The Trump administration is suing the state of California to block animal welfare laws that it says unconstitutionally helped send egg prices soaring. But a group that spearheaded the requirements pushed back, blaming bird flu for the hit to consumers’ pocketbooks.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in California on Wednesday, challenges voter initiatives that passed in 2018 and 2008. They require that all eggs sold in California come from cage-free hens.

The Trump administration says the law imposes burdensome red tape on the production of eggs and egg products across the country because of the state’s outsize role in the national economy.

“It is one thing if California passes laws that affects its own State, it is another when those laws affect other States in violation of the U.S. Constitution,” U.S. Agriculture Brooke Rollins said in a statement Thursday. “Thankfully, President Trump is standing up against this overreach.”

Egg prices soared last year and earlier this year due in large part to bird flu, which has forced producers to destroy nearly 175 million birds since early 2022. But prices have come down sharply recently. While the Trump administration claims credit for that, seasonal factors are also important. Avian influenza, which is spread by wild birds, tends to spike during the spring and fall migrations and drop in summer.

“Pointing fingers won’t change the fact that it is the President’s economic policies that have been destructive,” the California Department of Justice said in a statement Friday. “We’ll see him in court.”

The average national price for a dozen Grade A eggs declined to $5.12 in April and $4.55 in May after reaching a record $6.23 in March, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. But the May price was still 68.5% higher than a year earlier.

“Trump’s back to his favorite hobby: blaming California for literally everything,” Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office said in a social media post.

The federal complaint alleges that California contributed to the rise in egg prices with regulations that forced farmers across the country to adopt more expensive production practices. The lawsuit also asserts that it is the federal government’s legal prerogative to regulate egg production. So it seeks to permanently block enforcement of the California regulations that flowed from the two ballot measures.

“Americans across the country have suffered the consequences of liberal policies causing massive inflation for everyday items like eggs,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement. “Under President Trump’s leadership, we will use the full extent of federal law to ensure that American families are free from oppressive regulatory burdens and restore American prosperity.”

While 2018’s Proposition 12 also banned the sale of pork and veal in California from animals raised in cages that don’t meet minimum size requirements, the lawsuit only focuses on the state’s egg rules.

Humane World for Animals, which was named the Humane Society of the United States when it spearheaded the passage of Proposition 12, says avian influenza and other factors drove up egg prices, not animal welfare laws. And it says much of the U.S. egg industry went cage-free anyway because of demand from consumers who don’t want eggs from hens confined to tiny spaces.

“California has prohibited the sale of cruelly produced eggs for more than a decade — law that has been upheld by courts at every level, including the Supreme Court. Blaming 2025 egg prices on these established animal welfare standards shows that this case is about pure politics, not constitutional law,” Sara Amundson, president of the Humane World Action Fund, said in a statement.

The American Egg Board, which represents the industry, said Friday that it will monitor the progress of the lawsuit while continuing to comply with California’s laws, and that it appreciates Rollins’ efforts to support farmers in their fight against bird flu and to stabilize the egg supply.

“Egg farmers have been both responsive and responsible in meeting changing demand for cage-free eggs, while supporting all types of egg production, and continuing to provide options in the egg case for consumers,” the board said in a statement.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Meg Kinnard

Bitcoin has reached an all-time high, surpassing $118,000 as a flood of money moves into spot bitcoin ETFs, which have opened up cryptocurrency investing to millions.

A soft U.S. dollar and the digital currency friendliness of President Donald Trump’s administration has also helped to push the price of bitcoin to unprecedented levels recently.

Last month the Senate passed legislation that would regulate a form of cryptocurrency known as stablecoins, the first of what the industry hopes will be a wave of bills to bolster its legitimacy and reassure consumers.

The fast-moving legislation comes on the heels of a 2024 campaign cycle in which the crypto industry ranked among the top political spenders in the country, underscoring its growing influence in Washington and beyond.

Known as the GENIUS Act, the bill would establish guardrails and consumer protections for stablecoins, a type of cryptocurrency typically pegged to the U.S. dollar. The acronym stands for “Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins.”

Next week the House of Representatives will be considering the GENIUS Act as part of Congress’ efforts to strengthen the country’s crypto position.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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It started with a phone call to a men’s clothing store in the heart of Mexico City’s historic center. “I need you to put together 10,000 pesos ($500) for me weekly, or else we’ll have to do something,” the voice said.

The owner hung up and didn’t answer the phone again for days. But when another call came the following week, in a surge of courage and indignation the owner told the caller he wouldn’t pay, that the money demanded would have been half the store’s daily income. “Well, prepare to face the consequences,” the voice said.

Several years of escalating threats, visits from goons and armed robberies followed until the shop owner, who requested anonymity because he still fears retaliation, decided to close the store his grandfather had opened in 1936.

Extortion is strangling businesses in Mexico. Much, but not all, of it is linked to Mexico powerful organized crime groups. While some larger companies eat it as the cost of doing business, many smaller ones are forced to close.

The Mexican Employers’ Association, Coparmex, says extortion cost businesses some $1.3 billion in 2023. And this year, while other major crimes are descending, extortion continues to rise, up 10% nationally in the first quarter compared to the same period last year.

In Mexico City, the number of reported extortion cases nearly doubled in the first five months of 2025 to 498, up from 249 for the same period last year. It’s the highest total at this point in the year in the past six years, according to federal crime data.

A report to police goes nowhere

After the first call in 2019, the store owner had his employees stop answering the phone for eight months. Things quieted, but in early 2020, two men came to the shop and demanded payment. The owner pretended to be a shopper and slipped out.

In 2021, the weekly calls demanding money in exchange for “security” resumed. Under advice of his attorneys, eventually stopped going into the shop, instead managing everything remotely.

In one of several robberies, his employees were held at gunpoint, tied up and locked in a bathroom, while the thieves took money from the cash register.

Finally, after two years of threats and robberies, he reported it to authorities. Investigators demanded proof from him that he couldn’t provide because the threats were always verbal, he said. The investigation went nowhere.

Only fraction extortion cases reported

Reported extortion cases are only a small fraction of the reality.

Mexico’s National Institute for Statistics and Geography estimated that some 97% of extortion cases were not reported in 2023.

Reporting is low because of a combination of fear and skepticism that authorities will do something.

Mexico City police chief Pablo Vásquez Camacho said in an interview with AP that police were receiving more reports of extortion, but recognized that they still weren’t hearing about many more. “We can’t solve something that we’re not even seeing or that isn’t being reported,” Vásquez said.

The problem, said Vicente Gutiérrez Camposeco, president of the Mexico City Chamber of Commerce, “has become entrenched” in Mexico and especially the capital in recent years.

Daniel Bernardi, whose family has run a popsicle shop in the historic center for 85 years, was resigned to the situation. “There isn’t much to do,” he said. “You pay when you have to pay.”

Last month, the Mexico City prosecutor’s office announced that it was creating a special prosecutor’s office to investigate and prosecute extortion.

Pay up or die

In July, President Claudia Sheinbaum said she would propose legislation giving the government greater powers to pursue extortionists.

This week, her administration also announced a national strategy to address extortion. There will be a phone number to anonymously report extortion; the power to immediately cancel phone numbers associated with extortion calls; local anti-extortion units to investigate cases and the involvement of Mexico’s Financial Intelligence Unit to freeze bank accounts associated with extortion.

Nationally, extortion cases are up more than 6% on the year.

Extortion’s rapid expansion has to do with the significant sums it generates for organized crime, drawing in the country’s most powerful drug cartels among others. The Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation cartels have made extortion “one of the divisions of their criminal portfolios,” said security analyst David Saucedo.

And with the cartels involved, small-time crooks take advantage of the fear and run their own little extortion rackets, pretending to be associated with larger organized crime groups.

The Mexico City men’s clothing store owner didn’t know who was extorting him. But without help from authorities, he felt alone and exposed. The threats had grown stronger and they now said they’d kill him if he didn’t pay.

The owner recalled that a nearby restaurant that had opened around the same time as his own store, had closed after its owner was killed, supposedly after not paying extortion demands.

So in December 2023, he saw no other option but to close. Little by little he watched old pieces of furniture carried out of the store that his father had passed on to him as his grandfather had passed it on to his father.

“When I closed I felt very sad. And then it made me so mad to think that I could still go on, but because of fear I couldn’t,” he said. “You work your whole life for them to destroy it.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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The State Department is firing more than 1,300 employees on Friday in line with a dramatic reorganization plan initiated by the Trump administration earlier this year.

The department is sending layoff notices to 1,107 civil servants and 246 foreign service officers with domestic assignments in the United States, said a senior State Department official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters ahead of individual notices being emailed to affected employees.

Foreign service officers affected will be placed immediately on administrative leave for 120 days, after which they will formally lose their jobs, according to an internal notice obtained by The Associated Press. For most affected civil servants, the separation period is 60 days, it said.

“In connection with the departmental reorganization … the department is streamlining domestic operations to focus on diplomatic priorities,” the notice says. “Headcount reductions have been carefully tailored to affect non-core functions, duplicative or redundant offices, and offices where considerable efficiencies may be found from centralization or consolidation of functions and responsibilities.”

While lauded by President Donald Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and their Republican allies as overdue and necessary to make the department leaner, more nimble and more efficient, the cuts have been roundly criticized by current and former diplomats who say they will weaken U.S. influence and its ability to counter existing and emerging threats abroad.

The Trump administration has pushed to reshape American diplomacy and worked aggressively to shrink the size of the federal government, including mass dismissals as part of moves to dismantle whole departments like the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Education Department.

A recent ruling by the Supreme Court cleared the way for the layoffs to start, while lawsuits challenging the legality of the cuts continue to play out. The department had formally advised staffers on Thursday that it would be sending layoff notices to some of them soon. The job cuts are large but considerably less than many had feared.

Rubio said officials took “a very deliberate step to reorganize the State Department to be more efficient and more focused.”

“It’s not a consequence of trying to get rid of people. But if you close the bureau, you don’t need those positions,” he told reporters Thursday in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where he’s attending the annual Association of Southeast Asian Nations Regional Forum. “Understand that some of these are positions that are being eliminated, not people.”

He said some of the cuts will be unfilled positions or those that are about to be vacant because an employee took an early retirement.

The American Foreign Service Association, the union that represents diplomats, urged the State Department last month to hold off on job cuts.

Notices for a reduction in force, which would not only lay off employees but eliminate positions altogether, “should be a last resort,” association President Tom Yazdgerdi said. “Disrupting the Foreign Service like this puts national interests at risk — and Americans everywhere will bear the consequences.”

Michael Rigas, the department’s deputy secretary for management and resources, said in a notice Thursday that select staffers would be informed if they were being laid off and called it part of the department’s biggest reorganization in decades.

“Soon, the Department will be communicating to individuals affected by the reduction in force. First and foremost, we want to thank them for their dedication and service to the United States,” he said.

In late May, the State Department notified Congress of an updated reorganization plan, proposing cuts to programs beyond what had been revealed earlier by Rubio and an 18% reduction of staff in the U.S., even higher than the 15% initially floated in April.

The restructuring has been driven in part by the need to find a new home for the remaining functions of USAID, which was an early target of the Trump administration and then-aide Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.

The State Department is planning to eliminate some divisions tasked with oversight of America’s two-decade involvement in Afghanistan, including an office focused on resettling Afghan nationals who worked alongside the U.S. military.

A letter that the department had sent to Congress noted that the reorganization will affect more than 300 bureaus and offices, saying it is eliminating divisions it describes as doing unclear or overlapping work. It says Rubio believes “effective modern diplomacy requires streamlining this bloated bureaucracy.”

That letter was clear that the reorganization also is intended to eliminate programs — particularly those related to refugees and immigration, as well as human rights and democracy promotion — that the Trump administration believes have become ideologically driven in a way that is incompatible with its priorities and policies.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Cash is the lifeblood of the Gaza Strip’s shattered economy, and like all other necessities in this war-torn territory — food, fuel, medicine — it is in extremely short supply.

With nearly every bank branch and ATM inoperable, people have become reliant on an unrestrained network of powerful cash brokers to get money for daily expenses — and commissions on those transactions have soared to about 40%.

“The people are crying blood because of this,” said Ayman al-Dahdouh, a school director living in Gaza City. “It’s suffocating us, starving us.”

At a time of surging inflation, high unemployment and dwindling savings, the scarcity of cash has magnified the financial squeeze on families — some of whom have begun to sell their possessions to buy essential goods.

The cash that is available has even lost some of its luster. Palestinians use the Israeli currency, the shekel, for most transactions. Yet with Israel no longer resupplying the territory with newly printed bank notes, merchants are increasingly reluctant to accept frayed bills.

Gaza’s punishing cash crunch has several root causes, experts say.

To curtail Hamas’ ability to purchase weapons and pay its fighters, Israel stopped allowing cash to enter Gaza at the start of the war. Around the same time, many wealthy families in Gaza withdrew their money from banks and then fled the territory. And rising fears about Gaza’s financial system prompted foreign businesses selling goods into the territory to demand cash payments.

As Gaza’s money supply dwindled and civilians’ desperation mounted, cash brokers’ commissions — around 5% at the start of the war — skyrocketed.

Someone needing cash transfers money electronically to a broker and moments later is handed a fraction of that amount in bills. Many brokers openly advertise their services, while others are more secretive. Some grocers and retailers have also begun exchanging cash for their customers.

“If I need $60, I need to transfer $100,” said Mohammed Basheer al-Farra, who lives in southern Gaza after being displaced from Khan Younis. “This is the only way we can buy essentials, like flour and sugar. We lose nearly half of our money just to be able to spend it.”

In 2024, inflation in Gaza surged by 230%, according to the World Bank. It dropped slightly during the ceasefire that began in January, only to shoot up again after Israel backed out of the truce in March.

Cash touches every aspect of life in Gaza

About 80% of people in Gaza were unemployed at the end of 2024, according to the World Bank, and the figure is likely higher now. Those with jobs are mostly paid by direct deposits into their bank accounts.

But “when you want to buy vegetables, food, water, medication — if you want to take transportation, or you need a blanket, or anything — you must use cash,” al-Dahdouh said.

Shahid Ajjour’s family has been living off of savings for two years after the pharmacy and another business they owned were ruined by the war.

“We had to sell everything just to get cash,” said Ajjour, who sold her gold to buy flour and canned beans. The family of eight spends the equivalent of $12 every two days on flour; before the war, that cost less than $4.

Sugar is very expensive, costing the equivalent of $80-$100 per kilogram (2.2 pounds), multiple people said; before the war, that cost less than $2.

Gasoline is about $25 a liter, or roughly $95 a gallon, when paying the lower, cash price.

Bills are worn and unusable

The bills in Gaza are tattered after 21 months of war.

Money is so fragile, it feels as if it is going to melt in your hands, said Mohammed al-Awini, who lives in a tent camp in southern Gaza.

Small business owners said they were under pressure to ask customers for undamaged cash because their suppliers demand pristine bills from them.

Thaeir Suhwayl, a flour merchant in Deir al-Balah, said his suppliers recently demanded he pay them only with brand new 200-shekel ($60) bank notes, which he said are rare. Most civilians pay him with 20-shekel ($6) notes that are often in poor condition.

On a recent visit to the market, Ajjour transferred the shekel equivalent of around $100 to a cash broker and received around $50 in return. But when she tried to buy some household supplies from a merchant, she was turned away because the bills weren’t in good condition.

“So the worth of your $50 is zero in the end,” she said.

This problem has given rise to a new business in Gaza: money repair. It costs between 3 and 10 shekels ($1-$3) to mend old bank notes. But even cash repaired with tape or other means is sometimes rejected.

People are at the mercy of cash brokers

After most of the banks closed in the early days of the war, those with large reserves of cash suddenly had immense power.

“People are at their mercy,” said Mahmoud Aqel, who has been displaced from his home in southern Gaza. “No one can stop them.”

The war makes it impossible to regulate market prices and exchange rates, said Dalia Alazzeh, an expert in finance and accounting at the University of the West of Scotland. “Nobody can physically monitor what’s happening,” Alazzeh said.

A year ago, the Palestine Monetary Authority, the equivalent of a central bank for Gaza and the West Bank, sought to ease the crisis by introducing a digital payment system known as Iburaq. It attracted half a million users, or a quarter of the population, according to the World Bank, but was ultimately undermined by merchants insisting on cash.

Israel sought to ramp up financial pressure on Hamas earlier this year by tightening the distribution of humanitarian aid, which it said was routinely siphoned off by militants and then resold.

Experts said it is unclear if the cash brokers’ activities benefit Hamas, as some Israeli analysts claim.

The war has made it more difficult to determine who is behind all sorts of economic activity in the territory, said Omar Shabaan, director of Palthink for Strategic Studies, a Gaza-based think tank.

“It’s a dark place now. You don’t know who is bringing cigarettes into Gaza,” he said, giving just one example. “It’s like a mafia.”

These same deep-pocketed traders are likely the ones running cash brokerages, and selling basic foodstuffs, he said. “They benefit by imposing these commissions,” he said.

Once families run out of cash, they are forced to turn to humanitarian aid.

Al-Farra said that is what prompted him to begin seeking food at an aid distribution center, where it is common for Palestinians to jostle over one other for sacks of flour and boxes of pasta.

“This is the only way I can feed my family,” he said.

___

Kullab reported from Jerusalem.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© DAVID GRAY / AFP) (Photo by DAVID GRAY/AFP via Getty Images

President Donald Trump said in a Thursday letter that he will raise taxes on many imported goods from Canada to 35%, deepening a rift between two North American countries that have suffered a debilitating blow to their decades-old alliance.

The letter to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is an aggressive increase to the top 25% tariff rates that Trump first imposed in March after months of threats. Trump’s tariffs were allegedly in an effort to get Canada to crack down on fentanyl smuggling despite the relatively modest trafficking in the drug from that country. Trump has also expressed frustration with a trade deficit with Canada that largely reflects oil purchases by America.

“I must mention that the flow of Fentanyl is hardly the only challenge we have with Canada, which has many Tariff, and Non-Tariff, Policies and Trade Barriers,” Trump wrote in the letter.

The higher rates would go into effect Aug. 1, creating a tense series of weeks ahead for the global economy as recent gains in the S&P 500 stock index suggest many investors think Trump will ultimately back down on the increases.

While multiple countries have received tariff letters this week, Canada — America’s second largest trading partner after Mexico — has become something of a foil to Trump. It has imposed retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods and pushed back on the president’s taunts of making Canada the 51st state. Mexico has also faced 25% tariffs because of fentanyl, yet it has not faced the same public pressure from Trump.

Carney was elected prime minister in April on the argument that Canadians should keep their “elbows up.” He has responded by distancing Canada from its intertwined relationship with the U.S., seeking to strengthen its links with the European Union and the United Kingdom.

Hours before Trump’s letter, Carney posted on X a picture of himself with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, saying, “In the face of global trade challenges, the world is turning to reliable economic partners like Canada.” Implied in his statement was that the U.S. has become unreliable because of Trump’s haphazard tariff regime, which has gone through aggressive threats and reversals.

When Carney went to the White House in May, the public portion of their meeting was cordial. But Trump said there was nothing the Canadian leader could tell him to remove the tariffs.

“Just the way it is,” Trump said at the time.

Carney indicated he would be willing to be patient in pursuing talks on trade.

“There are much bigger forces involved,” the Canadian leader said. “And this will take some time and some discussions.”

Trump has sent a series of tariff letters to 23 countries so far. Those form letters became increasingly personal with Canada as well as a Wednesday note that put a 50% tariff on Brazil for the ongoing trial of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, for trying to stay in office after his 2022 election loss. Trump was similarly indicted for his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.

The letters reflect the inability of Trump to finalize the dozens of trade frameworks that he claimed would be easy to negotiate. Shortly after unveiling his April 2 “Liberation Day” tariffs, a financial market selloff caused Trump to announce a 90-day negotiating period during which a 10% baseline tariff would be charged on most imported goods.

But Trump has indicated that the 10% tariff rates are largely disappearing as he resets the rates with his letters.

“We’re just going to say all of the remaining countries are going to pay, whether it’s 20% or 15%,” Trump said in a phone interview with NBC News.

So far, Trump has announced trade frameworks with the U.K. and Vietnam, as well as a separate deal with China in order to enable continued trade talks. Trump jacked up import taxes on Chinese goods to as much as 145%, but after talks Trump has said China faces total tariffs of 55%.

In June, Trump said he was suspending trade talks with Canada over its plans to continue its digital services tax, which would hit U.S. technology companies. A few days later, talks resumed when Carney rescinded the tax.

Under the current tariff structure, the 2020 United States Mexico Canada Agreement has protected eligible goods from Trump’s tariffs. But a review of the pact is scheduled for 2026.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Just months after President Donald Trump returned to office vowing mass deportations, the share of U.S. adults saying immigration is a “good thing” for the country has jumped substantially — including among Republicans, according to new Gallup polling.

About 8 in 10 Americans, 79%, say immigration is “a good thing” for the country today, an increase from 64% a year ago and a high point in the nearly 25-year trend. Only about 2 in 10 U.S. adults say immigration is a bad thing right now, down from 32% last year.

During Democratic President Joe Biden’s term in office, negative views of immigration had increased markedly, reaching a high point in the months before Trump, a Republican, took office. The new Gallup data suggests U.S. adults are returning to more pro-immigrant views that could complicate Trump’s push for sweeping deportations in his second term. Americans’ views of immigration policies have shifted dramatically in the last year — including among Republicans, who have become much more content with immigration levels since Trump took office but who have also grown more supportive of pathways to citizenship for people in the country illegally.

The broader trend also shows that public opinion is generally much more favorable to immigrants than it was decades ago.

The vast majority of U.S. adults say immigration is good

Americans’ more positive view on immigration is driven primarily by a shift among Republicans and independents.

About two-thirds of Republicans now say immigrants are “a good thing” for the country, up from 39% last year. And independents moved from about two-thirds last year to 80% this year.

Democrats have maintained their overwhelmingly positive view of immigration in the last few years.

The share of Americans who want immigration decreased has dropped significantly

In the time since Trump took office, Republicans have become more satisfied with the level of immigration in the country.

The share of Americans who want immigration “decreased” in the United States dropped from 55% to 30%. While fewer Americans now want to decrease the number of people who come to the U.S. from other countries, more want immigration levels kept the same than want higher immigration levels. About 4 in 10 say immigration should be kept at its current level, and only 26% say immigration should be increased.

The poll suggests Republicans’ sharp anti-immigrant views highlighted before November’s election — which helped return Trump to the White House — have largely faded. The share of Republicans saying immigration should be decreased dropped from a high of 88% to 48% in the last year. Close to 4 in 10 Republicans now say immigration levels should remain the same, and only about 1 in 10 would like an increase.

Much of that Republican movement likely comes from support for the Trump administration’s stringent immigration enforcement, but there are also signs in the Gallup polling that Republicans have become more supportive of pathways to citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally and more likely to see benefits from immigration that could be at odds with the Trump administration’s priorities.

More Americans back a pathway to citizenship

Most Americans favor allowing immigrants living in the U.S. illegally the chance to become U.S. citizens if they meet certain requirements over a period of time, the poll shows.

Almost 9 in 10 U.S. adults, 85%, favor a pathway to citizenship for immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children, and nearly as many say they favor a path to citizenship for all immigrants in the country illegally as long as they meet certain requirements.

That increased support for pathways to citizenship largely comes from Republicans, about 6 in 10 of whom now support that, up from 46% last year. Support was already very high among independents and Democrats.

Support for deporting immigrants in the country illegally has also decreased across the board, but less significantly. About 4 in 10 U.S. adults now favor deporting immigrants who are in the country illegally, down from about half a year ago.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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The developer of what would be the first new coal mine in Wyoming in decades plans to process the fossil fuel to extract hard-to-get metals that are crucial for tech products and military hardware.

Energy Secretary Chris Wright, former West Virginia U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon, and Wyoming’s congressional delegation are on the VIP list for a groundbreaking ceremony Friday at the Ramaco Resources, Inc., Brook Mine outside Ranchester in far northern Wyoming.

Rare earth elements are a family of 17 metallic elements with unusual properties that make them useful for specific applications. Neodymium and dysprosium are used in the permanent magnets of wind turbines, lanthanum in electric and hybrid car batteries.

Yttrium and terbium have critical military uses, including in targeting devices.

China supplies almost 90% of the world’s rare earths. Concern about continued access to the substances has been a focus of recent negotiations between China and the U.S., and led the Trump administration to try to encourage more production domestically.

Rare earths aren’t especially rare but so scattered they are difficult to bring together in useful quantities. Currently the only U.S. rare earths mine is at Mountain Pass in California.

Analysis by U.S. national laboratories show the Brook Mine coal contains valuable quantities of the rare earths neodymium, praseodymium, dysprosium and terbium, as well as the critical minerals gallium, scandium and germanium, according to a Ramaco letter to shareholders on July 1.

“We would intend to mine it here in Wyoming, process it here in Wyoming and sell it to domestic customers including the government,” Ramaco CEO Randall Atkins said Thursday.

Manchin, who left office in January after not seeking re-election, joined the Ramaco board in April.

No new Wyoming coal mine has opened in 50 years. Wyoming’s coal industry instead has shrunk substantially since its peak over a decade ago, troubled as utilities switch to renewable energy and power plants fueled by cheaper natural gas.

The Brook Mine, stalled in part by landowners worried about groundwater depletion, has been in the works for over a decade. Atkins originally envisioned it as a source of subbituminous power plant fuel, much like Wyoming’s massive open-pit mines that supply about 40% of the nation’s coal.

A public company with metallurgical coal mines in Appalachia, Ramaco in recent years received Department of Energy grants to develop coal into carbon-based products such as carbon fiber. This year, it got a $6.1 million grant from Wyoming to build a rare earth and critical minerals processing plant.

A consultant report released this week found that fully developing the mine and processing plant would cost around $500 million, a sum that could be recovered in five years if the rare earths can be extracted and sold. Ramaco also would sell the processed coal as fuel, Atkins said.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio wrapped up his second and final day at a Southeast Asian security conference in a high-stakes meeting with his Chinese counterpart as tensions grow between Washington and Beijing over issues from trade to security and China’s support for Russia’s war in Ukraine.

After discussions with regional countries at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations forum in Malaysia, Rubio on Friday ended his first official trip to Asia with his first face-to-face talks with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

Neither man nor the delegations spoke to journalists as they posed for photos at the top of the meeting.

The meeting was held less than 24 hours after Rubio met in Kuala Lumpur with another rival, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, during which they discussed potential new avenues to jumpstart Ukraine peace talks.

The meetings come against a backdrop of global and regional unease over U.S. policies, notably on trade and large tariffs that U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened to impose on friend and foe alike.

While Rubio heard complaints about the tariffs from his Southeast Asian counterparts, he told reporters Thursday that many of them focused their discussion on security issues, their concerns about Chinese domination and desire for cooperation with the U.S.

“Of course, it’s raised. It’s an issue,” Rubio said. “But I wouldn’t say it solely defines our relationship with many of these countries. There are a lot of other issues that we work together on, and I think there was great enthusiasm that we were here and that we’re a part of this.”

However, Trump sees China as the biggest threat to the United States in multiple fields, not least technology and trade, and like previous U.S. presidents has watched the country greatly expand its influence globally while turning increasingly assertive in the Indo-Pacific, notably toward its small neighbors over the South China Sea and Taiwan.

Trump has warned of massive tariffs that he could impose on Chinese exports to the United States and preliminary discussions between the two sides have yet to produce significant progress.

Since former President Joe Biden was in office, the U.S. has also accused China of assisting Russia in rebuilding its military industrial sector to help it execute its war against Ukraine. Rubio said the Trump administration shares that view.

“I think the Chinese clearly have been supportive of the Russian effort, and I think that generally they’ve been willing to help them as much as they can without getting caught,” Rubio said Thursday, suggesting the topic would be discussed if he and Wang met.

Rubio and Wang have been shadowboxing during the two-day ASEAN meeting, with each touting the benefits of their partnership to Southeast Asian nations.

Rubio has played up cooperation, including signing a civil-nuclear cooperation agreement with Malaysia, while Wang has railed against Trump’s threatened tariffs and projected China as a stable counterweight in talks with Southeast Asian counterparts on the sidelines.

“The U.S. is abusing tariffs, wrecking the free trade system and disrupting the stability of the global supply chain,” Wang told his Thai counterpart Maris Sangiampongsa, according the Chinese foreign ministry.

In a meeting with Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Prak Sokhonn, Wang said that the tariffs are “an attempt to deprive all parties of their legitimate right to development.”

“In the face of turbulent global situation, China is willing to be Cambodia’s trustworthy and reliable friend and partner,” he added.

On Thursday, Wang and Lavrov met and delivered a subtle but unmistakable warning to the United States over Southeast Asia.

“Russia and China both support ASEAN’s central role in regional cooperation, are committed to maintaining peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region, and are wary of certain major powers creating divisions and instigating confrontation in the region,” they said, according to Russia’s foreign ministry.

But Rubio found support from Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong, who said Friday that continued U.S. engagement was crucial for regional stability.

“We want to see a region where no one country dominates and no country is dominated,” Wong told reporters when asked about China’s rising might in the region. “We want to see a region where there is a balance of power… where there is no coercion or duress.”

At the same time, Wong said Australia is committed to maintaining a stable relationship with China, noting that engagement remains the best path forward.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Vincent Thian—AP

A secretive competition to pioneer a new way of communicating with artificial intelligence chatbots is getting a messy public airing as OpenAI fights a trademark dispute over its stealth hardware collaboration with legendary iPhone designer Jony Ive.

In the latest twist, tech startup iyO Inc., which already sued Ive and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman for trademark infringement, is now suing one of its own former employees for allegedly leaking a confidential drawing of iyO’s unreleased product.

At the heart of this bitter legal wrangling is a big idea: we shouldn’t need to stare at computer or phone screens or talk to a box like Amazon’s Alexa to interact with our future AI assistants in a natural way. And whoever comes up with this new AI interface could profit immensely from it.

OpenAI started to outline its own vision in May by buying io Products, a product and engineering company co-founded by Ive, in a deal valued at nearly $6.5 billion. Soon after, iyO sued for trademark infringement for the similar sounding name and because of the two firms’ past interactions.

U.S. District Judge Trina Thompson ruled last month that iyO has a strong enough case to proceed to a hearing this fall. Until then, she ordered Altman, Ive and OpenAI to refrain from using the io brand, forcing them to take down the web page and all mentions of the venture.

A second lawsuit from iyO filed this week in San Francisco Superior Court accuses a former iyO executive, Dan Sargent, of breach of contract and misappropriation of trade secrets over his meetings with another io co-founder, Tang Yew Tan, a close Ive ally who led design of the Apple Watch.

Sargent left iyO in December and now works for Apple. He and Apple didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

“This is not an action we take lightly,” said iyO CEO Jason Rugolo in a statement Thursday. “Our primary goal here is not to target a former employee, whom we considered a friend, but to hold accountable those whom we believe preyed on him from a position of power.”

Rugolo told The Associated Press last month that he thought he was on the right path in 2022 when he pitched his ideas and showed off his prototypes to firms tied to Altman and Ive. Rugolo later publicly expanded on his earbud-like “audio computer” product in a TED Talk last year.

What he didn’t know was that soon after, Ive and Altman would begin quietly collaborating on their own AI hardware initiative and give it a similar name.

“I’m happy to compete on product, but calling it the same name, that part is just amazing to me. And it was shocking,” Rugolo said in an interview.

The new venture was revealed publicly in a May video announcement, and to Rugolo about two months earlier after he had emailed Altman with an investment pitch.

“thanks but im working on something competitive so will (respectfully) pass!” Altman wrote to Rugolo in March, adding in parentheses that it was called io.

Altman has dismissed iyO’s lawsuit on social media as a “silly, disappointing and wrong” move from a “quite persistent” Rugolo. Other executives in court documents have characterized the product Rugolo was pitching them as a failed one that didn’t work properly in a demo.

Altman said in a written declaration that he and Ive chose the “io” name two years ago in reference to the concept of “input/output” that describes how a computer receives and transmits information. Neither io nor iyO was first to play with the phrasing — Google’s big annual technology showcase is called I/O — but Altman said he and Ive acquired the io.com domain name in August 2023.

The idea was “to create products that go beyond traditional products and interfaces,” Altman said. “We want to create new ways for people to input their requests and new ways for them to receive helpful outputs, powered by AI.”

A number of startups have already tried, and mostly failed, to build gadgetry for AI interactions. The startup Humane developed a wearable pin that you could talk to, but it was poorly reviewed and the startup discontinued sales after HP acquired its assets earlier this year.

Altman has suggested that io’s version could be different. He said in a now-removed video that he’s already trying a prototype at home that Ive gave him, calling it “the coolest piece of technology that the world will have ever seen.”

What Altman and Ive still haven’t said is what exactly it is. The court case, however, has forced their team to disclose what it’s not.

“Its design is not yet finalized, but it is not an in-ear device, nor a wearable device,” said Tan in a court declaration that sought to distance the venture from iyO’s product.

It was that same declaration that led iyO to sue Sargent this week. Tan revealed in the filing that he had talked to a “now former” iyO engineer who was looking for a job because of his frustration with “iyO’s slow pace, unscalable product plans, and continued acceptance of preorders without a sellable product.”

Those conversations with the unnamed employee led Tan to conclude “that iyO was basically offering ‘vaporware’ — advertising for a product that does not actually exist or function as advertised, and my instinct was to avoid meeting with iyO myself and to discourage others from doing so.”

IyO said its investigators recently reached out to Sargent and confirmed he was the one who met with Tan.

Rugolo told the AP he feels duped after he first pitched his idea to Altman in 2022 through the Apollo Projects, a venture capital firm started by Altman and his brothers. Rugolo said demonstrated his products and the firm politely declined, with the explanation that they don’t do consumer hardware investments.

That same year, Rugolo also pitched the same idea to Ive through LoveFrom, the San Francisco design firm started by Ive after he left Apple. Ive’s firm also declined.

“I feel kind of stupid now,” Rugolo added. “Because we talked for so long. I met with them so many times and demo’d all their people — at least seven people there. Met with them in person a bunch of times, talking about all our ideas.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File

The U.S. has closed its southern border again to livestock imports, saying a flesh-eating parasite has moved further north in Mexico than previously reported.

Mexico’s president was critical Thursday, suggesting that the U.S. is exaggerating the threat to its beef industry from the parasite, the New World screwworm fly. The female flies lay eggs in wounds on warm-blooded animals, hatching larvae that are unusual among flies for feeding on live flesh and fluids instead of dead material.

American officials worry that if the fly reaches Texas, its flesh-eating maggots could cause large economic losses, something that happened decades ago. The U.S. largely eradicated the pest in the 1970s by breeding and releasing sterile male flies to breed with wild females, and the fly had been contained in Panama for years until it was discovered in southern Mexico late last year.

The U.S. closed its southern border in May to imports of live cattle, horses and bison but announced June 30 that it would allow three ports of entry to reopen this month and another two by Sept. 15. However, since then, an infestation from the fly has been reported 185 miles (298 kilometers) northeast of Mexico City, about 160 miles (258 kilometers) further north than previously reported cases. That was about 370 miles (595 kilometers) from the Texas border.

“The United States has promised to be vigilant,” U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said in a statement Wednesday announcing the border closing. “Thanks to the aggressive monitoring by USDA staff in the U.S. and in Mexico, we have been able to take quick and decisive action to respond to the spread of this deadly pest.”

In Mexico, President Claudia Sheinbaum said authorities there were following all established protocols to deal with the northernmost case. Mexican authorities said the country has 392 infected animals, down nearly 19% since June 24.

“From our point of view, they took a totally exaggerated decision to closing the border again,” Sheinbaum said. “Everything that scientifically should be done is being done.”

Three weeks ago, Rollins announced plans for combating the parasite that include spending nearly $30 million on new sites for breeding and dispersing sterile male flies. Once released in the wild, those males would mate with females, causing them to lay eggs that won’t hatch so that the fly population would die out.

The USDA hopes a new fly factory will be operating in southern Mexico by July 2026 to supplement fly breeding at an existing complex in Panama. The agency also plans to open a site in southern Texas for holding sterile flies imported from Panama, so they can be released along the border if necessary.

Also Thursday, U.S. Reps. Tony Gonzalez, of Texas, and Kat McCammack, of Florida, urged the Trump administration to quickly approve the use of existing anti-parasite treatments for New World screwworm fly infestations in livestock. They said labeling requirements currently prevent it.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Italian confectioner Ferrero, known for brands like Nutella and Kinder, is buying the century-old U.S. cereal company WK Kellogg in an effort to expand its North American sales.

The Ferrero Group said Thursday it will pay $23 for each Kellogg share, or approximately $3.1 billion. The transaction includes WK Kellogg Co.’s six manufacturing plants, and the marketing and distribution of its breakfast cereals across the United States, Canada and the Caribbean.

WK Kellogg’s shares were up 31% in early afternoon trading Thursday.

Kellogg was founded in Battle Creek, Michigan, in 1906 after its founder accidentally figured out how to make flaked cereal while he was experimenting with granola. Kellogg still makes Corn Flakes, as well as Froot Loops, Special K, Frosted Flakes, Rice Krispies and other cereals.

Kellogg now has four U.S. plants, which are located in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Nebraska. It also has a plant in Mexico and a plant in Canada. The company has around 3,000 employees.

The current company was formed in 2023, when Kellogg snack brands like Cheez-Its and Pringles were spun into a separate company called Kellanova. M&M’s maker Mars Inc. announced last year that it planned to buy Kellanova in a deal worth nearly $30 billion.

Ferrero Group, which was founded in Italy in 1946, has been trying to expand its U.S. footprint. In 2018 it bought Nestle’s U.S. candy brands, including Butterfinger, Nerds and SweeTarts. And in 2022 it bought Wells Enterprises, the maker of ice cream brands like Blue Bunny and Halo Top.

WK Kellogg’s brands have been struggling with a long-term decline in U.S. cereal consumption as consumers turned to protein bars, shakes and other breakfast items. Cereal sales got a bump during the coronavirus pandemic as more families stayed home, but sales continued to decline after the pandemic eased.

At the start of July, U.S. cold cereal sales were down 6% compared to the same period in 2022, according to market research company Nielsen IQ. Kellogg’s net sales fell 2% to $2.7 billion in 2024.

Brad Haller, a senior partner for mergers and acquisitions at West Monroe, said Kellogg’s large distribution network and relationships with grocery chains in North America is appealing to Ferrero because it would help the European company negotiate pricing and positioning for its products.

The purchase also helps Ferraro expand beyond snacks and sweets and into a meal category, Haller said. But the company also may wind up cutting Kellogg brands or shutting down manufacturing plants.

“As Americans, these brands are iconic and beloved by us, but a European company buying these wouldn’t have the same nostalgia,” Haller said.

Kellogg has had other issues. A nearly three-month strike by workers at all its U.S. cereal plants in late 2021 hurt sales. And last fall, dozens of people rallied outside the company’s Battle Creek headquarters demanding that Kellogg remove artificial dyes from its cereals.

Earlier this year, Kellogg said it was reformulating cereals sold to schools to remove artificial dyes and will not include them in any new products starting in January.

Ferrero’s acquisition, which still needs approval from Kellogg shareholders, is expected to close in the second half of the year. Once the transaction is complete, Kellogg’s stock will no longer trade on the New York Stock Exchange and the company will become a Ferrero subsidiary.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File

U.S. stocks edged lower in early trading Thursday as Delta Air Lines led a rally in airline stocks after releasing a solid outlook for the rest of this year and new government data showed fewer Americans sought unemployment benefits last week.

The S&P 500 slipped 0.1%. The benchmark index remains near the record it set last week after a better-than-expected June jobs report.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 55 points, or 0.1%, as of 10:03 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% lower a day after climbing to an all-time high.

Bond yields were mostly higher. The yield on the 10-year Treasury was at 4.36%, up from 4.34% late Wednesday.

Delta surged 12%, bringing other airlines along with it, after beating Wall Street’s revenue and profit targets. The Atlanta airline also gave a more optimistic view for the remaining summer travel season than it had just a couple months ago.

Delta and other major U.S. carriers had pulled or slashed their forecasts in the spring, citing macroeconomic uncertainty amid President Donald Trump’s tariff rollouts which had consumers feeling uneasy about spending on travel.

Delta’s encouraging report boosted the entire airline sector. United jumped 10.1%, American climbed 7.9% and JetBlue rose 4.8%.

Shares of WK Kellogg climbed more than 30% after Italian candy maker Ferrero agreed to acquire the cereal company in a deal valued at roughly $3.1 billion. The transaction includes the manufacturing, marketing and distribution of WK Kellogg Co.’s portfolio of breakfast cereals across the United States, Canada and the Caribbean.

In economic news, the Labor Department reported Thursday that applications for unemployment benefits, a proxy for layoffs, fell last week, remaining in the historically healthy range they’ve been in the past couple of years.

It’s been a choppy week for the stock market as Wall Street monitors the latest developments in President Donald Trump’s renewed push to use threats of higher tariffs on goods imported into the U.S. in hopes of securing new trade agreements with countries around the globe.

Wednesday was initially set as a deadline by Trump for countries to make deals with the U.S. or face heavy increases in tariffs. But with just two trade deals announced since April, one with the United Kingdom and one with Vietnam, the window for negotiations has been extended to Aug. 1.

European stock indexes were mostly higher Thursday following a mixed finish in Asian markets.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 fell 0.4 %, weighed down by selling of exporters’ shares amid the yen’s appreciation, which cuts profits from exports, and dampened sentiment because of the lack of progress in the Japan-U.S. trade talks.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg via Getty Images

The U.S. is having its worst year for measles spread in more than three decades, and the year is only half over.

The national case count reached 1,288 on Wednesday, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, though public health experts say the true figure may be higher.

The CDC’s count is 14 more than 2019, when America almost lost its status of having eliminated the vaccine-preventable illness — something that could happen this year if the virus spreads without stopping for 12 months. But the U.S. is far from 1991, when there were 9,643 confirmed cases.

In a short statement, the federal government said that the CDC “continues to recommend (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccines as the best way to protect against measles.” It also said it is “supporting community efforts” to tamp down ongoing outbreaks as requested.

Fourteen states have active outbreaks; four other states’ outbreaks have ended. The largest outbreak started five months ago in undervaccinated communities in West Texas. Three people have died — two children in Texas and an adult in New Mexico — and dozens of people have been hospitalized across the U.S.

But there are signs that transmission is slowing, especially in Texas. Lubbock County’s hospitals treated most of the sickest patients in the region, but the county hasn’t seen a new case in 50 days, public health director Katherine Wells said.

“What concerned me early on in this outbreak was is it spreading to other parts of the United States, and that’s definitely what’s happening now,” she said.

In 2000, the World Health Organization and CDC said measles had been eliminated from the U.S. The closer a disease gets to eradication, the harder it can seem to stamp it out, said Dr. Jonathan Temte, a family physician in Wisconsin who helped certify that distinction 25 years ago.

It’s hard to see measles cases break records despite the widespread availability of a vaccine, he added. The measles, mumps and rubella vaccine is safe and is 97% effective at preventing measles after two doses.

“When we have tools that can be really helpful and see that they’re discarded for no good reason, it’s met with a little bit of melancholy on our part,” Temte said of public health officials and primary care providers.

Wells said she is concerned about continuing vaccine hesitancy. A recent study found childhood vaccination rates against measles fell after the COVID-19 pandemic in nearly 80% of the more than 2,000 U.S. counties with available data, including in states that are battling outbreaks this year. And CDC data showed that only 92.7% of kindergarteners in the U.S. had the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine in the 2023-2024 school year, below the 95% needed to prevent outbreaks.

State and federal leaders have for years kept funding stagnant for local public health departments’ vaccination programs that are tasked with reversing the trend. Wells said she talks with local public health leaders nationwide about how to prepare for an outbreak, but also says the system needs more investment.

“What we’re seeing with measles is a little bit of a ‘canary in a coal mine,’” said Lauren Gardner, leader of Johns Hopkins University’s independent measles and COVID-19 tracking databases. “It’s indicative of a problem that we know exists with vaccination attitudes in this county and just, I think, likely to get worse.”

Currently, North America has three other major measles outbreaks: 2,966 cases in Chihuahua state, Mexico, 2,223 cases in Ontario, Canada and 1,246 in Alberta, Canada. The Ontario, Chihuahua and Texas outbreaks stem from large Mennonite communities in the regions. Mennonite churches do not formally discourage vaccination, though more conservative Mennonite communities historically have low vaccination rates and a distrust of government.

In 2019, the CDC identified 22 outbreaks with the largest in two separate clusters in New York — 412 in New York state and 702 in New York City. These were linked because measles was spreading through close-knit Orthodox Jewish communities, the CDC said.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Julio Cortez—AP

The Trump administration has resumed sending some weapons to Ukraine, a week after the Pentagon had directed that some deliveries be paused, U.S. officials said Wednesday.

The weapons heading into Ukraine include 155 mm munitions and precision-guided rockets known as GMLRS, two officials told The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity to provide details that had not been announced publicly. It’s unclear exactly when the weapons started moving.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth directed the pause on some shipments last week to allow the Pentagon to assess its weapons stockpiles, in a move that caught the White House by surprise.

A White House official speaking Wednesday on the condition of anonymity said there was never a “pause” in shipments, but a review to ensure U.S. military support aligns with its defense strategy. The official said the Pentagon never announced a pause.

In a press briefing with reporters last week, though, Pentagon chief spokesman Sean Parnell said he could not “go into detail about what weapons were paused and when and what we’re providing and when. Ultimately, the president and the secretary will make those decisions about what happens with those weapon systems.”

The pause affected Patriot missiles, the precision-guided GMLRS, Hellfire missiles, Howitzer rounds and more, taking not only Ukrainian officials and other allies by surprise but also U.S. lawmakers and other parts of the Trump administration, including the State Department.

It was not clear if a pause on Patriot missiles would hold. The $4 million munition is in high demand and was key to defending a major U.S. air base in Qatar last month as Iran launched a ballistic missile attack in response to the U.S. targeting its nuclear facilities.

President Donald Trump announced Monday that the U.S. would continue to deliver defensive weapons to Ukraine. He has sidestepped questions about who ordered the pause in exchanges with reporters this week.

“I would know if a decision is made. I will know,” Trump said Wednesday. “I will be the first to know. In fact, most likely I’d give the order, but I haven’t done that yet.”

Asked a day earlier who ordered the pause, he said: “I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me?”

Trump has privately expressed frustration with Pentagon officials for announcing the pause — a move that he felt wasn’t properly coordinated with the White House, according to three people familiar with the matter.

The Pentagon has denied that Hegseth acted without consulting the president, saying: “Secretary Hegseth provided a framework for the President to evaluate military aid shipments and assess existing stockpiles. This effort was coordinated across government.”

It comes as Russia has fired escalating air attacks on Ukraine, with a barrage that the largest number of drones fired in a single night in the three-year-old war, Ukrainian officials said Wednesday.

Trump has become increasingly frustrated with Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying he wasn’t happy with him.

“Putin is not, he’s not treating human beings right,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting Tuesday, explaining the pause’s reversal. “It’s killing too many people. So we’re sending some defensive weapons to Ukraine, and I’ve approved that.”

The 155 mm artillery rounds have become some of the most used munitions of the war. Each round is about 2 feet (60 centimeters) long, weighs about 100 pounds (45 kilograms) and is 155 mm, or 6.1 inches, in diameter. They are used in Howitzer systems, which are towed large guns identified by the range of the angle of fire that their barrels can be set to.

Howitzer fires can strike targets up to 15 to 20 miles (24 to 32 kilometers) away, depending on what type of round and firing system is used, which makes them highly valued by ground forces to take out enemy targets from a protected distance.

The U.S. has provided more than 3 million 155 mm rounds to Ukraine since Russia invaded its neighbor in February 2022. It has sent more than $67 billion in overall weapons and military assistance to Ukraine in that period.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Evan Vucci—AP

A Liberian-flagged cargo ship attacked by Yemen’s Houthi rebels sank Wednesday in the Red Sea, and a European naval force in the Mideast said only six of the 25 people who were on board have been rescued.

The attack on the Eternity C, which also killed at least three of the crew, represents the most serious assault carried out by the Houthis in the crucial maritime trade route where $1 trillion in cargo once passed through annually.

From November 2023 to December 2024, the Houthis targeted more than 100 ships with missiles and drones in a campaign the rebels describe as supporting Palestinians in the Gaza Strip during the Israel-Hamas war. The Iranian-backed rebels stopped their attacks during a brief ceasefire in the war. They later became the target of an intense weekslong campaign of airstrikes ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump.

The attack on the Eternity C, as well as the sinking of the bulk carrier Magic Seas in another attack Sunday, raise new questions about the Red Sea’s safety as ships had slowly begun returning to its waters. Meanwhile, a new possible ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war — as well as the future of talks between the U.S. and Iran over Tehran’s battered nuclear program — remain in the balance.

“We are now with grave concern seeing an escalation in the Red Sea with attacks on two commercial ships earlier this week by Ansar Allah, resulting in civilian loss of life and casualties as well as the potential for environmental damage,” warned United Nations special envoy Hans Grundberg, using another name for the rebels.

6 of 25 on board have been rescued

A statement from the European Union naval mission in the Red Sea said the crew of the ship included 22 sailors, among them 21 Filipinos and one Russian, as well as a three-member security team. Those rescued were five Filipinos and one Indian.

Three people also were killed during the hourslong attack on the ship, the EU force said, and their nationalities were not immediately known.

The armed rebels had attacked the ship with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms, later using two drones and two drone boats carrying bombs to strike the vessel, the EU force said. The Eternity C sank at 7:50 a.m. Wednesday, it added.

The ship, flagged out of Liberia but owned by a Greek firm, likely had been targeted like the Magic Seas over its firm doing business with Israel. Neither vessel apparently requested an escort from the EU force.

The U.S. military has two aircraft carriers in the Mideast, the USS Nimitz and the USS Carl Vinson, but both likely are in the Arabian Sea, far from the site of the attacks. There are two American destroyers believed to be operating in the Red Sea. However, the ships attacked had no U.S. ties and a ceasefire between the Houthis and America announced after the bombing campaign earlier this year still appears to be holding.

Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, a Houthi military spokesman, claimed the attack in a prerecorded message Wednesday night as the EU force acknowledged it was still searching for those onboard with private industry rescuers.

The Houthis later released footage of them launching missiles at the Eternity C. The bridge appeared heavily damaged by the attack and oil leaked from the vessel. The ship took on water from holes along its waterline before sinking beneath the waves, the rebels chanting: “God is the greatest; death to America; death to Israel; curse the Jews; victory to Islam.”

The Houthis released a similar video after their attack on the tanker Sounion in August 2024 and on Tuesday from their attack on the Magic Seas.

Attacks draw condemnation and support for sailors

In the Philippines, Migrant Workers Secretary Hans Cacdac said he has been leading an effort to reach out to the families of the missing Filipino sailors to update them on the search and rescue efforts.

“It’s human nature that one should be terribly worried and distraught about the situation,” Cacdac told The Associated Press by telephone. “It’s our role in government to be there for them in their utmost hour of need to ensure that not just government services but throughout this hand-holding process, we will provide the necessary support.”

The attacks on the ships drew international condemnation.

“These attacks demonstrate the ongoing threat that Iran-backed Houthi rebels pose to freedom of navigation and to regional economic and maritime security,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said. “The United States has been clear: We will continue to take necessary action to protect freedom of navigation and commercial shipping from Houthi terrorist attacks.”

The EU force earlier said one of the wounded crew lost his leg.

Grundberg, the U.N. envoy, also decried the targeting of civilian infrastructure after Israel bombed three Houthi-controlled ports in Yemen over the weekend and hit a power station.

“Yemen must not be drawn deeper into regional crises that threaten to unravel the already extremely fragile situation in the country,” he warned during an address to the Security Council.

Satellite photos show damage from an Israeli strike

Satellite images analyzed by The Associated Press showed new damage at Yemen’s rebel-controlled port at Hodeida after it was targeted by the Israeli airstrikes. The images from Planet Labs PBC showed new portions of the pier at the port torn away by Israeli bombing, likely to affect the unloading of cargo there.

In conducting the strikes, Israel said the Houthis used the port to smuggle military equipment into the country, a growing worry of analysts and Yemen watchers in recent years. Hodeida is the main entry point for food and other humanitarian aid for millions of Yemenis.

Jamal Amer, a Houthi official, reportedly said Wednesday that shipments continue to arrive “smoothly” to Hodeida. In comments published by the Houthis’ al-Masirah satellite channel, Amer also said that damage at the port ”directly affects civilians and is a disgrace to the United Nations, which is complicit in these crimes through its suspicious silence.”

Yemen’s war began when the Houthis seized Sanaa in 2014. A Saudi-led coalition backing Yemen’s exiled government considered trying to retake Hodeida by force in 2018, but ultimately decided against it as international criticism and worries about the port being destroyed grew.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Mohammed Hamoud—Anadolu via Getty Images

President Donald Trump singled out Brazil for import taxes of 50% on Wednesday for its treatment of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro, showing that personal grudges rather than simple economics are a driving force in the U.S. leader’s use of tariffs.

Trump avoided his standard form letter with Brazil, specifically tying his tariffs to the trial of Bolsonaro, who is charged with trying to overturn his 2022 election loss. Trump has described Bolsonaro as a friend and hosted the former Brazilian president at his Mar-a-Lago resort when both were in power in 2020.

“This Trial should not be taking place,” Trump wrote in the letter posted on Truth Social. “It is a Witch Hunt that should end IMMEDIATELY!”

There is a sense of kinship as Trump was indicted in 2023 for his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election. The U.S. president addressed his tariff letter to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who bested Bolsonaro in 2022.

Bolsonaro testified before the country’s Supreme Court in June over the alleged plot to remain in power after his 2022 election loss. Judges will hear from 26 other defendants in coming months. A decision could come as early as September, legal analysts say. Bolsonaro has already been ruled ineligible until 2030 by the country’s electoral authorities.

Brazil’s vice president, Geraldo Alckmin, said he sees “no reason” for the U.S. to hike tariffs on the South American nation.

“I think he has been misinformed,” he said. “President Lula was jailed for almost two years. No one questioned the judiciary. No one questioned what the country had done. This is a matter for our judiciary branch.”

For Trump, the tariffs are personal

Trump also objected to Brazil’s Supreme Court fining of social media companies, saying the temporary blocking last year amounted to “SECRET and UNLAWFUL Censorship Orders.” Trump said he is launching an investigation as a result under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which applies to companies with trade practices that are deemed unfair to U.S. companies.

Among the companies the Supreme Court fined was X, which was not mentioned specifically in Trump’s letter. X is owned by Elon Musk, Trump’s multibillionaire backer in the 2024 election whose time leading Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency recently ended and led to a public feud over the U.S. president’s deficit-increasing budget plan. Trump also owns a social media company, Truth Social.

The Brazil letter was a reminder that politics and personal relations with Trump matter just as much as any economic fundamentals. And while Trump has said the high tariff rates he’s setting are based on trade imbalances, it was unclear by his Wednesday actions how the countries being targeted would help to reindustrialize America.

The tariffs starting Aug. 1 would be a dramatic increase from the 10% rate that Trump levied on Brazil as part of his April 2 “Liberation Day” announcement. In addition to oil, Brazil sells orange juice, coffee, iron and steel to the U.S., among other products. The U.S. ran a $6.8 billion trade surplus with Brazil last year, according to the Census Bureau.

Trump initially announced his broad tariffs by declaring an economic emergency, arguing under a 1977 law that the U.S. was at risk because of persistent trade imbalances. But that rationale becomes problematic in this particular case, as Trump is linking his tariffs to the Bolsonaro trial and the U.S. exports more to Brazil than it imports.

Trump also targeted smaller trade partners

Trump also sent letters Wednesday to the leaders of seven other nations. None of them — the Philippines, Brunei, Moldova, Algeria, Libya, Iraq and Sri Lanka — is a major industrial rival to the United States.

Most economic analyses say the tariffs will worsen inflationary pressures and subtract from economic growth, but Trump has used the taxes as a way to assert the diplomatic and financial power of the U.S. on both rivals and allies. His administration is promising that the taxes on imports will lower trade imbalances, offset some of the cost of the tax cuts he signed into law on Friday and cause factory jobs to return to the United States.

Trump, during a White House meeting with African leaders, talked up trade as a diplomatic tool. Trade, he said, “seems to be a foundation” for him to settle disputes between India and Pakistan, as well as Kosovo and Serbia.

“You guys are going to fight, we’re not going to trade,” Trump said. “And we seem to be quite successful in doing that.”

On Monday, Trump placed a 35% tariff on Serbia, one of the countries he was using as an example of how fostering trade can lead to peace.

Trump said the tariff rates in his letters were based on “common sense” and trade imbalances, even though the Brazil letter indicated otherwise. Trump suggested he had not thought of penalizing the countries whose leaders were meeting with him in the Oval Office — Liberia, Senegal, Gabon, Mauritania and Guinea-Bissau — as “these are friends of mine now.”

Countries are not complaining about the rates outlined in his letters, he said, even though those tariffs have been generally close to the ones announced April 2 that rattled financial markets. The S&P 500 stock index rose Wednesday.

“We really haven’t had too many complaints because I’m keeping them at a very low number, very conservative as you would say,” Trump said.

Tariff uncertainty returns with Trump’s letters

Officials for the European Union, a major trade partner and source of Trump’s ire on trade, said Tuesday that they are not expecting to receive a letter from Trump listing tariff rates. The Republican president started the process of announcing tariff rates on Monday by hitting two major U.S. trading partners, Japan and South Korea, with import taxes of 25%.

According to Trump’s Wednesday letters, imports from Libya, Iraq, Algeria and Sri Lanka would be taxed at 30%, those from Moldova and Brunei at 25% and those from the Philippines at 20%. The tariffs would start Aug. 1.

The Census Bureau reported that last year that the U.S. ran a trade imbalance on goods of $1.4 billion with Algeria, $5.9 billion with Iraq, $900 million with Libya, $4.9 billion with the Philippines, $2.6 billion with Sri Lanka, $111 million with Brunei and $85 million with Moldova. The imbalance represents the difference between what the U.S. exported to those countries and what it imported.

Taken together, the trade imbalances with those seven countries are essentially a rounding error in a U.S. economy with a gross domestic product of $30 trillion.

The letters were posted on Truth Social after the expiration of a 90-day negotiating period with a baseline levy of 10%. Trump is giving countries more time to negotiate with his Aug. 1 deadline, but he has insisted there will be no extensions for the countries that receive letters.

The tariff letters are worded aggressively in Trump’s style of writing. He frames the tariffs as an invitation to “participate in the extraordinary Economy of the United States,” adding that the trade imbalances are a “major threat” to America’s economy and national security.

The president threatened additional tariffs on any country that attempts to retaliate. He said he chose to send the letters because it was too complicated for U.S. officials to negotiate with their counterparts in the countries with new tariffs. It can take years to broker trade accords.

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Associated Press writers Mauricio Savarese in Rio de Janeiro, David McHugh in Frankfurt, Germany and Eileen Ng in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, contributed to this report.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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Alan G. Hassenfeld, a renowned philanthropist and former CEO of iconic toy company Hasbro Inc., the maker of G.I. Joe and Play-Doh, has died. He was 76, according to the toy company.

Hasbro, the nation’s second largest toy company behind Mattel based on annual sales, declined to offer more details. Hassenfeld’s family foundation, Hassenfeld Family Initiatives, wasn’t immediately available to comment.

Hassenfeld was born in Providence, Rhode Island and graduated from Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts. He received an undergraduate arts degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1970. Upon graduation, he joined the Pawtucket, Rhode Island-based family business in 1970. Hasbro was founded in 1923, by Hassenfeld’s grandfather, Henry. Known initially as Hassenfeld Brothers, it sold textile remnants but expanded into school supplies and later toy manufacturing under the Hasbro name in the 1940s, according to Hasbro’s website. It went public in 1968.

Hassenfeld rose quickly in the family business serving as special assistant to the president and worked his way up the ranks. He became one of the key architects of Hasbro’s international operations and spent extensive time traveling overseas. He was named executive vice president in 1980 and became president in September 1984.

Hassenfeld labored for years in the shadow of his older brother Stephen. His brother’s death of pneumonia in June 1989 at age 47, however, moved Hassenfeld into the position of chairman and chief executive officer.

Hassenfeld stepped down as CEO in 2003 and in August 2005, he retired from his chairman position and became emeritus chairman. He stepped away from that role last year. Hassenfeld was the last family member to sit on the board, according to Hasbro.

“All of us who have ever had any connection to Hasbro today are mourning the profound loss of Alan Hassenfeld, our beloved former Chairman & CEO, mentor, and dear friend, ” Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks in an e-mailed statement to The Associated Press. “Alan’s enormous heart was, and will remain, the guiding force behind Hasbro — compassionate, imaginative, and dedicated to bringing a smile to the face of every child around the world. His tireless advocacy for philanthropy, children’s welfare, and the toy industry created a legacy that will inspire us always.”

Hassenfeld was involved in many charitable and social causes both nationally and locally in Rhode Island. His concerns ranged from childhood hunger to issues involving refugee settlement in the state. As chairman of the Hassenfeld Family Initiatives, he oversaw the foundation’s mission of globalizing safety and human rights within the area of children’s products; empowering women in developing countries; and enhancing the economy, education and business opportunities in Rhode Island.

Hassenfeld was also founding benefactor of Hasbro Children’s Hospital in Providence, and his family’s contributions helped to establish the Hassenfeld Child Health Innovation Institute at Brown University.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)

Turns out Donald Trump gauges his esteem for presidential predecessors by how well their portraits fit into his White House redecorating scheme. Or sometimes how well the frames around those portraits do.

“I’m a frame person,” Trump said Tuesday during a meeting with his Cabinet. “Sometimes I like frames more than I like the pictures.”

Trump wrapped up a 90-plus-minute session by explaining how he personally worked to redecorate the Cabinet Room, seeming to take real joy in choosing which portraits were hung. The president also said he helped choose the room’s drapes and polled those present about whether he should repaint the room in gold leaf. (Cabinet members think he should.)

“I actually spent time in the vaults. The vaults are where we have a lot of great pictures and artwork. And I picked it all myself,” Trump said. “I’m very proud of it.”

The president said that meant “a lot of time, effort” and “very little money.” He even recounted having gone to Secretary of State Marco Rubio ‘s office and directing that a grandfather clock there be moved to the White House.

“As president, you have the power — if I go into the State Department, or Department of Commerce or Treasury — if I see anything that I like, I’m allowed to take it,” Trump said, drawing laughs. He offered the anecdote despite there not being any record of Trump having paid a public visit to the State Department during Rubio’s tenure.

Trump also pointed out each portrait and shared what he thought of each ex-president depicted. He started by indicating “the great Andrew Jackson ” and went from there — renewing his frequent praise for William McKinley and getting in a dig about how Bill Clinton once offered donors overnight stays in the Lincoln bedroom in exchange for campaign contributions.

Here’s what Trump said about some past presidents:

James K. Polk (1845-49):

“That’s a gentleman named — and we call him — President Polk. He was sort of a real-estate guy. He was — people don’t realize — he was a one-termer. But he was a very good president. But, and I’m not sure I should be doing this, he actually gave us the state of California.”

Then Trump revealed that his choice of Polk’s picture might have had more do with the portrait’s frame being almost the same size as the frame surrounding Jackson’s portrait, which he suggested was especially aesthetically pleasing: “Polk is actually a very good president who’s got the same frame that I needed, OK.”

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-61):

“A very underrated president. Built the Interstate (Highway) System. And he was the toughest president, I guess, until we came along. But I don’t mind giving up that crown, because, I don’t want to be too tough on it. But we want to be humane. But he was the toughest president on immigration. He was very strong at the borders. Very, very strong. And, sometimes you can be too strong. He was strong at the borders and, during a certain period of time, there was so strong that almost every farmer in California went bankrupt. And we have to remember that. We have to work together. We have to remember that. But he was a very good president, and a very good general and a very good president and I thought he deserved a position somewhere on this floor.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933-45):

“He was not a Republican, to put it mildly. But he was, you know, a four-termer. He was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And, if you notice, we have a lot of ramps outside. You have a ramp. People say, ‘It’s an unusual place for a ramp.’ It was because of him. He was wheelchair bound. But he was an amazing man.”

Abraham Lincoln (1861-65):

“Over there is ‘Honest’ Abe Lincoln. And that picture was in his, ugh, in his bedroom. And we thought this would be a very important place because this is where wars are ended. I’m not going to say wars are declared. I’m going to say wars are ended. OK? We’ll be positive. And, that’s the picture of Abe Lincoln from his bedroom, sat in the bedroom for many, many years. That was his favorite picture of himself. And the Lincoln Bedroom’s very famous. You remember when Bill Clinton had it and he rented it out to people. We don’t do that.”

John Adams (1797-1801):

“They were the first occupants of the White House. 1800. And John Quincy Adams, Mrs. Adams, they were the first occupants. So we have them looking at each other and, in between their stares is Abraham Lincoln trying to make peace.”

(Trump is correct that John Adams, the nation’s second president, and his wife Abigail, were the first first couple to move into the White House in 1800. But he was mistaken about John Quincy Adams, who was John and Abigail’s son and the sixth president. He served from 1825 to 1829).

William McKinley (1897-1901):

“McKinley was a great president who never got credit. In fact, they changed the name of Mount McKinley and I changed it back because he should have been — the people of Ohio, he was the governor of Ohio — the people of Ohio were very happy when I did that. I heard they were very insulted. They took the name of Mount McKinley off. That was done by Obama a little while ago and I had to change it back. I changed it back. He actually was a great president. He was a president. He was the tariff, the most, I guess since me — I think I’m gonna outdo him — but he was a tariff president. He believed that other countries should pay for the privilege of coming into our country and taking our jobs and taking our treasure. That’s the way he explained it. They took our jobs and they took our treasure. And for that he should pay. And he made them pay. And he built a tremendous fortune.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File

A “click-to-cancel” rule, which would have required businesses to make it easy for consumers to cancel unwanted subscriptions and memberships, has been blocked by a federal appeals court just days before it was set to go into effect.

The Federal Trade Commission’s proposed changes, adopted in October, required businesses to obtain a customer’s consent before charging for memberships, auto-renewals and programs linked to free trial offers.

The FTC said at the time that businesses must also disclose when free trials or other promotional offers will end and let customers cancel recurring subscriptions as easily as they started them.

The administration of President Joe Biden included the FTC’s proposal as part of its “Time is Money” initiative, a governmentwide initiative that was announced last year with the aim of cracking down on consumer-related hassles.

The FTC rule was set to go into effect on Monday, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit said this week that the FTC made a procedural error by failing to come up with a preliminary regulatory analysis, which is required for rules whose annual impact on the U.S. economy is more than $100 million.

The FTC claimed that it did not have to come up with a preliminary regulatory analysis because it initially determined that the rule’s impact on the national economy would be less than $100 million. An administrative law judge decided that the economic impact would be more than the $100 million threshold.

The court decided to vacate the rule.

“While we certainly do not endorse the use of unfair and deceptive practices in negative option marketing, the procedural deficiencies of the Commission’s rulemaking process are fatal here,” the court wrote.

The FTC declined to comment on Wednesday.

The agency is currently moving forward with its preparations for a trial involving Amazon’s Prime program. The trial stems from a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit that accused Amazon of enrolling consumers in its Prime program without their consent and making it difficult for them to cancel their subscriptions.

The trial is expected to take place next year.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

© AP Photo/Jenny Kane, File