Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Monday.
Justices seem poised to reject late-arriving mail-in ballotsThe Supreme Court suggested today that it was likely to reject a Mississippi law that allows ballots postmarked by Election Day to be counted if they are received soon after the election. The court’s conservative majority appeared skeptical of the law, while the liberal justices seemed to defend it. The outcome of the case could have sweeping consequences, our politics reporter Nick Corasaniti told me. “Enacting a hard deadline of Election Day for all ballots to be in the hands of election officials could risk disqualifying hundreds of thousands of mail ballots in the coming midterms,” Nick said. In 2024, at least 725,000 ballots were counted that arrived after Election Day. Currently, at least 18 other states and territories allow late ballots to be counted. That would likely change if the conservative justices throw out the Mississippi law. And, as Nick noted: “Changing election rules during an election year almost ensures significant voter confusion.” In related news, a Republican sheriff in California seized more than 650,000 ballots, prompting criticism from the state’s top election official.
Audio suggests confusion before deadly LaGuardia crashAudio from the air traffic tower at LaGuardia Airport indicated that a controller appeared to have been distracted when a passenger plane struck a fire truck on the runway, killing the two pilots. “We were dealing with an emergency earlier,” a controller said after the crash. Video of the collision showed the plane and fire truck speeding toward disaster on the rain-slicked pavement. We talked to passengers on the plane, who described bracing for a rough landing. The escape slides did not activate, so passengers had to scramble over the wings to safety. The collision injured dozens of people, including a flight attendant who was ejected from the plane, and shut down the airport for several hours. Here’s what we know about the crash. In other travel news: Some airport lines stretched on for hours as T.S.A. workers went without paychecks. The more than 100 ICE agents deployed to help smooth the process appeared to have limited influence.
Trump says he’s holding off on striking Iran’s power plantsPresident Trump announced today that the U.S. was delaying any attacks on Iran’s energy sites at least until Friday. The president had initially threatened to strike the sites by this evening if Iran continued to block the Strait of Hormuz, but he said he would wait because the U.S. and Iran were engaging in “very strong talks” toward resolving the war. Iranian officials denied Trump’s claim. One top official accused the president of lying to calm rattled energy markets, saying that “no negotiations have been held with the U.S.” In related news:
Current and former officials describe turmoil at the C.D.C.Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has taken particular aim at the C.D.C. during his campaign to reimagine American public health. He has described it as “the most corrupt agency” under his purview, and he has moved to drastically reorder its priorities. To get an inside look at Kennedy’s changes, my colleague Jeneen Interlandi spoke to 43 current and former C.D.C. employees. Many of them expressed fear that science is being replaced with ideology. Read takeaways from the interviews here. More top news
The Canadian military lugged two four-and-a-half-ton howitzers north for its biggest-ever Arctic exercise. My colleague was there to observe the challenges.
Why are we still obsessed with Antigone?The Sophocles tragedy “Antigone,” about a girl who risks her life to give her brother a ceremonial burial, was first performed in 441 B.C. in Athens. But it’s still with us today. In the first few months of 2026, four different New York City theaters are staging adaptations of the play. As one of literature’s earliest “bad girls” — disruptive, a total pain, unpliable and willing to do the difficult thing — Antigone keeps finding relevance. Our theater critic Helen Shaw shows us how different adaptations do it.
Spring cleaning tips from a proIt’s easy for clutter to pile up. But at some point, piles of clothes, books and cords can turn into a mess that feels too overwhelming to tackle. So we turned to Christina Fallon, a professional organizer, for help. She explained the benefits of shaking your house like a snow globe: Once your items are out in the open, you may feel less bad about parting with them. Read the rest of her advice here.
Dinner table topics
Cook: This garden pasta salad is a great quick spring dinner. Read: “The Feather Wars” pays tribute to America’s first conservationists. Decorate: Here’s how to hang art like a pro. |
