“The U.S. Senate voted Wednesday to confirm Dr. Erica Schwartz as the leader of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, finally installing a new director for the agency after nearly a year. Schwartz was deputy surgeon general during President Donald Trump’s first term. She is a retired U.S. Coast Guard officer and Navy physician. The vote Wednesday was 51-44, mostly along party lines, NBC News reported. Sen.Tim Kaine, D-Va., voted with Republicans to approve Schwartz.” (08/05/26)
“Rescuers worked on Thursday to douse fires and clear debris in Ukraine’s eastern city of Balakliia after Russian strikes on homes killed three overnight, authorities said on the Telegram messaging app. Three people were also killed overnight and at least 19 wounded in Russian attacks on settlements in the northern region of Sumy. … Both Russia and Ukraine deny targeting civilians in the war triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.” (08/06/26)
“Iran says it has reached an agreement with Oman on a route for shipping through the Strait of Hormuz. Foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei did not give any further details on the agreement, which he said was ‘in the final stages’. Baqaei warned, however, that a deal with Oman would not guarantee safe navigation through the strait, arguing security remained impacted by the US blockade of Iran’s ports. The US and Oman have not commented on the proposal. … His comments came after senior US officials said talks had progressed to allow shipments to potentially resume later this week, though Iran has maintained that it is not negotiating with the US and has no plans to do so.” (08/06/26)
“Bitcoin held above $64,600 on Thursday, up marginally on the day and 0.5% on the week, while the rest of the majors offered little in the way of direction. Attention is also on Elon Musk-owned SpaceX, where roughly $101 billion of stock becomes tradable Thursday as the first lockup expires. The company holds 18,712 BTC, worth about $1.1 billion at the end of June. Ether rose over 1% to $1,904 but remains down 0.7% over seven days.” (08/06/26)
“Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said Wednesday that his office is joining two other states in issuing a subpoena to Dr. Anthony Fauci, alleging that he ‘profited’ from the recommendations he gave during the handling of the Covid pandemic. Uthmeier, joined by West Virginia Attorney General John McCuskey and Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, said in a news release that he was issuing an investigative subpoena to Fauci for ‘an official investigation into awards, professional opportunities, financial incentives, grants, and Covid-19 guidance that impacted Florida businesses and consumers.’ … Uthmeier said Fauci’s entries detail ‘substantial awards,’ including grants, book deals and board positions, linked to his public recommendations as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases that affected Florida.” (08/05/26)
“The average rate on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rose to 6.81% last week, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Wednesday morning, the highest in a year. Mortgage applications fell 2.9%. It reflects a surge in global bond yields. Longer-term rates moved higher after Federal Reserve chairman Kevin Warsh offered little guidance as to whether or when the Fed may raise rates to combat elevated inflation. That has particularly cut into refinancing activity, the MBA said, with its Refinance Index falling 1.9%. … Mortgage News Daily, which updates an average rate each day, put the 30-year rate at 6.75% Tuesday, down from 6.82% at the start of the week.” (08/05/26)
“The White House on Wednesday released declassified information claiming the FBI opened an investigation into whether President Trump was acting as an asset for Russia when he fired FBI Director James Comey, a theory an administration official said was not backed up by evidence. The official said the investigation, known as Oxferd Comma, was a subcomponent of Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI probe into potential collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and the Russian government — an investigation that has long drawn Mr. Trump’s ire. The predicate of Oxferd Comma was the newly elected president’s decision to fire Comey in 2017.” (08/05/26)
“The Houthis, [the government of much of] Yemen, said Wednesday that they had struck a Saudi oil tanker in the northern Red Sea, and they threatened to intensify attacks there in an effort to close ‘all access routes’ to Saudi oil shipments. The Houthi military spokesman, Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, said the group had fired ballistic missiles at a Saudi tanker called Wafa near the Saudi port city of Yanbu, though he did not say when the attack had occurred. The Saudi authorities did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Houthis’ claim. The Houthis declared a blockade of Saudi shipping last month. The territory they control in Yemen is near the Bab al-Mandab Strait, a narrow waterway that leads into the southern end of the Red Sea.” (08/05/26)
“Congressional candidate Amir Hassan, whom President Donald Trump endorsed last month, appears headed for defeat in the Republican primary for Michigan’s 8th Congressional District, as he trails rival Thomas J. Smith, who suspended his campaign and endorsed another candidate less than three weeks before Election Day. With 99 percent of votes counted at the time of writing, according to Associated Press estimates, Smith led the three-way primary with 50.4 percent of the vote, compared with Hassan’s 33.2 percent and Al Lemmo’s 16.4 percent. Smith held a lead of more than 10,600 votes, larger than the estimated number of ballots left to count, meaning Hassan cannot catch him if the remaining-vote estimate is accurate.” (08/05/26)
“Anthropic’s Mythos model created fake online identities as it looked to pressure humans into approving malicious code updates to an open source project, marking yet another cyber incident carried out by a frontier AI system. The incident happened during a cyber evaluation where the U.K.-based AI Security Institute (AISI), a research body, had removed safeguards, disabled some safety filters, and deliberately given the models Internet access. OpenAI’s GPT-5.6-Sol was also involved in other cybersecurity incidents during the evaluation. It comes after a series of cyber breaches carried out by models developed by Anthropic and OpenAI in recent weeks.” (08/05/26)
