How the climate crisis showed up in Americans’ lives this year: ‘The shift has been swift and stark’

Guardian US readers share how global heating and biodiversity loss affected their lives in ways that don’t always make the headlines

The past year was another one of record-setting heat and catastrophic storms. But across the US, the climate crisis showed up in smaller, deeply personal ways too.

Campfires that once defined summer trips were never lit due to wildfire risks. There were no bites where fish were once abundant, forests turned to meadows after a big burn and childhood memories of winter wonderlands turned to slush.

Published: December 31, 2025, 3:00 pm

Simple daily rituals for building fun, calm and play into your days in 2026

Breathe, make matcha, don’t eat so fast: these aren’t resolutions, they are simple habits for a more relaxing year

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Whether or not we realize it, all of us practice daily rituals. Maybe you read the news with breakfast, or maybe you always take a long bath on Friday nights. Rituals are simply practices that add some shape to our days. Chosen wisely, they can consistently bring a bit of pleasure, calm and fun into even the most chaotic times.

As a culinary educator and a holistic creativity coach, I have helped dozens of people weave joyful daily rituals into their lives. And the new year is an ideal time to shake things up. Just start with one or two that you love, and work them into your week. Before you know it, you will have fun, calming moments to look forward to every day – and you’ll want to add more.

Published: December 31, 2025, 8:15 pm

Lububus, Taylor Swift and Sydney Sweeney: here’s the deluge that was 2025 | Dave Schilling

It was a tough year (again) and we met it all with a shrug

It’s the end of another year, which means a deluge of dire looks back on the various atrocities of the last go around the sun. As is my duty, I have to add to the pile. But does it all have to be quite so sad? Do we have to dutifully trawl through the muck to find some elusive meaning to what we’ve been forced to endure? Unfortunately, yes. It was a tough year (again) and we met it all with a shrug. As we’ve all been made punishingly aware, Dictionary.com’s word of 2025 is “6-7,” a viral meme slogan which is technically two words. Pretty cheeky of the Dictionary to cheat on their own assignment.

How tragically emblematic of the year we just witnessed. We’re all too apathetic to even complain about getting swindled by a gaggle of word snobs. “Apathy” would have been a better choice for word of the year, considering how we’ve collectively shrugged at every dispiriting development of the last 12 months. Nicki Minaj popped up at the Turning Point USA conference to kiki with Erika Kirk and the most I could muster was “I guess she’ll do a concert at the Trump-Kennedy Center soon.”

Dave Schilling is a Los Angeles-based writer and humorist

Published: December 31, 2025, 11:00 am

Mystery meat and maggot-infested produce: the disturbing reality of US prison food

In Eating Behind Bars, author Leslie Soble details how food is used to further punish incarcerated people in the US

At best you get “mystery meat”. Or “sour-smelling heaps” of macaroni. In the worst cases, it’s undercooked chicken, spoiled milk and maggot-infested produce.

In prisons and jails across the US, people are routinely fed unhealthy, tasteless or inedible meals. Many are left hungry and malnourished, with devastating long-term health consequences. The hidden crisis affecting millions of incarcerated people is the subject of Eating Behind Bars, a new book offering a disturbing account of how correctional institutions punish their residents through the food they provide and withhold.

Published: December 31, 2025, 5:00 pm

Staying in with the old: the best films to watch on New Year’s Eve

For those not going out to celebrate, you can still party with Harry and Sally, play cards with Jack Lemmon and make merry hell at the Overlook Hotel

At the end of any especially troublesome year it’s always good to revisit The Apartment, Billy Wilder’s brilliantly bleak comedy of office politics and festive bad cheer. It memorably ends on the stroke of midnight as heartsick Fran Kubelik (Shirley MacLaine) abandons a drunken new year’s party to be with hapless, jobless CC Baxter (Jack Lemmon) instead. Is The Apartment suggesting that Kubelik and Baxter then live happily ever after? Probably not, because I’ve never been convinced that these two lovers are going to stay the course. They’re too mismatched and desperate; their wounds are still too fresh. What the ending gives us is the next best thing: a sudden sense of hope and freedom, with everything packed in boxes except for a bottle, two glasses and a deck of cards. Nothing to lose and nowhere to go. “Shut up and deal.” A clean break, a fresh start. Xan Brooks

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:00 am

The perfect night out: how to ditch the telly – and have next-level fun

Happiness research has found we get more joy from active, challenging experiences than from passive consumption. So go somewhere new, grab the karaoke mic and leap out of your comfort zone

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‘It’s nice to have a night out that doesn’t revolve around drinking,” says the person next to me as we put the finishing touches to our lino prints of pomegranates, wintry trees, the anime character Totoro (mine) and a martini-drinking cat, which we’ve spent our Friday evenings crafting. There has been wine, but it wasn’t central to the evening – a small block of clay and some inks were.

It’s a different kind of night out from going for dinner and, possibly, having one too many, which is the formula plenty of us fall back on. At best that can be fun and nurturing, but at worst you find yourself on the bus home feeling hollowed out and en route to a hangover. So how else can we let our hair down?

Published: December 31, 2025, 4:00 pm

New Year’s Eve live: US begins to enter 2026 as clock strikes midnight on east coast

Join our live coverage as we cross the globe to enter the new year

Sydney is the self-appointed “world capital of new year’s eve” and arguably rightly so. As always, eyes will be on the Opera House at 13:00 GMT when fireworks will light up the sky in spectacular fashion. But there are also huge crowds out in Melbourne to see off the year in style.

Thousands of people are expected to descend on Melbourne this evening to celebrate NYE. There will be two 7 minute firework displays and light shows tonight, first a family one at 9.30pm for young children, and the main one at the stroke of midnight.

Published: January 1, 2026, 5:25 am

Zohran Mamdani sworn in as mayor of New York City

New mayor, 34, was sworn in by state attorney general Letitia James in old beaux arts city hall subway station

Zohran Mamdani was sworn in as mayor of New York City soon after midnight in a private ceremony in an abandoned beaux arts subway station – a prelude to daylong celebrations set to include a second, public swearing-in and a block party outside city hall.

Mamdani, 34, was sworn into office by the New York attorney general, Letitia James, surrounded by wife, Rama Duwaji, members of his immediate family, including Mira Nair, his mother and a film-maker, and his father, Mahmood Mamdani, a professor of African studies at Columbia University.

Published: January 1, 2026, 5:15 am

Trump administration reportedly freezes all childcare payments to all states

Trump official says funds will be released ‘only when states prove they are being spent legitimately’

The Department of Health and Human Services is freezing all childcare payments to all states, an official for Donald Trump’s administration told ABC News in a report published Wednesday. States’ funds will be released “only when states prove they are being spent legitimately”.

The report came a day after Jim O’Neill, the HHS deputy secretary, and Alex Adams, an HHS assistant secretary who oversees the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), appeared in a Tuesday evening video message. O’Neill declared that the department had “activated our defend-the-spend system for all ACF childcare payments across America” and would now require “justification, receipt or photo evidence before we make a payment”.

Published: December 31, 2025, 11:13 pm

Jack Smith told House committee he had ‘proof beyond reasonable doubt’ in cases against Trump

Ex-special counsel testified in front of judiciary committee about aborted federal prosecution of Donald Trump

Jack Smith, the former justice department special counsel who led the aborted federal prosecution of Donald Trump, told a congressional committee that he never spoke to Joe Biden about his cases, according to the transcript of a deposition released on Wednesday.

In his behind-closed-doors testimony to the House judiciary committee earlier this month, Smith defended the charges he brought against Trump for allegedly possessing classified documents and attempting to overturn the 2020 election, while warning of the consequences of allowing election meddling to go unpunished.

Published: December 31, 2025, 10:34 pm

Trump backs away from deploying national guard in Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland

Decision comes after DoJ stopped contesting California court’s ruling to return control of guard to state’s governor

Donald Trump has staged a sudden climbdown from his attempts to impose federal troops in law enforcement roles on Democratic-run cities, announcing on Wednesday that he was ending attempted deployments from Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland.

The unexpected shift came after justice department lawyers said they were no longer contesting a California court’s ruling that returned the national guard troops to the authority of Gavin Newsom, the state’s governor. It also followed a rare rebuke from the US supreme court, which blocked the White House’s efforts to deploy national guards in Illinois.

Published: December 31, 2025, 10:27 pm

Search for survivors after US strikes on alleged drug boats

US military announces two separate strikes on boats it claims were transporting drugs in the Pacific

The US Coast Guard was searching for survivors of a US military strike against a convoy of suspected drug vessels in the Pacific Ocean, officials said on Wednesday.

In a statement, the US military’s Southern Command said the military had carried out a strike against three vessels.

Published: January 1, 2026, 2:01 am

Lauren Boebert claims Trump’s veto of safe drinking water bill is retaliation

Colorado lawmaker, who pushed for Epstein files release, points to bill’s unanimous passage through US House and Senate

Republican representative Lauren Boebert has fired back at Donald Trump for vetoing a bill that would have funded a drinking water project in her Colorado district, implying the president was playing at political retaliation.

The bill was aimed at funding a decades-long project to bring safe drinking water to 39 communities in Colorado’s eastern plains, where the groundwater is high in salt and wells sometimes unleash radioactivity into the water supply.

Published: January 1, 2026, 12:36 am

End of an era as New York City transit retires three-decade-old MetroCard

Resisted at first, the replacement for the subway token became an indelible symbol of the city

First, New Yorkers saw the elimination of subway token, which lasted for half a century. Now, its successor – the swipeable MetroCard, which lasted barely more than three decades – has seen its demise.

At midnight on 1 January, the flexible credit card-sized pass used by millions of New Yorkers to get through subway turnstiles is being terminated from sale just as a new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, takes office.

Published: December 31, 2025, 9:38 pm

‘A state of crisis’: record number of Americans are pessimistic about US healthcare system

Costs, insurance delays and difficult-to-obtain mental health treatment plague the US health system

A record 23 % of Americans believe the United States healthcare system is “in a state of crisis” and 47% think it has “major problems,” according to a recent poll from the West Health-Gallup Center on Healthcare in America.

The poll also revealed that a record 29% of Americans see “cost” as the most urgent health problem facing the US. Experts note that these two perceptions – that the healthcare system is in a state of crisis and that costs are an urgent health problem – are related.

Published: December 31, 2025, 4:07 pm

Grief, fear and fury: the Israeli and Palestinian mothers still standing united against bloodshed

Israeli movement Women Wage Peace and Palestinian group Women of the Sun held a mass rally in October 2023. Three days later a Hamas attack triggered war – leaving the women more determined than ever

On the shores of the Dead Sea, about 1,500 Israeli and Palestinian women had gathered, holding hands and calling for an end to what they called a “vicious cycle of bloodshed”. It was an October evening in 2023 and they had travelled from villages, settlements and refugee camps around the region for a mass peace rally jointly organised by the Israeli movement Women Wage Peace and the Palestinian group Women of the Sun.

Two of the organisers were friends: Yael Admi, 66, an Israeli mother of six, and Reem al-Hajajreh, 43, a Palestinian mother of four. The women had hoped their message would cut through decades of violence and mistrust. But three days later, Hamas launched its deadly attack on southern Israel, killing 1,200 people, followed swiftly by what turned into a genocidal war by Israel on Gaza which left more than 70,000 dead, most of whom were women and children. The fragile hope embodied by the Dead Sea event was overtaken overnight by grief, fear and fury.

Published: January 1, 2026, 5:00 am

‘We want the mullahs gone’: economic crisis sparks biggest protests in Iran since 2022

Demonstrations against deteriorating living conditions have widened to include criticism of how Iran is governed

Alborz, a textile merchant in the central Iranian city of Isfahan, decided he could no longer sit on the sidelines. He closed his shop and took to the streets, joining merchants across Iran who shuttered their stores and students who took over their campuses to protest against declining economic conditions.

The sudden loss of purchasing power pushed Alborz and tens of thousands of other Iranians into the streets, where protests are now entering their fourth day. Students have paralysed university campuses, traders have shut down their stores and demonstrators have blocked off streets in defiance of police. Protests have spread from the capital, Tehran, to cities across Iran.

Published: December 31, 2025, 7:13 pm

Ukraine war briefing: 10% away from peace, Zelenskyy tells Ukrainians

US intelligence officials persuade Donald Trump that Ukrainians did not target Putin with drones – reports. What we know on day 1,408

Ukraine was “10%” away from a peace deal, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Wednesday, and his country wanted an end to the war but not at “any cost”. The Ukrainian president, in his New Year’s Eve address, said any agreement needed strong security guarantees. “The peace agreement is 90% ready, 10% remains. And that is far more than just numbers.”

As the Russian ruler, Vladimir Putin, pushes for full control of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region as part of any deal, Zelenskyy said he did not believe Russia would stop there. “Pull out from the Donbas, and it will all be over. That is how deception sounds when translated from Russian – into Ukrainian, into English, into German, into French, and, in fact, into any language in the world.”

Zelenskyy said he would not sign a “weak” peace agreement that would only prolong the war. “What does Ukraine want? Peace? Yes. At any cost? No. We want an end to the war but not the end of Ukraine … Are we tired? Very. Does this mean we are ready to surrender? Anyone who thinks so is deeply mistaken.”

European leaders and allies meeting in Paris on 6 January will make firm commitments towards protecting Ukraine after any peace deal with Russia is brokered, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, said on Wednesday during his New Year Eve’s speech.

Ukrainian long-range drones struck the Temp oil depot in the Russian city of Rybinsk, sparking a large fire, an official from Kyiv’s SBU domestic security service said on Wednesday. In Ukraine, a Russian drone attack hit apartment buildings and the power grid in Odesa, injuring six people, including children. Officials said Wednesday that four apartment buildings were damaged and the power company DTEK reported significant damage to two energy facilities.

US and European officials agree that Ukraine did not target Putin and his house with drones. Donald Trump on Monday appeared to give the Russian claim credence, but on Wednesday the US president shared a New York Post editorial accusing Russia of blocking peace. A source familiar with the issue said on condition of anonymity that Trump had reposted the editorial after being briefed by the CIA director, John Ratcliffe, on the drone attack allegations. US national security officials including the CIA determined that the attack did not happen, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.

On Wednesday, as it tried to shore up its claims, Russia’s defence ministry released video including a Russian serviceman standing next to fragments of a device that he said was a downed Ukrainian Chaklun-V drone carrying a 6kg explosive device that had not detonated. “This is laughable,” said Heorhii Tykhyi from Ukraine’s foreign ministry, “both the fact that it took them two days to produce this, and the fact that the things they try to present as evidence basically shows that they are not serious even about fabricating the story. We are absolutely confident that no such attack took place.”

Kaja Kallas, the EU’s top diplomat, called Russia’s claims “a deliberate distraction … No one should accept unfounded claims from the aggressor who has indiscriminately targeted Ukraine’s infrastructure and civilians since the start of the war.” Reuters said that a Ukrainian briefing paper noted that in the hours after the alleged attack, various Russian officials made extremely similar and likely coordinated comments in public. Residents of a town near Putin’s Novgorod residence heard no sounds of air defences on the night of the alleged attack.

Kim Jong-un hailed North Korean troops fighting in an “alien land” in a new year message to soldiers, state media reported on Thursday. Without mentioning the Ukraine war, the dictator addressed personnel in what state-run KCNA described as “overseas operations units”. North Korea has sent thousands of troops to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to South Korean and western intelligence agencies, with at least 600 killed and thousands more injured – all having fought under instructions to kill themselves rather than be taken prisoner.

The US has granted the majority Russian-owned Serbian oil company NIS a reprieve until 23 January from sanctions targeting Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, a Serbian minister said on Wednesday. Petroleum Industry of Serbia (NIS) was forced in early December to shut down Serbia’s sole oil refinery, which supplied about 80% of Serbia’s fuel needs. Washington imposed sanctions on NIS demanding the complete exit of Russian shareholders and preventing the refinery from receiving supplies. But talks over its sale have dragged on.

Published: January 1, 2026, 1:53 am

What happened next: how KPop Demon Hunters became a global phenomenon and outranked Lady Gaga

It’s the Korean fantasy movie that came out of nowhere to become Netflix’s most-watched film ever. And social media mentions of its characters are outranking those of real-life superstars

When KPop Demon Hunters landed on Netflix in late June, no one predicted it would become a globe-sweeping, chart-topping phenomenon. The near-instant success of the animated kids’ film caught the industry by surprise, and six months later, fans are still hungry for merchandise, music, spin-offs and more stories. Here’s what you may have missed.

It’s an animated ‘musical urban fantasy film’
The story follows a K-pop girl group called Huntr/x (pronounced “Huntrix”), who are also demon hunters, responsible for protecting humanity from supernatural threats with their combat skills and empowering pop. Their rivals are the Saja Boys, who are secretly demons. When the groups are pitted against one another, the stakes are peace on Earth, and in particular the Honmoon: the magical barrier that protects humans from the underworld. Conflict, and personal growth, ensues.

Published: January 1, 2026, 5:00 am

‘Being annoying is worse than being evil’: the high-octane, low-culture genius of indie duo Getdown Services

Scatological lyrics, social conscience and a shoutout from Walton Goggins – 2026 is going to be the laptop garage band’s year

It’s a Saturday night in Camden, London, and Getdown Services’ fans are getting the beers in before “Britain’s best band” play one of their final gigs of the year. The Electric Ballroom is heaving, despite this being their second show here in a month. There’s no shortage of twentysomethings with shag hairstyles to explain why the duo live up to their slogan. “They’re fun, which we need right now – life is bleak,” says Dulcie. “And they’re socially aware,” adds her friend Lotte. “Even though they are quite silly, they’re grounded.”

Across the bar, Dylan, 22, says that he finds Getdown Services and their genre-agnostic beats empowering: “They’re a laptop garage band that are having fun doing what they love, and seeing that makes me want to do what I love as well.” His pal James, 29, has returned for a repeat performance. “I came to the other Getdown Services show and I felt more jubilant than I did at Oasis,” he says.

Published: December 31, 2025, 3:00 pm

My big night out: I realised I could leave the house party behind – and everything else that made me feel small

It was New Year’s Eve and there had been fireworks, drinking and dancing. Amid it all, I felt ashen and cold. As I walked out, I felt my first surge of quiet liberation

We drove out along the coast one afternoon, to a fireworks shop a couple of towns along. It was late in the year, and the light was low and dismal, rain scudding the windscreen. In a couple of days’ time it would be New Year’s Eve, and then our small town would scatter itself to parties held in bars and houses and nightclubs, and out along the harbour. At midnight, there would be an amateur firework display on the roof of the old lido.

In the shop that afternoon, some of the fireworks sat behind a glass-fronted cabinet. They had names like Stinging Bees, Vendetta and Sky Breaker, and beneath each item was a small laminated caption: “One hundred shot roman candle firing high whistling bees,” read one. “Twenty-five secs of time rain salutes. Noisy,” read another.

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:00 pm

‘It’s not a hen party hellscape’: Dublin’s Temple Bar strives to shake off its bad reputation

Despite reviews of the district as a raucous tourist trap, improved policing has restored safety and an eclectic vibe

When Ireland redeveloped a swathe of central Dublin in the 1990s, the idea was to create a version of Paris’s Left Bank, a cultural quarter of cobbled lanes, art and urban renewal.

Planners and architects transformed the run-down Temple Bar site by the River Liffey into an ambitious experiment that drew throngs of visitors and won awards.

Published: December 31, 2025, 11:00 am

It’s easy to feel powerless about climate chaos. Here’s what gives me hope | Nina Lakhani

I’ve spent six years writing about environmental justice. The uncomfortable truth is that we’re not all in it together – but people power is reshaping the fight

It’s been another year of climate chaos and inadequate political action. And it’s hard not to feel despondent and powerless.

I joined the Guardian full time in 2019, as the paper’s first environmental justice correspondent, and have reported from across the US and the region over the past six years. It’s been painful to see so many families – and entire communities – devastated by fires, floods, extreme heat, sea level rise and food shortages. But what’s given me hope during these six years of reporting as both an environmental and climate justice reporter are the people fighting to save our planet from catastrophe – in their communities, on the streets and in courtrooms across the world.

Published: December 31, 2025, 2:00 pm

Cecilia Giménez’s botched Monkey Christ became a global meme. The real marvel was the humble, graceful woman behind it | Sam Jones

The restorer, who died on Monday, brought unwanted attention to herself – and her small Spanish town. Then, slowly, a small miracle took place

Very few of us find fame quite as late, or quite as brutally, as Cecilia Giménez did in the summer of 2012. The Spanish amateur artist was already 81 when her efforts to restore a decent, if unremarkable, fresco of the scourged Christ brought her a renown that almost destroyed her.

Almost overnight, Giménez, who died on Monday at the age of 94, was stripped of her quiet existence in the north-eastern Spanish town of Borja, and recast as the well-meaning and unwitting creator of what would become known around the English-speaking world as Monkey Christ. In Spain, the meme phenomenon was dubbed Ecce Mono (Behold the Monkey), a play on the painting’s Latin title Ecce Homo (Behold the Man).

Sam Jones is Madrid correspondent for the Guardian

Published: January 1, 2026, 5:00 am

What’s the best path to take in 2026? | Fiona Katauskas

It depends which direction you take

• See more of Fiona Katauskas’s cartoons here

Published: December 31, 2025, 10:44 pm

Yes, women’s rights are under threat around the world. But we’ve found hope in unlikely places | Rahila Gupta

From El Salvador to Russia, Iceland and Syria, women are pushing back against the rise of regressive forces. Let’s support their fight

• Rahila Gupta is an anti-racist feminist activist and the co-author, with Beatrix Campbell, of Planet Patriarchy

In 2025, the world that had been opened up by women has often seemed to be closing in. The forces behind the rollback of abortion rights in Donald Trump’s US are attempting to do the same in the UK. In Afghanistan, the Taliban has doubled down on its attacks on women and girls. Sexual violence is commonplace in Haiti and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In Mexico, even the president is not safe from sexual assault. A perverse rewilding appears to be taking place.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that around the world, women’s rights are being concreted over. But in researching our book, Planet Patriarchy, Beatrix Campbell and I found women’s resistance erupting like green shoots through the cracks. In El Salvador, women can receive sentences of 30-50 years for miscarriages construed to be abortions. Yet feminists have managed to free all 72 women who had been imprisoned for this, using innovative penal and legal strategies. In Russia, feminists have taken to wearing blue and yellow ribbons, the colours of the Ukrainian flag, to signal their anti-war solidarity.

Rahila Gupta is an anti-racist feminist activist and the co-author, with Beatrix Campbell, of Planet Patriarchy

Published: December 31, 2025, 2:00 pm

Ella Baron on seeing in 2026 with Trump and Putin – cartoon

Continue reading...

Published: December 31, 2025, 5:09 pm

Life after LeBron James: who will inherit the NBA’s future?

As the millennial superstars near the end, an international generation reshapes the league. The question is whether an American can still carry the crown

That the NBA is reckoned in seasons is apt. To measure a legacy this way is as much existential as it is symbolic. Martin Heidegger argued that time is not something we pass through, but the condition of our being – less a pathway than a pressure. Heavy stuff, yes, but the NBA has always operated under similar weight.

The millennial superstars who stabilized the league for two decades are now entering their twilight: LeBron James (who turned 41 on Tuesday), Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, James Harden and Chris Paul. In their wake comes something genuinely new. For the first time, the league’s next dominant generation is unmistakably international. The NBA’s gen Z elite now emerge from Slovenia, Serbia, Greece, Canada and France.

Published: December 31, 2025, 9:00 am

US Olympic men’s ice hockey squad takes shape ahead of Friday’s reveal

• Clayton Keller captained US to world title last May

• NHL players back at Olympics after 12-year absence

• Team USA targets first Olympic gold since 1980

A trio of NHL players – Utah Mammoth captain Clayton Keller, Buffalo Sabres forward Tage Thompson and Florida Panthers defenseman Seth Jones – will make their Olympic debuts with Team USA at February’s Winter Games, ESPN reported on Wednesday.

Olympic rosters had to be submitted by Wednesday. USA Hockey plans to announce its roster Friday morning on NBC’s “Today.” This is the first time in 12 years that NHL players will compete in the Olympics.

Published: December 31, 2025, 11:28 pm

Diggins, Schumacher make US cross-country skiing history with World Cup double

• US men and women win World Cup races same day

• Schumacher and Diggins sweep new 5km event

• Tour de Ski milestone for American cross-country

American cross-country skiing reached a milestone on Wednesday when, for the first time, an American man and an American woman won World Cup races on the same day.

Gus Schumacher and Jessie Diggins delivered the historic double at stage three of the Tour de Ski in Toblach, Italy, both prevailing in a newly introduced 5km heat mass start free event that rewarded speed, pacing and collective tactics rather than head-to-head positioning.

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:36 pm

New England Patriots’ Christian Barmore faces domestic assault charge

• Barmore accused in alleged August incident

• Patriots say they informed NFL at the time

• Arraignment scheduled for early February

New England Patriots defensive tackle Christian Barmore is facing a misdemeanor domestic assault charge stemming from an alleged incident on 8 August in Mansfield, Massachusetts.

Barmore, 26, was in a relationship with the alleged victim, according to court documents cited Wednesday by Boston television station WCVB.

Published: December 31, 2025, 7:40 pm

NCAA attempts to clarify NBA stance after Baylor adds 2023 draft pick

• NCAA clarifies NBA contract eligibility rule

• Baylor signing sparked backlash from coaches

• Baker cites court rulings weakening enforcement

The NCAA said Tuesday it would not grant eligibility to any player who had signed an NBA contract after Baylor’s midseason addition of a 2023 draft pick who had been playing professionally in Europe prompted criticism from coaches across college basketball.

The Bears announced the signing of 7ft center James Nnaji of Nigeria on Christmas Eve. He could make his debut Saturday in Baylor’s Big 12 opener at TCU.

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:12 pm

Martin Ødegaard rediscovers his missing rhythm to dictate Arsenal’s tempo again

Rejuvenated by his goal on Saturday and free from injuries that have disrupted his season, Arsenal’s captain led their destruction of Villa

When Arsenal really needed Martin Ødegaard, the captain finally rediscovered his magic touch. Gabriel Magalhães had just opened the scoring against Aston Villa after a first half in which Mikel Arteta’s nervous side were struggling without the influential Declan Rice. Then it happened.

Jadon Sancho was waiting to receive a pass from Youri Tielemans inside Villa’s half but, before the forward knew it, Ødegaard had pinched the ball and was haring towards Emiliano Martínez’s goal. A jink back on to his left foot fooled Tielemans and allowed Ødegaard to play the perfect through ball for Martín Zubimendi to score the crucial second. It was the fifth goal or assist that Zubimendi has contributed since he joined in the summer – the joint-best return of his club career – and the Spaniard’s impact was rightly hailed by a delighted Arteta. “Credit to his teammates as well, how easy they make it for him,” said the Arsenal manager in a nod to Ødegaard.

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:00 pm

January transfer window 2026: what every Premier League club needs

Aston Villa have a decision to make about Harvey Elliott, Brentford have money to spend and Burnley and Everton need goalscorers

A busy summer with the arrival of more than £250m in reinforcements has proved to be invaluable given the number of injuries that have hit Arsenal, particularly in defence. But that also makes any more expensive incomings unlikely in January, especially after the timely return of the influential Gabriel Magalhães this week. A loan signing or two could be on the cards, however, with Arsenal not having filled either slot so far after bringing in Neto from Bournemouth and Raheem Sterling from Chelsea last season. Mikel Arteta could do with more cover at right-back and must also decide whether to allow Ethan Nwaneri to go on loan with the 18-year-old having made only three starts in all competitions. Ed Aarons

Published: December 31, 2025, 8:00 am

US justice department reportedly reviewing more than 5m pages of Epstein files

Figure represents significant expansion on earlier estimates as Democrats accuse Trump officials of ‘hiding something’

The US justice department is believed to be reviewing more than 5m pages of documents relating to the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein – an effort that is drawing resources away from existing cases, according to the New York Times.

The figure represents a significant expansion on earlier estimates, which drew on calculations based on 300 gigabytes of data, papers, videos, photographs and audio files held within FBI archives that relate to investigations in Florida and New York.

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:18 pm

US executions surged in 2025 to highest level in 16 years

Forty-seven men killed by states operating death penalty – almost double last year’s number

US executions have surged in 2025 to the highest level in 16 years, as Donald Trump’s campaign to reinvigorate judicial killings, combined with the US supreme court’s increasing refusal to engage in last-minute pleas for reprieve, have taken a heavy toll.

A total of 47 men – they were all male – have been killed by states operating the death penalty in the course of the year. That was almost double the number in 2024, amounting to the greatest frenzy of capital punishment bloodletting in America since 2009.

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:00 pm

Xi Jinping vows to reunify China and Taiwan in New Year’s Eve speech

Reunification ‘is unstoppable’, says Chinese president, a day after the conclusion of intense military drills

China’s president, Xi Jinping, has vowed to reunify China and Taiwan in his annual New Year’s Eve speech in Beijing.

Speaking the day after the conclusion of intense Chinese military drills around Taiwan, Xi said: “The reunification of our motherland, a trend of the times, is unstoppable.”

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:47 pm

Israeli ban on aid agencies in Gaza will have ‘catastrophic’ consequences, experts say

Thirty-seven NGOs told they have to cease operations, putting Palestinian lives ‘at imminent risk’

Israel’s new ban on dozens of aid organisations working in Gaza will have “catastrophic” consequences for the delivery of vital services in the devastated territory and will put Palestinian lives “at imminent risk”, diplomats, humanitarian workers and experts say.

Thirty-seven NGOs active in Gaza were told by Israel’s ministry of diaspora affairs on Tuesday that they would have to cease all operations in the territory within 60 days unless they fulfilled stringent new regulations, which include the disclosure of personal details of their staff.

Published: December 31, 2025, 3:10 pm

Finnish police seize vessel suspected of damaging underwater cable

Border guards say they found ship with anchor lowered into sea after detection of fault in Helsinki-Tallinn telecoms link

Finnish authorities have boarded and seized a cargo vessel sailing from Russia on suspicion of sabotaging two underwater telecommunications cables in the Baltic Sea, where a series of similar incidents have occurred in recent years.

The vessel, the Fitburg, was on its way from St Petersburg to Haifa in Israel. Finnish coastguard officers boarded the ship at 11am, about six hours after disruption to the cables was first reported. Fourteen crew members, including several Russians, were taken into custody.

Published: December 31, 2025, 4:52 pm

‘Life is pain without you’: Cary Elwes and Martin Scorsese pay tribute to Rob Reiner as autopsy reports sealed

As a judge puts a security hold on Rob and Michele Reiner’s cases and Joe Rogan criticises Donald Trump’s comments about Reiner’s death, collaborators continue to pay tribute

More than two weeks after the deaths of the film director Rob Reiner and his photographer wife, Michele, friends and colleagues continue to pay tribute to the couple.

Writing on Instagram, Cary Elwes, who starred in Reiner’s 1987 classic The Princess Bride, said he only now felt able to post publicly about his loss.

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:25 pm

Greenwashing, illegality and false claims: 13 climate litigation wins in 2025

Legal action has brought important decisions, from the scrapping of fossil fuel plants to revised climate plans

This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Paris agreement. It is also a decade since another key moment in climate justice, when a state was ordered for the first time to cut its carbon emissions faster to protect its citizens from climate change. The Urgenda case, which was upheld by the Netherlands’ supreme court in 2019, was one of the first rumblings of a wave of climate litigation around the world that campaigners say has resulted in a new legal architecture for climate protection.

Over the past 12 months, there have been many more important rulings and tangible changes on climate driven by legal action.

Published: December 31, 2025, 5:00 pm

‘Heartbreaking’: Florida wildlife groups decry state-sanctioned bear hunt

Fifty-two black bears were killed in three-week hunt state officials said was necessary to reduce ursine population

Wildlife officials in Florida say the slaughter of dozens of black bears during a controversial three-week hunt this month was a success, despite the opposition of protesters who condemned the “heartbreaking, bloody spectacle”.

The Florida fish and wildlife conservation commission (FWC) on Tuesday announced that 52 bears were killed between 6 and 28 December, and promised to release a “full harvest report” in the coming months that will provide details about where and how the animals died.

Published: December 31, 2025, 4:26 pm

Seven environmental wins across the US in 2025 despite Trump-era reversals

Environmental advocates notched key wins at local and state levels this year despite Trump rollbacks

As 2025 draws to a close, environmental advocates across the US find themselves weighing a year marked by both setbacks and successes.

Despite major environmental reversals taken by the Donald Trump administration including loosening fossil fuel rules and weakening endangered-species safeguards, conservationists, lawmakers and researchers still notched key wins at local and state levels.

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:30 pm

Fed up: inside Trump’s unprecedented bid to exert control over the US central bank

The US president and his allies spent 2025 attacking the Federal Reserve amid a rollercoaster year for the US economy

In the bowels of the US Federal Reserve this summer, two of the world’s most powerful men, sporting glistening white hard hats, stood before reporters looking like students forced to work together on a group project.

Allies of Donald Trump had spent weeks trying to manufacture a scandal around ongoing renovations of the central bank’s Washington headquarters and its costs. Now here was the US president, on a rare visit, examining the project for himself.

Published: December 31, 2025, 2:00 pm

Trump family business delays launch of $499 gold smartphone

US-made device planned by end of year hit by recent government shutdown affecting shipments

Trump Mobile, the phone company launched by Donald Trump’s family business, has pushed back plans to deliver a $499 (£371) gold-coloured smartphone by the end of the year.

The Trump Organization licensed its name to launch a mobile service and the device in June, in the latest monetisation of his presidency by a family business empire now run by Trump’s sons.

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:59 pm

Isiah Whitlock Jr, actor in The Wire and Veep, dies aged 71

Whitlock’s career spanned decades and included roles in many Spike Lee films

The American actor Isiah Whitlock Jr, who played a corrupt politician on HBO crime drama The Wire and had roles in numerous Spike Lee films, died at age 71 on Tuesday, his manager said.

“It is with tremendous sadness that I share the passing of my dear friend and client Isiah Whitlock Jr. If you knew him – you loved him. A brilliant actor and even better person,” Brian Liebman wrote on social media.

Published: December 31, 2025, 4:55 am

Trump administration freezes childcare funding to Minnesota in wake of fraud scheme allegations

Officials claim to find ‘rampant fraud’ in childcare funding, but prosecutions began in Biden era and Tim Walz says ‘we’ve spent years cracking down on it’

The Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it is freezing federal funding for childcare programs in Minnesota after allegations of fraud – first exposed and prosecuted during the Biden administration – recently became the focus of conservative influencers and media outlets.

Jim O’Neill, the deputy secretary of health and human services, said in a video statement that the funding freeze was in response to what he called “blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country … We have turned off the money spigot and we are finding the fraud.”

Published: December 31, 2025, 3:05 am

European human rights court questions UK decision to strip Shamima Begum of citizenship

Begum’s lawyers argue she was child trafficking victim when she travelled to live under IS in Syria in 2015

The European court of human rights has questioned the UK government over its 2019 decision to remove Shamima Begum’s British citizenship.

Lawyers in Europe have asked how Begum’s treatment complies with the UK’s responsibilities to victims of trafficking.

Published: December 31, 2025, 5:01 pm

France targets Australia-style social media ban for children next year

Draft bill to be submitted for legal checks as France aims to follow Australia’s world-first ban on platforms including Facebook, Snapchat and YouTube

France intends to follow Australia and ban social media platforms for children from the start of the 2026 academic year.

A draft bill preventing under-15s from using social media will be submitted for legal checks and is expected to be debated in parliament early in the new year.

Published: December 31, 2025, 3:31 pm

‘We live with war over our heads’: the Romanian villagers threatened by Russian drones

Intensifying attacks on Ukraine’s Danube ports bring blasts, evacuations and fear of escalation to border communities

At the edge of Romania’s Danube delta on the border with Ukraine, in the village of Plauru, cows graze in flat, marshy fields. Houses with blue-painted roofs and window frames line a dirt track, many shuttered or abandoned.

Residents can see the cranes and silos of Izmail, a Ukrainian port city separated from Plauru by the 300 metre-width of the Danube River. By day the scene is deceptively calm. But sometimes, after dark, that calm dissolves.

Published: December 31, 2025, 2:00 pm

Trump’s approach to Africa: more trade deals, less democracy and human rights

From Christmas strikes in Nigeria to peace deals and talks of trade, the US president’s diplomatic approach to the continent has been all over the place

When he convened the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to sign a peace deal in early December, Donald Trump promised an end to decades of fighting in the latter nation’s volatile east, and open up opportunities for businesses in all three countries “to make a lot of money”.

But Trump took a wildly different approach to conflict resolution weeks later, when he announced that the US military had carried out Christmas Day strikes on targets he said were linked to the Islamic State (IS) in north-west Nigeria. “I have previously warned these Terrorists that if they did not stop the slaughtering of Christians, there would be hell to pay, and tonight, there was,” the president wrote in a social media post that warned of further attacks to come.

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:00 pm

I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not review – abundant talent showcased in profile of SNL’s champion insult comic

Archive material shows Chase’s abilities but the times have changed around the self-aggrandising actor and comedian – and not always to his benefit

Feature films and documentaries can sometimes struggle to fasten down viewers’ attention if the central character isn’t sympathetic but maybe we’re a tad more forgiving of anti-heroes in nonfiction as we accept warts and all in real life. But this film about actor and comic Chevy Chase faces an uphill battle given that not only does it report on what an “asshole” – to quote the epithet most often applied to him – he has been in the past, we also witness some assholery first-hand. In the opening minutes, we see him telling the film’s director Marina Zenovich that he’s smarter than her, while he also interrupts her, rolls his eyes at her questions and generally acts the dork.

This is partly the infamous “teasing” Chase has always copped to, of a piece with his comically arrogant comic style which the film’s title encapsulates. (It used to be his catchphrase when he anchored the Weekend Update segment on US sketch show Saturday Night Live.) That self-aggrandisement went hand in hand with the denigration of everyone around him, which ended up turning Chase into the most obnoxious kind of coked-up insult-comic by the 1990s.

Published: December 31, 2025, 9:00 am

Lily Allen’s live return, Charli xcx’s Wuthering Heights and Simon Rattle’s Janáček: music to listen out for in 2026

Raye, Deftones and Yungblud do UK tours, Jill Scott returns for more neo-soul, and the classical world gears up to celebrate Hungarian composer György Kurtág at 100

• More from the 2026 culture preview

Seventeen years on from the release of her debut single, Florence Welch finds herself in an intriguingly strong position: while most of her early 00s indie peers are forgotten or in reduced circumstances, she is a major influence on pop, from Ethel Cain to the Last Dinner Party to Chappell Roan. Her recent album Everybody Scream was a strong restatement of her theatrical approach – with more light and shade than you might expect – but it’s on stage that she really comes into her own.
• UK tour begins 6 February at the SSE Arena, Belfast

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:00 am

‘A hell of a lot of fun!’ Your favourite podcasts of 2025

True crime, AI, romantasy and strange stories from a small Welsh town are among your picks of the best podcasts of the year

I stumbled across this podcast a few weeks ago and romped through the first season in short order. My Dad died recently, and I often feel sad. Ill-advised has helped me feel lighter. I have laughed out loud at both the questions and Bill’s dryly-delivered answers. I love the banned word portion (such as “pivot” and “like“, when used as fillers in sentences), while the book suggestions at the end are a perfect closer. Julie Hannaford, 59, librarian, Toronto, Canada

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:00 pm

The Dead Don’t Bleed by Neil Rollinson review – a gripping tale of family and forbidden love

Two brothers attempt to escape their father’s gangland past in a tense, tender debut that moves between Thatcher-era Northumberland and southern Spain

Andalucía is famous for its variety: high alpine mountains and snow-capped peaks, river plains and rolling olive groves, sun-baked coastlines and arid deserts. It is the perfect setting for Neil Rollinson’s debut novel, which is its own kind of spectacular mosaic. Built from short, seemingly discrete chapters that take us between Spain in 2003 and the coalfields of Northumberland in the 70s and 80s, The Dead Don’t Bleed coheres into an extraordinarily tense and tender portrait of two brothers trying to escape their father’s gangland past.

Until now, Rollinson has been known as a poet; his collection Talking Dead was shortlisted for the 2015 Costa poetry prize. Here he brings his talent for compressed evocation to an exploration of fraternal rivalry and the enduring impact of a violent patriarchy. If you took Frank and his brother Gordon apart on the autopsy table, he writes, “you’d find the same bones, the same blood. Almost everything interchangeable. The corkscrews of DNA, the cells, the posture, the downcast glance.” But from a young age, change is afoot within Frank. He knows his father has “high hopes for him” in the family business of petty crime: “Frank Bridge. King of Northumberland”. But Frank wants to be a different kind of king. He carries within himself a “yearning for something more expansive” – the kind of dream that could get him killed in his family’s closed world of criminal secrecy.

Published: December 31, 2025, 7:00 am

Roblox, James Bond and a billion-dollar multiplayer – here are our most-read gaming stories of 2025

In this week’s newsletter: The year’s most popular stories reveal how play, power and politics collided in the past 12 months – and what you’re psyched for in 2026

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With the best games of the year duly noted (yours and ours), I’d like to highlight some of the work we’ve done covering them. Reviewing the top-performing articles that we published in 2025, I see a portrait of a conflicted year: plenty of great works and games that captured the imagination and the world’s attention, but also growing anxiety about their place in the real world, and the political circumstances they reflect. And a lot of (justified) hand-wringing over Roblox.

But first: I wanted to extend heartfelt thanks to everyone who reads this newsletter and the rest of our work at the Guardian. If you’ve enjoyed our coverage, do consider supporting us to do more of it – either through a recurring or one-off contribution. Without your support, none of the great journalism we produce would be possible. Thank you for being with us in 2025, and I hope you stick around to watch me slowly lose my mind working overtime in the buildup to Grand Theft Auto 6’s release in November 2026. (Finally).

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:30 pm

€1m Picasso portrait up for grabs for €100 in charity raffle

Artwork by one of the most influential artists of 20th century raffled to fund Alzheimer’s research

His work is consistently ranked among the world’s most expensive art, with paintings fetching more than a $100m at auction. But you no longer need to be a multimillionaire to own a Picasso – for €100, anyone in the world has the chance to walk away with a painting by one of the most influential artists of the 20th century.

The French charity Alzheimer’s Research Foundation announced recently it was raffling Picasso’s 1941 portrait, Tête de femme, which is worth more than €1m, to a single winner. Proceeds from the tickets will help fund Alzheimer’s research, one of the leading causes of death and disability worldwide.

Published: December 31, 2025, 3:00 pm

Demon Slayer economics: how the anime juggernaut became a saviour

Once underground art form now props up slumped box office sales and is used by governments to build soft power

An animated drama featuring hordes of carnivorous fiends might not sound like classic box office fodder, but that’s exactly what Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle proved to be in September.

The film set new records for anime – Japanese animated films and series – making more than $70m (£52m) on its opening weekend in the US and £535m so far globally. To put that in context, Ghost in the Shell – an anime classic released in 1995 – made about £2m worldwide.

Published: December 31, 2025, 5:00 am

Rage bait, goblin mode … do words of the year have any real value?

Analysis shows obscure and barely used choices, drawn from online slang, do not stand the test of time

If you have seen a news story declaring 2025’s chosen “word of the year” in recent weeks, you might be forgiven for asking yourself: what, another one?

Depending on which dictionary you turn to, the chosen term this year was either Collins’s “vibe coding”, “parasocial” from Cambridge Dictionaries or their Oxford University Press rival’s “rage bait” – with many other selections besides.

Published: December 31, 2025, 10:39 am

Is ‘coasting’ the perfect way to enjoy an alcoholic drink this New Year’s Eve?

Retailers say appetite for alcoholic drinks that are about half the strength of the traditional versions is soaring

Christmas and New Year’s Eve celebrations often used to result in a hangover the next day, but with moderation now the order of the day the new drinks industry buzzword is “coasting”.

This involves choosing a white wine, lager or even a cocktail that is about half the strength of the traditional version of the drink – meaning you can have the same number of drinks without feeling the worse for wear.

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:00 am

What happened next: Valerie the dachshund taught us how to survive – and thrive

We could learn a lot from the pampered sausage dog who became a canine Bear Grylls. Perhaps all of us are capable of more than we might expect

Who among us hasn’t yearned, at least momentarily, to cast off the trappings of our comfortable lives and live wild, unfettered and free? This year someone showed us the way: a charismatic Aussie sausage dog (I believe that’s “snag” in local vernacular). Whether you already carry Valerie the miniature dachshund’s story in your heart or managed, somehow, to miss the pint-sized phenomenon’s incredible journey, join me as we revisit this heart-warming tale.

In November 2023, Valerie was a one-year-old “absolute princess” of a pup – those are the words of her emotional support human, Georgia Gardner, who received the sausage as a graduation gift. A diminutive 15cm high, she needed a ramp to help her get into bed in her New South Wales home and wore a pink sweater in chilly weather, with matching pink collar and lead. But Valerie chose to swap her pampered life of roast chicken and pupuccinos for freedom in the dangerous wilds of Kangaroo Island, South Australia, escaping while Gardner and boyfriend Josh Fishlock were on holiday there.

Published: December 31, 2025, 5:00 am

The perfect evening routine: how to prepare for bed – from blue light to baths

Whether you go for an easy jog or actively limit your screen time, studies show there are tried and tested ways to wind down and be sure of a good night’s sleep

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After a hard day at work, the last thing you want to do is fritter away your precious downtime slumped on the sofa in a dazed doomscroll. Yet, in the absence of a better plan, it happens with depressing ease. How we spend the hours between shutting down the laptop and slipping under the duvet affects sleep quality, mood and how restored we feel the next day. So, how can we reclaim those lost evenings?

According to Jason Ellis, a professor of psychology at Northumbria University and director of the Northumbria centre for sleep research, establishing a regular end-of-day routine sends a signal to your brain that you are making a shift between work mode, and rest and recreation. “It’s about putting the day to bed before you go to bed,” he says. Gretchen Rubin – an author, podcaster and creator of the Happiness Project – agrees. “Habits are the invisible architecture of everyday life,” she says.

Published: December 31, 2025, 11:00 am

From the World Cup to the return of Michaela Coel, 2026 promises to excite and bring joy

A very Long Wave-coded book, a landmark Nigerian film and more Black art, culture and sport on its way in the next 12 months

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The week between Christmas and New Year is a unique time. You’re free to not worry about what day of the week it is, or think too heavily on anything beyond your current state. But as we reach the new year, it is equally fun to think about the things we hope will bring some much-needed collective joy in the year ahead.

This week, our colleagues from across the diaspora have shared the Black cultural events that they are looking forward to in 2026, from books and TV shows to Ghana beating England at the World Cup.

Published: December 31, 2025, 12:56 pm

How to make garlic bread – recipe | Felicity Cloake's Masterclass

You may think you know how to make garlic bread. But have you made this garlic bread?

Once upon a time, an ex and I used to throw an annual party – a non-chic affair with a recycling bin full of ice and bottles – where the star, and the thing that everyone really came for, was the garlic bread: 10 or 15 loaves of the stuff, always demolished while still dangerously hot from the oven. I believe the original recipe was Nigel Slater’s; this is my tweaked version.

Prep 15 min
Cook 25 min
Makes 1 loaf

Published: December 31, 2025, 6:00 am

‘Not my first rodeo’: meet the 21-year-old serving as Georgia’s youngest state legislator

Democrat Muhammad Akbar Ali joins the Georgia state house as a legislator representing an Atlanta suburb

Muhammad Akbar Ali, a 21-year-old recent college graduate, won a runoff election for a state house seat in Atlanta’s suburbs earlier this month, becoming the youngest Georgia state legislator serving today – perhaps the youngest ever.

The key to the young Democrat’s victory and his strategy moving forward? Experience.

Published: December 31, 2025, 4:00 pm

Elon Musk’s 2025 recap: how the world’s richest person became its most chaotic

How the tech CEO and ‘Dogefather’ made a mess of the year – from an apparent Nazi salute during his White House tenure to Tesla sales slumps and Starship explosions

The year of 2025 was dizzying for Elon Musk. The tech titan began the year holding court with Donald Trump in Washington DC. As the months ticked by, one public appearance after another baffled the US and the world. Musk appeared to give a Nazi salute at Trump’s inauguration, staunchly championed a 19-year-old staffer nicknamed “Big Balls,” denied reports of being a drug addict while advising the president, and showed up at a White House press conference with a black eye – all in the first half of the year alone.

“Elon’s attitude is you have to get it done fast. If you’re an incrementalist, you just won’t get your rocket to the moon,” Susie Wiles, Trump’s chief of staff, told Vanity Fair in an expansive interview earlier this month. “And so with that attitude, you’re going to break some china.”

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:00 pm

Tell us: have you trained your AI job replacement?

We’d like to hear from people who are training AI to replace their current roles

Analysis by the International Monetary Fund says Artificial intelligence will affect about 40% of jobs around the world.

We’d like to find out more about the impact of AI on jobs now. With this in mind, we want to hear from people who have been training AI to replace their current roles. What has the experience been like? How do you feel about your future at your company? Do you have concerns?

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:03 pm

Ski jumps, dancers and bear festivals: photos of the day – Wednesday

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Published: December 31, 2025, 1:51 pm