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TikTok bans Musk documentary account

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk gestures as he speaks during the inaugural parade inside Capitol One Arena, in Washington, DC, on January 20, 2025. (Photo by ANGELA WEISS / AFP) (Photo by ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images) | AFP via Getty Images

Just ahead of the wider release of Alex Gibney's Musk documentary, TikTok has banned the film's social media account from its platform. TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film's distributor, Bleecker Street, was informed Friday afternoon that a "permanent suspension" was imminent. Bleecker Street has not yet responded to a request for comment from The Verge.

While TikTok has no official affiliation with Elon Musk, part owner Larry Ellison appears in the film via a text message offering to help Musk fund his Twitter purchase.

Last month, YouTube, Meta, X, and TikTok all face …

Read the full story at The Verge.

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Mercedes-AMG’s first ground-up SUV is a 1,150hp electric beast

Mercedes AMG GT SUV

Earlier this year, Mercedes' AMG performance brand grabbed our attention with the GT four-door coupe, a souped-up sports sedan with three axial flux motors delivering over 1,150 horsepower. Well, now meet its beefier cousin, the 2028 Mercedes-AMG GT SUV, an equally powerful, ultra-fast-charging electric people-hauler.

The AMG GT SUV (say that five times fast) marks the first time in the performance brand's 59-year history that it has developed a full-size SUV entirely in-house from the ground up. Scheduled to hit the US next summer, the new EV is built on Merc's high-performance AMG.EA architecture to combine sports-car handling with full-s …

Read the full story at The Verge.

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Elon Musk settles lawsuits over $1 million voter giveaway

Elon Musk with money.

In 2024, Elon Musk promised to give away $1 million a day to a randomly selected registered voter in a swing state. That prompted legal challenges, raised questions about its legality, and drew lawsuits from two Arizona residents claiming the lottery was a fraud. Musk has now agreed to settle the two lawsuits filed in Austin, Texas, though the details of the settlement have not been made public.

The plaintiffs claim that when Musk announced the sweepstakes, he falsely claimed the prizes would be awarded randomly. Philadelphia's District Attorney sued to stop the giveaway, claiming that Musk was running an illegal lottery. During a hearing, …

Read the full story at The Verge.

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Feud In Dolly Parton’s Inner Circle Reveals Arms Deal with Haitian Police

I’m thinking this nephew guy has turned out to be a problematic figure … The story here is about a deal to sell arms to the police in Haiti and the company in question, Fencebridge, was founded by “Daniel Nozell, Parton’s longtime manager, and Bryan Seaver, one of Parton’s nephews who was also her head of security.”

From the Miami Herald (gift link) …

A private security firm founded by two people close to late country music legend Dolly Parton is at the center of an unusually complex arms deal in Haiti that several sources with knowledge of the matter say was worked out with little due diligence.

The security firm, Fencebridge Strategic Risk, entered into a multimillion-dollar agreement about a year ago to supply the Haiti National Police with semi-automatic rifles and thousands of rounds of ammunition, as the agency struggles to combat violent gangs that have claimed the lives of more than 25,000 Haitians since 2021.

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Data Centers

Fascinating nugget of data from an Economist deep dive cross-referencing polling data with the location of datacenters: “Voters across the country are shifting towards Democrats, but for those living within 2km of a data centre the veer has been even sharper. Americans who live near a data-centre site are around six percentage points more likely to support the Democrats than those who live further away (see chart 2). Six months ago there was no such difference.” Link (requires sub).

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Generals Must Be Willing to Sacrifice Their Careers | Command Post

Gen. Mark Hertling and Ben Parker welcome renowned military strategist Eliot Cohen to discuss what makes great leaders, the dysfunction inside Trump’s Pentagon, and the difficult choices facing military officers. Drawing on lessons from Churchill, Afghanistan, and Iraq, they explore why wars go wrong, how to recognize victory, and what history teaches us about military strategy.

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We’re On the Road Again...

Happy Saturday! We kicked off our fall tour last night with a sold-out show in Columbia, South Carolina. Annie Andrews and Bakari Sellers joined us for an evening of Southern politics, 2028 superlatives, The Next Level and The Trio. A great crowd and a great way to start the tour. Charlotte, North Carolina is up next.

Join us this Sunday night for a Bulwark LIVEstream featuring Pete Buttigieg + the gang broadcasting live from Charlotte. This livestream is exclusively for Bulwark+ members.

Tune in from the comfort of your couch to watch Sarah interview Pete in front of a live audience. The rest of the gang—Tim, Sam, JVL—and Bulwark favorites Lauren Egan and Catherine Rampell will be there too.

The show starts at 7p.m. EDT/4pm PDT on Sunday, October 18th.

Watch on TheBulwark.com, Substack mobile, or TV apps.

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ICYMI: Here are links to each newsletter section so you can quickly get back to that edition you may have missed this week.

Morning Shots - Triad - Huddled Masses - Press Pass - Bulwark Goes to Hollywood - The Opposition - False Flag - The Breakdown - Receipts


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🚨OVERTIME🚨

Congratulations are in order for our Brewers fans on the sweep of the Dodgers! A few came to last night’s show repping the Brew Crew. And to my Dodgers friends: Welcome to the Cleveland bandwagon.

Last night’s ALCS game was postponed as the gales of November came early, but I remain hopeful that my Guardians will join Milwaukee for what might be called the Edmund Fitzgerald World Series.

I’m sure Rob Manfred (boo) loves the all-small-market World Series we’re now guaranteed. Mister Commissioner, just remember, as Ray Ratto observes at Defector: Good baseball isn’t necessarily beautiful (or super profitable!)

Embarrassing… The DGA has a new ad out knocking Vivek not just for his swing, but the important thing: his policies. For an Ohioan who has trouble publicly embracing Ohio, versus Ohio-obsessed Amy Acton, it’s a smart move and a good ad.

No Kings! Stay safe out there if you’re participating in today’s events. We booked our fall tour long before today’s date was announced, so we won’t be in as many places as we’ve been in the past. I’ll also miss sending a dispatch from the Queen City, which always shows up big! Meanwhile, the Bad Orange Man is across the river at Northern Kentucky University today, for some reason. You know things are going poorly when you have to play defense in… Kentucky.

RIP Laura Lytle… The former director of the Senate Daily Press Gallery has died at the age of 51. She was loved by all in the press corps and an amazing advocate for us in the halls of power. She will be missed.

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Keeping the record: Trump’s pardons sent January 6th defendants home to communities across the country. J6 Tracker follows what they do next, including new arrests and runs for office. Separately, the January 6 Memory Project preserved DOJ press releases and other statements from more than 1,000 cases and made them searchable. Two useful resources for keeping the public record public. Take a look at who’s back in your community.

Bulwark Book Club pick for October: The Age of Acrimony: How Americans Fought to Fix Their Democracy, 1865–1915.

Mona Charen, JVL and the author Jon Grinspan will discuss the book with Bulwark+ members on Wednesday, Oct. 28 at 1:30 p.m. ET. More details in this post.

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Diddy Moved to New Prison After Ugly Fight With Jamaican Drug Lord and Paying Inmates for Special Favors

Not long ago, Diddy was living as well as you could possibly live in prison. He had his other inmates doing a litany of favors for him at any moment. Massages, special meals, and people to do his laundry and clean restrooms at any given notice. He even had his own phone and a tablet to watch 50 Cent’s documentary about him.

According to a fellow prisoner, this is the kind of lifestyle you have when you’re as rich as Puff Daddy. “You can pretty much get anything except a key to the front door and a female,” one person told NBC News. “He’s a billionaire. People are in awe of him. Money is power, especially behind bars.”

However, after an alleged fight with Jamaican drug lord Christopher “Dudus” Coke, Diddy suffered a head injury that landed him in the hospital. Apparently, Dudus didn’t take kindly to the special treatment that was being given in prison. Reports suggested this led to prison raids and cell phone confiscation.

Now, according to TMZ, the Bad Boy mogul was transferred from his usual New Jersey prison to a new facility in Pennsylvania. The security isn’t as intense, and there are only 1,000 inmates. TMZ presumed that this meant there would be more eyes on him and allow for more protection from massive fights.

Diddy Transferred to Pennsylvania Prison After Nasty Brawl at Fort Dix

Currently, the state of Sean Combs’ health is unknown. What we do know is that his archenemy 50 Cent finds the whole debacle to be extremely amusing. He joked on Instagram that Diddy is bound to make the next prison he goes to even crazier than Fort Dix. Then, he posted an absolutely deranged video of a toy that resembles Combs blowing bubbles out of his butt.

50 has notoriously trolled his enemies, Puff included. He even made money off trolling his adversaries through a partnership with DoorDash. Back in February 2026, he was in a Super Bowl commercial that saw him tease Diddy’s lengthy 50-month prison sentence and make reference to his name through cheese puffs and a pack of combs.

“I’ve always been about keeping it real, so when DoorDash approached me about a social campaign around beef, it felt authentic from the start,” 50 Cent said in a statement. “They’ve got everything you need, and just like with beef, the receipts speak for themselves.”

Photo by Shareif Ziyadat/Getty Images for Sean “Diddy” Combs

The post Diddy Moved to New Prison After Ugly Fight With Jamaican Drug Lord and Paying Inmates for Special Favors appeared first on VICE.

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Zelenskyy: Trump is letting Putin off

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy criticized President Donald Trump’s decision to waive new sanctions against Russia on Saturday, warning that easing economic pressure would only embolden Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Trump signed an executive order Friday suspending sanctions and tariffs under the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, which he signed into law last month. The penalties were scheduled to take effect Sunday.

“A decision was unfortunately made in America to completely disregard the Lindsey Graham Act, which was supposed to impose truly effective pressure on Russia to bring this war to an end,” Zelenskyy wrote Saturday.

Yesterday, the Russians carried out one of their largest attacks on Ukraine’s energy sector – more than 15 critical power generation and transmission facilities were targeted across different regions of Ukraine. Restoration work is ongoing, with all necessary services and all available resources of Ukrainian energy companies involved. I thank everyone working practically nonstop to restore power.

The most difficult situation was in Lutsk, Rivne, Zhytomyr, Vinnytsia, Shepetivka, Slavuta, and Netishyn. Energy facilities in the Kharkiv, Kyiv, Dnipro, and other regions were also hit. The Russians have scaled up their anti-energy operation and are trying to stretch our reserves and repair capabilities as thin as possible. Between 7 p.m. yesterday and 7 a.m. today alone, more than 320 jet-powered and gasoline-powered “shaheds,” along with loitering munitions, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles, were used against our energy sector, our cities, and our communities. And although our warriors are shooting down a significant number of them, the sheer scale and unrelenting pace of Russia’s strikes, specifically against our energy sector, are unfortunately having severe consequences.

It is important that our European partners have already prepared new support packages for Ukraine. I am grateful to them for this. And it is important that everyone in America also sees what is really happening. At a time when the Russians have carried out such a massive attack on our energy sector, a decision was unfortunately made in America to completely disregard the Lindsey Graham Act, which was supposed to impose truly effective pressure on Russia to bring this war to an end. This Act could have helped enormously – and still can! But it needs to actually work, and every voice in support of it matters.

Russia is trying to cause a blackout in Ukraine – right before winter. Russia is trying to leave millions of our people without electricity and heating. Pressure is needed to stop this. A U.S. sanctions blackout, easing pressure on the aggressor, financial rewards for Putin – all of this only encourages him to keep attacking. We must not give up ground. We must keep trying to end the war. To end it, not give Putin every reason to continue it indefinitely. I thank everyone who is truly fighting for peace and helping Ukraine!

— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) October 17, 2026

“This Act could have helped enormously — and still can! But it needs to actually work, and every voice in support of it matters,” he added.

The White House said the waiver was in the national interest. The order suspends the new penalties but leaves existing sanctions against Russia in place.

Moscow, meanwhile, welcomed the decision. Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s investment envoy, called it an “important and truly historic moment,” suggesting it could open the door to renewed economic cooperation with Washington.

The move comes as Russia intensifies attacks on Ukraine‘s energy infrastructure ahead of winter. Zelenskyy said Russian forces targeted more than 15 energy facilities in an overnight assault. Ukraine’s air force reported 332 drones and four cruise missiles launched during the attacks.


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Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., accused Trump of undermining bipartisan efforts to pressure Moscow.

“Trump’s latest surrender to Putin again betrays our Ukrainian partners and defies clear congressional intent of legislation designed to punish Russia for its illegal war of aggression,” Beyer said.

Trump just waived all of the sanctions on Russia provided for in the Lindsey Graham Sanctioning Russia Act, just as I and others warned he would.

Trump’s latest surrender to Putin again betrays our Ukrainian partners and defies clear congressional intent of legislation designed to punish Russia for its illegal war of aggression.

Trump has proven he will twist this law and abuse the powers it conferred on him, and while he has let the tariff powers lie for the moment, the law as written also empowers Trump to weaponize new trade authorities against our allies and trading partners.

Congress must fix this flawed law to stop Trump from capitulating to Putin and ensure that it truly supports Ukraine.

— Rep. Don Beyer (@RepDonBeyer) October 17, 2026

The Graham Act authorized new economic penalties, including tariffs targeting countries that purchase Russian energy, but also granted the president authority to waive them on national-interest grounds.

The post Zelenskyy: Trump is letting Putin off appeared first on Salon.com.

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