7 – Breaking News & Latest Updates 2026
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Mia Sato

Mia Sato

Features Writer, The Verge

Features Writer, The Verge

    More From Mia Sato

    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    Luigi Mangione has entered the courtroom.

    We’re more than an hour and a half behind the scheduled start time for the hearing in New York. Mangione was allowed to wear street clothes today, which elicited wall-to-wall news coverage last month. He’s wearing a gray suit and light dress shirt.

    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    I’m here in person for the Luigi Mangione hearings.

    Hearings this week will focus on whether key evidence is admissible in the New York State case against Mangione, who’s accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. At each hearing, trucks have circled the courthouse with information about the case and stories of patients who have struggled to get healthcare claims approved.

    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    Even 89-year-olds are addicted to Temu.

    Nearly a year ago, I wrote that impending tariff policies seemed poised to turn American consumerism upside down. In the months since, many people have said that Donald Trump’s tariffs — and the higher costs passed on to shoppers — could force people to buy less stuff they didn’t need in the first place. But as the Wall Street Journal reports, even sky high tariffs might not be enough to break the habit for good.

    How Jeffrey Epstein used SEO to bury news about his crimes

    Documents released by the House Oversight Committee shed light on Epstein’s day-to-day, largely via email — including his preoccupation with his Google presence.

    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    Here’s Jeffrey Epstein complaining about SEO.

    In the trove of documents released this week, Epstein at times seems preoccupied with Google results related to him. In an email dated December 10th, 2010, Epstein complains that “the google page is not good,” and references what appears to be payments made to clean up search results. In other emails, associates give Epstein step by step instructions on searching in Incognito on Chrome.

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    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    Your favorite spaghetti could be in hot water.

    Italian pasta companies are preparing to pull their products from US grocery stores as early as January, the Wall Street Journal reports — another downstream effect of the Trump administration’s sky-high tariffs and duties on imports. Some of the new taxes (which total 107 percent) come after a US Commerce Department review of several pasta companies, and the severity of the penalty has Italian producers worried.

    Mia Sato
    Mia Sato
    We are so back (to back).

    Bluesky was the best place on the internet during the World Series last weekend. I wrote yesterday about how the matchup between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Toronto Blue Jays was a feast for fans old and new, and now we have some numbers to illustrate that: Bluesky says at least three percent of all posts on Saturday (Game 7) were about baseball, and the site had a 30 percent surge in traffic.