May 16, 2017 - Science

Ted Cruz: first trillionaire will be made in space

Ted Cruz at a signing ceremony for a recent bill to increase NASA's budget. (Evan Vucci / AP)

Ted Cruz offered an intriguing hypothetical Tuesday on stage at an event hosted by The Atlantic:

"I'll make a prediction right now. The first trillionaire will be made in space, will be the entrepreneur who invests and makes discoveries in space that we cannot even envision. Right now we have billionaires, the prediction I'm making: the first trillionaire will be in the space exploration world."

Key context: Cruz is an influential lawmaker when it comes to space (he represents Houston, home of NASA's Johnson Space Center) and said Tuesday he's planning to revisit a key treaty to see how it might be updated to encourage further investment in space. For what it's worth, one estimate says Bill Gates will likely be the world's first trillionaire — and of course, his assets are, as of now, Earthbound.

Why it matters: The final frontier is already big business thanks to interest from people like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos.

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Barak Ravid
Updated 16 mins ago - World

Scoop: Decisive meeting could lead to Israeli-Sudanese normalization

Lt. Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, Sudan's head of the Sovereign Council, meets with Bahraini aid officials in Khartoum, Sept. 15. Photo: Mazen Mahdi/AFP via Getty Images

U.S., Emirati and Sudanese officials will hold a decisive meeting in Abu Dhabi on Monday on a possible normalization agreement between Sudan and Israel, Sudanese sources told me.

Why it matters: If the U.S. and the United Arab Emirates accommodate Sudan’s requests for economic aid, an announcement on a normalization agreement with Israel similar to the ones struck with the UAE and Bahrain could be made within days, sources briefed on the process tell me.

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Axios
Updated 2 hours ago - Politics & Policy

Coronavirus dashboard

Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

  1. Global: Total confirmed cases as of 12:45 p.m. ET: 30,838,610 — Total deaths: 958,090— Total recoveries: 21,088,552 — Map.
  2. U.S.: Total confirmed cases as of 12:45 p.m. ET: 6,777,026 — Total deaths: 199,352 — Total recoveries: 2,577,446 — Total tests: 94,211,463 — Map.
  3. Politics: Testing czar on Trump's CDC contradictions: "Everybody is right" — Trump's health secretary asserts control over all new rules.
  4. Education: What we overlooked in the switch to remote learning
  5. Health: The dwindling chances of eliminating COVID-19.
  6. World: Guatemalan president tests positive for COVID-19 — The countries painting their pandemic recoveries green.
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Orion Rummler
Updated 2 hours ago - Health

7 states set single-day coronavirus case records last week

Data: Compiled by Axios; Map: Danielle Alberti/Axios

Seven states set new highs last week for coronavirus infections recorded in a single day, according to the COVID Tracking Project and state health departments. Wisconsin and Nebraska surpassed records set the previous week.

Why it matters: Problem spots are sticking in the Midwest, although the U.S. is moving in the right direction overall after massive infection spikes this summer.

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