France becomes the first EU country to bar under-15s from social media
Macron wants it in force by the September school term, and the Constitutional Council has yet to sign off.
Mamdani says New York City cannot arrest Netanyahu and asks Washington to1
New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani said in a video Tuesday that the city holds no independent legal authority to execute the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, retreating from a campaign pledge to have city police detain him.2 He called on the federal government, which he said does hold that authority, to join the ICC and carry the warrant out.3 He called Netanyahu a war criminal who is not welcome in the city. Netanyahu denies the war-crimes charges.
House passes a stopgap budget 220-205 to fund the government into December4
The House voted 220 to 205 on Tuesday to extend federal spending at current levels through December 4, a margin that held almost entirely along party lines.5 One Republican, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, voted no, and six Democrats crossed over to pass it.6 The bill now goes to the Senate, where members are weighing a rewrite rather than a straight vote.
A federal judge blocks the administration from cancelling work permits for asylum and TPS holders7
U.S. District Judge Nathaniel Gorton in Boston temporarily barred U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services from stripping work authorization from tens of thousands of asylum seekers and Temporary Protected Status holders.8 The plaintiffs, led by the Venezuelan Association of Massachusetts, argued the agency imposed provisions of the H.R. 1 tax-and-spending law without the notice-and-comment the Administrative Procedure Act requires.9 Gorton said he will rule on a longer pause by August 5.
Trump orders 50% tariffs on Canadian goods under a 1930 trade-retaliation clause10
Trump signed three proclamations imposing 50 percent tariffs on a range of Canadian products, from autos and dairy to wine and hockey sticks, invoking Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 to "offset Canadian discrimination against the commerce of the United States."11 The duties take effect in 30 days and exempt energy, potash, critical minerals, and fish.12 Prime Minister Mark Carney said Canada is ready to intensify trade talks.
France's parliament bans social media for children under 1513
France's National Assembly adopted the ban 279 to 81, with 66 abstentions, hours after the Senate approved the same text, making France the first EU country to bar under-15s from apps such as TikTok.14 The law also removes phones from lycées, and President Emmanuel Macron has pledged enforcement by the September start of the school year.15 The Constitutional Council must still review the text, which could push the start date back.
Google ships Gemini 3.6 Flash and teases Gemini 416
Google released three models led by Gemini 3.6 Flash, its workhorse tier, alongside a cheaper 3.5 Flash-Lite and a security-tuned 3.5 Flash Cyber, and previewed Gemini 4.17 The company says 3.6 Flash uses 17 percent fewer output tokens than 3.5 Flash and cut output pricing to $7.50 per million tokens, down from $9.00.16 GitHub added the model to Copilot the same day.18
Court gives final approval to Anthropic's $1.5 billion author copyright settlement19
A federal judge in San Francisco granted final approval to Anthropic's $1.5 billion settlement with authors who said the company trained Claude on pirated books, the largest known U.S. copyright settlement.20 The terms pay roughly $3,000 for each of about 500,000 works, and Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín rejected objectors who called the sum too small.21 An earlier ruling in the case had found that training on books can be fair use while storing pirated copies is not.
TSMC posts record profit and lifts its 2026 capital budget toward $64 billion22
TSMC reported second-quarter revenue of $40.20 billion and net income up 77.4 percent from a year earlier, both records, with gross margin at 67.7 percent.22 On the earnings call management raised full-year capital spending to a range of $60 billion to $64 billion, up from a $52 billion to $56 billion plan, citing demand for AI chips.23 It guided third-quarter revenue to a record $44.6 billion to $45.8 billion.24
FDA panel takes up seven peptides as its public comment window closes25
The FDA's Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee meets July 23 and 24 to weigh whether seven peptides, among them BPC-157 and Semax, may be compounded in bulk under section 503A.25 The public docket, FDA-2025-N-6895, closes at 11:59 p.m. Eastern on July 22.26 The review follows Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s move in February to shift more than a dozen peptides back toward eligibility, a wider list than this week's agenda.27
Zelenskyy replaces his commander-in-chief and calls it a reset of Ukraine's defense28
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a July 21 address that General Mykhailo Drapatyi will replace Oleksandr Syrskyi as commander-in-chief, framing the change as a reset of the war effort.28 The move followed roughly six days of protests in Kyiv over the removal of Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, who had clashed with Syrskyi.29 Zelenskyy said he and Drapatyi had already set the tasks the military must now carry out.30
Russian strikes hit cities across Ukraine, with casualty counts still in dispute31
Russia struck residential areas across at least nine Ukrainian regions on July 21, and rescuers in Sumy were hit by follow-up "double-tap" strikes.32 Casualty totals diverge by outlet and reporting window: the Kyiv Independent counted at least 10 killed and 87 injured over the day, while the Sunday Guardian reported 4 killed and about 20 injured in Odesa and Zaporizhzhia.33 Each figure traces to Ukrainian emergency and regional authorities, and no single toll is settled.31
Chip stocks rally as the Philadelphia semiconductor index jumps 5.2%34
The PHLX Semiconductor Index closed at 12,356.16 on July 21, up 612.31 points, or 5.2 percent, as dip-buyers moved back into chips ahead of Big Tech earnings.34 Reuters put the sector's gain at 5.5 percent, against the index provider's own 5.21 percent.35 Memory names led, with Micron up about 12 percent.36
Sources
- Zohran Mamdani · Video statement on the ICC arrest warrant
- NPR · Mamdani says NYC can't arrest Netanyahu, urges federal action
- TIME · Mamdani admits New York cannot arrest Netanyahu
- U.S. House Clerk · Roll call votes
- NPR · House passes continuing resolution to avoid a fall shutdown
- Roll Call · Funding extension passes House, heads for Senate rewrite
- CourtListener · Venezuelan Association of Massachusetts v. USCIS
- Reuters · U.S. judge blocks administration from stripping work permits
- Al Jazeera · U.S. judge blocks bid to strip work permits from immigrants
- The White House · Presidential actions
- NPR · Trump imposes tariffs on Canadian goods
- CBC · Trump imposes 50% tariffs on Canadian goods; Carney responds
- Assemblée nationale · Scrutins publics
- NPR · France passes a social media ban for under-15s
- Al Jazeera · French parliament passes social media ban for under-15s
- Google · Gemini 3.6 Flash, 3.5 Flash-Lite, and 3.5 Flash Cyber
- 9to5Google · Gemini 3.6 Flash launch
- GitHub Changelog · Gemini 3.6 Flash now available in Copilot
- CourtListener · Bartz v. Anthropic PBC
- Reuters · U.S. judge approves Anthropic's $1.5 billion copyright settlement
- TechCrunch · Anthropic's landmark $1.5B copyright settlement is approved
- TSMC · Second-quarter 2026 results
- Reuters · TSMC Q2 profit beats estimates, ups spending as AI boom continues
- CNBC · TSMC second-quarter profit surges on AI demand
- FDA · July 23-24, 2026 Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee meeting
- NBC News · Seven peptides head to FDA review
- RAPS · FDA considers adding a dozen peptides to its bulk compounding list
- President of Ukraine · Address naming Drapatyi commander-in-chief
- Al Jazeera · Zelenskyy replaces Ukraine's military chief after protests
- Euronews · Zelenskyy replaces Syrskyi with Drapatyi as commander-in-chief
- State Emergency Service of Ukraine
- Kyiv Independent · Russian attacks kill at least 10, injure 87 over past day
- Sunday Guardian · Russian overnight strikes kill 4, injure 20 in Odesa and Zaporizhzhia
- Nasdaq · PHLX Semiconductor Sector Index (SOX)
- Reuters (Spokesman-Review) · Wall Street rallies on chip-stock recovery
- Invezz · Dow jumps 380 points as a chip rally lifts Wall Street