America in Brief

Trump hosts peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan, U.S. freezes UCLA funding, and NASA crew returns to earth after five months in space.

U.S. President Donald Trump (C) joins hands with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev (L) and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan (R) during a signing ceremony in the State Dining Room of the White House on Aug. 8, 2025. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Trump Hosts Peace Agreement Between Armenia and Azerbaijan

U.S. President Donald Trump hosted the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan at the White House on Aug. 8, who signed a peace deal, marking a potential end to 35 years of conflict between the two nations.

The two agreed to establish the “Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity,” a 20-mile transit corridor between the two countries that will facilitate trade and energy exports, and connect them with the rest of the region, while giving the United States exclusive rights to the area.

The two countries have been in conflict with each other since the late 1980s.

A student walks toward Royce Hall on the campus of the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) on March 11, 2020. Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images

US Freezes Funding for Los Angeles University

The U.S. government has frozen $584 million worth in funding to the University of California–Los Angeles (UCLA) in the federal government’s latest move to rein in educational institutions over discrimination allegations.

On July 29, the Department of Justice accused UCLA of violating the Civil Rights Act over the way it handled pro-Palestinian protests in 2024 after the Hamas terrorist group’s attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and Israel’s response.

The DOJ said UCLA was “acting with deliberate indifference in creating a hostile educational environment for Jewish and Israeli students.”

Work progresses on a new detention facility dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz," at Dade-Collier Training and Transition facility in the Florida Everglades in Ochopee, Fla., on July 4, 2025. Rebecca Blackwell /AP Photo

Judge Blocks Construction of Florida’s  ‘Alligator Alcatraz’

A federal judge ordered a pause on further construction efforts of Florida’s illegal immigrant detention center, dubbed Alligator Alcatraz, on Aug. 7, following a lawsuit by an activist conservationist organization.

Friends of the Everglades had argued that not enough information was being provided to the public, and that the planning had not been through an environmental review as required by federal law.

Florida and federal defendants argue that the center was funded using state money; therefore, it didn’t require a review.

Alligator Alcatraz has been operating as a detention center for illegal immigrants since July 1, to facilitate deportations from the United States.

The SpaceX Crew Dragon Endurance spacecraft is seen as it lands with NASA astronauts in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego, on Aug. 9, 2025. NASA/Keegan Barber

NASA, SpaceX Crew Returns to Earth After Nearly 5 Months in Space

NASA’s SpaceX Crew-10 Mission ended as astronauts splashed into the Pacific Ocean at 11:33 a.m. EDT on Aug. 9—after 146 days in space.

NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov left Earth on March 14, and spent nearly five months at the International Space Station in the agency’s 10th commercial crew rotation mission.

The team travelled nearly 62,795,205 million miles and circled the Earth 2,368 times, according to NASA.