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Category: Politics

Carney to Trump: No one tells Canadians what to do

Carney to Trump: No one tells Canadians what to do

Politico reports: Canada’s warming relationship with the EU “is a positive” process and Ottawa will not be cowed into abandoning the relationship, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Thursday. Carney’s comment came after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to slap “serious tariffs” on the EU if Canada became an associate member, an idea floated by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in her State of the Union speech on Wednesday. “This alliance is a positive process. That’s my response to the…

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Corporate cowardice: Universal is getting cold feet on releasing the new Elon Musk documentary

Corporate cowardice: Universal is getting cold feet on releasing the new Elon Musk documentary

The Hollywood Reporter reports: If Universal opts against releasing the movie, it would mark an extraordinary reversal at a moment when media companies are already under scrutiny for bowing to various forms of political pressure. Amazon backed out of releasing Artificial as it got into business with Sam Altman’s OpenAI, while ABC News and Paramount/CBS News each paid millions to settle lawsuits with the Trump administration many legal experts felt would be quickly dismissed. Universal would be required to pay…

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Follow the money: Democrats demand to know where Venezuelan oil revenue is going

Follow the money: Democrats demand to know where Venezuelan oil revenue is going

The Washington Post reports: Three Democratic senators are pressing the Trump administration for transparency on billions of dollars in oil revenue from Venezuela believed to be in a U.S. government-controlled account. In a letter obtained by The Washington Post, Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) are asking Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Secretary of State Marco Rubio for information about the status and use of this revenue, which is being disbursed from an account…

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Deep in Trump country, a revolt against corporate money could reshape political spending

Deep in Trump country, a revolt against corporate money could reshape political spending

Reuters reports: More than 15 years after the U.S. Supreme Court reshaped American politics with its Citizens United campaign finance ruling, Montana voters will decide this November whether to make their state the first in the nation to bar corporations from spending money on ​elections through a ballot initiative. It’s a test case for a novel legal strategy that sidesteps the 2010 ruling rather than challenging it head-on — and taps into growing, bipartisan anger over the pervasiveness of so-called…

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The world economy is becoming wary of the U.S.

The world economy is becoming wary of the U.S.

The New York Times reports: Global investors are balking at U.S. bonds. Talk of the dollar’s dwindling power is getting louder. Foreign governments are hauling their gold out of American vaults. Almost two years into President Trump’s second term, the world economy is increasingly looking for ways to distance itself from America. Concerns about a $40 trillion debt burden, the excessive use of sanctions to solve foreign policy problems and Mr. Trump’s penchant for pushing the limits of the rule…

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Thanks, Trump: Why Canada may become the European Union’s first ever ‘associate member’

Thanks, Trump: Why Canada may become the European Union’s first ever ‘associate member’

By Stewart Prest, University of British Columbia Can a country change continents? Canada seems set to try. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has announced an intention to seek some novel form of associate membership in the European Union. It’s no mere flight of fancy, either, as Ursula von der Leyen, president of the EU Commission, has already endorsed the idea. It’s a proposal that manages to be both absurd and eminently logical, depending on how you frame it. Geographically, Canada…

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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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