“News Items is the first thing I read every morning.” — Jack Leslie, former chairman of Weber Shandwick and Adjunct Professor, Georgetown Global Health Institute.
1. Iran’s leadership has made a high-stakes calculation in its showdown with President Trump: maintaining control over the Strait of Hormuz is a nonnegotiable red line. By asserting authority over a critical waterway for global crude-oil flows, Tehran is betting that its ability to inflict pain on the American economy is its best leverage to avoid future military action from the U.S. and Israel. With gasoline prices and inflation elevated, Tehran believes Trump will ultimately accept its terms ahead of fast-approaching midterm elections that could determine the future of his presidency. Centering strategy on controlling the Strait of Hormuz is an extraordinary gamble. It assumes Trump will prefer a messy, volatile stalemate over an all-out war. In playing this card so aggressively, Tehran risks miscalculating Washington’s breaking point and threatening its own economic survival. (Source: wsj.com)
2. The U.S., Iran and Oman are closing in on an interim agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, with the U.S. aiming for a Wednesday announcement, according to two regional sources and a U.S. official. The deal, which has been under negotiations for several weeks, is aimed at resuming the ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran and restarting negotiations over a nuclear deal. President Trump decided on Saturday not to follow through on threats to unleash a massive bombing campaign, in order to allow more time for diplomacy. If a deal isn’t reached soon, however, Trump could green-light major strikes. The emerging deal would meet some of Iran’s demands for greater control over traffic in the Strait of Hormuz — control it didn’t have before the war. (Source: axios.com)
3. Masoud Pezeshkian, Iran’s president, has been forced to deny claims that he has repeatedly threatened to resign as he battles hardline factions opposed to reaching a settlement with the US over the strait of Hormuz. The US and Europe hope a deal is imminent to reopen the strait and they are putting pressure on Oman to accept a temporary agreement that officials in Muscat fear will leave Iran retaining near permanent dominance of the vital oil shipping channel. Ships would enter the strait in a route close to Iran, but leave on a route that passes through Iranian and Omani waters. But far from being feted over an imminent diplomatic victory, Pezeshkian was instead forced to deny that he had repeatedly offered to resign, verbally and in writing, during a television interview marking his second anniversary in the job. (Source: theguardian.com)
4. The U.S. Army has used up much of its global stockpile of highly accurate long-range missiles during its five-month war with Iran, according to three people familiar with the data, raising concerns about the military’s readiness for future conflicts. The missiles are principally the Army’s surface-to-surface weapons, known as Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) and Precision Strike Missiles (PrSM). The U.S. has used “virtually all” of these weapons, according to two of the sources. (Source: reuters.com)
5. Nikkei Asia:
The U.S. joined in a coordinated currency intervention with Japan to prevent yen weakness from spreading instability across Asian currencies, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Nikkei on Tuesday in an exclusive interview where he cited the lessons from the Asian financial crisis of the 1990s.
Explaining the reasons for the yen-buying intervention -- the first of its kind in roughly 28 years -- Bessent cited the crisis and the impact of significant yen depreciation. In 1998, the Japanese currency depreciated by 30 yen against the dollar over the course of a year, exacerbating the crisis.
“Many Asian currencies follow the Japanese yen currently. Korean won is weak because the yen is weak. Many people believe China has a very undervalued currency and they are reluctant to strengthen the currency too much just because of yen weakness,” Bessent said. (Source: asia.nikkei.com)
6. Kansas voters on Tuesday rejected a ballot measure that would have required state Supreme Court justices to be popularly elected rather than appointed by the governor, dealing another setback to Republican lawmakers trying to overturn a decision that established a constitutional right to abortion. That ruling in 2019 has preserved Kansas as a significant abortion provider for women in a wide swath of middle-American states that banned abortion after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. The ballot measure was defeated by ~140,000 votes, a margin of ~22 percentage points. (Source: nytimes.com)
7. Missouri voters overwhelmingly rejected a proposed constitutional amendment that would have given state lawmakers the ability to expand sales and use taxes in order to eliminate the state income tax. Amendment 5 failed Tuesday, with 83% of the ballots cast being no votes when the election was called at 8:15 p.m. The failure of Amendment 5 is a major blow to Gov. Mike Kehoe and other Republicans who supported it. Kehoe prioritized the elimination of the income tax in his State of the State address this year. In a statement issued Tuesday evening, Kehoe said that while Amendment 5 failed, the work “is far from over.” That’s one way to put it. Amendment 5 was defeated by ~935,000 votes out of ~1.4 million cast. (Source: stlpr.org, nytimes.com)
8. Molly Taft:
When people ask what I’m doing in Georgia, I give them something easy. People hate data centers, I say, so I’m trying to figure out if they hate AI too. That’s all true. But the topic has also consumed me. In all my years of reporting on energy and the environment, I have never seen anything like the type of vitriol leveled at data centers, or the near-religious fury that has built up around their construction, or the way this resistance seems to be uniting people from the complete opposite ends of the political spectrum. Data center resistance certainly has some of its roots in classic NIMBYism: Lots of Americans simply don’t trust stuff being built, in their backyards, by powerful companies for mysterious purposes. But the pace of the outrage that’s built up around the country is shocking. (Sources: 6 stories from wired.com)
9. A grass-roots organizer and climate activist prevailed in the Democratic primary for a battleground House district in Michigan yesterday, according to The Associated Press, scoring another victory for the party’s progressive wing in a district pivotal for the fight to control Congress. Backed by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Mr. Lawrence centered his campaign on opposing data centers, increasing taxes on billionaires and passing legislation for universal health care. He also said he would end arms sales to Israel. (Source: nytimes.com)
10. Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive former public health official, held a narrow lead over Representative Haley Stevens, a centrist, in a contentious Michigan Democratic Senate race that remained close as results continued to be tallied early Wednesday. The winner will face former Representative Mike Rogers, a Republican, in the race to succeed Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat who is retiring, in a battleground state that could determine control of the Senate. (Source: nytimes.com. Ed Note: We expect Dr. El-Sayed to emerge victorious once all precincts have reported, but the race is tight (much tighter than we thought it would be). Update: NBC News has called the race for El-Sayed.)
11. Liberal Democrats now make up a clear majority of their party and view universal healthcare, greater abortion access and higher taxes on the rich as essential political positions, underscoring how Democrats have moved leftward in recent years, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll. The six-day poll, completed on Monday, showed the proportion of Democrats who label themselves as “liberal” has risen to 71% from 55% in 2012, while the share who see themselves as "conservative" has dwindled from 33% to 16%. Some 76% of liberal Democrats said increasing taxes on corporations and billionaires was an “essential” policy position for anyone who considers themselves a liberal, the poll found. Another 72% said the same about expanding abortion access, while 71% said achieving government-provided healthcare for all Americans was a necessary goal for any liberal. Insurgent left-wing candidates this year have racked up a string of primary victories over more centrist Democrats, many of whom were backed by the party establishment. They have gone beyond New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani's election last year in a deeply liberal city to vie for office in more politically divided states. Only 16% of Democrats support military and economic support for Israel, while 57% oppose it, according to the Reuters/Ipsos poll. (Source: reuters.com)
12. Bloomberg:
Artificial intelligence models developed by OpenAI and Anthropic PBC carried out “unsanctioned” actions — including hacking a website and attempting to inject harmful code into software during safety testing — reinforcing fears that neither the creators nor seasoned researchers of these systems can predict their actions in testing.
The UK government’s AI Security Institute, established in 2023 to evaluate the safety of cutting-edge AI models, said Tuesday that both Anthropic’s Mythos 5 and OpenAI’s GPT-5.6-Sol models had both “engaged in sustained, potentially harmful activity directed at real people and organizations” during evaluations. The institute intentionally allowed the models internet access and used them without certain safety filters to test their capabilities.
“Even under test conditions, this incident is significant: It is the first time we have seen risks around autonomy and deception manifest this clearly in the real world,” the institute said in a post on the social media platform X. (Sources: bloomberg.com, aisi.gov.uk, x.com)
13. The number of U.S. student visas issued to Chinese and Indian nationals has plummeted under the Trump administration, with the global rejection rate hitting a decade high as restrictive immigration policies squeeze the pipeline of foreign academic talent. According to State Department data, the U.S. issued over a third fewer F-1 student visas to Chinese applicants in the summer of 2025 compared with the same period in 2024. Indian students saw an even sharper decline, with approvals dropping by nearly two-thirds. (Source: caixinglobal.com)
14. An invasive, malaria-carrying, insecticide-resistant mosquito that thrives in cities, where malaria has not been a major threat, has moved farther and faster across Africa than even pessimistic scientists had feared. And many public health experts believe it is too late to eliminate, or even contain, it. A new genomic analysis of the mosquito, called Anopheles stephensi, using specimens collected from 10 countries, showed that those found in Africa had genetic resistance to all of the chemicals currently used in spraying campaigns and other mosquito-control efforts, meaning those insecticides will not kill it. It is moving with terrifying efficiency and speed across flat, open, windy terrain, pushing westward to Ghana and south through Kenya, from its initial arrival on the continent in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa more than a decade ago. This mosquito alarms health experts because, unlike the species that historically spread malaria in Africa, it thrives in urban as well as rural areas, and is not deterred by dry seasons. This means that malaria, already one of the top killers in Africa, could become a grave problem in megacities such as Lagos and Kinshasa, each of which are home to about 20 million people. (Source: nytimes.com)
15. Ebola has killed more than 1,700 people in eastern Congo in what has become the fastest-growing outbreak of the disease, according to data — spreading faster than health officials can track and with patient zero still unidentified. As of Tuesday, 3,802 cases had been recorded, with 1,707 deaths, the latest government update showed. It is not clear when the outbreak will reach its peak. (Source: statnews.com)
16. Stanford researchers discovered immune cells in flatworms that explode within minutes, killing nearby bacteria and foreign cells before vanishing completely. Their unusually fast and localized attack could offer clues for developing targeted treatments against infections and cancer. (Source: sciencedaily.com)
17. A specially engineered chewing gum reduced HPV by up to 93% and nearly eliminated two bacteria linked to head and neck cancer. The treatment preserved beneficial mouth bacteria, raising hopes for a safer and more affordable therapy. More on this here. (Sources: sciencedaily.com, penntoday.upenn.edu)
Quick Links: “Shark Week” follow-up: 12-foot ‘Sharkzilla’ lurking in NY waters. America needs a bigger plan to control its tick problem. Parts of the UK endure first ever month without any rain.
Financialization Links: How Wall Street banks enabled Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking. Yen stuck at 157 as markets weigh limits of US-Japan intervention. China’s housing slump squeezes mid-tier developers. China launches global tax hunt going back decades. Trump administration refunds $100 billion in ‘liberation day’ tariffs.
Political Links: Arizona’s Democratic governor set to pick a Republican running mate. Democrats nominated a strong Senate candidate in Kansas. Unless there’s a Blue Tsunami, he’ll lose in November. State Senator Cindy Holscher, who has called for a moratorium on data centers, won the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in Kansas. She faces an uphill battle in the fall. In Missouri: Amendment #4 gets clobbered. The New York Times previews the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate in Minnesota. Democrat exits Senate race in South Dakota, clearing way for independent. India’s ruling BJP loses byelection in stronghold after Cockroach student protests. Ukraine becomes fault line in Italy’s next election. US revokes Brazil ambassador’s visa in escalation of diplomatic feud.
Science/Technology Links: Could mending damaged DNA prolong life? SpaceX’s first-ever earnings show higher revenues and huge spending. Britain will soon be Europe’s energy powerhouse. Europe can become a bioengineering powerhouse, but it will require investment and education. Shenzhen-based AI mathematician Yurii Nesterov wins top prize in applied maths. Remembering David G. Luenberger, pioneer in optimization theory. Video: Dolphin carries dead calf in what experts call grieving.
War: The Taiwan war China might choose. Projectile sinks Indian ship near Yemeni waters. Russian ballistic missiles pummelled Ukraine overnight, killing at least 15 in the capital Kyiv as each side intensified air campaigns targeting critical infrastructure and logistics centers. Kyiv’s former top commander says NATO is too outdated for Ukraine. Ukraine energy chief says infrastructure attacks will shape war’s outcome. At least a dozen states are reportedly responding to cyberattacks against local water systems.