🌊 Trump Makes Up with Bae-Jing

Happy Belated Hawk Tuah-versary.

Apparently yesterday was the one-year anniversary of the Hawk Tuah meme, and we have two questions: 1) How did we miss this? 2) Why was school not off?!

The Hawk Tuah chapter of future US history books may very well precede one titled “The Fall of the Empire,” but who cares? It gave us — eyes bloodshot and eye bags fully creased — a hilarious meme. Now how about another joke, Murray?

–Max and Max

KEY STORY

China Trade Deal Done?

President Trump announced that the US-China trade deal is “done,” pending approval by both leaders

• In April, Trump put steep tariffs on China, sparking a trade war between the countries. Among various policies, China restricted mineral exports to the US and the US restricted technology exports and student visas for Chinese students

• After reaching the outlines of an agreement last month, the sides agreed on Wednesday to a deal that will reportedly have China lift rare earth mineral export controls and the US loosen restrictions on student visas and technology exports

Dig Deeper

• Trump announced on social media that the US will maintain 55% tariffs on Chinese goods – keeping 25% tariffs that Trump imposed during his first term and 30% tariffs he has implemented this term. In return, Trump said that China will maintain a 10% tariff on US goods

• “OUR DEAL WITH CHINA IS DONE, SUBJECT TO FINAL APPROVAL WITH PRESIDENT XI AND ME,” Trump posted

• “Adding to the China readout, President XI and I are going to work closely together to open up China to American Trade. This would be a great WIN for both countries!!!” he continued

• A Chinese negotiator said that China has “agreed in principle” to the terms of an agreement

KEY STORY

Texas Deploys National Guard

Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R.) has deployed the Texas National Guard in response to escalating protests over immigration policies

• The unrest that began in California, when protests over ICE immigration raids devolved into violence, has spread across the US. In Texas, protesters clashed with police, injuring officers and graffitiing a federal building. Authorities used tear gas and pepper spray in response

• On Wednesday, Abbott said that he had deployed the National Guard “to ensure peace & order.” The move contrasts with California, where Trump deployed the troops without a request from local authorities

Dig Deeper

• Abbott added, “Peaceful protest is legal. Harming a person or property is illegal & will lead to arrest,” while his press secretary said, “Texas will not tolerate the lawlessness we have seen in Los Angeles"

• Abbott’s decision to deploy the Texas National Guard came ahead of protests planned in San Antonio and other major Texas cities

• In recent days, protests have gathered outside Texas city halls and federal immigration courts, where agents have been arresting migrants who are arriving for court appearances

• Anti-ICE protests have spread to New York, Las Vegas, Seattle, and Minneapolis, among other cities

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KEY STORY

Apple’s AI Paper

Apple researchers published a paper that alleges major flaws in the latest AI models

• The experiment tested older language models against newly developed “reasoning” models in a series of tasks, and found that the models completely collapsed during tasks that required more than “data memorization”

• Critics argued that the paper was biased, given Apple’s own struggles to develop AI, while the researchers claimed that the tests raise serious doubts about the purported reasoning capabilities of newer models

Dig Deeper 

• In the paper, entitled “The Illusion of Thinking,” Apple tested LRMs – including OpenAI’s o3, Anthropic’s Claude 3.7 Sonnet, and Google’s Gemini Thinking – on brain-teasing puzzles that can’t be solved via memorization

• The experiment involved comparing LRMs to traditional LLMs in a variety of low, medium, and high-complexity tasks to determine where the models hit their intellectual limits

• Researchers concluded that conventional LLMs outperformed LRMs in low-complexity tasks, while LRMs carried a slight advantage in medium-complexity tasks. In high-complexity tasks, both types of models failed completely

• The paper stated, "These insights challenge prevailing assumptions about LRM capabilities and suggest that current approaches may be encountering fundamental barriers to generalizable reasoning"

KEY STORY

Riots in Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland experienced two consecutive nights of anti-immigrant riots sparked by protests over an alleged sexual assault involving two Romanian teenagers

• On June 7, a teenage girl in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, was allegedly sexually assaulted. Two 14-year-old boys of Romanian descent were charged with attempted rape but pleaded not guilty

• The unrest began Monday night following a peaceful vigil, and quickly escalated into anti-immigrant violence. Police officers were attacked, and additional protests erupted in nearby towns

• “The terrible scenes of civil disorder we have witnessed in Ballymena again this evening have no place in Northern Ireland,” said Northern Ireland’s minister of the riots

Dig Deeper 

• On Tuesday night, police in Ballymena came under what the police called a “sustained attack” involving Molotov cocktails, bricks, and fireworks. At least 17 officers were injured

• Protests also spread to other areas in Northern Ireland, including Belfast, Coleraine, and Lisburn, with reports of additional violence and property damage

• By Wednesday morning, residents in parts of Ballymena had posted signs or flags on their homes to indicate their nationality in hopes of avoiding being targeted

• One Romanian resident told the Irish Times she displayed a British flag in her window for protection. Another resident placed a sign reading “Filipino lives here”

RUNDOWN
Some Quick Stories for the Office

🤖 Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is launching a specialized “superintelligence” lab aimed at creating AI systems that surpass human cognitive abilities

📊 New Labor Department data showed that US consumer prices rose 2.4% over the year to May, matching economists’ expectations

💣 Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass imposed a curfew following several nights of violence and looting during ongoing protests against immigration enforcement

🇺🇸 Elon Musk said he regrets some of the attacks he made against President Trump during their public feud last week

⚖️ Disney and Universal filed a lawsuit against AI company Midjourney, claiming it illegally made AI-generated copies of their copyrighted works

🪦 Legendary Beach Boys co-founder Brian Wilson passed away on Wednesday at age 82, his family confirmed

🧑‍⚖️ A New York jury found Harvey Weinstein guilty of one criminal sex act but acquitted him on a second on Wednesday

What does Roca Nation think?

🧠 Yesterday’s Question: Was life better in the early 2000s? Or is that just nostalgia?

🧐 Today’s Question: If you could go to one sporting event in the country where would you go? Prices don’t matter! (e.g., The Masters, night game at Death Valley, Yankees-Red Sox at Fenway, etc.).

Reply to this email with your response!

POPCORN
Some Quick Stories for Happy Hour

😴 Rough Sleeping Unbanned in England and Wales: The UK will scrap a 200-year-old vagrancy law, decriminalizing rough sleeping for the first time since 1824

🦈 It’s Raining Sharks: An osprey airdropped a hammerhead shark onto a disc golf course in South Carolina

🧼 The Sydney Sweeney Bathwater Soap Aftermarket: Sydney Sweeney’s limited-edition “Bathwater Bliss” soap bars are now being resold on eBay for upwards of $2,000 each

📷 Say Cheese!: An Indian orthodontist who holds the Guinness World Record for the largest film camera collection – 5,707 – has opened his own museum

🍟 Royal French Fraud: A French court convicted two renowned French antiques experts for selling fake 18th-century royal chairs

ROCA WRAP
Rent Surge?

New York City

This city just banned tenants from paying broker fees, but landlords are already raising rents in response.

New York City is the US’ – and potentially the world's – most expensive rental market, with the median two-bedroom apartment going for $5,560 monthly. On top of these astronomical rents, it’s been one of the few American cities where tenants are also responsible for paying a “broker fee” to the rental agent who markets the property. These fees, paid by landlords in most cities, are typically 10-15% of a year’s rent and add thousands of dollars to the up-front cost of signing a lease.

On Wednesday, the Fairness in Apartment Rental Expenses (FARE) Act went into effect, requiring landlords, not tenants, to pay broker fees. Yet while the law is expected to decrease moving costs by around 42%, according to rental platform StreetEasy, there are early indications that it could backfire.

On listing sites like StreetEasy, property managers are already advertising steep rent increases that took effect the moment the law went into force. Some brokers have listed two different prices for apartments – one before the FARE Act and one often hundreds of dollars higher for Wednesday onward. The shift comes with New York's rental vacancy rate at a record low 1.4%, giving landlords significant leverage.

Renters hope that the initial rent surges will taper off as the market adjusts; however, it’s also possible that the FARE Act will end up costing renters even more than a broker fee, as they’ll now be paying more not just up front, but per month as long as they stay in an apartment.

New York tried to make renting fairer – but in the city that never sleeps, neither does inflation.

EDITOR’S NOTE
Final Thoughts

RIP to Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys. You’ve gotta watch this BBC rendition of “God Only Knows” — which Paul McCartney hailed as the greatest song of all time — that features Wilson himself, along with other pop stars. We’ve spent many roadtrips listening to The Beach Boys and celebrate the brilliant legacy of Brian Wilson. May he rest in peace! And have a great Thursday!

–Max and Max