At a rally in Grand Island, Nebraska, President Trump signed an executive order temporarily letting drivers burn dyed farm diesel on public highways, with Treasury deferring the federal excise tax on that fuel through December 31. Diesel is up roughly 77 percent this year — on pace for the steepest annual jump in AAA records going back to 2000, with the national average around $6.32 a gallon. The move is aimed squarely at freight costs bleeding into grocery prices ahead of the midterms.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a state disaster emergency as New York logged 108 measles cases in an outbreak spilling over from Pennsylvania, which has reported 977 cases and five deaths as of October 2. Her executive order widens who can vaccinate — letting pharmacists immunize children as young as two and registered nurses order testing. Nationally it's the worst measles year since 1991, with nearly 3,900 cases.
The Cook Political Report shifted the Kansas Senate race from Lean Republican to Toss Up on Tuesday — a seat Democrats haven't held since the FDR era. Meanwhile the Senate Leadership Fund is dropping $5 million into South Carolina as an "insurance policy" for Sen. Darline Graham. With November 3 four weeks out, Republicans are now defending ground nobody penciled in as competitive.
Big banks and brokerages are tracking toward record 2026 profits even as New York Fed data shows total household debt at an all-time $18.8 trillion, with Americans owing more than a trillion on credit cards alone. High interest rates are making that balance dramatically more expensive to carry. It's the tale-of-two-economies story that keeps showing up in polling.
Trump said Tuesday the conflict with Iran will wrap up shortly before or after the November midterms and that consumer prices will "come tumbling down" when it does, pointing to Iranian inflation near 300 percent and the resignation of Tehran's oil minister. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian flatly dismissed negotiations as meaningless while sanctions and strikes continue. CENTCOM says its blockade has now redirected 130 ships and destroyed 13 that ran it.
German authorities arrested August Hanning, the former head of the BND foreign intelligence service, along with his ex-chief of staff, on suspicion of treason and espionage. Prosecutors allege roughly 2,000 internal documents — including executive briefings never meant to leave the building — were taken and shopped to at least one foreign power. Reporting points to alleged links with Russia and China, including a claimed direct line to the Kremlin.
A 28-year-old technician at Russia's Anti-Plague Institute in Siberia died, and nearly 200 people were placed under quarantine amid a local public health lockdown. Secretary of State Marco Rubio demanded transparency from Moscow; the CDC said there is "no indication" of a broader threat to the United States. Russia has welcomed Trump's offer of assistance while regional governor Igor Kobzev urged the public to stay calm.
SpaceX's Starship completed its first fully successful orbital flight, dispensing 26 Starlink V3 satellites about 35 minutes after launch at a clip of roughly one per minute. SpaceX says the vehicle will eventually carry up to 60 Starlink satellites per flight — about twenty times a Falcon 9 load. It's the operational turning point for the rocket NASA is counting on for future Artemis lunar landings.
Under a new 20-year power purchase agreement, Google will back upgrades at 11 Constellation-owned nuclear units in Illinois, Pennsylvania and New Jersey — new turbines, steam generators and digital controls rather than a single new reactor. The uprates would add 890 megawatts to the PJM grid serving about 67 million people, with the first increase expected in 2028. Constellation pegs the work at more than $4.3 billion, roughly 7,200 construction jobs and 4,400 existing jobs supported.
With a dead lab technician and 200 people in quarantine at home, Moscow publicly offered to assist the United States with its measles outbreak. The timing landed with a thud in Washington, where officials are still asking Russia for basic facts about the Siberian incident. Consider the offer respectfully declined.
