trump administration

us-officially-out-of-who,-leaving-hundreds-of-millions-of-dollars-unpaid

US officially out of WHO, leaving hundreds of millions of dollars unpaid

health, trump administration, WHO, World Health Organization / /

“The United States will not be making any payments to the WHO before our withdrawal on January 22, 2026,” the spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “The cost [borne] by the US taxpayer and US economy after the WHO’s failure during the COVID pandemic—and since—has been too high as it is. We will ensure that no more US funds are routed to this organization.”

In addition, the US had also promised to provide $490 million in voluntary contributions for those two years. The funding would have gone toward efforts such as the WHO’s health emergency program, tuberculosis control, and the polio eradication effort, Stat reports. Two anonymous sources told Stat that some of that money was paid, but they couldn’t provide an estimate of how much.

The loss of both past and future financial support from the US has been a hefty blow to the WHO. Immediately upon notification last January, the WHO began cutting costs. Those included freezing recruitment, restricting travel expenditures, making all meetings virtual, limiting IT equipment updates, and suspending office refurbishment. The agency also began cutting staff and leaving positions unfilled. According to Stat, the WHO staff is on track to be down 22 percent by the middle of this year.

In a recent press conference, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the US withdrawal is a “lose-lose situation” for the US and the rest of the world. The US will lose access to infectious disease intelligence and sway over outbreak responses, and global health security will be weakened overall. “I hope they will reconsider,” Tedros said.

US officially out of WHO, leaving hundreds of millions of dollars unpaid Read More »

fbi-fights-leaks-by-seizing-washington-post-reporter’s-phone,-laptops,-and-watch

FBI fights leaks by seizing Washington Post reporter’s phone, laptops, and watch

Policy, press freedom, trump administration, Washington Post / /

“Extraordinary, aggressive action”

FBI searches home and devices of reporter who has over 1,100 government contacts.

The Washington Post building on August 6, 2013 in Washington, DC, Credit: Getty Images | Saul Loeb

The FBI searched a Washington Post reporter’s home and seized her work and personal devices as part of an investigation into what Attorney General Pam Bondi called “illegally leaked information from a Pentagon contractor.”

Executing a search warrant at the Virginia home of reporter Hannah Natanson on Wednesday morning, FBI “agents searched her home and her devices, seizing her phone, two laptops and a Garmin watch,” The Washington Post reported. “One of the laptops was her personal computer, the other a Washington Post-issued laptop. Investigators told Natanson that she is not the focus of the probe.”

Natanson regularly uses encrypted Signal chats to communicate with people who work or used to work in government, and has said her list of contacts exceeds 1,100 current and former government employees. The Post itself “received a subpoena Wednesday morning seeking information related to the same government contractor,” the report said.

Post Executive Editor Matt Murray sent an email to staff saying that early in the morning, “FBI agents showed up unannounced at the doorstep of our colleague Hannah Natanson, searched her home, and proceeded to seize her electronic devices.” Murray’s email called the search an “extraordinary, aggressive action” that is “deeply concerning and raises profound questions and concern around the constitutional protections for our work.”

The New York Times wrote that it “is exceedingly rare, even in investigations of classified disclosures, for federal agents to conduct searches at a reporter’s home. Typically, such investigations are done by examining a reporter’s phone records or email data.”

The search warrant said the probe’s target is “Aurelio Perez-Lugones, a system administrator in Maryland who has a top-secret security clearance and has been accused of accessing and taking home classified intelligence reports that were found in his lunchbox and his basement,” the Post article said.

“Alarming escalation” in Trump “war on press freedom”

Bondi confirmed the search in an X post. “This past week, at the request of the Department of War, the Department of Justice and FBI executed a search warrant at the home of a Washington Post journalist who was obtaining and reporting classified and illegally leaked information from a Pentagon contractor. The leaker is currently behind bars,” Bondi wrote.

Bondi said the Trump administration “will not tolerate illegal leaks of classified information” that “pose a grave risk to our Nation’s national security and the brave men and women who are serving our country.”

Searches targeting journalists require “intense scrutiny” because they “can deter and impede reporting that is vital to our democracy,” said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. “Attorney General Bondi has weakened guidelines that were intended to protect the freedom of the press, but there are still important legal limits, including constitutional ones, on the government’s authority to use subpoenas, court orders, and search warrants to obtain information from journalists. The Justice Department should explain publicly why it believes this search was necessary and legally permissible, and Congress and the courts should scrutinize that explanation carefully.”

Seth Stern, chief of advocacy at Freedom of the Press Foundation, called the search “an alarming escalation in the Trump administration’s multipronged war on press freedom. The Department of Justice (and the judge who approved this outrageous warrant) is either ignoring or distorting the Privacy Protection Act, which bars law enforcement from raiding newsrooms and reporters to search for evidence of alleged crimes by others, with very few inapplicable exceptions.”

In April 2025, the Trump administration rescinded a Biden-era policy that limited searches and subpoenas of reporters in leak investigations. But even the weaker Trump administration guidelines “make clear that it’s a last resort for rare emergencies only,” according to Stern. “The administration may now be in possession of volumes of journalist communications having nothing to do with any pending investigation and, if investigators are able to access them, we have zero faith that they will respect journalist-source confidentiality.”

The Washington Post didn’t say whether Perez-Lugones provided information to Natanson and pointed out that the criminal complaint against him “does not accuse him of leaking classified information he is alleged to have taken.”

Post reporter has over 1,100 government contacts

Natanson does have many sources in the federal workforce. She wrote a first-person account last month of her experience as the news organization’s “federal government whisperer.” Around the time Trump’s second term began, she posted a message on a Reddit community for federal employees saying she wanted to “speak with anyone willing to chat.”

Natanson got dozens of messages by the next day and would eventually compile “1,169 contacts on Signal, all current or former federal employees who decided to trust me with their stories,” she wrote. Natanson explained that she was previously an education reporter but the paper “created a beat for me covering Trump’s transformation of government, and fielding Signal tips became nearly my whole working life.”

In another case this month, the House Oversight Committee voted to subpoena journalist Seth Harp for allegedly “doxxing” a Delta Force commander involved in the operation in Venezuela that captured President Nicolás Maduro. Harp called the doxxing allegation “ludicrous” because he had posted publicly available information, specifically an online bio of a man “whose identity is not classified.”

“There is zero question that Harp’s actions were fully and squarely within the protections of the First Amendment, as well as outside the scope of any federal criminal statutes,” over 20 press freedom and First Amendment organizations said in a letter to lawmakers yesterday.

The Trump administration’s aggressive stance toward the media has also included numerous threats from Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr to investigate and punish broadcasters for “news distortion.”

As for Perez-Lugones, he was charged last week with unlawful retention of national defense information in US District Court for the District of Maryland. Perez-Lugones was a member of the US Navy from 1982 to 2002, said an affidavit from FBI Special Agent Keith Starr. He has been a government contractor since 2002 and held top-secret security clearances during his Naval career and again in his more recent work as a contractor.

“Currently, Perez-Lugones works as a systems engineer and information technology specialist for a Government contracting company whose primary customer is a Government agency,” the affidavit said. He had “heightened access to classified systems, networks, databases, and repositories” so that he could “maintain, support, and optimize various computer systems, networks, and software.”

Documents found in man’s car and house, FBI says

The affidavit said that “Perez-Lugones navigated to and searched databases or repositories containing classified information without authorization.” The FBI alleges that on October 28, 2025, he took screenshots of a classified intelligence report on a foreign country, pasted the screenshots into a Microsoft Word document, and printed the Word document.

His employer is able to retrieve records of printing activity on classified systems, and “a review of Perez-Lugones’ printing activity on that dates [sic] showed that he had printed innocuous sounding documents (i.e., Microsoft Word‐Document 1) that really contained classified and sensitive reports,” the affidavit said.

Perez-Lugones allegedly went on to access and view a “classified intelligence report related to Government operational activity” on January 5, 2026. On January 7, he was observed at his workplace taking notes on a yellow notepad while looking back and forth between the notepad and a computer that was logged into the classified system, the affidavit said.

Investigators executed search warrants on his home in Laurel, Maryland, and his vehicle on January 8. They found a document marked as SECRET in a lunchbox in his car and another secret document in his basement, the affidavit said.

Prior video surveillance showed Perez-Lugones at his cubicle looking at the document that was later found in the lunchbox, the affidavit said. Investigators determined that he “remov[ed] the classification header/footer markings from this document prior to leaving his workplace.”

The US law that Perez-Lugones was charged with violating provides for fines or prison sentences of up to 10 years. A magistrate judge ruled that Perez-Lugones could be released, but that decision is being reviewed by the court at the request of the US government.

Photo of Jon Brodkin

Jon is a Senior IT Reporter for Ars Technica. He covers the telecom industry, Federal Communications Commission rulemakings, broadband consumer affairs, court cases, and government regulation of the tech industry.

FBI fights leaks by seizing Washington Post reporter’s phone, laptops, and watch Read More »

bursting-ai-bubble-may-be-eu’s-“secret-weapon”-in-clash-with-trump,-expert-says

Bursting AI bubble may be EU’s “secret weapon” in clash with Trump, expert says

Accenture, AI, Digital Services Act, Donald Trump, elon musk, European Commission, Mistral, Policy, Spotify, trump administration, X / /

Spotify and Accenture caught in crossfire as Trump attacks EU tech regulations.

The US threatened to restrict some of the largest service providers in the European Union as retaliation for EU tech regulations and investigations are increasingly drawing Donald Trump’s ire.

On Tuesday, the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) issued a warning on X, naming Spotify, Accenture, Amadeus, Mistral, Publicis, and DHL among nine firms suddenly yanked into the middle of the US-EU tech fight.

“The European Union and certain EU Member States have persisted in a continuing course of discriminatory and harassing lawsuits, taxes, fines, and directives against US service providers,” USTR’s post said.

The clash comes after Elon Musk’s X became the first tech company fined for violating the EU’s Digital Services Act, which is widely considered among the world’s strictest tech regulations. Trump was not appeased by the European Commission (EC) noting that X was not ordered to pay the maximum possible fine. Instead, the $140 million fine sparked backlash within the Trump administration, including from Vice President JD Vance, who slammed the fine as “censorship” of X and its users.

Asked for comment on the USTR’s post, an EC spokesperson told Ars that the EU intends to defend its tech regulations while implementing commitments from a Trump trade deal that the EU struck in August.

“The EU is an open and rules-based market, where companies from all over the world do business successfully and profitably,” the EC’s spokesperson said. “As we have made clear many times, our rules apply equally and fairly to all companies operating in the EU,” ensuring “a safe, fair and level playing field in the EU, in line with the expectations of our citizens. We will continue to enforce our rules fairly, and without discrimination.”

Trump on shaky ground due to “AI bubble”

On X, the USTR account suggested that the EU was overlooking that US companies “provide substantial free services to EU citizens and reliable enterprise services to EU companies,” while supporting “millions of jobs and more than $100 billion in direct investment in Europe.”

To stop what Trump views as “overseas extortion” of American tech companies, the USTR said the US was prepared to go after EU service providers, which “have been able to operate freely in the United States for decades, benefitting from access to our market and consumers on a level playing field.”

“If the EU and EU Member States insist on continuing to restrict, limit, and deter the competitiveness of US service providers through discriminatory means, the United States will have no choice but to begin using every tool at its disposal to counter these unreasonable measures,” USTR’s post said. “Should responsive measures be necessary, US law permits the assessment of fees or restrictions on foreign services, among other actions.”

The pushback comes after the Trump administration released a November national security report that questioned how long the EU could remain a “reliable” ally as overregulation of its tech industry could hobble both its economy and military strength. Claiming that the EU was only “doubling down” on such regulations, the EU “will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less,” the report predicted.

“We want Europe to remain European, to regain its civilizational self-confidence, and to abandon its failed focus on regulatory suffocation,” the report said.

However, the report acknowledged that “Europe remains strategically and culturally vital to the United States.”

“Transatlantic trade remains one of the pillars of the global economy and of American prosperity,” the report said. “European sectors from manufacturing to technology to energy remain among the world’s most robust. Europe is home to cutting-edge scientific research and world-leading cultural institutions. Not only can we not afford to write Europe off—doing so would be self-defeating for what this strategy aims to achieve.”

At least one expert in the EU has suggested that the EU can use this acknowledgement as leverage, while perhaps even using the looming threat of the supposed American “AI bubble” bursting to pressure Trump into backing off EU tech laws.

In an op-ed for The Guardian, Johnny Ryan, the director of Enforce, a unit of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, suggested that the EU could even throw Trump’s presidency into “crisis” by taking bold steps that Trump may not see coming.

EU can take steps to burst “AI bubble”

According to Ryan, the national security report made clear that the EU must fight the US or else “perish.” However, the EU has two “strong cards” to play if it wants to win the fight, he suggested.

Right now, market analysts are fretting about an “AI bubble,” with US investment in AI far outpacing potential gains until perhaps 2030. A Harvard University business professor focused on helping businesses implement cutting-edge technology like generative AI, Andy Wu, recently explained that AI’s big problem is that “everyone can imagine how useful the technology will be, but no one has figured out yet how to make money.”

“If the market can keep the faith to persist, it buys the necessary time for the technology to mature, for the costs to come down, and for companies to figure out the business model,” Wu said. But US “companies can end up underwater if AI grows fast but less rapidly than they hope for,” he suggested.

During this moment, Ryan wrote, it’s not just AI firms with skin in the game, but potentially all of Trump’s supporters. The US is currently on “shaky economic ground” with AI investment accounting “for virtually all (92 percent) GDP growth in the first half of this year.”

“The US’s bet on AI is now so gigantic that every MAGA voter’s pension is bound to the bubble’s precarious survival,” Ryan said.

Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, could exploit this apparent weakness first by messing with one of the biggest players in America’s AI industry, Nvidia, then by ramping up enforcement of the tech laws Trump loathes.

According to Ryan, “Dutch company ASML commands a global monopoly on the microchip-etching machines that use light to carve patterns on silicon,” and Nvidia needs those machines if it wants to remain the world’s most valuable company. Should the US GDP remain reliant on AI investment for growth, von der Leyen could use export curbs on that technology like a “lever,” Ryan said, controlling “whether and by how much the US economy expands or contracts.”

Withholding those machines “would be difficult for Europe” and “extremely painful for the Dutch economy,” Ryan noted, but “it would be far more painful for Trump.”

Another step the EU could take is even “easier,” Ryan suggested. It could go even harder on the enforcement of tech regulations based on evidence of mismanaged data surfaced in lawsuits against giants like Google and Meta. For example, it seems clear that Meta may have violated the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), after the Facebook owner was “unable to tell a US court that what its internal systems do with your data, or who can access it, or for what purpose.”

“This data free-for-all lets big tech companies train their AI models on masses of everyone’s data, but it is illegal in Europe, where companies are required to carefully control and account for how they use personal data,” Ryan wrote. “All Brussels has to do is crack down on Ireland, which for years has been a wild west of lax data enforcement, and the repercussions will be felt far beyond.”

Taking that step would also arguably make it harder for tech companies to secure AI investments, since firms would have to disclose that their “AI tools are barred from accessing Europe’s valuable markets,” Ryan said.

Calling the reaction to the X fine “extreme,” Ryan pushed for von der Leyen to advance on both fronts, forecasting that “the AI bubble would be unlikely to survive this double shock” and likely neither could Trump’s approval ratings. There’s also a possibility that tech firms could pressure Trump to back down if coping with any increased enforcement threatens AI progress.

Although Wu suggested that Big Tech firms like Google and Meta would likely be “insulated” from the AI bubble bursting, Google CEO Sundar Pichai doesn’t seem so sure. In November, Pichai told the BBC that if AI investments didn’t pay off quickly enough, he thinks “no company is going to be immune, including us.”

Photo of Ashley Belanger

Ashley is a senior policy reporter for Ars Technica, dedicated to tracking social impacts of emerging policies and new technologies. She is a Chicago-based journalist with 20 years of experience.

Bursting AI bubble may be EU’s “secret weapon” in clash with Trump, expert says Read More »

trump’s-ucla-deal:-pay-us-$1b+,-and-we-can-still-cut-your-grants-again

Trump’s UCLA deal: Pay us $1B+, and we can still cut your grants again

Policy, science funding, trump administration, UCLA, universities / /

On Friday, the California Supreme Court ordered the University of California system to release the details of a proposed deal from the federal government that would restore research grants that were suspended by the Trump administration. The proposed deal, first issued in August, had remained confidential as a suit filed by faculty at UCLA made its way through appeals. With California’s top court now weighing in, the university administrators have released the document, still marked “draft” and “confidential attorney work product.”

Most of the demands will seem unsurprising to those familiar with the Trump administration’s interest: an end to all diversity programs and those supporting transgender individuals, plus a sharp crackdown on campus protests. The eye-opening portion comes at the price tag of nearly $1.2 billion paid out, with UCLA covering all the costs of compliance. And, as written, the deal wouldn’t stop the Trump administration from cutting the grants for other reasons or imposing more intrusive regulations, such as those mentioned in its university compact.

Familiar concerns

In many ways, the proposed deal is much more focused than the odd list of demands the administration sent Harvard University earlier this year, in that it targets issues that the administration has focused on repeatedly. These include an end to all diversity programs at both the faculty and student levels. It demands that UCLA agree to “remove explicit or implicit goals for compositional diversity based on race, sex, or ethnicity, including eliminating any secretive or proxy-based ‘diversity’ hiring processes.”

Foreign students are also targeted, with UCLA being told to set up a program to ensure that no “foreign students likely to engage in anti-Western, anti-American, or antisemitic disruptions or harassment” are admitted. “UCLA will also develop training materials to socialize international students to the norms of a campus dedicated to free inquiry and open debate.” The hospital associated with the university would also be forbidden from engaging in any gender-affirming care, and UCLA would not only prohibit transgender athletes but also strip any prior ones of any achievements.

Trump’s UCLA deal: Pay us $1B+, and we can still cut your grants again Read More »

trump-eyes-government-control-of-quantum-computing-firms-with-intel-like-deals

Trump eyes government control of quantum computing firms with Intel-like deals

chips funding, Policy, quantum computing, trump administration / /

Donald Trump is eyeing taking equity stakes in quantum computing firms in exchange for federal funding, The Wall Street Journal reported.

At least five companies are weighing whether allowing the government to become a shareholder would be worth it to snag funding that the Trump administration has “earmarked for promising technology companies,” sources familiar with the potential deals told the WSJ.

IonQ, Rigetti Computing, and D-Wave Quantum are currently in talks with the government over potential funding agreements, with minimum awards of $10 million each, some sources said. Quantum Computing Inc. and Atom Computing are reportedly “considering similar arrangements,” as are other companies in the sector, which is viewed as critical for scientific advancements and next-generation technologies.

No deals have been completed yet, sources said, and terms could change as quantum-computing firms weigh the potential risks of government influence over their operations.

Quantum-computing exec called deals “exciting”

In August, Intel agreed to give the US a 10 percent stake in the company, then admitted to shareholders that “it is difficult to foresee all the potential consequences” of the unusual arrangement. If the deal goes through, the US would become Intel’s largest shareholder, the WSJ noted, potentially influencing major decisions that could prompt layoffs or restrict business in certain foreign markets.

“Among other things, there could be adverse reactions, immediately or over time, from investors, employees, customers, suppliers, other business or commercial partners, foreign governments, or competitors,” Intel wrote in a securities filing. “There may also be litigation related to the transaction or otherwise and increased public or political scrutiny with respect to the Company.”

But quantum computing companies that are closest to entering deals appear optimistic about possible government involvement.

Quantum Computing Inc. chief executive Yuping Huang told the WSJ that “the government’s potential equity stakes in companies in the industry are exciting.” The funding could be one of “the first significant signs of support for the sector from Washington,” the WSJ noted, potentially paving the way for breakthroughs such as Google’s recent demonstration of a quantum algorithm running 13,000 times faster than a supercomputer.

Trump eyes government control of quantum computing firms with Intel-like deals Read More »

trump-admin-pressured-facebook-into-removing-ice-tracking-group

Trump admin pressured Facebook into removing ICE-tracking group

facebook, ice, Policy, trump administration / /

Trump slammed Biden for social media “censorship”

Trump and Republicans repeatedly criticized the Biden administration for pressuring social media companies into removing content. In a day-one executive order declaring an end to “federal censorship,” Trump said, “the previous administration trampled free speech rights by censoring Americans’ speech on online platforms, often by exerting substantial coercive pressure on third parties, such as social media companies, to moderate, deplatform, or otherwise suppress speech that the Federal Government did not approve.”

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) last week held a hearing on his allegation that under Biden, the US government “infringed on the First Amendment by pressuring social media companies to censor Americans that held views different than the Biden administration.” Cruz called the tactic of pressuring social media companies part of the “left-wing playbook,” and said he wants Congress to pass a law “to stop government jawboning and safeguard every American’s right to free speech.”

Shortly before Trump’s January 2025 inauguration, Meta announced it would end the third-party fact-checking program it had introduced in 2016. “Governments and legacy media have pushed to censor more and more. A lot of this is clearly political,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said at the time. Zuckerberg called the election “a cultural tipping point toward once again prioritizing speech.”

In addition to pressuring Facebook, the Trump administration demanded that Apple remove the ICEBlock app from its App Store. Apple responded by removing the app, which let iPhone users report the locations of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. Google removed similar Android apps from the Play Store.

Chicago is a primary target of Trump’s immigration crackdown. The Department of Homeland Security says it launched Operation Midway Blitz in early September to find “criminal illegal aliens who flocked to Chicago and Illinois seeking protection under the sanctuary policies of Governor Pritzker.”

People seeking to avoid ICE officers have used technology to obtain crowdsourced information on the location of agents. While crowdsourced information can vary widely in accuracy, a group called the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant & Refugee Rights says it works to verify reports of ICE sightings and sends text alerts to local residents only when ICE activity is verified.

Last month, an ICE agent shot and killed a man named Silverio Villegas Gonzalez in a Chicago suburb. The Department of Homeland Security alleged that Villegas Gonzalez was “a criminal illegal alien with a history of reckless driving,” and that he “drove his car at law enforcement officers.” The Chicago Tribune said it “found no criminal history for Villegas Gonzalez, who had been living in the Chicago area for the past 18 years.”

Trump admin pressured Facebook into removing ICE-tracking group Read More »

taiwan-pressured-to-move-50%-of-chip-production-to-us-or-lose-protection

Taiwan pressured to move 50% of chip production to US or lose protection

Donald Trump, Howard Lutnick, Policy, semiconductors, Taiwan, trump administration, trump tariffs, TSMC, us-china trade war / /

The Trump administration is pressuring Taiwan to rapidly move 50 percent of its chip production into the US if it wants ensured protection against a threatened Chinese invasion, US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told NewsNation this weekend.

In the interview, Lutnick noted that Taiwan currently makes about 95 percent of chips used in smartphones and cars, as well as in critical military defense technology. It’s bad for the US, Lutnick said, that “95 percent of our chips are made 9,000 miles away,” while China is not being “shy” about threats to “take” Taiwan.

Were the US to lose access to Taiwan’s supply chain, the US could be defenseless as its economy takes a hit, Lutnick alleged, asking, “How are you going to get the chips here to make your drones, to make your equipment?”

“The model is: if you can’t make your own chips, how can you defend yourself, right?” Lutnick argued. That’s why he confirmed his “objective” during his time in office is to shift US chip production from 2 percent to 40 percent. To achieve that, he plans to bring Taiwan’s “whole supply chain” into the US, a move experts have suggested could take much longer than a single presidential term to accomplish.

In 2023, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang forecast that the US was “somewhere between a decade and two decades away from supply chain independence,” emphasizing that “it’s not a really practical thing for a decade or two.”

Deal is “not natural for Taiwan”

Lutnick acknowledged this will be a “herculean” task. “Everybody tells me it’s impossible,” he said.

To start with, Taiwan must be convinced that it’s not getting a raw deal, he noted, explaining that it’s “not natural for Taiwan” to mull a future where it cedes its dominant role as a global chip supplier, as well as the long-running protections it receives from allies that comes with it.

Taiwan pressured to move 50% of chip production to US or lose protection Read More »

judge-lets-construction-on-an-offshore-wind-farm-resume

Judge lets construction on an offshore wind farm resume

injunction, lawsuit, offshore wind, renewable energy, Science, trump administration, wind power / /

That did not, however, stop the administration from trying again, this time targeting a development called Revolution Wind, located a bit further north along the Atlantic coast. This time, however, the developer quickly sued, leading to Monday’s ruling. According to Reuters, after a two-hour court hearing at the District Court of DC, Judge Royce Lamberth termed the administration’s actions “the height of arbitrary and capricious” and issued a preliminary injunction against the hold on Revolution Wind’s construction. As a result, Orsted can restart work immediately.

The decision provides a strong indication of how Lamberth is likely to rule if the government pursues a full trial on the case. And while the Trump administration could appeal, it’s unlikely to see this injunction lifted unless it takes the case all the way to the Supreme Court. Given that Revolution Wind was already 80 percent complete, the case may become moot before it gets that far.

Judge lets construction on an offshore wind farm resume Read More »

white-house-officials-reportedly-frustrated-by-anthropic’s-law-enforcement-ai-limits

White House officials reportedly frustrated by Anthropic’s law enforcement AI limits

AI, AI ethics, AI law, AI regulation, AI security, Amazon Web Services, Anthropic, Biz & IT, Claude, Dario Amodei, Department of Defense, fbi, government contracting, ice, law enforcement, machine learning, national security, openai, Policy, Secret Service, surveillance, trump administration / /

Anthropic’s AI models could potentially help spies analyze classified documents, but the company draws the line at domestic surveillance. That restriction is reportedly making the Trump administration angry.

On Tuesday, Semafor reported that Anthropic faces growing hostility from the Trump administration over the AI company’s restrictions on law enforcement uses of its Claude models. Two senior White House officials told the outlet that federal contractors working with agencies like the FBI and Secret Service have run into roadblocks when attempting to use Claude for surveillance tasks.

The friction stems from Anthropic’s usage policies that prohibit domestic surveillance applications. The officials, who spoke to Semafor anonymously, said they worry that Anthropic enforces its policies selectively based on politics and uses vague terminology that allows for a broad interpretation of its rules.

The restrictions affect private contractors working with law enforcement agencies who need AI models for their work. In some cases, Anthropic’s Claude models are the only AI systems cleared for top-secret security situations through Amazon Web Services’ GovCloud, according to the officials.

Anthropic offers a specific service for national security customers and made a deal with the federal government to provide its services to agencies for a nominal $1 fee. The company also works with the Department of Defense, though its policies still prohibit the use of its models for weapons development.

In August, OpenAI announced a competing agreement to supply more than 2 million federal executive branch workers with ChatGPT Enterprise access for $1 per agency for one year. The deal came one day after the General Services Administration signed a blanket agreement allowing OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic to supply tools to federal workers.

White House officials reportedly frustrated by Anthropic’s law enforcement AI limits Read More »

will-tiktok-go-dark-wednesday?-trump-claims-deal-with-china-avoids-shutdown.

Will TikTok go dark Wednesday? Trump claims deal with China avoids shutdown.

bytedance, china, Donald Trump, national security, Policy, tiktok, trump administration, trump tariffs, us-china trade war / /

According to Bessent, China agreed to “commercial terms” and “technical details” of a deal “between two parties,” but Xi and Trump still needed to discuss the terms—as well as possibly China’s demands to ease export controls on chips and other high-tech goods—before the deal can be finalized, Reuters reported.

ByteDance, TikTok’s current owner, which in the past has opposed the sale, did not immediately respond to Ars’ request to comment.

While experts told Reuters that finalizing the TikTok deal this week could be challenging, Trump seems confident. On Truth Social, the US president boasted that talks with China have been going “very well” and claimed that TikTok users will soon be “very happy.”

“A deal was also reached on a ‘certain’ company that young people in our Country very much wanted to save,” Trump said, confirming that he would speak to Xi on Friday and claiming that their relationship “remains a very strong one!!!”

China accuses US of “economic coercion”

However, China’s Ministry of Commerce spokesperson on Monday continued to slam US export controls and tariffs that are frustrating China. The spokesperson suggested that those trade restrictions “constitute the containment and suppression of China’s development of high-tech industries,” like advanced computer chips and artificial intelligence, NBC News reported.

“This is a typical act of unilateral bullying and economic coercion,” the spokesperson said, indicating it may even be viewed as a retaliation violating the temporary truce.

Rather than committing to de-escalate tensions, both countries have recently taken fresh jabs in the trade war. On Monday, China announced two probes into US semiconductors, as well as an antitrust ruling against Nvidia and “an anti-discrimination probe into US measures against China’s chip sector,” NBC News reported.

Will TikTok go dark Wednesday? Trump claims deal with China avoids shutdown. Read More »

can-we-please-keep-our-broadband-money,-republican-governor-asks-trump-admin

Can we please keep our broadband money, Republican governor asks Trump admin

BEAD program, Broadband Equity Access and Deployment program, Policy, trump administration / /

Landry’s letter reminded Lutnick that “Congress granted NTIA clear authority” to distribute the remaining broadband funds to states. The law says that after approving a state’s plan, the NTIA “shall make available to the eligible entity the remainder of the grant funds allocated,” and “explicitly grants you wide discretion in directing how these remaining funds can be used for ‘any use determined necessary… to facilitate the goals of the Program,'” Landry wrote.

Landry asked Lutnick to issue clear guidance on the use of remaining grant funds by October 1, and suggested that grant awards be “announced by you and President Trump no later than January 20, 2026.”

Republican governors could sway Trump admin

Levin wrote that Louisiana’s proposal is likely to be supported by other states, even if many of them would prefer the money to be spent on broadband-specific projects.

“We expect most, if not all, of the governors to support Landry’s position; they might not agree with the limits he proposes but they would all prefer to spend the money in their state rather than return the funds to the Treasury,” Levin wrote. “We also think the law is on the side of the states in the sense that the law clearly contemplates and authorizes states to spend funds on projects other than connecting unserved and underserved locations.”

Levin believes Lutnick wants to return unspent funds to the Treasury, but that other Republican governors asking for the money could shift his thinking. “If enough Republican governors and members of Congress weigh in supporting the Landry plan, we think the odds favor Lutnick agreeing to its terms,” he wrote.

Levin wrote that “Commerce agreeing to Landry’s request would avoid a potentially difficult political and legal fight.” But he also pointed out that there would be lawsuits from Democratic state officials if the Trump administration directs a lopsided share of remaining funds to Republican states.

“Democratic Governors might feel queasy about the Landry request that would allow the secretary to reassign funds to other states, but that is still better than an immediate return to Treasury and keeps open the possibility of litigation if Commerce approves red state projects while rejecting blue state projects that do the same thing,” Levin wrote.

Can we please keep our broadband money, Republican governor asks Trump admin Read More »

harvard-beats-trump-as-judge-orders-us-to-restore-$2.6-billion-in-funding

Harvard beats Trump as judge orders US to restore $2.6 billion in funding

Harvard, Policy, Science, trump administration / /

Burroughs’ footnote said that district courts try to follow Supreme Court rulings, but “the Supreme Court’s recent emergency docket rulings regarding grant terminations have not been models of clarity, and have left many issues unresolved.”

“This Court understands, of course, that the Supreme Court, like the district courts, is trying to resolve these issues quickly, often on an emergency basis, and that the issues are complex and evolving,” Burroughs wrote. “Given this, however, the Court respectfully submits that it is unhelpful and unnecessary to criticize district courts for ‘defy[ing]’ the Supreme Court when they are working to find the right answer in a rapidly evolving doctrinal landscape, where they must grapple with both existing precedent and interim guidance from the Supreme Court that appears to set that precedent aside without much explanation or consensus.”

White House blasts “activist Obama-appointed judge”

White House spokesperson Liz Huston issued a statement saying the government will immediately appeal the “egregious” ruling. “Just as President Trump correctly predicted on the day of the hearing, this activist Obama-appointed judge was always going to rule in Harvard’s favor, regardless of the facts,” Huston said, according to the Harvard Crimson.

Huston also said that “Harvard does not have a constitutional right to taxpayer dollars and remains ineligible for grants in the future” in a statement quoted by various media outlets. “To any fair-minded observer, it is clear that Harvard University failed to protect their students from harassment and allowed discrimination to plague their campus for years,” she said.

Harvard President Alan Garber wrote in a message on the university’s website that the “ruling affirms Harvard’s First Amendment and procedural rights, and validates our arguments in defense of the University’s academic freedom, critical scientific research, and the core principles of American higher education.”

Garber noted that the case is not over. “We will continue to assess the implications of the opinion, monitor further legal developments, and be mindful of the changing landscape in which we seek to fulfill our mission,” he wrote.

Harvard beats Trump as judge orders US to restore $2.6 billion in funding Read More »