China's foreign ministry announced sanctions on Friday targeting 10 individuals and 20 U.S. defense firms, including Boeing's St. Louis branch, over arms sales to Taiwan https://reut.rs/4sdzsN9

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he backs a September 2 decision to launch a second strike on a suspected drug boat in the Caribbean.   A video of the attack was shown to members of Congress on Capitol Hill after reports surfaced that the commander overseeing the operation ordered a second strike to take out two survivors to comply with Hegseth's direction that everyone should be killed.   Administration officials have since said that Hegseth did not order the additional strike, and that Admiral Frank Bradley, who led the Joint Special Operations Command at the time, concluded the boat's wreckage must be neutralized because it might contain cocaine https://reut.rs/44IPOmG

President Trump’s sweeping strategy document that seeks to reframe the country's role in the world argues that the US should revive the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine, which declared the Western Hemisphere to be Washington's zone of influence https://reut.rs/48SUb0R

The confusion still swirling in Washington over President Trump's latest peace plan for Ukraine has made at least one thing clear: His unconventional, all-in approach to diplomacy carries big risks - both domestic and geopolitical - as well as potential rewards.   That approach has yielded some successes, most notably a ceasefire in Gaza that eluded Joe Biden. But so far, the unexpected plan to end the war in Ukraine and revelations that Russian officials had a hand in its creation have stirred harsh criticism from Republican lawmakers, exasperation from European allies and confusion inside the administration.   The president's political base has strongly backed him so far, but with worries rising about the US economy, voters could see him as deeply involved in overseas crises at the expense of concerns at home https://reut.rs/4pXCP98

The Pentagon failed an annual audit for the eighth year in a row, the Department of Defense said, continuing a pattern of financial accountability problems that have drawn bipartisan criticism and emerged as a campaign issue https://reut.rs/492hOD0

The board of the Kennedy Center, which President Trump filled with allies during a broad takeover earlier this year, decided last week to add Trump's name to the institution https://reut.rs/4pTLr0F

Social-media platforms with infinite scrolling, auto-play and algorithmic feeds will be required to display warning labels about their potential harm to young users’ mental health under a new law, New York Governor Kathy Hochul said https://reut.rs/3MOjCZc

"We are locked and loaded and ready to go," Trump said in a social media post threatening to come to the aid of protesters in Iran if security forces fire on them, days into unrest that has left several dead and posed the biggest internal threat to Iranian authorities in years https://reut.rs/45qnqpL

President Trump said the U.S. had "hit" an area in Venezuela where boats are loaded with drugs, which would mark the first known time the United States has carried out operations on land in Venezuela https://reut.rs/4jfjApa

Donald Trump is preparing for a more aggressive immigration crackdown in 2026 with billions in new funding, including by raiding more workplaces, even as backlash builds ahead of next year’s midterm elections.   ICE and Border Patrol will get $170 billion in additional funds through September 2029, a huge surge of funding over their existing annual budgets of about $19 billion after Congress passed a massive spending package in July.   Administration officials say they plan to hire thousands more agents, open new detention centers, pick up more immigrants in local jails and partner with outside companies to track down people without legal status https://reut.rs/4j8yk9n