President Donald Trump announced a $12 billion farm aid package Monday — a boost to farmers who have struggled to sell their crops while getting hit by rising costs after the president raised tariffs on China.

Most big U.S. retailers are closed on Thanksgiving Day. However, many will open early the following day, Black Friday, the unofficial start of the holiday gift-buying season and the biggest shopping day of the year.

President Donald Trump seems to be scaling back his ambition to repeal and replace the law. But he is struggling to ease voters’ concerns over the high cost of living — combined with a looming deadline to extend expiring subsidies that help people pay for their “Obamacare” premiums.

Most first-time homebuyers in the United States take out 30-year mortgages. Under a new proposal from the Trump administration, they may soon have an even longer loan option.

While the questions at times seemed to challenge the rationale for the tariffs, the arguments are still ongoing, and further questioning could shed additional light on their positions. A decision in the case could take weeks or months.

Key legal principles at the heart of conservative challenges to major initiatives in the Biden years are driving the arguments in the fight against Trump’s tariffs, which is set for arguments at the high court on Wednesday.

Wednesday’s decision brings the Fed’s key rate down to about 3.9%, from about 4.1%. The central bank had cranked its rate to roughly 5.3% in 2023 and 2024 to combat the biggest inflation spike in four decades.

The award was shared by Dutch-born Joel Mokyr, 79, who is at Northwestern University; Philippe Aghion, 69, who works at the Collège de France and the London School of Economics; and Canadian-born Peter Howitt, 79, who is at Brown University.

President Donald Trump has seized on the government shutdown as an opportunity to reshape the federal workforce and punish detractors, meeting with budget director Russ Vought on Thursday to talk through “temporary or permanent” spending cuts.

Washington is bracing for what could be a prolonged federal shutdown after lawmakers deadlocked and missed the deadline for funding the government. Neither side shows any signs of budging.

The latest order requires most state agencies to, within 30 days, “identify immediate spending reductions, including efficiencies that will result in reduced spending.”

Earlier this month, Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel said it would stop processing steel slabs at its Granite City Works plant in southern Illinois, just outside St. Louis, and “optimize” its operations by focusing on processing at its Mon Valley Works in Pennsylvania and Gary Works in Indiana.

The move is the Fed’s first cut since December and it lowered its short-term rate to about 4.1%, down from 4.3%. Fed officials, led by Chair Jerome Powell, had kept their rate unchanged this year as they evaluated the impact of tariffs, tighter immigration enforcement, and other Trump administration policies on inflation and the economy.

The Federal Reserve on Wednesday is widely expected to cut its key rate by a quarter point to about 4.1%, which would be the first reduction since last December.

Chicago-Based Kraft Heinz is splitting into two companies a decade after a merger of the brands created one of the biggest food manufacturers on the planet.

The company that brought the internet to the masses in the 1990s and early 2000s recently posted a notice on its website saying that it “routinely evaluates its products and has decided to discontinue Dial-up Internet” on Sept. 30, ending more than three decades of operations.