High Tension In Venezuela & The Young Republicans Leak

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Hi readers, happy Thursday! Today we’re covering tensions in Venezuela, Young Republicans, $40 billion to Argentina, bodies in Gaza, U.S. government layoffs, airlifts in Alaska, and a spicy ChatGPT update.

“When you have once seen the glow of happiness on the face of a beloved person, you know that a man can have no vocation but to awaken that light on the faces surrounding him.” – Albert Camus

The Threat Of Violence Over Venezuela

The U.S. is inching closer to war with Venezuela. On Tuesday, the U.S. Navy fired yet another missile at another alleged “narcoterrorist” boat in the Caribbean, killing six people. In total, the U.S. Navy has now killed 27 people in five missile strikes over the past few weeks. The Trump administration has justified repeatedly blowing up boats in international waters by leaning on a classified legal opinion – in it, the Justice Department argues that the military can use deadly force against a long list of cartels because they pose an imminent threat to Americans. 

Those strikes are part of a larger conflict between the U.S. and Venezuela, as Washington is hoping to force out Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro with a show of military force. The White House has accused Maduro’s government of working with cartels, and the U.S. Navy has been building up troops off the coast of Venezuela – right now, there are at least 10 Navy boats, a nuclear submarine, over 10,000 U.S. troops, and multiple fighter jets lurking in the Caribbean. Three separate B-52H Stratofortress bombers were also spotted flying over Venezuela on Tuesday. When you combine Washington’s willingness to bomb alleged “narcoterrorists” with Trump’s claims that Maduro is the head of the “Cartel of the Suns” (a cartel that may or may not actually exist), you can see how an armed conflict with Venezuela could be approaching fast.

Things got even more heated yesterday, when Trump announced that he’d authorized the CIA to conduct covert actions in Venezuela. Those actions could, theoretically, include lethal operations against Maduro or other top Venezuelan officials, and the CIA could operate independently or alongside the military. Speaking of the military, Trump also announced that the U.S. is “certainly looking at land” strikes in Venezuelan territory sometime soon, claiming that the Navy has “got the sea very well under control” after its attacks on boats in the Caribbean over the past month. “No to regime change, which reminds us so much of the endless, failed wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and so on,” said Maduro in a speech on Wednesday night. “No to CIA orchestrated coups d'état."

Making It Out Of The Group Chat, Gone Wrong

On Tuesday, Politico released 2,900 pages of leaked messages from a Telegram group chat. The messages included highly racist, antisemitic, and homophobic language – that type of rhetoric is, unfortunately, the norm across a lot of Telegram’s unmoderated group chats. So why does this leak matter? Because that specific group chat included many leaders of Young Republican organizations across the country. 

The Young Republican National Federation is a nationwide network of Republican support groups whose members are aged 18 to 40. Many Young Republicans either work as political organizers or are directly involved in the government – members of the leaked group chat include one state senator and a senior Trump official.

On to the contents of the leaked messages (brace yourself). Some group members repeatedly referred to Black people as “monkeys” or “the watermelon people.” Others repeatedly made antisemitic comments and advertised their support for Hitler, while more Young Republicans called for the deaths of their political opponents by putting them in gas chambers. Bobby Walker, the vice chair of the New York State Young Republicans chapter, even referred to the rape of Indigenous people as “epic.” Republicans across the country have largely condemned the dozen members of the group chat, leading to most of them being removed from their current jobs. Vice President JD Vance, however, referred to the backlash as “pearl clutching.” Does that mean the Young Republicans’ constant slur usage is normal to the vice president?

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$40 Billion For What?

• Last week, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confirmed that the White House would be handing Argentina a $20 billion bailout. The massive financing effort is an attempt by the Trump White House to prop up the conservative government of Javier Milei, which is facing a financial crisis as hotly-contested midterm elections approach later this month.

• Yesterday, Bessent indicated that Washington is considering doubling that bailout to a whopping $40 billion. For comparison, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (which protects consumers from unfair business practices) has an annual budget of roughly $400 million – that means Argentina’s bailout package could fund the agency for a literal century.

• In his statement on Wednesday, Bessent clarified that the Treasury Department would be working in partnership with the private sector and other entities in order to reach the $40 billion sum. It seems like the Trump White House and certain business owners have a dogged ideological interest in bailing out a government that’s focused on deregulation and slashing public spending – what a surprise!

The Bloodstained Dust Settles In Gaza

• As part of the ceasefire deal in Gaza, Hamas handed over two more bodies of deceased Israeli hostages yesterday. The group said it needs more time and specialized equipment to find the remaining hostages’ bodies, as much of Gaza has been reduced to rubble by Israeli airstrikes. If both bodies are confirmed to be hostages, Hamas will still have 19 more to dig up and return to Israel.

• Meanwhile, the 90 bodies of deceased Palestinians returned to Gaza by Israel as part of the deal have been examined by Palestinian doctors. “Almost all of them had been blindfolded, and had been bound up and they had gunshots between the eyes. Almost all of them had been executed,” said Dr Ahmed al-Farra, the head of pediatrics at Nasser hospital in southern Gaza. “There were also scars and discoloured patches of skin showing they had been beaten before being killed. There were also signs that their bodies had been abused after they were killed.”

Additional World News

• Ukraine imposes blackouts in most regions after Russian power grid attacks (BBC)

• Trump says Modi has agreed to stop buying Russian oil (BBC) 

• Spies, Burgers and Bombs: After a New War, Old Wounds Resurface in Tehran (NYT, $)

• Plug-in hybrids pollute almost as much as petrol cars, report finds (Guardian)

• Leader of Madagascar's military coup tells AP he is 'taking the position of president' (AP)

• Japan LDP's Takaichi explores coalition with right-leaning party in premiership bid (Reuters)

No More “You’re Fired” For Now

• The government shutdown continues on, and the Trump White House is looking to use the closure to lay off federal employees – especially those working for “Democrat programs.” Yesterday, a federal judge temporarily blocked the president’s firing spree in a case filed by unions against the federal government. Labor groups are claiming that Trump’s firings are illegal because the president needs support from Congress to slash federal agencies.

• In her initial review of the evidence, Judge Susan Illston wrote that the White House budget office had “taken advantage of the lapse in government spending and government functioning to assume that all bets are off, that the laws don’t apply to them anymore and they can impose the structures that they like.” In an order issued hours later, Illston temporarily blocked Trump’s first round of layoffs – over 4,000 across eight agencies – and also nixed any future layoffs. Trump officials seemed undeterred by the ruling, with White House budget director Russell T. Vought indicating that 10,000 more layoffs might be on the table.

Airlifted In Alaska

• Hundreds of people across Alaska’s southwest coast are being evacuated by air in one of the “most significant” airlifts in the state’s history. The airlift is a response to massive flooding caused by the remnants of Typhoon Halong, which hit the state last weekend. Roughly 300 people across two remote villages are being evacuated to Anchorage, as their homes are only accessible by boat or air this time of year.

• The floods have displaced over 1,500 people this week (many of them Indigenous), with powerful floodwaters ripping dozens of homes off their foundations. “Indigenous communities in Alaska are resilient,” said one Alaska climate specialist. “But, you know, when you have an entire community where effectively every house is damaged and many of them will be uninhabitable with winter knocking at the door now, there's only so much that any individual or any small community can do.”

Additional USA News

• Capitol Police called to investigate swastika in GOP congressional office (Politico)

• San Francisco opposes ‘authoritarian crackdown’ as Trump threatens to send troops (Guardian)

• Supreme Court weighs 'earthquake' ruling on Voting Rights Act (BBC) 

• Gavin Newsom Vetoes Reparations Bills in California (NYT, $)

• Is college worth the cost? Universities work to show the return on investment of a degree (AP)

• Journalists turn in access badges, exit Pentagon rather than agree to new reporting rules (AP)

You’ve Heard Of Machine Learning, But What About Machine Sexting?

• ChatGPT is freaky enough as it is, but OpenAI is planning to make the chatbot freaky sometime soon. On Tuesday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said that the company plans to allow users to have “mature” conversations with the chatbot later this year after it rolls out age-verification capabilities in December.

• “As we roll out age-gating more fully and as part of our ‘treat adult users like adults’ principle, we will allow even more, like erotica for verified adults,” he wrote on Twitter. He added that OpenAI had made ChatGPT “pretty restrictive to make sure we were being careful with mental health issues,” but noted that those changes made “talking” with the computer program “less useful/enjoyable to many users who had no mental health problems.”

• This week, OpenAI announced the establishment of a new council on “well-being and AI” which will guide the company’s response to “complex or sensitive” issues relating to its products. “Now that we have been able to mitigate the serious mental health issues and have new tools, we are going to be able to safely relax the restrictions in most cases,” Altman tweeted. 

Additional Reads

• Protein Powders and Shakes Contain High Levels of Lead (Consumer Reports)

• President Trump’s threatening to relocate 2026 World Cup games. Can he actually do that? (NYT, $)

• Faulty engineering led to deadly Titan sub implosion, US investigators rule (Guardian) 

• The Drink That Americans Won’t Give Up Without a Fight (Atlantic, $)

• We’re swimming in AI slop. Here’s how to tell the difference. (Vox)

• Why big tech's nuclear plans could blow up (BBC) 

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