes to open the facility by late 2028 or early 2029.
ChristianaCare also said the new facility would bring 83 new jobs. As it has done with other recently announced ventures, ChristianaCare positioned its expansion as a means of supporting Delaware’s growing and aging population.
The healthcare system also expects its new Georgetown facility to open by 2028. It is partnering with Emerus Holdings to build the facility — which would offer emergency beds, behavioral, specialty and primary care — at 20769 DuPont Blvd., just south of the Bridgeville Road intersection.
Turf war brews
For decades, Delaware’s three major health care systems largely fit into geographic monopolies: ChristianaCare serving New Castle County, Bayhealth serving Kent County and Beebe Healthcare in Sussex County.
But over the last five years, a health care arms race heated up between Bayhealth, Beebe and now TidalHealth, coming up from Salisbury, Md. They have all built or broken ground on major projects in locations, such as Lewes, Milton or Millsboro in recent years.
It follows a post-COVID population boom in Sussex County. The region is now designated as a “Medically Underserved Area” by the federal government, with projections showing that the population will increase from 237,000 in 2022 to over 361,000 by 2050. The county is also rapidly graying, as the population growth is largely driven by retirees who will demand more health care needs.
The arrival of ChristianaCare, which to date only had primary care offices in Milford and Rehoboth Beach, will bring needed resources, but also new competition to the crowded market.
But the downstate hospitals are hoping to convince the Delaware Health Resources Board that ChristianaCare’s plans would flood the market and offer redundant services.
In 2019, the board was central in a debate over whether to allow Beebe to build a freestanding emergency room in Georgetown. It ultimately denied that project, saying it was too close to Bayhealth’s Milford campus and Nanticoke Hospital in Seaford.
The board was also expected to be critical of plans by Bayhealth to build its own freestanding emergency room in Milton, which led the Dover-based health system to pull its plans.
Both of those projects predated the population surge that has particularly struck Sussex County after the COVID housing market boom though.
A quarter century after the September 11 attacks emboldened then-President George W. Bush to launch the “war on terror,” many Americans might like to think they’re wiser than the politicians and pundits who unleashed a flood of anti-Muslim hatred and eroded civil liberties through warrantless wiretaps and racist deportation campaigns.
But some of the most notorious Bush-era advents — like the Department of Homeland Security and the prison colony at Guantánamo Bay — don’t appear to be going anywhere. Nor does the phenomenon of Islamophobia, which is playing a major role in the current political cycle. Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed — who, if elected, would be the first Muslim U.S. senator — has been called a terrorist, a radical Islamist, and a threat to national security, as pro-corporate and pro-Israel super PACs spend millions on ads that paint him as a terrorist sympathizer. In New York City, meanwhile, local media has suggested that the city’s first Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, should not attend the commemoration of the World Trade Center attacks, as if to do so would be an insult to the victims and their families.
“Islamophobia actually becomes more rampant during election season — not necessarily after a terrorist attack, but actually during election season in the U.S.,” journalist Rozina Ali tells The Intercept Briefing. “What’s happened over the last three decades is that Islamophobia has become a feature of American politics. … When you can’t actually discuss the policies, when we’re not willing to engage in facts, it’s really easy to throw racist rhetoric at people.”
“The fight that we’re seeing now is whether we are willing to accept all forms of religion in this country. And as much as I want to say this is just more of what we’ve seen in the past, I think what does frighten me is how quickly we are moving to a place where some governor or some local official might try to outlaw Islam altogether. And mind you, this is even a policy shift from 10 years ago when Trump called for a Muslim ban,” says Ali. “What has been happening recently is that the rhetoric … has been shifting toward, ‘Islam is not a religion, it’s a political ideology.’ This is not a new talking point, but it is becoming institutionalized. There are efforts to make it into law, which is a frightening place to be.”
This week on the podcast, host Akela Lacy speaks to Ali about how anti-Muslim rhetoric and policies are on the rise and have endured, or even worsened, in the post-9/11 world, as well as her new book, “Seasons of Fury: Four Families and the Rise of Islamophobia in America.” Ali shares the first case in which the NSA admitted to spying on a U.S. citizen, Arab American attorney Abdeen Jabara, as well as the story of imam Yassin Aref, a victim of a controversial sting operation who served 15 years in federal prison due to the ambiguous “material support” for terrorism law first passed in the ’90s. It was the same charge used to convict anti-ICE protesters at Prairieland Detention Center to decades in prison this year.
“This was something lot of civil rights lawyers and activists were warning about even back then, because they recognized that this law and this war on terror can be used to attack dissidents and eventually will be used to attack a lot more people than the Muslim community. And that is what we’re seeing now,” says Ali.
“Because we’ve given so much power to the executive branch, because we’ve given so much power to the government over the last 25 years, the government gets to decide who they consider enemies, who they consider terrorists, and what they consider support for terrorism,” says Ali. “The Trump administration can say, ‘I now consider leftists terrorists,’ and unfortunately, there are laws in the books that allow him to do that.”
For more, listen to the full conversation of The Intercept Briefing on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you listen.
Transcript
Akela Lacy: Welcome to The Intercept Briefing, I’m Akela Lacy, senior politics reporter at The Intercept.
Jessica Washington: And, I’m Jessica Washington, politics reporter at The Intercept.
AL: Jessie, it’s Labor Day weekend. Unless you’re a summer-truther like me, this marks the end of summer for most people. And accordingly, things are taking a hard pivot toward November.
I’m going to run through a few things that caught my eye in the last few days: ICE is planning to pay $5 million to create a national voter database, per reporting from Wired. Nothing to see there, I’m sure.
The Trump administration is also deploying hundreds of Department of Homeland Security agents to conduct a witch hunt for unspecified voter fraud, despite lacking evidence that that’s a real issue.
In Congress, Democrats are considering whether to punish two lawmakers who sided with Republicans this week to advance a key procedural vote. And they’re weighing new rules for the caucus that worry progressives and several other caucuses across the ideological spectrum. But progressives in particular are worried that these new rules, if passed, could ice out the new class of socialists who are on track to take office in January. Separately, but perhaps most importantly, the United Nations said we’ve basically lost any chance to stop the worst of global warming.
JW: OK, I’m really going to avoid making a heat joke. But I will say that August in Washington is officially over and that means not only is the weather getting a little bit cooler, although, I guess, we’ll see. It also means there is a lot more news to cover. Although, I would say it is hard to argue we’ve gotten much rest this last month.
In Massachusetts on Tuesday night, Democratic Sen. Ed Markey easily defeated his challenger, Democratic congressman Seth Moulton. Moulton had run on his relative youth, but was hamstrung by people’s perception that he was both inauthentic and far too conservative for the state. After the 2024 presidential election, Moulton had made this very public appeal to the right, arguing that protecting transgender children had harmed Democrats electorally and that it made them seem out of touch. But as it turned out, from Tuesday night, Moulton ended up being the one who seemed out of touch with his voters in Massachusetts.
In some more somber news, this week marks one year since the Trump administration began carrying out strikes on civilians in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean. The Intercept’s Nick Turse reported that the United States has killed 227 civilians in the more than 65 attacks that have been carried out in the name of defeating so-called narco terrorists. There’s this one passage from Nick’s piece on the anniversary that really sticks with me.
“It’s been a year of murders,” said a defense official who was horrified by the first strike and has remained so as the U.S. has targeted scores of so-called “drug boats” in the year since. “The Trump administration has normalized murder.” The official added: “It’s absolutely criminal.”
And then of course, next week marks the 25th anniversary of September 11, so there’s a lot to reflect on when it comes to the legacy of that attack and how it fundamentally reshaped our society.
AL: Yes, and while so much has changed in the last 25 years since 9/11, it also feels like a lot has stayed the same — or, in many cases, gotten worse.
One of the major effects of 9/11 we’re reminded frequently of is the sprawling surveillance apparatus spawned by those attacks as we see its power put to use on almost a daily basis against immigrants, political dissidents, U.S. citizens, and particularly Muslim and Arab communities. We probably know only a small percentage of the destruction the post-9/11 wave of Islamophobia wrought not just in wars around the world, but here at home.
Today, Islamophobia is seeing its own grotesque renaissance, particularly in this year’s midterms. We’re going to get into all of this with our guest today, journalist Rozina Ali. But first, I wonder if you could tell us the latest here, Jessie.
JW: We got a really great example of what you’re talking about this week from CBS News, perhaps unsurprisingly.
AL: The shade. [Laughter]
JW: On Monday, the outlet, now led by conservative commentator Bari Weiss, published a story on Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed saying “Deleted tweets on Sept. 11 attacks invite scrutiny of past remarks.”
Now, the tweets were very innocuous; as many people pointed out, this is a non-story. In two of them, he asked Americans to take Covid-19 as seriously as the terror attacks. But it’s a familiar playbook from the right and their media apparatus: Weaponize 9/11 to stoke Islamophobic fear about a Muslim candidate, rinse, repeat.
You discuss the legacy of 9/11 and how Islamophobia has been weaponized with journalist Rozina Ali. Let’s hear that conversation now.
AL: Yes, joining me now is Rozina Ali, a journalist and contributing writer at New York Times Magazine, a fellow at Type Media Center and at New America, and previously a senior editor at the Cairo Review of Global Affairs. Ali writes primarily about the war on terror, Islamophobia, the Middle East, and South Asia. She has a new book out called, “Seasons of Fury: Four Families and the Rise of Islamophobia in America.”
Rozina, welcome to The Intercept Briefing.
Rozina Ali: Thank you so much for having me. It’s really nice to be here.
AL: Rozina, unfortunately, we are going to start with midterms. We’re approaching the 25-year anniversary of 9/11. You’ve covered the subsequent war on terror and the rise in Islamophobia. A quarter of a century later, Islamophobia is still not just alive and well, but playing a major role in our current political cycle. Why do you think that is?
RA: Over the last 25 years, Islamophobia actually becomes more rampant during election season — not necessarily after a terrorist attack, but actually during election season in the U.S.
What we’re seeing now isn’t unusual. Actually, what’s happened over the last three decades is that Islamophobia has become a feature of American politics.
That said, what we’re seeing now is so rampant, and the anti-Muslim vitriol is just so stark and prevalent, that it is shocking to people who’ve been following this for three decades, like myself.
AL: It feels, as you said, in some ways, like the Islamophobia of 2026 is even more explicit, in some cases, than it was in the post-9/11 world.
We’re seeing a rise in Islamophobic attacks in communities around the country. Three people were killed in an attack on a mosque in San Diego in May. And as you noted, all of this has taken a particularly ugly turn in midterms — specifically the Michigan Senate race, where Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed has been called a “terrorist,” a “radical” Islamist, and a threat to national security.
But we also saw a lot of similar rhetoric aimed at Zohran Mamdani in the New York City mayoral race last year. At The Intercept, this cycle, we reported on the record-breaking spending from pro-corporate and pro-Israel super PACs against El-Sayed amounting to about $60 million, much of which paid for ads that painted him as a terrorist sympathizer.
How are you seeing Islamophobia take shape this cycle, and how are people responding?
RA: What’s being thrown at Abdul El-Sayed is actually, again, not unusual. It’s the same playbook that we’ve been seeing. But what is interesting is the way in which the Islamophobic rhetoric somewhat differs between Zohran Mamdani and Abdul El-Sayed.
What’s interesting with Zohran is that a lot of the vitriol against him was that he was not American. That he was not born in the U.S., and there was a lot of anti-immigration rhetoric thrown at him too. There were calls to denaturalize him, suggesting that he was too foreign in many ways to be mayor of New York City.
You can’t quite do that with Abdul El-Sayed. He was born in Michigan. He was raised there; he went to school there. You can’t actually call for his denaturalization. But what Islamophobes have been doing and what the right-wing has been doing has been suggesting that he has alliances with foreign groups.
Specifically, that his family members have alliances with the Muslim Brotherhood or affiliations with them. The problem is that this has been a strategy that has been used over the past 25 years — suggestions that there are sleeper cells in the U.S., or that there are people who have affiliations with scary groups abroad.
Oftentimes, what the media did was just blare those headlines without really delving deeper into what does it mean to have such an affiliation, if it is true.
I think it’s really interesting that you brought up the San Diego mosque shooting that happened earlier this year, because one of the things that happened soon after was the New York Post did — and I know the New York Post has its flaws, and we should not take it seriously! But their headline when covering this tragic incident was saying, actually, the mosque had affiliations with some of the 9/11 hijackers. They chose to focus on that — as if the anti-Muslim attack was justified in some ways.
Earlier when you asked why is Islamophobia so rampant now, one reason is because for 25 years, anti-Muslim sentiment and rhetoric has been justified over and over again, both by policymakers and media and the public in general.
The New York Post “ chose to focus on that — as if the anti-Muslim attack was justified in some ways.”
AL: Your book touches on this, how the era that we’re living in right now with the attacks — particularly on pro-Palestine students, or surveillance of pro-Palestine activity in response to the genocide in Gaza — echoes the rise of the post-1967 surveillance state targeting Arab communities in the U.S.
A lot of this is encapsulated in the current obsession with leftist Twitch streamer Hasan Piker. We just can’t seem to get away from him being a prominent feature in the news cycle. But I’m going to ask you about this anyway, because I think it’s relevant to the discussion.
In response to a segment on CNN’s State of the Union with Dana Bash that spent six minutes on El-Sayed and Piker, Piker posted on X:
it sounds unbelievably stupid but i have become this media cycle’s “trans athletes” or “migrant caravan.” wild how much supposedly liberal outlets let fox news play the role of news desk editor.
odd how none of these outlets will have me on to interrogate my beliefs directly.
Over recent months, Piker, who has endorsed and campaigned with progressive candidates, has become a prime target of Democrats and Republicans and mainstream news.
Here, he’s pointing out this feature, as you’re describing it, Rozina — a feature, not a bug of our politics. Where rather than focusing on the issues actually impacting people’s lives, there’s this effort to distract attention and channel anger toward a minority group, stoke unfounded fears, and spread lies and disinformation.
I want to talk more about how you think about this dynamic and particularly why something that is such an obvious distraction can be so effective?
RA: This is what American media does, right? I will say I am part of the American media. We both are.
AL: We all are, yeah.
RA: We all are. There are journalists who are doing incredible work and trying to cut through the noise and trying to actually report on what’s happening.
But what I do find is that a lot of media coverage that revolves around conversations or opinions or talking points becomes so much about one thing.
“ A lot of the reason [Hasan Piker is] getting such vitriol is because of what he says regarding Palestine and Israel.”
This obsession with Hasan Piker actually reflects something that has been a long-standing issue, which is a lot of the reason he’s getting such vitriol is because of what he says regarding Palestine and Israel. Again, not something new.
This has been a problem for decades that the space to have a nuanced conversation about U.S. policy toward Israel and Palestine has contracted over many, many years. Certainly after the 1970s, definitely after the Oslo Accords in the 1990s.
But we really saw that much more after 9/11 — that any space to criticize U.S. foreign policy abroad, whether it be in Israel–Palestine, or Iraq, or Afghanistan, or even critique the war on terror in general, that space was just contracted, and certainly for Muslims and certainly for Arabs. I think what we’re seeing now is basically a continuation of that.
I do wonder what would happen — if we would be obsessed with Hasan Piker and what he says — if there were more opportunities to actually discuss some of the things that he was bringing up, rather than shut it down.
“The space to have a nuanced conversation about U.S. policy towards Israel and Palestine has contracted over many years.”
AL: The space for this conversation on Israel and Palestine is getting smaller at the same time that it should theoretically be getting wider, right?
Because American sentiment is historically on the side of Palestinians for the first time in recent history. The number of elected officials campaigning on this issue and who have entered Congress over the last six or seven years is at a record high. And yet you see the space not just contracting, but being astroturfed at levels that we’ve never seen when it comes to political spending.
And I think that conversation is often really lost because we are so apt to talk about the historic achievements of this movement in the zeitgeist or public opinion, if you want to call it [that]. But the forces that are working to undermine that movement are stronger than ever at this point.
RA: Absolutely. It is fascinating to me the ways in which the pro-Palestine movement has gained steam over the last decade. Obviously, what happened after October 7 has really changed the momentum and increased the momentum, but there were a lot of attempts to actually shift the conversation from even a decade ago or a decade and a half ago.
A lot of these groups were working on the ground for much longer. It’s just become such a huge part of the public conversation, one, because of what Israel has been doing in Gaza; two, because of the U.S.’s — both Biden and Trump administration’s — full-hearted support for that; and three, because there have been a lot more politicians speaking out about it. There’s actually challenges to this.
One thing to remember is that, yes, basically the pro-Israel lobby has had a lot of money for a long time, but they’ve been throwing money at local elections for the past decade while this movement has been ramping up.
What is interesting to me now compared to 10 years ago, or even, let’s say, after 9/11, is that there is such a discrepancy between what policymakers want or what these interest groups want versus public opinion on the ground, to your point.
“There is such a discrepancy between what policymakers want or what these interest groups want vs. public opinion on the ground.”
That discrepancy is actually something that we need to be paying more attention to. I wish that [the] media would be talking about that a lot more, because if we continue the same policies we have been that the U.S. population does not agree with, we are going to continue to basically worsen distrust in the government, which has been a problem for the last three decades.
There has been waning trust in the U.S. government by the American public, and we have seen how that can be catastrophic. We have seen what happens when people stop losing faith in institutions and in their government. Obviously, this is one policy matter among many, but I do think that gap is something worth paying attention to.
Speaking of the lack of nuanced discussion about Palestine and Israel among U.S. policymakers, a few years ago, I did a profile of Rashida Tlaib for the New York Times Magazine, and I was surprised to learn that the House has about over 300 different caucuses. There is not one that is dedicated to Palestine or Palestinian rights.
That just illustrates how little we are willing to actually talk about this as a policy matter. It’s not shocking to me that the vitriol thrown at Abdul El-Sayed, or even Zohran Mamdani last year, had a lot to do with Islamophobia.
When you can’t actually discuss the policies, when we’re not willing to engage in facts, it’s really easy to throw racist rhetoric at people.
[Break]
AL: I want to talk about what’s been happening in Texas, because I think this is a poignant example of how this has spiraled out of control and seeped into a new form, almost, in 2026. Last year, a promotional video about a Muslim-friendly planned community went viral and sparked a wave of Islamophobic vitriol.
Since then, Gov. Greg Abbott signed a law, “Banning Sharia Compounds.” He and Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is also the Republican Senate candidate in Texas, ordered investigations against the development and other Muslim institutions across the state. The Department of Justice even launched an investigation, but closed it without finding wrongdoing, according to reporting from PBS. Now, Republican candidates in the state have been campaigning on “The Islamification of Texas.”
What has been your reaction to all of that?
[Rozina Ali laughs]
AL: You can have a range of reactions. [laughs]
RA: I did! I did go through a range of reactions, which was, “Oh, this is Texas doing its thing again.” Or, “Oh, people hate CAIR. That’s not new.” I hate to say it, but there’s a humor about it, too, because this anti-sharia sentiment is so absurd. One of the first times I heard sharia being used — and I grew up in a Muslim household — the first time I heard the word sharia was through Islamophobes in like 2009. I truly did not know what it meant.
“I don’t think that Greg Abbott or any of the other Republicans who are so staunchly against visible Muslims in Texas can explain what sharia means.”
I don’t think that Greg Abbott or any of the other Republicans who are so staunchly against visible Muslims in Texas can explain what sharia means. They can say it’s Islamic law, which is against Western civilization.
But one, they have not been able to show what it means on a very practical level; and two, they haven’t been able to show how that differs from the ways in which other religious communities practice their own religion in the U.S., or how they seek moral guidance.
Ultimately, what it comes down to, what the fight that we’re seeing now is whether we are willing to accept all forms of religion in this country. And as much as I want to say this is just more of what we’ve seen in the past, I think what does frighten me is how quickly we are moving to a place where some governor or some local official might try to outlaw Islam altogether. And mind you, this is even a policy shift from 10 years ago when Trump called for a Muslim ban.
So within even 10 years, there’s a dramatic shift. We’re not even just saying ban Muslim immigrants from coming into the United States. We are now having conversations where officials want to ban Muslims or Islam altogether.
“We are now having conversations where officials want to ban Muslims or Islam altogether.”
Just a little background: There have long been suspicions about Islamic institutions in this country. Islamic institutions have been surveilled going back to the ’80s and ’90s, and I mean mass surveillance, informants showing up at meetings, talking to and interrogating leaders.
After 2001, there was even an investigation into Muslim chaplains who would visit prisons because some policymakers were worried that they were radicalizing the prison population. There wasn’t really any criminal wrongdoing found actually, but this sense of Muslim institutions are suspicious has been, again, a feature of America for a long time.
But what does worry me is what has been happening recently is that the rhetoric in Texas has been shifting toward, “Islam is not a religion, it’s a political ideology.” This is not a new talking point, but it is becoming institutionalized. There are efforts to make it into law, which is a frightening place to be.
Texas has a huge Muslim population, and I wonder, what does that mean? Does that mean you shut down all the mosques? Does that mean that no Muslim can practice in public?
I have conflicted feelings about the Muslim neighborhood that was being built, and I know it was open to non-Muslims. But I do think what it suggests and what we are seeing more and more in the U.S. is a desire to live in pockets and to live in silos because people feel more comfortable with their community.
That actually is a marked difference from what we decided in the U.S., that we wanted to be a society of pluralism and tolerance, and that’s not what we’re seeing in Texas. You can blame the Muslim community, but very much so I blame a lot of the Islamophobes who not only suggest but say outright that Muslims do not belong in this country.
AL: As you’re talking, I can’t help but think about the irony of trying to frame Islam as a political ideology, while the rise of the Christian far-right as an actual political ideology is completely undergirding the Trump administration and its policy priorities across disciplines — and redirecting attention away from what is a very real manifestation of religion as a political ideology toward this scapegoated community that is not just a distraction, but is causing actual harm.
I wonder, has that come up in your reporting? The parallel between the attacks on Islam and this attempt to paint it as this radical, growing tendril that’s seeping into the American political ideology — while the far-right is actually doing that.
RA: So one of the things I wanted to do in my book is really place this history of Islamophobia in the larger context of what’s happening in American politics and what’s happening in the country. And those two things don’t live in a vacuum.
What was happening to the Muslim community in the U.S. directly affected what was happening in the rest of the country and was affected by it. One of the things that was happening was that even as the media — for years after 9/11, for decades after 9/11 — even as the media covered cases of terrorism convictions or anyone who was charged with terrorism that was related to Muslims, covered the rise of ISIS, covered the rise of Islamic terrorism, it focused much less on the rise of right-wing extremism.
One study put it at over 300 percent more media covered Muslim terrorists than the far-right. What that did was really lull us into thinking that the biggest national security threat we are facing in this country comes from Islamic terrorists, rather than right-wing elements in this country.
It lulled “us into thinking that the biggest national security threat we are facing in this country comes from Islamic terrorists, rather than right-wing elements in this country.”
The other thing that’s happened is that a lot of rhetoric and policies over the past 25 years have actually tried to make Islam different. What’s ironic about what we’re seeing today versus 25 years ago is that after 9/11, the Bush administration tried in rhetoric — and I want to make that clear, in rhetoric, at least — tried to make this a not religious war. They really wanted to resist that this was a clash of civilizations. But the policies and the rhetoric that came out of those initial months after 9/11 actually suggested otherwise.
What happened was that the U.S. government and U.S. authorities and U.S. law enforcement and then eventually “experts” and anti-Muslim hate groups kept positioning Muslims as different or as a group to be suspicious of.
Ultimately, you are creating a religious war by stating the reality of the country in those terms. It’s a natural byproduct of that that Christian fundamentalism would rise as a response to what is considered “foreign elements,” like Islam.
AL: Your new book, “Seasons of Fury,” documents the rise of Islamophobia in the U.S. Can you tell us why you wanted to write this book, and how you started your work on it? Obviously, you’ve been covering this for a long time.
RA: So I was living in Egypt for a couple of years, and I was very much focused on wars abroad and how the war on terror has affected communities around the world. When I returned from Egypt, I was actually thinking a lot about terrorism convictions and how Muslims whose fathers or sons had been sent away to prison for decades, how they were faring.
I wasn’t actually trying to question these terrorism convictions, but while I was looking into these cases and speaking to families — this was around the time of the rise of Trump on the political stage, and I started noticing that there was a lot of anti-mosque activity around the country, not just in New York, but in New Jersey and Tennessee and Chicago, and it was shocking to me that it was happening in both blue and red states.
At the same time, after Trump was elected, people started calling his the most Islamophobic administration in U.S. history. I thought there was already a lot of anti-Muslim sentiment long before Trump came into power. I realized that all those threads that I was observing and starting to look into were actually connected.
One thing I wanted to do with this book is, one, reclaim the history that I think we too often forget about how the Muslim community in the U.S. was targeted and what it went through. But two, I really wanted to situate the Muslim story in the wider American story to explain how we’ve changed.
I really approached this book as an investigative journalist because one of the questions I was really trying to interrogate is: Why is Islamophobia worse now than it was even after 9/11? Why has our country changed so much that we have elected a president who is willing to say, “Let’s ban all the Muslims”? I wanted to really present a history that could explain why we are where we are today.
“Why has our country changed so much that we have elected a president who is willing to say, ‘Let’s ban all the Muslims’?”
AL: Through the stories of four families across eight decades in “Seasons of Fury,” you portray a range of Muslim experiences shaped by relentless suspicion and prejudice.
You write about Arab American attorney Abdeen Jabara, who “learned that the government had amassed an extensive file, covering his organizational affiliations, his travels through the country and abroad, transcripts of phone conversations, and notes from interviews with more than a hundred acquaintances, bank transactions, and summaries of speeches.”
It turned out that the U.S. government had been spying on him since 1967. Tell us more about Abdeen and how he became a target of the government.
RA: Abdeen’s history is so fascinating to me. One of the things that I wanted to do when I started this book was really actually situate Muslims as already part of America.
There’s such a predominant narrative that Islam and Muslims are foreign and they came into this country. I wanted to actually show the opposite, and it was very important to me to begin the book in the United States, rather than with someone’s arrival to the United States. Abdeen was born in 1940 in small-town America, in Michigan.
“There’s such a predominant narrative that Islam and Muslims are foreign and they came into this country. I wanted to actually show the opposite.”
His father, who came from Greater Syria, he was a staunch Republican. He joined the U.S. Army and fought during World War I. He was so patriotic that every Memorial Day he would march in a parade through town. Abdeen became really obsessed with his parents’ homeland; he became obsessed with the Middle East. But what really shook him was what was happening both in the United States and in Israel–Palestine.
So he really came of age during the 1950s and ’60s. He moved to Detroit, and what he saw was an uprising — the 1967 uprising — and he saw police brutality against Black Americans. That same year, there was a war in which Israel basically grabbed more land, more Palestinian land, and those two things really shook Abdeen, and he became very politically active.
He started going to socialist meetings to talk about Palestine. He started to speak at rallies and forums. He helped start a group in the United States that was focused on Palestinian rights. He even took many trips to the Middle East. He was part of the progressive network of National Lawyers Guild. He took a lot of members to the Middle East to meet with Palestinian activists and prisoners and really try to capture what was happening on the ground, bring those facts back to the U.S. to really help shape and influence public opinion and policymakers’ opinion about Palestine, because the U.S. government at that point had backed Israel.
So in 1972, the Munich massacre happens, in which a Palestinian militant group kidnaps and kills the Israeli Olympics team. It caused a huge sensation. It was tragic, and it was blared across national headlines in the U.S. Almost immediately after, Abdeen started to notice that his colleagues, his friends, people he knew in the community were being visited by the FBI.
What immediately came to light was that the U.S. government had started a surveillance program to monitor what it thought were radical elements within the Arab community. This is an operation they called Operation Boulder. Now, ostensibly, the U.S. government said that they were only tackling immigrants, visa holders. It became very clear that it was not just them; it was actually also U.S. citizens of Arab heritage that people were targeting.
He was a U.S. citizen, born, obviously, in the U.S. When Abdeen decided to sue the U.S. government to figure out exactly what they knew and how much they knew because he was suspicious that they had also surveilled him, what he eventually found was that they had been surveilling him since after 1967. So not even since after Munich, but long before then. And that they had shared his information not just with other federal agencies, but also with foreign governments.
AL: This is the first case where the NSA admitted to spying on someone, right?
RA: It was the first case in which the NSA admitted to spying on a U.S. citizen, yes. And it was against an Arab.
“It was the first case in which the NSA admitted to spying on a U.S. citizen.”
One thing that I find also interesting about Abdeen’s case and the entire surveillance program at that time is, Abedin grew up in a Muslim household. FBI and police notes noted that he was Muslim, that his family was Muslim.
They did not surveil him because he was Muslim. They surveilled him because he was Arab — which was the case for his other colleagues, too. They surveilled them because even if they happened to be Muslim, they were surveilled because they were Arab.
After 9/11, it was a similar sort of surveillance — except law enforcement surveilled Muslims because they were Muslims. And that really is a fascinating and damning shift that we see.
When I was doing this reporting and research, I was thinking to myself, I think this might be the first time in U.S. history that the government has targeted a religious group so widely and so systematically, which is, honestly, quite astonishing. And it is something that I wish we would talk about more and really reckon with.
AL: You said you started thinking about this book by thinking about convictions for terrorism charges, and we’ve seen the expansion of charges for “material support” for terrorism in a variety of protest spheres in recent years. I just want to zoom out a little bit because I think most of our listeners are familiar with the way that this apparatus exploded after 9/11.
We know that 9/11 gave way to George W. Bush’s so-called war on terror, the Department of Homeland Security, Guantánamo Bay, the erosion of civil liberties with the Patriot Act and warrantless wiretaps, and the acceleration of the unitary executive theory — resting more unilateral power in the hands of the president.
All of that — all of those institutions — now rest in the hands of Donald Trump and his administration, who, as we know, have proven willing to push the bounds of government surveillance, extrajudicial killings, unilateral wars, and detention of perceived enemies of the state even further. You wrote for The New York Times recently about the Prairieland activists that the government charged with “material support” of terrorism.
I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about how we got there, and how what constitutes terrorism and support for terrorism has evolved over the years.
RA: A lot of the structures and the laws that the Bush administration used to target terrorism were already in place in the United States. They were really expanded and founded during the Clinton administration in the ’90s.
This one specific law that you mentioned, the material support for terrorism, was actually passed in 1994, and then was expanded in 1996, ironically after the Oklahoma City bombing.
What it did was allow the U.S. government to prosecute anyone charged with support for terrorism, either a foreign terrorist organization or support a terrorist activity. The problem was that even in 1996, what “support” meant was so broad and vague.
It was so broad that even some senior administration officials asked the State Department, “Does that mean $25 in dues can be considered material support for terrorism?” The State Department official said, “Yes, actually. I don’t think anyone would prosecute for that, but yes.” So basically, by 1996, we had a really vague and powerful law on the books.
After 2001, prosecutors recognized that they had this really useful law to go after terrorists. One thing to remember is that after 9/11, the guiding star for the U.S. government across the board was prevention. “We have to prevent another attack before it happens,” which means that law enforcement were looking for not just terrorists before they could do something, but potential terrorists, anyone who could become a terrorist. It was a broad mission.
That plus the material support for terrorism law, which was already vague, allowed the U.S. government to basically put a lot of people in jail who were not even connected to a terrorist group or who did not even commit an act of violence or who did not even have particularly detailed plans for violence.
One of the cases I mentioned in the New York Times piece was the case of Yassin Aref, who was an imam in Albany, Kurdish imam. He came as a refugee. This is what’s so fascinating to me about the U.S. war on terror, is that when Yassin Aref came as a refugee, the U.S. considered Kurds their allies. After 2003, they were suspicious of Kurdish militants.
It was during that era, the post-9/11 era, that the U.S. government targeted Yassin Aref using an undercover informant. It’s not that Yassin Aref said, “I want to blow up something,” or “I have a plan,” or “I have a desire to kill someone.”
What actually happened was that the informant loaned money to one of Yassin Aref’s friends. Yasin Aref witnessed that loan. The informant said, “This money came from a foreign terrorist organization.” Yassin Aref did not really understand what this man was talking about and just nodded along. That was one of the pieces of evidence — the strongest piece of evidence — that U.S. prosecutors used to charge him with material support for terrorism.
Yassin Aref ended up in prison for 15 years. This is a case that illustrates, one, that material support was so vague and so broad, it really could mean anything and continues to mean anything. But two, what we consider terrorism has just broadened dramatically. We really have no good definition of what terrorism is.
And this was something that a lot of civil rights lawyers and activists were warning about even back then, because they recognized that this law and this war on terror can be used to attack dissidents and eventually will be used to attack a lot more people than the Muslim community. And that is what we’re seeing now.
We are seeing that because we’ve given so much power to the executive branch, because we’ve given so much power to the government over the last 25 years, the government gets to decide who they consider enemies, who they consider terrorists, and what they consider support for terrorism. And unfortunately, we have the legal backing in the books to back that mission. The Trump administration can say, “I now consider leftists terrorists,” and unfortunately, there are laws in the books that allow him to do that.
AL: They basically said as much claiming that all the socialists are heralding communism, et cetera, et cetera.
RA: Yes, it is one of the more, again, funny if not scary bits about the vitriol thrown at Abdul El-Sayed, is calling him an “Islamic communist.”
It’s so interesting to me that now it’s — I think especially because of the rise of the DSA and socialists in office — basically the right wing is throwing everything at him. And Abdul El-Sayed is not a socialist; he’s said it himself.
AL: He’s not. [laughs] On this show, he’s said that, yes.
RA: Yes. And Zohran Mamdani is a socialist, but it’s the same vitriol thrown at both of them. I think it’s really interesting and actually quite chilling that the rhetoric is starting to join the word “Islamic terrorist” with leftists or with socialists or communists. That actually spells something a lot more nefarious and dangerous for wider American society than just the Muslim community.
“It’s really interesting and actually quite chilling that the rhetoric is starting to join the word ‘Islamic terrorist’ with leftists or with socialists or communists.”
AL: Rozina, we’re going to leave it there. Thank you so much for joining us on The Intercept Briefing.
RA: Of course. Thank you so much for having me.
AL: I want to remind everyone that Rozina’s new book is out now. “Seasons of Fury” documents Islamophobia in the U.S..
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Under-pressure carmaker will shed 15% of workforce and halve its product line in sector’s biggest ever restructure
The car company Volkswagen has approved controversial plans to shed 100,000 jobs in a battle for survival as it faces fierce competition from Chinese rivals.
After the latest round of talks this week, the company announced a further 50,000 job cuts and agreed a staggered end to current production at four German plants: Emden, Zwickau, Hanover and the Audi site in Neckarsulm between 2031 to 2034. There are no specific plans beyond that.
As one card recently sold for £12m, opportunistic thefts have surged – envelopes are being opened en route, costing small businesses thousands
Pokémon’s success over the last 30 years has seen it grow from a much-loved Game Boy classic, to a world-dominating brand with TV shows, spin-off games, toys and even a theme park. The trading card game is a huge part of that, with more than 85bn cards printed over its lifetime, and the appetite for them shows no signs of slowing down. Packs get snapped up after release so quickly it’s now almost impossible to find them in shops, and a booming resale market is driving the hobby into murky waters.
One card recently sold for an eye-watering £12m, and an increasing number of people have gotten into the collecting business on the hunt for huge profits, leading to a rise in thefts targeting card shops. More recently though, some small businesses have reported that their sales have been hit by thieves targeting envelopes within Royal Mail, leading to thousands in lost revenue.
President cites Trump’s suggestion that he might reconsider US stance on British sovereignty and threatens swifter sanctions on UK oil interests
President Javier Milei has said “winds of change” favourable to Argentina’s claim to the Falkland Islands are blowing around the world in a televised address, citing signs that Donald Trump may reconsider the US position on the islands’ sovereignty.
“Recently, President Trump declared that the US is re-evaluating its historic position in relation to the Malvinas,” he said, using the Argentinian name for the islands.
Valuation above $11bn expected for firm whose fans include Prince Harry, Jennifer Aniston and Kim Kardashian
Fans of Oura are accustomed to using its trendy smart rings to fastidiously monitor their health but now investors are preparing to track a new metric: its share price.
The company’s filing to list imminently on the Nasdaq stock exchange in New York was made public on Thursday.
British ministers have hit back after the Argentinian president said “winds of change” favourable to his country’s claim to the Falklands were “blowing around the world”.
The foreign secretary, Ed Miliband, said the UK would “resolutely uphold” the self-determination of the islands after the Argentinian president, Javier Milei, said his country needed to take them back.
In my years of reviewing beauty tech, it was upgrading my hair dryer that made the biggest difference to my routine. I used to dread hair-wash days: the chore of shampooing, conditioning and rinsing my hair, plus the time – and aching arms – spent getting it dry again.
My clunky, bargain-bucket hair dryer of seven years was weighty, deafeningly loud, and took a painstaking 20 minutes to dry my hair. So happier days really did arrive when I switched to a new model.
Recruiting ex-pros. Inflaming Ukraine-Russia tensions. Suing the SEC and being sued back. The school is adapting to a new reality – and also creating a new one
In 1893, a chemistry professor named Charles Coates arrived at Louisiana State University and wrote that, to his surprise, “there was practically no athletics in the student body: no football, no tennis, and only very little baseball in the spring.” A broad program of sports struck him as the kind of thing a school should have, particularly as US universities were beginning to tout intercollegiate athletics as critical to a balanced higher-ed experience and another way to justify the cost of entry. But 133 years on, sports aren’t merely the main attraction at LSU. They’re the school’s raison d’être, the blinkered obsession that consumes the university and its most prominent ambassadors.
Any doubt that the business of educating college students is just a nettlesome distraction from the business of college sports in Baton Rouge has been emphatically dispelled over the past 10 months. On the football side, the school has spent or committed roughly $162m to its last three head coaches: Ed Orgeron, the folksy national champion in 2019 who received a $17m buyout when he was fired two years later; Brian Kelly, the unloved underachiever who received a $54m buyout after being fired last October; and Lane Kiffin, the Kelly replacement whom it signed to a $91m deal a month later. Clemson, the opponent for LSU’s season opener at home on Saturday, are about to find out what all that money buys.
As fed-up activists target Flock, the AI-powered surveillance camera company is battling back with a massive increase in donations to associations for mayors and other local officials.
Since the beginning of 2025, Flock has given 700 percent more to the partisan groups representing mayors, attorneys general, and governors than in the previous three years. The giving has gone to Democratic and Republican groups alike.
Donating to those groups is a time-worn strategy for companies under scrutiny. The gifts can sometimes reap face time with elected officials. Two major Flock competitors in the license-plate reader industry, Axon and Motorola Solutions, have also donated widely.
One group that received money from Flock, the Democratic Mayors of America, defended its decision to accept $30,000. A spokesperson said reports of Flock misuse are “deeply unsettling,” while arguing that the donations gave Flock no influence over local mayors.
Since the beginning of 2025, Flock donated a quarter-million dollars to a bipartisan slate of groups.
Critics of money in politics have long raised concerns that such donations create, at a minimum, the appearance of a conflict of interest. A surveillance skeptic said the groups could face blowback.
“There’s a reputational risk for them accepting donations from Flock at this time,” said Torin Monahan, a professor of communication at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Flock did not respond to a request for comment.
Over the past year, Flock has faced intense pushback from activists on the left and right over perceived civil liberties abuses. Flock was forced to admit that immigration officials had access to its data, despite earlier denials in the middle of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown last year. Dozens of police officers have also been accused of abusing Flock’s database to track people, often former romantic partners.
Flock was founded in 2017, but it was only five years after that that it began doling out money to what are known as 527 groups, according to records compiled by the nonprofit news outlet ProPublica. The so-called 527 groups can raise unlimited funds directly from corporations and spend that money on key political races.
Flock’s giving began at a relatively meager rate: From 2022 to 2024, the company gave $20,000 to the Democratic Mayors Association and $10,000 to its Republican counterpart, the Community Leaders of America.
Its spending has skyrocketed since then. Since the beginning of 2025, the company donated a total of $240,000 to a longer list of groups that includes the Democratic and Republican Governors Associations and the Democratic and Republican Attorneys General Associations.
Flock’s pattern of donating to 527 groups was identified by a widely cited critic of the company, Jason Hunyar, who asked on his blog what the company was receiving in exchange for those donations.
Influence Investments
The donations came as Flock was hiring an army of lobbyists. It has spent more than $2 million on state and federal lobbying since the start of 2025, according to a recent report from the transparency group OpenSecrets.
The rise of that multi-pronged influence campaign coincided with intense pushback to the company’s practices. Several members of Congress have proposed either outright bans or stricter regulations on Flock and other license-plate readers.
Much of the activism against Flock thus far has come at the local level. Scores of cities and other local governments have rejected or canceled Flock contracts or deactivated the company’s cameras since the start of 2026, according to the advocacy group DeFlock.
The suspicion crosses party lines. In Knox County, Tennessee, Republican Mayor Glenn Jacobs — the former professional wrestler Kane — recently led a campaign to cancel the company’s contract there. In Arizona, Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes announced that she was launching a review of Flock and other camera networks.
Flock is not the only license-plate reader company that has routed money to political groups. Motorola Solutions, which counts cameras as one product among many in its portfolio, has donated more than $986,000 since the start of 2023, according to public records.
Axon, which also hawks Tasers and body-worn cameras, has donated $225,000 to Democratic and Republican attorney general groups over the same period. (Motorola Solutions and Axon did not respond to requests for comment.)
Making Connections
Corporate donations to 527 groups long been controversial. Companies can use the groups to build connections with the same elected officials making decisions about whether to purchase their products and services.
More than a decade ago, the New York Times documented how corporations facing lawsuits used donations to the Republican and Democratic attorney general groups to cozy up to decision-makers.
On its website, the Democratic Mayors Association touts a program that connects mayors “with leaders from the private sector, organized labor, advocacy groups, and partner organizations to build relationships, share ideas, and take on the most pressing challenges facing America’s cities.”
That group defended its decision to accept donations from Flock.
“No donation made to the Democratic Mayors Association guarantees any form of influence over the mayors, no matter who the donor is,” said a spokesperson. “The reporting we’ve seen about police departments across the country misusing Flock cameras and the data is deeply unsettling, which is why mayors across the country have taken action to implement strict guardrails or ban them altogether. Ultimately, Democratic mayors have presided over a historic drop in crime and have proven they know how to keep their communities safe. Each mayor makes their own decisions about what is best for their cities, and we trust their judgement.”
The Democratic Governors Association also defended its donations from Flock and other corporations.
“The DGA does not take policy positions as an organization,” said a spokesperson for the group. “Every dollar sent to the DGA helps us elect more Democratic governors who make their own policy decisions about how to make life better in their states and stand up to Donald Trump.”
Other groups that have received money from one or more of three leading companies in the license-plate reader world — Axon, Flock, and Motorola Solutions — did not respond to requests for comment.
For almost four decades, the Guarani have fought to expand their four-acre territory, Brazil’s smallest officially recognized Indigenous area, to encompass 1,315 acres of largely preserved forest they consider ancestral land.
Intensification of Middle East conflict and ongoing Russian export ban leads to diesel prices rising 10% in less than a week
Farmers are facing an “astronomical” jump in the price of fuel needed to operate their vehicles and machinery after a surge in diesel costs in the UK and the US.
Renewed fighting between the US and Iran has driven up the price of crude oil, while last week Russia extended a ban on diesel exports, further pushing up market prices.
Jenifer Chatting and her husband, Luke, at home. Jenifer was diagnosed with liver damage after taking marijuana-based sleep pills. Stephen Swofford/The Denver Gazette
In March 2022, Colorado public health officials started getting startling reports of liver damage tied to a new marijuana-based sleep aid that had quickly become a top seller in the state.
But it wasn’t until June 2023, nearly 15 months later, that the state’s Marijuana Enforcement Division would warn consumers that the danger had become so serious that the manufacturer had halted production of the sleep pills, called 1906 Midnight Drops, after more reports of “acute liver injury.”
The delay highlights a slew of weaknesses in the system for protecting consumers from hazardous products in the nation’s first regulated recreational marijuana market.
The health complaints had prompted the division to investigate, but the agency decided it didn’t have the power to pull the drops from the stores in this situation. If the agency had dug deeper, it might have found what the state attorney general’s office later discovered: The manufacturer, Sima Sciences, began receiving complaints of harm shortly after it launched 1906 Midnight Drops and two years before health officials ever did.
Instead, the enforcement division took four months after the first report of liver damage to the state to post a notice on its website. But the agency didn’t call it a health and safety warning, which would have advised people not to consume the product. It released a more neutrally named “informational notification.” While there had been reports of “adverse health events,” the notice said, regulators didn’t find any violations. The manufacturer had reformulated the product, the notice added, and no additional issues had surfaced.
Jenifer Chatting didn’t even see it.
A surgical assistant at an oral surgeon’s office, Chatting wanted a safe, natural alternative to pharmaceuticals to treat her insomnia. So she was relieved when a local marijuana dispensary suggested a sugar-free option made of cannabis and herbal extracts that the manufacturer touted as the “the best sleep aid on the market.” She began taking the Midnight Drops nightly the same month that the state health department received its first complaint.
Unaware of the enforcement division’s notification, she didn’t worry when she started having full-body cramps and became lactose intolerant in September 2022, about six months after she started taking the drops. She thought she just needed to drink more water.
She continued taking the drops for nine more months until her dispensary stopped stocking them. Now, despite never having liver problems before, according to her medical records, she has liver damage at age 53; her doctor says she will ultimately need a transplant.
Colorado’s failure to get Midnight Drops off the market or to warn consumers to stop taking it despite repeated reports of harm was not an anomaly, The Denver Gazette and ProPublica found.
The division has limited authority to force companies to recall products. The agency instead relies on posting health and safety advisories on its website to warn the public, and on sending news releases to local media outlets.
Yet, in the cases for which the news organizations were able to identify the date of a complaint or the start of an investigation, it took regulators an average of more than seven months to issue a warning. That’s an incomplete snapshot because the division refused to release data on when investigations began. Complaint dates were private, it said, because the probes were ongoing — even years after the warnings were issued and some companies had surrendered their licenses.
Still, The Denver Gazette and ProPublica were able to identify initial complaint or investigative start dates for 23 of the 83 advisories the agency issued over the past five years by reviewing other licensing violation records.
Seven months is a long time for products that are typically smoked or ingested within days of purchase, industry insiders and consumer safety experts said. In comparison, federal investigators have criticized the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for taking an average of two months after learning of a potential hazard to not just warn consumers but to get companies to recall contaminated food.
Kimberly Anzarut, a former Denver marijuana regulator and now an industry consultant, said the delays mean Colorado consumers aren’t getting vital warnings while products are still on shelves.
“When you take a really long time to get a bulletin out to tell people about these issues, a lot of time, people have already consumed the product,” she said.
Sima Sciences’ production facility in Henderson, Colorado, in November 2018. After the launch of sleep aids in 2019, Sima began receiving complaints that Midnight Drops were seriously harming consumers’ livers.Carl Bower
Lab directors said it generally takes only three days to return test results identifying contaminants, and if there’s an emergency, they can do so in a day.
But MED spokesperson Heather Draper said in a statement that it’s more complicated than just getting test results and that it takes time to build a case that leads to a health and safety advisory.
“This most often requires investigative resources to evaluate the scope of concerns, gather evidence of potential product safety concerns, and receive test results that indicate a contaminated product has been sold to consumers,” she said.
Thuy Vu, Denver’s former head of marijuana inspections and enforcement, said regulators should act more quickly and that “time is of the essence,” because the safety problems reported to regulators are almost always a fraction of the harm a product is causing.
“Seven months, eight months, that’s ridiculous,” she said.
The delays mean contaminated marijuana products often remain on sale for a long time, with no public warning. In addition to complaint dates, The Denver Gazette and ProPublica were able to get sales start dates for nearly all the health and safety advisories and found that Colorado regulators also take, on average, more than seven months from the first sale of a contaminated marijuana product to warn the public.
The news organizations found that warnings take a long time in part because Colorado lacks measures adopted in many other legalized marijuana markets to improve testing procedures and prevent contaminated marijuana from going to stores.
And when the state does discover a problem in a product already on shelves, it gives manufacturers multiple chances to disprove the agency’s finding. Though the MED can require companies to stop distributing flagged products, industry lawyers and manufacturers said manufacturers often continue selling them while challenging the findings.
Chatting’s husband, Luke, is now fearful of losing his wife and critical of what he calls insufficient warnings about Midnight Drops. The couple is suing the company, which has denied their claims. The lawsuit is pending.
“Why weren’t there big banners in front of the dispensaries about these things?” he asked. “The state makes millions and millions and millions of dollars off of the taxes for the marijuana, but they don’t do any regulation at all.”
“My Patients Were Swearing by These”
Sima co-founder Peter Barsoom, right, displays the molds used to make THC- and CBD-infused peanut butter cups on a tour of his production facility.Carl Bower
The person behind Midnight Drops is Peter Barsoom, a wunderkind of Wall Street finance who left New York in 2014 to co-found a recreational marijuana company called Sima Sciences.
Soon he was turning up in splashy magazine profiles. The 1906 product line was a nod to the year the U.S. government enacted the Pure Food and Drug Act, which he said led to the first federal regulation and eventual prohibition of cannabis.
His initial focus was high-end marijuana-infused truffle chocolates.
“Our competitors are chardonnay, Xanax and coffee, not other edibles,” he said during an interview in 2017.
In 2019, he branched out into the sleep tablet line and also manufactured other “drops” meant to help with sex, anxiety, energy, focus and bliss.
By 2023, his company, based in Henderson, Colorado, was manufacturing 81% of the pills sold in dispensaries in the state, according to the cannabis analytics firm BDSA.
Vu, the former Denver regulator, worked for about a year as Barsoom’s head of regulatory compliance and said Barsoom wanted her to bend the rules on inventory reporting and product safety, though she stressed that she was unaware of the problems with the Midnight Drops, which were made after she left. They clashed, and he fired her in 2016, she said.
Barsoom declined interview requests and did not respond to detailed questions. His company’s lawyers also did not respond to requests for comment. But in court filings in response to personal injury lawsuits, they stated that “injuries, damages and losses, if any, may have been caused by plaintiff’s own comparative negligence.”
To promote the Midnight Drops, the 1906 website said the pills were infused with corydalis, an herbal extract, which, it said, “has been used for millennia.” It claimed the extract had sedative qualities and would help people stay asleep because it targeted body pain and tension.
A relative of the poppy, corydalis also contains a compound that researchers have linked to severe and potentially fatal liver injury.
Following reports about liver problems, the company reformulated Midnight Drops and added a warning label stating the product should be taken in consultation with a physician. But the new herbal supplement was also primarily composed of a compound with the same chemical makeup as the one in corydalis that had been tied to liver risks, regulators eventually concluded.
One doctor reported to the enforcement division in December 2022 that he continued to “see an uptick in patients with elevated liver enzymes,” which he believed was caused by Midnight Drops. He warned the agency that he had seen four such patients in the past two months and knew of other doctors treating more, state records show.
Dr. David Cristin, a gastroenterologist, said he was exasperated because patients kept using Midnight Drops despite his concerns. He said he registered a complaint through the company’s website, detailing the issues he had found, but was never contacted.
“The thing that was frustrating was my patients were swearing by these,” he said.
As late as May 26, 2022, months after the state started getting reports about liver damage, the 1906 website still advertised corydalis as the key ingredient in Midnight Drops, though it contains a compound linked to liver injury.Screenshot by ProPublica via the Internet Archive. Highlights added by ProPublica.By Aug. 17, 2022, the company started highlighting Stephania instead of corydalis while keeping the marketing language and plant image the same. Stephania contains a compound with the same chemical makeup as the one in corydalis that had been tied to liver risks, regulators eventually concluded.Screenshot by ProPublica via the Internet Archive. Highlights added by ProPublica.
By May 2024, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment would receive 52 reports of harm involving Midnight Drops, at least 20 severe enough to require medical care. Of those reports, 25 occurred before the MED’s second notification. While the health department often does the initial review, records show it typically finished gathering information within days, which would trigger an automatic referral to the MED.
Nearly a year after issuing its first “informational notification,” the MED and the health department issued the second one in June 2023, warning that Midnight Drops had continued generating reports of “acute liver injury.”
At that time, Sima announced it was stopping production. But Barsoom and his companies continued marketing Midnight Drops for several more months and did not adequately warn dispensaries to stop selling them, according to a Colorado attorney general’s office investigation.
Chatting didn’t see the second MED notification either. A couple of weeks after it was posted, she went into a dispensary but learned the drops were no longer in stock. She said a dispensary staffer told her they had been pulled because consumers had been abusing the product. She hadn’t been, so she didn’t worry.
But that summer, bloodwork during a routine checkup revealed Chatting’s liver enzymes had soared to abnormal levels, indicating potential damage.
The MED’s lawyers have refused to release any of the agency’s investigative files about Midnight Drops, making it difficult to assess why the agency didn’t act sooner. Draper, the spokesperson, said that when regulators were fielding complaints about Midnight Drops, their powers were limited: They could put a hold on products and require companies to issue recalls only for specific violations. She said because of a 2023 statute change, regulators can now place holds on products over safety concerns to prevent their sales, even without a violation.
Still, even with that change, the time it takes to warn consumers after the first complaint as well as after the date when a product goes on sale have both gotten longer, according to the news organizations’ analysis. Draper said the agency “has improved its Health & Safety Advisory processes and this work continues.” She added that agency officials do not believe that the newsrooms’ analysis is “an accurate representation of our process and progress in these areas,” but she did not say why or provide any evidence disputing it.
Loopholes in Safety Rules
The continued time lag in public warnings from regulators is another blow to consumer safety for Colorado’s marijuana industry, which has loopholes in safety rules other states have closed to make it less likely that contaminated products end up in dispensaries.
In one of the longest cases, it took regulators three years to warn consumers from the date of the first sales of marijuana products made by Pueblo County-based Boone Farms that were contaminated with yeast, mold and aspergillus, which can damage lungs and cause asthma, fungal infections and, in rare instances, death. Draper said she could neither confirm nor deny if there was any other investigation. The owner of the company declined to comment but previously said it was a small amount of product and that some of it sold before the state set standards for aspergillus.
An MED investigator had similar suspicions about contamination in products made by Boulder-based Range Street, but “due to other priorities and bandwidth,” had to put the investigation on the “backburner,” according to the investigator’s synopsis obtained through a public records request. The MED eventually found yeast, mold and aspergillus. But it didn’t warn the public until 410 days after the first sales. Range Street, whose former owner declined to comment, has since surrendered its medical marijuana cultivation license.
Unlike other states, Colorado operates largely on an honor code, with manufacturers free to choose the samples and the labs that conduct contaminant tests required before products can be sold. Colorado regulators in January said they were considering requiring lab personnel to collect samples, which would bring Colorado in line with 26 of the 42 state marijuana markets. But the agency backed away from the proposal after top manufacturers argued it would increase costs.
Colorado also allows marijuana manufacturers to test their products far less frequently if they can show consistent compliance, something only one other state does. And the time frame for demonstrating that compliance can be as little as a few weeks.
Colorado’s regulators acknowledged at a 2023 industry forum that the reduced testing program “potentially poses risks to public health and safety,” as problems with the program were “a common occurrence” in investigations.
This January, the enforcement division noted in an industry bulletin that problems with that program persist, leading to recalls and advisories for unsafe levels of pesticides. The division told manufacturers in July that it is reviewing the reduced testing program as it considers a broader overhaul of testing rules.
Colorado also has historically relied on complaints to identify tainted marijuana once it is actually in the marketplace, rather than randomly sampling products on shelves. The Cannabis Regulators Association recommends random sampling, and other states like Oklahoma have such programs. Colorado only this year launched a pilot program to randomly sample dispensary products, but the program has run into delays, and the state hasn’t identified a long-term funding source.
Once a contaminated product gets to dispensaries, Colorado regulators face challenges in getting the product off the shelves. Colorado expects manufacturers to voluntarily recall products. Regulators in Colorado can only force products to be recalled in a public health emergency, but regulators can encounter hurdles to quickly establishing that one exists.
Even when testing finds contaminants, manufacturers say marijuana that’s already in dispensaries often remains for sale. That’s because Colorado allows the manufacturer to retest the marijuana, and the rules don’t specify a time frame for when those tests have to be done. The rules state that the MED “may” require manufacturers to refrain from selling items during retesting.
In contrast, Missouri immediately puts a hold on all marijuana products that fail mandatory contaminant testing. Manufacturers there can have the products reanalyzed, but dispensaries can’t sell those products until retesting shows the original analysis was incorrect.
In an industry bulletin in January, Colorado regulators said the agency had seen “increased instances” of marijuana manufacturers taking advantage of the retesting rule to cover up the use of banned pesticides.
“Health Isn’t Really Their Primary Concern”
Tess Eidem, a research professor at the University of Colorado who has a federal grant to analyze the division’s health and safety bulletin process, said she worries the state prioritizes protecting the financial viability of the marijuana market over consumer safety.
She pointed out that the MED isn’t part of the state’s health department but instead is in the state’s revenue department.
“So health isn’t really their primary concern,” she said.
Draper said that “consumer safety has been and remains a top priority for the Division.”
Since her diagnosis, Chatting spends most of her time at home, caring for her and her husband’s rescue pug mixes. Her doctor has warned that her liver will continue to deteriorate and will eventually require a transplant.Stephen Swofford/The Denver Gazette
In September 2024, a little over a year after Chatting stopped taking Midnight Drops, she and her husband went on a dream vacation to England, where they lived on a houseboat. The trip was such a success that they began planning to retire there, projecting that in about a decade they could downsize and spend their golden years traveling the canals through the English countryside where Luke was born.
A month later, Jenifer got a call from a doctor. Because she’s a former smoker, she had gone in for a routine lung screening. Her lungs were fine, but the X-ray detected something suspicious with her liver. A follow-up ultrasound detected cirrhosis.
Chatting’s gastroenterologist ruled out alcohol consumption, noting in her medical records that Chatting had always been a light drinker, and instead cited an herbal sleeping aid as a likely factor. After she stopped taking the drops, her liver enzymes came back into normal ranges, but the damage was already done, her medical records show.
Two days before Thanksgiving, Luke couldn’t sleep and rose about 2 a.m. to Google information about cirrhosis. He said it was then that he finally discovered the MED’s notifications about Midnight Drops.
He started slamming his fists on the armrests of his desk chair. One armrest broke, and his fist hit jagged plastic, fracturing his left hand.
“Jen, they killed you,” he recalled shouting.
She has few symptoms now, other than body cramps, but her gastroenterologist has warned that her condition will inevitably deteriorate and she will require a liver transplant in as little as five years.
Struggling to come to terms with the diagnosis, Jenifer now stays mostly indoors, building elaborate Lego artwork and spending time with their rescue pug mixes.
“It’s hard because you think you’re doing something good for yourself and healthy and all natural,” she said. “And then it ends up being, you know … .” She stopped and gathered herself. “Just because something’s all natural doesn’t mean that it’s good for you.”
Last September, Barsoom and his companies settled with the attorney general’s office to resolve the office’s investigation. Barsoom and his companies denied that they had violated consumer protection laws. But they agreed to pay $400,000 in fines, and the settlement bars them from selling cannabis products in Colorado until at least 2027.
Barsoom also agreed to issue an apology.
“We’ve always believed that great products should improve people’s lives,” his statement read. “When we learned that Midnight Drops wasn’t meeting that standard for everyone, we realized we had let our customers down. We are sorry that we didn’t act faster and communicate better with both our customers and regulators.”
The Chattings said Barsoom’s apology doesn’t amount to much for them, and they wish Colorado regulators had acted faster and communicated better with consumers.
“How are people supposed to know this?” Luke asked. “The only way I found this stuff was by digging and digging and digging on the internet.”
Seoul reportedly seeking parliamentary approval to send military assets to Middle East but president’s office plays down claims
South Korea is reviewing a possible deployment of military assets to the strait of Hormuz amid pressure from Donald Trump over Seoul’s reluctance to provide support in the region, according to domestic media reports.
Citing unnamed government and military sources, the reports published on Thursday and Friday said preparations were under way and that the government intended to seek parliamentary approval for a new deployment. The reports, which appeared in major South Korean outlets, said the exact scale and timing had not been agreed.
Seven years after springing one of the biggest upsets in boxing history, the Mexican Rocky is back with his old trainer for one final run at the heavyweight summit
Seven years ago, Andy Ruiz Jr became the first fighter of Mexican descent to win the world heavyweight championship in one of the biggest upsets boxing has ever seen, stopping the undefeated Anthony Joshua inside seven rounds at Madison Square Garden.
A replacement opponent summoned on five weeks’ notice who went off as an 11-1 underdog, Ruiz came off the canvas in the third to knock Joshua down four times before the referee finally waved it off. Hailed as the “Mexican Rocky”, he was lionized as a border-straddling hero in his hometown of Imperial, the dusty agricultural community framed by the mountain ranges and flat deserts of south-eastern California. He made the late-night rounds, took an audience with Mexico president Andrés Manuel López Obrador and signed a $10m guarantee when Joshua activated his rematch clause. The money, cars, fame and women arrived all at once.
Tesla has begun offering public rides in Austin in its purpose-built Cybercab, a two-seat robotaxi with no steering wheel or pedals. "You can go outside, take rides," said Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla's VP of AI. "Anyone can take rides. It's open to the entire public." Previously, the fleet consisted only of Model Ys.
Texas records show Tesla had registered 45 Cybercabs as of Thursday, though the company has not disclosed how many are currently carrying passengers. Tesla also says it eventually wants consumers to be able to buy the vehicles for under $30,000. Business Insider reports: Videos posted online by Tesla influencers and content creators who were invited to the Austin event showed that the Cybercab can be hailed through the Robotaxi app. In a video posted by David Moss, an autonomous-vehicle content creator, Robotaxi users could open the car's butterfly doors through the app. After the riders enter the car, the doors closed automatically, Moss said in the video. The launch comes nearly two years after Tesla first unveiled the Cybercab at its "We, Robot" event in Burbank, California.
Major Australian alpine resorts are closing their ski operations up to a month early after a winter that broke multiple records for heat with limited snow falls being washed away by rain.
Governments are now quicker to point the finger at Moscow, but critics say their inaction invites more sabotage
Russia’s suspected sabotage campaign across Europe appears to be gathering pace again, confronting governments with a problem they have struggled to solve since the start of the war in Ukraine: how to impose a meaningful cost on Moscow for attacks that remain deliberately below the threshold of conventional war.
Over the past month alone, an explosives-laden drone was discovered next to a Ukrainian cargo plane at Germany’s Leipzig airport, Poland has faced suspected acts of sabotage, and a string of unexplained explosions and fires have hit defence facilities supplying Ukraine across Europe.
At 400mm, the FUJIFILM XF 400mm f/4.5 lens has everything you need to bring distant action up close. This is especially true when you consider that the lens delivers a 609mm equivalent focal length thanks to the smaller APS-C sized…
Washington, D.C. — Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., introduced legislation Thursday that would restrict federal funding for automated license plate readers and biometric surveillance cameras used by local governments and police departments.
The “Flock-Off Act” would prohibit federal money from being used to purchase, install, maintain, operate or upgrade automated license plate reader systems, including technology sold by Flock Safety and other companies.
The bill would also apply to contracts, subscriptions, licenses and data-sharing agreements involving the technology. Localities that used federal funds for prohibited systems could be required to repay the Treasury before receiving additional money.
Massie said taxpayers should not be forced to finance what he described as a growing “surveillance state.”
The legislation includes exceptions for systems used within one mile of the northern and southern borders for detecting unlawful entry, human trafficking and drug smuggling. It would also exempt cameras used solely for toll collection.
Flock Safety pushed back, warning that withholding funds from departments using license plate readers could hurt public safety. The company said Congress should establish safeguards and oversight rather than broadly restrict the technology.
Privacy advocates have raised increasing concerns about automated plate-reader networks because they can track vehicle movements across jurisdictions and allow agencies to search large databases of location information. Flock has faced lawsuits, public backlash and contract cancellations, while anti-surveillance group DeFlock says more than 150 cities have moved to reject or end agreements with the company.
As polls point to victory in Saxony-Anhalt for AfD party promising deportations, people face agonising choice: stay or go
As the Bible study session wrapped up, leaving worshippers to mingle over cake and coffee, Fatemeh, 44, fought back tears as the conversation turned to Sunday’s state election in Saxony-Anhalt.
“I worry about it every day,” she said. “I can’t stop thinking about my son and what might happen to us.”
Fatemeh worries about what might happen after the elections. Photograph: Christian Jungeblodt/The Guardian
Sept. 3, 2026 — The DOE Office of Science (SC) invites the community to participate in a virtual town hall focused on developing innovative approaches for preparing domestic doctoral-level students for science and technology jobs through the Genesis Mission. The virtual town hall will be held Thursday, Sept. 24, 2026, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Input from participants will inform an anticipated Genesis Mission Graduate Fellowship Pilot. This pilot is intended to establish and demonstrate innovative 4-year PhD pathways that include dual-competency “AI + discipline” research programs at universities integrated with two high-impact research experiences — one at a DOE National Laboratory or SC user facility and one in industry.
The town hall will include discussions on addressing the needs and challenges in standing up a four-year PhD track, concepts for integrating laboratory and industry research experiences into an accelerated PhD model, and identifying major merit review criteria for evaluation of the Genesis Mission Fellowship Pilot. Participants will also have opportunities to share best practices from established accelerated PhD programs, as well as pioneering domestic interdisciplinary graduate programs to inform and motivate discussions.
In addition to introductory remarks by speakers from DOE, industry, and DOE national laboratories, DOE invites speakers from universities to briefly address some or all of the following questions:
What are the most significant advantages or barriers you foresee (or have encountered) in implementing a 4-year PhD track at your institution? What innovations or approaches would make (or made) this feasible?
How does the dual competency requirement (AI + discipline) align with or challenge your current graduate program structure? Are there examples of dual competency requirements within an accelerated framework?
How would you balance depth in AI versus depth in the scientific discipline?
What student support structures are essential for success in an accelerated dual-competency doctoral model?
How do we identify and recruit domestic students who can thrive in this intensive model?
How should students who need more than 4 years, or who face unexpected challenges, be handled?
Beyond time-to-degree and post-degree employment, what metrics would indicate success of the dual-competency degree? What data should be collected during graduate study versus after graduation?
Community members are encouraged to register and participate in the discussions during the town hall. In addition, university participants wishing to provide input through a brief presentation should submit a virtual hall speaking request, available on the registration site.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Hill: Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) are calling for a permanent ban on the development and deployment of artificial superintelligence, citing a series of recent hackings involving "rogue" models. The bicameral duo announced Thursday they will introduce the Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act, which would institute the permanent ban, along with temporarily pausing "advanced AI development" until federal regulators establish safety standards. The bill would also direct the U.S. to "pursue international agreements to prevent superintelligence from being developed anywhere in the world" and establish a new Cabinet-level federal agency focused on AI safety rules.
Superintelligence refers to AI technologies that will surpass the smartest humans. Several technology leaders, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, have suggested superintelligence is on the horizon. The legislation would also set new penalties for any person or company trying to circumvent the ban, including the corporate death penalty, in which a court forces a company to shut down. Individual developers could also face up to 20 years in prison, the lawmakers said. "Nearly every day, there is a frightening new story about how Big Tech companies are losing control of the technology they are developing, with potentially cataclysmic results," Sanders wrote in a press release.
"The leaders of the major AI companies publicly acknowledge that they do not fully understand the technology and that it is escaping their control. It is irresponsible for society to allow them to move forward and make these products even more advanced."
Casar emphasized AI's fast development, writing in a statement, "In just four years, we have gone from the first version of ChatGPT to AI models so powerful they cannot be properly controlled."
Electric vehicle sales in Australia exceeded petrol cars for the first time last month as a transformation driven by high fuel prices and government policy encouraging clean car uptake accelerated.
More than 27,000 EVs were sold in August, a new record for a single month and representing 24.9% of new cars sold. The climate-friendly technology surpassed both petrol vehicles (nearly 26,000 sold) and diesel cars (23,600).
Sept. 3, 2026 — QunaSys Inc., a company specializing in the development of quantum computing algorithms and software, today announced that its quantum software development kit, QURI SDK Enterprise, has been officially adopted for RIKEN’s Quantum-HPC Hybrid Platform as part of the JHPC-quantum Project.
JHPC-quantum is a project commissioned by NEDO (New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization) under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). The project has developed JHPC-quantum platform for quantum-HPC hybrid applications by linking the supercomputer Fugaku and the IBM Quantum System Two “ibm_kobe” at the RIKEN Center for Computational Science (R-CCS) in Kobe with the trapped-ion quantum computer “Reimei” (Quantinuum System Model H2) at RIKEN’s Wako campus in Saitama.
With this adoption, JHPC-quantum users will be able to access quantum devices from Fugaku’s compute and pre/post nodes through QURI SDK Enterprise. The SDK incorporates state-of-the-art quantum-HPC hybrid algorithm libraries, including QSCI (Quantum Selected Configuration Interaction) and ADAPT-QSCI, supporting computation in fields such as quantum chemistry, materials science, and CAE (Computer-Aided Engineering), with a view to future practical applications. Comprehensive documentation, sample code, and toolchains allow researchers to begin development quickly.
QURI SDK Enterprise supports both the IBM Quantum System Two and the Quantinuum System Model H2, helping researchers build computational workflows that leverage the characteristics of each quantum device. On the HPC side, it supports Fugaku (compute and pre/post nodes) and JHPC-quantum GPU supercomputer “ROQUO”, the NVIDIA GB200 NVL4-based cluster. In both environments, quantum circuit simulation can be run with MPIbased distributed parallelism, using mpiQulacs as the simulator on Fugaku’s compute nodes and a cuQuantum-based backend on ROQUO. Parallel computation spanning multiple nodes and processors makes it possible to simulate quantum circuits at scales beyond the reach of a single node. QunaSys will continue to expand this environment step by step toward utilityscale quantum-HPC hybrid computing.
Building on this milestone, QunaSys will continue to deepen its collaboration with RIKEN. By expanding the functionality of QURI SDK Enterprise and its support for additional devices and HPC environments, and through collaboration with RIKEN and other research institutions and industry both in Japan and abroad, QunaSys will drive the real-world deployment of quantum-HPC hybrid technology and contribute to the development of Japan’s quantum industry.
“The Test User Program, which JHPC-quantum Project is also running, has likewise shown strong demand for QURI SDK Enterprise, which is why we decided to adopt it this time,” said Mitsuhisa Sato, Division Director of Quantum-HPC Hybrid Platform Division, RIKEN Center for Computational Science. “We hope this will be an opportunity to deepen our collaboration with QunaSys within the project and to make the project’s achievements even greater.”
QunaSys CEO Tennin Yan commented: “QSCI is a quantum-HPC hybrid algorithm developed by QunaSys. It is now one of the most widely used approaches to quantum-HPC hybrid computing worldwide, and has led to a wide range of research advances, including work to optimize the algorithm for Fugaku and other supercomputers. For quantum computing to deliver practical value, it is essential that these advances be readily accessible to all users, including those in industry. QURI SDK Enterprise brings together algorithms such as QSCI with an easy-to-use environment that lets anyone work across Fugaku, “ROQUO,” and quantum computers. We see this deployment as an opportunity to deepen our collaboration with RIKEN and further accelerate the research and development of quantum-HPC hybrid applications.”
RIKEN is Japan’s leading national comprehensive research institute in the natural sciences, conducting research across a broad range of fields including physics, engineering, chemistry, mathematical and information sciences, computational science, biology, and medical science. The RIKEN Center for Computational Science (R-CCS) operates the worldclass supercomputer Fugaku, providing computing resources to a wide range of users in universities, research institutions, and industry, and carries out research and development under the banner of “The Science of computing, by computing, and for computing”, contributing to the advancement of computational science and computer science. Learn more: https://www.riken.jp/en.
About QunaSys
QunaSys is a quantum computing software company leading the development of quantum algorithms for industrial applications, including chemistry and materials science. In addition to quantum machine learning and quantum chemistry, QunaSys focuses on CAE (Computer-Aided Engineering) using quantum technology, working with academic institutions, industry, and government to unlock the full potential of quantum computers and tackle scientific challenges. Learn more: https://qunasys.com/en.
Is the battery pack the only option for this? I’ve seen pictures of battery packs mounted on top of some Onewheels, and I really don’t like how they look.
The federal government plans to start excavation over the next two weeks on a massive triumphal arch near Washington, D.C., Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said, a controversial project championed by President Trump.
President Trump has named Adam Telle as the acting Army secretary, following the departure of Dan Driscoll amid widespread reports of tensions with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
Republican oversight chair James Comer has also weighed in on Leon Black not sitting for a deposition about his ties to Jeffrey Epstein. The billionaire financier, who has denied wrongdoing, filed suit against the oversight committee Thursday alleging the subpoenas were improper.
“It’s a shame Leon Black is hiding behind litigation rather than provide answers to the American people. Our investigation is examining how the federal government for decades failed survivors of Jeffery Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s crimes and how Mr. Epstein sought to curry favor with influential individuals to avoid scrutiny,” Comer said in a statement. “Mr. Black’s testimony is crucial to our investigation as he was one of Mr. Epstein’s fee paying clients and has several nondisclosure agreements.”
Federal prosecutors have charged an ICE officer who shot a Venezuelan immigrant in Minnesota with making false statements about the incident, sources said. He is now in custody.
A federal prosecutor in Minnesota who was investigating an ICE officer for possible civil rights crimes has been fired, four sources familiar with the matter told CBS News.
Republican candidate Thomas Ross and former campaign manager allegedly devised plan to stash drugs in rival Louise Secker’s purse or vehicle
A Missouri House race has been rocked by the Wednesday arrest of Republican candidate Thomas Ross, whom prosecutors accuse of attempting to frame his primary opponent Louise Secker for cocaine possession.
In June, Ross allegedly gave his former campaign manager, identified by the initials “CS” in court documents, a bag of cocaine and Adderall. The two allegedly devised a plan for the former manager to stash the drugs in Secker’s purse or vehicle.
The Justice Department asked the Supreme Court to intervene in an ongoing legal battle over U.S. Postal Service rules for mail ballots just weeks before the November midterm elections.
Telle has previously worked for Trump during his first term as a special assistant to the president for legislative affairs
Donald Trump on Thursday named Adam Telle as the acting army secretary after the departure of Daniel Driscoll amid widespread reports of tensions with defense secretary Pete Hegseth.
Telle is currently the assistant secretary of the army for civil works.
Sean Alfortish and Leon Parker convicted on some counts but not murder charges linked to insurance fraud plot
A federal jury in New Orleans on Thursday returned a split verdict after more than 30 hours of deliberations in a three-week-long blockbuster fraud and murder trial that garnered headlines far beyond Louisiana.
Jurors deadlocked on murder charges Sean Alfortish and Leon “Chunky” Parker faced, leading US district judge Wendy Vitter to declare a mistrial as prosecutors vowed to try the case on those counts again.
Troops escort settlers into al-Mughayyir and raze village outside Hebron as ethnic cleansing of West Bank continues
Israelis have shot dead two teenagers in a Palestinian village encircled by settlers, and Israeli troops have razed an entire village outside Hebron, in the latest attacks in a surge of Israeli terror and ethnic cleansing across the occupied West Bank.
The shootings targeted Khalil Abu Alia, 16, who was about to start 11th grade at the al-Mughayyir boys school, and 19-year-old Omar al-Nassan, who graduated from the same institution with top marks this summer.
The Missouri Supreme Court has blocked a new House map backed by President Trump from being used in the November election, a setback in Republicans' efforts to pick up an additional House seat.
New York, New York — The world is now expected to exceed the 1.5°C warming threshold established under the Paris climate agreement, according to a new United Nations report that shifts attention toward limiting how far temperatures rise and eventually bringing them back down.
The United Nations Environment Programme said global temperatures are likely to cross 1.5°C above preindustrial levels within the next few years. Earth is already about 1.4°C warmer when measured using a 20-year average.
Under current government policies, UNEP projects warming of about 2.6°C by 2100. Even under an optimistic scenario involving aggressive emissions cuts, temperatures could peak around 1.8°C near mid-century.
The report describes a strategy known as “overshoot,” in which temperatures temporarily exceed 1.5°C before declining later in the century through steep reductions in fossil-fuel emissions and large-scale removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Scientists stressed that exceeding 1.5°C does not mean climate action becomes pointless. Each additional fraction of a degree is associated with greater risks from extreme heat, flooding, sea-level rise, food shortages and ecosystem loss.
The report also warns that prolonged warming increases the risk of irreversible tipping points involving major ice sheets, the Amazon rainforest and Atlantic Ocean circulation.
UN officials said adaptation will become increasingly important because some climate impacts can no longer be avoided.
Jefferson City, Missouri — The Missouri Supreme Court on Thursday blocked the state from using a Republican-drawn congressional map in the November midterms and ruled that voters may decide the redistricting plan through a referendum.
The unanimous decision means Missouri will use its previous 6-2 congressional map rather than the newer map, which was expected to give Republicans a 7-1 advantage by dismantling Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver’s Kansas City-based district.
Judge Ginger K. Gooch wrote that the referendum petition challenging the new map was “legal, sufficient, and timely.” Because the petition was valid, the court concluded that the redistricting law never took effect and cannot do so unless voters approve it.
The group People Not Politicians submitted more than 330,000 signatures seeking a referendum, more than twice the number required. Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins had previously blocked the effort, a decision later upheld by a lower court before Thursday’s reversal.
Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway said she plans to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. President Donald Trump also criticized the ruling, calling it “horrible” and arguing there was not enough time to switch maps before the general election.
The ruling marks a setback for Republican efforts to redraw congressional districts before the midterms. Missouri lawmakers had acted after Trump urged GOP-controlled states to pursue maps that could improve Republican chances of retaining control of the House.
The redistricting question will now go before Missouri voters in November.
Cull of animals that eat native shrubs, causing spread of fast-igniting grasses, to go ahead despite fierce opposition
Locals and tourists have long fawned over Catalina Island’s mule deer population. For nearly a century, the ungulates have roamed the land’s waterfronts and woodlands, so comfortable around humans that it is not uncommon to spot deer roaming downtown Avalon.
But that sight will soon disappear, after a judge this week paved the way for the island’s conservancy to kill nearly all the island’s 2,000 deer.
ChatGPT, Claude, Grok, and Gemini all suffered significant service disruptions within roughly the same few-hour window Thursday morning. OpenAI and Anthropic reported elevated errors and later restored service, while Grok remained impaired and third-party monitoring indicated a likely Gemini outage despite no public acknowledgment from Google. Ars Technica reports: Other major Internet services, including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Cloudflare, have not reported any major issues as of press time Thursday, though issue reports on DownDetector did spike somewhat for all three this morning.
While the affected frontier models go down occasionally, having all four experience interruptions in the same short period is practically unheard of. Claude reports 99.4 percent uptime for its services over the last 90 days and last reported a similar three-hour "partial outage" on August 24. OpenAI reports 99.63 percent uptime for ChatGPT and 100 percent uptime for ChatGPT Codex in the same period. ChatGPT's so-called "Work Mode" reported an hours-long period of "elevated latency" on August 31.
It wasn't immediately clear what charges Sanchez was pleading guilty to, but he is facing a felony battery charge and several misdemeanors, including unlawful entry of a motor vehicle and public intoxication.
Auger-Aliassime lost in the second round, as did Musetti against Australia’s Dane Sweeny, but Fritz, Swiatek and Andreeva won in straight sets and Osaka survived in three
It feels rather odd saying this, given that Osaka is a two-time former US Open champion, but she’s something of a wildcard contender this fortnight, having not won a title since 2021. But over the past year she’s been building momentum, after returning from her maternity leave in 2024, and there were plenty of green shoots on the grass at Wimbledon, where she beat Aryna Sabalenka en route to the quarter-finals. And Osaka has started strongly today, leading Siniakova 3-1 and serving at 40-15. Make that game, as the 13th seed’s pace is too much for the Czech to handle.
Swiatek is serving for the first set at 5-3. And on her second set point, at her advantage, she takes it, when Podoroska prods a return wide. After starting with three holds to love, the set got closer, but the eighth seed found a way through and she’s skipping to the back of the court to start the second set. She looks up for this – and most importantly, more confident than she has done for so much of this year.
The question of whether President Donald Trump’s restrictions can move forward in time for November’s midterm elections has been the subject of a dizzying legal battle in recent weeks.
Setback for Republicans in redistricting battle as court forbids maps from being used in November elections
The Missouri supreme court has unanimously blocked new congressional districts backed by Donald Trump from being used in the November election and ordered a statewide vote on whether to uphold or reject the new map.
The decision Thursday marks a rare setback for Republicans in a national redistricting battle. Republicans had hoped Missouri’s new congressional boundaries could help them win an additional seat and hold on to their slim House majority in the midterms. The ruling still could be appealed to the US supreme court.
Organ kept Tim Andrews off dialysis and acted as a ‘bridge’ while he waited for a human transplant in the US
A genetically modified kidney from a pig called Wilma has kept a 66-year-old man with kidney failure alive for a record nine months and successfully acted as a “bridge” to a human transplant in a world first.
Tim Andrews was seriously ill with end-stage kidney disease caused by type 2 diabetes and had only a 9% chance of receiving a human kidney within five years, against a more than 40% risk of dying or being removed from the waiting list.
(The Center Square) – California’s strict pollution and clean air laws will remain in place, at least for now, after a federal judge granted a preliminary injunction in a lawsuit against the Trump administration.
(The Center Square) – A Pennsylvanian who once received support from President Donald Trump to run for U.S. Senate may be selected to serve as the next secretary of the Army.
Student protesters among those hacked, says digital rights group, though Aleksandar Vučić’s government denies spying
At least 14 people from across Serbian civil society were targeted with advanced spyware earlier this year in what the digital rights group Share Foundation said was the largest documented wave of such infection in Serbia to date.
The wave of spyware infections was discovered in August after Apple notified people in 110 countries that they had probably been victims of mercenary spyware.
US tech company has sued London mayor after he prevented it from working with Metropolitan police
Sadiq Khan has agreed for his text messages and emails to be searched as part of a legal battle with Palantir, the high court has been told, after he prevented the US technology company from working with the Metropolitan police.
The London mayor stepped in to block a £50m deal between Palantir and the Met in May, with the artificial intelligence developer suing Khan’s office over the decision.
Williamsport, Pa. — PA CareerLink Lycoming County officially opened the doors of its new home Thursday with a ribbon-cutting ceremony outside its Williamsport offices at 330 Pine Street.
A former UK competition official has filed a $2.7 billion lawsuit against Apple on behalf of app developers, alleging its App Tracking Transparency rules unfairly disadvantaged third-party apps while favoring Apple's own advertising ecosystem. Engadget reports: ATT debuted in 2021, ostensibly to give users more control over how much of their activity app developers can track across other apps and websites. The company told Reuters it was "bound by the exact same requirements as all developers."
However, regulators across Europe including in France, Italy and Poland have investigated ATT. Germany's competition regulator, the Federal Cartel Office, last month determined that Apple was favoring its own apps over those from external developers. It said the ATT pop-ups Apple used for its services "had the potential to encourage users to give their consent, whereas they had the potential to discourage consent for third-party apps."
As such, the company agreed to make some changes to how ATT works in the European Union. That follows the French Competition Authority fining Apple $175 million at current rates over ATT last year.
The decision came nearly a month after the president tried for a second time to limit via executive order which people born in the US can become American citizens. The supreme court ruled in late June that Trump’s previous sweeping order denying birthright citizenship to the children of undocumented immigrants or temporary visitors was unconstitutional.
Project that critics say will disrupt historic sightlines in Washington DC is facing a lawsuit
The Trump administration said on Thursday that excavation work will start over the next two weeks on the site where it plans to build a towering, gilded arch, a project that is facing a lawsuit and that critics say will disrupt historic sightlines in Washington DC.
The proposed arch is one of several projects the Republican president is pursuing to leave his lasting imprint on Washington, including renaming and renovating the Kennedy Center, building a huge new White House ballroom, refurbishing the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool and rebuilding a golf course in East Potomac Park that could significantly reduce the public’s access to running and biking paths.
Why Should Delaware Care? A new report claims that the elected recorder of deeds in New Castle County offered a job to a county councilman to prevent him from challenging him in the September primary election, raising questions around the legality of such an offer. The low-key race comes with a salary that is three times the average for New Castle County residents.
Despite calls for investigations following a damning report over an alleged job proposal to keep an opponent out of the looming primary election, New Castle County Recorder of Deeds Michael Kozikowski won’t drop out of the race.
Kozikowski was defiant Thursday afternoon, telling Spotlight Delaware that he categorically denied “any wrongdoing,” and that he still is running in the Sept. 15 Democratic primary election. He declined further comment on the episode on the advice of his legal counsel.
According to a report first published by WHYY on Thursday morning, Kozikowski met in June with New Castle County Councilman David Tackett, who at the time was still considering a bid for the elected office.
Tackett, suspicious of Kozikowski’s intentions, reportedly recorded their more-than-hourlong conversation in which the incumbent told the councilman that he could set him up with a $76,295 job in the office if he didn’t file for the election.
As its name suggests, the recorder of deeds manages the paperwork on property sales in the county along with mortgagees, easements, federal tax liens, and more. The office, which comes with an annual salary of $123,000 — about three times the average per capita income in New Castle County — has been elected in Delaware since 1897. Many other states have stopped electing the position and instead typically assign the duties to a county or court clerk.
Kozikowski, 75, who has served in the role since 2002, has never faced a primary challenger in his six terms as recorder of deeds. He’s faced a Republican general election challenger only twice in that time.
In the WHYY report, Kozikowski said that he didn’t see any problem with his offer because Tackett had not yet officially filed his candidacy. County Council officials are not allowed to hold other county office positions or employment during their term or for one year following their exit from office though, according to Delaware state law.
New Castle County Councilman David Tackett said his campaign manager, Rich Jester, left, convinced him to file a complaint with the Department of Justice over the incident with Kozikowski. | PHOTO COURTESY OF TACKETT CAMPAIGN
Last month, Tackett submitted a formal complaint to Attorney General Kathy Jennings’ office, in which he claimed Kozikowski “attempted inducement of a prospective political candidate through repeated offers of public employment and compensation.”
Tackett told Spotlight Delaware he originally did not feel comfortable filing the complaint. But conversations with his campaign manager, Rich Jester, and fellow County Councilman Brandon Toole reiterated that the situation “wasn’t right.”
“They said that this should not be covered up and should be exposed,” Tackett said. “This type of [manipulation] should not be happening for anyone in any office.”
Delaware Department of Justice spokesperson Mat Marshal confirmed to Spotlight Delaware that it also has received a complaint, but said the department does not discuss, confirm, or deny investigations.
New Castle County Councilman Kevin Caneco also filed a complaint Thursday with the New Castle County Ethics Commission, asking it to conduct an investigation and official review of the incident.
Caneco submitted his investigation request just hours after WHYY released the report.
“I find it really, really problematic that an elected official, a sitting elected official who’s been in office for 24 years, is telling another elected official that they’ll give them close to an $80,000-a-year job to stay off the primary ballot,” he said.
While he knows an investigation is not likely to be completed before the Sept. 15 primary election, Caneco said an investigation should still be done regardless of the election’s outcome.
Natalie Criscenzo, a spokesperson for New Castle County, said County Executive Marcus Henry has “directed his administration to provide any information they request as part of their review.”
Henry previously endorsed Kozikowski, but Criscenzo said the County Executive’s office “cannot comment on campaign decisions.”
In WHYY’s report, Kozikowski is alleged to have told Tackett that Henry was familiar with his plan to offer the job and called it an “olive branch.”
(The Center Square) – Medical watchdog Do No Harm’s Center for Accountability in Medicine released its second index on medical schools, ranking schools by excellence and merit instead of identity politics.
The vice-president says he’s ‘extremely skeptical’ of Iran reports when asked whether US was responsible for deaths
The US vice-president, JD Vance, said “sometimes things happen” when asked on Thursday whether an American strike was responsible for killing four people, including a child, at a wedding celebration in southern Iran this week.
The strike hit Kuhestak, a town in Sirik county on the strait of Hormuz. The toll was reported not by the Iranian government but by the Iranian Red Crescent, a member of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement that operates independently of Tehran and is generally treated by international monitors as a credible source on casualty figures.
(The Center Square) – Social isolation will increase as people increasingly use artificial intelligence companions, says a new study and poll from two Elon University research centers.
Microsoft is imposing monthly limits on Xbox Cloud Gaming starting in November, with Game Pass Ultimate, Premium, and Essential subscribers getting 15, 10, and 5 hours respectively before they have to buy additional playtime. "Currently, Game Pass subscribers can stream without these monthly hour limits," notes IGN. From the report: The change means those who use cloud gaming most via Game Pass will end up having to pay more, although Microsoft said this impacts 4% of Game Pass subscribers. Also in November, Microsoft said players will be able to buy cloud playtime hours through the Xbox Store and 'stream eligible games they own on supported devices' without subscribing to Game Pass.
In a blog post, Microsoft said it was making the changes because the cost of providing cloud gaming has grown as more people use it and play for longer. The monthly limits, Microsoft continued, will mean it can invest in reliability and performance. But it said it understood that for some players the practical result is a higher cost.
The deadlocked jury in the Lindsay Clancy trial went home without a verdict Thursday in a dramatic sixth day of deliberations.
Her defense lawyer told the judge that the panel’s foreperson said in a note that a single juror would not follow the court’s instructions about reasonable doubt and was holding up a verdict.
(The Center Square) – A Zapata County judge, his family members and campaign staff were served with search warrants as part of an ongoing investigation into voter fraud in the Texas border county.
A new MCP server lets AI agents operate Fuzzball under explicit permission, and the workflows running inside the cluster can now direct additional work themselves.
RENO, Nev., Sept. 3, 2026 — CIQ, the enterprise software company behind Rocky Linux, today announced Fuzzball 4.2, a release of its turnkey sovereign AI and HPC orchestration platform that helps organizations turn training and inference jobs from fragile infrastructure projects into reliable production workloads. The release also connects the platform to the agentic AI ecosystem, so an AI agent can now operate Fuzzball directly, and the workloads running inside it can orchestrate additional work themselves. Long-running AI workloads require infrastructure-aware reliability, and 4.2 builds that reliability into the platform itself, so enterprise teams can build, train, and serve their own models on hardware they already own.
Fuzzball 4.2 is agent-ready infrastructure. A new MCP server lets AI agents inspect a Fuzzball environment directly and draft, submit, and monitor workflows. Writes, workload execution, and destructive actions each require explicit permission, so every agent works inside boundaries an operator sets. Separately, workflows can now reach the Fuzzball API themselves. Every job and service container receives a workflow-scoped API credential and the cluster’s API address automatically, so a running job or service can submit, track, and stop additional workflows with no separate login and no long-lived shared secrets. That opens the door to more complex Fuzzball-native pipelines, and to hosted services that broker access to Fuzzball-managed compute for users who never touch the cluster directly. Taken together, an AI agent can now drive the platform, and the platform can now run an agent that does the same.
“Enterprises have moved their AI in-house faster than they have built the operations to run it. What decides whether that works is the software layer above the hardware, and Fuzzball 4.2 is that layer. Teams build, train, and serve on one platform, on infrastructure the organization governs, with their models and their data staying where they belong,” said Gregory Kurtzer, CEO and founder of CIQ and founder of Rocky Linux.
Fuzzball’s updated scheduling collects host and GPU health signals, assigns every node a reliability score, and incorporates that health directly into scheduling decisions. Jobs restart elsewhere when a node fault is detected, and Fuzzball automates controlled cordoning, draining, and replacement of degraded hardware, so organizations get more useful work from expensive infrastructure.
Production AI infrastructure must also safely serve more than one team. Organization-level storage isolation, default storage provisioners, and compute-policy grants allow enterprises and service providers to share large GPU environments while they maintain clear boundaries around data, infrastructure, and placement rights. Those boundaries rest on architecture rather than policy alone, because Fuzzball executes workloads unprivileged and rootless, an approach inherited from high-performance computing systems shared by thousands of users. Per-workflow accounting for compute, storage, and network egress gives operators visibility into what each workload consumed.
These capabilities change what an organization can do with accelerators it already owns. One GPU environment serves many teams at once, with enforced boundaries around each team’s data, storage, and placement rights. Inference services run as persistent endpoints in the same platform as the training that produced them, and the pipelines and agents that drive that work run there too. Models, weights, and data stay on infrastructure the organization owns and governs, on premises or in any supported cloud, with the same workflow definition in both places and every action auditable.
AMD ROCm GPU support expands Fuzzball’s ability to discover and schedule workloads across both NVIDIA and AMD infrastructure. As GPU vendors acquire the schedulers their customers depend on, Fuzzball remains hardware agnostic and independent of any single accelerator supplier, so enterprises buy the hardware that fits the workload without changing how they operate it.
Availability
Fuzzball 4.2 is available now. Fuzzball deploys to AWS, Google Cloud, Oracle Cloud, CoreWeave, and Azure, as well as on-premises clusters built with Warewulf, VMware, or bare metal. To get started, contact CIQ at ciq.com/products/fuzzball.
About CIQ
CIQ is the founding support and services partner for Rocky Linux and a leading provider of Enterprise Linux infrastructure. CIQ delivers commercially supported Linux offerings, high-performance computing solutions, and AI infrastructure to enterprises, government agencies, research institutions and supercomputing centers worldwide. CIQ’s products include the Rocky Linux from CIQ (RLC Pro) family of operating systems, Ascender Pro for IT automation, Fuzzball job-based container orchestration, Warewulf cluster provisioning and Apptainer, the leading container system for high-performance computing. For more information, visit ciq.com.
Wildfire victims rebuilt their homes in Lahaina only to find USPS had ‘eliminated’ their addresses – while houses that didn’t burn receive mail as normal
Two months after a devastating wildfire whipped through Lahaina in August 2023, Pam Reader was allowed back to see what was left of her home. With a heavy heart, she returned to the Hawaiian oceanside town now filled with endless blocks of burned houses. As she rounded her corner, she saw the only thing remaining was her bright turquoise mailbox.
“It was an old crappy mailbox,” Reader said. “It was metal, though, which is why I think it survived.”
One official in California said that scanning individual ballots for every voter in the state would take roughly 43 years based on the Postal Service's estimates.
OpenAI has released GPT-6 Astra, a new model that president Greg Brockman called a "generational leap" and suggested may represent the arrival of AGI. "I think it might be about this model," Brockman said in a briefing with reporters. He ended the briefing by saying: "Welcome to the AGI era." Axios reports: Astra pushes AI agents closer to doing complex professional work on their own -- while also raising questions about how safely they can be deployed. OpenAI said that Astra was built on its largest-ever training run, using more than 100,000 GPUs at its Stargate site in Texas.
The company also said this is its first model to use other models in a significant role in supervising Astra's training.
GPT-6 Astra will first be available to a limited set of organizations in OpenAI's Daybreak Access program and will be available "in the coming days" for ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Business and Enterprise customers and API developers.
OpenAI said earlier this week that Astra would be released soon, but that its most powerful cybersecurity capabilities would remain limited to a small group of trusted testers. Astra is the first model OpenAI has designated as reaching its "critical" cybersecurity threshold under its preparedness framework -- meaning it can potentially find and exploit previously unknown vulnerabilities across well-protected systems without step-by-step human guidance. OpenAI previously slowed Astra's release to add safety testing after determining that its cyber capabilities could reach the critical threshold. Further reading: OpenAI's New Reasoning Technique Alarms AI Safety Experts
Exclusive: New environment secretary insists ‘nothing is off the table’ in dealing with ailing Thames Water
Britain’s insolvency laws cannot deal with the aggressive behaviour shown by the companies that control Thames Water, the environment secretary has said, as she confirmed ministers were prepared to take it into public ownership.
Angela Eagle told the Guardian she was determined to reform the water industry after being told by Andy Burnham to make it her top priority.
By the time she died on Wednesday, at 92 years old at her home in New York, Gloria Steinem was synonymous with feminism, a kind of human mascot for the movement. So it can be easy to forget that when she was born, feminism was over. It was something that had been faddish years before, among women who were now old ladies; something that seemed, in retrospect, like it might have been a bit overwrought and out of touch. To the girl Gloria Steinem, growing up in Ohio in the 1930s and 40s, the suffrage movement that had gained women the right to vote less than two decades prior probably seemed remote – especially to a girl like her, growing up itinerant and poor under the care of a single mother who was plagued by a violent and debilitating mental illness. You might say that growing up, Steinem had worries that were more immediate than the status of women.
But experience has a way of radicalizing women about their own gendered condition. Steinem attended Smith, and her education opened up previously unhoped for possibilities. En route to a postgraduate fellowship in India in 1957, when she was in her early 20s, she had an illegal abortion in London. Later, in 1969, while she was working as a journalist for New York magazine, she attended an “abortion speak-out” put on by a group of radical women from the emergent fringe of what was then called the Women’s Liberation movement.
Exclusive: Angela Eagle urges UK citizens to be ‘a bit more resilient’ as they plan for national emergencies
British people have been urged to have enough food and water on hand to survive a few days without power or water, as the UN said the El Niño climate phenomenon was “supersizing before our eyes”, exacerbating extreme weather events worldwide.
Forecasters say they are braced for the biggest El Niño in 1,000 years, bringing wildfires and floods to parts of the world, and the threat of a wet, stormy winter for the UK.
As the British government plans a campaign urging citizens to prepare for national emergencies, Angela Eagle told the Guardian the likelihood of a wild winter showed the importance of keeping supplies at home.
Julio Sosa-Celis, who was shot in the leg by Christian Castro and survived, was one of three people shot by federal immigration agents during Trump’s ‘Operation Metro Surge’
A US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer has been indicted on charges of lying to investigators about the events leading up to the shooting of a Venezuelan man during the Minneapolis immigration crackdown earlier this year, according to multiple reports.
A source told the Associated Press that Christian Castro, the officer accused of shooting Julio Sosa-Celis in the leg in January, has been charged by US federal prosecutors with making false statements to federal investigators. He had been previously charged in state court.
Federal complaint does not charge human trafficking, but advocates say the allegations illustrate grooming tactics and vulnerabilities that can precede exploitation.
By George D. Rotsch, Editor of Delaware LIVE
DOVER, Del. — Federal charges against a Dover Air Force Base airman accused of using Snapchat to communicate with a 15-year-old girl before transporting her from Pennsylvania to Delaware are drawing renewed attention to online grooming, child exploitation and the warning signs of human trafficking.
Dylan Williams, 27, is charged with coercion and enticement, transportation with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, and travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct, according to a federal criminal complaint filed Aug. 28 in U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware.
Investigators allege Williams began communicating with the teenager through Snapchat in June, knew she was 15 and later drove from Delaware to Pennsylvania to pick her up. Authorities found the girl at Williams’ Camden-area residence Aug. 20 after her parents reported her missing, according to the complaint.
The FBI alleges Williams admitted picking up the girl and bringing her to Delaware. Court records also describe alleged sexual encounters in Pennsylvania and Delaware.
Williams is an active-duty airman stationed at Dover Air Force Base, according to the complaint. The Dover Police Department, FBI, Air Force Office of Special Investigations, U.S. Marshals Service and Pennsylvania authorities participated in the investigation.
The charges are accusations. Williams is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
Grooming can begin online
While the Williams complaint does not allege a commercial exchange, advocates say cases involving online enticement can help parents and the public understand tactics that also appear in trafficking cases.
Those tactics can include gradually gaining a young person’s trust, introducing sexual conversations, encouraging secrecy, isolating the child from family members and convincing the child to leave a safe environment.
Trafficking does not always involve kidnapping, physical restraint or an organized criminal network. Exploiters may present themselves as romantic partners, protectors, employers or friends before using emotional dependency, threats, housing instability, substance use or financial pressure to gain control.
Young people experiencing family conflict, homelessness, prior abuse, social isolation or a lack of stable adult support can be particularly vulnerable. Social media, gaming platforms and messaging applications can give offenders direct and private access to young people.
A child may not recognize the relationship as abusive and may believe he or she willingly participated. Advocates say that makes it important for adults to look beyond whether a young person describes the relationship as consensual.
Delaware cases remain underreported
The full extent of trafficking in Delaware is difficult to measure because victims may fear retaliation, distrust authorities, depend on their trafficker or not recognize that they are being exploited.
The National Human Trafficking Hotline identified 32 trafficking cases involving 61 victims in Delaware during 2024. The organization identified 31 cases in 2023, 28 in 2022, 30 in 2021 and 26 in 2020.
Those figures represent situations reported to and identified by the hotline. They are not a count of arrests or prosecutions and should not be treated as a complete measure of trafficking in Delaware, according to the National Human Trafficking Hotline.
Delaware’s location between Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, combined with its major highways, tourism industry and seasonal workforce, creates opportunities for both sex and labor exploitation. However, advocates caution against assuming trafficking is primarily caused by interstate highways or strangers moving victims from place to place.
Many cases originate within families, relationships, workplaces or online communications involving people the victim knows.
Summit aims to improve recognition
The Delaware Coalition for Human Trafficking Survivors will bring survivors, national experts, law enforcement officials, medical providers, mental health professionals and community leaders together for Delaware’s inaugural Human Trafficking Awareness, Prevention and Action Summit.
The public summit will be held Friday, Oct. 2, at Hyatt Place Dewey Beach. Registration remains open through Sept. 18.
The program is intended to explain what trafficking looks like in Delaware, challenge common misconceptions and help professionals and residents recognize potential exploitation without putting a victim in greater danger.
Sessions will focus on survivor experiences, law enforcement, mental health, direct services and medical care. Topics are expected to include familial trafficking, trauma affecting children and adults, substance use, multidisciplinary response teams and vulnerabilities affecting boys and members of the LGBTQ community.
Kevin McNeil, a retired police officer and survivor of trafficking and sexual abuse, will deliver the opening keynote address. Survivor, therapist, author and comedian Marty MacGibbon will discuss the intersection of trafficking and substance abuse and close the conference with a presentation on mental wellness, self-care and trauma-informed practices.
The summit is open not only to professionals but also to parents, educators, business owners, hospitality employees, faith leaders, volunteers and other residents who want to understand the warning signs.
The Delaware Coalition for Human Trafficking Survivors was established in 2014 as Meet Me at the Well Delaware. The organization provides individualized support to survivors seeking to leave sex trafficking and rebuild their lives, including mentoring, advocacy and connections to housing, employment and treatment.
To Go Box
What: Human Trafficking Awareness, Prevention and Action Summit
When: Friday, Oct. 2, 2026
Where: Hyatt Place Dewey Beach, 1301 Coastal Highway, Dewey Beach
Who may attend: Professionals, organizational leaders, service providers and members of the public
Report suspected trafficking: Call the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888 or text 233733. Call 911 when someone is in immediate danger.
The former Arsenal, Barcelona and France star says players shouldn’t underestimate their ability to change how football works
As Fifa continues to face scrutiny from some confederations and fans, Thierry Henry has encouraged players to use their voice as the political battle for control of international soccer unfolds. The former Arsenal and Barcelona forward turned pundit spoke with the Guardian on Tuesday alongside Kate Scott and Jamie Carragher as CBS and Paramount prepare for this season’s Champions League broadcasts.
“For me, the players have more power than they think they have,” Henry said when asked for his thoughts on the situation. “And if they want it to change, they can make it happen – especially nowadays.”
This is an extract from Soccer Desk, a newsletter from the Guardian US. Subscribe for free here.
Liz Oyer says department fired her after she refused to recommend restoring gun rights of actor and Trump ally
The former pardon attorney for the US justice department, Elizabeth Oyer, filed a lawsuit on Thursday against the department and attorney general Todd Blanche, accusing them of “unlawfully” firing her last year after she said she refused to recommend restoring actor Mel Gibson’s gun rights.
In the complaint, filed in the US district court for the District of Columbia, Oyer alleges that in early 2025, while she was serving as pardon attorney, she was asked to “disregard her duties and facilitate a political favor” for Gibson based on his “relationship with President Trump”.
Office for Students made decision to punish University of Sussex with fine last year after claiming it breached free speech regulations
England’s higher education regulator has apologised for a string of mistakes in its decision to punish the University of Sussex with a record fine that was later overturned by the high court.
The Office for Students (OfS) tried to impose a £585,000 fine against Sussex last year after claiming the university breached free speech regulations involving its former professor Kathleen Stock. It was forced to back down in April after a judicial review initiated by Sussex found the OfS “had closed its mind” and acted with bias.
Nvidia has launched PAIR, a free open-source tool that links compatible computers on a home network so they can pool idle processing power for local AI inference and agentic workloads. "While the compatible devices are mostly Nvidia GeForce GPUs (PAIR works with RTX 20-series cards and newer, as well as RTX Pro GPUs and DGX Spark systems), Apple's M4 chips or newer will also work," reports The Verge. From the report: The key thing here is that PAIR uses your in-home systems when they're idle to avoid interfering with other tasks. And this disaggregated system of computers can work in parallel to chew through lots of processing requests -- which should be helpful for an agentic workflow that breaks complex tasks into smaller jobs. This should prevent large bottlenecks on a single GPU, and Nvidia says PAIR can adapt as devices join or leave the network -- including if a user does something like start playing a game on their desktop PC.
[...] Nvidia says PAIR is secured by pairing all devices through a six digit code and then securing the channel via mTLS (Mutual Transport Layer Security), to create an encrypted communication line that's trusted in both directions between computers. The Nvidia PAIR beta is available today, with support for Windows, Linux, and macOS.
The Justice Department is planning to try to use a legal regime last used during the Spanish-American War to speed up the seizure of ships and their cargo during the Iran conflict.
The Pentagon will begin requiring male service members ages 30 and older to get screened for testosterone deficiency, after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth called for the change over the summer.
After more than two years in pilot mode, the National Science Foundation this week announced that it’s releasing the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) into full operational mode with the launch of the NAIRR-Operations Center. The San Diego Supercomputer Center will take the lead in managing the NAIRR-OC with assistance from the Texas Advanced Computing Center.
The NAIRR Pilot program was launched by the NSF in January of 2024 to promote the study of AI for science in the nation’s 4,000 colleges and universities. The pilot program, which was originally allocated an $800 million per-year budget, ultimately resulted in more than 700 different projects at universities, impacting 7,000 students across all 50 states.
The pilot program’s success ultimately led the Trump Administration to shift NAIRR into a full program, as NSF’s Senior Advisor for Cyberinfrastructure Katie Antypas said three months ago in a keynote address at the Trillion Parameter Consortium’s 2026 conference in Baltimore, Maryland.
NAIRR-OC leaders (clockwise from upper left): Frank Würthwein, Ashley Atkins, Maytal Dahan, Subhashini Sivagnanam, Mahidhar Tatineni (Image courtesy SDSC)
The announcement this week helps to flesh out NAIRR will look like in the future. The NSF has awarded the University of California, San Diego’s SDSC a $35 million grant to manage the NAIRR-OC for the next three years. TACC, which is located at the University of Texas, Austin, will take a supporting role with NAIRR-OC.
NAIRR-OC will be headed by SDSC Director Frank Würthwein, who also takes the role of principal investigator for the program. He will be assisted by Maytal Dahan, the director of the Advanced Computing Interfaces at TACC, who will be a NAIRR-OC co-principal investigator. SDSC Deputy Director Ashley Atkins is a NAIRR-OC co-principal investigator and deputy director, while Subhashini Sivagnanam, director of SDSC’s Cyberinfrastructure Solutions and Services, and Mahidhar Tatineni, director of SDSC’s User Services, are also listed as NAIRR-OC co-PIs.
The two supercomputing centers will work together to meet NAIRR goals by 2030. Some of the tasks include: coordinating funding among federal, private, and academic providers; integrating the necessary compute, data, AI, and other software; building and operating a unified national NAIRR portal; providing user support, documentation, training, outreach and engagement; establishing a NAIRR user forum and feedback channels; leading the transition of functions from the NAIRR Pilot into long-term national infrastructure; and identifying challenges that prevent researchers, educators and students from fully engaging in AI-enabled discovery.
“The NAIRR-OC is an important step toward making advanced AI resources genuinely usable by researchers, educators and students across the country,” Würthwein stated. “By expanding access, we can enable ambitious ideas and discoveries that might otherwise remain out of reach.”
The two universities will support the NAIRR-OC in different ways. UCSD hosts the National Data Platform (NDP) and National Research Platform (NRP), while TACC leads the NSF Leadership-Class Computing Facility (NSF LCCF). TACC recently installed Horizon, a new Dell PowerEdge cluster with 360 petaflops of high-performance compute.
The universities will also help coordinate three other NSF programs via NAIRR-OC, including the NSF State and Regional AI Infrastructure Hubs program, the NSF Integrated Data Systems and Services program, and the NSF Unlocking Dataset Value for AI-Enabled Scientific Discovery program. The NSF says that by connecting these regional resources, national data systems and scientific datasets with capabilities available through NAIRR “will create a stronger national ecosystem for AI-enabled scientific discovery.”
Some patients and doctors are calling on the FDA to formally recognize a shortage of the medications, saying the agency's shortage database does not reflect problems they are seeing at pharmacies.
We are pleased to announce the release of ReactOS 0.4.16! After a year and a half of development, we’re excited to showcase the improvements we’ve made between a new graphical installer; a unified bootcd and livecd image; video, audio, networking, and storage stack improvements; a new installation type; and third-party code syncs.
The amount of changes and improvements is quite staggering, honestly. They’ll always be chasing a moving target, sure, but if they manage to keep this rate up ReactOS might actually grow into something usable in its own right, full compatibility with Windows or not. Excellent progress.
Astra’s arrival comes days after Sam Altman, OpenAI’s chief executive, described AGI as an ‘irrelevant marketing term’
The president of OpenAI, Greg Brockman, has claimed the world has entered a new era of artificial general intelligence after the release of his company’s latest model, Astra, which it described as the “world’s most intelligent and aligned model”.
Brockman made the claim on Thursday as the San Francisco company released the model only weeks after a serious AI safety incident involving other models under its development caused international concern and a pause in Astra’s training.
Bartiromo had been a host at the network for more than a decade and Fox gave no explanation for the decision
Fox News Media on Thursday abruptly ousted one of its most well-known hosts and anchors, Maria Bartiromo, without providing an explanation.
“Effective today, Maria Bartiromo is no longer with FOX News Media,” the network said in a press release, adding in a statement: “We thank Maria for her work over the last 12 and a half years and wish her all the best on her next chapter.”
Leading figures from politics, entertainment and wider society led glowing tributes to Gloria Steinem on Thursday, with Hillary Clinton hailing the American feminist icon who died at 92 at home in New York City as “one of the architects of the entire structure of women’s equality”.
Clinton, a former US secretary of state, presidential candidate and first lady, was among the first to jump in with praise early on Thursday when she appeared on the CBS Mornings TV show to share her respect and gratitude for Steinem.
The man suspected of killing two people and injuring six others in a mass shooting at a downtown Minneapolis apartment complex Wednesday was facing eviction after a string of incidents including assault and allegedly showing a gun to apartment management, according to court documents.
Itamar Ben-Gvir claims proposal for illegal forced displacement of 2 million people is ‘realistic’ and ‘concrete’
Israel’s far-right national security minister has set out a plan for the illegal forced expulsion of all Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, with the intention of sending them abroad.
Speaking in the run-up to close-fought Israeli elections, Itamar Ben-Gvir said the plan aimed to remove 250,000 Palestinians from Gaza in the first year, followed by the rest of its population of roughly 2 million over the next six years.
Rhododendron ferrugineum (rusty-leaved alpenrose) on the western slopes of Mount Schrankogel in Tyrol (Austria) in front of Bockkogel. (Kryštof Chytrý via SWNS)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: OpenAI's new Astra model will use a reasoning technique called "recurrent depth" that allows it to operate outside of the sequential thinking that characterizes most reasoning models, The Information reported on Tuesday. This technique, also called "opaque recurrence," will likely make the model's chain of thought more difficult to monitor -- and that has AI safety experts rattled. While Astra's use of the technique is reportedly limited, its emergence has still raised significant concerns among AI safety experts.
"I am extremely concerned by the reporting that Astra uses opaque recurrence," wrote Redwood CEO Buck Shlegeris in a post after the news broke. "I don't know whether Astra is much less CoT monitorable than previous models. But if OpenAI pushes this technique further, they'll have the option to massively increase the recurrence and totally destroys CoT monitorability."
Longtime AI safety advocate Zvi Mowshowitz also weighed in and wrote that laws might be necessary to prevent a "race to the bottom" among AI labs. "The technique is playing with fire, risking a taboo that OpenAI and Anthropic have fought to establish that we work hard to maintain Chain of Thought faithfulness and monitorability for as long as we can," Mowshowitz wrote. "More intensive use of such techniques would probably damage monitorability."
[...] In a post responding to the news, Redwood Research chief scientist Ryan Greenblatt said opaque reasoning could easily scale faster than conventional chain-of-thought reasoning, effectively removing all reasoning from visible channels. "My biggest concern is that a natural progression from here would involve scaling up the opaque reasoning to the point where the model reasons entirely or almost entirely in latent space," Greenblatt wrote. "I hope it isn't too late to avoid the most concerning architectures and that OpenAI will stop here." Astra's use of the technique appears limited. "OpenAI has worked to preserve and utilize chain-of-thought monitoring since our very first reasoning models," wrote OpenAI chief scientist Jakub Pachocki. "It's a core goal of our current research program."
(The Center Square) – Federal prosecutors are charging an ICE agent with making false statements in connection with a shooting during Operation Metro Surge, according to an anonymous AP source.
Opposition mounts as at least 20 projects proposed, including one in Fife billed as second largest in world
Kat Jones may be the closest thing Scotland has to Erin Brockovich in 2026. Standing in the shadow of Arthur’s Seat outside Holyrood, the 52-year-old is revving up the crowd of protesters around her. “Who is here from Lammermuir? Ayrshire? What about Aberdeen?” she calls to the crowd.
On Thursday, hundreds travelled to Edinburgh to call for an immediate moratorium on Scotland’s datacentre boom, which includes one project in Auchtertool, Fife, that has been billed as the second largest in the world.
See every state candidate running for every office on your ballot, all in one place.
DOVER, Del. — Delaware voters head to the polls Sept. 15 for a primary that will decide the Democratic and Republican nominees for U.S. Senate, U.S. House, attorney general and state treasurer, along with dozens of state Senate and House seats across all three counties. For early voting dates, hours and locations, see Delaware LIVE’s full voter guide.
Most legislative seats up this cycle aren’t actually contested, incumbents in both parties are running unopposed in a majority of districts. But where there is a race, it’s often a real one: Senator Chris Coons faces three Democratic challengers, eight legislative seats are open due to retirements, and one House district, District 8, has a contested primary on both sides at once. Six Republican candidates across these races are also still listed as “provisional” with the state still awaiting SBI criminal background check and residency review. Read more about how those late nominations came about here.
Not sure which state Senate or House district you’re in? Look up your district by address at the state’s official district lookup tool before checking Tables 2 and 3 below.
Locally, New Castle County is losing two of its longest-serving council members this cycle. Councilman Penrose Hollins, who represents District 4, is retiring after decades in office and has endorsed Curtis Linton to succeed him. Read his full profile and endorsement here. Councilwoman Janet Kilpatrick’s District 3 seat has drawn a head-to-head Democratic primary between Kira Alejandro and Kyle Grantham. Read their side-by-side profile here.
New Castle County residents: County Council and Recorder of Deeds are covered below. Kent and Sussex County residents don’t vote on these two offices, but you do have your own county-level races on the Nov. 3 ballot: Kent County has a Levy Court seat and Recorder of Deeds; Sussex County has two County Council seats and Recorder of Deeds. None required a primary, so they’re not listed here, but you can look up your full ballot here.
Not sure which New Castle County Council district you’re in? The same district lookup tool from above will show you that too.
(The Center Square) - Colorado is set to mail ballots to all of its registered voters for the November midterm elections as usual despite ongoing litigation surrounding a federal order and conflicting judicial rulings about the U.S. Postal Service.
From left: Pa. Department of Labor and Industry Secretary Nancy Walker, State Rep. Jamie Flick, Erica Mulberger, executive director of Advance Central PA, and Lycoming County Commissioner Mark Mussina.
Police say two lorries were driven into industrial estate in Runcorn and attached to trailers holding about 800 barrels
The famous tagline “Guinness is good for you” applies only when the drink is bought and paid for, police have said, after thieves made off with more than 70,000 pints’ worth in Cheshire.
Officers said they believed two lorries were driven into a depot in Runcorn on Monday and attached to waiting trailers holding a combined total of about 800 barrels before being driven away.
A Maltese businessman has been cleared of involvement in the journalist’s death, but his trial revealed the challenges faced by those leading the search for her killers
The conclusion of the longest-running murder trial in Maltese history has left a country in turmoil, and a grieving family still searching for answers.
At 7.30pm on Wednesday, gasps and cheers echoed around hall 22 of the courts of justice in Valletta, as a jury pronounced a businessman accused of ordering the murder of the investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia not guilty.
Sept. 3, 2026 — Forschungszentrum Jülich and Siegen-based start-up eleQtron have officially inaugurated the quantum computer JION. Developed in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), JION will be made available to research institutions and industry through the JUNIQ user infrastructure, enabling hybrid computations with Jülich’s supercomputers. NRW Minister-President Hendrik Wüst and NRW Science Minister Ina Brandes hailed JION as a technological milestone.
Inside the computer: Prof. Dr. Dr. Thomas Lippert, Director of JSC, and Prof. Dr. Kristel Michielsen, Director of JSC, Dr. Michael Johanning, CTO of eleQtron, Prof. Dr. Astrid Lambrecht, Chair of the Executive Board of Forschungszentrum Jülich, Minister Ina Brandes, Minister President Hendrik Wüst, Jan Leisse, CEO of eleQtron, are standing in the room with the JION ion-trap quantum computer. Credit: Forschungszentrum Jülich / Kurt Steinhausen.
The inauguration ceremony at the Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC) of Forschungszentrum Jülich focused on a shared political, scientific, and technological breakthrough. Minister-President Wüst and Minister Brandes emphasized the importance of JION for North Rhine-Westphalia as a research and industrial hub. The ceremony served to underline the close collaboration between politics, research, and industry. As a symbolic part of the ceremony, a computing operation was performed publicly on JION for the first time.
JION – short for “Jülich trapped-ION quantum computer” – is a digital, gate-based trapped-ion quantum computer. Its qubits consist of ionized ytterbium atoms, which are held in a vacuum by electromagnetic fields and precisely controlled for computations. Unlike superconducting systems, the quantum processor does not need to be operated at temperatures close to absolute zero. To control the qubits, JION utilizes the magnetic gradient induced coupling (MAGIC) technology developed in Siegen. Microwaves and deliberately generated variations in the magnetic field allow the qubits to be controlled individually and connected directly to one another. This simplifies control and could facilitate the development of larger, more powerful quantum systems in the future.
JION is being realized as part of the EPIQ project – a development partnership for trapped-ion quantum computers in NRW. When the project was launched in Siegen in March 2024, JSC and eleQtron announced that they would jointly develop a modular supercomputer consisting of a quantum module and several classical digital modules. The Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia is providing around € 21 million in funding to the partnership over a four-and-a-half-year period. EPIQ was born out of the quantum computing network “EIN Quantum NRW.”
From Project Launch to an Integrated System
With today’s inauguration, this project has developed into a fully operational system at Forschungszentrum Jülich. JION is set to open up new prospects for applications in science and industry, for example in optimization tasks in logistics, transport, and process engineering, as well as in physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, materials research, and machine learning.
JUNIQ: Access and Hybrid Use
JION will be integrated into the Jülich UNified Infrastructure for Quantum computing (JUNIQ), making it part of Forschungszentrum Jülich’s modular supercomputer architecture. JUNIQ provides access to various quantum systems and connects them to JSC’s high-performance computing (HPC) infrastructure. With JUNIQ, certain computing operations can be offloaded to quantum systems when using classical JSC supercomputers.
In future, researchers and companies will be able to use JION to test hybrid HPC–quantum computing workflows and prepare applications. JUNIQ thus makes the system more than just a demonstrator and strengthens Jülich’s position as a centre for integration, benchmarking, and user applications. Within the EPIQ project, service, support, and training will also be offered for JION, supporting users from science and industry.
Next Step: Scaling and Industrial Application
As part of the inauguration ceremony, Minister-President Hendrik Wüst, presented the funding approval for SQALING (scalable quantum computing from NRW). eleQtron’s independent development project is being funded by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia with up to around € 25 million from EU funds through the ERDF/JTF programme in NRW. The aim is to further develop the trapped-ion technology developed in Siegen into scalable, chip-based quantum computing platforms that could potentially also be used in industry. While JION demonstrates what has already been built, SQALING represents the next development stage. Together, the two projects are intended to help strengthen technological expertise and economic value creation in Germany.
The funding approval for the new Q-STAR.NRW project was also presented. The aim of Q-STAR.NRW is to procure and integrate a scalable semiconductor quantum computer into JUNIQ, with the aim of strengthening research, industrial collaboration, and structural change in the Rhenish mining area. Funded with up to around € 25 million from structural funding for the Rhenish mining area under the Investment Act for Coal Regions (InvKG) and by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, the project aims to integrate a system with up to 200 qubits. Like EPIQ and SQALING, Q-STAR.NRW will strengthen North Rhine-Westphalia’s technological sovereignty, increase the international visibility of the Rhenish mining area as a high-tech location, and establish a high-performance innovation ecosystem for quantum computing. This in turn will enable long-term value creation, new industries, and sustainable employment in the region.
“With JION, we are bringing together a quantum computer developed in North Rhine-Westphalia with our high-performance supercomputing infrastructure here at Jülich,” said Prof. Astrid Lambrecht, Chair of the Board of Directors at Forschungszentrum Jülich. “In doing so, we are creating the conditions for combining quantum computing and high-performance computing, allowing us to use quantum computing to address specific problems in research and industry.”
“JUNIQ provides access to a range of quantum computers and allows their performance to be compared,” said Prof. Kristel Michielsen, head of the Jülich Supercomputing Centre. “With JION, we are expanding this unique user platform to include a trapped-ion system from North Rhine-Westphalia and connecting it to our HPC infrastructure – for research and industrial applications.”
BrianFagioli writes: Audacity 4.0 has been released with a rebuilt Qt interface, a new clip-editing model, customizable workspaces, native high-DPI rendering, and a new AUP4 project format. The open source audio editor also adds ASIO playback and recording support to official Windows builds, while bringing major changes to recording, playback, plugins, and project handling. The overhaul comes with some tradeoffs. Audacity 4.0 currently lacks several features found in Audacity 3, including Time Tracks, Note and MIDI tracks, Mixer, Macro Manager and scripting pipe, VAMP and LADSPA plugin hosting, and play-at-speed. The developers say they plan to bring the missing functionality back in future releases.
Semi-conductor giant bets that support for open AI models could offset potential slowdown in demand for chips
Nvidia will buy the popular developer platform Hugging Face for nearly $13bn, betting that support for open AI models could offset a potential slowdown in demand for the semiconductor giant’s chips.
Shares in Nvidia were slightly lower after the $12.93bn (£9.57bn) deal – which ranks among its biggest ever – was announced for the database of AI models on Thursday.
During the height of President Donald Trump’s winter immigration enforcement surge in Minneapolis, a new AI-driven “alien” targeting app appeared on the phones of U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement deportation officers.
Created by tech giant Palantir, a CIA-backed firm known for data mining and using artificial intelligence for everything from warfighting to “predictive policing,”the ELITE app helps ICE target immigrants and issues a “confidence score” for how accurate the information on a target is. The app analyzes data from government agencies and other sources, producing dossiers on targets, compiling them into lists, and mapping their locations.
Thousands of the new ICE hires, then, were able to hit the streets without cleared background checks, according to reporting by Reuters in early 2026.
“Some of these guys should’ve never been hired, let alone have access to the information on ELITE.”
The hiring spree at ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations division, coupled with the powerful new handheld technology of the ELITE app, created potential civil liberties nightmares and threats to national security, according to ICE whistleblowers, former Department of Homeland Security officials, and legal experts who spoke to The Intercept.
“No one should have been hired by DHS before background reviews were completed. This never happened in previous administrations,” said Mary Ellen Callahan, former chief of staff to the deputy secretary of Homeland Security. “Furthermore, giving the newly hired ICE ERO staff access to sensitive databases such as ELITE threatens public safety by allowing non-vetted teams to access and potentially misuse data.”
The ELITE app, Callahan said, did not go through the usual process government tools undergo to prevent abuses and ensure privacy rights.
“It’s one of the first applications they give new officers so they can start working,” said one ICE deportation officer who came through the hiring surge. “You can access it without full background clearance.”
“Some of these guys should’ve never been hired, let alone have access to the information on ELITE,” the officer, who asked for anonymity to protect their livelihood, told The Intercept.
Every ICE deportation officer is issued a phone, where the ELITE app comes standard, according to five ICE officials who spoke to The Intercept. (Neither the Department of Homeland Security nor Palantir responded to requests for comment.)
The five ICE officials, who each work in different regions across the country, said deportation officers without completed background checks continue to work in all their jurisdictions, some of whom were hired nearly a year ago.
No Privacy Assessment
ELITE’s user guide identifies a dozen distinct sources that the app draws from. The databases include sensitive data sets like addresses, criminal histories, immigration records, court rulings, and other personal information about both immigrants and U.S. citizens.
Much of that information would constitute what the government calls PII, or personally identifiable information. According to a Department of Homeland Security document that catalogs the agency’s use of artificial intelligence, the ELITE app does involve PII.
A 2002 law, however, says that government agencies must conduct and publish the findings of a “privacy impact assessment” for “all new or substantially changed technology that collects, maintains, or disseminates personally identifiable information (PII),” according to a Justice Department summary of the statute.
The processes are designed to assess how technology affects personal privacy and outline what safeguards are in place to ensure accountability if systems are misused.
“You can access it without full background clearance.”
Yet the Department of Homeland Security privacy office hasn’t published an assessment for ELITE, according to Callahan, the former Homeland Security official, who also served as the department’s chief privacy officer.
“The DHS privacy office should have worked with ICE to publish a privacy impact assessment,” said Callahan, noting a general lack of productivity by the privacy office. “In fact, the DHS privacy office has only published one PIA all year. In comparison, I published 228 PIAs in my three-and-a-half years as privacy officer.”
The failure to conduct a privacy impact assessment has a profound impact on transparency and accountability, the very aspects of privacy policy the E-Government Act of 2002 was intended to regulate.
“This is not a technicality,” said Clare Garvie, a privacy lawyer and deputy director of technology policy at the New York University Law School’s Policing Project. “PIAs are an essential component of transparency and privacy governance, they are how the public understands what information is collected about us, how long it is kept, who can use it, and what remedies exist if it is wrong or subject to misuse.”
“If ICE can’t fulfill this prerequisite,” Garvie said, “I lack confidence in its ability to use the tool in a lawful, privacy-protective manner in the field.”
The Department of Homeland Security site for cataloging its uses of AI does list a privacy impact assessment on its page for ELITE, but the assessment is not actually for the ELITE app. Instead, the link goes to a 2019 privacy assessment for ICE’s Enforcement Integrated Database.
The Enforcement Integrated Database is just one of the systems ELITE incorporates into its searches, meaning the PIA only scratches the surface of what personally identifying information appears in ELITE and how the app organizes the data.
“The document DHS points to as fulfilling this obligation was updated in 2019, years before it acquired ELITE,” said Garvie. “This PIA completely fails to describe the app’s data sources, its AI analysis, or the inferences it produces that are used to focus immigration investigations and removal operations.”
Public concerns surrounding the incorporation of AI surveillance in law enforcement — including ICE’s new AI initiative to combat doxing of its staff — are reaching a boiling point in the U.S. today, leaving some ICE officials concerned.
“I know I sound crazy, but this is 1984 shit,” said another ICE official familiar with ELITE who requested anonymity to protect their job. “ELITE is used on illegal immigrants right now but can easily be used on Americans.”
NFL reporter resigned after fallout from photo scandal
Patriots coach, Russini were pictured at Arizona resort
Investigation unable to find ‘exact nature’ of relationship
The Athletic’s internal investigation found that the relationship between former NFL reporter Dianna Russini and New England Patriots coach Mike Vrabel was in “clear violation” of the newsroom’s standards.
The outlet, which is owned by the New York Times, released a report Thursday detailing the findings of a five-months-long investigation. Mike Semel, the Athletic’s editorial director for standards and quality, wrote that he was unable to find signs of clear bias in her coverage or determine the exact “nature of their relationship”, but said it gave the appearance of a conflict of interest.
The Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has questioned Donald Trump’s oil deal with Venezuela’s interim government, saying the country’s natural resources do not belong to “an illegitimate regime”.
In her first public comments since Trump announced what he called “the biggest oil deal in world history” with Venezuela last Friday, Machado walked a diplomatic tightrope between challenging the agreement and trying not to rile the White House.
GOP-backed bill mandates institutions receiving federal funds not impose restrictions on programs related to Israel
The US House of Representatives on Thursday passed a Republican-backed bill that would penalize universities that participate in boycotts of Israel, or attempt to prevent students from taking part in exchange programs with the country.
The Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act passed by a 237-169 vote, with 33 Democrats breaking with the rest of their party to vote in favor, and only two Republicans opposed. It now goes to the Senate for consideration.
Homeowners in the UK are braced for a jump in mortgage rates, driven by higher inflation and interest rate increase expectations amid turmoil in the global bond markets.
UK swap rates, which lenders use to price mortgages, have risen to a three-year high, as this week’s global bond market sell-off ripples through the economy.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has told people close to him that Sean Parnell would be his top choice for secretary of the Army, several senior officials told CBS News.
Google released Gemini 3.8 Flash, its third Flash model in six weeks, claiming it's their best reasoning and coding model yet (topping the DeepSWE leaderboard). Ars Technica reports: Gemini 3.8 Flash comes in two variations. There's the standard Flash, which Google describes as a "workhorse" model that's good for anything from agentic tasks to software development. Then we have Gemini 3.8 Flash Cyber, which runs on the same foundations but has been tuned for vulnerability detection and mitigation.
For developers, Google has the same pitch as it did for the 3.7 Flash release just a couple of weeks ago. API access to the model is available at an "introductory rate" through the end of the year: $0.75 per million input tokens and $3.75 per million output tokens. The regular price will be $1.50 / $7.50, but it's likely there will be new models available long before the price changes. Google probably sees the lower prices as a necessity given that other AI labs have recently dropped token pricing to keep increasingly wary businesses engaged with AI tools.
[...] Gemini 3.8 Flash will be available across the Google ecosystem starting today, but Gemini 3.8 Flash Cyber is currently limited to trusted testers and governments. Like the past Flash release, you'll need a Pro or Ultra subscription to access Gemini 3.8 Flash in the Gemini app, but you can always visit AI Studio if you want to tinker with it for free.
LONDON, Sept. 3, 2026 — Quantum Motion today announced the second close of its series C funding round to accelerate the scale-up of its fault-tolerant quantum hardware. This second close of the series C round led by DCVC and Kembara contributes investments from Imec.ventures, Lansdowne Partners, Sony Innovation Fund, S3 Ventures, and Inkef.
The funding will drive custom silicon co-development, leverage global semiconductor manufacturing pipelines and build upon key milestones including international expansion, notably opening US lab in Maryland, and participation in stage B of DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI).
Quantum Motion is deliberately focused on industrial scalability. While many alternative quantum computing architectures carry a price tag upwards of $100 million per machine, because of the need for bespoke specialised hardware, Quantum Motion’s silicon transistor-based approach using the standard silicon CMOS fabrication technology used in everyday chip manufacturing enables a 100-fold reduction in cost to single digit millions. Its systems are designed to be deployed into standard data-centre environments and racks, with a 100-fold reduction in space and 1000-fold reduction in energy consumption compared to alternatives.
“Silicon technology transformed classical computing and it remains the only platform capable of delivering the density and scale required for practical quantum utility,” said James Palles-Dimmock, CEO of Quantum Motion. “This commitment from major strategic and financial investors validates our engineering-first strategy and will accelerate our progress towards a utility scale quantum computer. By tapping into existing global semiconductor supply chains, we are bypassing the cost bottlenecks of bespoke manufacturing and bringing commercially viable quantum systems to market faster.”
“Our investment goes beyond capital; it is a commitment to co-developing disruptive silicon innovation that moves the entire industry forward. Quantum Motion’s track record of translating silicon research into market-ready solutions speaks for itself. We are investing in Quantum Motion because of its demonstrated ability to execute and scale where others face bottlenecks. By providing deep technical support and ecosystem access, we will help it build on this momentum,” said Olivier Rousseaux, head of imec.ventures.
“Quantum Motion is operating in an incredibly exciting area of technology and has made strong progress to date. We are very excited by the team’s approach in silicon, and the milestones achieved across performance and manufacturing. We are pleased to back this company through the next stages of development,” said Peter Davies, senior partner and head of Developed Markets at Lansdowne Partners.
“Sony Innovation Fund invests in entrepreneurs developing technologies with the potential to create meaningful impact across industries. Quantum Motion stands out for its pragmatic, engineering-led approach leveraging established semiconductor manufacturing to accelerate the path to commercially viable quantum computing. The team has consistently executed against an ambitious roadmap, demonstrated through the deployment of their full-stack silicon CMOS system at the UK’s National Quantum Computing Centre. We are excited to deepen our investment and leverage our global network as Quantum Motion continues to scale its business and technology,” said Antonio Avitabile, managing director EU at Sony Innovation Fund.
“While alternative architectures rely on bespoke hardware costing upwards of $100 million per machine, Quantum Motion leverages existing semiconductor infrastructure to drive costs down to single-digit millions at volume. As Andy Kessler famously noted, ‘CMOS always wins.’ Quantum Motion’s progress proves that silicon spin is the most scalable, cost-effective path to practical quantum utility,” said Aaron Perman, general partner at S3 Ventures.
“Realizing useful quantum computing isn’t just a physics problem, it’s a manufacturing problem. Quantum Motion is the only company tackling scale from within a semiconductor supply chain that already operates globally. We’ve backed their contrarian vision since 2020, and their recent milestones prove that the future of quantum is being built on standard silicon,” said Frank Lansink, general partner at Inkef.
Quantum Motion is building utility-scale quantum computers using industry-standard silicon transistors. The proprietary architecture uses a scalable array of qubits, manufactured with the same silicon technology found in smartphones and computers. The result is the most scalable, cost-efficient and energy-efficient quantum computers, which also fit inside existing industry standard data centres. The company operates offices and labs in the UK, Spain and Australia. Learn more at www.quantummotion.com.
Labour chair says uch cuts ‘could mean vital public services like hospitals, schools and law enforcement are put at risk’
The Electoral Commission has released political donation figures for the second quarter of 2026. They show that Reform UK continues to rake in far more than other parties. Nigel Farage’’s party had declared donations worth £5.3m. Labour got £3.6m, and the Conservatives £2.8m.
Most of Reform UK’s money came from Ben Delo, who gave £4m. As Rowena Mason reported earlier this year, Delo is a British billionaire convicted in the US for failing to implement adequate anti-money-laundering controls in his cryptocurrency business.
Q: Did the Trump administration have 60 cherry blossom trees cut down in D.C. to build a golf course?
A: In what the Department of Interior called “routine maintenance,” about 60 trees were removed from East Potomac Park, according to the Washington Post. But only one cherry tree removal was mentioned in that article, and an advocacy group opposed to major changes to the park told us it only knew “for certain” of one cherry tree being cut down.
FULL ANSWER
In a June 28 Truth Social post, President Donald Trump said that renovations to Washington, D.C.’s East Potomac Golf Links would begin Sept. 1 to build “one of the Greatest Golf Courses anywhere in the World” that could “host Major Golf Tournaments.” No major renovations have begun yet. The public golf courses include two nine-hole courses, an 18-hole course, a driving range and other facilities.
As of Sept. 3, tee times were available for booking on the website over the following week for all three courses. The East Potomac Park area also includes bicycle lanes and picnic areas. It’s unclear what the exact renovation plans are, and the project is subject to a lawsuit filed by a preservation group and two D.C.-area golfers.
People play golf as the Washington Monument is visible in the background at the East Potomac Golf Links on May 3 in Washington, D.C. Photo by Pete Kiehart for The Washington Post via Getty Images.
The potential removal of historic cherry trees became a concern this summer, after Trump was photographed at the golf course on June 28 holding renderings of a redesigned course. The Washington Post wrote at the time that those plans “do not appear to show several of the park’s best-known public amenities, including the riverside bicycle trail, the miniature golf course and Washington’s oldest grove of cherry trees.”
Then, on Aug. 28, the Washington Post reported that more than 60 trees had been removed in recent weeks in the area surrounding the East Potomac Golf Links. The newspaper mentioned only one cherry tree that was removed.
Social media posts are distorting the Washington Post report. Several readers have asked us about social media claims that the Trump administration had cut down 60 cherry trees. One reader asked us to validate a post claiming: “Trump just illegally chopped down SIXTY historic cherry trees in Washington D.C. WITHOUT court approval so that he could ‘renovate’ a GOLF COURSE!” The post goes on to cite the Washington Post, falsely saying that the newspaper “has reported that Trump has gone ahead and chopped down dozens and dozens of beloved cherry and sycamore trees at the historic East Potomac Golf Links.”
As we said, the article doesn’t say that “dozens” of cherry trees were removed. It mentions one cherry tree, as well as two sycamore trees. It doesn’t provide details on what other types of trees were chopped down.
Alex Rosen, a spokesman for the advocacy group Save East Po, told us that the social media claims were false. “I have noticed people online saying ‘60 cherry trees.’ I can tell you that this is totally untrue. We know for certain that 1 cherry tree was cut down.”
Save East Po describes itself as “an independent, grassroots coalition of DMV neighbors, runners, cyclists, picnickers, fishers, families, and the golfers who actually play this course, who all want the same thing: keep East Potomac Park public, accessible, and affordable.”
“There might have been one other [cherry tree] cut down but I am not certain on that,” Rosen said in an email. “What we are worried about is that more will come down as the admin continues to operate in very closed door ways.”
The Department of the Interior told us — as it told the Washington Post — that “[a]rborists are doing routine maintenance at East Potomac Park with selective removal of hazard trees, non-native invasive trees and declining and dying trees that cannot be brought back to good health through any degree of intervention. Trees throughout the park are regularly monitored for potential safety impacts to visitors, and when a tree is determined to be dying, declining or hazardous our arborists may make the decision to remove it.”
The Washington Post reported that workers with the company RTEC Treecare were cutting down trees at the park on Aug. 27, but RTEC told the Post that it hadn’t removed any cherry trees. RTEC Treecare now has a pop-up message on its website saying, “We want to be clear: RTEC Treecare has not removed any cherry trees at East Potomac Park Golf Course. Our work has been limited to trees identified by the National Park Service as hazardous, non-native, or invasive.”
We asked the Interior Department if it could clarify whether any of the trees were cherry trees, but we did not get a response. We also did not receive a response from the National Park Service.
East Potomac Golf Links Renovation
Tee times at East Potomac Golf Links for the 18-hole course start at $42 for non-seniors, below the national average of $48 for public courses.
Rosen’s group and others are concerned that the administration’s renovations could lead to higher prices and reduced access to the courses and other public spaces in the larger park.
In May, Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum shared a rendering of the renovated course, saying it would offer “championship-quality golf at affordable, highly discounted rates.” The rendering posted by Burgum would combine the existing courses into one, 18-hole course, and add a short, par-3 course and an expanded practice area, as the New York Times explained.
Burgum credited the plan to Fazio Design, led by golf course designer Tom Fazio. The Fazio family has designed many of Trump’s golf courses.
The Times reported that “Washington’s oldest grove of cherry trees — a gift from Japan in 1910 — currently sits between the fourth and the ninth holes on the White Course. In the Fazio plan, the grove is shown in the middle of the practice range. Its fate is uncertain.”
In July, Rosen told us the publicly released image from Burgum “differs significantly from the one Trump was recently photographed holding” in late June. In the designs Trump was holding, there was no short par-3 course, and it was unclear what would happen to the existing bicycle path and mini-golf course.
On Sept. 1, Rosen said there has been no further clarity on the future of the renovations. He pointed out that the potential renovation isn’t included in the Sept. 3 National Capital Planning Commission meeting agenda. The NCPC is responsible for reviewing the federal government’s plans for developing the National Capital Region.
The New York Times reported on Sept. 2, “The administration has not submitted plans to any review panel.”
Fazio told Golf.com in June that the president’s vision did not include removing the cherry trees. “The president has mentioned that several times he loves the trees,” Fazio said. “He wants to make sure we protect those trees and take care of the trees.”
The fight over the legality of the golf course renovation is ongoing. The DC Preservation League filed a lawsuit in February, arguing that the administration’s actions threaten to “wrest the Park from the people.” The suit asked the courts to block the administration from dumping dirt and debris — from the White House East Wing renovations — at East Potomac Park and to block the administration from implementing a renovation plan without going through environmental and preservation approval protocols.
U.S. District Court Judge Ana C. Reyes is overseeing the case. In May, the Associated Press reported that she “told the National Park Service that it should first discuss any plans with government lawyers if it was going to cut down more than 10 trees.”
In July, the AP reported that Reyes asked for assurances that the plaintiffs wouldn’t “suddenly learn in the ‘middle of the night’ that there were bulldozers at the course ‘chopping down cherry trees.'”
Michael Robertson, an attorney from the Justice Department, “told Reyes repeatedly that there was still a lengthy process to undergo that would include signoffs from various planning organizations, the National Capital Planning Commission and the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts,” the AP said.
The National Park Service said in an April court filing that it would “complete its compliance in accordance with all applicable laws and regulations prior to authorizing construction activities at the East Potomac Golf Course.”
Reyes has asked both sides in the suit to convene for a status conference on Sept. 3.
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What is the United Nations for? Audiosseth.drupal@c…
On this week’s episode of Independent Thinking, our experts discuss the issues facing the United Nations ahead of the 81st General Assembly.
The United Nations convenes for its 81st General Assembly next week amid turmoil around the world that it seeks to bring together. The conflicts in Iran, Ukraine and Gaza, and the US, China and Russia’s undermining of the rules-based international order cast a shadow over UNGA. Can the organization renew itself for a dangerous multipolar world? Or is it doomed to the same fate as the League of Nations?
Bronwen Maddox discusses the UN’s present and future with Heather Hurlburt, associate fellow with our US and North America Programme; Marc Weller, head of our Global Governance and Security Centre; and Zizette Darkazally, associate fellow with our Middle East and North Africa Programme.
About Independent Thinking
Independent Thinking is a weekly international affairs podcast hosted by our director Bronwen Maddox, in conversation with leading policymakers, journalists and Chatham House experts providing insight on the latest international issues.
The federal government will shift into using artificial intelligence in the interview process for some job applicants in the coming days, according to U.S. officials.
Issue: When I fully charge it, if I just unplug, it will remain telling me the battery state when I started charging. Including in app. (Ex: Plug in at 20%, charger turns green after charging, I unplug and it stays reading 20% both in app and on the indicator light). This persists with reboots and with time.
"Fix": after the full charge I unplug, have to turn it on, Bluetooth to phone, then plug back in WHILE ITS ON" and then I watch the app and board light show 100%. This is the only way I have found to get the board to believe it's fully charged.
I doubt this is normal? Sign of bad bms? Glitch? Any advice would be great!
The EU’s ability to respond to a foreign invasion by 2030 remains in doubt due to a continuing reliance on the US and fragmented national defence systems, according to a report from its official auditor.
The European court of auditors (ECA) said the EU was much better prepared than before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine of 2022, but achieving its goal of defence readiness by the end of the decade would be difficult.
Government lawyers tell coroner disclosing intelligence would pose serious risk to national security
Ministers are seeking to block intelligence material from being heard at an inquest into the death of two men killed in the 2025 Manchester synagogue attack.
Lawyers for Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, told a coroner on Thursday that disclosing the MI5 files would pose a serious risk to national security.
Leon Black, a former close associate of Jeffrey Epstein, was subpoenaed in June after he abruptly left a voluntary appearance before the House Oversight Committee.
Washington, D.C. — The Trump administration is proposing new rules that could strip tax-exempt status from private schools and colleges that use race-conscious policies in admissions, scholarships or other programs.
The Treasury Department said Thursday that the proposal is intended to enforce what it calls a longstanding public policy against racial discrimination. Officials cited the Supreme Court’s 1983 Bob Jones University decision and the court’s 2023 ruling against race-conscious admissions at Harvard and the University of North Carolina.
The proposed rules would replace older IRS guidance and could affect an estimated 18,000 private educational institutions, from K-12 schools to universities.
Losing tax-exempt status could have significant financial consequences. Donations to affected institutions would no longer qualify for federal tax deductions, potentially making fundraising more difficult.
The administration says the rules would still permit race-neutral programs aimed at helping disadvantaged students, including aid based on income or other socioeconomic factors.
IRS Chief Executive Officer Frank Bisignano said schools would have until May 31, 2027, to bring their policies into compliance.
Critics argue the proposal could be used to pressure schools to abandon diversity initiatives even when those programs are designed to address inequality without imposing explicit racial quotas.
One tax-law expert warned the rules could give the IRS broad leverage over schools and trigger years of litigation over how far the government can go in defining discriminatory practices.
Guardian reporters in Nepal have witnessed first-hand the scenes of destruction and grief after the flash floods. Plus, a not-to-be-missed interview with the legendary Mr T
Good morning. Thousands remain missing and the delivery of aid has been hampered by treacherous conditions in communities almost wiped out of existence by the flash flooding in Nepal and Tibet. A week after the disaster, survivors who fled up mountainsides are still being collected by army helicopters and evacuated.
The mountain village of Syabru Besi was among those destroyed, with even the road to the village gone. According to local government officials, at least 500 people there are missing, a quarter of the population. The village resembles nothing more than a muddy riverbed, with just one building left standing.
What have Guardian reporters witnessed? Hannah Ellis-Petersen and Gaurav Pokharel have been in the Betrawati and Rasuwa districts with the photographer Ahmer Khan. In this video, Ellis-Petersen explains what she has seen alongside haunting footage of the debris. They have spoken to multiple survivors in a region now full of human suffering.
(The Center Square) – Ohio’s inspector general says he has uncovered more than $3 million in suspected unemployment benefits fraud dating back to the COVID-19 pandemic period.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Michele Spagnuolo, the Google engineer arrested in May by U.S. authorities for alleged insider trading on Polymarket, is making a new bold bet. On Wednesday, his legal team filed a motion to dismiss the charges against him. Spagnuolo isn't outright denying that he made money using internal information from Google. Instead, his legal team says that the wagers were not financial instruments subject to regulation by the United States' Commodities Exchange Act but rather good old-fashioned international betting that the U.S. has no authority over.
Spagnuolo, who has been placed on leave from Google, is accused of committing commodities fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering. Using the alias "AlphaRaccoon," he allegedly made a series of wagers on Polymarket's flagship platform that resulted in profits totaling over $1.2 million. According to the criminal complaint, "AlphaRaccoon" correctly wagered that the singer D4vd, who gained notoriety for his suspected connection to a grisly killing, would be Google's most-searched person of the year in 2025. (D4vd was later charged with murder; he pleaded not guilty.) [...] Spagnuolo's lawyers argue that defining swaps to include wagers like who the most-searched person on Google will be each year "would fly in the face of the statute's purpose and history" and lead to "absurd results." They say it would make it so that any wager in the world, from a charity raffle to a local Ping-Pong match, could be classified as a financial instrument. "Spagnuolo is basically making the same argument as the states that are suing prediction markets," says a financial services regulation expert Todd Phillips. "This is the issue that will likely go up to the Supreme Court."
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In addition to disputing the idea that prediction markets offer swaps, Spagnuolo's legal team argues that the U.S. government had no jurisdiction over him in the first place because he's a non-U.S. citizen who was wagering on a non-U.S. platform. Although Polymarket is headquartered in New York, the company's flagship prediction market is banned in the United States and technically is administered by an ostensibly Panama-based entity known as Adventure One QSS. Spagnuolo was living in Zurich, Switzerland, when he allegedly made the Google-related trades on Polymarket. "The extraterritorial argument is interesting and raises the question of whether the U.S. should be the world's prediction markets cop," Philipps says. Spagnuolo's team also claims that the charges should be dismissed because the internal information he supposedly leveraged did not have any commercial value to Google.
O’Donnell, who co-hosted show from 2012 to 2019, was recently named correspondent for revamped 60 Minutes
CBS is bringing back journalist Norah O’Donnell to co-anchor the channel’s morning show, a role she previously held from 2012 to 2019. The move comes amid ratings struggles and broader challenges at the network.
O’Donnell, who was also recently promoted from contributor to full-time correspondent for the rapidly approaching 59th season of 60 Minutes, had left the morning show to take on the role of evening news anchor.
Judge says US Postal Service has told her nothing about how it plans to regulate mail ballots for midterm elections
A federal judge in Boston said on Thursday the US Postal Service had told her nothing about how it would implement a plan to regulate mail ballots for the midterms as she considers whether to let the plan proceed in the weeks before election day.
US district court judge Indira Talwani is deciding whether to extend her prohibition on the proposed regulation of mail ballots, an effort undertaken as part of an executive order by Donald Trump. The hearing in the closely watched case came a day before the first state begins sending mail ballots to voters.
President said Howard Lutnick had Venezuela operation on his mind when he was discussing Iran war on CNBC
Donald Trump has claimed his commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, erroneously stated that no Americans had been killed in the war with Iran because he was thinking about a previous US operation, in Venezuela.
The claim, at odds with the Pentagon’s count of 18 US service members dead in the US-Israel war on Iran, sparked a swift backlash as Trump struggles to end the conflict after six months.
Bookworms may still cherish the feel of leafing through pages, the whiff of new-book smell, and stacking their shelves with beloved tomes, but nothing beats an e-reader (ebook reader) for convenience.
You can bring your entire library on vacation without an extra suitcase. If you’re working through a 1,349-page novel such as Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy, your wrists will thank you. And unlike a phone, your e-reader won’t constantly interrupt you with news alerts and texts, so you can lose yourself in a new world or focus on learning something new.
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, Sept. 3, 2026 — Quantinuum, a leading quantum computing company, today announced the signing of a non-binding MOU with Aramco, one of the world’s leading integrated energy and chemicals companies, to explore a series of industrial use cases, enhance quantum computing capabilities, and prepare for a potential research collaboration focused on fault-tolerant quantum computing.
Under the MOU, the companies intend to undertake preliminary technical onboarding and engage in knowledge exchange activities. They will also identify Aramco’s challenges that may be suitable for quantum computing research with an emphasis on solving complex problems in energy and digital transformation. The collaboration aims to assess how future generations of quantum systems may address relevant scientific and industrial challenges, and to benchmark different quantum computing modalities.
The collaboration complements Aramco’s existing initiatives to position itself as a leader in the application of advanced quantum technologies within the energy industry, reinforcing its efforts towards supporting the digital transformation of the sector and contributing to the evolving quantum computing roadmap for the energy industry.
“Organizations that expect to benefit from quantum computing need to begin developing their expertise, algorithms and workflows today,” said Dr. Rajeeb Hazra, President and CEO of Quantinuum. “This MOU creates a framework for Quantinuum and Aramco to exchange expertise, identify important industrial challenges and prepare for a deeper research collaboration. By combining Aramco’s scientific and engineering knowledge with Quantinuum’s integrated hardware and software capabilities, we aim to build a strong foundation for research across future generations of quantum computing.”
About Quantinuum
Quantinuum is a leading quantum computing company offering a full-stack platform designed to make quantum computing deployable in real-world environments. The company has commercially deployed multiple generations of trapped-ion based quantum systems built on the well-established QCCD architecture, which it has implemented with novel designs and capabilities to achieve the industry’s highest accuracy levels based on average two-qubit gate fidelity.[1] Quantinuum has active engagements with market leaders across pharmaceuticals, material science, financial services, and government and industrial markets, as well as academic and research institutions globally. The company has a global workforce of over 800 employees, including top scientists and researchers. Quantinuum’s headquarters is in Broomfield, Colorado, with additional facilities across the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Qatar, and Singapore. For more information, please visit www.quantinuum.com.
Giorgia Meloni’s government has become the longest-running in Italy since the second world war – a milestone the prime minister is determined not to let pass unnoticed.
In the port area of Bari, the capital of the southern Italian region of Puglia, where Meloni hosted the G7 in 2024 and where she spends her summer holiday, preparations are well under way for a festival-style showcase of her rightwing administration.
McDonagh’s new film, Wild Horse Nine, stars John Malkovich as an agent in 1970s Chile who feels ‘guilt and regret’ over his role in global interventions
The US’s history of intervening in democratic processes around the world deserves more attention in the light of current political developments, playwright and film-maker Martin McDonagh has said, as his Oscar-tipped film about a rueful CIA agent premieres at the Venice film festival.
“I’ve been very interested in the truth of what the CIA has been doing over the last 60 years, and the awful things they’ve done all around the world,” McDonagh said about Wild Horse Nine, his first film since his 2022 tragicomedy The Banshees of Inisherin. “I think maybe something that’s not talked about enough. We know what the KGB are like, but we probably don’t question the CIA’s activity as much as we ought to.”
(The Center Square) – Congressional Republicans have introduced dozens of bills since January 2025 challenging sanctuary policies. Most have been referred to committees and seen no further action, despite Republican control of Congress and GOP-led committees holding at least nine…
Reckoning or rhetoric: Is now the time for reparative justice on the global stage?
15
October 2026 — 18:00 TO 19:00 BST
Anonymous (not verified)
Chatham House and Online
Hear from leading voices on what a landmark UN resolution means for the future of global reparations.
Hear from leading voices on what a landmark UN resolution means for the future of global reparations.
A landmark UN resolution recognising the transatlantic slave trade as the “gravest crime against humanity” has reset the terms of the global reparations debate. Resolution A/80/L.48, backed by a unified front of African, Caribbean and global Black diaspora leaders, passed by a comfortable majority – though a significant bloc of abstentions, concentrated in the Western world, signalled how far the international community remains from agreement on substance or obligation. A subsequent high-level “Next Steps” conference has pushed discussions of reparative justice from principle toward implementation, even as that divide persists.
To commemorate Black History Month, Chatham House’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Working Group brings together speakers to examine where reparatory justice frameworks can move from acknowledgement to policy, and where the limits of political will and international consensus lie.
This event discusses:
What would it mean to move beyond symbolic recognition toward material and structural forms of reparative justice?
What incentives might encourage Western actors to support reparative justice efforts?
How does deepening solidarity between Africa and the Caribbean change the leverage behind efforts to refine visions of justice, development and collective political power on the global stage?
What can domestic reparatory schemes – local, municipal or national – teach international efforts about design, delivery and durability?
This panel discussion is followed by a drinks reception and exhibition launch.
Air bases used by US in UAE and Kuwait hit as Israeli defence chief says Iran’s regime fears collapse due to economic pressures
Iran has continued to demonstrate an ability to target bases in the Gulf used by the US despite six months of war and a new sanctions regime described by the Trump administration as an “economic D-day”.
As Iran’s military targeted US bases in the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, despite threats of further strikes by the US president, Israel’s defence chief warned that economic pressures from the sanctions could lead Tehran to escalate to more “extreme measures”.
Billionaire financier, who previously walked out of a deposition, instead launches lawsuit against the committee
The billionaire financier Leon Black did not appear on Thursday in front of the House oversight committee for a scheduled deposition about his ties to Jeffrey Epstein, and has instead launched a lawsuit against the committee arguing that it does not have the authority to compel him to turn over non-disclosure agreements.
Black was a top Epstein client over several years, and the committee is investigating the men’s relationship as well as the existence of any NDAs to which Black is a party.
Domestic security service says clash with military intelligence directorate ‘definitely shouldn’t have happened’
Several people have been injured in a shootout in central Kyiv between two branches of Ukraine’s security services, in an incident Volodymyr Zelenskyy described as “disgraceful”.
The shootout, which took place on Wednesday morning in a downtown area of the capital, was between officers from the domestic security service, the SBU, and the military intelligence directorate, the HUR.
Joplin, Missouri — A Republican candidate for the Missouri House has been charged in federal court after prosecutors accused him of plotting to plant cocaine and Adderall on a primary opponent in an effort to damage her campaign.
Thomas Ross, who won the Republican nomination for Missouri’s 161st House District by 32 votes, was charged Wednesday with conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance.
According to a federal criminal complaint, Ross allegedly spent weeks discussing a plan to place drugs in the purse or vehicle of his primary opponent, Louise Secker. The investigation began after Ross’ former campaign manager contacted Joplin police on July 30 and turned over a bag containing cocaine and an Adderall pill, authorities said.
Court records say text messages between Ross and the former campaign manager referred to the alleged plot in coded language as the “substance of the matter.”
The FBI later provided the former campaign manager with a covert recording device. During a July 31 meeting, the campaign manager allegedly told Ross he still had “the bag and addies” and asked whether Ross wanted him to proceed.
“If you can pull it off…pull it off,” Ross allegedly replied, according to court documents.
Federal prosecutors stressed that the allegations remain subject to the judicial process. U.S. Attorney R. Matthew Price said voters deserve confidence that candidates will compete with “integrity, honesty and respect for their opponents.”
Our world is getting hotter. Summer heatwaves are so frequent, they’re stretching the bounds of what we think of as summer. Hot-and-bothered home working and sweaty, sleepless nights are now alarmingly common.
Get a good fan and you can dodge the temptation of air conditioning. Aircon is incredibly effective, but it uses a lot of electricity … and burning fossil fuels is how we got into this mess in the first place. Save money and carbon by opting for a great fan instead.
The judge said the issue raised in Trump’s August executive order was settled by the Supreme Court, and “no Presidential Executive Order can undo what the Supreme Court has done.”
Farms across the country have built their fall corn mazes this year around America’s 250th birthday. Patriotic designs are growing in live cornfields from Pennsylvania ... Read moreThe post This fall, corn mazes got a patriotic makeover appeared first on…
In rural America, guns are a fact of life. But even conservatives agree that properly locking them up is crucial in preventing deaths
I have six guns in my house.
The first was a vintage Winchester 12-gauge. It was the winter of 1990, and my husband and I had just moved from an urban block in north-west Philadelphia to a 100-year-old farmhouse in Appalachian Virginia, where my family goes back seven generations.
A bakery that started making pizza two years ago beat a chef trained by a 13-time world champion by one-hundredth of a point, in a ... Read moreThe post Plain cheese pizza looked simple until 730 competitors tried to make…
The writer, publisher and activist spent a lifetime advocating for greater rights for women around the world and brought feminist discourse into the mainstream
Every fall, travelers point their cars toward the same handful of famous foliage corridors. This year, booking and search data from two major travel platforms ... Read moreThe post 4 fall color drives you’ve probably never considered are trending right…
(The Center Square) — Private schools that discriminate on the basis of race could lose federal tax-exempt status, Trump administration officials announced on Thursday.
John Lewis is launching an online chatshow and social media studio to help make itself and its products more visible to chatbots and more prominent in AI search results.
The department store chain’s Gift List “vodcast” hosted by the TV presenter Angela Scanlon will air on YouTube with clips disseminated via other social media channels and comes after the success of its sister chain Waitrose’s Dish podcast.
Pensacola, Florida — A federal magistrate judge has recommended dismissing a Florida sexual cyberharassment claim involving a crude satirical video that depicted a YouTube personality as Adolf Hitler while implying he was receiving oral sex.
The dispute involves Jeremy Hales, who operates the “What the Hale$” YouTube and Facebook channels, and blogger Richard Luthmann. Hales alleged that Luthmann violated Florida’s sexual cyberharassment law by publishing the manipulated video online.
Magistrate Judge Zachary C. Bolitho concluded the video did not meet the statute’s definition of a “sexually explicit image.”
The ruling turned on the law’s specific language. Florida defines sexually explicit imagery as depicting nudity or a person engaging in actual or simulated sexual conduct. The video showed Hales’ face superimposed on another person’s clothed body, along with a woman whose movements implied oral sex. However, no genitals, breasts or buttocks were visible.
Bolitho wrote that while the video was designed to suggest sexual activity, it did not explicitly depict the physical contact required under the statute. It also failed the law’s definition of simulated sexual conduct because no uncovered sexual body parts were shown.
The judge described the video as “vulgar, offensive, and juvenile,” but said that was not enough to transform it into criminally defined sexual cyberharassment.
The recommendation is not a final judgment. A district judge must still decide whether to adopt it.
Technique avoids costly calculations of quantum algorithm performance on large circuits.
Sept. 3, 2026 — Quantum computers have arisen as a possible solution for highly complex mathematical problems, offering “quantum advantage” over classical computers in certain cases. The Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) is a leading candidate for realizing this advantage, and some success has been achieved for small problems. But demonstrations on large problems have remained too computationally costly to run on classical computers and current quantum hardware.
Simulation results showing that average approximation ratio approaches 1 as QAOA depth grows in the large-system limit.
Researchers from JPMorganChase and the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have now found a way to make such calculations possible. Their results were published in Physical Review Letters.
Overcoming the Computational Barrier
The team focused on the Sherrington–Kirkpatrick (SK) model, a disordered system with random interactions between every pair of variables.
“As problem size grows, the SK model’s optimal value is known in the large-system limit. This value provides a baseline to measure how well QAOA is performing,” said Jeffrey Larson, a computational mathematician in Argonne’s Mathematics and Computer Science division and a coauthor of the paper.
The researchers discovered that in the infinite-size limit, a high-depth QAOA state for the SK model converges mathematically to a single quantum spin coupled to bosonic modes. By translating the problem into this “spin-boson” system, the team replaced the costly calculations with much simpler simulations using matrix product state simulations.
For this problem setting, Larson developed a novel optimization method for identifying high-quality QAOA parameters. The simulations and parameter optimization were performed on the supercomputers at the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility (ALCF) and DOE’s National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center. The researchers were able to use these facilities through a grant from the DOE’s Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment (INCITE) program. The ALCF is a DOE Office of Science user facility.
“This multi-institutional collaboration is a great way to work because the questions are both practical and fundamental,” Larson said. “We are asking how far quantum optimization algorithms can go, and we need advanced classical simulation, strong optimization tools and high-performance computing to understand what is really possible.”
A New Pathway for Quantum Computing Studies
The new technique lets researchers evaluate the expected solution quality of QAOA without running it end to end.
“Progress in quantum computing is not just about building larger devices,” Larson said. “It also depends on better algorithms, better optimization methods and better classical tools for testing and understanding those algorithms.”
The researchers believe their results lay a foundation for understanding the potential and limitations of quantum optimization algorithms as quantum hardware matures.
For more details, see the full paper by Sami Boulebnane, Abid Khan, Minzhao Liu, Jeffrey Larson, Dylan Herman, Ruslan Shaydulin, and Marco Pistoia, “Spin-Boson Mapping of the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm,” Physical Review Letters 136, 240601 https://doi.org/10.1103/2w94-rymn. A preprint is available at https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.07929.
Sept. 3, 2026 — Today, NVIDIA announced that it has agreed to acquire Hugging Face for approximately $12.9 billion, confirming reports that emerged last week. NVIDIA said Hugging Face will remain an open platform supporting models, frameworks, cloud providers and computing platforms from across the AI ecosystem. In the following blog post, NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang discusses the acquisition and the companies’ shared vision for the future of open models.
I’m excited to announce that NVIDIA has agreed to acquire Hugging Face for $12,930,300,000. Together, we will scale Hugging Face’s platform, strengthen its infrastructure and expand access to AI for developers and institutions worldwide.
Over the past decade, Clem, Julien, Thomas and the team at Hugging Face have built something remarkable: a vibrant home for the open model developer community.
More than 18 million developers, researchers and creators use Hugging Face to share more than 3 million models, 500,000 datasets and 1 million applications. More than 200,000 companies use the platform to discover, evaluate, customize and deploy AI.
Hugging Face will remain an open platform for the entire AI ecosystem. Developers will choose the models they want, the frameworks they want, the clouds and inference service providers they want and the computing platforms they want. NVIDIA compute will not be required to build on or deploy through Hugging Face.
Hugging Face will continue to support open source and open weight models from across the ecosystem, from every model builder. It will continue to support multi-cloud and multi-accelerator development and deployment, so builders can use the hardware and infrastructure that best fit their work.
Recently, I coauthored an open letter on the importance of open weights to the AI economy. Joined by leaders from across the industry, we made a simple point: open weights broaden access to AI and help ensure that AI leadership is distributed across companies, institutions and communities.
Open models let startups, businesses, universities and public institutions build on advanced capabilities without training every model from scratch. They enable organizations to match the right model to the right job. That is how AI can advance safely, strengthen cybersecurity and sovereignty, accelerate innovation, and reach factories, hospitals, farms, classrooms and Main Street businesses around the world.
AI advances faster when people can build together.
NVIDIA has been committed to open weight models for years, demonstrated by multiyear investments and major contributions to open source platforms, including Hugging Face. NVIDIA has said that open models, data and tools broaden access to AI, and it has contributed hundreds of open models and datasets to Hugging Face as part of that effort.
NVIDIA is the largest contributor of open models and data to Hugging Face, and our contributions continue to grow.
NVIDIA has released more than 500 models on Hugging Face and more than 250 open datasets.
We build our own models, libraries and tools in the open so developers everywhere can use them, modify them and build on top of them.
As the opportunity for open models accelerates, Hugging Face can serve the global AI community at unprecedented scale. NVIDIA’s infrastructure, engineering and global reach can help improve platform reliability, safety, model evaluation, inference and deployment capabilities, while preserving the open ecosystem that made Hugging Face foundational.
I am honored that Clem came to me as he considered the next chapter of Hugging Face and believed NVIDIA would be a great home for the company, its community and the future of open models. We share this vision, and the Hugging Face team will now bring their passion and expertise to a much larger canvas, with their same iconic brand.
To the millions of builders on Hugging Face: thank you for pushing the boundaries of what is possible. We can’t wait to build the future together with you. Together, we will make AI more open, more capable and more accessible to people and institutions around the world.
Judge voices concern about possible copycat incidents after boy, 16, found guilty over attack at school in Pembrokeshire
A judge has expressed concern over possible copycat attacks on school staff as he sentenced a teenager who stabbed a teacher in the head to four and a half years in youth detention.
Judge Thomas KC said it was the second such attack in south-west Wales in two years and that the authorities might have to consider what security measures were in place to protect teachers.
Non-profits say requests for legal help and housing on rise amid Trump funding cuts for prevention and response
As cities and states across the US report historic drops in homicides, domestic violence killings remain alarmingly high.
In Chicago, where homicides fell from 805 in 2021 to 425 in 2025, killings tied to domestic violence increased by 15% between 2024 and 2025. In Kansas City, Missouri, homicides in general have dropped since 2023, but 2025 was the second deadliest year for homicides tied to domestic violence. In Ohio, too, 2025 was the deadliest year for domestic violence killings, while homicides in general followed the national decrease. Across the US, the share of violent crimes that involve domestic violence has increased from 25% in 2020 to 27.5% in 2024, according to a 2026 FBI report.
Sept. 3, 2026 — George Mason University and Oxford-based frontier computing company TreQ announced a partnership this week to bring open-architecture quantum infrastructure to the Commonwealth of Virginia beginning with the first open-architecture quantum computing system in the state and National Capital Region.
Dean Cody Edwards, President Gregory Washington, TreQ CEO Mandy Birch, QSEC Director Patrick Vora, and George Mason Rector Sumeet Shrivastava. Photo credit: Ron Aira/Office of University Branding.
“The opportunity for the Commonwealth of Virginia is significant. Experts project that quantum will create a multi-trillion-dollar economy within the decade, and the states that build workforce and infrastructure now will lead in the future,” said George Mason President Gregory Washington. “George Mason has spent nearly a decade boldly building the foundation for this moment. Bringing an open-architecture quantum computing system to our university and making it available to our students and faculty, our partners, the region, and state is the kind of collaborative innovation that will advance Virginia’s continued successes.”
Located on one of George Mason’s Northern Virginia campuses, the system will be the first U.S. deployment of a computing system based on TreQ’s proprietary Open Architecture Quantum (OAQ) framework. With strategic support from Virginia Innovation Partnership Corporation (VIPC) and TreQ, George Mason is investing in the new $7.7 million system planned for delivery and installation in early 2027, with commissioning expected by late summer 2027. The university commercialization and researcher recruitment grant from VIPC is helping to catalyze and attract strategic industry investment and additional philanthropy support for Virginia’s ecosystem.
“Open architecture widens the path for innovation, allowing for different quantum processors, software, networking, and other technologies as they mature, rather than a single integration approach,” said TreQ CEO and Founder Mandy Birch. “That gives established companies, startups, and researchers a place to build, test, and integrate, and move the field forward faster. This first deployment creates a foundation Virginia can keep building on, and we’re glad to be part of George Mason’s vision for what comes next.”
TreQ will design, deploy, and operate the new built-to-evolve quantum computing infrastructure at George Mason, collaborate on research and curriculum, and connect Virginia and the region with companies and innovators across the global quantum technology ecosystem.
“VIPC’s mission is to grow Virginia’s innovation ecosystems through public–private partnership. This unique collaboration with George Mason, TreQ, and other partners will help attract industry investment, accelerate research commercialization, develop next-generation talent, and empower entrepreneurs and startups to advance cutting-edge quantum technology in the commonwealth,” said VIPC President and CEO Joe Benevento. “VIPC is proud to provide catalytic funding to help unlock these exciting opportunities for Virginia’s future.”
Quantum computing is expected to reshape fields including public health and medicine, emergency response, logistics, national security, and infrastructure. Quantum computing is predicted to generate up to $2.7 trillion in economic value internationally by 2035, limited only by two barriers: a shortage of trained talent and the high cost of specialized infrastructure. Alongside ambitious research and interdisciplinary quantum curriculum, the investments at George Mason will help expand access and accelerate discovery, building toward a quantum-enabled future that overcomes both those obstacles.
“The open architecture system provides needed infrastructure to work across the full quantum stack, and fuels rapid innovation that no single organization could tackle alone, advancing the region as a magnet for the quantum supply chain,” said College of Science Dean Cody Edwards. “Open architecture isn’t about being vendor-neutral. It changes what’s possible by opening the system to more technologies and innovators. With the infrastructure and curriculum to train the workforce, George Mason can help drive the advanced computing economy forward.”
This partnership builds on George Mason’s Quantum Science and Engineering Center (QSEC), where 24 faculty across seven departments and several colleges have developed the university’s foundation in quantum. QSEC also recently signed an MOU with two of Korea’s leading quantum organizations, the Future Quantum Convergence Forum and the QCI Quantum-AI Convergence Center (QCI), establishing an international relationship with a key U.S. ally in technology and workforce.
Quantum is a priority area within George Mason’s Grand Challenge Initiative — a university-wide effort to focus talent and resources on problems of regional and national consequence — and the university is backing it with a $2.4 million catalyst investment, six new postdoctoral positions, and three new faculty positions. The university also launched Virginia’s first interdisciplinary master’s degree in quantum science and engineering. With 80-85% of George Mason graduates working in the Commonwealth of Virginia and the region, the university is creating a talent pipeline to meet the region’s workforce needs.
“George Mason engineering is advancing the frontiers of quantum computing through pioneering research, transformative student experiences, and strategic partnerships with innovators such as TreQ,” added College of Engineering and Computing Dean Ken Ball. “We are preparing the next generation of engineers to turn quantum breakthroughs into practical solutions that will shape the future of technology and society.”
As a top-ranked university, George Mason is already working with regional and industry partners across the state to formalize a broader quantum coalition that is shaping quantum research and workforce development. The new system will also serve as foundational infrastructure for international companies exploring expansion into Northern Virginia.
“Our partnership with TreQ gives QSEC faculty and students access to true quantum computing hardware for the first time,” said QSEC Director Patrick Vora. “We can now launch ambitious new research initiatives, build globally unique workforce training programs, and team with our industry colleagues to grow the Virginia quantum ecosystem. This will truly let Virginia take a quantum leap and drive the future.”
Spotlight Delaware deputy editor Tim Carlin recently spoke with Alonna Berry and Ruby Keeler Schaeffer, who are seeking the Democratic nomination for House District 20 in Delaware in the Sept. 15, 2026, primary election.
Berry is an incumbent seeking her first full term in the General Assembly after winning a 2025 special election, while Ruby Schaeffer, the wife of a former county councilman and local businesswoman, is seeking to make the race a referendum on land use in Delaware’s booming southern region.
The winner will face Republican Gene Dvornick in the November general election, where the race is expected to be among the closest in the House this year.
Readers can find condensed versions of the candidates’ answers below, while the accompanying podcasts feature unedited excerpts from our conversations.
Rep. Alonna Berry
What is something that you think voters should know about you that they wouldn’t be able to glean from reading your website or looking at your campaign materials?
I think I would want voters to know that I care deeply about this community, not just because I currently live here or because it’s where I’ve chosen to raise my family, but I care because I’m from this community for multiple generations. This has always been where my family and our roots have been planted.
And I’ve seen it change over time. I’ve seen it change in lots of different ways towards a better life for myself and my kids. And I want tocontinue to see growth that benefits everyone here in this community.
You won, last year’s special election by 121 votes over about 9,000 votes that were cast, which is a particularly close margin. What do you think that that margin actually says about how District 20 voters feel about you as a candidate? And how do you think that margin has informed your reelection campaign this year?
Yeah. District 20 is, I would argue, the most, purple district in the state. And I think that’s part of what makes this district so great.
And the margin, the less than 1% margin from the special election, is also reflective of historically what we’ve seen to be true in this district. I believe since 2018, the margin has been 1%. It hasn’t changed. And so I think it’s reflective of a couple of things for District 20.
One, that we have a wide variety of opinions on every single topic, and if nothing else, I’ve learned that in my first year as an elected official. Any issue there is, I talk to people, who feel strongly on one side and strongly on another. And so I think that’s why this district really needs and deserves a leader who can listen and understand all the different perspectives and the diverse backgrounds, that come with District 20.
They care about the issues. And every vote here really does matter. It’s reflective of neighbors talking to neighbors about things that they care about, and it’s my job as state representative, and hopefully if reelected, to continue to listen to those conversations and make decisions that are responsive to what I’m hearing from everyday eastern Sussex Countians.
Your primary opponent, Ruby Schaeffer, has framed you as a vulnerable candidate in this election cycle, and then kind of contrasted herself as someone who would be able to handily win against a Republican in District 20. Aside from those specific claims, is there something that you think that Ruby is getting right about voter concerns going into the election, even if you may disagree with some of her proposed solutions or campaign platforms?
I can speak to what I’ve heard from voters. And what I’ve heard from voters is they care about increasing access to healthcare. They care about supporting families, teachers and first responders. They care about making sure that our veterans have the supports that they need.
And everyone is very interested in how the county and District 20 is growing — and what that means for them. And for many people, I’ve heard challenges on the roads, concerns for safety. I’ve heard lack of accessibility in terms of getting around without a vehicle if you wanted to.
And those have been the issues that I’ve focused on as a state legislator. I think those have been responsive to what I’ve heard from my constituents, over the past year and in this election. I think that this role requires me to work closely with county council and our towns to make sure that how growth is happening and development is moving forward makes sense and is responsive to what we’re hearing.
Last year, you campaigned on smart growth, infrastructure improvements and reining in some of the overdevelopment in, probably one of the fastest growing parts of Sussex County, if not the state as a whole.
I think one bill that tried to tackle some of those issues and some of those challenges this year was Senate Bill 23, which is an affordable housing and zoning bill that has drawn some pushback from local officials here in Sussex County.
You co-sponsored that legislation. I want to give you an opportunity to respond to some of the criticisms that have been levied against that bill.
Sure. So the Housing for Every Delawarean Act is a really important step forward for our state as a whole in terms of ensuring that there is thoughtful planning related to affordable housing access. So what the bill does is allow for towns and municipalities through their strategic planning process to select from a list of strategies to utilize for those towns to be able to thoughtfully ensure that they’re increasing the amount of affordable housing stock in their communities.
I think that that is a critical tool and lever if we want to make sure that, as the community continues to grow, we are also making sure that our teachers and our nurses, and our restaurant workers, can also live and work in this community. And as I said on the House floor, it’s my hope that we’re creating a community that our kids and our kids’ kids can also continue to live and work in the future.
And so for me, that’s what the Housing for Every Delawarean Act is about. I believe some of the speculation that I’ve heard doesn’t quite articulate the intent of the bill accurately. And in fact, I believe misrepresents some of what the bill does on its own.
Can you point to any of those specific instances where you feel like some of the criticisms either don’t fully represent the bill fairly or actively misrepresent the bill?
This notion that particular development and the development process can go through without approval.
What the bill actually does and says is it pertains to by-right housing, which, in the state of Delaware, our county councils are the ones who set ordinances around zoning, and the rules in which any developer would have to follow in order to move a development forward. And the Sussex County Council recently went through a process where they released a new set of rules around housing.
And so what the term by-right means is that if that particular development met every single one of those rules that the county council established as what is appropriate for the development, that that’s then considered by-right, and they would move through the process. The reason why it’s important to have housing stock available more readily is because in addition to the imbalance that we see in Sussex County with housing prices, meaning what’s available on the market right now is outprices your average Delawarean and their salary.
Just in terms of housing stock across the entire state and in the county, we don’t have enough houses. So utilizing the tool by-right is a measure by which to say if county council believes these are right metrics, to have in place in order to check developers, and make sure that they’re following rules, then those particular developments should be able to come onto the market faster because we need them to come on market faster because Delaware is in a housing crisis.
The other thing that I’ve heard is this notion of a debate between the terminology around hearing versus public meeting. And both hearings and public meetings require public comment. So, the example that I will give is all school board meetings are public meetings. They’re not hearings, they’re public meetings.
And all school board meetings have a portion in the agenda where the public can come and give public comment. The difference is that the particular entity who’s running that meeting has a little bit of choice about where that public comment happens, whether it’s at the beginning of the meeting or the middle of the meeting or the end of the meeting, how long that public comment can be.
But both written and spoken public comment are part of the process in a public meeting.
I live in your district in Lewes, and I’ve seen some of the large yard signs for your opponentthat say “Repeal SB 23” on some of them. What’s your response to the idea of repealing SB 23? Is that responsible?
There technically isn’t a repeal process in the Delaware legislative process.
The way one would go about “repealing,” quote-unquote, if that’s the terminology that you would utilize, is by running a new bill. And so that new bill would have to run through the entire legislative process, just as the Housing for Every Delawarean Act did, meaning it would have to be drafted with the intent to change the rules that the Housing for Every Delawarean Act put into place.
It would then have to be read in and approved through whatever chamber it starts on, their legal team to make sure that it is legal. Then would have to run through the public hearing process and the floor vote in both chambers.
What was interesting about the Housing for Every Delawarean Act when it was passed is that it required one of the highest standards of votes in the chamber, meaning it wasn’t a simple majority. It had to receive a two-thirds vote in order to move forward. And it did that in both chambers and was bipartisan. So I do think it would be a huge challenge to try to get through that process again.
You’ve built an identity around education, as a teacher, a charter school founder, in a state that ranks, I believe 47th nationally, in education.What has been your biggest accomplishment in one single legislative session on the education front? And what have you not been able to accomplish? What’s something that you would like to be your single biggest education priority, if reelected?
I’m a systems thinker so, our education system is just that.
It’s a really big system that has lots of levers within it. And as has been articulated for decades, the biggest and most impactful lever that could be pulled to improve our education system as a whole in Delaware is redesigning our school funding formula. Yeah. It’s work that I’d been a part of previously as an educator, when I worked at the Department of Education, when I was the senior policy advisor for education in the governor’s office.
That formula doesn’t go into place until school year 2027. And I actually think the most critical, even more critical than changing the funding formula piece of legislation that we passed was keeping the committee in place to track and monitor the implementation of that new formula and its effectiveness.
And so I think that was one of the most monumental things we could have done, and I was proud to be able to do it in my first legislative session. And monitoring and tracking that work will be the work over the next ten-plus years to make sure that what we’ve put into place is operating as it should.
What have we missed that you think is important for our listeners, and arguably more importantly, District 20 voters to know before they head to the polls on Sept. 15?
So I first just want listeners to know that I am proud of the work that I’ve done in my first legislative session. I’ve been able to deliver on healthcare, work with our towns, support our first responders, draft legislation supporting our veterans and mothers, and schools in our state because it matters.
It’s the work and the bills that I’ve been able to pass are bills that directly impact people’s everyday lives, and that’s why I decided to run in the first place. As many people know, I’m a mom of two young boys, and what drives me every day is making sure that this community will be better for them and all of their peers as they grow in this community.
And so, I said last year that I wasn’t running just to sit in the seat. I’m proud of the work that I’ve done. I personally drafted and passed 10 bills in 45 days that have a direct impact on this community and District 20. I’m ready in this next legislative session to pass even more bills that are responsive to the needs of what I’m hearing from my constituents.
Ruby Keeler Schaeffer
What’s something that voters should know about you that they would not be able to glean from reading your website or other campaign materials?
So as far as things that I’ve done or like to do, in the past, I did manage a fitness center. I was an aerobics instructor, and I instructed in the gym. I believe in being very active and keeping yourself physically fit.
Consequently, both my husband and I are active scuba divers. We’ve scuba dived all over the world. And I am very concerned about climate change.
And I enjoy restoring my father-in-law’s farm that was built in 1730. So I do like decorating and restoring things.
On your FAQ page, you say that you registered as a Republican to be supportive of your husband’s role in local politics. Your husband, Mark Schaeffer, is a former Sussex County councilman. And you since switched back, you say that you’ve always been a Democrat. How can Democratic voters trust that you truly will uphold their values if elected to this office?
Well, they absolutely can trust me.
My grandmother, when I was growing up, was Democrat chairwoman up in Blackbird Hundred, which entails Townsend and Blackbird. I grew up at her knee. I grew up in a Democratic union family.
At 18, I registered as a Democrat. Through my first marriage, I was a Democrat. When I married Mark, when I was almost 50, he asked me if I would change my party to support him so that I could go into meetings.
Just like it is on the Democrat side, you have to be one party or the other. I said, “Sure, I’ll do this. I’ll support you, but I’m not going to support the Republican platform.”
Now, when Mark lost his office in November 2024, that next day I asked him if he would ever run again, and he said, “Absolutely not.” I said, “I’m going back to the Democrat Party. I’m switching my party,” which I did.
And I want to remind, voters of one thing. Everyone loved, and I loved [Former District 20 Rep.] Stell Parker Selby. But in case not everyone knows this, she used to be a Republican.
In fact, she ran against Thurman Adams, the former Democratic Senate Pro Tem from Sussex County, as a Republican. Years later, she changed to Democrat, and people didn’t have a problem supporting her or trusting her.
I think it’s a moot point when it comes to whether you were Democrat or Republican. Chris Coons was a Republican.
Your website and your campaign are kind of built around this idea that you, as opposed to Representative Berry, can win decisively in November. You said that she’s a vulnerable candidate. Representative Berry has already won a competitive special election in this district.Why doyoubelieve youwould be able to outperform her in this district.
Well, first off, when Stell Parker Selby first ran for that seat that was created, a few years ago, I think Steve Smick was the first person that was the representative, and he was a Republican who had won that seat. And then when he decided to change and run for a different seat, Stell Parker Selby stepped in, and she won that seat by 250 votes.
If you split that, it would be a 126 people would have had to have voted for the Republican, and Stell wouldn’t have been in.
Last year, when Alonna Berry won that seat, that was in a special election that was focused solely on her. And she had all the resources at her fingertips.
She won that seat by, I think, a 121 votes against the same candidate that Stell Parker Selby ran against. And if you would split that, and 62 more people had voted for the other way, then you would have had a Republican in there.
So I am recognized simply because of my association with Mark, too, in the general election. I’m recognized by both parties, and I can easily, easily, I think, defeat the Republican candidate that’s running.
The Republican candidate in this race, Gene Dvornick, is the town managerof Georgetown, where he has someRepublican connections of his own. If you win in this primary, do you think that you would be able to court Republican voters from voting for you as opposed to voting for Gene?
I do. I don’t know Gene. Gene, from what I’ve heard, is a very nice gentleman.
And Gene came into this late in the game. I don’t know why he stepped in at the last minute, but I will tell you, I wasn’t a last-minute candidate. I’ve been working at this for a very long time. I’ve knocked on well over 5,000 voter doors. And I’ve had tremendous support from the unions.
I’ve been endorsed by the Delaware Building and Construction Trades Union, the Delaware State AFL-CIO, and AFSCME. So I get support from them even to the point that they go out and they canvas for me. I don’t know that Gene has been working, doing that. I can’t speak to that. But people know that I’ve been out for months working hard in the heat, in the cold.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s rain, I’m out knocking on doors and actually speaking personally to voters about their concerns. And that’s the important thing, is meeting people at their door. There aren’t a lot of candidates that do that. I would say that I’m probably, the only candidate that has worked that hard in the 20th for that representative seat.
You also sought the Sussex County Democratic Committee’s nomination for the special election last year. Ultimately, they went with Alonna Berry. What is different this time around? What do you think the committee saw in Alonna Berry that maybe they didn’t see in your candidacy? And how are you making your pitch to voters to choose you over Alonna?
My main thing that I’m running on is Senate Bill 23, which has raised a lot of concern. That Senate Bill 23 is tagged “workforce housing.” But it isn’t. It is an unaffordable housing bill, and people have now had the light bulb that has switched on that this is a horrible bill.
And as Jane Gruenebaum said, our county councilwoman, this is an “insidious” bill. It’s only going to increase density, and it has taken away our right to have public hearings and public comment.
You could wake up tomorrow morning, and you had a field of corn or maybe trees across from you, and you could wake up the next morning, and all of a sudden there’s bulldozers out there dozing the trees and starting to prepare to build houses with no notice to you. That is awful. I went to a planning commission meeting the other night for the City of Lewes, and they are in turmoil over this bill. They actually implemented a moratorium until they can figure out how to handle this bill.
It’s the same with Sussex County, where [County Administrator] Todd Lawson said that this was “a Trojan horse.” It was designed for workforce and affordable housing, which by the way, I am all for, but he said it is unlikely to generate one affordable house.
There are no guardrails in that. And furthermore, that bill was drafted by the Homebuilders Association, and actually the president of that Homebuilders Association got up and spoke before the legislature, where Alonna Berry sits, sponsored the bill and voted yes.
So that is the biggest difference. As far as the county committee supporting me, when we went in last summer, there were five of us that went in to vie for that seat. It was already predetermined that Alonna was going to be picked for that. She was their chosen candidate, and that’s fine, but there have been many candidates that have not been supported by their party that have won an election, and I’m going to be that candidate.
I’ve seen some of your campaign signs to “Repeal SB 23.” I think it’s important to note there’s been a lot of talk, especially down in Sussex County, about SB 23 and its potential ramifications. I’ve spoken to Sen. Russ Huxtable, who was the prime sponsor of that bill.
In the bill itself, the removal of public hearings, and spoken public comment is only for by-right developments. So those would be developments that Sussex County has already determined fit the character of a certain area.
So let’s drill down on that. It’s for subdivisions and it’s also for cluster subdivisions.
And the by-right pertains to AR-1 zoning. So AR-1 zoning is farmland.
So, if you have farmland across from you that’s AR-1, a developer goes in and buys it from the farmer, he has a right to go in, do his engineer plan and take it to the county planning office.
The planning office makes sure he ticks off the very basic things in that plan. If he meets those very basic things, he gets his sheet of paper that gives him the right to go over to the permitting office, pull a permit, and start building the next day.
So when Russ is saying that, that’s not quite the same thing.
And what he’s talking about, I’ve heard him say, “Oh, well, your right to comment is, still there.” The right to comment and make public comment is only during the comprehensive land use planning phase. Every 10 years, a citizen has the right to go in and give public comment on that, but only every 10 years.
Alonna Berry did this, and she sponsored SB23. And she should have known what she was sponsoring when she signed her name to that bill.
The other way they can make comment. They’re going to say, “OK, well, you can make written comment.” Well, yeah, like Jane Gruenebaum said, you can make written comment, but it’s not really going go anywhere.
And the main thing about the written comment, it’s only on objective standards, which means that a normal person would have to be able to go in, look at the subdivision plan and say, “Oh, that road’s not quite thick enough. The sidewalks aren’t wide enough. The lift station isn’t, big enough to support, whatever that community would do with regard to sewer.”
Those are the written comments that you can make. The normal person is not going to do that.
I think another response that I’ve heard from Senator Huxtable about the bill is that his intention behind it was to shift the conversation around growth and development from being very piecemeal and being about specific subdivisions, and shift it more toward municipalities and local governments, and force them to take a harder look at their own policies and procedures when it comes to the rules around, zoning and subdivisions and things like that.
What is your response to that argument? It sounds like, that maybe doesn’t hold water to you, but I wanted to give you a chance to respond to that.
It does not hold water. And first off, at the planning commission meeting the other night in Lewes, they were in a turmoil over this trying to figure out which of the 11 items they had to take and abide by, regulations, and they can pick five.
Milton didn’t like this. Both Milton and Lewes mayor and council wrote letters to the legislature telling them that this was not the bill that fit their agenda, so to speak. And furthermore, when this bill came about, as Todd Lawson from the county said, neither one of those legislators went to them and said, “Hey, what do you think about this bill?”
Because after all, that’s what county does: land use and sewer plants. They want to know how is this going to affect us, and do you have any comment? None of the three counties were asked, none of the municipalities that are affected were asked. It was done, and that was it. And furthermore, as Todd Lawson said, this is the first time in county history that a legislator has never come to them and discussed a land use bill with them.
And I would also want to point out that Russ Huxtable was a developer with the Milford Housing Development Corp. This was a gift to homebuilders and developers, make no mistake.
It’s going to change the landscape of Delaware for years to come.
You’re running on repealingSB23. If elected, what does that look like? I don’t believe there’s a mode to actually repeal a state law.Would you planto write new legislation to undo the effects?
If we can’t repeal the bill, obviously I will have a bill drafted that will strike the language in Senate Bill 23.
I will take and do a new bill that will restore our rights to public hearings and public notice, and to also put guardrails into what is exactly workforce and affordable housing.
What is the price of it? What is workforce and affordable housing? What’s this supposed to look like? There is nothing in there about that.
And the cost to implement this bill was passed on to the municipalities and to the county. Of course, that means the taxpayers footing the bill for the hundreds and hundreds of hours and months that it’s going take to figure out how to implement this nightmare of a bill.
What’s something that we haven’t touched on about your campaign or about this race that you think is important for our listeners or voters in District 20 to know about you or the campaign?
Well, I think that they know that I’m going to get out and work hard for them, that I’m going to be there when they call me. I will answer their concerns.
I’m going to have Republicans that are going to want to vote for me too.
I can look across the aisle and see a friend and work to get something done for the people. Because it’s all about the people. It’s not about the party, it’s about their concerns. And I think when people get in the legislature, they surround themselves with other legislators, and they’re listening to other legislators tell them what they think should be done.
They forget about us. They forget about we’re the ones that should have a voice, and we don’t get asked what our opinion is. And I tend to keep in contact with my voters.
Spain has seen no evidence “whatsoever” that Morocco planned or facilitated a mass border breach into its north African territory of Ceuta, the Spanish prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has told parliament.
The address on Thursday followed the emergence of a police report, commissioned by a judge and widely quoted in the media, claiming Moroccan border forces had actively aided about 70,000 people to cross the border in late July.
How will young voters shape Morocco’s political future?
22
September 2026 — 14:00 TO 15:00 BST
Anonymous (not verified)
Online
As Moroccans head into their first election since Gen-Z protests swept the country, experts will discuss the forces shaping youth participation, and whether activism will influence Morocco’s political future.
As Moroccans head into their first election since Gen-Z protests swept the country, experts will discuss the forces shaping youth participation, and whether activism will influence Morocco’s political future.
Morocco’s national elections on 23 September will provide an important test of youth political engagement following the country’s recent Gen-Z protests. While young people have become more active in public debate, it remains to be seen whether this engagement will translate into electoral participation. The results could offer insights into the future direction of Moroccan politics.
This event discusses:
How have the Gen-Z protests reshaped political engagement in Morocco?
Will youth activism translate into electoral participation?
What issues matter most to young Moroccan voters?
What barriers continue to limit youth participation in politics?
How are political parties responding to younger generations?
What could the election reveal about Morocco’s political future?
Agreement builds on SEEQC’s established Taiwan ecosystem across semiconductor manufacturing, electronics and advanced research
TAIPEI, Taiwan, Sept. 3, 2026 — SEEQC, Inc., a chip-based quantum computing company, today announced the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding with Taiwan’s Quantum Industry Technology Promotion Office to expand cooperation and exchange across quantum technology and the emerging global quantum supply chain.
The MOU was signed by SEEQC Chief Technology Officer Dr. Shu-Jen Han during SEMICON Taiwan 2026. The agreement establishes a framework for SEEQC and Taiwan’s quantum ecosystem to explore collaboration across technology development, product development, manufacturing, testing and validation, commercialization and supply-chain development. Under the MOU, the parties may also facilitate connections between SEEQC and relevant Taiwanese companies, research institutions and technology capabilities, supporting technical exchange, commercial collaboration, joint development and other potential areas of cooperation.
“Taiwan has an extraordinary concentration of semiconductor, electronics and manufacturing expertise that can play an important role in the development of a scalable global quantum industry,” said Shu-Jen Han, Chief Technology Officer of SEEQC. “This MOU builds on the ecosystem SEEQC has already established in Taiwan and creates additional pathways to connect our technology and roadmap with the capabilities of Taiwan’s research and industrial community.”
The agreement builds on SEEQC’s broader strategy to combine its U.S.-developed quantum technology with Taiwan’s semiconductor, electronics and advanced manufacturing capabilities. SEEQC has established relationships in Taiwan across room-temperature electronics, superconducting chip manufacturing and advanced CMOS interface development.
The signing follows Dr. Han’s participation in Quantum Taiwan Forum – Full Stack, where he joined representatives from leading international quantum and technology companies, including IBM, Fujitsu, Google, NVIDIA, Xanadu and D-Wave, to present Quantum Computing on a Chip. Dr. Han will also participate in Quantum Computing Hardware: Technology Trends and Industry Opportunities on September 4, where he will discuss SEEQC’s strategy of forming a global alliance with Taiwan-based quantum research and development leaders, including SEEQC’s work to build a broader quantum technology and supply-chain ecosystem in Taiwan.
About SEEQC
SEEQC is building the chip-based infrastructure for the quantum age. The Company develops and manufactures digital technologies designed to make quantum computing scalable, energy efficient and commercially viable. SEEQC’s platform combines superconducting Single Flux Quantum chips, cryogenic CMOS electronics, room-temperature control systems, firmware and software to reduce system complexity and enable scalable, fault-tolerant quantum computing. The Company’s digital quantum control technology, published in Nature Electronics, demonstrated the first integrated qubit control system operating at millikelvin temperatures, achieving gate fidelities exceeding 99.9% at nanowatt-scale power consumption. SEEQC works with leading organizations across the quantum computing ecosystem, including collaborations with NVIDIA, IBM and major government research institutions, and operates advanced chip development and fabrication facilities in the United States and Europe. More than half of SEEQC’s workforce holds Ph.D. degrees across physics, electrical engineering, materials science, computer science and related disciplines.
Across the world, hundreds of people have come to believe they have made extraordinary scientific discoveries with AI chatbots such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. Others say their AI has ‘awakened’, or is leading them to a higher spiritual realm. The Guardian journalist Michael Safi begins investigating a phenomenon labelled ‘AI psychosis’, travelling to the US to meet two people who have been on weird journeys with their chatbots
A leading Swedish opposition party has promised an urgent reprieve for British nationals facing deportation from the country over Brexit administrative issues.
Niels Paarup-Petersen, the migration spokesperson for the Centre party, said it would introduce laws to end the suffering of people such as the 78-year-old British widow Joyce Thomas if, as polls project, it forms a new centre-left coalition after the general election in 10 days’ time. Thomas has been told to leave by next Wednesday after 21 years in Sweden.
Memory is an imperfect thing: research shows that recollections of single events – a purse being snatched, say – differ from those about repeated or ongoing events, such as incidents of domestic and family violence.
“What our research shows is that compared to a single-event witness, a repeated-event witness tends to report more gist-like details, the overall details of what typically would happen, and the things that remain constant between the episodes,” said Helen Paterson, an associate professor in forensic psychology at the University of Sydney.
MALTA, N.Y., and PETA TIKVA, Israel, Sept. 3, 2026 – GlobalFoundries and RAAAM Memory Technologies have announced a strategic collaboration to develop and qualify Gain-Cell RAM (GCRAM) technology. The partnership has reached a major milestone with the successful tape-out of a GCRAM test vehicle on GF’s industry-leading FDX FD-SOI platform.
As edge AI, automotive, and IoT devices continue to demand unprecedented amounts of data, on-chip memory has become a critical bottleneck and often constitutes the majority of the silicon area. Designers are looking for innovative on-chip memory solutions offering higher-density and lower-power consumption compared to commodity SRAM.
Leveraging RAAAM’s patented GCRAM, the companies have co-designed the GCRAM bitcell using “pushed” design rules on FDX technology, achieving 40% memory area shrink and up to 60% memory power reduction compared to SRAM. The companies have jointly designed and taped out a GCRAM test chip. At the next step, the companies will start providing GCRAM design access to lead customers in early 2027.
“The successful tape-out of our GCRAM test vehicle on GF’s FDX platform is a testament to the powerful synergy between RAAAM’s memory innovations and GlobalFoundries’ manufacturing excellence,” said Robert Giterman, CEO and co-founder of RAAAM Memory Technologies. “Our GCRAM technology allows semiconductor companies to significantly increase their on-chip memory capacity or reduce the silicon area while keeping the same amount of on-chip memory, while the ultra-low leakage of FD-SOI technology extends data retention, enabling designers to unlock substantial energy savings for edge AI devices”
“At GlobalFoundries, we are continuously pushing the boundaries of what is possible on our FDX platform and keep enhancing our IP offering to meet our customers’ needs,” said Sudipto Bose, vice president of FD-SOI product management at GlobalFoundries. “Partnering with RAAAM Memory Technologies allows us to offer our customers an incredibly compelling on-chip memory solution that redefines the power-performance-area (PPA) equation for advanced AI and other applications.”
The semiconductor ecosystem is already recognizing the potential of this joint development. NXP Semiconductors, a leader in intelligent systems at the edge, is closely evaluating the benefits of the GCRAM solution.
“The industry needs a paradigm shift in on-chip memory. The GCRAM solution developed by RAAAM and GF offers immense potential,” said Victor Wang, VP of front end innovation at NXP Semiconductors. “The projected area shrink and power reductions provide a clear path to increasing on-chip memory capacities, which is vital for reducing off-chip data movement and driving greater system-level efficiency.”
About GF
GlobalFoundries (GF) is a leading manufacturer of essential semiconductors, enabling AI at scale from the cloud to the physical world. Through deep partnerships with customers, GF delivers differentiated, power-efficient and high-performance solutions for automotive, aerospace and defense, data center, smart mobile devices, internet of things and other high-growth markets. With global manufacturing operations across the U.S., Europe and Asia, GF is a trusted and holistic technology partner for customers around the world. GF’s talented, global team remains focused every day on security, longevity and sustainability.
About RAAAM Technologies
RAAAM Memory Technologies is a fabless semiconductor IP company providing the most cost-effective on-chip memory technology in the industry. RAAAM’s patented Gain-Cell RAM (GCRAM) technology provides up to 50% silicon area reduction and up to 3X reduced power consumption over traditional SRAM. GCRAM can serve as a drop-in SRAM replacement in SoCs and is fully compatible with standard CMOS fabrication flows, allowing designers to integrate more memory in a smaller die area with lower power consumption.
The league is awash with ultra-wealthy owners. Adam Silver is hoping a hefty punishment for the Clippers will send them a message about who is in charge
When Steve Ballmer bought the Los Angeles Clippers for $2bn in 2014, it was widely regarded as a coup for the NBA.
Not only is Ballmer one of the richest men in the world – worth an estimated $152.7bn – but his passion and enthusiasm for the sport stood in stark contrast to the team’s embattled former owner. Donald Sterling, who bought the Clippers for $12.5m in 1981, was forced to sell after being handed a lifetime ban by the NBA in response to a series of racist comments.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton remembered activist Gloria Steinem as "one of the architects of the entire structure of women's equality," while encouraging young women to lift up each other.
Gloria Steinem, co-founder of Ms. Magazine, was a leader in raising awareness about gender equality and violence against women, and for promoting inclusion, representation and social justice for women and girls.
The Pentagon says "Operation Epic Fury" ended on May 5, after an Air Force email last month told service members to stop using the name for ongoing Iran operations.
Combining local expertise with a hardware-independent platform to enable quantum development in chemistry, materials, defense and academia
TAIPEI, Taiwan, Sept. 3, 2026 — Kensho and Classiq have announced that they have entered into a market development partnership agreement to expand access to the Classiq quantum software platform in Taiwan. Kensho will leverage its existing customer network to introduce the platform to government agencies, research institutions and enterprises, while providing local support and training, and exploring joint R&D initiatives.
From left: Mr. Fu-Hsin Hsiao, Chairman at Kensho and Akira Tanaka, VP, Head of APAC at Classiq, at signing of the partnership agreement.
The initial focus of the partnership will be on chemical and materials companies, defense organizations, and organizations evaluating quantum computing to address simulation and optimization challenges. Kensho has extensive experience in the distribution of advanced semiconductor equipment and automation systems, providing a strong local foundation for introducing advanced quantum algorithm capabilities. Classiq’s hardware-independent platform automatically converts high-level functional models into optimized, hardware-executable quantum circuits, enabling organizations to flexibly deploy quantum applications across different quantum hardware and cloud environments.
Fu-Hsin Hsiao, Chairman of Kensho, said, “Taiwan is gradually gaining access to more quantum hardware, but hardware alone is not enough to build practical applications. Classiq provides the software layer needed to transform domain expertise into quantum programs, enabling us to offer customers a complete path from technology evaluation to application development.”
Nir Minerbi, co-founder and CEO of Classiq, said, “Taiwan has strong semiconductor expertise, advanced research capabilities, and a growing demand for new computing technologies. Kensho understands the local technology environment, and together we will provide trusted local support to help customers develop quantum software with cross-platform portability.”
The two companies expect to support organizations in building internal quantum capabilities and identifying optimal use cases in areas such as materials research and complex optimization. The two companies will introduce this partnership during SEMICON Taiwan 2026.
Exhibition Venue: Nangang Exhibition Center, Hall 1, 1F
Booth No.: K2483
Classiq will demonstrate its platform, while Kensho will assist in arranging meetings with local customers.
About Classiq
Classiq, a leading quantum computing software company, provides enterprise-grade technology that makes it practical to develop scalable, efficient quantum applications. Used by dozens of global enterprises, the Classiq platform combines AI agents, a high-level quantum programming language and design automation to accelerate the development of optimized, hardware-ready quantum software. The platform also supports hardware benchmarking, cost and performance optimization, and execution across quantum hardware platforms.
The trillions in tax cuts going to the rich and corporations could have instead been used to address the affordability crisis
Dear reader, I recognize that your eyes might glaze over at any mention of the nation’s $40tn federal debt. But your reaction to this mind-boggling number shouldn’t be ennui; it should be outrage and dismay.
Outrage is in order because the nation’s debt has climbed to more than $40tn under Donald Trump, even though back in 2016, when the debt was less than half what it is today, candidate Trump insisted that he’d totally eliminate the debt within eight years. That was yet another example of the Demagogue-in-Chief’s willingness to say anything, no matter how insincere or untrue, to woo voters.
Relocation coincides with proposed laws that opponents say would entrench power of US tech billionaires in country
Dozens of protesters converged on Peter Thiel’s mansion in Buenos Aires this week after a congressional session raised questions about the billionaire’s presence in the country.
In white masks, they held signs saying “Peter Thief” and “No to the Peter Thiel law” in front of the wrought-iron gates of the $12m (£8.9m) residence, which Thiel bought in April as he moved his family to Argentina.
The U.S. military intercepted and sank a vessel that was allegedly being used to support at-sea drug trafficking by the Ecuadorian criminal organization Los Choneros, officials said.
Nepal authorities have said they are “confident” that dozens of workers in Nepal’s Rasuwagadhi hydropower plant are still alive, more than a week after deadly flash floods left them trapped in an underground chamber.
Authorities said that at least 639 workers were still missing from hydropower plants built along Nepal’s Bhote Koshi and Triushuli rivers.
A car tax conviction against the mayor of London has been withdrawn after it transpired that he was targeted by a “scam” that led to him being fined for failing to tax a car that was not his.
Sadiq Khan was found guilty last month under what has been described as a system of “conveyor-belt justice”, in which magistrates decide on hundreds of cases a day, sometimes spending less than a minute on each.
Care workers, chefs and others in danger of losing their migration status under post-Brexit rules if they leave an exploitative employer will be helped by new visa changes, the Home Office says.
Officials said if an employee was found to be a victim of modern slavery they would be allowed to work for any employer for the remainder of their visa.
Out of new potluck ideas? These 17 summer recipes cover crisp salads, easy dips, handheld sliders, simple sides, cookies, pies, and chilled desserts without repeating the same old dish.The post 17 summer potluck recipes for when you’re out of new…
Washington, D.C. — Two Democratic lawmakers are pressing the Department of Homeland Security to release nearly $40 million in election security funding that Congress approved earlier this year, warning that states and localities are running out of time before the November midterms.
Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., and Rep. Joseph Morelle, D-N.Y., sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and acting Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Director Nick Anderson seeking restoration of $39.6 million for election security programs.
The lawmakers said funding gaps have weakened the Election Infrastructure Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which once provided free cybersecurity threat information to state and local election officials. Following funding cuts in 2025, the center shifted to a paid membership model that Padilla and Morelle said smaller jurisdictions may be unable to afford.
They also cited reductions in CISA staffing and proposed budget cuts as threats to election preparedness, particularly amid increased cyber activity linked to foreign adversaries including Iran, Russia and China.
The lawmakers argued that artificial intelligence and increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks have made election systems more vulnerable to disruption, information operations and attempts to undermine public confidence.
DHS and CISA did not immediately respond to NPR’s request for comment.
Padilla and Morelle said the administration may not be able to rebuild trust with election officials before November but still has an obligation to distribute congressionally approved funding and maintain regional election security support.
People online are distressed at men butchering words such as ‘hyperbole’ and ‘hors d’oeuvres’ – highlighting a gender reversal in ‘intelligence gaps’
There are common non-negotiables we look for in a prospective partner. They should be kind, caring and thoughtful. Having a shared interest helps. So does remembering important dates and anniversaries. But how much does it matter if they know how to pronounce the word “gnocchi”?
Turns out that’s a potential dealbreaker, at least according to a (rather judgy) cohort on TikTok. See: the “Illiterate Boyfriend” trend, which is testing some couples on the app. Users have compiled a list of what are essentially SAT words for women to ask their male partners to read. Many of these men – this is an overwhelmingly heterosexual activity – fail to finish the list unscathed. They trip over entries such as “hyperbole”, “cynicism”, “diaphragmatic” and the oft-butchered French term, “hors d’oeuvres”.
Marx’s All Things Possible Florida model uses private funds for cop pay and surveillance tools without public oversight
The All Things Possible ministry (ATP) is an unusual, and critics say potentially dangerous, operation. It has in the last year funded surveillance equipment and salaries for out-of-state law enforcement agencies, hired a range of private security and intelligence contractors, and is connected to a network of other self-appointed sex-trafficking rescue groups whose leading figures have attracted significant controversy.
And its founder is the man who wants to be Colorado’s next governor.
Mitchell Berman is among Democrats the party hopes can flip a Republican-leaning district in November’s midterms
Democrats are targeting vulnerable seats this midterm election with working-class candidates they hope will resonate with voters exhausted by the economy.
Some candidates are new to politics, and many have backgrounds as union members and leaders, which the party hopes will give them an edge over Republican incumbents as people have grown weary of Washington and the higher cost of living.
These 15 cookout picks cover smoky meats, grilled chicken, crisp sides, fresh salads, snack-board bites, and dessert for a spread memorable enough to come up in conversation again.The post 15 cookout picks my coworker brought up again at the next…
BrianFagioli writes: Perplexity has built a local artificial intelligence engine designed specifically for Apple silicon and the Qwen3.6-35B-A3B model. Called Lily, the engine uses a Rust runtime and custom Metal kernels, with neither PyTorch nor MLX in its execution path. Perplexity says Lily averaged 23 percent faster prompt processing and 35 percent faster token generation than MLX-LM on an M5 Max MacBook Pro with 128GB of unified memory. Lily is more specialized than MLX-LM, which supports a much wider range of models and architectures. Perplexity says it plans to release Lily as open source, but the code is not available yet, leaving its performance claims dependent on internal testing for now.
After judge allows partial access rights, Catherine Birmingham and Nathan Trevallion say the enforced separation ‘broke each of our hearts’
A couple have told of their heartache, trauma and stress after fighting for two years for their right to parent their children as they choose in the glare of the world’s attention.
The three children of a Melbourne woman, Catherine Birmingham, and her British partner, Nathan Trevallion, were removed from their “dilapidated” off-grid home in Italy last year.
American journalist Thomas Weir Pauken II has been sentenced to two years in federal prison for acting as an agent of China's government within the U.S., the Justice Department says.
Claim relating to 1960 attack on hundreds of protesters part of wave of litigation over apartheid crimes in South Africa
The day dawned brightly on 21 March 1960, as residents of the South African township of Sharpeville gathered to protest against pass laws, which forced “Black, Indian and Coloured” South Africans to carry documents at all times specifying where they were allowed to be.
Abraham Mofokeng joined the march, one of dozens organised nationwide by the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC), a breakaway group from the African National Congress (ANC). “The weather was very nice, the sun was out. You could not have suspected that the day would go so horribly,” said Mofokeng, who was then a 20-year-old factory worker.
Firm will complete fewer homes than expected in year to 31 October – between 1,350 and 1,400
The British housebuilder Crest Nicholson has warned of a surprise loss this year as it bemoaned difficult trading in a “subdued” property market.
In an unscheduled trading update, the company said it would complete fewer homes than expected in the year to 31 October – between 1,350 and 1,400, down from its previous estimate of 1,400 to 1,500.
At this week’s world championship, the women’s record holder who once feared a 5K will try to top her own 144-hour distance – and beat the US men’s mark
While many teachers head back to school this week, middle-school math teacher Megan Eckert will be 5,000 miles from her classroom in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She has a good reason to miss a few classes: she’ll be competing at the Global Organization of Multi-Day Ultramarathoners World Championship.
On Thursday, more than 100 runners will gather on a start line in Balatonfüred, Hungary, and attempt to run as many miles as they can in six days.
The founder of The Ringer and Grantland was famous for discovering and developing writers. Now he is promoting a technology eroding the creative industries
Bill Simmons may have stopped writing with any regularity in the mid-2010s – he claims his fingers don’t work – but that won’t stop him from reminding you of his greatest hits. On a recent podcast about Russell Westbrook’s retirement, he couldn’t stop quoting his old columns. He first referenced an article from the 2012 NBA finals, and wasn’t finished until 11 minutes into the podcast. His guest, The Ringer contributor Kirk Goldsberry, deserved an award for patience. But the biggest blight on the episode came later, in the form of a bizarre ad read.
“This episode,” Simmons announced, “is brought to you by ChatGPT, the Bill Simmons PodcastAI sponsor.” (Emphasis mine; his overenthusiastic delivery mandates the italics.) Simmons said that he had asked ChatGPT what Westbrook’s defining game was. “That was a pretty good answer,” he said of ChatGPT’s offerings, as if it were a precocious, loveable nephew, before encouraging his listeners to try the platform.
Ben-Gvir did not come into power in a vacuum: he was helped into his position by an international community that has afforded Israel complete impunity
Let me introduce you to Itamar Ben-Gvir, the leader of Israel’s far-right Jewish Power (Otzma Yehudit) party, the minister of national security, and an almost cartoonishly evil man. You’ll have heard his name before: he made international news when he filmed himself taunting bound activists who had been detained trying to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. But you might not be familiar with many of his recent shocking comments, because they haven’t been widely covered by much of the US media.
Let’s start with an AI-generated video that Ben-Gvir posted on Twitter/X on Sunday and then deleted. It shows portly Palestinian prisoners being loaded on to a conveyor belt and going into a detention camp, then emerging emaciated. The caption is “we promised – we delivered!” which seems to be a reference to the national security minister’s promise to worsen conditions for Palestinian prisoners. An ambitious goal, considering conditions are already hellish: Israeli human rights group B’Tselem has likened the prisons where Palestinians are kept to “torture camps”.
As the Trump administration refuses to end its war in Iran, it is steering into the storm, not out of it
Russia hasn’t yet killed large numbers of Europeans outside Ukraine, but it’s getting closer. The night of 4-5 August, an airport bus driver discovered an armed drone lying near the tarmac of the Leipzig-Halle airport, which is a central hub of Europe’s logistical support to Ukraine’s war effort. A cargo jet, meanwhile, may have struck a second drone shortly after takeoff, forcing an abrupt landing, and investigators found a third drone laden with military explosives nearby.
In 2024, incendiary devices hidden in parcels ignited in DHL cargo at the same airport. Had these detonated in the air, a major air catastrophe and large-scale civilian casualties would have ensued, probably resulting in a broader war.
Donald Trump posted his own presidential rankings to Truth Social last week, separating past US presidents into six categories from ‘greatest’ to ‘failures’
Donald Trump has declared himself to be the “greatest” US president ever, sharing a post on social media last week which graded him above the likes of Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D Roosevelt and George Washington. Experts take a different view.
Few presidential historians have previously suggested Trump holds such a place in the history books. After all, neither Lincoln, nor Roosevelt, nor Washington – the three leaders typically seen as America’s best – orchestrated an insurrection. None were impeached. And none of them were convicted of felonies over hush-money payments to a pornstar-turned-ghost hunter.
Marc Rowan has a vision for Gaza. “The potential here is tremendous,” he said at a February gathering of President Donald Trump’s so-called Board of Peace, where Rowan described land devastated by Israeli bombing with a developer’s zeal. “This is not a problem of money or collateral. This is a problem with peace.”
In the U.S., Rowan is simultaneously helping ensure a pro-Israel political project has no problem with money. Since the start of this year, according to Federal Election Commission filings, the billionaire CEO of Apollo Global Management has donated $1.5 million to the United Democracy Project, a super PAC for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, spending a fraction of his vast wealth to preserve a foreign policy defined by support for Israel’s genocide and the flow of U.S. weapons to Israel.
“Palestinians did not choose him, and neither did American voters.”
Rowan — who is worth more than $8 billion and reportedly consulted on his business with convicted sex offender and disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein — is an executive member of Trump’s “Board of Peace,” a United Nations-approved body tasked with carrying out Trump’s stalled plan for Gaza.Hemade his first donation to UDP of the year in early March, giving $1 million, filings show, just as the group began spending aggressively against the now-ousted Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., a loud critic of U.S. support for Israel.
A second donation for $500,000 arrived on July 23. The same day, the AIPAC super PAC shelled out nearly $50,000 in campaign mailers in Michigan to attack the progressive pro-Palestine candidate for U.S. Senate, Abdul El-Sayed. In Missouri, it dropped another $100,000 for phone banking services against former Democratic Rep. Cori Bush in her race against pro-Israel incumbent Rep. Wesley Bell.
It’s not clear which specific UDP efforts have been backed by Rowan’s largesse, and neither Rowan nor UDP responded to requests for comment. But Raed Jarrar, advocacy director with Democracy for the Arab World Now, connected Rowan’s position on Trump’s Gaza board and his major part as a donor to AIPAC’s super PAC as a matter of transparency.
“Now he sits on a board that will decide Gaza’s future,” Jarrar told The Intercept. “Palestinians did not choose him, and neither did American voters. Americans and Palestinians alike deserve to know whose interests are actually being served.”
Rowan, a major donor to Trump’s failed 2020 presidential campaign, has long made his animus toward critics of Israel known. In recent years, he has been a fierce advocate against student protesters calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza, broadly mischaracterizing their anti-genocide calls as “antisemitic,” and played a key role in ousting leadersat his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, over their handling of the protests. In 2025, he served as a consultant to the White House in its recent attacks on higher education. He donated an initial $250,000 to UDP in 2022, the year the AIPAC super PAC was founded, and more than quadrupled his giving by 2024. Trump appointed him to the Board of Peace this past January.
“Marc Rowan has used his position to try to silence Palestinians and smear students protesting Israel’s genocide,” said Margaret DeReus, executive director of Peace, Accountability, and Leadership PAC, which launched this cycle as a pro-Palestine counterweight to the pro-Israel lobby. PAL PAC backed both El-Sayed and Bush, who have committed to cutting military aid to Israel. (El-Sayed prevailed in his Democratic Senate primary against Michigan Rep. Haley Stevens, while both Bush and Massie lost their races.)
Rowan “gives millions to fund the now-fringe idea that billions of our tax dollars should fund the Israeli military and targets candidates who are calling to stop sending U.S. tax dollars to Israel’s genocide,” DeReus said. She added that his presence on “Trump’s corrupt board” lays bare the actual goal of the governing body: “the continued genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians living in Gaza.”
As support for Israel among the American people has plummeted, and more leftist candidates run on promises to enact an arms embargo on Israel, AIPAC has broken its own spending records and set new ones, helping make El-Sayed and Massie’s primaries among the most expensive ever. In Congress, the lobbying giant has also worked to consolidate power among its pro-Israel base. In July, AIPAC lobbied members for the passage of a Pentagon program that further enmeshes military technological sharing between the U.S. and Israeli militaries. Last week, Democratic leadership appointed three hawkish, pro-Israel, and AIPAC-backed Democrats to the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
In addition to his AIPAC super PAC spending, Rowan has also directly given to a host of pro-Israel candidates this cycle, including New Jersey Democrats Rep. Josh Gottheimer and Sen. Cory Booker, as well as Minnesota Rep. Angie Craig in her failed Senate bid.
The majority of Rowan’s spending, however, has been in favor of Republicans, including Mike Rogers, who is facing off against El-Sayed; Florida Sen. Ashley Moody, a vocal opponent of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement; and Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and former Israeli Defense Forces volunteer who famously wore his IDF uniform to Congress.
AIPAC has long championed Trump’s plan for Gaza, which has included overt calls to displace Palestinians, and supports Israel’s hard line in its negotiations with Hamas leaders. Israel, which occupies nearly 70 percent of Gaza, has refused to withdraw its military from the Strip. Israel blames Hamas for refusing to disarm, though the Palestinian militant and political group has said it would only surrender its weapons in exchange for a full Israeli withdrawal and the establishment of a Palestinian state — conditions the Israeli government has refused.
AIPAC also regularly celebrates the ongoing bombardment of the Strip, where more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes since the so-called ceasefire was brokered, including this week when bombing killed two children.
In Rowan’s view, there’s money to be made from the carnage. At the meeting in Washington, D.C., this past February — when Trump also pledged $10 billion in public funds to the board — Rowan fired off property value estimates in Gaza, more than 80 percent of which lies in ruins. He cited a coastline valued at $50 billion; a housing stock, if rebuilt, worth $30 billion; and infrastructure projects worth another $30 billion. Rowan spoke next to generic renderings of glistening high-rise apartments, palm tree-laden highways, solar power plants, and coastal oil depots. Consolidating all of these assets under the supervision of Trump’s Board of Peace, Rowan said, would allow for “conflict-free management of the resources to benefit the Gazans.”
“One hundred fifteen billion of value,” he promised. “It just needs to be unlocked and financed.”
Trump administration has indefinitely stranded hundreds of kids and lawyers from over 50 organizations are fighting for their release
An army of attorneys is rallying to free hundreds of children from immigration custody, where they have been stranded indefinitely by the Trump administration without their parents or loved ones, the Guardian can reveal.
The effort is a counter strike to what critics see as unprecedented moves by federal officials to ride roughshod over children’s rights and increase deportations – while in the meantime corralling them in conditions that can allegedly lead to psychological harm.
Why Should Delaware Care? A report from the Delaware State Forester, who oversees forest preservation around Delaware, found that Sussex County lost 21,000 acres of forestland over the past two decades, a decrease of about 10 percent. Sussex County officials are aiming to reverse this trend with a newly approved forest preservation ordinance, but conservation advocates say the measure is too generous to developers.
The Sussex County Council has approved a set of rules for forest preservation in southern Delaware, the latest chapter in the region’s debate over balancing the demand for growth with maintaining green spaces.
The preservation ordinance, which establishes a concrete definition of what counts as forestland in Sussex County and creates minimum requirements for the amount of trees a developer must preserve on a property, has undergone numerous rounds of discussion and revisions over the past year.
The majority of county council members lauded their affirmative vote on Tuesday morning, saying they equitably balanced the interests of developers and conservationists.
But land preservation advocates are criticizing the council, saying it watered down the original proposal and bowed unnecessarily to the suggestions of local developers.
“Apparently, the council believes that it’s more important to assist the builders than to protect the forest,” Joe Pika, president of the Sussex Preservation Coalition, an influential group of residents that advocates for land conservation in the southernmost county, told Spotlight Delaware.
Jon Horner, president of the Home Builders Association of Delaware, said he supports the measure, and described it as “reasonable changes” that are long overdue.
Both New Castle and Kent counties already have forest preservation ordinances, which Pika said go further to protect forestland than the measure Sussex County adopted.
Sussex’s preservation ordinance was first discussed as a part of the recommendations presented last summer by the Sussex County Land Use Working Group, a task force assembled by county council to suggest reforms to the area’s approach to development.
It then went through a series of discussions among county staff and the Planning and Zoning Commission, before being introduced to the county council in July.
Council’s consideration of the measure also comes in the immediate run-up to the November 2026 election, which will determine who is in office when the county’s 2028 comprehensive plan — a once-in-a-decade review of property zoning across the county — is solidified.
County Council President Doug Hudson and Vice President John Rieley are up for reelection this fall, while the three more recently elected council members, all of whom ran, in part, on an anti-development platform in 2024, will serve terms through 2028.
Nonetheless, all five council members gave speeches before casting their votes on Tuesday, seemingly trying to defend their recent approach to development and preservation.
“It is not a binary choice between ‘pro this or anti that,’ it is about finding the correct balance,” Rieley said. “What will be remembered is that we, the council, passed a tree or forest preservation ordinance.”
All five council members ultimately voted in favor of the preservation ordinance, though Councilwoman Jane Gruenebaum, who founded the Sussex Preservation Coalition, was the most vocal in expressing concern about a number of the provisions that she said do not go far enough in preserving forests.
County council members appeared to have reached consensus about the majority of the ordinance’s provisions in the Tuesday vote.
Still, the questions of allowing developers to pay a large fee instead of preserving trees on a property, and whether there should be a delay before the ordinance goes into effect, became points of contention.
The approved measure defines a forest in Sussex County as “a vegetative community dominated by trees and other woody plants covering a land area of 1 acre or greater.”
Pika, the preservation coalition advocate, said his group had lobbied the county to make the threshold qualifying as a forest as small as a quarter of an acre, but the council opted not to include the change.
The ordinance also includes provisions requiring developers to preserve between 30% and 50% of the existing trees on their properties, depending on whether the property is located in what is designated by the county comprehensive plan as a “growth area,” or a “rural area,” respectively.
If a developer does not preserve that minimum 30% or 50% of trees, they must re-plant at least double the number of trees they removed.
This summer, a disagreement emerged between council members over whether to include an additional clause allowing developers to pay a large fee — or a payment in lieu — if they did not meet the minimum preservation requirement or chose to re-plant trees.
Under the proposal, revenue generated from payments in lieu would have been allocated to the county’s open space preservation fund.
Sussex County Councilman Matt Lloyd. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY OLIVIA MARBLE
Councilman Matt Lloyd spoke in favor of the payment-in-lieu option at two recent meetings, arguing the revenue would “go really far” toward allowing the county to purchase more farmland in his district, which encompasses the municipalities of Seaford and Laurel.
Gruenebaum, whose district includes the eastern side of the county, where land prices are substantially higher, was the most vocal opponent of the concept.
Gruenebaum said the idea “came out of the mouth of Jon Horner,” the president of the homebuilders association, and would represent the county capitulating to the interests of developers with every part of the ordinance.
When asked by Spotlight Delaware about his reaction to the controversy over whether to include the payment-in-lieu option, Horner asserted that Gruenebaum was mischaracterizing the proposal, because she “doesn’t want a single tree cut down in all of Sussex County.”
Sussex County Councilwoman Jane Gruenebaum | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY OLIVIA MARBLE
The council ultimately opted not to include payment in lieu in the final ordinance.
Lloyd and Gruenenbaum again butted heads over whether the preservation requirements should go into effect immediately, or after a six-month buffer period for developers who had planned their projects under the prior greenspace regulations.
Lloyd said at the Tuesday council meeting that it is only fair to give developers more lead time, saying he is “too business-friendly to leave people out in the cold like that.”
Gruenenbaum conversely argued that council members had been discussing the concept of a preservation ordinance since last summer, so developers have had plenty of warning these requirements were coming.
The council eventually compromised on a three-month buffer period, meaning the ordinance will go into effect in December 2026.
Developers who have already submitted site plans to the Sussex County Planning Department will not be subject to the ordinance’s requirements.
Written in the middle of the last century, the US Department of State memo conveys its message in a curt and undiplomatically honest tone: the glue that binds Washington to Caracas is, and is always likely to be, oil.
“All US policies toward Venezuela are affected in greater or less degree by the objective of assuring an adequate supply of petroleum for the US,” the 1950 document reads.
Why Should Delaware Care? A new law recently took away public hearings for by-right developments as part of a larger push for more affordable housing. Understanding why requires an in-depth look into the role of public hearings, and what “by-right” actually means.
Earlier this summer, the Sussex County Council spent an hour collectively lamenting a new law that bars local governments from holding certain public hearings.
Last week, Lewes planning officials called for a moratorium on all residential development in response to that new law.
And one primary challenger to a politically vulnerable Milton-area legislator is using the lawmaker’s past support for the new law as a top campaign issue.
In all, the backlash across southern Delaware to Senate Bill 23 is reverberating through politics. But much of the rhetoric doesn’t capture all of the nuances of the preexisting law, or how the new changes it.
The newly signed Senate Bill 23 — or the Housing for Every Delawarean Act, as it is officially known — has many provisions that aim to promote more affordable housing in the state.
The most controversial section prohibits public hearings for “by right” development projects, which are those that comply with local land use rules at the site. The prohibition is designed to speed up the development process and bring building costs down.
Joe Pika, president of the Sussex Preservation Coalition, a local conservation advocacy group, said there may be as many as 25 current applications for developments — representing thousands of new homes — that could now move forward without a formal public hearing.
While residents can still comment on projects at informal public meetings, critics argue that only at formal hearings can the public’s voice be effectively heard.
Spotlight Delaware spoke with two county planning officials, as well as supporters and opponents of the law, to explain what “by-right” actually means, what role public hearings have played in those developments, and how less-formal public meetings could be different.
What does ‘by-right’ mean?
All developers go through a government approval process that decides whether they can build their proposed project — regardless if it’s a housing subdivision, strip mall or factory.
The first question to answer in that process is whether their plan follows the zoning code, which are the local laws outlining what can be built where.
The zoning code divides municipalities into districts. Those districts and what’s allowed in them can be modified at any time, but are typically edited once a decade when a government updates its comprehensive plan.
In each zoning district, there are “permitted uses,” which are the types of developments that are allowed without additional permissions.
A by-right development is any project that is a permitted use and follows all local laws. Local authorities cannot legally deny a plan that is already allowed by-right.
Officials can require developers of by-right projects to follow certain conditions, such as planting trees around the border of the property but those conditions have to be “reasonable.”
Although governments cannot deny proposed developments that follow local laws, all developers still need to go through the process of attaining certain permits before they can build.
What role do public hearings have?
Before Senate Bill 23 passed, many local governments, including Sussex County, held public hearings for some types of by-right developments.
Public hearings are formal meetings that often have strict standards for how to record and compile what is said. Neighbors are typically individually notified when a project planned near them has a public hearing.
Public hearings for by-right developments have typically been held by appointed boards, like the Planning & Zoning Commission in Sussex County, rather than elected officials.
Those boards held a vote at the end of the public hearing, but they were not legally allowed to vote “no” unless they determined that the plan failed to follow local zoning laws. But that rarely occurred.
Dense housing developments near existing towns, such as this one near Cape Henlopen High School, are being pushed by Delaware officials. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY OLIVIA MARBLE
Sarah Keifer, director of planning services for Kent County, noted that it could be confusing for residents when they learn that a public body must vote to approve a by-right project. In the past, she said some people who have attended public hearings for by-right developments assumed that the board could vote “no,” and were then upset when they didn’t.
“When you invite people to a hearing, I don’t think it’s unreasonable that they think something can be denied,” Keifer said.
Are by-right public hearings too combative?
The prime sponsor of Senate Bill 23, Sen. Russ Huxtable (D-Lewes), said that public hearings can become “combative” when residents show up en masse to oppose a development that a board can’t legally deny.
At times, those formal hearings can delay a project and make it more expensive to build, he said, which is why he decided to prohibit them in his affordable housing bill.
Mike Riemann, former president of the Delaware Homebuilders Association, agreed. He said delays and lack of predictability make building housing more difficult and expensive.
Huxtable said a more casual gathering, such as a public meeting or a workshop, could allow residents to give feedback on a project in a collaborative manner, without delaying it.
Sen. Russ Huxtable (D-Lewes) sponsored Senate Bill 23, which would require most localities to increase housing density. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY OLIVIA MARBLE
“The current process has got us to where we are,” Huxtable said, referring to the affordable housing shortage in the state. “Why not explore new ways of collaboration to get the outcomes we all deserve?”
But David Culver, land use general manager for New Castle County, said he thinks formal public hearings are a “necessary part of the process,” because they ensure neighbors know about the project and can get involved.
He said while some commenters can be “negative” at hearings, others simply want to learn more about the project or give suggestions that ultimately make it better.
Culver emphasized that the county should gather as much feedback as possible for major developments because often, once something is built, it will stay that way for decades.
“The more input you can get on these types of things, the better product you get,” he said.
Public meetings could have a similar effect, as long as they are well-documented, Culver said. But, it is important to notify nearby residents that they are happening, and there is not currently a process to do that with informal meetings.
Keifer said Kent County officials added public hearings for by-right housing developments in 2003 because some residents were angry that homes were being built near them without any warning.
She said the county executive at the time hoped the rule change would “help ease that anger by inviting them in.” But she said that didn’t work.
“It just changed the point at which people were unhappy,” Keifer said.
Keifer said public hearings can be useful when a neighboring resident gives county officials ideas about specific conditions to add to a project.
Pika, the president of the Sussex Preservation Coalition, said he is not sure the new law will allow government officials to consider public comments made at informal public meetings.
Huxtable said lawyers are still debating whether that is true.
Pika said it is “impossible” for local governments to make laws that cover the many potential problems with a project. Therefore, public comments are essential, he said.
“There has to be room left for making situational decisions,” Pika said.
Keifer said residents most often complain about issues that the county can’t address in its conditions, like the additional traffic a development will add to roads.
“A lot of people who come to these hearings simply don’t want the subdivision there. And even if I’m sympathetic, the law does not care about that,” Keifer said.
What’s next?
Huxtable said he is currently consulting with attorneys to figure out whether Senate Bill 23 needs technical corrections or amendments.
He said any changes would be made during the next legislative session, which starts in January.
Keifer and Culver said they are working on creating a new review process for by-right developments that complies with the law.
Sussex County officials denied a request for an interview about by-right development. The county previously canceled several public hearings for housing developments in response to the law.
The nonprofit, Dream Flights, honored a group of Delaware veterans on September 2, with short flights, delivering an opportunity for veterans to take to the sky once again.
The Honor Guard from VFW Post 8801 located in Smyrna, Delaware, performs at the Dream Flights event. The event took place at Delaware Airpark.
Cheswold Mayor, Jennette Williams, enjoyed the event which honored a group of Delaware veterans.
The group of veterans honored during the Dream Flights event pose for a group photo along with their care team members from the Delaware Health Care Facilities Association.
A 1942 Boeing Stearman biplane used during the event.
A look inside the cockpit of the 1942 Boeing Stearman biplane.
US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Sheldon Slater (age 95) was the first veteran to take flight. Here he shakes the hand of Founder and President of Dream Flights, Darryl Fisher, before the two go up in the air.
Lt. Col. Slater gets strapped in and is ready to go. Slater served in the Korean War and Vietnam War.
Lt. Col. Slater and Fisher take flight. Fisher was the pilot for the event.
Fisher gives a thumbs up to the crowd after a successful landing.
Lt. Col. Slater received a hat and certificate from Dream Flights after participating in the event.
US Army Corporal Basil Wisner (age 91) sits in the front cockpit ready to take off.
A look at the plane while Fisher and Cpl. Basil fly around.
Cpl. Basil poses for a photo with his hat and certificate from Dream Flights.
Every veteran honored got a chance to take to the skies thanks to the non-profit organization, Dream Flights. According to the organizations’ website, they have participated in over 8,200 flights to date.
All photos courtesy of Dave Reeder. To see more of Dave’s work follow him on Instagram @bfr_photo
Zack Polanski will seek to stand as a candidate in the Holborn and St Pancras byelection, he has announced.
The leader of the Green party in England and Wales told the Camden New Journal on Thursday he would “stand up for people struggling to pay their bills” if he was elected as the representative for the area, which became vacant when Keir Starmer announced he was standing down as an MP.
Former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife asked a judge to toss their drug trafficking indictment on the grounds that they have immunity as the leader and first lady of a foreign country.
Minneapolis, Minnesota — Federal election regulators are asking Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s Senate campaign for more information about a $42,695 transaction involving her Minnesota gubernatorial committee.
According to an Aug. 27 letter from the Federal Election Commission, Klobuchar’s federal committee reported receiving money from the sale of campaign assets but did not provide enough detail about what was sold or whether the transaction reflected fair market value.
Minnesotans for Klobuchar, her gubernatorial campaign, paid Klobuchar for Minnesota, her Senate committee, $42,695.14 on March 31 and labeled the transaction an “asset transfer.” A Klobuchar spokesperson told NOTUS the assets were a website domain and an email list.
FEC guidance requires campaigns to explain the nature of assets sold and whether they were sold at fair market rates. The commission asked Klobuchar’s federal committee to amend its filing and provide that information by Oct. 1.
Klobuchar’s campaign said the transaction was legal and routine, stating that the gubernatorial campaign purchased the assets at fair market value “in full compliance with state and federal election law.”
The request does not itself establish a campaign finance violation. The FEC has sent more than 12,000 Requests for Additional Information to political committees since 2025, ranging from routine filing questions to potential compliance issues.
Federal rules generally allow campaign assets to be sold to a state committee if the sale reflects fair market value.
Musk denied he was aware Grok ever produced ‘any naked underage images’
A survivor of child sexual abuse has sued Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company, alleging that its chatbot used pictures of her abuse to generate new illegal pornographic images that depict her.
“Using real images of Plaintiff and class members, Grok generated child pornography depicting Plaintiff and class members,” states the complaint, which was filed last week in a US district court in California.
As graduates of an online training course gather from across the continent, the consensus is overwhelming: computers and saving animals go together
On a bitingly cold night in Lapalala Wilderness nature reserve in South Africa’s Limpopo province, Duncan Kanyakera watches as instructor Jacques Viljoen deploys a thermal drone in search of a lone cheetah. Once the drone has disappeared into the inky sky, Kanyakera, from Tsavo in Kenya, and 20 other conservation professionals from across Africa turn their attention to the open-air screen in anticipation.
Many of the students – from 11 African countries as far flung as Benin, Liberia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Madagascar – witnessing the demonstration have earned their places at Lapalala after performing well on an online training programme for protected area technicians (PAT) run by the Connected Conservation Foundation (CCF). Also on the course, are five members of Peace Parks staff in training.
Photo illustration by Lisa Larson-Walker/ProPublica. Photos by Spencer Platt/Getty Images and Kurt Miller/The Riverside Press-Enterprise via Getty Images.
When President Donald Trump returned to the White House, he pushed for a seismic shift in immigration enforcement resulting in mass detention. Immigrants with no criminal convictions, who under previous administrations would have been released on bond or not detained in the first place, would now be held while their immigration cases were pending.
In an effort to gain their freedom, tens of thousands of detainees have filed what are known as habeas petitions, asking federal judges to rule that they have been unlawfully held by the government. But their chances of a speedy ruling have varied dramatically. For some, freedom came within days. Others have waited months for a decision. Some were deported before a judge could rule.
A ProPublica analysis of court records from the more than 70,000 habeas cases filed since January 2025 found that some judges take far longer than others to resolve cases as federal courts have adjusted unevenly to the unprecedented flood of filings.
The waits have been particularly long in parts of Mississippi and Louisiana, where federal judges have usually taken three months or more to decide whether a detainee should be released. Among the cases that have been resolved in Mississippi, half took 92 days or more — the longest of any state.
How Long Habeas Cases Take to Close, by District
Source: ProPublica analysis of court records, as of Aug. 25, and Deportation Data Project. Districts with fewer than 10 cases closed not shown.
While new habeas petition filings have slowed somewhat in recent months, they remain far higher than before Trump began his second term.
The massive caseload has inundated the already overwhelmed federal courts and overburdened judges who suddenly have had hundreds more cases on their already crowded dockets. District courts with staffing shortages have struggled to keep habeas cases moving.
The delays have left many detainees waiting in prisonlike facilities overseen by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that advocates say are substandard and unsafe, riddled with allegations about spoiled food, beatings and medical neglect, though federal officials dispute those claims. Some immigrants have been deported or accepted the government’s offer to leave the country rather than wait for a federal judge to rule on their freedom.
“The amount of food they are being given is simply not enough, and people are left hungry,” said Liudmila Nafikov, whose husband has been detained in a large Mississippi facility for nearly two years and is awaiting a decision on his habeas case. “For three days, they have had no hot food or hot water.”
“I do not believe it is fair or humane to keep people in these conditions for such a long time, especially people who have committed no crime and people who are sick.”
A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson acknowledged an Aug. 22 fire outside the Natchez, Mississippi, facility that affected “all hot water, kitchen services, and laundry operations,” adding, “No one was injured as a result of this incident and as of August 24, the facility is back in 100% operation with hot water and meals.” The spokesperson called claims of substandard conditions in federal detention facilities false, adding, “All detainees are provided with 3 meals a day, clean water, clothing, bedding, showers, soap, and toiletries.”
Federal courts elsewhere have adjusted to the new reality and closed cases at a faster pace. In Texas, California and Florida, courts have handled thousands more habeas petitions and typically have made decisions in about a month and a half or less, according to ProPublica analysis.
Courts in Minnesota, which experienced a surge in habeas petitions during an immigration enforcement push earlier this year, have reached decisions and closed cases even faster, with a median of about 12 days.
One commonality across districts: The vast majority of judges have ruled against the Trump administration in habeas cases, Politico found. Lawyers say that judges who are more receptive to habeas relief often issue decisions relatively quickly.
“A Completely Unresponsive Black Hole”
Habeas corpus, which means “you should have the body” in Latin, gives anyone in the United States a chance to challenge their detention in court. It is intended to be adjudicated quickly because a person’s liberty is at stake.
“Delay is undesirable in all aspects of our justice system, but it is especially to be avoided in the sensitive context of habeas corpus,” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit wrote in a 1988 decision.
The habeas statute directs judges to give the government three days to initially respond with justification for the detention but allows for that deadline to be extended up to 20 days.
In practice, however, judges have broad discretion to set their own deadlines as they balance habeas petitions alongside other civil litigation and criminal trials that can tie up a court, lawyers told ProPublica. They have the power to order the parties to respond, grant extensions and determine the priority of cases before them.
The U.S. courts’ rules governing non-immigration habeas cases are less specific, saying only that judges must order the government to respond “within a fixed time.”
California-based immigration attorney Bonita Gutierrez has seen swift movement on her habeas cases in the state, leading to the release of her clients — some within days.
But after the adult son of a longtime client was detained in August 2025 and sent to a detention center in Mississippi in November, she filed a habeas petition in that state in February. Both sides presented their arguments, and the case sat for about a month with no decision from the judge. Gutierrez received “radio silence” when she emailed the court deputy about it, she said.
“It’s just like your petition has gone to a black hole, a completely unresponsive black hole.”
The man was deported in late April, rendering his habeas case moot after he spent eight months in ICE custody. The case was closed on May 1, according to electronic records reviewed by ProPublica.
Almost all cases in the Mississippi Southern District are assigned to one longtime judge, David C. Bramlette III, who was appointed by George H.W. Bush, and referred to two magistrate judges. Bramlette presides over a division within the court district where Adams County Correctional Center, one of the country’s largest ICE facilities, is located.
A total of 747 habeas cases have been assigned to Bramlette during the second Trump administration, as of Aug. 25. (Only 14 federal judges around the country have been assigned more.) A total of 539 of his cases, about 72%, remain active, according to electronic court records.
A spokesperson for Bramlette did not answer questions from ProPublica about case wait times, instead pointing to a page tracking his habeas caseload.
Lawyers who practice in Mississippi told ProPublica that many of their cases were languishing after the parties filed briefs and were waiting on a judge’s response. One case involved Aidar Nafikov, a Russian asylum seeker hoping to be reunited with his family. Nafikov filed his habeas petition in April after being detained in Adams County Correctional Center for over a year and a half. His case was argued before Bramlette in June of this year with no response.
Meanwhile, his health has deteriorated in detention, where he has suffered repeated bouts of strep throat and developed kidney problems, his wife, Liudmila, said.
“Getting medical help is very difficult because even if you complain, they don’t provide medical help right away,” she said.
A DHS spokesperson did not comment on Nafikov’s case but denied claims of medical neglect at ICE facilities, saying that it is “longstanding practice to provide comprehensive medical care” for anyone in ICE custody.
The harm caused by the delays spurred immigration attorneys and advocates in the state to send a letter to Chief Judge Sul Ozerden in March about the habeas bottleneck. The letter recommends distributing habeas cases among other judges in the district, noting that a district in Pennsylvania had recently done the same.
Other than adding an option to file habeas cases electronically, officials have not addressed the other suggestions in the letter, according to Korbin Felder, a Mississippi attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights, one of the organizations that signed it.
Ozerden did not respond to a request for comment.
More than 2,600 habeas cases have been filed in Louisiana, which has the second-largest immigrant detainee population after Texas. Over half of the resolved cases there have taken 89 days or more to be decided, according to ProPublica’s analysis.
Louisiana attorneys say that it’s hard to get a habeas case moving in the first place. Until recently in Louisiana’s Western District, petitioners had to formally deliver the lawsuit and summons to government defendants in person and through certified mail. Deadlines set by the judge for the government to respond would then begin after the U.S. attorney’s office received a suit. In other states, this process, carried out by the court, is faster.
In addition, attorneys say judges in Louisiana have been giving the government generous deadlines to respond to a habeas petition — sometimes up to 60 days, treating the cases like ordinary civil litigation. By contrast, judges in Minnesota have ordered responses within three or four days.
Through a spokesperson for the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, the Western District of Louisiana declined to answer questions about the backlog.
Steep Learning Curve
ProPublica’s analysis also found that judges within the same district can take vastly different amounts of time to resolve habeas cases.
Seven judges in Oklahoma’s Western District have been assigned more than 150 habeas cases each during the second Trump administration. Two Trump-appointed judges, Charles Goodwin and Patrick R. Wyrick, have taken a median of 144 and 91 days, respectively, to resolve their cases. (Around 67% of Goodwin’s cases and 80% of Wyrick’s cases remain unresolved.) Meanwhile, their fellow Trump-appointed colleague Jodi W. Dishman has taken about 49 days to close her cases. (Only 26% of Dishman’s cases remain open.)
The court clerk of Oklahoma’s Western District declined to comment on behalf of the district and the judges.
How Long Do Habeas Cases Take in Different Judges’ Courtrooms?
Among judges who have been assigned at least 50 habeas cases during the second Trump administration, the median time for a case to be closed varies widely.
Source: ProPublica analysis of court records, as of Aug. 25. Judges who have been assigned fewer than 50 cases not shown. Some districts have allowed habeas cases to be initially assigned to magistrate judges.CARLA ASTUDILLO/PROPUBLICA
Maggie Kopel of the National Immigration Litigation Alliance points out that rapid expansion of ICE facilities in states like Oklahoma has led to a steep learning curve for courts that did not have a history of dealing with habeas cases. In Oklahoma, cases have taken a median of 63 days to close.
“That’s not an excuse,” Kopel said. She notes that New Hampshire and the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which have closed habeas petitions faster than Oklahoma, also did not have a history of detention centers. “Both those districts got up to speed extremely quickly.”
Out of the 130 completed cases Elissa Stiles, an Oklahoma immigration attorney, has filed, nearly 1 in 5 ended before her client received an answer. In four of those cases, the detainee was deported, and in 15 of them, they chose to return to their country.
Most of her clients want to fight their cases, she said.
“It’s rare that a client is immediately interested in voluntary departure because their entire lives are here,” said Stiles, adding that the conditions inside the detention centers are so dire that leaving the country becomes a better option. “If their cases had been adjudicated more quickly, they would not be taking voluntary departure.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said that the department is “working rapidly and overtime to remove these aliens from detention centers to their final destination — home.” Detained immigrants can request “a free flight home and a $3,000 exit bonus,” the spokesperson said.
“Judicial Emergency”
Many federal courts answered the upsurge in habeas cases by issuing standing orders shortening briefing schedules and assigning public defenders to certain detainees without lawyers. Some courts, like those in California, have temporarily assigned judges from other districts to help cut the backlog.
Courts in other states have established ways to standardize certain habeas proceedings.
In the Georgia Middle District, home to the Stewart Detention Center, the majority of the roughly 1,500 cases filed since Trump retook office have been assigned to Judge Clay D. Land and two magistrate judges. Land has the most habeas cases of any judge in the ProPublica analysis.
To address the backlog, Land directed magistrate judges that if a habeas petition falls under certain parameters, they can use preapproved language ordering the government to provide a bond hearing without the district judge’s approval.
“The volume of these petitions has created an administrative judicial emergency which requires the Court to consider novel solutions to assure that these cases are handled expeditiously,” Land wrote in the directive.
His district takes a median of 29 days to close a case and has cleared nearly 80% of its habeas docket.
The spokesperson for the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, which provides a range of support services and collects statistics about the federal judiciary, said the agency and the Judicial Conference do not “impose directives on judges to manage their dockets differently.” The spokesperson pointed to an “unprecedented number” of habeas petitions and a shortage of federal judges.
In 2025, the Judicial Conference recommended that Congress create 71 new judgeships to address increasing caseloads. The list, however, did not ask for any new judges in Mississippi, Louisiana or the Western District of Oklahoma, where habeas cases have been delayed the longest.
New district judgeships have not been authorized for more than two decades, the spokesperson said.
Congress did pass a bill in December 2024 that would have added 66 new federal judges, but then-President Joe Biden vetoed the legislation a month before leaving office.
In July, the Western District of Louisiana issued an order authorizing the court, instead of the habeas petitioners, to serve defendants copies of the lawsuit. The court can also issue a standard scheduling order rather than wait for a clerk or magistrate judge to review it.
While the order doesn’t require judges to set shorter deadlines, Carley Tatman, a Louisiana immigration lawyer, is cautiously optimistic. In practice, it’s still taking several days or even weeks for the courts to issue scheduling orders.
In addition, Mississippi lawyers have said they have seen movement recently in some of their long-delayed cases. Bramlette has closed over 90 of his cases since July.
However, Liudmila Nafikov is still waiting for a decision in her husband’s case before the judge.
Being apart from her husband of 20 years has been “physically and emotionally taxing,” she said. She is the family’s sole caregiver and has been struggling to pay for basic necessities in addition to her husband’s legal expenses. She adds that her three children are also traumatized after being separated from their father.
All they can do is what they’ve been doing for almost two years now: wait.
“The kids always ask me when Dad will come back home,” Nafikov said. “And I can’t give them an answer because I don’t have it myself.”
As FromSoftware’s new multiplayer game The Duskbloods nears release, the legendary game director behind Dark Souls talks connection, pessimism and of course, feet
Since 2009’s Demon’s Souls, Japanese video game director Hidetaka Miyazaki has shown the world a different way to think about game design. His games defy convention with punishing fights, obscure rules, and unknowable, inhospitable worlds. The “Soulslike” genre – named after Demon’s Souls and its sequel Dark Souls – is now ubiquitous, influencing multimillion-sellers from God of War and Star Wars: Jedi to Hollow Knight. Miyazaki’s most recent success, 2022’s Elden Ring, which credited Game of Thrones author George RR Martin as a co-creator, sold over 30m copies and inspired Alex Garland to adapt it for the big screen at A24. It earned Miyazaki a spot on Time magazine’s “most influential” list, an accolade he shares with just one other game developer: Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto.
Miyazaki is now 51 and has been FromSoftware’s president since 2014, elevated from game designer to CEO after the success of the Souls series. He has a cherubic face that could pass for 35. He rarely speaks publicly, and never on camera. When he does speak, he answers questions like one of his characters – softly, sadly, his head bowed, making eye-contact only when I am speaking. Outside the studio where we speak is the sprawl of Tokyo’s Shinjuku, an ever-changing maze where tourists get lost and pop-up stores appear and vanish without a trace. Today, a J-pop band performs in the square as the cicadas scream from the trees. A gilded statue of Malania, one of Elden Ring’s toughest bosses, looms over this dimly lit conference room inside From’s headquarters, a bonfire checkpoint away from the chaos.
Anker’s security division has big plans, and the company is prepping an even bigger AI management system for your home — without relying on cloud data or subscriptions.
"Enshittification of car controls [is] rapidly accelerating," writes longtime Slashdot reader sinij, pointing to a new report from Car and Driver. From the report: Remember when iPhones used to come with free headphones and a phone charger (including the wall plug)? It didn't feel so much like Apple giving you free goodies as it did that the company was providing you with the relevant hardware to use the device. Apple stopped including headphones and charging blocks in 2020. Now, Hyundai is pulling some of its standard hardware from the box, at least for two models.
Hyundai is charging customers extra for a driver's display in the new Elantra generation (more specifically, the Korea-market Avante), as well as the Ioniq 3, Motor1 reported. Both models feature Pleos Connect, Hyundai's new infotainment setup that pairs a center touchscreen with a slim 9.9-inch instrument cluster mounted above the dashboard -- except where it doesn't.
In its domestic market, the instrument cluster screen is offered as a 350,000 won ($255) option for the base trim. Not the most expensive optional extra in the world, but still kind of a slap in the face for a feature traditionally viewed as standard fare. Things are more expensive for the electric Ioniq 3. In the EV's case, the base trim gives customers the full Tesla-screen experience, meaning if customers want the driver's display, they'll need to fork over the additional $5000 necessary to move up to the next-level trim. [...] Hyundai plans to have the setup equipped in 20 million cars globally by the end of the decade.
Greenbelt, Maryland — A federal judge on Wednesday blocked President Donald Trump’s latest attempt to restrict birthright citizenship, saying the policy is almost certainly unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment and recent Supreme Court precedent.
U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman issued a preliminary injunction preventing federal agencies from denying citizenship to children covered by the lawsuit while the case proceeds.
The administration’s August 6 executive order sought to revive limits on birthright citizenship by targeting what it described as “birth tourism.” The new directive followed an earlier Trump order that was challenged in court and ultimately rejected.
Boardman wrote that the latest policy conflicts with the Constitution’s Citizenship Clause, which grants citizenship to nearly everyone born on U.S. soil and subject to U.S. jurisdiction. She also pointed to the Supreme Court’s recent treatment of the issue as further support for blocking enforcement.
The lawsuit was brought by immigrant-rights groups including CASA and the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project, which argued that the order would leave affected children without recognition as U.S. citizens despite being born in the country.
Justice Department attorneys had argued that the challenge was premature because federal agencies had not yet released final implementation guidance. That guidance was expected by Sept. 5.
The injunction prevents the administration from applying the new restrictions to the plaintiffs while litigation continues, setting up another legal fight over the scope of presidential authority on citizenship.
Case is latest in string of post-Brexit deportations from country, which has been criticised for high refusal rate for British people to remain
The wife of a British man detained by police in Stockholm on Tuesday ahead of a threatened deportation has pleaded with Andy Burnham to get involved in the Brexit catastrophe unfolding for many British citizens in Sweden.
Charles, who does not want to be fully identified, and his Swedish wife, Lily, were summoned to the police station at 10am on Tuesday, where he was told he would be held at a detention centre and deported within the next two weeks.
Leading public health experts, the Australian Medical Association and Labor have rejected Angus Taylor’s plan to cut tobacco excise by 80%, labelling the move to curb soaring illegal cigarette sales as a backward step on tobacco control.
Taylor and the Nationals leader, Matt Canavan, on Thursday announced plans for an 80% cut to excise, as well as moves to legalise and regulate vapes and nicotine pouches. The announcement comes weeks after the One Nation leader, Pauline Hanson, proposed a 75% cut.
Wayve robotaxis added to Uber app and will have human in front ready to take over if needed – but only 15 cars licensed
Londoners are now able to hire self-driving taxis for the first time, after rides in Wayve’s autonomous vehicles were added to the Uber app on Thursday.
The chances of landing a robotaxi on request immediately are slim, with only 15 vehicles so far licensed. That contrasts with the more than 100,000 private hire vehicles in the capital – roughly the same number of Uber customers who have registered to take autonomous rides.
Michael Zheng spent years making the long trek from northern New Jersey, first by bus across the Hudson River to the Port Authority bus terminal and then nearly the full length of the No 7 subway line, all for the opportunity to train at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. On a rainswept Wednesday afternoon in Queens, the destination was the same but the purpose had changed entirely.
The 22-year-old American wildcard and two-time NCAA champion from nearby Columbia University brushed aside Hungary’s Fabian Marozsan 6-4, 6-4, 6-2 to win his rain-interrupted US Open debut, providing one of the more unlikely highlights on a busy day for the home contingent in New York.
Elon Musk's super PAC disclosed over $800,000 in spending last month to support Republican Senate and House candidates in competitive races, with the bulk in Texas and Maine.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Global heating will reach at least 1.8C under even the most optimistic future, well beyond the Paris agreement goal of 1.5C, according to a UN report that warns every fraction of temperature rise intensifies destructive extreme weather, glacier melt, ecosystem loss, and island and coastal city submersion. The report by the Nairobi-based UN Environment Program confirmed overshooting the 1.5C goal inscribed in the landmark Paris agreement of 2015 was now "unavoidable" and, despite some progress in addressing the human-caused climate crisis driven by burning fossil fuels, likely in the next few years. It said: "There are no good outcomes above 1.5C."
Heating of up to 3C above preindustrial levels could lead to glaciers losing more than a quarter of their mass by 2100, raising sea levels by up to 13cm. Global food production could decline by up to 14% by 2050 if there are not effective strategies to adapt. Human health, water supplies, nature, cities, infrastructure and economies could all be severely damaged. Some losses would be irreversible. Many communities may have to relocate or change their livelihoods. The report said the best hope for humanity to limit damage was to adopt an "overshoot, peak and decline" pathway that required immediate and sustained greenhouse gas emissions cuts combined with steps to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
It described the goal of net zero emissions -- increasingly politically contentious in some countries -- as "an essential milestone that cannot be skipped" and stressed carbon dioxide removal through steps such as establishing vast new forests must occur alongside, not as an alternative to, deep cuts in fossil pollution. Crucially, the authors of the report, titled Limiting Overshoot, said the average global temperature could be returned to 1.5C this century only if heating stayed below about 1.8C. They warned nature's capacity to store carbon was uncertain and would shrink the more the planet heats. [...] The report's authors cited earlier work that found limiting heating to about 1.8C required global emissions to be halved by 2035. They said existing national policies were projected to lead to at least 2.3C heating, but it would still be possible to limit stay below 2C if countries delivered on net zero emissions commitments by mid-century.
Two people are dead and at least five others are injured, including three officers, after a shooting near 15 East Grant Street Wednesday afternoon in downtown Minneapolis, according to police. The suspected shooter is also dead.
Sabalenka made quick work of Iatcenko in the second round, while Tiafoe, Tsitsipas, Pegula and Muchova were among the other notable winners
And Nakashima breaks too – he’s hitting it hard off both wings and I wonder if he’s in the process of finding a new level. The first few times I watched him, I thought he had a bit of something and, real talk, I thought he’d be better by now than he is. But I really like what I’m seeing from him and, as we know, progress isn’t always linear.
It’s a good start for Medvedev, Gorzy – who saved five match points in round one – tamely ceding serve to 15.
Washington, D.C. — President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he plans to campaign for Texas Republican Senate nominee Ken Paxton, but not before delivering a lengthy critique of Paxton’s appearance and television presence.
Speaking at a Rose Garden dinner with Republican lawmakers, Trump said voters “might not like the way he looks” or dresses, but argued that Paxton’s record as Texas attorney general mattered more.
“You might not love his look. You might not love his television interviews,” Trump said, before calling Paxton “the best attorney general in the country.”
Paxton is running against Democratic nominee James Talarico in one of the most closely watched Senate races of the 2026 midterms. Recent polling has shown a competitive contest, with some surveys favoring Talarico, others showing a tie, and at least one putting Paxton ahead.
Trump said he intends to focus heavily on roughly 35 competitive races during the final 30 days before the Nov. 3 election. He also floated holding multiple “tele town halls” in a single evening to boost Republican candidates.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune has said Republicans will need Trump’s help in Texas because of the cost of campaigning statewide. Paxton and Talarico have together raised nearly $100 million, underscoring the race’s national importance.
Trump said he wants party leaders to identify candidates who are tied, narrowly ahead or slightly behind so he can concentrate his campaign appearances where they could have the greatest effect.
Washington, D.C. — State election officials are warning that new federal requirements for mail ballots could be impossible to implement before the Nov. 3 election and may increase the risk that valid ballots are rejected.
President Donald Trump’s March executive order directed the U.S. Postal Service to impose new standards on mail ballot envelopes, including barcode requirements and the collection of voter information through a federal portal.
Election administrators say the timetable is one of the biggest problems. Washington state Elections Director Stuart Holmes estimated that replacing already-prepared ballot envelopes could cost nearly $2 million, while other jurisdictions face similar logistical and financial challenges just weeks before voting begins.
The warnings come amid separate concerns about the Postal Service’s new ballot verification system. A whistleblower disclosure released this week alleged the portal was developed in less than three months and insufficiently tested. The whistleblower said a single barcode-scanning error could cause thousands of ballots in a batch to be rejected.
The administration argues the changes are intended to strengthen oversight and election-mail security. Election officials and Democratic lawmakers counter that imposing new technical standards so close to Election Day could cause widespread disruption and disenfranchise eligible voters.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked implementation of portions of the rules. The Trump administration has asked the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to lift that order while litigation continues.
The current pause remains in place through Sept. 11 as courts consider whether the administration has authority to impose the requirements.
As tensions flare in the mideast with American military forces resuming strikes on Iran, Donald Trump has taken to social media to discuss his ballroom project.
“We have hundreds of happy construction workers in D.C. busily doing their job building the finest Ballroom/Military complex anywhere in the World,” Trump said in a truth social post Wednesday morning. “There is nothing like it, and never will be! It was a long, hard, fight in the Court System, but the winner is, as always under ‘TRUMP,’ the U.S.A.”
Greg Kurtzer is biased. As the creator of CentOS, Rocky Linux, Apptainer (Singularity), and Warewulf, he clearly has a bias toward open source software, to the benefit of many HPC professionals. So when Kurtzer noticed earlier this year that a lot of people were talking about open-weight AI models as if they were actually open source, it didn’t sit right with him.
“It’s very unfortunate that a lot of people have confused open source and open weight,” Kurtzer said. “[Open-weight models] are licensed under an open-source license, but they’re not open source. And so the terms have gotten confused.”
To be considered truly open source, all of the source material used to create a given piece of software must be made available for anyone to use or inspect. For a piece of enterprise software like Rocky Linux, that means all of the source code is available for anyone to inspect and use under an open source license. For an AI model to truly be open source, it means that the architecture, weights, and training data are available for anyone to inspect and use.
Greg Kurtzer is the creator of OpenWALDO
That is not what we have with the popular open-weight AI models today, such as Llama-3, Qwen3, and DeepSeek 4. These pieces of software function more like freeware binaries, which are executable programs that have already been compiled. The most critical element that make up those AI models–the training data–remains a secret that nobody besides the model builder can access.
That is a problem for anyone who values security and legality.
“It’s a box and you don’t know what’s inside this box,” Kurtzer told HPCwire. “And the box could easily have malicious training content that they were using for training. So the best way of handling that is, well, if these things were actually open source, we wouldn’t have as big of a problem, right?
“So that’s kind of when it clicked for me,” he continued. “Wait a second. There is no real open source community and project around building AI models like this. And so that’s when I started working on it.”
The Training Data BOM
“It,” of course, is OpenWALDO, which Kurtzer announced in a blog post last month on the website of his enterprise software company, CIQ. (Kurtzer is the CEO and founder of CIQ, which is sponsoring the project, but it remains Kurtzer’s.)
The name WALDO is an acronym that stands for open weights, open artifacts, open licenses, open data, and open origins. “It basically is the fundamental making of everything that’s inside of an AI model to be open source,” Kurtzer said. “So OpenWALDO literally means open source AI.”
The idea with OpenWALDO is to create a repository where AI model builders can house their training data and provide downstream users with a bill of materials (BOM) that proves the provenance of the data: where it originated from, who collected it, and how it can be used. The BOM is critical for delivering greater transparency into AI model origins and removing the uncertainty that comes with open weight models today.
So if the BOM shows an AI model is 99.99% open source, but there’s a 0.01% piece of it that’s not open, the customer will be aware of that with OpenWALDO.
(Efkaysim/Shutterstock)
“And then the question is, well, do you want to go with that company? Do you trust the company?” Kurtzer said. “I can tell you, at least in the US, large corporations and in US federal, whether they trust the models or not isn’t part of the question. They just can’t do it.”
Chinese open-weight models, in particular, have achieved near parity with American closed-source models, tempting many organizations to use them. However, you use these models at your own risk, according to F5 Labs.
“In most cases, the training data is not disclosed, there are no guarantees of the integrity of the training pipeline, and there exists a risk that specific fine-tuning has been included for reasons that may be opaque,” the security firm wrote in a July 30 blog post on Chinese open-weight models. “By running these models locally, the user assumes the risk of using them and securing them, which can add significant barriers to deploying them. These risks are not insignificant.”
Building an Open AI Community
In addition to the BOM for the training data, OpenWALDO also provides tooling for AI builders and a community for them to collaborate, which are other important pieces for the future of open source AI.
“It’s also the community of people that are contributing to OpenWALDO, people who want to learn AI, people who want to take what they know about AI and see if they can adopt it into OpenWALDO and share it with others,” Kurtzer said.
The training data itself isn’t stored in OpenWALDO. Instead, the project uses a federated storage system, where contributors house their own repositories of training data and link it to OpenWALDO via Git, the open version control system that maintains the source code for millions of open source projects.
“You would be hosting the Parquet files themselves, which are the corpus shards… in your own S3 bucket,” Kurtzer said. “And then the index will be linking and pointing to that with the appropriate metadata for us to guarantee that that object has not been tampered with.”
The OpenWALDO Project will be able to validate every object based on the index, Kurtzer said. “We know it’s checksum. We know exactly what’s in it. We can audit it. We know where it is, who put it there, who signed off for it, the licenses–everything,” he said.
(Photo-For-Everything/Shutterstock)
AI model builders would access the training data by calling a compose file. These compose files are written in YAML and define everything about the model the user wants to build: from the basic model architecture all the way through your pre-training, mid training, post training.
“The goal is eventually to level everybody up,” Kurtzer said. “So whether you’re a company who wants to just build a very small language model focused on a very particular task, or you’re a neo AI lab or you’re a frontier lab, the goal is to say, well, just go train on this data. Like, it’s free, it’s available. Any part of this data that you want to leverage, you’re free to leverage.”
Open Source for AI
In addition to avoiding the use of AI models that could be security threats, this approach would help organizations avoiding copyright violations. Today’s large language models are trained on giant corpuses, such as Common Pile, which are scoured off the Internet. How many copyright violations were committed as part of that scraping? Nobody knows.
Copyleft is another thorny issue that calls for greater transparency in training data. For instance, say an organization builds their own model that was trained on data protected with a copyleft license, which requires free use of any derivative work based on that piece of data. Does that copyleft license require the organization to publicly release their model?
The courts have not ruled on many of these questions, which remain legally up-in-the-air. In any case, in Kurtzer’s opinion, the AI boom is screaming for open source, and he feels compelled to act.
“Whenever I see a problem, I always see it through the lens of here’s how open source can fix this, and I’m seeing exactly the same situation in AI right now,” he said. “We need an open source community around AI. We need an area where people can come together, where they can talk about AI, where they can share the things that they’re working on, ask questions, get helpful responses, build different subprojects and build different things from that community. And we just don’t have anything like that.”
the damage was pretty bad but the battery itsself was unharmed. just a dent in the casing but i dont want to spent 200$ fixing that. the rear footpad flaps whenever i carry it around though because the threads on the rail stripped. the original screws are bent so i cant use those but replacement screws go right through the existing whole. is there a way to rethread the two rear holes that hold the pad on? i need to get a replacement footpad for the bumper screws to go through the pad but i might have friends with the right tools to skip it.
I got this board as a possible canidate for vesc. But with the reliability and just enough torque it might not see vesc and just be a stock warrior since my vesed pint has been a bastard lately. Plus the footpad area got me spoiled on a xr.
Edit: spelling in title, "original" is not spelled correctly and really not worth reposting to fix.
Federal agents face off with protesters in a Minneapolis neighborhood after a federal agent shot a man from Venezuela while attempting to detain him in January. Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Over the “strongest possible” objections from the federal prosecutor handling the case, leaders at the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C., quashed plans to bring civil rights charges against an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent accused of shooting a Venezuelan immigrant and then lying about it.
The agent, 52-year-old Christian Castro, allegedly shot Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis in the leg in Minneapolis this January during Operation Metro Surge, the Trump administration’s immigration blitz that sent thousands of federal agents into the state. The incident was one of three shootings by immigration agents in the city, the other two of which were fatal.
Late on Tuesday, Matthew Evans, the assistant U.S. attorney in Minnesota in charge of the case, told lawyers for Sosa-Celis and other victims to prepare for Castro to be charged “only with False Statements,” according to an email that was reviewed by ProPublica.
That charge would likely carry a far less severe punishment if he were convicted.
“This is being directed by the Main Justice and the US Attorney,” Evans wrote in a remarkably candid account of internal deliberations. “I objected in the strongest possible terms and fought it as hard as I could. It wasn’t enough.”
He wrote that the false statement charges could come soon and would likely be filed under seal.
“It has been an honor and a privilege to try to get justice for your clients,” Evans concluded the email.
A DOJ official said civil rights charges require consultation with the civil rights division in Washington, and “any charging decisions that come out of such investigations are collaborative and deliberative and adhere to the facts and law of that specific case and controversy.”
The agency “has not yet reached a conclusion on this matter and will never rush an investigative process and the thorough review of all evidence,” the official said.
Evans and a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Minnesota declined to comment. An attorney for Sosa-Celis did not return phone calls from a reporter. Castro, who has an outstanding warrant in Minnesota for this case, could not be reached for comment.
Under the Trump administration, the Justice Department’s civil rights division has been thinned and has dropped some Biden-era oversight of law enforcement agencies. This move by the DOJ is likely to fuel further concerns that the department is operating more in support of President Donald Trump’s political agenda than to preserve the rule of law. Earlier this year, a ProPublica analysis found that in almost every instance of immigration agents shooting people, Trump’s administration blamed the injured and dead within hours of the incident. In many of those cases, federal or local police declined to investigate the agents.
Castro, who was put on leave by the Department of Homeland Security, is also facing multiple state felony charges in Minnesota, including assault with a dangerous weapon. After he left Minneapolis and returned to Texas, Minnesota officials had requested state officials there extradite Castro to face the charges, but Texas Gov. Greg Abbott refused to cooperate. Castro had been held for 90 days in jail while the two states fought over the extradition. He was released last week.
Sosa-Celis was shot on Jan. 14, as Castro and another ICE agent chased Alfredo Aljorna, an immigrant from Venezuela, after a traffic stop. Aljorna ran to his home, which he shared with Sosa-Celis. The two men made it inside after a brief scramble, and Castro fired through the closed door, “knowing [the home] was occupied by several people,” according to state charging documents. One witness said there were two children in the house when Castro shot into it. Sosa-Celis was hit in the leg.
ICE agents then deployed tear gas into the home and took the men and their partners into custody, according to the documents and other court records.
DHS originally said Castro and the other agent were ambushed by the men and beaten with a shovel or broomstick, making Castro fear for his life and fire in self-defense. DHS called Sosa-Celis and Aljorna “violent criminal illegal aliens,” and federal prosecutors charged them with assault.
The next month, however, they dropped the charges against both men, and the DHS backed off its narrative in a rare admission of possible wrongdoing of its officers. “Video evidence has revealed the sworn testimony of the two agents appeared to be false,” then-acting ICE director Todd Lyons said in a statement.
After Castro’s release from jail, Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty, who is leading the state’s prosecution against him, said she worried that Castro will flee to Mexico.
Reached for comment Wednesday, Moriarty compared the Justice Department’s decision to overrule Evans to its actions after ICE agents killed Renee Good. A week before shooting Sosa-Celis, ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot Good in her car. Agents alleged she drove toward them, but video of the incident showed Good’s wheels turned away from them when they shot her. Federal authorities first agreed to a joint investigation, but Justice Department officials later refused to cooperate with state police, deeming any review of the fatal shooting unnecessary.
Deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro launched a sweeping attack on the U.S. criminal case against him, urging a judge to dismiss the charges as an an unlawful effort to prosecute a foreign head of state.
I rode the plus XR for a few years and just now upgraded to the S-series Rally XL. And while it rides like a beast! I have a bit of trouble with getting the motor to engage. I. I noticed a huge improvement when I wear flat shoes, and tbh Nike running shoes were not the best pick for my first ride, but I want to know if there are any settings I can tweak in the app or something like that. I have never messed with custom shaping.
VALENCIA, Spain and SANTA CLARA, Calif., Sept. 2, 2026 — iPronics, a pioneer in silicon photonics-based optical circuit switching for AI infrastructure, has announced $125 million in Series B funding co-led by Maverick Silicon and Light Street Capital. NVIDIA joined the round, with participation from new and existing investors including Triatomic Capital, Bosch Ventures, Catalight Capital, European Innovation Council Fund, The Tate Family Trust, Fine Structure Ventures, Amadeus Capital Partners, Build Collective, and Criteria Venture Tech. Today’s Series B brings the company’s total funding to $177 million.
“Securing this support from Maverick Silicon, Light Street Capital and NVIDIA strengthens our vision as we build iPronics into a new class of optical networking leaders,” said Christian Dupont, CEO of iPronics. “With this investment, we can significantly accelerate our commercialization, delivering the scale our customers need to drive broad adoption and ensuring data centers can fully utilize their GPUs without compromising performance.”
The adoption of optical circuit switching (OCS) is accelerating across AI data center networks, with deployments across a range of connectivity applications. As AI clusters grow, the demands of scale-up networking are accelerating the transition from copper to optics and creating the need for a new generation of high-density scale-up switching solutions. Built on silicon photonics, iPronics has developed a compact, purpose-built OCS platform designed to address the connectivity requirements of AI infrastructure, helping hyperscalers expand AI capacity while managing cost, power and complexity.
“The explosive growth of AI workloads has pushed traditional network infrastructure to its power and bandwidth limits, making optical circuit switching more critical than ever,” said Manish Muthal, senior managing director at Maverick Silicon. “We’re proud to co-lead this round and partner with the iPronics team, as they expand commercial deployments worldwide.”
Muthal joins the iPronics board of directors, along with Geoffrey Tate, an advisor to Light Street Capital. Tate brings decades of technology leadership, first as Senior VP of Microprocessors at AMD. He was also the founding CEO of Rambus, which he led for over a decade and took public, and most recently served as co-founder and CEO of Flex Logix, an AI inference acceleration hardware company that was acquired by Analog Devices. Tate serves on the board of Ayar Labs.
“Light Street is excited to co-lead this Series B,” said Shef Osborn, partner at Light Street Capital. “We believe iPronics offers the most scalable and cost-effective approach to solid-state optical switching at the interconnect layer, a critical requirement for meeting AI compute demand over the next decade.”
Additionally, Young Sohn of Catalight Capital, which manages a dedicated fund focused on AI infrastructure, becomes an advisor to the company. Sohn, a founding member of Catalight Capital, brings decades of semiconductor and silicon photonics leadership and experience scaling global technology platforms. He previously served as Corporate President and Chief Strategy Officer at Samsung, CEO of Inphi, and serves on the boards of Arm and Cadence Design Systems.
“Next-generation AI infrastructure will require a more dynamic, optical-first network fabric,” said Sohn. “iPronics’ approach to programmable optical switching can help data centers scale performance while managing power and cost. I am honored to support the company as it accelerates commercialization.”
The company will use the funds to significantly scale its operations, accelerate commercial deployment, and meet increasing market demand for its iPronics Optical Networking Engine (ONE), a rack-mounted optical switch built for AI. With integrated control, telemetry, and APIs, iPronics ONE provides a programmable optical layer that enables AI clusters to reconfigure connectivity in real time for training and inference workloads.
“This Series B is a testament to our team’s relentless execution,” said Dr. Daniel Pérez-López, founder and CTO, iPronics. “Together with our tier-one partners we are successfully demonstrating that we can build and deploy this technology at scale for AI infrastructure.”
To strengthen its U.S. presence, iPronics has opened an office in Santa Clara, California, and is actively hiring to bolster its product strategy, customer deployments, and AI infrastructure partnerships. For a list of open roles, visit: https://ipronics.com/careers.
About iPronics
iPronics is a pioneer in optical connectivity solutions for AI data centers, delivering a rack-ready optical circuit switching (OCS) platform built on silicon photonics. Its flagship product, iPronics ONE, provides programmable optical connectivity within and across racks for dynamic AI infrastructure. With integrated control, telemetry, and APIs, iPronics ONE enables real-time reconfiguration to improve GPU utilization, reduce energy consumption, and scale without costly network overhauls.
Founded in 2019 as a spin-off from Universitat Politècnica de València, iPronics is backed by strategic and financial investors, including NVIDIA, Maverick Silicon, Light Street Capital, Triatomic Capital, Bosch Ventures, Catalight Capital, European Innovation Council Fund, The Tate Family Trust, Fine Structure Ventures, Build Collective, Criteria Venture Tech, Amadeus Capital Partners, and others. For more information, visit www.ipronics.com.
Washington, D.C. — The House on Wednesday rejected a Republican-backed constitutional amendment that would have permanently limited the Supreme Court to nine justices, falling well short of the two-thirds majority required.
Lawmakers voted 212-206 for the proposal from Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz. While the measure received more votes in favor than against, constitutional amendments require approval from two-thirds of both chambers before being sent to the states for ratification.
Biggs argued that fixing the court at nine seats would prevent future congressional majorities from expanding it for political advantage. The Supreme Court has had nine seats since 1869, although Congress has changed the court’s size several times since the nation’s founding.
Republican leaders framed the vote as a response to renewed calls from some Democrats and Democratic Socialists to restructure the court. Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., recently voiced support for expanding the Supreme Court to 13 justices.
Democratic leaders opposed the amendment, arguing that Congress should not permanently surrender its constitutional authority to determine the court’s size. Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said Republicans were attempting to lock in the current conservative-majority court ahead of a potentially difficult midterm election.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., defended the proposal, saying court expansion would risk turning the judiciary into a political tool.
To become part of the Constitution, the amendment would also have needed two-thirds support in the Senate and ratification by three-fourths of the states.
A woman involved in a hit-and-run incident in Denver last week believes the driver who struck her vehicle was Barry Morphew, the man currently charged with murdering his wife Suzanne Morphew.
The city’s police department and mayor warn the public to stay away from the Loring Park neighborhood nearby
Two people were killed and the suspect was dead after a shooting at an apartment building in downtown Minneapolis on Wednesday afternoon, officials said.
One shooting victim died at the scene. A second diedafter arriving at Hennepin county medical center, a hospital spokesperson said.
Tech company submits to controversial Trump order to rename body of water amid US trade spat with Canada
Apple has renamed Lake Ontario as “Lake America” for US users of its Maps app, after an executive order from Donald Trump to change the name of the Great Lake amid his trade spat with Canada.
The Apple Maps app now displays the controversial new name for the lake, which sits between New York state and the Canadian province of Ontario, for users in the US. Apple users outside the country will still see the Lake Ontario name.
President’s order strips nearly 3m acres of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante, sacred tribal sites, of safeguards
Patagonia, the outdoor clothing and gear company, has joined a lawsuit challenging Donald Trump’s decision to significantly reduce the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments in Utah, removing protections from nearly 3m acres.
In July, the president approved the reduction of the sites by 90%, clearing the way to open the land to oil and gas companies. He argued in his proclamations that doing so would allow lands to be “put to a higher-priority use” and that they contained critical minerals important to “resource independence …[and] national security”.
Collaboration aims to develop advanced quantum algorithms and applications in support of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Quantum Genesis initiative
UPTON, N.Y., Sept. 2, 2026 — The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory and PsiQuantum today announced a collaboration that will leverage PsiQuantum’s software platform “Construct” to support Brookhaven Lab scientists researching new algorithms and scientific applications for the first generation of fault-tolerant quantum computers.
Brookhaven’s Associate Laboratory Director for Discovery Technologies Gabriella Carini. Photo credit: Tim Kuhn/BNL.
“We are excited to partner with PsiQuantum to give our researchers access to these new tools,” said Brookhaven Lab Associate Laboratory Director for Discovery Technologies Gabriella Carini. “DOE’s new Quantum Genesis initiative requires innovative partnerships across our national labs, industry, academia, and government. This is a great example of one such collaboration.”
The Quantum Genesis initiative is focused on developing and deploying the world’s first fault-tolerant, scientifically relevant quantum computing capability for research and development by 2028. Quantum Genesis will serve as a foundational element of DOE’s broader artificial intelligence-focused Genesis Mission, which is designed to usher in a new era of computational power for the nation to accelerate scientific discovery and innovation.
“We are excited to partner with Brookhaven National Laboratory to use these tools in support of its research into fault-tolerant quantum algorithms and applications,” said PsiQuantum Vice President of Government Relations Heath Bumgardner. “Through this partnership, we’re demonstrating how effective public-private collaboration can help accelerate scientific discovery.”
PsiQuantum’s Construct software platform is the first comprehensive platform designed to help companies, researchers, and the public sector create fault-tolerant quantum algorithms, which are computational procedures designed to operate effectively on utility-scale quantum computers once these systems are built and deployed. Construct represents years of development by PsiQuantum’s quantum applications team, which created a suite of tools for new algorithm development to help solve some of the world’s leading quantum application challenges.
Fault-tolerant algorithms can help advance research in materials science, pharmaceutical research, and cryptography, among other areas. In May 2026, PsiQuantum announced that Construct is now available as a free and open-access platform, allowing researchers to design quantum circuits, write and simulate quantum algorithms, and optimize resources.
About Brookhaven National Laboratory
Brookhaven National Laboratory is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, visit science.energy.gov.
About PsiQuantum
PsiQuantum was founded in 2016 and is headquartered in Palo Alto, California. The company’s mission is to build and deploy the world’s first useful quantum computers. PsiQuantum’s photonic approach enables it to leverage high-volume semiconductor manufacturing, existing cryogenic infrastructure, and architectural flexibility to rapidly scale its systems. Learn more at www.psiquantum.com.
Sept. 2, 2026 — Imagine a construction site where the bricks are individual molecules and the “cranes” are microscopic needles so sharp they can feel a single atom. For decades, building at this scale was a laborious and time-consuming task where a single human error could break the delicate tools. Now, researchers at the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have handed the controls to an artificial intelligence that can “learn” how to build these materials autonomously, working more than 25 hours straight without a human operator.
AI guides an ultra-sharp microscope tip to push single molecules across copper, automatically building custom atom-scale patterns — advancing design of new electronics and quantum materials. Credit: Andy Sproles/ORNL
In a landmark study published in ACS Nano, the ORNL researchers, from the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS), describe the creation of a fully automated system capable of building functional materials atom-by-atom. The effort grew from a conceptual framework shaped by P. Ganesh and Arthur P. Baddorf, together with An-Ping Li and Rama Vasudevan, who supervised the implementation and guided the interpretation of the results.
Turning that vision into a working platform required an unusual blend of software and hands-on experimental skill. Ganesh Narasimha prepared the core automation software based on inputs from Vasudevan, while Mykola Telychko developed the experimental setup; the two then jointly carried out the manipulation trials and assembled the resulting dataset. Wooin Yang helped design the AI’s object-detection workflow and performed the critical spectroscopic studies used to verify the materials. Narasimha said the collective effort enables “atomically precise fabrication, with significantly reduced human input.” He added that this effort is shifting the research paradigm from discovering materials in nature to engineering specific “artificial lattices,” which are orderly, repeating patterns of atoms or molecules that form a material’s underlying framework, with tailored electronic behaviors.
AI Vision and Control
The team developed AI models that served as microscopic “eyes” and a “brain.” As the “eyes,” a computer vision model called YOLO (“You Only Look Once”) was used to rapidly detect molecules on a copper surface. As the “brain,” reinforcement learning enabled the model to evaluate different strategies for moving molecules and receive a numerical reward based on how well each attempt succeeded. The reward was highest when a molecule reached the intended target site and much lower when it missed. By linking higher rewards to the actions that produced them, the model learned the best combination of electrical current, bias and manipulation speed to nudge molecules into place without damaging the microscope tip.
The researchers proved their designer results work by using the AI to build an artificial graphene lattice made of 37 molecules in a perfect honeycomb pattern. Most importantly, they confirmed the structure worked by finding a Dirac point, a unique electronic signature, proving the man-made material behaved exactly like real graphene. To demonstrate versatility, the AI even spelled out ORNL using individual molecules.
Science is entering an era in which matter itself is a programmable resource. By combining AI decision-making with atomic-scale precision, researchers can force electrons to behave in custom-designed ways that do not exist in the natural world. This capability, showcased in the ACS Nano study, enables the engineering of materials needed for high-speed electronics and advanced memory devices from the ground up.
The process is currently semi-automated because a human operator must still occasionally step in to condition or repair the microscope tip if it becomes unstable. Additionally, construction is time-sensitive; building the 37-molecule lattice required approximately 900 iterations over 25 hours, with each individual manipulation taking roughly one minute.
The researchers point to a future shift toward “inverse design,” where scientists define a desired electronic property and the AI autonomously determines and builds the required structure. This is a vital steppingstone toward building topological qubits, building blocks for ultra-stable quantum computers. “We expect this approach will accelerate realization and lead to new breakthroughs in our understanding of quantum states and future technology,” Narasimha said.
The experimental research was primarily supported by the DOE Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Scientific User Facilities Division, as part of the QIS Infrastructure Project “Precision Atomic Assembly for Quantum Information Science” (FWP ERKCZ62). The algorithmic development was supported by CNMS. Portions of the research used resources at the CNMS, which is a DOE Office of Science User Facility at ORNL. By combining state-of-the-art nanoscience tools, deep technical expertise and ORNL’s computing capabilities, CNMS helps make precision, AI-driven atom-by-atom assembly possible.
UT-Battelle manages ORNL for DOE’s Office of Science, the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. The Office of Science is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit energy.gov/science.
With Best of the West being cancelled we have decided to do an event in Tahoe. Morning sidewinder trail, early afternoon ride along the bike path from tahoe city to palisades, then a sunset ride along the bike path to sand harbor. There will be stops for food, drink and charging along the way too!
President Donald Trump’s Justice Department took the side of tech giant OpenAI in its court battle with The Intercept and other media companies over the company’s use of others’ creative work to train its artificial intelligence tools.
In a federal court filing in New York, the Justice Department argued that the U.S. has a vested interest in OpenAI having access to a vast array of intellectual property. The Trump administration warned that restricting OpenAI’s access to the data could hamper scientific progress and harm the country’s dominance in the race for artificial intelligence.
“The United States has a strong interest in continuing to develop a robust and competitive artificial intelligence industry that sets the standard for the practice and procedure of AI use globally,” said the filing, which was signed by associate attorneys general Stanley Woodward Jr. and Brett Shumate, along with the attorney general’s senior counsel Michael Weisbuch.
Matt Topic, the litigating attorney representing The Intercept in its lawsuit, warned that the Trump administration’s position was out of touch and a threat to the financial survival of media outlets.
“This is pretty reflective of the administration’s pro-AI policies, which are out of step with the public skepticism of AI and out of step with our long tradition in this country of protecting human expression,” said Topic. “If the administration’s position was accepted, it would result in an unprecedented, uncompensated transfer of IP rights from news organizations to tech companies.”
“If the administration’s position was accepted, it would result in an unprecedented, uncompensated transfer of IP rights from news organizations to tech companies.”
The Intercept originally filed its lawsuit against OpenAI and its partner Microsoft in February 2024, arguing that OpenAI’s use of work reported and written by its journalists constituted a breach of copyright law. In November 2024, the judge then presiding over the case dismissed all of The Intercept’s claims against Microsoft, but allowed its claim against OpenAI to proceed under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
The Intercept’s case was later consolidated under U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein alongside a number of other media plaintiffs, including the New York Times, Tribune Media Company, and Ziff Davis.
OpenAI has argued that its practice of hoovering up staggering amounts of copyright-protected materials to feed its large language models — the underlying technology powering generative AI tools like ChatGPT — falls under the domain of “fair use,” a doctrine protecting the unlicensed use of copyrighted material under certain circumstances.
In its filing, the Justice Department supported OpenAI’s fair-use defense, accusing the Times and other plaintiffs of taking an overly narrow definition of the doctrine. OpenAI’s use of the material, the government argued, met the criteria for “transformative” use, one of the ways in which “fair use” comes into play.
“In this litigation, the New York Times seeks to narrow fair-use doctrine to exclude the training of OpenAI’s large language models (LLMs). That result would be inconsistent with basic copyright law principles and severely hamper ‘the Progress of Science and useful Arts,’” the filing says. “An erroneous fair use ruling would hamper competition in the market for LLMs, because only the largest technology companies might have the capital necessary to pay licensing fees.”
The filing is the latest move from the Trump administration to protect the interests of U.S.-based artificial intelligence companies amid an AI arms race with companies based in other countries, most notably China.
In December 2025, Trump signed an executive order aimed at creating a federal standard, applicable in all 50 states, to “ensure that the United States wins the AI race, as we must.”
Topic, The Intercept’s attorney, said this position — combined with the fact that the Justice Department has not been privy to any discovery in the case — shows that the Trump administration is operating from a fixed position in support of tech companies, rather than arguing the merits of the case.
“What they’re saying isn’t based on any understanding of actual facts,” Topic said. “It just reflects what Microsoft’s and OpenAI’s PR machines have been putting out into the public.”
The St. Anthony Community Center will unveil its new name, logo and brand during a community celebration and fundraiser from 6 to 9 p.m. Sept. 10 at Juniper by Tonic in downtown Wilmington.
Wilmington organization will also mark the 40th anniversary of its Meals on Wheels program during a Sept. 10 fundraiser
WILMINGTON — After more than five decades of serving children, older adults and families, St. Anthony’s Community Center is preparing to introduce a new name and identity designed to reflect the breadth of the organization’s work today.
The center will unveil its new name, logo and brand during a community celebration and fundraiser from 6 to 9 p.m. Sept. 10 at Juniper by Tonic in downtown Wilmington.
The event will mark the organization’s 55th anniversary and celebrate 40 years of delivering meals and support to older adults through its Meals on Wheels program.
“Our new identity better reflects the breadth of the programs and services we provide today and our vision for the future,” said Kim Caputo, executive director of St. Anthony’s Community Center.
Why the new identity matters
For a community organization, a brand is more than a name or logo. It tells residents whom the organization serves, helps families recognize where they can find assistance and gives donors, volunteers and community partners a clearer understanding of the work they are supporting.
St. Anthony’s name is well known in Wilmington, but it may not fully communicate the organization’s expanded role across New Castle County. Some residents may associate the center primarily with senior activities without realizing that it also provides countywide meal delivery, housing for older adults, early childhood education and caregiver resources.
A clearer identity can help connect more people with those services. It also can strengthen the organization’s ability to attract financial support, recruit volunteers and develop partnerships with health care providers, government agencies, businesses and other nonprofits.
That increased visibility will be important as the needs of older adults, caregivers, children and families continue to grow. By presenting its programs as parts of one coordinated mission, the organization hopes to serve more residents while preparing for its next generation of community work.
More than a senior center
Although St. Anthony’s has long been associated with services for older Wilmington residents, its work has expanded substantially since the organization was founded.
Today, the center operates the Meals on Wheels program throughout New Castle County, provides housing and activities for older adults, runs an early learning center and helps families caring for aging or disabled loved ones through its caregiver resource center.
Those programs allow the organization to serve people at several stages of life — from children beginning their education to older adults who want to remain independent in their homes.
The new identity is intended to bring those services under a name and brand that more clearly communicate the organization’s countywide reach and multigenerational mission.
The name will remain under wraps until the Sept. 10 celebration.
Four decades of delivering more than meals
The celebration also will recognize the 40th anniversary of St. Anthony’s Meals on Wheels program.
For four decades, the program has delivered meals to older adults across New Castle County. The visits also provide regular personal contact and an important connection for residents who may live alone or have difficulty leaving their homes.
Meals on Wheels has become one of St. Anthony’s most visible programs, but the organization’s expanding services reflect the increasingly complex needs of older adults and their families.
Its newest initiative, the caregiver resource center, connects caregivers with information and assistance as they navigate the responsibilities of helping an aging or disabled family member.
A celebration with a purpose
The New Brand Launch Party and Fundraiser will give community members an opportunity to see the new name and logo, learn more about St. Anthony’s programs and help support its continuing work.
The evening will include drinks, raffles, a silent auction and guest bartending.
State Sen. Dan Cruce, who represents the 1st Senate District, will serve as a guest bartender and present a proclamation recognizing the organization’s new name. Other state and community leaders also have been invited.
Proceeds from the fundraiser will support programs serving older adults, children, families and caregivers throughout Wilmington and New Castle County.
The organization said the rebranding represents a new chapter rather than a departure from its history. Its mission will continue to focus on responding to the changing needs of the community while building on more than 55 years of service.
To Go Box:
What: St. Anthony’s Community Center New Brand Launch Party and Fundraiser
When: Sept. 10, 6-9 p.m.
Where: Juniper by Tonic, 111 W. 11th St., Wilmington
Highlights: Unveiling of the organization’s new name, logo and brand; recognition of its 55th anniversary and the 40th anniversary of its Meals on Wheels program; guest bartending, raffles and a silent auction
Is China’s humanoid robot industry a bubble?Expert commentjon.wallace
The market debut of Unitree, China’s leading humanoid robot company, has stoked fears that Beijing’s ambitions for robots exceed demand. Until humanoid robots reach their ‘ChatGPT moment’ those worries will remain.
China’s robotics industry has been making headlines again. Videos of humanoid robots running, jumping and boxing at Beijing’s World Humanoid Games swamped social media feeds in late August – including a robot that broke Usain Bolt’s 100m record.
Meanwhile financial media were gripped by wild gyrations in the stock market valuation of Unitree Robotics, China’s leading humanoid company. After soaring to a $66 billion valuation on its debut listing in Shanghai, it then plunged by around $30 billion. By 1 September, the share price had stabilized at levels roughly 45 per cent down from its post-IPO peak.
Underlying these events lies a stubborn question. Does the enthusiasm surrounding China’s extraordinary emerging robot industry outstrip its financial fundamentals?
The answer is complex. The industry’s future prospects are not only a matter of whether humanoid robots can earn enough to justify the market valuations of the companies making them. The technological trajectory of the industry is also crucial. One key issue is when, if ever, the industry will attain a watershed ‘ChatGPT moment’.
There are also important issues relating to state support. Beijing classified robotics as a priority strategic emerging industry in its 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030). It has backed this intent with a venture capital fund focused on robotics, AI and innovation that is expected to raise around $138 billion. Filling out the picture, Beijing recently unveiled ambitions to lead efforts to set industry standards for humanoid robots.
Indeed, China has already established a dominant lead in the global humanoid robotics industry: its makers accounted for more than 90 per cent of global shipments in the first half of this year.
What Unitree’s debut means for the industry
There is little doubt that Unitree’s IPO was met with irrational exuberance. At one point, its share price rocketed so high that the company’s price-to-earnings ratio reached a giddy multiple of 1,300, compared with an average of 124 for the Shanghai STAR market. It is therefore little wonder that its share price retreated in the days after the debut.
The question is: are humanoid robots capable enough to do a broad spectrum of jobs well enough to make money? And if not, how soon before they are?
Of course, these events do not necessarily signify that China’s humanoid robot sector lacks technological merit and commercial prospects. When the dot com bubble burst between 2000 to 2002, trillions of US dollars were wiped off the valuations of internet companies. But it did not signify the death of the internet.
What Unitree’s gyrating share price does highlight is the business model for humanoid robots. The question is: are humanoid robots capable enough to do a broad spectrum of jobs well enough to make money? And if not, how soon before they are?
Making robots fit for jobs
Humanoid robots still have important flaws. Battery life is often too short. Robots often struggle with navigation, avoiding obstacles and knowing when to stop: many ran into barriers at the World Humanoid Games. Manual dexterity is often clunky. And robots’ ‘eyes’ are a bottleneck in areas such as contextual comprehension, or for example guessing what is hidden behind a partial view.
But while shortcomings remain, progress to address them is rapid. A recent breakthrough by AgiBot, a Chinese maker, claims a battery life of up to 10 hours on a single charge. On dexterity, industry leader Linkerbot has developed a hand that can position objects with a 0.2 millimetre margin of error and lift something weighing 30 kilogrammes. And industry leaders such as Hikvision are developing 3D machine vision that can capture an object’s depth, shape and spatial coordinates.
One key goal for the industry is to reach the so-called ‘ChatGPT moment’. That is defined by those in the industry as when a humanoid robot can be placed in unfamiliar surroundings and complete 80 per cent of tasks after hearing text or voice commands.
When such a moment is reached, humanoid robots will be able to complete a range of tasks without the kind of specific pre-programming currently required. That would give them the adaptability to undertake a range of tasks with similar efficiency as human workers, but at a cheaper cost – the technology’s key selling point.
Wang Xingxing, CEO of Unitree, said last month that such a moment could arrive ‘in two to three years if things move fast, or five to ten years if they move slowly’. Others have more aggressive projections. Wang Xiaogang, chairman of ACE Robotics, said his company expected to reach the moment by the end of 2027.
Finding jobs fit for robots
As humanoid abilities improve, the hunt is on to find them money-making jobs. Thus far, the market is still in its infancy. But the possibilities appear considerable: at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in July, robots were filmed making coffee and pizza, doing laundry, dispensing medicines, doing production line work, cleaning toilets, giving massages and more.
The search for robot employment is part of a bigger push by Beijing to diffuse AI throughout its economy. The Five-Year Plan states that by 2027 AI devices, agents and applications should be used in 70 per cent of key industry sectors and by 2030 in 90 per cent.
However, Unitree’s prospectus shows that the lion’s share of the company’s humanoid robot revenue comes from universities, academic bodies and research laboratories – who often are buying the robots with the assistance of state subsidies.
These labs then commonly sell the data they derive from training the robots back to robot companies such as Unitree. The circular nature of this economy has raised some concern over its sustainability. Only about 9 per cent of Unitree’s revenue came from sales to industry, suggesting lacklustre commercial demand thus far.
More technological dominance?
The upshot of such market dynamics is that the humanoid robot industry in China looks similar to the early years of the Chinese EV industry. Considerable government funding is helping to bolster demand, buying time for companies to develop technologies.
But there are many uncertainties ahead. Until robots reach their ChatGPT moment, fears of bubble dynamics will persist, creating risks for investors and for scores of Chinese robot start-ups daring to dream big.
Beijing hopes to reach that moment swiftly and create another industry like EVs, in which Chinese manufacturers lead the world, and China has an opportunity to set global industry standards for a potentially revolutionary future technology. In that case the Chinese robotics industry could follow the course of the EV industry. That would see it max out domestic demand, before seeking to establish export success through a similar mix of high quality and unbeatable cost.
But the EV industry’s export success may itself hinder a similar effort in robotics. Chinese EVs have become a source of significant security, economic and resilience concerns in markets like Europe, as they threaten to overwhelm European manufacturers and create dependencies on Chinese supply.
As a result, these markets could be quicker to raise barriers to Chinese robot imports. The US already banned new foreign-made humanoid robot imports in July. And Washington may pressure other countries to follow suit.
On the other hand, it’s not clear what the alternative to a future robot industry dominated by Chinese models will be – when other countries’ robot industries lag so far behind.
The sooner the ChatGPT moment arrives for China’s robots, the sooner European policymakers will be confronted by another set of familiar issues: how far should they go to defend their domestic industries? And how deeply should they integrate their technology with China’s?
New law requires hospitals to document clinical justification, transportation and backup care for pregnant patients discharged with signs of labor
DOVER — Delaware hospitals must create formal discharge plans for pregnant patients sent home before delivery after Gov. Matt Meyer signed Senate Bill 301 into law Monday.
The legislation applies when a pregnant patient experiencing signs or symptoms consistent with labor is discharged from inpatient care or observation status. It does not require hospitals to admit every patient who may be in labor, leaving the discharge decision to the documented clinical judgment of the treating health care professional.
However, when a patient is discharged, the hospital must provide a written plan intended to ensure the patient understands what to do next and has a safe way to obtain additional care.
“When a mother is in labor, ‘good luck’ is not a plan,” Meyer said. “Any pregnant woman who shows up to a hospital in Delaware should feel seen, heard and cared for until she and her baby are safe.”
The ceremonial signing was held at Josie’s Grace, a Newark-based nonprofit that provides maternal mental health support during pregnancy, after childbirth and during the transition to parenthood.
What hospitals must provide
Under the new law, a discharge plan must include:
Aftercare instructions and confirmation that they were explained to the patient, the patient’s representative or a caregiver;
An assessment of the distance and travel time between the patient’s primary residence and the hospital;
Verification that the patient has reliable transportation between the residence and hospital;
Identification of a backup hospital or facility where the patient could receive labor and delivery services; and
The clinical justification for discharging the patient.
The plan must be discussed with the patient, the patient’s representative or a caregiver and included in the patient’s medical record. If the patient or representative declines to participate, the hospital must document that refusal.
The legislation was sponsored by Sen. Marie Pinkney, D-Bear, and House Speaker Melissa Minor-Brown, D-New Castle. It passed the Senate 20-0 on May 20 and the House 40-0 on June 24.
“As a nurse, I know that discharge is not simply the moment a patient walks out of the hospital; it is a critical part of their care,” Minor-Brown said. “A pregnant patient who seeks help because she is in pain or experiencing labor-like symptoms deserves to leave knowing what is happening, what warning signs to watch for, what steps to take next and when to return for immediate care.”
Pinkney said the measure is intended to address gaps in maternal care, including concerns that Black women are more likely to have their symptoms or concerns dismissed by medical professionals.
The Delaware legislation was modeled after the federal Women Expansion of Learning and Labor Safety, or WELLS Act, advanced in Congress by U.S. Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester of Delaware and U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly of Illinois.
The federal proposal is named for Mercedes Wells, an Indiana woman who gave birth along a roadside shortly after being discharged from a hospital while experiencing labor symptoms.
“From the first trimester to the fourth trimester, we want to make sure moms and families have the support they need to be healthy,” Blunt Rochester said. “The signing of Delaware Senate Bill 301 will save lives while building on the work we’re doing in Congress to end the maternal health crisis.”
Hospitals supported goal, questioned mandate
During the legislative debate, the Delaware Healthcare Association supported the bill’s patient-safety goals but took a neutral position because of concerns about placing additional clinical requirements into state law.
The association said Delaware hospitals already operate under federal emergency-care standards and other regulatory oversight and maintain protocols for responding to pregnant patients showing signs of labor.
It recommended that the state also collect and publish annual county-level information about births that occur while a patient is traveling to a hospital or unintentionally at home. Such reporting, the association said, could help determine whether inappropriate hospital discharges are occurring in Delaware.
The law’s unanimous passage suggests lawmakers ultimately viewed the additional planning requirements as a reasonable safeguard. Implementation will now determine how hospitals document transportation, identify backup facilities and incorporate the requirements into existing discharge procedures without unnecessarily delaying care.
TO GO BOX
Law: Senate Bill 301
What it does: Requires Delaware hospitals to create a documented discharge plan when a pregnant patient experiencing signs or symptoms of labor is sent home before delivery.
Required information: Clinical justification, aftercare instructions, travel assessment, reliable transportation and a backup labor and delivery facility.
Who oversees it: Delaware Department of Health and Social Services.
Delaware voters have multiple days to cast ballots before the Sept. 15 primary, providing greater flexibility and another opportunity to participate in decisions that often shape state and local government.
Early voting for Delaware’s 2026 primary election begins Wednesday, Sept. 2, and continues through Sunday, Sept. 13, with a two-day pause for the Labor Day holiday.
Unlike absentee voting, voters do not need to provide a reason for voting early. The process is essentially the same as voting on Election Day: Election officers verify the voter’s eligibility, the voter signs the electronic pollbook and then casts a ballot on an accessible voting machine.
A Delaware voter may use any early-voting center in the county where the voter lives. Voters do not have to use their assigned Election Day polling place during early voting. Delaware Department of Elections
When can I vote early?
Dates
Hours
Sept. 2-5
7 a.m.-7 p.m.
Sept. 6-7
No early voting
Sept. 8
7 a.m.-7 p.m.
Sept. 9-13
11 a.m.-7 p.m.
The primary election will be held Tuesday, Sept. 15. Election Day polling places will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Delaware primary-election information
Who can vote in the primary?
Delaware conducts closed primary elections:
Registered Democrats may vote in the Democratic primary.
Registered Republicans may vote in the Republican primary.
Unaffiliated voters and voters registered with minor parties generally may not participate in either major party’s primary.
Not every voter will have a contested race on the ballot.
The regular deadline to change political parties for this primary was May 29.
There is a special exception for some voters automatically registered through the Division of Motor Vehicles who were not previously given an opportunity to select a party. Those voters may affiliate with the Democratic or Republican Party through Sept. 15, including at an early-voting center. Delaware voter-registration guidance
Voters should use the state’s iVote portal to confirm their registration and review their voting information before leaving home.
Where can I vote early?
New Castle County
Appoquinimink State Service Center, 122 Silver Lake Road, Middletown
Claymont Community Center, 3301 Green St., Claymont
Department of Elections Warehouse, 220 Lisa Drive, New Castle
Hudson State Service Center, 501 Ogletown Road, Newark
The Delaware Contemporary, 200 S. Madison St., Wilmington
Wilmington Police Athletic League, 3707 N. Market St., Wilmington
Kent County
BPOE No. 1903 Elks Lodge, 200 S. Saulsbury Road, Dover
Frederica Senior Center, 216 Market St., Frederica
Harrington Parks and Recreation, 114 E. Liberty St., Harrington
Wyoming United Methodist Church, 216 Wyoming Mill Road, Dover
Sussex County
Department of Elections Warehouse, 542 S. Bedford St., Georgetown
Department of Elections Warehouse, 200 Allen St., Seaford
Ellendale Fire Hall, 302 Main St., Ellendale
Fairfield Inn by Marriott, 19113 Coastal Highway, Rehoboth Beach
Indian River Fire Company Station No. 2, 25375 Banks Road, Millsboro
Laurel Fire Hall, 205 W. 10th St., Laurel
Margaret Rollins Community Center, 101 Adams Ave., Lewes
Millville Community Center, 32517 Dukes Drive, Millville
Roxana Fire Hall, 35943 Zion Church Road, Frankford
The Fairfield Inn location is designated for the primary only. Voters should confirm locations before traveling through the state’s official early-voting list.
What should I bring?
Poll workers will ask voters to show identification, and presenting it generally speeds up check-in. However, Delaware does not require photo identification to vote in state and federal elections.
A voter whose name appears on the poll list but who does not present identification may complete an Affirmation of Voter Identity and then vote.
Before going to the polls:
Confirm your registration and party affiliation.
Review your sample ballot.
Select any early-voting center in your county.
Bring identification if available.
Leave candidate clothing, buttons and other campaign materials outside the voting room.
Voters may bring children age 17 or younger with them. Cellphone conversations are not permitted inside the polling place. Delaware voting FAQ
Why participation matters in Delaware
Primaries can be decisive
In districts where one party has a substantial registration advantage, the winner of that party’s primary may enter the general election as the strong favorite. That gives primary voters considerable influence over who ultimately holds office.
Local decisions affect everyday life
Many primary ballots include candidates for the General Assembly, county government and other offices responsible for decisions involving state spending, taxes, schools, land use, roads, housing, public safety and business regulation.
Smaller elections magnify each vote
Delaware is a small state, and legislative and county contests involve much smaller electorates than presidential races. A relatively modest number of votes can therefore determine a nomination.
Broader participation produces a more representative result
When only the most committed political voters participate, a small portion of eligible voters may choose the nominees presented to everyone in November. Greater turnout gives candidates and elected officials a clearer picture of the priorities of the broader community.
Early voting removes Election Day uncertainty
Work demands, family responsibilities, illness, traffic and weather can interfere with Election Day plans. Voting early gives residents several opportunities to cast a ballot while allowing Election Day polling places to serve voters who need or prefer to wait.
Looking ahead to November
Delaware’s general election is Tuesday, Nov. 3. Every eligible registered voter may participate regardless of party affiliation.
2026 Delaware primary: Tuesday, Sept. 15 Early voting: Sept. 2-13, excluding Sept. 6-7 Who may participate: Registered Democrats and Republicans voting in their respective party primaries Where: Any early-voting center in the voter’s county Identification: Requested, but photo ID is not required Check registration:ivote.de.gov Official information:elections.delaware.gov
Three political newcomers sat down with Spotlight Delaware to discuss their Democratic primary campaigns for House District 9, where longtime Republican Rep. Kevin Hensley is retiring.
The seat is a target for Democrats to flip as they seek a House supermajority.
The candidates include Ayanna Khan Flowers, the founder, president, and CEO of the Delaware Black Chamber of Commerce; Gemma Lowery, a community advocate with two decades of experience in the healthcare industry; and Michelle Wall who served on the Appoquinimink Board of Education for a decade.
The winner will face Republican Jamar Money in the November general election.
Readers can find condensed versions of the candidates’ answers below, while the accompanying podcasts feature unedited excerpts from our conversations.
Ayanna Khan Flowers
You’re the founder and CEO of the Black Chamber of Commerce. So to start, why did you go from this particular role with the chamber to wanting to run for the state seat?
So my work has been really about opening doors for people from the beginning who are often been left behind. I have been doing a lot of advocacy in this space just to ensure that policies are fair and equitable for all.
So my advocacy has taken me to Legislative Hall down in Dover, and also to the Capitol in Washington, D.C. So I can be part of the policy building, the policy creation, ensuring the policies are equitable for all.
So for me, that was a wake-up call where I needed to just step my advocacy up and now run for this seat
What experiences do you think you can take from your advocacy work that would help prepare you for potentially serving in this role?
So my priorities are straightforward. Day one, for the past 15 years working in this MOT district, it has always been about economic opportunity that reaches everybody; that reaches every neighborhood.
I was able to inject almost a million dollars back in funding and resources back in this very community from when I started here back in 2013, being an intern and a volunteer and serving on boards. So I’m really about supporting working families, supporting our schools, which I’ve been doing, creating pathways for jobs, accessible healthcare, all those things.
So for me, I am really an outside-the-box thinker. I am not a politician by any means. So I think that’s what’s needed. We need folks who can think of other strategies, that’s able to hold others accountable that’s not gonna put the burden back on the residents. Building a small business back in 2015, being laid off from my corporate job in the most tumultuous of times, building a nonprofit in the height of the pandemic – that is my strength.
I work well under pressure. I know how to build communities and bring people together. I know all about partnerships and collaborations. I know about scaling a business, growing a business, creating a statewide nonprofit to help individuals. So I have that small business economic mindset where we have to just look at other strategies ’cause we’re hitting working families really hard.
We’re hitting our senior community really hard, and we have about eight or nine senior communities here in the MOT area. For me, when the chamber was growing and we ran into funding bumps, I could not expect the small businesses that are already having a hard time to fill those gaps. That would be unfair when I’m the one responsible for bringing opportunities and resources to them.
So I think that’s where we fall short, where we’re depending on the residents with tax increase after tax increase, with referendums, with energy hikes, with all the things back to back. We have to really look at closing the funding gaps in other ways.
You’re in a race where there’s a lot of political newcomers.How do you hope to differentiate yourself?
My differentiation is that I have this experience. I’m down in Legislative Hall advocating. I’m not just here now as a newcomer popping up because I need a title, because I need a job or to fill employment gaps, right? So that’s the differentiator with me and my opponents in this primary race.
I’ve been doing this work. So one of my slogans is, “I am not new to this. I am true to this.” I am really true to this. I am down every session really down in Legislative Hall either giving public comment or either writing letters of opposition or letters of support or just meeting with legislators one on one, either in person or in Zoom.
So that’s my differentiator. I haven’t seen my opponents down in Legislative Hall doing that. I don’t see them giving public comments and advocating. I don’t see them at the bill signings. I’m part of policy creation. I’ve helped with so many policies, creating bills, where I’m bringing people to the table to say, “This is what we need.”
As Spotlight Delaware’s education reporter, something I’ve heard a lot in the last few months is the struggle for parents navigating their working hours and taking their kids to either preschool or childcare along with general concerns about affordability.
What do you think the state should be doing to try and alleviate some of those stressors for working parents who have preschool-aged children who aren’t able to go into the K-12 system all day yet?
So affordability and access is definitely a barrier, especially for single parents. We need more facilities in that space, but the small businesses that are trying to open up those types of centers are dealing with a lot of red tape. So it’s a continuous conversation we’re having where access and affordability is a problem, especially down in Sussex County.
So they’ve built out different priorities for us to tackle in the state, and the lieutenant governor is spearheading that, and she’s been doing an amazing job. And we’re continuing those conversations, so also looking at transportation, the workforce, and it’s all part of the ecosystem that’s creating barriers for these families.
But we need more access and more affordability and tiers. So for me, it’s never a one-size-fits-all because every family is different. We’re looking at tiers. We have a whole system built out for that.
House District 9 isa part of the Appoquinimink School District. This time last year, residents expressed outrage after the district revealed its projected$7.9 million savings balance for the year had essentially been a mirage after numerous accounting errors, and that left the district facing a significant budget deficit.
A year later and moving forward, how do you plan on navigating concerns between community members who are still frustrated with the errors that were experienced, because they also are likely to see another school tax increase in the coming months and in future years possibly?
Here in District 9, we’re part of Colonial and Appo. So we have to make sure that we’re doing what’s right for these families, because I was at that meeting two weeks ago where they announced another potentially 1.85% that was coming for the residents and 1% for commercial.
So I was at that meeting, and I’m like, “Unbelievable.” We have six schools in the pipeline. We are building state-of-the-art facilities that can withstand for 50-plus years, but we’re not paying our teachers. And I know this for a fact. My daughter is an educator. She graduated from Middletown High and got a job there as a special education science teacher, was underpaid and was able to go outside of the district this summer seeking new opportunities, and had job offers for $10,000 to $12,000 more.
But we’re building these state-of-the-art schools. We’re going back to the state. We’re going back to the legislators to get more funding and the teachers and the support staffs are not being paid. I think we have to start there first. We’re gonna lose good talent, and we’re doing our children an injustice when we have so many kids that are having a hard time reading at a grade level, writing and math.
As a state, period, we’re failing. So we have to look at other opportunities to fill those funding gaps other than putting it back on the residents.
District Nine along with others throughout New Castle County were hit really hard by the state’s first in a generation property tax reassessment.
And we know that this is not gonna be the only reassessment that Delawareans are gonna see. We know that lawmakers know that there’s more work that needs to be done to avoid another major fallout after the next reassessment.
What do you think that lawmakers need to do? What needs to be discussed so that properties are being accurately assessed in a way that still balances homeowners’ concerns of affordability?
I think what the main upset was is that they took way too long to do that.
Forty years is insane. Who is gonna wait 40 years to do an assessment and then slam the community like that?
They have to do a better job informing, not waiting so long. I know there’s legislation now that had passed that said they’ll do one in five years.
That five years is gonna come quickly where they have to require also a quality review, I believe, on the commercial property before taxes could be finalized. So that’s good. Definitely reviewing, giving people enough time to do the appeals and just, again, just not waiting and then making sure they’re doing it accurately because there were so many errors that were found in the assessment, like the square footage, the amount of bedrooms.
And this district is so diverse, right? You will have like half a million, million-dollar houses, and then you have mobile homes. One of the residents of the mobile homes was saying that their property tax was assessed $90,000 because they were backed up to a affluent development, where there were million-dollar homes.
Gemma Lowery
Can you explain how you went from the healthcare industry to wanting to run for the State House seat?
The 20 years in healthcare was career number three. I started in banking, and then I was in fabrics with Gore for a while. But I’ve always had this kind of process improvement, how can we do things better vibe, no matter what the career that I’ve done. So it’s also opened my eyes to, like, when things are broken, how you need to fix it.
And you always need to go to the people that are gonna use the solution. And I just keep seeing that just translates. I keep seeing it out in the world, out in politics, out in everything where we’re telling people what we’re doing for them, but we didn’t bother to ask them what they wanted. So that underlying theme, it got to the point where I was frustrated enough with waiting for someone else to do it, that I thought, “Well, this is in my head.
It seems to resonate and work. Why don’t I try?” And the why wait turned into why not. And honestly, that’s what pushed me is what could I do differently instead of helping people one-on-one if I could get to Dover? Like, what could we do on a much bigger level if I was in the room where the conversations were happening and maybe could say, “Where’s the people
that need their voices in the room?” Or bring all that experience into the room as just something different than what’s normally in Dover.
You’re in a race with a lot of political newcomers. How do you hope to differentiate yourself?
I believe I have a very unique perspective because I’m born and raised in Delaware. I went through Delaware schools. I raised my kids here. I’ve been an advocate and a person who has supported across lots of different areas in the state. So I know the state very well, but I’ve also experienced it.
And I think that brings something different than hearing about it. All of us in the race plug in in different ways in how we provide our service, but I cross a lot of barriers and categories that a lot of people don’t. I’m a biracial female.
I have kids that had special needs in school. I’m a veteran wife. I’m still going through the how do you get a disability claim through, space. I’m a labor and delivery coach. I’ve experienced moms almost dying. I’ve tried to connect people to services. And I think it just layers on until there’s a certain cumulative level of knowledge that for me, I think is a differentiator.
I think I can speak to a lot more situations and scenarios than at first glance people realize. And I think that gives me a skill set that is very different. I’m not in one lane. I’m in a lot of different lanes, but those different lanes show how the interconnectedness of one thing being broken impacts so many other things.
And I think that perspective is just different than what a lot of people bring. And I’m also one that’s not afraid to have really tough conversations with people on any side of the aisle. I don’t care. I will talk to anybody. I will work with anybody. It’s about getting to the outcome that helps the constituent or the person that’s really suffering, and whatever that has to look like, I don’t care.
Your campaign websitetalks a bit about “responsible growth.” District Nineisan area of Delaware that has seen a considerable amount of growth in recent years, and in turn that impacts things like road quality, local businesses, school capacity. Canyou to expand on what responsible growth looks like to you, and what state leaders, in your opinion,need to be doing and focusing when it comes to that growth?
Yeah, I think we’re really, especially in nine, we are really in a tough spot because a lot of these agreements were made during COVID. A lot of these approvals have already happened, and they happened in a vacuum because there was so little sharing of information. Number one, that makes me crazy, and I think Delaware does a really bad job.
Spotlight and others are trying to tackle it, but there is no one information source. As the consumer, you have to work to find out what’s going on in your community. And a lot of times, and what we’re seeing in nine is the decisions have been made. We’re going to town forums, we’re having conversations, and everybody’s expressing an opinion that really doesn’t matter.
There’s surveys. There’s just so many tools that we don’t use that we could get people’s honest feedback that we don’t avail ourselves of. I also think that as leaders, the contracting conversations for me, that’s a space that I work in with vendors and others. Getting in front of this stuff would be enormously helpful.
Having a conversation after you’ve agreed with a developer and then saying, “Okay, now we wanna define what affordable use looks, affordable housing looks like, mixed use.” They have the contract signed. They don’t have an incentive. If they wanna partner with you, it’s because they want to, and we can’t be so enamored with the deal that we don’t put in some guardrails to make sure that the community is actually gonna be supported.
This is the county, this is councilman, but we’ve gotta partner better so that it’s not explaining after the fact. It’s asking ahead of time and making sure that the community needs are brought to the conversation.
House District 9 is a part of the Appoquinimink School District. This time last year, residents expressed outrage after the district revealed its projected $7.9 million savings balance for the year had essentially been a mirage after numerous accounting errors, and that left the district facing a significant budget deficit. A year later and moving forward, how do you plan on navigating concerns between community members who are still frustrated with the errors that were experienced, because they also are likely to see another school tax increase in the coming months and in future years possibly?
I think you just have to be really honest about it. I think the timing of when the information came out was really troubling because the fact that there were issues was known. And it didn’t come out until, well after the community should’ve been involved.
I do think as legislators we can mandate or legislate that some accountability tools have to be used. They shouldn’t be optional for the school board and the financial folks. If there’s a way to involve the community and there’s supposed to be a community board, why wasn’t there?
If there were check-ins and checkpoints in places where we could have known ahead of time that things were not what they appear to be, finding out that there’s an excess of $4 million that is magic money when the kids need real money is a problem, and especially when we have rules now where you can then put in a tax increase without a referendum.
So people were literally getting shocking news and then being held hostage to having to pay for it. I’m concerned also that there’s two schools that need to be built that now we’re short-funded. Okay. So this is a snowball effect problem because we need better finance people that can project and look into the future and see.
I know they can’t control tariffs. I know there’s outside influences that will always impact a build and what that cost is. But responsible planning is that you factor in for a certain level of variability and the swing was not millions of dollars. It wasn’t this big. We shouldn’t be this short.
District Nine along with others throughout New Castle County were hit really hard by the state’s first in a generation property tax reassessment.
And we know that this is not gonna be the only reassessment that Delawareans are gonna see. We know that lawmakers know that there’s more work that needs to be done to avoid another major fallout after the next reassessment.
What do you think that lawmakers need to do? What needs to be discussed so that properties are being accurately assessed in a way that still balances homeowners’ concerns of affordability?
As somebody who’s been in Delaware this long, I cannot tell you how my mouth dropped when I heard 40 years.
I’m like, I don’t even understand the business case where that can happen, and I think that’s first. Ripping the covers off of what happened is huge. People needed to know what happened, and I went to the town halls, I went to meetings, I listened to people scream and holler, and I get it.
I also think that as much as it’s frustrating and hard and expecting people to come up with that money within months was insane. I think that was a foolish way to address it. But there’s also the fact that for a lot of people, for decades, they didn’t have to pay the increases.
And we’ve been funding it with this mismatch this whole time. So a reckoning needed to happen. I think it should’ve been done in a tiered approach. So like, we’ve done the reassessment, here’s what we’re projecting your change is gonna be, and over the next X amount of years, we’re gonna get this corrected so that by the next assessment, you are at your new normal, we’ll say.
I think expecting like, “Here’s the assessment. We paid this company, they did whatever, now pay it in 90 days,” was too much for people. Change management seems to be lacking. I’m just gonna keep it real. There’s a process for how you change manage, and we’re not following it. We’re going discovery, rip off the curtain, here.
Is there anything else you wanna add that maybe I didn’t already ask you?
We’re in a place where everybody looks for someone to save them, and that’s not happening a lot, and I think people need to understand their power.
It is a team sport, but it is a messy team sport, but the way that it works is by participation. I’m out there, I’m talking to folk, they’re really apathetic. They’re so frustrated about national politics that I just wanna remind people that “your vote is your voice” sounds common, you hear it all the time, but it really, really does matter.
It’s the one time when you get to help influence. Win or lose, you were a team member. You were on that team fighting to get somewhere, and we shouldn’t be so disturbed by what’s happening outside of Delaware that we forget to participate in Delaware.
Michelle Wall
Can you explain how that experience on the school board influenced your decision to run for the state seat?
So for 10 years, I had the privilege of serving on the Appoquinnimink School Board. During that time, I feel like I learned about issues that face families in my community, and not just school issues, but affordable housing, access to healthcare, transportation needs. And all of that, I think, can affect how kids succeed and then ultimately families.
So I have decided to run for this office as a natural progression of service to this community. I spent time, like, listening to residents, solving problems, bringing people together, and also being frustrated about the things that I couldn’t change on their behalf at that seat.
It was a natural kind of, “Oh, yes, I wanna do this.” I’m very interested in education funding reform, and so it was really important to me the efforts that were made during this General Assembly and specifically those efforts, how they affect my community.
And so again, if I would sum it up, it’s a natural continuation of service to a community I really love.
House District 9 is a part of the Appoquinimink School District. This time last year, residents expressed outrage after the district revealed its projected $7.9 million savings balance for the year had essentially been a mirage after numerous accounting errors, and that left the district facing a significant budget deficit. A year later and moving forward, how do you plan on navigating concerns between community members who are still frustrated with the errors that were experienced, because they also are likely to see another school tax increase in the coming months and in future years possibly?
I think that I would wanna make sure that I don’t wanna say constituents I guess they would be constituents at that point, or my neighbors is really who they are, realize that I’m just as frustrated as they are.
If not maybe even more. Because I spent 10 years of time investing in something for me to find out that the numbers weren’t real. And I learned about the numbers not being correct as I was leaving. And I think the most frustrating thing about it is I no longer had a seat at the table to be a voice for the repair.
I mean, you’re looking at, and I know you’re well aware of this, years and years of us not reassessing properties. Years and years of education funding reform not occurring. And I think that kept hitting Appo. I think people wouldn’t be very familiar with, during my time on the board, I often said, “We run on this shoestring budget all the time.”
Well, there’s gonna be a point when that lace breaks, and I think that we saw that. And I think the district was saying again and again, these funding mechanisms that we have placed in the State of Delaware, they don’t support the challenges that we have in the Appoquinimink School District, because none of our funding mechanisms look at growth.
And that is what I wanna be as a voice for this community. Are we talking about growth? Because prior to these changes, the only meaningful education funding reform the State of Delaware saw is when we moved from a singular unit count to a secondary unit count, and those were my efforts. I mean, it was short of me going down to the legislative hall with a poster with the 327 kids or, I think that was the number the one year, that we had grown post September 30th that we weren’t being funded for, and we were trying to pull from our operating budget to cover those needs of students.
I’m not real sure how to wrap that up for you other than, again, it’s a segue of service. I learned about all of these things and I felt like the changes that are being made don’t always consider those individual challenges of my district.
There’s gonna be people who vote off of name recognition, and they might say, “Michelle Wall, she was on the Appo School Board when all of this was going down.” Yeah. “Therefore, I’m not gonna vote for her.” What would you say to those people?
I think I would ask them to look at my record of service beyond that and that I continually showed up, I continually asked questions, I continually was a voice for the people in terms of, how do we communicate better?
I tried to communicate as transparently as I could. I held bagels with a board member every Thursday following school board meetings from before I was elected through my entire tenure. I think I would say, please look to my record of service of showing up. I would always tell people at the start of bagels with a board member, “I know you’ve come here with a concern, and this meeting is a starting point.
We might not come to a resolution today. And quite honestly, we might not come to a resolution you like. But we’re gonna try.” And I always tried to value the questions I got, even the questions I didn’t know the answers to, and I’ll continue to do that because I think both a school board member and somebody who is a state representative, it’s not a fair assumption of someone to be a subject matter expert in everything.
What you’re supposed to do is get asked the question, gather the information, and make an informed decision. And I think if people will look at my record of service, then they would see that.
Growthwas something you mentioned a few minutes ago and then I saw on your campaign website you talk about smart land use.
I was wondering what responsible growth looks like to you and what you think state leaders, like yourself, if you’re to be elected, need to be focusing on when it comes to that growth.
I think that the key to successful growth is collaboration. I raised two kids in this area.
I first joined the school board when my girls were in first and third grade. Now they’re in college. I think we’re at a place where they won’t be able to afford to come back to this community, and a lot of those decisions were made prior to me even living in this area. So I wanna make sure we’re thoughtful and intentional with all of the stakeholders around the table.
Sometimes in Delaware I feel like we make decisions in silos that impact each other. I think we saw that a lot with the reassessment. It was sort of like this triangle of blame, and everybody who was a taxpayer was sort of caught in the middle. But we weren’t really coming around the table, I think, together with the state, with the county, with the school district to say, “What does this look like?”
District Nine along with others throughout New Castle County were hit really hard by the state’s first in a generation property tax reassessment.
And we know that this is not gonna be the only reassessment that Delawareans are gonna see. We know that lawmakers know that there’s more work that needs to be done to avoid another major fallout after the next reassessment.
What do you think that lawmakers need to do? What needs to be discussed so that properties are being accurately assessed in a way that still balances homeowners’ concerns of affordability?
I think it comes back to collaboration. I think from the onset we need to make sure that we’re working as a group for what’s best for residents, that it’s not the county leading a part of the effort and the state leading another part of the effort, or the state coming in behind the county and changing part of the effort, and the school district not knowing what’s going on most of the time because they’re waiting for numbers from both.
It does need to be a collaboration of stakeholders from all of those entities where we start the process, and communication is always key. I think that’s part of the success, too. I think that’s part of the problem, too, with what Appo experienced, is they were dealing with kind of this perfect storm of reassessment occurring and then them having the budget shortfall.
Is there anything you wanna add that maybe we didn’t already touch on?
I think I just want people to know, like, I’m running as a continuation of service. This isn’t a big political thing for me. I know I’m running in a Democratic primary that’s really competitive, but for 10 years, like I’ve worked on representing people, and people who didn’t always agree with me.
But I worked together on behalf of that community. I’m just interested in collaborating with others to make this a place where people wanna raise their families, where their kids will wanna return to. I experienced relocating an elderly parent to this area, and I know the challenges of looking for healthcare here.
So I just want it to be a place that people wanna call home.
Why Should Delaware Care? Affordable housing has been a persistent theme within the city of Wilmington with debates over subsidies for developers and rent stabilization. Now a different fight is also emerging at some of the few affordable apartments available for the city’s seniors, with some saying their publicly supported homes are falling short of basic living standards.
For the past week, residents of a Wilmington apartment for seniors have publicly called on their building’s management to fix what they say are horrible living conditions that have persisted for the past year.
At a protest last Friday and during subsequent news interviews, the older residents have said their homes within the Windsor Apartments — a 14-story high-rise that offers low-income units — have lacked consistent hot water for about a month.
They also said that the Walnut Street building has been infested with bed bugs, cockroaches, and mice for several months.
“We’re tired of paying our rent and living like this. They don’t want to do anything,” resident Jane Morrow said.
The residents say they will take their grievances to the Wilmington City Council, which has scheduled a discussion of “ongoing issues impacting seniors in high-rises” for its council meeting on Wednesday.
Wilmington City Council President Ernest “Trippi” Congo told Spotlight Delaware that the elected body had been planning the meeting for the past three weeks after hearing years of similar concerns about other publicly supported apartments in the city, separate from Windsor.
He said the council had hosted meetings before to discuss such problems, but Wednesday’s will be the first that will include the Wilmington Police Department, the city’s Department of Licenses and Inspections, and the Wilmington Housing Authority.
Get Involved The Wilmington City Council Committee of the Whole will meet at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 2, in the Redding City/County Building at 800 N. French Street. To see the agenda, click here.
Windsor Apartments is owned and operated by Arbor Management LLC, which is an affiliate of Leon N. Weiner & Associates (LNWA), a Delaware-based affordable housing developer.
The 169-unit apartment complex offers efficiency and one-bedroom apartments to seniors. According to the company’s website, the building operates under the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Section-8 and Low Income Housing Tax Credit programs.
Neither officials from Arbor nor LNWA responded to requests to comment for this story.
Claims of poor repairs
Beyond complaints about hot water and pests, Windsor Apartments residents also pointed to what they described as poor and incomplete repairs.
Michelle Webster, who’s lived in the complex for the past three years, said mold has built up in her bathtub lining, and water damage has spread across her ceiling from flooding that came from the floor above. She asked for the issues to be fixed months ago, but they have gone untreated, she said.
Spotlight Delaware also visited Webster’s apartment and saw mold in the bathroom, damage to the ceiling, and rotten wood on the cabinets.
The water from her faucet was hot during the visit.
Webster and other residents say the hot water in the building has been periodically turning off, then back on.
Peeling paint is visible on the walls of Michelle Webster’s Windsor Apartments home. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY BRIANNA HILL
In response, Webster and two other residents said they intend to withhold their rent, and instead place it into Wilmington’s newly established rent escrow account.
Under Delaware Law, tenants can withhold two-thirds of their daily rent if their landlord does not provide such vital items.
Caroline Klinger, spokeswoman for Mayor John Carney, told Spotlight that the city is aware of residents’ concerns after receiving complaints in recent months about a lack of hot water, ceiling leaks and bugs.
City inspectors cited the property and worked with management and contractors to address the issues, she said.
She also said officials continue to evaluate the situation, and the Department of Licenses and Inspections will conduct a full inspection of the Windsor Apartments building later this month.
‘Shut ’em down’
Morrow and Webster were among more than a dozen residents who staged a protest on Friday in front of the Windsor Apartments to express their frustration with the conditions.
Wilmington police blocked off Walnut Street from traffic as residents and supporters took to the streets, chanting “Shut ’em down!” and “We matter!” drawing attention to the conditions inside.
Also attending the protest was Wilmington City Councilwoman Michelle Harlee, who represents the area. There, she encouraged residents to express their concerns at Wednesday’s city council meeting. She made the suggestion before Congo officially announced that the council would discuss the issues.
Michelle Booker, a political candidate running to represent the 2nd district in the state legislature, stands outside the Windsor Apartments in August. | SPOTLIGHT DELAWARE PHOTO BY BRIANNA HILL
The demonstration was organized by Michelle Booker, a political candidate running to represent the 2nd District in the state legislature, and her husband, Mahkieb Booker, a community advocate.
Michelle Booker said she decided to organize the protest after knocking on residents’ doors as part of her campaigning and hearing resident concerns.
“I wouldn’t want nobody to treat my family like that. We got people in here on oxygen and all kinds of stuff,” Michelle Booker said.
State Rep. Stephanie Bolden (D-Wilmington). | PHOTO COURTESY OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY
Booker’s primary election opponent, state Rep. Stephanie Bolden (D-Wilmington), said she regularly hosts events at Wilmington’s senior housing facilities, including the Windsor Apartments. She said residents have not raised concerns with her.
She also said the issue is primarily a matter for local government rather than the state legislature, asserting that there are state-level issues lawmakers need to focus on.
She also suggested that Booker was highlighting the issue for political gain.
“Everybody has the right to run [for office], but all I can say is run, get your information, and run for the right reasons, and don’t use people’s tragedies or their concerns,” Bolden said.
Illustration by Shoshana Gordon/ProPublica. Source images: via Wikimedia Commons, lori05871 via Flickr.
The rejections piled up one after another as leaders of Alpha School, a growing network of private school campuses, tried to convince states that their artificial-intelligence-led teaching model belonged in publicly funded charter schools.
The Alpha system is centered on the idea that students can “crush academics,” like reading and math lessons, in just two hours a day. AI software teaches the lessons. The human teachers, referred to as guides, focus on motivation and emotional support. “School is broken, and we’re here to fix it,” Alpha’s “2 Hour Learning” tagline claims.
But over the last two years, officials in numerous states have questioned the model, characterizing it as “untested” and ”experimental.” In North Carolina, one charter school board member feared two hours was “not nearly enough” to teach required subjects. A month earlier, in August 2024, an official in Utah worried that the school’s instructors may act more like “a life coach” than a teacher.
Even the largely conservative Texas State Board of Education, which had approved most charter applications over the last decade, rejected Alpha’s pitch last summer.
“I’m just a little skeptical of those types of gains,” said Keven Ellis, a Republican board member in Texas, in response to Alpha’s claims of massive improvements in student academic outcomes over short periods of time.
By this spring, Alpha had applied to form charter schools in at least 10 states, according to an Instagram post from co-founder MacKenzie Price in March. Only Arizona had said yes.
“I’ve met with White House representatives. Policy makers at the federal and state level. Decision makers who hold the fate of our society in their hands,” said Price in the Instagram post, months after Texas rejected the company’s charter pitch. “Unfortunately, change is hard.”
What Price didn’t mention in her post was that Texas leaders were rolling out a new education program that would allow private schools to earn state funding, and Alpha School was set to benefit. The inaugural voucher initiative would award tax dollars for select students’ homeschooling or private school tuition. Price and her husband, Andy, had personally pushed for vouchers by donating over $2 million, before and after the program was approved, to Texas legislators and political action committees that helped pass the controversial program and oversee it.
Now, just one year after the state rejected its charter school application, Alpha has roughly quadrupled its Texas private schools, with more than 30 virtual and in-person campuses, most of which were accepted into the voucher program, ProPublica and The Texas Tribune found. This rapid expansion has made Alpha among the largest private school chains participating in the voucher initiative.
MacKenzie Price, Alpha School’s co-founder, and Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath speak during a visit to an Alpha School campus on Sept. 9, 2025.Kaylee Greenlee for The Texas Tribune
“They took a backdoor approach,” said Democrat Tiffany Clark, one of several Texas State Board of Education members who voted against Alpha’s charter school application last summer and were concerned with its entrance into the voucher program. “They said, ‘You know what, we can’t get in as a charter, but we can continue to be a private school and take these funds.’”
Texas and Arizona appear to be the first states where Alpha’s campuses have been approved to participate in school choice programs, though they could qualify in others. After starting with one campus in Austin, the chain now has private schools in 17 states and Puerto Rico. Most of those states run voucher programs.
As ProPublica reported in July, private schools across the country have multiplied in recent years, often with little oversight, alongside the growth of state voucher programs. The result is that taxpayer dollars sometimes go to school leaders who have misused public funds or have documented histories of abusing children. Elected leaders in Texas, which has one of the newest andlargest voucher programs in the country, promised that they had implemented strong guardrails, including some that other states had not.
But Alpha School’s acceptance into the voucher program, after state education leaders rejected the same model just last year, underscores the limitations of those standards, according to education experts. Alpha leaders didn’t apply again to the state education board but to the Texas comptroller’s office, essentially the state’s chief financial officer, which legislators designated to run the voucher program. The comptroller checked for only four criteria: that a school operates in Texas, that it’s accredited by an approved organization, that it’s been in operation at least two years and that it administers annual standardized tests.
None of Alpha’s private schools had to meet state curriculum standards or show how the company’s model would lead to student success. None of the concerns raised by the Texas board just last year about Alpha’s rejected charter applications, test scores or use of AI to teach mattered.
“That wasn’t relevant,” said Travis Pillow, a spokesperson for the voucher program. “Our role is to make sure that a school meets the requirements in the law.”
Have you had trouble finding a school or using a voucher-style program? Do you have concerns about schools — public or private — in your area? Help us understand how families across the country are navigating their school options.
None of the Alpha leaders named in this story, nor the company’s press office, agreed to interviews, nor did they answer most of the newsrooms’ questions, including about their test scores. An Alpha spokesperson provided an emailed response only to questions about previous reporting by other news outlets. Alpha officials have defended their model in interviews and podcasts, saying it has drastically improved student outcomes and test scores that it says place their kids in the top 1% to 2% in the country.
Price has said she co-founded the school in 2014 to allow students to learn at their own pace after her oldest daughter grew bored and felt held back in public schools, according to multiple interviews.That mission was supercharged four years ago, when tech mogul Joe Liemandt poured $1 billion into the school and its AI-guided platform with the goal of reaching 1 billion students worldwide. Since then, Alpha has transformed into a sprawling education company with a fast-growing national profile. The schools have caught the attention of Trump endorser and billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman and Elon Musk, whose Starlink internet will be used to launch more Alpha schools across the world.
Education experts have raised skepticism about Alpha’s bold claims, noting that private schools can self-select affluent students, who are likely to perform well academically. ProPublica and the Tribune interviewed five such experts, who noted that private schools aren’t required to share their internal data and so can easily cherry-pick positive examples.
The newsrooms also examined some of Alpha’s outcomes among lower-income students and charter schools, including a partnership the company had with an existing charter in Texas that has not yet been reported. The experts ProPublica and the Tribune spoke with said in those examples, Alpha either didn’t release enough data to verify its alleged successes or the test scores released by state education agencies fell far short of the academic growth that company leaders predicted.
“I don’t believe their claims that typical students will see rapid improvements,” said Justin Reich, director of the Teaching Systems Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “There are tons of reasons to be skeptical of that claim.”
Rejection After Rejection
To achieve their ambitions of teaching a billion students, Alpha leaders had to break into the same public education system they aimed to revolutionize.
By 2024, the company was in the midst of a nationwide sprint, hoping to open virtual or in-person charters in over half the country.
The concept intrigued some state leaders, who liked the self-paced learning or the opportunity to pioneer AI instruction in classrooms. “My mind is kind of blown by all this,” one North Carolina education official said in September 2024.
But charter leaders across the country raised similar concerns that led them to reject Alpha’s pitches, according to ProPublica and the Tribune’s review of applications, interviews and written feedback from the six states where the newsrooms were able to verify the company had applied: Texas, Arizona, Arkansas, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Utah.
Officials in every state the newsrooms reviewed worried about what would happen to the role of teachers if Alpha’s AI-led platform, rather than certified educators, provided lessons to students. Many state charter leaders also doubted students could master necessary lessons in just two hours a day or questioned whether Alpha’s courses covered each individual state’s required curriculum. In at least one instance, in Utah, Alpha leaders admitted they had not checked the curriculum standards before applying.
In several states, charter leaders criticized Alpha’s habit of projecting multiplying enrollment year after year, or the little community support and outreach they’d secured to back up the claims. Alpha leaders told education officials at times that they surveyed Price’s social media followers to measure parent interest in a state.
At least two state education boards also took issue with Alpha’s plan to keep Price and her husband on the charter’s oversight board while the school simultaneously paid their companies, which provide services like the two-hour learning platform. The Prices acknowledged the conflict of interest and repeatedly promised to correct it. In Arizona, the only state to approve the Alpha-affiliated charter, Andy Price said in 2024 that they were “fully committed to having a majority board of 100% independent Arizona folks by the end of this year.” MacKenzie and Andy Price were still serving on the board as recently as this June, according to board meeting minutes.
Among state officials’ most consistent concerns was the fact that Alpha’s model had been tested only among affluent students whose families could afford expensive private schools or among students who’d received scholarships. They questioned whether the learning platform would work in charter schools, where there could be more students behind academically, who had special education needs or were learning English as a second language. (In at least four of its charter applications, Alpha said it incorporates programs like the language app Duolingo to help students with their English.)
A new Alpha school near Houston opened this year.Hope Mora for ProPublica and The Texas Tribune
Alpha leaders often countered concerns by referencing successful student test scores in two more diverse campuses in Texas where they’ve operated. But the achievements they highlighted were not so clear-cut as they made them seem, experts said.
In one instance, Alpha partnered with an Austin charter called Texas Preparatory School that was already facing a potential state-imposed closure because of low student test scores and failed financial audits. An Alpha leader told Texas education officials in May 2025 that after they implemented their two-hour learning platform at the charter, outcomes changed from most students failing state exams to 50% to 60% of students passing them.
Test results published by the Texas Education Agency don’t back up that claim. The scores indicate that students may have performed worse on state tests than before Alpha’s involvement, according to several education experts who reviewed them. The portion of students who achieved “approaches grade level,” the lowest category that counts as passing the test, slightly rose, from 19% to 21%. The share of students that the test showed were at their grade level dropped from 10% to zero after the Alpha partnership.
Texas Preparatory School received its third consecutive F rating, largely based on the test scores it received during the partnership with Alpha.
“I don’t see the extreme growth,” said Toni Templeton, a research scientist at the University of Houston Education Research Center who reviewed the records at the newsrooms’ request. “If you’re such a high-performing school, you should have no problem demonstrating it.”
The state decided to shut down the charter permanently last year in the middle of the Alpha partnership, but it allowed the campus to finish out the school year.
Alpha leaders also pointed to its private school campus in Brownsville, a majority-Latino city in South Texas, as another example of their success. Alpha boasted to state charter boards that its Brownsville students, located in one of the poorest school districts in the nation, still excelled using the company’s AI program.
“We don’t care if a student is white, Black or brown, rich or poor. An AI tutor is infinitely patient,” Price said during an interview with education officials in Utah about opening a charter campus there. “I believe this is the most kind of equitable answer to the problem of education.”
However, reports from Wired and CNN have detailed families leaving the school after students fell behind academically or developed anxiety trying to keep up with learning expectations. Alpha has vehemently denied the findings, which a spokesperson wrote in an email to ProPublica and the Tribune “contain inaccurate reporting, misleading context and potentially defamatory representations.” “Prior to publication, WIRED was provided with documentation that directly contradicted its central claims, yet the piece did not accurately reflect that information,” the spokesperson wrote. She did not share that documentation with ProPublica and the Tribune, saying some of the “strongest evidence involves sensitive mental health records, personal records and individual data related to minor children.”
ProPublica and the Tribune specifically looked at the Brownsville student outcome data that Alpha self-published, which does not include detailed test scores to prove academic growth for all students, according to several education experts who reviewed it. There was also inconsistency in how Alpha presented the data. An Alpha leader told Texas education officials that students across grade levels in the Brownsville campus had scores that jumped from 30% to 80% mastery. But Jennifer Steele, an education professor at American University, said that Alpha’s published report shows those improvements for only its second graders, who may not be representative of the entire school.
“The bottom line is that if you desperately want your child to drill on screens two hours a day and you are prepared to pay a lot of money for that, you might have the kind of child who will test well after doing so. These kids do exist, and the Alpha schools are built to attract their parents,” Steele said. “But as a scalable model for public schools — even public charter schools — there is no evidence that it works.”
Even in Arizona, the sole state to green-light Alpha’s charter pitch, the academic outcomes appear to again fall short, based on the preliminary state test scores recently presented to the charter school’s oversight board ahead of their official release this fall. (The Arizona Education Department would not provide ProPublica and the Tribune with the underlying scores.)
In their application to form a charter school in Arizona, Alpha leaders had predicted 65% of their students would test proficient in English at the end of the first year, but just 28% did, the state test scores showed. They projected 60% could reach that level in math. Only 10% achieved it.
The Expansion Continues
Kaylee Greenlee for The Texas TribuneJordan Vonderhaar for ProPublica and The Texas Tribune
One of Alpha School’s Austin campuses
Even as many states have rejected Alpha’s charter applications, the company’s push to expand its footprint hasn’t slowed. It’s only intensified. By this summer, Alpha had announced the launch of private campuses in 50 cities across the country, each catering to a different type of learner: Athletes can attend one of Alpha’s 13 sports academies. There are options for kids who play video games like Fortnite or who like to spend time in nature. One high school campus in New York challenges students to launch business ventures and net $1 million by the time they graduate, or else Alpha will pay back their $150,000 annual tuition. In another program, students spend their year abroad in Kenya and Ecuador. Their mission: help start new Alpha schools.
As the number and types of schools multiplied, so did Alpha leaders’ efforts to win support from public officials, particularly those who have pushed voucher programs.
In 2023, the Texas Observer reported that an LLC called Future of Education, whose incorporation address is the same as the Prices’ Austin home, donated $1 million to the campaign committee affiliated with then-Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, an outspoken voucher advocate. In Texas, Andy Price gave over $250,000 to a political action committee that helped elect pro-voucher candidates, and MacKenzie Price gave $10,000 to Rep. Brad Buckley, the Republican lawmaker who successfully carried the Texas voucher bill last year. She also donated to the leaders whose office oversees the state’s voucher program: $200,000 to Kelly Hancock and $100,000 to Don Huffines, who have both served as Texas comptroller.
MacKenzie Price personally donated the most money in Texas to the main fundraising committee of Gov. Greg Abbott, who led the charge to bring a voucher program to the state. She contributed over $1.5 million to the governor’s campaign in the last three years.
Alpha even got a mention in a press release the governor’s office issued in September 2025, after Abbott met with U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon. McMahon had toured an Alpha campus in Austin earlier that day. “The Secretary noted the innovation of Texas schools using artificial intelligence as a beneficial tool to assist students in learning how to ask the right questions to better understand educational materials,” the press release said.
Joining McMahon on that tour was Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath, though about two months earlier the state board of education — which oversees his initial charter decisions and often agrees with Morath — had rejected Alpha’s charter proposal despite his recommendation.Morath has been a supporter of Alpha’s model before and after the vote, which he doesn’t have the power to override.
State board member Julie Pickren was thrilled to learn from ProPublica and the Tribune that Alpha private schools were accepted into the voucher program. Pickren, who voted in favor of Alpha’s Texas charter last summer, thought the model brought a promising individualized learning solution that could improve student outcomes, especially in academically struggling districts.
“I would say thank you to them,” said Pickren, referring to Alpha. “Thank you for not giving up and looking for a way to serve children.”
Fellow Republican and education board member Evelyn Brooks disagreed. She was shocked to learn about Alpha’s acceptance into the voucher program and rapid expansion in Texas.
“You’re just making money. You’re reproducing a model, regardless of the region, regardless of the state,” said Brooks, who voted against Alpha’s charter proposal last year.
And Alpha continues to open campuses where its leaders say there is enough demand.
Last month, the company sent out a news release announcing a new school in a suburb of Houston.
Joe Rogers, a former resident of the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park near Clyde, North Carolina. Hurricane Helene swept his mobile home into the nearby river with his wife and three of their dogs still inside. The county still allows trailers and campers at the mobile home park. Jesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
Dave Masters could no longer ignore the storm as trees cracked and the swollen river roared. It was dark outside, but through the window he could see his father’s house, usually 100 feet away from the Pigeon River, was surrounded by water. Masters, tall and slender, forded the frigid waist-deep water to wake up his father and convince the 63-year-old to evacuate.
From the son’s trailer on the hillside, the two watched the water rise as Hurricane Frances wreaked havoc on Western North Carolina in early September 2004. Within an hour, his father’s home floated up like a bobber on a fishing line and then sailed down the middle of the road before veering into a telephone pole and cracking in half. The two pieces finally stopped when they got caught under a bridge downstream.
Just 10 days later, Hurricane Ivan dumped more rain in an unprecedented double whammy for the mountainous region far from the coast. Haywood County realized it needed to prevent further harm. It condemned several neighboring mobile homes along with a wood-frame house across the river.
Recognizing the threat of flooding, the county eventually bought out that house, making the land near the town of Clyde permanent open space under a federally funded program to reduce the risk of future loss of life and property damage. The state also paid to relocate Masters’ father and another family from the trailer park on Hyder Mountain Road out of the floodplain “to mitigate the possibility of future damage to life and property should subsequent events occur.”
But although federal floodplain maps showed that the land where the trailer park sat was at risk, the county didn’t buy out the mobile home park or stop the park’s owners from again renting out the lots where trailers were destroyed, including the one where Masters’ father had lived.
It was a decision that would have great consequence. In 2021, the Hyder Mountain Road park flooded again during Tropical Storm Fred, damaging five of the six trailers that fronted the river, including one on the plot where Masters’ father had lived. Despite the damage, all the trailers in that first row remained. Then, in 2024, flooding from Hurricane Helene swept one of those mobile homes into the river, driving it into the same bridge and killing a resident and three of her dogs.
The repeated losses at the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park are in part the result of a gap in disaster policy that allows mobile home residents to be put in harm’s way again and again.
Hurricane Helene devastated trailers at the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park near Clyde, North Carolina.Courtesy of Michael Foster
The federal government’s programs to buy out disaster-prone buildings are “the cornerstone of the Nation’s system for emergency management,” according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. But the program was developed with traditional homeowners in mind, and mobile homes, the country’s largest source of affordable housing, are often left out. Trailers, even when they become immovable and lifelong homes, aren’t typically considered real estate but instead personal property, like motorcycles and boats.
That still leaves people living on flood-prone land. For the state to actually buy that land, mobile home park owners have to take the buyout, and FEMA’s program offers little incentive for them to do so: They can’t collect from the government for lost rent or for the value of the mobile homes on top of the land.
Some park owners say the payouts are not high enough to allow them to relocate; others aren’t even aware of the buyout program. So park owners regularly allow new trailers to move into the vacant spots. Art and Lynne Heinmiller, who own the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park, did not respond to questions — which were emailed, texted and mailed via certified letter — about allowing trailers and campers to move back to where they’d washed away.
What to do about such properties is now a big question for counties and Renew NC, Gov. Josh Stein’s billion-dollar Hurricane Helene recovery program. Renew NC’s manual states that it can help relocate mobile-home owners whose damaged trailers face future flood risks. But the program doesn’t keep new families from moving onto lots with a record of flooding.
At the Hyder Mountain Road park, families now live in recreational campers on plots where mobile homes have twice washed away. The county knows it’s a problem. The mobile home park is one of the spots Wentfard Henson, chief of the Clyde Volunteer Fire Department, watches during storms. Twice ahead of Helene in 2024, his team visited the community, knocking on doors and telling people to evacuate.
“Where they’re at, it’s not if, it’s just when,” Henson said. “It’s going to flood again, there’s no doubt, because it flooded every time we’ve had a storm. It’s flooded four times.”
Asked why residents are again allowed to live by the river, Cody Grasty, Haywood County’s recovery officer, told The Assembly and ProPublica that until a neighboring county bought out a park decimated by Helene, he “did not know it was even possible” to buy out a mobile home park. Small counties like Haywood, which has 60,000 residents, often look to the state for direction.
North Carolina Emergency Management, which reviews buyout applications and often completes these transactions for local governments, said there is no specific guidance for mobile home park buyouts and that the process is no different than it is for commercial or residential properties. In a statement, Justin Graney, the agency’s spokesperson, said, “It is entirely the property owners and the local jurisdiction’s decision on whether or not they wish to participate in the program.”
Neither Haywood County nor the state of North Carolina maintain a list of high-risk properties where they believe mitigation is necessary for public health and safety, a standard practice in many states.
That disturbs Masters, an auto mechanic who moved out of the mobile home park before the 2021 floods.
“Without a doubt in my mind, it’s going to happen again,” Masters said. “They need to remove it.”
Dave Masters at his auto shop in Clyde, North CarolinaJesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
A Second Disaster
Joe Rogers was 38 and living less than a mile away on the other side of the Pigeon River when hurricanes Frances and Ivan struck in 2004. He walked down and saw the destroyed mobile homes at the Hyder Mountain Road park.
He didn’t expect that two years later, he’d move to the lot next to where Masters’ father once lived.
But Rogers’ own father, whose health was declining, gave him a single-wide trailer in 2006, intending to help him stay in the increasingly expensive Appalachian region where his family had lived for generations. The trailer’s roughly 900 square feet was enough space for Rogers to raise his son. And at $200 a month, renting the lot on the river was affordable on his wages as a Waffle House cook.
In the front yard, he and his high school crush, Sandra Justus, planted two peach trees for shade and a pink rose of Sharon for the birds, and they put up a fence so the dogs Justus was prone to rescuing could play outside.
Caring for others was at Justus’ core. In addition to raising her daughter, she often took in other children and animals in need. She was a wildlife rehabilitator and hair stylist who loved Renaissance fairs, rock ’n’ roll and Halloween.
Sandra Rogers devoted much of her life to rescuing animals, including opossums, dogs and birds. One opossum she cared for became an educational animal for a local wildlife rehabilitation center.A peach tree blossoms outside the Rogers’ former home on Hyder Mountain Road.Sandra shared her love for wildlife with Joe Rogers’ son, Kody.
Courtesy of Joe Rogers
Rogers’ lot was only 100 feet from the Pigeon River, but he’d heard that large floods should happen only once every 40 years and figured he’d have a few decades before he’d have to worry about that.
During heavy rainstorms, the Pigeon River would sometimes creep over Hyder Mountain Road 40 feet away. But the river spared their home for 15 years, until Tropical Storm Fred in August 2021. Water flooded all but one of the six trailers closest to the river. Inside the couple’s home, muddy water rose 3 inches, damaging the particleboard floors and the foundation — a burden made lighter when FEMA’s assistance paid for repairs.
The couple got married in 2022, and Sandra changed her last name to Rogers. Two years later, they were planning to move when, in September 2024, Helene hit Florida as a Category 4 hurricane and was spinning fiercely toward Western North Carolina. The county sheriff warned residents that “a catastrophic, life-threatening event” that could surpass the 2004 and 2021 storms was “about to befall Haywood County.”
But none of the park’s residents had been there during the 2004 storms, so they only had memories of the minor damage from Fred. So most residents of the Hyder Mountain Road park stayed, as did the couple, who wanted to look after their army of dogs and pet birds. “We thought that maybe it would be just like the last flood,” Joe said.
The Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park sits on the banks of the Pigeon River and has flooded four times in 20 years from hurricanes and tropical storms.Jesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
On the night of Sept. 26, 2024, the couple went to bed. Within hours, the river, usually about 5 feet deep, crested at a record 30 feet. It took less than an hour for the water in their home to go from ankle-deep to chest-high. They packed the birds into travel boxes and cages, and Joe moved two of their cars to higher ground, giving up on the third when its wheels spun in the waterlogged soil.
Sandra told Joe she thought they should leave but changed her mind when she found out she’d need to swim through water now above her head. Sandra sat on a wooden chair on top of their saturated foam mattress in the bedroom. In the living room, Joe dodged floating furniture, trying to figure out what to do, as the cold, murky water rose.
Suddenly, the water pulled the back door off the trailer. Joe watched several of the dogs make their way toward the opening, where they could swim toward higher ground.
The water had reached his neck when, for a moment, it seemed to recede. He thought the worst was over, only to realize it was because the home had been pushed off its foundation. The trailer lurched, thrusting Joe toward the ceiling. His fingers gripped the top of the bedroom door frame as he called into the darkness to his wife.
Thinking the only safe way to get Sandra out would be by breaking a window, Joe swam through the kitchen and escaped out the back doorway. He clung to a sharp metal gutter, fighting the raging water, and yelled for someone to call 911, hoping emergency responders would be able to reach Sandra by busting a hole through the roof.
Rogers at his new home in Candler, North Carolina, with five dogs that his wife rescued Jesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
Buyout Program’s Fatal Flaws
Most homeowners at the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park didn’t want to endure another flood after Helene, but they didn’t own the land underneath them so they couldn’t pursue a buyout. It was the park’s owners who would need to apply to the government and ask it to buy the land.
But that’s not what the owners of the mobile home park did. After Helene, Haywood County officials spoke with local mobile home park owners about “how they wanted to recover” and “based on those conversations, none of them seemed interested to be done” with running the mobile home communities, said Grasty, the county’s Helene recovery officer.
The buyouts he manages are voluntary, and the county will not consider condemning the land, Grasty said, noting the property owner could choose to not lease out the low-lying lots, to require homes to be elevated as part of lease agreements or to use the land for something else.
“It comes back to that property rights thing,” Grasty said. “We can work on solutions, but not until the property owner or homeowner even says, ‘I want to do this.’”
Pam Quinn, who owned the wood-frame home that Haywood County purchased across the Pigeon River in 2007, said she is baffled that the county still hasn’t bought out the neighboring mobile home park.
“It’s right across the river. It’s so close, but they got treated so differently,” Quinn said.
Pam Quinn stands outside the Clyde home she bought after the Pigeon River destroyed her wood-frame house in 2004.Jesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
The Assemblyand ProPublica reached out to the current and former owners of the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park on multiple occasions. They briefly spoke to a reporter in person but declined to be interviewed. Terry McCracken owned the property with her husband, who died in 2013, before selling it in 2019. McCracken told a reporter outside her home that she thought the 2004 floods were “once in 100 years” and she didn’t know if her husband ever considered a buyout.
The park’s current owners, the Heinmillers, have experienced two floods in the seven years they have owned the park. From behind a screen door, Lynne told a reporter that she was not offered an application for a buyout and would need to confer with her husband as to whether the couple would consider one now. Neither Heinmiller returned follow-up calls.
A buyout is often a financial loss for park owners, said John Richardson, who until this year owned a small mobile home park in neighboring Buncombe County. With a housing shortage, even decades-old mobile homes will bring in at least $1,000 a month in rent, and a lot to park one on yields upward of $300 monthly, he said.
“The cash flow is so good once you’re established in it that there isn’t an incentive to take a buyout,” Richardson said.
Still, after the Swannanoa River washed seven of the nine homes in his park off their foundations during Helene, Richardson decided to pursue a buyout. He didn’t want other families to face similar destruction, and, unable to pay his mortgage without the rental income, he felt he had no other choice.
Hurricane Helene Floods the Hyder Mountain Road Mobile Home Park
Thelma Jent purchased her double-wide trailer on the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park’s hillside in 2010. After growing up in Kentucky, she was familiar with the potential for floods, but her plot was high enough to avoid the rising waters from Hurricane Helene. Her yard became a refuge for neighbors who kept climbing higher on the hill, escaping their homes as they filled with water.Thelma Jent
Foreseeing future disasters, local governments in at least 11 states have fully funded buyouts and relocation assistance for mobile home parks, benefiting the park owners and residents of the mobile homes.
Central Pennsylvania’s Greene Township bought out the property owner and paid to relocate residents of a 54-home park after excessive rainfall rendered all but four homes uninhabitable in 2006. In Harris County, Texas, the owner of a mobile home park that endured severe, repetitive flooding received a multimillion-dollar sum for the lot while homeowners were offered up to $210,000 to purchase a home outside of the floodplain and renters received up to 42 months of assistance.
North Carolina attempted to implement its own solution after Hurricane Floyd struck the Cape Fear region in 1999. The state legislature funded a Crisis Housing Assistance Fund that paid to repair homes or relocate families that didn’t qualify for federal programs, like homeowners in mobile home parks. It also provided funding for families whose buyout did not cover a comparable home.
A lot of the families the program assisted were in mobile homes, said Yolanda Abram, the retired director of the North Carolina Redevelopment Center, which oversaw the program. In almost every circumstance, the program would not allow new homes to go back in the floodplain and paid to help families relocate.
The program got additional state funding in 2005 to relocate homeowners in flood and landslide zones impacted by the past season’s hurricanes. Roughly 40 Haywood County families participated, including Masters’ father.
But the program did nothing to prevent new families from moving to the same lots.
At the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park, staircases have been built to reach utility boxes mounted more than 8 feet in the air. That’s the height a future mobile home would need to be lifted to meet the county’s current floodplain regulations.Jesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
“I Watch the River”
As homeowners started to rebuild after the devastation wrought by Helene, Haywood County required homes in the floodplain to be elevated and securely anchored into the ground to limit catastrophic damages.
At the Hyder Mountain Road park, that means new mobile homes along the river would need to be raised at least 8 feet off the ground. So far, only staircases leading to raised electrical boxes have been added, but no mobile homes have returned to those lots as the elevation costs could reach tens of thousands of dollars.
Recreational vehicles can be in the floodplain, so long as they can be driven or towed away in case of a storm. After the floods, the county issued permits for five campers to occupy the same lots the formerly flooded homes did.
But at least here, those campers have become year-round homes, their undercarriages wrapped in insulation. The county approved them for water, sewer and electric hookups. Yet without elevation and anchoring, fast-moving waters could easily sweep them downstream.
The image of homes going back in where others have repeatedly washed away astonished Abram, whose team helped relocate past residents of the park.
“It continues to happen where homes are being placed in floodplains, and maybe that shouldn’t be happening now,” Abram said.
K.K. Bautista, a single mother, lives in one of the campers in the same row where Masters’ father and Rogers lived. She never wanted to be this close to the water again. The Pigeon River tore through her trailer at another mobile home park during Helene, ripping off the siding so passersby could see through her entire house.
Bautista lost almost everything except her car. A nonprofit gave her a small Jayco Eagle travel trailer, and the lot at Hyder Mountain Road was the only place she could afford. She knew the river had also surged there during Helene but felt she had no other choice.
“When it rains, I don’t sleep and I watch the river,” Bautista said, clutching a cup of McDonald’s coffee, her eyes jumping between the river, her 2-year-old daughter and the road.
K.K. Bautista, left, and her adoptive mother hold their respective children outside a camper at the Hyder Mountain Road mobile home park. Bautista moved there because it was the only place she could afford after Helene destroyed her previous home.Jesse Barber for ProPublica and The Assembly
Rep. Byron Donalds, a Republican from Florida who is running for governor, has blamed “rampant illegal immigration” during the Biden administration for measles outbreaks. But we found no link to illegal immigration in several recent large outbreaks, and infectious disease experts told us that the main driver of the cases is falling measles vaccination rates in the U.S.
Measles was eliminated in the U.S. in 2000, meaning there were no sustained outbreaks lasting more than a year. But since January 2025, cases have risen markedly and the country’s elimination status is now in question. Last year, there were 2,289 confirmed cases — the highest number since 1991. As of Aug. 30, there have been 2,903 confirmed cases in 2026, already breaking 2025’s tally.
Donalds weighed in on the cause of measles outbreaks during an Aug. 23 interview on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” in response to a question from host Margaret Brennan, who asked whether he would tell Florida parents to get their children vaccinated against the disease. “No, actually, my message to Floridians and, quite frankly, to Americans is the reason why we have seen a measles outbreak in certain parts of the country is because of rampant illegal immigration into the United States from the previous administration,” Donalds replied.
When Brennan asked him for evidence for this statement, Donalds referred to “the outbreaks in El Paso, Texas, in Southwest Florida, where I live, and many other parts where you know that you have a situation,” adding that people entering the country illegally “have not had that vaccination schedule.”
Donalds appeared to refer to one outbreak at an immigration detention center, but it’s unclear exactly which outbreaks he was linking to illegal immigration. We did not receive a reply to questions we sent to his office. There’s no evidence illegal immigration under President Joe Biden caused the recent uptick in measles cases in the U.S., and there is clear evidence of vaccination rates falling within U.S. children.
“The U.S. measles problem is due to gradually dropping rates of measles vaccination among children,” Noel T. Brewer, a professor of health behavior at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told us. “Most of the current measles cases are from domestic transmission. A sizable but much smaller portion of measles cases are from international travel. Immigrants play a very minor role in the US measles crisis.”
“There is no evidence that the 2025-2026 outbreaks of measles are due to immigration or immigrants,” Dr. Jonathan L. Temte, a professor of family medicine and community health at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, told us, noting the U.S. has a long history of blaming immigrants for the spread of infectious disease. “The CDC does not track immigration status of individuals diagnosed with measles. Public health data shows that the vast majority of U.S. measles cases stem from unvaccinated domestic residents.”
As we will explain, the data indicate an increasing proportion of measles cases are acquired within the U.S., and not brought in from other countries. Among cases where people were infected abroad, most are related to U.S. residents traveling outside the country and then returning.
Nor could we find any evidence connecting measles in Southwest Florida to illegal immigration, despite Donalds’ implication of a link. In El Paso, Texas, and an adjacent county, there have been some measles cases in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility and a U.S. Marshals Service detention center. Little information has been confirmed about the cases among detainees, including the immigration status of those infected. But even if all of those individuals were undocumented, it would make up only a small fraction — less than 6%— of the total measles cases so far this year in the U.S. Settings like detention facilities and prisons are known to accelerate the spread of infectious diseases.
Eroding Vaccination Increased Measles Cases
The prevalence of measles in the U.S. has been closely tied to vaccination in U.S. communities, with lower vaccination rates leading to more measles cases. Receiving two doses of the vaccine against measles reduces a person’s risk of getting the disease by 97% if exposed.
Before the measles vaccine was released in the U.S. in 1963, almost all children eventually got measles, according to the CDC website. After the vaccine became available, measles cases fell but the virus continued to circulate. In 1989, the vaccine schedule incorporated a second dose of the vaccine.
After this, cases fell further, and by 2000, the U.S. had met the criteria for measles elimination “as a direct result of high 2-dose childhood coverage with the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine,” according to an April 2025 update on measles published by CDC scientists. A country can maintain its measles elimination status if it has limited outbreaks when measles is introduced from other countries, but it cannot have sustained local transmission lasting over a year.
The Pan American Health Organization will review data in November on whether the U.S. should keep its measles elimination status. Experts are doubtful that the country will retain it.
In an Aug. 6 opinion piece in STAT, Brewer cited as concerning, for example, the fact that there have been cases each week since early 2025. This was when a large outbreak began in Mennonite communities in West Texas that would ultimately lead to 762 cases in Texas and span multiple states and countries. He also mentioned an outbreak in Utah that seems to have continued for more than a year. Brewer is the chair of an independent committee that reviews the CDC’s annual report determining whether the country has maintained elimination status. He published his STAT opinion article before doing the review.
“Given the current epidemiological context, it appears highly likely that the USA will lose its measles elimination status in 2026,” another group of researchers wrote in a May 2 paper published in the Lancet.
Maimuna Majumder, a computational epidemiologist at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School and co-author of the Lancet paper, told us that she is “even less confident” that the U.S. will keep its measles elimination status than she was a few months ago when the study was published. “As outbreaks continue to pop up across the US due to under-vaccination, our risk of losing elimination status mounts further,” she said.
CDC data released Aug. 17 on the 2025-2026 school year show that 92.4% of kindergartners had received the MMR vaccine. This is down from 95.2% in the 2019-2020 school year. For the seven school years before that, vaccination rates had stayed between 94% and 95%. Meanwhile, CDC data show that 94% of people who have had confirmed measles in 2026 are unvaccinated or have unknown vaccination status. Another 3% got just one of two doses of the vaccine.
The erosion in vaccination rates at the national level doesn’t tell the whole story of why the U.S. is now more vulnerable to large outbreaks of measles, Ana Bento, an assistant professor in the department of public and ecosystem health at Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine, told us. These outbreaks are taking hold in pockets of the U.S. with very low vaccination rates.
“A national average of 92 percent does not describe any actual classroom,” she said. “It describes the midpoint of a landscape that includes schools in the low twenties, and those are the schools where these outbreaks begin.”
Bento and a colleague put together a database looking at MMR vaccination coverage across most of the U.S. states and the District of Columbia, looking at the county, district and school level. In results published Aug. 18 in Nature Medicine, the researchers calculated whether and at what point communities reached a lower level of vaccination that would allow sustained transmission of measles. They found that schools on average crossed this threshold during the 2022-2023 school year.
Bento explained that these clusters of high vulnerability are not visible when monitoring vaccination coverage at the county level, because large schools tend to have higher vaccination rates than small schools and obscure the existence of pockets of unvaccinated children. She also noted that her group’s data does not cover children who are homeschooled, and that homeschooling has increased in recent years. Some recent outbreaks have been in communities with high rates of homeschooling, she said.
Infectious disease researchers have for years noted measles outbreaks in what CDC scientists have called “undervaccinated, close-knit” communities.
“The practical implication is that outbreaks are not landing randomly,” Bento explained. “They land in the specific places where susceptible children have accumulated into dense pockets.”
A Falling Percentage of Cases from Overseas
The CDC does not track the immigration status of people with measles. However, the agency does keep track of whether measles cases in the U.S. were imported internationally, meaning a person was likely infected overseas and then carried the virus to the U.S.
In a setting where measles has been eliminated, a greater proportion of cases are imported, whereas when measles circulates more within a country, this percentage falls. These data indicate a growing proportion of measles cases in the U.S. are acquired locally, and not brought in from abroad.
Between 2001 and 2011, 41% of measles cases were imported, according to CDC researchers. This proportion subsequently fell. A CDC analysis of cases between 2013 and 2019 found that 12% were imported, with an increase to 31% for the pandemic years of 2020 through 2023. By Jan. 1 through April 17, 2025 — the last period for which the CDC released data on imported cases — internationally imported measles made up just 6% of cases. Since 2000, most imported cases have been brought back to the country by unvaccinated U.S. residents who travel overseas, according to the CDC website, and this remained true as of early 2025. Agency scientists reported that 92% of imported cases in early 2025 were in U.S. residents.
The Johns Hopkins University measles tracking project, which collects data from a variety of sources including state and county health departments, also categorizes confirmed cases based on whether they are locally acquired or imported from out of the country or out of state. By this count, 5% of cases since the beginning of 2025 have been imported. “Of the imported cases, the vast majority occur in travelers returning from other countries with ongoing measles outbreaks,” the project’s website says.
It’s worth noting that most imported measles cases in the recent past have involved unvaccinated U.S. residents who traveled to Europe, Asia or Africa — and not the Americas. Between 2001 and 2019, for U.S. measles outbreaks with at least 50 cases, the known source countries were Israel, the U.K., Belgium, Ukraine and the Philippines.
What’s Known About Recent Large Outbreaks
It’s also not clear what evidence Donalds was considering when linking the largest recent outbreaks in the U.S. to illegal immigration during Biden’s presidency.
We first wrote more than a year ago about unsupported claims connecting the large Texas outbreak, first identified in Mennonite communities in Gaines County in January 2025, to illegal immigration. The source of the outbreak is unknown, according to the CDC.
“We don’t know exactly how the Gaines County outbreak [began],” Chris Van Deusen, director of media relations at the Texas Department of State Health Services, told us. “It spread through a community with low immunization rates.”
Majumder said that the “most concerning” element of the Texas outbreak is that rather than “staying localized to a single under-vaccinated community, the outbreak spread — not only throughout the state, but to other states, too.”
Once in other communities, measles continued to spread. “These outbreaks demonstrate that under-vaccination across the US is now widespread enough that one under-vaccinated community can cause an entirely ‘homegrown’ outbreak in another,” Majumder said.
Mennonites who had been living in Mexico since the 1920s first attempted to establish a community in Gaines County, Texas, in 1977, the nonprofit Texas State Historical Association explains. The initial group struggled with their immigration status until 600 members of the community attained legal status in 1980, and the community maintains ties to Mennonite communities abroad.
The Gaines County outbreak in fact started a large measles outbreak in Chihuahua, Mexico. “Mexico’s outbreak in Chihuahua was seeded by an unvaccinated child who had visited Seminole, Texas, and every one of the more than one hundred cases Mexican authorities sequenced carried the same lineage,” Bento said. “We exported this epidemic.”
Bento said that while it is not established how measles arrived in Gaines County, genomic data indicate that the measles lineage was the same as one that caused an outbreak in Canada with links to Mennonite communities beginning in October 2024, suggesting possible spread from Canada to the U.S.
“The US, Canada, and Mexico have been trading measles cases over the last year and a half,” Brewer said. “It’s one of the things that’s made it hard for any of these countries to fully stop ongoing transmission.”
The Utah outbreak, which has lasted since mid-2025, early on involved communities with ties to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. A large outbreak in South Carolina, meanwhile, centered on evangelical churches and schools in Spartanburg County, spanning October 2025 to March 2026.
Bento said that no link tying any of these outbreaks to unauthorized immigration had been identified.
She and her colleagues wrote in an Aug. 13 commentary in Vaccine that the South Carolina outbreak spread in an area with a high rate of religious exemptions from school vaccine requirements, which rose sixfold in Spartanburg County between the 2013-2014 and 2024-2025 school years.
In Spartanburg County, the researchers found, 73% of schools whose MMR vaccination rates were below 80% had measles exposures, while 5% of schools with 95% or higher vaccination rates did. “That is a local exemption-policy story, not a migration story,” Bento said.
Nor were we able to find a link to immigration in measles outbreaks in Southwest Florida, even though Donalds mentioned cases in this area as an example when asked to justify his claim that illegal immigration had caused measles outbreaks.
There was a 2026 outbreak of measles in Collier County that started at Ave Maria University, a private Catholic school. The county reported 107 measles cases between January and April. However, there isn’t evidence this outbreak was related to illegal immigration. The university’s dean of students reported in a letter to students that Florida’s health department “has indicated these measles cases most likely originated with a student’s holiday travel from another state,” according to NBC News.
Cases in Texas Detention Facilities
Donalds also referred to an outbreak in El Paso, Texas. There were measles cases in federal detention facilities in Texas this year, including at an ICE facility in El Paso. The legal status of those involved and how the outbreak began have not been established. ICE did not reply to our request for comment, nor did the El Paso department of public health.
The El Paso department of public health lists 16 cases this year in congregate settings and eight cases in the community. The local news outlet El Paso Matters reported that all 16 congregate cases were at the ICE detention facility Camp East Montana. El Paso’s lead epidemiologist told the outlet that all eight cases in the community were among people who worked for the federal government or worked at or had ties to the West Texas Detention Facility, in nearby Hudspeth County, where a larger measles outbreak has been reported.
Hudspeth County has had 136 confirmed cases of measles in 2026, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. Van Deusen, the spokesperson from the state health department, told us that all 136 cases were in people housed in federal detention.
The West Texas Detention Facility houses inmates in custody of the U.S. Marshals, and these can include immigrant detainees, according to the Texas Tribune. It’s unclear how many immigrant detainees are at the facility, what the immigration status was of people who got measles, and how measles got into the facility.
Regardless of the source of the initial infection, a factor in the spread of disease is the nature of detention centers themselves.
“Measles is extremely contagious and tends to cause explosive outbreaks in congregant settings like detention centers and prisons,” Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University, told Scientific American when a measles outbreak at Camp East Montana was first reported. “Anytime you have a group of unvaccinated or undervaccinated people crammed into a common indoor space for an extended period, you can expect outbreaks if an infection is introduced.”
In the case of the Texas outbreak, emails obtained by El Paso Matters suggest that delays in reporting cases and “limited information sharing by ICE and by a hospital hindered El Paso’s ability to trace and contain infections,” Bento said. Meanwhile, the emails show public health workers contending with a lack of information about vaccination coverage in the detention centers.
“The failure documented in Texas was screening, vaccination, and reporting inside federal custody,” Bento said.
She added that in contrast to the large Texas outbreak from the year prior, the 2026 El Paso area outbreak did not grow rapidly in the community. “El Paso County and Gaines County both had measles introduced in the same state in the same period,” Bento said. “El Paso, at about 96 percent kindergarten [vaccination] coverage, had eight community cases. Gaines County, at 77 percent, had 414. The variable that mattered was local vaccination coverage, not proximity to the border.”
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Pictured L-R – From Del-One, CIO Marc Kidwell, CBO John Chartrand, CXO Horacio Garcia-Korosec, President & CEO Dan McCarthy, and Joseariel Gomez-Ortigoza, Founder and CEO of Shastic.
Delaware’s largest credit union says its digital assistant reviews auto-loan documents in minutes, offering other businesses a model for adopting AI within their existing systems
DOVER, Del. — Del-One Federal Credit Union is using artificial intelligence to expand its auto-lending capacity without increasing its staff, offering a Delaware example of how businesses can incorporate AI into everyday operations.
The credit union has deployed an autonomous digital assistant named Valeria to review documents submitted by automobile dealerships through Del-One’s indirect lending program. The technology, developed by Shastic, works within Del-One’s existing MeridianLink lending platform.
Del-One said the system could help its two-person funding team increase indirect loan production from approximately $8 million to $15 million per month without hiring additional employees.
“With Valeria, we believe we can nearly double our indirect production, from $8 million a month to $15 million, without adding a single person,” said John Chartrand, chief operating officer of Del-One. “We want our people to think, not enter data.”
AI handles paperwork, employees make decisions
When an auto-loan packet arrives, Valeria reads the documents, creates a funding checklist and flags missing, incomplete or inconsistent information before a Del-One employee begins the final review.
The process takes less than 15 minutes per packet, according to the credit union. Del-One said Valeria has completed more than 500 reviews without clearing a defective packet.
The AI system does not determine whether an applicant qualifies for credit or whether a loan should be approved. Those decisions remain with Del-One employees. The technology completes repetitive document-review work and provides an auditable record of its findings.
The distinction is important as financial institutions and other businesses explore ways to use AI while maintaining human oversight of decisions affecting customers.
“The model here is that our best people manage exceptions, verification and strategy; the digital workforce handles the box-checking, staring and comparing,” said Dan McCarthy, president and CEO of Del-One.
Working within existing systems
Del-One’s approach illustrates how an organization can adopt AI without replacing its primary software systems. Instead of purchasing an entirely new lending platform, the credit union added the digital assistant to a system its employees already use.
The strategy also represents a shift from treating AI as a general-purpose tool to assigning it a specific, measurable business responsibility. In Del-One’s case, that responsibility is checking dealer loan packets for missing or conflicting information.
Del-One said it has deployed two digital assistants and identified other potential applications in lending, account opening and collections. Each would perform a defined back-office function while employees retain responsibility for decisions, unusual cases and member interactions.
A potential AI road map for other businesses
The experience provides a potential road map for other businesses considering AI. Companies can begin with a focused project inside their existing systems, while regional technology and business consultants such as Trellist Marketing and Technology can help identify appropriate processes, develop an implementation plan and manage the organizational transition.
“What Del-One is doing reflects a pattern we see across every industry right now,” said Maria Gunther, CEO of Trellist Marketing and Technology. “Businesses do not need to replace their core systems to get real value from AI. They need to give it a specific, well-defined job inside the systems they already run.
“The first step for most companies is not a big platform decision. It is identifying one repetitive, high-volume process where a person is currently doing work a machine can do faster, then keeping human judgment in charge of the exceptions and the relationships. That is how AI transformation actually takes hold in an organization — one clearly scoped responsibility at a time.”
Building a digital workforce one role at a time
Shastic describes that approach as building a “digital workforce,” with AI agents added one role at a time to perform defined back-office responsibilities.
“Every credit union is trying to figure out how to get real value from AI,” said Joseariel Gomez-Ortigoza, founder and CEO of Shastic. “Del-One has shown what it looks like in production: not one tool, but a digital workforce added one role at a time, on a platform they already own.”
The initiative could allow Del-One to process a larger volume of loans without increasing administrative costs at the same rate. It also could shorten the time between a dealer submitting a complete loan packet and receiving funding.
Del-One, founded in 1960, describes itself as Delaware’s largest credit union. Its mission is to create an easy and enjoyable banking experience in which convenience is combined with personal service.
Shastic develops autonomous digital assistants that perform lending-related administrative work within credit unions’ existing technology systems.
To Go Box
What: Del-One Federal Credit Union’s use of Valeria, an autonomous AI assistant that reviews indirect auto-loan packets
Purpose: Identify missing or inconsistent documents before a Del-One employee completes the funding review
Processing time: Less than 15 minutes per loan packet, according to Del-One
Human oversight: The technology does not make credit or loan-approval decisions
Projected impact: Del-One expects to increase indirect lending production from approximately $8 million to $15 million per month without adding staff
For businesses: Companies considering AI can begin by identifying a repetitive, high-volume process within an existing system while preserving human oversight
Learn more: Visit del-one.org, trellist.com or shastic.com/valeria-autonomous-loan-packet-reviewer
La Red Health Center will celebrate 25 years of expanding health care in Southern Delaware during an anniversary gala Sept. 24, while highlighting a mission that has become an important part of the Milford Wellness Village.
Community health center is a key partner in the Village’s effort to give Milford-area families coordinated access to medical, behavioral and dental services
MILFORD, Del. — La Red Health Center will celebrate 25 years of expanding health care in Southern Delaware during an anniversary gala Sept. 24, while highlighting a mission that has become an important part of the Milford Wellness Village.
The 25th Anniversary and Community Awards Celebration will run from 6 to 10 p.m. at the Hyatt Place Dewey Beach. The event will recognize the community partners, business leaders and supporters who helped La Red grow from a bilingual telephone referral line into a comprehensive health center serving more than 15,000 patients annually.
“This event is very special for La Red, we aren’t only celebrating the milestone of turning 25,” said Rachel Hersh, La Red’s President and CEO, “we are honoring our founders’ vision and the commitment of everyone involved that has led to La Red become a flourishing healthcare center that 15,000 people rely upon every day for their healthcare needs. It really is a testament to what communities can do when they work together.”
For residents of Milford and northern Sussex County, La Red’s work is visible at 21 W. Clarke Ave., where the organization operates as a key service partner within the Milford Wellness Village.
The Village brings more than 30 health, education and community-service organizations together on the former Milford Memorial Hospital campus. Its goal is to make care more accessible and coordinated by allowing residents to find multiple services in one location.
La Red plays a vital role in that model by providing a direct entry point into primary and preventive health care for children, adults, seniors and families — including people who may have difficulty obtaining care because of cost, insurance status, language or transportation.
A health care anchor within the Village
La Red moved its Milford Family Practice into the Milford Wellness Village as the former hospital campus was being redeveloped into a collaborative health and wellness center.
The move gave La Red room to expand pediatric and adolescent care, adult and senior services, women’s health, behavioral health and oral health services in northern Sussex County.
That combination makes La Red more than another tenant at the Village. It is one of the organizations helping the campus fulfill its central purpose: connecting residents with care in a convenient setting where medical providers, rehabilitation programs, laboratories, child care organizations and social-service agencies can work near one another.
“La Red was the first tenant to join the Milford Wellness Village and significantly enhanced its facility when it moved here, including the addition of a brand-new, six-chair dental center,” said Meir Gelley, founder and owner of Milford Wellness Village. “As a medical home serving uninsured and underinsured residents, La Red is a key component of primary care at the Village and plays a vital role in making quality health care accessible to the Milford community.”
The Village’s model is intended to reduce the stress of traveling to separate locations for medical appointments, testing, rehabilitation and support services. For patients with multiple health needs — particularly older adults, families with children and people
managing chronic conditions — having services concentrated on one campus can make it easier to remain engaged in care.
La Red contributes broad family health services to that network. Its Milford center provides adult and senior care, pediatric and adolescent care, women’s health and prenatal services, health screenings, treatment for acute illness and chronic disease management.
Services also include behavioral health care, dental care, substance-use disorder treatment, laboratory services, cancer screening referrals, HIV screening, diabetic retinopathy screenings and help obtaining affordable medications.
La Red’s presence ensures that the Milford Wellness Village includes a community health provider whose mission is specifically focused on reaching people who might otherwise fall through gaps in the traditional health system.
From hotline to health network
La Red’s story began before its formal incorporation in 2001, when it operated as a 24-hour telephone hotline. The service helped people with limited English proficiency connect with bilingual physicians who offered discounted medical care.
In 2001, a group of Sussex County physicians joined with a hospital, community center, faith-based organization and local government to establish La Red Health Center.
“La Red” means “the network” in Spanish, a name that reflects both its origins and its continuing reliance on partnerships.
The organization became an independent ambulatory care center in 2003 and later received full status as a Federally Qualified Health Center. That federal designation helps nonprofit, community-based providers deliver care in areas where residents may face financial barriers or shortages of medical services.
Today, La Red operates health centers in Georgetown, Seaford, Milford and a mobile health unit. It welcomes patients regardless of insurance status, income, language or background.
Care beyond an appointment
La Red’s role extends beyond examinations and treatment.
Bilingual community health workers, known as promotoras, help patients understand medical information and navigate the health system. Transportation assistance helps residents reach appointments, while the organization’s mobile health unit carries primary care, vaccinations and pharmacy assistance into Sussex County communities.
La Red also helps patients enroll in insurance programs, obtain medications and coordinate care among providers.
Its outreach includes support for people experiencing homelessness, individuals returning to the community after incarceration and businesses seeking employee wellness programs.
The Produce RX program works with local farms to provide fresh fruits and vegetables to patients in need. On-site services through the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, commonly known as WIC, offer nutrition education and assistance to families at La Red’s Georgetown location.
Those programs support the same principle behind the Milford Wellness Village: Health is affected not only by what happens during a medical appointment, but also by whether a patient has food, transportation, information and access to continuing support.
Partnerships drive the mission
La Red works with hospitals, schools, nonprofits, businesses and government agencies across Sussex County. Its regional partners include Bayhealth, Beebe Healthcare, TidalHealth Nanticoke, the Delaware Division of Public Health and the Sussex County Health Coalition.
At the Milford Wellness Village, that collaborative approach is built into the campus itself. La Red operates alongside organizations providing rehabilitation, skilled nursing, child care, laboratory testing, mental health support and other services.
The arrangement allows La Red to serve as both a health care provider and a connection to a larger network of help.
The anniversary gala will recognize the people and organizations that have sustained that network during La Red’s first 25 years. It will also raise support for the health center’s future work, including its efforts to improve access and health outcomes for families in Milford and across Sussex County.
Individual gala tickets are $175. Sponsorship opportunities are available at several levels.
To Go Box
What: La Red Health Center’s 25th Anniversary and Community Awards Celebration
When: Thursday, Sept. 24, 2026, from 6 to 10 p.m.
Where: Hyatt Place Dewey Beach, 1301 Coastal Highway, Dewey Beach
Tickets: $175 per person · Registration: Tickets are available through the La Red Health Center gala page
Milford health center: La Red Health Center at the Milford Wellness Village, 21 W. Clarke Ave., Milford Appointments and services: Call 302-855-1233 or visit La Red Health Center
A picture of Salesianum’s preseason scrimmage against St. Joseph’s Prepatory School. Photo Credit: Dave Reeder.
The 2026 Delaware high school football season begins on September 3, and continues through December with the state championships scheduled for December 4 and December 5.
The 2026 Delaware high school football season starts in a few days with a matchup between Hodgson Vo-Tech and Howard Vo-Tech on Thursday, September 3. The KickOff Classic starts a three month regular season schedule that culminates in championship games in early December.
To get ready for the upcoming season, let’s recap what happened in the 2025 season:
2025 Class 3A Champion: Middletown High School
For the second year in a row, the Class 3A championship game featured a matchup between Salesianum and Middletown. The Middletown Cavaliers won the game, 28-14, defeating Sallies in the state title game for the second season in a row. It’s the program’s 10th state title.
Middletown scored all of its points in the first half, leading by three scores at halftime. Three of Middletown’s four touchdowns came through the air with senior Derian Cunningham connecting with three different receivers for the scores. The first connection was a 77-yard pitch and catch between Cunningham and fellow senior Darius Pope that opened the scoring in the first quarter and gave Middletown a lead it never relinquished. Junior Hanif Miller scored the Cavaliers fourth touchdown before halftime.
Middletown begins its 2026 campaign on September 3, at home against Tottenville High School from New York. Tottenville is the 46th ranked football team in New York, according to MaxPreps. Salesianum begins its season on the same day with a home matchup against Springside Chestnut Hill Academy from Pennsylvania. Springside Chestnut Hill is the 13th ranked team in Pennsylvania, according to MaxPreps.
A state championship game rematch will take place on October 30, at Cavalier Stadium.
2025 Class 2A Champion: Red Lion Christian Academy
Red Lion earned the program’s first football state championship with a double overtime win against Indian River last season. Similar to the Class 1A game this matchup was a nail biter that came down to the final plays.
After trading touchdowns and two-point conversions in the first overtime period, Red Lion opened up the second overtime period with a touchdown run from senior Judah Barber. The Red Lions elected to send out their kicker, sophomore Teigan Norris, for the extra point and his kick put them ahead by seven. The Indians responded via a Michael Peranteau touchdown run, but the team’s extra point attempt was no good. Red Lion won, 22-21.
Red Lion will begin their season at home against Smyrna High School on September 4. Indian River starts a day before, playing Odessa on the road on September 3. The two teams won’t play each other during the regular season which means a state championship rematch will have to come in the postseason. Last season, Red Lion started the season 0-2 before winning 11 straight games and the state title. Indian River was undefeated until the state championship game.
2025 Class 1A Champion: Seaford High School
The Seaford Blue Jays earned their first state championship in over three decades when they defeated the Newark Charter Patriots, 21-20, last season. The championship game was a close contest that was tied 14-14 at the end of regulation.
The Blue Jays started the overtime period on offense and scored the initial touchdown of the frame on a run by senior Vincent Evans. Senior Luke Metzner converted the extra point and gave Seaford a seven point lead. The Patriots answered via an Austin Gbadegbe touchdown run and decided to go for a two-point conversion instead of kicking the extra point. The Blue Jays stopped the Patriots two-point play and claimed the state title.
The Blue Jays will begin the 2026 season on September 3, on the road against AI duPont High School. The Patriots begin their season that same day against Christiana High School. The two programs will play a championship game rematch on October 23, in Newark.
Important Notes for this Season
The regular season begins on September 3 and continues until the end of competition on November 14. The playoffs will begin with quarterfinal matchups on November 20 and 21, semifinal matchups on November 27 and 28 and championship matchups on December 4 and 5.
The football classification system used last season is still in effect, though Caravel will not be competing in varsity football this season, according to Delaware Online. Caravel was a playoff team last year in the program’s first season in Class 3A.
To see a full breakdown of the football classification system click here.
The leading scientist urging policymakers not to criminalize kratom, a substance that has left a trail of death and addiction around the world, has routinely failed to disclose longstanding financial ties to the industry’s most powerful lobbying group, ProPublica has found.
University of Florida professor Christopher McCurdy has accepted travel reimbursements, donations to his university’s foundation and funding for an annual symposium on research into the leaf’s medicinal potential from the American Kratom Association — none of which has been disclosed in his conflict of interest statements or on the papers he publishes.
The fight to keep kratom legal across the country has taken on increased urgency as more potent kratom derivatives have appeared on store shelves and evidence has mounted of the leaf’s risks to users’ health. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 5,200 people in the United States died from drug overdoses involving kratom between 2020 and 2024. And calls to poison control centers involving kratom have spiked 1,200% in the last decade.
The lobbying group, which says it advocates for kratom consumers, has waged a pitched battle in statehouses and in Washington, D.C., to keep kratom products widely available in America’s gas stations, smoke shops and convenience stores. Documents show it has relied repeatedly on McCurdy to help convince lawmakers kratom is safe enough to remain legal — deploying him to key states that are either considering full bans on the leaf or are on the verge of overturning an existing ban. His success fighting federal regulators earned him a place in the AKA’s Legacy Advocate Hall of Fame.
Kratom comes from a tree native to Southeast Asia and is sold as a powder or in capsules, tablets or shots like energy drinks. In small amounts, it acts as a stimulant. In larger amounts, it acts like an opioid. Although the Food and Drug Administration prohibits marketing it as a supplement or using it as a food ingredient, it’s advertised as a mood and energy enhancer, a painkiller and an alternative to opioids.
ProPublica’s review of McCurdy’s appearances in recent years shows he has emphasized kratom’s therapeutic potential while downplaying its risks — despite his own published research finding kratom use can lead to severe withdrawal symptoms in newborns exposed in utero, and to dependency and even death in those who take it. McCurdy has brushed off questions about the hazards by noting that even water can kill if consumed in excessive quantities. McCurdy does, however, argue for better manufacturing standards and labeling, and for putting age restrictions on kratom’s use.
Other scientists who consult with and do research for the kratom association disclose that relationship. But McCurdy, who does not disclose it, has built a reputation as a neutral arbiterin the emotional debate pitting those with life-altering kratom addiction against those who say they use it without ill effects to combat opioid use or relieve pain.
Indeed, McCurdy’s research focuses on developing kratom’s dominant chemical compound into a pharmaceutical to treat addiction. That work has been funded by the federal government, which has poured an estimated $100 million in grants into the research. Such funding could be disrupted if kratom is declared illegal.
McCurdy told ProPublica that he has accepted invitations to speak to policymakers because “decisions about kratom should be informed by the best available science.” Reimbursed travel expenses don’t influence the “substance” of his presentations or his “scientific conclusions,” he said.
“My views on kratom are based on more than two decades of scientific research,” he said. “They are my own and are not dictated by the American Kratom Association or any other outside organization.”
Those advocating for restrictions on kratom contend that as McCurdy testifies, publishes research or provides public information, he should be more forthright about his relationship with the kratom industry.
Jennifer Brandt, a Virginia pharmacist who advocates for a total ban on kratom sales, was the first to file records requests with the University of Florida for McCurdy’s correspondence. She has subsequently asked a medical journal to append corrections listing his ties to the lobbying group. “I’m really confused on where science ends and lobbying begins,” she said of McCurdy.
McCurdy’s work opposing the criminalization of kratom started as early as 2018. That year, he joined with other scientists — including the AKA’s lead science consultant — to convince the Drug Enforcement Administration not to classify kratom as a Schedule I narcotic. The designation, reserved for drugs with no medical purpose and high abuse potential, would make kratom illegal. The scientists said in a letter to federal regulators that it would also “severely hinder” their research into possible therapeutic uses. In a paper, McCurdy argued that scheduling kratom would erect new regulatory hurdles to studying the leaf and dissuade funders from supporting it. The effort to schedule kratom was halted during the first Trump administration.
However, the association’s fight continued as it worked to convince state lawmakers to explicitly legalize kratom by regulating its sale. McCurdy also became a key player in this effort, according to emails obtained by ProPublica through public records requests to the University of Florida.
While the group’s membership is made up of kratom users, its lobbying efforts are funded by manufacturers and vendors. It spends about $2.5 million a year on lobbying.
In 2023, at the AKA’s request, McCurdy briefed the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs, which regularly considers kratom regulation. He conducted the briefing remotely and did not travel to the annual meeting in Vienna that year. In 2025, however, he made the trip to brief delegates in person. Emails indicate his hotel room was paid for by the lobbying group.
In 2024, McCurdy traveled several times for the association. He planned an August trip to Indonesia, which was considering a full ban on the leaf, with the association paying $8,700 for a first-class plane ticket. McCurdy canceled the trip at the last minute, the association said. Email correspondence indicates, however, that he kept the flight credit for future AKA-related travel.
But he was soon back on the road. In September, he went to Washington, D.C., to dine with and brief members of Congress and their staffs. There, he told lawmakers that he couldn’t say kratom is “entirely safe” but that it should remain available to the public as research continues.
“I want it to be accessible to everybody,” he said. “Always have.”
In a video recording distributed by the American Kratom Association, Christopher McCurdy speaks to members of Congress and their staff during a briefing in 2024.American Kratom Association via YouTube
The following month, the AKA arranged for McCurdy’s travel to Little Rock, Arkansas, where lawmakers were debating whether to lift a kratom ban enacted in 2016. He told them kratom dependence was similar to caffeine dependence, describing withdrawal symptoms as akin to those caused by missing a morning cup of coffee. Kratom users have described dependence, so severe they suffer debilitating withdrawal symptoms and can’t quit the leaf. McCurdy has also said in a deposition that some users have been unable to stop taking it.
The lobbying was unsuccessful in Arkansas. But a few months later, with McCurdy’s help, the organization had its first success overturning a state ban.
Rhode Island’s Gov. Dan McKee had vetoed a bill to legalize kratom after weighing the concerns of his top public health officials. The association booked travel for McCurdy and other scientists to Providence to brief those health officials. When the legislature reconvened in 2025, the AKA’s bill passed and McKee signed it. This time, the state health officials stayed silent.
That frustrated Rep. Michelle McGaw, a Democrat who is also a pharmacist. She opposed legalizing kratom, citing the threat to public health, but struggled to get her legislative colleagues to take seriously data showing kratom’s risks. “It has been a struggle, particularly in light of having kratom lobbyists finding ways with their own research or data to counter that narrative or try to confuse the narrative.”
Mac Haddow, the AKA’s lead lobbyist, said his organization relies on McCurdy and other scientists to provide accurate information but has “no control” over what they tell policymakers. “We think that science should dictate what the public policies are,” he said.
Regarding McCurdy’s lack of disclosure that the association funds his travel, Haddow contends that beneficiaries aren’t typically required to reveal travel-related payments and said the association has never commissioned a study from McCurdy that would require disclosure.
Instead, the group has donated to the University of Florida’s foundation and has helped to underwrite McCurdy’s annual kratom symposium, attended by about 100 scientists, to promote research into kratom’s therapeutic potential. The AKA, through its nonprofit arm, the Center for Plant Science and Health, has donated more than $100,000 to the school.
McCurdy estimated while speaking to lawmakers in Georgia this summer that his research has been supported by $1 million from industry donations to the foundation.
McCurdy had not disclosed any ties to the industry on papers he’s published until Brandt, the Virginia pharmacist, spoke up in 2025. She provided one publisher with email correspondence she had obtained under public records laws revealing McCurdy’s ties to the association. The publication required McCurdy to append a correction to the paper that discloses his work as an expert witness in court cases, which he has done for both kratom companies and families bringing wrongful death claims. The correction doesn’t mention his work with kratom industry lobbyists.
Rules for disclosure vary depending on the scientific journal. But the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors, which recommends publishing standards, requires reimbursed travel to be disclosed for research submissions.
Such information is important to understanding the validity of research, said Ivan Oransky, executive director of the Center for Scientific Integrity.
“It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t trust anything that’s funded by industry,” Oransky said. “It’s part of knowing the whole picture.”
Oransky said giving to a university foundation instead of directly funding research is similar to a business using a shell company to conceal its true ownership. Such a donation might not trigger disclosure the way sponsoring a specific study would.
“These things are technically legitimate but not intellectually honest,” Oransky said of McCurdy’s funding sources. “It’s obscuring what’s really happening.”
McCurdy did not list any travel in his conflict of interest statements required by the University of Florida. The university requires disclosure if travel exceeds $5,000 in a calendar year. The total value of the travel reimbursed by the AKA is unclear, and neither McCurdy nor the association responded to questions about how much was spent.
A university spokesperson said a review of McCurdy’s university disclosures “found no indication of non-compliance.” The spokesperson did not reply to a question about whether McCurdy’s travel totaled less than $5,000.
In an email to a university colleague, McCurdy said he sees talking to policymakers for the AKA as “part of my work related expertise and education of the public and policy makers,” which does not need to be disclosed.
University of Florida professor Christopher McCurdy holds kratom, a drug that he has advocated for keeping legal.Dirk Shadd/Tampa Bay Times via ZUMA Press
The AKA does not support the sale of all products derived from kratom. More recently, McCurdy has sounded the alarm on new kratom derivatives, such as MGM-15 (dihydro-7- hydroxymitragynine), MGM-16 (9-fluorodihydro-7-hydroxymitragynine), and MP (mitragynine pseudoindoxyl), which the AKA is trying to have banned. This has involved drawing a bright line between whole-leaf kratom — generally the products sold by the vendors that fund the association — and its new derivatives, which have been described as more potent than morphine.
This summer, McCurdy told a committee of Georgia lawmakers that such derivative products have a high potential for abuse and are causing deaths in his state. “These are the things that are really scary to me,” he said. “These synthetics are far from kratom, they are derived from kratom, but they are not kratom at all.”
The DEA cited McCurdy’s research in its recent notices seeking temporary classification of some derivatives as Schedule I drugs. In a news release, the DEA specified the classification does not apply to “botanical kratom products,” such as the ones McCurdy has sought to protect from scheduling.
But whole-leaf kratom — the natural product and its extracts — has also led to dependence and death, according to McCurdy’s own research.
In 2022, he co-authored a review of medical literature that found cardiovascular, neurological and psychiatric adverse events from kratom use and emphasized an “urgent” concern about babies born experiencing withdrawal after exposure to kratom in utero.
In 2025, he co-wrote a paper analyzing kratom-related deaths in Florida from 2020 to 2021, well before the more dangerous derivatives came on the market, that concluded dozens of people “died of kratom (mitragynine) exposures alone.”
When talking to policymakers, McCurdy stays largely silent on these findings.
McCurdy told ProPublica he doesn’t contend kratom “is without risk” and that his findings on its dangers should “be taken seriously.”
“At the same time, the existence of risk does not by itself answer the policy question of whether a substance should be prohibited,” he said. “My scientific assessment has led me to support appropriate regulation, including manufacturing and labeling standards, age restrictions, and safeguards addressing products that present materially different risks.”
When pressed by lawmakers on the danger, he answers that any substance can be dangerous at the right dose, including caffeine and water.
“There is such a thing as water intoxication that can cause death, and does cause deaths every year,” he told a lawmaker in Arkansas in 2024. “But we don’t ever think about banning water or making it illegal. It’s an essential part of life.”
Republicans added 10 candidates after Aug. 1, including eight during the final week before the deadline; Democrats added two
By George D. Rotsch, Editor, Delaware LIVE
DOVER, Del. — Delaware’s November ballot became considerably more competitive during August as the Republican Party nominated candidates for 10 offices that otherwise would have lacked a Republican contender.
Eight of those nominations were filed during the final week before Delaware’s Sept. 1 deadline for major parties to fill vacant ballot positions, according to the state Department of Elections.
The Democratic Party also made two late nominations, adding candidates for a Sussex County Senate seat and a New Castle County-area House district.
Brent Burdge, chair of the Northern DEGOP region where many of these candidates are running and a newly added candidate himself, stated, “Most of the candidates came forward to give voters in these communities real options in November. Incumbents and primary winners need to be challenged so voters can determine the future of their community. That’s how democracy works. These individuals are passionate about the neighborhoods and want to make a difference. They are knowledgeable about the community, local leaders, and understand the political process.”
“Contested elections allow voters to compare candidates, hear different positions and hold officeholders accountable,” concluded Burdge.
Republicans fill ballot vacancies
The 10 Republicans filed after Aug. 1 are:
Candidate
Office
Filing date
Status
Anton Brogden
State representative, District 31
Aug. 6
Qualified
David C. “Dave” Graham
Attorney general
Aug. 24
Provisional
April Callaway
Auditor of accounts
Aug. 26
Qualified
Brent Burdge
State senator, District 5
Aug. 26
Provisional
Tanya Hettler
State representative, District 6
Aug. 26
Qualified
Shane Stoneman
State representative, District 7
Aug. 26
Provisional
Dolores Dunleavy
State representative, District 10
Aug. 26
Qualified
Hildi Bachtle
State senator, District 1
Aug. 28
Provisional
Enala A. Mwashitete
State representative, District 16
Aug. 28
Provisional
Lisa McInnis
State representative, District 1
Aug. 30
Provisional
The Democratic Party nominated Harry S. Gold for the 20th Senate District on Aug. 25 and Tori Parker for the 11th Representative District on Aug. 28. Both are listed as qualified.
Several of the newly nominated Republicans will face Democratic incumbents or the winners of Democratic primaries. Graham, for example, is positioned to face the winner of the Democratic primary for attorney general, where incumbent Kathy Jennings is seeking another term.
Some November matchups will not be complete until Delaware holds its statewide primary Sept. 15.
A rarely used route to the ballot
Ordinarily, Democratic and Republican candidates file by the July deadline and advance through a primary if more than one candidate seeks the same party’s nomination.
State law provides another route when no candidate from a major party has filed for an office. Party officials may nominate someone to fill that ballot vacancy by submitting a certificate of nomination to the Department of Elections by Sept. 1.
The late nominees do not go through a primary because no other candidate from their party filed for the same office.
Delaware’s online candidate records indicate that this year’s Republican recruitment effort is unusually large. Eight Republican nominations were filed during the final week before the deadline. No Democratic or Republican organization matched that total in the state’s date-stamped candidate lists from 2010 through 2024.
The closest comparison came in 2016, when Republicans filed five candidates during the closing days of the nomination period. That year’s late additions included candidates for Wilmington offices and Kent County positions.
That makes this year’s group the largest final-week addition by either major party in at least 16 years. Records before 2010 available on the Department of Elections website do not contain filing dates, making a longer historical comparison difficult.
More candidates, but difficult campaigns
Late nomination comes with disadvantages.
Candidates entering near the deadline have little time to raise money, recruit volunteers, introduce themselves to voters and develop positions on complicated state issues. Some will be challenging incumbents who have spent years building name recognition and campaign organizations.
A name on the ballot, therefore, does not necessarily create a competitive campaign. The new candidates will still have to demonstrate that they are prepared to serve and capable of making a serious case to voters.
Their presence nevertheless prevents several races from being decided without a general-election contest.
Unopposed candidates can still be held accountable by the public, news organizations and members of their own party. But an opposing candidate creates a more direct test. Debates become possible. Policy differences become clearer. Voters can evaluate competing records and priorities before selecting who will represent them.
That is a basic feature of representative government: Elections work best when voters have meaningful choices.
Some candidates remain provisional
Several late nominees are currently listed as provisional by the Department of Elections.
Provisional status does not mean a candidate has been rejected. It generally means the state is reviewing residency documentation or awaiting the results of a required criminal-history background check.
Candidates listed as qualified have completed those reviews and have been determined eligible to appear on the ballot. The Department of Elections periodically updates the list as reviews are completed and additional filings are processed.
Minor parties also added candidates during August. The Independent Party of Delaware nominated Austin Cassidy for auditor of accounts, Carolyn Frank for the 5th Senate District and Steven Washington for the 1st Senate District.
The result is a November ballot with more contested races than Delaware voters appeared likely to see only a few weeks ago. Whether the late nominees can build competitive campaigns remains an open question. But in the districts where they qualified, voters will at least have a decision to make.
To-go box:
What happened: Delaware Republicans nominated 10 candidates after Aug. 1, including eight during the final week before the Sept. 1 deadline.
Why it matters: The nominations give more voters a choice between major-party candidates in November.
Historical context: It is the largest final-week group added by either major party in at least 16 years, based on Delaware’s available date-stamped records.
What’s next: Several nominees must complete state qualification reviews, while some November matchups will be determined by the Sept. 15 primary.
President Donald Trump and other administration officials are claiming credit for a recent drop in prescription drug prices, citing deals they’ve struck with drugmakers and the launch of the online direct-to-consumer platform TrumpRx. But experts are skeptical those measures have had much impact on prices overall, and they say other factors likely explain most of the decline.
Trump and his allies were quick to celebrate when the latest consumer price data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, released in mid-August, showed prescription drug prices falling 3.1% over the past year. The data measure prices paid by consumers and insurers at retail, internet or mail-order pharmacies.
“Under my most-favored-nation policy on drug prices, we are delivering the largest prescription drug price cuts in the history of our country,” Trump said during an Aug. 14 speech on Long Island, referring to agreements with companies to offer certain drugs at prices comparable to those in other countries.
He repeated the claim during an Aug. 31 event at the White House at which he announced deals with additional companies.
Trump announces the launch of his TrumpRx prescription drug platform on Feb. 5. Official White House photo by Joyce N. Boghosian.
Similarly, in an interview with CBS News’ “Face the Nation” on Aug. 23, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz attributed the drop to the administration’s dealmaking and the launch of TrumpRx, which lists discounts on certain drugs for consumers paying cash prices.
“This increasing savings that we’re seeing, the additional amount of savings we’re getting — primarily driven not just by having the medications at most-favored-nation pricing, but available to the American people on TrumpRx.gov — is seismic in its nature,” Oz said.
Oz put it more succinctly in an X post two days earlier: “Why did drug prices DROP? The answer: President Donald J. Trump fulfilling his promises to the American people.”
But several drug pricing experts told us the reasons for that decline are a lot more complicated than the administration is letting on — and neither TrumpRx nor the agreements with drug companies are likely to have been major drivers.
They cited other factors they see as likely having a bigger impact, including market pressures driving down the cost of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs, more generics entering the market and a Biden-era policy that allows Medicare to negotiate drug prices.
“I think it’s totally possible that there are both some Republican policies — or, you know, Trump policies — as well as Biden policies that are at play here,” Cynthia Cox, a senior vice president at the nonpartisan health policy research organization KFF, told us. “But I think there’s also just market forces at play, in particular around GLP-1 drugs, that are really hard to ignore.”
Asked about the basis for the president’s claims that his policies are driving a major reduction in drug prices, White House spokesman Kush Desai rejected the idea that Medicare price negotiations implemented during the Biden administration, which apply to 10 drugs so far, made a big difference.
“President Trump’s Most-Favored-Nations deals, on the other hand, cover hundreds of drugs, including GLP-1s and fertility drugs that are enormously popular and not typically covered by insurance,” he said in a statement. “TrumpRx.gov has already saved real patients over $700 million, and the President’s MFN policies are set to save America over $500 billion in the next 10 years.”
We’ve previously written about the shaky assumptions behind that $500 billion number. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services referred questions to the White House.
Effects of Drug Pricing Deals, TrumpRx ‘Murky’
It’s true that prescription drugs have just seen the largest one-year price decline in decades, as measured by the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Price Index. The CPI tracks prescription drug prices based on what individuals and insurers, including Medicare drug plans, pay to pharmacies.
Those prices are down 3.1% since last July, the largest one-year decrease since 1963. Prices didn’t change much in the second half of 2025, but have dropped 3.3% since the start of this year — the steepest six-month drop since the BLS started tracking prescription drug costs in 1947.
Trump and other administration officials say the drop is due to deals they’ve struck with major pharmaceutical companies to offer certain drugs at so-called “most favored nation” prices, or prices that are comparable to those in other developed countries. The U.S. tends to pay significantly more than other wealthy nations for brand-name drugs.
Since November, the Trump administration has announced agreements with 17 large drug companies, including Pfizer, Merck and Johnson & Johnson, to implement MFN pricing for certain drugs in exchange for three years of tariff relief. (The administration announced similar deals with nine midsize biotech companies Aug. 31.) Trump has sometimes described those deals in sweeping terms.
“For decades, Americans paid the highest prices for prescription drugs,” Trump said in his Aug. 14 speech. “We paid more for prescription drugs than anywhere in the world. And now we pay the lowest price anywhere in the world for prescription drugs.”
But as we’ve explained before, the agreements are much narrower than Trump’s description suggests.
Companies did pledge to release at least some new drugs at prices comparable to those in other wealthy nations. But for existing drugs, MFN prices apply in only limited circumstances — drugs sold to state Medicaid programs, direct-to-consumer sales through TrumpRx and certain GLP-1 weight loss and diabetes drugs sold to Medicare or Medicaid. The agreements do not affect the prices of drugs already on the market for the majority of Americans who use private insurance.
“Right now, the only places where those MFN prices would show up in the CPI would be through TrumpRx,” said Jeromie Ballreich, a health economist at Johns Hopkins University who studies pharmaceutical economics and policy. (As a measure of consumer prices, the CPI doesn’t factor in what Medicaid pays because it’s fully taxpayer-funded.) And he said TrumpRx is unlikely to have had major effects on the overall prescription-drug market because it serves a relatively small subset of patients. “It’s not a big factor in the market.”
TrumpRx, which the federal government launched in February, features discounts on a selection of brand-name drugs for self-pay consumers, i.e., those not using insurance. As we’ve written before, the site may offer savings for some patients buying certain drugs, such as those without insurance or those who need expensive medications their insurance won’t cover, including GLP-1 drugs for weight loss. But most people will get a better deal going through their insurance, and some drugs featured on the platform also have cheaper generic versions available elsewhere.
The White House says TrumpRx has already saved Americans more than $700 million, though it hasn’t released the details of how it calculated that figure. A spokesperson said it’s based on comparing what people paid when buying medications through the site to what the prior net prices would have been. Seven hundred million dollars would represent less than 0.2% of the $467 billion that was spent on prescription drugs in the U.S. in 2024, according to the government’s national health expenditure data.
Additionally, Ballreich said drug companies and the White House have been relatively vague about the details of the MFN deals in their public statements, so it’s unclear exactly how far-reaching they are. Some companies’ Securities and Exchange Commission filings suggest that only some of their products are subject to the agreements.
“They didn’t have enough detail about, is it all new drugs?” Ballreich said. “Only some new drugs?”
Similarly, Richard Frank, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and director of the think tank’s Center on Health Policy, said the limited scope and lack of detail make it hard to assess the impact of these deals.
“There are an unknown, but probably small, number of drugs where there have been any negotiations with the Trump people, and it’s not even obvious that those have been implemented yet,” he said. “So all of this is kind of murky. It’s not that it’s implausible that they have some effect. But it’s really unlikely that they are the major drivers here.”
As for TrumpRx, Frank said there are still questions around its uptake and the extent of savings it actually offers.
“That’s an area where there could be a contribution,” he said. “But again, I would be surprised if it was very large.”
Cox, with KFF, said it’s possible that a newly launched pilot program to make reduced-price GLP-1 drugs available to certain Medicare beneficiaries factored into the most recent CPI prescription drug data, which registered a 0.8% drop in July.
The administration says Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly — the makers of Ozempic/Wegovy and Mounjaro/Zepbound, respectively — have agreed to provide the drugs to Medicare for $245 per month, and certain Medicare beneficiaries became eligible to access the drugs for weight loss for the first time at a $50 monthly copay, starting July 1.
“That would correspond with the timing of this particular [month’s] drop in the CPI,” Cox said, but not the declines that happened earlier this year.
Other Reasons for the Drop in Prices
Experts told us they see other factors as more likely explanations for the year-to-year drop in drug prices, though they cautioned that they don’t yet have clear empirical data on exactly what’s going on.
For one, Cox said, GLP-1 prices have been coming down for reasons other than the administration’s dealmaking, including heightened competition between drugmakers as new GLP-1s enter the market.
“There’s competition within the class, there’s competition from compound pharmacies, there’s the fact that a lot of people don’t have insurance coverage for these drugs but really want them, and so they’re paying out of pocket and price-sensitive,” she said. “And there’s this kind of pressure from insurers and employers to bring down the prices, because they might want to offer that coverage but not at the current price.”
Frank likewise pointed to competition in the GLP-1 market lowering prices for those drugs. “Since their sales have been so high, they would get quite a bit of weight in the CPI,” he said.
Another likely factor is that a number of bestselling brand-name drugs recently lost patent protection, Ballreich said. “So we had generics and biosimilars come on the market at cheaper prices.”
Ballreich also credits a policy signed into law by President Joe Biden as part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which gave Medicare the authority to negotiate prices for certain expensive drugs. The negotiated prices for the first 10 of those drugs — which were dispensed to nearly 9 million beneficiaries in 2023 and accounted for about 20% of Medicare prescription drug spending that year — took effect in January.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services estimated in 2024 that the negotiated prices would have saved the program $6 billion had they been in effect for the prior year. It also projected that beneficiaries would save around $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket costs on those drugs in 2026 because of the lower prices.
“For Trump to take credit in drug pricing, I do think one of the biggest things he did was he did not dismantle Medicare price negotiations,” Ballreich said.
Frank is less confident that the initial batch of Medicare price negotiations was a major driver of the decline in overall prescription drug costs. He views it as possible but unlikely, given the negotiations involved a relatively small, if costly, set of medications. Some of the impact would depend on how much those particular drugs are weighted in the CPI index, he said.
“On the Medicare side, there are 10 drugs. They were generally relatively big sellers,” he said. But as with Trump’s MFN deals, “we don’t know how quickly they’ve all worked their way through the supply chain.”
Frank said other possible factors could be in the mix as well. Pharmacy benefit managers — the third-party companies that manage prescription drug benefits for insurers — have been under pressure to pass on more of the savings from rebates they negotiate with drug companies. He also said that we don’t know how a separate provision of the IRA — the Inflation Rebate Program, which aims to discourage drugmakers from raising their prices too fast — may have affected prices.
“There are a lot of moving parts here,” he said. “It would be surprising to me if the administration’s MFN negotiations played a big part of it, just like I wouldn’t have guessed that the IRA negotiations played a huge part of it.”
In his statement, Desai, the White House spokesman, called the idea that the Medicare price negotiations had made a big difference in the CPI “absolutely idiotic and unfounded.”
“The so-called Inflation ‘Reduction’ Act negotiated prices just on Medicare for a whopping 10 drugs, and failed to deliver any meaningful price reductions beyond discounts that private insurers had already negotiated,” he said. “These discounts came into effect in January 2026 without making a dent in the prescription drug CPI for February 2026.”
The CPI’s prescription drug index dropped about 0.2% in February before registering a bigger decline of 1.5% in March.
Whether people notice a difference in what they’re actually paying at the pharmacy, of course, generally has more to do with the specific features of their insurance plan, Ballreich said. “That will have a much more influential effect on them as patients, rather than general drug pricing trends.”
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The Aug. 29 deployment ceremony recognized members of Alpha Company, 198th Expeditionary Signal Battalion-Enhanced, as they transitioned to active mobilization. Image Courtesy of the Delaware National Guard
Nearly 100 members of the 198th Expeditionary Signal Battalion-Enhanced were honored at a Harrington ceremony, marking Delaware’s second major Guard mobilization this month
HARRINGTON, Del. — Nearly 100 Delaware Army National Guard soldiers are preparing to deploy to the Middle East after family members, friends and community leaders gathered Saturday at the Delaware State Fairgrounds to honor their service.
The Aug. 29 deployment ceremony recognized members of Alpha Company, 198th Expeditionary Signal Battalion-Enhanced, as they transitioned to active mobilization.
U.S. Sen. Chris Coons and Maj. Gen. James Benson, adjutant general of the Delaware National Guard, attended the ceremony.
The specific location, mission designation and expected length of the deployment have not been publicly released. Guard officials have said the soldiers are preparing to serve in the Middle East.
Providing battlefield connections
The 198th is a communications unit responsible for delivering the secure voice, data and network connections that military commanders and ground forces need to operate.
Its soldiers can establish satellite communications, secure wireless networks and other systems in places where military units do not have enough communications equipment of their own.
The “Enhanced” designation reflects a major modernization of the battalion’s technology. The new equipment is lighter, faster to establish and easier to tailor to missions of different sizes. It also reduces transportation requirements by more than 60% compared with the older equipment package.
The Delaware unit became the first Army National Guard signal battalion — and the sixth Army unit overall — converted to the enhanced configuration.
Although signal soldiers typically work behind the front lines, their mission is essential. Modern military operations depend on reliable connections among commanders, aircraft, intelligence systems and troops operating across large areas.
The battalion has a long history of overseas service. In 2019, about 250 members deployed to Southwest Asia in support of U.S. Central Command and Operation Inherent Resolve. The unit has also supported missions in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Second major Delaware mobilization
The Army Guard ceremony followed another large Delaware deployment ceremony earlier in August.
More than 160 airmen from the Delaware Air National Guard’s 166th Airlift Wing were honored Aug. 2 at the New Castle Air National Guard Base. Those airmen are preparing to join the Pennsylvania Air National Guard’s 171st Air Refueling Wing to form a deployable combat wing.
The 166th operates C-130H Hercules aircraft and provides airlift and airdrop support for troops, cargo and passengers. The wing also performs aeromedical evacuation and other support missions.
The Army and Air Guard mobilizations are separate assignments. Together, however, they mean that more than 250 Delaware Guard members are preparing for federal service — a significant commitment for one of the nation’s smallest states.
The ceremonies also recognize the sacrifice made by the families, employers and communities that support Guard members while they are away.
To Go Box:
What: Delaware Army National Guard deployment
Unit: Alpha Company, 198th Expeditionary Signal Battalion-Enhanced
Number deploying: Nearly 100 soldiers
Destination: Middle East
Mission: Provide high-speed tactical communications and secure network connectivity to military forces
Ceremony: Held Aug. 29 at the Delaware State Fairgrounds in Harrington
Salesianum football competed in a preseason scrimmage against St. Joseph’s Prep school from Pennsylvania on August 26, to prepare for the upcoming 2026 Delaware high school football season.
Sallies quarterback Brady Nabb receives the snap as Salesianum football takes on the Hawks in a preseason scrimmage.
Nabb sets and fires to a teammate downfield.
Salesianum Junior EstherVell Cotton leaps into the air to haul in a pass.
The Sallies defense closes the running lane and makes a tackle, stopping the St. Joseph run.
St. Joseph’s quarterback surveys the Salesianum defense as he receives the snap.
The Hawks wide receiver looks in a pass from his quarterback, completing the catch along the sideline.
Cotton fights through a pair of tackles earning extra yards for the Sals.
The St. Joseph QB launches a deep pass toward the left sideline.
The Hawks wide receiver tracks the pass and looks in the catch.
The Hawks receiver completes the catch and scores a touchdown. St. Joseph’s Prep is the top ranked program in the state of Pennsylvania according to MaxPreps.
Salesianum senior Michael Brock breaks on the football hoping to break up the pass.
Cotton breaks a Hawks tackle and runs into the endzone for a score.
Nabb loads up for a deep throw to a teammate downfield.
Nabb’s pass flies over the outstretched arm of the Hawks defender and lands perfectly in the arms of senior receiver Tysir Jones.
Jones reaches for the goal line, scoring a Salesianum touchdown. Sallies begins the regular season on September 3, against Springside Chestnut Hill Academy from Pennsylvania.
All photos courtesy of Dave Reeder. To see more of Dave’s work follow him on Instagram @bfr_photo
Jimmie “Chris” Duncan lived in a motel in Alexandria, Louisiana, for weeks until he found an apartment. Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Jimmie “Chris” Duncan wiped the sweat off his forehead as he assessed his temporary home from the parking lot of a rundown motel in central Louisiana. Sure, there’s drug dealing and prostitution, he said on a recent summer afternoon. And he suspected his neighbors were cooking meth on a floor below the room he paid $350 a week to rent.
But, he said, “I feel safe here. I mean, I’ve been on death row. I feel safe anywhere.”
Duncan had spent the last three decades trying to prove his innocence after a jury convicted him of killing his former girlfriend’s toddler. An investigation by Verite News and ProPublica last year showed that prosecutors had relied on key evidence that appeared to be fabricated by a pair of forensics experts whose use of bite mark analysis has since been widely discredited as junk science.
Nevertheless, Louisiana prosecutors continued to argue that Duncan should be put to death. The threat became ever more real as Gov. Jeff Landry began expediting executions, despite the state’s track record of convicting and sentencing to death people later found to be innocent. It wasn’t until June that the Louisiana Supreme Court threw out Duncan’s murder conviction, ruling that the bite marks found on the child’s body, the only physical proof tying Duncan to the alleged crime, could not have been made by a human.
Chief Justice John Weimer was so outraged by the prosecution of Duncan that he compared it to 17th-century witch trials. “We now look back at those practices as asinine and absurd” with “no basis whatsoever in logic,” he wrote. Some of the evidence against Duncan, he said, was “similarly specious.”
The trauma that the state imposed on Duncan as a result of his wrongful conviction continues today. Although Louisiana’s top jurist tore apart the state’s case against Duncan, the 57-year-old West Monroe native still isn’t truly free. Steve Tew, district attorney for Ouachita Parish, where the crime allegedly took place, had warned the justices during an April hearing that he would retry Duncan if the court vacated his conviction. Tew, who did not respond to requests for comment, has said in court that he still believes that Duncan is not only guilty but deserves to be executed. Tew has until next June to decide on a retrial, though his term ends in January and he is not running for reelection.
Until then, Duncan said, he is trapped in limbo, both mentally and financially. He came out of Angola with nothing in the bank and now makes $17 an hour working the night shift at Walmart unloading and stocking freight. While he enjoys the job — he was named employee of the month in June — Duncan said he is barely scraping by.
There is a state restitution program designed to compensate exonerees up to $480,000 over a decade for wrongful convictions, but he is not eligible until either the district attorney decides not to retry him or he is acquitted in another trial, which can take years. And even then, there is no guarantee he will ever be awarded any money. Attorney General Liz Murrill has opposed nearly all applications for compensation, telling lawmakers last year that defending the state against such claims consumes an enormous amount of time and resources and that the fund should be abolished altogether.
“The foreseeable future for me is the year between now and when they can’t prosecute me no more. That’s the only future I get to play with,” Duncan said. “I’m 100% factually innocent, but not 100% free from prosecution.”
Duncan runs errands after finishing a night shift unloading freight at Walmart.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Surviving His First Decade in Angola
Over the course of more than six hours of interviews with Verite News and ProPublica, Duncan described in harrowing detail the nightmare he lived since police arrested him on Dec. 18, 1993. By far the worst of it all, he said, was thinking that his neighbors, friends and even relatives could believe he had committed such an unspeakable crime against a child.
It felt as if everything he was as a person was “being torn out of you, violently, in an emotionally painful way,” Duncan said. “Just having your identity eviscerated.”
Duncan was babysitting Haley Oliveaux in the home he shared with the girl’s mother, Allison Layton Statham, in West Monroe when the 23-month-old died. Duncan told law enforcement he had put the child in the bath, then went to wash dishes. When he heard a noise coming from the bathroom, he rushed to check on her and found Haley floating face down in the water. She was pronounced dead a few hours later.
Police initially arrested Duncan for negligent homicide, but prosecutors upped the charge to first-degree murder after pathologist Steven Hayne and dentist Michael West conducted Haley’s medical exam and claimed they discovered evidence, including the purported bite marks, that she had been sexually assaulted and intentionally drowned. Following two weeks of testimony during the trial in 1998, the jury found Duncan guilty; months later, the 30-year-old was sentenced to death.
His first decade at the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola was the hardest, Duncan said. Not only did he lose his initial appeal in 2002, and with it the dream he could convince the courts of his innocence, but he was forced to watch helplessly as his family gradually fell to pieces.
His mother, Barbara Oren, used to visit him every Thursday, and then in 2004, she stopped coming without explanation. Duncan would stare out the window across the hall from his cell, “almost obsessing, like my mom’s gonna show up any time now,” he said.
Three years later, Oren died of complications from excessive drinking, her sister, Elaine Whiteside, said. But in truth, Whiteside said, grief killed her.
“She fought for Chris for so long, and she turned to alcohol,” Whiteside said. “It’s been very traumatizing for everybody. For the last 32 years, how do you tell someone your nephew’s on death row for the rape and murder of a baby?”
Fourteen years after his mother passed, Duncan’s brother, David, died of an overdose. During the first several years of his incarceration, Duncan said he spoke with his brother often, but those calls grew less frequent as David’s addictions took hold.
“My brother ended up going from being the region’s No. 1 car salesman to being addicted to drugs to eventually dying of overdose,” he said. “He just couldn’t take it. He couldn’t escape being my brother.”
Duncan wasn’t allowed to attend either of their funerals.
“There was nobody who was immune from it,” Duncan said.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Daily life on death row nearly robbed him of his sanity, Duncan said. Like all inmates awaiting execution, Duncan remained in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day. This lasted almost 20 years. And there was never a set schedule for that one hour he would be let out and allowed to use the phone. Some days, it would be 2 a.m. Who could he call at that hour? (Death row inmates were eventually allowed to spend at least four hours outside their cells following a 2017 class-action lawsuit.)
The concept of time gradually disappeared. Duncan tried to keep a strict routine: wake up, drink coffee, watch the news, exercise and read books, mainly about other cultures and religions. He learned Hebrew so he could better understand the Bible. He became a tutor and helped other inmates earn their GEDs.
But the years of confinement began to take their toll physically. After about four years, Duncan started experiencing severe heart pain caused by a bacterial infection. “By the time I was 34 years old, my health had went all the way downhill,” he said. “A lot of nights, I went to sleep, said my prayers and really didn’t think I was going to wake up the next day.”
During the summer months, when the heat inside could rise to 115 degrees, Duncan said he experienced seizures. “I’m pretty sure I got brain damage as a result of it,” he said. “There were times when I got out of bed and I didn’t even know if I was left-handed or right-handed. There were a few times when I got up, I didn’t even know my name.”
In 2013, three death row inmates sued the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections for “appalling and extreme conditions” as a result of the high temperatures. Their experiences described in the lawsuit closely matched Duncan’s. For 85 straight days in 2012, the heat index in one section of death row exceeded 126 degrees, according to the suit. A judge ordered the state to provide air conditioning throughout death row, but a federal appeals court overturned the order. The corrections department did not respond to questions about conditions within the prison.
Instead of breaking him, Duncan said the brutal conditions hardened his resolve to keep fighting. But it didn’t seem as if anyone was listening.
“Sometimes the louder you scream, the more people look at you and laugh, like, ‘There’s another one claiming he’s innocent,’” Duncan said. “I was suicidal at one point because I was hopeless.”
Photographs kept by Duncan’s aunt show him during his time in prison.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Signs of Hope
Duncan had been on death row for about a decade when he learned from his lawyers and the news that there were others like him — people convicted based on inaccurate evidence, including discredited bite mark science, presented by Hayne or West. Four of them had been exonerated by 2008, and five more would follow.
In 2009 journalist Radley Balko wrote about Duncan’s case in Reason, a libertarian magazine, and how it was part of a larger pattern of “forensics fraud” perpetrated by Hayne and West. At the time, Duncan’s attorneys with a New Orleans nonprofit had filed a post-conviction appeal but did not have the resources to conduct a fuller investigation and uncover new evidence required to win. That left his case largely dormant.
Then in 2016, Duncan’s attorneys contacted the American Bar Association, which put him in touch with an Atlanta firm that took Duncan on as a client pro bono. (The Innocence Project in New York signed on six years later.) They filed a series of discovery requests that unearthed a trove of evidence pointing to Duncan’s innocence. This included expert witnesses who said the child’s death was an accidental drowning brought on by a seizure and a jailhouse informant who recanted his trial testimony that Duncan had confessed to the crime.
Most important was a recording of West’s 1993 examination of Haley. In that grainy black-and-white video, West can be seen taking a mold of Duncan’s teeth and grinding it into and across the girl’s body, seemingly creating bite marks where none previously existed — the marks later used to secure a death sentence against Duncan. The trial judge had not allowed the jury to see the video on the grounds that it was not an indication of Duncan’s innocence.
West, who has not responded to multiple earlier requests for comment, had previously said he was simply using what he called a “direct comparison” technique — in which he presses a mold of a person’s teeth directly onto the location of suspected bite marks. He admitted in a 2011 deposition in another case that he no longer believed in bite mark analysis. Hayne died in 2020.
Atlanta attorney Christian Bromley, who had joined the case, recalled the first time he was shown the recording in 2016 and being “horrified and surprised that the video had been available at that point for over 20 years and just essentially ignored and deemed not relevant.” The video would provide the foundation for Duncan’s latest bid for freedom.
Duncan describes his feelings about how calls for the death penalty impacted his case.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Filmmaker Catherine Legge, who spent more than three years creating a documentary about his case, also played a pivotal role. Duncan said he’s indebted to her for tracking down Statham, Haley’s mother, and convincing her of his innocence. He knows it wasn’t easy.
“Allison spent 30 years being accused of being a partner to her baby’s killer,” Duncan said.
In April of last year, then-Ouachita Parish Judge Alvin Sharp overturned Duncan’s conviction, criticizing the “questionable” work of Hayne and West. Tew appealed, claiming that bite mark evidence was an accepted science at the time of Duncan’s trial and that some experts still consider it to be a useful forensic methodology.
At Duncan’s bail hearing last July, Statham told the court that the district attorney’s office had lied about her daughter’s death to make it look like murder and continues to perpetuate the lie. She said Duncan deserved to be free. He wept as he listened to his former girlfriend come to his defense.
“Just seeing her on the stand and hearing her voice engaged in the same struggle that I’ve been fighting for 30 years, knowing that what mattered to her was the truth,” he said, “That was the only thing that mattered to me.”
Allison Layton Statham and her boyfriend, Mark Dillingham, outside the courthouse in Monroe, Louisiana, during a break in Duncan’s bail hearing in July 2025.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Four months later, Sharp granted Duncan bail. He was released into the embrace of his family the day before Thanksgiving. Then, this June, the state Supreme Court rejected the district attorney’s appeal and threw out Duncan’s conviction. Of the four people sentenced to death based in part on the work of Hayne or West, Duncan was the last to be freed.
Rebuilding a Life From Scratch
Since his release from prison, Duncan has been trying to piece together some semblance of a normal existence. There were the everyday logistics of finding permanent housing and a job. And then the deeper work of addressing the decades of pain that he — and his family — experienced.
At first, he slept on his aunt’s living room couch in Pineville in central Louisiana. But she broke her leg in June, which required twice-weekly visits from nurses and physical therapists, leaving little room for Duncan. That’s how Duncan ended up at the motel across the Red River in Alexandria, with half of his belongings packed into the back of a truck. In August, he moved into his own apartment, the first place he has ever lived by himself.
“I never really had a place to just be comfortable and relax,” he said.
Duncan moved into his new apartment in Pineville, Louisiana, in August. He is carrying cowboy boots that he ordered before going to prison; they didn’t arrive until after he was gone.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublicaDuncan’s Bible is one of his most cherished possessions. He taught himself to read Hebrew while in prison.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
Duncan’s main focus now is doing the best job he can at work. On most nights, he said he puts his earbuds in, listens to music, unloads the trucks and lets the world drift away. “Ain’t got to think about nothing else,” he said. But Duncan has his eye on the future and enrolled in a Walmart management training program that will bring additional responsibilities.
One day soon, though, he knows that he will need to shift his attention back to the flawed criminal justice system in Monroe and the conditions in Angola prison. He wants to make sure the horrors he experienced don’t happen to anyone else, including the guys on death row, men who were convicted of terrible crimes but with whom he still formed true friendships.
“I was under the same roof with those people twice as long as I was under the same roof with my own family,” he said.
He’s also rekindled a relationship from long ago. Recently, he was going through Facebook friend requests and saw a familiar face, but one he couldn’t quite place. He accepted, and the woman texted him a photo of herself when she was just a kid. It was his childhood sweetheart.
The last time he saw her was at a skating rink just after Christmas in the early 1980s. He had given her a pair of earrings. A short time later, her family moved out of town.
“She just disappeared,” Duncan said. “She’s one of the only people I remember from my past. I still missed her just the same as I always did.”
That part of his life seems at times to be more of a dream than reality, Duncan said. He lived a simple, country life. He hunted and fished. He drank beer, rode motorcycles and worked on hot rods. And he planned to become a firefighter like his dad.
But then Haley died.
“I can’t be a simple person anymore,” Duncan said. “I try to find ways to be happy, but nothing is simple anymore.”
Duncan turns on a light in his new apartment.Kathleen Flynn for ProPublica
With the goldendoodle beside her during appointments, Lucy’s family began seeing a change. There were fewer tears, more smiles and a greater sense of calm during situations that previously had been filled with fear.
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