USA

About 42 million Americans will lose their food benefits from November 1 because of the government shutdown.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programme (Snap) helps low-income families buy groceries. It is relied upon by one in eight Americans.

Eligible families use an Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) card much like an ordinary debit card to purchase food. They are usually reloaded by the federal government at the beginning of every month. But on Saturday, this might not happen.

UPDATE: Judges order Trump admin to use emergency funds to pay for SNAP benefits with cutoff Saturday

A pair of federal judges ruled Friday that the Trump administration must use emergency funding to restore at least some SNAP food benefits — one day before the US Department of Agriculture had warned money for the program would run out due to the ongoing government shutdown.

The judges in Boston and Providence, RI, both said that the USDA could decide whether to fund the entitlement commonly known as food stamps in full or in part for the month of November — but a full cutoff was unlawful.

GYEONGJU, South Korea — President Donald Trump on Thursday morning said he directed the Pentagon to begin testing nuclear weapons “on an equal basis” with Russia and China, an apparent attempt to flex the United States’ military might ahead of a high-stakes trade meeting here with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping.

Trump’s announcement on Truth Social signaled a reversal of decades of United States nuclear policy that could have far-reaching consequences for relations with U.S. adversaries, though his post included very few details about what the tests would entail. The last nuclear weapon test in the United States was held in 1992, before President George H.W. Bush implemented a moratorium on such exercises at the conclusion of the Cold War.

Trump wrote that the process would begin immediately and was in response to other countries’ testing programs.

US forces have killed 14 people in strikes on four alleged drug boats in the Pacific, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said.

Mexico’s navy says it is still searching for a lone survivor approximately 400 miles (643km) from the Pacific coastal city of Acapulco.

It is the latest in a series of attacks on boats the US says have been carrying drugs in both the Pacific and Caribbean.

The US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced that the US military attacked four drug boats yesterday in three different strikes in the Pacific Ocean, and 14 people on them were killed. One person survived, and the authorities in Mexico acted to rescue him pic.twitter.com/UISinTGFPK

— Raylan Givens (@JewishWarrior13) October 28, 2025

US President Donald Trump has signed a flurry of deals on his Asia visit to secure the supply of rare earths, a critical sector that China has long dominated.

The deals with Japan, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia differ in size and substance and it’s too early to assess their tangible impact. But they all include efforts to diversify access to the minerals that have become essential for advanced manufacturing, from electric vehicles to smartphones.

The agreements, which aim to lock partners into trading with the US, are a clear bid to reduce dependence on China, ahead of a key meeting with its leader Xi Jinping.