Good morning. In this edition:

• 🫏🐘 America’s redistricting arms race
• ⌨️ Calibri, the font of justice
• 🕰 How people spend their time throughout the day

…and much more.

Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news should be a ~3.79-minute read (1,009 words).

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“It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.”

–Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962)

This week, Texas Republicans began a special legislative session aimed at redrawing the state’s congressional maps in a way that creates up to five new winnable House seats for GOP lawmakers.

Background: The redistricting process involves a committee of policymakers who adjust—or completely redraw—the border lines of their state’s voting districts to reflect recent population shifts. Political gerrymandering, or manipulating these lines to favor one political party, is legal and commonplace, though racial gerrymandering is illegal.

• Texas’ effort, pushed strongly by President Trump, comes at an unusual time. Redistricting is typically only done after the decennial US census, most recently in 2020, or in response to a court order, Axios reports.
• But Trump and GOP leaders say Texas’ new maps are essential to helping the Republican party avoid losing House control in the 2026 midterms, as they did during Trump’s first term in 2018.

The Lone Star State has company

Republicans in Ohio are also looking to redraw their congressional map from one that favors the GOP by a 10-5 margin, to one that grants Republicans 12 or 13 House seats. Trump won the state last year by a 55%-44% margin.

On the Democratic side: In response to Texas’ redistricting plan, California Gov. Gavin Newsom last week pledged to “gerrymander” the state’s 52 congressional districts to try and pick up at least five Democratic House seats, saying “two can play at that game.” But it won't be easy, since California mandates that an independent commission draws congressional maps instead of partisan lawmakers.

• Democrats are also targeting more House seats from the battleground of Wisconsin, though the state Supreme Court recently declined to hear their redistricting case.

Big picture: Republicans hope to hold on to their slim congressional lead heading into the 2026 midterms. Democrats need to flip six seats next November to win a majority in the House, where all 435 members are reelected every two years. In the Senate—which elects ~⅓ of its members every two years—Dems need to flip four seats to regain a simple majority.

📊 Flash poll: Which of the following best describes your opinion about the congressional redistricting process in America?

• It’s a major problem
• It’s a minor problem
• It’s not a problem at all
• Unsure/other

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…and just when everyone thought the craze had come to a GameStop. Shares in department store chain Kohl's surged as much as 105% yesterday morning before trading was temporarily halted due to volatility (a Kohl-down cool-down), in a wild ride echoing the retail investor-driven rallies of recent years.

• The stock ended the day up ~38% to reach $14.34/share.

The squeeze is on

Kohl’s hasn't announced updated guidance or a flashy new investment, and like it tripped over a diamond watch, has fallen on hard times. Revenue has been dropping for years as consumers gravitate to online shopping, causing Wall Street to increasingly bet against the company—especially after the high-profile May firing of CEO Ashley Buchanan.

• Roughly 48% of Kohl’s public float is now sold short, Bloomberg reports.
• That’s below the ~140% seen by GameStop at the start of the initial r/wallstreetbets-powered meme-stock rally, but well above levels seen by companies like Apple and Tesla, which are at less than 3%.

In short: With that level of short interest and a name people recognize, r/wallstreetbets chatter suggests Kohl’s is ripe for a squeeze. When investors flock to a heavily shorted stock, those with short positions may buy more to cover their losses, which can drive the price higher.

Meme stocks are Roaring🐱 back: Shares of OpenDoor Technologies, an online home-buying platform, have also more than doubled in recent days.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

• 🥤 Coca-Cola plans to introduce Coke with US-grown cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup following push from President Trump.
• 🚗 GM takes $1.1 billion tariff hit in Q2; net income down 35%. | Tesla opens Tesla Diner in Hollywood, CA; the location serves American food in company packaging, has charging stations and two 66-foot movie screens; CEO Elon Musk says if it goes well the company will look to put more in major cities around the world.
• 💰 Musk's xAI reportedly seeking up to $12 billion to buy Nvidia chips for a new data center to train Grok, its AI chatbot. | OpenAI agrees to pay Oracle $30 billion/year for data center services.

SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

in partnership with Autio

• 🙏 Ozzy Osbourne, legendary frontman of Black Sabbath, dies at 76; it comes ~2.5 weeks after Osbourne and the band played their final concert, which raised ~$190 million for charity.
• 🎙️ NPR editor-in-chief Edith Chapin is stepping down; move follows recent Congress vote to strip $1+ billion in federal funding from public media company, though Chapin says her decision is unrelated.
• 🏈 Farewell, Honey Bagder: New Orleans Saints S Tyrann Mathieu, 33, announced his retirement one day before team's first training camp practice.

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SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

• 🤖 CEO of AI coding platform Replit apologizes after chatbot wiped a company’s codebase in a test run, then lied about it. | Google’s AI Overviews in Search results have reduced clicks to websites by ~50%, per new Pew Research survey.
• 🌌 Supernovae study suggests dark energy—the mysterious force driving our universe’s expansion—may be weakening over time; if confirmed, results would point to undiscovered physics that could affect the fate of the universe.
• 🕷️ New study challenges longstanding perception that spiders evolved from land animals; posits their relatives originated and evolved in the ocean instead.

US, WORLD & POLITICS

in partnership with Particle

• 📝 President Trump announces trade deal with the Philippines with 19% tariffs; says US goods will not face tariffs in the Philippines in exchange for US military cooperation. | Trump also announces trade deal with Japan that includes 15% levy on imported goods; Japan to invest $550 billion in the US.
• 🏫 Columbia University penalizes 70+ students for their participation in Israel-Gaza protests amid negotiations to restore $400 million in federal funding; disciplinary action includes two-year suspensions, expulsions.
• 🏛️ House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) shuts down chamber and calls summer recess one day early to avoid vote on releasing files related to Jeffrey Epstein. | Senior DOJ official plans to meet with Ghislaine Maxwell, who’s serving a 20-year sentence for her role in Epstein’s sex-trafficking ring.

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☝️ The US Postal Service is marking its 250th anniversary with a pair of new stamp releases, including a "meticulously illustrated pane of 20 interconnected stamps" showing a postal worker's day (left).

🤔 Did You Know? The text font Calibri helped lead to Pakistan’s Prime Minister being disqualified from office in 2017 due to corruption and fraud exposed by the Panama Papers. The PM’s daughter had submitted forged documents about his family’s income, typed in Calibri, that claimed to be from 2006—but the font wasn’t publicly released until 2007.

📰 Worth a Read: The beauty entrepreneur who made the Jheri curl a sensation

🖱️ Clickbait: The cities where college grads are actually landing jobs

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🌊 Alaskan inventor Lance McMullan has been on a 14-year mission to harness the power of the moon and tides into usable energy.

🧪 A new tool to fight harmful algae blooms is getting an initial run in Utah. The scientists behind it say they're getting breakthrough results.

🎨 A growing amount of research indicates that art can radically improve both physical and mental health in effective and measurable ways. 

+Note: These stories previously appeared in a June 2024 edition of Positive DONUT, our weekly newsletter surfacing all the good things you don't hear about in the news.

Below you'll find three poorly explained plots to different movies. Your challenge is to name the movie that each describes.

1. Retired Olympian is harassed by a telekinetic monster
2. A blonde woman named Elsa with Germanic origins has a famous scene where the phrase “Let it go” is uttered
3. The hero only wins because he saved before the final boss

🔫 Nerd out: Are blasters in Star Wars laser guns? Answer: no. Here’s why.

🕰 Interesting: How people spend their time throughout the day.

📉 In the red, grab the red: A real-estate tycoon’s loan went bad. Then they came for his Ferraris and fine wine.

🗺️ Explorer’s guide: InsideHook's dedicated-travel newsletter, The Journey, is your go-to for travel intel, insider recommendations and inspiration to help you better navigate the world.*

🟣 Balance: Each day, Tangle breaks down the biggest political story with real depth—and gives you the left, right, and center takes. Read Tangle and make up your own mind.*

*A message from our partners

1. Matilda (1996)
2. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)
3. Dr. Strange (2016)

+Clue for the Games newsletter: (y2 - y1) / (x2 - x1) or Δy/Δx 👈 this is the formula to calculate rate of change. It’ll make sense when you play today’s Conjoiner sequence.