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    A reversal on Ukraine, new tariffs, and the measles crisis

     
    TODAY'S POLITICAL STORY

    Trump U-turns on weapons to Ukraine

    What happened
    President Donald Trump yesterday said the U.S. would resume sending weapons to Ukraine, because "they have to be able to defend themselves" against Russia's attacks. The administration last week paused critical weapons deliveries to Kyiv, citing concerns over dwindling U.S. stockpiles. But in recent days, Trump has expressed increasing frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the lack of progress in ending the more than three-year war. "I'm not happy with President Putin at all," Trump told reporters at the White House yesterday.

    Who said what
    Ukraine is "getting hit very, very hard" by Russia, Trump said. This is undoubtedly "a difficult moment for Ukraine," said The Associated Press, as the embattled nation faces "increasing, and more complex, air barrages from Russia."

    Trump's turnaround comes amid "warming ties" with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy (pictured above), said the Financial Times. But relations with Russia appear to be cooling, with Trump telling reporters at last month's NATO summit in The Hague that Putin was proving to be the "more difficult" partner to bring to the negotiating table.

    As well as sending previously approved weapons shipments, Trump could crank up the pressure on Putin by asking Congress to approve additional deliveries, said former U.S. National Security Council staffer David Shimer. "Lifting the pause is just a necessary first step," Shimer told The Wall Street Journal. "Now is the time for this administration to go further."

    What next?
    The White House National Security Council will meet today to discuss resuming weapons deliveries to Ukraine, sources told the Journal. Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said yesterday that the U.S. would continue to follow an "America First" strategy when considering military shipments.  

     
     
    Today's Trade story

    New tariffs set on 14 trading partners

    What happened
    President Donald Trump yesterday announced a new slate of tariffs scheduled to begin on August 1. Rates range from 25% to 40% tariffs on imports from 14 countries, including Japan, South Korea, Thailand and Bangladesh.

    Who said what
    It's "hard for me to circle the square" of hitting "two of our closest allies," Japan and South Korea, with tariffs, Wendy Cutler, the vice president of the Asia Society Policy Institute, told The Washington Post. The U.S. has "benefited from cooperation with them." 

    Trump's announcements come as BRICS nations meet for their annual summit in Brazil, where they released a joint statement voicing "serious concerns about the rise of unilateral tariff and nontariff measures." Trump responded by threatening an additional 10% tariff for "any country aligning themselves with the anti-American policies of BRICS." 

    What next?
    Although Trump has extended his tariff deadline, originally set to take effect tomorrow, the EU has been "aiming for an agreement in principle by Wednesday," said The Wall Street Journal. Trump had threatened to raise EU import fees to 50% unless a deal is struck.

     
     
    Today's health Story

    Measles cases surge to 33-year high

    What happened
    The U.S. has reached its highest annual measles cases tally since 1992, with 1,277 confirmed cases across 38 states and the District of Columbia, according to latest data from the Johns Hopkins University Center for Outbreak Response Innovation. Most of the infections are in Texas, but at least 155 people have been hospitalized nationwide, with three deaths from measles-related complications. 

    Who said what
    "It's only July," said CNN's chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta. "Let that settle in." This surge is "devastating," Claire Hannan, executive director of the Association of Immunization Managers, told The Washington Post. "We worked so hard to eliminate the threat of measles and to keep it at bay." 

    Measles was declared eliminated from the U.S. in 2000 but has seen a resurgence amid vaccine hesitancy. Less than 93% of kindergartners received the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine last year, below the 95% rate needed to prevent outbreaks. "People don't remember how sick this virus can make you – or how dead it can make you," Dr. Paul Offit, director of the vaccine education center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, told The Guardian. 

    What next?
    Public health experts warn that the U.S. will lose its measles elimination status if the outbreak continues at the current rate for longer than a year. A Senate committee will vote tomorrow on whether to advance the Trump administration's nominee to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Susan Monarez, who has said that "vaccines save lives."

     
     

    It's not all bad

    AI-designed paint could help cool down cities, slash energy bills and ease the urban heat island effect, according to researchers. Scientists from China, Singapore, Sweden and the U.S. have used machine learning to develop a new formula able to keep buildings at least 41 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than standard paint. In hot cities like Bangkok, coating 1,000 apartment roofs with this paint could save enough electricity to power 10,000 air conditioners for a year.

     
     
    Under the radar

    Retro tomatoes: a species is evolving backward

    Wild tomatoes on the Galápagos Islands are using chemical defenses reminiscent of their ancestors, according to a study published in the journal Nature Communications. The flowering plants have "started making a toxic molecular cocktail that hasn't been seen in millions of years," said the study.

    Tomatoes are nightshades, like potatoes and eggplants, that produce alkaloids, or "bitter toxins that protect the plants against predation," said the BBC. Researchers discovered tomatoes "on the older eastern islands produced alkaloids found in modern cultivated tomatoes" while tomato plants "on the younger western isles were making unique alkaloids." And the latter alkaloids were largely produced by ancestral tomatoes.

    Usually, evolution "moves forward, adapting organisms to current conditions," said Earth.com. The "idea that it can loop back and restore long-lost traits" is "considered highly unlikely."

    Interestingly, these tomatoes developed the ancestral trait using the same genetic route the ancestral plants did. Researchers identified a specific enzyme responsible for the tomatoes' alkaloid production and "confirmed its ancient roots," said ScienceAlert. 

    The plants may be "responding to an environment that more closely resembles what their ancestors faced," Adam Jozwiak, the lead author of the study, said to the BBC. The eastern islands are "biologically diverse and more stable," said IFLScience. But the western islands, where the plants are producing the ancient alkaloids, are "younger, the landscape is more barren, and the soil less developed." 

    This looks like evolution is "going backward," said the BBC. But what it really shows is the "amazing flexibility of evolutionary processes."

     
     
    On this day

    July 8, 1877

    The independent Vermont Republic established its constitution, which banned slavery prior to any U.S. state doing so. Vermont became the 14th state in 1791, and while several northern states went on to ban slavery, the practice would not be outlawed nationwide until the passage of the 13th Amendment in 1865. 

     
     
    TODAY'S newspaperS

    'All-out war on illegal immigration'

    Trump plans "major crackdown" on "naturalized citizens suspected of unlawfully obtaining their US citizenship," in an "all-out war on illegal immigration," the Miami Herald says. "Surging immigration enforcement across the country" leaves federal agents "hurt and hospitalized" as they make "increasingly public and risky" arrests, says USA Today. President also "intensifies trade skirmish with allies," says The Boston Globe. In Dallas, "death toll rises, hopes ebb," says The Dallas Morning News, as the search for flood survivors continues. 

    ► See the newspaper front pages

     
     
    Tall tale

    Cancel the caviar and Champs

    Norway's state-owned lottery has apologized after a conversion error meant thousands of players were mistakenly told they had won big on the Eurojackpot draw. Prizes were multiplied by 100 rather than divided by 100 when converting payouts from euros to Norwegian kroner, leaving players like Elise Dalen believing they had won 1.2 million kroner ($1.18 million) rather than 110 kroner ($11). "You can probably buy something cool with that too," Dalen said to Norwegian state broadcaster NRK.

     
     

    Morning Report was written and edited by Nadia Croes, Catherine Garcia, Jessica Hullinger, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Justin Klawans, Summer Meza, Chas Newkey-Burden, Devika Rao, Rafi Schwartz, Peter Weber and Kari Wilkin, with illustrations by Marian Femenias-Moratinos.

    Image credits, from top: Ida Marie Odgaard / Ritzau Scanpix / AFP via Getty Images; Kevin Carter / Getty Images; Adriaticfoto / Shutterstock; Illustration by Marian Femenias-Moratinos / Getty Images
     

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