Today's HEALTH CARE story

Judge halts GOP defunding of Planned Parenthood

What happened
A federal judge in Massachusetts ruled yesterday that the Trump administration can't withhold Medicaid funds from Planned Parenthood under a provision of the recently passed Republican "big, beautiful" megabill. The preliminary injunction, a nationwide expansion of a narrower order issued earlier this month, comes as the White House works to defund the women's health care provider, citing its abortion services.

Who said what
The new GOP law likely violates Planned Parenthood's constitutional rights by singling it out for punishment, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani said in yesterday's ruling, and the organization's patients are "likely to suffer adverse health consequences where care is disrupted or unavailable." The judge found that the administration was trying to "indirectly squeeze clinics" into dropping their abortion services "using Medicaid payments as leverage," said The New York Times.

Federal law already prohibits using Medicaid to cover abortion costs. Planned Parenthood member locations "stand to lose over a third of their aggregate revenue" from the Trump-backed law, said Axios.

What next?
The White House has filed an appeal of Talwani's earlier ruling. Barring action from the appeals court, said the Times, her broader ruling will likely "stay in effect for the time being."

Today's INTERNATIONAL Story

Thailand, Cambodia agree to ceasefire in border fight

What happened
Cambodia and Thailand agreed to an "immediate and unconditional" ceasefire yesterday after five days of intense fighting along their shared border. The ceasefire, negotiated in Malaysia with involvement from the U.S. and China, took effect at midnight. At least 38 people, most of them civilians, were killed and more than 300,000 displaced in the recent violence, the worst between the two Southeast Asian nations in more than a decade.

Who said what
"This is a vital first step towards a de-escalation and a restoration of peace and security," Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said at a news conference in Putrajaya, flanked by Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet and acting Thai Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai (all pictured above).

Cambodia and Thailand, "which both amassed troops in their border regions, blamed each other for instigating the violence and said they acted in self-defense," The Washington Post said. The two countries have "wrangled for decades over border territory," Reuters said, and this skirmish, which began with an exchange of fire that killed a Cambodian soldier in May, led to a "full-blown diplomatic crisis that brought Thailand's fragile coalition government to the brink of collapse."

What next?
It was "unclear" if yesterday's agreement "would lead to a genuine truce," The New York Times said. The ceasefire announcement included no details on how it would be enforced or "who would verify if it was being upheld," and "nationalist feelings are still running high on both sides."

It's not all bad

After moving to rural Tunbridge, Vermont, and finding that there was limited cell service for miles, electrical engineer Patrick Schlott began fixing up old pay phones and installing them around town. The phones connect through an internet telephone line that converts to an analog line, and Schlott covers the $8 a month in costs so his neighbors can make calls for free. "It's cool to see something retro that has that old-school appeal but also works," he told The Associated Press.

Under the radar

Clues about life on Earth may be stuck on Mars

The mystery of how life on Earth originated, and whether it exists elsewhere in the universe, is the "raison d’être of space exploration," said Louis Friedman, the co-founder of the Planetary Society. The answer, he said in The Washington Post, "might be in one of the test tubes now sitting on Mars." But the samples, collected by NASA's Perseverance rover, "seem doomed to endlessly wait for no answer" because Donald Trump is cancelling the mission to bring them home.

Since Perseverance touched down on the Red Planet in February 2021, the "car-size, nuclear-powered robot" has been gathering samples for delivery to Earth, where "close-up inspection" might provide the "first compelling evidence of life beyond Earth," said Scientific American — unless, that is, the Trump administration "gets its way." The president's recent "budgetary bombshell" proposes to cut NASA's funding by a quarter and "entirely eliminate the Mars Sample Return program," which the White House claims is "grossly over budget."

The samples will be collected by "human missions to Mars," the White House maintains. But that's "nonsense on several levels," Scott Hubbard, a Stanford University scientist and NASA's inaugural Mars program director, told Scientific American. "I know of no credible 'humans to Mars' scenario that's earlier than 2039 or 2040."

The answers to how life began could also "advance" fields like robotics, artificial intelligence, communications, synthetic biology, chemistry and more, said Scientific American. This is why China and India are pursuing similar missions. "By abandoning the return of Mars samples to other nations, the U.S. abandons the preeminent role that JFK ascribed to the scientific exploration of space" in his 1962 Rice University speech, said a 2023 NASA independent review of the project.

On this day

July 29, 2005

Astronomers announced the discovery of Eris, a celestial body that was believed to be the 10th planet in the solar system. However, after scientific consideration, Eris was determined to be a dwarf planet and was officially designated as such the following year. Eris remains the largest object in the solar system that hasn't been visited by a spacecraft.

TODAY'S newspaperS

'Return to war yields little but misery'

President Donald Trump vows "U.S. and Europe will provide more aid to Gaza," The Wall Street Journal says on Tuesday's front page. "Israel's return to war yields little but misery," The New York Times says. But "Israelis call images of starvation fake, rebuffing Trump," the Los Angeles Times says, while in the U.S., "casino shooting in Reno kills 3." "Gunman kills 4 in NYC skyscraper," The Boston Globe says. "New whistleblower challenges judicial nominee" Emil Bove, alleging he "misled Congress in hearings," The Washington Post says. Federal judge rules that "Planned Parenthood must stay reimbursed by Medicaid," The Dallas Morning News says. "Dissension grows among anti-abortion groups after Roe abolished," says the Houston Chronicle.

► See the newspaper front pages

Tall tale

A public pooh-poohing

Social media users are making it clear they think the Toronto Transit Commission's new name for fare inspectors, Provincial Offenses Officers (POO), stinks. Many wondered how the POO acronym was approved, and in a snarky response, the commission said it refers to the Provincial Offenses Act of 1990, adding, "We thank the snickering, puerile 12-year-old boys who dominate the internet for their insights." That reply did not go particularly well. "Lighten up," one commentator retorted.

Morning Report was written and edited by Theara Coleman, Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Scott Hocker, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Justin Klawans, Harriet Marsden, Summer Meza, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz, Peter Weber and Kari Wilkin, with illustrations by Stephen Kelly and Julia Wytrazek.