10 things you need to know today: August 26, 2015

(Image credit: (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan))

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1. Stocks remain volatile due to China fears
2. Trump jumps to huge lead over GOP field in New Hampshire
3. Pentagon watchdog looks into report of skewed intelligence on ISIS fight
4. Prosecutors file terrorism charge against suspect in French train attack
5. Trump battles Fox News and Univision
6. Judge temporarily halts executions in Mississippi
7. Two NATO soldiers killed in attack by gunmen in Afghan security force uniforms
8. Man who once jumped White House fence killed at courthouse
9. Schilling dropped from Little League series broadcast over anti-Muslim tweet
10. Marcy Borders, woman in a defining 9/11 photo, dies at 42

last updated 26 August 2015

1. Stocks remain volatile due to China fears

U.S. stocks rallied briefly from a day of huge losses before closing sharply lower on Tuesday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the day down more than 200 points, or about 1.3 percent. The S&P 500 Index fell by 1.4 percent, and the Nasdaq 0.4 percent. The Dow is now down 12 percent on the year. Fear has been growing among investors that trouble in China, the world's second largest economy, could spread. China's central bank cut a key interest rate to stabilize markets, but the benchmark Shanghai index still fell by 1.3 percent on Wednesday.

Donald Trump surged to his biggest lead yet in Public Policy Polling's latest survey of New Hampshire, with more than three times the support of his nearest rival in the race for the Republican presidential nomination. Trump had the backing of 35 percent of respondents, with Ohio Gov. John Kasich next at 11 percent. Trump wasn't included when PPP surveyed the state in April. Among Democrats, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders led national frontrunner Hillary Clinton, 42 percent to 35 percent.

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The Pentagon's inspector general has opened an investigation into whether officials at the U.S. Central Command have slanted intelligence assessments to give a more optimistic account of the fight against the Islamic State. At least one Defense Intelligence Agency analyst reported that officials had deleted negative conclusions from assessments prepared for President Obama and other policy makers. Officials at Centcom, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the White House declined to comment.

French prosecutors charged Ayoub el-Khazzani, the 26-year-old Moroccan suspect in last week's thwarted attack on a high-speed train, with making a "targeted and premeditated" terrorist assault. The Moroccan man's lawyers say he is not a terrorist, but a destitute man who was out to rob passengers. Prosecutors said he would have slaughtered people had five passengers, including three Americans, not intervened. Prosecutor François Molins said el-Khazzani watched a cellphone video calling for extremist violence minutes before boarding the train.

Fox News chief Roger Ailes called on Donald Trump to apologize for his latest attack on host Megyn Kelly, whom Trump sparred with in the first GOP presidential debate early this month. Trump, via Twitter, called Kelly a bad journalist this week. Ailes called the attack "disturbing." Trump also clashed with Univision anchor Jorge Ramos, who was ejected from a Trump event in Iowa on Tuesday for demanding details on Trump's immigration policy without being called on. "He can't just stand up and scream," Trump said. "He's obviously a very emotional person."

A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order on Tuesday blocking Mississippi from using two drugs in executions, temporarily halting the death penalty in the state. The decision by U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate came after three death-row inmates filed a lawsuit saying they could experience excruciating pain during a lethal injection in violation of the U.S. Constitution's Eight Amendment guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment. A Mississippi Department of Corrections spokeswoman said the state would appeal.

Two men in Afghan military uniforms opened fire Wednesday on a vehicle carrying NATO troops in southern Helmand province, killing two NATO soldiers, the U.S.-led coalition said in a statement. The attackers were killed when the NATO troops returned fire. NATO, which still has about 13,000 troops in the country to train Afghan forces, did not immediately release the slain soldiers' names or nationalities. It was the third so-called insider attack by assailants in Afghan security-force uniforms.

A man who jumped an outer wall by the White House in March was shot and killed at a Pennsylvania courthouse Tuesday after allegedly slashing a sheriff's deputy with a knife. A second deputy shot the man, 34-year-old Curtis Smith, after the attack at the security entrance to the Chester County Justice Center in West Chester. It was not immediately clear why Smith was at the courthouse. The wounded deputy had cuts on his hands and arm, and was hospitalized in stable condition.

ESPN pulled Curt Schilling from its Little League World Series broadcast team on Tuesday after he retweeted a post that said, "Only 5-10 percent of Muslims are extremists. In 1940, only 7 percent of Germans were Nazis. How'd that go?" The post promptly disappeared from his Twitter feed. The network said the tweet was unacceptable, and it had removed him "pending further consideration." Schilling had no argument with the punishment, saying, "Bad choices have bad consequences."

Marcy Borders, a 9/11 survivor whose photograph became one of the iconic images of the terror attacks, died this week a year after being diagnosed with stomach cancer. She was 42. Borders, then 28, worked as a legal assistant at the Bank of America on the 81st floor of 1 World Trade Center, but she was late to work that day. After the second of the Twin Towers fell, AFP photographer Stan Honda photographed her, stunned and covered in white dust. Borders suspected her cancer was related to 9/11.

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.