strategy

WASHINGTON — President Trump faces the most important international meeting of his second term so far on Thursday: face-to-face negotiations with Xi Jinping, who has made China a formidable economic and military challenger to the United States.

The two presidents face a vast agenda during their meeting in Seoul, beginning with the two countries’ escalating trade war over tariffs and high-tech exports. The list also includes U.S. demands for a Chinese crackdown on fentanyl, China’s aid to Russia in its war with Ukraine, the future of Taiwan and China’s growing nuclear arsenal.

Trump has already promised, characteristically, that the meeting will be a major success.

“It’s going to be fantastic for both countries, and it’s going to be fantastic for the entire world,” he said last week.

But it isn’t yet clear that the summit’s concrete results will measure up to that high standard.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday that the two sides have agreed to a “framework” under which China would delay implementing tight controls on rare earth elements, minerals crucial for the production of high-tech products from smartphones and electric vehicles to military aircraft and missiles. He said China has also agreed to resume buying soybeans from U.S. farmers and to crack down on fentanyl components.

In return, Bessent said, the United States will back down from its stinging tariffs on Chinese goods.

Nicholas Burns, the U.S. ambassador in Beijing under then-President Biden, said that kind of deal would amount to “an uneasy trade truce rather than a comprehensive trade deal.”

“That may be the best we can expect,” he said in an interview Monday. Still, he added, “it will be a positive step to stabilize world markets and allow the continuation of U.S.-China trade for the time being.”

But U.S. and Chinese officials have been close-mouthed on what, if anything, has been agreed on regarding Xi’s other big trade demand: easier U.S. restrictions on high-tech exports to China, especially advanced semiconductor chips used for artificial intelligence.

Burns said the two superpowers’ technology competition is “the most sensitive … in terms of where this relationship will head, which country will emerge more powerful.”

Giving China easy access to advanced semiconductors “would only help [the Chinese army] in its competition with the U.S. military for power in the Indo-Pacific,” he warned.

Other former officials and China hawks outside the administration have said, even more pointedly, that they worry that Trump may be too willing to trade long-term technology assets for short-term trade deals.

In August, Trump eased export controls to allow Nvidia, the world leader in AI chips, to sell more semiconductors to China — in an unusual deal under which the U.S. company would pay 15% of its revenue from the sales to the U.S. Treasury.

Matthew Pottinger, Trump’s top China advisor in his first term, protested in a recent podcast interview that the deal risked trading a strategic technology advantage “for $20 billion and Nvidia’s bottom line.”

Underlying the controversy over technology, some China watchers warn, is a basic mismatch between the two presidents: Trump is focused almost entirely on trade and commercial deals, while Xi is focused on displacing the United States as the biggest economic and military power in Asia.

“I don’t think the administration has a strategy toward China,” said Bonnie Glaser, a China expert at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. “It has a trade strategy, not a China strategy.”

“The administration does not seem to be focused on competition with China,” said Jonathan Czin, a former CIA analyst now at Washington’s Brookings Institution. “It’s focused on deal making. … It’s tactics without strategy.”

“We’ve fallen into a kind of trade and technology myopia,” he added. “We’re not talking about issues like China’s coercion [of smaller countries] in the South China Sea. … China doesn’t want to have that bigger, broader conversation.”

It isn’t clear that Trump and Xi will have either the time or inclination to talk in detail about anything other than trade.

And even on the front-burner economic issues, this week’s ceasefire is unlikely to produce a permanent peace.

“As with all such agreements, the devil will be in the details,” Burns, the former ambassador, said. “The two countries will remain fierce trade rivals. Expect friction ahead and further trade duels well into 2026.”

“Buckle up,” Czin said. “There are likely more sudden moves from Beijing ahead.”

In the long run, Trump’s legacy in U.S.-China relations will rest not only on trade deals but on the larger competition for economic and military power in the Pacific Rim. No matter how this week’s meetings go, those challenges still lie ahead.

On a hot October morning, fuel pumps at a dozen service stations in Bamako, the capital of Mali, sputtered to a stop. Drivers who had spent hours waiting in line left empty-handed. Motorbikes, taxis, and vans idled where they stood. Market stalls that depended on refrigeration closed early. Hospitals began counting fuel reserves. 

What appeared to Mali residents as an everyday shortage was, in fact, the result of a deliberate, sustained campaign by Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, known as JNIM, an Al-Qaeda affiliate operating in the Sahel, to choke the flow of fuel into the country. The group has moved beyond hit-and-run attacks to economic warfare, burning tankers, ambushing convoys, and enforcing a de facto embargo on fuel imports.

Videos shared online after the Oct. 21 attack showed dozens of burning tankers in Zégoua, near the border with Côte d’Ivoire. JNIM later released a propaganda message claiming responsibility for ambushing 37 vehicles that day.

The first publicly reported attacks began in early September, when the group blocked routes to Kayes and Nioro du Sahel in western Mali, bordering Mauritania and Senegal. That same day, Sept. 3, JNIM reportedly abducted six fuel tanker drivers from Senegal.

Despite an increased military presence, the jihadists struck again on Sept. 13 and 14, torching over 40 tankers under military escort while transporting from Senegal to Mali along the Diédiéni–Kolokani corridor. 

The consequences have rippled far beyond queues at fuel stations. There is currently a sharp inflation that has affected commercial activities. Mines operations have also slowed, and there is a steady erosion of the state’s control over basic life. Across the country, schools have also been closed, further disrupting daily life and cutting several young people off from education.

The residents of Mali expressed their grievances, urging the military junta led by Assimi Goita to step up the fight and counter the group’s atrocities.

JNIM has also sought to control the narrative. In a video released in early September, a spokesperson justified the blockade as retaliation against what he called “the bandit government’s persecution of the population” and “the closure of gas stations”.

This rhetoric points to a deeper cause. Mali’s government recently banned the sale of fuel outside official stations, a measure meant to disrupt the jihadists’ supply chains. 

Blockades and ambushes 

Mali is a landlocked country in West Africa, and it imports most of its fuel by road from Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire. Convoys, sometimes more than 100 tankers, travel through routes to Bamako, and that includes passing through jihadist-controlled areas. 

JNIM have staged checkpoints on key routes where they conduct their attacks by igniting the lead vehicles to create conflagrations. They have destroyed dozens of tankers, with a single ambush in mid-September affecting at least 40 tankers. Videos circulated online showed burning wrecks and stranded drivers. 

The attacks are designed to make transport by road both physically dangerous and economically untenable. As a result, many private companies have stopped sending fuel tankers; others now insist on military escorts, which often become targets in themselves, and neighbouring countries hesitate to transit fuel through overtly dangerous routes. 

Analysts note that by choking off fuel transport, JNIM aims to undermine public confidence in the junta’s competence, stir unrest, and increase its leverage in negotiating local control, taxation, or governance arrangements in contested areas. The approach aligns with Al-Qaeda’s long-standing strategy of exploiting social grievances and state fragility to entrench influence.

The group’s broader objective is to pressure Mali’s military government, which seized power in a coup five years ago, while expanding its own authority through informal taxation and control of smuggling routes. JNIM now holds sway over vast areas of Mali, particularly across the tri-border zone with Burkina Faso and Niger.

The economic shock 

Since the start of the attacks, Bamako and other urban centres have seen fuel queues stretch for hours and a surge in black-market operations, the very activity the government intended to stamp out in its recent ban.

One video posted on X on Oct. 23 captured the desperation: a long procession of cars trailing a fuel tanker to a station, hoping to secure a few litres.

The shortages have cascaded through every layer of the economy. Power supply has been hit as electricity utilities begin implementing emergency plans amid dwindling diesel reserves. For households dependent on private generators, costs have spiked overnight.

The price of goods transported by road has risen sharply in markets across Mali. Small traders who buy fresh produce daily for resale in Bamako say profits have evaporated. For ordinary families, higher transport costs translate directly into more expensive food.

Reports from the weeks following the convoy attacks documented widespread closures of petrol stations and soaring costs of travel and delivery. The military halted certain deliveries to mines over security concerns, and some tankers destined for large gold operations were stopped to avoid creating easy targets. 

For a country already weakened by years of conflict, coups, and economic instability, the fuel blockade has become a multiplier of hardship, a crisis that compounds every existing vulnerability.

Losing the grip 

At first glance, the scarcity hurts everyone, and JNIM gains leverage. 

By controlling or denying access to commodities, the group converts scarcity into political capital. In areas under its influence, it already collects taxes, fines, and “security levies” from traders. Smugglers who can move fuel through alternative routes find new profit, often paying bribes or cutting deals with armed groups to secure passage. 

Meanwhile, formal businesses tied to regulated supply chains and formal employment lose trust and capacity. Local elites who depend on state contracts feel the pinch. The junta, unable to guarantee basic services, faces a mounting legitimacy crisis. Analysts warn that such conditions hollow out institutions and entrench shadow economies, allowing parallel systems of governance to take root.

The government’s response has been uneven; part denial, part damage control. Initially, officials blamed the shortages on heavy rains delaying tanker arrivals. But when JNIM released its propaganda videos claiming responsibility, public outrage forced an acknowledgement of the crisis.

“The sellers should make things easy for the population; the hydrocarbon sellers should not raise the prices at this time of crisis,” said one resident in Bamako, interviewed by DW Africa, voicing his frustration over the difficulties of getting the fuel. 

The armed forces have since launched airstrikes, escorted convoys, and convened emergency committees to protect fuel shipments. Yet these measures have proven costly and largely ineffective.

Transitional Prime Minister Abdoulaye Maïga, who convened an interministerial crisis management committee, announced further steps, including price controls, new regional depots, and increased convoy protection, but they have done little to stem the attacks. Some local reports suggest negotiations or attempts at local truces in areas where the terrorists have influence, but negotiations are politically sensitive for a government that prizes a posture of strength.  

Complicating the situation further is the evolving role of foreign paramilitaries. The Wagner Group’s replacement by the so-called Africa Corps has yet to yield stability, and persistent accusations of human rights abuses risk undermining their counterterrorism efforts.

The longer the blockade continues, the sharper the choices before Mali’s leaders: concede territory and influence to armed groups, or escalate military operations that risk civilian casualties and further infrastructure damage. Either way, the cost of control grows heavier with each passing week.

TORONTO — There might be no greater reminder of how far the Dodgers have come than the opposing pitcher on Monday. When the World Series returns to Dodger Stadium for Game 3, the starting pitcher for the Toronto Blue Jays is scheduled to be Max Scherzer.

You may remember his brief tenure with the Dodgers four years ago, which ended with an elimination game in which Scherzer said he could not pitch. The Dodgers lost, the last domino in a cascade triggered by a front office that miscast its humans as widgets in a search for even the tiniest of edges.

Don’t just take my word for it. This was the word from Hall of Fame pitcher Pedro Martinez at the time: “Dodgers analytics dept really misused probably the best rotation in all of baseball. …They need to figure out a way to let starters be who they really are and let them pitch how they are used to.”

In the 2021 postseason, by choice, the Dodgers used an opener three times, a 20-game winner as a middle reliever, and a Hall of Fame starter as a closer. There would be no parade.

In the 2024 postseason, and not by choice, the Dodgers ran four bullpen games. There would be a parade.

In 2025, the Dodgers are simply throwing out a top-flight starting pitcher in every game. Presumably, there is nothing for the front office to overthink here.

Just sit back and enjoy the show — on Saturday, Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s second straight complete game show. This must be less stressful, at least.

“I don’t think it’s less stressful,” Dodgers pitching coach Mark Prior said to an inquiring middle-aged reporter with gray hair getting a little too noticeable. “We’ve got matching hair.”

Still, there isn’t much mystery in the Dodgers’ 10-2 postseason record. In every game in which their starting pitcher has gotten an out in the sixth inning, they have won. In every game in which their starting pitcher has not gotten an out in the sixth inning, they have lost.

To the rotation of Yamamoto, Blake Snell, Tyler Glasnow and Shohei Ohtani, take a bow.

To Andrew Friedman and his front office, take a bow too. Just because your ownership provided you with a $1.35-billion rotation does not guarantee that you will leave well enough alone.

In the final month of the season, remember, the Dodgers entertained a flurry of ideas about how to best combine a talented rotation and an iffy bullpen into an effective October staff.

Would they deploy Ohtani in relief? Would they use their best arms as often as possible, as the Washington Nationals did in 2019, when they used their top three starters — Scherzer, Patrick Corbin and Stephen Strasburg — as starters and relievers?

The Dodgers let their starters be starters. The conventional wisdom does not always need to be challenged.

“Clearly, Blake Snell, Yama, Glasnow, Shohei, all really good pitchers,” Prior said. “I think we can all agree that they’re all really good pitchers, and any team would probably roll them out in a playoff game.

“So I don’t think this is any master plan.”

Said catcher Will Smith: “I think that’s just this team. We have four starters now that are pitching their best. … We’re just riding those guys.”

Dodgers pitcher Tyler Glasnow is set to start Game 3 of the World Series against the Toronto Blue Jays on Monday.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times )

That brings us back to 2021, when the front office decided the best way to approach the winner-take-all finale of the division series against the San Francisco Giants was to use reliever Corey Knebel as an opener, 20-game winner Julio Urías from the third through the sixth innings, closer Kenley Jansen in the eighth inning and Scherzer as the closer.

That is the kind of all-hands-on-deck approach better suited to the end of a World Series. The Dodgers won that game against the Giants, but Scherzer could not complete five innings in his first championship series start and said he could not take the ball for his next start, an elimination game.

“My arm’s been locked up the past couple of days,” Scherzer said then.

He said that he would be the one at risk if he were not honest with the Dodgers about his condition, rather than trying to push through.

“Guys, when they lie, they go out there and they take on too much, then they blow out,’’ he said. “That’s the ultimate risk here.”

That line of thought did not go over too well in some corners of the clubhouse. Urías was miffed because he believed the Dodgers did not believe in him. Walker Buehler, who started on short rest as a late replacement for Scherzer, gave up four runs in four innings. The Dodgers were eliminated.

Scherzer’s last World Series start, for the Texas Rangers in 2023, lasted three innings. He isn’t thinking about the Rangers, or for that matter the Dodgers.

“I wouldn’t be looking backwards at all for any motivation,’’ he said here Saturday. “I have plenty of motivation. I’m here to win and I’ve got a clubhouse full of guys who want to win too. So we’re a great team and that’s the only thing I need to think about.”

The only thing the Dodgers need to worry about on Monday, at least based on their postseason run: Can they get six or seven innings from Glasnow? If they can, they should be halfway to the World Series championship.

Highlights from the Dodgers’ 5-1 win over the Toronto Blue Jays in Game 2 of the World Series.

The United States has carried out strikes near Venezuela that President Donald Trump says are targeting drug gangs.

That is disputed, but the major military mobilisation has brought the issue of narcotics front and centre.

How bad is the problem in the country, and what’s Trump’s strategy?

Presenter: Adrian Finighan

Guests:

Sanho Tree – Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and director of the Drug Policy Project

Carrie Sheffield – Senior policy analyst at the Independent Women’s Forum

Ernesto Castaneda – Director of the Center for Latin American and Latino Studies at American University

The United States has imposed multiple sanctions on Chinese companies for assisting the Russian military-industrial complex in its war against Ukraine. The US Department of Commerce and the Treasury alleged that several Chinese companies evaded US sanctions by selling sensitive technology needed by Russia to manufacture military weapons. One of these Chinese companies subject to US sanctions and its military dealings with Russia is “Sino Electronics Chinese Company,” which is considered as a part of a network of companies that has allegedly sent shipments worth approximately $200 million to Russia since the Chinese company was placed on the US sanctions list in September 2022. The shipments sent by the “Chinese Sino Network” to Russia included several microchips, cameras, and navigation equipment, technologies critical to Russian weapons used in its war with Ukraine, according to US accusations against Beijing.

 These measures include broad US sanctions in 2024 and 2025 targeting entities in China and several other countries that support Russia’s war efforts. In October 2024, the US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on two Chinese drone companies, accusing them of participating in the production and supply of long-range attack drones to the Russian Air Force. Immediately following, in May 2024, US sanctions targeted Chinese companies and companies in several other countries for allegedly supplying electronic components and chemicals used in the manufacture of Russian weapons and missiles. US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen also warned that “the United States will take action against any Chinese companies that assist Russia in its efforts to obtain military supplies.” As a result of these US sanctions, Chinese banks have become more cautious in dealing with Russia, leading to a slowdown in trade between the two countries during 2024.

  Since July 2025, the United States has threatened to impose secondary sanctions on any entity that continues to cooperate with Russia in an attempt to isolate Moscow by striking its cross-border trade networks, particularly with China. Secondary sanctions target third parties that deal with the directly sanctioned country, Russia in particular.  The sanctions are not imposed because of the actions of the third party, but rather because of its economic ties to the sanctioned entity. Washington uses these sanctions to deter any entity that might indirectly contribute to supporting the sanctioned regime or helping it circumvent sanctions. In 2018, the United States imposed sanctions on a Chinese bank for allegedly conducting financial transactions with North Korea, even though the bank itself had not previously been subject to any sanctions.

 A series of US sanctions on China have been imposed, alleging its military cooperation with Russia in its war against Ukraine. In July 2025, US intelligence reports alleged that Chinese companies were shipping engines to the Russian arms company IEMZ Kupol by mislabeling them to evade sanctions.

The US Department of Commerce expanded its blacklist of Chinese companies and state-owned entities, alleging their cooperation with Russia and supporting it in its war against Ukraine. The US Department of Commerce added several Chinese companies to the US blacklist, including Shanghai Fudan Microelectronics, which was added to the US list of banned Chinese companies for supplying technology to the Russian military sector. Washington also imposed controls on the Chinese export sector, expanding export control restrictions to include Chinese companies that are 50% or more state-owned, as well as entities on the US blacklist. 

 Here, China has rejected all US accusations regarding its dealings with Russian military companies in its war against Ukraine. Beijing has repeatedly denied US accusations of providing military support to Russia. China has also taken several countermeasures, such as imposing sanctions on US companies, in a move to escalate trade tensions between the two countries. Regarding China’s response to US sanctions, China has publicly rejected all these accusations. At the same time, these US sanctions have raised concerns among Chinese banks and companies about secondary sanctions, which may indicate that these US measures are having an impact on trade relations between China and Russia.

 As for China’s official response to the US sanctions imposed on it for its dealings with Russia, the Chinese Foreign Ministry confirmed in an official statement that the United States, by demanding that countries stop purchasing Russian oil, is participating in threatening and undermining international trade.  In response to Trump’s threats regarding the purchase of Russian oil, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement that “China will take decisive countermeasures if its legitimate rights and interests are harmed, and that China opposes the United States using Beijing as a pretext to impose illegal unilateral sanctions on the Russian side.” The Chinese Foreign Ministry also stressed that “China has lodged a protest with Britain regarding the inclusion of Chinese companies on the sanctions list against Russia. Cooperation between Russian and Chinese companies should not be subject to interference or influence.” The Chinese Foreign Ministry also commented on the British sanctions imposed on it for allegedly dealing with Russian companies and entities, saying that “Beijing will take necessary measures to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests.”

 China has categorically rejected all unilateral US sanctions against it, and the punitive tariffs imposed by Trump have angered Beijing. However, unlike Europe or other countries, China has shown confidence, with official Chinese authorities declaring that “it will fight to the end.” An official statement issued by China on October 13, 2025, stated that “threatening to impose high tariffs is not the right way to negotiate with China. The United States must adjust its position.” Beijing has already responded by imposing counter-tariffs and restrictions on US exports, including rare earths.

 As for the nature of the sanctions directed against Russia in 2025, these new US sanctions focus on indirectly strangling the Russian economy by pressuring countries and companies that deal with Moscow in strategic sectors such as energy, metals, and technology. In July 2025, US President Donald Trump announced a 50-day deadline for reaching a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine; otherwise, tariffs of up to 100% would be imposed on countries importing Russian oil or gas. Meanwhile, the US Congress is discussing a bill that would impose tariffs of up to 500% on Russian exports, including secondary sanctions on financing or transporting entities.  Trump warned that all companies dealing with Russia, especially Chinese companies, entities, and institutions, particularly those operating in the technology and metals sectors, could be barred from entering the US market or using the international financial system.

  Finally, regarding the impact of these unilateral US sanctions on China and other countries for allegedly dealing with Russian companies, I believe these US threats will not go unchallenged, as they could undermine confidence in the global economic system and raise questions about who has the right to punish whom and under what international legitimacy? Applying this to Russia, we find that Moscow is linked to extensive trade networks with major economies in strategic sectors such as energy, minerals, and food. These Russian entanglements with global economies make attempts to isolate Moscow a test not only of Washington’s ability but also of the ability of the entire global system to bear the cost of confrontation.

On October 17, 2025, hedge fund TB Alternative Assets Ltd. disclosed a new position in Strategy (MSTR 2.12%), formerly known as MicroStrategy, acquiring 126,000 shares for an estimated $40.6 million.

IMAGE SOURCE: GETTY IMAGES.

What happened

According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission dated October 17, 2025, TB Alternative Assets Ltd. disclosed a new position in Strategy during the third quarter ended September 30, 2025. The fund reported owning 126,000 shares worth $40.6 million. The purchase corresponds to an estimated $40.6 million transaction value, calculated using average prices for the reporting period ended September 30, 2025.

What else to know

This new position represents 6.1% of TB Alternative Assets Ltd.’s reportable U.S. equity AUM as of September 30, 2025.

TB Alternative Assets’ top holdings after the filing are:

• META: $76.97 million (11.5% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• GOOG: $58.56 million (8.8% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• INTC: $51.26 million (7.7% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• PDD: $45.72 million (6.8% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025
• MSTR: $40.60 million (6.1% of AUM) as of September 30, 2025

As of October 16, 2025, shares were priced at $283.84, up 34.3% over the past year and outperforming the S&P 500 by 32.8 percentage points during the same period.

Company Overview

Company Snapshot

Strategy provides enterprise analytics solutions, enabling organizations to derive insights from data at scale. The company leverages its robust software platform and specialized services to address complex business intelligence needs for large enterprises.

Strategy offers enterprise analytics software, including a software platform with features such as hyperintelligence, data visualization, reporting, and mobile analytics.

The company generates revenue primarily through software licensing, support services, consulting, and education offerings for enterprise clients. It serves a diversified customer base across industries such as retail, finance, technology, healthcare, and the public sector.

Foolish take

Hedge fund TB Alternative Assets’ investment in Strategy shares is noteworthy for a few reasons. The buy represents an initial position in the stock. Moreover, the hedge fund went big with the purchase, putting Strategy shares into its top five holdings. Lastly, those top holdings are dominated by tech stocks, and although Strategy began as a data analytics software platform, it’s now more of a cryptocurrency play.

Strategy became the first publicly-traded company to buy Bitcoin as part of its capital allocation strategy back in 2020. Since then, it has transformed into “the world’s first and largest Bitcoin Treasury Company,” according to Strategy.

As of July 29, the company holds 3% of all Bitcoin in existence. This brought its Q2 total assets to $64.8 billion with $64.4 billion of that in digital assets. As a result, Strategy’s fortunes rise and fall with the value of the cryptocurrency rather than its software products.

So far, the gamble has paid off. As Bitcoin’s value has risen, so has Strategy’s stock. And now, the company is leveraging its cryptocurrency holdings to offer various Bitcoin-related investment vehicles.

TB Alternative Assets may have found this new direction for the former MicroStrategy a compelling case for investing in the stock. If you’re seeking exposure to Bitcoin, Strategy offers a unique take, and with the stock down from its 52-week high of $543 reached last November, now may be a good time to buy.

Glossary

13F AUM: The total market value of U.S. equity securities reported by an institutional investment manager in quarterly SEC filings.
Position: The amount of a particular security or asset held by an investor or fund.
Stake: The ownership interest or share held in a company by an investor or fund.
Holding: A security or asset owned by an investor or fund, often listed in portfolio disclosures.
Outperforming: Achieving a higher return compared to a specific benchmark or index over a given period.
Enterprise analytics: Software and tools that help organizations analyze large-scale data to support business decision-making.
Business intelligence: Technologies and strategies used to analyze business data and support better decision-making.
Software licensing: The practice of granting customers the right to use software under specific terms and conditions.
Support services: Assistance provided to customers for software maintenance, troubleshooting, and technical issues.
Consulting: Professional advisory services that help organizations implement and optimize software or business processes.
TTM: The 12-month period ending with the most recent quarterly report.
Reportable U.S. equity AUM: The portion of assets under management invested in U.S. stocks that must be disclosed in regulatory filings.

Thomas Tuchel may have expressed public displeasure with England’s fans after the emphatic Wembley win against Wales, but the performance of his players will have left him feeling only the warm glow of vindication.

Tuchel delivered a highly-critical and unusually blunt verdict from any coach in the direction of his own “silent” supporters after a 3-0 stroll was effectively wrapped up inside the first 20 minutes.

It was, however, another message delivered by the German manager that will carry wider significance as England gather momentum towards next summer’s World Cup.

Tuchel’s words stretched way beyond the shockwaves that greeted Jude Bellingham’s exclusion when he named his latest England squad.

He made it crystal clear that England’s star system was over, that players in possession could cement their places by sheer weight of performances, the biggest names no longer guaranteed an automatic recall.

England victory in the Wembley friendly must be placed in the context of Welsh opponents with eyes seemingly fixed on their vital World Cup qualifier against Belgium on Monday, but this was still a night with a large measure of satisfaction for Tuchel’s strategy.

Tuchel made it clear he is picking an England team, not individuals. He even stated: “We are not collecting the most talented players. We are trying to build a team. Teams win trophies, no-one else.”

Bellingham’s superstar status meant Tuchel’s selection was laced with risk, even though it was shaped by common sense as he had only started one game for Real Madrid following shoulder surgery.

He may have wanted to be included, but on this occasion Tuchel was happy to do without Bellingham, keeping faith with the players who produced the best result and performance of his reign by winning 5-0 against Serbia in the World Cup qualifier in Belgrade.

And, to add further credibility to Tuchel’s decision-making process, England’s outstanding player against Wales was Aston Villa’s Morgan Rogers, excelling in Bellingham’s number 10 role, as he did in Belgrade.

Rogers, on the evidence of England’s past two games, is fast becoming the poster boy for the new identity Tuchel wants to create.

And if Tuchel’s measure is applied, the England shirt is now Rogers’ to lose, with a further opportunity to cement his place against Latvia in Riga on Tuesday.

In this podcast, Motley Fool contributors Travis Hoium and Lou Whiteman and analyst Emily Flippen discuss:

• Apple‘s headset strategy.
• Tesla‘s delivery numbers.
• Earnings trends to watch.

To catch full episodes of all The Motley Fool’s free podcasts, check out our podcast center. When you’re ready to invest, check out this top 10 list of stocks to buy.

A full transcript is below.

This podcast was recorded on Oct. 03, 2025.

Travis Hoium: Are smart glasses the future of technology hardware? Motley Fool Money starts down.

Welcome to Motley Fool Money. I’m Travis Hoium joined by Lou Whiteman and Emily Flippen. We’re going to jump right in today, and the big topic I thought for this week was Apple at least reportedly pulling back on their lighter Vision Pro headset. They’re going to be moving in the same direction, it looks like as Meta has with their Ray Ban glasses, this AR technology. Emily, what are your thoughts on this whole space and where Meta and Apple fits into it?

Emily Flippen: I’m incredibly disappointed by Apple here. Look, Apple invested a lot of time and resources into convincing all of us that the future was in these lightweight, daily wearable glasses that were the visionary of spatial computing. Then a year later, just backtracks and it’s not clear to me if this is, a desperate pull for them to say, no, me, too, when they see the innovation that Meta is doing and literally the metaverse, or if this is just throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. But in my opinion, I just am so incredibly bearish. Pivoting toward heavy duty VR glasses when it seems like we have years and years of evidence coming out of Meta that consumers just do not want this.

Travis Hoium: It seems like a space where they’re throwing stuff at the wall, and we don’t know exactly what’s going to stick. But at least we know these lightweight things are going to stick a little bit. That seems like a little bit of the move in the right direction, Lou, but it’s still it seems like this is a money losing proposition for the foreseeable future.

Lou Whiteman: We should say that this is one report, and we don’t know what’s going on, really. Apple has $65 billion in cash. I feel like they can do both. But look, the cynical take here is, I can’t figure out to spin is Meta was right or Apple is really that desperate. Because in a way, this seems like it’s validation of everything Meta is doing. In a way, it’s Apple are they really just they need something? I agree with Emily. I see more potential in the Vision Pro. There’s also more of a chance an outright flop. I don’t get the obsession with glasses right now, and I’m worried to see everyone pushing in that direction.

Travis Hoium: One of the things that was interesting when the Vision Pro came out is look, I’ve been in the VR space for almost a decade now, and what was unique about it is it was almost like an AR pair of glasses while actually being VR. The pass through was better than we’ve ever had in any other device. It seemed like they were, even at that time, moving toward this AI future but the technology wasn’t quite there yet. They hadn’t miniaturized things enough to get to even where Meta and Ray Ban are with their current glasses. Maybe we were headed this direction all along, and like Lou said, they’re walking and chewing gum at the same time. They’re probably doing both of these things, but they’re maybe now saying, hey, look, the Vision Pro has been a flop, and people are at least a little excited about these sunglasses or these glasses from Meta. Emily, is that maybe the right way to think about it? They’re seeing what’s gonna work and what’s not, and they’re seeing Meta’s success. They have always been a follower. They’re never usually the first company to release a device, so maybe that’s the right strategy.

Emily Flippen: Yes, that’s a really generous interpretation, I think, Travis. I think this is an issue. Really, I think it’s an issue of bloat. I say that as somebody who is a fan of Apple. Ultimately, Apple is still a hardware business when push comes to shove. They have to be on the bleeding edge of whatever the new exciting hardware accessory is, even if that ends up getting commoditized, because otherwise, they could lose their position as one of the largest companies in the world. I understand the desperate need to be there. If Meta is onto something, Apple needs to be right there too. But here’s the problem when you have so many extra billions of dollars in cash flow, is that it really does allow you to lack discipline where you choose to invest your CAPEX. I wish there was more focus coming out of the Apple Management team. Again, to your point, we don’t exactly know how many resources are being put behind this larger version of these AR VR glasses. But I really do think that it’s disappointing to see them spread out their attention when the Vision Pro hasn’t lived up to its potential yet, and there is potential there. They might be a little early, but they invested more time and resources into convincing consumers about why this would be an addition to their everyday life. That can actually be onto something great. My concern is that when you do two things poorly, you do nothing well. I wish they would just focus on doing one thing well.

Lou Whiteman: Here’s a question, and I don’t know if this will end up being bullish or bearish, but, the Apple value proposition from the start was always, it just works. In a way that was tech for the normies. I’m a normie, so I appreciate that. I am yet to be convinced that the normies want these glasses, that there really is the market that they think there is. To me, I don’t see it doing anything right now that you can’t do on your phone, so it’s an accessory to the phone, not a replacement. The watch is, too. The watch has done pretty well, but the watch is half the price of these. Do we want.

Travis Hoium: The watch is also nowhere near the market share that the iPhone.

Lou Whiteman: It is a niche product. Do we want an accessory that costs as much as the phone? I doubt it. The Glass Half Full is, Apple really sees a chance to do what they did with the iPhone relative to the Palm Pre and all those. They really have come up with something that is that next step. Glass Half Empty is that this is going to just be like the watch and be just another product out there that can’t move the needle. When in theory, if they get the Vision Pro right over time, that could be a whole new product category. This is, again, what are we swinging for hits or swinging for home runs? Because this feels like going for a base hit and giving up on the home run swing.

Travis Hoium: I’ll start with you, Lou, do you think the combination of artificial intelligence and these different form factors. Usually the technology revolutions, the disruption that happens, it comes with a new form factor. The mainframe, the PC, the smartphone, brought about all new winners, new business models. We’ve been talking about new form factors in AI for quite a while. The pendant didn’t seem to stick. It seems like glasses has a chance. But then you run into this strange, I don’t know if it’s an uncanny valley where I can see some real value in, look, I can see in our recording, I can see your names. Sometimes I look down there when I’m reading the outro. I don’t know why. I just do it. I’m meeting new parents as my kids go to school. I know I’ve met you before. I know you said your name, but I can’t remember. If it just popped up on my glasses, that’d be great. On the flip side of that, if we’re constantly recording everything all the time, that seems like a pretty dystopian vision of the future. It seems like we do need that killer app and we’re just not there yet, and nobody’s quite figured that out. Is that a fair critique of this next gen issue? It’s almost like we’re in the Apple Newton phase of the industry. We’re 10 years too early.

Lou Whiteman: Let me give you a more subtle critique. Because I’m not going to go dystopian, although I see that, I see the fear. But look, we talk about what a distraction the phone is when you’re driving, when you’re walking down the street, whatever. Maybe, yes. If it just popped up Emily’s name, if I couldn’t think of it, that would be a help. But 90% of the things, be it directions, watching Netflix for gosh sakes while you’re driving or something. All of these things that seem to be obvious use cases, that just doesn’t seem like a good idea for me. Again, it does feel like that, yes, it’s a neat accessory onto the phone, but largely, the reason this is the next big thing is, I think, because no one has any better ideas, not because it is a great idea.

Emily Flippen: That’s an interesting way to put it. I’ll just quickly tap off by saying, I wish Apple was OK with being second, in some cases. I think when you look at the success of the smartphone, Apple wasn’t the first company to come out with a smartphone, but they waited for the proof and the pudding there with Blackberry before they entered the market and destroyed it. The same is true for smart watches. They waited for Garmin and others to come out, fit bit to show the demand for watches, and then said, let’s take this market that already exists, and let’s crush it. The market doesn’t exist right now for these glasses. I think that’s part of the problem that Apple’s running up against.

Travis Hoium: When we come back, we are going to get to Tesla’s phenomenal delivery numbers for the third quarter of 2025 and see what the future looks like because this may be a peak for a while. You’re listening to Motley Fool Money.

One of the other big pieces of news for the week was Tesla had a phenomenal quarter. Deliveries were 497,099 vehicles. That was a 7.4% increase from a year ago. The problem is, the $7,500 tax credit ended at the end of the third quarter. Emily, is this going to be as good as it gets for Tesla, at least for the foreseeable future?

Emily Flippen: I think it’s a fair statement. I do think two things can be true at once, which is, that this was a great delivery month they put up, but it was also this deadline sprint that you mentioned for people to place orders before the tax credit expired. If I had to estimate, I would imagine that we’re probably looking at a softer fourth quarter here, despite how strong the third quarter was in terms of deliveries, but at the same time, I’m still really bullish on the entire EV sector, especially in the United States, but across the world. I think the rumors of its death, so to speak, have been greatly exaggerated. There’s a lot of people out there, a lot of investors who think that without government incentives, demand for electric vehicles just won’t be there. It’s an interesting argument, and it’s one that I think we’re going to get some more evidence toward or against as we see these tax credits expire, but big picture, we’ve seen higher interest rates, and that softens demand for more expensive cars. EVs are still on average, more expensive than more traditional vehicles, and you still need to have the installation and charging options. A lot of people choose to finance those if they have them installed on their house. Of course, with higher interest rates, less people being willing to finance at higher rates. There’s a lot of factors that are going against EV adoption right now that are unlikely to persist over the long term. That’s the thing where I’m like, it’s great to see a Sean Carter from Tesla. I’m not expecting that to persist for Tesla or any other EV maker. I think Ford‘s CEO, which is commenting earlier this week that he expects EV market share to drop by half for this foreseeable future. Crazy numbers. But when I zoom out 10 years, I’m very not worried about electric vehicles here.

Lou Whiteman: Here’s the interesting thing to me. These are the times autos are very cyclical. These are the times when historically, the big giants of the industry, based at Detroit, through most of the industry, they’ve used their balance sheet to muscle out competitors. When pricing becomes a problem, when affordability becomes a problem, and Ford today still has that great captive Auto Finance unit. GM is rebuilding theirs, where they really can offer you a deal you can’t refuse. Someone else who’s smaller, in this case, a Rivian, back in the day with others just can’t afford to. On paper, Tesla is better positioned to do that than even the Detroit companies. They have a great balance sheet. However, Tesla, unlike all of these companies, also has a huge long list of things other than consumer finance they want to put their money to. I feel like to some extent, Tesla’s near term destiny is in their own hands. If they want to minimize the blow of the tax credit, I think they have the wherewithal to do that. I don’t know if for long term investors, that would be the best use of their capital, though, but I mean, I do think it’s an interesting moment. In terms of the big picture for EVs, for me, right now, it makes sense that hybrids are where it’s at because I think hybrids offer you a better deal, and I’m biased because I have a hybrid. Maybe I’m saying that. To me, the future of EVs is not tied to tax credits. It’s not tied to what Elon Musk thinks when he wakes up in the morning. You tell me how and when that Model 2 hits the streets. You tell me if that Model 2 really is a $25,000 car. I will tell you what I think the near term future for Tesla EVs are. Similarly, all of these companies, Ford has a pickup truck. That’s a very similar value proposition. Tell me whether or not those actually can be made at profit anytime soon. That, I think, is going to be the answer to the question of how quickly and how strongly we see EVs take off from here, not a $7,000 tax credit.

Emily Flippen: Why are we so focused on Tesla and Ford when we actually already have evidence that is the case. BYD out of China has been making profitable, low cost electric vehicles that are getting worldwide adoption. We don’t see them a lot here in the United States because of our own tariff regime and lack of importing there. But I do think that we have evidence that this battery company, originally a battery company now a big car company can do it. There’s no reason to believe that others can’t eventually get there, as well. But that evidence exists. It’s just a matter of, to your point, Lou, how quickly?

Travis Hoium: Absolutely. Speaking of companies that are growing in EVs, I think this one’s fascinating is General Motors, do you know how much their EV growth was year over year? Gulf the third quarter, 105% to 144,668 vehicles. The Equinox EV, which is their entry level, $35,100. I believe that’s less than you can get a Tesla for today. It does seem the dynamics have shifted quite a bit. What will be fascinating, they’re still focusing on big trucks and SUVs. That’s where the money is made, even though Tesla used to be high margin. Their margins are now lower than the traditional automakers today. It’s partly because they’re not making these expensive trucks and SUVs, which are selling like crazy today. This is going to be fascinating because it does seem like one thing that’s going to be consistent is the market will probably not be growing as much as it would have had that $7,500 tax credit remained, and therefore, it’s going to be more competitive because there is more supply coming into the mat.

Lou Whiteman: The one caveat there, I would say on just looking at GM numbers is, I think the dealer model provides more incentive to try and get move metal before the tax credit disappears because as soon as it’s on location, that’s the dealers problem, not the automakers problem. The dealers don’t have that balance sheet to put to work. They wanted to move that metal. But we’ll see if it holds up, that’s great for GM.

Travis Hoium: I want to get your thoughts on we have the end of the third quarter just happened this week on Tuesday. That means the earning season is going to be coming very soon. Emily, what are you looking at for this earning season as it starts next week and the week after?

Emily Flippen: I’m actually looking for companies that are very obviously sandbagging with guidance. I say that, I think we all expect for guidance this quarter to come in weaker. It was that case last quarter. We are living in a really uncertain environment now, so it makes sense that not only are companies expecting their profit margins to be squeezed, especially with weak consumer spending, they don’t know what’s going to happen with inflation or tariffs, whatever the overhang may be. I always love it when a company’s management team is always a bit more pessimistic than I’m, and sometimes I can be a red flag, but sometimes I can also be a buying opportunity. For instance, I think about Dutch Bros, who when you look back at their business at this point last year, kept guiding for low to mid single digit same store sales growth, so much weaker than what they were putting up because management was just that uncertain about the cannibalization that’d be happening with their business or consumer spending. Quarter after quarter, they just kept hitting it out of the park they only recently raised guidance. But that mismatch, in my opinion, between a really conservative management team and a really strong business, where I can see their path to out performance, even more than maybe management can, can be appealing because if you see shares fall really dramatically based on weak guidance that you think is a hurdle that can be easily passed, it can be a buying opportunity.

Lou Whiteman: It’s so funny you say that because I was thinking the other day. I was like, I’m more excited about the opportunity to go shopping this earning season than normal. I do think that that’s yeah, we’re ripe for it, I think. All the containers are there. As far as what I’m looking for, I’ll go big picture. I’m focused on margins just across the board. I’m really curious how much the macro is eating into margins. We know there’s tariffs out there. We know that the consumer is struggling to get a feel for how much that companies are eating it. I think I’m more interested in looking at margin change over time than I’m even, revenue growth or earnings growth. I want to know not what happened in the last three months. I want to know what to expect the next three, six months to come, and I think that is at least a little bit of a window into what’s going on out there.

Travis Hoium: Lou, do you think tariffs is going to be a bigger topic of discussion or less than it was over the last two quarters? I’ll say maybe the second quarter, first quarter was a lot of, we have no idea what’s going on. Second quarter, companies have gotten their heads around it. Third quarter, now we’re really in it. Are we going to hear a lot about it, or is it going to just be in the background?

Lou Whiteman: I think we’re going to hear a ton about it, but I think it’s going to be in the guidance side because we’re in the holiday quarter now, and I think that that’s going to be front of mind. Travis, I’ve used this with you before the boiling frog analogy that you, tariffs are not a light switch. It’s just over time, suddenly what happened? The holiday season seems like if I was a CEO, that would be front of mind for me at the holiday season. I think you’ll be hearing about it a lot in the guidance.

Travis Hoium: It is going to be fascinating to see what companies can who has pricing power. Who doesn’t? Who has to, like you said, eat those tariffs and who’s able to pass them on to customers and where they’re impacting a lot to learn over the next few weeks. When we come back, I’m going to have Emily and Lou take an over or under position on a bunch of predictions for the rest of the year you’re listening to Motley Fool Money.

Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Today, we’re going to play a little game called over-under. I’m going to give a prediction about something that’s going to happen in the economy or the market, and Emily and Lou are going to guess whether they think there’s going to be an over or under. Let’s start with the topic that we discussed earlier, Metas Glasses. They sold about 1 million pairs of these smart glasses in 2024. That’s a pretty big number. My question is, are they going to sell over or under 5 million units in 2028? Emily, I’m going to have you go first over or under 5 million.

Emily Flippen: I feel this will come as no surprise for anybody who listen to the first half of the show, but I have to go under here. I just don’t see the use cases for it on Meta side. When you look at Metas financials, this business spent more on CapEx in the last 12 months than the business generated in operating income or an operating cash flow in all of 2022. They are just throwing money at the wall, and it’s amazing to me how much money they’re investing into various things, but nothing is sticking with consumers. Ultimately, you can’t force a consumer to come out and buy a new product if they don’t see a use case for it. It’s amazing to me that they even sold 1 million units in 2024. That is peak hype, in my opinion. Unless something really sticks here for Meta, I expect that number to actually fall over the course of the next.

Lou Whiteman: Wow. I’m going to use Emily’s words and come to the conclusion that over. Because, yes, Zuck needs this, and Zuck is more than willing to spend money, and Zuck is still hurting about.

Travis Hoium: You may just give them away.

Lou Whiteman: I wasn’t going to go quite that far, but since you got there, I don’t think that profitability, I’m glad we’re talking volume. We’re talking units, not profitability or success here.

Travis Hoium: But, I don’t think we’re under the delusion that these are going to be profitable in the next three years.

Lou Whiteman: My guess is, he’s going to move these darn things. Come high or high water.

Travis Hoium: This will be interesting because I do think the adoption of the VR space really hit a wall. But glasses are different. Glasses are a little bit more passive. They’re not quite lower cost, which is, I think, interesting $800 for these new display glasses. But there’s definitely a market for it. The other thing to think about, too, is if you bought one in 2024, when are you going to want to update that? If there’s not a lot of new features, that could be a headwind, too. We’ll be fascinated to see how successful or unsuccessful Meta is moving into more of the glasses space. Let’s go to the overall economy, and I want to get your thoughts on mortgage rates. The reason that I think this is important is housing is a huge driver of the economy. It’s huge portion of our money is spent on rents, on mortgages. It provides tons of jobs. Higher mortgage rates, at least than we’ve had over the past decade, has been a real headwind. Fed funds rate is coming down. The rate that the Fed controls is coming down. The problem is, the longer term rates that drive mortgage rates and the borrowing rates for companies is not coming down at the same rate. Right now, we have a mortgage rate average of about 6.3% a year from now, do you think those mortgage rates are going to be over or under 6%? Down just slightly from where we are today, Lou how you go?

Lou Whiteman: Getting a real time lesson in the limits to the Fed’s power. Wait, there’s just so much going on other than the Fed that’s driving these long term rates. I’m going under, and I’m not sure it’s a good thing. I’m all over the place. What’s going to happen in the economy in the next year? But I’m increasingly worried, I think, and I think that there’s going to need to be more and more aggressiveness. I think housing is a natural place for both politics and policy to get involved here. I don’t want to go too much under there, but I have a feeling we’ll be eventually pushed downward one way or the other.

Emily Flippen: Might be a hot take here, but we’re sitting at about 6% right now, and I think the general expectation is that the market can handle the housing market can handle these high rates for very much longer, and that the Fed is going to continue to cut rates, which eventually, hopefully, even though there is obviously a disconnect here between the Fed is doing and what lenders are doing, that will eventually come down, but I have to say over. I think mortgage rates are going to be over 6% one year from now. The reason is is because I don’t actually think we’re going to get as many rate cuts as the market is expecting. I think that tepidness is going to pull over into the market for mortgages. The reason I say that is because a lot of the inflation data, despite the fact that it has cooled off, and it’s down, although obviously not to Fed’s target rates, I expect that we probably heat up as a lot more of these price increases from tariffs are passed along to consumers in the back half of this year, a lot of that evidence has shown that companies so far have eaten the price of these tariffs, and that is eventually that dam is eventually going to break. In my opinion, that’s unfortunately going to impact interest rates.

Travis Hoium: I do think it is interesting that we have not really seen we’ve been talking about this on these shows for months. We have not really seen the impact of tariffs yet. The inventory cycle for a lot of these companies is not a month or two. If tariffs went in place, April 2, it’s not like you’re going to see that in stores, even in June. They were planning in April now for the holidays. This is when we’re going to see those price increases. I have kids. We’re buying stuff for them all the time, and you’re seeing those prices go up. I’m interested to see if that impacts consumers. Emily, is your point just that the market is going to say, you know what? Sure, these rates are going to come down short term, but long term, they’re going to have to go back up to fight inflation.

Emily Flippen: I think it’s going to be a combination between a weaker labor market and inflation here that’s going to put the Fed in a bit of an odd position. Ultimately, I think, whenever you see broader economic concerns in combination with the dynamics that we’re seeing in terms of the housing market today, I would just be surprised if rates fall that dramatically within one year. I hope I am wrong. I do tend to be a pessimist, and I like to be pleasantly surprised. I hope a year from now we’re sitting here in October 2026, talking about our nice four per to 5% mortgages. But that feels like a pipe dream to me these days.

Lou Whiteman: You know what’s fascinating, Emily, I’m pessimistic, too, but I think in the near term, it’s easier to play games with it, and in the long term, it eventually comes back to bite you. I’m focused on the one year, too, but who knows? That’s what makes market.

Travis Hoium: Let’s quickly do an over under on the number of fed rate cuts in the next 12 months. Emily, it sounds you’re going under three. That’s where I’m going to set the bar. But is that officially your call?

Emily Flippen: It is. In fact, I’ll tell you what. In the next 12 months, I will even go further. I think we have maybe one rate cut.

Travis Hoium: The market is pricing into this year.

Emily Flippen: Yes.

Travis Hoium: You don’t think that’s going to happen in 12 months?

Emily Flippen: I don’t talked about this on Motley Fool Money in the past, I believe. I think I expected one rate cut in September, which we got. Despite the fact that all of the blind polling here from the Federal Reserve does indicate that even the people on the panel themselves expect a number of rate cuts over the remainder of the year.

Emily Flippen: We don’t have, obviously, with the government shutdown, our most recent jobs data, and inflation has not moderated. I can’t emphasize this enough. It has not moderated to the extent that the Fed wants it to moderate. It’s still well above their target rate. We’ve actually seen it accelerates on a month over month basis, and there’s a fair bit of evidence that despite the fact that tariffs have not had the impact that I think a lot of economists and investors fear to this point, which is wonderful, that that shoe is, in my opinion, likely to drop toward the back half of the year. Again, I really hope I’m wrong here. I really hope mortgage rates come down. I really hope we have three rate cuts. But I’m betting on one rate cut in the next.

Lou Whiteman: I really hope I’m wrong, Ron Gur, because for the record, I agree. If you want me, I play pundit. I agree with everything Emily said. I was reluctant to even cut the first time. I was scared about that, and I don’t want rate cuts. I’m worried about inflation. But again, I think politics plays into this, and especially as the year goes on with the Fed. I think market dynamics is providing pressure. Officially, I would push to three. I think we are at three. But, if anything, if you force me not to push, I’m going to take the over. That scares me a bit, but I do think that just the pressure on the Fed to cut rates is only going to accelerate as Pal steps away and as other changes, and as just assist the situation, I’m afraid we are going to deteriorate some from here.

Travis Hoium: Lou, I did allow you to push on that one, but this one, we’re going to make things a little bit more difficult. NVIDIA is the most valuable company in the world, $4.6 trillion market cap; Microsoft, 3.9, Apple, 3.8 trillion. My question for you, is NVIDIA going to be over or under the 1.5? Basically, are they going to be first or are they going to be lower than first? Most valuable company on January 1st, 2030. You have a little over four years between now and then. Are they going to maintain this ranking?

Lou Whiteman: Any good gambler has to take the field on that. I’m going to take the field and say under. However, NVIDIA is a pretty good choice to be there. It’s a great company. They have staying power. But no, if you’re going to give me every company or NVIDIA and have it play out four years, I’ll take everybody else.

Emily Flippen: Unfortunately, if you look historically speaking, companies that are the largest in the world when you zoom out in a 5-10 year period don’t tend to maintain that positioning. I have to agree with Lou here, I to take the under. That being said, if anybody can do it, it’s NVIDIA. This would be, and you hate as an investor to say this time is different, but this could be the exception to the rule.

Travis Hoium: We’ll end on this one. I want to get your S&P 500 picks over the next 12 months. Over or under 7,000. As we’re recording, we’re at about 6,750. I’m giving a little bit of a gain, 5% gain or so. Do you think a year from now we are under 7,000 on the S&P 500, Emily?

Emily Flippen: This is an interesting question because I think everyone in their dough will tell you right now that the S&P 500 is overvalued. The market is overvalued. We have all of these headwinds, consumers are feeling hurt. The government, as we are talking, is literally shut down, and the stock market is up. Make that make sense, exactly. There is this real disconnect that’s happening between the American consumer, the American economy, and, I guess, general vibes of the American people here versus what we’re seeing in the market. I fear that the irrationality, to some extent, can maintain over the course of the next year because it hasn’t made a lot of sense to this point. That being said, I can’t get behind why that would be. I have to take the under. I think it’s less than five. In fact, I think the stock markets probably down from where we are today a year from now. Again, I hope I’m wrong, and pessimists sound smart, optimists tend to make more money, so I’m staying fully invested, regardless of what my short-term prediction is for the markets. But it’s hard for me to rationalize how the market could go up from here, given the factors and the headwinds that we’re seeing in the broader economy.

Lou Whiteman: It’s hard to disagree with that. I’ve been all doom and gloom when we were talking about the Fed and stuff, but here’s the deal. I do think that it’s “priced in.” I think one of the weird things is Liberation Day was such a shock that we just normalized that or became immune to that real quick. I am more confident that we aren’t going massively in one direction or the other. I think it’s going to just be a grind, but I’m going to take the over. I think that we can just grind along almost regardless of what’s going on on Main Street for a while.

Travis Hoium: When we come back, we will get to stocks on our radar. You are listening to Motley Fool Monday.

As always, people on the program may have interest in the stocks they talk about, and the Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against, so don’t buy or sell stocks based solely on what you hear. All personal finance content follows Motley Fool editorial standards and is not approved by advertisers. Advertisements are sponsored content and provided for informational purposes only. To see our full advertising disclosure, please check out our show notes. One of the interesting news items for the week is Spotify founder and CEO, Daniel Ek, is stepping down. He is going to be replaced by co-CEOs Gustav Soderstrom and Alex Norstrom. Emily, this has been a phenomenal run for Spotify and for Ek over the past three years. I think they’ve solidified their business model, but going with the co CEO strategy seems to be a trend, too. What did you take away from this announcement?

Emily Flippen: I was really disappointed by this announcement because, as you mentioned, Travis, wow, it looks good for Spotify over the last couple of years; it wasn’t always the case. When Spotify first went public, part of my conviction behind the business was the way that Dan Ek talked about the company being very focused on the long term, and investors can forget that there is a period for Spotify there, a very long period where investors were very pessimistic, believing that Spotify would never be able to get its gross margin above 30% because of the limits and the caps on the way that the licensing agreements for music operated. Dan Ek had a really impressive long-term vision for what the Spotify platform could be, and he really did execute well on that, raised prices when it was appropriate, while expanding into things like audiobooks and podcasting, of which so many people, even internally in Spotify, were very skeptical about his investments there. Ek led that initiative. It’s disappointing to see him leave, even though he will stay on his executive chair. I don’t love co-CEOs in general, but I will say if anybody can pull it off, it’s possibly this pair. Norstrom and Soderstrom have already acted together as co-presidents of Spotify. They seem to have different expertise, one more product, one more operational. Hopefully they’ll find a way to marry in that sense, but the devil’s always in the details, and it’s scary when you have a founder, CEO leaving the helm of a great company.

Lou Whiteman: Everything in my gut makes me want to hate the co CEO structure. You need one person in charge. I think I need to get over that, though. We’ve seen it in a lot of companies. I do think, look, the CEO title has always been vague. It means different things in different companies. It’s too much for one human being to do all the work of a big company. Average tenure of CEOs is falling, so you need to have a lot of talent there. I think if you look at this case, and I think there’s a good chance it works. I think the idea of just we’re almost just recategorizing what we call people. When inevitably, nobody was multitasking everything, and everybody had different roles, anyway. I think what’s evolving more is just how we describe these things, not how companies work. You need the right people. You need well-defined roles. You need, maybe a founder as executive chairman to play referee if needed. I think it can work, and I need to be less scared of it. Hopefully for the best year.

Travis Hoium: It has been interesting to see Netflix has done a similar thing, where they have different expertise. It does seem like a two-headed dragon at the top, and these companies are so big now that maybe that makes sense because it’s a huge job to fill. Let’s get to the stocks that are on our radar. We’re going to bring in Dan Boyd from behind the glass. Lou, I’m going to have you go first. What’s on your radar this week?

Lou Whiteman: Dan, I’m looking at Delta Airlines, ticker DAL. They kick off transport earnings next week, Thursday, I think, should set the tone not just for airlines, but could provide insight into the consumer, into big macro, and all that. Baseline expectations is that corporate travel is holding up better than tourists. International is steady, and premium products are in demand. If that proves true, that is really good news for investors not just in Delta, but United too, which I think Delta and United, probably the best stocks in this sector. Very curious to hear what they have to say and what we can read into the entire sector from them.

Travis Hoium: Dan, what do you think about getting into airline stocks?

Dan Boyd: Now, Lou, you are a Georgia guy. How much of this is blind Homerism?

Lou Whiteman: I haven’t lived in Georgia that long.

Dan Boyd: You’re saying none?

Lou Whiteman: No.

Dan Boyd: I don’t believe it. I don’t believe that for a second.

Lou Whiteman: Dan, as someone who flies Delta regularly, I have all the reason in the world to hate them, trust me.

Dan Boyd: Fair enough.

Lou Whiteman: Emily, what’s on your watch list?

Emily Flippen: Well, hopefully, a stock that generates a little less hate than Delta Airlines. I’m looking at Mercado Libre. The ticker is MELI. Mercado Libre shares are down about 15% this week because this e-commerce behemoth that operates in South America looks like it’s getting a bit of renewed competition from Amazon. Amazon announcing that in their attempt to expand their presence in Brazil, they’d be waiving additional fees for sellers and fulfillment by Amazon throughout the country over the holiday season. In my opinion, this is a great buying opportunity, Dan. You have to listen to me here because Mercado Libre’s been there, done that. Sea Limited, with the Shoppe app, tried to move into Brazil in Latin America, South America, a couple of years ago, and got absolutely trounced by Mercado Libre. Mercado Libre has by far the biggest lead in this space. I couldn’t be less concerned for the lead they have here, and with shares off around 15%. What’s a better time to be buying?

Travis Hoium: Dan, Emily’s going with a long-term winner compared to the troubling industry in the airlines. What do you think about Mercado Libre?

Dan Boyd: She said, you have to listen to me. Travis, so I guess I have to listen to Emily now.

Emily Flippen: Let this be a lesson to ask for what you want in life.

Travis Hoium: What’s going on your watch list? Is it officially Mercado Libre?

Dan Boyd: It’s definitely going to be Mercado Libre. I think the price point might be a little too good to ignore these days.

Lou Whiteman: For Lou Whiteman, Emily Flippen, our production leader, Dan Boyd, and the entire Motley Fool team, I’m Travis Hoium. Thanks for listening to Motley Fool Money. We’ll see you here tomorrow.

Like that one friend who repeatedly promises to quit drinking after just one last round, the American government is staggering toward another shutdown. It’s starting to seem inevitable — because it looks as though neither side is going to swerve in this game of chicken.

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Senate minority leader who somehow manages to perpetually look both tired and smug, can’t afford another political retreat. He’s refusing to give Republicans another blank check, aiming instead to wring out some key concessions in exchange for a few Democratic votes to get a funding bill through the upper chamber.

The problem? President Trump, who runs the show for Republicans, views a shutdown the same way Hans Gruber viewed the FBI in “Die Hard”: as a feature, not a bug. Shuttered agencies and mass firings of federal workers aren’t obstacles; they’re leverage (and sometimes the goal itself).

Schumer can’t back down, and Trump doesn’t want to back down. That’s why the shutdown feels more imminent than the last time we flirted with one, back in March, when Schumer and Democrats folded.

In fairness, their reasoning wasn’t crazy. Trump and Elon Musk were running roughshod with their Department of Government Efficiency, and a shutdown would have only given Republicans more discretion to decide which services (Space Force, a new White House ballroom and, I don’t know, a National Strategic Spray Tan Reserve) were “essential.”

Democrats also had a plausible reason to believe that Trump’s steep “reciprocal” tariffs would wreck the economy. They reasoned that if they just kept their heads down, the president would take all the blame for the crash — a reasonable idea that fell apart when Trump pumped the brakes before careening the economy off a cliff.

Since then, Trump has engaged in a campaign of authoritarian-tinged vengeance at such an impressive pace that the Democrats’ strategy of “playing possum” seems laughably passive and utterly naive — like assuming a hurricane will just get tired and stop.

So now Democrats are thinking, “Well, things can’t get any worse if we fight back.”

(Spoiler alert: Things can always get worse.)

Still, you can’t blame Dems for drawing a line in the sand, consequences be damned. Blocking government funding is one of the only mechanisms at the disposal of a minority party to demonstrate their opposition. Moral outrage and pride practically demand it.

Why help bankroll a government led by a man who doesn’t negotiate in good faith and seems intent on bulldozing democracy itself?

Why be complicit in normalizing — and funding! — Trump’s abnormal behavior?

Unfortunately, most voters don’t care about democracy in the abstract, and even fewer care about the inner workings of Congress. They care about kitchen-table issues.

So Democrats are trying to marry their righteous fury with something more practical and concrete — casting the shutdown as a battle to extend Obamacare subsidies and undo GOP Medicaid cuts.

If you’re keeping score, the opposition party is now trying to portray this looming shutdown as being about multiple things. And anyone who’s ever cracked a marketing textbook knows, that’s a fraught strategy. Dare I say “doomed”? If you can’t stay on one message, your opponent will control the narrative — meaning Republicans will blame the fallout on obstructionist Democrats.

Republicans have a simpler pitch that could almost fit on a bumper sticker: “We just want to keep things funded at the current level, plus toss in a little extra security for lawmakers.”

Which message will prevail? Who will take the blame if the government shuts down and Americans are suffering in myriad ways? Democrats say that Republicans control everything, so the buck stops with them. Republicans will say the Senate requires 60 votes and Democrats are withholding support to score political points. It’s not a slam dunk for either party. The American people just want the government to function, and neither side is making that easy.

You really have to squint to imagine a scenario where Dems could honestly declare “mission accomplished” when this is all over. Still, there is a growing sense that it’s better to go down fighting, even if you’re destined to lose (which they might be).

But make no mistake, a shutdown is very likely happening. The Republican-controlled House of Representatives isn’t even set to return to Washington until Wednesday (the day the government could be shuttered).

Meanwhile, Trump abruptly canceled negotiations with Democratic leaders, citing “the unserious and ridiculous demands being made by the Minority Radical Left Democrats.”

The good news: We’re not talking about the debt ceiling or a possible government default; it’s just a government shutdown (something that has happened many times already). Social Security checks will still arrive. Federal workers will eventually get paid. Parks will close. Life will stagger on.

And so, barring some deus ex machina, we slouch toward another shutdown: a bureaucratic farce that everyone can see coming a mile away. It accomplishes nothing productive, yet feels destined to happen — like the “Austin Powers” slow-motion steamroller gag, except stretched out over weeks, costing billions of dollars and hurting millions of lives.

We’ve seen this movie before. We’re the ones being flattened.

Matt K. Lewis is the author of “Filthy Rich Politicians” and “Too Dumb to Fail.”

Two days after solidifying control of his family’s empire, Fox Corp. Chief Executive Lachlan Murdoch touted the strength and newfound stability of their media business.

Murdoch spoke briefly Wednesday at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia + Technology Conference, a fireside chat cut short because of Murdoch’s late arrival in San Francisco thanks to a weather delay. Instead of speaking for about 40 minutes, Murdoch appeared for just about 10 minutes.

The session followed this week’s $3.3-billion settlement of the Murdochs’ bitter succession feud, which handed Lachlan the keys to the kingdom. Rupert Murdoch’s trust will be replaced with new ones that benefit his six children. In the coming weeks, the family’s controlling News Corp. and Fox shares will pass from Rupert to Lachlan, sealing the scion’s status as one of the world’s most influential moguls.

The 54-year-old executive already was overseeing Fox News, the Fox broadcast network and the free video service Tubi as CEO of Fox since 2019. As chairman of News Corp., Lachlan Murdoch is perched atop the publishing firm that includes the Wall Street Journal, New York Post, the Times of London, HarperCollins publishing house and newspapers in his family’s native Australia. Now his inheritance and legal standing is etched through 2050.

“It’s great news for investors,” Murdoch said of the family settlement. “It gives us a clarity about our strategy going forward — and shows that our strategy will be consistent.”

The settlement was reached after months of negotiations among representatives of Rupert Murdoch’s children. Three of his offspring — Prudence MacLeod, Elisabeth Murdoch and James Murdoch — had tried to block the elder Murdoch’s plan to consolidate Lachlan’s power — sending the dispute to a Nevada probate court.

Prudence, Elisabeth and James agreed to surrender their shares and abandon any future involvement in the companies in exchange for $1.1 billion apiece.

Analysts said they don’t expect major changes at Fox, particularly at Fox News, which will continue its conservative drumbeat and support of President Trump.

“We expect the strategy will likely stay the course,” Robert Fishman, a MoffettNathanson research analyst, wrote in a report. “Fox’s emphasis on its differentiated linear assets — namely sports and Fox News — should continue while at the same time balance a streaming push with its recently-launched Fox One and rapidly growing Tubi.”

During the Goldman Sachs conference, Murdoch sounded an upbeat note about last month’s launch of its latest streaming service, Fox One, which delivers news and sports to consumers.

“I don’t want to read too much into our success and our data of the last few weeks but suffice to say its take-up [rate] has exceeded our expectations,” Murdoch said.

Fox One will be part of a streaming bundle with ESPN next month. “We think it’ll be … the essential sports bundle for sports fans in America,” Murdoch said.

Murdoch has been running Fox since 2019 after Rupert Murdoch sold the bulk of the company’s entertainment assets to the Walt Disney Co., in a $71-billion deal which provided Murdoch’s children with a payout of about $2 billion each. At the time, Rupert Murdoch wanted to simplify his company and pave the succession path for Lachlan.

Murdoch noted that resolving the family control issue carried other side benefits, including smoothing the application process for state gaming licenses for the online sports wagering business, FanDuel. Fox has options to take a minority stake in that enterprise.

Rupert Murdoch sought to cement Lachlan’s control as a way to preserve the conservative leanings of his media empire after he is gone.

The 94-year-old patriarch has long viewed Lachlan as his natural heir, in part because his oldest son is the most ideologically in sync with him.

Rupert had become increasingly troubled by the more liberal attitudes of three of his older children, particularly James, who has been outspoken in his disdain of Fox News.

Rupert Murdoch and Lachlan Murdoch at the 2018 Allen & Co. Media and Technology Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho.

(Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Fox shares have fallen about 8% since Monday when the settlement was announced, after the company said the Murdochs planned to price the shares they would sell at $54.25. Shares were trading at $52 on Wednesday.

At one point, I owned seven rental properties. Today, I’m down to just one (and I’m getting ready to sell it soon).

No more tenants, no more maintenance calls, and no more juggling spreadsheets and 5,000 receipts at tax time… I’m moving all my money into one low-cost index fund strategy that’s easier to manage and way less stressful.

I’m not saying real estate isn’t a good wealth-building tool. It’s worked out well for me.

But I learned (the hard way) that passive income isn’t always passive. Here’s the backstory and my plans moving forward.

What drew me to real estate in the first place

Fresh out of high school, I was eager to build a real estate empire.

My original plan was to buy 10 solid rental properties, each cash flowing around $1,000 per month. That would give me a cool $10,000 per month in income — enough to retire early and live life on my terms.

And honestly, as vague as that plan was, it made a lot of sense at the time.

I worked hard to save up down payments, slowly bought properties, and actually enjoyed the process (mostly).

Not every property I bought was a slam dunk. But I definitely found and experienced many of the benefits I was chasing. I built equity, earned decent cashflow, and took advantage of real estate tax perks.

But eventually, the cracks started to show.

The downside nobody warns you about

If you’ve ever owned rentals, you know: the spreadsheets don’t tell the full ownership story.

They don’t show leaks under the kitchen sink. Or the three-month turnover delay because your contractors ghosted you. Or the multiple tenants who stopped paying right after moving in.

Some properties ran fine for many years. Then in a single 12-month period all of the profits would get wiped out by a perfect storm of emergencies.

True story — I had this one rental that was amazing for three years straight. I always got paid on time, and never heard a peep from the tenant… Then one day out of the blue I got a phone call from a lawyer. Turns out my tenant was a “lady of the night,” using my apartment as a place of business for illegal services.

Property managers helped me manage everything. But they are costly. And at the end of the day, the responsibility always falls on the owner.

With each place I bought, my stress grew. Even when things were going well, there was always a low-grade sense of stress in the background.

My new strategy: Index funds

I made it up to seven rentals, then I decided maybe I was climbing a ladder I didn’t want to be at the top of.

So I’ve been slowly exiting real estate ever since — selling one place at a time. I began with the trouble-maker properties first, keeping the higher performers longer. And now I’m down to just one single property left.

In my early 30s, I stumbled into index investing. It was something I hadn’t taken seriously before. I’d always known what index funds were (wide market exposure, low fees, blah blah blah). But I didn’t realize how freeing they could feel until I actually tried it.

I’ve now moved most of my money into a total stock market index fund. And it’s been one of the best financial decisions I’ve made.

I use Fidelity as my main broker. And I’ve been with them for over a decade now. Between my personal accounts, retirement funds, and custodial accounts for my kid and nephews, I’ve got 11 accounts with Fidelity… and I pay $0 in fees. Read my full gushing review of Fidelity here, all about why I’m a big fan.

Passive income that’s actually passive

I now keep most of my investments in total market index funds like FZROX (Fidelity ZERO Total Market Index Fund) and VTI (Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF).

These funds own thousands of companies across nearly every sector. I don’t pick individual stocks or worry about trying to outperform. Average returns are fine with me.

And the best part is, I don’t have to manage anything. It’s truly passive.

Here’s why I’m a big believer in index funds:

• Built in diversification — I’m invested across all industries, and own pieces of all the big and small publicly traded companies out there.
• Liquidity when I need it — I can sell just a small slice of my index funds at any time, unlike real estate where I’d have to offload an entire property just to access cash.
• Low fees — FZROX literally has a 0.00% expense ratio, so I love that fund. But most index funds have a tiny expense ratio compared to managed funds. Also most brokers have no trade fees when you buy or sell.
• Hands-off — The only thing I have to do is not mess with it.
• Strong historical returns — Large index funds like the S&P 500 have averaged ~10% annually over their long history.
• Mental clarity — I don’t get wrapped up in the headlines or have to think about my investments daily.

Even during the COVID-19 pandemic when my index funds were down 30%-40%, I was actually stressing about my rental properties more than I was about the stock market.

Thankfully, both rebounded after 2020. But that experience reinforced something big:

I’d rather hold an asset that can drop 40% without me having to lift a finger, than one that drops 10% and demands all my attention (or seven that demand attention).

Onwards and upwards

Seven rentals taught me a lot. But once I shifted my mindset away from “owning stuff” and toward growing wealth simply, index funds just made more sense.

I’ve reclaimed my time, simplified my financial life, and stopped managing my investments — and finally started enjoying what they’re doing for me.

It’s not too late to switch strategies, simplify your approach, or start fresh. Index funds are a great place to begin.

Check out our favorite online brokers and trading platforms for index investing (and more) — with low fees, no account minimums, and no stress.

A negative analyst note published before market open on Thursday was the wet blanket that dampened Strategy (MSTR -1.95%) stock. The company, now transformed into almost a pure-play Bitcoin investor, saw its shares slump to close the day almost 2% lower in price. That compared unfavorably to the S&P 500, which shed a comparatively modest 0.4%.

A bear weighs in

The prognosticator who authored the Strategy update was Gus Galá of Monness, Crespi, Hardt. In the note, Galá reiterated his sell recommendation and $175 price target on the company. That’s far below the stock’s most recent closing price of $337.58.

Image source: Getty Images.

According to reports, Galá zeroed in on several discouraging elements of Strategy’s business in the note. He expressed concern about the premium valuation of the stock versus its total Bitcoin holdings. And he believes that the company might take hits to its financial strength with its growing load of convertible bonds (issued to, of course, raise funds to buy more Bitcoin).

Regarding convertible bonds, they either remain as debt or are converted into equity. The danger for an issuer of such securities is that they could weigh down a balance sheet with excessive debt, or on the other hand be quite dilutive to existing shareholders if many holders convert to equity.

Exposed to potential volatility

Another danger for any company with heavy Bitcoin exposure — and Strategy is Exhibit A for this grouping — is that it’s very exposed to developments with its favorite asset. Lately Bitcoin has been performing well, at times shattering all-time highs. However, even though it’s at the top of its asset class, it’s still a cryptocurrency — and as ever, cryptos can be volatile investments.

Deep in the badlands of defeat, Democrats have soul-searched about what went wrong last November, tinkered with a thousand-plus thinkpieces and desperately cast for a strategy to reboot their stalled-out party.

Amid the noise, California Gov. Gavin Newsom has recently championed an unlikely game plan: Forget the high road, fight fire with fire and embrace the very tactics that virtue-minded Democrats have long decried.

Could the dark art of political gerrymandering be the thing that saves democracy from Trump’s increasingly authoritarian impulses? That’s essentially the pitch Newsom is making to California voters with his audacious new special election campaign.

As Texas Democrats dig in to block a Republican-led redistricting push and Trump muscles to consolidate power wherever he can, Newsom wants to redraw California’s own congressional districts to favor Democrats.

His goal: counter Trump’s drive for more GOP House seats with a power play of his own.

It’s a boundary-pushing gamble that will undoubtedly supercharge Newsom’s political star in the short-term. The long-game glory could be even grander, but only if he pulls it off. A ballot-box flop would be brutal for both Newsom and his party.

The charismatic California governor is termed out of office in 2026 and has made no secret of his 2028 presidential ambitions.

But the distinct scent of his home state will be hard to completely slough off in parts of the country where California is synonymous with loony lefties, business-killing regulation and an out-of-control homelessness crisis. To say nothing of Newsom’s ill-fated dinner at an elite Napa restaurant in violation of COVID-19 protocols — a misstep that energized a failed recall attempt and still haunts the governor’s national reputation.

The redistricting gambit is the kind of big play that could redefine how voters across the country see Newsom.

The strategy could be a boon for Newsom’s 2028 ambitions during a moment when Democrats are hungry for leaders, said Democratic strategist Steven Maviglio. But it’s also a massive roll of the dice for both Newsom and the state he leads.

“It’s great politics for him if this passes,” Maviglio said. “If it fails, he’s dead in the water.”

The path forward — which could determine control of Congress in 2026 — is hardly a straight shot.

The “Election Rigging Response Act,” as Newsom has named his ballot measure, would temporarily scrap the congressional districts enacted by the state’s voter-approved independent redistricting commission.

Under the proposal, Democrats could pick up five seats currently held by Republicans while bolstering vulnerable Democratic incumbent Reps. Adam Gray, Josh Harder, George Whitesides, Derek Tran and Dave Min, which would save the party millions of dollars in costly reelection fights.

But first the Democratic-led state Legislature must vote to place the measure on the Nov. 4 ballot and then it must be approved by voters.

If passed, the initiative would have a “trigger,” meaning the redrawn map would not take effect unless Texas or another GOP-led state moved forward with its own gerrymandering effort.

“I think what Governor Newsom and other Democrats are doing here is exactly the right thing we need to do,” Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin said Thursday.

“We’re not bringing a pencil to a knife fight. We’re going to bring a bazooka to a knife fight, right? This is not your grandfather’s Democratic Party,” Martin said, adding that they shouldn’t be the only ones playing by a set of rules that no longer exist.

For Democrats like Rep. Laura Friedman (D-Glendale), who appeared alongside Newsom to kick off the effort, there is “some heartbreak” to temporarily shelving their commitment to independent redistricting. But she and others were clear-eyed about the need to stop a president “willing to rig the election midstream,” she said.

Friedman said she was hearing overwhelmingly positive reactions to the proposal from all kinds of Democratic groups on the ground.

“The response that I get is, ‘Finally, we’re fighting. We have a way to fight back that’s tangible,’” Friedman recounted.

Still, despite the state’s Democratic voter registration advantage, victory for the ballot measure will hardly be assured. California voters have twice rallied for independent redistricting at the ballot box in the last two decades and many may struggle to abandon those beliefs.

A POLITICO-Citrin Center-Possibility Lab poll found that voters prefer keeping an independent panel in place to draw district lines by a nearly two-to-one margin, and that independent redistricting is broadly popular in the state.

(Newsom’s press office argued that the poll was poorly worded, since it asked about getting rid of the independent commission altogether and permanently returning line-drawing power to the legislators, rather than just temporarily scrapping their work for several cycles until the independent commission next draws new lines.)

California voters should not expect to see a special election campaign focused on the minutia of reconfiguring the state’s congressional districts, however.

While many opponents will likely attack the change as undercutting the will of California voters, who overwhelmingly supported weeding politics out of the redistricting process, bank on Newsom casting the campaign as a referendum on Trump and his devious effort to keep Republicans in control of Congress.

Newsom employed a similar strategy when he demolished the Republican-led recall campaign against him in 2021, which the governor portrayed as a “life and death” battle against “Trumpism” and far-right anti-vaccine and antiabortion activists. Among California’s Democratic-heavy electorate, that message proved to be extremely effective.

“Wake up, America,” Newsom said Thursday at a Los Angeles rally launching the campaign for the redistricting measure. “Wake up to what Donald Trump is doing. Wake up to his assault. Wake up to the assault on institutions and knowledge and history. Wake up to his war on science, public health, his war against the American people.”

Kevin Liao, a Democratic strategist who has worked on national and statewide campaigns, said his D.C. and California-based political group chats had been blowing up in recent days with texts about the moment Newsom was creating for himself.

Much of Liao’s group chat fodder has involved the output of Newsom’s digital team, which has elevated trolling to an art form on its official @GovPressOffice account on the social media site X.

The missives have largely mimicked the president’s own social media patois, with hyperbole, petty insults and a heavy reliance on the “caps lock” key.

“DONALD IS FINISHED — HE IS NO LONGER ‘HOT.’ FIRST THE HANDS (SO TINY) AND NOW ME — GAVIN C. NEWSOM — HAVE TAKEN AWAY HIS ‘STEP,’ ” one of the posts read last week, dutifully reposted by the governor himself.

Some messages have also ended with Newsom’s initials (a riff on Trump’s signature “DJT” signoff) and sprinkled in key Trumpian callbacks, like the phrase “Liberation Day,” or a doctored Time Magazine cover with Newsom’s smiling mien. The account has garnered 150,000 new followers since the beginning of the month.

Shortly after Trump took office in January, Newsom walked a fine line between criticizing the president and his policies and being more diplomatic, especially after the California wildfires — in hopes of appealing to any semblance of compassion and presidential responsibility Trump possessed.

Newsom had spent the first months of the new administration trying to reshape the California-vs.-Trump narrative that dominated the president’s first term and move away from his party’s prior “resistance” brand.

Those conciliatory overtures coincided with Newsom’s embrace of a more ecumenical posture, hosting MAGA leaders on his podcast and taking a position on transgender athletes’ participation in women’s sports that contradicted the Democratic orthodoxy.

Newsom insisted that he engaged in those conversations to better understand political views that diverged from his own, especially after Trump’s victory in November. However, there was the unmistakable whiff of an ambitious politician trying to broaden his national appeal by inching away from his reputation as a West Coast liberal.

Newsom’s reluctance to readopt the Trump resistance mantle ended after the president sent California National Guard troops into Los Angeles amid immigration sweeps and ensuing protests in June. Those actions revealed Trump’s unchecked vindictiveness and abject lack of morals and honor, Newsom said.

Of late, Newsom has defended the juvenile tone of his press aides’ posts mocking Trump’s own all-caps screeds, and questioned why critics would excoriate his parody and not the president’s own unhinged social media utterances.

“If you’ve got issues with what I’m putting out, you sure as hell should have concerns about what he’s putting out as president,” Newsom said last week. “So to the extent it’s gotten some attention, I’m pleased.”

In an attention-deficit economy where standing out is half the battle, the posts sparkle with unapologetic swagger. And they make clear that Newsom is in on the joke.

“To a certain set of folks who operated under the old rules, this could be seen as, ‘Wow, this is really outlandish.’ But I think they are making the calculation that Democrats want folks that are going to play under this new set of rules that Trump has established,” Liao said.

At a moment when the Democratic party is still occupied with post-defeat recriminations and what’s-next vision boarding, Newsom has emerged from the bog with something resembling a plan.

And he’s betting the house on his deep-blue state’s willingness to fight fire with fire.

Times staff writers Seema Mehta and Laura Nelson contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — After styling himself for decades as a dealmaker, President Trump is showing some receipts in his second term of ceasefires and peace agreements brokered on his watch. But the president faces extraordinary challenges in his latest push to negotiate ends to the world’s two bloodiest conflicts.

Stakes could not be higher in Ukraine, where nearly a million Russian soldiers have been killed or wounded in pursuit of Vladimir Putin’s war of conquest, according to independent analysts. Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers add to the catastrophic casualty toll. Trump’s struggle to get both sides to a negotiating table, let alone to secure a ceasefire, has grown into a fixation for Trump, prompting rare rebukes of Putin from the U.S. president.

And in the Gaza Strip, an alliance that has withstood scathing international criticism over Israel’s conduct of its war against Hamas has begun to show strain. Trump still supports the fundamental mission of Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to destroy the militant group and secure the release of Israeli hostages in its possession. But mounting evidence of mass starvation in Gaza has begun to fray the relationship, reportedly resulting in a shouting match in their most recent call.

Breakthroughs in the two conflicts have evaded Trump, despite his efforts to fashion himself into the “peacemaker-in-chief” and floating his own nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize.

In Turnberry, Scotland, last month, Trump claimed that six wars had been stopped or thwarted under his watch since he returned to office in January. “I’m averaging about a war a month,” he said at the time.

He has, in fact, secured a string of tangible successes on the international stage, overseeing a peace agreement between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda; hosting a peace ceremony between Armenia and Azerbeijan; brokering a ceasefire between Cambodia and Thailand, and imposing an end to a 12-day war between Israel and Iran after engaging U.S. forces directly in the conflict.

Olivier Nduhungirehe, Rwanda’s foreign minister, from left, U.S. Vice President JD Vance, President Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Democratic Republic of the Congo foreign minister Therese Kayikwamba Wagner in the Oval Office of the White House on June 27. The Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda agreed to a U.S.-backed peace deal meant to end years of deadly conflict and promote development in Congo’s volatile eastern region.

(Yuri Gripas/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“As president, my highest aspiration is to bring peace and stability to the world,” Trump said at the ceremony with Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders Friday.

“We’ve only been here for six months. The world was on fire. We took care of just about every fire — and we’re working on another one,” he said, “with Russia, Ukraine.”

Trump also takes credit for lowering tensions between Serbia and Kosovo, and for brokering a ceasefire between two nuclear states, India and Pakistan, a claim the latter supports but the former denies.

“Wars usually last five to 10 years,” said Michael E. O’Hanlon, chair in defense and strategy at the Brookings Institution. “Trump is tactically clever, but no magician. If he actually gets three of these five conflicts to end, that’s an incredible track record.

“In each case, he may exaggerate his own role,” O’Hanlon said, but “that’s OK — I welcome the effort and contribution, even if others deserve credit, too.”

One-on-one with Putin

Well past his campaign promise of ending Russia’s war with Ukraine “within 24 hours” of taking office, Trump has tried pressuring both sides to come to the negotiating table, starting with the Ukrainians. “You don’t have the cards,” Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in an infamous Oval Office meeting in February, chastising him to prepare to make painful concessions to end the war.

But in June, at a NATO summit in the Netherlands, Trump’s years-long geniality with Putin underwent a shift. He began criticizing Russia’s leader as responsible for the ongoing conflict, accusing Putin of throwing “meaningless … bull—” at him and his team.

“I’m not happy with Putin, I can tell you that much right now,” Trump said, approving new weapons for Ukraine, a remarkable policy shift long advocated by the Europeans.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and King of Malaysia Sultan Ibrahim walk during a welcoming ceremony at the Grand Kremlin Palace on Wednesday in Moscow. Malaysian King Sultan Ibrahim is on an official visit to Russia.

(Getty Images)

The Trump administration set Friday as a deadline for Putin to demonstrate his commitment to a ceasefire, or otherwise face a new round of crushing secondary sanctions — financial tools that would punish Russia’s trading partners for continuing business with Moscow.

Those plans were put on hold after Trump announced he would meet with Putin in Alaska next week, a high-stakes meeting that will exclude Zelensky.

“The highly anticipated meeting between myself, as President of the United States of America, and President Vladimir Putin, of Russia, will take place next Friday, August 15, 2025, in the Great State of Alaska. Further details to follow,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Friday. “Thank you for your attention to this matter!”

Meeting Putin one-on-one — the first meeting between a U.S. and Russian president in four years, and the first between Putin and any Western leader since he launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 — in and of itself could be seen as a reward for a Russian leader seeking to regain international legitimacy, experts said.

In this June 28, 2019, file photo, President Trump, right, meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin during a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan.

(Susan Walsh/Associated Press)

Worse still, Putin, a former KGB officer, could approach the meeting as an opportunity to manipulate the American president.

“Putin has refused to abandon his ultimate objectives in Ukraine — he is determined to supplant the Zelensky government in Kyiv with a pro-Russian regime,” said Kyle Balzer, a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “He wants ironclad guarantees that Ukraine will never gain admittance to NATO. So there is currently no agreement to be had with Russia, except agreeing to surrender to Putin’s demands. Neither Ukraine nor Europe are interested in doing so.

“Put simply, Putin likely believes that he can wear down the current administration,” Balzer added. “Threatening Russia with punitive acts like sanctions, and then pulling back when the time comes to do so, has only emboldened Putin to strive for ultimate victory in Ukraine.”

A European official told The Times that, while the U.S. government had pushed for Zelensky to join the initial meeting, a response from Kyiv — noting that any territorial concession to Russia in negotiations would have to be approved in a ballot referendum by the Ukrainian people — scuttled the initial plan.

The Trump administration is prepared to endorse the bulk of Russia’s occupation of Ukrainian territory, including the eastern region of Donbas and the Crimean peninsula, at the upcoming summit, Bloomberg reported. On Friday, Trump called the issue of territory “complicated.”

“We’re gonna get some back,” he said. “There will be some swapping of territories.”

Michael Williams, an international relations professor at Syracuse University, said that Trump has advocated for a ceasefire in Ukraine “at the expense of other strategic priorities such as stability in Europe and punishment of Russia through increased aid to Ukraine.”

Such an approach, Williams said, “would perhaps force the Kremlin to end the war, and further afield, would signal to other potential aggressors, such as China, that violations of international law will be met with a painful response.”

Gaza

At Friday’s peace ceremony, Trump told reporters he was considering a proposal to relocate Palestinian refugees to Somalia and its breakaway region, Somaliland, once Israel ends hostilities against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

“We are working on that right now,” Trump said.

It was just the latest instance of Trump floating the resettlement of Palestinians displaced during the two-year war there, which has destroyed more than 90% of the structures throughout the strip and essentially displaced its entire population of 2 million people. The Hamas-run Health Ministry reports that more than 60,000 civilians and militants have died in the conflict.

Hamas, recognized as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and others, has refused to concede the war, stating it would disarm only once a Palestinian state is established. The group continues to hold roughly 50 Israeli hostages, some dead and some alive, among 251 taken during its attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which also killed about 1,200 people.

Protesters gather in a demonstration organized by the families of the Israeli hostages taken captive in the Gaza Strip since October 2023 calling for action to secure their release outside the Defense Ministry headquarters in Tel Aviv on Saturday.

(Jack Guez/AFP via Getty Images)

Israel’s Cabinet voted this week to approve a plan to take over Gaza City in the north of the strip and, eventually, the rest of the territory, a deeply unpopular strategy in the Israeli military and among the Israeli public. Netanyahu on Friday rejected the notion that Israel planned to permanently occupy Gaza.

Despite applying private pressure on Netanyahu, Trump’s strategy has largely fallen in line with that of his predecessor, Joe Biden, whose team supported Israel’s right to defend itself while working toward a peace deal that, at its core, would exchange the remaining hostages for a cessation of hostilities.

The talks have stalled, one U.S. official said, primarily blaming Hamas over its demands.

“In Gaza, there is a fundamental structural imbalance of dealing with a terrorist organization that may be immune to traditional forms of pressure — military, economic or otherwise — and that may even have a warped, perverse set of priorities in which the suffering of its own people is viewed as a political asset because it tarnishes the reputation of the other party, Israel,” said Robert Satloff, executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “So Trump really only has leverage over one party — his ally, Israel — which he has been reluctant to wield, reasonably so.”

In Ukraine, too, Trump holds leverage he has been unwilling, thus far, to bring to bear.

“There, Trump has leverage over both parties but appears reluctant to wield it on one of them — Russia,” Satloff said.

But Trump suggested Friday that threatened sanctions on India over its purchase of Russian oil, and his agreement with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to secure greater security spending from European members, “had an impact” on Moscow’s negotiating position.

“I think my instinct really tells me that we have a shot at it,” Trump said. “I think we’re getting very close.”

Brazil, India, China and Russia remain firmly in Donald Trump’s sights as targets for his tariffs.

Others, like the European Union, have caved and negotiated deals.

But could the United States president’s confrontational stance forge new alliances, among those who have not, against Trump?

Presenter: Adrian Finighan

Guests: 

Einar Tangen – China specialist and senior fellow at the Taihe Institute

Gustavo de Carvalho – Senior researcher in the geopolitics of the Global South at the South African Institute of International Affairs

David McWilliams – Economist, author and podcast host

Paying for a seat on a plane is an added expense that many travellers prefer to avoid, but one expert has shared how to travel in comfort without spending any money.

After paying for your flight and any checked luggage, many of us would prefer to not fork out even more for a seat. But waiting to be assigned a random seat can often mean you end up squished in between strangers, making for a rather uncomfortable journey, especially if you’ve got a long way to go.

While some airlines like British Airways will let you choose a seat if you pay for luggage, there’s plenty of packing tips and tricks out there which means many travellers stick to hand luggage. With recent reports that travellers who sit in an unassigned seat in the hopes it might be free could face a hefty fine for what’s being dubbed seat squatting, there’s one more secure way of grabbing a good seat.

Chelsea Dickenson is known for sharing budget travel advice on her blog Holiday Expert, and in a recent article for Metro, she revealed the easy way to get the best seat on the plane without having to spare a single penny.

However, she warned that this isn’t for those who get easy stressed when travelling, as it requires leaving things quite last minute.

Referring to her tactic as “check-in chicken”, Chelsea explained that the trick to getting the best seat on the plane is done by delaying online check-in until the last possible moment.

Chelsea said: “After years of flying on a budget, I’ve learned a thing or two about how they operate. And more often than not, my method lands me a seat with extra legroom without paying a penny”, reports the Express.

However, this strategy won’t be suitable for those travelling in groups, particularly families who wish to be seated together.

If you want to sit together but don’t want to fork out extra for seats, Money Saving Expert instead recommends groups of travellers check-in as soon as you’re able to.

In a post on their website, they explained all major airlines except Ryanair will attempt to seat groups on the same booking together, provided there are seats available next to each other that other passengers haven’t already reserved.

But if you are travelling alone, a game of check-in chicken could work in your favour, particularly if you end up at the front of the aircraft with extra leg room, or in a window seat.

However, Chelsea cautioned that travellers “need a cool head, a charged phone and very firm grasp on when online check-in closes” to do this successfully, and check-in times can differ depending on the airline.

The savvy traveller also pointed out that she primarily employs this tactic, which she refers to as one of her “favourite budget travel joys”, when flying with budget carriers such as Ryanair or Wizz Air, noting that airlines like easyJet and British Airways don’t typically allocate the less desirable seats initially.

Once check-in has opened, which is typically 24 hours before your flight departs, Chelsea said she keeps monitoring the seat map throughout the day, and proceeds with the check-in when she’s satisfied with the remaining seat options.

However, the secret to doing this is to not actually leave it to the very last minute, which could see you having to pay a fee at the airport, and likely more than you would have if you’d simply paid for a seat.

Chelsea clarified that: “I often find that by six hours to go there’s only ‘good’ seats left – ones with extra legroom, seats on the front rows or simply non-middle aisle seats,” and she recommended setting alarms to make sure you don’t forget.

July 18 (UPI) — Colombia’s government this week introduced a new protocol to monitor firearms used by private security companies, aiming to prevent their diversion to illegal groups and improve traceability.

The initiative, led by the Ministry of Defense, targets loopholes in the oversight of private security firms following a spike in incidents involving the misuse of firearms by private security personnel.

Colombia remains a key hub for illegal arms trafficking in Latin America — a persistent threat that fuels internal conflict and threatens President Gustavo Petro’s “Total Peace” strategy.

Weapons enter the country from multiple global and regional sources. An estimated one in three firearms in Colombia is illegally obtained. So far in 2024, more than 10,000 of the country’s 13,341 reported homicides were committed with firearms.

“The illegal firearms market is behind 78% of homicides in Colombia,” said Carolina Ortega, a political scientist at the National University of Colombia (UNAL), an expert in territorial security management and a researcher on security issues. She warns that “it has shifted toward technological upgrades, including drones, which now pose new threats to public safety.”

Taking advantage of Colombia’s complex geography, weapons arrive from multiple regions via land, sea and air routes — many of which overlap with established drug trafficking corridors.

The United States is a major source of handguns and lightweight firearms. Each year, between 250,000 and 600,000 guns cross the southern border in what is called the “iron river,” according to a report by Fundación Carolina. The steady flow supplies civilians, criminals and organized crime groups across Latin America through direct smuggling or diverted legal sales.

Colombian authorities have warned that weapons linked to cocaine trafficking also enter the country through the land border with Bolivia, while surplus military weapons and ammunition from Venezuela are being diverted into Colombia.

In Mexico, drug cartels maintain direct ties with Colombian criminal groups.

Another source of weapons comes from those used in past conflicts in Central America — including the civil wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua — and in Eastern Europe. Many of these weapons continue to be reused and sold on the black market, eventually finding their way into Colombia.

Theft of legal weapons from military stockpiles, police forces or private security firms also contributes to the problem. These weapons are primarily destined for terrorist groups operating in Colombia, including FARC dissidents, the National Liberation Army (ELN) and the Gulf Clan, among others.

Since taking office, President Gustavo Petro has advanced his “Total Peace” strategy, which includes efforts to disarm illegal armed groups. The government has stepped up weapons seizures — destroying 23,500 firearms so far in 2024 — and the Ministry of Defense and National Police, through their intelligence and criminal investigation units, are working to dismantle trafficking networks.

Colombia’s Congress is considering legislation to regulate gun ownership and bolster the capabilities of security forces. One recurring proposal calls for lifting bank secrecy protections for public officials and members of the armed forces to combat the corruption that enables arms trafficking.

Organizations such as the Conflict Analysis Resource Center (CERAC) monitor and analyze the issue, warning of a correlation between the increase in firearms and rising homicide rates. According to the group, 32 people have been killed by stray bullets so far this year.

“Arms trafficking in Colombia is a persistent challenge that requires a multidimensional approach. Without effectively curbing this flow, the path toward peace and public safety will remain steep and marred by violence,” said Israel Vilchez, a journalist and international analyst for Cosmovisión.

The House Oversight Subcommittee on Health Care and Financial Services held a hearing recently about diversity, equity and inclusion. Fewer than five of the 90 minutes were spent talking about healthcare or anything related to money. Instead, conservative lawmakers wasted time and taxpayers’ dollars advancing an anti-DEI agenda with which they have become obsessed. Anecdotes were more interesting to them than were evidence-based truths about the Americans whom discrimination most harms.

Because the GOP comprises the majority in the House, all but one of the four expert witnesses in the hearing were theirs. Like the three other times I had testified on Capitol Hill, I was the lone Democrat. The Republicans’ strategy was familiar: ask a series of yes/no questions that would require contextualization to answer adequately, then interrupt as the witness attempts to provide a nuanced response.

One question for me from Rep. Brandon Gill (R-Texas): “Should people be treated differently based on their race?” As I had done in my written testimony, I tried to explain to him that Black, Indigenous, Asian American and Latino American people have long been mistreated because of their race, which has led to persistent and pervasive racial inequities that disadvantage them relative to white people. But he apparently did not want to hear any of those facts, because he kept cutting me off, repeatedly declaring that this was a yes or no question.

Gill posed another question to which he did not allow an informative answer: “Do you believe that race should be considered in employer hiring practices?” For centuries, racism and white supremacy have been powerful determinants of who works where, what they are paid, and their opportunities for advancement to leadership in workplaces across industries. Race should not influence employment outcomes, but it too often has and still does.

Because of both implicit and explicit biases, race influences hiring processes across industries. Research makes painstakingly clear, though, that it is white applicants who most often and most lucratively benefit from preferential treatment. People of color and job seekers with ethnic-sounding last names have long been and continue to be routinely discriminated against, a highly cited University of Chicago study shows.

I do not believe that the remedy for discrimination is more discrimination. Instead, strategy and intentionality are both necessary and required to right past and present wrongs in hiring processes. Because the inequities are racialized and gendered, programs and practices ought to deliberately address the mindsets, structures and systems that have routinely locked irrefutably qualified people of color and women out of well-deserved opportunities. Perhaps had I been allowed to answer fully, Gill and I would have found common ground in our opposition to unlawful workplace discrimination.

Corporations, universities and other organizations need high-quality professional learning experiences that help employees who are involved in hiring processes understand how and why white job applicants are typically presumed to be smarter and more qualified than applicants of color. Gill and other opponents of diversity programs need to learn about these particular manifestations of white supremacy too. They also could benefit from exposure to research that shows how workplace racial stratification systems cyclically route the majority of employees of color into the lowest-paid, lowest-authority jobs and lock them out of leadership positions.

Federal statistics show that 77% of managers across all industries are white. Furthermore, 84% of executive-level leaders at Fortune 100 companies are white, according to a Heidrick & Struggles report. If our positions had been reversed and I were the one posing questions, I would have asked Gill about those statistics: Is it that most white people are just that much more talented and deserving than people of color, or could it be something else? In the midst of our chaotic crosstalk, I was able to make the point that I do not believe that white candidates are the only qualified people for jobs.

“I didn’t say that, nobody said that,” Gill replied. “And you’re not going to intimidate me by slandering me as a racist.” I did not say or imply that he was. However, his mistaken presumption is revealing and unsurprising. It sometimes happens — especially among white people — when simplistic or otherwise problematic positions on race are challenged. I was able to make this clear: “And you’re not going to intimidate me by insisting that I called you a racist.” I reminded him that a hearing transcript confirming what I actually said would be made publicly available.

Gill was in search of yes/no responses to his questions. Racism and racial inequities in employment, university admissions and other processes are far more complicated than that. But if he was indeed only interested in simple truths, there are at least two. First, professionals of color and women are systematically passed over for job opportunities and promotions because of their race and gender considerably more often than are their white male counterparts. Second, diversity policies and programs aim to redress such inequities accrued to employees because of their skin color, nationality, ethnicity, sex, gender, disability, weight, accent, sexual orientation and other traits.

Shaun Harper is a professor of education, business and public policy at the University of Southern California and the author of “Let’s Talk About DEI: Productive Disagreements About America’s Most Polarizing Topics.”