Good morning from Santa Barbara, Calif., where we are about to kick off the 2026 Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit. When I got in yesterday afternoon, after a winding, ocean-side Uber ride up from L.A., the sun was shining. (I heard it was raining at home in NYC!) This is always one of my favorite weeks of the year—and I can already tell this year won’t disappoint.
I’ll be interviewing some fascinating leaders onstage, from Kalshi cofounder Luana Lopes Lara to recently retired WNBA star Nneka Ogwumike. You’ll be in fantastic hands here with my colleagues through the rest of the week, who will be bringing you highlights from the Summit in this newsletter.
Programming kicks off this afternoon, so it’s not too late to send your thoughts or requests. What are you dying to ask any of the speakers on this year’s roster? If you have a question for the CEOs of Lean In or Lumen; for Ruth Porat or Jane Fraser; or even for Emma Grede or Hailey Bieber, pass it along. We’ll get it into the right hands.
You can livestream our mainstage conversations starting this afternoon PT at Fortune.com. The stream will be especially jam-packed on Tuesday, or busiest day of programming. Check out the full agenda here and thanks for following along!
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
The Most Powerful Women Daily newsletter is Fortune’s daily briefing for and about the women leading the business world.
ALSO IN THE HEADLINES
About that Elon Musk documentary. Ashley St. Clair, mother to one of Musk's children, is heavily featured in the new four-hour documentary Musk. But she's reminding everyone that the only reason the film features so much of her is because "other people," bound by strict NDAs, "cannot speak." "I feel a moral obligation to talk about my experience," she says.
An SNL monologue not worth watching. Comedian Shane Gillis used his opening monologue for some less-than-insightful material. "I haven’t been to the gym in so long I didn’t know women just dress like whores now?” he said. “Look, I’m sorry, there’s no other way to describe [it.]" You can hear the crowd grown.
Violent threats against public officials are a new normal. From Sen. Elissa Slotkin's parents' home being swatted to the assassination of House speaker Melissa Hortman in Minnesota, a NYT investigation finds that at least 44 governors, 70 senators, and 185 House members have received threats.
Sydney Sweeney is back again. The sports prediction market Novig put out another ad featuring the actress (and Novig investor) over the weekend. She's still nude, holding footballs—and this time takes more pointed jabs at other prediction markets that allow "betting on wars." Novig's valuation has risen to $2 billion.
ON MY RADAR
A striking decline in openness to IVF The Atlantic
WNBA superagent Lindsay Kagawa Colas is landing groundbreaking deals for the sport's stars Bloomberg
Is your boyfriend making you ugly? Allure
PARTING WORDS
"I really want my work to spark a conversation among the audience, with the critics, with the press. I just want people to come out asking more questions than they have answers."
— Missy Mazzoli, whose opera Lincoln in the Bardo will be the first world premiere by a female composer at the Met Opera since it was founded in 1883.