The U.S. budget deficit widened to $738.6 billion in the first eight months of the fiscal year, a $206 billion jump from a year earlier. President Donald Trump has boasted that America is taking in billions of dollars through trade war tariffs (though U.S. importers are paying the levies). While government revenues did rise by 2.3%, they haven’t kept pace with a 9.3% hike in spending, and fallout from Republican tax cuts. —David E. Rovella

Here are today’s top stories

Senator Bernie Sanders derided Jamie Dimon for his critical remarks about socialism. The Democratic presidential candidate, who gave a major speech Wednesday on expanding healthcare and education rights, said he “didn’t hear” the JPMorgan CEO “criticizing socialism when Wall Street begged for the largest federal bailout in American history.”

A House panel voted to hold U.S. Attorney General William Barr and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in contempt of Congress for withholding documents on plans to add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census. Earlier Wednesday, Trump asserted executive privilege over the material.

U.S. tech shares fell as investor concerns about the trade war cooled any optimism that slowing inflation would trigger Fed rate cuts. 

A class of drugs is emerging that can attack cancer cells in the body without damaging nearby healthy ones. The medicines have the potential to replace chemotherapy and its disruptive side effects.

China is preparing to ride out Trump’s trade war while rewriting its relationship with America.

How do you save General Electric? The embattled giant has a new CEO, Bloomberg Businessweek reports, and this may be his greatest test.

What’s Sid Verma thinking about? The Bloomberg cross-asset editor is pretty optimistic. Despite the growing trade conflict and risk the Fed doesn’t cut rates this year, there’s some positive news. U.S. financial conditions are at a five-year norm, Sid says, suggesting whipsaw markets aren’t really dragging down growth. 

What you’ll need to know tomorrow

• Trump made a new threat, this time to Germany over a pipeline.
• Remember the BB&T-SunTrust merger? Meet Truist.
• The U.S. home-flipping trend may be coming to an end.
• A business-class flyer was jailed for life. Why? A fake hijack note.
• Here’s the truth about that choice gig at a wealthy family office.
• This Austrian motorcycle maker just passed Harley-Davidson.
• Netflix is unveiling video games based on its own shows.

What you’ll want to read tonight in Checkout

The Beyond Meat of Fish Is Coming

Salmon has become the guinea pig of the seas when it comes to using technology to supplement falling fish populations. Now it’s moved onto land—and into the laboratory. 

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