Minnesota United vs. Queretaro FC

When: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday
Where: Allianz Field
Stream: MLS Season Pass on Apple TV
Weather: 75 degrees, party sunny, 9 mph south wind

What: The third annual Leagues Cup has all 18 teams in Mexico’s Liga MX and 18 MLS teams that qualified for the tournament based in making the 2024 MLS Cup Playoffs.

MNUFC will play three Mexican teams in “Phase One.” After Queretaro, the Loons will play Club America in Houston on Saturday and host Atletico de San Luis in St. Paul next Wednesday.

How: The four teams with the most points in both Liga MX and MLS will move on to the knockout quarterfinal round. Three points awarded for regulation wins. If it’s a draw after 90 minutes, each team receives one point and the winner of a shootout gets an additional point.

Context: The Loons are ranked 17th out of the 36 clubs in the tournament. Queretaro is 31st, America is ninth and San Luis is 23rd.

View: Minnesota should prioritize its two home games, with a daunting match against America — the reigning Liga MX champions — coming at in a muggy Houston at the weekend. Fans of the Mexican giants will certainly make that a hostile environment.

Six points in wins over Queretaro and San Luis might not be enough to get through, but trying to go for it against America will spread a smaller squat too thin and jeopardize energy levels against San Luis.

Quote: “We will, for sure, approach every game with a real seriousness,” head coach Eric Ramsay said. “I think the fact that we were able to go and win (Saturday) was really helpful in that sense because I feel like we’re able to put to one side (MLS) play, really try and take the team a step further over the course of the coming days.”

Form: MNUFC is 1-1-1 in its last three matches but is on the upswing after a 2-1 comeback win at St. Louis on Saturday. Queretaro has lost all three of its games to start the Liga MX Apertura season, with a minus-five goal differential.

Update: New this year: Each club will play three matches against opponents from the other league. This was needed because it was odd for MNUFC to play MLS teams in previous Leagues Cups.

Look-back: Loons are 2-0-1 against Liga MX since the tournament started in 2023. Minnesota beat Necaza on the back of Dayne St. Clair’s 16 saves last season; it was a Leagues Cup record. But United failed to get out of its group with a loss to Seattle. In 2023, MNUFC advanced to the next round and topped Toluca in a shootout in the round of 16 but got smoked 5-0 to Nashville in the quarterfinals.

Stats: With two penalty kicks in the win at St. Louis, striker Kelvin Yeboah has five goals in six matches across all competitions in July.

“As always, I try not to ride the highs too high and the lows too low,” Yeboah said about his surge. “I try to stay at that center in my roach to the games, and that keeps my head cool.”

Prediction: Queretaro has an added day of rest after a 2-0 loss to Pumas on Friday, but travel to the U.S., their poor start to Liga MX play and an away match in Minnesota will mean a Loons victory: 1-0.

By MATTHEW DALY, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday proposed revoking a scientific finding that has long been the central basis for U.S. action to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change.

The proposed Environmental Protection Agency rule rescinds a 2009 declaration that determined that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare.

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The “endangerment finding” is the legal underpinning of a host of climate regulations under the Clean Air Act for motor vehicles, power plants and other pollution sources that are heating the planet.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin called for a rewrite of the endangerment finding in March as part of a series of environmental rollbacks announced at the same time in what Zeldin said was “the greatest day of deregulation in American history.” A total of 31 key environmental rules on topics from clean air to clean water and climate change would be rolled back or repealed under Zeldin’s plan.

He singled out the endangerment finding as “the Holy Grail of the climate change religion” and said he was thrilled to end it “as the EPA does its part to usher in the Golden Age of American success.”

Tailpipe emission limits also targeted

The EPA also called for rescinding limits on tailpipe emissions that were designed to encourage automakers to build and sell more electric vehicles. The transportation sector is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States.

Three former EPA leaders have criticized Zeldin, saying his March proposal would endanger the lives of millions of Americans and abandon the agency’s dual mission to protect the environment and human health.

“If there’s an endangerment finding to be found anywhere, it should be found on this administration because what they’re doing is so contrary to what the Environmental Protection Agency is about,” Christine Todd Whitman, who led EPA under Republican President George W. Bush, said after Zeldin’s plan was made public.

The EPA proposal follows an executive order from Trump that directed the agency to submit a report “on the legality and continuing applicability” of the endangerment finding.

Conservatives and some congressional Republicans hailed the initial plan, calling it a way to undo economically damaging rules to regulate greenhouse gases.

But environmental groups, legal experts and Democrats said any attempt to repeal or roll back the endangerment finding would be an uphill task with slim chance of success. The finding came two years after a 2007 Supreme Court ruling holding that the EPA has authority to regulate greenhouse gases as air pollutants under the Clean Air Act.

Passing court muster could be an issue

David Doniger, a climate expert at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group, said it was virtually “impossible to think that the EPA could develop a contradictory finding (to the 2009 standard) that would stand up in court.”

Doniger and other critics accused Trump’s Republican administration of using potential repeal of the endangerment finding as a “kill shot’’ that would allow him to make all climate regulations invalid. If finalized, repeal of the endangerment finding would erase current limits on greenhouse gas pollution from cars, factories, power plants and other sources and could prevent future administrations from proposing rules to tackle climate change.

“The Endangerment Finding is the legal foundation that underpins vital protections for millions of people from the severe threats of climate change, and the Clean Car and Truck Standards are among the most important and effective protections to address the largest U.S. source of climate-causing pollution,” said Peter Zalzal, associate vice president of the Environmental Defense Fund.

“Attacking these safeguards is manifestly inconsistent with EPA’s responsibility to protect Americans’ health and well-being,” he said. “It is callous, dangerous and a breach of our government’s responsibility to protect the American people from this devastating pollution.”

Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency at https://apnews.com/hub/us-environmental-protection-agency.

By MATT OTT, AP Business Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans’ view of the U.S. economy improved this month, but Americans remain concerned about the impact of tariffs on their economic futures.

The Conference Board said Tuesday that its consumer confidence index rose two points to 97.2 in July, up from 95.2 the previous month.

The increase in confidence was in line with analysts’ forecasts.

In April, American consumers’ confidence in the economy sank to its lowest reading since May 2020, largely due to anxiety over the impact of President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

A measure of Americans’ short-term expectations for their income, business conditions and the job market rose 4.5 points to 74.4, however that’s still significantly below 80, the marker that can signal a recession ahead.

Consumers’ assessments of their current economic situation inched down by 1.5 points to 131.5.

Tariffs and the impact they could have on personal finances remains respondents’ greatest concern, the Conference Board said.

Trump’s aggressive and unpredictable policies — including massive import taxes — have clouded the outlook for the economy and the job market, raising fears that the American economy is headed toward a recession.

Consumers’ fears of a recession during the next 12 months declined slightly in July but remain elevated and above last year’s levels.

Also Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund upgraded its economic outlook for the U.S. and the world this year and next because Trump’s protectionist trade policies so far appear to be doing less damage than many expected.

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The IMF now forecasts 3% growth for the global economy this year. That’s down from 3.3% in 2024, but an improvement on its previous forecast of 2.8% growth.

Though concerns about inflation eased in July, it remains a major concern among respondents, who frequently mentioned higher prices in tandem with tariffs.

Another government report earlier this month showed that consumer prices rose last month to its highest level since February Trump’s sweeping tariffs push up the cost of everything from groceries and clothes to furniture and appliances.

Consumer prices rose 2.7% in June from a year earlier, up from an annual increase of 2.4% in May. Core prices, which exclude the volatile food and energy categories, also rose.

Economists pay close attention to core prices because they generally provide a better indication of where inflation is headed.

In the Conference Board’s survey, respondents’ views of the job market deteriorated for the seventh straight month, though the reading remains in positive territory as the U.S. labor market continues to churn out jobs.

In June, U.S. employers added a surprisingly strong 147,000 jobs and the unemployment rate ticked down unexpectedly to 4.1%.

However, those headline numbers masked some weaknesses as the U.S. economy contends with fallout from Trump’s economic policies.

The Labor Department said Tuesday that U.S. employers posted 7.4 million job vacancies last month, down from 7.7 million in May. The number of people quitting their jobs — a sign of confidence in their prospects elsewhere — dropped last month.

By PAUL WISEMAN, AP Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Employers posted 7.4 million job vacancies last month, a sign that the American job market continues to cool.

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The Labor Department reported Tuesday that job openings in June were down from 7.7 million in May and were about what forecasters had expected.

The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) showed that layoffs were little changed in June. But the number of people quitting their jobs — a sign of confidence in their prospects elsewhere — dropped last month to the lowest level since December. Hiring also fell from May.

Posting on Bluesky, Glassdoor economist Daniel Zhao wrote that the report “shows softer figures with hires and quits rates still sluggish. Not dire, not amazing, more meh.”

The U.S. job market has lost momentum this year, partly because of the lingering effects of 11 interest rate hikes by the inflation fighters at the Federal Reserve in 2022 and 2023 and partly because President Donald Trump’s trade wars have created uncertainty that is paralyzing managers making hiring decisions.

On Friday, the Labor Department will put out unemployment and hiring numbers for July. They are expected to show that the unemployment rate ticked up to a still-low 4.2% in July from 4.1% in June. Businesses, government agencies and nonprofits are expected to have added 115,000 jobs in July, down from 147,000 in June, according to a survey of economists by the data firm FactSet.

The seemingly decent June hiring numbers were weaker than they appeared. Private payrolls rose just 74,000 in June, fewest since last October when hurricanes disrupted job sites. And state and local governments added nearly 64,000 education jobs in June – a total that economists suspect was inflated by seasonal quirks around the end of the school year.

So far this year, the economy has been generating 130,000 jobs a month, down from 168,000 last year and an average 400,000 a month from 2021 through 2023 during the recovery from COVID-19 lockdowns.

Employers are less likely to hire, but they’re also not letting workers go either. Layoffs remain below pre-pandemic levels.