FIVE MINUTE DAILY

Trump is creating an “AI Force” with a new federal tsar, while California makes seizing ballots or election records a felony ahead of the midterms. Elsewhere, ICE remains without a confirmed leader, France faces its smallest wine harvest in 70 years, and astronomers discover the Milky Way’s fastest star.

Unlock a focused set of AI strategies built to streamline your work and maximize impact. This guide delivers the practical tactics and tools marketers need to start seeing results right away:

Stay ahead of the curve with these top strategies AI helped develop for marketers, built for real-world results.

Download the Free Report

President Trump said the administration will stand up a new "AI Force" and appoint an artificial intelligence tsar to coordinate federal strategy on the technology. He pledged the government "will not in any way hinder or stifle the growth" of the sector. No nominee has been named, and details on the tsar's authority, reporting line and budget were not disclosed. The announcement lands as Washington argues over guardrails on frontier models, chip exports and the energy demands of data centers.

The move signals a lighter regulatory posture than the previous White House pursued through executive order. It also hands AI policy a single political owner — a job that until now has been quietly split across several agencies.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a package of election security bills on Sunday that extends mail-ballot drop-off hours and makes seizing ballots or election records a felony in the state.

His office cast the laws as a response to federal efforts restricting voting ahead of the midterms. The measures land while California prepares for its next statewide contests. A state is now writing criminal penalties against the possibility of federal intrusion into its own count. That is a new front in a long argument over who actually administers American elections.

Markwayne Mullin lost his choice to run Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a defeat traced to missteps with the White House. Hard-liners have questioned whether he is tough enough on immigration.

He is now working to overcome those doubts, though the failed pick undermined his position inside an administration that prizes visible enforcement. The agency still has no confirmed leader. Personnel fights like this one decide how aggressively immigration law actually gets carried out. Who runs ICE shapes daily policy more than most higher-profile appointments do.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog pardoned former soldier Elor Azaria, who was convicted over the 2016 killing of an incapacitated Palestinian attacker in Hebron, reigniting a long-running domestic debate over military conduct.

Voters in Berlin and Mecklenburg head to the polls in eastern Germany on Sunday in regional elections widely seen as a test of the far-right AfD's growing national ceiling.

A militant faction with al Qaeda links claimed responsibility for a mosque bombing inside a Pakistani police compound that killed at least 24 people near the Afghan border.

The Texas Supreme Court ruled a month-old baby born via surrogate can travel to Los Angeles for treatment, the latest turn in a bitter custody fight involving a rejected abortion request.

New York is bracing for gridlock as nearly 200 delegations converge on Midtown East, First Avenue shut from 41st to 48th Streets and a citywide gridlock alert running September 21 to 25.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a post-production tax credit expansion the Motion Picture Editors Guild called "historic," aimed at luring finishing work back from lower-cost states.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and China's Vice Premier He Lifeng will hold weekend talks on AI, trade and critical minerals, part of an ongoing effort to stabilize an increasingly transactional bilateral relationship.

Jaguar Land Rover's suppliers want out of cars, telling the prime minister in an open letter that Britain's supply chain is "not in decline" but "in the wrong market," and should pivot to aerospace.

Spain's sovereign film fund has badly underspent, with SETT investing under €250 million of a pot that could have drawn €1.5 billion in EU recovery money, its director blaming "strict implementation deadlines."

ALL-INCLUSIVE GETAWAY

Today's best deal might be the one that costs nothing.

We're giving away a $4,883 all-inclusive Mexico escape for two, including an ocean-view room, spa treatment, sunset catamaran cruise, and $1,000 toward airfare.

All you have to do is enter.

Sunscreen not included.

WIN THE TRIP

_{Please support our sponsors!}

Astronomers identified S301, the fastest known star in the Milky Way, tearing around Sagittarius A* at 25,000 kilometers per second and offering a first shot at measuring the black hole's spin.

New chemical analysis suggests the Chicxulub impactor that killed the dinosaurs 66 million years ago was a rare carbonaceous asteroid, not the more common rocky variety scientists had long assumed.

European researchers say they can now rewrite the atomic structure of glass while it is still molten, unlocking properties extreme heat had previously made impossible in metallurgical and optical applications.

Vanderbilt pulled off a stunning last-second win over NC State in what CBS ranks among the wildest college football endings of the century, a genuine Music City miracle.

Kentucky shocked No. 9 Texas A&M on the road, giving first-year coach Will Stein his first marquee victory after a third-quarter scoring explosion in College Station.

At UFC 331, Sean Sharaf landed a picture-perfect left hook just 12 seconds in to knock out Olympic gold medalist Gable Steveson, an all-time upset on the sport's biggest stage.

Winger Alex Zendejas could return to Club America's starting lineup for El Super Clasico against Chivas Guadalajara, his first start since the World Cup in a table-defining match.

Tom Cruise says he trimmed his unrecognizable "Digger" prosthetic transformation from six hours to under one, ahead of Alejandro G. Iñárritu's dark comedy opening in theaters October 2.

Cate Blanchett stopped her London stage curtain call to ask a filming audience to put phones away, calling live theater a place where people "can simply be together and be present."

Earl Spencer sees Diana's story repeating, calling press coverage of the Sussexes "a cancerous influence in their life" and saying it would be "beholden on people to learn from Diana's example."

What it is: France's agriculture ministry warns output could sink to a 70-year low in 2026, a third straight down year. Economist Jean-Marie Cardebat expects France to slip behind Italy and possibly Spain: "France has a genuine production problem."

The detail: Heat has rewritten the calendar. Maison Louis Latour's Florent Latour began picking on August 14, his estate's earliest ever, and took in about half a harvest; the national harvest midpoint has moved a full month since the 1930s.

The pressure runs both directions. Regulators let producers lift champagne's alcohol cap to 15% after five summer heatwaves left grapes freakishly sugary — a first, granted "exceptionally and temporarily."

Why it matters: Demand collapsed before the weather did. Daily wine drinking fell from nearly half the French population in 1960 to under 10% by 2018, and sector business failures tripled between 2019 and 2025. So the state now pays growers to shrink: some 20,000 hectares of Bordeaux vines have gone since 2023, and 4% of all French vines are due out this year at €4,000 a hectare.

What to watch: Paris cut France's growth forecast to 0.5% from 1%, pinning a tenth of a point on heat and drought, and pledged over €1 billion in aid. Maxime Toubart of the Comité Champagne thinks this harvest "will probably become the norm in 10 to 15 years." The 2026 vintage reaches shelves in 2028; the bill lands sooner.

You don't have to scroll every AI thread, track every new tool, or watch every demo. 

The Rundown AI breaks it all down for you — the latest AI news, tools, and tutorials in one free 5-minute email every morning. 

Trusted by 2M+ professionals at Apple, Google, and NASA.

Sign up to start learning.

A Cornish magnet-fishing group is marking a decade of pulling an inflatable doll, a Nintendo and assorted mystery metal from the harbor, proving Britain's weirdest hobby is also its most patient.

Britain is relitigating its gray-squirrel problem, tracing the invasion to a Cheshire banker who imported a decorative pair in 1876 — arguably the worst piece of interior design in Victorian history.

Pete Davidson and Colin Jost, mocked for buying a decommissioned Staten Island ferry, hosted a comedy show onboard that actually worked, quietly vindicating the dumbest celebrity purchase of the decade.

That’s your Five Minute Daily. Thanks for making us part of your day — share this edition with someone who wants the important stories without the endless scroll, and we’ll see you in the next briefing.

—The Five Minute Daily Team