Good Morning! Today’s edition is 1,027 words, a 4-minute read.

What’s on tap: 

• Democrats flee Texas to prevent vote

• Flesh-eating cases on the rise in the Gulf

• Having multiple secret jobs is the key to $1M+ salary

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Big Stories

Democratic Walkout in Texas

• About 30 Texas House Democrats fled to Illinois Sunday to deny Republicans the quorum needed to pass new congressional maps that would help the GOP pick up 5 House seats in the 2026 midterms. The lawmakers face $500-a-day fines and possible arrest under a 2023 law designed to punish legislative walkouts.

• Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, a potential 2028 presidential candidate, orchestrated the plan and is providing hotels and meeting spaces for their exodus. A House committee approved the maps Saturday, with Republican chair Cody Vasut openly admitting they were designed to help his party win more seats. "This map was politically based," Vasut told NBC News, calling it "totally legal, totally allowed and totally fair."

• The walkout echoes 2021 when Texas Democrats fled for three weeks to block an elections bill. "We're leaving Texas to fight for Texans," said Democratic Caucus Chair Gene Wu, vowing they won't allow disaster relief to be held hostage to what he called a "Trump gerrymander." With Republicans needing a quorum on Monday, the Democratic exodus effectively kills the special session unless they return.

FAA Investigation Reveals Fatal Negligence

• A National Transportation Safety Board investigation found a broken altimeter caused the helicopter in January's deadly Washington D.C. crash to fly 78 feet above its safety limit without the pilots realizing. The Black Hawk was flying at 278 feet when it collided with a passenger jet, killing 67 people, but the faulty gauge was reading 80 to 100 feet lower than the actual altitude. The NTSB also found similar altimeter problems in three other helicopters from the same unit.

• Officials knew this exact scenario could be deadly but ignored repeated warnings for years. An FAA working group documented increasing dangerous events around Reagan Airport and tried to add warnings to helicopter charts in 2022, but the agency refused. The NTSB found 85 near-misses in the three years before the crash, with controllers cramming planes through tight spaces using risky "squeeze plays" and saying they'd just "make it work."

• The FAA's response after the crash was to transfer managers out rather than acknowledge they'd been warned. During this week's hearings, both FAA and Army officials deflected blame instead of taking responsibility for the preventable deaths of elite figure skaters, families, and union workers. NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy erupted: 'Are you kidding me? Sixty-seven people are dead! How do you explain that? Our bureaucratic process?

Ethereum’s 10th Anniversary

• Ten years ago, developers in a Berlin loft launched Ethereum, an experiment that's quietly becoming the framework moving trillions of dollars as Wall Street races to build on it. Unlike Bitcoin, which works like digital gold for storing value, Ethereum created programmable money that could run applications and automatically execute contracts. Today it's a $420 billion platform that lets code move funds without traditional banking middlemen.

• Digital dollars on Ethereum now power $28 trillion in transactions annually, more than Visa and Mastercard combined. Major companies like BlackRock and Deutsche Bank are building financial services on the network because it can process in seconds what takes traditional banks days, while operating 24/7 at lower costs.

• Despite crypto's volatile reputation, companies choose Ethereum because its network has run continuously for ten years without major outages. Ethereum's creators believe the tech will eventually enable seamless global payments, automated loan approvals, and self-executing contracts for everything from mortgages to insurance claims.

Quick Stories

US News

• The Senate confirmed former Fox News host Jeanine Pirro as US attorney for Washington, D.C. in a 50-45 party-line vote Saturday night. (More)

• The Justice Department is requesting voter registration data from at least 15 states as part of Trump's crackdown on election fraud. (More)

• A minor 3.0 earthquake centered in New Jersey shook the New York area Saturday night with no injuries or damage reported. (More)

World

• India denied stopping Russian oil purchases after Trump threatened tariffs, saying decisions are based on economic factors, not politics. (More)

• Pope Leo XIV led mass for over a million young pilgrims in Rome, ending a week-long Catholic youth gathering from 146 countries. It was the largest young Catholic gathering in 25 years. (More)

• Torrential rains killed at least 70 people in northern China, dumping a month's worth of rainfall around Beijing in one week. (More)

Business & Economy

• US stock markets closed lower on Friday (S&P -1.60%, Nasdaq -2.40%, Dow -1.23%). The jobs report signal of a weakening economy gave each of the indexes its worst single-day decline in months. (More)

• OPEC+ agreed to raise oil production by 547,000 barrels per day in September amid concerns over potential Russian supply disruptions. (More)

• About 3,200 Boeing fighter jet workers will strike today after rejecting a contract offering 20% wage increases over four years. (More)

Sports & Entertainment

• Celtics owner Steve Pagliuca bought the Connecticut Sun for a record $325 million and plans to relocate the WNBA team to Boston. (More)

• The US set a world record in the women's 4x100 medley relay during the last event of the swim world championships, winning nine golds to Australia's eight overall. (More)

• Lando Norris won the Hungarian Grand Prix, cutting teammate Oscar Piastri's championship lead to just 9 points before the summer break. (More)

Science, Health, & Tech

• Men reached a record one-third of Pinterest's 570 million users, with searches spiking for Pilates, skincare routines, and parenting tips. (More)

• Delta says it won’t use AI to set ticket prices based on personal data, after lawmakers warned it could unfairly charge each person their “breaking point” price. (More)

• Gulf Coast officials warn of rising flesh-eating bacteria cases, with Louisiana reporting 17 cases and four deaths this summer compared to the usual seven cases. Florida confirmed 13 cases and four deaths this year. (More)

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