The U.S.’s national debt surpassed $40 trillion for the first time ever this week—more than double what it was a decade ago.

The record-breaking figure comes after the government reported in March that the total debt reached $39 trillion, meaning that the debt grew by $1 trillion in less than half a year. Just a few months before that, in October, that figure was $38 trillion.

And the country has reached the $40 trillion milestone earlier than experts had previously predicted; in 2023, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the total debt wouldn’t hit that figure until 2028.

The debt has been increasing for decades, but much of the current total has been accumulated over the past ten years, during the administrations of President Donald Trump and former President Joe Biden. Here’s how much the debt grew under each of their terms in the White House.

Trump’s first term

When Trump took office for his first term in January 2017, the total debt was about $19.95 trillion. When his presidency ended four years later, the debt stood at roughly $27.75 trillion, meaning that the debt rose by about $7.8 trillion under his Administration.

Biden’s term

The debt grew by about $8.4 trillion while Biden was in the White House, increasing from about $27.75 trillion when he was sworn into office in January 2021 to roughly $36 trillion by the time he finished his term in January 2025.

Trump’s second term so far

Since Trump returned to the White House for a second term in January last year, the debt has gone up by about $3.8 trillion. That means that the national debt has climbed by a total of $11.6 trillion across the two Trump Administrations—so far—a figure that comprises more than a quarter of the total amount.

Why has the debt soared?

Experts credit a significant portion of the growth in the national debt to the federal government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. According to Reuters, about one-third of the growth seen since 2017 took place during two years or so of the pandemic, when the first Trump Administration and then the Biden Administration intensified borrowing to fund the country’s pandemic response and recovery.

Both Trump’s and Biden’s fiscal policies have also contributed to—and exacerbated—the longer-standing issue of government spending exceeding tax and other revenues, which has led to the ballooning national debt. 

For instance, according to the Brookings Institute, the tax cuts that Trump signed into law during his first year in office in 2017 were expected to contribute almost $2 trillion to the deficit by 2028. And in March, the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget predicted that Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” a signature piece of his second-term agenda that also included steep tax cuts, will add $4.7 trillion to the national debt through 2035.

A woman who authorities have accused of planning to bomb the New York State Capitol building has been arrested and charged, the Justice Department announced on Thursday.

Jessica Bowie, a 35-year-old woman from Albany, New York, was arrested on Wednesday and appeared in federal court the following day to face one count of attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.

“The FBI detected and stopped an alleged plot to attack the New York State Capitol and kill elected officials,” Matt Fodor of the FBI National Security Branch said in a statement. “According to the criminal complaint, the defendant in this case swore allegiance to ISIS and wanted to follow up with additional horrific acts of terrorism. This case is yet another example of how this FBI is built to not only identify threats of terrorism quickly, but to stop their alleged plots before they are able to harm the American people.”

A criminal complaint filed in federal court on Thursday outlines the FBI’s investigation into Bowie, including how agents reviewed social media posts she had shared with “anti-American messages” and the ensuing sting operation that led them to apprehend her.

An FBI confidential source, the document details, posed as an “ISIS facilitator” and began messaging with Bowie in July about “her plans to attack the New York State Capitol building in Albany.”

Bowie visited the building several times, according to the complaint. Included in the filing and the Justice Department’s press release was an image of an individual wearing all black and holding up a phone, seemingly to take a photo. The individual’s face is not visible in the photo, but authorities identified them as Bowie; the complaint says the image shows Bowie “doing reconnaissance on July 21” on the Capitol building.

The complaint goes on to describe an in-person meeting that Bowie had with two other FBI confidential sources on Aug. 5. The meeting was filmed and recorded, and the complaint alleges that Bowie “reaffirmed her desire to bomb the New York State Capitol” during the encounter. The filing includes part of the transcript from that meeting, during which she allegedly said that she would “ideally do [the attack] on a day when the most amount of senators are there, maybe we time it where there we know there’s a meeting with the senators, try and get a good enough explosive in there to kill the senators and ideally to destroy as much of the building as possible really.” She then said that she wanted “to be able to get away and migrate,” according to the complaint.

The complaint goes on to allege that Bowie and the two FBI informants discussed what items she would need to build the bomb and how she would obtain them. She later went to a Home Depot to purchase the materials, after one of the informants gave her $200 for the items, according to the complaint. The document and the Justice Department's press release include an image of someone wearing all black at a store “collecting the various items needed to build an explosive device.” As in the other photo, the individual’s face is not visible, but authorities identified the person as Bowie.

Last week, Bowie asked the first informant if they knew anyone who could sell her a gun, the complaint alleges. On Wednesday, it says, she allegedly met with the two other informants in a car and gave them $150 to buy a firearm, one magazine, and ammunition. During that meeting, the informants also showed her “an inert explosive device that was purportedly built using the components” she bought at the Home Depot earlier in the month, and showed her “how to operate the explosive device and further detailed how to detonate the device when she was ready to carry out the attack,” according to the complaint.

When Bowie exited the car—while in possession of the gun, magazine, ammunition, and the inert explosive device—she was arrested by FBI agents, the complaint alleges.

In a statement shared on X on Thursday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul thanked the FBI and New York state police for their work apprehending the suspect.

“Earlier this year, amid a rise in political violence and threats against public officials, we took steps to strengthen security at the State Capitol and across state government,” the governor said. “While there is no immediate threat at this time, we will continue working closely with our law enforcement partners to protect New Yorkers and keep our communities safe.”

Tens of millions of State Farm customers are eligible to receive payments as part of a $5 billion dividend from the company’s Mutual Automobile Insurance, which State Farm has already begun doling out.

The dividend, first announced in February, is the largest in the company’s history. 

“This dividend is possible due to State Farm Mutual’s financial strength and a stronger than expected underwriting performance, which has been reported industry wide,” the company wrote at the time of the initial announcement. 

Here’s what to know about the dividend payments, and how to see if you’re eligible to receive one.

Who’s eligible?

More than 49 million vehicle owners across State Farm’s network are set to get dividend payments this summer, the company said. 

Customers who had a State Farm personal auto insurance policy active at any time in 2025. You do not need to be currently insured by State Farm to receive a payment. To receive a payment, customers' share of the dividend based on their premium payments and state must be $10 or more.

Qualifying customers who have an email address registered with the company will receive an email with further instructions on how to sign into a payment portal for the dividend and select the manner in which they’d prefer to be paid, the company said.

Those who are eligible but do not have a registered email with the company will automatically get a check in the mail. 

Customers can access information about their dividend payment at sfdividend.com. 

When will customers get their dividend payments?

The payments began going out on July 31. State Farm has not indicated when they will stop. 

“Millions of customers have already received their individual dividend payments, with more on the way,” State Farm announced when the payments began. 

Customers will be notified by State Farm regarding their pending payments “beginning late summer of 2026,” the company’s website states, adding that dividend payments are being sent out “in waves by state where the policy is assigned.”

Over 7.2 million checks have been mailed since payments began, with another 3.8 million set to go out this week, a State Farm spokesperson told CBS News in an email.

How much could eligible customers get paid?

The dividend payments average $100 per vehicle, according to State Farm. 

The amount an eligible customer receives will vary based on a couple of factors, however. The payment a customer gets will be based on a percentage of the premiums they paid, and that percentage ranges from 4% to 10% depending on the customer’s state.