(Want to get this newsletter in your inbox? Here’s the sign-up.) Good evening. Here’s the latest at the end of Wednesday.1. Russian forces seized their first major city in Ukraine, stepped up attacks on civilian targets and pushed to encircle the capital, Kyiv.Kherson, a city of about 300,000 near the Black Sea, fell to Russian troops on the seventh day of Russia’s invasion. “There is no Ukrainian army here,” Kherson’s mayor said. Follow our live updates.2. A State of the Union address with a side of meat and potatoes.President Biden led his address by promising to make Russia pay for invading Ukraine. But the hourlong speech was heavy on business and the economy.His “top priority is getting prices under control,” Biden said. The global economic effects of the invasion are clouding the Fed’s clear plan to raise rates — “a nightmare scenario,” one economist told The Times — but Jerome Powell, the Fed chair, said that a rate hike was still expected.Upstaged by inflation and war, Biden barely mentioned global warming. Immigration, gun control and abortion rights also received only cursory treatment. Instead, Biden renewed his call for pieces of his failed Build Back Better plan, including expanded child care and lower prescription drug prices. Here are five takeaways.
One initiative, highlighted in the State of the Union address, will provide Americans with free antiviral pills on the spot if they test positive for the coronavirus at a pharmacy. Other initiatives would accelerate research into long Covid and into vaccines that could be delivered within 100 days of the arrival of a new variant.But much of the plan requires funding from Congress. Cost estimates range as high as $100 billion over the next year.In other Covid news, researchers tied Covid to erectile dysfunction. Studies showed that vaccine protection against moderate illness waned among adolescents after five months, and that the Pfizer vaccine was less effective in preventing infection in 5- to 11-year-olds than in older groups.
5. “I just want to see Nancy Pelosi’s head hitting every step on the way out.”Guy Wesley Reffitt spoke those words into a camera as he moved toward the Capitol, armed with a .40-caliber pistol, during the Jan. 6 riot.With this scene, prosecutors opened the first criminal trial over the riot. The government plans to show that Reffitt plotted with the Texas Three Percenters, a militia movement, to violently seize the Capitol.At the heart of the case is the accusation that Reffitt obstructed the work of Congress during the attack. It is the first time a jury will consider the legal theory, under which the government has charged hundreds of defendants.6. In the Texas primaries, Republican turnout exceeded that of Democrats, while progressives posted wins.Though some important races remained too close to call, there were several clear winners and losers in the first elections of the 2022 midterms. In South Texas, Jessica Cisneros, a 28-year-old immigration lawyer, forced Representative Henry Cuellar, a conservative Democrat who has held the seat for 17 years, into a runoff. Gov. Greg Abbott and Beto O’Rourke, the former El Paso congressman, easily won their primaries and will face off in November, with O’Rourke trying to become the first Democrat to lead Texas in more than 25 years.But Democrats have a long way to go in making Texas competitive.
7. Amid a labor dispute, Major League Baseball canceled the first two series of the season.After nearly a year of negotiating, including nine straight days of talks, the players’ union and the league failed to reach a new collective bargaining agreement. The union has been seeking higher pay for younger players earlier in their careers and increased spending that is in line with rising club revenues.9. Comically brief weight training could make you stronger.In a small-scale new study, men and women who contracted their arm muscles as hard as possible for a total of three seconds a day increased their bicep strength by as much as 12 percent after a month.They repeated this routine once a day, five times a week, for a month, for a grand total of 60 seconds of weight training. It changed their biceps in ways that were slight but biologically meaningful, especially for people new to weight training.The findings add to mounting evidence that even tiny amounts of intense exercise, like four seconds of strenuous biking or 10 seconds of all-out sprinting, can aid health.
10. And finally, trouble in paradise.Two days before Christmas, a court in St. Barts ordered construction to stop on an ultramodern hotel on a popular and fragile beach. Pitting billionaire against billionaire, the case may signal a turning point in the hyper-development of this tropical paradise for the rich.Reefs are dying and native islanders face a housing shortage as the ultrarich and developers overrun the island. But a backlash has brewed among natives and tycoons alike.With the support of some wealthy residents, a group of young people, Ouanalao’s Guardians, and an environmental organization organized an effective opposition to the development. “It was like a ‘Rocky’ story, that the locals won,” one longtime visitor said.Have a restorative evening.
Angela Jimenez compiled photos for this briefing. Your Evening Briefing is posted at 6 p.m. Eastern.Want to catch up on past briefings? You can browse them here.What did you like? What do you want to see here? Let us know at briefing@nytimes.com.Here are today’s Mini Crossword, Spelling Bee and Wordle. If you’re in the mood to play more, find all our games here.