July 10, 2026
U.S. ELECTIONS | ILLINOIS | U.S. EMPLOYMENT | U.S. MORTGAGES | U.S. HOUSING | NEW YORK | U.S. AND MEXICO | PAKISTAN | CANADA | SPAIN | U.K. | TAIWAN AND CHINA | CHINA | AFRICA POLLUTION | WORLD CUP | TENNIS | TODAY IN HISTORY
U.S. ELECTIONS | Reports say President Donald Trump yesterday fired the three remaining members of the independent Election Assistance Commission, which serves as a national clearinghouse of information on election administration and security, accredits testing laboratories, and certifies voting systems. The move comes just months ahead of November's mid-term elections and amidst Trump's push for increased federal intervention in voting processes. [more]
ILLINOIS | Overturning a lower court decision, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld an Illinois ban on semiautomatic firearms yesterday, saying the law is "consistent with the principles that underpin our Nation’s tradition of firearm regulation" and is not in violation of the Second Amendment. [more]
U.S. EMPLOYMENT | Labor Department data released yesterday indicates that 215,000 people in the U.S. filed initial applications for unemployment benefits in the week ended July 4 – down by about 2,000 from the previous week. [full report] [more]
U.S. MORTGAGES | The average interest rate for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage in the U.S. rose to 6.49% this week, according to mortgage firm Freddie Mac – up from 6.43% last week and down from the year-ago average of 6.72%. [more]
U.S. HOUSING | According to the National Association of Realtors, the median home sales price in the U.S. rose for the 36th month in a row in June, increasing by 1.8% to a record-high $440,600. [more]
NEW YORK | State Attorney General Letitia James announced a lawsuit yesterday against several large chemical and agricultural companies, including 3M and DuPont, alleging that the companies "knowingly sold toxic products" containing so-called forever chemicals that have been linked to increased risks of certain cancers and developmental delays in children and that she claimed have "threatened New Yorkers’ health and polluted our environment for decades" [more]
U.S. AND MEXICO | Mexican Foreign Minister Roberto Velasco announced yesterday that his country will pursue criminal charges over 17 Mexican citizens who died either during U.S. immigration enforcement operations or while in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Reports note that the move follows the fatal shooting of Mexican citizen Lorenzo Salgado Araujo by an ICE agent in Houston, Texas, this week and that Mexico also intends to file civil lawsuits against companies that operate U.S. immigration detention centers. [more]
PAKISTAN | Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif yesterday vowed to continue anti-militant operations in Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province following multiple attacks carried out by the outlawed Baloch Liberation Army this week in which at least 42 people were killed. [more]
CANADA | Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta announced this week that it plans to invest more than US$9.1 billion to build an AI-related data center in Sturgeon County, Alberta, Canada. The facility will be Meta's first data center in Canada and its largest outside the United States. [more]
SPAIN | Emergency response officials say at least 11 people have died, eight have been injured, and 19 others remain unaccounted for, amidst a wildfire near the city of Almeria in southern Spain. An estimated 1,000 residents of the area have been evacuated as efforts to contain the blaze continue. [more]
U.K. | Senior British police officers said yesterday that technology and online platforms are increasingly being used by hostile countries, Islamic extremists, and far-right groups to threaten the United Kingdom and that investigations into such threats require cooperation from technology and online platform companies. [more]
TAIWAN AND CHINA | Schools are closed, and some flights and ferry routes have been cancelled, in Taiwan today ahead of the arrival of Typhoon Bavi, which is expected to pass just north of the island territory and then make landfall on China's eastern coast near Shanghai tomorrow. [more]
CHINA | State media reports that at least 28 people were killed yesterday in a fire that engulfed a shoe factory in southeastern China’s Fujian province. Investigations into the cause of the fire are ongoing. [more]
AFRICA POLLUTION | Officials with the International Energy Agency say African countries have secured $900 million in new funding commitments to expand access to clean cooking technologies, bringing to more than $3.1 billion the pledges inaugurated at the Africa Clean Cooking Summit in Paris in 2024. The initiative aims expand access to cleaner cooking fuels, stoves and related infrastructure across the continent. [more]
WORLD CUP | France beat Morocco, 2-0, yesterday to advance to the semi-finals of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. In other quarter-final matchups, Spain plays Belgium today and Norway faces England, and Argentina plays Switzerland, tomorrow. [full bracket] [more]
TENNIS | Jannik Sinner plays Novak Djokovic, and Arthur Fery plays Alexander Zverev, today in the men's semi-finals at Wimbledon, with the winners to face one another in Sunday's championship. In women's play, Karolina Muchova and Linda Noskova will play for the women's championship tomorrow after defeating Coco Gauff and Marta Kostyuk, respectively in the semi-finals. [more]
TODAY IN HISTORY | On this date in 1925, the so-called Scopes Monkey Trial, in which high-school teacher John T. Scopes was charged with violating state law by teaching Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, began in Dayton, Tennessee. The trial’s proceedings helped to bring the scientific evidence for evolution into the public sphere and sparked a national debate on the issue. [more history]