DOJ leaves in place ruling that deregulates silencers, shotguns

A Texas judge earlier this month issued a ruling that deregulated silencers, shotguns and certain rifles.

Europe heatwave live: UK sees temperatures of 38.1C, the hottest day of 2026; Greece battles gale force winds, sparking fears about wildfires

A former UK government scientific adviser warned amid the ‘shattering’ heat that worse is still to come

Met Office has just offered an update on temperatures across the UK, with several stations already reporting temperatures above 30C – and it’s not even 11am.

It’s 30.4C in Wych Cross, 30.3C in Charlwood, 30.2C at Kenly Airfield.

Hegseth downplays USS Abraham Lincoln conditions amid reports of food shortages and mental health crises on board – live

US defense secretary says conditions ‘misrepresented’ on military vessel as 5,000 sailors and marines endure record-breaking deployment at sea tied to war in Iran

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Donald Trump’s executive order on vaccines does not change the US recommendations for the shots – but experts say it does create confusion and doubt about vaccines, which will lead to more illness and possibly deaths among children and will make it harder for families and pediatricians to protect them.

The executive order was an attempt to reinstate sweeping changes to the vaccine schedule made earlier this year by Robert F Kennedy Jr, secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services and a longtime vaccine opponent – changes that were later halted by a federal judge.

Celta Vigo’s La Liga opener postponed due to fungal outbreak on pitch

• Fungal outbreak damages surface at Estadio de Balaidos

• Turf for Osasuna match left ‘unfit for football’

Celta Vigo’s ⁠season-opening La Liga match against Osasuna has been postponed after ⁠a fungal outbreak ⁠affected ​the pitch at Estadio de Balaidos, the Spanish club ⁠said on Thursday.

Celta had been due to host Osasuna on Sunday, ⁠but the fixture was postponed with ​the decision ‌agreed by both ‌clubs and the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) ‌following a technical inspection by La Liga.

Judge dismisses Trump lawsuit that claimed Harvard failed to protect Jewish students

Federal court rules administration failed to plausibly show ongoing violation of civil rights law

A US federal ⁠judge ⁠has dismissed ​the Trump administration’s lawsuit that ⁠claimed ​Harvard ‌University failed ‌to protect Jewish ‌and Israeli students from harassment in the aftermath of the war in Gaza.

In a ruling on Thursday, US district ‌judge Richard Stearns in ​Boston said the administration’s lawsuit – ⁠filed in March – failed to plausibly ​show ​an ongoing ​violation ‌of ​federal ​civil rights law on Harvard’s campus.

Trump-linked oil venture delays Greenland drilling plans after government warning

Greenland Energy Co. and joint venture partner 80 Mile have delayed planned oil drilling in Greenland until winter 2027.

Ukrainian cathedrals, Gaza’s archives, Iranian squares – modern war is systematically erasing human history | Simon Jenkins

It is not enough now for war to kill, it must eradicate a people’s cherished and precious heritage too

Wars may not take summer holidays, but they do sometimes see exhaustion. As drones race back and forth across Ukraine and the strait of Hormuz, a grim stalemate seems to have invaded the earth beneath. Aerial bombardment knows limited resistance and even less victory or defeat. Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Iran and their allies seem able to defy diplomacy and drop bombs on each other for ever.

At which point the outside world can merely count some of the costs. Vladimir Putin’s known desire to eliminate Ukraine’s historical identity has led to its cultural devastation. Two weeks ago Unesco reported the destruction or dereliction of 545 of its historic buildings, including 156 religious sites and 43 museums. The attempted eradication of what Putin himself claims to be an intrinsic part of Russia’s own history is sickening.

Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Carrick rules out £100m signing for Manchester United as Rashford rejoins squad

• United unable to financially compete with rivals

• Rashford back after Barcelona loan but could leave

Michael Carrick has stated that Manchester United will not make a £100m signing this summer due to their finances, with the manager also insisting that Marcus Rashford “is our player” despite the forward and club preferring him to depart.

In the current window United have invested a total of £85m on Youri Tielemans and Andrey Santos but have never spent £100m on a single transfer.

The mindblowing invertebrates you have never heard of – video

Each year the Guardian runs a competition to find the invertebrate of the year. To find out more about the 2026 nominees, science editor Ian Sample hears from climate reporter Petra Stock, environment reporter Oliver Milman and Science Weekly co-host Madeleine Finlay. They each nominate an incredible invertebrate that you might never have heard of, and argue why their choice should come top. Vote for your favourite now and the winner will be unveiled on 17 August

Oklahoma man put to death in first of three US executions scheduled on same day

If all executions go ahead, it will be first time in over 15 years there have been over three judicial killings in US in one day

Carlos Cuesta-Rodriguez has been put to death by the state of Oklahoma, in the first of three executions scheduled for Thursday in a rare triple procedure that underlines the renewed appetite in the US for state killings.

Cuesta-Rodriguez, 70, was pronounced dead at 10.13am at the Oklahoma state penitentiary in McAlester. He was sentenced to death for murdering his common-law wife, Olimpia Fisher, in 2003. He had unsuccessfully appealed for mercy, saying he was remorseful and had struggled all his life from mental illness.

Football Daily | Brian Madjo and the tendency to lump expectations on young shoulders

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Aston Villa supporters could have been forgiven for approaching the new season with feelings of great anxiety, nagging angst and face-twitching trepidation. Youri Tielemans has gone: such an elegant player with an eye [and nose? – Football Daily Ed] for the spectacular. Morgan Rogers has also departed: so energetic and skilful, always carrying that goal threat. And goodbye to Lucas Digne. But Villa fans who have been keeping their eye trained behind the curtain may not have been quite so concerned. Earlier this month, their 17-year-old striker Brian Madjo – 6ft4in, body of iron ore – was cleared by the court of arbitration for sport to play competitive fixtures for the club. Born in London but already capped for Luxembourg, Villa and Fifa were in diagreed over whether Madjo, signed from Metz in January for £10m, qualified as a home purchase or an international transfer. If it was the latter, as a minor, he wouldn’t have been eligible until turning 18 next January. While waiting for the verdict, Madjo banged in four goals in pre-season friendlies, against Walsall, Real Sociedad and Indonesia All Stars, and upon finally being cleared for the big boys, could have scored as many again in 45 minutes against the best team in the world, Paris Saint-Germain.

This is an extract from our daily football email … Football Daily. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions. 

By sky and sea, Ukraine's drone strikes challenge Russia's grip on Crimea

Russia maintained an iron grip on Crimea since seizing it from Ukraine in 2014. Many Russian civilians go there to enjoy the beaches. But now Ukraine is hitting Crimea hard, upending daily life.

DRC’s fast-growing Ebola outbreak spreads to sixth province

Man dies in Bas-Uele after travelling from Haut-Uele, as head of WHO says outbreak on track to be deadliest ever

The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has spread to a sixth province, officials have said, a day after the head of the World Health Organization said the outbreak was on track to surpass the deadliest in history, which erupted more than a decade ago and killed more than 11,000 people.

Jean Kaseya, the director general of Africa CDC, said a death had been recorded in the previously unaffected Bas-Uele province. Kaseya said the man had travelled from Isiro, in Haut-Uele province, to Buta, the capital of Bas-Uele, where he died.

Floodwaters submerge Midwest neighborhoods bracing for more severe storms

Muddy floodwaters seeped into the homes of Indiana and Ohio residents this week, as severe storms struck the Midwest. Now, some areas are bracing for even more rain.

The Lakers have become a poker chip for some of the most powerful men in America

One of the most famous teams in the world is about to change hands for the second time in less than a year for more than $12bn. Will anyone push back?

One of the most brutal lessons we must learn as fans is that the team we shed blood, sweat and tears for is seen by those who own it as just one of many assets. That gap has never felt as wide as it does this week. On Wednesday, ESPN reported that the Los Angeles Lakers are set to change hands, for the second time in 10 months, for $12.5bn, a sum that would be a record for any North American sports team. (The deal must be approved by the NBA’s board of governors before it can go through.) The buyers aren’t diehards who saved up every penny like the good Dr Jerry Buss in the 1970s. Those days are gone. If and when the deal is approved, the new owners will be venture capitalist Josh Kushner and his business partner, Bob Iger. Kushner is the younger brother of Jared Kushner, the titleless Wormtongue to Donald Trump’s Saruman. Iger used to run Disney. These men have connections across the political world and influence in every corner of the American empire. A franchise woven into a city’s identity should never become an asset vastly wealthy people move around like a chip around a poker table. But that is exactly what the Lakers are about to become. The way the deal came together should terrify anyone who still thinks sports belong to the fans.

Mark Walter took control of the team from the Buss family last October at a valuation of roughly $10bn. Now he is set to cash out around $2bn richer. That’s not how this is supposed to work. The old guard, like Buss, used to guard their NBA teams like heirlooms and pass them down. Walter is set to flip the team after less than a year.

‘It was fun to get pushed around’: Andrew Rannells on ‘razzle dazzle’, kissing co-stars and being a better friend to Lena Dunham

The star of Girls and The Book of Mormon talks about coming out, turning a showmance into a romance, and going toe to toe with the West Wing’s Allison Janney in new film Miss You Love You

Imagine a cute, young, gay Jim Carrey with a withering line in put-downs: that is Andrew Rannells. Or rather, it was, back when he starred in Lena Dunham’s HBO series Girls as Elijah, the formerly closeted ex of her character, Hannah. Dunham had seen Rannells playing Elder Price, the zealous missionary spreading the good word in the original 2011 Broadway production of the bad-taste musical The Book of Mormon, for which he received a Tony nomination. Girls, in turn, spread the good word about him. To this day, fans still shout “Your dad is gay!” at him in the street, a call-back to the moment when Elijah tartly advises Hannah that she might want to fine-tune her gaydar.

It is an older, gentler, salt-and-pepper-bearded Rannells who stars in the comedy-drama Miss You, Love You. He plays Jamie, a personal assistant arriving in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to shepherd the spiky and recently widowed Diane (Allison Janney) through the initial weeks after her husband’s death from Parkinson’s. As it dawns on them that Diane’s son – Jamie’s employer – may not make it to his stepfather’s funeral, these strangers navigate their way through the grey area of their flung-together friendship.

Reese's Halloween pumpkins hit shelves unchanged after lawsuit victory

Hershey said the Halloween-shaped candy, which had sparked a lawsuit over the product's lack of detail, will return in its familiar oval shape.

Bugging devices: the astounding ways insects are talking and listening all around us

From spiders tuning their silken listening tools, to the beetle’s heady perfume, hundreds of conversations are happening in languages we don’t understand

• It’s invertebrate of the year – vote for your favourite

All around us, every day, hundreds of conversations are taking place in languages we don’t understand, or even, in most cases, notice. Birdsong is one you would probably recognise, and you may have heard of honeybee “waggle dances”. But what about the spider tuning their web to listen for prey, or a waft of arousing perfumes emitted by a passing beetle? At any moment you may be walking right through a whole critical dialogue – and have absolutely no idea.

To delve into the world of invertebrate communication about food gathering, coordinating nest building, defending a territory, attracting a mate, and babycare is to realise just how smart and sophisticated they are. Spiders, for example, can “hear” vibrations on the silken strands of their web using sensors on their legs. With their legs and body weight, the spiders will adjust the silk strings, as we would a guitar string, to change its pitch, pulling, loosening or reconnecting strands to adjust how it sounds. In fine-tuning the silk they can know just who is walking on it – a possible mate to woo, a fly for feasting on or maybe a larger bug on the lookout for prey.

French ambassador to CAR investigated over claims he hosted dozens of women

Disciplinary proceedings under way after security concerns raised over reported visits to official residence

France has opened disciplinary proceedings against its ambassador to Central African Republic over allegations of misconduct, after claims he brought dozens of women into his official residence, raising potential security concerns.

The investigation comes as Paris seeks to rebuild relations with CAR after their sharp deterioration in recent years amid Russia’s expanding influence in the former French colony.

Hodgkinson’s key rival Werro reinstated after shock fall to set up dream Euro 800m final

• Werro advanced after review reveals accidental trip

• Hodgkinson and Broeders-Bol ease into final together

Keely Hodgkinson’s biggest rival for European 800m gold has been dramatically put through into Friday’s final after being tripped and sent sprawling during Thursday’s first semi-final.

It means that the hugely anticipated showdown is still on between Hodgkinson, the Olympic gold medallist; Audrey Werro, the 22-year-old Swiss superstar who ran the third fastest time in history in June; and the Netherlands’ Femke Broeders-Bol, the 400m hurdles world champion who has moved up this season.

Democrats demand Trump reveal stock managers, explain suspicious trades

Warren and Garcia said they sought answers from Trump to inform their work on potential legislation to ban presidents from owning individual stocks.

Universality by Natasha Brown audiobook review – a sparkling multi-voiced satire

A magazine article about stolen gold sparks a culture war between a cast of politically polarised characters

A stinging dissection of wealth, class and the media, Natasha Brown’s satire begins with a man named Jake gazing at a gold bar he has found at a farm in West Yorkshire. Outside, an illegal rave is taking place which will end in three hospitalisations and property damage. Pondering what to do with the ingot that he has just used to bludgeon a stranger, Jake decides to do a runner.

The story of the stolen gold is told by a journalist, Hannah, in a magazine article named A Fool’s Gold, replicated in full here, which she claims exposes “the fraying fabric of British society, worn thin by late capitalism’s relentless abrasion”. Her piece, which goes viral, features Richard Spencer, an arrogant, philandering banker and the owner of the farm, whose reputation is left in tatters; a contrarian rightwing newspaper columnist named Miriam Leonard, known as Lenny; and a group of radical anarchist squatters who call themselves The Universalists.

Are teens on ebikes the ‘new Hells Angels’? Not so fast, boomers

Experts say better regulation is needed but that bad press about ‘motorized menaces’ puts the ebike revolution at risk

Beware, Americans: there’s a battery-powered threat cruising down beach paths, rolling up hiking trails and zipping along the streets of our cities.

By now, you’ve probably seen footage on social media of teens racing along streets, popping wheelies and weaving around car traffic with reckless abandon. The Los Angeles Times recently dubbed them the “new Hells Angels”. Other news outlets have referred to them as “motorized menaces” terrorizing communities. Sounds scary.

Imelda Staunton: ‘Umbridge’s giggle needed to be short and sharp. So I just did a boom, boom’

The actor answers your questions on working with her dog, becoming a dame, Harry Potter, and making televisual history in The Singing Detective

You and Bill Nighy were comrades in Pride, but play estranged spouses in & Sons. Was it more fun marching alongside him or giving him a piece of your mind? MrSOBaldrick
It’s fun doing anything with Bill Nighy!

I once saw you at RHS Garden Wisley. Are you a keen gardener? What’s your favourite plant? HeyJudithB
Yes, I am a gardener. We love doing the garden. My favourite plant – this week – is the rose Munstead Wood, which has an incredible scent, and a deep, dark raspberry colour. It’s a rose we might be in danger of losing because of climate change. Roses need water, so I think we’re going to have to change our planting.

Robert Gilman was on "death's door" before Russia freed him, advocate says

Robert Gilman, a U.S. Marine veteran, was imprisoned in Russia for over four years and now faces a long road to recovery, says a hostage crisis expert who advocated for Gilman's release.

Behind the rise of teen takeovers and how some cities are cracking down

A growing number of U.S. cities are trying to crack down on so-called teen takeovers, when large groups of young people gather in a public place, often in response to online invites. Some of the events have ended with violence and arrests. Mark Strassmann shows how some cities are responding.

Surrogate gives birth to baby with heart condition despite intended parents seeking abortion

In Texas, a legal battle is intensifying after a surrogate gave birth to a baby with a severe heart condition. The intended parents in California had wanted to terminate the pregnancy after learning of the diagnosis, but the surrogate refused. Jason Allen reports.

Is your career "rusting out"? Here's what that means, and how to spot it.

Many employees feel their employers don't value them and that they're not contributing as much as they could, a workplace poll finds.

Italian businessman admits organising bomb attack ‘to boost friend’s security’

Valter Lavitola has confessed to masterminding bombing at home of investigative reporter Sigfrido Ranucci

An Italian businessman has admitted to masterminding a bomb attack at the home of Sigfrido Ranucci, a prominent investigative journalist, claiming it was intended to boost his security protection.

Valter Lavitola, who was friends with Ranucci, the host of Report, an investigative programme aired by the state broadcaster, Rai, made the confession to investigators after his arrest earlier this week in connection with the case, the businessman’s lawyer, Sergio Cola, told the Italian media.

Taiwan briefly slows its mobile internet to text-only speed as part of defense drill

The drills come amid rising tensions with China, which frequently sends military planes and ships towards Taiwan.

Wholesale prices were flat in July, below expectations for 0.2% increase

The producer price index was expected to increase by 0.2% in July, according to the Dow Jones consensus.

‘At any moment I might fade out’: archives reveal fearless era of land speed record breakers

Unseen material gives insight into how death-defying attempts by drivers made impact on public imagination

With the Bonneville salt flats in Utah echoing to the sound of a new land speed record achieved by a British team, the timing could not be more apposite. The historical legacy of the challenge of pushing the envelope of pace is being dusted down and made public in the form of an extraordinary archive from more than a century of record-breaking machines and their singularly driven pilots.

On Tuesday JCB’s Hydromax car took the hydrogen-powered International Automobile Federation (FIA) land speed record, reaching 406.320mph at Bonneville. Appropriately the car was driven by Andy Green, the former RAF wing commander who holds the current outright land speed record of 763.035mph, set in 1997 in the ThrustSSC car in which he also became the only person to have broken the sound barrier on land.

Agent 64: Spies Never Die review – licence to kill time like the 90s never ended

PC; Replicant D6
This GoldenEye 007-styled retro shooter is an agreeable set of straightahead shooting missions that hark back to a simpler time, with simpler controls

With 007 First Light, 2026 has already given us the best James Bond game in more than three decades, since the release of Rare’s N64 classic GoldenEye 007. But what about those players whose loyalties lie not with the super-spy himself but the particulars of that 90s interpretation of his adventures?

Enter Agent 64: Spies Never Die. Made almost entirely by a single developer (who goes by the very cloak-and-dagger alias Replicant D6), its production values couldn’t be much further from the blockbuster First Light. There’s no voice acting, with all dialogue instead delivered via subtitles, while each location on your globe-trotting adventure is depicted by a repeating texture wallpapered over scenery so blocky you can count the individual polygons.

‘Absolutely unacceptable’: Japan condemns visit by Vladimir Putin to disputed Kuril Islands

Japanese PM says islands seized by Soviets late in second world war are part of her country under international law

The Japanese government has reacted angrily to Vladimir Putin’s first visit to the disputed Kuril Islands, which are claimed by both Tokyo and Moscow.

Japan’s foreign minister, Toshimitsu Motegi, summoned the Russian ambassador Nikolay Nozdrev, while the prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, called Putin’s actions “absolutely unacceptable”.

Single winning ticket sold for $1.04 billion Powerball jackpot

A single ticket sold in Illinois won the biggest Powerball jackpot of the year, $1.04 billion, in Wednesday night's drawing, the game says.

Single ticket sold in Illinois wins $1 billion Powerball jackpot

Only one Powerball ticket, sold in western Illinois, matched all six numbers from Wednesday's $1 billion drawing. Tom Hanson reports.

Wisconsin, Michigan primaries expose limits of polls and prediction markets

It's the second time in just over a week that polls and prediction markets' odds were off, following a miss in the Democratic U.S. senate primary in Michigan.

60 cats rescued from abandoned boat anchored off Washington state

Police in Tacoma, Washington, say they have rescued 60 cats and kittens from an abandoned sailboat that was found anchored off a city beach last week.

2 soldiers killed in Apache helicopter crash in Texas

The U.S. Army is investigating after an Apache helicopter crashed Wednesday in central Texas, killing both crew members on board and sparking a wildfire. Army officials say the helicopter was on a training flight when it crashed. Charlie D'Agata reports.

First responders use boats to rescue people from flooded homes, cars in Midwest

Extreme flooding in parts of Indiana reached car roofs and sent water rushing into homes, leading to first responders using boats to rescue people who were trapped. Meg Oliver reports on the damage.

Wildfires, a giant Castro and a wave of 500,000 dahlias: photos of the day – Thursday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

AOC’s public egg-freezing shouldn’t feel radical. But in today’s US, it does | Moira Donegan

The congresswoman’s decision is an assertion of women’s freedom and dignity at a time when our status is rapidly eroding

“Don’t be weird about this,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive star and rumored 2028 presidential contender, said on her live video broadcast as she raised her shirt to angle the syringe into her abdomen. Then, with resignation, “even though I know all of you will be.”

The New York Democrat is 36 years old, and this week she revealed that she is beginning the process of freezing her eggs during Congress’s August recess. In the video, Ocasio-Cortez said that she was seeking to destigmatize the realities of women’s lives as they navigate the conflicting demands of professional aspiration and family building; she explained to viewers the process of the hormonal injections she was administering to herself, showing them the drugs and injector she was using arrayed on a paper towel, beside a disinfecting towelette. The procedure, Ocasio-Cortez explained, was not covered by her insurance, and she would be paying “100% out of pocket”. She had been saving to afford it for some time. “This is a choice that I am making to feel more in control of my life,” she said, going on to assert her hope that transparency about such questions will destigmatize women’s reproductive lives and promote their dignity.

Berries with a hint of tarmac – what do we mean when we call a wine ‘fruity’?

Bananas, peaches, strawberries – anything but ‘grapes’. What do all those volatile organic compounds really mean for your summer sipping?

“Strawberries, cherries and an angel’s kiss in spring,” sang Nancy Sinatra. “My summer wine is really made from all these things …” Overlook the angel’s kiss and, if you’re a wine drinker, you might recognise some of those fruity tasting notes – strawberries and cherries, indeed, but also citrus, orchard, other stone fruits and the whole berry family. In fact, it’s common to liken a wine to almost any fruit – except grapes.

A wine can have notes of almost anything – pencil shavings, tennis balls, cat pee – but fruit is the most obvious (clearly, wine is made from fruit) and universally recognised. If I told you I was getting, say, green apple and lime zest from a riesling, you would probably have a good sense of what that meant, and what you might be able to expect on tasting it yourself. If I described a petroleum aroma, that might sound a bit cryptic and much less appealing, unless you were familiar with this tasting note commonly found in riesling. In other words, a wine’s fruit profile is often leveraged as a marketing tool. What better example of this than the “strawberries and cream” of Provence rosé? It’s a tasting note that underpins our collective sense that rosé is a summer drop, perfect for sun-drenched days filled with watching tennis, ocean views and seasonal produce.

Billion-streamers, Beyoncé and heart-bruising beauty: Frank Ocean’s 20 best songs – ranked!

It’s a decade since the Los Angeles musician released the seminal album Blonde. To lessen the pain of his hiatus, we count down the best of an artist who redefined R&B

Frank Ocean’s pre-fame demos are hard to find – there’s a fan-made, 64-track compilation called The Lonny Breaux Collection floating around – but worth checking out, as evinced by this brief but potent piano ballad. Sweet but heartsore, it packs an emotional punch; it would have been a highlight of the mixtape Nostalgia, Ultra, had it made the cut.

Mark Zuckerberg says the future of AI is for everyone. But who owns it? | Raffi Krikorian

It’s a nice sentiment, but all AI users should ask three questions about their preferred choice of AI platform

On Monday, Mark Zuckerberg published a 6,500-word essay, The Future Is for Everyone. The essay came with something even rarer: a new Meta open-weight model. An open-weight AI model is the kind of AI with which you download the entire thing, and it works on your own computer (with or without the internet) and nobody can switch it off except for you. Almost every mainstream AI tool you use, whether it be Gemini, ChatGPT or Claude, is one you rent access to. Meta’s is one that you can download and actually own. I downloaded it before I finished the essay. So can you.

This major move by the world’s largest tech heavyweight comes amid a summer heavy with AI news, full of nations at war. Washington against Beijing; tech founder against tech founder. But beneath those conflicts is a deeper contest between two kinds of power: a government that can order technology offline in an instant, and a company that can simply close your account. Neither is necessarily villainous. But the rest of us are not merely the audience in this fight; we are the prize. And the terms are already being written: intelligence on lease, a future we pay for but never quite own.

Severe storms cut power supply to 540,000 homes in US midwest

Indiana faced most outages at 267,000, about 8% of its customers, with severe thunderstorms and wind ahead

Power supply was cut on Thursday ⁠to about 540,000 homes and businesses across the US midwest as severe storms battered the region, data ⁠from PowerOutage.us showed.

Indiana ⁠was the ​hardest-hit state, with more than 267,000 outages, representing about 8% of its roughly 3.3 million customers, the data ⁠showed.

Escaping the ​heat​ and rediscovering the ​joy of ​cooking

Parts of the UK are roasting but some of us are glad to turn the oven on. Bring on the​ ​curries and pasta pies

Sign up here for our weekly food newsletter, Feast

I don’t wish to boast, but I’m typing this with a jumper on. Not because my flat has air-conditioning, but because it doesn’t – and the relentless heat of south-east England was having a seriously detrimental effect on my productivity and the health of my elderly dog (NB: the two are not mutually exclusive). So, with a second novel to write, I decided to rent a studio as far north, and as far west, as I could reasonably drive in a day. And, so far, I have no regrets. Driving through North Yorkshire, I had to put on a sweatshirt – the weather in the Pennines gave my car the first good wash it’s had in months – and now, in Scotland, the dog and I feast on hot porridge in the mornings. I’d genuinely forgotten what it’s like to be cold – and what it’s like to cook for pleasure.

This newsletter isn’t just for those parts of the country enjoying, rather than suffering, the sunshine; yesterday it was raining and tonight the temperatures will drop to almost single digits. It’s also for anyone, wherever you are, who’s eaten enough cool, crunchy salads and chilled soups to last a lifetime, or at least until next summer. (You’re not alone: last month, Waitrose reported a spike in sales of cottage pie and robust South African red wine.)

Inflation eased slightly in July. And, ICE plans to give officers electric shock gloves

Inflation cooled a bit last month, according to a new report from the Labor Department. And, ICE plans to equip its officers with electric shock gloves.

The drug lenacapavir is a mighty weapon against HIV. Its rollout gets mixed reviews

It's a twice-a-year injection that is remarkably effective in preventing an HIV infection. Distribution is starting. But questions are being raised about getting it to the areas that need it most.

Hikers watch as molten lava spews from Mount Etna – video

Mount Etna has continued to erupt in Sicily, sending molten lava, rocks and ash down its slopes as hikers watch nearby. The Italian volcano is Europe's most active

Ash Gardner apologises for ‘pain’ caused by relationship with Australia teammate

• Cricket Australia boss backs women’s vice-captain’s leadership

• Monica Wright went public over ex’s affair with Georgia Voll

Australia vice-captain Ash Gardner has apologised for the pain caused by her marriage breakdown and thanked Cricket Australia for backing her leadership.

Gardner’s affair with Australian teammate Georgia Voll while married to ex-wife Monica Wright created headlines.

Chelsea Wolfe: The Dark review – existential reflection goes from whisper to gothic scream

(Loma Vista)
The genre-blending Californian artist casts off past toxic influences with a powerful set of tender, brooding and emotionally charged songs that wouldn’t feel out of place as festival anthems

When Chelsea Wolfe was interviewed by the Guardian in 2015 about her fourth album, Abyss, she revealed that her music had been informed by the bouts of sleep paralysis she’d suffered from since childhood. The condition – a transitional state between being awake and asleep – affects sufferers in different ways. Some wake up feeling paralysed, others see ghosts or demonic figures. For the California-born singer-songwriter, it meant “waking up, and you can move your body and your eyes are open, but there are figures and people from your dreams still present in your room”.

No surprise, then, that her music – a blend of drone, alt, folk, industrial and doom metal – had ended up so spookily unsettling. She appeared on album covers with pupil-less eyes, spoke in interviews about “following the path of witchcraft” and even covered Norwegian black metal act and convicted arsonist/murderer Burzum. She did have a sense of humour about it all, however, telling one interviewer, with a chuckle: “It’s not party music.” Since then, though, much has changed. Wolfe left Los Angeles for the mountains above the city – where she’s finally been able to enjoy a good night’s sleep. Sobriety since 2021 has also brought what she calls “a new clarity”. Both developments inform The Dark.

Premier League 2026-27 preview No 8: Crystal Palace

Palace take a risk with new manager Pierre Sage, who is tasked with building on Glasner’s unprecedented success

Guardian writers’ predicted position: 16th (NB: this is not necessarily Ed Aarons’ prediction but the average of our writers’ tips)

Last season’s position: 15th

‘We bring the craic’: how spice bags became an Irish-Chinese takeaway hit

Restaurant critic and award-winning author Jimi Famurewa travels through London, Belfast and Birmingham getting messy with the fusion treat of spicy chicken, chips and curry sauce. Should you dip or pour? What’s it like with a Filipino flavour? And with a Michelin-style glow-up?

Primary voters send mixed signals about what they want from the Democratic Party

Primary results this month in Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin paint a muddled picture of just how far to the left Democratic voters want their candidates to be come this fall's midterm elections.

How our food became so dependent on oil

Global food prices have hit their highest level in over three years. We are told this is due to rising oil and energy costs, but how exactly do they affect prices? The most reported reason is that transport and fertiliser are to blame, but the reality is that the oil and gas industry is far more integrated in our food production than many of us realise. To get a better understanding, Josh Toussaint-Strauss takes a closer look at the production processes of three categories of food: meat, processed staples and fruit and vegetables. What he discovers is a level of involvement that is shocking

In pictures: Europe's best solar eclipse since 1999

A total solar eclipse crossed Iceland and Spain on Aug. 12, while much of Europe saw a partial eclipse and businesses benefited from demand.

Ukraine attacks Russian grain export terminals in Black Sea, prompting warning about food markets

Ukraine has launched a heavy drone assault on warships and major Russian grain export terminals in the Black Sea port city of Novorossiysk.

Trump administration accused of ‘bullying’ union leader at consumer protection agency

Critic of Consumer Financial Protection Bureau leadership was put under investigation and suspended from job

The Trump administration has been accused of “bullying and intimidation” after a labor union leader and critic was put under investigation and suspended from his job at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

Stephen Wheeler, a data scientist at the agency since 2022 and chair of the CFPB union organizing committee, was placed on administrative leave effective immediately earlier this month. The union said it was not provided with any specific violations or given any details of the investigation.

‘Everyone is scared’: flood-hit Porto Alegre braces for another El Niño

Two years after southern Brazil’s worst climate disaster ravaged the city, and with poor areas still recovering, many fear official neglect has left them exposed once again

In the backstreets of Porto Alegre, a state capital in southern Brazil, you can still see signs of the devastating flood that swept through the city two years ago: scattered debris, waterlogged homes and destroyed businesses.

In May 2024, flooding killed 183 people in the state of Rio Grande do Sul and displaced more than 600,000. The neighbourhood of Sarandi was one of the hardest-hit parts of Porto Alegre, with water levels reaching up to 5 metres above normal, completely submerging many of its streets.

Taylor Swift has put her love story out there – so it’s not fair she won’t let us see her wedding dress | Polly Hudson

How a bride decides to look on the big day tells us a lot about that person. But the singer is leaving us hanging

Having hope in your heart is all well and good, but you also need to know when to give up. At a certain point it’s time to accept cold, hard reality: we’re never going to see pictures of Taylor Swift in her wedding dress, are we?

There are many reasons this matters, and the first, admittedly, is plain old nosiness, with a side order of entitlement. We’ve spent years absorbing – some unintentionally, by osmosis – the details of Swift’s relationships, following her journey to happily ever after every step of the way, including the photos she released of the engagement moment. Obviously she is allowed to keep her wedding private, but being denied a glimpse of the dress feels – insert foot stamp here – unfair. More than that, it’s like a romcom ending before the final embrace, the protagonist still en route to the airport they have yet to run through. For somebody who is essentially a storyteller, this tale is uncharacteristically incomplete, unsatisfying. It’s not like Swift to leave us hanging.

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U.S. ambassador calls settler siege of Palestinian homes a 'horrific act of terror'

The U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee condemned the actions of Jewish settlers who are besieging the home of an American Palestinian family in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

South Korean airport becomes busiest in world for global traffic amid Iran war

Incheon airport had 38.39m international passengers in first half of 2026, as traffic diverted from Middle East hubs

South Korea’s Incheon airport has become the world’s busiest airport for international passengers, in part owing to disruption in the Middle East caused by the Iran war.

The airport, South Korea’s main gateway, about 30 miles (48km) west of Seoul, handled 38.39 million international passengers in the first half of 2026, according to preliminary figures compiled by the Airports Council International (ACI), the global trade body for airports.

We’re going to party like it’s 1629… the masques, the music and the mayhem of Banqueting House

What music soundtracked 17th-century England? Ahead of a DJ set in Banqueting House, Georgia Mann looks at the wild, the experimental, the melancholic – and why a theorbo caused a security alert

King Charles is on the throne, there’s anxiety around the power-brokers of Whitehall, and an age of deep political division and conspiracy obsession is under way.

That’s right, I’m referring to the middle years of the 17th century, a period I’m immersed in as I’m putting together a Jacobean-Carolean Classical DJ set, where the beats are to be dropped beneath one of the UK’s most awesome works of art: the Rubens painted ceiling at the Banqueting House in Whitehall.

‘I feel like I’m at war’: are we losing the battle against machine-made music?

Despite outcry from musicians, AI slop is creeping into the charts as record labels scramble to adapt to a new normal where hits can be made at the click of a button

This year, the battle for song of the summer has been eclipsed by a much more complicated – some would even say disturbing – debate. That’s because we find ourselves asking not “What’s the song of the summer?” but rather “Is the song of the summer even real?”

Among the top contenders for the title is Fenix Flexin’s Rubberz, a single released in June that has ascended to No 58 on the Billboard Hot 100 and racked up more than 35m Spotify streams. It’s not the sort of fare Fenix usually cooks up. The artist is known for his trap music as part of the rap duo Shoreline Mafia, but Rubberz is a mildly noirish, 80s-inspired synth-pop track featuring a voice nothing like his. The song has drawn comparisons to Morrissey, but it more closely resembles Men at Work’s Down Under, or a Weird Al Yankovic parody of Men at Work. It’s pretty awful. But more importantly, it has an uncanny quality to it. It sounds off.

What end-of-life experts know about living well: love your wrinkles, celebrate birthdays and don’t obsess over work

How can our understanding of mortality shape the way we live? Palliative care doctors and death doulas share the lessons they have learned

We will all face death one day, but our attitude towards this is individual. How can our understanding of mortality shape our approach to life? Here, palliative care doctors and death doulas share what they know about the end – and how it informs the way they live.

Sailors and their families have lives on pause, uncertain if they'll return to Mideast

Sailors and family members who were evacuated from U.S. bases in the Middle East months ago are waiting for the military to figure out what will happen to the lives they left behind.

These swing voters in Nevada say they are not dismissing socialist candidates

In online focus groups, 10 of 12 Biden-to-Trump voters said they wouldn't automatically think negatively of a politician who identifies with socialism.

Stop the bites! How to survive another summer of mosquitoes, midges and horseflies

Dress like a zebra, wash your feet, keep off the beer: insect experts explain what works and what doesn’t – and why some of us get bitten more than others

It’s a good time to be a mosquito or other blood-sucking insect. In the UK and beyond, they are enjoying the summer heat, and there are lots of humans outdoors, some wearing very little, like an all-you-can-eat walking buffet. Some of the humans are drinking beer, which apparently makes them even more irresistible to mosquitoes. Many of us are warm and sweaty, which is all the better for the blood-suckers seeking us out.

Insect populations are changing because of the warming climate and there are organisations keeping an eye on invasive species, especially mosquitoes, which can be vectors for diseases such as dengue and malaria (globally, more than 600,000 people a year die from malaria). The UK “will have a threat from mosquito-borne diseases as time goes on,” says James Logan, professor of medical entomology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and CEO of Dot, an “odour intelligence” company. “The biggest threats are arboviruses [viruses transmitted by arthropods, especially insects and ticks], such as dengue. We have mosquitoes throughout [mainland] Europe now that can transmit dengue. We also know that we do get those mosquitoes coming across to the UK, but they don’t seem to be breeding here successfully and surviving over the winter.” But, he warns, with milder winters and warmer summers, it is only a matter of time.

Morning news brief

Primary results reveal divide among Democratic Party, new inflation report could give the Fed more time to bring inflation under control, rescues teams race to find survivors of Colombia earthquake.

Author discusses the common myths and stereotypes about domestic violence

Allegations of domestic violence against Congressman Max Miller, which he denies, have raised persistent stereotypes about abuse. NPR's Michel Martin talks to author Leslie Morgan Steiner.

How to keep babies and children safe in heatwaves

Biological factors mean a child’s core temperature rises faster than an adult’s – and that can result in a medical emergency

Children and babies are more vulnerable in heatwaves than healthy adults. As temperatures rise again, how do we keep children safe?

Nuclear power plants are being shut down as Europe’s drought becomes an energy crisis

Heat and drought are curbing nuclear output across Europe, with Romania starting the process of disconnecting its sole working reactor from the power grid.

The End of Tom Six review – Human Centipede director delivers one last freaky flick

Now living with multiple sclerosis, Six rants about the masturbation film distributors won’t touch and the money mystery behind his horror hit

Fifteen years ago, Dutch film-maker Tom Six succeeded where almost everybody fails – particularly in the world of horror. He actually shocked people. No self-respecting sophisticate admits to being shocked, of course, and no horror connoisseur will admit to being really and truly horrified. But Six really did freak audiences out with his extreme exploitation nightmare The Human Centipede, the first of a trilogy. It was a grenade in the faces of prim conformists, and also those badass horror fans who thought they’d seen it all.

The “human centipede” of the title is created by a sadistic surgeon who imprisons three young people in a basement and sews them together mouth-to-anus as a vivisectional experiment. Six himself had been a director on the original Dutch TV show Big Brother that started the global franchise, and it was easy to see how his movie masterwork was intended as a satire on consumerist voyeurism and cruelty. Or maybe it just sprang from the same dark creative place that gave birth to the TV phenomenon of the age.

You be the judge: should my girlfriend stop annotating her books?

Julie makes notes in the margin as she’s reading, but Charlie says she’s ruining books he may want to read. Should they get on the same page? You decide
• Find out how to get a disagreement settled or become a juror

It breaks my immersion in the stories – like when someone says ‘This next bit is so good’

‘I wanted to capture the range of British culture at the time’: the photographer who documented late nights on the 90s London tube

In the 1990s, Mark McEvoy took portraits of punks, partiers and late-night lovers on the underground. His images show city life before smartphones – when people still had to rush to make the final train

Mark McEvoy’s tube photographs, taken in London Underground carriages at around 11pm on Friday and Saturday nights from 1992 to 1995, capture moments that may seem superficially frivolous, but might be the most significant of our lives. These are the golden hours of the end of the week, where friendships are found and sealed; gabbled conversation rolls along with the sway of the carriages; and new lovers meet up en route for an encounter that may turn out to be a fleeting one-off, or in fact the beginnings of a lifelong companionship.

All are swept along in the scramble to hop onboard the last tube – a panic that ended when all-night services began on some lines 10 years ago this month. The night tube arrived when my time of going out all weekend was fading, and gave me a slight feeling of missing out. Looking at photos of other people’s social lives can make one feel like that too; at the same time, it’s not hard to see ourselves in these tired, happy and thoughtful faces.

Israeli militants besiege two Palestinian families in their West Bank homes

Settlers and soldiers cut off water and electricity to homes, and block medical care in campaign of terror

Israeli militants have besieged two Palestinian families in their homes since the weekend, aiming to take over their properties in the West Bank village of Qusra through a campaign of terror.

A group of settlers and soldiers set up a tent outside the home of Yousef Hassan’s family on Sunday afternoon, trapping him inside with his wife and two young daughters.

‘Living proof damaged landscapes can recover’: exploring a vast restored forest in southern Sweden

Söderåsen national park is one of Europe’s largest protected broadleaf woods, offering wild swimming, spectacular hiking trails and an inspiring story of regeneration

From the bus window, the ridge looks like a giant slumbering beast stretched deep green across the flat farmland. “It feels alive,” I say to the woman beside me. “Yes,” she answers. “It is where you would run for safety, don’t you think?”

I am in southern Sweden to explore Söderåsen national park, established in 2001 to protect more than 1,600 hectares (4,000 acres) of the larger Söderåsen ridgeline. Shaped over millennia by immense geological collisions, fractures, volcanic eruptions and ice ages, today it is one of northern Europe’s largest continuous protected broadleaf forests, and only 90 minutes by car from Copenhagen or, in my case, two hours by public transport.

Clacton byelection polls open with Farage up against slew of fringe candidates

Longest ballot in UK voting history features likes of Count Binface and Howling Laud Hope alongside Reform leader

Polls have opened in Clacton, with thousands of residents in the Essex seat to vote in a ballot featuring Nigel Farage and a range of novelty and fringe candidates led by Count Binface.

The Reform UK leader resigned as the MP for Clacton at the start of July and forced a byelection in an attempt to address complaints over a deepening scandal about gifts he received.

Sailors, shadows and a dog in a dress: heroes of the street – in pictures

From dazzling shifts in perspective to astounding tricks using shade, reflections and rain, these winning images from the Pure Street Photography awards all capture ‘marvellous moments of fleeting serendipity’

Can Nothing Save Us? by Irvine Welsh review – US family saga is a late-career triumph

The Scottish author focuses on gun culture and generational conflict in this darkly satirical tale about a great power in decline

“Why expect unconditional love from somebody you’ve brought into a fucked, dying planet, who then has to sit around and watch you screw it up even more?” So muses twentysomething college dropout Luke Ayrton on his parental lineage as he works the Las Vegas Strip, “comping girls for clubs” in Sin City. His job is to trawl the “plankton” of bacherlorette parties in order to lure the “whales” – rich men willing to spend to try to impress young women.

“In this game your sociology skills sharpened,” it’s observed, but beyond the seedy side hustle lie weightier concerns: the matter of his family legacy. Electronic dance music aficionado and aspiring writer Luke is estranged from his Maga-positive Mom and Dad, and now lives with grandparents George and Molly, affluent boomers with a countercultural past.

Taiwan says it was hit by ‘abnormal’ AI-assisted cyber-attack

Taiwan’s statement comes a day after reports that suspected China-linked hackers had carried out a first-of-a-kind breach

Taiwan says it detected AI-assisted cyber-attacks on government agencies that came from overseas last month, a new kind of threat that has been reported as “first-of-a-kind breach”.

The Ministry of Digital Affairs (MDA) said its cybersecurity monitoring units ‌detected the “abnormal attack” targeting government agencies, which began on 20 July. The National Institute of Cyber Security issued a series of warning alerts while it investigated.

Thursday news quiz: A speeding car, a police faux pas and an app that’s gone too far?

Test yourself on topical news trivia, pop culture and general knowledge every Thursday. How will you fare?

On this day in 1888, the mechanical mastermind John Logie Baird was born in Dunbartonshire. He was the pioneering inventor who first beamed a recognisable image across a room, giving the world the very first working television. Without his early experiments with biscuit tins, darning needles and bicycle lenses, half of the questions the Thursday quiz has asked would never have been possible. So tune in, turn up your mental brightness, and test your frequency with these 15 questions. Allons-y!

The Thursday news quiz, No 260

Rachel Roddy’s recipe for figs with raspberry cream and cat tongue biscuits | A kitchen in Rome

Combine these simple Italian baked treats with chilled fruit and thick cream for a playful summer pudding

In his exquisite The French Menu Cookbook, Richard Olney has clear ideas and strong opinions about everything, including dessert. He believed that rich desserts should follow only the simplest of meals, whereas with most menus (meaning all the sophisticated menus in his book), something light, airy and playful is best. His suggestions read like a summer fruit poem: peach melba, apple mousse with peaches, apricot fritters dusted with icing sugar, strawberries in sweetened orange juice, strawberries in beaujolais, strawberry mousse with raspberry puree, iced cherries and fresh almonds. One of his late summer/early autumn menus also suggests fresh figs with raspberry cream (figues à la crème framboise), which is both fun to make (the red puree streaking through the cream for a raspberry ripple) and to eat.

An airy and playful pudding calls for an airy and playful biscuit. What better than lingue di gatto, or cat tongues, so called because of their flat, elongated shape. Made from butter, sugar, flour, and egg whites, lingue di gatto are not complicated to make, but do require a piping bag, which can be mimicked by a zip-lock bag – just remember to scrape the mixture into the bag first, and only snip the end off when you are ready to pipe.

‘I ran away to Paris to be a writer and ended up begging’: Bill Nighy on dashed dreams, golf emojis and playing a cranky novelist

As his new film & Sons hits the screen, the actor turned podcast agony uncle relives his ‘cliched’ ambitions, deplores working lunches – and yearns to do the splits like Prince

A dying patriarch summons his brood for a dramatic announcement. It may not be the most original starting point for a movie, but & Sons adds an eccentric twist – one that it would be unfair to reveal here but which nudges the material into the realm of science fiction. The father in question is a revered novelist who is as reclusive as JD Salinger and as whiskery and dishevelled as Catweazle. Dormant for decades, the fictional AN Dyer is first glimpsed in a horizontal position on the sofa, refusing to come to the telephone: “I don’t do phonecalls,” he grumbles.

That is patently not true of the actor who plays him. “I spend a lot of time on the phone,” Bill Nighy says breezily. He is speaking to me from north-west London, where he has been nosing around bookshops. “I’m also an enthusiastic texter. I was always very quick on the old Nokia. Quite proud of myself, I was.” Where does he stand on emojis? “I used to be philosophically opposed. Most of them are a bit naff.” He then proceeds to list the exceptions. “I like the flamingo and the purple dahlia. I like the leaping shark. Sometimes I combine it with the leaping dolphin. Very occasionally, I like the golfer in mid-swing if I’m congratulating someone. I don’t do smiley faces.”

‘I’ve been on plenty of dates – but nothing happened’: are we looking at the death of the kiss?

Call it a crisis, call it a decline, call it a recession: the long, lusty snog is in trouble, harder to experience in real life or even watch on screen. But why? And what’s it like to think you may never lock lips with another?

Spencer’s last kiss was two years ago, on a first date. It started off promisingly: after matching on Tinder, they met for a walk, then got drinks and ice-cream, before having dinner at her place. Finally, they kissed. “I didn’t like it,” says Spencer. He still struggles to identify why. “I found her attractive. There was chemistry, but something was lacking. There was nothing behind the kiss – it felt like a mechanical thing to do.”

That wasn’t just Spencer’s most recent kiss – it was his first ever, at the age of 29. Now 31, he says a second kiss in some ways feels less possible than having sex: “The jump feels way bigger.”

India fuels worldwide jump in planned coal production

Rise in new mine proposals, mainly in states of Odisha and Jharkhand, comes despite plateau in global demand

Enough new coalmining projects were proposed last year to increase global supplies by 2.5bn tonnes a year, an increase of 11% from the year before, even as demand for coal plateaus, according to a new report.

Global Energy Monitor, an NGO, found that India ignited a rise in new coalmine proposals in 2025 despite a global slowdown in the number of mine openings because of falling demand for the fossil fuel.

An Amputation Obsession: the Monster and the Surgeon review – an engrossing story, if you can stomach it

This documentary follows the shocking case of Neil Hopper, a top surgeon who had his own legs removed due to a fetish.

No fetish or obsession is unique, and the internet can always connect you with others whose minds work the same way. It’s one of the great blessings and curses of the digital age, and central to An Amputation Obsession: the Monster and the Surgeon, a two-part documentary on which the “contains material some viewers may find disturbing” disclaimer is no exaggeration.

We begin at the Royal Cornwall hospital, known locally as Treliske, in Truro, Cornwall. It used to have a man on its staff who was a minor medical superstar: Neil Hopper, a vascular surgeon, was well known for his clinical expertise and comforting bedside manner, particularly when advising on and performing amputations. He acquired full hero status in 2019, when he was diagnosed with sepsis and had both legs amputated below the knee but miraculously returned to work within six months, astonishing physiotherapists and other medical professionals with how well he adapted to disability.

An Amputation Obsession: the Monster and the Surgeon is on Prime Video

ICE plans to give officers gloves that can deliver electric shocks

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers may soon be outfitted with gloves that can deliver painful electric shocks that are intended to gain compliance from combative individuals.

Surrogate gives birth to baby at center of multistate legal battle

Surrogate McKenna West declined to get an abortion requested by the intended parents after the baby she was carrying was diagnosed with a severe but treatable heart defect.

The comeback story of baby elephant after her mother rejected her

Linh Mai, a baby elephant born at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., was rejected by her mother. But after the zoo's elephant caretaker and a dozen others stepped in to help her, she has bonded with other elephants. Tony Dokoupil has the story.

Texas steps in as surrogate delivers baby, despite intended parents seeking abortion

California parents wanted to end a surrogate pregnancy when doctors diagnosed the baby with a severe heart defect at 20 weeks. The surrogate refused and went to Texas, where the state has now stepped in. The baby was born on Wednesday. Jason Allen reports.

Cerebras stock plunges 14% after second earnings report following IPO

Cerebras Systems reported better-than-expected second-quarter revenue and raised its full-year guidance.

What is credit card skimming, and how can you protect yourself?

A form of credit card theft known as skimming is on the rise as thieves install their own card readers to steal your information and money. It's a particular threat to users of EBT cards. Carter Evans reports on how to spot them and protect yourself.

Lindsay Clancy sobs in court as medical examiner describes children's injuries before they died

Lindsay Clancy had an emotional day in court on Wednesday in the trial for killing her three children. She's fighting murder charges, saying she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and overmedication. Shanelle Kaul reports.

Miraculous rescue gives moment of hope in Colombia after devastating earthquake

48 hours after the devastating earthquake in Colombia, its president said the death toll jumped to 181 people, and thousands were still reported missing. Lilia Luciano reports on a rescue effort in a hard-hit city.

11 charged for alleged sham marriages to help Chinese nationals get green cards

The DOJ unveiled criminal charges alleging 11 people participated in a scheme that involved more than 1,000 "sham marriages" between Chinese nationals and U.S. citizens.

2 killed as Apache helicopter from Fort Hood crashes in Salado, Texas

Two soldiers aboard an AH-64 Apache attack helicopter based out of Fort Hood were killed in a crash on Wednesday, according to local authorities and the Army.

Flash flood emergency hits Midwestern states

Illinois and Ohio were hit with a flash flood emergency this week as a long line of storms dumped heavy rain on the Midwest. Boats had to travel down what should be roadways for rescue efforts. Meg Oliver reports and Lonnie Quinn has the forecast.

Whole Foods recalls some jalapeño products over salmonella risk

Certain salsas, guacamole, pico de gallo and prepared jalapeño products at Whole Foods are among the products recalled over possible salmonella risk.