Reuters World News - Cornell prosecutor, Tennessee's botched executions and Obamacare checks

Episode Date: October 2, 2026

New York Attorney Leticia James is appointed special prosecutor in the Cornell gang rape case. A Tennessee death row inmate is in critical condition after surviving two lethal injections. The Trump administration sends $500 'refund' checks to nearly a million Americans, but most of the money is heading to battleground states. And student protests in France turn violent. Podcasts, breaking news, and video analysis from the source. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Download the Reuters app here.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Listen to the Morning Bid podcast ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Sign up for the Reuters Econ World newsletter ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Listen to the Reuters Econ World podcast ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Visit the ⁠⁠Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, I'm Kim Vinal in Wanganui, New Zealand. It's Friday, October 2nd. Today, New York's state governor intervenes in the gang rape case at Cornell, appointing a special prosecutor to take over. Tennessee grapples with its second botched execution attempt in a year, raising questions about the lethal injection. And student protests in France turn violent. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, seven days a week.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming, Ontario. Outraged students have held a public hearing at Cornell University after allegations of a 2024 gang rape resurfaced, sparking fresh scrutiny of how the case was handled. A lot of women were saying something along the lines of, you know, I am Jane Doe as well. And so there was quite a lot of solid, and also criticism of the university's response.

That's reporter Ed O, who was at the hearing. Cornell has defended its handling of the case, saying it investigated and imposed discipline on the seven accused students, ranging from suspensions to expulsions. But with new details coming to light after the alleged victim filed a civil suit, controversy over the case continues to grow. New York Governor, Kathy Hochel, stepped in, appointing State Attorney General Letitia James as special prosecutor in the case.

Meanwhile, a New York state law, which makes it difficult to prosecute cases where the victim was voluntarily intoxicated, is coming under scrutiny, with some state lawmakers now pushing for change. Reporter Joseph Axe has more. This case has clearly touched a nerve with an awful lot of people. I think in part that's because sexual violence on college campuses has been such a persistent and dangerous and frustrating problem that has resisted a lot of the reforms that have been pursued over the years. So as the law is written right now, if a victim of a sexual assault chose to get drunk

or took drugs voluntarily and then lost the capacity to consent, it's actually harder to prosecute those cases than in cases where the victim was given something without their knowledge or consent. And these lawmakers, of view this is a form of kind of putting the blame or the responsibility on the victim. It's a law that's been actually proposed for a number of years. It's never actually passed the legislature. But these lawmakers now are hopeful that the kind of public pressure because of the Cornell case might be enough to finally get it across the finish line. A Tennessee death row inmate is in critical condition in a Nashville hospital after surviving two doses of what should have been lethal injections. I counted at least seven needles used in her left arm alone, one of which

appeared to be bent when it was pulled from her arm after an unsuccessful look at. That's Randy Spivey, Pike's attorney, who was at the execution and says what happened to her amounted to chemical torture. It was cruel and it was torturous. 50-year-old Krista Pike was sentenced to death in the 1990s for a murder she carried out as a teenager. Her botched execution was the second in Tennessee this year. Tennessee governor, Bill Lee, has suspended all executions for the rest of the year, while an independent review looks into what went wrong.

A major sell-off in government bond markets is pushing borrowing costs to multi-decade highs around. the world. Investors are demanding higher returns to lend money, driven by expectations that interest rates will stay higher for longer, alongside concerns about inflation and growing government debt. Our morning bid host, Elena Kassas, has more. So there was some reprieve for US bond yields overnight. They came down a bit from the 24-year high that they hit on Thursday, but where they go next is all about the jobs report. That comes in later on Friday. An average forecast of economists Polled by Reuters saw the US economy adding 90,000 jobs in September.

But the problem will be if that comes in hot, those estimates were all over the place. Some of them were as high as 180,000 jobs. And if we get another really strong number, as we saw in August, that would put more pressure on the Fed to height rates this month and more pressure on US treasuries. You can catch MorningBid wherever you get your podcasts. Visit BetMDM casino and check out the newest exclusive. The Price is Right Fortune Pick. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly.

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Every place I've gone, we win. You know, the press says, oh, I don't know. Trump really, his heart isn't it. My heart's in it. I would be home right now, my heart. My heart is in it like never before. U.S. President Donald Trump at a rally for Republican Ken Paxton in Texas. Trump is kicking off a 32-day campaign blitz ahead of the midterms. As he tries to court voters, his administration is also sending nearly 950,000 Americans checks for about $500 each. The White House says the payments are refunds.

arguing those who bought health insurance through the Affordable Care Act were charged excessive marketplace fees. But a Reuters analysis found most of that money is going to a handful of politically important states. More than two-thirds of the $339 million being distributed is headed to residents in key mid-term battlegrounds. Reporter Andy Sullivan has more. These checks are only going out to people in a group of 30 states that use the federal portal to provide care.

They tend to be Republican-run or they tend to be sort of more politically competitive. The states that set up their own exchanges tend to be solidly democratic, places like California and New York. The administration has portrayed this as a refund for people who paid too much for Obamacare. But if you look at where the money is going, the overlap with the administration. midterm battleground is really quite striking. I mean, we're a little more than a month out from the November 3rd midterm elections. That'll decide whether Trump's Republicans maintain control of Congress. There's a lot of really competitive races.

And the most competitive Senate races, almost all of them are in these states. You've got places like Texas, North Carolina, Ohio, Alaska. The pattern's really quite striking. British counter-terrorism police have made another arrest in a suspected plot near RAA Fairford, the airbase used by US bombers during strikes on Iran. The latest person in custody is a 25-year-old dual British-Iranian national. Police detained five British men in their 20s near the base on Sunday.

They were later released on bail. Now investigators are examining whether a foreign state may have been involved. British officials say all possibilities remain on the table. Iran has rejected any suggestion it played a role. Student protests across France have turned violent, with attackers dousing a head teacher in gasoline in Marseille and setting fire to at least two schools and a fire truck. Police responded with tear gas as hundreds of young people blocked school entrances, protesting staff shortages and dilapidated buildings. The demonstrations and blockades have become a political flashpoint

after the government announced deeply unpopular spending cuts in its 2027 budget. Hundreds of protesters, mostly teenagers, have been arrested and dozens have been injured. Prime Minister Sebastian Leconiou has called a crisis meeting to address the unrest. The family of 37-year-old Minnesota woman Renee Good, is suing the Trump administration, an ICE agent, and several senior federal officials over her death during federal immigration operations in Minneapolis in January. The lawsuit alleges negligence and civil rights violations. We are here because Renee's love and legacy demand a better world for her children.

That's Becker Good, Renee's partner, who was sitting in the car with Renee when she was shot and killed. After the shootings, senior Trump administration officials publicly described good as a domestic terrorist. Federal officials declined to bring charges against the agents involved. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the Omani co-pilot who stabbed the captain of the fly Dubai flight in an apparent attempt to crash the plane had undergone radical Islamist indoctrination and was suicide. Omani authorities have not commented. Meanwhile, Hindu priests say prayers for the speedy recovery of the Indian pilot who was stabbed mid-air. Smith Machad is being hailed a hero after lunging to unlock the cockpit door, despite serious

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We'll be back later with an update.