📊 Minab Postmortem, Empire State Building, and USMCA

School strike investigation, climbing stunt, and trade pact renewal.

Jul 02, 2026

Greetings! Happy National Gingersnap Day to those celebrating.

Let’s get into today’s top stories.

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🌎 GLOBAL NEWS

🇮🇷 American strike killed children. A new reconstruction detailed an American strike on an Iranian school. The Pentagon has stayed publicly quiet more than 120 days later. The strike hit Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School in Minab on February 28th. The school’s name means “Good Tree” in Farsi. It sat inside a walled compound near a Revolutionary Guard base. Students were waiting after teachers called parents to collect them early. Multiple munitions struck the compound. Hundreds of pounds of explosives collapsed the school. Airwars identified 156 of the dead. That count included 120 children, all age 13 or younger. The group said 95 people were injured. State media had put the death toll at 168. President Trump said last week he had not read the Pentagon report. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said findings would be released at the appropriate time. A school became a target file, then a silence.

🇺🇦 Kyiv shakes for hours. Russia launched a large overnight attack on Kyiv into Thursday. Missiles and drones shook the capital for hours. Loud explosions echoed across the city. Residential buildings were damaged. Tymur Tkachenko, head of the Kyiv City Military Administration, said one person was killed. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said at least 11 people were injured. The attack affected all 10 districts of the city. Damage spread across both sides of the Dnipro River. Many residents took shelter in metro stations. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other officials had issued warnings before the strikes. Klitschko urged residents to remain in shelters. He described a furious enemy attack. A paramedic was among the critically injured in Shevchenkivskyi district. Fires broke out in several districts as debris trapped people in buildings. Kyiv spent another night measuring time by sirens, windows, and rescue crews.

🇺🇸 LOCAL NEWS

🗽 Empire climbers get arrested. Two climbers scaled the Empire State Building’s antenna Wednesday. They unfurled a banner about the power of love and peace. The stunt appeared tied to a high-altitude marriage proposal. Police identified the Russian climbers as Angelina Nikolau and Ivan Kuznetsov. The pair were featured in the 2024 Netflix documentary “Skywalkers: A Love Story”, and climbed without tethers. The antenna rises above the public areas of the 102-story tower. Video showed them balancing on a narrow ledge. They appeared to kiss above midtown. One then appeared to kneel as part of a proposal. They later descended, embraced, and were arrested. Charges included burglary and reckless endangerment. Management called the episode unauthorized. Love chose the skyline, and the skyline called security.

🕵️ Brennan sues over records. Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John Brennan sued the Trump administration Wednesday. He wants a court order preserving investigation records. Brennan says the investigations target him for phantom criminal conduct. His lawyers say the records could show officials’ motives. They argue those motives could support a future vindictive-prosecution defense. The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Washington. It cites more than 100 statements President Trump has made since 2017 attacking Brennan. It also cites Trump directives to the Justice Department. Brennan’s lawyers say those directives lacked factual or legal justification. Brennan has long been one of Trump’s most visible intelligence-community critics. The case comes amid investigations tied to Russia-related inquiries and government recordkeeping. Brennan is not asking the court to stop the investigations now. He is asking that records survive long enough for review. The Justice Department did not immediately comment. A paper trail became the battlefield before any indictment arrived.

🗂️ MISC

🌐 Trade pact gets reopened. The United States, Canada, and Mexico began renegotiating their trade pact Wednesday. The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) came up for renewal. President Trump negotiated the pact in 2020. It replaced the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The region now trades $1.9T a year in goods and services. That equals about $5B a day. Canada and Mexico are America’s top two trading partners. United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said America is not ready to renew the pact as written. The deal remains in effect while talks continue. The countries have until 2036 to resolve differences. One dispute concerns Canada’s dairy protections. Another concerns pressure to make more products in North America. A proposed rule would require 50% of cars to be made in the United States. Canada and Mexico view that as a red line. North America’s trade machine still runs, but the manual is back on the table.

📉 Tech pulls stocks lower. Most American stocks rose Wednesday. Wall Street still ended lower because major technology shares fell. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index (S&P 500) slipped 0.2%. It was the index’s 8th loss in 11 days. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped 13 points. That was less than 0.1%. The Nasdaq composite fell 0.7%. Three of every 5 S&P 500 stocks rose. General Mills ($GIS) climbed 8.5%. The company reported stronger quarterly results than analysts expected. It also announced a $3B cost-cutting plan over 4 years. Artificial intelligence (AI) favorites weighed on the market. Micron Technology ($MU) fell 10.6%. Advanced Micro Devices ($AMD) dropped 6.9%. Nvidia ($NVDA) lost 1.3%. Most stocks rose, but the biggest room in the market still controlled the exits.