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During these nonstop military flyovers, locals shared stories online of pets hiding under the couch, night workers losing sleep, and the roar of low-flying aircraft setting off car alarms. Some complained that the jets recalled the terror of 9/11 after the plane hit the Pentagon. “Why are we having so many jets scorching over DC?” posted New York Times reporter Lulu Garcia Navarro during the July 3 display. “Nerve-wracking. I get 250 celebrations but it feels like the apocalypse.”

By 6 p.m. Sunday, the union had already run out of the colorful pins representing each bargaining unit—all 7,000 of them—as people kept coming up to congratulate them. When members had already packed up, people were still on the convention floor, talking and trading the pins.

Since 2024, Blizzard Entertainment workers—first those working on quality assurance in Albany**,** New York, and Austin, Texas, then the team behind World of Warcraft, unionized one after another, including staff working on story development, technology, and ultra-high-profile games like Overwatch and Diablo.

Blizzard—and Microsoft, now its owner—eventually recognized some 1,900 unionized workers, striking a 2022 labor neutrality agreement with the Communications Workers of America.

New York is leading a 22-state lawsuit against the Trump administration for unlawfully expanding the “public charge” rules that restrict entry to the United States for immigrants deemed likely to make use of public benefits. A group of municipalities, led by New York City, is separately suing over the same rules.