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Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Wednesday.
1. The Supreme Court preserved the availability of an abortion drug through Friday evening, giving the court more time to consider the case.
In a brief order this afternoon, Justice Samuel Alito announced that the court had extended a pause on a lower-court ruling that had sought to limit access to a commonly used abortion pill. The announcement slows down what has been a muddled and fast-moving landscape for the drug mifepristone, which will remain widely available for now.
The upcoming Supreme Court decision — which will address a ruling out of Texas, where a judge invalidated the F.D.A.’s approval of the pill — is the most significant abortion case taken up by the court since it overturned the constitutional right to an abortion last summer. Medication abortion, as it is called, is both safe and widely popular: more than half of all abortions in the U.S. are done with medication.
In related news, a company that makes the generic version of mifepristone sued the F.D.A., seeking to block the agency from complying if the courts ultimately order the drug off the market.
2. India is passing China as the world’s most populous country.
With 1.428 billion people, India has passed mainland China in population and will soon surpass the mainland and Hong Kong combined, new U.N. estimates show.
But India’s immense size and lasting growth are laying bare enormous challenges, renewing a perennial, if uncomfortable, question: When will the country fulfill its vast promise and become a power on the order of China or the U.S.? To do so, experts say, India will need to make major investments in education, employment and health in the coming years.
For more: China’s declining population is a problem for everyone, as the country’s shrinking work force could hobble the global economy.
In other international news, the two warring military factions in Sudan said they had agreed to a 24-hour cease-fire.
4. Amid the war, Russian propaganda plagues Ukrainian communities.
In the eastern Ukrainian town of Kostyantynivka, which Russian forces have repeatedly attacked in recent months, some residents are convinced that they are being attacked by Ukraine’s military. They repeat Russian propaganda lines and confound officials and the police with their support for Russia.
Ukrainian soldiers call them “waiters,” people who refuse to be evacuated in anticipation of a Russian takeover of their region, even as the Russian bombardment endangers their lives.
In related news, China is on track to massively expand its nuclear arsenal, just as Russia suspends the last major arms control treaty. The moves augur a new world in which Beijing, Moscow and Washington will likely be atomic peers.
6. New York City agreed to pay $53 million to detainees wrongfully held in solitary.
The payout will settle a lawsuit on behalf of thousands of pretrial detainees on Rikers Island and in Manhattan who were wrongfully isolated and held in small cells for up to 23 hours per day, according to court documents. The final size of the payout depends on how many wronged detainees claim their share, but the settlement could be one of the largest ever involving the Correction Department.
“The department brazenly ignored the Constitution,” said one of the lawyers who filed the class-action lawsuit. “They knew this was highly restrictive housing, and they knew it was illegal, but they kept using it anyway.”
7. Social media has become a lot less … social.
Facebook established itself on college campuses as a way for students to stay in touch. Twitter was once a place for posting about what you had for breakfast. And Instagram used to be a place to show off photos to friends. But now, as their user bases and revenues have grown, the platforms have all increasingly become more about connecting with brands and influencers than with friends or family.
The change — which has been gradual over the last several years — has left some people searching for community-oriented sites, without scrolling through a deluge of advertisements.
8. The Met rebuilt an ancient cup in a seeming marvel of scholarship and luck. Investigators doubt the story.
Over 16 years, multiple people gave or sold the museum pottery shards with ancient Greek designs that surprisingly came from the same ancient drinking cup from roughly 490 B.C. Then, in a feat of patience and puzzle solving, the Met reconstructed the cup in its entirety.
Law enforcement officials, finding the circumstances to be a bit too convenient, seized the cup — valued at more than $1 million — and declared it an object of looting. Investigators suggested that the cup’s shards had been knowingly dispersed among dealers who sold them separately to the Met in an effort to avoid detection.
10. And finally, what would you do for a Taylor Swift sweatshirt?
On a recent rainy night in Tampa, hundreds of fans camped outside the concert venue where Swift was scheduled to perform, hoping to purchase $75 hoodies or $45 T-shirts with her name on them. (One woman even hid overnight beneath a merchandise truck in order to get a good spot in line.)
Many of the fans were after the same blue crew neck sweatshirt, which is only available at Swift’s Eras Tour stops. Its popularity on social media has elevated this unexceptional article of clothing to cult status, and resellers have charged hundreds of dollars for it.
“I’ve been having nightmares about getting this crew neck,” one fan said. “I haven’t been sleeping.”
Have an enthusiastic night.
Brent Lewis compiled photos for this briefing.
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