Good morning! PSL season is imminent. Starbucks teased everyone’s favorite fall drink yesterday and leakers claim the 2024 fall menu drops tomorrow.

If guac is more your speed, you can score free burritos by playing Chipotle IQ trivia. You better hurry up, though — the game ends tomorrow.

POLICY

💰 Harris unveils economic agenda

Kamala Harris gave an economic speech in North Carolina last Friday, just ahead of the Democratic National Convention. In it, she pushed some standard ideas like a supply-focused housing agenda with a promise to build 3 million new homes. On the spicier side, she evoked the spirit of Richard Nixon with a call for a federal ban on “price gouging” of groceries.

The policy: Inflation has slowed but food prices are up 26% since 2019. President Biden has long blamed the problem on corporate greed and it seems the VP agrees. Harris's new policy fights food inflation by taking the fight straight to Big Grocery™.

Her campaign called her plan the "first-ever federal ban on price gouging on food and groceries." It aims to prevent the exploitation of consumers by nixing "excessive" grocery prices. Though it doesn't define "excessive," it does call on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to enforce the limits.

• Price gouging is often defined as the predatory boosting of prices by more than 20%. Most states have laws banning the practice, but there's no federal law against it. Harris wants to change that.

• In this spirit, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is pushing a more specific bill in Congress that hits "grossly excessive" food prices and profit margins. Major bills don't get passed in election years, but expect Warren to make a similar push next year if Harris wins.

Harris also wants more scrutiny of the food industry. That could be a problem for things like the proposed $36 billion Mars (aka M&Ms) buyout of Kellanova (aka Kellog's).

The response: Republicans aren't fans. They're using an all-time economic slur to slam the Harris plan, saying it amounts to "price controls" (dun dun dun). That's a reference to Nixon-era policies that tried to fight inflation by demanding that prices can't rise above a certain level. Those policies backfired and sent inflation flying.

• The Washington Post editorial board said Harris's plan amounted to "gimmicks" rather than serious ideas. Many economists aren't fans, either, with one calling the plan "lazy" and another pointing out that higher prices don't necessarily equate to price gouging.

• Donald Trump basically read the dictionary in response. He called Harris's proposal "dangerous," "communist," "Marxist," and, of course, "fascist."

• Criticisms came streaming in from Democrats, too. Ex-economic advisors to Presidents Clinton and Obama echoed the Nixon comparisons, warning of the dangers of price controls.

Is Harris’s plan pro-consumer? Anti-business? Who knows. But her allies say her critics are "poorly informed" and don't understand the policy. They also point out the other tenets of her plan, like a $6,000 credit for newborn babies.

For a broader look at what a Harris-Walz administration might look like from a policy perspective, check out the 2024 Democratic Party platform. It's a quick 92-page read that mentions Donald Trump a cool 150 times while name-dropping Harris only 32 times.

UNITED STATES

✈️ The Department of Transportation (DOT) is reviewing the proposed $1.9 billion merger of Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines after the plan cleared a Department of Justice review.

🚨 Uh oh. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) might have lost 32,000 kids. Between 2019 and 2023, thousands of unaccompanied minors didn’t show up for immigration hearings after entering the country illegally. A report from ICE says the agency was “not able” to determine their locations.

👩‍⚖️ A federal judge struck down the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) new rule banning noncompete agreements. The judge said the FTC doesn’t have the legal authority to enact such a ban, which was set to kick in on September 4. The FTC says it’s considering appealing the ruling to a higher court.

POLITICS

The political world is focused on the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago this week, which runs through tomorrow. And boy are they playing the hits. President Biden and Hillary Clinton gave enthusiastic speeches supporting Kamala Harris on Monday (Biden’s, Hillary’s). The Obamas brought the house down last night, while Bill Clinton and Tim Walz will speak tonight before Harris herself closes things out tomorrow.

• DNC organizers went all-in on influencers, giving them access to campaign staff, yacht parties, and more. Traditional reporters, though? Not so much.

• The DNC drew ~20 million viewers on Monday, compared to ~18 million for the first night of last month's Republican convention.

• A handful of Republicans are speaking this year, including Trump’s former White House press secretary, Stephanie Grisham.

At a stop in Michigan, Donald Trump threw out a policy idea that will be tough for anyone to publicly oppose: He wants the death penalty for child sex traffickers.

• On a lighter note, JD Vance committed the mortal political sin of wondering aloud — in Philly, no less — why cheesesteaks have cheese whiz instead of Swiss cheese. You just gotta roll with some things, JD, no matter how weird they are.

• RFK, Jr.’s campaign is sinking. His own VP nominee, attorney Nicole Shanahan, says they’re considering dropping out and endorsing Trump to avoid the “risk” of a Harris win. The Kennedy campaign bank account is down to ~$4 million.

• Donald Trump has drawn the ire of the Swifties for sharing AI images that fooled absolutely nobody and kinda-sorta implied that Taylor endorsed him.

💰 The Harris-Walz campaign is slaying in the money race. In the month since Biden dropped out, the new Democratic nominee has raked in $500 million, dwarfing Trump’s July haul of just (“just”) $139 million.

📉 Polls:

• 🔵 Harris leads Trump in Virginia by 3%. Republicans last won here in 2004.

• 🔴 Trump leads Harris in Pennsylvania by a razor-thin 1% margin.

🏛️ The Senate is down to 99. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) resigned yesterday in the wake of his felony bribery conviction. Gov. Phil Murphy (D) will appoint his own former aide, George Helmy (D), to fill the empty seat for a few months until a long-term replacement is elected in November. Democrats narrowly retain control of the Senate, 50-49.

TRIVIA

Barack Obama rocked the Democratic National Convention last night with a speech making the case for Kamala Harris. Of course, this wasn’t his first speech at a DNC. In which year did Barack Obama deliver the DNC’s keynote address, paving the way for his first presidential bid?

Hint: The Democratic nominee that year, whom Obama spoke in support of, lost in a close race.

BRIEFS

• “Call Her Daddy” podcast inks $125 million, three-year Spotify deal

• World’s oldest woman dies in Spain aged 117

• Waymo now giving 100,000 robotaxi rides every week in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Phoenix

• Fear not: Mpox not the new COVID, says World Health Organization

• Gold bars now cost $1 million as gold hits record $2,500 per Troy ounce

• Claude AI maker Anthropic hit with class-action copyright infringement lawsuit

• Shein sues Temu for copyright infringement in crap vs. junk battle royale

QUOTE

SNACKS

🦔 Aww: How? We have no idea. But a groundhog, now dubbed Colonel Custard, snuggled himself into a pile of stuffed animals inside the claw machine at a Pennsylvania custard shop.

▶️ Watch: If you thought the DNC vibes were wild last night with Lil Jon, go check out this classic of 1996 DNC attendees rocking to the Macarena.

🖼️ Woah: The BBC has an icy, photographic tour of one of the world's "most remote places.”

ANSWER

Barack Obama gave the infamous keynote address supporting then-Sen. John Kerry for president at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. At the time, Obama was a lowly Illinois state senator who was running for U.S. Senate. He won that race and, on the back of national acclaim from his DNC keynote, launched his own campaign for the White House just two years later. As president, he later appointed Kerry as his second-term secretary of State.