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| Good evening. Here's the latest. |
 Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York Times |
| 1. All 50 states were targeted by Russia in 2016, the Senate Intelligence Committee concluded, painting a more far-reaching Russian intelligence effort than the federal government had previously acknowledged. |
| But the report — the first from the committee's investigation into 2016 election meddling — was so heavily redacted at the demand of American intelligence agencies that key lessons for 2020 were blacked out. |
| The findings landed just hours after Senator Mitch McConnell stepped forward to block consideration of a package of election security bills, and a day after special counsel Robert Mueller warned that Russia was moving again to interfere. |
| Also on Capitol Hill: A divided House passed a two-year budget deal that raises spending by hundreds of billions of dollars, avoiding a potentially catastrophic default. The Senate is expected to approve the deal. |
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 Jenna Schoenefeld for The New York Times |
| 2. Four big automakers made a deal with California that largely upholds Obama-era pollution rules, a setback to President Trump's rollback plans. |
| As the Trump administration prepares to drastically weaken rules on planet-warming vehicle pollution, Ford, Honda, Volkswagen Group of America and BMW of North America have been holding secretive talks in Sacramento on a plan to move forward with the standards in California, the nation's largest auto market. |
| In other auto news, Nissan said it would cut as many as 12,500 jobs after its profit plunged, suggesting its problems could be more serious than it has acknowledged. |
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 Robin Utrecht/EPA, via Shutterstock |
| 3. Imagine the hottest day in recorded history. Now, imagine it without any air conditioning. |
| Such was the case for many in Western Europe as a dangerous heat wave swept across the region. Temperatures in Paris soared to 42.6 degrees Celsius (108.6 Fahrenheit); Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands set national records. Here's how to find relief in nine popular destinations. |
| People cooled themselves in public fountains and dangled their feet in a repurposed kiddie pool at a cafe in Amsterdam, above. But one thing you were far less likely to see: an air conditioner. The technology that transformed American homes and offices over the last century still gets a chilly reception in much of Europe. |
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 Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York Times |
| 4. Who will become Puerto Rico's next governor? No one on the island of 3.2 million people knows for sure. |
| Following Gov. Ricardo Rosselló's resignation overnight, Wanda Vázquez, the secretary of justice, became next in line. But the governor appeared to leave open the possibility that a different successor could be in place by the time he steps down Aug. 2. Whoever it is will be left with a financial mess. Above, celebrations in San Juan on Thursday. |
| Mr. Rosselló had a close circle of associates who shared advice and friendship. But critics said the governor became too isolated from others. |
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 Michael Conroy/Associated Press |
| 5. The federal government will resume executions of death-row inmates for the first time since 2003, Attorney General William Barr said. |
| The announcement reversed what had essentially been a moratorium on the federal death penalty. Five men convicted of murdering children will be executed in December or January at the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Ind., Mr. Barr said, with additional executions to follow. |
| The decision came despite dwindling support for the death penalty; 21 states have outlawed it. |
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 Brendan Mcdermid/Reuters |
| 6. The Jeffrey Epstein case took another turn. |
| The financier was found unconscious in his cell on Tuesday at a federal jail in Manhattan, above, with what one official described as "bruising around the neck." Law enforcement is treating it as a possible suicide attempt. |
| The #MeToo movement is starting to shift how prosecutors look at sexual assault cases like Mr. Epstein's. Here's how things have changed. |
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 Julio Cortez/Associated Press |
| 7. The fallout from Boeing's 737 Max jet crisis continues: Southwest Airlines said it would pull out of Newark Airport because of the jet's grounding. |
| The carrier also said its profits were down about $175 million in the second quarter because of the troubled jet's inability to fly after two deadly crashes. Southwest, Newark's fifth-busiest passenger airline, above, had expected to take delivery of 44 of the planes this year. |
| Also from our Business desk: Chris Hughes helped Mark Zuckerberg build Facebook from scratch. Now, he's working behind the scenes with the government to press for its breakup. |
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 Jeenah Moon for The New York Times |
| 8. A Whitney Museum trustee resigned amid protests over his company's sale of tear gas, which included the recent withdrawal of eight artists from the Whitney Biennial. |
| Protesters had demanded Warren Kanders's resignation, or removal from the board, after reports that the tear gas had been used against migrants and protesters at the southern border. In what amounted to a counterprotest, the hedge fund titan Kenneth Griffin stepped down from the board hours later, citing what he described as the museum's left-wing tilt. |
| In other arts news, Swedish prosecutors charged the rapper ASAP Rocky with assault following an altercation on the street there. He will remain in custody until the trial begins on Tuesday. |
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 Illustration by Tala Safie/The New York Times |
| 9. Your briefing writer walked by a crowd and much fanfare at a Dunkin' in Times Square on Wednesday — and it wasn't over coffee. People were celebrating the release of meatless sausage, egg and cheese sandwiches. |
| As brands like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat expand into mass markets, the meat industry has worked to pass legislation in 24 states that makes it illegal for plant-based food to be called meat. And vegans are fighting back. |
| For a different kind of plant-based meal, Yotam Ottolenghi offers his most versatile summer salad. He chars his vegetables for salads that can be served over pasta, tucked into sandwiches or used as a dip. |
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 Sebastian Leuzinger |
| 10. And finally, a tree stump that is clearly not dead. |
| Two ecologists hiking in New Zealand discovered the stump of a leafless kauri tree, a variety that can grow to be 168 feet high. To most it would appear lifeless, but upon further inspection, they found living tissue. But how could it still be alive? |
| For more than 150 years, how stumps survived without leaves for photosynthesis was a mystery. The researchers discovered that the kauri stump lives by sharing water with neighboring trees. The discovery supports the notion that while trees may appear solitary above ground, they're intimately connected underground. |
| Have a lively night. |
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| Correction: An item in Wednesday's briefing about the Booker Prize misidentified one of the authors pictured. It was Oyinkan Braithwaite, not Elif Shafak. |
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