In Midterm Elections, Afghan War Barely Surfaces

“Hours before a federal law banning TikTok from the United States was set to take effect, the social media app went dark, and U. S. users could no longer access videos on the platform. Instead, the app greeted them with a message that said ‘a law banning TikTok has been enacted,’” the New York Times reports. From the message: “We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work us on a solution.

This article is part of The D. C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to get stories like this sent to your inbox. Mary Kramer has lived in a near-total news blackout since Election Day. The Baltimore-area healthcare professional briefly dipped her toe back into the media puddle to watch President Jimmy Carter’s funeral, but quickly returned to limited consumption of the news.

On Friday night, just days before his inauguration, President-elect Donald Trump took to X to celebrate…the launch of his new meme coin. “It’s time to celebrate everything we stand for,” he wrote, “WINNING!” It’s a move that, at least on paper, seemed to inflate Trump’s personal wealth by billions ahead of ushering in the most crypto-friendly administration in history. With this launch, Trump joins the ranks of celebrities like Iggy Azalea, Caitlyn Jenner, and more recently, Haliey Welch, better known as the “Hawk Tuah” girl, all of whom have launched their own meme coins in the last year.

“The incoming Trump administration wants regime change in Venezuela, where dictator Nicolás Maduro stole his election, jailed a rival and this month even threatened to invade the U. S. territory of Puerto Rico,” Axios reports. “Venezuela under Maduro has been a massive problem for Latin America and the U. S. It’s accounted for the largest modern-day migration in the Western Hemisphere — nearly 8 million people have fled Maduro’s regime in the past decade.”

It wouldn't be so intensely watched if it were an inconsequential (or fraudulently elected) leader.

Suddenly, El Salvador has bad weather?