Shares of German defense powerhouse Rheinmetall took a sharp dive on Thursday, plummeting up to 16 percent after the company slashed its long term financial outlook. This latest downturn comes as the firm struggles with persistent delays in military contracts and hurdles in delivering critical ammunition. It is the second time since August that the manufacturer has had to walk back its expectations, following a major blow when Germany abandoned plans for a massive warship project that would have represented the company’s largest order since the end of World War II.
The revised projections paint a more cautious picture for 2026, with anticipated sales dropping to roughly 13.2 billion euros, well below previous estimates that topped out at 14.2 billion euros. Company officials pointed specifically to setbacks in artillery ammunition testing and scheduling issues surrounding the Arminius Boxer project, which is now not expected to be commissioned until next year. These operational hiccups have shaken investor confidence, adding to a difficult year where shares have already fallen about 35 percent despite a period of explosive growth fueled by Europe’s response to the invasion of Ukraine.
Despite these forward looking worries, the company’s current books actually show significant strength. Third quarter sales surged by 32 percent compared to last year, while operating profits jumped by an impressive 62 percent. With a staggering backlog of orders totaling 78 billion euros, Rheinmetall remains fundamentally busy, but market analysts warn that timing is everything. Experts from RBC suggested this volatility might feed into a larger industry debate regarding whether traditional hardware giants can keep pace with newer defense technologies during periods of geopolitical instability.
For decades, China has quietly built an iron grip on the global supply of critical minerals, leaving the West in a precarious position. From semiconductors and defense systems to electric vehicle batteries, the modern economy runs on materials that Beijing can effectively weaponize through periodic export controls. While Washington and various European capitals have recently woken up to this danger, their current strategy focuses heavily on building refineries and processing plants. While improving midstream capacity is a necessary step toward independence, experts warn that it is merely a temporary bandage if there are no raw materials to feed those factories.
The real challenge lies in the grueling timeline of mining. Opening a new mine typically takes around twenty years, meaning any security sought for the 2040s must be invested today. Japan provides a sobering cautionary tale here; despite fifteen years of aggressive effort to decouple from Chinese rare earths, they have only managed to reduce their dependence from ninety percent down to roughly sixty five percent. For the United States and its G7 allies, simply refining existing ore isn’t enough. They need a steady pipeline of new discoveries transformed into working mines, yet they are failing at the most critical juncture of development.
This failure happens in what industry insiders call the valley of death. Western firms actually lead the world in early stage mineral exploration, but once a promising deposit is found, funding tends to dry up. Small exploration companies known as juniors can find seed money for prospecting, but they struggle to afford the tens of millions required for feasibility studies and permits. Commercial banks view these projects as too risky without collateral, and giant mining corporations are too beholden to shareholders demanding immediate returns to gamble on long term developments.
Because Western capital disappears during this middle phase, Chinese firms have stepped in as the lender of last resort. By providing equity and infrastructure deals in mineral rich nations via initiatives like the Belt and Road, Beijing ensures that it captures the rewards of Western discovery. Essentially, China maintains its dominance not necessarily by being better at finding minerals, but by being the only entity willing to pay for them while they are still stuck in the valley of death. Until democratic allies embrace similar long term risk tolerance, they remain dependent on a competitor who views resource control as a primary tool of state power.
For nearly two years, the British government has leaned heavily on a staggering projection that artificial intelligence could inject 400 billion pounds into the national economy. This optimistic figure served as a convenient shield against public anxiety regarding mass job losses and economic instability brought on by automation. However, those claims have come under intense scrutiny following an admission from AI Minister Kanishka Narayan that the number originated from a report commissioned by Google rather than internal government analysis.
When pressed during a parliamentary session, Narayan revealed that the government’s own projections are far more modest, placing the potential gain between 55 billion and 140 billion pounds by 2030. With a central estimate of roughly 120 billion pounds, the official state forecast is less than a third of the figure previously touted to the public. Even so, the minister cautioned that these updated assessments remain hugely uncertain, suggesting that predicting the exact financial impact of such a volatile technology is an imprecise science at best.
Critics and lawmakers are now questioning why a corporate-funded study was treated as gospel across multiple administrations. Dame Chi Onwurah, chair of the Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee, warned that relying on such inflated figures creates a culture of hype that can ultimately undermine genuine digital transformation. Similarly, Lord Holmes of Richmond noted that robust data is essential when billions in taxpayer funding are at stake, expressing frustration that it took so long for officials to clarify where these numbers actually came from.
The discrepancy has sparked a broader debate about the influence of big tech companies on government policy. While PF Global, the consultancy firm that produced the original report for Google, suggests their initial high estimate reflected faster expected adoption rates, observers like Sumedha Deshmukh of the Ada Lovelace Institute argue this highlights a dangerous pattern. She suggested that precisely phrased economic gains often hide baked-in incentives from industry funders and urged the government to prioritize independent research over polished corporate presentations before building national strategy upon them.
American voters delivered a stinging rebuke to the expansion of artificial intelligence infrastructure in Tuesday’s midterm elections, rejecting data center proposals in a landslide across dozens of jurisdictions. In more than 40 races spanning 13 states, citizens pushed back against the massive facilities required to power modern AI, voting them down in 38 instances. The resistance manifested in various forms, ranging from six cities enacting total bans to another dozen imposing strict limits on energy consumption. This wave of opposition extended beyond ballot measures, claiming the careers of several high profile politicians who aligned themselves with Big Tech interests.
The most prominent casualty was Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who lost his bid for a fourth term by over 700,000 votes. Abbott had positioned Texas as the global epicenter of AI development and accepted millions in donations from industry insiders, but his efforts to appease a skeptical public via a superficial pause on new projects failed to convince voters. His opponent, Democratic governor elect Gina Hinojosa, successfully framed the issue as one of corporate greed versus community stability. Across the country, similar patterns emerged in places like Kentucky and Oklahoma, where incumbents were ousted or beaten by write in candidates simply for supporting hyperscale data projects.
Advocates for the movement argue that the perceived benefits of AI have not trickled down to local residents who instead face rising utility bills and environmental degradation. Michael Whitesides of Local Progress noted that many voters view these facilities as billionaire backed monstrosities that drain vital resources without improving daily life. From Emporia, Kansas, where tensions boiled over into arrests at city meetings, to Asheville and San Marcos, newly elected leaders are signaling a shift toward prioritizing local ecology and affordability over Silicon Valley’s appetite for land and electricity.
Even those with deep pockets found their influence limited on election night. Elon Musk spent hundreds of millions attempting to shape outcomes particularly in Texas where he has significant business interests tied to data growth. Following the defeat of his allies and the rejection of expansive infrastructure plans on the ground, Musk took to X late Tuesday night with a sarcastic admission that putting data centers in space was starting to look appealing. For now it seems American communities are drawing a hard line against the physical footprint of the AI revolution choosing their own landscapes over the needs of an algorithmic future.
The satirical news site The Onion isn’t waiting to take possession of Infowars to launch a parody of Alex Jones ’ conspiracy platform.
More than a year after first trying to buy Infowars, The Onion on Thursday will debut a send-up under its own website with plans to give some of the revenue to families of the victims in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.
The families have still received no money from Jones since courts ordered him to pay more than $1 billion for falsely calling the 2012 shooting a hoax.
The Onion will start by sending the families $100,000 from merchandise sales that combine the conspiracy empire’s brand with the The Onion’s logo in rainbow colors, according to CEO Ben Collins, whose company is still in court trying to take control of Infowars.
“Don’t give comedy writers a grudge for 18 months,” Collins said.
The parody will include a series of shows and other content under Infowars branding that spoof Jones’ aggressive mashup of conspiracies linking major news events, dubious scientific claims, attacks on people suffering in tragedies and sales of supplements and survival gear.
Alex Jones in Houston in 2024.David J. Phillip / AP file
Jones’ claims that the 2012 shooting that killed 20 first graders and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut is a hoax have no truth, but Jones continued to amplify them. His followers started to harass victims’ families, suggesting they were “crisis actors” and even making death threats.
Jones’ Infowars empire had 10 million visitors a month and generated more than $50 million in annual revenues at its peak, according to the company. But the $1.4 billion judgments in defamation cases in Connecticut and Texas, where Jones is based, forced him into bankruptcy and broke Infowars apart.
“All he’s been left with is an iPhone and a fancy microphone,” said Chris Mattei, an attorney for nine of the Sandy Hook families.
Jones has moved his show to a different website. An email sent to an address to request interviews went unanswered.
The families knew they could never stop Jones from getting his message out, and he has managed to avoid paying the judgment so far. But they could expose what he said and assure he can never profit again, Mattei said.
“Every dime Alex Jones makes from here until the end of eternity is going to be claimed by the families,” Mattei said.
The Onion stepped in when Collins saw Infowars’ assets were going to be sold at auction.
Collins spoke to Sandy Hook families, who said they were briefly skeptical, but then saw how The Onion’s staff could use the Infowars style and branding to take the moral high ground and make fun of the people who not only caused them so much pain but they felt also poisoned society.
Collins didn’t want to give away too much of the new stuff before it goes live Thursday.
But the new Infowars will maintain The Onion’s sharp satire sprinkled with shock value. Collins said there will be a section selling a penis flattening device, a fake “pro oxygen” supplement pill that the host claims can replace breathing, as well as an extended debate on how many Bozo the Clowns there are.
“It’s old-fashioned Infowars — using the tricks that they use to get people addicted to outrage and, I would say, addicted to anticipation, trying to find the thing that’s around the corner that’s going to save your life,” Collins said.
The Onion will keep chasing Jones’ property. Collins thinks they will soon get control of the Austin, Texas, studio Infowars once used.
Some families can’t wait for that day. Collins said that Robbie Parker, whose daughter died at Sandy Hook, plans to read his book about fighting Jones while dealing with so much grief in the place Jones once sat.
The families at first wanted Infowars shut down forever and Jones never heard from again. But they are now looking forward to seeing what The Onion has planned, attorney Mattei said.
“The idea that it could be turned to some social good. I think it’s even better,” Mattei said. “So, yeah, I think the families are both pleased and amused with what they’ve been able to achieve here.”
The Trump administration has proposed new tariffs of up to 12.5% on imports from 60 economies after determining they had failed to curb trade in goods made with forced labor, an assertion that was rejected by its trading partners.
The proposal from the U.S. Trade Representative’s office, issued late on Tuesday, comes from a Section 301 unfair trade practices investigation designed to help rebuild U.S. President Donald Trump’s emergency tariffs, struck down by a U.S. Supreme Court decision in February.
Despite laws banning them, the products of forced labor are deeply embedded in supply chains around the world. But European lawmakers in particular bristle at the accusation that the region is less effective than the U.S. at curbing the trade in such goods, with one describing the U.S. findings as “utterly absurd.”
The USTR proposed 10% additional duties on imports from Canada, Ecuador, the European Union, Indonesia, Mexico, Pakistan, Argentina, Bangladesh, Cambodia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Malaysia, Taiwan and Britain. The USTR said all had plans or partial schemes in place.
Employees work on the spinning production line at a workshop of a textile factory in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of China on March 5.Bao Liangting / VCG via Getty Images file
The trade agency said it would impose additional duties of 12.5% on the remaining 45 countries that it investigated. These include China, India, Nigeria, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Australia and New Zealand.
“The failure of our most important trading partners to address the importation of goods made with forced labor is unacceptable,” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in a statement. “This creates a dynamic where American workers are forced to compete globally on an unlevel playing field.”
The USTR said it would accept public comments on the proposed tariffs and other remedies through July 6, with a public hearing scheduled for July 7.
The announcement comes ahead of the July 24 expiration of a 10% temporary tariff imposed by the Trump administration on Feb. 20, the day the Supreme Court struck down Trump’s tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.
The European Commission said the tariffs were unjustified and reiterated its commitment to the trade deal sealed with Washington last year.
Bernd Lange, the chair of the European Parliament’s trade committee, which voted on Tuesday to accept that trade deal, said the new tariffs were expected, but said the results of the U.S. investigation were still “utterly absurd” given a 2024 E.U. law to ban imports of forced labor products.
“The impression is increasingly emerging that a tariff measure is sought first, and only then is a suitable legal justification found,” he said. However, he added that the key question would be whether the additional tariffs would exceed those agreed between both sides last July.
The U.S.’s largest trading partner, the European Union, agreed last July to accept tariffs of 15% on a broad range of its exports. In its report, the USTR said the E.U. measures came into force only in December 2027 and lacked key elements.
“We know there are ups and downs in what people say,” French Finance Minister Roland Lescure told reporters after a Cabinet meeting. “But the goal is to ratify the (trade) accord and stick to that.”
Britain said it was in regular talks with the United States and was taking action to tackle forced labor. It added that the preferential access to U.S. markets that it had negotiated for U.K. businesses remained in place.
Taiwan said it was “hopeful and confident” that the final results would reflect agreements already reached, securing relatively preferential treatment.
Beijing, facing 12.5% tariffs, said that it opposed all forms of unilateral tariffs and that there was no forced labor in China. India, confronted with the same rate, said it was engaged with Washington on the Section 301 proceedings, noting the proposed tariffs were not final.
On Monday, the USTR proposed a 25% duty on many Brazilian goods as a result of a Section 301 investigation into the country’s digital trade practices and preferential tariffs.
The trade agency is also expected to soon unveil the findings of another major Section 301 probe into the buildup of excess industrial capacity in 16 trading partners, including China and the European Union.
In the forced labor findings, the USTR said it would exempt from tariffs products including energy, rare earths and some other metals, beef, coffee, certain fruits and vegetables, pharmaceuticals, organic chemicals and aircraft parts.
It also said it was proposing a textile mechanism that would allow for a certain volume of apparel and textile imports to enter the U.S. at a reduced tariff rate, without giving details.
Growing up in South Florida, Jozy Altidore heard a lot of Spanish playing soccer with local kids and at home from his Dominican grandmother. As a teenager, he went to play for Villarreal, in the Castellón part of Spain, an area that isn’t that touristy. His coach and teammates mostly spoke Spanish. Along the way, Altidore picked up the language.
“A lot of people look at me like, ‘What? You speak Spanish?’” Altidore told NBC News.
It will come in handy this summer, when Altidore serves as a World Cup commentator for Telemundo, the games’ official Spanish-language network. Altidore has no experience in broadcasting, and he admits that his Spanish is just OK. But he saw the World Cup was coming to North America, and he didn’t want to be left on the sidelines.
“It’s the biggest, most historical World Cup we’ve had,” Altidore said. “For me, it was a good opportunity to stay involved, be a part of the World Cup.”
But what about his Spanish? “I can get by,” he said. “I thought, ‘What a cool challenge.’ I think you want to challenge yourself, in the things that you’re doing, always.”
Plus, he’ll get to see the Telemundo broadcast up close, the excitement of it, which is a stark contrast to the English-language telecasts, particularly the “goal” calls from the announcer Andrés Cantor. “I always wondered, how does he do that in one breath?” Altidore said. “This guy goes just the whole time. I can’t wait to see the legend in action.” (Telemundo and NBC News share a parent company, NBCUniversal.)
Altidore during the Gold Cup semifinal match between the U.S. and Jamaica in Nashville, Tenn., on July 3, 2019.Robin Alam / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images file
Altidore will be offering analysis and insight on Team USA’s games not far removed from his own time playing for the team. He is considered one of the best American players of the last two decades, a striker who scored 42 goals in 115 appearances. He helped the U.S. make it to the 2010 and 2014 World Cups, though he got injured during the latter tournament. He played with a few members of the 2026 roster, including Christian Pulisic.
Altidore told NBC News he has a rose-colored view of the current team. “I’m optimistic,” he said. “I’m bullish. I think this team can win the World Cup. I really do. I think they have the talent. And I’m so excited for them to get their flowers.”
Altidore understands how that sounds: Team USA? Winning the World Cup? But he pointed to past examples of host countries making deep runs in the tournament: South Korea reaching the semifinals in 2002, and Germany doing the same in 2006. Colombia also reached the quarterfinals in 2014, when the World Cup was held in neighboring Brazil.
With this World Cup being held on home soil, maybe “we’re able to push our team to a bit of a better performance than we have historically,” Altidore said.
He didn’t just mean the players — he meant the fans, too. “Can we show up in numbers in a way that, from the players’ arrival, they feel the emotion, they feel the enthusiasm, they feel the camaraderie?” Altidore said. “And we can push them on to play a little bit above themselves, to play a little bit above what we’ve seen already.”
You can sense his excitement. As a media member, Altidore will have to now learn to balance his rooting interests with offering clear-eyed analysis. “For me, it’s really getting behind these guys, applauding them for how far they’ve now taken the flag and where they’ve brought it,” he said. “But at the same time, it’s not all rainbows. You’ve got to be critical of guys, and you have to obviously critique their performances.”
Altidore was first introduced to soccer in 1994, the last time the U.S. hosted the World Cup, when he was just a young boy. His father recorded games on VHS tapes. He imagines lots of families will do the same this summer, three decades later, albeit with updated technology.
“They’re going to get exposed to soccer in a wonderful way for the first time, and it’s going to birth soccer players, it’s going to birth soccer fans, soccer enthusiasts,” Altidore said.
He’ll be doing his part, by showing his enthusiasm on the Telemundo broadcasts. “It’s more than just X’s and O’s in my opinion,” Altidore said. “This is a very good opportunity to continue growing the game for another 30, 40 years to come.”
Federal Reserve Governor Jerome Powell warned Sunday about the impact of a politicized Fed and made a broader call for the defense of democratic institutions in his first public remarks since the end of his eight-year stint as head of the central bank.
“Democratic institutions take much time, effort, and patience to build but can be torn down all too quickly,” Powell said in remarks prepared for delivery as he accepted the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award, given by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation.
“It is essential that we preserve what is good about these institutions, even as we strive to improve them,” said Powell, who included the Fed along with the courts and universities as among the core institutions key to the country’s success and standing in the world.
“Like many other institutions, the Fed has been undergoing a stress test,” Powell said, which in the central bank’s case has included efforts by President Donald Trump to fire Fed Governor Lisa Cook, calls for Powell’s resignation and a criminal probe of Powell.
Powell’s term as chair formally ended on May 15. His successor, Kevin Warsh, was sworn in as Fed chair on May 22. Powell has decided to continue as a Fed governor in part because of what he regards as ongoing threats to the Fed’s independence, a decision that effectively prevents Trump from appointing another member to the Fed board for now.
Jerome Powell with Caroline Kennedy and Jack Schlossberg after receiving the Profile in Courage Award.Scott Eisen / Getty Images
The Fed’s structure is meant to allow it to make monetary policy decisions free of political considerations, and “these protections have served the public well, and administrations from both parties have respected them,” Powell said. “If any administration finds a way to remove Fed officials over policy differences, then future administrations will do so as well. The public would lose faith that the central bank will make decisions based only on what’s best for all Americans.”
In announcing the award to Powell earlier this year, the foundation said he had “safeguarded one of the country’s most essential apolitical institutions and demonstrated extraordinary courage in the face of sustained personal and professional risk.”
The award this year was also given to the citizens of Minneapolis and St. Paul for the public response to the surge in immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities area, including protests and efforts to monitor government enforcement efforts.
Major League Baseball owners made their long-expected salary cap proposal to the players’ association on Thursday, a system the union has vowed never to accept, setting the sides on course for a confrontation that threatens the 2027 season and perhaps beyond.
Baseball owners hadn’t proposed a firm cap since 1994. Their effort prompted a 7 1/2-month strike that forced the cancellation of the World Series for the first time in 90 years.
MLB’s proposal would cap spending in 2027 at $245.3 million, using figures for luxury tax payrolls that include benefits and the pre-arbitration bonus pool, and establish a payroll floor of $171.2 million. The Los Angeles Dodgers, baseball’s biggest spenders, had a $415.2 million payroll on opening day this year — around $170 million over the proposed cap.
Owners said they would discuss a phase-in schedule that would give teams like the Dodgers time to comply with the cap and an escrow system with the union as part of a proposed seven-year deal, that all current contracts would remain guaranteed and there would be no prohibition of guaranteed contracts under the cap system.
MLB said it would centralize local media revenue from the 30 teams equally and give players a 50-50 split as part of a proposal that would eliminate the current revenue-sharing plan among the clubs.
Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred.Matthew Grimes Jr. / Atlanta Braves via Getty Images file
“Our salary cap and floor proposal levels the playing field while sharing baseball revenue with the players 50/50 as we grow the game together,” MLB spokesman Glen Caplin said in a statement. “Further, by sharing media revenue equally as part of our proposal, we can address another top fan concern of local TV blackouts.”
Baseball’s current five-year deal, agreed to in March 2022 after a 99-day lockout, expires Dec. 2. While a lockout next winter is expected, talks are not likely to intensify until late February or early March 2027, when the possibilities of losing regular-season games and revenue near. If regular-season games are lost, negotiations may become a standoff of which side can tolerate the most economic loss.
Based on 2026 opening day figures, eight teams would have to cut payroll to get under the cap. The teams over are the two-time reigning World Series champion Dodgers, New York Mets ($379.2 million), New York Yankees ($339.6 million), Toronto ($319.5 million), Philadelphia ($315.2 million), Boston ($263.7 million), San Diego ($260.1 million) and Atlanta ($247.9 million).
Twelve teams would be required to increase payroll by a total of $617 million based on 2026 numbers: Miami ($81.8 million), Cleveland ($95.7 million), Tampa Bay ($108.2 million), the Chicago White Sox ($108.6 million), St. Louis ($114.4 million), Washington ($119.1 million), Pittsburgh ($122.6 million), Minnesota ($125.6 million), Milwaukee ($130.9 million), the Athletics ($139.2 million), Colorado ($142.2 million) and Cincinnati ($148.8 million).
Owners and the union agreed to a luxury tax in 2003 designed to slow spending, but teams feel it has had little or no impact on the Dodgers and Mets in recent years. The last small-market MLB club to win a World Series was Kansas City in 2015, although Cleveland, Tampa Bay and Milwaukee all lead their divisions as of Thursday, while the Mets and Red Sox are in last place.
MLB said its revenue has grown by 247% since 2003 and player payroll has increased by 149% in that span.
Management gave the union its latest plan during a bargaining session at the commissioner’s office, one day after the union made its economic proposal. Owners say a cap is needed to improve competitive balance and restrain wealthy teams from assembling starrier rosters than their smaller-market brethren.
Players want expanded free agency and salary arbitration rights along with almost doubling the major league minimum, increasing the money high-revenue teams share with the less-wealthy clubs and establishing penalties for teams that drop below payroll floors.
Aaron Judge of the U.S. leads teammates onto the field before game against Venezuela in the World Series of Baseball in Miami on March 17.Megan Briggs / Getty Images file
Other U.S. major sports leagues operate under a cap. The NBA had a cap in its initial season in 1946-47, then dropped that and began its modern version in 1984-85. NFL players and owners adopted a cap for the 1994 season, and the NHL did so in 2005-06 after a lockout wiped out the entire 2004-05 season.
The Dodgers shattered MLB’s spending record with a combined $515 million in payroll and luxury tax last year en route to their second straight World Series title. Los Angeles’ total was seven times the $68.7 million payroll of the Marlins, the lowest-spending team, and more than the payrolls of the bottom six clubs combined.
Players say a cap would hurt them and enrich owners, and they say they will never agree to one. Without a cap, MLB stars have landed lucrative, guaranteed contracts that outpace what the biggest stars in other U.S. sports leagues make. Juan Soto’s $765 million, 15-year contract with the Mets is believed to be the biggest ever in team sports and is far greater than the largest deals in the NFL (Patrick Mahomes at $450 million over 10 years) and NBA (Jayson Tatum at $314 million over five years).
MLB’s last salary cap proposal in 1994 offered players a 50-50 split of revenue in a system that would have forced teams to maintain payrolls of 84%-110% of the average. Salary arbitration would have been eliminated and the threshold for free agency would have been lowered from six years’ major league service to four — with the provision that a player’s former club could match any offer until he had six years.
MLB’s offer came on June 14 that year, and players struck on Aug. 12. MLB withdrew the cap proposal the following Feb. 6 after pressure by the National Labor Relations Board. The strike ended on March 31 after U.S. District Judge Sonia Sotomayor — now a Supreme Court justice — issued an injunction restoring the work rules of the expired labor contract. Two days later, owners accepted the union’s offer to return to work without an agreement. A deal wasn’t reached until 1997.
MIAMI — A federal judge on Wednesday declined to jail a Florida teenager accused of killing and sexually assaulting his stepsister, allowing him to remain in the custody of a family member while he awaits trial.
Timothy Hudson, 16, has been free since the slaying of Anna Kepner, who died on Nov. 7, 2025, aboard a Carnival cruise ship. At the time he was arrested and charged as a juvenile and allowed to live with an uncle because of his age. But in April a federal grand jury indicted him as an adult, introducing the possibility that he could be jailed as he awaits trial.
“If it were a 20-year-old under the exact circumstances I probably would have detained,” U.S. District Judge Edwin Torres said. “The presumption would be we were just not going to take that chance.”
“This is a different animal,” Torres said.
Anna Kepner.anna.kepner16 via Instagram
Torres took into consideration that detaining Hudson in Miami-Dade County — where he was charged — would make it difficult for his family, which lives hundreds of miles away in Hernando County, to visit him.
The judge said he wanted to “know what my options are” about potentially detaining Hudson closer to home before deciding to hold him behind bars.
Alejandra Lopez, a lawyer for the government, argued that Hudson is “a danger to the community” and questioned how authorities can trust “this defendant won’t act again.”
She noted that two minors live in Hudson’s uncle’s home, where he is residing.
“What is needed to prove a danger? A second dead body?” she asked.
Evan Kuhl, a public defender representing Hudson, argued that his client is not a danger to the public or a flight risk because he has abided by the conditions of his release for several months without any incidents.
Lopez shot back that it took months after Kepner’s death for officials to charge Hudson because authorities were gathering evidence.
“How is he going to be a risk of flight if he doesn’t even know if he’s going to be charged?” she asked. “That doesn’t make sense.”
Hudson is only allowed to leave his house with his uncle or aunt and will be electronically monitored by authorities.
Anna Kepner’s car, decorated by her classmates at Temple Christian School, remained in the school parking lot in Titusville, Fla., for weeks after her death. Malcolm Denemark / USA Today Network via Imagn
The November cruise vacation included the victim’s father, stepmother and two of her children, including Hudson. Kepner’s father and Hudson’s mother married in December 2024.
Kepner’s body was found wrapped in a blanket, bruised and under a bed in her room, concealed by life vests. Her death was ruled a homicide caused by “mechanical asphyxiation,” according to the Miami-Dade medical examiner.
The girl and her stepbrother were sharing a room on the cruise, according to Hudson’s father’s lawyer.
The teenager was arrested while the ship was in international waters en route to Miami. He was hospitalized upon the ship’s docking and has since been in counseling, according to a lawyer for his mother.
On the day Hudson’s indictment was made public, Chris Kepner — Anna Kepner’s father and Hudson’s stepfather — declared that “justice needs to be served.”
Kepner was a high school senior and cheerleader, with hopes of cheerleading for the University of Georgia. She was remembered in her obituary for lacking a filter and being “bubbly, funny, outgoing, and completely herself.” At the time, her family said that “in true Anna fashion, the family would like everyone to know there is no GoFundMe” for her funeral. She was set to graduate from high school this spring.
Hudson’s trial could begin in September, Lopez said Wednesday.
