Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Monday.
The U.S. will provide only partial food stamp benefitsThe Trump administration said today that it would send partial payments this month to the roughly 42 million Americans who receive food stamps. Officials announced the plan after a pair of federal judges said the government had acted unlawfully by initially refusing to pay for the food aid during the government shutdown. It is unclear, however, when food stamp recipients will receive the funds or whether it will be enough for some families. The administration opted against using its full stable of available funds to sustain the program in full, and eligible households may receive only half as much in benefits compared with their usual amounts, officials said. Administration officials have said that partial payments could take weeks to arrive. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, is the largest of a handful of federal safety-net programs that are running out of funds while Congress has seemed to make no real effort to end to the shutdown. A nutrition program for low-income women and children received an additional $450 million from the Trump administration. For more: Houses of worship are trying to step in to feed hungry Americans. In other administration news: President Trump pardoned the crypto billionaire Changpeng Zhao last month. In an interview with “60 Minutes” last night, Trump claimed that he didn’t know who Zhao was.
Democrats lead in polls heading into an off-cycle Election DayMillions of Americans will head to the polls tomorrow. Two new governors will be elected: In Virginia, the Democrat, Abigail Spanberger, leads in polls by a healthy margin; in New Jersey, where the race appears highly competitive, Democrats are hoping to maintain their early-voting advantage. On the other side of the country, California is voting on a ballot measure to redraw the state’s congressional district lines. It’s Democrats’ response to Trump’s effort to tilt maps around the country. In New York, mayoral candidates made their closing argument to voters. For more on politics:
The maker of Tylenol is set to be acquiredKimberly-Clark, the consumer products giant that owns Kleenex and Huggies, said today that it agreed to spend about $40 billion to buy Kenvue, the maker of Tylenol. For the last couple of months, Kenvue has been fighting unproven claims by the Trump administration that link the common pain reliever to autism. Acquisition talks were underway before the president criticized Tylenol. But the turmoil helped pushed Kenvue’s stock price down, giving Kimberly-Clark an opportunity to bet that the market overreacted.
Survivors describe a massacre in SudanSince the city of El Fasher in Sudan’s Darfur region fell to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces last week, images and witness accounts have showed a massacre taking place — with echoes of the genocidal violence that defined the region two decades ago. Tens of thousands of people have tried to escape, but relatively few have made it to the nearest aid zone. Many who escaped there arrived with bullet wounds and signs of torture. In accounts shared with The Times, survivors described scenes of horror: “There were bodies of men and women everywhere — some people were run over by vehicles,” said Saeeda, a 28-year-old woman who fled. “While we were on the road, they took girls from our group — choosing them and dragging them away.” More top news
Margaret Atwood leans into her dark side in a new memoirOver the last six decades, Margaret Atwood, Canada’s pre-eminent novelist, has published more than 50 books, including poetry, short stories, nonfiction, speculative fiction, children’s books and the era-defining dystopian novel “The Handmaid’s Tale.” But she hadn’t tried memoir, until this week. Atwood enjoys being forbidding and settling scores, and “Book of Lives” is a vessel of wrath that “frequently reads like a Politburo speech,” our critic Dwight Garner wrote in a review. But it’s at its best when Atwood writes about her love for nature — her father was an entomologist and a woodsman — and her fascination with her own dark side.
Walking may slow cognitive declineNeurologists have long said that exercise is one of the best ways to reduce your odds of developing Alzheimer’s. Now we have a better idea of how much is necessary: A new study found that about 3,000 to 5,000 steps a day can slow cognitive decline in older adults who are at increased risk of developing dementia.
Dinner table topics
Cook: These simple shrimp and bacon burritas (not a typo) taste like vacation. Watch: “Baahubali: The Epic” is a rollicking tale of royal intrigue. Plan: |
