Greetings! Happy National Publicist Day to those celebrating.

Let’s get into today’s top stories.

🇨🇳 Trade reset aims to unwind tariff damage. American and Chinese negotiators outlined steps to ease the cost of a self-inflicted trade war, signaling lower duties on selected categories and revived purchase commitments. Economists say tariff roll-offs could shave tenths off headline inflation while unclogging supply chains for machinery, semiconductors, and consumer goods. Manufacturers care about certainty more than headlines, so customs codes and phase-in dates will determine whether factories retool. Agricultural exporters want guaranteed volumes and faster port clearance to lift margins eroded by retaliation. Currency stability and guardrails on export controls will be the quiet hinges for corporate planning. Markets will read the fine print for dispute mechanisms that survive political weather.

🇺🇦 Kyiv’s long-range strikes bite Russian refining. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukrainian attacks have idled roughly 20% of Russia’s oil refining capacity, a figure with implications for domestic fuel supply and export flows. If sustained, throughput losses can pinch diesel availability that undergirds logistics and agriculture. Russian operators can reroute crude to export, but crack spreads and sanctions insurance make the math messy. Repair timelines depend on access to specialized parts and foreign expertise, both constrained under restrictions. Energy traders will watch product inventories at key hubs and rail loadings for confirmation of durable outages. The strategic bet is simple: degrade economic capacity to shrink war capacity.

⚖️ Pentagon details Judge Advocate Generals (JAGs) to the Justice Department. The Department of Defense (DoD) began assigning dozens of military attorneys to assist the Department of Justice (DOJ) on high-volume immigration matters, a move supporters cast as surge staffing and critics view as mission creep. Case backlogs have stretched court calendars and detention facilities, amplifying due-process and cost concerns. Judge Advocate General (JAG) officers bring trial chops, but civil-immigration law is its own maze of statutes and precedents. Civil-liberties groups want guardrails so uniformed lawyers do not blur lines between defense, prosecution, and policy implementation. The operational question is throughput: can added counsel reduce continuances and shrink average case duration. State and local systems will feel any speed-up first in county jails and shelter networks. Budget committees will want metrics within weeks, not quarters, even as assignments run through next fall.

✊🏿 Fraud probe targets Black Lives Matter (BLM) finances. The DOJ opened an investigation into alleged misuse of funds, amounting to defrauding in the tens of millions of dollars, connected to entities within the movement’s broad ecosystem, responding to complaints about governance and disclosures. Nonprofit experts say failures tend to cluster around commingled accounts, weak boards, and late audits. Prosecutors will follow bank records, vendor contracts, and grant agreements to map flows and fiduciary duty. Movement leaders argue that bad-faith attacks often conflate separate organizations under one brand. Donors should expect subpoenas, and charities should expect a chill until filings are clean. Legal standard is narrow, but reputational standard is brutal. Accountability is the only solvent that works on both.

🏰 King Charles III moves against Andrew. The monarch has stripped his brother of remaining titles and ordered him to vacate his longtime residence, escalating a slow-burn palace reckoning. The former prince will be known as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor and must leave his stately lodge. Royal watchers note that housing, security, and patronage decisions often telegraph the family’s internal red lines. The shift consolidates authority around the sovereign while reducing ambiguity about public roles. Legal exposure from past associations continues to shadow public perception and private logistics. Courtiers will manage relocation timelines and staff changes under intense tabloid oxygen. For the institution, clarity is costly but cheaper than drift.

☢️ Talk of nuclear testing scrambles old norms. Comments about resuming explosive tests stirred decades of bipartisan policy that favored non-testing, verification regimes, and lab simulations. The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) maintains readiness, but crossing from subcritical experiments to full tests would trigger global blowback. Allies would face parliamentary fights over basing and burden-sharing, while rivals would seize propaganda wins. Arms-control architects warn that one test begets escalation in both yield and frequency. Defense planners counter that signaling matters when deterrence is contested on multiple fronts. Markets care less about doctrine than about volatility, which spikes on any whiff of strategic instability. The cost of a test is measured in megatons and months of mistrust.

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That’s all for today!

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See you tomorrow!