News From Around the Web
#1 New Laws in 2026 Target AI and Deepfakes, Paid Leave and Rising Obamacare Premiums - Maya Rosenberg for NBC News, Local 3 News, Luciana Moherdaui - esta conta é pessoal, Judy Graves, KATV News, Joel Pollak, and Gavin Newsom/Gate Keeper on X
As the country prepares to ring in the new year, new state laws will take effect around the country on a host of issues, including the use of artificial intelligence in health care and elections, paid family and medical leave and rising medical insurance costs. Some states are looking for ways to soften the blow of higher health care premiums as Affordable Care Act tax subsidies expire after Congress failed to extend them. And on the verge of the coming year’s midterm elections, a slew of more restrictive voting laws are taking effect. Here are some of the laws that go live in 2026...
#2 Trump Administration Says It’s Freezing Child Care Funds to Minnesota After Series of Fraud Schemes - Hallie Golden for AP, Armstrong Williams, Mario Nawfal, Tosca Austen, Jay Sekulow, and Pioneer Press on X
President Donald Trump’s administration announced on Tuesday that it’s freezing child care funds to Minnesota and demanding an audit of some day care centers after a series of fraud schemes involving government programs in recent years. Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services Jim O’Neill said on the social platform X that the move is in response to “blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country.” Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz pushed back on X, saying fraudsters are a serious issue that the state has spent years cracking down on, but that this move is part of “Trump’s long game.” “He’s politicizing the issue to defund programs that help Minnesotans,” Walz said...
#3 US Poised to End 2025 With the Largest One-Year Drop in Homicides Ever Recorded - Bill Hutchinson for ABC News, Norm Roulet, Charleston Gazette-Mail, 10TV, Daniel Fisher, and Rev Dr Charles Harrison on X
This year began with a deadly New Year's Day car-ramming terrorist attack in New Orleans and is finishing with a flurry of horrific shootings, including a mass shooting at Brown University, but 2025 is also poised to end with the largest one-year drop in U.S. homicides ever recorded, according to data from cities both large and small. Based on a sampling of preliminary crime statistics from 550 U.S. law enforcement agencies, the year is expected to end with a roughly 20% decrease in homicides nationwide, Jeff Asher, a national crime analyst, told ABC News.
#4 Notable Deaths 2025 - Ben Milneand and James Percy for BBC News, Vale50Plus, Boston Globe Sports, Paul Litterick, Keep Belfast British, AARP, and RK PR Solutions on X
There were a number of notable deaths in 2025, from iconic musicians and actors to religious and political figures. This year, we bid farewell to the "Prince of Darkness," a pioneer of the Neo-Soul sound, and the "Chimpanzee Lady." Sad fact of life: We're born, we live a little while, we die. So while 2025 has been filled with exciting new celebrity babies, we've lost our fair share of beloved celebs as well. Last year, fans had to say goodbye to some Hollywood heavy-hitters, including Liam Payne, Maggie Smith, and Quincy Jones—and this year hasn't been any easier. From legendary director David Lynch to Aubrey Plaza's husband, Jeff Baena, let's take a look back at all the stars we've lost in 2025...
#5 IRS Hands Workers Bigger Tax Break for Business Expenses in 2026 - Daniella Genovese for FOXBusiness, Financial Express, Karoline Leavitt/Ty Loomis, Work to Wealth, Chris Fleming/Undercover White Hat, and Sandpot on X
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) announced this week that the standard mileage rate for business driving will increase by 2.5 cents per mile. Additionally, vehicles used for medical purposes will decrease by half a cent, which the agency said reflects "updated cost data and annual inflation adjustments." The standard mileage rate is an IRS-set figure, which is expressed in cents per mile, that is used to calculate the deductible costs of using a personal vehicle for business purposes when filing federal income taxes. Self-employed individuals, gig workers, freelancers, and small businesses who use personal vehicles for business can claim the standard mileage deduction on their tax returns. However, the standard mileage rate is also calculated for vehicles used for medical purposes, moving purposes for active-duty members, and for charity work.
#6 Farmers Are About to Pay a Lot More for Health Insurance - Sarah Boden and Drew Hawkins for npr, Republicans For A Better Government, Thinkwakeup/NancyNunes, Carlos Turcios/Eric Daugherty/Mok, Iowa Democrats, and Devin Nunes' Cattle Dog/Salva for the Soul on X
It's been a tough year for farmers. Between falling prices for commodity crops like corn and soybeans, rising input costs for supplies like fertilizer and seeds, the Trump tariffs, and the dismantling of USAID, many in agriculture won't be profitable this year. The enhanced subsidies that many Americans, including farmers, rely on to purchase health insurance are set to expire at the end of this month. James Davis, 55, who grows cotton, soybeans, and corn in north Louisiana, said he doesn't know how he and his wife will afford coverage next year, when their insurance premium will quadruple, jumping to about $2,700 a month...#7 Trump Bars 5 Europeans From the U.S. Over Their Censorship Efforts - J.D. Tuccille for Reason, Nancy Levine Stearns, Oden, Ian Dobson, Miloš Hampl, and Nick Rizzo on X
Two days before Christmas, the European Commission—essentially the executive branch of the European Union (E.U.)—protested U.S. travel restrictions against five residents of the bloc. According to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the five were sanctioned for "organized efforts to coerce American platforms to censor, demonetize, and suppress American viewpoints they oppose." Whether the penalties were appropriate is worth a conversation, but there's no doubt the five played a role in growing efforts by government officials in the E.U.—and elsewhere, including the U.S.—to muzzle views they don't like...#8 Two African Nations Ban American Citizens in Diplomatic Tit-For-Tat Following Trump Admin Move - David Unsworth for Fox News, Michael Seger, YepFedUp, African News, Ishaq Samaila, and Benjamin Amaechi 2 on X
Two West African nations have issued a simultaneous ban on American citizens in a diplomatic tit-for-tat move, amidst heightened tensions with both the United States and Europe, and as Russia seeks to increase its economic and geopolitical influence in the region. Mali and Burkina Faso made the move in response to the Trump administration's Dec. 16 expansion of travel restrictions to more than 20 countries. The policy particularly affected the African continent, with Chad, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Libya, Niger, Republic of the Congo, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Sudan, and Sudan also being subject to travel restrictions...#9 The Silver Correction - Portfolio Armor for Zerohedge, Nikhil Gangil/Prabhakar Singh Bais, StockChaser, Anjaneya | RocketStocks, Aashish Jain, and DiscvrAI on X
After an almost vertical move higher, the CME hiked margin requirements on silver futures again, and we got a fast, ugly flush: double-digit intraday drops, headlines about “speculative excess,” and miners getting hit even harder than the metal. (The Economic Times) That’s the kind of tape that makes late longs puke, and tourists swear off commodities for a while. It’s also the kind of tape that tends to create opportunity if the underlying bull case is still intact. One of the more thoughtful voices on that bull case has been Alexander Campbell of Campbell Ramble, who has been early and loud on this trade. Campbell previously ran commodities at Bridgewater Associates before founding a financial data platform. His latest post, “10 Silver Days of Christmas”, laid out both why a pullback was likely and why he still thinks silver’s structural setup is extremely bullish...
#10 After 44 Years, MTV Is Officially Ending the Last of Its 24-Hour Music Channels on a Global Scale - Steve Seigh for JoBlo, World of Statistics/JohnNguyen, Eric Alper, Iรαɓεℓ, La Abuela García®™, and Jono Read on X
What is this world coming to? Just when you thought 2025 beat the dollar signs out of your bank account and gave you too many reasons to go back to therapy, it’s ready to deal another blow before a new year introduces a host of other problems to sift through. Am I being too pessimistic? Too bad! One of the most formative aspects of my childhood is dying, and I need somewhere to put my feelings. After forty-four years, MTV is going the way of the dodo. Pour one out, folks, because MTV‘s remaining 24-hour music channels will soon shut down globally...Full Circle - The last song played was the first song played in 1981...
