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Category: Politics

The broad coalition warning about the threats from AI

The broad coalition warning about the threats from AI

Toluse Olorunnipa writes: If there was any question over whether the concept of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” is still operative in Washington’s hyper-partisan political environment, the answer may be found in the budding coalition of progressives and MAGA-friendly activists who have united in recent days to speak out against artificial intelligence. Which is how Senator Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon found themselves speaking on the same stage today. With warnings that the technology could cause mass…

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Trump escalates his war on federal data

Trump escalates his war on federal data

Axios reports: The nerdy, traditionally apolitical world of federal data is increasingly getting swept up in the Trump administration’s push to control every level of government. Across the federal government, agencies are changing how they collect and publicize information. More and more, politics and ideology are part of the equation. Why it matters: Reliable, unbiased data informs nearly everything the federal government does — from distributing benefits and enforcing workplace discrimination laws to responding to public health threats. Driving the news: The administration’s moves…

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Saudi Arabia faces ‘worst-case scenario’ after being rebuffed by Trump

Saudi Arabia faces ‘worst-case scenario’ after being rebuffed by Trump

The New York Times reports: Saudi Arabia has increasingly found itself caught in the middle of the war between the United States and Iran. Now, the kingdom’s leadership is assessing dwindling options on how to respond. In recent weeks, the Iran-allied Houthi militia in Yemen has repeatedly attacked the kingdom, threatening to throttle its ability to export oil and piling pressure on the global economy. But Saudi Arabia has been left frustrated and disappointed by President Trump’s reluctance to confront…

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Photos show U.S. positions damaged by Iranian attacks: ‘We’re just watching them get destroyed’

Photos show U.S. positions damaged by Iranian attacks: ‘We’re just watching them get destroyed’

CBS News reports: New photos obtained exclusively by CBS News reveal for the first time the widespread damage and destruction of buildings and vehicles at multiple U.S. positions across the Middle East, as a result of Iranian missile and drone attacks. The images were sent to CBS News by active service members on condition of anonymity because of rigid media restrictions within the military. “This is major damage to our bases that hasn’t been communicated to the American public,” one…

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The U.S. just admitted it has weapons in space. Why that’s a big deal

The U.S. just admitted it has weapons in space. Why that’s a big deal

Jeffrey Kluger writes: On Sept. 14, Air Force Secretary Troy Meink said the quiet part out loud. Speaking at the Air, Space, and Cyber Conference in National Harbor, Md., Meink openly conceded something U.S. policymakers have been avoiding acknowledging for years—that the American military intends to weaponize space, and indeed, that it already has hostile hardware in Earth orbit. “We are increasing readiness against existing threats,” Meink said. “[T]he United States has on orbit space control weapons capable of defending…

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Trump’s effort to assert control over elections continues, despite court loss

Trump’s effort to assert control over elections continues, despite court loss

The New York Times reports: The Supreme Court on Monday dealt President Trump a major blow when it blocked his executive order to restrict mail ballots. But Mr. Trump’s battle to assert control over the election process is far from finished. The stymied attempt to have the U.S. Postal Service screen mail ballots was just one piece of a broader effort involving the full power of the federal government to take more control of state-run elections. Just days before the…

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Papa Johns, propaganda and Putin: How a MAGA influencer with ties to Russia became Trump’s Arctic adviser

Papa Johns, propaganda and Putin: How a MAGA influencer with ties to Russia became Trump’s Arctic adviser

By Heather Vogell This story was originally published by ProPublica For more than 40 years, the U.S. Arctic Research Commission has advised Congress and the president on what to study in the frigid and dynamic far north, from the environment to military security. It’s typically done so without making waves, led by people well-versed in science and public policy. That was until December, when President Donald Trump appointed a Texas venture capitalist and MAGA influencer with no formal background in…

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Supreme Court blocks Trump mail-in ballot plan

Supreme Court blocks Trump mail-in ballot plan

Politico reports: The Supreme Court has rejected the Trump administration’s attempt to enforce new mail-in ballot delivery rules that threatened to severely disrupt the looming midterm elections. In a ruling Monday, the justices left in place a lower-court decision that blocked the Postal Service from implementing the new requirements in the coming weeks due to the potential that millions of voters could be disenfranchised by not having their ballots delivered. Most of the high court’s majority did not offer a…

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Whistle-blower: Federal agents may have broken state laws in search for voter fraud

Whistle-blower: Federal agents may have broken state laws in search for voter fraud

The New York Times reports: Investigators may have broken state laws under the direction of top Homeland Security leaders by posing as voters as part of an expansive effort to find noncitizens on the nation’s voter rolls, according to a federal whistle-blower’s account released on Monday. The authorities also required agents to meet quotas, which afforded them a mere 12 minutes to review each voter record. The effort has relied on questionable data, and has likely improperly flagged U.S. citizens…

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As fears of AI catastrophe magnify, Washington stirs, but mostly slumbers

As fears of AI catastrophe magnify, Washington stirs, but mostly slumbers

The New York Times reports: Trump’s blasé attitude about existential A.I. fears influences both his administration and the Republican Party he still tightly controls. At a conference in Washington last week, government officials and corporate executives talked about the promises of A.I. — for everything from next-generation military operations to espionage to cybersecurity in critical infrastructure — during nearly every panel. While the risks of A.I. wielded by adversaries were mentioned at times, what was little discussed was the need…

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Corporate tax payments plunge as AI feasts on new incentives

Corporate tax payments plunge as AI feasts on new incentives

Politico reports: Corporate tax payments are plummeting even as profits soar. A big reason: all that AI spending. The tech world is pouring oceans of money into chips, data centers, power supplies and other components of the artificial intelligence infrastructure. And that’s eligible for generous tax breaks on investments Republicans included in their 2025 tax cuts. The tax incentives weren’t designed with AI in mind specifically — they’re available for all kinds of business investments. But it’s the tech industry…

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Donald Trump Jr.’s Bahamas wedding was secretly bankrolled by Russian oligarch close to Putin

Donald Trump Jr.’s Bahamas wedding was secretly bankrolled by Russian oligarch close to Putin

By Justin Elliott, Brett Murphy, Joshua Kaplan and Alex Mierjeski This story was originally published by ProPublica On May 24, Donald Trump Jr. was celebrating in the Bahamas, as scantily clad dancers in stilettos and sailor caps performed for him and his guests. It was the last night of his wedding, a lavish, three-day party held across a pair of ultra-exclusive private islands. A five-tier funfetti cake had been airlifted in from Florida, and helicopters and seaplanes descended on the…

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MAGA is making the world safe for corruption

MAGA is making the world safe for corruption

Anne Applebaum writes: In the summer of 2025, the government of Brazil suddenly found itself in a deep crisis. The Trump administration had unexpectedly imposed 50 percent tariffs on the country’s products, threatening everyone from coffee planters to shoe manufacturers. At the same time, the United States canceled the visas of eight Brazilian supreme-court justices and placed unprecedented financial and travel sanctions on a powerful justice and his family. Many things about this crisis were novel. For the first time…

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EPA expected to remove limits on climate pollution from power plants

EPA expected to remove limits on climate pollution from power plants

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration plans to announce Monday that the United States will no longer limit the planet-warming pollution that power plants pump into the air while burning coal and gas, according to two people familiar with the proposal. The shift by the Environmental Protection Agency would complete the administration’s erasure of the most consequential climate policies of Presidents Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Barack Obama. If the move survives expected legal challenges, it could also…

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Saudi pipeline outage threatens loss of 4% of global oil supply

Saudi pipeline outage threatens loss of 4% of global oil supply

Reuters reports: Saudi Arabia will run out of oil stocks for exports ‌if it doesn’t restart its major pipeline to the Red Sea within days, leading to a loss of up to 4% of global supply, Saudi oil buyers and traders said. A further decline in Saudi flows will worsen the global supply crunch, which has already pushed global fuel prices to record highs, spurred ​inflation around the world and sent U.S. bond yields to the highest levels since the…

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As hostilities flare and oil prices spike, U.S. consumers pay at the pump

As hostilities flare and oil prices spike, U.S. consumers pay at the pump

By Marianne Lavelle September 8, 2026 This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here. Hours after President Donald Trump predicted on Truth Social that oil prices would fall precipitously once the United States wins its war with Iran, strikes on Saudi Arabia’s oil infrastructure by Iranian-backed Houthis Tuesday caused global oil prices to spike to nearly $100 per barrel. The latest runup,…

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