October 17, 2026

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado remained outside Venezuela through October 16, having been turned back or blocked on at least seven attempted return trips since fleeing the country roughly nine months earlier. Venezuela's opposition leader, who has lived abroad since late 2025, was also excluded from U.S.-backed talks between Venezuela's interim government and a rival opposition faction led by Dinorah Figuera, negotiations Washington chose to run without her. Machado and running mate Edmundo Gonzalez said they would not help "design, develop or operate" talks they were not asked to shape, though she said she would not obstruct genuine progress toward freeing political prisoners and scheduling elections. U.S. officials sent mixed signals: a State Department official told Congress the U.S. would not obstruct her return, while other officials privately urged her to delay following Venezuela's June earthquakes, and President Trump said in early October that things would "turn out fine" when asked about her return. She remains under investigation in Venezuela and was left out of the country's recent amnesty law. Only 11% of the Predict Six community expected her to reach Venezuela by October 16, correctly anticipating that political and logistical obstacles would keep blocking her return.

Judge Loren AliKhan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia had not ruled on ABC's bid to block the FCC's early review of its eight station licenses by October 16, so no injunction took effect by the deadline. At an October 6 hearing, AliKhan pressed a Justice Department attorney to justify the FCC's unusual decision to review ABC's licenses years ahead of their normal renewal schedule. FCC Chair Brendan Carr had ordered the review in April, shortly after a Jimmy Kimmel on-air joke about President Trump drew Trump's public calls for Kimmel's firing. The government argued the dispute belongs in a different venue and that ABC had not shown irreparable harm, while ABC and parent company Disney argued the review amounted to retaliation for protected speech. Rather than ruling from the bench, AliKhan ordered additional written submissions, due October 9 from the government and October 14 from ABC, pushing any decision past the window this question tracked. Sixty-three percent of the Predict Six community expected the judge to block the review by October 16, but the case remained pending instead. A ruling could still follow once AliKhan has reviewed the supplemental briefing, determining whether the license review proceeds while litigation continues or is paused pending a fuller hearing on the merits.

Israel's October 8 deadline to shut Britain's consulate in East Jerusalem passed without the United Kingdom expelling any Israeli diplomats. Israel had ordered the consulate closed in retaliation for UK sanctions tied to the Gaza war; its foreign minister said the consul general and roughly 20 staff departed Israel on October 8, while a small team stayed on under a rebranded "UK Mission, Jerusalem" rather than a full shutdown. In the lead-up, Israeli media reported London had privately warned it could expel up to 27 Israeli diplomats, one for each British staffer affected, if the closure went ahead. Reuters-sourced reporting said any UK retaliation likely would not come before Israel's October 27 election, if at all, and British officials, including Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband, emphasized the mission's functions would continue in reduced form rather than describing any expulsion plan. No UK expulsion followed by October 16. The Predict Six community largely anticipated this outcome, with only a third expecting expulsions by that date, correctly reading the dispute as more likely to settle into a reduced-presence standoff than escalate into reciprocal expulsions while Israel's own election approached.

Dancing with the Stars season 35 produced a new high score on October 13's "Super Bowl Night" episode, topping Maura Higgins and Mark Ballas's week-four mark of 25 out of 30. With ESPN's Joe Buck sitting as a guest judge, the judging scale expanded to 40 points, and two couples tied for the night's top mark at 36 out of 40: Jenna Dewan and Val Chmerkovskiy, who danced a paso doble to Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance," and Ezra Frech and Daniella Karagach, who performed a salsa to Nelly's "Hot in Herre." Julia Stiles and Ezra Sosa followed close behind at 33. At the bottom of the leaderboard, Guillermo Rodriguez and Witney Carson scored 22 of 40 for their salsa to Bad Bunny's "Titi Me Pregunto," the lowest judges' total of the night, and the couple was eliminated after four consecutive weeks hovering near the bottom despite fan support. The Predict Six community was evenly split going in, with half expecting a couple to top Higgins's mark and half doubting it. The expanded 40-point scale on guest-judge nights makes such records more likely to fall, since the guest judge's marks are simply added to the three regular judges' total rather than averaged into the existing 30-point scale.

The U.S. Court of International Trade had not ruled on Section 301 forced-labor tariffs by October 16, so the duties on 60 trading partners remained in place. A three-judge panel heard oral arguments on September 30 in the consolidated In re: Section 301 Forced Labor Cases, which includes Burlap and Barrel v. United States and a 25-state challenge led by Oregon. Plaintiffs argued the administration skipped the legally required country-by-country findings that forced labor burdens U.S. commerce before imposing the duties, which took effect July 24 at 10% to 12.5% on imports from the EU and 59 other countries. A Justice Department lawyer countered that the government did not need "metaphysical certainty" on that burden before acting. The panel gave no timeline for a decision, and neither pending lawsuit paused collection of the tariffs, so importers kept paying duties that could later be refunded if the tariffs are struck down. The case relies on Section 301 trade authority rather than the emergency economic powers the Supreme Court rejected earlier in 2026, a distinction the administration is counting on to survive judicial review this time. Sixty-seven percent of the Predict Six community expected the court to strike the tariffs down by October 16; it did not, extending a now months-long wait for a ruling that could still arrive at any time.