general

WASHINGTON — One year after Trump retook the White House and set into motion a dramatic expansion of executive power, the Republican president figures prominently in state and local elections being held Tuesday.

The results of those contests — the first general election of Trump’s second term — will be heralded by the victors as either a major repudiation or resounding stamp of approval of his second-term agenda. That’s especially true in high-profile races for Virginia and New Jersey governor, New York City mayor and a California proposition to redraw its congressional district boundaries.

More than half of the states will hold contests on Tuesday. Here’s a look at some of the major statewide and local races on the ballot:

Governors: New Jersey and Virginia

In New Jersey, Democrat Mikie Sherrill and Republican Jack Ciattarelli are the nominees to succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy. Sherrill is a four-term U.S. representative and former Navy helicopter pilot. Ciattarelli is a former state Assemblyman backed by Trump. In 2021, Ciattarelli came within about 3 percentage points of toppling Murphy.

In Virginia, Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears and Democratic former U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger look to replace term-limited Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. While Spanberger has made some efforts to focus on topics other than Trump in stump speeches, the president remained a major topic of conversation throughout the campaign, from comments Earle-Sears made about him in 2022 to some of his more polarizing policies, such as the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill tax and spending cut measure and the widespread dismissal of federal workers, many of whom live in northern Virginia.

Trump was scheduled to participate in telephone rallies for the candidates on Monday night.

As the only gubernatorial races held in the year following a presidential election, the contests have long served as the first major test of voter sentiment toward the party holding the White House. In every race for governor since 1973, one or both states have elected a governor from a party different than that of the sitting president.

New York City Mayor

The race to lead the nation’s largest city features Democratic state legislator Zohran Mamdani, independent candidate and former Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Republican Curtis Sliwa.

Mamdani’s comfortable victory over Cuomo in the June primary generated excitement from the party’s more progressive wing and apprehension among the party establishment. Party leaders like Gov. Kathy Hochul and U.S. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries eventually endorsed the self-described democratic socialist months after he won the nomination.

The winner will replace outgoing Mayor Eric Adams, who initially sought renomination as a Democrat. After losing the primary Adams opted to run as an independent, but dropped out of the race in September and eventually endorsed Cuomo. In February, the Trump Justice Department asked a court to drop corruption charges against Adams because the case impeded Trump’s “ immigration objectives.” Trump later said he’d like to see both Adams and Sliwa drop out of the race in an effort to defeat Mamdani.

California Proposition 50

California voters will decide a statewide ballot measure that would enact a new congressional map that could flip as many as five Republican-held U.S. House seats to Democratic control.

Proposition 50, championed by Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, is in response to a new Texas map that state Republicans enacted in August as part of Trump’s efforts to keep the U.S. House under Republican control in the 2026 midterms. The Texas plan, which could help Republicans flip five Democratic-held U.S. House seats, has sparked an escalating gerrymandering arms race among states to pass new maps outside of the regular once-a-decade schedule.

Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Control of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court will be at stake when voters cast Yes or No votes on whether to retain three justices from the high court’s 5-2 Democratic majority.

Partisan control of the court could have major implications for the 2028 presidential race, since justices might be asked to rule on election disputes, as they did in 2020. Spending on Tuesday’s contests is on track to exceed $15 million as Republicans have campaigned to end the majority and Democrats have responded.

If all three justices are ousted, a deadlock in the confirmation process to replace them could result in a court tied at 2-2. An election to fill any vacant seats for full 10-year terms would be held in 2027.

Other notable contests

VIRGINIA ATTORNEY GENERAL: Republican incumbent Jason Miyares seeks a second term against Democrat Jay Jones. Much of the fall campaign has focused on text messages suggesting violence against political rivals that Jones sent in 2022.

TEXAS-18: Sixteen candidates hope to fill a vacant congressional seat previously held by the late Democratic U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner.

STATE LEGISLATURES: Control of the Minnesota Senate and Virginia House of Delegates is at stake, while New Jersey Democrats defend their 52-28 General Assembly majority.

BALLOT MEASURES: Maine voters will decide statewide questions on voting and a “red flag” law aimed at preventing gun violence. Texas’ 17 ballot measures include constitutional amendments on parental rights and limiting voting to U.S. citizens. Colorado and Washington also have statewide measures on the ballot.

MAYORS: Detroit, Pittsburgh, Jersey City and Buffalo will elect new mayors, while incumbents in Atlanta, Minneapolis and Cincinnati seek another term.

Yoon writes for the Associated Press.

SACRAMENTO — Atty. General Rob Bonta said Monday that he anticipates the Trump administration, which last week announced plans to use federal election monitors in California, will use false reports of voting irregularities to challenge the results of the Nov. 4 special election.

Bonta, California’s top law enforcement officer, said on a call with reporters that he is “100%” concerned about false accusations of wrongdoing at the polling places.

Bonta said it would be “naive” to assume Trump would accept the results of the Nov. 4 election given his history of lying about election outcomes, including his loss to President Biden in 2020.

The attorney general also warned that Trump’s tactics may be a preview of what the country might see in the 2026 election, when control of the U.S. House of Representatives — and the fate of Trump’s controversial political agenda — will be at stake.

“All indications, all arrows, show that this is a tee-up for something more dangerous in the 2026, midterms and maybe beyond,” Bonta said.

The U.S. Department of Justice last week announced it would send election monitors to five California counties where voters are casting ballots in the Proposition 50 election to decide whether to redraw state’s congressional boundaries.

Federal election monitors will visit sites across Southern California and in the Central Valley, in Fresno, Kern, Los Angeles, Orange and Riverside counties, the Justice Department said last week.

Gov. Gavin Newsom called the move an “intimidation tactic” aimed at suppressing support for Proposition 50 and inappropriate federal interference in a state election.

While federal monitoring is routine, particularly in federal elections, it recently has been viewed with heightened skepticism from both parties. When the Justice Department under President Biden announced monitoring in 86 jurisdictions across 27 states during last November’s presidential election, some Republican-led states balked and sought to block the effort.

Democrats have been highly suspect of the Trump administration’s plans for monitoring elections, in part because of Trump’s relentless denial of past election losses — including his own to Biden in 2020 — and his appointment of fellow election deniers to high-ranking positions in his administration, including in the Justice Department.

The California Republican Party requested the election monitors and cited several concerns about voting patterns and issues in several counties, according to a letter it sent to the Dept. of Justice.

Bonta, in his remarks Monday questioned the GOP claims, and denied the existence of any widespread fraud that would require federal election monitors. He compared the monitors to Trump’s decision to dispatch the National Guard to Democratic-led cities, despite an outcry from local politicians who said the troops were not necessary.

More broadly, Bonta told reporters that the Trump administration appears to be ready to fight the Nov. 4 results if Prop. 50 passes.

“People vote and you accept the will of the voters — that’s what democracy is. But that’s not what they’re teeing themselves up to do based on everything that we’ve seen, everything that’s been said,” said Bonta, describing Trump’s recent call on social media for Republicans to “wake up.”

Bonta also said that the state would dispatch observers — potentially from his office, the secretary of state and county registrars — to watch the federal monitors at polling places.

Early voting has already started in California, with voters deciding whether to temporarily reconfigure the state’s congressional district boundaries. The Democratic-led California Legislature placed the measure on the Nov. 4 ballot in an effort to increase their party’s numbers in the U.S. House of Representatives .

Gov. Gavin Newsom and other backers of the measure have said they generally support independent redistricting processes and will push for nonpartisan commissions nationwide, but argued that Democrats must fight back against Trump’s current efforts to have Republican states reconfigure their congressional districts to ensure the GOP retains control of Congress after the 2026 election.

Natalie Baldassarre, a spokesperson for the U.S. Dept. of Justice, declined to comment on Bonta’s remarks. Baldassarre also declined to say how many election monitors would work in California.

Federal election monitors observe polling places to ensure compliance with the federal voting rights laws, and are trained to observe and act as “flies on the wall,” said David Becker, executive director of the nonpartisan and nonprofit Center for Election Innovation and Research, in an interview last week.

“Generally, what you do is walk inside, stay off to the side, well away from where any voters are, and take some notes,” said Becker, an attorney who formerly worked in the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

Oct. 23 (UPI) — The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions has scheduled a virtual confirmation hearing for surgeon general nominee Dr. Casey Means five months after she was nominated.

The hearing is scheduled on Oct. 30, and Means, 38, who is pregnant, will be in Kilauea, Hawaii, when she testifies remotely, ABC News reported.

If the committee votes in favor of her recommendation, she then would be subject to a confirmation vote before the full Senate.

President Donald Trump cited her “impeccable” credentials as an advocate for the Make America Healthy Again movement begun by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Means also is an advocate for wearable health devices and co-founded health tech firm Levels, which promotes the use of technology to track individuals’ health information, according to The Hill.

Kennedy, likewise, favors the use of wearable health-tracking devices and wants to make it possible for everyone in the United States to wear one within four years.

Means also is the sister of Kennedy adviser Calley Means.

Trump nominated Means in May after withdrawing his prior surgeon general nomination for Janette Nesheiwat when her qualifications were questioned.

Means obtained her medical training at Stanford University but exited her residency program when she was disillusioned by the financial incentives for and practice of surgical care.

She since has become known for her advocacy for wellness and the roles of diet and nutrition in people’s health.

Means says diet is the root cause of much of the chronic illnesses that people experience.

Her HELP committee confirmation hearing was delayed due to Means not submitting financial and ethics records until recently, according to The New York Times.

Her financial records show Means has turned her support for diet as a root cause of illnesses into a moneymaker by accepting payments from companies that sell dietary supplements, deliver home meals and other revenue sources.

She also receives sponsorship money for her newsletter, which generated about $116,000 in income over a recent 18-month period, according to The New York Times.

Her financial disclosures also show Swiss firm Amazentis contributed another $79,000 in newsletter sponsorship funding and paid $55,000 for Means’ book tour fees.

She also reported earning less than $1 million but more than $100,000 on the sales of her book, “Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health.”

Some of Means’s critics say her health advocacy is not rooted in science and might cause harm.

On October 17, 2025, Nixon Peabody Trust Company disclosed in an SEC filing that it sold 25,734 shares of General Dynamics (GD 0.22%), an estimated $8.11 million trade.

What happened

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission dated October 17, 2025, Nixon Peabody Trust Company reduced its stake in General Dynamics by 25,734 shares during Q3 2025. The estimated transaction value, based on the quarter’s average price, was $8.11 million. The fund now reports holding 30,224 shares in General Dynamics, worth $10.31 million.

What else to know

This reduction brings the stake in General Dynamics to 0.75% of Nixon Peabody Trust Company’s 13F assets, as of Q3 2025. Previously, the position made up 1.26% of the fund’s AUM, as of Q2 2025.

Top five holdings after the filing:

• IDEV: $88.54 million (6.48% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• MSFT: $81.41 million (5.96% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• AVLV: $71.50 million (5.24% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• AAPL: $67.89 million (4.97% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• NVDA: $65.25 million (4.78% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025

As of October 17, 2025, shares of General Dynamics were priced at $331.15, up 7.4% for the year through October 17, 2025 and underperforming the S&P 500 by 3.2 percentage points over the same period.

Company Overview

Company Snapshot

General Dynamics offers business jets, naval vessels, combat vehicles, weapons systems, and advanced IT solutions through four segments: Aerospace, Marine Systems, Combat Systems, and Technologies.

The company generates revenue primarily through manufacturing and servicing defense platforms, business aviation, and technology solutions for government and commercial clients.

It serves U.S. and allied government agencies, defense departments, and commercial aviation customers worldwide.

General Dynamics is a leading global aerospace and defense contractor with a diversified portfolio spanning business aviation, shipbuilding, land combat systems, and defense technology.

Foolish take

Nixon Peabody Trust Company scaled back its position in General Dynamics, but even before the sell, this stock accounted for only a small fraction of the fund’s overall portfolio at just 1.26% of AUM — well outside its top five holdings.

It’s worth noting that although General Dynamics has lagged behind the S&P 500, it’s up by more than 25% year to date and 133% over the last five years, as of October 17, 2025. With the timing of this sell-off, it’s not surprising that institutional investors are cashing in on those earnings.

General Dynamics remains a major name in the defense sector, recently securing a $1.5 billion contract with U.S. Strategic Command to modernize its enterprise IT systems.

The company also has a long history of dividend growth, increasing its dividend payout for 28 consecutive years. Defense companies like General Dynamics can already offer some stability and predictability for investors thanks to contracts with the U.S. government, while consistent dividends can be appealing to income investors, too.

Glossary

13F: A quarterly SEC filing by institutional investment managers disclosing their equity holdings.
Assets Under Management (AUM): The total market value of investments managed on behalf of clients by a fund or institution.
Quarter (Q3 2025): The third three-month period of a financial year; here, July–September 2025.
Position: The amount of a particular security or asset held by an investor or fund.
Top five holdings: The five largest investments in a fund’s portfolio by value.
Stake: The ownership interest or share an investor holds in a company.
Defense contractor: A company that provides products or services to military or government defense agencies.
Segment: A distinct business division within a company, often reporting separate financial results.
TTM: The 12-month period ending with the most recent quarterly report.

The next stage in the evolution of the Gray Eagle Short Takeoff and Landing (GE STOL) drone sees General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) team up with South Korea’s Hanwha Aerospace for co-development and co-production of the uncrewed aircraft system, with work set to begin immediately. A demonstrator for the medium-altitude, long-endurance (MALE) drone has already operated from a South Korean amphibious assault ship, but the new partnership will see production of the Gray Eagle STOL for all customers taking place in South Korea.

GA-ASI and Hanwha Aerospace had an official signing ceremony at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) main annual symposium today. That ceremony took place alongside GA-ASI’s company-funded Mojave STOL drone, which has been flying for years and is being used as a proof-of-concept demonstrator for the Gray Eagle STOL.

As for the Gray Eagle STOL, this is the latest iteration of GA-ASI’s MQ-1C Gray Eagle UAS. At the center of the Gray Eagle STOL is its ability to operate from remote or austere locations with rough strips and limited logistical support. GA-ASI says the aircraft will be able to operate from semi-improved surfaces, including dirt roads, open fields, beaches, and parking lots. The same capabilities render it suitable for flying from aircraft carriers and big-deck assault ships, too.

In the past, GA-ASI has described the Gray Eagle STOL as its “most rugged UAS design,” although it’s worth noting that the basic MQ-1C Gray Eagle for the U.S. Army already put something of a premium on efficiency and usability. The original MQ-1C Gray Eagle was tailored for warfare in the Middle East, uses a heavy-fuel piston engine instead of a turboprop, and can be operated by a cadre of enlisted soldiers.

Under the new joint initiative, GA-ASI and Hanwha plan to build a production-representative Gray Eagle STOL aircraft, which should take to the air in 2027. The companies will, in the meantime, establish a production line that will be able to provide the Gray Eagle STOL to customers in the United States and South Korea, as well as globally, and which should result in cost savings for the drone. The first deliveries to customers should take place in 2028.

“GA-ASI and Hanwha are committed to investing in this project and building development and production capabilities in South Korea,” said GA-ASI President David R. Alexander. “We’ll be leveraging the expertise of both companies to quickly bring the Gray Eagle STOL to global customers.”

“This landmark agreement marks the beginning of a new phase in U.S.-Korea defense cooperation, extending beyond traditional alliance structures to deliver next-generation, runway-independent UAS solutions that maximize commanders’ options in the face of evolving mission demands,” GA-ASI said in a statement.

The next steps will see GA-ASI and Hanwha Aerospace working closely together to complete the design phase for the drone and then establish a production facility in South Korea. The final assembly and manufacturing of the GE STOL will be the responsibility of Hanwha in South Korea, with GA-ASI handling the final integration. Meanwhile, GA-ASI will continue to produce other Gray Eagle models at its plant in San Diego, California.

GA-ASI says the new partnership “offers the fastest path with lowest risk to operational capability.”

“Co-producing GE STOL in South Korea and the U.S. will create jobs and help Hanwha secure talent in related fields as well as foster our domestic (Korean) UAS industry ecosystem,” said Jae-il Son, president and CEO of Hanwha Aerospace. “Hanwha is poised to become a comprehensive UAS company capable of executing everything from design to production and maintenance based on our capabilities, which span from fighter jet engines to radar and avionics equipment.”

For Hanwha, the Gray Eagle STOL also presents a way of gaining a foothold in the South Korean military. The country’s armed forces already operate a diverse drone fleet, including Israeli-supplied aircraft. However, on the domestic front, this segment is currently dominated by Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) and Korean Air, both of which already build drones for the South Korean military.

However, GA-ASI has already been working closely with the South Korean Ministry of Defense as it continues to develop the Gray Eagle STOL drone.

Last year, the Mojave demonstrator was used in a demonstration when it took off from the Republic of Korea Navy’s amphibious landing ship ROKS Dokdo, as it was underway off the coast of Pohang, South Korea.

The Mojave has also been used for takeoff and landing trials aboard the British aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales in 2023.

Other milestones for the demonstrator drone have included live-fire testing at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona, using the Dillon Aero DAP-6 Minigun, and operations from a dirt strip to prove its STOL credentials, something we have reported on before. The stated performance of the Mojave includes a takeoff run of 400 feet for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) missions, or 1,000 feet when armed with 12 Hellfire missiles.

Clearly, having Hanwha Aerospace onboard the Gray Eagle STOL program, including local production, should make the drone even more attractive to South Korea.

As well as operating from the two Dokdo class amphibious assault ships — the drone doesn’t necessarily need a catapult for launch or arresting gear for recovery — the Gray Eagle STOL could be a valuable addition to the South Korean military’s land-based units.

For the Republic of Korea Army, the Gray Eagle STOL’s runway independence would be a huge advantage during any kind of conflict with North Korea. In the past, GA-ASI has outlined the fact that the drone’s commanders “can choose virtually any bases of operation and take advantage of unconventional locations not normally affiliated with unmanned aircraft or aviation operations as an added level of survivability and surprise.”

In such a scenario, it would likely be in heavy demand for reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition (RSTA), as well as strike. Meanwhile, its manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) capability could see it operate closely with the Republic of Korea Army helicopter fleet, including the AH-64E Apache.

The Gray Eagle STOL is also intended, from the ground up, to be rapidly deployed to remote locations by C-130 Hercules cargo aircraft, a type also operated by South Korea. GA-ASI says the drone can be ready to fly from austere locales in as little as 1.5 hours once rolled out the back of a C-130. This makes it ideal for different sorts of distributed and expeditionary operations.

As well as the aforementioned Mojave weapons, the Gray Eagle STOL is planned to be armed with launched effects, a capability that it inherits from the improved Gray Eagle 25M. The latter was developed to provide the U.S. Army with the option to procure a more advanced version of the MQ-1C, which would incorporate various enhancements to better meet the demands of a future conflict, likely to be expeditionary peer conflicts rather than a counterinsurgency fight.

GA-ASI has previously underlined the potential use of this drone to tackle enemy air defense systems in a large and very contested battlefield — just like the one that South Korea could face if it goes to war with its neighbor. In this scenario, the drone would lob its launched effects toward the air defenses before acting as a “quarterback,” relaying data gathered by the smaller drones to other friendly elements, be they aircraft, long-range fires, or other platforms.

At the same time, the growing questions around the survivability of drones like this need to be acknowledged. The Gray Eagle STOL and its relatives are potentially vulnerable even when faced by lower-end adversaries, a fact that has been underscored by the scale of losses suffered by U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drones when faced by Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen. The use of LEs at standoff distances and the addition of self protection and electronic warfare pods, as well as combined force tactics, will help them in the fight in the years to come.

The Gray Eagle STOL would also port other advanced technologies over from the Gray Eagle 25M, including the EagleEye synthetic aperture radar, which can detect and track ground targets out to 50 miles and maritime targets out to 124 miles. GA-ASI is also working to introduce an increased-range active electronically scanned array (AESA) antenna, which is intended to allow it to operate beyond the weapons effects zone of many threat systems.

As we have highlighted in the past, the Gray Eagle STOL would also seem to offer a broad portfolio of capabilities that could be of particular relevance to the U.S. military as it prepares for a future high-end conflict, especially one fought in the Pacific against China.

In the past, GA-ASI has specifically said that the “Gray Eagle STOL might go with American forces into an expeditionary base deep downrange, co-locating with them as necessary to support missions, including delivery of supplies with the range to reach from island chain to island chain for units separate from the main body. Operating from a semi-prepared landing zone, a dirt road, or any paved surface, it expands commanders’ options.”

Other roles planned for the Gray Eagle STOL include logistics, and GA-ASI has explored the idea of underwing pods capable of carrying up to 1,000 pounds of cargo. This could be of particular interest for the U.S. military, as it looks increasingly at diverse distributed logistics chains as an essential requirement for supporting future operations in contested environments, especially in the context of a potential future high-end conflict, including in the Pacific.

With these kinds of peer and near-peer conflicts in mind, the Gray Eagle STOL is also intended to be more resilient to hostile electronic warfare jamming, especially to GPS networks. It will have vision-based navigation that can be used to overcome GPS jamming and have SATCOM anti-jam technologies.

Ultimately, the Gray Eagle STOL should emerge as a drone that’s able to fly a wide range of missions, from a variety of land bases and ships. It’s clear that, with their new partnership, GA-ASI and Hanwha Aerospace foresee interest from operators outside of the U.S. and South Korean militaries, too.

Contact the author: [email protected]

The U.S. Army continues to lag behind global trends when it comes to fielding drones and systems to counter their use by hostile forces, according to a top general overseeing soldiers in Europe. Units forward-deployed in the European theater are trying to break a cycle of seemingly endless experimentation to actually operationalize relevant capabilities, especially within smaller units, buoyed now by major U.S. military-wide initiatives.

Army Lt. Gen. Charles Costanza, commander of V Corps, talked about issues relating to drones and counter-drone capabilities at a panel discussion at the Association of the U.S. Army’s (AUSA) main annual symposium yesterday. TWZ‘s Howard Altman was in attendance and had a chance to talk further with Costanza immediately afterward. From World War II through the Cold War, and for years afterward, V Corps was a key component of the Army’s presence in Europe. Inactivated in Germany in 2013, it was reestablished at Fort Knox in Kentucky in 2020, and a forward headquarters in Poland was subsequently stood up.

“We’re behind. I’ll just be candid. I think we know we’re behind,” Costanza said in response to a direct question at the panel from our Howard Altman. “We’ve been talking about counter-UAS [uncrewed aerial systems] and UAS capability for a better part of a decade, since, really, we watched the war in Armenia and Azerbaijan go on, and saw very much the beginning of the drone UAS capabilities.”

Azerbaijan’s armed forces captured particular global attention with their use of kamikaze drones during a war with Armenia in 2020. They had already been employing those capabilities on a more limited level for years beforehand. The Israeli-made drones they employed traced their roots back decades, and came from companies that continue to be world leaders in this space, as you can read more about here. In 2020, Azerbaijan also employed Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2s, a traditional fixed-wing design capable of employing precision munitions that has seen significant sales globally, including to Ukraine.

The propaganda video below from the State Border Service of Azerbaijan highlights how much of a fixture kamikaze drones were in the 2020 war between that country and Armenia.

“We aren’t moving fast enough,” Costanza continued. “And it really took Russia’s invasion of Ukraine [in 2022], and the way they’re innovating, and Ukrainians are innovating, to realize, hey, we need to move fast.”

Both sides of the ongoing conflict now make extensive use of various types of weaponized drones, especially highly maneuverable first-person view (FPV) kamikaze designs, in and around the front lines, and now increasingly deeper behind them. Ukraine and Russia also employ longer-range kamikaze drones for attacks further inside each other’s territory. Various types of uncrewed aerial systems had already become steadily more significant factors in the fighting between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists in the eastern part of the country that followed Moscow’s seizure of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

“I think we do,” Costanza also said when asked specifically if the U.S. military needed a capability broadly in line with the Iranian-designed Shahed-136 long-range kamikaze drone. The Shahed-136 has become something of a household name as a result of Russia’s heavy use of variants and derivatives, including types it now produces domestically, in attacks on Ukraine. Last month, TWZ laid out a detailed case for why the U.S. military should already be buying tens of thousands of Shahed-136 clones, which you can find here.

As part of his response to the questions from our Howard Altman, Costanza highlighted Project Flytrap as a prime example of efforts underway to try to reverse these trends. Flytrap is an ongoing series of Army-led training events in Europe focused on counter-drone capabilities and tactics, techniques, and procedures to go with them.

“I think Flytrap is the start point to that, right? So I think Flytrap is taking the capabilities we have right now, identifying how we layer those capabilities, and then taking that, giving it back to the Army, and saying, here’s how you do it now, go make the acquisition purchase,” Costanza said. “Flytrap is just really trying to figure out what the systems are that we need. The scope and scale piece goes back to the Army.”

“What we learned is that there’s really no one system solution. It takes a layered approach. And you know, the way to think about it is, you have to detect what’s in the air, what’s a threat. You have to decide what you’re going to do about it, and that you need the means to actually do something about it,” Col. Donald Neal, commander of the Army’s 2nd Cavalry Regiment, which falls under V Corps, also said yesterday while speaking alongside Costanza. “There’s no one system solution to protecting the air above you.”

A key “challenge has been getting the network straight, being able to have the data in a cloud-based environment that we can process it in a way that’s integrated, not just with the counter-UAS systems, but the larger, integrated air and missile defense network, and how we do that. So we’re working through that,” Costanza further noted. “What we need to do now is take those systems, integrate them with an AI [artificial intelligence] capable, data-driven mission command system, [and] sync it all together, not just [for the] U.S., but across all our NATO partners.”

The 2nd Cavalry Regiment has been taking a leading role in Project Flytrap, as well as separate but adjacent efforts to step up the fielding of uncrewed aerial systems, including weaponized types, within the service’s own formations.

“2nd Cavalry Regiment is standing up what they call Delta Company,” Costanza noted during the panel. “It’s taking all the different systems that can have effects, lethal, non-lethal – so not just kinetic, but EW [electronic warfare] – counter-UAS, [as well as] UAS, [and] creating one organization to synchronize those capabilities faster than what we’re able to do right now.”

The Army has already been experimenting with similar units, which have been referred to as Strike Companies and Multi-Purpose Companies (MPC) in the past, outside of 2nd Cavalry, which you can read more about here.

Project Flytrap is also tied in with a NATO-wide initiative announced earlier this year, dubbed the Eastern Flank Deterrence Line, to bolster counter-drone and a wide array of other capabilities with a particular eye toward threats emanating from Russia. America’s allies in Europe have been seeing a surge in drone incursions, including over sensitive sites, as Moscow has been ramping up hybrid war efforts.

“I think Putin feels he’s in conflict with NATO right now,” Costanza told our Howard Altman in the interview after the panel. “I think he’s just going to continue to ramp that up until we stop it, and NATO knows that, but we still haven’t done that yet.”

When it comes to the broader issue of the Army lagging in the fielding of drones and counter-drone systems, Project Flytrap and the other work V Corps is involved in are clearly aimed at operationalizing new capabilities. The Pentagon has publicly lauded Flytrap as an example of the services moving to act on the new direction from the Secretary of War intended to address increasingly worrisome capability and capacity gaps that extend well beyond American forces in Europe.

In July, the Pentagon announced a sweeping array of policy and other changes structured around the central goal of getting huge numbers of drones, including weaponized types, into the hands of units, especially smaller ones, across the entire U.S. military. In August, Joint Interagency Task Force 401 (JIATF 401) stood up as the newest U.S. military organization intended to act as a focal point for the accelerated development and fielding of counter-drone systems for use on the battlefield, as well as to defend facilities and assets within the homeland.

At the same time, what Gen. Costanza talked about yesterday still sounds very much like the kinds of test and evaluation efforts that have been going on for years already. As he himself acknowledged, much of the work that has been done to date has not translated into major new operational capabilities, even as Ukraine and Russia, and many other countries globally, particularly China, have pushed ahead. The Army faced pointed criticism in July after touting the test of a grenade-dropping drone in Europe, a capability that has been in daily use for years now on the battlefield in Ukraine.

Democrats on the Senate panel grilled her over her leadership of the Justice Department. She hit back, with GOP support.

United States Attorney General Pam Bondi faced fierce questioning at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, as Democrats accused her of politicising the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Republicans rallied behind her pledge to restore law enforcement’s core mission.

In her first appearance before the Republican-controlled committee since the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey, Bondi on Tuesday defended the department’s direction under her leadership, saying she came into office determined to end the “weaponisation of justice” and refocus on violent crime.

She said the DOJ was now “returning to our core mission of fighting real crime”, pointing to increased federal activity in Washington, DC; and Memphis, Tennessee.

Bondi also defended the deployment of National Guard troops to cities like Chicago and Portland, saying local governments failed to protect citizens. She tied challenges in enforcing public safety to the ongoing government shutdown, blaming Democrats for undermining law enforcement readiness.

One of the critical moments of the hearing came with Bondi’s justification for prosecuting Comey, a longtime critic of US President Donald Trump. Comey faces charges of false statements and obstruction of Congress related to his 2020 congressional testimony, and is scheduled to appear in court on Wednesday. Democrats pressed whether the indictment followed from independent prosecutorial judgement or political pressure. Bondi declined to answer questions about private conversations with the White House, calling them “personnel matters”.

The Jeffrey Epstein files were another flashpoint in the hearing as Bondi repeatedly refused to explain her decision to reverse course on releasing documents. She instead accused Democratic senators of having accepted campaign donations from an affiliate of the late, convicted sex offender.

Democrats also quizzed her on allegations that Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, accepted $50,000 in cash from undercover agents last year, before the current US administration came into office. Bondi said the decision to drop the inquiry preceded her tenure and declined to state whether the money had been recovered.

Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the panel, repeatedly accused Bondi of using her leadership to help weaponise the DOJ. “Our nation’s top law enforcement agency has become a shield for the president and his political allies when they engage in misconduct,” he said. The Illinois senator claimed Bondi “fundamentally transformed the Justice Department and left an enormous stain on American history”.

“It will take decades to recover,” he added.

Under Bondi’s leadership, key divisions such as civil rights have seen mass departures, and career prosecutors tied to investigations into Trump or the January 6 attack on the US Capitol have been removed or reassigned.

A letter by nearly 300 former DOJ employees, released just before the hearing, warned that the administration was “taking a sledgehammer to other longstanding work” and urged a return to institutional norms.

Republicans on the committee largely defended her actions, echoing claims that the DOJ under the prior Biden administration — which brought two criminal cases against Trump — was the one that had been weaponised. Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley commended Bondi for resetting priorities and asserted that law enforcement needed new direction.

Ukraine and Gaza. China and North Korea. Iran and Russia. There was so much to address Tuesday when 800 generals, admirals and their senior enlisted leaders in the U.S. military were ordered into one location from around the world on short notice.

The sudden meeting in Quantico, Va., was called by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. And it was an unprecedented event for unprecedented times, but not in the way that anyone imagined. Hegseth took aim at the packed room’s waistlines, proclaiming that he no longer wanted to see “fat generals and admirals,” or overweight troops.

“Frankly, it’s tiring to look out at combat formations, or really any formation, and see fat troops,” he said to the 800 likely stunned souls in the room. “Likewise, it’s completely unacceptable to see fat generals and admirals in the halls of the Pentagon leading commands around the country and the world.”

Flanked by a portly President Trump, he proclaimed, “It’s a bad look. It is bad, and it’s not who we are.”

President Trump joined his Defense secretary in urging his top military brass to shape up.

(Andrew Harnik / Getty Images)

Like a sugary doughnut, the hypocrisy was too tempting to pass up. California Gov. Gavin Newsom‘s X account posted, “I guess the Commander in Chief needs to go!” Newsom also juxtaposed a clip of Hegseth’s speech with a photo of Trump in a McDonald’s restaurant, the president’s stomach protruding over the belt line of his slacks.

The former Fox News personality turned secretary of Defense initially gave no reason last month when he summoned leaders stationed across the globe to attend the meeting, causing concern and conjecture among military and congressional officials about the purpose of the gathering. Trump told NBC that they would deliver a “good message” about “being in great shape, talking about a lot of good, positive things.”

That new “positive” messaging? Terminating restrictions on hazing for boot-camp recruits, toughening grooming standards (no more “beardos”), doing away with racial quotas and raising physical standards for everyone in uniform to a “male level.”

“I don’t want my son serving alongside troops who are out of shape, or in a combat unit with females who can’t meet the same combat-arms physical standards as men, or troops who are not fully proficient on their assigned weapons, platform or task, or under a leader who was the first but not the best,” Hegseth said Tuesday.

He added that troops will have to meet “gender-neutral, age-normed, male standard, scored 70% ” fitness levels. “If that means no women qualify for some combat jobs, so be it,” he said. But all will be fat-shamed on an equal basis.

“Today, at my direction, every member of the joint force, at every rank, is required to take a PT [physical training] test twice a year, as well as meet height and weight requirements twice a year, every year of service,” he said.

Hegseth’s obsession with appearing ripped and manly is nothing new. The 45-year-old has challenged 71-year-old Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to fitness tests in which the men do 50 pull-ups and 100 push-ups in 10 minutes or less.

The “Pete and Bobby Challenge,” as Hegseth calls it, was posted on the official HHS YouTube account and circulated widely on social media.

Hegseth’s deep message to the troops keeping America safe: “It all starts with physical fitness and appearance. If the secretary of war can do regular, hard PT, so can every member of our joint force.”

Hegseth has repeatedly emphasized that the updated fitness requirements for troops are part of a larger effort to achieve a “warrior ethos” in the U.S. military. Uncle Sam wants YOU! But not until you drop that BMI below 24.9.

QUANTICO, Va. — President Trump revealed that he wants to use American cities as training grounds for the armed forces and joined Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Tuesday in declaring an end to “woke” culture before an unusual gathering of hundreds of top U.S. military officials who were abruptly summoned to Virginia from around the world.

Hegseth announced new directives for troops that include “gender-neutral” or “male-level” standards for physical fitness, while Trump bragged about U.S. nuclear capabilities and warned that “America is under invasion from within.”

“After spending trillions of dollars defending the borders of foreign countries, with your help we’re defending the borders of our country,” Trump said.

Hegseth had called military leaders to the Marine Corps base in Quantico, near Washington, without publicly revealing the reason until this morning. His address largely focused on his own long-used talking points that painted a picture of a military that has been hamstrung by “woke” policies, and he said military leaders should “do the honorable thing and resign” if they don’t like his new approach.

Meetings between top military brass and civilian leaders are nothing new, but the gathering had fueled intense speculation about the summit’s purpose given the haste with which it was called and the mystery surrounding it.

Admirals and generals from conflict zones in the Middle East and elsewhere were summoned for a lecture on race and gender in the military, underscoring the extent to which the country’s culture wars have emerged as a front-and-center agenda item for Hegseth’s Pentagon, even at a time of broad national security concerns across the globe.

‘We will not be politically correct’

Trump is used to boisterous crowds of supporters who laugh at his jokes and applaud his boasts during his speeches. But he wasn’t getting that kind of soundtrack from the generals and admirals in attendance.

In keeping with the nonpartisan tradition of the armed services, the military leaders sat mostly stone-faced through Trump’s politicized remarks, a contrast from when rank-and-file soldiers cheered during Trump’s speech at Fort Bragg this summer.

During his nearly hour-long speech, Hegseth said the U.S. military has promoted too many leaders for the wrong reasons based on race, gender quotas and “historic firsts.”

“The era of politically correct, overly sensitive don’t-hurt-anyone’s-feelings leadership ends right now at every level,” Hegseth said.

That was echoed by Trump, who said “the purposes of America military is not to protect anyone’s feelings. It’s to protect our republic.″

″We will not be politically correct when it comes to defending American freedom,” Trump said. “And we will be a fighting and winning machine.”

Loosening disciplinary rules

Hegseth said he is loosening disciplinary rules and weakening hazing protections, putting a heavy focus on removing many of the guardrails the military had put in place after numerous scandals and investigations

He said he was ordering a review of “the department’s definitions of so-called toxic leadership, bullying and hazing to empower leaders to enforce standards without fear of retribution or second guessing.”

The defense secretary called for “changes to the retention of adverse information on personnel records that will allow leaders with forgivable, earnest, or minor infractions to not be encumbered by those infractions in perpetuity.”

“People make honest mistakes, and our mistakes should not define an entire career,” Hegseth said. “Otherwise, we only try not to make mistakes.”

Bullying and toxic leadership has been the suspected and confirmed cause behind numerous military suicides over the past several years, including the very dramatic suicide of Brandon Caserta, a young sailor who was bullied into killing himself in 2018.

A Navy investigation found that Caserta’s supervisor’s “noted belligerence, vulgarity and brash leadership was likely a significant contributing factor in (the sailor)’s decision to end his own life.”

Gender-neutral physical standards

Hegseth used the platform to slam environmental policies and transgender troops while talking up his and Trump’s focus on “the warrior ethos” and “peace through strength.”

Hegseth said the department has been told from previous administrations that “our diversity is our strength,” which he called an “insane fallacy.”

“They had to put out dizzying DEI and LGBTQE+ statements. They were told females and males are the same thing, or that males who think they’re females is totally normal,” he said, adding the use of electric tanks and the COVID vaccine requirements to the list as mistaken policies.

Hegseth said this is not about preventing women from serving.

“But when it comes to any job that requires physical power to perform in combat, those physical standards must be high and gender neutral,” he said. “If women can make it excellent, if not, it is what it is. If that means no women qualify for some combat jobs, so be it. That is not the intent, but it could be the result.”

Hegseth’s speech came as the country faces a potential government shutdown this week and as Hegseth, who has hammered home a focus on lethality, has taken several unusual and unexplained actions, including ordering cuts to the number of general officers and firings of other top military leaders.

Hegseth has championed the military’s role in securing the U.S.-Mexico border, deploying to American cities as part of Trump’s law enforcement surges, and carrying out strikes on boats in the Caribbean that the administration says targeted drug traffickers.

Finley, Toropin and Vucci write for the Associated Press. Finley and Toropin reported from Washington. AP writer Sylvie Corbet in Paris contributed to this report.

General Atomics provided an update on some of the firm’s biggest aerospace initiatives and accomplishments at this year’s Air, Space and Cyber Conference outside of Washington, D.C. We talked to Patrick “Mike” Shortsleeve, Vice President of DoD Strategic Development for General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc (GA-ASI), on the show floor to get the latest from the company.

Shortsleeve discussed the company’s YFQ-42A Collaborative Combat Aircraft, LongShot air-launched missile carrier, and achieving a whopping 9,000,000 flight hours across GA-ASI produced-aircraft.

Check out the latest from General Atomics in the video below:

Contact the editor: [email protected]

As world leaders talked about acting against Israel at the UN General Assembly, more than 360 Palestinians in Gaza were killed, with many more injured, starved and displaced by the ongoing genocide. Israel has killed 66,000 Palestinians since October 7, 2023.

UN delegates walked out as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took to the podium at the UN General Assembly. Other world leaders condemned Israel’s genocide in Gaza, while a further 10 countries have recognised Palestinian statehood. Observers say Israel has never been more diplomatically isolated.

Picture the crowded sidewalks and standstill traffic of New York City. Pedestrians jostle past street vendors as they rush to their destinations. The wail of sirens mingles with the sudden screech of car horns.

Now add to the fray an influx of world leaders and diplomats, accompanied by gaggles of journalists, advocates and security officers.

Each year in September, the bustling east side of Midtown Manhattan becomes even busier as it hosts the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).

New York briefly transforms into the centre of international politics as presidents, prime ministers and royals descend on the UN headquarters to speak at the opening debate for the latest UNGA session.

This year, the summit arrives amid heightened security concerns in the United States following the assassination of right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk. It also comes at a time of growing global outrage at the horrors that Israel is inflicting on Gaza.

Traffic has been blocked in the eight city blocks flanking the UN complex, establishing a restricted zone that can only be accessed by authorised personnel.

Hundreds — if not thousands — of heavily armed local and federal law enforcement agents surround the area, ensuring that no one gets near the summit without prior approval.

Due to the restrictions, many local residents told Al Jazeera they feel a mix of apathy and annoyance towards the annual gathering, which has been informally dubbed the World Cup of Politics.

Ugur Dikici, who operates a fruit stand across from the UN, said it may seem cool to have leaders from across the world come to your neighbourhood. “But when you’re stuck in traffic for two hours, it’s not fun,” he told Al Jazeera.

Dikici added that the event also hurts his business; tourists and delegates don’t buy fruit and vegetables as much as locals, who may be deterred by the commotion.

However, he said having New York as a global platform is still worth it. “You can deal with three, four days once a year. It’s fine.”

‘International ideals’

Entering the UN headquarters during the general debate requires navigating through a maze of checkpoints.

Delegates, visitors, staff and journalists are distinguished by different badges that allow them access to certain areas — but not others.

Even within the UN complex, some buildings and floors have their own airport-like screenings for multiple layers of security.

The East River, which borders the four main UN buildings, has also not been spared.

Only police and US Coast Guard vessels, about a dozen of them, can be seen on the water at any point. No ferries, cruises or commercial ships are allowed.

Authorities have declared the stretch of the water a security zone that is blocked to most ships during the summit.

Despite the intricacy of the security arrangements, the event tends to go on smoothly every year.

The occasional hiccups do occur, however. On Monday evening, for example, the motorcade of US President Donald Trump blocked the path of his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, as he tried to reach France’s embassy.

Video captured the French leader gently haggling with a police officer to let him and his delegates pass. “Guess what? I am waiting in the street because everything is frozen for you,” Macron later told Trump in a cellphone call.

New York has been hosting the summit at the same spot for more than 70 years, and the city’s leaders take a lot of pride in it.

“The iconic UN sits near the East River [and] remains a symbol of not only peace but a symbol of hope,” New York Mayor Eric Adams said last week.

“And I’m proud to be the mayor of this city that would house this important conversation.”

But in his speech to the UNGA on Tuesday, Trump disparaged the international body, describing it as little more than a conveyor of “empty words”.

Dozens of protesters had gathered outside the event to denounce the US president. Paul Rabin, one of the demonstrators, said he hoped to show his support for the UN’s founding ideals — values he feels Trump is trampling.

“This is a city of people from all over the world,” he said of New York.

“The international ideals are in alignment with the ideals of New York. And we want to call out people who are against the values that the UN and the United States are really founded on.”

‘I lose business’

But Harry Khan, who owns a corner store nearby, was not as thrilled about the summit.

“When there is a road closure, I lose business. My regular customers, they avoid coming outside,” he told Al Jazeera.

And the influx of tourists does not offset the losses, according to Khan.

As mammoth as the UNGA is, its impact on New York is limited to the immediate neighbourhood outside the restricted area.

In the vast and densely populated city, signs of the UNGA start to dissipate within a few blocks from the UN complex.

With the world’s eyes on the summit, some of the city’s 8.5 million residents say they’re more worried about daily struggles. More than 18 percent of New York City’s population lives under the poverty line.

On Tuesday evening, a young woman grew visibly frustrated when she found out that her bus stop was barricaded within the security zone.

When asked how she feels about the UNGA being in New York, she replied: “Because it stops traffic, I don’t care for it. I can’t get to my bus to go home. Now, I’ve got to find another route.”

Taking the stage at a political forum in New York City for an interview, Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and retired four-star United States General David Petraeus have acknowledged the peculiarity of the situation.

Al-Sharaa, who overthrew former President Bashar al-Assad and ended his family’s 50-year rule of Syria in a blazing military offensive late last year, has been president since January.

Petraeus commanded US forces during their invasion of Iraq – forces who captured and imprisoned al-Sharaa from 2006 to 2011 for fighting against the invasion. Petraeus later served as the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

After his release, al-Sharaa established the al-Nusra Front in Syria in 2012 to fight al-Assad. Four years later, it severed its ties with al-Qaeda. A year later, al-Nusra merged with other groups to form Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), led by al-Sharaa.

HTS was designated a “terrorist organisation” by the US in 2018, citing past ties to al-Qaeda, a designation the US revoked in July as Washington softened its approach to post-Assad Syria.

The US had placed a $10m bounty on al-Sharaa’s head, lifting it only in late December.

Significance of timing and venue

Al-Sharaa arrived in New York on Sunday to attend the United Nations General Assembly, the first Syrian head of state to do so in almost six decades.

The president and his large delegation held meetings, including with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and the leader addressed events on the sidelines of the General Assembly on Monday.

With Petraeus, he then participated in the 2025 Concordia Annual Summit, a global affairs forum held alongside the General Assembly that brings together world leaders, business executives and NGO figures to foster public-private partnerships and dialogue.

Last year, Concordia said it had more than 300 speakers, including nine heads of state, and more than 3,600 attendees from 112 countries. Past participants include UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, US business titan Warren Buffett and former US President Joe Biden.

Why is Petraeus a ‘fan’ of al-Sharaa?

The former US general not only acknowledged the odd pairing but used it to praise al-Sharaa, who has set an October date for parliamentary elections in Syria.

“His trajectory from insurgent leader to head of state has been one of the most dramatic political transformations in recent Middle Eastern history,” Petraeus told the audience.

Later in the interview, he showed concern for the Syrian leader’s personal wellbeing, asking whether he is getting enough sleep. Petraeus said al-Sharaa has “many fans” and that he is one of them.

“At a time, we were in combat and now we move to discourse,” al-Sharaa said with a smile when asked about their history, adding that people who have gone through war know the importance of peace.

“We cannot judge the past based on the rules of today and cannot judge today based on the rules of the past,” the Syrian president said.

Talking about his time as an al-Qaeda commander, al-Sharaa said “maybe there were mistakes” before but what matters now is defending the Syrian people and the region from instability.

“Our commitment to that line is what brought us here today to [New York], sitting here among allies and friends.”

Al-Sharaa said he believed he was fighting for a “noble” cause that deserves support.

Asked about deadly sectarian violence in Syria this year, he said the al-Assad regime had left Syria in chaos and “all parties made mistakes, including parts of the government”, during the violence.

He added that a newly formed council is investigating and would prosecute all violators.

He said the Syrian people have rallied around the new government and the economic development and unification of Syria are the priorities now.

In this vein, he reiterated his request for the US Congress to revoke the Caesar Syria Civil Protection Act of 2019, which sanctions Syria.

The president reiterated his stance on protecting Syria’s minorities, including the Kurdish population in the north, whose rights must be protected in the constitution. However, he added, Kurdish armed forces must not operate outside the state’s auspices as the government and its army must be the only entity with guns.

The Syrian leader talked about Israel as well, pointing out that Israel has attacked Syria more than 1,000 times since al-Assad fell and continues to occupy the Golan Heights.

However, al-Sharaa said Syria is focused on rebuilding and avoiding another war, so security talks are under way with Israel to reach an agreement based on a 1974 disengagement deal that was mediated by the US.

Sept. 23 (UPI) — U.S. President Donald Trump has said he plans to address “the good and the bad” across the globe as one of the first speakers when the U.N. General Assembly’s annual general debate opens Tuesday in New York City.

Specifically, he’s expected to speak about his own accomplishments handling conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine, White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt said ahead of his appearance.

Trump touted his role in negotiating peace across the globe Friday while making remarks on an executive order on H-1B visas.

“Nobody’s done a better job than I’ve done on world peace. Nobody’s settled so many wars as I have,” he said, claiming to have “settled” seven conflicts.

Trump spoke about the two ongoing wars in Gaza and Ukraine as well as his upcoming U.N. appearance to reporters Sunday.

“The hatred between [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and [Ukrainian President Volodymyr] Zelensky is very substantial,” Trump said, according to CBS News. “There’s a lot of bad blood.

“And, course, Gaza is a basic disaster. We’ve got to get that taken care of. But the big thing will be that I’m going to be speaking at the United Nations, and I hope to do a good job.”

Trump is likely to touch on some of the bigger news coming out of meetings on the sidelines of the general debate — the recognition by several countries of an independent Palestinian state.

At an international peace summit hosted by France and Saudi Arabia on Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron formally recognized Palestine. His announcement was joined by the countries of Andorra, Belgium, Luxembourg, Malta and San Marino, and Australia, Britain and Canada made their own declarations Sunday.

“The time has come for Israel to live in peace and security,” Macron said, sharing his support for a two-state solution to the conflict. “The time has come to give justice to the Palestinian people and to recognize the state of Palestine.”

First day of high-level meeting to kick off with speeches from world leaders, including from Brazil, US, Turkiye, Qatar and France.

VLADIMIR Putin has fired his top general amid ongoing humiliating blows from Ukraine.

General Alexander Lapin, 61, was reportedly sacked for failing to sweep through the Sumy region – considered one of the tyrant’s key war goals.

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Once a decorated militant, he was awarded the Kremlin’s top honour: the Hero of Russia.

Despite his many medals, however, he came under fire and was criticised as “incompetent” by military experts.

Putin ally Ramzan Kadyrov, head of Chechnya, said of him three years ago: “If I had my way, I would have demoted Lapin to private, deprived him of his awards, and sent him to the front line to wash off his shame with the rifle in his hands.”

Reports suggest Russia lost three battalions in its attempt to capture the Sumy region as Ukraine continues to grind down on Vlad.

His dismissal, however, has raised suspicions Putin is looking for scapegoats to explain his humiliating military defeats.

This includes his slow territorial gains into Ukraine while losing millions of men both injured and killed.

He was also earlier blamed for Ukraine’s impressive advance into Russia’s Kursk region, which the tyrant only narrowly pushed back on thanks to North Korean forces.

During the war, Lapin commanded the Centre group of forces, reaching  the title Hero of Russia.

A year later, he was appointed Chief of the General Staff of Russian Ground Forces.

Later he commanded the Leningrad Military District, then the North group.

In his new role, he will be in charge of recruiting contract soldiers in Tatarstan, the 44th largest region in Russia.

He will also liaise with service families including widows of fallen soldiers. 

It comes as analysts have recognised how Ukraine has been heavily defending a key town for over a year in its war with Russia.

The key town of Pokrovsk has also been deemed strategically critical for Putin’s territorial ambitions.

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As a vital railway and transport hub, Provosk could give Russia a huge supply line if captured, according to intelligence officer Philip Ingram.

It has been nicknamed the “gateway to Donetsk” by Russian media with key crossroads that could enable Putin the seize the rest of the area.

Putin has also revealed how he just about “dodged” death trying to fire up the engine of a motorbike.

The 72-year-old told defence minister Andrei Belousov of the incident: “I once got on a motorcycle, revved it.

“And it went into a spin and flipped over.

“I just dodged it at the last second. It fell right next to me.”

The Russian leader has long sought to cultivate an image as a macho tough guy as part of his domestic persona.

He shared the motorbike anecdote dressed in military fatigues – despite being hundreds of miles from the war zone.

The 80th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) begins this week in New York City, bringing together world leaders for a spectacle of speeches as the institution faces mounting scrutiny over its role on the global stage.

The annual gathering comes at a time of particular reckoning, not least marked by internal handwringing over unsustainable funding, ossified outrage over Israel’s ongoing war in Gaza, and increased urgency for non-Western countries to wield more influence.

Already sparking dismay ahead of this year’s event has been a decision by the United States, under the administration of President Donald Trump, to withhold or revoke visas for Palestinian Authority and Palestinian Liberation Organization officials to attend the gathering.

That comes as France and Saudi Arabia are set to host a conference on Israel and Palestine, promising to join several European countries in recognising a Palestinian state.

All told, according to Richard Gowan, the UN director at the International Crisis Group, the gathering comes during a year when “illusions have been rather stripped away”.

“It’s now very, very clear that both financially and politically, the UN faces huge crises,” he said. “Now the question is, is there a way through that?”

Here’s what to know as the UNGA session begins:

When does it start?

The proceedings officially start on Tuesday when the incoming president, former German Minister for Foreign Affairs Annalena Baerbock, is set to present her agenda for the coming session, which will run through September 8, 2026.

This year’s theme has been dubbed, “Better Together: 80 years and more for peace, development and human rights.”

The first week will be largely procedural, but will be followed by the organisation’s most prominent event, the so-called “high-level week”. That begins on September 22 at 9am local time (13:00 GMT), with a meeting to commemorate the UN’s 80th anniversary and to consider “the path ahead for a more inclusive and responsive multilateral system”.

On Tuesday, September 23, the “General Debate” begins, with at least 188 heads of state, heads of government, or other high-ranking officials preliminarily set to speak through September 29.

An array of concurrent meetings – focusing on development goals, climate change and public health – is also scheduled. Customary flurries of sideline diplomacy are in the forecast, too.

What does the UNGA do?

The UNGA is the main deliberative and policy-making body of the UN. It is the only body in the organisation where all 193 member countries have representation. Palestine and the Holy See have non-member observer status.

Under the UN Charter, which entered into force in 1945, the body is charged with addressing matters of international peace and security, particularly if those matters are not being addressed by the UN Security Council (UNSC), a 15-member panel with five permanent, veto-wielding members: France, China, Russia, the United Kingdom and the US.

The UNGA also debates matters of human rights, international law and cooperation in “economic, social, cultural, educational, and health fields”.

Operationally, the UNGA approves the UN’s sprawling annual budget, with one of its six main committees managing the funding of 11 active peacekeeping missions around the world.

Will more countries recognise Palestinian statehood?

Israel’s war in Gaza, which began in the wake of the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, largely defined last year’s gathering.

With Israel’s constant attacks, and atrocities continuing to mount, the war is expected to again loom large, with anticipation focusing on several countries that have recently recognised or pledged to recognise a Palestinian state.

Last week, Belgium became the latest country to pledge to do so at the UNGA, following France and Malta. Other countries, including Australia, Canada and the UK, have announced conditional recognition, but it has remained unclear if they will do so at the gathering.

While recognition of Palestine as a full member of the UN would require UNSC approval, a move almost surely to be vetoed by the US, the increased recognition will prove symbolically significant, according to Alanna O’Malley, a professor of UN studies in peace and justice at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

“France’s recognition will be important, because it means that the only European member of the Security Council in a permanent seat is now recognising Palestinian statehood,” O’Malley told Al Jazeera, noting that 143 UN member states had already recognised a Palestinian state ahead of the most recent overtures. 

“I think it puts pressure on the US, and then, in that regard, increases pressure on Israel,” she said. “But, of course, it also reveals that the European countries are far behind the Global South when it comes to the Palestinian issue and when it comes to cohesive action to combat the genocide.”

Multilateralism challenged from inside and out?

Despite UN leadership seeking to strike a celebratory tone as the institution marks its 80th year in existence, the last decade has been punishing for the global cooperation the body has long spearheaded.

During Trump’s first term, from 2017 to 2021, he withdrew the US from the landmark Paris Climate Accord, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the UN Human Rights Council. Former US President Joe Biden then reversed his predecessor’s actions only to see Trump repeat them upon taking office in January this year.

The Trump administration has undertaken widespread cuts to foreign aid, including hundreds of millions to UN agencies and caps on further spending. The US remains far and away the largest funder of the UN, providing about $13bn in 2023.

“The US funding caps have put the UN in an incredibly bad financial situation,” the International Crisis Group’s Gowan said.

Further adding to that instability have been questions over UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s campaign to streamline and refocus the UN as part of what he has dubbed the “UN80 Initiative”.

Proposals under the initiative, which will appear in a preliminary budget later this month, have been opposed by some UN member states and staff, with employees in Geneva passing a motion of no confidence against the UN chief earlier this year.

“Guterres will be talking about his efforts to save money,” Gowan said. “But I think there’s going to be a lot of people asking if the UN really can continue at scale without very major institutional changes, because it just doesn’t have the cash any longer.”

A chance for new influence?

But this year’s gathering may also be marked by efforts by traditionally marginalised countries to take on a bigger role at the UN, according to Leiden University’s O’Malley.

While no country has shown a willingness or capability to fill the US’s financial commitments, China has for years sought more influence within the UN, particularly through funding peacekeeping missions.

Countries like South Africa and Jamaica have also leaned into UN mechanisms, notably its International Court of Justice (ICJ), to seek accountability for Israeli abuses in Gaza and climate change, respectively.

“I think a lot of Global South countries, especially those like Brazil and India, and South Africa and Indonesia, to a certain extent, are looking at this not as a crisis of multinationalism,” O’Malley said.

“This is an opportunity to remake the system of global governance to suit their ends more precisely, and also to serve their people more directly, since they represent most of the world’s population.”

This has, in turn, refreshed energy towards long-sought reforms, including expanding the number of permanent members on the UNSC, O’Malley said, while noting a clear pathway for such a reform still does not exist.

History-making moments?

The first weeks of the UN General Assembly are known for history-making moments: Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez calling George HW Bush “the devil”; Muammar Gaddafi’s 100-minute screed in 2019 against the “terror and sanctions” of the UNSC; Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s literal drawing of a red line under Iran’s nuclear programme.

It also includes Trump’s inaugural speech in 2017, when he first took the podium, pledging to, among other aims, “totally destroy” North Korea.

The bellicose speech was met with chortles from the foreign delegations gathered. The tone is likely to be much different this time around, as world leaders have increasingly embraced flattering the mercurial US leader.

At the same time, with rumblings of lower attendance due to Trump’s restrictions on foreign travel, it is not out of the question that this year’s event could be a swan song for the long-held tradition of kicking off the UNGA in the US, the International Crisis Group’s Gowan said.

“I do think that, down the road, when people are organising big events around the UN, they are going to say ‘Should we do this in Geneva or Vienna or Nairobi?’” he said.

“If the US isn’t going to give out visas, then what’s the point of trying to do the global meetings there?”

Norway’s Labour Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere has claimed victory in Monday’s legislative elections, which also saw a record surge in support for the anti-immigration populist Progress Party.

“We did it,” the 65-year-old leader Stoere exclaimed at an election night rally after Labour came out on top, with about 28 percent of votes, which enabled him to remain in power with the support of four other left-wing parties.

Rapturous cheering erupted in Oslo on Monday night as Labour supporters gathered to celebrate a closely fought campaign in which the future of a wealth tax that dates to the late 19th century has been a central issue.

Addressing the crowd, Stoere thanked his supporters and said the victory showed that it was possible for Social Democratic parties to win elections, even with right-wing forces on the rise in Europe, according to the broadcaster VG.

The right-wing Progress Party saw its best result ever in a national election, coming in second place. Addressing supporters, Progress Party leader Sylvi Listhaug was pleased with her party’s result but lamented what she called “four tough years ahead for people and businesses”.

Conservative Party leader Erna Solberg apologised for the dismal performance of her party, which fell to third place in parliament.

Sovereign fund’s investment in Israel

About 4.3 million people in the Scandinavian nation were eligible to vote for the new 169-member parliament, or Storting. With almost all votes now counted, centre-left parties have won just more than the 85 seats needed to form a majority.

Final results are expected on Tuesday. They are likely to be followed by weeks of negotiations to build a coalition and agree on Cabinet positions before King Harald can swear in a new government.

Stoere’s second term in office comes after a fiercely contested election, surviving internal party strife, Cabinet scandals and an attempted leadership coup to cling to power.

His Labour Party has faced turbulent years, marked by soaring inflation, rising interest rates and a string of ministerial resignations over tax evasion, ethics breaches and undisclosed share trades.

The election campaign in Norway – a country of 5.6 million people and among the richest per capita in the world – has revolved around the cost of living, inequality, public services and how much citizens should pay in tax.

However, a debate over the country’s $2 trillion sovereign fund’s investments in Israel took centre stage at the beginning of the campaign. Since then, the fund has divested from at least 11 companies following media reports that it owned a stake in a jet engine company that provides maintenance for Israeli fighter jets.

The fund had divested from just two Israeli companies before that.

Norway’s wealth fund also divested from Caterpillar on ethics grounds over the use of the company’s products, bulldozers in particular, by Israeli authorities in Gaza and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Wealth tax

The wealth tax, in particular, has divided the political landscape. In recent years, dozens of wealthy Norwegians have relocated to Switzerland to escape it, sparking heated debate between the two main blocs over whether to scrap the levy.

Labour campaigned to retain the wealth tax, while the Conservatives wanted it reduced, and the Progress Party, which advocates for stricter immigration controls, wants it scrapped.

In early 2025, Stoere reshaped his cabinet to shore up his authority, naming former NATO Secretary-General and former Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg as finance minister.

A longtime ally and personal friend, Stoltenberg’s return was widely seen as pivotal in stabilising Stoere’s leadership and boosting Labour’s international credibility.

The reshuffle also saw the rural-based Centre Party expelled from government, signalling a more streamlined Labour operation.

Economic pain, however, continues to haunt Stoere’s government. Inflation peaked at 7.5 percent in 2022 and interest rates reached levels not seen since 2008, though both have since eased, giving households some relief.

Despite his victory, Stoere faces a fragmented parliament. He will now rely on the support of four smaller left-leaning parties, making the task of governing far more complex.

The Democratic field for attorney general of California is crowded but mixed, divided among several capable candidates and several who do not have the background or vision worthy of the office. Those who merit serious consideration by voters are San Francisco Dist. Atty. Kamala Harris, former Facebook executive Chris Kelly and Assemblyman Ted Lieu (D-Torrance). The Times sees strengths in all three, but endorses Harris.

To dispense with the bottom of the field first: Rocky Delgadillo was a deep disappointment as Los Angeles city attorney and has done nothing since to suggest that he would do better in a higher office. Assemblyman Pedro Nava (D-Santa Barbara) has a legislative record to be proud of but offers no compelling vision for the office he’s seeking. Assemblyman Alberto Torrico (D-Newark) is focused almost exclusively on his campaign to pass an oil extraction fee in order to fund education, a perfectly defensible notion but one that has little to do with being attorney general. Attorney Mike Schmier has neither ideas nor experience worth noting.

Among the leading candidates, Lieu is a thoughtful legislator with a solid record in Sacramento. He proposes innovative ideas for building on the current duties of the attorney general’s office while recognizing its essential functions — defending the state, enforcing its laws and protecting its residents. He also has waged an uncommonly civilized campaign, evidence of his character and decency.

Kelly’s background makes him a unique candidate in this field, though one familiar in this election cycle: the public-spirited business leader. He views the office as a platform for protecting consumers, among other things, and would bring fresh ideas for improving the state’s technological capacity. He hews to most Democratic Party tenets — support for same-sex marriage, environmental protection and the death penalty — while suggesting that he would not be captive to the party’s leading constituencies, such as labor, because he comes from outside the political establishment.

We give our endorsement to Harris because she shares much of what Lieu and Kelly bring to the race yet also offers the most germane and impressive experience. A former prosecutor, Harris has served as San Francisco district attorney since 2004; in that role, she has supervised one of the state’s largest public law agencies and navigated the turbulent politics of that city. Moreover, she has demonstrated creativity, tenacity and toughness, aggressively prosecuting violent criminals while searching for ways to reduce recidivism and take pressure off the state’s overburdened prison system. Harris has alienated some critics with her refusal to bring capital cases, but this is hardly a demerit given the profound moral, constitutional and practical questions raised by capital punishment. If elected, Harris promises to uphold the law and defend death sentences imposed by the state.

In addition to electing California’s next attorney general, this race presents voters with the opportunity to consider what they want the office to be. Harris sees it as a convening agent, as a collector and distributor of best practices that could raise the performance of prosecutors throughout the state. That’s a promising idea, and Harris has the energy and the background to attract top-notch deputies to help her realize it.