Trump Takes Over D.C. And Also Chickens Out Again

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Hi readers, happy Tuesday! Today we’re covering Trump’s takeover of D.C., Trump chickening out, upcoming U.S.-Russia negotiations, the IDF targeting journalists, a shooting at a Target, an explosion at a U.S. Steel plant, and a weird chip-selling deal.

Here’s the good news: After a few months of anxiety over rice shortages in Asia, rice prices have plummeted to an eight-year low following record-breaking harvests. Also, the biggest-ever trial of the four-day work week showed that the benefits of a shorter work week outweigh the stress of having to work harder while on the clock.

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” – Mother Teresa

A Trumped Up Takeover

The president has decided to take over the nation’s capital. Literally. On Monday, Trump announced that the federal government would be seizing control of Washington D.C.’s police department while simultaneously deploying 800 National Guard troops to the city in a truly unprecedented move.

In a press conference announcing the takeover, Trump said that the action was necessary to “rescue” Washington from a supposed crime wave. “Our capital city has been overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals,” he told reporters. Crime statistics show that violent crime in D.C. did spike in 2023, but has been on a strong decline over the past year and a half, hitting a three-decade low in 2024. 

If that wasn’t enough, Trump went on to threaten other major Democrat-held cities across the U.S. (that’s pretty much every major city in the country in case you were wondering). “If we need to, we're going to do the same thing in Chicago, which is a disaster,” the president threatened. “Hopefully L.A. is watching.” Federal troops are now fanned out across  D.C., and are expected to remain present for 30 days with the supposed goal of reducing crime and homelessness. 

The Big Man Balks Before Beijing

Remember “Trump Always Chickens Out”? Well, he’s done it again. Yesterday, the president signed off on an executive order delaying his sweeping tariffs on China. The order, which Trump pushed out just hours before the tariffs were set to take effect, will push back their implementation for 90 days – this marks the second time Trump has chickened out of implementing his own tariffs.

Beijing responded yesterday by promising to postpone its own tariffs on U.S. goods for 90 days as well. If Trump’s tariffs actually went into effect, the U.S. would have taxed Chinese goods as high as 245%, and China would have implemented its own tariff plans which slap 145% duties on American goods.

According to economists, Trump’s tariffs will lead to higher costs for American consumers even as the U.S. jobs market continues to slow down – not a good combination. The U.S. Federal Reserve says that Americans are absorbing 22% of the costs of Trump’s tariffs as of June, but that number is projected to rise to 67% after the latest raft of tariffs begin to affect the economy. What a time to be alive!

Deal Or No Deal?

• Trump’s drift away from Putin continued this week as the president said he would seek to reclaim Ukrainian territory currently held by Russia in talks scheduled for the end of the week. “Russia’s occupied a big portion of Ukraine. They occupied prime territory. We're going to try to get some of that territory back for Ukraine,” he told reporters at the White House. Trump is set to meet with his Russian counterpart in a so-called “feel-out meeting” which will be held on Friday in Alaska.

• The president went on to say that there would be “some swapping, changes in land” between Russia and Ukraine, adding that, “out of respect,” he plans to tell Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky the results of the meeting before the U.S.’s other European allies.  “I’ll call him after, and I may say, ‘lots of luck, keep fighting,’” Trump said. “Or I may say, ‘we can make a deal’.”

Silencing The Press With Strikes

• The IDF killed an Al Jazeera journalist and his colleagues with a targeted airstrike in Gaza over the weekend. Anas al-Sharif was an Al Jazeera correspondent providing on-the-ground coverage of the war in Gaza before his death at the hands of the Israeli military – seven others were killed in the airstrike, including Al Jazeera correspondent Mohamed Qreiqeh and four other journalists. The Israeli government has defended its targeted attack on the press by claiming that al-Sharif was the leader of a Hamas cell.

• According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), the Israel-Hamas war has been the deadliest conflict for journalists since it started tracking journalist deaths in 1992, with at least 186 journalists killed since October 2023. Most of those journalists are Palestinian correspondents, as Israel does not allow international news companies, such as the BBC or New York Times, to send their journalists into Gaza. “Israel must respect & protect all civilians, including journalists,” said the U.N. Human Rights office after al-Sharif’s death was announced. “We call for immediate, safe and unhindered access to Gaza for all journalists.”

Additional World News

• North Koreans tell BBC they are being sent to work 'like slaves' in Russia (BBC)

• EU leaders say Ukraine should have freedom to decide its future ahead of Trump-Putin summit (Guardian)

• Canada wildfire season already second worst on record as experts warn of ‘new reality’ (Guardian)

• Netanyahu’s Gaza takeover plan satisfies no one but himself (CNN)

• Miguel Uribe, Colombian Senator Shot at Campaign Event, Dies at 39 (NYT, $)

A Tragedy At Target

• Yesterday, a gunman opened fire in the parking lot of a Target in Austin, Texas. The shooter killed two adults and a child before fleeing the scene in a stolen car – he then drove 20 miles across the city, stealing another car along the way before eventually being detained. Austin’s police chief said the suspect was a 30 year-old man with “a mental health history,” and investigators are still working out his motive for the shooting.

• “This is a devastating situation, and my heart is with the victims and their families,” wrote Austin Mayor Kirk Watson on X. “While this remains an active and ongoing investigation, what I’ll say is that this was a sickening, cowardly act of gun violence.” The shooting marks the second attack at a retail store in less than a month – on July 26, a man stabbed 11 people at a Walmart in Michigan before being taken into police custody.

Strife Strikes The Steelmaker

• Yesterday, an explosion occurred at a U.S. Steel plant outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The blast reportedly left one person dead, hospitalized at least ten more, and left two others missing. “It felt like thunder,” said one construction worker present at the time of the explosion. “Shook the scaffold, shook my chest, and shook the building, and then when we saw the dark smoke coming up from the steel mill and put two and two together, and it’s like something bad happened.”

• The plant supplies coal coke – a carbon-rich material used to fuel the steelmaking process – to America’s largest steelmaker. The facility is 120 years old, and the explosion was the third safety incident that took place at the site this year, according to a local air quality watchdog group called the Breathe Project. “This is the third major event at this plant in 2025. There was a stack explosion on February 2, 2025. A pollution control room malfunction on June 2-3, 2025 took pollution control equipment offline for an extended period of time. There were no known major documented injuries from these prior two incidents. Unfortunately, the incident today is more dire,” said the organization in a statement. “Many people have been concerned about this facility and the community that hosts it for a long time.”

Additional USA News

• Trump Names EJ Antoni New BLS Commissioner (NYT, $)

• Musk says he plans to sue Apple for not featuring X or Grok among its top apps (AP)

• Gavin Newsom urges Trump to abandon Texas redistricting effort in letter (Guardian)

• Officials say gunman who attacked CDC may have had anti-Covid vaccine beliefs (BBC)

• Delta plane clips empty jet during pushback from gate at Atlanta airport (CNN)

Betting It All On Their Chips

• How much would you pay to have the chance to make money? According to two of the biggest companies in the world, the answer to that question is “15% of our future profits from China.” Nvidia and AMD – the two largest computer chip manufacturers in the world – just agreed to a historic deal with the U.S. government yesterday. The White House has promised to end a recent export ban which blocked the chipmakers from selling their most advanced chips in China. In exchange, the companies will give Washington a 15% cut of the revenue they earn from selling their top-of-the-line chips to Chinese buyers. Nvidia and AMD make the most cutting-edge processors required to train AI models, and given China’s decision to go all-in on AI, access to China’s massive markets is apparently worth even a 15% cut in profits for the chipmakers.

• The agreement marks the first time that a private firm has agreed to share its revenue with the U.S. government in order to keep exporting its products.While that’s a pretty interesting fact, trade experts say the deal might be long-lasting, as the quid pro quo might turn out to be unconstitutional. “In addition to the policy problems with just charging Nvidia and AMD a 15% share of revenues to sell advanced chips in China, the US constitution flatly forbids export taxes.” said Biden’s former White House senior director for international economics. “This is the Trump playbook applied in exactly the wrong domain,” said another critic. “You’re selling our national security for corporate profits.” 

Additional Reads

• What Does Palantir Actually Do? (Wired, $)

• US teen influencer has been stranded in the Chilean Antarctic since landing without permission (AP)

• RFK Jr. wants a wearable on every American — that future’s not as healthy as he thinks (Verge)

• What Happened When Mark Zuckerberg Moved In Next Door (NYT, $)

• Headphones that scan your brainwaves and keep you focused? It’s not science fiction. (Vox) 

• Ford’s Answer to China: A Completely New Way of Making Cars (Wired, $)

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