Good morning. This is Artificially Intelligent News for Friday, September eighteenth, twenty twenty-six. I’m Mark Ellison. This AI-created program is fact-checked against authoritative reporting available early this morning.

Early voting is beginning in parts of the country for midterm elections that will determine control of Congress. The immediate operational news is from the Postal Service. Postmaster General David Steiner says the agency has stopped work on a computer system that would have played a central role in the administration’s effort to restrict mail voting.

The decision follows the Supreme Court’s rejection this week of President Trump’s executive order for this year’s election. The order called for federal agencies to assemble state citizenship lists. Under the proposed system, the Postal Service could have sent mail ballots only to voters cleared through that process.

Steiner told the Associated Press that an injunction means the agency is not proceeding. An internal memo said the Postal Service will not enforce the new rules in the twenty twenty-six federal election and that election mail remains business as usual. The court action does not settle every broader policy dispute over voting by mail. But it removes an immediate late-stage change as election offices prepare ballots and voters begin casting them.

That development arrives as early voting opens in a handful of states and localities, with more jurisdictions following in the weeks ahead. The midterms are seven weeks away. All House seats and a portion of Senate seats are on the ballot.

Election officials had warned that a new federal verification system introduced so close to voting could disrupt established state procedures. The administration has argued that its approach is aimed at election integrity. Voting-rights advocates and many state officials have said it would create errors and disenfranchise eligible voters. For the current election, states can continue using their existing mail-ballot processes.

For listeners voting by mail, the practical guidance from election administrators remains simple: check your state’s deadline and return a ballot early enough to satisfy its receipt or postmark rules. The exact rule varies by state.

That continuity is particularly important in the eight states where voting is conducted almost entirely by mail: California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Vermont and Washington. Officials had said late changes would be difficult to put in place after ballot preparation was already underway. The ruling allows those systems to continue without a new federal postal requirement during this election.

In Washington, a federal judge has ordered the Kennedy Center to give thirty days’ notice before making significant physical changes to its main building, including any demolition.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper issued the order after the Kennedy Center abruptly closed to the public this week. The center’s executive director cited what he described as acute public-safety risks from structural deterioration. President Trump had suggested the building could be torn down if changes he supports are not allowed.

The order does not require the Kennedy Center to stay open or prohibit all repairs. It requires advance written notice before major physical work so the parties in the underlying legal dispute can respond. The case has grown out of litigation over the Trump-aligned board’s efforts to add the president’s name to the institution. Earlier this week, the same judge blocked a renewed renaming effort.

The notice requirement is procedural, but consequential. It gives the parties time to ask the court for relief before irreversible work begins. It does not resolve the safety claims or decide what repairs may ultimately be needed.

The Kennedy Center is both a federally supported national memorial and a working performing-arts venue. The immediate question is how long the closure will last and what safety assessment will find. The legal question is whether the board can make large-scale changes while the naming dispute is still before the court.

Another federal court ruling could restore hundreds of millions of dollars for teacher-training programs. Judge Angel Kelley in Boston struck down a twenty twenty-five Education Department directive that cut about six hundred million dollars in grants.

The administration had said the programs supported what it called divisive ideologies, including diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. The grants were intended in part to help address teacher shortages.

Judge Kelley found that the department’s action violated federal law and was arbitrary and capricious. She said the administration did not follow required procedures for notice and public comment and did not adequately account for the reliance interests of states, schools, teachers and students.

Those reliance interests refer to the planning already done around the grants. States and education providers had incorporated the funding into programs intended to prepare teachers, so the court found the department needed to address the effects of a sudden cancellation.

The ruling is a district-court decision and the administration can appeal. But for now it is a significant check on the cancellation of funds that states had already planned around. The case also illustrates a wider legal fight over how much discretion federal agencies have to reshape grant programs authorized by Congress.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement will remain without a Senate-confirmed director for now. The White House withdrew the nomination of Lance Schroyer, a former Oklahoma state trooper, to lead the agency.

The White House did not provide a detailed explanation. Schroyer is close to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin but had limited immigration experience. His withdrawal comes while ICE remains at the center of intense national debate over enforcement operations, recruitment and training as the administration pursues its deportation agenda.

A vacancy does not stop the agency’s work. An acting leadership structure remains in place. But withdrawing the nomination delays a Senate confirmation process for one of the administration’s most consequential domestic-enforcement agencies.

The Justice Department has also announced charges it says disrupted an alleged Russian intelligence-linked network that sought to recruit people in the United States for surveillance and targeted killings.

According to the unsealed indictment, five defendants allegedly worked for Russian intelligence services in a network that conducted or planned violent operations internationally. The government says members of the network tried to recruit people in the United States to surveil and attempt to kill a prominent Russian dissident based here.

Federal prosecutors say the alleged conduct dates to at least twenty twenty-four and also involved efforts directed at infrastructure and targets in European countries seen as aligned with Ukraine. The FBI says its New York and Washington field offices helped investigate.

The defendants remain at large. These are criminal allegations, not findings of guilt. The Justice Department’s announcement is nevertheless notable because it describes what U.S. officials say was an effort to direct political violence from abroad onto American soil. Prosecutors will now have to prove the case in court if the defendants are brought into custody.

In northern Michigan, an F-16 crashed during training on Thursday after its pilot safely ejected. The plane was operating near a National Guard base in Alpena when it went down in a rural part of Grand Traverse County.

Authorities temporarily evacuated nearby residents after hazardous material was reported at the crash site. The pilot was conscious and talking with law enforcement while receiving medical care, according to the county sheriff. The Air Force says the crash is under investigation.

Audio posted online included another pilot saying he believed the aircraft may have struck a bird. Military officials have not confirmed a cause. That distinction matters: bird strikes are a known aviation risk, but no formal finding has been made. The key immediate facts are that the pilot ejected safely and that authorities lifted the emergency response after securing the area.

Overseas, Russians are beginning three days of voting in a parliamentary election that is expected to reinforce the Kremlin’s political control during the war in Ukraine.

It is Russia’s first parliamentary election since the full-scale invasion began in twenty twenty-two. The vote includes virtually no meaningful opposition. The liberal Yabloko party, the only registered political group openly critical of the war, was removed from the ballot last month by Russia’s Supreme Court.

President Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party already dominates the legislature and is expected to retain that position. Russian authorities present the election as a normal democratic exercise. Critics say the absence of viable opposition, restrictions on dissent and voting in Russian-controlled Ukrainian territory undermine its legitimacy.

The election runs through Sunday. Its likely political result is not in much doubt. Its importance lies in the message the Kremlin hopes to send: that domestic support for the war and the government remains intact despite the human, economic and diplomatic costs of the conflict.

The Middle East conflict is also widening pressure on energy routes. Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels have pushed down the Red Sea coast, gaining reach around the Bab el-Mandeb chokepoint and threatening Saudi oil exports.

The chokepoint links the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and is a major route for commercial shipping. Saudi Arabia has reported drone and missile attacks, while the Houthis say they are responding to Saudi military action and blockade policies. On Thursday, Saudi civil defense said falling debris from an intercepted Houthi drone killed one person in the kingdom.

The United Nations and aid organizations are also concerned about civilians. Reporting from the region indicates that at least one hundred twenty-five thousand people have fled during the recent escalation. The fighting has displaced families along a coast already marked by years of war and humanitarian strain.

For American listeners, this is not a distant shipping story. Disruption around the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz can affect insurance, transport costs and global oil supplies. It is one reason energy prices and wider inflation concerns remain so sensitive this week.

Now to the markets and the economy. These are final closes from Thursday, September seventeenth, the most recent completed U.S. trading session.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained three hundred sixteen point fourteen points, or six-tenths of one percent, to close at fifty-one thousand seven hundred seventy-eight point zero four. The S and P 500 rose eighty-five point ninety-five points, or one point one percent, to seven thousand six hundred thirty-seven point seven six. The Nasdaq Composite climbed four hundred thirty-nine point eighty-seven points, or one point seven percent, to twenty-six thousand four hundred eighteen point three zero.

The rally followed a rougher Wednesday. Falling oil prices and lower Treasury yields helped equities recover, particularly technology shares. Brent crude fell about one percent Thursday, while the yield on the ten-year Treasury eased to four point nine three percent.

The larger economic story remains the Federal Reserve’s quarter-point rate increase on Wednesday. The Fed lifted its target range to three and three-quarters to four percent, its first increase since twenty twenty-three. The policy-setting committee voted unanimously.

Chair Kevin Warsh said inflation remains too high and that the committee needs confidence it is moving back toward its two-percent objective. The Fed said economic activity is expanding at a solid pace, job gains have kept pace with the workforce and unemployment has changed little. Its projections signal that at least one additional increase later this year is possible.

The target range guides the short-term rate at which banks lend reserve balances to one another. Longer-term market rates move separately, which helps explain why Treasury yields can change even after a widely expected Fed decision.

Higher policy rates do not instantly determine every household bill. But they generally feed through over time to borrowing costs for credit cards, auto loans and some mortgages. The conflict-driven rise in fuel costs and higher longer-term bond yields make the Fed’s job more difficult: officials are trying to restrain inflation without unnecessarily weakening growth.

In sports, the Buffalo Bills opened their new Highmark Stadium with a statement win, beating the Detroit Lions forty-one to thirty-one on Thursday night.

Josh Allen accounted for five touchdowns as Buffalo built a twenty-one-point lead early in the second quarter. Detroit kept working back into the game, and Jared Goff threw four touchdown passes, but the Lions never completed the comeback.

The result gives Buffalo a two-and-zero start under head coach Joe Brady. It drops Detroit to one-and-one. Beyond the standings, it was a landmark night for the Bills: the first regular-season game in the franchise’s new home in Orchard Park. A national audience saw a game that paired two recent contenders and produced a reminder of how difficult Buffalo’s offense can be when Allen is both creating plays with his arm and finishing drives himself.

College sports could be nearing a major federal rewrite. The Senate voted seventy-four to twenty-four to end debate on the Protect College Sports Act, clearing the sixty-vote threshold needed to move toward a final vote.

Supporters say the bipartisan measure would bring greater order to a system reshaped by athlete compensation, the transfer portal and repeated litigation. The bill would put a twenty-two-percent cap on the revenue schools may share directly with athletes, roughly twenty-one and a half million dollars this year. It also proposes a twenty-seven-and-a-half-million-dollar retention pool for schools.

Backers including Senators Ted Cruz and Maria Cantwell say the legislation could reduce legal uncertainty and spending pressure. Opponents argue it would entrench an unfair system and limit athlete bargaining power. The House would also need to pass compatible legislation before anything becomes law.

Ending debate is not final passage. It is the procedural step that lets the Senate proceed toward a vote on the bill itself, and its large margin shows the measure cleared a significant hurdle.

Still, the Senate vote is meaningful. It shows broad enough support to move a college-sports bill beyond the stage where similar proposals have repeatedly stalled.

A quick results roundup from Thursday. In the NFL, Buffalo beat Detroit forty-one to thirty-one. In Major League Baseball, the Dodgers defeated the Reds eight to two, and the Phillies shut out the Mets three to zero. In the WNBA’s return from its World Cup break, the Atlanta Dream routed the Connecticut Sun one hundred three to fifty-nine, while the Washington Mystics beat the Chicago Sky one hundred ten to eighty.

The Dream game included a record: Rhyne Howard made her one hundred twenty-ninth three-pointer of the season, setting a new WNBA single-season mark.

And in culture, Gustavo Dudamel is beginning his tenure as music director of the New York Philharmonic after nearly two decades leading the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Dudamel’s opening weeks have already included a concert at Radio City Music Hall featuring a mix of orchestral music and guest performers. He began rehearsals with the Philharmonic on Labor Day. The Venezuelan conductor first appeared with the orchestra as a guest in two thousand nine, and his appointment puts one of the world’s most visible conductors at the helm of one of America’s oldest orchestras.

The transition matters beyond New York’s arts scene. Dudamel became known in Los Angeles for pairing standard repertoire with new work, educational programs and ambitious programming meant to broaden the audience for classical music. The Philharmonic says early ticket revenue and September seat sales are ahead of the same point last year.

That early sales comparison does not determine the season’s artistic reception. It does offer an early indicator of public interest as the orchestra begins a new chapter under a conductor already familiar to many American audiences.

That is your Friday briefing. We covered the mail-voting ruling and early voting, the Kennedy Center and teacher-training decisions, immigration leadership, national security, markets, the Red Sea conflict and the major sports stories.

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I’m Mark Ellison. Thanks for listening, and have a thoughtful Friday.