“A federal judge sided with the Sierra Club and other groups Sept. 1 to halt a controversial data center project outside Boulder City, Nevada, southeast of Las Vegas. Backed by the Trump administration, the project had come from Townsite Solar 2 LLC, a Houston-based company that had previously received approval for a solar farm in the same location. The legal setback marks a high-profile failure for what would have been the first data center on federal land. Though both the Trump administration and the tech industry seek to build more data centers to support generative artificial intelligence technology like ChatGPT, public sentiment has largely turned against them, particularly in areas plagued by drought, and where people worry about rising energy bills and access to public land.” (09/11/26)
“British MPs threw out a bill legalizing assisted dying for terminally ill adults in England and Wales Friday. In a narrow vote, MPs rejected the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill’s second reading by 286 to 270. The decision was a marked contrast to a near identical bill by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, which received two votes of support from MPs in 2024 and 2025. The legislation failed to become law after running out of time in the unelected House of Lords earlier this year.” (09/11/26)
“Yemen’s Houthis have seized Perim Island in the Bab el-Mandab Strait, tightening their grip on the strategic waterway, a local government official and eyewitnesses told AFP on Friday, September 11. Boats carrying armed Houthi fighters reached Perim, also known as Mayyun, after [Saudi puppet regime] forces withdrew from the island on Thursday, the official said. Reuters separately reported that Houthi forces had reached Dhubab, a coastal town on the strait directly opposite Perim, strengthening their position around the waterway. The advance follows the Houthis’ capture of the Red Sea port city of Mocha on Thursday, September 10, as their forces pushed south along Yemen’s western coast towards Bab el-Mandab. Perim sits inside the strait and divides the waterway into two shipping channels.” (09/11/26)
“The Supreme Court on Thursday blocked an order that told Missouri to keep implementing Republicans’ favored 7-1 congressional map, which sparked confusion about what boundaries would be used in the November election. By lifting that federal judge’s directive, it leaves in place a state court directive that tells elections officials to return to the existing map with a 6-2 split. The GOP had pushed for a pickup opportunity as part of the mid-decade redistricting war. Missouri state leaders have said reverting would cause chaos, as they already conducted their primaries using the new map. The Supreme Court did not publicly explain its decision, and no justice publicly noted a dissent.” (09/10/26)
“At least two people were killed in a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s Tula region, while eight people were injured in Russian air strikes which caused a fire in a nine-storey apartment building in Kyiv on Friday morning, the authorities said. … Russia returned to its near-constant air attacks on Kyiv this week after a brief halt during the visit to Moscow and Kyiv of U.S. President Donald Trump’s negotiators seeking to end the war which the Kremlin started by invading Ukraine in 2022.” (09/11/26)
“Leaders of the BRICS nations will meet in New Delhi this weekend as wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and U.S.-China tensions test the group’s ability to act together. Host India will seek to balance its ties with China and Russia against its growing partnerships with the United States and other Western powers. Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian are among the leaders expected to attend. BRICS is a grouping of major emerging markets and developing countries, named after an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. It has expanded from its original membership to include 11 countries that together represent about half the world’s population and a large share of its energy, resources and economic output.” (09/11/26)
“A longtime ally of Donald Trump resigned from his post leading a Department of Justice investigation into whether former law enforcement and intelligence officials conspired against the Republican president. ‘Sometimes people want things done faster and that’s all you can do,’ Joe diGenova said on Thursday. He appeared to be referring to concerns among other Trump loyalists that the president’s retribution cases were not moving quickly enough. … DiGenova had previously asked the then US attorney general, Pam Bondi, to appoint him to the job and had openly and repeatedly claimed Trump was the victim of an intelligence community conspiracy. But five months later, no charges have been brought, and it remains unclear whether any will be, or what information has been gathered to support any basis for the idea of a plot against Trump by the government officials who investigated him.” (09/10/26)
“Algeria decided to sever diplomatic relations with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) after what it described as the ‘exhaustion of all means to preserve bilateral ties’, Algerian state media said on Thursday. Algeria accused the UAE of ‘provocative and hostile acts’, without providing details in a statement released by the foreign ministry. … Shortly after Algeria’s announcement, Anwar Gargash, diplomatic adviser to the UAE president, said on X that diplomatic relations should be based on ‘rationality, communication and clarity of interests’, rather than ‘riddles and signals that require decoding’.” (09/10/26)
“The city of Denver filed a lawsuit Thursday to block Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers from going to voting sites. The lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Secretary Markwayne Mullin argues that ordering federal officers to carry out detainments and serve warrants violated the ‘troops at polls’ law. The troops at polls law, established by Congress during the Civil War, imposed fines and potential jail time for federal officers who show up to ‘any place where a general or special election is held, unless such force be necessary to repel armed enemies of the United States.'” (09/10/26)
“US wholesale inflation picked up more than expected in August, government data showed Thursday, driven by higher energy costs in the month – particularly for diesel – as the US war with Iran continued. Rising prices at the pump are squeezing US households and businesses weeks ahead of key midterm elections, pressuring President Donald Trump’s administration, as average diesel costs hit new highs. The Producer Price Index (PPI) was up 5.4 per cent year-on-year last month, the Department of Labour said. This was a significant acceleration from the 4.8 per cent rise in July and above the 5.3 per cent that economists expected in a consensus forecast published by MarketWatch.” (09/10/26)
