Monday, Sept. 19

• Afghanistan’s acting foreign minister Amir Khan Muttaqi announced that the Taliban and the United States completed a prisoner swap, with American Navy veteran Mark Frerichs traded for Bashir Noorzai, an alleged drug lord and key Taliban associate. Frerichs was kidnapped in 2020 while Noorzai was held in U.S. captivity for over 17 years.
• President Joe Biden spoke with Chinese President Xi Jinping, warning him that it would be a “gigantic mistake” to violate U.S. sanctions against Russia after its invasion of Ukraine. “Thus far, there’s no indication [that China has] put forward weapons or other things that Russia has wanted,” said Biden.
• On the sidelines of the annual United Nations General Assembly, Secretary of State Antony Blinken hosted the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan and urged peace between the two nations following aggression from Azerbaijan the previous week. “There is a path to a durable peace that resolves the differences through diplomacy,” Blinken said. “The United States is prepared to do whatever it can to support these efforts.”

Tuesday, Sept. 20

• The U.S. Institute of Peace released a report describing how China has achieved geo-strategic goals among Pacific nations, which it said should be a cause for concern if not alarm. “Perhaps to a greater extent than any other geographic area, the Pacific Islands offer China a low-investment, high-reward opportunity to score symbolic, strategic, and tactical victories in pursuit of its global agenda,” read the report.
• Biden called on Congress to pass the “Disclose Act,” a bill requiring political organizations involved in elections to reveal the names of big donors, to combat “dark money” in U.S. elections. “Right now, advocacy groups can run ads on issues — attacking or supporting a candidate — right until election day without disclosing who’s paying for that ad,” Biden said. “Too often powerful special interests use front groups to run these ads to win at any cost.”
• The Justice Department charged 47 people in Minnesota for an alleged scheme to steal $250 million from a federal program providing food to low-income children during the COVID-19 pandemic. FBI Director Christopher Wray said plot “amounts to the largest pandemic relief fraud scheme yet.”

Wednesday, Sept. 21

• NASA astronaut Frank Rubio joined two Russian cosmonauts in a Russian-operated flight to the International Space Station despite rising tensions between Russia and the U.S. over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
• To combat inflation, the Federal Reserve raised its key interest rate by three-quarters of a point for a third time, hitting its highest level since early 2008.
• The Senate ratified the Kigali Amendment to the international environmental treaty the Montreal Protocol. The amendment phases out the use of hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, in a move to confront the climate crisis. HFCs are used in heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration.
• The U.S. military’s Africa Command (AFRICOM) said it killed 27 al-Shabab fighters in Somalia’s central Hiran region the previous Sunday by carrying out an air strike against the fighters as they were attacking Somali military forces.
• Biden addressed the United Nations General Assembly, accusing Russia of aiming to end Ukraine’s right to exist as a nation. “The United States wants this war to end on just terms, on terms we’re all signed up for — that you cannot seize a nation’s territory by force,” he said.

Thursday, Sept. 22

• A federal appeals court lifted the hold on the Justice Department’s ability to evaluate the criminal investigation into classified records seized from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. “We conclude that the United States would suffer irreparable harm from the district court’s restrictions on its access to this narrow — and potentially critical — set of materials, as well as the court’s requirement that the United States submit the classified records to the special master for review,” the court wrote.
• Raymond Dearie, the judge appointed to vet the documents seized from Trump’s home last month, ordered Trump’s legal team to provide evidence to back up the unsubstantiated claims that some of the files were planted by the FBI.
• Biden vowed to utilize the full force of his administration’s support to help Puerto Rico recover from the devastation left in the wake of Hurricane Fiona. “We’re with you. We’re not going to walk away,” Biden said to Puerto Rican residents.
• Senate Republicans blocked the Disclose Act, the Biden-endorsed anti-dark money bill, by unilaterally failing to support it in a procedural vote that required clearing a 60-vote threshold to bring it to a final vote.
• The Treasury Department sanctioned Iran’s “morality police” for alleged abuses and violence against Iranian women and protesters after Iranians took to the streets over the recent death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who was arrested in Tehran for “unsuitable attire” and detained by the police force.

Friday, Sept. 23

• The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan arrived in South Korea ahead of joint military exercises. “This is a way of showing the strength of the alliance in the face of what the U.S. and South Korea say are these increased threats from North Korea,” said Al Jazeera journalist Rob McBride.
• The Treasury Department relaxed its sanctions on internet services in Iran to “support the free flow of information” for Iranians amid anti-government protests, a decision that the department said comes on the heels of Iranian authorities restricting internet access in the country to disrupt demonstrations and “prevent the world from watching its violent crackdown on peaceful protesters.”
• Secretary of State Blinken met with China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi to encourage open communication between the two global powers as competition and tensions persist. Yi also accused the U.S. of sending “very wrong, dangerous signals” on Taiwan and said it has “no right to interfere” in Taiwanese issues.

Saturday, Sept. 24

• No news to report.

Sunday, Sept. 25

• National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said the U.S. warned Russia that there would be “catastrophic consequences” if it used nuclear weapons in the war on Ukraine. “We have communicated to the Russians what the consequences would be,” Sullivan said, “but we’ve been careful in how we talk about this publicly, because from our perspective we want to lay down the principle that there would be catastrophic consequences, but not engage in a game of rhetorical tit for tat.”