Hard Numbers: A loss for the GOP in Ohio, Poland beefs up border, shark attacks in Gotham, chips fall well for Dresden, Chinese parents swipe for their kids
57: In what’s broadly seen as a bellwether vote, 57% of Ohio voters this week rejected a measure, known as Issue 1, that would make it harder to amend the state constitution. This was broadly seen as a win for abortion rights advocates ahead of a vote in November that will seek to enshrine abortion rights (up until the point of fetal viability) in the state constitution.
1,000: Poland has sent 1,000 additional troops to the Belarusian frontier in response to a surge in illegal border crossings that Warsaw says is being driven by Belarusian border guards and mercenaries of the Wagner Group. This isn’t the first time this has happened. Back in 2021, Warsaw threw up barbed wire and dispatched troops to stop a surge of Middle Eastern and African migrants braving freezing temps to cross the border. At the time, the EU accused Belarus of deliberately stoking a migrant crisis in retaliation for fresh EU sanctions on Minsk.
20: Cue the Jaws soundtrack. New York City saw its first shark attack in decades on Tuesday, when a woman was bitten while swimming at Rockaway Beach (now cue the Ramones.) Shark attacks anywhere in the world are exceedingly rare to begin with, but to put things in perspective, this was the first one recorded in the Big Apple since Dwight Eisenhower was president, and just the 20th in nearly 200 years. The victim is expected to survive.
$3.8 billion: If there’s a single German word for “GiganticTaiwaneseSemiconductorInvestment,” you finally have an excuse to use it. Taiwan’s TSMC, the world’s largest chipmaker, is set to spend $3.8 billion on a new plant in the eastern German city of Dresden. Germany has been attracting huge investments from chipmakers in recent months as part of its bid to become a European semiconductor superpower. For more on the geopolitics of microchips, see our explainer.
181: Think it’s annoying to have your parents swipe through your love life? In China, where rates of marriage and birth are plummeting, a new industry of dating apps has sprung up for parents to match their unmarried kids with suitable spouses. For $181 you can sign up for the optimistically named service “Perfect-In-Laws.” How long does the subscription last? “Until there’s marriage.”