Tracy Mumford

Meanwhile, in Washington, Senate Democrats have struck a deal with President Trump and Republicans that could allow them to negotiate new restrictions on ICE agents.

With a potential government shutdown looming, they agreed to fund much of the government for the rest of the fiscal year, but only gave two weeks of funding to the Department of Homeland Security.

They say they want to use that time to push for limitations like a ban on officers wearing masks.

Senators said they'd hoped to vote on the spending package today, but House Speaker Mike Johnson said the earliest the House could act would be Monday, meaning the government could still partially shut down over the weekend.

Across the country, a dizzying array of new rules have gone into place around what food stamps can and cannot be used to buy.

As part of the Trump administration's Make America Healthy Again agenda, federal regulators have been increasingly letting individual states set their own standards for SNAP benefits.

They say it will allow them to limit how much junk food Americans consume.

But grocery stores and SNAP recipients say the results have been confusion and frustration over what can seem like arbitrary rules.

In Idaho, for example, you will be able to use food stamps to buy a Twix bar, but not a flourless granola bar.

And in Iowa, you can't buy a Snickers, but you can buy a Snickers ice cream bar because it's refrigerated and has milk in it.

Grocery stores say they're trying to keep up, but it's a logistical nightmare, with employees trying to manually check thousands of items to comply with the new rules.

If they screw up, the stores could be removed from the SNAP program altogether, in rural areas in particular that could leave SNAP recipients without any local grocery options.

Anti-hunger groups say the states haven't done enough to prepare stores or consumers, and other critics argue that the rules amount to an attack on low-income Americans.

One Iowa resident who relies on SNAP benefits told The Times that officials are effectively saying they, quote, "...don't trust their constituencies to make decisions around their own health."

In France, the government announced yesterday that it will stop using Zoom, the American-owned video conferencing software, and move its meetings over to a French-made platform instead.

If you're thinking Zoom, French Zoom, it's all the same.

The move is actually part of a broader effort by European leaders to reduce their dependence on American digital infrastructure.

As the U.S.

and Europe have found themselves increasingly at odds over the last year, over trade, Greenland, etc.,

Europe is trying to be more independent in strategic fields like technology.