“Bettors on the prediction platform Polymarket made a killing with suspiciously timed wagers that the United States would attack Iran by February 28, the day President Donald Trump announced a bombing campaign against the Middle East nation. Bloomberg reported that six accounts on Polymarket, all newly created this month, ‘made around $1 million in profit’ by betting on the timing of the US attack on Iran. The accounts, according to Bloomberg, ‘had only ever placed bets on when US strikes might occur’, and ‘some of their shares were purchased, in some cases at roughly a dime apiece, hours before the first explosions were reported in Tehran.’ One account with the name Magamyman raked in over $515,000 by betting roughly $87,000 that ‘the US strikes Iran by February 28, 2026.'” (03/01/26)
“A federal judge on Friday extended an order protecting refugees in Minnesota who are lawfully in the U.S. from being arrested and deported, saying a Trump administration policy turns the ‘American Dream into a dystopian nightmare.’ U.S. District Judge John Tunheim granted a motion by advocates for refugees to convert a temporary restraining order that he issued in January into a more permanent preliminary injunction while the case develops further. The order applies only in Minnesota. But the implications of a new national policy on refugees that the Department of Homeland Security announced Feb. 18 were a major part of the discussion at a hearing held by the judge the next day.” (02/28/26)
“A candidate for the United Kingdom’s left-wing Green Party has comfortably won a closely-watched election for a vacant parliamentary seat, delivering an embarrassing defeat for Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour Party in one of its former strongholds. Results announced Friday showed the Greens’ Hannah Spencer, a 34-year-old councillor and plumber, had won 40.7 percent of the vote in the by-election in Gorton and Denton, a constituency in Greater Manchester that has been considered a secure Labour seat for almost a century. In an outcome that analysts said pointed to the fracturing of the UK’s traditional two-party politics, the hard-right candidate for the populist, anti-immigration Reform finished in second place.” (02/27/26)
“OPEC+ has agreed in principle to a modest oil output increase on Sunday, five OPEC+ sources said, after the U.S.-Israeli war on OPEC+ member Iran and Tehran’s retaliation led to shipment disruptions in the Middle East. OPEC+ has a history of raising oil output to cushion disruptions but analysts said the group currently has little spare capacity to add to supply, except for its leader Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who will also struggle to export oil until navigation in the Gulf returns to normal.” (03/01/26)
“Violent clashes between protesters and security forces in Pakistan’s southern port city of Karachi and in the country’s north left at least 22 people dead and more than 120 others injured as demonstrators supportive of the Iranian government attempted to storm a U.S. Consulate on Sunday, authorities said. In the north of the country, demonstrators attacked U.N. and government offices. The violence came after the United States and Israel attacked Iran, killing its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Police and officials at a hospital in Karachi said that at least 50 people were also wounded in the clashes and some of them were in critical condition.” (03/01/26)
“OpenAI announced it secured a deal to provide artificial intelligence services to the Defense Department hours after the Trump administration directed all federal agencies to stop using those provided by Anthropic. OpenAI is the San Francisco-based tech research company founded by Sam Altman, Elon Musk and others behind applications including ChatGPT and DALL-E. … Contract negotiations [sic] between the tech company and the Defense Department soured after the Trump administration demanded it be allowed to use the AI system for ‘all lawful purposes.'” [editor’s note: Demanding that an already in force contract be nullified to let you do anything you want is not “negotiation.” It’s just breaking the contract – TLK] (02/28/26)
“Thousands of supporters of Brazil’s former President Jair Bolsonaro demonstrated in cities across the South American nation on Sunday, as organizers hoped to build momentum for a right-wing victory in the upcoming presidential elections. Protesters draped in yellow and green – the colors of the national flag — took to the streets in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and the capital Brasilia to voice their opposition to current President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva who faces a tough reelection bid in October. … Bolsonaro is in prison, where he is serving a 27-year sentence for attempting a coup despite his 2022 electoral defeat to Lula.” (03/01/26)
“Iran has announced the formation of a three-member transitional council to handle the state duties following the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Ayatollah Alireza Arafi, member of a powerful constitutional watchdog, was appointed on Sunday to the temporary council, whose other two members are President Masoud Pezeshkian and Supreme Court Chief Justice Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Ejei. … According to Article 111 of the Iranian Constitution, the transitional council will govern the country until an 88-member panel called the Assembly of Experts chooses a new supreme leader after almost 37 years of rule by Khamenei. His killing on Saturday by the joint United States and Israeli forces has raised crucial questions about Iran’s future.” (03/01/26)
“The gunman who killed two people at a bar in Texas early Sunday in a mass shooting that left 14 others wounded was wearing a sweatshirt that said ‘Property of Allah,’ and another shirt with an Iranian flag design, a law enforcement official told The Associated Press. The shooter has been identified as 53-year-old Ndiaga Diagne, the law enforcement official and another person familiar with the matter said. The sources spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the investigation. The shooting erupted a day after Israel and the United States launched an attack on Iran that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The FBI said it was investigating the shooting as a potential act of terrorism. Diagne was originally from Senegal, according to multiple people briefed on the investigation. One of the people told the AP that Diagne came to the U.S. in 2006 and was a naturalized U.S. citizen.” (03/01/26)
“A resident shot a home intruder early Saturday morning. Authorities say the man tried to break into a residence in the 600 block of Saint James Street [in Rapid City, South Dakota]. Police responded to the home at around 3:25 a.m. after reports of a shooting. When officers arrived, they found a man with a single gunshot wound. He was transported to a local hospital, where he received treatment for serious but non-life-threatening injuries.” (02/28/26)
